Until the Night

18

CARDINAL WAITED FOR DELORME AT the end of the alley where it opened onto College Street. She arrived in a cab, which was itself unusual, and there was something else about her that seemed a little … off. He could not have said exactly what it was.

“Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Well, you’ve been calling in sick and—”

“Who called this in?” Delorme headed down the alley toward the lights.

“A teaching assistant who came by to pick up some term papers. Hayley knew she was coming. When she got here, she found Hayley’s bike lying in the alley and no sign of her.”

“How’d they know to call you?”

“I used to work with Art Drexler, the lead guy at 52 Division, a century ago.”

They were waved past the crime scene tape and Cardinal introduced Delorme to Drexler. He didn’t waste any time on preliminaries.

“Don’t bother with the bunny suits, we’re just about done here.”

Two cops were loading a woman’s bike into the back of a van.

“That’s hers,” Cardinal said. “It looks like she never made it into her apartment.”

“She didn’t,” Drexler said. “But he did.”

He led them up the fire escape to a door on the second floor. Inside, the scene people were collecting their markers, putting camera gear away, snapping cases closed.

“I asked the wizards to leave some stuff out for you to see. First of all, check out her land line.” He picked up the handset, which was wrapped in clear plastic and dotted with print powder, and pressed a couple of buttons. “It’s got an automatic message retrieve function. I’m putting it on speaker.” The phone beeped a couple of times and a synthetic voice said there were five old messages. Drexler skipped four of them. “Students and TAs. But get this.”

Hi, sweetheart, it’s me again. Why can’t I get you on your cell? I suppose you were in class. Listen, I know you said you don’t want anything to do with a bodyguard, but I’ve gone ahead and contacted a company anyway. Their top guy will come around in person tomorrow morning at eight-thirty.

“That’s Ronnie Babstock,” Cardinal said to Drexler. “I know him.”

“He saw this coming?” Delorme said. “Why didn’t he call us?”

It’s crucial that you listen to him, the message went on. These people know what they’re doing and he won’t waste your time. If you have any reason to fear for your safety—anything untoward—call the police. And tell them to call Detective John Cardinal at the Algonquin Bay police. Hayley, please, please, be careful.

“Looks like someone else picked up that message,” Drexler said. “Also, take a look at this.”

Someone had scrawled a number on a small notepad next to the phone.

“79,” Delorme said. “Could be anything. Is it her writing?”

“Not enough there to be definitive,” Drexler said, “but the sevens and nines in her chequebook are quite different.”

“We had numbers at two other scenes,” Cardinal said. “25 at one and 45 at the other. We’re not a hundred percent sure about those either.”

“Well, I think we can be reasonably sure it’s not an address where we can find him,” Drexler said.

“No, but it might contain some other information.”

“You’re with 52 Division?” Delorme said. “I don’t suppose you ever happened to work with a guy named Loach? He’s with us now.”

“Ugh. You can keep that prick.”

“We might have got here sooner,” Cardinal said, “but Loach has got everyone running in circles.”

“Chasing this,” Delorme said. She pressed the Play button on her phone and the mysterious caller told them in thick French-Canadian tones that he would soon strike again.

Drexler’s face changed. “That’s your suspect?”

“It’s Loach’s suspect.”

“Caller have anything not general knowledge? He mention any of your holdbacks?”

“Yeah, he did,” Cardinal said. “He mentioned those two numbers, 25 and 45, in an oblique sort of way. We don’t know how he got them—obviously a leak somewhere. It’s not that chasing down the voice is insane, it’s just—”

“It’s just not good prioritizing. That’s Loach. Also, you’ve got a leak. And Loach, you may have noticed, is a real motormouth. Has a habit of yakking to people off the rez.” He turned to the last remaining member of the scene squad, who was waiting by the door with hands folded and head bowed. “Jackson! Sorry! You guys can go. We’ll be along in a minute.”

When the scene man was gone, Drexler said, “I don’t normally bad-mouth a former colleague, but in Loach’s case I’m making an exception. The thing about Loach—well, there’s a lot of things—but thing number one is, he gets something in his head, it don’t leave.”

“We noticed.”

“Thing number two, Vernon Loach is not a team player. You have a big success, Loach is its daddy. No one else had anything to do with it. Thing goes sour, Loach had nothing to do with it.”

“Our D.S. is pretty dazzled by the Montrose case,” Cardinal said.

“I can’t blame him, way it played in the media. But Montrose got cleared because two dozen detectives worked nights and weekends to follow all the boring little details that make a good case. Plus we got lucky—Mr. Montrose having used a firearm that matched a case from eight years ago.”

“Was it Loach followed that up?” Delorme said.

“It was me. But it coulda been any one of us. I can’t tell you the number of court cases went belly up with Loach. Chain-of-evidence crap. Witnesses who didn’t pan out. My blood pressure’s going up just remembering.” Drexler laughed. “And the whole time he’s yapping about how his ship’s about to come in.”

“At the moment,” Delorme said, “he seems to be expecting a CBC biography or something.”

Drexler shook his head. “It makes you want to roll on the floor laughing. Except it also makes me want to cry. I can’t say I ever hated Loach. I try not to hate anybody. But a lot of people did. In particular, a sergeant named Chuck Rakov. Rakov used to make fun of him all the time. To his face. Refused to take him seriously. Eventually, Loach got him fired on some trumped-up thing—actually got the guy fired—which as you know is pretty near impossible to do. Listen, come on down to the div with me. The others should be wandering back with their reports, and you may as well get the stuff first-hand.”

Drexler was everything Loach was not. He brought everyone to order quickly. He had Cardinal and Delorme stand up when he introduced them.

“Hayley Babstock was abducted in our town and this is absolutely our case,” he told them, “but these two detectives are our total allies. They know way more than we do at this point, and I’ll have them run through it for you once we get everyone debriefed.

“Now, there was a number written at the scene that may or may not be in this maniac’s handwriting. That number is 79. Cardinal and Delorme are telling us there were numbers found at two previous scenes. Those numbers are 25 and 45.”

“Could be a combination,” someone said. “To a lock of some kind.”

Someone else suggested a computer key or maybe a password.

“It could be a lot of things,” Drexler said. “We’re going to have to brainstorm it.”

Detectives got up one after another and gave a summary of what they’d found. A security camera across College Street had picked up a white van leaving the alley. They had a techie trying to enhance the image so they could pull up a licence plate. But the alley had two other exits that were not covered by any kind of surveillance.

Cardinal got up and told them what he knew so far. When he was done, someone asked where he thought the perpetrator might be headed.

“Possibly Algonquin Bay—he’s killed two people there so far, including one he abducted from Ottawa. But his first victim was in Parry Sound. So, other than that … somewhere cold. Right now I’m working on the theory that this series of killings is aimed not at the victims themselves but at their husbands—or in this case, her father. All of these men worked together years ago, and all of them have managed to keep that fact quiet up to now. The minute I have any more, I’ll let you know.”

“For our part,” Drexler said, “I want to put everything we’ve got onto narrowing down that white van. I want every one of those neighbours questioned in detail. Keep in mind it’s likely this guy was hanging around scoping the place out, possibly following the victim. Somebody had to see him.”

As his team scattered, Drexler took Cardinal and Delorme to a meeting room where a sleek black computer with an extra-large screen was set up.

“Gimme one minute,” he said, and left them alone.

They sat in silence. Expensive equipment everywhere, and all the furnishings of a much higher grade than they were used to. Chouinard is right, Delorme thought. We’re not Toronto.

“It’s good to have you here,” Cardinal said.

She looked at him. “Right.”

“I don’t like it when you’re not around.”

Delorme didn’t feel like saying anything. Or maybe a lot of things. She became aware of a sudden longing for sleep. She wanted to be unconscious. She could see Cardinal was in full terrier mode, ready to go all night.

Drexler came back and stuck a flash drive into the computer. He picked up a wireless keyboard and put it on his lap. A couple of clicks and the screen lit up with a blur of people. Much clinking of glasses, laughter, lots of people talking at once. One voice skimmed above the rest.

“That’s Loach,” Delorme said.

No, I was talking with their backroom boys—they’re seriously considering getting me to run.

Drexler grinned. “Hasn’t changed, right? But watch—sorry about the quality. Guy who took this was hammered, obviously. Interesting thing from your point of view is, it’s not Loach …”

The image blurred and swung once more, coming to rest on a bulldog of a man in a houndstooth jacket and cap.

“That’s Chuck Rakov. Bit of a clown, Chuck, but a solid investigator. Definitely someone you want watching your back.”

Rakov put a phone up to his ear. That’s right, honey … The Prime Minister … I know … Yeah, me personally. Gotta go.

“Great mimic,” Cardinal said, getting up. “Guy should be on late-night TV. Listen, Art, is there a desk I can take over for a few hours?”

“Hang on, hang on. You gotta see this.” Drexler was fast-forwarding in jerks and hops. “Here we go.”

A lot of shouting and then Rakov, still wobbling on his chair, launched into a new voice. I’m tell you the troot—for shore! We get to de address and dis lady, she and ’er ’usband are sitting side by each on da porch swing. And da guy, he’s got no clothes on—nudding!

Cardinal and Delorme looked at each other.

“That’s the guy,” Delorme said. “He’s the damn caller.”

Drexler froze the image. “Loach annoyed everyone he worked with. As I’m sure you know.” He pointed the remote at the screen. “But I guarantee you, nobody hates him like Chuck Rakov.”

Drexler found an empty desk for Cardinal to use, and Cardinal stayed there after Delorme had gone back to the hotel and Drexler had gone home. He looked at the brochure he had purchased from the eBay brothers: the four young men and their prototype robot. Eventually the clatter and hum of the big-city police station vanished and he focused on the task before him.

He began working the search engines, beginning with Arctic, crime, 1992. With each response he narrowed it down a little more. LARS research, robotics. That didn’t get him anything useful. Finally, he typed in murder, Axel Heiberg Island, and that brought up a JPEG of an old clipping. RESEARCHER ACCUSED OF MURDER IN DRIFT STATION DISASTER.

The article was brief, but a quick scan of it gave Cardinal enough names and dates to hone his search even further. What the bizarre story boiled down to was this: an enraged researcher’s murder spree had been foiled only by the sudden disintegration of their camp on an ice floe. Cardinal had a dim memory of the events—very dim indeed, because that summer he had been working on an extremely difficult case of his own. And yes, Catherine had been hospitalized at the time. He had had no spare attention for cases thousands of kilometres from his jurisdiction.

Axel Heiberg Island was in the northern territory of Nunavut. He would have to wait until morning to call their corrections department. He switched off his desk lamp, left a note of thanks for Drexler and headed for his hotel.

It had been snowing for the past fifty or sixty kilometres. Big lazy flakes in no hurry to hit the highway. They swirled in the headlights and around the side windows and stuck to the windshield, except for the smeary arcs left by the wipers.

The traffic had thinned and he hadn’t seen a single patrol car since Toronto. The girl was silent in the back and appeared to be in no distress. His main concern was catching the turnoff. Many of the signs were obscured by clinging snow. Eventually it came up on the right, and he saw it in enough time to signal and slow and make the turn.

Different road, different journey. Narrower—thick trees pressing up close—darker. No ploughs had been through, and the snow was falling more heavily now. Visibility dropping.

It would be fifteen or twenty minutes on this road, then one more turn. Beyond his headlights, blackness. No other headlights anywhere. He switched on the dome light and looked back at the girl. Still out cold. The sharp turn hadn’t woken her, nor the new roughness of the ride.

He didn’t know what hit them when it hit. He didn’t even hear it. As he turned back from looking at the girl, the windshield came in on him and the van went into a spin. He couldn’t see through the shattered glass and the wheel was slick with blood. Chances were good they were going to flip, but somehow the wheels held as they turned and turned.

Durie’s eyes were blind with blood and he had no idea which way they were headed as the van spun or, when it finally came to a stop, which way they were facing.

His head was a sphere of black cloud and he couldn’t think. He held his eyes closed against the blood, and when he tried to wipe them, his arm was stopped by something. There was no pain, but he considered that might just be a matter of shock. He was over on one side, something pressing heavily on his hips and legs. The driver’s seat was totally disarranged, he could feel that much. Tilted way back so that he was nearly falling into the back of the van.

There was a snuffling sound from somewhere. He craned his neck to see forward. Windshield shattered and dark. Strange shapes bulging over the passenger seat. Antlers. That snuffling sound the beast’s dying breaths.

The pressure on his side was the airbag.

He thought the girl should be all right, he had strapped her down pretty well. He forced his left arm free and wiped some blood away. Yes, she was twisted around a little and the blanket had been thrown clear, but otherwise she looked okay.

He reached for the passenger seat and pulled but didn’t get anywhere. His fingers found the seatbelt buckle and released it and he managed to drag himself nearly free. Blood all over him, but that could be the animal’s. The snuffling had stopped.

Slam of a car door.

Durie reached for the glovebox, opened it and pulled out the Glock. He freed the last of himself from the airbag and opened the passengerside door and crawled out of the van hands first, snow a cold bracelet on each wrist.

“Ho-ly Christ,” someone said, “are you all right in there?”

Durie heard no footsteps. He grabbed the door handle and pulled himself up, breathing hard. He pushed the gun into his coat pocket but kept his hand on it. The grip was sticky with blood.

Leaning against the van, he hobbled to the back end of it and shielded his eyes against the man’s headlights, and now his flashlight.

“Holy Christ,” the man said again. He stood still, shining his light. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah.”

“You’re covered in blood.”

“Moose blood. I’m okay.”

“The moose ain’t. That’s the third one this year.” He gestured with the flashlight. “There anyone else in there?”

“No.”

The man moved toward the van. It was on the side of the road, at an almost perfect right angle, with the dead moose half sunken into it.

Durie gripped the Glock in his pocket. His head was clearing a little, but even so, he was not seeing a wealth of alternatives.

“Not that big,” the man observed, “as moose go. Van’s a writeoff. Tell me what you need outta here.”

“Leave it,” Durie said. “Just take me somewhere.”

The man pulled at the side-door handle.

“Leave it,” Durie said.

The man pulled again and the door slid back. “What in the hell?”

He stepped back and looked over at Durie standing in the headlights.

He leaned back into the van, and when he came back out he said, “Girl looks okay, but she’s out cold. You must of incurred a head injury, mister—you said there was no one in there. Shouldn’t let people sleep in the back like that, even if they are strapped in.”

He reached into his pocket.

“Don’t.”

“I gotta call an ambulance.”

“We don’t need an ambulance.”

“I’m gonna call.”

“Just help me get her into your car.”

“No way. I’m not gonna risk moving an unconscious person.” The man held his phone out at arm’s length to shade his eyes. “Okay? Why don’t you go siddown in my truck, eh?”

He held the phone to his face to dial. The screen lit up his features—doughy, harmless, middle-aged—and a surrounding nimbus of falling snow.