Forty
Luke didn’t have the opportunity to ponder much on staying in Pelican Crossing as, in the next week, there was a spate of animals arriving at the clinic with signs of poisoning, culminating in him being unable to save the chihuahua belonging to a distressed tourist. Following on from the earlier cases with Lady and Bluey, this appeared to be a deliberate attempt to harm dogs on the dog beach. It was where all of the incidents had taken place.
As soon as he closed the clinic, Luke contacted the police and called Joe to ask him to close the dog beach till further notice. He was glad there had been no cases on Pelican Crossing’s main beach or on the secluded beach below his and Rachel’s homes.
They couldn’t risk more cases. At Joe’s request, he agreed to meet with him and Finn at the council chambers later that day.
‘This is a bad state of affairs,’ Joe said when the three men met. ‘How many did you say?’ he asked Luke.
‘Four cases today, all belonging to tourists, one fatal. They wouldn’t have been aware of the warnings.’
The three men stared at each other, a chill entering the room despite the temperature being in the high twenties.
‘Can’t be by chance,’ Joe said at last. ‘You contacted the police?’
‘Yeah. Not much they can do without evidence. You don’t think…?’ Luke remembered Joe’s earlier reference to two councillors who wanted dogs banned from running free on the beach.
‘I hope I’m wrong, but…’
‘Well, we need to find evidence,’ Finn said. ‘What should we be looking for?’ He met Luke’s eyes.
‘Rat poison tends to be in green pellets, easy to detect if you know what you’re looking for, and easily obtainable from most hardware stores. It appears the cases I’ve had to deal with all spent time on the dog beach, hence my request for the council to close it.’ He looked across at Joe, who nodded.
‘It’s done,’ Joe said. ‘The notice should already be up warning that the beach is closed till further notice and that there may be poison, and we’ve erected barricades to stop people from wandering from the main beach. It’s not only dogs who might be tempted to eat it, though I doubt it tastes good.’
‘Is anyone searching the beach?’ Finn asked.
There was a charged silence, then, ‘There’s still an hour of daylight,’ Luke said. ‘We could make a start.’
The next hour saw the three men searching the beach for any sign of green pellets, to no avail. As the sky darkened, they finally gave up and retreated to The Grand . Over several glasses of beer they discussed their options, frustrated till Joe said, ‘Tomorrow’s Saturday. Let me see who I can round up and we can do a thorough search of the area. If someone has dumped rat bait on or near the beach, enough to poison several animals, there must surely still be some lying around.’
‘Sounds like a plan,’ Luke said, and Finn nodded, all three agreeing to meet again at daybreak to conduct a thorough search with as many others as they could manage to round up.
Exhausted, Luke drove home, worried that some bait might still be out there and that despite the warning notice, some tourists might decide to ignore it and allow their dogs to run on the beach. He could scarcely believe the poison had been set deliberately, but what other explanation could there be?
He was slowing down at the gate to Bob’s house, when he saw the lights of Rachel’s in the distance and, in need of the comfort he knew her presence could offer, drove on to her gate.
*
Rachel had been so busy with Verity and a new batch of B&B guests that she and Luke had only managed to get together briefly in the past week and she was beginning to wonder if she’d imagined their closeness. So it was a shock to see him standing at her door looking exhausted.
‘Luke, is something the matter?’ she asked, glad she was wearing one of the new outfits, a pair of white wide-legged pants with a multicoloured tunic.
‘Can I come in?’
‘Of course.’ Rachel stood back to allow him to enter, as Molly frolicked around his ankles.
‘Coffee? Wine?’ she asked when they reached the kitchen. In the bright light there, she could see shadows under his eyes and what looked like a new network of wrinkles around them.
‘Thanks. Coffee would be good.’ Luke dropped into a chair, making no move to hug her.
Something must really be wrong.
Rachel waited till she had made coffee for Luke and a cup of camomile tea for herself, then joined him at the table. Molly, realising no one was interested in her and there was no food to be had, had returned to her bed by the door. ‘Now, what’s happened?’
‘We’ve had more poisonings. Four today, and one dog died.’
‘Oh no!’ Rachel’s hand went to her mouth. She knew this was what he’d been afraid of, what they’d all been afraid of. ‘What happens now?’
Luke took a sip of coffee and sighed. ‘Joe’s closed the dog beach, and a few of us have been out searching for evidence but with no luck. Joe and Finn are calling in reinforcements, and we’re going out again tomorrow.’
‘Oh, I wish I could help.’ If she hadn’t Verity to take care of, Rachel would have been glad to go with them.
‘It’s okay. You have responsibilities. I just hope we can find something tomorrow, something to prove this is a deliberate attempt at sabotage. Joe and Finn think it may be the same guys who tried to ban dogs from the beach last year.’
‘Surely not!’ Rachel was horrified to think anyone in Pelican Crossing would set out to deliberately harm animals, but with so many cases, what else could it be? She looked across to where Molly was lying happily in her bed, glad she never took her to the dog beach, but so many others did.
‘I’m afraid so. But first we need to find the evidence, find the bait… then comes the difficult part – to prove who is behind it.’
‘Oh, Luke!’ Rachel wanted to comfort him. She put a hand on his shoulder, and he turned to meet her eyes.
‘Thanks, Red. It helps me, being here with you. I couldn’t face going back to an empty house, to Nelson who’d remind me…’ He shook his head.
Rachel felt the familiar warm glow at his use of her nickname and moved closer till her forehead touched his. She wished she could cuddle up with him in bed, but she had two lots of guests in the house, and a granddaughter who was likely to sneak into her bed at any time. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, not knowing exactly what she meant, sorry for Luke, sorry for the affected dogs, their owners, or sorry they couldn’t make love. Probably the latter, she thought as she experienced a now familiar rush of desire. Did Luke feel it too, or was he too worried about the poisonings?
His next words didn’t help. ‘I’m sorry too, Red. It’s all such a mess.’
They didn’t speak for the next few minutes. Luke took a few sips of his coffee and Rachel her tea. Then he said, ‘I should go and let you get to bed. Thanks for listening. It helped.’
Rachel accompanied him to the door, feeling helpless and wondering what more she could have done to help. At the doorway, Luke pulled her into a warm hug. ‘Thanks,’ he said again.
‘Good luck tomorrow. You will let me know how you go? I’ll be here if…’ she gazed into his handsome face, now etched with worry.
‘I will. Take care.’
‘You, too.’ Rachel reached up to kiss him, but tonight there was no passion in his response. She watched him as he made his way to the car, the slump of his shoulders a sign of his distress, and wished again she could make things better for him.