Missing?

Angel Beaumont is about four or five years old with brown hair and eyes. It is unknown what she might have been wearing at the time of her disappearance.

Jolene quickly flipped to the next weekly newspaper and scanned for an article about the murder. The girl was still missing a week later?

Searchers are combing the creek behind the farmhouse for the girl’s body, but with no sign of the daughter. If anyone knows of the child’s whereabouts or has information about the killing, they are to contact the sheriff’s department at once. All calls will be confidential.

A few issues later, Jolene found the news article about the daughter.

Dulcie grabbed something to eat at a small café downtown and debated if she should call this Arlene Evans woman or drive out to her place. She opted to drive out unannounced and talk to her face-to-face.

As she was leaving the café, her mind on what she would say once she reached the Evans place, Dulcie bumped into a young woman coming out of one of the local businesses.

“Pardon me,” Dulcie said as the woman, slim, dark-haired and pretty, dropped the folder she’d been carrying. Papers fluttered across the sidewalk. “I’m so sorry.”

Dulcie hurried to help her pick up the scattered sheets, noticing that they were copies of newspaper articles. One headline caught her eye. Investigation Continues in Murder Case.

“Thank you,” the young woman said, clearly upset as she hurriedly stuffed the copies back into the folder and rushed to her compact car parked at the curb.

Murder? Dulcie wondered how many murders they had in a town like this and what were the chances the article could have been about Laura Beaumont. She told herself that when she had more time and information, she’d come back and have a look at some old newspaper stories.

As she climbed into her rental car, she put the incident out of her mind and drove south to the Evans place outside of Old Town Whitehorse.

Like everything else in this part of Montana, the houses were few and far between, with a lot of prairie and gullies and sagebrush to fill the spaces.

It was late and Dulcie wasn’t sure what approach to use when she knocked on the farmhouse door.

“Arlene Evans?” she asked the tall, rawboned ranchwoman who answered the door. Her hair was short in a becoming style that made her appear younger than Dulcie had expected.

“Yes?”

“I’m looking for some information and I was hoping you could help me.”

“I’ll certainly try. Why don’t you step in out of the heat? I just made some lemonade. Would you like a glass?”