Hippie House (24 page)

The constable asked someone on the steps to throw the shoe down to him. Again, I thought this was odd. On TV they were always so cautious with evidence, handling it as though it were infectious, picking it up with a stick and sealing it in a bag. The boy standing closest to the shoe must have thought as I did for he appeared reluctant, but he did as the police officer asked.

Constable Wagner signaled Arthur to come closer and identify the shoe.

Arthur walked meekly toward him. I didn't blame him, because Constable Wagner looked far more formidable than compassionate. An odd reaction, considering the kid's mother was likely dead.

“Well?”

Arthur shrugged. “Yeah, I guess it is.”

The constable nodded. “I thought so. I was behind her in the market yesterday.”

I now noticed Arthur's expression, and it dawned on me that he appeared more embarrassed than distraught.

“Now,” said the constable, “why don't you turn around and apologize for scaring these people half to death.”

Arthur glanced up at Constable Wagner, whose defiant chin was set. Folding his arms across his chest, he nodded at the boy.

Arthur Nash turned toward his audience. With his eyes fastened to the ground, he murmured a barely audible, “Sorry.”

“Alright,” Constable Wagner continued. “Now I want you to hose down these steps. But before you do that, I want you to get in the car—you and I need to have a little talk.”

ARTHUR WAS SAVED THE EMBARRASSMENT
of apologizing to Mr. Gillespie because, as Eric informed me, Mr. Gillespie had already left Pike Creek.

“Where did he go?” I asked as we bumped along on the bus.

Eric sat sprawled across the seat in front of me, facing sideways, an arm draped over the back of the seat. Megan sat next to me, grinding loudly on a jawbreaker.

Eric shrugged. “Probably somewhere where nobody knows him. Maybe he's gone to open a Dairy Bar in North Dakota or some other place far away like that.”

Megan pulled the jawbreaker from her mouth. “He moved in with his brother in Toronto.”

I stared at her a moment. Not because I didn't believe her, but because her tongue was fluorescent blue.

“Well, it's true. Mom heard it from Mrs. Gillespie herself.”

Wherever he was, he was no longer in Pike Creek, so attention turned away from Mr. Gillespie when Suzy McLaren disappeared. Suzy went missing in the third week of June, somewhere between Pike Creek and her farm near tiny Marsville.

Suzy was fourteen—the same age as me, Hetty made a point of telling me as we walked back to school from the Pike Creek Market after lunch.

“Yeah, and the same age as you were last month. So what's your point?”

“Oh nothing. It just seems to me that his victims are getting younger. Katie was eighteen. Fiona, she was sixteen. Now Suzy.”

“I doubt if it means anything. It's probably who's available at the time.”

“Yeah, I guess.”

Suzy's disappearance set my mother off again. Although her excitable episodes had tapered off some since Fiona's death, even something as mildly unnerving as Halley barking at Mr. Fraser when he dropped off Dad's extension ladder could get her upset. She began to talk in earnest about moving back to Toronto. She knew at least four families in Pike Creek that had already put
their houses up for sale. It would be infinitely safer than the farm, she maintained. The city was at least comforting in its numbers. It was not one long stretch of barren road bordered by woods where murderers could lurk, waiting to snatch young girls. Not like this—this dark and sordid world around Ruddy Duck Farm. Then a horrifying thought occurred to her. Even if they did put it up for sale, with its morbid history, who in their right mind would buy the place?

My father didn't respond. He left her ranting in the kitchen and went out to feed the trout instead.

An hour later Detective Mather drove up the lane. Mom was crashing around the kitchen, throwing carelessly wiped silverware into the utensil drawer. Through the window of the sun-room, where Megan and I were studying for exams but mostly painting our toenails metallic gold, I could see Dad standing on the spillway, tossing handfuls of Purina trout chow into the water now percolating with fish.

Detective Mather parked his car and, moments later, followed my father into the kitchen. He informed us that he had some news.

“What is it? Have they found Suzy McLaren?” My mother removed her apron and invited him to sit in the nearest chair. But she was still in a dark mood, and I noticed she didn't offer the detective so much as a glass of water. It appeared that she was beginning to blame even him for the state of the world.

“Yes,” Detective Mather answered. “Suzy's been found. And she's safe. She took the bus to a cousin's house in Brampton. She had a disagreement with her mother and decided to leave home. It was an unfortunate decision under the circumstances.”

Unfortunate was hardly the word. With half the province looking for her, I was sure she was going to look back on that disagreement like it was a tea party compared to what she was in for now.

“Oh, man,” said Megan, “I wouldn't want to be in Suzy McLaren's riding boots.”

“Don't be too hard on her.” Detective Mather made an effort to smile. With little success. “If she hadn't run away, what I've come to talk to you about might never have happened. We have a description. It's not terrific, but it's more than we've had up until now.”

“Where did you get it?” my mother asked.

“It was given to us by a young girl in Shelburne. She tells us that in early May she was walking to a girlfriend's house when a man grabbed her from behind. After blindfolding her, he dragged her into a vehicle where he tied her wrists. Somehow she was able to twist free and she escaped within a few blocks.”

It was an amazing story and I wondered if it was true. Detective Mather answered my unasked question, as I'm sure it had been the first thought to strike him.

“We believe her story. It hasn't changed, and although she saw little of the vehicle, her description suggests it was some sort of van.”

My mother was calmer now, although skeptical. “But why would she wait a whole month to say anything?”

“She was terrified,” the detective explained. “She was trying to cover it up, maybe thinking that if she ignored it, it would go away. Or maybe she thought if she said anything, her abductor might retaliate. Or perhaps that she would somehow be blamed. It's not always easy to know why people do the things they do, but thankfully, after she'd heard that Suzy disappeared, she thought it was important enough and she somehow gathered the nerve to tell us.”

“That poor child,” my mother moaned. “Oh, this is awful. It means he's still around.”

Detective Mather nodded. He then opened his briefcase and withdrew some drawings. “Eric, I would like you to take a look
at these and tell me if this man resembles anyone you might have seen at the Hippie House last summer.”

My brother bent over the first drawing. He frowned. I frowned too, because they were rough pencil drawings of a very generic-looking man. All I could really be sure of was that the man was white skinned, dark haired and probably more than twenty-five years old. He did not wear glasses—at least they weren't included in the sketch—and he did not have a moustache or a beard. Okay, so that ruled out one guy.

“It's not Maury.”

“No, it's not,” Megan agreed. “But Emma, don't you think he kind of looks like that new guy who works at the post office?”

I could sort of see it, although the eyebrows were too heavy. “No, I think it looks like Mrs. Suringa's husband more than anyone else.”

Detective Mather set the first drawing aside, exposing a profile beneath. The detective once again turned to Eric.

Eric shrugged. He stood up. “I can't say. I mean, that guy looks like a ton of people, and on the other hand, he doesn't look like one person I know. I wish I could help you. I wish I could say, ‘Oh, yeah, that was so-and-so,' but I can't. I can't tell you if that guy was here or not.”

“Geez, Eric,” Megan said. “Don't be so paranoid. So you don't recognize him. There's no crime in that.”

Eric looked at her. He sat down again.

Detective Mather placed the drawings back in his briefcase. “Well, if anything comes to any of you, please give me a call. Thanks again.”

My mother was suddenly on her feet. “Thank you, Detective Mather. Thanks for letting us know Suzy's alright and for, well, looking after things.”

The detective gave her a weary smile.

And as if suddenly waking up after a knock on the head, she apologized, “Oh dear, what have I been thinking—you must be hungry. Let me get you something to eat.”

Detective Mather shook his head as he held his palms in the air. But, of course, Mom wouldn't allow him to leave empty-handed, and despite his protests she loaded him up with pickled vegetables and sausages to cheer him up. My father accompanied him back to his car.

“Isn't it amazing that girl in Shelburne got away?” I asked Eric an hour later.

He sat at his desk where he was replacing a string on his guitar. Halley and I lay flopped across his bed. Lifting a leg in the air, I admired the sparkly gold nail polish on my toes.

Eric shrugged. “Yeah, it is. It also sounds to me like the guy's getting sloppy.”

“What do you mean?”

“Exactly what Detective Mather said would happen. Remember? He said he'd get bolder each time until he made a mistake big enough to get caught. He picked her up in town and in broad daylight. And she somehow got away.”

I suddenly sat up. “I'm scared.”

“Yeah, I don't blame you. I would be too.”

I watched Eric tighten a machine head. He tested the string by playing a couple of chords. “How come it bugged you so much that you didn't recognize the pictures Detective Mather showed us? I mean, they're so general, they could be just about any guy.”

“Because I should. Look, it was obviously somebody who knew about the Hippie House. I've always been pretty sure about that. But so many people came out here. I guess—if anybody should recognize him, I should—that's why.”

I
WAS GLAD TO BE FINISHED SCHOOL
. In the final week of June we spent our lunch hours in the courtyard, propped up on our elbows, soaking up the sun. It became harder and harder to leave the warmth outside and return to the fluorescent halls. The classrooms seemed stale and suffocating when the fresh air was so deliciously fragrant. Even our teachers were anxious to leave the dusty rooms. Mrs. Suringa allowed us to take our textile projects to the courtyard. Sitting on the grass we passed around fabric swatches, discussing, identifying and recording the individual characteristics and care.

Megan got a job that summer as a cashier at the drugstore in Pike Creek. At first I went to visit her a lot, we were both so excited that she was old enough to have a real job. She'd show me what was new in cosmetics, then run and look after customers while I tried all the testers. But when I got home I realized it was the first summer I didn't have her around to help occupy my time. I missed her. It was no fun drifting in the canoe, tanning, by myself. Those long hazy days of doing nothing were over for Megan, and I was too old to spend them swimming, ignoring how slimy the pond was anymore. Then Megan started going
out with Duncan Friesen, who delivered prescriptions for the drugstore. I felt even more abandoned. I thought of Donny and I sighed. I wondered if he would ever be able to separate me from what happened to Katie. I doubted it. I knew I would never be able to look at him without remembering what had happened on our farm. So while Megan spoke of Duncan with starry eyes, I lamented my own past love affair. By then, in my mind, it had escalated into a love affair.

During the first two weeks of July, Hetty and I made a bit of money picking strawberries. Early in the morning, while dew still glistened on the fields, we rode our bicycles out to the gas station on the corner of Highway 9. Here, Mr. O'Callaghan would be waiting in his truck. The last to be picked up, we squeezed onto the benches in the open box next to the other berry pickers. The sun climbed higher and we shed our jackets as Mr. O'Callaghan drove down the gravel road headed toward his farm. Dust thickened our hair, and our rubber sandals left scuff marks on the rough plank floor. Mrs. O'Callaghan had set out a long table covered by a bright vinyl tablecloth on the lawn. She served plates of sandwiches or she cooked a big pot of chili for the workers at lunch. At four o'clock we were returned to the gas station where we again collected our bikes.

It was sweaty work that turned my hands pink and earned me more than one blackfly bite. But over the two weeks I made enough money to buy the most exquisite piece of periwinkle silk. Enough for a midi-skirt and waist jacket. I'd had my eye on the fabric in a store in Brampton for some time. Hetty bought a transistor radio with her money so she could listen to CHUM radio station wherever she went.