The Girl in the Moss Read online

  “She needs only to reach the elevator at the bottom. She’s independent. If she wants help, she’ll ask for it. Come inside. Let me take your coat. I’ll get the tea ready.”

  Gudrun settled Angie in the living room and disappeared to rustle up the tea.

  Angie sat facing the sea and checked her watch again. Four fifteen.

  “Good afternoon, Angela!”

  She jolted, came sharply to her feet, and spun to face the voice. The judge had ditched her coat and boots for a large sweater and slippers. She hobbled determinedly into the living room, a look of ferocity on her face. But after having witnessed the old woman struggling along the beach Angie recognized the set in her features for what it was—grit against pain, against showing vulnerability. The woman had pride. Oddly, this warmed Angie to the retired justice. It gave her a peek into the woman’s psyche, and Angie understood something about pain and pride. And fear of displaying her vulnerabilities.

  “Angie,” she reminded the judge as she stepped forward and held out her hand. “Angie Pallorino. Not Angela.”

  “Yes, of course.” The judge shook Angie’s hand with a man’s grip. Her eyes bored into Angie’s. “Very good to meet you. I’ve seen you look worse, on television and in the papers. Sit. Gudrun is bringing tea, unless you want coffee.”

  “Whatever you’re having.”

  “Tea.” The judge winced as she lowered herself into a chair diagonally across from Angie’s seat, a glass coffee table between them. Gudrun appeared and set a tray on the table. The housekeeper poured tea into china cups with saucers, and she offered around a plate of gingersnaps. Victoria was like that—the legacy of British colonial tradition lingered. High tea at the Empress Hotel on the harbor had become a draw for US tourists, as had the olde sweet shoppes and other Brit idiosyncrasies in the historical quarter of the city. Gudrun then fetched a leather file box from a cabinet across the living room. She placed the box on the floor at the judge’s side.

  Raising her cup to her lips with a slightly trembling hand, the judge sipped and eyed Gudrun until the woman exited the room. Then she said, “I’ll come straight to the point. I want to hire you for a cold case. An old one.”

  “Well, as I mentioned on the phone, I’m no longer taking cases.”

  “Yet you are here.”

  Angie readjusted her position on the sofa. “I’ll admit, I’m curious.”

  The judge gave a small smile. “Which opens a window. All I have to do now is twist your arm and get you through that window.”

  Angie opened her mouth, but the judge shook her head. “No. Wait. Hear me out. Twenty-four years ago my granddaughter, Jasmine Gulati, went on an all-female angling trip. The group consisted of nine women and their two male guides. Jasmine was twenty-five at the time, a UVic master’s student, English literature. Expert angler—learned from her dad, my son-in-law.”

  She leaned forward and set her cup and saucer on the table with a wobble and chinking of china. “The trip was organized by a woman named Rachel Hart. Rachel is a fly-fisher and filmmaker who was making a documentary of the trip. It was tentatively titled Women in the Stream. The project was being sponsored by OutsideLife magazine and by Kinabulu, which is an outdoor apparel enterprise catering to enthusiasts of the ‘silent sports.’” The judge made air quotes. “Sports like climbing, trail running, fishing, surfing, skiing. My Jasmine vanished on that trip.” She paused, holding Angie’s eyes.

  “Jasmine was last seen washing over Plunge Falls on the Nahamish River on the second-to-last day of the trip. She’d been fishing alone in a small bay just upstream of the falls. It was presumed that she slipped on slick rocks and fell into the river. Her body was never found.”

  A chill rippled over Angie’s skin. “The Nahamish?” she said.

  The judge angled her head, assessing Angie. “I saw you on the news,” she said. “That shallow grave, those human remains, it’s my Jasmine.”

  Angie leaned forward sharply. She placed her cup and saucer on the table. “The skeletal remains have been positively identified?”

  “DNA, dental records, and jewelry have confirmed that the body in the grove is that of my missing granddaughter. I got the call from the coroner’s service yesterday morning.” The judge paused, continuing to watch her. Angie felt as though she was being played on some level.

  “So . . . you saw me on the news and decided to call me?”

  “Things happen for a reason, Angela. I firmly believe this. And one needs to seize the opportunities where they present. You found her. You’re an investigator—you presented to me.”

  “I didn’t find her.”

  The judge dismissed the comment with a flutter of her hand. “I know, I know. But you were there, on that very same river as my Jasmine. You stayed in the same lodge where she and those eight other women stayed. You camped along the same beaches. You were right there on the water at the exact time the mushroom picker’s dog unearthed Jasmine’s grave after all these years. He called for help, and you responded. You saw her lying there, her bones. You saw her with your own two eyes.” She stopped as if to gather her breath or possibly to marshal emotion.

  “The way I see it, you have a personal connection now to my Jasmine. I also know something about your background from the news, Angela.”

  “Angie,” she said quietly.

  “Yes, of course. Angie. From what I have learned on the news about your past, I think you are very well equipped to answer some questions about what really happened to Jasmine on that river twenty-four years ago.”

  Angie stared at the woman, a sense of unease and disbelief deepening inside her.

  “What do you know about my past?”

  “I watch television news and read the papers religiously. I’ve been intrigued by your angel’s cradle story and the Baptist killing. I know you investigated your own cold case. I know how you discovered who your biological father is. I await his trial with interest, and I have preordered Dr. Grablowski’s unauthorized biography on you.” She bent forward. “All of that”—she motioned her hand to the windows as if to indicate a wealth of information lying out somewhere over the ocean—“tells me one thing. You are stubborn. When you want something, you go after it irrespective of personal cost. You don’t give up in the face of roadblocks.” She fell silent, held Angie’s gaze. “I like you.”

  Angie blinked.

  “You’re a pit bull. I like pit bulls.”

  Angie cleared her throat. “You say your granddaughter was—”

  “Jasmine. Her name is Jasmine. Let’s call her by her name.”

  “You say that Jasmine was last seen washing over Plunge Falls, that she might have slipped into the river?”

  “Yes.”

  “So she was presumed drowned?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then what questions do you have about what happened twenty-four years ago?” Angie immediately had a question of her own—if the judge’s granddaughter had gone over Plunge Falls, why were her remains found in a grove almost two hundred meters away from the river?

  Justice Monaghan picked up a gingersnap and bit into it. She chewed carefully, swallowed, and wiped her mouth with a napkin. “Let me show you something.” She reached down into the leather-sided file box beside her chair and pulled out a file followed by a framed photograph. She set the file on the table and held the frame out to Angie.

  Angie reached for it. The photo was a close-up of an attractive young woman. Dusky skin. Liquid black eyes fringed with dense lashes. A broad smile with all the white wattage of a toothpaste advertisement. Dark hair tumbled about slender shoulders. She wore waders and a fly-fishing vest, and she held a fly rod.

  “See that bracelet?” the judge said.

  Angie peered closer, and her pulse quickened as she recalled the blackened, dirt-encrusted, metal-looking cuff that had been lying next to the long gnawed bone.

  “This is what it looks like cleaned up.” From the file folder on the table, the judge extracted a photo. She s
lid it across the glass surface toward Angie. “I gave Jasmine that silver cuff. I bought it on a trip to Egypt. It fitted nice and snugly with a solid clasp, which is why it probably stayed on her wrist when she went over the falls. That cuff was found with her body. It was our first clue it could be Jasmine. This was also in her grave.” The judge slid another photo over to Angie. “That ring. It was still on her ring finger or, rather, the bone that was her ring finger.”

  Angie studied the image. “Engagement ring?” she said. Her skin went hot suddenly as she recalled her own diamond on the chain. She’d removed the chain and ring before her Muay Thai session. She’d secreted the jewelry in the glove compartment of her car and forgotten she’d done so. Angie made a quick mental note to check it was still there when she got back into her vehicle.

  “That’s one of my questions.”

  Angie looked up, distracted. “What is?”

  “Is that an engagement ring? The coroner’s service still has possession of the ring, along with the cuff bracelet. They haven’t yet released Jaz’s remains or finalized their official report. But I still have connections, and I managed to obtain a copy of the pathologist’s preliminary postmortem findings.” The judge pointed at the photo in Angie’s hand. “Those diamonds are real. High-end. It’s a very expensive ring. I’d like to know where Jasmine got it—who might have given it to her. Or whether she bought it for herself.”

  “Was she involved with anyone at the time of her accident?”

  “Not to her parents’ knowledge nor mine. None of her friends mentioned a significant other from what I know. And no one came forward when she went missing.”

  “So maybe she did buy it herself.”

  “Then I want to know that. That’s my first question. My second is, where is her journal? Jasmine was a compulsive recorder of events, a born storyteller. She’d been keeping journals since she was nine years old. She has one in her hand in this photo here.” The judge dug into her file box and found another picture, which she held out to Angie.

  “This is the group of them together at the campsite on the second evening of their trip.”

  Angie studied the image. Jasmine Gulati sat on a log. She was laughing, her eyes sparkling. In her hand was a purple book. Standing behind her and seated alongside her on the log were eight females who varied significantly in age. The youngest looked as though she was barely a teenager. The oldest Angie guessed to be in her seventies. The group was flanked by two males. One of the men was tall and slender with sandy hair. The other was slightly shorter and built like wrestler. He sported a shock of thick black hair and a trimmed black beard. Blue eyes. Blue like cornflowers, and piercing. He looked eerily familiar. “Is . . . is this a young Garrison Tollet?” Angie said, pointing to the dark-haired man.

  “That was the guide’s name, yes.”

  “He owns and runs Predator Lodge now,” Angie said. “It was his daughter, Claire, who guided our boat.”

  The judge held Angie’s gaze. Quietly, she said, “See? You are the right choice for this.”

  “Who’s the other guide?”

  “Jessie Carmanagh.”

  “Carmanagh? Our other guide was a Hugh Carmanagh. Is he related?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “There’s a Carmanagh Lake up near the lodge. I was told it was named after a family that settled the area a long time ago. Who took this group shot?”

  “Garrison Tollet’s wife, I believe.”

  “She was on the trip, too?”

  “No, just brought some supplies to one or two of their camps.”

  Angie set the photos back on the table. “You want to know where Jasmine’s ring came from and where her journal went?”

  “Yes. I have an inventory of her belongings that were returned to her parents. There is no journal listed. I believe Jasmine was hiding something. I think there was indeed a special man in her life. I want to know why he never showed his face when she went missing. I want to know exactly what was happening in her life during the months leading up to her drowning. And I want to know exactly how she came to go over those falls.”

  Angie regarded the judge. Rain gusted against the large windows, sending watery spatters across the panes.

  “You don’t think it was an accident.”

  “I don’t.”

  “You know, sometimes it’s hard to accept the news when it finally comes. Sometimes people need to find someone to blame—”

  “No.” The judge leaned in, eyes turning hot and beady like an eagle. “This is not like that. When I learned it was Jasmine in that shallow grave, I got out this file box, and I went through the contents. I had not done this before. That box came to me after the death of Jasmine’s parents. My daughter and son-in-law died in a car accident seven years ago, and by the time the box came to me, Jasmine had been gone for almost two decades, so I didn’t give it much thought until I saw the news and the coroner’s service confirmed for me that it was my granddaughter who’d been found. In this box are copies of the original police interviews with witnesses from the river trip, plus the search and rescue report on the search for Jasmine’s body and some photos of the group. Going through it all now, something just doesn’t feel right to me.”

  “Feel?”

  “Oh, don’t tell me you’ve never acted on gut feelings or followed hunches as a detective, Angie. Do not deny to me that the best investigators out there develop a sixth sense that tells them when something is off or when someone is hiding something. Even if I am wrong, I’m Jasmine’s only remaining kin. Her going missing near killed my daughter and her marriage. I just want some answers before I lay my grandchild’s remains properly, and finally, to rest.” She paused, catching her breath. “As long as you do your best to paint me a picture of Jasmine Gulati’s life and her acquaintances in the months leading up to her death, as long as you interview whoever was connected to that trip who is still alive, as long as you try your level best to find that journal and discover who her secret fiancé might have been, this is what I will pay.” She scribbled some numbers onto a piece of paper, folded the paper in half, and shunted it across the table along with a signed check.

  Angie picked up the piece of paper. As she unfolded it, the judge said, “The first figure is an advance—a retainer. The second figure is what I will pay per hour before expenses if I am satisfied with your progress. The third figure is the bonus if I’m satisfied with the results.”

  Angie dropped her gaze to the numbers the judge had scrawled, and then she glanced at the check. She had to focus on not blinking or catching her breath.

  “This would be taking advantage of you,” Angie said, carefully refolding the paper.

  The justice held up both hands as Angie tried to give it back. “No. It’s me who is taking advantage of your expertise and your time. I can afford to. Indulge me, Angela. Indulge an old woman with some answers before she dies.”

  “I can’t. By law you cannot hire me to work directly for you. I really am sorry.”

  “Just take it, take this box, take the reports, take the retainer check. Find a way.” She creaked to her feet, wincing as she pressed her hand to her back.

  “Did it ever air?” Angie said.

  “What?”

  “The documentary.”

  “What documentary?”

  “Women in the Stream, the film Rachel Hart was making on the river.”

  The justice looked confused suddenly. Then her eyes showed panic. “Gudrun! Where are you?”

  The housekeeper came bustling in.

  “Show . . . uh . . . Ms. Pallor . . . Palloridio the way out. Make sure she takes that . . . that box with her.” The judge shuffled hurriedly toward a door that led off the living room. “If you have questions, Angela, give me a call.” She began to sing as she reached the door, her words soft at first, then rising in strident tenor. Her voice was remarkable. Stunned, Angie stared at the judge’s back. She recognized the tune—a song about being in the arms of an angel and finding comfort
there.

  Angie stared after the judge as she disappeared through the door.

  Gudrun said, “A song for an angel’s cradle child.”

  Angie faced the housekeeper, confused.

  “She’s losing her mind,” Gudrun said. “When she gets tired, her memory suddenly goes. It’s a terrible thing for a woman with a formidable intellect to lose. She’s bored. She has the money to pay you. You should do this for her.”

  “So I’m to be paid entertainment?”

  “There are worse things to be.” The woman paused. “Like unemployed.”

  She’d been listening at the door.

  Gudrun replaced the photos and files in the box and picked it up. “Come, I’ll show you out.” She carried the box as she escorted Angie back to the front door.

  In the mudroom, as Angie shrugged into her coat, Gudrun said, “Rachel Hart, the filmmaker, is still alive, if you’re interested. She’s in her seventies, lives in Metchosin now. There’s a list of everyone who was on the trip in the original SAR and coroner’s reports from twenty-four years ago. And no, the documentary never aired. The sponsors killed the film after the tragedy. Just take a look at it.” She held the box out to Angie. “Please.”

  Inside her car, engine running, heater on full blast to clear the fogged windows, Angie rummaged quickly in the glove compartment. Relief sliced through her as she found her engagement ring where she’d secreted it. Angie stared at the ring, thinking of Maddocks, of their last phone call. Anxiety twisted in her stomach.

  She fastened the chain and ring around her neck and hesitated, her hand wrapped around the ring. She wanted to call him. Yet she didn’t want to call him.

  Reaching forward, she put her Mini Cooper in gear. She’d wait until he returned from his trip. It would give them both a bit of a breather. It would give her time to decide what to do about the bodyguard job offer. Because she really couldn’t even begin to consider taking the old judge’s money.