Fiona Silk Mysteries 2-Book Bundle (39 page)

“Oh, yeah,” she said at the end, “by the way, I got that information for you.”

Defence lawyers are scarce in St. Aubaine. Except for a bit of cigarette and liquor smuggling centering around the Britannia Pub, a few low-level drug dealers, and the racing of pick-up trucks on Rue Principale after midnight, we're a pretty lawabiding community. The combination of my annuity, my house and my occasional writing windfalls pushed me past the eligibility point for legal aid, so Liz was looking after my interests. Later that evening, she ushered a lawyer whose name sounded like Natalie into my living room and popped her into the wingback. Liz plopped herself into the bean-bag chair. Apparently, Liz knew this lawyer from the golf club. Or maybe the tennis club. Somewhere.

I sat cross-legged on the floor and eyed the woman warily. And I eyed Liz too. When she found out about the scattering, was she going to drop the lawyer and send for a psychiatrist?

Liz discounted my whispered protests. “Of course, you need a lawyer. Anyone who might get charged with a murder needs a lawyer. Got any of that Courvoisier left?”

“No.”

“In the cupboard?”

“No.” Let Liz guess the spot. No way was I volunteering.

“Anyway, our friend here can give you an idea of your rights.”

“I'm in corporate, not criminal,” the lawyer said. She was as wiry as a whippet and looked as though she were planning to sprint through the front door as soon as opportunity permitted.

“Fine with me. I'm not a criminal. I don't think I need a lawyer.” I wondered exactly what dirt Liz had on this woman to compel her to offer this quasi-expertise.

Liz got between us. “Natalie and I think if someone dumps a dead man in your bed and leaves you to explain it to the police, that makes you a victim in your own right.”

Natalie made a face. Perhaps it didn't seem that way to her. Insufficiently corporate perhaps.

Tolstoy got up and left the room.

Liz rattled on. “And now this note thing just ratchets up the problem. But Natalie says you should be free to come and go as you want and you should ask to have legal counsel with you when the police harass you with questions.”

Natalie must have been working out her irritation, swinging her long, thin legs. “I'll help you out in an emergency until you find someone fairly competent.”

“Let's hope they have a sale on.”

“So I can testify she was nowhere near here at the key times,” Liz said. “Right? And that note in Benedict's cabin, the one the police were hassling her about? We could prove that was planted.”

Natalie made another face, worse than the first one.

I said, “It's been quite a while, and in spite of all the talk, there's no sign of them arresting me.”

Natalie burst our bubble. “Don't count on it. This is a small force, and they have to wait for results from the Montreal lab. That note thing? If they want to nail you for this murder, and they give you that kind of information, they're just trying to trip you up. That's why you need a lawyer.”

“You heard Liz. I have an alibi.”

“That alibi's only good if the autopsy results didn't indicate this guy was killed earlier—or later. Maybe someone stuck him in a refrigerator or a warming oven or something to throw off the time of death calculations. That Sarrazin may look asleep, but he logged plenty of time in Serious Crimes on the Montreal force. He knows what he's doing. He won't take a chance on screwing up a case like this. Don't be fooled.”

I was awfully glad I'd hidden the rest of my Courvoisier in the washing machine.

After they left, I took advantage of the sudden peace and quiet to examine the fat package of clippings, complete with citations, obtained by Josey and dropped off for a small consideration. I carried the package out to the porch swing and made myself comfortable.

If there was a fact in print about Mme Flambeau, Josey had found it in La Bibliothèque Municipale de St. Aubaine and photocopied it. She'd purchased a copy of the latest
Maclean's
, where Benedict's face beamed from the cover along with the banner H
AS THE
F
LAMBEAU
F
LIPPED
?

I stuck my nose in the
Maclean's
, discovering the literary community was making not-too-subtle suggestions that the reclusive Mme Flambeau was overdue for a reality check.

I couldn't imagine what the next week's cover might hold. A picture of my four-poster perhaps? With me in it? If I could find the price of a ticket, perhaps I could migrate to one of the lesser known South American countries until the fuss died down.

Mme Flambeau had homes in Montreal, Palm Springs and Nice, which was nice, but there were no addresses or telephone numbers for her homes and absolutely no indication where Madame might spend her time.

Josey had added a note in her neat penmanship: Marc André Paradis' car repair business was about eight kilometres north of St. Aubaine. He specialized in European cars and was not accepting new clients at the moment.

What I want most in life is to be alone. Alone in my own little house with my dog, my fireplace, my books, and even my writing, when the writing is going well. What I want least is to be the focus of salacious gossip in my community and to have regular visits from police, lawyers and people with urnfuls of dead poets.

I started another day, staring at the blank screen, hoping for a romantic thought. It struck me that the balance in my life was wrong. Do something, I told myself. Everyone else is trying to take charge of your life. Sarrazin, Liz and Josey. And now Bridget in a major way.

I wasn't even sure what needed doing. Okay, there had been a dead man in my bed, and I hadn't killed him. But on the other hand, twice a year since I'd moved back to St. Aubaine, I practically sold my soul to pay the taxes on my two unserviced acres. So wasn't that supposed to buy me police protection? Weren't the police supposed to be part of the solution instead of part of the problem?

Apparently not.

Then there was the thing about needing a lawyer. That was a worry, even if Natalie was more or less on the case. Sort of.

And I was worried about Josey. Well, I could probably deal with Josey. Like me, she was sort of an innocent bystander.

The only thing to do was to try and figure it all out. And the sooner the better. So, who had killed Benedict? Who had planted him in my bed? Why? How could a note from me have ended up in his cabin?

I sharpened my pencil and sat down to put my ideas on paper.

If I'd been Bridget, I sure would have wanted to kill Benedict, and I probably wouldn't have waited all those years. But Bridget couldn't have lugged Benedict's body into my place, even if she'd wanted to. Even with a crane, never mind her broken ankle. More to the point, Bridget couldn't have beaten Benedict to death with her tiny fists, even if he'd been unconscious at the time. And logic would tell you Bridget would have plunked the old philanderer in the bed of one of his recent and more blatant lovers. Say Abby Lake. Or even better, Zoë Finestone.

I shivered when I remembered the evil glance Zoë had shot me at Benedict's little memorial.
She
was a really good candidate. Sure, she'd been pretty cut up about Benedict, but after all, hadn't he dumped her for some other woman? I couldn't even remember who came after her in the line-up. And she'd have the physical strength and stamina to lift him. Under certain circumstances, she could probably have beaten him. I tried to remember what her hands were like. I thought they might have been rather hamlike. On the other hand, why would Zoë display Benedict in my bed? Zoë wouldn't even have known where I lived. More likely she would have dumped him on her challenger. Dozens of other women were closer to Benedict than I had been. Many had succeeded me. There had to be a reason. Had Benedict said that stupid thing about me being the lost love of his life to Zoë? No doubt about it, she was a possibility.

But only one of many.

Logic also told me I didn't know enough about Benedict and his recent doings, his friends, his new loves and his rivals. It seemed to me it was worth finding out what had been going in his life.

Speaking of rivals, the other thing that nagged and bothered me was the whole business with the Flambeau. Considering that Benedict was dead less than two weeks after the announcement, it made you wonder if there wasn't a connection.

If I delivered those damn parcels Bridget had left throbbing in the corner of my living room, I stood to learn a lot. After all, they were to be given to people who knew Benedict, cared about him and would no doubt be prepared to blather on for hours about his doings.

Plus, with any luck, I could sell some of those One Act Play Competition tickets for Hélène so I wouldn't have to buy all ten myself. Time to get moving. Let's just say it would beat sitting home brooding about the urn and waiting to be arrested.

The next stage began with a plan. Not my favourite way to work up to lunch but then, it wasn't my plan.

My
plan had been to visit Rachel, the most sensible person in the world, at L'Auberge des Rêves and pick her brain.

Easy. Fast. Efficient. She'd stayed close to Benedict and to Bridget. She knew the O'Mafia, plus the O'Girlfriends, Zoë and Abby. She knew everyone. She might know what Benedict had been up to recently and even how to get a line on the phantom poet, Marc-André Paradis. No one else did. It would be time well invested in piecing together what had happened. Plus I could pick up some sensible advice on how to minimize the aggro brought on by the scattering plans. I'd be home again quickly, leaving just enough time to nudge Cayla and Brandon closer to physical union and out of my life forever.

Rachel was friendly, reasonable, helpful when I called. Delighted to have a chat and assist in any way possible. She even invited me to join her for dinner. As I made the arrangements, Josey was gluing and clamping the legs on the little Queen Anne chair.

“Did you say you were going into Hull?” she asked.

“No. Definitely not.”

“It would be great if you were, because we could go to the Museum of Civilization in Hull. I love that building, it's like a big sand dune. Did you know it was designed by...”

“We could not go to the Museum of Civilization for several reasons, such as today being a school day and you being
AWOL
.”

“Didn't I tell you school got cancelled this afternoon because of a malfunctioning fire alarm?"

I didn't want to think about what might have triggered that.

“And anyway,” she said, “how come it didn't bother you that I wasn't in school when I offered to fix your chair?”

I said, “St. Aubaine is an hour away from the Museum of Civilization. Rachel lives in St. Aubaine.”

“Yeah, sure, but at the end that's closest to Hull.”

I ignored that. “I promised you these trips, and we agreed on the weekend, didn't we? We're all set for Saturday, which is not a school day. Right?”

Josey shrugged. “You have a funny attitude. For one thing, a visit to the museum is an educational experience. Don't you remember Dr. Prentiss talking about that? Better than school. I can get a note from my Uncle Mike. Not a problem.”

Well, of course, it wouldn't be a problem getting a note from your uncle if you'd recently bailed him out of the local clink.

“Absolutely not.” I sounded like I meant it.

The Skylark cooperated long enough to get us all the way to Hull and the Museum of Civilization. My mood lightened as Josey made her careful way through every exhibit in the building, not missing a detail, touching what could be touched, reading each plaque, craning her neck to check the totem poles. Josey was an exhibit designer's dream audience.

“Jeez, that was excellent, Ms. Silk,” she said as we left. “Very educational.”

“Glad you liked it,” I said, as we prepared to cross the street and walk the three blocks to where I'd found free street parking.

“I hate to leave here. What a wicked building,” she said, pausing to look back at it. “I love all those curves. It's like a big sand dune.”

What the hell, if the kid couldn't go to France, why not spend the afternoon giving her a rare good time?

“And the lunch. That was a pretty elegant restaurant.”

“Yes.”

“Thanks a lot.”

I was thankful myself because the bill squeaked through on my overworked and underpaid card, and I hadn't had to plunder my emergency cash roll. Although I'd had it with me, in case.

“And those exhibits. Jeez.”

“Indeed.”

“I like the native stuff. Those totem poles. That's an experience.”

“For me, too.” I was concentrating on Josey, and I almost careened into a large, shambling street person on the edge of the sidewalk. He stuck out his hand.

Without thinking too much, I fished out a loonie and dropped it into his waiting palm. The loonie vanished. Its new owner whipped around and headed rapidly away from us without so much as a thank you. I was left thinking sad thoughts about the impersonality of modern life, where all street people seemed to be identical. And where they appeared to have production quotas.

Josey curled her lip. “What did you do that for?”

“Why not? It's good to help other people out if you can.”

“He doesn't have to beg, you know. They've all got welfare, but they take the tourists for suckers. I don't feel sorry for them. They have a choice. Especially that one.”

Her small freckled face hardened. Josey had fought her way out of a legacy of poverty, ignorance and alcoholism. She didn't feel sorry for anyone she figured had volunteered for the downward spiral. She was halfway across the street when I caught up, puffing.

“What do you mean, especially that one?”

Josey stood still, her saucer-sized freckles on full alert.