innocent toes dangling from a dock.
EIGHT
Belle slept late, squirrelled away under a goosedown duvet, having slapped off her radio wake-up station when it blasted out a song about Bubba shooting a jukebox. The warm undulations of the waterbed, so forgiving of bones and sinews and muscles, undermined good intentions about early rising. I spend too much time in bed, she decided, trying to rouse herself with thoughts of a postcard sunrise and the Toronto Stock Market quotes.
Out of luck on the first count at least, the warmer temperatures having painted a steel-blue sky, overcast with a threat of snow. What had happened to the greenhouse effect? It had been the coldest winter in 140 years, the paper said. The frost had reached an incredible eight feet into the ground; so many town water mains had ruptured that people were being asked to run one tap at a pencil width until the end of April! Steam jet outfits were making three hundred dollars a trip, blasting frozen septic lines. Belle thought ruefully of her perennials under their blanket of snow. Would she ever touch the bronze irises again, the Oriental lilies, the Jacob’s ladder, monkshood, peonies? Had she been crazy to plant a kiwi in Northern Ontario, though the forever optimistic spring catalogue had dubbed it hardy through Siberian zone 3?
She shivered as she inserted her feet into a pair of sheepskin-lined house slippers and put on her fleece robe. Downstairs, only a bed of coals remained in the stove. She went onto the deck and down the stairs to a wood supply under a tarp, bringing back two pieces of maple.
From the feeder tank in the basement, she collected six victims in a juice pitcher and bore them upstairs. First she tossed Big Mac a handful of chopped sole. His twenty inches of lithe gray muscle vacuumed the tank, gulping large frozen chunks with a piscine sang-froid. The “dickeybird” discus, soft blue and brown stripes and delicate mouths (tossed out of the piranha family for good behaviour) picked demurely at a few shreds. Then when Mac slowed down, Belle dumped some flakes and the live sacrifice. The goldfish, shocked by the warmer water, dropped to pant on the bottom, hiding confidently beside Mac’s battleship bulk, which they interpreted as cover. He merely opened his mouth and swallowed them along with a few small rocks, bits of scales spewing out along with the pebbles. What was keeping Hannibal? Finally the needlefish’s radar located a moving target. His tiny propellers fanning, he zeroed his torpedo body, long ball-tipped snout pointed at his prey. Then with a z-kink from the Permian programme in his old reptilian brain, he zapped forward, snatching the fish in the middle, working it gently to slide head first down his gullet. “Good for you,” Belle said with a maternal nod.
So much for finding any leads at the Beaverdam, Belle thought. Maybe a chat with the local coroner would be more fruitful. She paged through the phone book to find Dr. Patrick Monroe’s practice. A personal visit would tell more in body language than in words, not that she expected a doctor would take a phone call anyway. The Ontario Health Insurance Plan had delisted that luxury.
Downtown Sudbury hadn’t changed much in the years since Belle had arrived. Businesses had suffered in the boom-bust mining town, and multiplying suburban malls had dealt the downtown area a further blow. Why pay parking fees only to run a gauntlet of winos and annoying teenage panhandlers in their shiny Doc Martens? Even the icon Canadian Tire had moved to the south end. Aside from a theatre, the YMCA complex, a chain store or two and some established shops with a loyal clientele, only a new seniors’ apartment along with the city and provincial government building porkbarrels kept the core on artificial respiration. And not all the fancy brick sidewalks or tree plantings could revitalize it. The only good news lately was the rumour about a giant call centre taking over the old Eaton’s complex.
Parking at one of the meters, she dropped in a loonie, narrowing her eyes as a young man sidled up. He wore a heavy hydro parka and carried a worn plastic bag. A red toque covered his head, mashing his long hair well down his neck. Stubble covered his chin as he gave her a lopsided grin, exposing a dark tooth. “Spare a dollar-fifteen?”
A dollar-fifteen. That was a novel approach, she thought. “Sure, but that won’t buy a beer,” she said.
“Huh, I want a coffee, that’s all. It’s cold.” He blew out his breath for effect, and Belle retreated a step.
“Well, that sounds reasonable. Tell you what. I’m going down the street to pick up some heavy cartons at the bookstore. Give me a hand, and the money’s yours.”
He leaned against the meter, placing it under his arm like a crutch. “Ah, get away with you.”
“I’m serious. Do you want the job or not?”
“Get away with you,” he repeated in a cheerful tone that implied that he found her as much a character as he was and turned to consider the saner prospects leaving the bank teller machine down the street.
The Maley Building, circa 1922, tall for its time at five storeys and once a decent professional address, reeked of musty paper, cigar smoke and antiseptic as Belle walked down the dark hall to an old-fashioned frosted door which bore Monroe’s name, General Practitioner. In the tiny waiting room sat, or rather perched, a gigantic woman, shifting buttocks in polite discomfort, while she read from Max Haines’ Doctors Who Kill. She smiled a Rita MacNeil greeting, and Belle nodded back, looking in vain for a secretary. Shrugging, she picked up an ancient Newsweek with Reagan, the Great Communicator, on the cover. The world had turned over many spins since then, and his descent into Alzheimer’s was depressing for someone with an aging father, so she opted for a pamphlet on smoking. Maybe it was time to convert to the patch. Her arm itched already.
For a few minutes, the only sounds were the flipping of pages and Rita’s laboured breathing. Finally, a young man in work clothes emerged from the inside office with a limp characteristic of industrial back injuries, lit up a cigarette and walked out whistling “Country Roads”. When the door opened again, an attractive man in his late fifties, silver hair carefully brushed, a pressed lab coat and Windsor knot in his red striped tie over a pale blue oxford shirt, announced, “Judith Ann Harrison.” Rita beamed and twiddled a goodbye.
By five o’clock, the office had cleared. “I don’t have an appointment, Doctor. My business is personal. Could you spare five minutes?” she asked at his puzzled stare.
“Medicine is always personal. If I can help you, my dear,” he eyed her appraisingly, “come into my office.”
Seated in the chair in front of his desk, Belle could see framed certificates on the wall attesting to his degrees. Golf trophies and tournament photographs lined the shelves behind him. There was a moment of silence while he looked at her expectantly. “I understand that you acted as the coroner in the Burian drowning,” she said abruptly.
He stiffened and shifted to a cold, official tone. “We don’t have a full-time coroner. I was on call that month. Is this a police matter? You didn’t show me any identification.”
Belle gave him a worried smile that spelled naïveté. “I’m a realtor, Doctor, not even a private investigator. But I was Jim Burian’s friend, and I was the one who found his body. I still see his face in my dreams. And that hand.” Her voice trembled and she looked at the floor, a human version of Rusty’s deferential belly presentation.
Monroe sat back in his chair, his voice mellowing sympathetically. “Well, now I understand. That must have been quite a shock. The hand protruding from the ice was unusual. Apparently a branch worked under the coat. Shallow lake full of deadwood, the officers said. Now, normally a body floats head down, bent over from the waist.” He passed her a box of tissues, which she accepted with a grateful nod. Then he flexed his hands, patrician fingers curving gently around a Mont Blanc pen. “As for what I found, there’s a copy of my report at the police department. These deaths
