Winter of Secrets (13 page)

He turned a corner and came into a straightway. The lights of Smith’s car behind him flooded the van.

Meredith Morgenstern had been calling, leaving messages hinting that she knew why he was keeping the bodies and why he was showing so much interest in a car accident. John Winters knew lots of good reporters. Men and women who did their jobs and let the police do theirs. Meredith Morgenstern wasn’t one of them, and he wouldn’t normally give her the time of day. But he might be able to toss her enough of a crumb that she’d write a story asking anyone who’d seen Ewan to come forward.

No one seemed to know where Ewan Williams had gone that night. But he had to have gone somewhere, and seen someone. If only the person who’d last seen him alive.

If that person was Jason Wyatt-Yarmouth, Winters might never find out what happened.

***

Lucky Smith bit into a piece of shortbread. She didn’t even chew, just let the buttery dough dissolve in her mouth.

“Perfect,” she said to Ellie Carmine.

“Thanks.” Ellie sipped at her tea. She looked troubled.

“What’s happening about your guests?” Lucky asked. “I’m surprised they’re still here, after…Well, after what happened to their two friends.”

“The sister, Wendy, is waiting to leave with her parents and the boy’s body. I’ve no idea what’s going on but apparently the coroner isn’t releasing the bodies yet, and won’t say when.”

“That seems strange.”

“Perhaps you could ask Moonlight…”

“No.”

“I haven’t even said what I want to know.”

“I don’t ask my daughter anything to do with police business.” Lucky would happily ask anything at all, but Moonlight wouldn’t tell her more than was available to all in the pages of the
Trafalgar Daily Gazette
. She’d confided a few things to her mother in her early days with the department, but that had stopped.

“Having the police poking around, questioning the guests, it’s upsetting for everyone. It was just a car accident, for heaven’s sake. He is rather attractive, that Sergeant Winters, isn’t he?”

“I hadn’t noticed,” Lucky said, as her hand hovered over the plate of treats before settling upon a cookie formed into the shape of candy cane. Bands of pink and white dough wound through the cookie. She took an exploratory bite. Not as good as the shortbread.

The kitchen door flew open.

“Robbed. I ‘ave been robbed.” It was a young woman, with long black hair and full lips. She would have been pretty if not for a much too prominent nose. She was dressed in leather ankle boots, form-fitting jeans, and a tight red T-shirt with Quebec printed across her chest in silver glitter.

Mrs. Carmine jumped to her feet. “Sophie, what on earth?”

“My money. I ‘id my money in the drawer. Beneath my clothes. It is gone. All gone.”

A strikingly handsome young man stood behind her. “She’s right, Mrs. C. Sophie doesn’t like to carry too much money when she’s skiing, so she hides it in the dresser. It isn’t there.”

Ellie placed one hand to her chest. “There must be a mistake.”

“No mistake,
certainement
. Phone the
Sûreté
.”

“The what?”

“She means the police, Mrs. Carmine. Call the police.”

“I’m sure that’s not necessary. Did you look carefully?”

“What am I, an
imbécile
?” The young woman threw up her hands, turned to the young man, and let loose a stream of French.

He lifted his hands. “Calm down, Sophie. I’ll sort it out. She says her cash and credit card are gone.”

“She must be mistaken. Nothing can have been stolen. Not from my establishment. Why, why, no one’s been here today.”

“Lorraine was.” Wendy Wyatt-Yarmouth stood at the door. She pushed Sophie aside. “She was here wasn’t she? This morning, around noon. I wasn’t up to skiing today. Just stayed in my room mostly. But I went into town for lunch and some shopping, and I saw her. She was in the kitchen, eating soup.”

“Lorraine was here as my guest,” Ellie said. “She’s upset about the death of your brother, it seems she was quite fond of him…”

“Fond,” Wendy snorted. “Fond of his money.”

“I don’t know about that, but she came to the door, and she was sad, and I was about to sit down with my lunch. I’d made enough for Kathy, but I hadn’t seen hide nor hair of her since she did a pretty poor job at her chores. So I gave her soup to Lorraine.”

“Who are we talking about?” Lucky asked, although she could guess. Lorraine LeBlanc. Sixteen years old and already a disaster looking for a place to happen.

“That miserable Lorraine creature. My brother smiled at her sideways, and she seems to think that meant they were about to be married.”

“More than smiled at,” Alan said with an unpleasant chuckle.

“Who the hell asked for your opinion?”

“Lest you forget, Wendy, I am the complainant here.”

“Sorry, I thought that was Sophie. And Sophie wants to call the police, don’t you Sophie? People can’t be allowed to just walk into a private home and poke around looking for anything they want, right?”

“Yes, I said so, didn’t I?”

“Hold on,” Lucky said. “So Lorraine was here, having soup in the kitchen. You were with her the entire time, weren’t you, Ellie?”

Thoughts raced across the woman’s face as she struggled to find the right answer.

Lorraine. Poor Lorraine. Left alone in the B&B, the girl might well be tempted to walk up the stairs, to peek into the two hundred dollar a night rooms and see what sort of stuff the rich carried around with them. And even help herself to what she thought no one would miss.

“Ellie,” Lucky said. “Did you leave Lorraine alone for a length of time?”

“I might have gone to the bathroom. I don’t remember.”

“There you have it,” Wendy shouted. “It takes no
length of time
to run upstairs, open a drawer, and snatch the money.”

“No,” Lucky said. “But it does to find the right room, and the right location, without turning the place over. Was anything in your room disturbed, Sophie?”

Sophie looked at Alan.

He shook his head. “Not so as I noticed. Sophie went into her drawer to get money for dinner and noticed it was gone.”

“Lorraine obviously cased the place earlier,” Wendy said. “That explains it.”

“Explains what?”

The girl’s eyes shifted to one side. “Nothing. Just thinking. Are you going to call the cops, Mrs. C?”

Ellie twisted her apron in her hands. She looked perilously close to sheer panic. Lucky touched her friend’s arm. “This won’t reflect on you.”

“It most certainly will,” Wendy said. Her voice was rising. “I can’t imagine who’ll want to stay here after this gets out. In fact, we all should get a sizeable discount, if not our entire stay for free. This place isn’t at all the quality it’s advertised to be.”

“We need to calm down,” Lucky said. “We have plenty of time to discuss this. It isn’t an emergency.” Wendy was over-reacting to a considerable degree, and Lucky suspected it had nothing to do with the loss of Sophie’s money, or even with Lorraine, but with the young woman’s own all-encompassing grief.

Wendy pulled a cell phone out of her pocket. “If you won’t call the cops, I’ll have to do it.” She punched in three numbers, and went into the hall to make the call.

“This is dreadful, simply dreadful,” Ellie said. “I didn’t leave Lorraine alone for more than a couple of minutes. Well, perhaps I did, I don’t quite remember every detail.”

Wendy came back. “The police,” she said, very haughty, “will be here shortly.”

Ellie groaned.

***

The small procession pulled into town. John Winters turned into the police station, and Molly Smith drove past. He’d heard she’d taken the apartment above Alphonse’s bakery.

He made a quick decision, and turned the van around. There was no traffic on Monroe Street and he caught up to the Focus as it made the next corner.

The Ford climbed over dirty packed snow and ice to reach its parking slot on the other side of the alley. He pulled up behind her, opened the window and waited.

“Everything, okay?” she asked, coming up to the driver’s window, ski boots in hand. She’d pulled a knitted red cap over her head.

“I don’t know what Jason Wyatt-Yarmouth was doing the day his pal was missing. I need to find out. I know you’re not working today, but thought you might want to come with me.”

She grinned. “Thanks, John, thanks. Do you want me to put on my uniform?”

“You’ll do.”

She tossed her ski boots back into her car, locked it, ran around the van and jumped into the passenger seat. As eager as a puppy at play time.

It was almost six. A good time to find skiers resting between the day on the slopes and heading out to dinner. The Wyatt-Yarmouth family and friends were a prickly bunch, and he’d decided, on the spur of the moment, that it would be a good idea to have someone else on hand. Even if only to observe and pick up on unspoken communication.

He backed the van into the alley. The radio crackled. Reported theft at 1894 Victoria Street. Winters turned to Smith. “Isn’t that the Glacier Chalet?”

“Yeah, it is.”

“What a coincidence.” He grabbed the radio. “Winters. I’ll take that call.”

“You got it, Sarge.”

***

Molly Smith was not pleased to see her mother, once again, standing in the hallway of the Glacier Chalet B&B. But she knew that Lucky and Ellie Carmine were friends, so her mom did have the right to be here. Although the hotels and B&Bs in town did a lot of mutually-beneficial business with the outfitting and tour companies, Lucky and Ellie hadn’t become friends until recently. While Molly was away at University there was something about Ellie having trouble with the police over guests using hard drugs in her B&B. How that would bring her into Lucky Smith’s circle, Molly didn’t want to know.

“That was quick,” Mrs. Carmine said, opening the door. Looking like Mrs. Claus no longer, her face was set in hard, tight lines.

“Constable Smith and I were passing,” Winters explained.

Mrs. Carmine hesitated and then stepped back to let them in.

A good-sized crowd was gathered in the entrance hall. Not only Ellie Carmine and Lucky Smith, but Wendy Wyatt-Yarmouth, and two of her friends, the Quebec girl and her boyfriend.

Wendy looked at Smith, sizing up the police jacket and ski pants, red wool gloves, and matching red hat. She didn’t bother to contain a sneer. “Are you the only cop they have in this miserable town? Every time I turn around you’re standing there. Nice uniform though.”

Not that Smith cared much about Wendy Wyatt-Yarmouth’s opinions. In her short career she’d already run into plenty of rich types who considered themselves to be above the law, and plenty of young women who wanted to have the female equivalent of a pissing contest with a woman cop. Smith reminded herself to be charitable, that Wendy had just lost her brother, and wasn’t handling it all that well.

“You should be pleased Constable Smith is so dedicated,” Winters said. “Perhaps someone can explain the problem before we go any further.”

“All my money and my credit card ‘ave been stolen,” the Quebec girl shouted. “From my room.”

“We’re not entirely sure about that.” Mrs. Carmine’s face was very pale.

“I am sure,
Madame
.”

Lucky avoided her daughter’s eyes and put her arm around her friend’s shoulder.

Winters asked the standard questions. Smith should be taking notes, but not being in uniform she didn’t have a notebook with her.

“Is it possible you misplaced the items, Sophie?” Mrs. Carmine asked.

“
Non
.”

“Did you make a thorough search, sir?” Winters said to the young man. “Alan Robertson isn’t it?”

“Yes. No. Yes, I’m Alan and no we didn’t search. Sophie said her money was missing and we came downstairs.”

“This is ridiculous.” Wendy almost stamped her foot. “That girl is obviously up to no good and I for one refuse to stand here chattering about it”—Smith dearly hoped that Wendy Wyatt-Yarmouth would insist on leaving the scene—“while she spends every penny of poor Sophie’s money. God, Sophie, you’d better cancel your credit cards right away.”

Sophie gasped.

“Who is ‘she’?” Winters asked. “Do you suspect someone of taking the money?”

“No,” said Alan and Mrs. Carmine and Lucky Smith.

“Yes,” said Wendy.

“Go on,” Winters said to Wendy.

“Lorraine what’s her name, of course.”

“She means Lorraine LeBlanc,” Lucky said.

“You think Lorraine LeBlanc was responsible.” Winters said. “Why?”

“Why? It’s perfectly obvious,” Wendy shouted. She turned to Smith. “You saw the state she was in last night. Demanding to be included in my family.”

“I don’t see…”

“She was in the house. I saw her myself. I demand you arrest her.”

“Is everyone who was in this house today to be arrested?” Winters asked pointedly.

Wendy flushed.

“Before this goes any further,” Lucky said, “I’d suggest we have another search of the room. Sophie, you’re sharing the room with Alan, right?”

The girl nodded.

“When two people share close accommodations and a strange room, it’s easy for things to get misplaced. And Alan,” she smiled sweetly, “you did say that you only watched Sophie look in the place she
thought
she’d left the money. You didn’t actually search.”

Smith glanced at Sergeant Winters. The left edge of his mouth twitched. It was the only sign of a smile he would allow himself.

“Can’t hurt,” Alan said to Sophie.

“That’s a perfectly wonderful idea,” Mrs. Carmine said.

“If we must,” Wendy said. She began to turn.

“While I’m here, Ms. Wyatt-Yarmouth,” Winters said. “I’d like to speak to you about your brother and Ewan Williams. Perhaps Mrs. Carmine would allow us to talk in the common room.”

Wendy shot daggers at him with her eyes.

“If it’s okay with Alan and Sophie, Constable Smith will go with them. You won’t assist with the search in any way, Constable. Just observe.”

“Yes, sir,” she said.

The front door opened and Jeremy walked in. He stopped so abruptly that Rob crashed into the back of him.