Gold Fever (24 page)

His mind was made up for him when a piercing scream came from behind. A lady had come in off the street and seen the empty-eyed body sprawled across the lobby. Her two companions, dance hall girls judging by their dress and the amount of rouge on their cheeks, simultaneously tried to prevent her from falling and see what was going on. The first lady hit the floor in a faint, and her friends started to scream. Men streamed in from the street, pushing and shoving to get a good look. Euila Forester hurried down the stairs, drawn by the noise.

Angus MacGillivray held Miss Witherspoon in his arms, looked pleadingly at Miss Forester, tried to hide the body from the view of passersby with his own, calculated how long it might take until the Mounties arrived, and wished his mother were here

Most of the day passed in a state of high excitement, as I thought of little other than my appointment with the dressmaker. I decided upon the purchase of one day dress and a minimum of two evening gowns. First thing in the morning, I'd sorted through my jewellery box—sadly depleted since my glory days in London and Toronto—to consider coordinating fabric, colour and texture.

“You're looking pleased with yourself this afternoon, Fee,” Ray said when he arrived for work.

I peeked at him through the corner of my eyes in a way that I knew to be most flirtatious. “And what is there not to be pleased about on a beautiful spring day such as this while our coffers overflow with money.” I swept my arm in an arc to indicate the entirety of our business.

“Beautiful day, it may be,” he said, eyeing my skirt, “but ye ken ye've got mud all across the bottom o' that dress. Turn around, it's no doubt splattered up the back too.”

My partner never did let me get away with being too cheerful. I stuck my tongue out at him.

“Not to mention that we've got the suspicion o' murder hanging over our workers,” he continued.

“Oh, stop it,” I said. “Soon you'll have me crying in my drink.” I'd been about to tell him about giving Irene thirty per cent on drinks (he is my partner, after all) but decided to hold that bit of information back, for no reason but to be difficult. It would come out soon enough. Like good partners should, Ray trusted me to keep the books, but he examined them carefully every Monday morning.

Joe Hamilton, who made an occupation out of hanging around the docks collecting news, burst through the doors. “Did you hear?” he shouted.

Every man in the saloon looked up. Joe crossed the room to the bar. “There's been another murder,” he announced.

We all waited for further news. None was forthcoming. “Let me buy you a drink, lad,” one of my regulars offered.

“Don't mind if I do.” Men gathered around, waiting for Joe to spit it out. Ray poured a drink, and Joe tossed it back in one swallow. He slammed the empty glass down on the bar. His benefactor gestured for Ray to serve another.

When he had the full glass clutched safely in hand, Joe took a deep breath. “Man found dead at the Richmond minutes ago.”

“What kind of news is that?” the man sneered, regretting the cost of two glasses of good whisky. “Folk dead all over town from sickness, bad food, bad drink. Bad life.”

Joe tasted his second drink with more care. “Blood all over the floor. Ladies fainted straight away soon as they saw it.”

“Where? When?” “Hotel lobby. No more than half an hour ago. The hotel clerk came tearing down Front Street shouting for a Mountie. Pissed his pants too.”

Half the men in the saloon headed for the door. “Know who the dead fellow is?” someone asked.

“Nope.”

“How's he killed?” Joe grudgingly admitted he didn't know that either. It was looking as if he'd had his two drinks' worth. Those who hadn't rushed out at the very mention of the words “blood” and “fainting ladies” turned back to whatever they'd been doing.

I wanted to go upstairs and check the ledger one last time before I left for my dressmaker's appointment.

“Mrs. MacGillivray?” Joe Hamilton said in his soft, always polite voice.

“Yes?”

“I came to the Savoy first because I thought you would be particularly interested in the goings on at the Richmond. You have friends staying there, do you not?”

“Yes, I do.”

Even in a town of poor sanitation, Joe Hamilton emitted a particularly unpleasant odour. His clothes had been torn and mended then torn and not mended. And they probably hadn't seen a soap flake since leaving the factory. He came into the Savoy occasionally, when he'd managed to gather some money together, and nursed one or two drinks all night. He usually spent the night watching me. He was always unfailingly polite and respectful, and I sometimes felt a bit sorry for him.

“Your son, Angus, he visits your friends at the Richmond regularly?”

“Yes.” I signalled to Ray to pour Joe another drink. This had better be worth it: I was not feeling quite so sorry for Joe Hamilton at this particular moment.

“Angus MacGillivray found the body,” Joe said.

The rest of our customers rushed for the doors.

I was ahead of them all.

If there is one thing nice about living in such a small town, it is that one can cross distances in a matter of minutes. I made it from the Savoy to the Richmond Hotel on Princess Street in record time. A good-sized crowd had gathered in front of the hotel; a handful of Mounties struggled to keep them back.

“Sorry, ma'am,” one of the redcoats said to me, “you can't go in there right now.”

He looked too young to shave and was new to the Yukon. I swatted him aside. “I am Mrs. MacGillivray and I am needed inside.” I pushed my way past him. I have found that if you convincingly pretend you belong somewhere, almost anyone will believe you.

The lobby of the Richmond Hotel was crowded. Inspector McKnight was there, observing everything through his thick glasses; a doctor (a real doctor, not that fool who always seemed to appear whenever I was feeling faint) ministered to a dance hall girl while her friends fluttered uselessly about; Richard Sterling knelt by the body, which had dispensed much less blood across the floor than Joe Hamilton's theatrics led me to expect; Sergeant Lancaster was doing nothing but trying to look important; halfway up the stairs, Martha Witherspoon wrote in her notebook while Euila clung to her. My son leaned over Richard, observing everything and peppering the constable with questions about such delightful topics as lividity and rigor mortis.

“Oh, Fiona, thank heavens you're here.” Euila launched herself off the staircase.

Angus looked up and saw me, wrapped in a sobbing Euila. He straightened, leaving Richard to his inspection of the body. “Mother,” he said, “you shouldn't be here.”

I patted Euila on the back. “And neither should you.” I peered around my son's attempts to block me from viewing the body on the floor. “Oh, it's Tom Jannis. No harm done, I must say. Other than to that floor.”

“You know the gentleman, madam?” Inspector McKnight asked. I thought I'd spoken quietly. Apparently not quietly enough. Perhaps one day I'd learn to control my tongue.

I decided to speak my mind—Jannis's untimely demise clearly being none of my doing. “Nasty fellow this. Goes by the name of Tom Jannis. If I were you, Inspector, I'd start investigating in the less respectable gambling halls.”

“Well, you are not me, Mrs. MacGillivray, and I don't need your advice, as well-intentioned as I'm sure it is.”

I blinked. Was McKnight insulting me? Euila sobbed against my shoulder, her tears leaking through the cotton of my day dress. I tried to shrug her away. “Pull yourself together, girl.”

Euila made no attempt to move. I looked around for help: none was forthcoming. Martha Witherspoon continued to write furiously in her ever-present notebook.

The doctor approached us after finishing with the fainting dance hall girl. She was being led out the door by her friends, who were tossing their heads and swirling their skirts around their ankles in anticipation of the attention they were about to receive as they stepped through the hotel doors. “Perhaps you should sit down, ma'am,” he said to Euila.

I gave her a surreptitious shove to get her off my shoulder.

“I'm quite all right, sir, thank you,” Euila said, swallowing her sobs.

“Euila, allow the doctor to take you upstairs. This is no place for a lady.” Martha Witherspoon lifted her head from her notebook.

“I'm perfectly…”

“You're staying at this hotel, miss?” McKnight asked.

“Yes.”

“Your name?”

Euila gave it.

“Go to your room, please. I'll want to talk to you later.”

“Miss Forester knows nothing about this wretched business,” Miss Witherspoon said.

“I'll decide that,” McKnight said. “Why does it seem that lately you are always around when something is happening?”

“Now see here, Inspector,” a voice boomed from the door. “That is a baseless accusation.”

“Calm down, Mouse. The inspector wasn't making any accusations,” Richard said from his kneeling position on the floor. “How did you get in here anyway?”

Mouse O'Brien crossed the lobby in two gigantic steps. He had probably done nothing but loom over the constable guarding the door until the nervous boy stood aside. “I came as soon as I heard the news, Miss Witherspoon. Are you all right?”

“O'Brien, get out of here,” McKnight shouted. “Doctor, take Miss Forester to her room. Miss Forester, wait there until you are called upon. Miss Witherspoon, you do the same. Mrs. MacGillivray, you may remain while I question young Angus. And you, sir!” He was now bellowing at the cowering desk clerk. “You can explain to me how you happened to stand there working while a dead man lay not five feet away!”

The clerk went quite pale. “Actually sir,” Angus hurried to explain, “he wasn't lying on the floor; he was sitting in that chair until Miss Witherspoon touched him.”

Euila put one hand to her mouth. Martha continued to scribble.

“Doctor, take those women upstairs. O'Brien, I told you to get out of here. Angus, you and your mother wait for me in the dining room. Lancaster, go outside and see why it seems as if every passing man and his dog is able to wander in here at will. And send someone for the undertaker. Sterling, finish examining that body, and you,” he shouted at the clerk, “wait right here.”

Mouse O'Brien took Martha's arm and guided her upstairs, over her protests that she was a writer and had a responsibility to her readers. Euila followed. The doctor decided that a dead body on the floor was more interesting than a wobbly Englishwoman and joined Richard in an examination of the remains. Lancaster politely suggested that if I felt the need to go home and lie down, he would act as the responsible adult while Angus was questioned. Richard lifted one eyebrow at me, then bent his head to accompany the doctor in the examination of the late, unlamented Tom Jannis.

“Thank you for your kindness, Sergeant,” I said with a flutter of my eyelashes. “But I am needed here. And I think,” I glanced at McKnight, who was growing increasingly agitated as no one followed his orders, “you are needed outside. Your authority will help the younger men to control the crowd.”

The crowd was indeed getting quite lively. Two constables were trying to block the door while men were pushing against them, trying to see in. Several rows of faces lined the two small windows on either side of the door, Graham Donohue's first amongst them. He waved at me, hoping I would somehow be able to gain him admittance.

“Let's go, dear,” I said to my son. “We'll sit in the dining room.”

“I want to watch.”

“Go with your mother, Angus,” Richard said without looking up. “You're a witness to what happened here. You can't be involved in the investigation this time.”

The dining room, the site of yesterday's aborted tea, was deserted, save for two white-aproned waiters lining the walls as if they were part of the decor. The customers had all been told to leave, but no one bothered with the staff. “Tea,” I said, settling down at the biggest table in the centre of the room. A single sprig of droopy fireweed tossed into a dirty glass served as a centrepiece. “And sandwiches. Not fish paste.”

“I don't know how you do it, Angus,” I said as the waiters hurried away, no doubt glad of something to do. “You always manage to land in the middle of police business.”

“I don't do it on purpose, Mother.”

As we waited for our tea, I realized that I was making a lawabiding living just in time. My previous careers couldn't have withstood the degree of police attention Angus attracted.

I finished my fish paste sandwich as McKnight arrived to interview Angus. They didn't talk for long, and shortly after four o'clock, I hustled my son out of the empty dining room.

The lobby was empty, save for a bored-looking constable standing guard over a small wet patch on the floor. I averted my eyes.

“I'd like to check on Miss Witherspoon and Miss Forester, Mother,” Angus said.

I checked my watch again. It was approaching ten past. How long would Irene wait? If I missed this appointment, would they give me another right away or make me suffer?

I hesitated. “I don't know, dear. Perhaps you'd best come with me. That killer might still be around somewhere.”

He looked horrified. “Mother! I can't trail around after you.”

Actually, I thought that not such a bad idea. Was I making a mistake with my son by letting him be so unsupervised?

He read my mind. “I'll be fine, Mother, if I'm with Miss Witherspoon and Miss Forrester. The Mounties will catch the killer soon.”

I smiled at him. “Very well, but until then, please Angus, stay with Miss Witherspoon.”

He kissed me on the cheek. Our eyes were on the same level. It seemed that he grew taller every day. I hugged him tightly.