The Dead Letter (20 page)

56.

Ben had met up with Deputy Commissioner Bill Truman in the afternoon after completing his orientation sessions. Ben had wanted to drop everything when he learned of the forensics concern and book a flight back to PEI. Truman had talked him out of it.

“Wait 'til tomorrow,” he had said. “The results will have been processed by then, and you'll have a clearer picture of what you're faced with.” Ben agreed, but cancelled his appointments with CSIS, OPP, and Sûreté du Québec and arranged a flight home.

Truman invited Ben for supper at his home that evening, and they chatted about Ben's new position with the PEI government. Truman had a great laugh when he learned Ben got the job as a result of his association with old Bill Darby's niece and her entanglement in a bizarre case of blackmail, murder, counterfeit bills, and the intelligence community. Ben also laid out details of the current investigation that Anne had begun into the deaths of Carolyn Jollimore and Simone Villier. Ben mentioned Anne's suspicions and his. Truman looked thoughtful but said nothing.

The next day Ben and Bill met at an old watering hole. The location was Ben's third choice. The first, a hotel lounge they used to frequent, had been bulldozed and replaced by a condominium. The second had burned.

Choice number three, His Majesty's Horse, had been a traditional
British pub for many decades. In the early seventies, though, its
clientele had shifted from English transplants to Quebec activists and Irish immigrants. It was a peculiar mix unless one considered that the turmoil in Quebec and the “troubles” in Ireland shared a common goal: separation from the Crown.

The entertainers who played there shifted as well from Brit to folk, but the atmosphere remained rollicking. The sign above the pub remained, but the patrons never referred to it as His Majesty's Horse. Instead, the new clientele dubbed it His Majesty's Arse, with
the exception of people like officers Solomon and Truman who,
having sworn to uphold the constitution as well as the Crown, never felt comfortable referring to the place by its colloquial name. Instead, as a compromise, they called it The Horse's Arse.

Although Ben never shared the separatist goals of the clients, he did love the camaraderie and lively atmosphere, especially on weekends. This was not a weekend, nor was it the seventies. So Ben was disappointed to find the tables at the pub filling for lunch with suits and ties from the nearby government buildings.

Truman arrived a few minutes after Ben.

“Not the same, is it?” he said.

“Hasn't been for the last fifteen years, I guess. The most radical activity you'll find around here is some NDP volunteer spouting rhetoric about the evils of fracking. What time's your flight?”

“One forty-five.”

“Have you ordered?”

“Yeah, two specials on their way. That's what you always order, right? Or has the leopard changed its spots?”

“Some things change, some things stay the same.”

“Any developments?” Ben asked.

“It definitely was a bomb. A stick of dynamite, to be exact. With a blasting cap. No timer or remote detonator. A crude device wired to the exhaust manifold and cradled in a length of rubber hose to hold the heat from the pipe. When it hit 300 degrees, it would ignite. Your friend made a couple of stops. So it never reached its ignition temperature. However, the impact of the collision triggered the explosion. Blasting caps are sensitive to getting knocked about. It blew. At least, that's what the crime-scene investigators are suggesting. They're still following up on details and testing other bits of debris. That's about it.”

“Thanks for the help, Bill.”

“No problem, Ben. Glad to help, and I'll give our staff in ‘L' Division a personal call. You'll have their complete cooperation and be kept up-to-date on our end of the investigation.”

The waiter placed the bill on their table. Ben took a coin from his pocket.

“Call it,” said Truman.

“Okay, heads PEI wins, tails Feds lose.”

“With decision-making skills like that, you could have been a senator.”

57.

John Jacob Dawson slipped quietly through the front door and into
Irene MacLeod's boarding house. His backpack weighed heavily on his shoulder, and he headed for the stairs and his room. He heard the shuffle of Irene's slippers in the kitchen. Guilt and shame stalked him like a nagging shadow. He felt like a thief sneaking up the stairs, but he was at the end of his tether, and that was the stronger pull.

“Is that you, Jacob?”

He stopped cold. His throat constricted. He felt trapped but held on to a thread that gave him the strength of mind to answer and not to bolt up the stairs straightaway.

“Yes,” he said faintly, and again, more clearly, “Yes, it's me.”

“Sit in then. Lunch is on the table.” said Irene with a holler. “Hungry?”

He descended and slung his backpack into a corner of the sitting room. He smelled beef vegetable soup and followed the sweet aroma to a table in the dining room.

“A bit, maybe. Have to hit the books, though. Mid-terms next week.”

Jacob looked distracted and tired, and he fidgeted. He sat in front of a steaming bowl, a buttered biscuit on a side dish, but he sampled nothing. His spoon swam through the broth as if to dispel the heat. He took a taste or two and pushed it aside.

“I made a sandwich, too, if you'd rather that.”

Jacob didn't respond. His mind had drifted elsewhere.

Irene left the room and returned a few minutes later. She found Jacob still brooding.

“I guess I'm not hungry after all,” he said, pushing away from the table and getting up.

“I'll save it for a while. I can heat it when you're ready,” she said, then added, “Something bothering you?”

“I'm fine,” he said. “Just tired.”

He rose from the table, grabbed his backpack, and headed to his room. A few minutes later Irene heard a rumble of footsteps descending the stairs. It was Jacob. His face was twisted and ferocious when he confronted her.

“Where is it?” he demanded.

“What do you mean?”

“You know what I mean, goddammit. The bottle.”

“It's where it should be. Did you think I wouldn't recognize the clunk of a whisky bottle…or catch the signs of a dry alcoholic? I've been in this business for twenty-five years, Jacob. I've seen it all, and I don't put up with any of it. You know that.”

“Where is it? Did you pour it out? What'd you do with it? I need it.”

“I know you need it, and I will tell you where it is, but you don't need it this very instant. So, sit. I want a word with you first.”

Irene sat down at the table. Jacob remained standing. His fingers snaked through his hair frantically, and he spun full circle as if unable to find a way out. Then he just stood there in the middle of the floor, staring at Irene, and contemplating whether or not he should tear the kitchen apart looking for it. Irene remained calm and resolute, and then she began to speak.

“What's the first step to sobriety?”

Jacob was dumbfounded, then angry.

“What is this? Twenty questions?” he asked.

“You've taken it. You've been to AA in prison. You went to it in Nova Scotia, and you started here, too. So tell me. What's the first step? You won't find the bottle. I guarantee it…and I won't give it to you until you answer.”

“I admitted that I was powerless over alcohol…that it had made my life unmanageable.”

“Was that true?”

Jacob nodded.

“What changed you? How did you stop?”

“It's pretty easy in prison. The bars are closed.”

“No smart answers now. Something else. What was it?”

“I prayed.”

“Did that work?”

He nodded again, but again he became angry. “But seeing MacFarlane again was too much. Now I can't get him out of my head, and I just want to get blind drunk and maybe…forget him…for a while anyway. If I can't kill him, at least I can flush him out of my head.”

“Jacob, just think. Drinking and drugs isn't the way out. It's the way in. Think about it. Way back when, it was you that decided to get stoned. MacFarlane didn't make you do it. You did. You slid to the bottom. You got caught between a rock and a hard place, and you were so out of it you didn't know how you got there. You, not MacFarlane, are to blame. If he left you with a bad hand, it was because you dealt him the cards. You were so greedy for a drink that you even talked your way into a conviction. You did that, not MacFarlane.”

Irene paused to let her words sink in. Jacob sat, reflective and in pain.

“Who pulled you out of that awful hole, Jacob?”

“God,” said Jacob, his answer hovering somewhere between question and statement.

“He may have made the way easier, Jacob, but it was you, mostly you. God didn't make you a drunk any more than He made you sober. The question is… Are you going to let MacFarlane sucker you again…without putting up a fight?”

Jacob shook his head with a slight resolve. He took a deep breath and held it for a long time before he expelled it. His eyes had softened a bit.

Irene held out the telephone.

“Here,” she said. “Call your sponsor. If you still want it, the bottle's in the trash can on the porch.”

Jacob took the phone.

58.

Jacqui said nothing until they left the hospital and stepped into the
cab that was waiting for them. Ben's phone call just after noon still resonated in her ears. He had confirmed the lab results: a crude bomb had blown up her car. He told her to go home and stay there until he got back. She was considering it.

“What are we going to do, Mom?”

“Go home,” said Anne. “Just one stop first.”

The taxi took them to Kelly Rentals, and they completed their trip home in a late-model blue Ford sedan.

“Mom, I'm scared.”

“I know you are, and until this is cleared up, you can't stay here…or around me. It'll just be a couple of days. How 'bout Aunt Delia's? You liked visiting her there in the country, and it would be pretty this time of year.”

“I can't. I'm babysitting. I promised Madame Desjardins, and she's depending on me.”

“How 'bout Mary Anne's? She'd love to have you, too, and I wouldn't be far away.”

“Okay, but I promised Madame.”

“Great. Pack a bag. I'll call her and take you over. Lunch first, though.”

Anne took Jacqui to The Blue Peter. Mary Anne helped Jacqui gather up her things, and they headed toward a back room that served as Mary Anne's office.

Anne headed for her office, too. A small pile of letters had accumulated below the mail slot inside her door. She shuffled through them, looking especially for a letter of reinstatement from the Department of Labour, but to no avail. She hadn't really expected one. The rest she left unopened on her desk.

The thought that someone was trying to kill her had never left her mind, but she had avoided the subject and played down the gravity of the threat as long as Jacqui was around. Mary Anne had read that message in Anne's eyes, and she, too, had kept mum about it while the girl was there.

Now, alone for the first time, it was a time to make decisions and put together a game plan. Whoever had been tracking her movements throughout the investigation had attempted to cripple her progress and had been pretty successful. Anne was even uncertain whether Edna's withdrawal of support from the case arose from a personal decision or as the result of outside pressures.

Anne's options were limited. Legally, she couldn't engage a new client. Nor could she conduct surreptitious activities or follow up her previous case regarding the death of Carolyn Jollimore. What choices did that leave her? She could say “to hell with it” and violate the regulatory restrictions. The downside to that was the likelihood that she was still being watched, or tracked with new surveillance devices. If either were true, she would be stopped again pretty quickly, detained by the police, or worse.

Doing nothing wasn't an option. She was too pig-headed for that, and she knew it. Even thinking about doing nothing, willingly or not, made her angry and bolder. The trick was to do nothing, break no laws, get some answers, and not get killed. Piece of cake, she thought glibly. But how?

Then it came to her. Perhaps having no client presented another opportunity, not a road block. Technically, the Simone Villier murder had nothing to do with Carolyn Jollimore's death. Legally, she could still dig around in that backyard. No one could fault her for asking questions about a closed case, and it might prove useful to see what alarm another wild card tossed on the table would stir.

She picked up the phone and dialled.

“Bernadette? Billy Darby. I'd like to speak with you. It's important. Not over the phone.”

In her hurry to leave her office, Anne collided with the two detectives who had interviewed her at the hospital that morning.

Detective Iris Caine appeared to be the senior of the two. She did most of the talking. Detective Will Bryant stood behind her. Caine said they needed a word with her. Anne ushered them into the outer office and shut the door.

Caine had a long, though not prominent, nose and small eyes, which gave her a bird-like appearance. She stood six inches shorter than Bryant, but she moved with a muscle-bound stride.

“Do you know Michael Underhay, Ms. Brown…or is it Darby?”

“Yes, and I answer to both…my married and single names. Why?”

“He may have a role to play in the attempt on your life.”

“I can't see why. We have some serious history, but that was over a year ago.”

“What kind of history?”

“I had a valuable package from a client that had to be delivered. Cutter's men stole it. I got it back. He didn't like it, and a couple of his boys are doing time for a related abduction.”

“Anything else?”

“In the course of retrieving my merchandise, the bar he runs caught fire. It was closed for a month. He didn't like that either. What makes you think he had something to do with the explosion?”

“We viewed some surveillance videos of Victoria Row for the night of the break-in at your office. Underhay's Camaro was spotted on those tapes. It circled a couple of times.”

“Interesting, but I don't see a connection between him and anything that may have been in my office.”

“He and his gang have connections with Hell's Angels. They've used dynamite to settle scores in Montreal that way. It's a crude method, but they're not big on subtleties, and they're indiscriminate when they're targeting the competition or people who get in their way. It sends a big message.”

“It seems like a tenuous link.”

“We're still gathering information, but there is one more connection. The dynamite wired to your car was partly encased in a rubber hose. RCMP crime lab has just identified it as an old radiator hose. It came from a Camaro, same year as Underhay's.”

“Are you going to pick him up?”

“We will be…now that we have a motive. Revenge.”

Michael Underhay was a vicious sonofabitch, no doubt, but Anne never took him for stupid or ostentatious. He had always been more direct in his brutality, a hands-on kind of thug, but maybe he had changed. Maybe he was learning a new thing or two, Anne thought, as she drove across the bridge toward Bernadette Villier's home.

Anne didn't have to ring Bernadette's doorbell. She was watching as Anne pulled up, and she invited her in.

“Thank you for seeing me,” said Anne.

“You didn't give me much choice, dear. Your news sounded urgent and, frankly, you sounded desperate, too. Come in. Sit down.”

Hospitality was a time-honoured tradition in many homes, especially among older residents, and that was evident in Bernadette Villier's welcome. She led Anne into the dining room. Table was already set with a pot of tea, two china cups, saucers, and small silver spoons with an old pattern. Homemade sweets were stacked on the glass dish between them.

“Tea?” Bernadette asked. Anne nodded and thanked her again, and they sat. “Help yourself. They're fresh,” she said, pointing toward the pastries and scones.

It was evident to Anne that Bernadette wanted company. She was a working widow, childless, living alone with few relatives or friends to pass the time. So Anne hadn't the heart to rush her through the formalities of a tea and, for the next half-hour, Anne and Bernadette chatted about the fall weather, speculated on the severity of winter, and found a common thread in acquaintances they both knew slightly. Anne had felt the urge to brag about her daughter, Jacqui, but caught herself on two occasions. Instead, they ate sweets and lamented the doings of several local legislators and, at what seemed an appropriate lull, Anne shifted topic to more serious business.

“You were right earlier, Bernadette. My business is urgent, and I am desperate. In the last four or five days, several people have threatened me, my office has been ransacked, my business has been shut down…and yesterday someone tried to kill me…and anyone near me.”

“Oh my!” said Bernadette. The shift in topic from the mundane to attempted murder stunned her. She looked genuinely horrified.

“What made it even worse was that my daughter and her girlfriend almost lost their lives as well. All of this followed my investigating the connection between your daughter Simone's death and Carolyn Jollimore. Someone wants to stop me one way or the other, but now I'm running out of options. That's why I've come here today. I have to ask you to do something…something that will be extremely painful for you.”