‘You were not told about her?’
Blanche Lecointe shook her head. ‘Not a word, not a whisper, not a hint. Nothing. But she had her birth certificate, on it were daddy’s name and address and his occupation. . mechanic. . an auto mechanic. He was a blue collar, beer loving guy but I never figured him for a Lothario, always seemed to be a home boy, apart from Friday and Saturday nights in the Tavern but other evenings he was happy to sit home. . dug his garden at the weekends and took us on family vacations, so it came as a shock when Edith rang my doorbell with a couple of valises at her feet. Some shock.’
‘She brought valises?’ Marianne Auphan commented.
‘Valises?’ Ventnor queried.
‘Suitcases,’ Marianne Auphan explained quickly, glancing warmly at him.
‘Yes,’ Blanche Lecointe continued, ‘that’s the point, she wasn’t visiting with her half-sister, she was looking for a cot and a roof, already.’
‘And you let her in? I mean, you let her stay?’
‘Yes, after we had chatted some and she showed me her birth certificate. . and we looked like each other and we fell to talking quickly. Yes, I had a spare room and she was kin, so no reason not to, but the agreement was that it would be for only a short while; she had to look elsewhere for something permanent. It worked out well, she stayed for little under a year, she worked and she paid fair rent, picked up after herself like a good house guest and did her share of the housework.’
‘She took up employment?’
‘Yes, she did. She worked in a realtor’s in Barrie. She had office skills, you see. She had a good resume and got a job quickly. It wasn’t much, she was just a middle-aged secretary without a family, but she had a steady job and that was when the economy was beginning its downturn. I’m afraid I don’t know what it’s like in the UK right now but here in Canada. . well, there’s not much work right now.’
‘Same in the UK,’ Yellich said. ‘Myself and DC Ventnor here don’t get paid much but we see life and we have security of employment. We are among the lucky ones and we are not ungrateful.’
‘I know what you mean. I taught school. I have this house and an inflation-proof pension. I need to budget but I am also a lucky one.’
‘Yes. . so you and your sister must have talked?’
‘Yes, did we talk. . I mean did we talk. . we had a lot to talk about, a real lot to talk about, years to catch up on.’
‘Did she indicate she felt to be in danger?’ Yellich asked. ‘Did she say that someone was out to harm her?’
‘No,’ Blanche Lecointe shook her head slowly, ‘she didn’t but you know, for all that we talked, and we had a lot to talk about, she was always a very guarded and a private person. She had a social life that I wasn’t allowed to be part of.’
‘Any friend in particular?’
‘Sally Brompton. She was a co-worker at the realtor’s. They would go out together two or three nights a week. I reckon Sally Brompton will be able to tell you more that I can about her private life. She worked for Andrew Neill Realtor. .’
Ventnor scribbled the name in his notebook. ‘We’ll pay a call on her.’
‘They’re in Barrie near the terminal.’
‘The terminal?’ Ventnor queried.
‘The bus terminal on Simcoe Street, very near your hotel,’ Marianne Auphan explained. ‘I’ll let you have a street map, already, you’ll need it.’
‘Thanks.’ Ventnor smiled briefly and held eye contact with her.
‘So,’ Yellich rested his arms on the tabletop, ‘probably a bit of a difficult question, but what can you tell us about your half-sister’s death?’
‘No. . it’s all right and essential that you know. She died of exposure one winter.’
Marianne Auphan groaned and put her hand to her forehead, ‘One of those? It happens each winter, all across Canada. . it’s so tragic. . cometh the spring, cometh the grief.’
‘Yes,’ Blanche Lecointe repeated, ‘One of those. Her body was found near Bear Creek in Ardagh Bluffs. .’
‘It’s quite close to here,’ Marianne Auphan explained, ‘and also quite a similar housing development mixed in with spruce plantations. You can seem to be well out in the boonies. . out in the country, yet you are just a short walk from someone’s house or from a main road.’
‘I see. . ironic though,’ Yellich commented.
‘Ironic?’ Blanche Lecointe turned and glanced at him.
‘Well, that was how the lady using your half-sister’s identity died, of exposure in a cold spell, in an open area beside a canal. . not in woodland but. . nonetheless, she died of exposure.’
‘I see what you mean, but Edith had no connection that I knew of with Ardagh Bluffs or with anyone living there.’ Blanche Lecointe glanced out of her window. ‘I well remember the last night I saw her, dressing up in her finery and she a middle-aged woman. She was going out on a date like an excited teenager. It was winter. Snow had fallen. More was forecast. She didn’t come home. I filed a missing person’s report forty-eight hours later, then. . nothing. . nothing. . nothing until the thaw, it was about this time of year when her body was found. It had lain under the snow all winter.’
‘That is what I meant by “one of those”,’ Marianne Auphan explained to Yellich and Ventnor. ‘Come each thaw. . come each spring. . all across Canada missing person’s reports are closed. Sometimes there is evidence of foul play but mostly it is misadventure. . accidental. . very often young men walking home with too much drink inside them, they take a short cut through an area of woodland, succumb to the alcohol, lay down or collapse, snow covers their body and keeps it covered.’
‘I see. Tragic,’ Ventnor said.
‘It’s Canada. . and it’s any country with heavy snowfall.’
‘Dare say,’ Yellich echoed. ‘So can we please go back a little further if possible? What do you know of her life before she turned up so unexpectedly at your door?’
‘Not a great deal. She did talk a little about it, but not a lot. The foster home sounded more like an institution than a foster family. It seemed that it was a large house full of children supervised by a single foster mother. Then she was with the nuns. . she didn’t talk about that at all. . and that says a lot.’
‘I see. . and yes, it does.’
‘It was out at Aldersea, the foster home, I mean.’
‘That’s an easy drive from Barrie,’ Marianne Auphan turned to Yellich, ‘by the side of Lake Simcoe.’
‘Another lake?’ Yellich replied.
‘Same one really. Barrie is on Kempenfelt Bay but Kempenfelt is a bay of Lake Simcoe.’
‘I see.’
‘So. .’ Blanche Lecointe continued, ‘Edith told me she left the nuns at sixteen years old so she must have been very vulnerable, no family. . no money. She moved to Toronto to live in the big city. I swear it never had any attraction for me. I always thought that Toronto is such a mess of a city. . not like Montreal. I could live in Montreal. I really could live in that city. She returned to Barrie when she was in her thirties.’
‘Did she marry?’
‘No. Well, she never said she did. . Edith never had a ring on her finger. . and she used her maiden name. She had a warm personality all right. So neither of us are or ever were catwalk models but we were still not bad looking. She had a warm personality like I said, she was a very giving sort of girl. She had no career to pursue, just had office skills, which are good enough but hardly a substitute for a family. So you’d think she would be hungry for marriage, but no, she never did marry. Two spinster half-sisters we,’ Blanche Lecointe smiled, ‘that was us.’
‘Where did she live before she turned up at your door?’
‘Dunno,’ Blanche Lecointe inclined her head, ‘that will be one for Sally Brompton. I believe she could answer that question.’
Driving away from Blanche Lecointe’s house along Wattie Road, Marianne Auphan said, ‘It’s looking like murder. I didn’t want to say anything in there but it’s a common method of murder here, all over Canada really, pour alcohol down someone’s throat. . or some other substance, carry them outside in a snowstorm, leave them somewhere, some semi-remote place. . and a stand of spruce at Ardagh Bluffs is ideal. Just perfect. . near at hand and not easily overlooked. Without a witness or a confession all the coroner can do is return a verdict of “death by misadventure” but in not a few cases we have our suspicions.’