by John Farrow
He had all these questions. And many more.
He threw his bags into the front-end trunk of his VW Bug. Clambered in behind the wheel. Deep breaths. Pulled out of the motel lot and headed for town.
He soon had company. Two bikers on his tail. They had a few opportunities to kick it and go around but declined to do so. When he slowed, they did so, too. They weren’t generic enthusiasts or geriatrics on Hondas. A clear look in his rearview mirror confirmed they were full-patch members of the most notorious biker gang and one of its most deadly chapters on the planet.
Another pair pulled out from a service station down the highway and rode on ahead of him. No coincidence, he speculated. Easy to assume that they meant to be intimidating. They were good at it. They stuck precisely to the speed limit. Traffic was busy enough approaching town that a chance to pass never came up. Usually he had double lines and when he didn’t, oncoming vehicles foiled the attempt. The bikers took no obvious interest in him, but two in front, two in back, by design, posed a threat. In the habit of entering the penitentiary in recent days, Cinq-Mars had been locking his service revolver in the glovebox of his car, which is where it was now. Out of reach and locked in. If he was forced to pull over, he’d have to stop, pull the keys from the ignition, unlock the glove box, retrieve his weapon, insert the keys in the ignition again, start up in case he had to step on it, and hope that he did all that at something approaching the speed of light.
Now ten. Six more bikers pulled out and fell in behind. The sound of their engines reached jet-like decibels. A saving grace occurred when the town limits rose up to greet him – he welcomed the safety of population. The bikers slowed to fifty kilometers an hour to suit the new speed limit, and Émile Cinq-Mars slowed his Beetle accordingly.
He parked alongside the hotel in the center of town. All ten bikers did so as well, demonstrating that those ahead and the two groups behind were in this together. He retrieved his weapon, casually, no rush, and clipped the holster to his belt. As he exited his car and heaved out his bags, the others took no interest in him. He found that conspicuous by itself, the way they expressly paid him no mind. Cinq-Mars walked past them to check-in to the hotel where he hoped the love of his life was waiting. If she was waiting. If she was the love of his life.
And how was he going to win her over with all this scruff around …
Checking-in was perfunctory and quick, but Sandra had not arrived. Highly worrisome. He felt his heart lightly pound. He ditched his bags in his second story room, then waited for her in the street-level bar.
The presence of the bikers invoked danger into his liaison. If Sandra did arrive, he should perhaps dispatch her home. That they were ignoring him was no consolation. He knew that bikers didn’t threaten. The ride-in aside, they either went after you or they didn’t. But what did they have against him, other than his investigation which was going approximately nowhere? He reminded himself that bikers had always kept a victim’s family out of their actions. They knew that attacks on family would provoke a more concerted response from the authorities, so they simply didn’t go there. All things considered, he and Sandra should be safe.
All things considered, he wanted her to show up.
While he sipped a cold beer – which, after his day, felt miraculous – the bikers in their grungy pose were checking-in as well. The hotel manager came out to assist a disconcerted clerk, and the man’s consternation was apparent. He was not going to deny them entry – he was neither that brave nor that foolish. Paul Lagarde was not among the visitors. Cinq-Mars recognized none of the men as having stayed down the road a few days ago. Curiously, they were bereft of girlfriends, which suggested they had an agenda that excluded their molls. Cinq-Mars returned to ruminations aroused by the beer and the next time he looked up Sandra stood before him, three feet away, all smiles and beautifully brown quizzical eyes, a travel bag gripped in each hand.
‘You’re here.’
‘You doubted me?’ she asked.
She could fluster him so easily. ‘No, I—’
‘I did,’ she said. ‘I never thought. I got to the border with my dog—’
‘You came with a dog?’ He really did not know her well.
‘Sandy, my golden retriever. Sandy, Sandra, get it?’ She finally put her bags down. ‘Anyway, I got to the border and didn’t have the paperwork for the dog. Her shots, etcetera.’
‘Oh no.’
‘I mean, Canada really is another country. I don’t know what I was thinking. Then all this talk about the dog among the guards in French, of course, a language I haven’t spoken since university, and I’m like, what? Am? I? Doing? Here?’
‘Do you always take your dog on a date?’
‘Stop. This is a trip. It’s like a vacation, only not to any part of the world you’d visit on vacation. I don’t mean Canada. I mean Joliette. What’s jolly about it? First impressions, anyway, I can see why they chose this place for a prison. I mean, you don’t need to do a thing, right? No walls. Just put people here, it’s like jail. Anyway, long story short, I have friends in Vermont, fifty miles from the border. So fifty miles back there, drop off Sandy, fifty miles return trip to the border, and here I am, late, and without my doggie protector and why, tell me, is this hotel loaded with bikers who look like they want to kill me for breathing too loudly? Or only for breathing?’
He laughed. He loved her spiel. He loved her. He saw that she was nervous about all this, too, but he was so delighted to see her and now relieved that, if they slept together, it would only be the two of them, no dog.
‘Let’s get your room straightened away.’
‘It’s reserved, right?’
‘Right.’
‘Then finish your beer, Detective. Tell me, do you always wear a gun on a date? I’ll have one, too. Not a gun. A beer. I need a cold one. I passed a dozen bar salons along the way and was tempted. Neon signs advertising naked girls kept me driving.’
He kissed her then. It lasted. Then she laughed and gave him a quick peck back after they broke it off. Everything had happened so fast, but they were in love and both knew it.
They sat together at the bar in their own wee bubble of a world and shot the breeze. All wonderful. Nothing was awkward despite their lengthy separation. Then Sandra checked in and collected her key. She washed away the road dust, changed, and met him again within twenty minutes in the hotel dining room for dinner in the company of ten Hells Angels.
ii
The maître d’ placed the gang members as far from the front windows as possible, to conceal their presence, leaving a table by the window as the preferred spot for a couple. Cinq-Mars hesitated.
‘What’s wrong?’ Sandra asked.
‘It’s not as though there’s a view. In this case, we’re the view, to anyone outside.’
‘It’s fine.’
‘You don’t like the table, monsieur?’ the maître d’ inquired. The restaurant was not high-end, its menu a mixed fare that catered to a variety of tastes. Yet the maître d’ was well dressed, black suited and bow-tied, as though to evoke a former, formal adherence to propriety and glamour. The restaurant was still the nicest spot in town, and the maître d’ was determined to evoke a bygone glory day that probably never existed. Not here.
‘I’ll take that one,’ Cinq-Mars said, and pointed.
Sandra Lowndes caught on once they were seated. Émile put his back to the wall to give himself an expansive view of the premises.
He felt more secure that way. She didn’t mind. ‘Ohh-kay …’ she said, drawing out both syllables. ‘You with the gun on your hip. I didn’t know Canada was like the Wild West. You’ll let me know if I need to duck.’
‘I only have eyes for you tonight. Not them,’ Cinq-Mars teased. ‘And yes, I just said that. On the other hand, I prefer to keep them in front of me. It’s not typical for the Hells to commandeer a place like this while wearing gang colors. It’s possible that it has something to do with me.’
‘Not to alarm me
or anything like that.’
‘Not at all. If they’re making a spectacle of themselves, they intend no crime. That would be stupid, and unfortunately for me in my line of work, they’re not that.’
He wasn’t the only one to exercise a speck of caution. The waitress appeared frazzled, making faces to communicate her trepidation.
‘Nobody will blame you for leaving,’ she let them know.
‘Is the food good here?’ Cinq-Mars asked.
‘The best, but, you know, who can eat?’
Cinq-Mars took her at her word. He was confident the dinner would be an improvement over his hot dog and poutine diet lately. ‘We’ll stay. They’ll behave in public. They look quiet.’
‘They do, don’t they?’ the chubby brunette with an upturned nose and the rosiest of cheeks agreed. ‘Let’s hope they stay that way.’ Her tone betrayed her doubt.
‘Have they been by before?’
‘Not all at once, not like this. Can I get you drinks? You might need one.’
After she skipped away, Sandra turned more serious. ‘That was said for my benefit, wasn’t it? About the bikers being polite.’
‘I don’t always sit with my back to a wall, but honestly, I would get you out of here if I was concerned. I don’t expect them to be disruptive.’
‘Just sitting, they’re disruptive.’
He agreed. ‘What they do in secret we don’t want to imagine. Still, they’re a criminal enterprise. That takes discipline. When they’re a public spectacle, they make that work for them, it’s intimidating. It lets people know they’re present. But they won’t give people like me cause to arrest them.’
‘That sounds brave, but I think – let me count – yup, you’re outnumbered.’
Drinks and menus arrived. Settling into their meal, Cinq-Mars’s prognosis proved accurate until another biker arrived. The jangle of Paul Lagarde’s boots alerted the detective first despite his back-to-the-wall, eyes-on-the-room positioning. The biker seated himself at their table before the policeman could react. Cinq-Mars shot a glance at Sandra expecting her to be in panic mode, but she clearly thought the intrusion was a hoot.
‘Cinq-Mars! You fart!’ Lagarde slapped a beer bottle down on the table. ‘We meet again. Good looking lady.’ He addressed Sandra: ‘Me and this guy eat out. I admit, you are prettier than me. I don’t blame him not to send an invitation in the mail.’
Sandra raised an eyebrow. She retained more than a smattering of French from university, but the man’s dialect was impenetrable. Not receiving much of a reaction from her, he looked to Cinq-Mars, perturbed.
‘She doesn’t speak French,’ he told him.
Cinq-Mars didn’t mention that he struggled with the man’s unique patois himself, although he was getting the hang of it. Sandra thought to correct him, that she did speak a little, but given that she could not comprehend a syllable of their visitor’s diction, she explained instead, ‘I’m American.’
‘Love Americans,’ Lagarde announced in passable English. ‘I ride in New Hampshire. You know New Hampshire?’
‘That’s where I’m from.’ She glanced at Cinq-Mars, wondering if she should have admitted to that.
‘Live Free or Die. The best motto. Mine, too.’ He patted her shoulder with his big hand. ‘In New Hampshire, no helmets. I like to live free or die when I ride my bike.’
‘A private dinner, Paul,’ Cinq-Mars commented. ‘I’m sure you understand. Sandra, this is Paul Lagarde, who’s pretty high-up in the Hells Angels, although he might be splitting with a rebel group. Paul, this is Sandra.’
‘You a lawyer? A cop?’ the biker inquired.
‘I raise horses for a living.’
‘Good. Then we be friends. Not like this guy. He might shoot me someday. Or put me in jail with very bad men. Me, I am not a bad man. I am a sheep in the clothes of a wolf.’
Sandra smiled at his inversion of the familiar phrase.
‘Don’t believe him,’ Cinq-Mars interjected, sticking with English for Sandra’s sake. ‘Paul, your boys were supposed to show their faces to Constable Dubroc today. We agreed. They didn’t. That was not an option, Paul. I’ll scoop them up. Your fault.’
‘No need. They were delayed. Couldn’t be helped. I’ll get them to you real soon, Cinq-Mars. No problem. No worries.’
‘By noon tomorrow.’
‘Works for me.’
‘What can I do for you, Paul?’
Lagarde tried to explain himself in English but fumbled his words. He apologized to Sandra, then switched to his shotgun French. ‘What you told me, Cinq-Mars. Truth in it. Not like you think.’
‘What did I tell you?’ He and Sandra accepted that the interruption would not soon end so resumed their meal. Cinq-Mars had opted for the prime rib, while Sandra had chosen the chicken vol au vent. The fare did not rise to a gourmet standard yet was respectful of anyone’s pallet.
‘We do business, inside the organization.’
‘Have you voted yet?’
That gave Lagarde pause. He stuck his fists on his thighs and glared back at Cinq-Mars with a look that conveyed both mystification and respect. ‘Watch out for this guy,’ he said in English to Sandra. ‘There are different kinds of cops. He’s the worst kind there is.’
‘What kind is that?’
‘He’s informed.’
Her mouth full, Sandra suppressed a laugh. The heavyweight tough guy with the Iron Cross suspended from an earlobe and the skull and crossbones in his eyes was not devoid of charm.
Back to French. ‘A vote’s been taken, if you know what I’m talking about. If you’re only guessing, I say nothing more.’
‘Are you still a Hells Angel?’
‘Don’t ask. You know too much already. Not good for your health maybe.’
‘Paul, remind me. What did I say before, that now you find true?’
‘Not my turf, Cinq-Mars. I did not come here on my own. I’m away for the vote. I didn’t know about it at first. When it’s discussed, where am I? Not there. Not in the room. I’m out here in the wilderness with the deer and the wolves visiting a ladies’ prison.’
‘You still get a vote, no?’
‘We’re waiting on the count. Democracy, man. One jackass, one vote. But I got a rep even you maybe don’t know about. Guys call me the peacekeeper in the gang.’
‘Are you really?’
‘Don’t give me that look. My guys know that about me. I can persuade guys this way or that way. Did certain people around the countryside and in the city want a peacekeeper, a guy with a gift to show the blind how to see, did they want their peacekeeper in that meeting, help persuade the vote? Don’t think so. Some wanted me out in nowhere-land because they don’t want peace. They’re itching for war. If I was there maybe I’d find a way to make peace happen.’
‘Meaning, you’re not for the war.’
‘Bring it on. It’s coming anyway. You coppers will love it. Dead bikers all around. The streets littered with our corpses. The gutters will flow with our blood.’
Cinq-Mars put his knife and fork down. He was sensing an opportunity, and Sandra’s presence was not enough to let it pass him by. For her sake, though, he switched back to English.
‘It’s done? There’s been a vote? The Hells Angels are at war with their own satellites? And you, you’ve thrown in with the Alliance?’
‘I’ve made progress with the name. The Rock Machine. It’s catching on.’ He asked Sandra her opinion, in English. ‘Do you like the name?’
‘Much better than having the word devil or demon in it. Sounds modern.’
‘Keep her,’ Lagarde said. ‘She’s a smart cookie.’
‘What’s true?’ Cinq-Mars asked again.
He reverted to French. ‘I got played. Out here to visit the prison. That was a play. To keep me away when the big meeting happened. Now I’m on the outside, looking in. And the outside is at war with the inside.’
Meaning, the gangs across the Quebec countryside were going to fight Hells An
gels in the cities.
‘I wanted to let you know, Cinq-Mars. Guys arranged for me to be here so I wouldn’t be someplace else. If being here makes me look bad when a prison guard is whacked, that doesn’t make me part of it. Because I wasn’t. My enemies used to be my brothers. Look at them for that.’
The man stood, his chains jangling.
‘Thanks for the visit, Paul.’ He had a thought. ‘You’ve been respectful. That’s appreciated. To be clear, I still need to see the four guys who were around earlier this week.’
‘Busy voting. A priority.’
‘This is my thought, or I should say my suspicion, Paul. I’m being respectful, too. Still, it’s my job to be suspicious. If a gang knows a war is on the horizon, then the side in the battle that carried out a killing might be motivated to see the other side take the blame.’
The biker glared back at him a moment; his gaze less friendly than it had been. He looked down at Sandra then, and nodded towards her dinner companion. In English: ‘Smart guy, hey? My advice, watch out for him.’
‘I promise,’ she told him, which made Lagarde laugh. ‘I will.’
‘See you later, Cinq-Mars.’ He picked up his beer bottle, empty now, and departed. He did not join his companions at their tables but vacated the hotel.
‘Sorry about that,’ Cinq-Mars said.