The Reluctant Detective

by Finley Martin

  “What on earth are you talking about, ‘not regular’?” she asked, a little annoyed that he was taking so long to say nothing.

  “It’s not your run-of-the-mill counterfeit.”

  “Anybody listening to you would think you overdosed on that cheesecake and were slipping into a coma. Spit it out, Ben.”

  Ben wasn’t about to be rushed. In fact, he stretched out the vague preface to whatever he was going to say even further. Using Anne’s complaint as a starting point, he ruminated on the lost virtues of patience and cool-headedness, all the while staring off into an empty corner, as if he were talking out loud to no one but himself. Anne knew Ben was baiting her and, if she wanted to find out what he had to say, it was better to let it go, she thought. She did. She let him have his fun. And it worked. When he realized that he couldn’t get a rise out of her, he got to his point.

  “Those bills you deposited in the bank the other day, they weren’t just good. They were damn near perfect.”

  “Well, that’s interesting,” she said, and she tried to look interested in order to humour Ben, but she couldn’t imagine how the difference between a good counterfeit bill and a great one had anything to do with her. Anyway, she already had more than enough real problems to deal with.

  Ben looked pleased at Anne’s show of interest. She leaned forward on the table, and that encouraged him to go on.

  “He called them ‘supernotes,’” Ben said.

  “Wait a minute. Who are we talking about here?”

  “The teller. The one who caught the counterfeit notes in your deposit. He used to work at the foreign currency clearinghouse at the bank’s headquarters in Toronto. He retired, moved to PEI, and got bored. He took a part-time job with your bank.”

  “You were investigating me?!” she cried. Now Anne was leaning very forward over the table. Her elbows and hands were poised as if she had planned to jump over the table at him. Ben leaned back, a concerned look on his face.

  “Take it easy,” he said. “You’d already been brought in by the Mounties. They were digging into your background, probably following your activities, could have tapped your phone for all I know. Who better to look after your interests?”

  Anne loosened her grip on the table and slumped back in her chair. Ben continued on.

  “Anyway, the Mounties don’t own this investigation. They just think they do. Arrogant bunch, some of them.” Ben’s eyes searched the ceiling for the broken end of his train of thought. When he found it, he continued on. “Oh yeah, the teller. He got pretty good at spotting counterfeit. They had special machines to detect it, but his eyes got good, too. So did his sense of touch.”

  A waitress swept in and filled both their cups with coffee. Ben added a double cream and sugar.

  “So he could feel a difference in the texture of these supernotes,” Anne concluded.

  “Actually, no,” said Ben. “It was the same paper the Bureau of Engraving uses. Seventy-five per cent cotton and twenty-five per cent linen.”

  “It can’t be the same,” said Anne.

  “You tell me. Supernote paper, he said, even incorporates coloured micro-fibres, a thin security thread marked ‘USA 100’ in microprint, and a special watermark.”

  “I thought that paper was impossible to get,” said Anne.

  “It is,” Ben replied, “but that’s not all. The quality of the printing’s as good as the real stuff.”

  “Real paper and a quality printing press. That’s a great combo if you’ve got good plates, too.”

  “The peculiar thing about that, says Mr. Bingham – he’s the teller – is that there’s only one press that can produce that quality. It’s Italian. Giorgio or Giorio or Gloria in excelsis something, I can’t remember, but it costs upwards of 50 million for one new. Maybe 30 mill for a used one at the Thrift Store.”

  “Who can afford that kind of start-up?”

  “Your guess is as good as mine. You could buy a lot of politicians for that much dough, and probably get a bigger return on your investment.”

  “I guess that explains why the US Secret Service parachuted their boy in from the embassy.”

  “Get a jump start on a lead,” said Ben.

  “I don’t get it, though. If the paper is perfect and the printing is flawless, how did Bingham spot it as phoney?”

  “He couldn’t see any flaws, and he couldn’t feel any, but he flashed it with an ultraviolet light. Some banks use them to check for fake Canadian bank notes. Bingham does it just for fun, like those guys who go out with metal detectors on weekends. When the UV light hit one of the hundreds, some numbers disappeared.”

  “So you’re saying that the engraving was faulty.”

  “No, Bingham said that the engraving was second to none.”

  Anne’s face clouded with bewilderment. Perfect paper, perfect printing, perfect engraving. An enormous bankroll to get things rolling. Obviously top-notch technical support. A huge operation. And they screw up on something as basic as an infrared or UV scan?

  “That makes no sense whatsoever!” she blurted out.

  “Absolutely none,” said Ben, and an enormous Cheshire cat grin played out across his face.

  42

  An overcast sky drew a blanket of night more quickly over the city. Eight-thirty and it was already dark – dreary, too, in spite of the festivities ramping up around her. Confederation Landing Park and the entire waterfront area were bustling with Canada Day crowds. A large stage had been erected in what had been a parking lot behind the green lawns and flora-lined walkways running to the water’s edge. All afternoon musicians had entertained, local bands and lesser-known pop groups had performed earlier in the day, and headliners would take the stage after the fireworks scheduled for nine-thirty.

  Peake’s Quay lay at the west end of the park. It was a collection of gift shops, snack bars, and craft stores housed in structures resembling the fishermen’s shacks and bait sheds typical of the Island’s coastal villages. A lounge and restaurant rose up in the centre of that collection, and tourists and visitors dining on its second-floor balcony had an unencumbered view of the floating docks and boats in the marina below, as well as a stunning view of Charlottetown Harbour over which the fireworks would soon be launched.

  Anne sat alone on a bench below the restaurant and lounge, and near the boat ramp. She could see the dock where she and Sean McGee would exchange the suitcase of money for Dit. The boats and docks of the marina were gated off to the public, but the gates weren’t locked, and anyone with enough boldness could walk in and look at the cruisers and sailboats close up with little or no scrutiny.

  Anne arrived early for the switch. She scouted the area closely and hoped to anticipate any undesirable surprises Sean and his crew might throw into the plan. The hand-off would happen at the end of the first dock. It was in plain view. That made it an unlikely spot for some kind of double-cross, but vengeance couldn’t be too far from his mind. People like him never forget, forgive, or let things go. The only obstacle that might rein back his baser impulses was a witness or two, and they were plentiful here, even within the gated-off dock area, where many boaters and their guests sprawled across decks and cozied up in cockpits, drinking beer, sipping wine, and digging into plates of finger food.

  Anne looked around for Ben. She couldn’t see him, but she knew he was nearby, somewhere, out of sight. He had listened carefully to her plan over dinner the night before. He had said it was a good one but insisted that someone back her up. False pride shouldn’t rule common sense, he had said. If the police depend upon back-up, he reasoned, shouldn’t she consider it, too? He offered to help even though it was his scheduled day off. Just a friend helping a friend, he said.

  Anne accepted his offer, but she pretended to be reluctant to do so. It was a matter of pride, but in her heart she realized that he was right. Acting alone could prove to be a re
ckless move on her part, and having someone share the risk would double her chances of success. That brought some consolation because it was Dit’s well-being that was in jeopardy, maybe even his life.

  So Anne waited on the bench, the suitcase beside her, feeling a bit lost, like a tourist waiting for a bus and worrying if she were at the right station. At quarter to nine, Anne picked up the suitcase and passed through the gate to the docks. The floating docks gave slightly under her weight. The chains linking each platform clanked. Her sneakers padded over the wooden planks. Every berth at the marina was filled with a vessel, some with people aboard. Giggles, the mutter of conversations, the clank of beer bottles, and swells of laughter echoed from corner to corner. She saw few of the noisemakers until she was almost upon them, and few of them noticed her as she passed in the darkness.

  At the end of the dock she set the suitcase down. It was the same one that she’d taken from Cutter at the Hole in the Wall; it carried the same bullet hole in the side panel; everything was the same except for the contents. She’d switched the Client’s counterfeit with Dit’s replica bundles. She figured that McGee or Cutter could be duped, especially in the reduced light of the marina. The Client wouldn’t be taken in so easily.

  Anne stared toward the water, then turned slowly around and watched the silhouettes etched against the fake fishing shacks on the landing and the dancers and diners on the balcony of the restaurant above. She didn’t know from which direction McGee would come. Perhaps he was among them. Perhaps he was in a boat berthed at this very dock. Maybe he was watching from the near edge of the park. She faced back toward Charlottetown Harbour. A stone breakwater stretched across the marina’s entrance. A blinking white beacon marked the entrance. Through the opening Anne saw the running lights of a dozen boats. They were drifting or anchored nearby for a clear view of the festivities.

  The red and green lights of one of those vessels grew larger and brighter. It was approaching the entrance. Just inside, it idled, the engines emitting a gentle burbling. It lost headway and stood motionless as if hunting for an empty slot to pull into or searching for the fuel dock to gas up. Anne heard a muted clunk. The boat shifted into gear and swung around, its bow pointing out again. Another clunk. It edged back until it was abreast an empty sailboat. One of the crew reached out, grabbed a stanchion on deck, and held his boat in place without tying up. Another crewman stooped over, clambered across the deck of the sailboat and jumped onto the dock. It was not until then that Anne realized that any escape route had been cut off. If these were Cutter’s men, then she was trapped at the end of the quay.

  The outline of the figure that swaggered toward her was tall and muscular. Heavier than Sean McGee. Taller than Cutter, and half a man lighter than the Bouncer at Cutter’s club. Before he got too close, he pulled a neck scarf over his nose to hide his face. Darkness hid the pattern of his tattoos.

  “That the money?” he asked, no threats, no bravado, just business.

  “Yes. First, where’s Dit?”

  “In the box,” he said and pointed to a large plastic cooler strapped to the swim platform on the stern of his cruiser, a Chaparral.

  “How do I know he’s okay?”

  He snapped his fingers a few times. A crewman hammered on the box and said something she couldn’t make out. Then she heard a muffled shout that she recognized as Dit’s voice.

  “Get him out of there,” she said angrily.

  “The money,” he said, motioning with his hand.

  Anne passed him the valise. He popped the latches, cradled the valise in the crook of his arm, and lifted the lid. He peered in, shuffled a few bundles, locked it again, and leapt from the dock to the sailboat. Two strides and a jump brought him onto the deck of his Chaparral. Anne thought they were going to bolt, and she was about to shout for help, when a blade glinted in his hand, and he cut the straps holding the cooler. He signalled the driver, who hit the throttle. The Chaparral lurched forward, the stern dug in, and the cooler slid off the swim platform and into the water.

  The cooler floated and bobbed a few times. Then it became unstable and rolled. The hinged lid opened with Dit’s weight against it and water surged in. The harbour seemed to swallow the cooler. It disappeared, Dit Malone still inside.

  43

  Ben had been watching Anne from a second-floor-balcony table of the restaurant. It overlooked the marina. From there he had been keeping an eye on Anne, waiting on a bench, the valise beside her. She looked small and young and as anxious as a waif running away from home. The sight of her there, and realizing what she had gone through so far, disturbed him. He was damned if he knew why she took over Billy’s agency. If it wasn’t craziness, he didn’t know what it was. Maybe some side effect of Billy’s death had set her off. Maybe it was some women’s lib thing. It was beyond his understanding. He admitted that, but he had done his best to discourage her. He had gotten her a job, one that anyone else would have jumped at. He couldn’t tell her – or for sure she would have turned him down – but the job was hers for the taking. Not that he had pulled strings, but he had convinced the right people that she was perfect for the position. And after all that, it looked like she was going to pass on it.

  The waitress brought a smoked meat on rye sandwich. He ate the slice of dill pickle first. He sipped his beer. Then he dug into the sandwich. He wanted it to taste like those he remembered from Montreal or Ottawa, but it didn’t. He finished it anyway, wiped mustard from the corner of his mouth with a paper napkin and watched Anne make her way to the head of the dock.

  When he saw a boat moving in, he pulled a small pair of binoculars from his pocket and focussed on it. It seemed to stall near the breakwater. A blinking white navigation light lit up the boat’s registration number. He jotted it in his notebook, just in case. Then he hurried down the restaurant’s steps and walked slowly toward the docks. He could just distinguish Anne’s silhouette from the other shadows. For not more than a minute, the boat slipped out of sight. Then he heard the roar of its engine. It sped away too quickly, he thought, and that was enough to send him running along the dock toward Anne.

  Anne watched in horror as the container that held Dit disappeared beneath disturbed black ripples of water. She leapt aboard the empty sailboat to get closer. Then the cooler bobbed up and rolled again. Dit’s head broke the surface. He sputtered and coughed, choking on the sea water. He seemed disoriented. Anne reached out toward him, but it was too far. She grabbed a boat hook lying on the floor of the cockpit. The shaft was about five feet long.

  She shouted, “Dit! Over here!”

  His arms flailed the water. He had no sense of direction in the darkness. At first he began to make for the flashing beacon on the breakwater, but Anne’s shout turned him around. He did not appear to see her, but she extended the boat hook as far toward him as she could. When he felt the hook graze his shoulder, he caught it, and she pulled him toward the dock.

  By that time Ben was at her side. He hauled Dit by his underarms onto the dock. Dit lay there retching and gasping. His right eye was black, swollen shut, and dried blood caked his hair. Ben said nothing, but he knew that Dit had taken a bad beating and probably had been kept isolated in that box for some time. On his cell phone he called for an emergency vehicle, no lights, no siren.

  “Dit, are you all right?” she asked frantically. He didn’t answer. He just lay there.

  “You can’t stay here,” Ben said. “You’ve still got work to do.”

  “But Dit...?”

  “He’ll be all right. He’s hurt a bit. Exhausted. But nothing serious. Don’t worry. I’ll take care of him until the medics get here. But there’s going to be a commotion in a few minutes. A lot of gawkers wantin’ to see what happened, and one of them might be your Client. If he sees you, it blows the set-up.”

  “Are you going with him to the hospital?” she asked.

  “No. I’ll call Sarah. She’l
l want to be there. I’ll stay until the medics take him away. Then I’ll be keeping an eye on you. Now, go! Sarah will keep us updated.”

  Once he’d hauled Dit onto the dock, called EMS, and sent Anne away to prepare the trap for the Client, Ben phoned the police dispatcher who transferred him to the harbour patrol vessel.

  “Harbour patrol, this is Sergeant Solomon, Charlottetown PD. I have a partial registration on a Chaparral cruiser... sierra tango four niner seven. It left Peake’s Quay marina at high speed maybe three minutes ago. Two men aboard are suspects in a kidnapping. They may be armed, and they may try to dump some evidence, a medium-sized brown suitcase. Over.”

  “Roger that, Ben. We caught them on radar when they left. They’re still a blip on the screen, but it’s dark and they’ve got a pretty good head start. We’re in pursuit. If they don’t take cover along the shore, we’ve got a chance. Over.”

  “Do your best, Danny. This one’s special. Over.”

  “Roger, Ben. Harbour patrol out.”

  Even without emergency lights and siren, two paramedics rushing through the mass of people gathering for the fireworks drew stares and interest. Small groups assembled on the walkway that bordered the marina and looked down over it, but the drama was short-lived. The paramedics were quick to load Dit aboard a stretcher and move him to the ambulance. After their departure, Ben looked around for Anne.

  The gazebo where she was to meet the Client was a stone’s throw from the marina. It formed part of several walkways that followed the shoreline from the marina to the commercial wharves four hundred yards away. The walking paths had a nineteenth-century look to them. They were paved with antique brick. Period lampposts lit the way. Varnished wood benches with heavy wrought-iron frames were set at comfortable intervals. Most of the walkways had short runs before a turn. That gave the park an intimacy. Adding to that effect were the gardens that bordered them. Red and white rose bushes and plots of yellow lilies added colour to the sugar maples above them. Farther on, the path led through cedars and lilacs, pussy willow bushes, and thick pines. On any summer day, one could feel alone there without being so.