The Last Witness

TWENTY-TWO

Elena observed her hand shaking as she put her cup of herbal tea back in its saucer. The shaking was less now, but still evident.

Another three squad cars she’d passed that afternoon with her nerves on a knife-edge until they’d finally gone from view. She should have known that trawling door to door across half of Montreal, the chances of crossing the path of the police would be greatly increased — but the rationalisation did little to ease the tight-rope pressure. She didn’t know how much more she could take of this.

She’d dived into a local chemists after squad car number two — which slowed for a second while the passenger officer gave her the once-over as she gave her by now standard door-step pitch to Stevens family sixteen or seventeen, she’d lost count — and grabbed a bottle of natural nerve-calming tablets. Their main ingredient was something called Valerian, and the label advised to take two tablets at four hour intervals. She swilled down four straight away with an orange juice from a deppaneur.

Then she started to recall the advice given by Gordon’s doctor for him to combat stress and high blood-pressure and head off another heart attack. Avoid fatty foods, dairy produce and high sugar intake; avoid stimulants such as coffee and coke; brandy and vodka were a definite no-no, but beer was okay in moderation and whisky was actually good for him ‘…Has a calming effect and also thins the blood, actually improves the circulation.’ But again in moderation.

She’d miss the kick-start of her normal five or six cups of fresh caffeine a day, and already the craving for it was excruciating with the energy badly needed, but sadly lacking, to plod around yet another six or seven doors that evening before finally calling it a day. The herbal tea was a poor substitute.

She’d picked up three whisky miniatures at the same depanneur and had downed the first just before the next door call; but she’d held herself in check since, hadn’t taken any more. She hadn’t slept well the night before, and with her eyes slightly bloodshot and her nerves frayed, she was starting to look increasingly like a woman on the edge: she couldn’t help noticing that the doors were being opened more cautiously, tentatively, some people talking through only foot gaps. If she started enveloping them in whisky fumes, she’d be given even less of a welcome.

The thought put a faint ironic smile on her face, and from the side of the cafe she noticed Lorena smiling back at her, coming out in sympathy. Elena smiled more openly. Lorena was zap-crashing her way through Tombraider on a game machine, for the moment seemed happy, untroubled: brief respite from the pressure of the sessions and the tedium of reading Harry Potter or listening through the half-dozen more cassettes Elena had bought her to help pass the car-waiting time while she continued with her door-stepping vigil… each time hopefully the last one. The one that would suddenly smile and invite her in rather than the succession of knit eyebrows and shaking heads.

I’ll bury him out of sight and out of reach… Who was she kidding? Two days, and she didn’t even have the faintest sniff of a lead. And the way the sessions were going with Lorena, it didn’t look likely that anything would be uncovered there either. Her father had got the better of her, and now Ryall too. Dominant men, story of her life: why should she be so surprised? Her hand gripped tight on her teacup as she took another sip. At least she was consistent. And when she returned to England defeated, maybe even as soon as tomorrow — she was facing a jail term for this. Gordon had made that clear on their last phone conversation: the deadline for no charges being pressed was now almost twelve hours past. No possible reprieve. Don’t pass GO, don’t collect?200, go straight…

A plump woman in a thick quilted parka brushed past her heading for her table, broke her from her mental maudlin. Middle-aged, Afro-Caribbean. This area of East Montreal around Rue Hochelaga had a heavy Caribbean population, both French and English, with an equal mix of French Canadians and a wider ethnic mix than probably any other area of the city making up the remainder. Halal butchers jostled next to Greek steak houses, burrito bars and deppaneurs selling yams and cassava, with every so often shops that were boarded up and covered with posters and graffiti.

There were actually some areas of the city where Elena hoped she wouldn’t find him: she didn’t want to face the added guilt that his life might have been tough, underprivileged.

She decided to try and buoy her spirits with some calls in a better area. She paid, hung over Lorena’s shoulder a moment while she finished her game, then they headed north to the block between Rue Beaubien and d’Iberville — a Stephanou this time.

Halfway through the day it had suddenly struck her that her enquiry line was incomplete. She’d ask if there was a Nicholas, Maria or George Stevens in the house, give respective ages and some background — then that was it. There was nowhere else to go. She couldn’t ask if they might be relatives, because Stevens was an assumed named. And she began to wonder too about the choice of Montreal: if the sole purpose of the change to Stevens was a common anglicised name to help bury them deeper in the city — then why not Chicago or New York where the population was almost completely anglophile? Maybe the choice of Montreal was because they had relatives there. She checked the phone book: eight Stephanous. It added to her door-call burden, but at least she could feel assured that she was covering all the bases. She’d called on two earlier, and this now was Stephanou number three.

The street was wider and tree-lined, and her hopes raised for a second when the elderly man that answered said there was a Maria in the family. But the age was wrong, thirty-four, and she’d moved to Montreal only nine years ago.

Elena’s shoulders slumped and she closed her eyes for a moment as she sat back in the car. 6.40pm. She’d hoped to squeeze in three or four more calls before calling it a night, but the way she felt now she didn’t think she could face it. Washed-out, dejected, her nerves in shreds, she hardly felt able to raise an ounce of spirit or energy for anything.

‘I’m sorry you haven’t been able to find him yet,’ Lorena said thoughtfully, almost worriedly.

‘That’s okay.’ Elena was about to add mechanically ‘It’s not your fault’, but instead chewed at her lip for a second before commenting: ‘I’m sorry too to trail you around so much like this.’ She reached across and gave Lorena’s hand a gentle squeeze. ‘You’ve been very good. Very patient.’

Elena looked again at her list and checked the map: one Stevens only five blocks away, another within a mile. She should at least check these two while she was here, then see how she felt.

She could sense that Lorena wanted to say something else. It finally came as she started up and pulled out.

‘You know what the doctor asked — about where I might go. Was it wrong that I mentioned perhaps staying with you?’

‘No, no… not at all, I — ’

‘I mean, is that something that could happen… if I had to leave the Ryalls? Maybe I could keep your Katine company and play with her — be like a sister.’

She’d jumbled it all together before Elena hardly had a chance to think about it. Elena reminded herself that Lorena could at times be cute to get what she wanted — leftover from her having to become streetwise before her time to survive in Bucharest — but the raw plea in Lorena’s voice came through strongest. She was obviously deeply concerned what might happen to her. Elena’s throat tightened. Ashamedly, she’d spared little thought to where Lorena might go: a good family somewhere, yes, without saying; but not necessarily hers.

‘Yes, of course — you know that I’d love to have you.’ Her voice was laden with assurance. She pushed from her mind the chain of procedural nightmares that might make it impossible: the whole mess uncovered with giving up her own child and her now being an abductor no longer made her exactly ideal adoption parent material. But she sensed that right now it was more important to keep up Lorena’s hopes of a familiar, welcome alternate home to hopefully ease the block in her mind.

Yet another deceit to add to the heap, albeit well-meaning. She tried not to dwell on the ludicrousness: making promises to Lorena when with the jail-term probably ahead she’d have trouble even caring for the two she already had.

As she slowed to a stop at the next junction, she noticed her hands were still shaking steadily on the steering wheel. But at least the Valerian pills had helped in one respect: they made the lying easier and numbed some of the crushing burden of the problems she faced; she felt oddly distanced from reality, driving through the night-time streets of a city strange to her with more purpose and more at stake than she’d ever known before, yet feeling totally aimless, lost.

* * * *

‘So, what sort of problem is it with my father?’ Mikaya Ryall arched an eyebrow.

‘As I said, nothing serious.’ Gordon had already assured her on first approach that her father wasn’t ill or anything. Looking agitatedly each side in the bustling university corridor, he’d added that all the same it was something he’d prefer not to discuss too openly. Guarded nod from Mikaya after a second, and they’d headed to a nearby cafe. ‘Has he phoned you in the last couple of days?’

‘No, why?’

Strange, thought Gordon. Either the Ryall’s panic with events had kept them from phoning her, or it was an indication of some distance and barrier between them. He’d introduced himself as Donald Benham, one of his clients, because he hadn’t wanted her blurting out Waldren? Aren’t you the people who’ve abducted Lorena? She’d have refused to speak to him. They’d taken a seat by the far wall of the small cafe. It was only a third full with about a dozen people interspersed. The smell of bacon frying was heavy in the air, but there was a no-smoking policy so there was only one pollutant to cope with. Gordon held one hand out and made an expression of strained apology.

‘Well, it’s young Lorena, you see… she’s been taken. Your stepparents know the person who has taken her, so there’s nothing to fear for her safety. But it is the reason why I’m here.’

That eyebrow again. ‘Are you with the police?’

‘No, nothing like that. I know both Lorena and the person who has taken her — though it’s more the reason why she’s been taken that’s brought me here.’ Gordon launched into the dramatic chain of events, interrupted only by their coffees being brought to the table: Lorena and the two social services visits, her stepfather blocking psychiatric counselling, and then the final abduction. All the while he watched Mikaya’s expression, especially her eyes: large, dark-brown with only a slight slant, but he was looking more for the shadows, her reaction as he spoke. Five-six, slim, with sleek dark hair almost to her waist and a warm if cautious smile, she was stunning. It was hard to get away from the thought that Ryall chose his stepdaughters primarily for their beauty. Heavier shadows as he mentioned Lorena possibly being interfered with — but that could have been just the shock reaction most people would have to such news.

‘Are you with the social services?’ she asked.

‘No — let us just say I’m a family friend who knows everyone involved, including the aid worker who has taken her for counselling — and I sympathise with the reasons why.’ Gordon took the first sip of his coffee. Now for the difficult part. ‘But, you know, I wondered if there was anything from your own past experiences with your stepfather that would lead you to think that Lorena might in fact be telling the truth.’ More delicate than just asking straight out if her stepfather might have molested her as well — but the only effect was a second’s delay before the shock realization hit her.

She stood up abruptly, shaking her head. ‘I really don’t think this is a good idea… us talking.’

‘Please, I… I’ve come a long way.’ He half raised, lightly clutching her arm, his eyes imploring. ‘The woman who has taken Lorena has done so with all good intention, only because she didn’t see any other option and couldn’t bare the thought of just leaving her at your stepfather’s mercy — if something is happening. But she could be in a lot of trouble for what’s she’s done. And she happens to be a very nice person, someone I care a lot about.’

Uncertainty, the shadows in Mikaya’s eyes darker. Gordon was sure in that moment that she knew something: it surfaced only fleetingly, then was pushed back as she pulled her arm away.

‘I’m sorry, I can’t talk to you.’ She half turned, found it hard to meet the plea in his eyes. ‘Anyway, nothing happened to talk about.’ She hitched her bag hastily back on her shoulder.

She was flustered, the bravado uncertain: Gordon could tell that she was lying. Whatever had happened, the thought of it suddenly re-surfacing to face again was making her intensely anxious. He observed her hand shaking on her bag. He clutched back at her arm.

‘I know it’s difficult, but please — if you can help, if you can think of anything. The woman who’s taken Lorena could face prison if she’s got it wrong about her.’ Gordon’s tone was urgent but low under his breath so that others in the cafe couldn’t hear. Still a few were starting to look at them: an older man clutching at the arm of a beautiful young girl, the girl agitated and eager to get away. A lover’s tiff that looked like it might develop interestingly.

‘I’m sorry… I’m sorry.’ Mikaya shook her head again and looked close to tears. She kept her eyes stoically from meeting his, as if afraid of what he might see there. ‘I just can’t help you.’ She pulled her arm back and turned away.

‘Please… what about the pregnancy? Anything you can tell me.’

Gordon had to raise his voice slightly because she was already a couple of paces away. Others in the cafe did hear this time, confirming their suspicions. But Mikaya was head down, shoulder bag clutched tight to her along with her secrets, and didn’t look back as she headed out.

Elena didn’t look round at first as the policeman walked in the shop, she was too busy trying to watch and direct what Lorena picked up from the shelves: left to her own devices she’d pick up an armful of sweets, pop magazines and CDs, when all they’d come in for was some soft drinks and a chocolate bar. It was quite a large depanneur, almost a small supermarket.

She only half turned as she felt the presence of the figure a couple of paces behind: black leather jacket and dark navy trousers, motorcycle boots, wide black belt with baton and gun, French writing arched over an insignia on his jacket epaulette. A tall, rangy man, at least six-three, with his crash helmet making him look even taller. She looked away hastily, her heart thudding wildly, put her gaze back stoically on Lorena as the policeman shuffled closer behind, browsing along the newspaper and magazine shelf displays to one side.

‘Look, they’ve got the Spice Girls — but I think it’s in French.’ Lorena was looking down a rack of CDs. ‘They’ve got Billie too, and this one’s in English. Do you think I could have it?’ Lorena lifted it out of the rack with a hopeful smile.

‘Yes, fine. Fine.’ The last thing Elena wanted to do was protest and lengthen the conversation. If Lorena had picked up 1 °CDs she’d have just dumbly nodded: Right. Great. She didn’t want to hiss ‘Let’s go,’ which was her first inclination, the policeman might pick up on the tremor and haste in her voice, tune into some problem. So she just glared at Lorena and shifted her eyes slightly to indicate the problem behind. But Lorena couldn’t see the policeman because of her height and the shelf rack in between, and before Elena could catch her eye she was absorbed back with the CDs for a second before moving further down: pop posters, cards, chocolates.

Lorena picked up a chocolate bar and a bag of toffees. ‘Do you think they might have J-17?’

‘No, I don’t think so. The magazines are mostly in French.’ Come on, Elena silently screamed. The policeman was now just two feet away, she could almost feel his breath at her left shoulder. She’d injected a slight American lilt to her speech, tried not to sound so English, and she hadn’t wanted to say straight out that they wouldn’t have magazines from England. Her pulse was racing, she could feel it wildly pumping a vein in her neck and her throat felt tight; she could hardly swallow. They could easily have traced where she’d gone by now: a dispatch alert rattling around in the back of policeman’s mind about an English woman with a young girl, and then as he hears them talking it all finally gels.

The policeman approached the counter with a newspaper and magazine, said something in French, and handed across a note. The boy at the counter, pimply and barely out of his teens, cashed it on the register and held out the change. But the policeman seemed to remember something else at the last moment and pointed behind the boy. ‘Et vingt Winston.’

Elena observed with a sideways glance towards the till counter and the boy, she didn’t trust herself to look around fully at the policeman now directly at her side. She stood there clutching a bottle of orange juice and a coke, and could feel the policeman’s eyes on her for the first time as the counter-boy reached behind for some cigarettes.

‘Cinquante-cinq cent plus.’

The policeman handed some coins over, and at the moment Lorena emerged from behind the shelves.

‘Maybe they’ll have Sug…’ She stopped as she saw the policeman and her eyes went wide. Her hands suddenly seemed to lose co-ordination on the items she was clutching and she fumbled and dropped the bag of toffees. Her face flushed heavily as she bent to pick them up.

Elena stepped sharp and got there before her: she could just see Lorena dropping everything in panic as she stooped.

‘Okay. That’s everything now.’ A statement so that Lorena didn’t have to respond.

As she straightened, the policeman was smiling lightly at Lorena: hopefully thinking that Lorena was merely surprised at seeing someone so large in uniform rather than anything else. Elena gave a tentative smile back as she put everything on the counter. She pressed her hands against the counter so that hopefully he wouldn’t notice them shaking, and with a brief nod — Elena wasn’t sure if it was at them or the counter-boy, she’d pulled her eyes swiftly away — he turned and left.

The heavy step of his motorcycle boots receded almost in time with her pounding heart, and she thought: never again. She couldn’t stand another minute of this, let alone hours or days.

* * * *

‘We’re looking. Believe me, we’re looking.’ Jean-Paul closed his eyes for a second and held out one hand. That’s all he seemed to have done these past long hours: make excuses, make penance.

Simone shook her head. ‘It’s almost two days now with no sign of him. Nothing. I know something’s wrong, seriously wrong. I can feel it.’

They were in Jean-Paul’s study. Raphael had been talking to Francesca the house-maid in the corridor outside, enquiring whether two of his favourite sweat shirts were in the laundry or not, and they’d shut the door for privacy. Simone looked worse than when she’d first confronted him after her furious drinking binge. Two nights of fitful sleep and her worst fears bedding deeper with each hour had put dark circles under her eyes, and her hair was lank, unwashed, her usually immaculate make-up scrappy. She chewed nervously at the side of one nail.

‘How do you know Roman’s not done something to him already?’

‘I can’t be sure, I know.’ His eyes closed for a second again: more contrition. ‘I’m stuck with taking his word. But if it’s a bluff — it’s a good bluff. Don’t forget it’s Roman that right now has got half of Montreal looking for him.’

She switched off from what he was saying halfway through, was lost again in her own thoughts. ‘It’s just what Georges feared — was why he asked me to talk to you.’

‘Like I said before, Simone, I just don’t think Roman would do something like that without my sanction. He might be hot-headed and irrational at times, but he’s not completely suicidal.’ Her first screams of accusation, at first light the day after Georges’ disappearance, had been directed at Jean-Paul with Roman merely doing his dirty-work. Jean-Paul fired back that a six-month cooling-off period in Cuba or Mexico was what he’d had in mind. ‘That’s not how I do things any more, and you more than anyone else should know that.’ His reprimand, carrying with it Pascal and all he’d fought so hard for since to make amends, made her flush and softly say she was sorry, and they’d turned their thoughts to Roman possibly acting on his own. Jean-Paul had pointed out that there was little point in Roman investing so much time convincing him that there was a problem with Georges, only to then suddenly jump the gun and take action himself. ‘Even if he was of a mind to do it himself, he could have done it long before. He didn’t need to waste breath on me.’

‘Yeah, you’re probably right,’ Simone agreed dolefully, looking down. She stopped nibbling her nail and pulled a lank strand of hair behind one ear. The photos were back before them as the only reasonable explanation for his disappearance. He knew that they’d been found and was embarrassed as hell, knew that she’d be furious and so he’d gone to ground for a few days until she cooled off. He was right on that count: she’d phoned at least thirty times between the two numbers, each time ready to slam the phone straight down. ‘Good, now that I’ve got you — this is just to say fuck off and never phone me again!’

‘Maybe he’s looked up an old friend up-Province or out of Quebec or headed to a ski-cabin for a while to re-think and re-evaluate.’ Jean-Paul didn’t add that the main reason he had Roman trawling half of Quebec wasn’t to find her lost albeit fallen-from-grace love, but because Georges going to ground could be the final signal that he was about to talk to the RCs. Roman could have been right all along. ‘Or maybe even he’s gone on a short hop to Mexico. He’s got a lot of friends and contacts down there now.’

‘Yeah. He’ll probably surface later tonight or tomorrow and call me.’ She eased a tentative smile, the first in forty-eight hours. ‘And then I can kill him.’

The policeman was a bad start to the day, seemed to have sapped all of Elena’s energy barely a half an hour into her door-calls. Or maybe it was the build-up of nerves, the lack of sleep and the valerian pills and whisky — she’d downed the two remaining miniatures last night, then had nursed another two at the hotel bar with Alphonse after Lorena had gone to bed.

Now she’d sunk another three valerian straight after leaving the depanneur with the policeman to steady her nerves. She was a quivering jelly, frantic. Her trembling was clearly visible, and as she looked in the car’s vanity mirror after sinking the pills she noticed a small muscle spasm at intervals below her left, very bloodshot eye: she looked more like a hardline heroine case.

The spasm eased after twenty minutes and her nerves settled, she just felt numb. But the problem was the numbness was all over her body, and her step felt heavy, laboured, as she made her way towards the front door of her second call of the day. Her thighs and legs felt leaden, as if they were weighted with sacks. She’d hoped to squeeze in three or four calls before Lowndes’ session in just under an hour — but the way she felt now this would probably be the last.

Or maybe it was the repetitive nature of the calls, the endless chain of head-shakes, frowns and ‘sorry’s’ creating her lethargy, steadily grinding her down so that now she couldn’t raise the faintest spark of hope or enthusiasm as she approached a fresh door. It just wouldn’t be any different. More head shakes and frowns with nothing left but to trudge on to the next. And the next. And the…

She felt dizzy, disorientated, felt herself sway slightly, her step unsteady.

She was deep inside the chine and with dusk approaching the light at its end was fast dying. She started to head back up the slope to home, but her legs felt heavy — the same heaviness she felt now as she made her way up the four steps to a cream front door — progress was slow, she started to fear that she might not make it back up before the light died completely. She wouldn’t be able to find her way any more: the darkness of the chine was intense, no trace of moonlight or starlight filtered through the thick blanket of trees above. And it suddenly hit her that the light at the end didn’t just represent hope, but that without it she wouldn’t be able to find her way at all. She was totally lost.

She rang the bell. Its chime lingered in her head for a second after she pulled her finger away.

But didn’t she know her way in and out of the chine practically blindfold, she been there so many times? Muted sound of footsteps approaching the other side. Suddenly she wasn’t so sure — she wasn’t sure of anything any more.

And when after her standard pitch the man confronting her, a Stephanou in his late fifties, nodded and with a strained grimace opened the door wide — ‘You’d better come in’ — she was still grappling with reality, slightly lost. It took her a moment to finally respond and walk into his house and realize that the light at the end of the chine was suddenly back again.

TWENTY-THREE

‘Pardon. Bell Canada, Madame.’

‘Oui, oui. C’est vite.’ Odette Donatiens opened the door wider to let the man in. ‘We noticed the line was dead — but we haven’t even reported it yet. I was just about to go to my neighbours and phone in.’

Carlo Funicelli shrugged and smiled amiably. ‘We found a junction box burnt out with a short that effects you and three other houses. Which means that one of you has a problem with too much resistance on the line.’ He followed her down the hallway. Slightly broad in the beam, but still a good figure for what he’d heard from Roman was a mid-fifty year old: the grey track suit and trainers maybe helped her look more youthful and there was only a touch of salt in her auburn hair. ‘So we thought we’d better check.’

‘Oh, right.’ She could see him scanning to each side of the lounge. She pointed. ‘It’s over there.’

‘Thanks.’ Funicelli smiled back at her as he reached the phone, as if to say ‘it’s okay now’, hoping that she’d disappear for a moment and leave him to it. But she just stood there looking at him as he undid the phone cradle casing. ‘Could take a little while.’

She stood there a moment more looking blankly on, then jolted slightly. ‘Oh, sorry. Would you like coffee or something?’

‘Yes, thanks. That would very nice, Madame.’

‘Black, white?’

‘White, no sugar. Thanks.’

Funicelli breathed a sigh of relief as she finally disappeared. At a push he might have got away with the phone bug with her still watching, but the other two would have been more difficult. He had both in place — one under the sofa, another behind a sideboard — within forty seconds of her turning away, then started on the phone bug. He’d have to hurry: the last thing he wanted was her coming back in and asking, ‘What’s that?’ Or why was he tampering with the handset rather than the cradle? As it was he’d been nervous about the few minutes he’d had to spend up a telegraph pole outside to disconnect her line. If she’d seen him through the window, fine, that tied in with his story now. But he was more worried about a real Bell engineer passing and seeing him. His uniform looked authentic enough, but a van with logo had been impossible to arrange: he’d parked his plain white van twenty yards along so that it was obscured from the Donatiens’ view by some trees.

His hand shook slightly as he positioned the bug behind the earpiece and connected it. Sound of footsteps starting back along the hallway. He clipped back the handset cover and tightened its one connecting screw, then quickly shifted to putting the phone cradle casing back on as she walked in. He gave the cradle a few more screwdriver turns as she put his coffee on a side table.

‘Thanks. There were a couple of wires touching that could have caused a problem, so I’ve seperated them. I’ll just check the socket, then I’m done.’ He busied himself undoing the socket and checking connections with a metre between sips of coffee while Odette Donatiens talked aimlessly.

‘…Lot brighter today for a change. I might go out and do some gardening later.’

‘Yeah, yeah. Looks like it could turn out nice.’ He screwed the socket back together and knocked back the last of his coffee. ‘That should be okay now. I’ll just re-connect on the junction box outside — and you’re ready to go.’

She thanked him and showed him out, and after another three anxious minutes on the telegraph pole outside — hoping that no Bell engineers passed or that none of the on-looking neighbours thought something was suspicious and decided to phone in — Funicelli drove away.

Roman was probably right: if anyone, Donatiens was bound to contact his stepparents at some stage. But word was settling deeper on the streets that Roman had already taken Donatiens out, and all of this frantic, blanket search activity was merely a smokescreen for Jean-Paul’s benefit. Funicelli had no firm thoughts on it either way: if Roman wanted to waste time with planting bugs that he knew already wouldn’t bear any fruit, it was his money.

Viana couldn’t help looking around as she stood in the boarding gate queue for her flight to Haiti at New York’s JFK, afraid that Roman or one of his goons would appear at the last minute and stop her escape. She’d done the same at ticket check-in just an hour ago and at check-in and boarding for her flight from Montreal to New York at 5.14 a.m that morning.

Only five people ahead of her in the queue now. She could hardly believe her luck that she might actually get away.

The first warning sign had been Azy early on last night. ‘You know that Georges has disappeared. What happened with you two the other night?’ Azy looked heavily concerned and kept his voice low, even though he’d chosen a moment when there was nobody at the bar. He obviously saw her answer as potential dynamite, not for anyone else’s ears.

‘Nothing. I don’t know what you mean.’ She acted nonchalant.

He leant closer as he gave the bar a couple more wipes. ‘Look, Viana. What you get up to in private is your own business. But the thing is I saw you get in his car the other night. And then the very next day he disappears. Gives you plenty to think about, no?’

‘It was nothing. He just gave me a lift home, that’s all.’ She shook her head and got up from the bar. ‘How should I know what’s happened to him?’

But she could tell by Azy’s eyes following her as she went back to dance that he’d picked up on her nervousness, was doubtful.

Then Roman came by the club two hours later with the same thing. ‘He disappeared the night after your place. Not a trace since. Hasn’t been on to you, has he? If nothing else to ask what happened at your place that night.’

‘No, no. Nothing.’ She tried to read the bluff in Roman’s eyes, but as usual she just couldn’t tell: poker face, poker heart. Then she recalled him gloating at Georges powerless on the bed and him pinching her cheek and telling her not to worry about what was going to happen to Georges. She felt certain in that moment that Roman had killed Georges: he’d been dumped at the bottom of a river or chopped into two or three sacks for a garbage-truck mangle or incinerator, never to be found again. And all of this was just a pretence to throw her off the scent. He didn’t want any possible leads back to his connection.

But how long was that going to last? At some stage he was going to panic that with her knowing about the sex sting with Georges, she could provide a lead back. And that would come sooner rather than later if Azy let slip to Roman that he’d seen her get in Georges’ car that night. She’d be next for the garbage sacks and incinerator!

Roman kept her dancing for him for four records in a row, and it was one of the hardest things she’d ever done. She was desperately afraid that he’d notice how nervous she was — a couple of times she’d had to lithely snake away from his hand in case he connected and felt her trembling — or how hard it was for her to force a smile and keep the small talk going. He stayed another twenty minutes nursing a brandy at the bar with Azy — all the while her panicking that Azy might mention about her getting in Donatiens’ car. Then as soon as he’d gone she headed for the bathroom and emptied her stomach.

She resolved then to leave that night: she couldn’t face Roman another minute, let alone night after night sitting like a caged bird waiting on when he’d finally decide to kill her.

She got clear of the club at 2.18 am, and forty minutes later she was packed and heading back out of her apartment to Mirabelle airport. New York, Atlanta and New Orleans were the best hubs for Haiti: the earliest she could get on was the 5.14 am to New York. Now the 12.10 pm from JFK to Haiti.

A smiling stewardess held out one hand for her boarding card and welcomed her on board.

Viana couldn’t resist one last glance back to make sure that she’d actually made it before returning the smile. ‘Thank you.’

Elena found her eyes drifting to different objects in the room as Sotiris Stephanou talked: a decorative plate with five different harbour and city views of Limassol, photos of a boy and two girls at what looked like their holy communions, a horribly syrupy wedding portrait in sepia with its edges fading into misty, heart-shaped clouds. Elena could still see the likeness in Sotiris of the young man he was then, but it was harder to discern in his wife Nana, now a good fifty pounds heavier, ferrying in with halva and cakes and a pot of thick strong coffee both to show good as a host and presumably the fuel to help her beloved recall events from almost thirty years ago.

Sotiris shook his head. ‘A tragedy. A real tragedy.’

Elena found it hard to catch up, assimilate it all. She’d been starved of detail for so long: twenty-nine years without hardly thinking about it, then the forced drought of the last days and weeks, and suddenly there was a torrent of information hitting her all at once. A car accident over twenty years ago, the boy’s stepmother Maria killed, his stepfather Nicholas — Sotiris’ younger brother by three years — heavily injured, the boy surviving with only minor injuries.

When Sotiris’ eyes had clouded with the first mention of tragedy and accident in the same breath, her heart fell like a stone thinking for a moment that her son was dead. She quickly masked her look of relief as Sotiris filled in the details, nodding in sympathy as Sotiris remarked what a terrible ordeal it had been for his brother and how he’d never really recovered from it.

‘Believe me, the last thing he wanted to do was let the child go. If he could have possibly avoided that, he would. But he just couldn’t cope.’

The second stone fall. ‘What — you mean let him go to another family?’ Elena’s voice was slightly high-pitched, strained.

‘No, that would have taken eight or nine months, even if at that age — little Georgiou was almost four by then — he could have been placed anywhere. And when the problem hit with Nicholas, it hit hard and quick. He felt he couldn’t cope another day, let alone months.’ Sotiris cast his eyes down, found it hard to meet her searching stare directly. ‘I’m afraid the only choice in the end was an orphanage.’

The third. But this time the stab of pain went deeper, made her feel emptier and number inside than a whole bottle of valerian pills. Her eyes shifted inadvertently to Lorena in the car outside. Oh God how she’d fooled herself. She’d clung to the false hope all those years that at least he might have had a good life somewhere, but in reality it had been little more than a living hell: one stepparent dead and then the other giving him away to an orphanage when he was barely four. Tears started to brim in her eyes and she kept her gaze turned away as she bit at her lip for more composure.

Sotiris still clearly saw her distress and tried to lighten the impact. ‘It was a very good orphanage — run by Gray nuns if I remember right. Nicholas visited a couple of times and it was a nice place, apparently. They were very kind, very caring.’

‘I don’t doubt that. But what I don’t understand is why your brother didn’t keep him.’ She’d managed to push back the tears, but still her voice was strained. ‘Why he didn’t at least try to make more of- ’ Elena broke off. Lorena in the car outside! With her explaining the reason for her visit and then Sotiris talking, she’d got carried away with time; at least half an hour had gone. She checked her watch: she should leave now for the session with Lowndes, but there was so much more she wanted to find out. ‘Look, I’m sorry about this — but my young daughter is in the car outside and she needs to be downtown urgently. Do you know of a good, reliable cab firm?’

Sotiris looked genuinely relieved at the shift to more comfortable ground, where he could also be more helpful: his cousin worked as a cabbie. ‘…I’ll make sure it’s either him personally or one of his close friends that he knows he can trust.’ You didn’t want a ten-year old girl jumping in any old cab.

Because it was a quiet time of day, they were able to get his cousin Dimitrios. He arrived in only four minutes and Sotiris gave him instructions that he was to walk the girl right to this doctor’s door and she wasn’t to be left on her own for a minute.

Elena told Lorena that she’d be there as soon as she could, twenty minutes or half an hour. ‘But if I’m late, stay right there at the doctor’s. Don’t go anywhere.’

In the four-minute wait for Dimitrios, Sotiris explained that his brother had been crippled by the accident. He wasn’t a permanent wheelchair case, otherwise he might have got permanent help — only one leg was affected. So he was allocated a home help two half days a week to take care of washing and chores, but the rest of the time he was on his own. He tried to cope, but what got him in the end was self-pity because with half a leg lost he felt that both his job prospects and his chances of finding another woman were slight. He felt that Georgiou needed a woman’s touch and love. And so he hit the bottle, decided to drown out what he’d lost and what he felt he could no longer provide for the boy. ‘…Within two months he was a hopeless case, and the orphanage became practically the only option.’

Sotiris waved one hand towards the photos on the side cabinet as they sat back down inside. ‘We would have gladly had him ourselves — but we already had three of our own, and money was tight. Very tight. I’m sorry.’

‘No, I understand. I… I suppose I’m just looking for others to point the finger because of my own guilt.’ She hadn’t told Sotiris that her baby had been practically ripped from her arms. She just said that she’d been under-age, there’d been a bit of family pressure and it had all very awkward at the time. Finally she made the decision to let him go. The wrong decision she felt years later with the benefit of hindsight — but she’d mainly blanked it from her mind and hadn’t troubled to look for him until now.

Her eyes stayed on the cabinet for a second: it was stuffed with silver and silver framed photos, with decorative plates dotted in-between, mainly from Cyprus and Greece. She saw only one from Canada: Niagara Falls. The cabinet marked the main separation from the dining-room beyond: dark wood furniture and still more decorative plates, an oil painting of a terraced olive grove and a dark velvet and silver-thread embroidery of the Acropolis. In contrast the lounge where they sat was modern: beige leather sofa, glass coffee table, and an abstract and a David Hockney print duelling from opposite walls. It was as if the dining area represented their old life in Cyprus and the lounge their new life in Canada; or perhaps Sotiris and Nana had already filled the dining room with family heirlooms, so the children took charge of the lounge’s decoration.

And she suddenly realized why she was so interested, sucking in every small detail: Sotiris had mentioned that his brother hadn’t lived that far away then, only eight blocks: she was trying to get some measure of what Georgiou’s environment might have been like those few years. She stopped the chain of thought abruptly, chiding herself. Only eight blocks, but a million miles in heart and spirit: stepmother dead and a stepfather intent on blotting out what little life he felt was left with drink. The only hope was that Georgiou had been too young to remember it all, that the scars wouldn’t have been too long-lasting.

‘We wondered at the time, didn’t we?’ Sotiris aired this more towards his wife than Elena.

Nana just nodded as she nibbled at some halva.

‘…There was all this talk about some problem with them having children and getting fertility treatment from some doctor in London…’

‘Dr Maniatis?’ Elena prompted.

‘I… I don’t remember. I’m not even sure they mentioned a name at the time.’

Maniatis was the only likely middle-man Elena could put between her father and the childless Stephanous. She nodded and Sotiris continued.

‘Well, anyway… suddenly there was a child. But the gap seemed to short, and we thought we would have heard something as soon as she was pregnant.’ Sotiris ran one hand through his thinning hair. ‘We guessed that they’d probably adopted, but we never stuck our noses in and pushed them on it. We thought maybe Nick had heard the problem was down to him and they were embarrassed to talk about it. You know, male pride and all that. Especially Greek male pride.’ Sotiris forced a weak smile.

‘And the new name, Stevens — my God we argued over that.’ The smile quickly died. ‘I told him he should be proud of the name Stephanou like I was, not try and bury his roots and his heritage. But he said that he wanted to make a fresh start, didn’t want to be seen as ethnic and have any possible discrimination that might hold him back — or his new son for that matter. We didn’t see eye to eye on that one, I can tell you: things were strained between us for quite a while.’

They were silent for a second.

‘What happened to your brother?’ Elena asked.

‘He met someone else eventually — about five years later. And a few years after that they ended up going to Cyprus to settle there. Too many bad memories here, I suppose.’ Sotiris’ eyes drifted slightly: melancholy at the lost years or something that would have been best left not recalled. ‘I think he felt a lot of guilt later about giving up Georgiou, but by then it was too late.’

‘Why — what happened?’ Elena’s interest was piqued, though the last thing she wanted was to empathise with Nicholas Stephanou, especially not on the guilt front. She surely had the market cornered there.

‘Well, not long after meeting this woman and finally getting his act together, clean of the drink once and for all — he went to the orphanage hoping to see Georgiou. But he was too late: he’d already left and been placed with a family.’

‘How long before?’ Elena’s spirits raised a fraction: maybe he’d had a more settled and happy family life the second time around.

‘Fifteen, eighteen months, I think.’ Sotiris shrugged. ‘I’m not totally sure.’

Elena calculated: three and a half years in the orphanage, almost eight years old before he was finally picked off the shelf again. She reminded herself that it would have been a far cry from the orphanages she was used to in Romania. If it wasn’t too austere or cool an environment, hopefully the experience wouldn’t have been… then quickly stopped herself again, realized she was just rationalising to ease the weight of guilt she’d felt settling heavier as Sotiris talked.

She checked her watch again: she’d covered practically everything, and Lorena would already be over halfway through her session by the time she got there. ‘Do you remember the name of this orphanage?’

‘I don’t remember exactly, but it’s in a small town about seventy miles up-Province… Baie de something.’ Sotiris pulled at the air with his fingers for the exact memory.

‘Baie du Febvre,’ Nana prompted.

‘Yes, that’s it… du Febvre. And it’s the only orphanage there run by nuns I would think — so it shouldn’t be difficult to find.’

Elena thanked them for the help and the coffee and cake, said that she’d better go. ‘Catch up with my daughter.’

As they were walking along the hallway, Sotiris commented, ‘You know, it’s funny, we had a man phone a while back asking exactly the same thing about where young Georgiou had gone?’

‘When was this? Did he give a name?’ Elena turned by the door.

‘Five, six years ago. He didn’t give a full name — just said he was Tony, an old friend of Nick’s from when he had young Georgiou. Said he was curious what might have happened to the boy, that’s all.’

Tony. Tony. Her nerves tingled, the name spinning in her head as she drove to Lowndes’ office… but she finally discarded it as a coincidence. Why bury the boy out of sight only to try and find him again years later? It made no sense. No, it was obviously just some other friend of the Stephanous.

Lorena was forty minutes into her session when Elena arrived and the receptionist informed her that Dr Lowndes thought it best that she not interrupt, he’d talk to her afterwards and she’d be able to listen to the tape. So she decided to use the wait with the receptionist to find out the name of the orphanage in Baie du Febvre. Eight minutes of leafing through Quebec telephone directors and two calls later and she had the name: Convent de St Marguerite. She phoned and made an appointment: 4.00 pm that afternoon.

Hanging-up, she tapped the details she’d scrawled on a piece of paper thoughtfully with one finger. With the nightmare saga from Sotiris, she was already regretting coming on this odyssey: her son’s real life was so opposed to the gloss image she’d fixed in her mind to help ease her guilt. She wasn’t sure she could face any more nightmare tales.

Michel Chenouda sat quietly as the three men the other side of the conference table leafed through the thick file before them, the exact same copy for each of them. He let out a quiet cough muffled with one hand at one point, then the heavy silence again: only the sound of flicking pages and the faint air-rush of the heating vents below the tinted-glass windows behind the men. The view was over Ottawa’s McArthur Avenue seven floors down.

The man at the centre, Superintendent Neil Mundy, silver-haired with sharp blue eyes in an otherwise nondescript rotund, ruddy face, was the first to look up.

‘So, your claim is that the Lacaille family organized this hit now on Georges Donatiens, who apparently worked as a money man for their organization?’

‘Yes, that’s right. It’s all there: dates, times, movements.’ Michelle pointed across at the file. ‘How they set it up is almost identical to a hit on Eric Leduc back in February, part of which was monitored by us during a surveillance operation.’

‘Yeah, I can see that.’ Mundy flicked back a couple of pages before returning to the place he held with one finger by Chenouda’s summary notes. ‘Pretty cheeky, huh? Right under your noses.’ Wry, awkward grimace from Chenouda, but Mundy rolled straight on without waiting for response. ‘And your reason for coming to us here now is that you’re afraid there’s a leak in your department?’

‘Yes, I… I think it was how the Lacailles knew about the set-up with Leduc, and perhaps also how they knew they’d have to jump quick with Donatiens.’

Mundy arched one eyebrow sharply, almost doubtingly, and as if to add support to what he was thinking at that moment, Inspector Kaufman to his right commented: ‘That’s quite a serious charge.’

‘I know.’ Michelle nodded and cast his eyes down for a second. ‘Otherwise I wouldn’t be here troubling your department with it.’

S-18. The Ottawa-based RCMP department you went to when you suspected internal corruption or an information leak and there was nowhere else left to go. Ultra-secret and the ultimate sanction over every other RCMP department. To Mundy’s left was Inspector Bob Welch, his first point of contact when he’d approached them.

‘You didn’t think this was something you could go to your department head with?’ Mundy checked the file for the name. ‘Chief Inspector Pelletier. Surely you don’t suspect he’s in on it too?’

‘No, I… well, I just don’t know. It could be anywhere up or down the chain from him, or sideways… I just didn’t want to take the risk.’

Mundy nodded thoughtfully. The questions continued for a while, mainly clarifying details already in the file — then Michelle was asked to wait in the adjoining annexe while the three discussed his request privately for a moment. Michelle waited almost another twenty minutes before Mundy finally reappeared with the good news: request approved. Michelle’s smile was slow in rising as he shook Mundy’s hand, the uncertainties that had settled during the wait finally slipping away. His first judgement had been right after all: the combination of such a large organized crime strike and internal corruption, S-18 would find impossible to resist.

Mundy passed him a sheaf from a notepad. ‘Phone this man at three this afternoon, Inspector Steven Graydon right here in Ottawa. I’ll have already spoken to him by then, so he’ll have been fully primed to provide the men and the back-up you need from hereon in.’ Mundy patted his shoulder and perfunctorily checked his watch. ‘And if we can move everything along as fast as I hope — perhaps we can aim to make an official announcement by say… ten or eleven tomorrow. Okay?’

Michelle’s step was light for the first time in weeks as he left the building. No more leaks or inter-departmental wrangling that he could see to stop him from now finally nailing the Lacailles. His only regret was that things might have been different with Donatiens; but with a game of chess this big, there were always pawns that ended up having to be sacrificed.