Seaweed on the Street Read Online Free PDF

he was like a bulldog.”
    â€œWell,” Service said, “let’s go upstairs and meet the boss.”
    I followed Service to the hall. A staggeringly broad staircase curved up to the second floor. As we mounted the stairs a side door opened and the young maid appeared, sobbing and lugging a suitcase. The Chinese gardener was standing in the room she had just vacated, holding a cup of coffee and looking startled, his mouth half open. Still sobbing, the maid ran out the main door and fled down the driveway.
    Service, his hand clasping the banister, watched her go. His glance carried to me, a step behind him on the stairs. He gave a barely perceptible shake of his head, his face expressionless. “So much for a day’s notice.”
    I said, “What’s her name?”
    â€œEffie.”
    â€œHas Effie worked here long?”
    â€œFive years or so. Then something trivial happens, and she’s out the door in five minutes.” He shook his head in annoyance as we continued up the stairs.
    A wide inner balcony encircled the second floor. We stopped outside a big double door. Service knocked. After a muffled reply from within, we entered.
    Calvert Hunt was sitting in his invalid chair near windows over-looking the gardens. He pointed outside. “What’s going on in this house? Was that Effie running down the drive?” Hunt’s deep voice was surprisingly resonant for a man of 85.
    â€œYes, sir, that was Effie,” Service said unctuously, crossing the room to look out of the window himself. “Something upset her. A few minutes ago she told me she couldn’t work here anymore.”
    â€œDamn nuisance. I liked the girl,” Hunt said. He turned his eyes to me. “I know you. You’re the Indian cop who came here last night.”
    I grinned at him. “I’m a glutton for punishment.”
    He went on, “You were here five years ago as well. The day young Harry Cunliffe was murdered.”
    â€œThat’s right. I was a crime-squad detective back then.”
    â€œYou’re a smartass, but maybe you’re the right man to find Marcia. Mr. Service tells me that you quit regular policing to work with street derelicts.” Hunt bared long yellow teeth in a wolfish grin. “You may as well tell me. Did you quit? Or did you get pushed?”
    â€œPeople were lined up in the hallways when I left, throwing rose petals. Maybe they were glad to see me go.”
    Hunt smiled in cold pleasure. “A lot of people were glad to see me go, too, when I packed up a good job to start my own little business.”
    He stopped speaking to savour a delicious memory, then added, “I started out in life as a sawmill labourer. My boss was a slave-driving fool. If he’d treated me better I might have stayed with him. If I had, I’d be drawing a nice little pension now.”
    Hunt gave a bark of laughter and shook his head, pleased with the joke. Hunt’s “little business” was Seacoast Pulp and Paper, one of Canada’s largest corporations.
    The old man rose to his feet shakily, steadying himself with a cane. He was tall and skinny, but had a pot belly. He wore a well-cut grey suit, an old-fashioned wing-collar shirt with a black bow tie, and had a fresh carnation in his buttonhole. Service moved forward, ready to assist, but Hunt waved him away and crossed to the windows unaided.
    There was a large oil painting of Hunt’s pulp mill hanging over the fireplace. A small green object rested inconspicuously atop the painting’s ornate, heavily carved frame. I knew what that object was, but I didn’t know what to do about it. Before I could make up my mind, Hunt turned back into the room and looked at me from a distance of two generations.
    Abruptly he said, “When you drove up here, Mr. Seaweed, did you happen to notice what kinds of shrubs line the driveway to my house?”
    â€œRhododendrons. I’m no gardener, but