A Sorrowful Sanctuary Page 17

  “Oh, of course!” Lane said. “Let me run you home. Constable, I’m afraid you’ll have to back out so I can take Angela home to her waiting family.”

  “Nonsense,” said Darling. “Ames, be good enough to run Mrs. Bertolli home.”

  Ames saluted and opened the passenger door gallantly for Angela. If he couldn’t break up with Violet like a gentleman, he could at least be one getting Mrs. Bertolli home.

  Lane and Darling watched the car back out and trundle up the road.

  “I can’t decide whether to kiss you now or wait to see what interfering thing you’ve been up to,” Darling said.

  “I should get on with it now, because you’ll be cross with me about the interfering, and Ames will be back in a minute.”

  He took her hand and they walked toward the house. The door was open and Darling could see the pool of light in the sitting room.

  “It’s too bad about Ames,” he said, pulling her close.

  Lane closed her eyes at the feel of his lips, and agreed that it was a bit of a shame about Ames.

  “Are you going to answer that?” Darling whispered, his mouth brushing her cheek as the phone jangled in the hallway.

  “Two longs and a short. I suppose I’d better. I mean, it’s no good, is it, with Ames popping back any second.” She reached up and kissed him again, and went into the hall. “KC 431, Lane Winslow speaking. Oh, hello. No, I’ve been on the lake with Angela.” She listened and then looked down the hall toward her living room, frowning. Darling had gone through and now stood at her front window watching the evening coming on. “Her water bowl? And the sword? Good grief. Anything else? No, of course you must. Inspector Darling and Constable Ames are here right now. No, no, that’s quite all right.”

  The tone of Lane’s voice alerted Darling, who now came into the darkening hallway and watched Lane. “And Gladys? All right. I’ll certainly tell them, and when there’s a complete list they can look at it. I suppose I’d better check my own house, though I’ve not got much that’s stealworthy. Will you be all right?”

  Assured that Kenny and Eleanor felt safe, Lane hung the earpiece back on the hook. “Someone has been around stealing things from the Armstrongs’ and the Hughes’ places. They think it’s the phone man. Do you mind? I just want to take a quick look. I’ve been out all day. The thief could have loaded up a moving van and taken the lot. Though as I told Eleanor, I don’t have much of any value.”

  Darling, wanting to be the one to go through the house in case whoever it was was still inside, followed Lane into the kitchen.

  “Everything looks all right. I expect if it was the phone man, he scratched me off the list after his inspection.”

  “He was here?”

  “Of course he was. Allegedly to fix the phone. I didn’t pay attention to what he was doing, so he probably did a quick scan to see if there was anything worth taking. Listen to me! Blaming the poor phone man. He’s probably innocent.”

  “Possibly,” Darling said cautiously. “But he’s the only stranger that’s been around and in people’s houses. What did he look like?”

  “A phone man, really. He had on some sort of coveralls and one of those peaked caps with a phone logo. I did notice that he kept the cap on when he came in. Maybe your height, brown hair. I couldn’t have told you about his eyes, as they were sort of in the shadow of the hat.”

  Ames knocked on the open door at that moment and came in.

  “Those dogs bark even when the lady of the house comes home,” he commented. Seeing Lane’s and Darling’s expressions, he added, “What’s going on?”

  “A couple of people here have reported having things stolen sometime earlier today,” Darling said. “Antiques.”

  “Well, I’ll be da . . . I’ll be.”

  “Thank you, Ames. Moderation in all things, including your language. Take your little black notebook and pop over to the Armstrongs’, and then up to the Hughes’. They seem to want to wait till they have a full tally, but I’d like to get to this at once.”

  “Sir,” Ames said, resisting an impulse to salute again. He cast one last longing look at the sofa and side table with its promise of a drink.

  “There’s a good constable. In the meantime, Miss Winslow, you’d better tell me what you’ve been up to.”

  Ames left, not in the least bit fooled by that “Miss Winslow” nonsense. Darling and Lane sat in the two easy chairs, which in the winter she had situated in front of her Franklin stove but were now placed facing the window and the view of the lake, with a convenient end table holding a bottle of Scotch and two glasses, between them.

  “I did knock before I went in,” Lane said. Darling listened intently and without comment as she reached the part of the story when she and Angela had discovered the shed, and was feeling anxious about the next bit. If it proved to be important, he would probably be cross about her having been in the shed, touching things.

  “What did you find?”

  “Clearly someone has been living there. There was bedding, a kerosene lamp, a suitcase used as a side table, and a couple of books in German on top.”

  “Which you can read perfectly, I suppose?”

  “Not perfectly, no. I speak better German than I read. They were both classics of socialist thought.”

  Darling said, “Our dead man turns out to have been German. We were up in Kaslo while you were bumbling around what may well prove to be the crime scene, and we learned a fair bit. His name was Klaus—”

  “Lazek!” cried Lane. “That was the name in his books. I mean, not the ‘Klaus,’ it was just ‘K,’ but ‘Lazek’ was the surname.”

  “All of which goes to explain why we couldn’t find hide nor hair of where he lived. He used to get picked up along the road by a fellow worker, but he told us he never saw Klaus’s house, and we couldn’t find anything to indicate where he might live.”

  “Oh. I think I can help you there. There’s a very rough path up the hill from the beach and it comes out near the road. I didn’t go right out to the road because I didn’t want to fight through the underbrush, but I’m certain I could find it from up on the road. It’s just before a bridge.”

  “Anything else?”

  “There was a photo of a family in one of the books, with a label in maybe Polish, which I thought was odd. Oh, and Angela found the other important thing: the beach sort of curls around toward the northwest. She was exploring while I was going up the path, and she found a single oar sort of floating half in and half out of the water. And before you ask, I realized this might be a crime scene, so tempted though I was, I backed away with a view to calling you about it.”

  Darling smiled. “It’s good to know you are not a stranger to all decency. Of course now I’m going to have to drive all the way back there and have you show me what you found and where the damn place is.”

  Ames called out and then came through the door.

  “All done, sir, as far as it goes. I’ve got a list of items I can check for in the local antique shops tomorrow.”

  Lane got up, smiling. “Scotch, Constable Ames?”

  Though a beer man himself, it had been a long day. However, Darling apparently had no interest in Ames’s day ending.

  “Not for you, Ames.” He stood up and stretched. “You’re driving, and we should set a good example. Thank you, Miss Winslow. We’ll see you tomorrow at, say, nine? Let’s go, Ames. You can tell me what you found out about the thefts, and if you’re very good, I’ll tell you what Miss Winslow has found for us.”

  The night was a soft, inky, moonless darkness as Ames turned the car onto the Nelson road. They could see a few lights twinkling along the great curve of the cove. “It would be nice to have a summer home along here,” he commented.

  “You’d hate it. You’re a townie if there ever was one.”

  “
You’re right there, sir,” Ames said. “It’s pretty isolated out here. Take these robberies. None of the victims lock their doors. I’m surprised they haven’t been robbed before now.”

  Darling, who was doing a poor job of ignoring his anxiety about leaving Lane alone in her house, though she had assured him that she would lock all the doors, said, “Well?”

  “Well, it’s pretty much what Miss Winslow learned from her phone call. Someone broke into—but, that’s wrong, isn’t it?—walked into the Armstrongs’ and the Hughes’ and helped themselves to some valuable antiques. I’ve got a complete list here, but you know the sort of things: Chinese porcelain, silver tea service, regimental sword, some sterling boxes. They’re the only two affected. I know this because they called around to the neighbours. But some places had someone home all day, and others didn’t have antiques, as such, like the Bertollis’.”

  “I can’t help thinking this must be the same outfit that’s been stealing antiques in town. I noticed that they were beginning to move up the lake a bit, but there must be scores of people between the last house they robbed and King’s Cove. What made them pick it?”

  “I don’t know, but they do have a theory about who is behind it . . . the phone man. Apparently there have been some problems with the phones, and a guy in a van with the phone company logo came round and checked everyone’s phones, but people weren’t very impressed with him. To quote old Mrs. Hughes, ‘If he’s a phone man, I’m the king of England.’”

  “That’s what Miss Winslow thought as well. Did the phones start working? I know there was some trouble. I’ve been cut off a couple of times in conversations with Miss Winslow.”

  “Yes, sir. It all stopped as mysteriously as it started.”

  “Any description?” Darling asked, hoping the other victims had had a better look than Lane.

  “About forty, medium height, brown hair. Some sort of brown work coveralls and a cap. In short, every second repairman for miles around.”

  “Wonderful. Let’s put O’Brien onto interviewing every man of that description. It’ll serve him right,” said Darling glumly.

  “If I looked like that, I’d embark on a life of crime. It’s the perfect disguise.”

  “Yes, well. It’s also a perfect disguise for perfectly law-abiding citizens. I wouldn’t recommend a life of crime for you, Amesy. You’d be picked out of a lineup immediately. You look like an over-eager Boy Scout.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  “What’s this?” Darling asked crossly as he came into the station the next morning. He was holding an expensive-looking envelope on which his name was written in elaborate script.

  “I don’t know, sir. It had your name on it so, as tempted as I was to steam it open with the morning’s tea kettle, I thought I’d better give it to you,” O’Brien said.

  “No need for cheek, O’Brien. Ames and I have to go up the lake. Where is he?”

  “Gassing up the car, sir. It’s a good thing there’s no crime in Nelson, the way you two gad about. Are you going to open that envelope or not?”

  Darling put his finger under the flap of the envelope and tore it open. Much to his amazement it was an invitation to an “evening” at the home of Councillor Lorimer to celebrate the work and achievements of the distinguished citizens of Nelson. “Feel free to bring a guest. RSVP.”

  “What’s this nonsense?”

  “I thought, now that you’ve opened it, you’d tell me.”

  “Why am I getting an invite to some sort of do at Lorimer’s?”

  “You’re the inspector?”

  “I’m to bring a guest,” Darling added.

  “Well, that shouldn’t be too hard, should it, sir? Ah. Here’s Ames. I’ll try to stave off the criminal hordes while you’re gone.”

  “You’ll do better than that. Find out where a person who was injured in Kaslo would go for treatment, and when you’ve done that ask them about any man who came in looking like he’d had a beating in the last week or so. Find out if the mine up there has an infirmary, for example, or if the town has a local doctor who goes out. And get the names.”

  O’Brien, thinking longingly of his quiet days answering the phone and doing the crossword, said, “Sir,” and set about finding the pile of local directories the station had.

  “I haven’t heard a word from her,” Ames said, as they were driving down the hill from the Balfour store and gas pump. Darling, who had not asked and had been using the long silence since they had rumbled off the Nelson ferry to think about the missing man, Carl Castle, and whether he might be connected to any of the other crimes they seemed suddenly to be juggling, now raised his eyebrows and looked at Ames.

  “By ‘her’ you mean your Violet?”

  “Yes, sir. Sorry, sir. But it’s nerve-racking. I feel like a guy who goes into his house having no idea it’s been booby trapped with a pail of cold water over the door. She’s going to pop out from behind a building somewhere, and I’ll have to get into a donnybrook with her.”

  “You ought to manage your affairs better, Amesy. Break it off, for God’s sake. You’ve already said you have doubts. And at least she doesn’t work at the local café, so we won’t be subject to her bitterly slinging our cups of coffee at us in the morning.”

  His boss was right, Ames thought. He should break it off. He should telephone her—no, that would involve the slamming of receivers. He’d much better be a man and ask to meet her. The worst that could happen is she’d flounce off. Or slap him and then flounce off.

  “Are you planning to take the corner up to Miss Winslow’s at breakneck speed, Ames?” Darling asked. “Or shall we drive on by and go digging around ourselves?”

  “Sorry, sir. I was a million miles away,” Ames said, slowing precipitously and just managing the sharp corner up to King’s Cove. A truck behind them that had not expected this manoeuvre honked loudly.

  “Well, get back here, and try not to kill us in a road accident.”

  A chastened Ames pulled the car up to the gate at Lane’s house and waited in the car while Darling went to collect her.

  “Good morning, darling,” Lane said. “I’ve not been idle since last night. I’ve talked to Robin Harris, who asserted that that ‘damn fool didn’t look like a telephone man’ to him, and that the fellow hadn’t got past the kitchen because he could see at a glance that Harris would have nothing worth stealing. And Eleanor called and wanted to add a silver frame to the list. She and Kenny are both upset because it contains a picture of John right before he went overseas in ’15. You may recall he was killed over there.”

  “I do, yes. Swine. We’ve contacted the phone company, and they said they’d had reports of some trouble on the lines up the lake but had not sent anyone out yet. So he wasn’t a phone man. I’ve got someone going around the antique shops to see if any of the things turn up for sale.”

  “Surely they wouldn’t be so foolish as to fence them locally. If it were me, I’d send them all to the coast.”

  “Happen you’re right. I hope you don’t take up a life of crime. You’re too clever by half.”

  Lane insisted on the back seat, in no small measure because it was her plan to move to sit behind the driver’s seat when they drove the frightening stretch of road just before Adderly so she wouldn’t have to look out at the sheer drop.

  The road was quiet and the morning fragrant and warm. Lane wondered, not for the first time, if she should be at home husbanding something or other in her garden. She was sure her neighbours would be busy all day digging potatoes or canning corn. Her plan was simply to pick enough peas from her little garden patch for dinner, and not to consider for one minute the full-scale battle plan that must be required to put up a lot of food for the coming winter. Lane rolled down her window so that her hair whipped around her face, and she drank in the scent of the passing forest, warming in the mo
rning sun. She thought about Darling’s remark.

  “You know,” she said, leaning forward, “it makes me wonder. Do you two think criminals are clever? I mean, fiction is full of diabolical and intelligent malefactors who can be stopped only by brilliant Holmesian detection. You have a lot of experience with crime. What do you think?”

  The two men considered this. Ames finally said, “I think they think they are smarter than they truly are, some of them. Why else are they committing crimes in the first place? They can’t think of legitimate ways to get what they want, or get out of some jam they’re in.”

  Darling opened his mouth to speak, and then Ames went on, “I mean, take what we’re dealing with now. We have three different sorts of crime, all committed for different reasons. Someone disguised as a phone man is stealing antiques. Someone has killed this Lazek guy, and that Carl Castle has disappeared. In the case of the antiques, it’s sheer burglary to try to make a quick buck. The criminal thinks he’s fooled all the victims, and because he hasn’t been stopped yet, I bet he feels he’s fooled everyone.”

  “He fooled you,” Darling pointed out.

  “Yes, but not for long. We’re already after him, aren’t we? People have seen him, the phone company doesn’t own him, it’s a matter of time. Someone like that should take the money and run, but he won’t. He’ll think, I can do this one more time and then I’ll clear off, and that’s when we’ll have him.”

  “And our murderer?” Lane asked.

  “There’s a story there, isn’t there? The victim was a threat to someone or he made someone mad. Either way, killing him, or trying to, if that’s what happened, was the act of someone who was not smart enough to think of another way to handle it. We just have to figure out what the story is.”

  “You are not buying the coroner’s verdict of a possible suicide? I believe our Ames is going to retire and write books like Watson did,” said Darling. “I think, in a way, we have the advantage on the criminal. He’s busy trying to cover up his crime, now he’s had the misfortune to commit it. He was either drunk, or frightened, or angry when he did it. His mind is focused by fear, so he is limited in what he thinks about. We come in—not you, Miss Winslow; I’d like to reduce the amount of involvement you have in police work—and we can look at all the angles and possibilities. We are not limited in our thinking by fear. We are animated by logic.”