Hound

by Ken Ogilvie

  Hound collapsed onto a heap of decaying leaves and stared at the huge beast. It raised its head, tilted its antlers back and trotted over a nearby ridge. Hound struggled to get up, but he slipped on the moist leaves and tumbled to the ground again. He caught sight of Matthew, doubled over in silent laughter.

  “Matthew!” Hound shrieked. “That wasn’t funny.”

  Matthew laughed aloud. “Truly, Hound. You are most fortunate.” They were the first words he had spoken, other than “run”.

  “Yeah.” Hound brushed at his pants and trudged over to his companion, glowering. “About time we went back to the shack, don’t you think?”

  Matthew scooped up his bow and arrows and set off through the woods, still chortling, with Hound trailing behind him, making as much noise as possible, so as to warn off any more moose they might encounter.

  By the time they arrived at the shack, the sky was dark and the woods were quiet.

  Hound caught up to Matthew and started to speak, but Matthew held up his hand. “I will sleep on the floor tonight,” he stated. “Tomorrow, we will talk.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Tuesday, October 2, 2007

  Jackie took two quick steps forward and fell to the ground. Her mother ran across and dropped to her knees at her side. She rocked Jackie tenderly, stroking her hair and crying.

  Cora came over to stand beside her. Laying a hand on her head, Cora spoke to her in one of the Iroquois languages. They carried Jackie into the house, and laid her down on a futon. Cora brought Lily a pinewood chair, and she settled next to Jackie, holding her hand.

  After a while, Jackie’s eyelids fluttered open and she gazed into the troubled eyes of her long-lost mother. She turned her head to look at Cora, who was standing in the doorway, smiling gently. For the first time in more than two decades, Jackie felt surrounded by love. Her mother leaned over and wrapped her arms around her.

  Jackie pushed herself upright on the bed, searching her mother’s face. “Why, Mama? Why did you leave me?”

  Lily turned and gazed through the window. Her shoulders sagged. “I have prayed for God’s forgiveness for what I did, and for leaving you at such a terrible time. The Jesuits taught our ancestors, the Hurons, about the sanctity of human life, and that only God has the right to choose our moment of death. I violated that sanctity, and I shamed them and myself.” Lily began to weep.

  “What are you telling me, Mama?”

  Lily released a long, shuddering breath. “I killed Steven Bradley. I was shocked and filled with rage at what he did to you.” She looked into Jackie’s eyes. “Yes, my daughter, I knew about it, although you refused to speak of it.”

  Jackie was stunned. All the people she’d murdered! All because Steven Bradley had sexually abused her, and took her family from her. She didn’t regret his death.

  “Mama, I love you,” Jackie said. “I too have killed, but I wanted revenge, and I couldn’t stop myself.”

  “I know, my dearest. And I am to blame. I fled from Conroy so that no one would find out what I did, so you wouldn’t have to bear my shame. That was wrong, and I will suffer in hell for my sins.” She hung her head.

  They sat in silence for a long time. Then Lily said, “After I killed Steven Bradley, I came to Cora and confessed my crime. She has sheltered me and helped me cope with my remorse. I was ready to kill myself, but Cora restored my faith in God. She made me realize how wrong it was to take another life, even my own.”

  “What will I do now, Mama?” Jackie said. “The police will come. They won’t stop searching till they find me. And when they do, if I’m here, you’ll be arrested, Cora too. But I didn’t know where else to go.” She paused. “The police will shoot me. That would be for the best.”

  “No, dearest, you mustn’t let that happen. You must turn yourself in, as must I. We will go together to the police. I, too, will confess. But we will never mention Cora.”

  Jackie thought about this. Her mother was alive. She loved her. And she had told her the reason why she had abandoned her. She no longer felt alone in the world. Still, she refused to surrender herself to the police.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  I feel awful. Dad and I aren’t talking, and I can barely see Mom’s face in my mind anymore. I have no friends and no romantic interests. Other than my job, I have nothing to occupy my thoughts except my mission to catch her murderer.

  — From the diary of Rebecca Sarah Bradley (May 26, 2006)

  Monday, October 1, 2007

  A few hours after booking into the Royal Oak Hotel, DI Sykes phoned Rebecca and invited her to join him in the lounge. O’Reilly had led Chad and Hadi off to Georgie’s Pub, planning to put down a pint or two and plough into a hearty dinner. O’Reilly claimed that Georgie’s meals beat anything the Royal Oak could produce.

  On her way to the lounge, Rebecca tried to tell herself not to get her hopes up too much. After all, Sykes hadn’t said what he wanted to talk about. It might only be something to do with her job, or to fill her in on Hound’s childhood. It might have nothing to do with Sarah, or her killer.

  In the lobby, she spotted Sally Partridge floating in through the front entrance, humming as if she didn’t have a care in the world. No doubt she was here to start her afternoon shift.

  “Hi, Sally.” Rebecca made an effort to sound nonchalant. “Still no sign of Hound?”

  “Not a whiff, Rebecca. Gone to earth somewhere in the wilds again, I’ll bet. Such a strange man. I adore him, though. Life in Conroy would be boring without Hound around to liven things up.”

  Rebecca smiled. Hound was far and away the most intriguing person she had ever met. Besides his lengthy forays into the woods, and that eerie cave of his, he also had artistic talent. She thought of the intricate wood carvings in his house, and his stunning replica of Sherlock Holmes’s living room in Baker Street. Rebecca wished he was here now. She was convinced that he was the key to finding the elusive Jackie. “I’ll be in the lounge with DI Sykes,” she said. ”If you hear from Hound, or get any news of him, please tell us. We need his help.”

  Sally gave Rebecca a big hug, then she went to the front desk to relieve the woman on duty.

  Rebecca continued into the lounge, where she found Sykes slouched in a wingback chair. A second chair had been dragged over to face it, with a small round table between them. He waved her over.

  “I’ve ordered a pint. The waiter will be here shortly.”

  “Wine for me today,” Rebecca said. “Although whisky might be more suitable. I’m just beginning to understand how frustrating a homicide investigation can be when things aren’t going well.” She clapped her hand over her mouth, realizing how insulting that sounded. He grinned as though her comment amused him.

  The waiter arrived with Sykes’s beer and took her order for a glass of Chardonnay. Sykes shifted in his chair. “By the way, the autopsy results on the farmer’s wife are in. The woman had a weak heart and must have died of fright when Jackie threatened her. Damn shame.” He shook his head and looked down at the carpet. Rebecca sensed him ordering his thoughts, as he often did before speaking. He was going to talk about her mother.

  When the waiter had come and gone, Rebecca took a sip of wine and braced herself. What was he about to say?

  Sykes leaned forward and formed a steeple with his fingers. “I’m ready now.” He inhaled slowly. “What I’m going to tell you, Rebecca, is part fact and part speculation. It’s about your mother, but you know that.”

  “Sarah,” Rebecca mumbled. “You called her Sarah once.”

  “I suppose I did.” His face softened. And was he blushing?

  “Go on, please.” Rebecca fought an impulse to shake him. She’d never seen him so hesitant. She felt her own cheeks flushing.

  After a moment, Sykes eased back in his chair. “Damn it all. Why am I beating around the bush like this? I’ll just lay it on the table and we’ll go from there. The first thing for you to know is that Sarah and I were lovers.”

  Re
becca turned away, finding it hard to meet his eyes. She hadn’t anticipated this.

  “I’m sorry to hit you with it like that.” Rebecca turned back to him. “I just couldn’t figure out how to tell you in a roundabout way. I’ve been worrying about this moment from the day you joined the OPP. It’s one of the reasons I did everything I could to avoid talking to you, and, I’m ashamed to say, keep you out of the CIB.” He seemed relieved to have said it. “Once you’ve digested that stunning bit of news, I’ll tell you more.” He grabbed his beer and took a large gulp.

  Rebecca struggled to compose herself. Before Sykes volunteered anything else, she wanted answers to the things that had bothered her during the McBride investigation — in particular, the relationships between her mother, her father, Sykes, Maggie, and Archie MacDougall. She sipped at her wine, studied the glass, and said, “What did you do for my father when you worked for him? You did work for him, right?

  “Yes, Rebecca.” Sykes chuckled softly. “For a decade or so. Until a year before I joined the OPP, I worked in the security branch of the Bradley Gold Mining Company, dealing with employee misconduct, such as fraud in the accounting and finance departments, as well as high-graders stealing gold from the mining operations. As you know, those things happen frequently, and the perpetrators can be quite creative. I was good at sussing them out. Maybe too good. Digging too deeply can sometimes unearth very awkward issues.” He stared across the room, closing his mouth as though he’d said too much.

  “Why didn’t I see you around Prospect, or at my home, if you and my mother were so . . . ?” She balked at saying ‘intimate.’

  “Because I was seldom in Prospect,” he said. “The accounting and finance operations were based at company headquarters in Toronto. Then there were one-off investigations that I undertook first at the Prospect mine site, and then elsewhere as your father’s mining empire grew. Most of the employees had no idea what my job was, nor did the Prospect townsfolk. I didn’t live there. Instead, I shared a flat in Toronto with another employee.” Sykes took another mouthful of beer.

  “That headquarters employee,” Rebecca said. “It was Archie MacDougall, right?”

  “Correct again. We became best friends, or perhaps I should say, second best. Archie was intensely loyal to your father, and still is, whereas I broke rank a few times and defied His Majesty. Whenever I confronted him, I fell out with Archie, although not for long, until your mother was murdered. After that, we had nothing to do with each other for sixteen years. Abigail McBride’s murder brought us together again, in a way. Archie is still devoted to your father.” Sykes frowned.

  Rebecca recalled her father’s concern when she’d called to tell him someone had stabbed Archie in the neck and hit him on the head. Both of those wounds were inflicted by Jackie Caldwell. The menace in her father’s voice when he asked Rebecca who had done it, frightened her. By then, she had figured out that Archie wasn’t just another employee. “Tell me about Sarah.” She almost touched his hand, but then thought better of it. “Anything that might help me find her killer. You don’t have to talk about your affair if you don’t want to.”

  Sykes raised his thin shoulders. “I’ll skip telling you about it, at least for now. In any event, I was on an overseas assignment when Sarah was murdered. I came back to Canada and rushed to Prospect as soon as I heard, but your father ordered me to stay clear of the police investigation. I defied him and checked into the murder in my own time.” He sighed heavily. “I had to, you see.” Rebecca understood his grief all too well. She had suffered the same for sixteen years. She felt herself drawing closer to this complicated man, and at the same time turning away from her father.

  “What did you find out?” Rebecca leaned forward, her throat dry. She took a mouthful of wine, and then another, until the glass was almost empty.

  Sykes appeared to be wrestling with indecision. Then he blinked rapidly. “Of course, Rebecca. I owe it to you.” He took a breath. “I found out that your father was embroiled in a love affair of his own at the time of your mother’s murder. I don’t know if his affair had anything to do with it, but I do know that he didn’t tell the police, and he must have sworn anyone in Prospect who knew about it to silence. As you know, most of the townsfolk depend upon his goodwill, one way or another. Anyway, I confronted him, and he challenged me about Sarah. We were at a stalemate. To my lasting regret, I didn’t report either affair to the police. I had no evidence to link your father’s affair, or mine, to the murder, so I let it go.”

  Rebecca was certain he had more to say, yet he seemed loathe to continue. “Please don’t quit on me now,” she urged. “You haven’t given me much to work with, beyond my father’s affair. And your own affair with my mother might have been a motive for him to murder her. But you’re not going to tell me who his affair was with, are you?” Rebecca stared at him. “In any event, you were wrong to dismiss it. It will be difficult, if not impossible, for me to ask my dad about this relationship. He’ll refuse to answer my questions. He’s refused to discuss anything even remotely related to Sarah’s murder, and the townsfolk clam up every time I ask them about her. So I don’t know how to proceed.” Her voice quavered.

  Sykes got to his feet and paced about the lounge, his head bent in his customary thinking pose. After a while, he came back and stood in front of her. “What perplexes me most of all is my conviction that Archie MacDougall knows things about the murder that he won’t divulge, maybe even who did it. When I pressed him on it, we had a falling out that persists until today. You see, he knew Sarah before she met your father, but I only knew her as his wife. Their relationship had always felt strained to me. In any event, Archie was in Conroy when she was killed. He accompanied your father to the house, after the police called to break the news.” There was a sudden catch in Sykes’s voice. He hesitated, and then seemed to reach a decision. “You should know that Archie was, and still is, your father’s ‘fixer,’ if you know what that means. Your grandfather’s too, although I always had a feeling that Archie didn’t care much for him.”

  “No, I don’t know what a fixer means. Tell me.”

  Sykes lowered his eyes to the floor. “All I’ll say, Rebecca, is that whenever your grandfather, or your father, got into trouble, Archie was called in to sort things out. He protected both of them and settled whatever liabilities they created. He’s not a bad man, you know. At heart, he’s a fine person, but sometimes loyalty can be carried too far.” Abruptly, Sykes pivoted on his heels and headed towards the lounge exit.

  Taken aback by his abrupt departure, Rebecca called out, “Tell me more, DI Sykes. I need to hear it all.”

  He halted with his back to her. “My apologies, Rebecca. I can’t go on. I’ve said too much already, and I’ve given you some valuable information to work with, even if you may not understand it yet. I’d prefer to see what you uncover by yourself before I say any more. I don’t want to bias your thinking — you should understand that from your work in homicide. There are things I don’t know, and matters that I won’t disclose unless you open the door to them. Some of the information I’m holding back isn’t pleasant. It may not be linked to Sarah’s murder, and it could be dangerous for you.” He strode from the room.

  Rebecca was left feeling confused and angry. She wasn’t sure what to do with what he’d given her, but she decided to place her trust in him. She would do some further digging on her own, and then come back to him with whatever she found. After thinking about what to do next, and coming up with nothing, Rebecca went to the front desk to chat with Sally. She might not be the most observant person in Conroy, but she was refreshing to talk to, and she might know some things about Archie MacDougall that could help Rebecca understand him better. From what Sykes had told her, Archie could be central to unlocking the mystery of Sarah’s murder. It was becoming increasingly obvious to Rebecca that her mother’s death wasn’t a random act of violence. There was a reason for it. Rebecca’s intuition told her that Sykes had an idea of who’d do
ne it, although it was a mystery why he wouldn’t share his suspicions with her. She couldn’t believe that her father had murdered Sarah. Nevertheless, Sykes had indicated that George Bradley was involved in something covert, and possibly illegal.

  Rebecca resolved to find out more about Archie’s close relationship with her father, and to confront them both about her mother’s death. Maggie Delaney might be a prime source of information, although it wasn’t clear what she could add to the puzzle. Rebecca recalled the conversation she’d had with Maggie two and a half months ago. She had referred to her father in the past tense, as though he was no longer alive. Rebecca now realized that she’d been talking about her affair with him. It had ended badly, at least where Maggie was concerned.

  Rebecca decided it was time to figure out what had been, and apparently still was, going on in her shady family, including Steven Bradley’s gold mining scam. She wondered if there was more to it than just bilking money from the townsfolk.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Wednesday, October 3, 2007

  On the Tuesday night, Hound suffered through another night of fitful sleep in Matthew’s shack. He wished his friend had taken the tiny cot and ceded him the floor, where he could have stretched out and maybe slept for a few hours, rather than tossing about, vainly trying to find a comfortable position.

  It was pitch black inside the shack, and all he could make out was the dark shape of Matthew on the floor beneath him. He had the feeling that his friend was wide awake. Hound figured his friend knew some things about Jackie that the Conroy townsfolk didn’t. She bothered him. It wasn’t just her ability to evade the police and her extraordinary skill with a rifle. Most of all, it was her unflagging loyalty to Kingsley McBride. Why was she so devoted to him?