Chapter 10
Slade and Sheri watched as Fitz was still trudging in snowshoes across the lake. Without skis, it would take him a lot longer to reach Mr. Lincoln’s campsite than Slade and Sheri had.
A yellow shelter and a red shelter had been set up on the lake farther off in the distance, and four more fishermen were sitting on camp chairs in open air while fishing now. The sky was so blue and pretty that Slade thought about taking down the shelter to enjoy the great outdoors more, but he didn’t want Sheri to get too cold. A chilling breeze was blowing across the lake and the tent protected them from it.
“What did you think of Fitz’s reaction to you asking if he was related to Gerard?” Slade asked as they baited their hooks, then sat down in their tent and began fishing. He was glad Sheri wanted to try this again. Some fishermen swore by fishing early in the morning, but there were so many fishermen out here now, he figured this was as good a time as any.
“His reaction was odd. Just like I thought Betty’s reaction had been strange about Gerard’s return. I suspected Fitz didn’t want your help taking down Mr. Lincoln’s campsite because he didn’t want us to ask him any further questions about where his brother had been.”
“I think you’re right. I’d kind of gotten that impression.”
“But I figured it was fine that he didn’t want your help because it would give us time to get back to fishing. Otherwise, you could have been gone for a couple of hours or so, making your way there, packing up the site, and then coming back.” She watched her fishing line in the water, waiting for any movement on the hook.
Slade pulled his line up a little and tensed, thinking something was nibbling on it, then not, and he relaxed. “Fitz might be kind of a loner and maybe he felt put out to even be here.”
“Oh, sure, you could be right. He might have been busy with something else and didn’t like the interruption. Still, I thought it was odd that he didn’t seem concerned about Mr. Lincoln’s health.”
“I thought that too. Does it make you want to investigate the situation further?”
Sheri nodded. “I sure do.”
“What was the clue you had that you were going to check on before Gerard’s wife told you he had returned home and was fine?” Slade got a tug on his line but lost the fish.
“Oh no,” Sheri said, peering into Slade’s fishing hole.
“He got my bait too. Sneaky guy.” Slade put a minnow on his hook and started all over again.
“About your question about the clue concerning Gerard,” Sheri said. “Someone had spotted a plane flying awfully low in this area. It fit the description of the plane Gerard was flying. I was going to confirm with the airport to see if he’d landed there, but then his wife called me before I could check and said he’d returned home. I figured that answered my question.”
“But you weren’t satisfied with that.”
“No, because he had disappeared for two weeks. Where had he been? Then I wondered if he had been doing something illegal and that’s why it was all suddenly hush-hush. That his wife hadn’t known about his involvement, but someone else did and told her to call off the search.”
“That could be. My first thought was that he was ferrying drugs someplace.”
“That could very well be. My first thought was that he was having an affair. I called on Gerard’s close friends to see if he had told any of them where he’d been off to, hoping someone knew that he was seeing a woman. But no one had believed he was seeing anyone else.
“Not that he and Betty hadn’t had their share of fights during their twenty-year marriage, according to friends, but no one believed he was having an affair or had run out on her. No one knew where he had been going either. Betty had sounded ashamed that she didn’t know, but she’d told me it was always like that when he flew off. It had all been very mysterious.”
“I’ll say.”
They continued to fish for a couple of hours. They both lost their fish a couple of times. Sheri threw one back that was too small, attached fresh bait, and put her line back in. The rest of the time, Slade envisioned the fish swimming by, ignoring their bait.
“So are you going to check with the airport to see if Gerard landed there in time to arrive home to see his wife before she called you?” If Slade had been the PI investigating the case, paid or not, he would.
Sheri smiled. “Yeah. I might not have done so before, but after witnessing the wife and Fitz’s strange reactions, it confirms my sense of unease about what is truly going on. If we’d known before that Mr. Lincoln was related to Gerard, I would have asked him about his cousin. He might have been more forthcoming. Or he might have slipped up and told us something that would have clued us in as to what was going on. When I return to the office at the end of the week, I’ll check into it. I mean, if I had been Fitz, I would have said, ‘Oh, yes, my brother came home safe and sound. We were so relieved. Thanks for looking into it for us.’”
“Exactly. But Fitz and Gerard might not have been very close, and Fitz might not have cared if Gerard had shown up at all.”
“That’s true. Not all families are all that close to each other. Age-wise, they looked like they could be a couple of years difference is all, unlike their cousin, Mr. Lincoln.” Then Sheri got a tug on her line. “Ooh, I have a live one. This is so much fun. I’ve been ice fishing in Yellowknife at some of the parks, but this is my first time in Minnesota.”
“And even better—you’re with me.”
Sheri laughed. “Yes!” Then she pulled up a northern pike twenty-four inches long and put it in the ice chest.
“That’s enough for about five meals,” Slade said, hurrying to take a picture of Sheri’s pike.
“It sure is. So I guess we ought to filet it and then leave a couple of filets out for lunch and freeze the rest. I’ll have to let you do the fishing next time so I don’t get to catch all the fish.”
He laughed. “It’s all good.”
They packed up their fishing stuff and Slade pulled the sled back to the cabin, then got a call on the satellite phone, stopped, and pulled it out. “Slade speaking.”
“Hey, it’s Candice. Owen and I would love to come to the cabin on your last two days and nights there. I just turned in my deadline book and I’m so thrilled to be able to celebrate finishing it. Owen was worried he might be needed for investigations because of Gavin’s new babies, but everyone said that Owen was due for a vacation, that business was slow because of the holidays, and to go for it,” Candice said.
“All right. Well, we look forward to seeing you. We, uh, I mean, Sheri just caught a northern pike.” Slade rubbed Sheri’s back. She smiled at him.
“Wow, that’s great. Save some for us.”
“We’ll have to catch some more for everyone.”
Candice said goodbye and Slade put his phone away. Then he began pulling the sled again. “They’ll enjoy being here. I’m sure the others didn’t want to bring the babies here. Or Cameron and Faith and their six-year-olds. We would have fun, but—”
“With the babies crying at night?”
Slade chuckled. “Yeah. And with the triplets, it would just be different dynamics.” He was glad it would be just all adults for this vacation.
“I agree.” Sheri pulled out her satellite phone. “I’m going to call my brother and see how he’s feeling. We have plenty of room at the cabin for him to come too. He doesn’t have to wait until the last couple of days if he’s feeling well enough to join us earlier.”
“Yeah, I was thinking the same thing.”
“Hey, Hans, how are you doing? Okay, totally understand. Well, we want you to know that you’re welcome to join us at any time, okay?” Sheri said. “Candice and Owen will be here for the last two days, but seriously, come as soon as you’re over this. All right. Feel better. Love you.” Then she ended the call. “He’s still sick, but he said he’ll let us know how he’s feeling, and he’ll join us when he can.”
“Okay, good. So here we are,” Slade said as they reached the cabin. She unlocked it, and they went inside with their fishing gear.
They shed all their outdoor clothes, hats, gloves, parkas, boots, and snow pants and he started a fire in the woodburning stove. After they processed the fish, they froze some of it, then made the rest for lunch with french fries and coleslaw.
“The wind is really beginning to pick up,” she said, glancing out the window. “I thought we could snowshoe to the location of whatever Andy and his friends found out in the woods at the coordinates they gave us, but I think because of the winds and deadfall, we would be safer staying indoors for now.”
“Yeah, I was thinking we might just stay inside and play some board games for the rest of the evening, then run as wolves tonight. What do you think?” He finished peeling the potatoes, then began slicing them into french fries.
“That sounds like fun. They have some books on the shelves to read too if you feel like just reading.”
“We could do that.” Even though Slade loved to read, he really wanted to play a game with Sheri and talk to her about some things that he felt they needed to discuss if they were going to mate. Reading books wasn’t conducive to doing that. Plus, he hadn’t played any board games with her before. “We could go snowshoeing tomorrow and try to find whatever Andy and the others had seen. As to our meal, would you like a glass of chardonnay with our fish?”
“Sure. That would be super, and I think it would be great fun to go on a treasure hunt tomorrow. There’s no telling what we might find.”