Free Murder in a Cold Climate: An Inspector Matteesie Mystery by Scott Young Page B

said, and then shipping south.”
    It all sounded reasonable. If true, it explained why the downed aircraft hadn’t put out markers and radio signals. It might even explain why Christian and Batten had taken a powder so suddenly: that they’d suspected strongly, or been tipped, that the police were closing in. If that was true and any of them were left alive, they’d know that a rescue would send them right back into the arms of the RCMP.
    But unless there’d been a police leak, what could have scared them to the extent of feeling their only hope was to get the hell out of here somewhere and split up and try to lose themselves down south?
    â€œSo why do you figure that only half the gang went out with the money?” I asked. “Or three fifths of the gang if Johns is in on it.”
    â€œYou got me,” Ted said. “One possible theory is that they fought among themselves over something, maybe even over who could have been responsible for blowing the whistle on them. Another could be that at the last moment there was something left to be done around here.”
    â€œSuch as bumping off Morton Cavendish?”
    â€œCould be. But I sure as hell can’t figure out where he’d be mixed up in the thing at all.”
    â€œWould NorthwestTel have any way of checking if Bonner phoned long distance from the airport and if so, where to?”
    Ted grinned, picked up the piece of paper he’d made the note on, and held it up so I could see. “Check NorthwesTel. Question Bonner Re airport calls.”
    There was a silence. Like Kansas City in the song from Oklahoma, we’d gone about as far as we could go.
    Then he looked at me with a twinkle in his eyes. “So where does your Northern Affairs business take you next, Matteesie?”

 
Chapter Four
    â€œWell, well, the wandering minstrel!” Corporal Charlie Paterson said on the phone, and sang in a reedy tenor, ‘
A wand’ring minstrel I, a thing of ra-a-a-ags and patches
. . .’”
    I wondered if he was always like this in the morning. The time was eight a.m., the day Thursday, about thirty-six hours after Morton Cavendish’s murder. I’d called to let him know I was back in Norman Wells and to ask if there’d been anything new overnight.
    â€œDid Ottawa get you?”
    â€œNo, were they trying?”
    â€œTrying, Jesus! The commissioner did everything except offer a reward and have dead or alive posters put up in the post office. The guy from Northern Affairs wasn’t so bad, but amongst all the umming and ahing I got the idea he wants to talk to you too. Where the hell’ve you been?”
    â€œMaybe I better call Buster first.”
    He pleaded, “Just tell me where you are, in case, ah, the superior officer you refer to gets me before you get him.”
    â€œI’m at this Esso place, Mackenzie House.”
    â€œMackenzie House! Wait’ll the dirty muck-raking newspapers find out about yet another civil servant accepting favors! A guy with beaucoup opportunities to influence major environmental decisions! On the dole from the oil elite!”
    â€œHoly God, Charlie,” I protested.
    â€œOkay,” he said. “Better make your calls and call me back.”
    It was a few minutes past ten in Ottawa. Buster came on the line.
    â€œI understand you’ve been trying to get me, sir.”
    He was calmer than Charlie Paterson. “Yeah, a few things happening. I hear you were in Inuvik yesterday but I missed you. What I wanted to say was, I told you originally to nose around about that missing aircraft. But now the
Globe
, the
Star
, the
Sun
, the
Citizen
, the
Gazette
, and every goddamn body else in the media business is making a big deal out of you being on the plane when Morton Cavendish got it. They’ve raked up every big case you been on. First, do you think there’s any connection between those drug guys taking off so fast, and Morton