LITMIR.BIZ

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The owner had invested heavily in Cobalt silver mines and lost everything. When you’re an only child, it’s hard to sell your family home, but it’s simply too big.” She gave a small sigh. “Has been for years.”

      Belle nibbled at a coconut square, piquant with lemon rind, its sweetness opposed to the bitter personal loss left unspoken. “As a realtor, I wear two hats, Bea, one for the buyer and one for the owner. I had imagined that Cayuga House might be demolished. People want modern homes.” She tried to couch the observations in language that wouldn’t insult the woman.

      “I suppose so.” Bea’s large mouth sagged at the corners.

      As the winey taste of Earl Grey cleared her palate, Belle added, “Now that I’ve seen everything, I’m not at all sure that will happen.”

      “The heating bills are plain murder, even though I love the old hot-water system.” She put down her cup and patted a radiator near her shoulder. “A convenient place to dry mittens and toques.”

      “It’s a stellar property. I’ll get a lockbox set up for the front door tomorrow and take out a large ad in the paper for the weekend. MLS will reach outside the city. We’ll keep our fingers crossed.” She gave Bea a reassuring smile and opened the attaché case for the paperwork. “Hélène said that you liked the Kingsmount area. ‘Historical’ is the latest catchword for that part of town. I have a classic little place on Roxborough Drive. Mullioned windows. Fretwork. Steep gables. Private gardens out back.” She paused for effect. “And a spanking new gas furnace.”

      On a tour of the property, Belle noticed a cozy doghouse in the backyard. A large grey and white sheepdog ambled out and shook itself. “Buffalo. Dave said a kid should always have a dog.”

      “I agree,” Belle said, kneeling to embrace the massive shaggy head. “Mine’s a German shepherd. Not as laid-back as this guy.” She noticed that the left incisor was broken. Probably a stone chaser like Freya.

      Bea pointed to a caragana hedge at the rear, beyond it a tiny cottage barely visible through the maples. “He can be a noisy one. Kids running through on their way home from school get him barking. Jean McBride over there calls me every now and then when he bites his rope and gets into her yard. Buffy’s only outside a few hours a day in good weather. He sleeps on Micro’s bed.”

      They strolled for a few minutes, remnants of the old estate adding charming touches. Bea’s “secret garden” had a verdigrised sundial, a gazebo, and rock terraces to hold the soil against erosion on the steep slope. In the distance, a cigarette boat streaked across Lake Ramsey, two minutes across, then a turnabout, throwing up spray as its engines roared like 747s. A kayak struggled to position itself against swamping waves.

      “You don’t want to know my opinion of jet skis. And the snowmobiles are even worse,” said Bea. “Here we are in the middle of town and have to put up with this.”

      “Perils of lakefront, I guess. But it adds one heck of a punch to the property values.”

      As Belle prepared to leave, Bea stood under a huge sugar maple by the front steps. One hand touched the rugged grey bark. Leading upward was a trail of nailed boards. In a spreading crotch twenty feet up, Belle glimpsed a structure. Bea’s grin lit up her face. “My treehouse. Mother nearly had a heart attack passing up the heavy boards. Micro loves to camp out up there. And don’t I provide the catering.”

      THREE

      After breakfast, Belle ripped a page from her Tough Dames calendar, with its daily quote. “You gotta get up early in the morning to catch a fox and stay up late at night to get a mink.” Mae West wore the minks, but Belle was determined to save their relatives.

      Rousing a snoring Freya from her overstuffed easy chair in the computer room, she set off behind her house, taking a secret cut to the Bay Trail. She headed for the area where the trapper had verged into the bush. The dog lagged behind, flaring her nostrils at a mustard-yellow mound of grouse poupon under a branch.

      “Leave it, girl. We’re on dawn patrol.”

      Brushing aside drooping alders, she marched up the peaty path, narrowing her eyes and scowling at black tips of delicate earth-tongue fungi and a brilliant fly agaric dislodged by the quad. She imagined serving him the poisonous reddish mushroom on a silver platter. Rounding a turn at the Paper Tree, a birch divesting itself of bark like the dance of the seven veils, she spied his tracks trampling a lovely grove of interrupted fern as the quad verged from the trail. The four-foot plant boasted fragile brown seed pods dripping like caviar from its fronds. Freya started going wild with scent, plowing into the bushes, raising her ruff. “Come here!” Belle commanded, but the dog ignored her. Something reeked. All she needed was for the dog to start rubbing herself over a carcass or even eating it.

      As she ran, she pulled the leash from around her neck. Rarely did Freya disobey, but this temptation even her excellent Schutzhund lineage couldn’t ignore. Belle’s yells distracted the dog and slowed her pace as she neared a low mound buzzing with flies. Leaping over a cedar stump, Belle lunged for the chain collar. “What’s the matter with you?” she asked in a firm, low voice. Never yell into a dog’s face. They had a clear sense of rudeness.

      She looped the leash around a small oak, then clipped it to Freya’s collar, giving her hand signals to reinforce the verbal commands. Sobered by the rare physical message of a leash, Freya sat and began a small whine, swivelling her plumed tail in agitation. With caution, Belle approached the shapeless mass. It was the flayed carcass of a beaver, gnawed by a series of flesh eaters in the usual food chain. Foxes had been on the scene, judging from the appearance of the entrails. She looked around with concern, aware that a wolf pack had territory less than a mile away. One December she’d seen their tracks on the ice of Surprise Lake and noticed a young moose drinking in the broken shallows below the beaver dam, a deep gash raking its flank. With this wholesale baiting, the trapper could be inviting guests very unwelcome to hikers, perhaps even an opportunistic, omnivorous bear. Feast on, fellow carnivores red in tooth and claw. The late Mr. Castor would be bones before a few more sundowns. Until then, she’d stay off the trail.

      Scrabbling through the underbrush toward the fir grove, she located several marten traps, all nailed a good six feet up the trunks. At least he was keeping his promise about placement. Grabbing a sturdy grey stick, she broke off the side branches, squinted up into one trap and began to poke. Snap! The cruel spring gave way. A wad of ground beef, greasy and grey, splatted onto the leaf mould. Snickering, she followed suit with the rest. It wasn’t as if the man was making a living from the sales, but so many people used the bush as a supermarket or woodlot.

      Finally she released Freya, giving her a warning wave, and they headed back down the trail. A few minutes later, she relaxed at a job well done, checking a rare patch of Indian cucumber root in a shaded maple grove. A single purple berry rose from leaf whorls blood-streaked in the centre. Suddenly she was aware that the dog was absent. “Not again!”

      Seconds passed, and a brown form came barrelling through the undergrowth. Belle looked down in horror to see quills protruding from the dog’s muzzle. “Jesus. You’re a handful today.” Making her sit under the wrath of Mom, she yanked each one quickly, and the dog made no moan. She ran her eyes over the rest of the body, satisfying herself that Freya had been either smart or lucky. Some dogs ran wild with pain, driving quills into their pads and even blinding themselves.

      After a long day at the office, she arrived home at six and opted to go vegetarian, making a potato curry with a can of Madras sauce. Diced zucchini, green onions and a sprinkle of mustard seeds completed the medley. Soon, nutty aromas of basmati rice floated from the microwave. For some reason the dog wasn’t eating her chow, but slopping her chops as if something was bothering her. Belle tipped Freya’s head back, parted the giant jaws, and nearly cancelled dinner. A porcupine quill was lodged deep in the ribbed roof of the animal’s mouth. She closed her eyes, unable to imagine the discomfort. Then shaking herself into action, she took pliers from the utility drawer and pulled it free. Without delay,

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