Murder at five finger light Read online

  At Alex’s suggestion of a visit, the impatience on Jessie’s face was replaced with pleased surprise. “Really? That’s a great idea. Why’re you going to Dawson?”

  “Del called yesterday afternoon. The Canadian government’s put money behind its decision to create a joint plan to improve border security. So Commander Swift is sending me to help get the cooperation started with a planning meeting between the Alaska State Troopers and a new RCMP Border Enforcement Team that Del’s been assigned to as well.”

  “There’re only two, aren’t there? The main customs station on the Alaska Highway at Beaver Creek and the one on the Top of the World Highway, though that road’s closed in the winter. Oh, I forgot. You have to cross the border coming north from both Skagway and Haines, don’t you? That’s four.”

  “A couple of guys are coming up from Vancouver to coordinate with us on those two that cross into British Columbia, then back into the Yukon. But you’re forgetting the entire Southeast. There’s a lot of water traffic along the Inside Passage—cruise ships, private power- and sailboats, fishing boats, oil tankers, commercial container ships—probably more people crossing the borders in both directions than ever use the highways. And there is one other that’s off the Cassiar, between Stewart B.C. and Hyder, though it’s probably got the lowest use.

  “We want to have everything organized and in place before the tourist season rolls around next spring and all those motor homes and boats start pouring back and forth across the borders. Then we’ll be looking hard for drug dealers, gun smugglers, and border runners.”

  “So you guys’ll really be working?”

  “Yup. But you can visit with Clair, and we’ll all get together in the evenings except for a day or two when Del and I have to go down to Whitehorse.”

  “Won’t be much that’s really active for Clair, considering she’s just a couple of months from presenting Del with twins,” Jessie reminded him.

  “Yeah, well. It’ll be cool over there this time of year anyway, but we shouldn’t have real snow for another week or two. You can always stay inside and knit booties,” he teased.

  “Bloody likely! There are a lot of things I can do but knitting’s close to the top of the I-can’t or I-won’t list. You know Clair. She’s no knitter either. Now that they’re adding to the people living in that small cabin of hers, she’d probably rather build on an additional room.”

  Alex got up to retrieve the coffeepot from the kitchen and lifted a questioning eyebrow at her before replenishing her cup along with his own.

  “When are we leaving?” Jessie asked as she shoved her empty plate aside with a sigh of satisfaction and leaned forward to put both elbows on the table, coffee steam once again warming her nose.

  “Well, I’ve got a few things to clear up at the office and the paperwork to finish on a robbery case, but I thought we might get an early start Thursday morning. Would that suit you?”

  “Perfectly,” she agreed. “That’ll give me time to do laundry and get Billy set up to take care of the few dogs I have left in the yard. I’d like to get a present for the new twins too. Can Tank go with us?”

  “Sure. Bring the dog.” Alex collected the plates, ferried them to the kitchen, and turned back. “You okay to clean up here? I’d better hit the road.”

  “Ah-h,” she sighed theatrically. “Should have guessed I’d be relegated to bottle washer. I’ll call Billy and then take care of the kitchen. Tonight you can sort out what clothes you want washed and I’ll do that tomorrow.”

  Billy Steward, the young man who worked with Jessie in caring for her dogs and kennel, often joined her on training runs with a second team. Though the injury to her knee had removed her racing possibilities, Jessie felt Billy was ready to run one or two of the shorter sled dog races during the approaching winter, and she had kept enough dogs at home for his use, along with one that would soon have pups and two past racing age. Steady and dependable, Billy had more than earned his privileges, the practice would be good for him, and a couple of races would give him experience and entrée to the racing community.

  Alex soon disappeared down the drive to Knik Road and Jessie, who had kissed him and waved goodbye from the front porch, turned thoughtfully back to her chores inside. It seemed a little strange to have someone else living in her house, even Alex—or, perhaps, especially Alex. Seven months earlier, when he had left Alaska, having taken a job in his home state of Idaho, she had assumed their relationship was over. His sudden return less than a month ago in time to rescue her from a nasty imprisonment in a remote and abandoned cabin in the wilderness had renewed their bond, and she was content to have him back in her new cabin and her life. At times it was almost as if he had never left at all, though at others she knew there were questions still to be answered and adjustments to be made. For now they were both inclined to give it time without examination. Things for them had always had a way of working themselves out, with patience.

  The idea of a trip to Dawson, across the border in Canada’s Yukon Territory, was appealing and raised her spirits. The injury to her knee, the result of a fall down the steep side of a mountain that summer, had been severe enough that the doctor had given her little choice in the matter. “If you’re wise,” he had solemnly advised her, with a penetrating look over the rims of his glasses, “you’ll give it a rest this year, Jessie. If you don’t compromise now, you’ll be able to race next year without it bothering you unduly. I can’t promise that if you don’t. So no training runs or heavy kennel work, okay?” The tendon she had torn enough to require surgery was healing well, and she was no longer wearing a brace, but there would be no sled-riding behind her dogs. Billy Steward would make training runs with the few dogs left in her kennel, keeping them and him fit for the racing she would encourage him to do.

  Before attacking the laundry and kitchen cleanup, Jessie made the call to explain why she intended to be away from home for the next week or so, and Billy agreed to show up shortly to feed and water the stay-at-home dogs and house-sit for her while she was gone. “I’ll be taking most of them out on runs anyway, so I might as well stay there.”

  True to his word, when she had finished the dishes and, finding she had enough for a load to wash already, was adding detergent into the machine, Billy could be heard whistling as he clattered food pans in the dog yard.

  She was about to go out and help with the morning routine of caring for the dogs when the telephone rang.

  “Arnold Kennels,” she answered.

  “Jessie? Jessie Arnold?” a vaguely familiar voice asked in her ear.

  “This is Jessie.”

  “This is Laurie Trevino. Do you remember me?”

  The name, like the voice, rang bells from somewhere in her past, but a distinct memory eluded Jessie.

  “The Spirit of ’98 and the Ton of Gold Run from Skagway to Seattle in July of 1997? Remember, Alice La Belle—the ‘bird in a gilded cage’?”

  Recognition chimed a harmonious chord in Jessie’s mind as she recalled a friendly face to go with the name and voice from the Klondike Gold Rush Centennial celebration several years earlier. This caller had played a dance-hall girl in a melodrama enacted on board during their voyage down the Inside Passage.

  “Laurie! How are you? Still singing the oldies?”

  There was a chuckle from the other end of the line before Laurie answered.

  “Off and on, but I’ve taken on some other, very different things. We now own a lighthouse.”

  “A lighthouse? Who’s ‘we’? Where? Tell me everything.”

  “Well, Jim Beal and I. You remember Jim, right? He dressed as a riverboat gambler on the Spirit. Anyway, the Coast Guard asked for proposals from anyone interested in leasing one of several Alaskan lighthouses. We applied and were given a thirty-year lease on Five Finger Lighthouse in Frederick Sound north of Petersburg. Then they decided to simply turn it over to us, so we own it. Now all we have to do is restore it. And, boy, does it need restoring! Nobody’s lived here since
1984, so you can imagine.”

  “So you’re moving into a lighthouse?” Jessie asked. “That’s a long commute from your interest in the theaters in Juneau and Douglas, isn’t it? Do you have to keep it working?”

  “All the Alaskan lights are automated now, so they run on solar energy and don’t need live-in keepers. We’re not moving down—just going back and forth on weekend restoration parties, or for a week or so at a time, which is why I’m calling you. It’s already September and we want to get the main building painted and a new roof on a storage shed before we close it up for the winter. The weather is supposed to be good for a change, so we’re organizing an end-of-season work party for next week, as large as we can put together in a hurry. I thought you might like to come down and help. We can’t pay your plane fare, but we can promise to feed you well—and that trooper of yours, if he can come.”

  Jessie hated to refuse, but this would clash with the trip Alex had mentioned. The idea of a week in a lighthouse was very appealing—she had long had a yen to visit one or more of the historic lighthouses in Southeast Alaska. Why did it have to come at the same time as the trip to Dawson?

  “I’d love to come,” she told Laurie, then explained the conflict between the two trips and why Alex would not be able to get away.

  “Damn,” Laurie swore. “I’d hoped he could come too. There was something I wanted to talk to him about. Ah well, another time, I guess.”

  Jessie considered the concern she recognized in Laurie’s voice.

  “Problem? I could have him call you when he comes home tonight.”

  There was a thoughtful silence before Laurie continued.

  “Oh, no. It’s nothing that important. Just . . . Hey, listen, if I remember right there’s a way you could come from Dawson, even if he can’t. I think you could fly to Juneau on Air North from Dawson early next week. From there it’s an easy hop to Petersburg on Alaska Airlines. Some of us from Juneau and Skagway are going down in our boat on Sunday. We’re waiting to hear from a couple of others who are hoping to come on their own during the week. But the thing is that Jim’s going on down to Petersburg on Tuesday to pick up one guy and some roofing material for the shed. You could come back with him from there. What do you think?”

  Jessie hesitated, considering, tempted by the idea.

  “I’d have to check and talk to Alex about it,” she told Laurie. “Give me your number and I’ll call you back when we’ve had a chance to think it over and check the flights to see what’s possible. I’d really like to come if I can work it out, but I know Alex won’t be able to make it.”

  There was a laugh from the other end of the line. “Hey, we’ll take whatever help we can get. I’ll expect to hear from you.”

  With a click in the receiver Laurie was gone.

  Jessie stood for a long moment staring at the receiver, then dropped it back into its cradle and headed out to help Billy in the dog yard, wondering briefly what Laurie had wanted to talk over with Alex. There had been something about her tone that raised mental flags of concern and now she wished she had questioned her about it.

  But her mind soon turned to making the trip herself. Would it work out? She hoped so. It was at least worth checking on flights and Alex’s reaction to this unexpected opportunity. When she and Billy finished the chores she would get online and see if she could find the connecting flights Laurie had mentioned.

  Slipping on a warm fleece vest over her long-sleeved shirt, she headed for the dog yard, glad to be back in fall clothing again, even if this year they wouldn’t be the insulating kind she wore in the deep of winter on the back of a sled behind a dog team.

  CHAPTER THREE

  “I KNEW THE COAST GUARD WAS GOING TO TURN THE lighthouses over to private groups for renovation and received a flood of applications and proposals. So Laurie and Jim got lucky,” Alex said that evening, when Jessie told him about the invitation to visit Five Finger Lighthouse. “Doesn’t surprise me a bit that the two of them would take on something so dramatic, and a work party is a great idea—should be a lot of fun. I think you should go.”

  “She asked us both,” Jessie reminded him.

  He frowned and shook his head. “Sure would like to, but Del’s already scheduled that meeting for Monday and Tuesday next week and the guys are practically on their way from B.C. Since I’m our only representative this time, I’ve got to be there. But you don’t. So—go.”

  “But what about our visit with Del and Clair? You’ve already told them we’d both come.”

  “Do what Laurie suggested. Come to Dawson with me on Thursday, visit for a couple of days, then catch that Air North flight out of Dawson on Sunday afternoon. I can take care of business and start home from Dawson on Wednesday or Thursday at the latest. I’ll be back to pick you up when you fly in to Anchorage on the weekend.”

  “So I can have my cake and eat it too—so to speak.”

  “I guess you could look at it that way. Just keep in mind that I’m not baking cakes till your birthday and that’s a month away. Even then, my baking usually turns out more interesting than epicurean, if you recall.”

  “I seem to remember a lopsided tendency,” Jessie agreed with a grin. “Okay. I’ll check on the flights and call her back. But I wish you could come with me.”

  “Me too, but maybe we could go down together next spring. It sounds like restoring a lighthouse will be a long-term project. Take the camera this time and bring back lots of pictures?”

  Jessie agreed and headed off to check online for possible flights, forgetting to mention that Laurie had wanted to speak to Alex. She would remember later—too much later, unfortunately.

  The following Sunday, after two enjoyable days of visiting in Dawson, Jessie flew Air North to Whitehorse, as Laurie had suggested, then on to Juneau. After staying overnight with a friend, she was at the airport a little early to catch the afternoon Alaska Airlines flight to Petersburg, less than an hour away in the maze of islands that define the waterways of Southeast Alaska’s Inside Passage.

  Checking in and relinquishing her duffel bag, she headed for the departure gates upstairs, where she found a long slow parade of passengers inching their way toward security. Making a detour into the nearby gift shop, she took a few minutes to browse the magazines, hoping the line would shorten. As she thumbed through the latest Mushing magazine a harried woman with an awkward carry-on bag and two children in tow shouldered past her, headed for the cash register, holding a paperback in one hand, pulling a child along with the other. The four- or five-year-old boy struggled to twist away from his mother’s firm grip on the shoulder of his jacket, failed, then spitefully punched his younger sister, who instantly howled a protest. Jessie suspected reading was more wishful thinking than a realistic expectation for the woman, and hoped, if they were on her flight, that she wouldn’t be seated anywhere near them.

  Traveling with sled dogs is easier, she thought, putting the magazine back in its place and picking up an Alaskan husky from a rack of stuffed animals. Checking dogs through baggage in their portable carriers meant you could relax without having to contend with a whining, squirming presence in the seat next to you.

  A glance told her that the number of people waiting to go through security had dropped by half, so Jessie put down the stuffed dog and left the gift shop to join the line. Moving up a step or two at a time behind a man who shoved his briefcase ahead with one foot while scanning the front page of the local Juneau Empire, she watched a little girl in a bright pink sweater come out of a nearby restroom. Her pale blond curls bounced as she scampered across the room and threw her arms around the legs of a tall man carrying a suitcase. He smiled and took her hand as they went down the escalator together. A father coming home from a business trip, Jessie guessed with a grin, mentally comparing this child with the two she could see ahead of her in line.

  As the girl and her father sank out of sight, a slender young woman with shoulder-length dark hair half-opened the same restroom door and stood lookin
g out. In a navy blue skirt and blazer over a white-and-yellow striped top, she was half hidden behind it as she glanced around outside with a concerned frown. Apparently not seeing anyone she recognized, she turned quickly to vanish inside and the door closed itself behind her.

  The mother of the child in the pink sweater, Jessie guessed again, then amended that assumption. Maybe not. There had been a hint of caution in the woman’s scrutiny of the area, as if she was checking for someone she didn’t care to see. Must be a man, Jessie thought, if she’s hiding out in the one place he wouldn’t venture. Or maybe she’s just afraid she’ll miss whoever she’s looking for.

  The line lurched forward again and the woman with the two children arrived at its head to dump her carry-on bag onto the conveyer belt that fed the maw of the X-ray machine. Swinging toward her son, she grabbed for the small daypack he was wearing, but he ducked out of reach shaking his head.

  “Mine,” he told her defiantly.

  “Stop it, Michael. You give me that—right now.”

  With the help of a security guard, she cornered him and stripped off the child-sized daypack while he yelled resentfully. Tossing it onto the moving belt, she marched him by the scruff of the neck through the security gate and collected their carry-on items and her daughter, who had obediently followed them through. Jessie could still hear her scolding as they turned left and went off down a hallway toward a distant waiting area.

  She took another step forward and heaved an audible sigh of relief. Wherever they were going it was not Petersburg, for she could see that gate from where she stood.

  The briefcase man turned to give her a rueful grin. “I know just how you feel. Unfortunately, I’m afraid . . .”

  “You have my extreme sympathy,” she told him with a grin.