LITMIR.BIZ

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in hearing about —"

      "All right… All right," steps in Anderson, smiling wryly as he turns puce. "I'm sure Mrs. Dennon wouldn't have minded me telling you that I spoke to her about her account. It was my duty when she applied for the overdraft. After all, she was asking for a lot of money for someone with only a state pension to sustain her."

      "So, what did she want it for?" asks Bliss, wondering how Minnie had sold him on the idea of a world tour.

      "She said it was some kind of business partnership," continues Anderson. "Something so big she couldn't tell anyone for risk of ruining the deal."

      "And you didn't need a business plan or some kind of collateral?" asks Bliss in surprise.

      "Some of our more senior customers can be very persuasive, Chief Inspector," Anderson admits, giving Daphne a poisonous glare. "Anyway, in view of the circumstances, the bank has written off the debt."

      "I guess Minnie knew about his past as well," says Bliss as they leave the bank. "What on earth did he do as a teenager?"

      "I've absolutely no idea, David," chortles Daphne, "though something certainly made him poop his pants."

      "You are incorrigible, Miss Lovelace," laughs Bliss, taking her arm and leading her up the High Street towards Watson Street and Minnie's last known place of abode.

      Nothing has changed in the flat since Bliss's previous visit. "There's no point in going through the cupboards again," he is saying as he takes a contemplative pull at a corner of carpet while Daphne scours the little sitting room and rechecks the cushions of the settee, saying, "God knows what she did with the money. She certainly didn't buy furniture. This lot wouldn't get ten quid at auction."

      "What's going to happen to it?"

      "I'll probably chuck it out for the dustmen," suggests Daphne, and Bliss looks up with a thought.

      "Bingo," he yells a few minutes later as he squats on the floor of Minnie's kitchen next to a garbage bag he's dragged out of a bin in the backyard.

      With one hand over his nose, Bliss is holding up a crumpled piece of paper to Daphne with the other.

      "What is it?" she asks, keeping her hands in her overcoat pockets.

      "This," he says, unfolding it and flattening it on the floor, "is a Western Union receipt for four thousand, nine hundred pounds. And I bet there's another in here if I dig deep enough. Thank God the garbage hadn't been collected."

      "But, I don't understand…"

      "It's the missing money, Daphne. Stapleton didn't steal it. She sent it to…" Bliss pauses while he deciphers the writing on the receipt. "She sent it to Canada."

      "She didn't know anyone in Canada," spits Daphne indignantly. "Why on earth would she do that?"

      "I think it's a company name," says Bliss, reading aloud. "‘CNL Distribution, White Rock, British Columbia.'"

      "Call Mike, your Mountie friend in Vancouver," says Daphne, indicating Bliss's cell phone. "He'll know."

       chapter four

      Mike Phillips is a recently promoted inspector with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in Vancouver, and he is growing accustomed to becoming embroiled in murder cases involving his English counterpart, David Bliss.

      "I could get shot for this," says Bliss as he opens his cell phone and flicks through the digital address book looking for his Canadian colleague's number. "It's my job to make sure that people don't short-circuit the system," he continues irritably as he taps in the number of the officer with whom he had once teamed up to trace a serial killer. "That's what Interpol's for," he carries on as he waits for the connection. "If everyone made their own enquiries with foreign forces there would be anarchy."

      "Oh, you can be such a stuffed shirt sometimes," says Daphne snatching the phone. "The closest I've ever been to being on the force was cleaning the constables' toilet down at the police station. So unless you think that applies…" She pauses, with the phone close to her ear, mouthing "Voice mail," then adds, "He's on leave — Hawaii for two weeks," as she waits to leave a message, but then she changes her mind and slowly closes the phone. "Minnie and I were planning on going to Hawaii," she tells Bliss, with a sniffle of unfulfilled nostalgia, and then she brightens with an idea. "What about Trina?" she says, pulling out her diary and searching for a number.

      "I don't know…" begins Bliss hesitantly, having mixed feelings about the zany Canadian woman who had become enmeshed in Phillips's mass murder case and had found a kindred spirit in Daphne.

      "It can't do any harm," continues Daphne as she punches in the international code. "We only need the phone number of the company, and then we can ask them about Minnie's money ourselves."

      "I still think I should do it officially through Ottawa," Bliss is saying as Daphne listens for the ringing tone.

      "Don't you worry, David. I'll talk to her," says Daphne sarcastically. "I wouldn't want her getting into trouble with Interpol as well."

      "Vancouver Zoo. Monkey House," answers the voice on the phone, and Daphne puts on a puzzled face.

      "Is that you, Trina?"

      "Oh. Hi, Daph. Yeah, it's me. Hang on. There's a guinea pig on the loose…" Then she yells, "Kids!" with such force that Daphne ducks.

      "Sorry, Daphne," says Trina, coming back on the phone. "It's a madhouse here. I was just making some curried banana cake."

      Daphne grabs a pen from Bliss's breast pocket, enthusing, "It's one of Trina's recipes."

      "Hold on a minute," complains Bliss, grabbing it back as Daphne begins writing in her diary. "And that's my personal cell phone you're using."

      "Oh. Sorry, Trina, I'll get it later. David's worried about his bank account now he's a lowly chief inspector. Oh. Did you know Samantha, his daughter —"

      "Daphne… please," implores Bliss.

      "Oh. Hang on, Trina. He wants to talk to you himself."

      "Trina, do you know a place called White Rock?" asks Bliss without wasting expensive seconds on pleasantries.

      "Sure. Just south of here on the American border. Hey, have you got another murder for me?"

      "No… Well, yes, in a way. One of Daphne's friends has been killed, and for some strange reason she sent all her money there last week — more than twenty thousand dollars, judging by the receipts," explains Bliss, before giving Trina the details of the money transfers, each for a little under five thousand pounds.

      "Ten-four," says Trina once she has the information.

      "What does that mean?" queries Bliss.

      "No idea, but the cops always say it on television… or is it ten-ten?"

      Trina Button puts down the phone as her husband, Rick, wanders in from the garage with grease-stained hands.

      "Rick, you'd better put a padlock on the guinea pig cage. I've got another murder case."

      "What… What are you talking about, Trina?"

      "Surely you remember? The last time I was on a case the mob tried to murder him."

      "Trina," Rick reminds her gently, "you were never on a case. You are a homecare nurse who just got caught up in some nasty business, that's all. Anyway, you don't have time for this now. I've almost finished the machine and Norman is on his way over for the inaugural run."

      "Great!" shrieks Trina. I'll be out in two minutes. Just gotta make a call."

      CNL Distribution is a multimillion-dollar corporation with shareholders who prefer to remain unlisted — everywhere, and the phone book offers Trina no help. Neither does the directory enquiry operator. With Rick calling, "Hurry up, Trina," she quickly tries the Western Union office in White Rock, but draws a blank there as well.

      "I've no idea," says the clerk

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