The Night Bell Read Online Free

unsold: they were still available “from” $299,999. The Ascot Group – an American corporationthat specialized in large-scale, pop-up communities complete with malls or golf courses or spas – had left half a dozen houses incomplete and made those people who had bought in antsy about the safety of their investments.
    Tournament Acres had been advertised and sold on the promise of its sumptuous country-club living and its two eighteen-hole courses. Now there was talk of building more bungalows where the second course was supposed to go – currently a sodden field of rotting corn stalks. People were incensed, and the
Westmuir Record
had been chewing the scenery over the debacle. The fact that most of the owners were from the Golden Horseshoe – Toronto, the 905, Hamilton – lent an air of
schadenfreude
to the talk about the ugly development, but Hazel felt for the investors. Retirees, mostly. People had spent their life-savings.
    Hazel drove to Honey Eisen’s address on Pebble Beach Boulevard, the new name for the 15th Sideroad, and found Macdonald’s cruiser outside the house. Hazel parked behind it and tried the driver’s door. She looked through the window, her hands cupped over her eyes, and inspected the inside of the cruiser. She found nothing abnormal about it, except that Macdonald wasn’t in the car. All the doors were locked.
    She looked around the area, over the fields to the east and at the discordant cottage-bungalows built on identical frames that lined the west side of the road. Around whereEisen lived, the houses and gardens were complete, but farther north, they were less finished, and a couple were still being framed. The development stopped altogether less than halfway up Pebble Beach Boulevard.
    She considered Mrs. Eisen’s dwelling. It had been done up in the same white wood as the clubhouse, with stuccoed columns in front. The front room throbbed white and blue with television light. Maybe Macdonald was in there watching reruns with the old lady. He’d always take a cup of tea if offered, and he was a tireless conversationalist, in both French and English. But three hours of chatting?
    She went up the walk and rang the doorbell. The flickering in the front window stopped. She rang again. The woman who answered wore a shapeless, pale-green dress over her bony frame. “Did you get it back?” she asked.
    “Did I get what back?”
    “Baby Jesus, do you people even talk to each other? My bone!”
    “May I come in, please?” Honey Eisen swept her arm out in mock welcome and Hazel entered. “Did a police officer named Macdonald come to –”
    “Well, that’s why you’re here, aren’t you? To
arrest
me.”
    “So he was here?”
    “You should arrest the people who are building this place. They don’t know
what
they’re doing. And Schnozzola covers for them every step of the way. You speak Jewish?”
    “No. Be quiet. Don’t say anything else because I’m not following most of it. Sergeant Macdonald was here, yes?”
    “Yes.”
    “When?”
    “He left a … an hour ago at least.”
    “Do you know his cruiser is still parked outside of your house? He’s not in it.”
    Eisen went to the window of her front room. “He went to talk to Givens. It’s a two-minute drive!”
    “Who’s Givens?”
    “Brendan Givens. The property manager of this whole schmazzle. Do you golf?”
    “I don’t. Is Givens the person you struck with the pen holder?”
    “Oh, and they never built the wave pool either. It was supposed to be finished before anyone took possession. They’re cancelling the second course to build more bungalows, and they’ve presold – signed and sealed – so our protests are pointless. Why are they selling more parcels when they can’t finish the houses they’ve already sold?”
    “You smashed his knee because the golf courses aren’t finished?”
    “No. I … bonked him because he locked my bone in his desk.”
    “He locked your bone?”
    “Your sergeant was