Alpine Hero Read Online Free PDF Page B

on, oozing comfort. “If there’s anything we can do, let us know. Remember, Honoria, we’re all your friends here in Alpine.”
    Honoria started to offer Vida another pathetic smile, but then her thin mouth abruptly turned down. “Not everyone,” she said grimly.
    Honoria didn’t need to remind us that somebody in Alpine had killed her sister-in-law. Maybe that somebody had meant to kill her. Still without saying a word, Trevor Whitman pushed his sister out into the cold, darkening late afternoon.
    At five-oh-five, the lights were still on at Stella’s Styling Salon. Carla had relayed the information before leaving work.
The Advocate
is located across Front Street and two full blocks east of the Clemans Building. We couldn’t see the storefronts from that distance, so Vida had sent Carla on a brief scouting expedition.
    “That’s good,” Vida said after Carla had made her final exit. Leo had also left for the day. “I’ll stop by Stella’s on my way home.” She began to gather up her belongings.
    So did I. “You’re not going without me,” I declared, shrugging into my duffel coat.
    Vida didn’t protest. She had often tagged along with me on important stories, and usually I was glad that she did. My House & Home editor had a way with her when it came to eliciting even the most intimate confidences. Sometimes she badgered, sometimes she cajoled, sometimes she exuded almost saintly sympathy. Whatever the ploy, it was rare that she didn’t find out what she wanted to know.
    The snow had stopped, but a thin layer covered the ground and the rooftops. Alpine is nestled in the Cascade Mountains at the three-thousand-foot level, which means that winter lasts almost half the year. The town climbs up Tonga Ridge, its man-made roosts looking awkward in full sunlight, but melding into the trees under rain and snow. Mount Baldy’s twin crests brood over the Skykomish River Valley, the snow line marking time with the seasons.
    Mining brought the first outsiders to the area, back before the turn of the century. The whistle-stop on the Great Northern Railroad was known as Nippon until Carl Clemans came from Snohomish to build a logging camp. He renamed the site Alpine, built a mill and another camp, and eventually erected small houses for the families who wanted to join their husbands and fathers in the woods.
    The original mill had been shut down by Clemans in 1929, after the timber harvest was complete. When the mountainsides were scarred and shorn, there was talk of abandoning Alpine, of letting nature reclaim its own. But Vida’s father-in-law and some enterprising Norwegians had spared the cluster of family cabins and fledgling enterprises by putting up a ski lodge. As the second-growth forest matured, new mills had sprung up. Butnow, with the threat to the spotted owl and other endangered species, the timber industry was once again suffering death pangs. Only one sawmill remained, though the ski lodge continued to flourish, especially during the winter. A surge of commuters in the past decade had helped keep the town’s heart beating, and now the proposed community college promised to inject new blood.
    Unfortunately, it was Kay Whitman’s blood that commanded my attention after Stella let Vida and me into the salon. She was alone, isolated behind crime-scene tape.
    “Milo said I could come in to close up, as long as I didn’t touch anything except the counter stuff.” Stella grimaced. “I’ve canceled the morning appointments. Even after all the money we sank into that bond issue, Milo can’t handle a homicide. He still has to ask for help from Snohomish County.”
    The sheriff’s expanded facilities included a small lab and funding for a part-time forensics pathologist. Kay Whitman’s death was the first murder in Skykomish County since the renovation had been completed. It appeared that Milo still had to rely on Everett, which was the seat of our neighboring county. Situated some fifty miles away,