Northern Lights: A Due South Novel

Chapter 11: A Few Good Men

The Bear Falls Medical Clinic on Grizzly Street was in a small building with a pitched roof and grey wood siding. Although double doors protected the empty waiting room, the Arctic air would still blast anyone foolish enough to sit near the entrance. Snow fell from Fraser's boots and parka onto the doormat and rapidly began to melt.

The lone receptionist, the same young blonde who had accompanied Dr. Douglas to the memorial service, sat in her own curved cubicle in the corner. Despite the cold air from the door, she wore a too-tight yellow cotton blouse with the three top buttons undone. Several empty boxes were piled up behind her. Swiping frantically on her smartphone, she glanced up when Fraser entered without registering him, then returned to her phone. A moment later, as he crossed the room, her focus flipped to panic. She threw the phone aside and pretended to inspect patient files. By the time Fraser reached the ledge that wrapped around her desk, she had moved several folders to cover a phone-shaped object.

"I wasn't expecting anyone yet!" she babbled. "Fraser, right?"

Fraser had booked the first morning appointment and arrived early to give him an excuse to question the staff. When she finished checking him in, he placed his right elbow on the ledge and summoned his best small-talk questions.

"So, how long have you worked here?" Fraser asked.

"Six years," Jennifer said. "As of last month."

"Do you like it?"

"I'll only be here until I get married. Then I won't need this job anymore."

"Oh, congratulations!" Fraser said. "When is the wedding?"

"I'm not engaged." Jennifer waved her left hand and long pink nails in front of him to show she wore no ring. "Still single. It's so hard to meet a good man in this town. All the men my age are useless. And the few good ones just won't take a hint."

Jennifer tossed her long, blonde hair over her shoulder as she glanced toward Dr. Douglas' examination room, then back to Fraser. "But I'll find one soon." She fluttered her eyelashes.

"I'm certain you will. There are many fine young men in this town," Fraser said, completely misinterpreting Jennifer's eyelash fluttering.

Jennifer sighed. "They're all so...young. So unambitious. Unsuccessful."

"Generally, it takes time to become successful." Fraser placed his left hand on the ledge as he reminisced. "You know, when I was your age I was a junior constable in an Inuit hamlet smaller than this town. I tracked poachers and ticketed snowmobilers. I lived in rented rooms and I could carry most of my possessions on my back. And if you had asked me then, I would have told you that was all I would ever want."

Judging by her eye roll, Jennifer wasn't interested in nostalgia or wisdom. "Martin Franklin said you're, like, the chief of police for the whole territory. That must pay well."

Fraser felt the prickle of Jennifer's gaze on his left hand, which was also ringless. He yanked his hands off the counter and leaped back. Fraser hoped she didn't mean what he thought she meant. He prayed she didn't mean that. Jennifer, with her flawless foundation, blue eyeliner, and strawberry-pink lip gloss, looked closer to Elizabeth's age than Fraser's. She couldn't be over thirty. Several of Fraser's colleagues had children older than Jennifer. Several of Fraser's colleagues were grandparents.

Yet for the sake of his dignity, and hers, he had to pretend he didn't know what she meant.

"The compensation is, err, commensurate with the, uh, responsibilities of the position and federal government pay policy."

"Commensate?" she asked.

"Commensurate. It means proportionate. Corresponding in magnitude, amount, or degree."