In the Shadow of the Glacier (5 page)

The woman stood back. Her face a mask of stoic incomprehension. Winters didn’t condescend to smile at her.

The police walked into the house.

The front hall was vast, but mostly empty. A thin-legged piecrust table was the only piece of furniture on the squares of black and white tile. As they passed into the living room, the tiles gave way to thick planks of a rich dark pine. The couch and chairs were white leather, a bad match for the rustic floor. The curtains were pulled back, and the lights of the town winked below. The kitchen was open plan; a long granite counter separated it from the living and dining areas. Everything was as neat, as Winters’ mother always said, as a pin.

Mrs. Montgomery was dressed in a pink summer suit, skirt to the knees, matching short-sleeved jacket nipped in at the waist, stockings, expensive-looking pumps. She was very thin, with the look of an expensively maintained body.

“You should have had a better look at my ID before letting me in your home, Mrs. Montgomery,” Winters said.

“Perhaps.” She gave a nervous laugh. “But this lovely town isn’t anything like Vancouver or Los Angeles, is it? Can I offer you a drink? I can make coffee, or tea. We have beer, if you’d like, or something stronger. Juice?”

“Nothing, thank you, Mrs. Montgomery.” Not anything like Vancouver, indeed. Her husband hadn’t been murdered in Vancouver. “Perhaps you should sit down, ma’am.”

She sat. The dog snarled at Winters. He was tempted to snarl back. Instead he said, “Constable, will you get me a glass of water, please.”

Smith blinked. “Water?”

It’s not for me, you fool, he wanted to shout. “Yes, please. Water.” Smith bustled off, her braid flapping behind her. She’d taken off her hat as they came through the door, and tucked it under her arm. He turned to their hostess and settled his face into lines of sympathy. “I’m sorry to have to tell you this, Mrs. Montgomery, but your husband, Mr. Reginald Montgomery, died earlier this evening.” Cupboards opened and shut as Smith searched for a glass. He rubbed the face of his watch with his thumb.

Mrs. Montgomery scratched behind her dog’s right ear. “That’s too bad.” Henry wiggled in ecstasy.

Smith returned, carrying a glass full of water. There was no ice. She handed it to him.

“Perhaps Mrs. Montgomery…”

Comprehension crossed the constable’s pretty face. “Oh. Right. Mrs. Montgomery would you like a drink of water?”

“Thank you, dear.” She accepted the glass and held it out to Henry. The dog drank.

“Do you understand what I told you, ma’am?” Winters said. “Mr. Montgomery was found dead a short while ago.”

“I understand, Mr. Winters. Poor Reggie. His heart, I suppose. No matter how I nagged, he simply wouldn’t give up fried foods.”

“Is there someone we could call to be with you?”

Smith’s cell phone rang. She fumbled at the buttons to send it directly to voice mail. Winters glared at her.

“We haven’t lived here long,” Mrs. Montgomery said. “I don’t have close friends or family in town. Except for Henry, of course.”

“Of course.” Winters had broken the tragic news to many people in his long career. He’d never seen anyone react so stoically. She hadn’t even asked him if he was sure, or told him he must be mistaken.

“I’ll call my son, Gerald. He lives in California, so it might be a while before he gets here.”

“I can arrange for someone from victim services to wait with you until your son arrives.”

“No, thank you. I don’t care for strangers in my home.” She put the glass on the coffee table, scooped up the dog, and stood. “Thank you for coming, Mr. Winters, Miss Smith. It was most kind of you to deliver the news in person. Do you need me to identify the body, or something?”

“That can wait until tomorrow.”

“Good. It is late. You can call me any time after ten to arrange a viewing.”

Viewing? “Mrs. Montgomery, we should call someone to be with you. Constable Smith can wait until a neighbor arrives.”

“I assure you, Mr. Winters, that I will be quite fine until my son gets here in a day or two.”

A day or two? “Before we go, can I ask what your husband was doing this evening?”

“Other than getting himself killed?” She laughed.

He heard a strangled sound from Smith, and didn’t dare look at her.

“Reginald and Frank were having dinner with potential investors. Japanese fellows, looking for someplace to spend their money. These Asians are buying up the entire province. Someone should put a stop to it before they expect us to eat with chopsticks, don’t you agree, Mr. Winters?”

“Who’s Frank, and what’s his last name?”

“Frank Clemmins, my husband’s business partner.”

Winters glanced at Smith. She gave an almost imperceptible nod, indicating that she knew who they were talking about.

“Did your husband say where they were dining? Or when he expected the dinner to be over?”

Mrs. Montgomery shook her head. “No. But Reginald never stayed out late. He was almost always home by ten, and never later to bed than eleven. He didn’t care for dinners with Asian businessmen. He said they were too interested in having a good time, as long as he was paying. If he didn’t get at least seven hours’ sleep, Reginald had a tendency to fall asleep in the afternoon, sometimes in meetings, and he disliked that. Made him look old, he said. Poor Reginald. I’ll miss him. And so will Henry, won’t you, Henry?” The dog barked in agreement. “Now if you’ll excuse me, Mr. Winters, it is late.”

“Did your husband perhaps forget to take his wallet?”

“I can’t imagine him doing so. I haven’t seen it around.”

“Did he carry a cell phone?”

“Reginald is…was…a busy man. He made phone calls all the day long. He told me many times that he can’t imagine how he ever coped in the days before cell phones. I assume you’re asking me these questions because his possessions are missing.”

“Did he wear a watch?”

“Of course. I told you he was punctual. He lived by his watch. Is that missing as well? It was a good one.”

“Can you describe it?”

“It’s a Rolex Oyster. His mother gave it to him for his fortieth birthday. Reginald treasured it.”

“Do you happen to have a picture of it, Mrs. Montgomery? For insurance purposes, perhaps.”

“How clever of you to think of that, Mr. Winters. I believe we do. I’ll just be a minute.” She put Henry down, and left the room.

Winters walked to the French doors. Hands in his pockets, he stood there, looking over the lights of town.

Smith watched Henry. Henry watched Smith.

“Here it is.” Mrs. Montgomery was back, waving paper in the air. “Two photos, front and back. You can see the inscription here.” She handed him the pictures. “It says ‘To Reginald on his birthday. Love, Mother.’”

“May I borrow these, Mrs. Montgomery? I’ll have them returned tomorrow.”

“Certainly. Now if there’s nothing else?”

“What did you do this evening, Mrs. Montgomery?”

“These Japanese businessmen don’t care for the company of wives. As I was on my own, I had a friend over for dinner.”

“We may need to speak with you tomorrow.”

“I should be here most of the day.”

Winters headed for the door.

“Mrs. Montgomery,” Smith said. “Was it Dr. Tyler you had dinner with?”

Mrs. Montgomery tilted her head and looked at Winters almost flirtatiously. “I might have told you a little lie.” She giggled. “I do have one good friend in the area. I know what you’re thinking, young lady, but I assure you that neither of us had reason to wish harm to poor Reginald.”

Henry barked in agreement.

Chapter Five

Winters was silent as Smith negotiated the SUV down the steep streets. The lights of the bridge leading out of town shone on the water.

“That’s a new one on me,” he said, as she pulled into the alley behind Front Street. Constable Evans stood aside to let them pass. “Not exactly the grieving widow. How did you know who her friend is? Her lover, I guess, judging by that schoolgirl giggle. We were supposed to be there in a sympathetic capacity. Deliverers of tragic news and all that stuff. Not that I’m criticizing, mind. You got to the point fast enough.”

“Mrs. Montgomery didn’t even pretend to be upset at her husband’s death. And by the sounds of it, she doesn’t expect her son to be too broken up, either. I thought that was sad, so sad,” Smith said. “Everyone needs someone to mourn them.” Her hat threw shadows across her face and he couldn’t read her expression. He waited for her to continue. “I’ve seen Dr. Tyler’s car parked at their house. I sorta guessed why he was there because one of my mom’s friends mentioned that the Montgomerys’ marriage was somewhat unorthodox. I suppose I paid attention because you don’t expect that sort of thing in people of that age. Sorry, John. No offense meant.”

Winters grunted. Considerable offense had been taken. “Your mother knows the Montgomerys?”

“No more than anyone else. He’s here to build a big resort, the most exclusive resort between Alberta and the Pacific, he calls it. Called it, I should say.”

“Some people would be opposed to that.”

“You’d be right there. Plus he’s, I mean he was, strongly opposed to the peace garden. You know, the park they’re wanting to build at the O’Reilly place?”

“I’ve heard about it.” Everyone in North America had heard about the Commemorative Peace Garden. In the 1960s and early ’70s Trafalgar and the Kootenays had been the major settling point for young Americans fleeing to Canada because of the war in Vietnam. Draft dodgers, deserters, anyone against the war, had settled in the Kootenay Mountains. A good number never left. War resisters, they called themselves. And now, in the first decade of the twenty-first century, more were coming.

Tom Maas, mayor of Trafalgar for more than twenty years, a Canadian of the same age as the American hippies who’d found refuge in the mountains, had thrown his considerable influence behind the proposed Commemorative Peace Garden. Three acres of prime land had been left to the town in the will of Larry O’Reilly, a one-time draft dodger who’d prospered in Canada. He’d also left money, and the plans, for a fountain to be built at the center of the park. A stream of water flowing from the broken sword of Ares, the Greek god of war, into a reflecting pool. An inscription honoring the war resisters was to be inscribed at the base of the statue.

No one had foreseen any problems with the bequest. At no expense, the town of Trafalgar would have a pleasant park for the enjoyment of the citizens.

But word leaked out to the wider world. Opposition hit the unsuspecting town like an arrow cast by Ares himself. Winters had no opinion on the park one way or the other. But he was probably one of the only people in town on the sidelines. Once the U.S. media had gotten wind of the plan, the town was under siege. Times were not right for a somber reflection of the history and motives of Vietnam protesters. Trafalgar was less than a hundred kilometers from the border, and local businessmen quaked in fear of a tourist boycott.

Reginald Montgomery had not been a calming force. His proposed resort development was facing opposition enough (threat to the grizzly bear habitation, ruination of the bucolic town that was Trafalgar). If the Americans didn’t come, his resort would fail for sure.

But Tom Maas, the mayor, had been enthusiastic about the park, talking up its virtues as both a tourist attraction and a moral imperative, convincing everyone that negative U.S. media attention would pass as soon as another pretty, young, blond white woman disappeared.

Anti-park forces retreated; plans for the park went ahead.

And then Maas died. A heart attack moments after he greeted the annual meeting of the Mystery Writers of British Columbia. Linda Patterson, the deputy mayor, thrust into the top job until the next election, was better known for organizing civic functions and speaking at school graduations than for her political skills. She blew with the wind and agreed with whoever was presenting their side at that moment.

“Evening, John. Constable.” A large man straightened up from the pavement behind Alphonse’s Bakery. A woman was brushing fingerprint dust on the shop doorknob, while a young man rooted through the garbage bags behind the convenience store.

“Anything?” Winters said. Ron Gavin was the lead RCMP crime scene investigator for the entire Mid-Kootenays. They were stationed just outside of Trafalgar, so there hadn’t been too much of a delay in getting to the scene.

“At a guess, I’d say the vic was killed where he stood. The doc’ll know better, but the amount of blood, brain tissue, and the splatter pattern is consistent with suffering a massive head trauma and falling right over.”

“One person? More?”

Gavin shrugged. “Can’t say. This alley’s well traveled. We’ve had a steady stream of people wanting to stop by and give us advice on how to do our jobs.”

“That damned TV program.”

“You can say that again. This alley’s a major route for foot traffic. It rained this morning, so we’ve gotten some nice partial casts of footprints.” He nodded toward the entrance to the alley. The pavement was in bad condition, patches of weeds growing between cracks. Anyone stepping in the mud would track that mud in their wake.

“Tell your people I’m interested in locating a wallet, cell phone, and Rolex watch.”

“Will do.”

“When did the newspaper people leave?” Smith asked.

“Not long after you. They took a couple of pictures of my rear end bending over the bloody residue and called it a night. Hope he wasn’t using a wide angle lens.”