Death on a Short Leash (13 page)

“So where is she?”

“Her mother's sick and she's gone to look after her. Her parents live over in the British Properties, you know.”

“So I understand. You didn't mention my visit, did you?”

“No, you can trust me. I'll let you know when she comes back.”

“Thanks. Really appreciate your help.”

That's odd. Joan Betteridge said that they were arguing and it appeared that Prudence didn't want to get into the car. Why would she argue about going to look after her sick mother?
She turned back to the TV but found her mind wandering.

The second call came as she had her foot on the bottom stair and was thinking of her comfortable bed and finishing her latest whodunit.

“Margaret, I've got you at last.”

“Harry?” she asked in surprise. “What's wrong?”

“Does there have to be something wrong for me to call?”

“At this time of night, yes. What is it?” She knew she sounded testy, but what the hell!

“It's about that house of yours, the one in Quebec.”

“Can't this wait until tomorrow? I'm whacked.”

“No. I've had a letter from my associate in Montreal, and I promised I'd call him back tomorrow. I'm off on a business trip for a few days. He's more than willing to sell it for you. You've got to do something soon.”

“Why? I'm sure it's quite happy sitting where it is.”

“Margaret, don't be facetious. It's already winter in Quebec and you can't leave property unattended.”

“Harry, please get to the point.”

“The point is that pipes freeze, Margaret. If it snows early, the roof might leak,” he paused for breath. “It could easily fall into rack and ruin, and then it will lose its value.”

“It's only a very small house, and my aunt's neighbour has the key.”

“One can't rely on neighbours.”

“Well,” she answered crisply, “it's too late to do anything about it tonight. I'm going to bed.”

“I can see you're in one of your moods,” he said. “I'll call you when I return. In the meantime,” he added, “give some serious thought to my suggestion.”

“Oh, hell!” She replaced the phone and scooped Emily up under one arm and Rosie under the other. “Come on you two, let's go to bed.”

M
aggie was suddenly awake. The wind and rain had increased during the night, and blustery bursts were slamming against the house. She had snuggled further down in her bed and lay listening to the wind's fury, when Rosie gave a low growl. “It's okay, Rosie. Just the wind.” But the dog gave another growl and Maggie heard her getting out of her makeshift cardboard-box bed. Sitting up, Maggie instinctively put her left hand over to where Emily usually slept. No cat!
Something has disturbed them both!
She reached for the bedside lamp. Nothing! “Damn! Power's gone again.” This was the third time in the past month it had happened. “God knows what it's going to be like when winter really gets here,” she muttered. Sitting on the side of the bed, she felt around until her feet located her slippers, then she reached for her blue velvet robe. Picking up the small flashlight she had taken to keeping on her beside table for emergencies, she shone it on Rosie, who was standing by the door and still making low growling sounds. She patted the dog's head. “It's okay. Just settle down.” But she took the time to pick up the baseball bat that she kept beside her bed whenever Nat wasn't spending the night with her. Then she opened the door and cautiously peered over the railing into the dark well of the hall below. Everything seemed quiet. Playing the light on each stair, she made her way, with Rosie right behind her, to the ground floor and pushed open the door to the kitchen and dining area at the back of the house. Shining the flashlight around the room, she gave an involuntary shiver—the place looked positively eerie. But everything seemed as she had left it the previous night. Then, holding the baseball bat on high, she pushed open the door to the sitting room. Nothing!

At the window that overlooked the front of the house, she pulled aside the drapes, but apart from a small section of road beyond her garden gate, her vision was completely blocked by tall maple and oak trees swaying violently in the high wind. In the distance, a car's engine grew fainter and fainter.
Perhaps it was a car that woke me?
But now a scratching sound caught her attention, and she swung her flashlight over to the front door, where Rosie was frantically pawing. “What is it?” She bent down to calm the animal. “There's nothing out there, Rosie.” But the dog continued to growl and scratch. “Look, I'll show you.” And throwing caution to the wind, she unlocked the front door and stepped onto her porch. Rosie was out the door before her and pawing at a large blanket-wrapped object lying on the path just beyond the edge of the porch. She shone the light on it. “What is it, girl? What have you found?” Hands shaking, Maggie knelt and slowly pulled back the blanket.

She found herself staring down at Jasmine's bruised and bloody face. “My God! Jasmine!” The front of the girl's dress, the same one she had been wearing when Maggie had last seen her, was covered in blood. God knows where else the girl was hurt. Quickly, she felt for a pulse and was relieved to find that there was one, albeit only faint. Maggie shivered as another blast of the cold wind blew through the gate and down the path. “Can you hear me, Jasmine?” The girl's eyes flickered and slowly opened. “Come on, that's the girl.” But a moment later the girl had slipped back into unconsciousness. Putting her arms around the frail little figure, Maggie was about to drag her into the house when she realized that perhaps she should leave her where she was. From the amount of blood on the dress, she must have other injuries. “Who could have done this? And why was she dumped here on my doorstep?”

Sitting back on her heels, she felt the world turning around her. “Ambulance, I must call an ambulance and then Nat.” Hauling herself upright, she ran back into the house, grabbed an afghan from one of the wicker chairs, ran back to the porch and wrapped it around the girl, then went inside again to telephone.
My mind's gone numb. Where do I find the number for an ambulance? Oh God . . . let me find it.
“Pull yourself together, Margaret,” she told herself firmly. Then she remembered that all the emergency numbers were in the front of the phone book, and she focussed the flashlight on them. “Ambulance, ambulance . . .” she muttered, running her finger down the list.

The call was answered promptly, but the questions seemed never-ending. “Please just send someone right away,” she interrupted, after giving the number of the house and her name for the second time. “The girl's badly hurt.”

“Now for Nat.” She dialed again. “Please answer.” But it seemed an eternity before she heard his familiar voice.

“Do you realize what time it is?” he asked sleepily.

“Nat! It's me,” she said in a choked voice.

“Maggie? What's happened?”

“It's Jasmine,” she managed to get out. “Oh, Nat, she's been badly beaten and . . . and . . . she's unconscious . . .”

“Jasmine? Maggie, where the hell are you?”

“At home. She was dumped on my porch. What do I do?”

“Stay calm. Start at the beginning.”

“I haven't got time. I'm waiting for the ambulance. Oh, Nat!

They just dumped her . . .”

“I'm coming right over.”

“The police . . . should I call the police?”

“I'll deal with everything when I get there. Just sit tight and have a stiff drink.”

But a terrible thought had come to her.
Perhaps she's died?
She tore out into the garden again, where a faint grey dawn now threw the girl's pathetic, bundled little body into sharp contrast against the surrounding autumn garden. Maggie knelt beside her again, but it took all of her courage to fumble inside the blanket to feel for a pulse. It was still there but very faint.
Why was she left on my porch? Perhaps it's a warning for me?
Then other thoughts raced through her head.
But how did they find me? And will they be back?
She glanced anxiously around her as she got slowly to her feet.
But I can't just leave her on her own.
She turned off the flashlight, now wet and sticky from the girl's blood.
Oh dear God!
Leaning against the brick wall of the porch and oblivious to the rain soaking through her robe, she slowly slid down into a crouch to wait for the ambulance and Nat. Rosie snuggled in beside her, and Maggie hugged the little dog to her.

Nat arrived first and Maggie met him at the gate.

“Why, Nat? Why did they do this?” she cried, tears streaming down her face. And she took his arm and urged him toward the house.

“Let me look,” he answered.

“She's here,” she whispered, and standing aside, she trained the beam of the flashlight on the girl while he knelt beside her.

“There's still a faint pulse,” he said, straightening up.

It was getting lighter now, and Maggie's white, tear-streaked face was clearly visible to him. He watched her lift a bloodstained hand to push her hair out of her eyes. “Here's the ambulance now,” he said. “Put the porch light on so they can see.”

“The power's gone again.”

The first paramedic, kneeling beside the girl, asked, “How did it happen?”

”I don't know,” Maggie said. “I just found her here.”

When Rosie pushed in to have a look, too, the attendant did his best to shove her aside. “Does the mutt belong to the girl?”

“No,” Maggie answered, “she's mine.” She bent and scooped the squirming dog into her arms.

With one of the attendants holding a portable spotlight on Jasmine, the other carefully unwrapped the blanket to see the extent of her injuries. “She's been stabbed, by the look of it. But there's still a pulse.”

“Isn't there something you can do to help her?” Maggie asked.

“We'll get her on board and give her a shot to stabilize her,” the attendant beside the girl said. “And then some oxygen.”

Within minutes Jasmine had been lifted onto a stretcher and into the ambulance. “You know we have to notify the police?”

“Of course,” Nat answered. “You taking her to the General?”

“Yeah.”

“Let's go inside,” Nat said after the ambulance had driven away. He picked up the flashlight and then, putting an arm around Maggie and the dog, gently guided her inside. “You're soaked to the skin. Where do you keep the candles?”

“In the kitchen drawer next to the fridge.”

He pushed her toward the stairs. “You go and put the dog into your bedroom and take a hot shower before the police arrive.”

“George . . . we should call George.”

“I'll call him while you're showering.” He pulled a new packet of candles out of the drawer. “I'll put them on saucers for now, okay?”

Maggie nodded. “There should be matches in the same drawer.”

“I just wish there was some way of preventing Farthing from getting wind of this.”

“For Chrissake!” George bellowed over the phone when Nat called him. “Have you called the police?”

“The ambulance guys are doing that,” Nat replied. “But listen, George, she's that girl from the commune. Jasmine. How are we going to explain all of that to them?”

“I'll be right over. But you should have called the police yourself.”

“George,” Nat replied wearily, “just get your ass over here.”

The wind and rain had abated somewhat by the time George arrived. “What in God's name happened to the lights?” he exclaimed, taking in the candlelit room. “You gone all romantic, Maggie?” he asked, watching her come slowly down the stairs, holding a candle in front of her.

“Power's off,” she explained unnecessarily. “That wind must have brought down some wires again. Did I hear a car?”

The two of them waited until George returned with a uniformed man that he introduced as Sergeant Hallscroft.

“Now,” Hallscroft said, sitting down at the table. “I take it from Sergeant Sawasky that you know this girl. What about filling me in?”

“We've only seen her a couple of times,” Maggie explained. “She's a member of one of those commune sects.” The lights suddenly flickered, went out again and then came on and stayed on.

“That's better,” Hallscroft said. “Now this commune . . . ?”

Nat took over, doing his best to explain how they had first visited the commune when they were following up a case.

Sergeant Hallscroft looked skeptical all through the explanation. “That still doesn't explain why she was left here, does it?”

“Probably because Jasmine . . . that's her name . . . called me on the phone,” Maggie said. “Jasmine who?” Hallscroft said, writing in his notebook.

“I don't know her other name,” Maggie answered. “But I went back there because she told me she knew where the puppy mill was.”

“What the hell's a puppy mill?”

Maggie explained briefly. “There's a big market for highly bred small dogs,” she ended.

“And did you find this . . . this mill?” Hallscroft asked.

Maggie nodded. “Yes. It was terrible . . .” Her voice cracked and she paused to give herself time to carry on. “The dogs were in a terrible condition. All in wire cages . . .” Her voice trailed off again and Nat could see she was having a difficult time controlling her tears. “We called George and he got in touch with the Abbotsford police, but the dogs had been removed by the time they got there.”

“I still don't understand why you're mixed up in this. And how did you know there was this puppy mill in the first place?”

Nat cut in with, “We were on another case at the time. It was really just a coincidence.”

Hallscroft went into the front hall to use the phone. He came back running a hand over his stubbly face. “I'm bushed. And I know you must be too.” As he buttoned his overcoat, he added, “But Inspector Farthing is expecting you both at the station at ten o'clock sharp.” Then he said, as if to soften this bad news, “We should have a report on how the girl's doing by then.”