by Warren Court
Armour look at the photos around the spot where the Housen photo had been. He saw a photo marked 1989. A group of teenage boys were playing basketball and there in amongst them going for a three pointer from the key was a young Sergeant Kenny. Armour speculated that Barbara Housen was probably in the crowd watching her beau make that shot. Perhaps even a freshman Truscott girl.
Next to that photo was one of a group of girls in dark blue, one-piece swim suits, with white bathing caps. They were on the deck of an indoor pool, standing and kneeling in two rows of five. The photo was labelled Girls Water Polo 1982. He searched the faces but Barbara Housen was not among them. Armour remembered trying his hand at that sport, though he loved to swim he found the rough and tumble aspect of that game took all the fun out of it and he quit the team.
There was a coach next to the girls, a very attractive woman who couldn’t have been more than late twenties. She was in a t-shirt and short shorts, nice looking thighs, a full head of blonde hair done like that famous photo of Farah Fawcett that wound up on posters on thousands of adolescent boys’ bedroom walls. He looked closer at the woman. There were no names on the photos but he recognized her. It was Cynthia Graham. “Nice,” he said to himself. Lester Graham had been a lucky guy snatching up a beauty like her. He realized it was the same woman as the one in the Barbara Housen soccer team photo. She had coached that too. It made sense.
“Can I help you?” It was a woman’s voice, an adult. Armour didn’t even have to turn to realize that.
“Hi,” he said. “I’m interested in registering my daughter for the next semester.” He turned and saw the same woman who had been teaching math. She had a student with her who looked pale and about to throw up. Armour was five feet away but he could smell booze coming off the young girl and looked shocked at the state she was in. The math teacher realized this.
“I’m taking Miss Parker here to the office, her father is coming to get her. I can show you the way if you’re lost.”
“No, that’s okay, I was just there. I’m leaving.”
Armour strode out the back door, the one he had come through that night the kids broke in. He could feel the math teacher’s eyes watching them, then he heard a retching sound and the teacher say, “Oh Jessica.”
37
“Armour what is it?” Melanie asked.
Armour was looking out her front window. She came up behind him and put a hand on his shoulder. He swirled around fast, a shocked look on his face.
“Welcome back,” she said.
He smiled weakly.
“Where were you just now?”
“Huh. Oh. I was just thinking of someone.”
“Oh,” Melanie said.
“I met her out there, on the Scotch Line road.”
“I see.” She removed her hand from his shoulder but did not walk away. Her face showed genuine concern for her friend.
“I’m worried about her. Her husband beats her. He is a dangerous man.” Armour hoped she would say something but she was silent.
“I’m so confused about this whole thing, Melanie. I was sure the security guard was the killer. Now he’s gone and I’m no closer to the truth. He was killed by the real killer.”
“Who may or may not be the Truscott killer,” Melanie said. “You don’t know for sure what was going on.” Armour reluctantly nodded.
“Then I met this woman and as I got to know her I thought maybe her husband was capable of it; killing the security guard. But something doesn’t fit right with it,” Armour said.
“Doesn’t sound like concrete proof.”
“I know, I know.” Armour walked back into the center of the room and slouched down on one of Melanie’s chairs.
“There’s so much swirling around in my head. That song, the spell. I tried to recreate it. I drove up and down the Scotch Line road humming that tune. Nothing.”
“Maybe you should stay away from there for the time being. I mean seriously, what else is there to be learned?”
“But if this woman’s husband is the killer then I have to go back. To get her out of there.”
Melanie sat down and fiddled with a magazine on the coffee table then looked straight up at Armour.
“Did you sleep with her?”
“What makes you say that?”
“Woman’s intuition.”
Armour looked away and then back at Melanie.
“I thought I felt something for her. I knew she was married but she’s so alone.”
“What’s her house like?”
“Small. Two-bedroom farm house, it’s tiny really.”
“Then it can’t be her husband. You would have seen evidence.”
“I would have?”
“The Sanders girl was found two years after she was abducted.”
“Yes.”
“You told me the cop told you she had suffered horrendous abuse. Constant abuse.”
“Yes, he thought she was working as a prostitute.”
“Or she was held captive for all that time.”
“What?”
“Yes, Armour, it happens. That mad man in Germany. Those girls just found and released in Cleveland, I think it was.”
“I’m not familiar.”
“No, I guess you’re not. Modern news stuff, Armour. Don’t you see how your lifestyle hinders you sometimes?”
Armour nodded. Then he said, “But the Truscott girl was not held captive, was killed within an hour of meeting her killer, that’s the general assumption.”
“I’ve been thinking about that. What if that was just a spur of the moment thing? He had tried before?”
“Barbara Housen,” Armour said.
“Yes, his first clumsy attempt. She could have stopped him right there if she hadn’t been hit by that car and lost her memory. So, he waits a couple of years, the urges build and then he goes for it again and succeeds. But it’s not enough for him. The thrill is fleeting. He wants it to last longer. What if he tries again with Sanders. Has her for a while.”
Armour had a sour look on his face.
“I know, it’s horrible but what if that’s what happened? Till one day she sees a way out. An escape. The ultimate escape, death. He has to get rid of the body, dumps it on the same road. Why, who knows?”
“There is one person who is connected to this whole thing,” Armour said.
“Who?”
“Sergeant Kenny, the cop. He dated Housen. They went to high school together. He was there the same time as the Truscott girl, only two or three grades apart. He may have known her. And we have a picture of him at the Sanders scene. But he’s a cop now.”
“Armour,” Melanie said. “It’s not that farfetched. Cops do bad things all the time. He might be the key you’re looking for. Do you get any sense that it’s him in the car with you during the spell?”
“I can’t be certain,” Armour said. “Anyways, I think he’s had his fill of me. He’s certainly not going to just up and confess. Quite the contrary. Somebody moved Bill Powers’ body, who better to clean up a crime scene than a cop?”
“Go see him,” Melanie said. “I can’t believe I just said that.”
“I don’t know where he lives.” Armour then had a thought. “But I could find out.”
“He won’t be in the phone book, cops have unlisted numbers. My cousin is a cop,” Melanie said.
“That’s not what I had in mind.”
38
Armour caught Gim in front of his house pushing a dark grey garbage bin on wheels to the curb. It was a good reminder to Armour that he had to do likewise and put his own garbage out. He figured there were things in his fridge that were getting past it and had to be tossed. A glass bottle of milk that was looking a little chunky, some left over steak from the previous week. He silently admonished himself for letting everything slide. The power of these spells had taken over his life – damn he hated them.
Gim saw Armour walking towards him and stopped what he was doing.
“Evening, Gim.�
��
“Mr. Black.”
Armour wasted no time, mostly because he didn’t want Gim’s parents to look out a window and see the two of them talking. Dr. Muthukarma’s car was in the driveway. The garage door was open and Mr. Muthukarma’s BMW was parked inside.
“Do you still have the access into the Ministry of Transport?”
“I do. But it’s dangerous. You go to the well once too often… that’s how my associates get caught.”
“Associates?”
“Fellow hackers, we’re all over the world.”
“I need the address of somebody who is not in the phone book. I have their license plate only.”
“So, follow them home.”
“That would be unwise. Reason he’s not in the phonebook is that he’s a cop.”
“What is the license plate?” Gim said with a sigh.
Armour pulled out his notebook and ripped off Kenny’s plate number.
“Come back in an hour.”
“Okay thanks, Gim.” Armour turned to leave.
“And please, another hundred.”
“Gim,” Armour said. He really couldn’t afford it and besides they were friends.
“Fine, this one is on the house. But we need to come to some sort of arrangement,” Gim said.
“I might start charging you to fish on my property.”
Gim smiled. “Yes, but I don’t need to fish.”
Armour went home and sure enough his fridge needed a good cleaning out. He quickly put the compostable garbage in the new city-issued green bin and pushed it to the curb. Then he sat on the damp cushions of his porch swing and waited. Using the soft glow of light from his living room he checked his watch every ten minutes. He waited an hour and ten minutes for good measure walked back up to the Muthukarmas’. Gim came out of the dark garage.
“I printed it out. I am shutting down the connection for now. Need their logs to cycle over, so they don’t spot anything.”
“I understand,” Armour said unconvincingly.
“I doubt that very much, Mr. Black.” Gim handed Armour a single sheet of paper, at the top of which was a printout of Kenny’s vehicles and address. In addition to the pickup truck Armour had seen him driving, the police sergeant owned a 1966 Chevy Impala. Nice car. But it was Kenny’s address that interested Armour. It was listed as 216 Cumber Road, Cordroy, ON. Armour was unfamiliar with Cordroy but there were a lot of hamlets and small towns in southern Ontario.
39
The next morning Armour drove out to Port Dover. He had been out here so many times in the last week that the drive seemed to take no time at all – funny how that was. He had tried to find Cordroy on his map without luck, but that didn’t mean much. It may be a town in name only. Maybe smaller than Nanticoke hamlet. He pulled into the gas station at the foot of Main Street in Port Dover and filled up. The long-haired kid behind the counter shook his head when Armour asked him about Cordroy.
The OPP detachment was just up the street so he headed in that direction. Kenny’s pickup truck wasn’t in the staff parking spots and admittedly Armour was relieved. He didn’t need a psychic ability to tell him that Kenny had grown weary of the amateur sleuth from Hamilton poking his untrained nose into his town’s past. But he would have to get past that if he was going to ever solve this case and banish the spells back to where they came from. Kenny was a key player in this, at least in Melanie’s mind. And now Armour’s too.
Armour stifled a yawn. He hadn’t slept much the night before, tossing and turning. Thinking about this murder case one moment, a bruised and battered Cathy the next. But mostly what had kept him up was the look on Melanie’s face when he had confessed to her that he had been intimate with Cathy. That might haunt him most of all.
The spots in front of the coffee shop were taken which was usual. One spot held a gorgeous big blue vintage car with white vinyl roof. Armour parked the next block up and walked back. He intended to sit down and enjoy his coffee and slowly, eventually work his way in to talking to some of the townsfolk, the regulars. One them was bound to know where Cordroy was.
Armour saw the phone booth outside the coffee shop and remembered Powers had used it. To call the blackmailer, Armour presumed. Then he remembered he had the listing of Kenny’s house in his pocket and pulled it out. It had his phone number. He had been leery of calling Kenny from his own house, he knew that Kenny would be able to trace it. But from this phone booth, he could just hang up. At least he would know Kenny was home before he drove all the way out to Cordroy, wherever that was.
Armour plopped a loonie in and dialed the number.
A recording came on. We’re sorry your number is long distance and cannot be completed as dialed.
Armour fished around in his pocket but didn’t have any more change, just a couple of tens and fives. He’d have to get some change. He hung the receiver up and out plopped his loonie. Armour held it in his hand. A loonie. A single loonie. He remembered Powers plopping a loonie in the same phone. The call he made had been local. The killer he was blackmailing was right here in town. The call couldn’t have been to Kenny’s house. And Powers wouldn’t have called a cop at work to blackmail him. Powers had been an angry and frustrated man but he didn’t come across as stupid. Armour felt dizzy and held on to the phone. Things started to swirl in his vision. Christ, not here. He still held the phone’s receiver in his hand.
We’re sorry, please hang up and try your call again. We’re sorry…
Armour was in the car. Passenger side. The wipers were going swish swish, swish swish. Buckets of rain coming down on to the windscreen. He saw the arm, it was slender and brown from the sun and it reached and turned on the radio. That song, it filled Armour’s head.
There was humming, then a high lilting voice. It wasn’t coming from him though. He could see things clearly, the person sitting in the driver’s seat.
Armour came out of the spell with a shout. Remarkably he had not fallen down onto the pavement but instead had just slumped against the phone booth. The receiver had slipped from his hand and was swinging from its cord. He could still hear the operator’s recording, we’re sorry, please try your call again.
“Mister you alright?” a woman’s voice said.
“You drunk mister?” A man’s voice.
“Alright, back off, back off. Give the man some air.”
Armour recognized the voice as things started to come into focus. It was Sergeant Kenny. He placed his hand under Armour’s armpit and helped straighten him up.
“You hit your head?” Kenny said. Armour rubbed it.
“No, don’t think so.”
“You fainted,” Kenny said.
“Yeah, guess I did.” Armour looked at Kenny. He was in civilian clothes, jeans and a dark blue windbreaker. He held a steaming cup of coffee in one hand. He must have been in the coffee shop while Armour was using the phone booth.
“You’re not at home. Phoning you would have been a waste of money,” Armour said.
Kenny gave him a funny look. “If you’re alright I have to get going.” Kenny stepped down off the curb and went between two cars. He took his keys out and opened the door of that big blue classic.
“Nice Impala,” Armour said, not recognizing the make and model of the car but remembering the vehicle registration.
“Thanks. Where’s your Model T?”
“Down the block.”
“I’m off to a car show, you should swing by.”
“It’s not just for Chevy guys?” Armour asked. He remembered what the real estate agent had said about Ford guys and Mopar guys sticking together.
“No, it’s open to everyone. As long as it’s an American brand. Ford, Chevy, AMC, Mopar.”
“AMC,” Armour said.
“Yes. Pal of mine has a nice little AMC Pacer.”
Armour went as white as a sheet and Kenny saw it.
“You sure you’re okay?”
“Yes,” Armour said. “I can’t make the show, I have something to do
.”
“Okay, another time then.”
He stood there and watch Kenny fire up his Impala and slowly pull out. The sergeant chirped the tires a little driving away.
“Something I have to do,” Armour said again under his breath.
40
Armour rang the bell and there was a fumbling of the dead bolt and slowly the door opened. Lester Graham poked his head around it at waist level, he was in his chair.
“Mr. Graham,” Armour said.
“You again. This is beginning to be a bit of a pain.”
“Can I come in?”
“My wife isn’t home,” he said.
“It won’t take a minute.”
“I guess.” Graham opened the door and wheeled his chair over to the elevator. Armour took the open door as an invitation to come in and he followed Mr. Graham down into the den.
Graham wheeled over to his easy chair and picked his cane off the end table. Armour went over to the wall of photos.
“You never had any kids?” Armour said.
“No,” Graham said. “We tried. Didn’t work out.” He was thumping his wooden cane against the side of his chair.
Armour nodded his head, aware of the contradiction. Remembering the diapers he had carried in for Cynthia. The noises from the top floor of the house.
“What’s this all about?”
“The day Detective Burke came to your plant. What did he ask you, if you had any employees who had a small, foreign looking, brown car?
“Look, I told you everything I remember.”
“Burke really came to see you. He didn’t know it at the time, all he had was a lead on a small brown car with a local steel worker’s sticker on it. He knew which plant to come to. You directed him to Powers. Pretty quick thinking on your part.
Graham was silent.
“Sure, Bill Powers had a Toyota Corolla, possibly even the same sticker on the back of it. But Bill Powers had an alibi, he was on the line at the time of the murder. Not an easy thing to get out of to go do a killing. From the plant to the Scotch Line road is a fifteen-minute drive and that’s driving fast. Fifteen minutes there, fifteen back. That’s half an hour. Not counting the time to find a victim, abduct her. Have your way with her. Armour turned and watched Graham’s reaction. Nothing. The old man was staring out the window, clutching his cane. He turned back to the photos.