A Kayak for One Read online

  Chapter 23

  Bob

  He saw two people in a fishing boat in the bay down the lake a bit close to the little island that was crown land. It looked like they had a fishing line in and must have anchored since the boat wasn't moving too much. The motor wasn't going anyway. He hoped they weren't going to pull up on shore since that's what he had in mind and didn't want anyone around.

  Chapter 24

  Dan

  Now who is that? Dan wondered as he heard the motor of another boat. He was hoping to be in a secluded part of the lake. By the time he turned his head he missed the boat as it went past him on the other side of the island. It sounded like whoever it was slowed down then sped up again in a hurry.

  Chapter 25

  Charlene

  It was too windy for Sam to finish the painting. He asked if it was okay with Charlene if he could just head home and catch up on some chores while the kids were in school. Charlene found Sam acting a little strange and was avoiding eye contact more than usual when they walked down to the pontoon boat so she could take him over to his car.

  "What's up Sam?" she asked when they got to the landing. "Are you thinking you've had enough painting and don't want to come back?"

  "Sam?" She tried to get his attention again. "I won't be offended. I hate all the painting too."

  Sam looked at her for a long time before he said, "I'm not sure how to tell you this Charlie."

  "What Sam?"

  "It's only because I would want to know if it was me," he said.

  "What! What!"

  "I was up on the ladder painting when I heard a motor and turned to look. I saw a guy in a fishing boat with a woman sitting up front. They were towing a kayak, a yellow kayak. Like you and Joe have. It was Joe. They were heading down the lake," he said not looking at Charlene.

  "Are you sure it was Joe? Did you see him?" Charlene asked her stomach already in a knot.

  "No," he said.

  Phew. It could have been anyone she thought. It seemed everyone had yellow kayaks on the lake.

  "It was too far. It had to be Joe's boat, the motor was making the same noises Joe's motor makes. You know that catchy sound like it's going to cut out and then revs up. The sound that drives you crazy because he hasn't fixed it yet since he's too busy fixing other people’s motors," Sam explained.

  "Could you see who was with him?" Charlene asked, not really wanting to know, but wanting to know more.

  "No, I just saw long hair blowing back," he said.

  "Thanks for telling me Sam. I'll see you later." It was all she could get out as Sam walked off the boat.

  No, no, no, no! She couldn't believe Joe would do that to her! No wonder he canceled lunch. No! Even though she thought there must be some explanation she took the boat back over to the resort with a heavy heart.

  Chapter 26

  Bob

  He felt fantastic. It had been building up inside him and the release was amazing.

  He couldn't wait to download the photos. He was about to dock and get at it when he saw the van at the resort landing. The students were back. He looked at his watch. It was only 3:30 p.m. He wondered why they were so early. He took his boat over to the dock, if only to prolong the way he felt. They told him they finished early and were just about to pick up the phone to call Charlene to come and get them. He said he would boat them over so Charlene wouldn't have to bother. They took him up on his offer and he let them off in front of cottage #1 before heading back across the lake to his cottage and his laptop.

  Chapter 27

  Dan

  When the professor docked the boat and started to walk up to the office to tell Charlie he was back, he was surprised to see the guys back already and in front of the cottage, beer bottles lined up on the picnic table. Was it after 5:00 pm already? He barely had time to do what he needed to do. Wasn't that the Scottish canoe group coming out of the office? That seemed like a fast trip. He thought they were supposed to be gone another day.

  He would wait until Charlie was finished checking the canoes over. Dan watched as she checked the inside and outside of the canoes before giving the group the thumbs up. They were all clearly in a good mood and looked like they spent a month in the bush and not just one night.

  They couldn't have picked nicer fall days with the temperatures going up to 20 degrees Celsius each day, and warmer out of the wind in the direct sun. The colours on the trees were magnificent against the robin-egg blue of the September sky. He heard one of the men ask Charlie if they could have a picnic in front of the beach to dry out before she took them back to their SUV parked at the landing. Charlie must have said yes because they walked over to the beach and stretched themselves out on the beach chairs facing the lake.

  "Did something happen for them to come back early?" he asked Charlie as she was dragging a canoe back to the canoe rack. "Here, I'll give you a hand," he said, picking up the end of the canoe.

  "No. They just had enough they said."

  Charlie laughed and added, "One night with husbands and wives in the bush is usually enough for any couple."

  "No, they seemed to be all still getting along. That wasn't nice of me to say that. I've got something unpleasant on my mind right now," she said thinking again of Joe.

  "They are heading to Sudbury from here to visit the Big Nickle, then they will drive east. One of them has a daughter in Nova Scotia, going to St. Francis Xavier University. They are going to tour the area and drop off their car rental in Halifax and fly home from there."

  "Don't you have family in Nova Scotia?" Dan asked, remembering something about an old house there or something.

  "You have a good memory Dan! My grandfather's house was left to my father and his brothers. Nobody wanted it. They had it appraised and it went up for sale this past spring. I bought it for next to nothing. It's a fixer-upper. I'd been to Nova Scotia on driving trips a few times in the years before I bought the resort and drove by the house once. I don't remember anything about my visit there as a kid but I love the area. I hope to live in the house and work on it when the resort closes up for the season."

  They worked together to get the three canoes upside down on the slots on the rack.

  Charlie gave Dan a big smile when she noticed the students were back and she didn't have to pick them up, thinking Dan must have gone over in the fishing boat when she was in the back bush. She would have been ready to pick them up, but it was nice to keep working while it was such a nice day.

  "That's odd," Charlie said when they had the last canoe on the rack. "Someone's moved my kayak.

  She walked over to the kayak to the side of the rack closest to the shore. She pushed some branches aside and put her hands on top of the kayak.

  "It's wet," she said. She pulled at a piece of weed stuck on the handle at the end of the kayak.

  "It's turned the wrong way on the rack too. I always store it so the back goes in first so the seat can fold down into the kayak as I push it back on the rack. And it's on the first tier instead of the second," she added.

  Dan looked at Greg, who looked right at him before turning his back to face Peter.

  "I never put it here. I don't like this spot," said Charlie. "It's too close to the brush and water snakes.”

  She turned to the students and asked if they took the kayak out.

  "No. I didn't," said Peter.

  "Nope," said Haiden.

  Greg took longer to answer, almost like he didn't hear Charlie, Dan thought.

  "No," he finally said.

  Charlie started to drag the kayak off the rack. Dan moved to the back of the rack. They both took an end. Dan pushed and Charlie pulled.

  "God it's heavy," said Dan.

  "It feels like it's full of water, but nothing's coming out," said Charlie.

  "Hold on Dan. I better check what's going on."

  Dan watched Charlie crawl over the wooden beams of the rack. She stepped one foot into the water at the shore then got down on her hands and knees. He no
ticed she had on her high green rubber boots, the kind the Queen wore, she once told him.

  "Aaahhh no," said Charlie quietly as she looked into the kayak from below. "Don't push Dan. We need to leave the kayak right where it is."

  "Why. What's wrong?" he asked as he ducked under the rack, crawled to the side of the kayak and turned his head to look up. He turned to face Charlie. They looked at one another before he backed up, walked around the rack and stood waiting while Charlie crawled back out to join him.

  Chapter 28

  Charlene

  The O.P.P. officer docked the police boat in front of cottage #3 after Charlene waved him away from the dock in front of cottage #1. He looked puzzled, but followed Charlene's frantic hand gestures and did what he was told.

  "Hi James. I'm not sorry to see you again, but I am sorry it's under these circumstances. How have you been?" Charlene greeted the young police officer as she caught the line he threw to her to tie the boat to the dock. "I guess it's just you. No new officers hired yet?"

  "Hey Ms. Parker," he said. "It's great to see you again. You're stuck with me until Sarah shows up. She was off today but at home, so she should be here as soon as she goes to the station and gets her gear. I haven't seen you for months and now I've seen you twice in one day! I saw you in town earlier as you were pulling out from the side street. More books eh? I wish I had time to read." His smirk told Charlene he was trying to get a rise out of her, knowing how busy she was too.

  "I wish you would just call me Charlene," she said, again, thinking it unlikely that would ever happen. He kept himself in his Officer James Edwards role, and was formal when he was on the job and off the job, with her anyway.

  "I was on my way to a fender bender on the highway so couldn't stop to chat. I was just finishing up that report and eating my lunch when dispatch sent me here. It was lucky the boat was at the station and all set to hook up," he said, as he ignored what Charlene just said to him.

  "I knew you would be here all night and I have guests to take care of, so I won't be at your beck and call with the pontoon boat. I was up late last night with the students and now this. I doubt I will get much sleep anyway," said Charlene as they walked off the dock toward cottage #1, where she noticed Dan standing inside the screen porch watching them. He backed into the shadow when he saw her look over.

  "I have the geology students here and that's Professor Dan Bowen," whispered Charlene. "He was with me at the canoe rack. I told him to go inside the cottage with the students. The three guys went inside as we were trying to move the kayak, so I don't know what they saw or heard. There are two other students, both girls."

  She and the officer looked at each other without saying anything.

  "They're staying in cottage #2. I told Dan to keep quiet and not say anything to the students until you arrived. He was inside the cottage when I called 9-1-1. I had my cell on me and managed to get a signal. I tried to keep my voice down when I talked to the dispatcher. I had a bit of trouble explaining the boat situation since they are in North Bay, and probably don't know much about this area. She was good though, not panicky," Charlene said as she steered him toward the canoe rack.

  She put her arm out to the side to stop him as he seemed intent on walking right into the crime scene.

  "That's why I had you dock in front of #3. This whole area may be your scene," Charlene was careful to say 'may' and guide him rather than tell him what to do.

  She met Officer Edwards three years ago when he started his policing career and she needed some help from the police to escort a drunken couple off the resort. Both the husband and wife started drinking as she picked them up on the pontoon boat, and didn't stop for the first three days of their week-long stay. She had to talk to them about their loud voices after the 11:00 pm quiet time on the first night and then she had to talk to them and warn them about loud swearing during the day. Their cottage was right in front of the beach and the other guests didn't like what their kids were hearing. She had to take the fishing boat they rented away from their dock since they were drunk most of the time. That led to a heated discussion in the office about wanting money back and demanding the right to use the boat. Charlene pointed to the paperwork they signed that included the right to forfeit the use of the boat and then warned them they would be asked to leave the resort if they didn't change their behaviour. They seemed to get the picture. But later the husband started calling up to Charlene as she was in the kitchen after the office closed. She told him she would call the police and have them removed as trespassers, but that didn't seem to bother him. He kept calling her name, not saying much more, but clearly still drunk. The other guests seemed amused but Charlene was not.

  Officer Edwards and another young officer arrived and waited patiently while the couple packed up their belongings The couple were submissive once they saw the police officers walk up to their cottage. Charlene took them all back to the landing. They were both too drunk to drive, so the officers drove them to Espanola to a motel then drove them back the next day so they could get their car and leave.

  James was stationed just outside of Espanola and really seemed to fit in with the community. He was only 24-years-old but got along well with everyone. He grew up with Sam on the same Anishinaabe Indian reservation, and Sam told her James was a great liaison with the first nation police on site there. It also didn't hurt that he was fit and handsome, with short black hair, and dimples in both cheeks when he smiled. More importantly though, he treated everyone with great respect on or off the job, especially his elders, like her, Charlene thought, thinking he could easily be her son.

  He was a real homebody, and only left the area for the time it took to go to training at the police college in Aylmer. The last time Charlene saw him, James told her he moved out of his parents' home and moved in with his girlfriend Tracy, into a reserve house on the same street. He once told her Tracy was not a good cook so he wanted to be close enough to pop in to eat his Mom's home-cooked meals. He had to do it on the sly though he told her, being careful not to hurt Tracy's feelings. He often stopped in to visit Charlene at lunch time in the fall or spring, not adverse to home-made macaroni and cheese, or a biscuit or four with a big bowl of her home-made soup.

  Charlene liked how he handled himself on the trespass call, quiet and polite. She worked with him on another police matter after that and got to know him a fair bit. She knew though, that his enthusiasm did not match his experience. He needed guidance in criminal investigations, like not walking onto a crime scene.

  Focusing back on this police matter, as soon as she saw the body Charlene got right into police mode. As a former detective with the Hamilton Police Service, she knew she had to take care not to disturb the area as much as possible. She and Professor Bowen had already walked and crawled around the canoe rack. There was not much to be done about that. While waiting for the police to arrive she got the tarp from the pontoon boat storage bench and spread it out under the kayak, trying to put her feet into the same place where she had stepped before. She marked her passage with small sticks she picked up along the path along the shore. She asked the professor to remove his hikers and leave them upside down on newspaper on the porch. The police would want to check his boot tread against any footprints they found around the kayak. She saw that he changed into Crocs as he came out to tell her the boots were available if need be. He went back into the cottage. She knew she should take her rubber boots off too, but she didn't trust leaving the site, so she didn't.

  She noticed there were drips of moisture coming from the kayak to the ground below. The tarp would protect the ground below it and catch what was falling from above. It looked like water. She wasn't sure if she should put another tarp over the second level of the rack to protect the kayak below. There were canoes on the third level and Charlene was worried she may disturb insects or leaves or whatever had naturally gathered in the underside of the canoes. She decided she should leave it alone.

  She was careful to watch cottage #
1 making sure no one came out and no one went near the canoe rack. At this stage, everyone on the resort would be treated as a suspect, including her.

  "I like your crime scene tape Ms. Parker," Officer Edwards said with only a bit of a smile, always careful it seemed to Charlene not to offend, but to add some levity to a terrible situation. Like most officers Charlene met, that was one way of dealing with what they experienced as part of their job.

  Charlene collected some yellow rope from the shed when she got the tarp. She used the rope for makeshift clotheslines between trees for guests who wanted to hang up wet bathing suits and towels. Now though, she strung the rope from the side of the canoe rack closest to cottage #1 and attached it at the other end to the picnic table in front of the cottage. She tried to rope off as much of the scene as she could, knowing it was likely not big enough, but with all the bush and shoreline around, the suspect could have come and gone from all different places. She tied bits of fluorescent trail tape at intervals so no one would walk into the rope in the dark, which was coming in fast.