Bush Poodles Are Murder - Lou Allin A Belle Palmer Mystery

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Olympia,” even a disturbing Klimt’s “Danaë,” a huge thigh dominating the picture. She backed away from a crotch close-up entitled “Origin of the World” by Corbet but had to admire the wit and technique. Some of the waif-like anorexic Picassos, a hole in one torso, were amusing, and the Degas ballerinas confirmed a taste for much younger women.

      Twenty-five minutes later, buzzed up from below, Steve remarked to Belle at the door: “I actually finished my dinner this time.”

      With a shrug, she pointed down the hall. As they entered the living room, he turned on more lights, pulled out a notebook and parked at one end of the sofa, frowning at the tea display. “I know this isn’t easy, Miriam, but you were first on the scene. Here’s the routine. While I take notes, go over everything you noticed, then start again, and I’ll ask questions. Slow as you want.”

      The woman forced her mouth around one word at a time. “I came. About seven. He was there. Like that.” She pointed to the body, squeezed her eyes shut and refused to continue, though he prompted her several times.

      “Shock,” Belle mouthed. “That’s why I made—”

      A muscle on his temple twitched, and his voice mixed patience with frustration. “If it were anyone else, I’d ask you to come to the station right now, Miriam. But under the circumstances, it can wait until Monday.” He took sets of their fingerprints with a small kit, providing Handiwipes for cleanup. Oblivious to the movements, Miriam was less responsive than a zombie, her hands falling limply after Belle cleaned each finger.

      Minutes later, clatter filled the hall, voices, boots sucked off. White coats and paper overalls of the crime scene analysts. The roll of a gurney. Miriam remained silent, her eyes vacant. Then she began to rock back and forth.

      “That’s the coroner come to certify the death. Take her home before she . . .” Steve said, cocking a thumb at the body. “When this settles down, we’ll need to know all about Mr. Elphinstone.”

      Forcing Miriam into her coat was like dressing a large, pliable child, but luckily the boots had zippers. Belle was surprised at the fox jacket, not that Miriam was anti-fur, but it seemed rich for her bank account. Recent investment profits perhaps. Casting a last look at Melibee, her friend began weeping uncontrollably. Belle found the Neon’s keys in her purse on a hall table and drove her home, steadying her as they moved across the icy lot to the lobby of her two-bedroom apartment near Junction Creek in New Sudbury.

      “Do you want me to call Rosanne?” Belle asked as she opened the door.

      Miriam hung up her coat with a devastated look, smoothing the fur like stroking a sleeping baby. Then she answered in a toneless voice, “I’ll be fine. I’m sorry I—just go home, please.”

      Like the lone character on stage as the curtain fell, Belle called for a taxi and stared out the window until it arrived fifteen minutes later. Vague sounds issued from the bathroom, taps, clinks, drawers, so she assumed that Miriam had settled in. After collecting her van at the condo, Belle wondered if she shouldn’t have insisted that her friend stay with her for the weekend. Big trouble lay ahead. Melibee hadn’t clunked himself with a ten-pound carving and dropped it fifteen feet away. Who could have wanted the man dead? She was beginning to have suspicions about those all-too-lucrative stock opportunities.

      On Monday morning, with Miriam silent, either a good or very bad sign, Belle pushed into a dark office with no signature aroma of freshly perked coffee to meet her frozen nose. Miriam rarely missed a day. Feverish with the flu, she’d had to be beaten from the door more than once. Fingers on the faltering pulse of Palmer Realty, the woman was an absolute necessity. After shucking off her coat, Belle made the coffee with studied nonchalance, which dissipated after the third cup as she began watching the clock. After such an ordeal, had Miriam slept in?

      Finally, she succumbed to worry and called, listening to twenty unanswered rings. Then the door opened, and Steve walked in, a deadly serious look in his dark eyes, a memory of his Ojibwa heritage and Scottish grandfather in Western Ontario. “Sit down. I have some bad news,” he said as her blood pressure hit Zone Red.

      Protocol over, he explained the events of the weekend, official activity behind closed doors. “I’m on my way to Miriam’s for another interview. As a favour, I’m asking you to come—”

      “Are you going to arrest her? That fast? Can’t you see that she couldn’t harm a blackfly if her life depended on it?” Her flailing arm spilled the coffee across the desk, soaking a sheaf of papers. Blindly, she blotted them with a pile of tissues.

      “Stop panicking. Of course we don’t make arrests that quickly. Why waste the time of the courts until a case is locked and loaded? But even you must admit that things aren’t looking good. That statue was identified as the murder weapon, and the only prints are hers.”

      An orderly world shuddered and broke apart like the off-kilter merry-go-round in Strangers on a Train. Until that moment, Belle hadn’t imagined the possibilities of Miriam killing anyone, but beneath the sensible, sang-froid exterior lay passionate depths. Miriam had an abiding contempt for child molesters, had watched her former husband slug the family uncle when he’d tried to continue his historic abuse with Rosanne. Even so, what could have caused her anger? The merry trio had been off to dinner. “That’s absurd! She was in love with him.” At Steve’s calculating look, she stopped short. Giving him information was one thing, providing ammunition that might hurt Miriam was another. Passion was one of the world’s paramount murder motives. “Each man kills the thing he loves,” according to Oscar.

      He poured himself a cup of black coffee, warming his hands on Miriam’s “Are We Having Fun Yet?” mug. “Not a very discriminating choice for our mutual friend. Elphinstone is linked with phony investment schemes in Vancouver and Calgary going back twenty years. He slithered out of the major charges, but spent a year in Club Fed on the coast. Guess he didn’t like the ocean view or the tennis courts because we haven’t any recent records.”

      “Invest . . . but she was doing fine. Last time we talked . . .” she said. Suddenly cold at possibilities, she recalled her friend’s unguarded trust and infatuation. Or was she trivializing Miriam’s feelings, smug in her solitary, risk-free world of tramping forest paths with Freya? Suddenly she felt mean-spirited.

      Steve’s eyes narrowed with interest. “So she did invest with him. How much?” But Belle merely shook her head. “Apparently he was quite the ladies’ man, a lucrative avenue. Cozied up with wealthy widows,” he added, giving her a sidelong glance. “A bit older than you, I’d say.”

      The drive across town in the unmarked Crown Vic took only minutes. Except for the manager chipping ice from the sidewalk with a wicked pick, all was quiet at Miriam’s six-suite apartment building. Her Neon sat out back, blanketed with the weekend’s snowfall, which made Belle increasingly uneasy. As they got out of the vehicle, she said, “I hope she’s OK. She hasn’t answered the phone. Why did I leave her like a sick dog licking her wounds?”

      After climbing the stairs, they stood before the door to 3B and knocked to a hollow response. With a shrug, Steve tried the knob, which turned easily. Belle held her breath, knowing that townies never left homes unlocked. The door opened into the living room, a scene of chaos. Newspapers were scattered on the floor amid islands of tissues and crumpled mail. Vinyl records had been sailed against the wall, some broken, others scratched or bent. Miriam’s tastes appeared to run to Johnnie Mathis and late Sinatra. Belle placed a battered LP onto the table. “The Twelfth of Never” was the featured song.

      Then with a nod from Steve, she went down the hall. In the bathroom, towels smeared with make-up littered the floor, along with tatters of the lovely apricot dress, as if Miriam had rent her garments in classical fashion. Signs of illness appeared on the toilet bowl rim. An empty pill bottle had rolled into a corner, a tap dripped. Suddenly Belle was reminded of the shower scene in Psycho. Shivering,

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