Murder at the Movies (16 page)

Over the next couple of weeks, Tretheway received several interesting phone calls from the group. Once again, he was surprised at the keen response. The Civil War came out on top.

Gum called first to suggest the war itself posed endless possibilities of murder from bullets to sabres to bayonets, among others. Basil Horsborough supposed wildly that despite their vintage someone might try to activate the ship's guns guarding his museum. But how they could be pointed effectively, or how anyone could be inveigled to stand in front of one, taxed his and Tretheway's imagination. Neil Heavenly thought the scene where Scarlett shoots the Union Army deserter in the face with his own firearm could somehow be recreated. It also gave credibility, Neil implied, to the theory of a female killer. The burning of Atlanta garnered favourites, Tretheway among them. Joshua Pike had it at the top of his selections, but when pressed for an explanation couldn't explain. “Just a gut feeling,” he said.

Freeman Thake proposed death involving horses, inspired by Mr O'Hara's riding accident. Lulu Ashcroft said the same thing, but her reason came from Bonnie's fall from yet another horse. Doc Nooner insinuated that Melanie's waning strength, resulting in her lingering demise, could have been brought about by injection or poison. His viewpoint was the least popular with Tretheway. Jake and Wan Ho felt that the actual fighting should play a part but neither could recall enough of the surprisingly short montage of battle scenes to argue sensibly.

Tretheway forced himself to remain objective. “Let's keep it open,” he said.

Addie abstained. And Zulp gave no suggestions at all for
Gone with the Wind
. He did, however, urge Wan Ho for some action (he didn't say what) on the midget cowboy musical movie.

By the middle of August, Tretheway was disconsolate. He had all the necessary facts within his grasp, in his opinion, to solve the murders, but appeared to be no closer to the solution.

“Doesn't that dog ever go home?” he said.

Fred wagged her tail. She had wandered into the parlour after supper and lay now with her head on the lower shelf of the tea wagon.

Addie looked disapprovingly at her brother. “Albert, what's the matter?”

Tretheway didn't answer. In the background, the canned voice of The Old Ranger was spinning one more tale on the Friday episode of “Death Valley Days.” Jake lowered his newspaper.

“You want to talk about it?” he asked his boss.

“We've talked our ears off.” Tretheway complained.

“You certainly have.” Addie's empty cup and saucer rattled with indignation as she put it back on the tray. Fred lifted her head. “Too much talk. It's time you did something. Get a move on.”

Jake hid behind his paper. Tretheway's face reddened. He jerked upright in his soft chair. Cigar ashes
sprayed over his shirt front. Just as suddenly, he relaxed and leaned back.

“You're quite right, Addie,” he said. “It
is
time to get a move on. A time for action. Sometimes a decision, right or wrong, is better than none at all.” He brushed the ashes from his chest. “If the Fan follows his pattern, something should happen in a week. Maybe two.”

“Okay.” Jake folded his paper away. He clapped his hands together. “What's the movie?” he asked Tretheway.

“
Gone with the Wind
,” Tretheway replied without hesitation.

“And the scene?”

Tretheway hesitated only briefly. “Atlanta,” he said. “The burning of Atlanta. A huge raging fire. That would appeal to the Fan. A great climax.”

“Where?” Jake pressed. “What's he going to burn down?”

“Something spectacular,” Tretheway said.

“Like what?”

“How do I know?” Tretheway's foul mood threatened to return.

“What did they burn down in the movie?” Addie asked.

“An old MGM set,” Jake said. “From King Kong.”

“But we don't have one of those,” Tretheway said.

“I'm just trying to help,” Addie said.

“And it was planned. Everybody knew about it,” Jake said. “It was all in the script.”

“We don't have one of those either,” Tretheway said.

No one spoke for a moment. Then Addie cleared her throat unnecessarily. Tretheway looked at her sideways. So did Jake.

“We do in a way,” she said quietly. “I know of a fire. A nice big spectacular planned fire.”

On December 13, 1889, a meeting was held of those interested in building a railway up the Fort York Mountain (elevation 290') from the head of James Street. A scheme was decided on, a Board of Directors elected and one third of the capital stock of $20,000 subscribed. Thus began the Fort York Incline Railway.

The Incline climbed at a forty-five degree angle on two raised tracks, one for up, one for down, laid on creosote-treated wooden ties. An ingenious steam powered cable system (later electric) allowed the two mirror-image cars to pass each other at the midway point. Each twenty-ton steel car accommodated two horse-and-buggies (later automobiles). Approximately thirty passengers sat on the practical bench seats inside a covered side section. At the mountain's top stood a sturdy, four storey building. It housed a 125 hp engine, living quarters for the engineer and his family, a waiting room and ticket office. Adults or vehicles could take the eighty-second trip up for ten cents, children five cents. Prices dropped for going down. Wooden stairs parallelled the tracks for those who wished to pay nothing up or down.

The Fort York Incline prospered. People flocked up the escarpment to visit restaurants, summer
playhouses, wooded parks or the mountain TB sanitorium. They came just to inhale the famous healthy mountain breeze or, when Stelfy wasn't puffing black smoke over FY Harbour, to enjoy the stunning view over Lake Ontario as far as Toronto, forty miles away. Even delivery vehicles and ambulances rode the Incline instead of negotiating the slower, circuitous mountain roads, most in need of paving.

By the thirties however, the blasting of a new mountain access route through the limestone, and the increase of more privately owned, dependable vehicles on the improved roads meant less and less business for the railway. The Fort York Incline withered into bankruptcy. In 1933 the city took it over for back taxes. For the past six years, it had lain unused, rails rusting, ticket office and building deserted, with the two cars, wheels chocked, exposed at the top of the Incline. An adventurous youth out to prove his manhood could occasionally be seen clambering up the deteriorating ties. From a viable transportation service and a tourist attraction, the FY Incline had degenerated into a liability.

Mayor Phineas “Fireball” Trutt came to the rescue; or really, his trustworthy wife Bertha did.

“Give us a lemon,” she paraphrased her family motto, “and we'll give you lemonade.” Bertha suggested to her husband that, “Rather than spend good city money on labour and machines to tear the structure down, why not burn it down? And if you do,” she further suggested, “why not make it an event, a municipal fete, perhaps on a holiday?”

The mayor wasn't the brightest person she had ever lived with, but even he saw the money-saving
aspects and electoral showmanship of her idea. And as a bonus, he could don his old firefighter's uniform, with helmet, to safely face once more his loveable enemy, fire. After a quick telephone conference with the Fire Chief and Zulp, he decided on his own authority to call a press conference the next day and announce his surprise spectacular. That evening Bertha Trutt called at least one of her close friends.

Tretheway and Jake stared at Addie.

“They're supposed to announce it tomorrow,” she continued.

“Addie,” Tretheway said, “what are you talking about?”

“The Fort York Incline. They're going to burn it down. On Labour Day.”

“Who's they?” Jake asked.

“Why?” Tretheway asked. “And how do you know all this?”

Addie pulled her crocheting out from behind a sofa cushion and examined the stitches closely. “Bertha Trutt told me.” She went on to explain the whole story to her attentive audience.

“I'll be damned,” Tretheway said when Addie finished.

“You think we've got our location?” Jake asked. “I'd say so,” Tretheway said. “Now we need the two main characters.”

“Any ideas?” Jake said.

“When's Labour Day?” Tretheway side-stepped Jake's question.

“Two weeks Monday,” Addie said. “September four.”

Tretheway frowned.

“What's the matter?” Jake asked.

“Nothing special.” Tretheway heaved himself out of his chair and stepped over to the bookcase. “Didn't we have an encyclopedia?”

“Two volumes,” Addie said. “Right in front of your nose.”

“They're not very good,” Jake said. “Book-of-the-Month Club bonus.”

Tretheway plucked both books from the shelf with one hand. He blew dust from their tops. Addie looked away.

“I think I'll go read for a while.” Tretheway started out of the parlour, then stopped.

“This theory,” he said pretending to examine the encyclopedias, “tieing in the burning of Atlanta to the Fort York Incline. We'll just keep it to ourselves.”

“What about Wan Ho?” Jake asked.

Tretheway reconsidered. “He should know.”

Addie looked as if she was going to ask a question.

“But no one else,” Tretheway said to his sister. “Even Bertha Trutt.”

Addie went about her crocheting but nodded imperceptibly. She and Jake heard Tretheway open and close the ice box on his way upstairs. Jake spun the radio dial to “Hollywood Hotel.”

Close to midnight, by the end of the overseas news broadcast, Jake assumed his boss was gone for the night. Addie had retired an hour earlier, right after “First Nighter.” Jake made the regular rounds of the ground floor checking doors and windows. When he entered the kitchen, Tretheway appeared suddenly and silently from the darkened opening of the back stairs. “Geez!” Jake jumped out of his skin.

“Did you know that Atlanta is the capital of Georgia?” Tretheway waved the AA to Lavca Bay volume of the encyclopedia in the air.