Northern Exposure

by Michael Kilian

  York read to the bottom, then read the piece again, as though it were a document awarding him a large sum of money.

  “This will be in the afternoon papers,” he said, finally.

  “Yes, Prime Minister. There will be some formalities. You ought to send someone to California, someone from the RCMP.”

  “No, I don’t want to involve the bureaucracy. This has to be handled with efficiency and dispatch, eh? And with discretion. I don’t want to see Porique’s body claimed by some grieving old woman and turned up in a martyr’s parade through Old Montreal. Not until after the vote on the amendments.”

  “Someone from External Affairs?”

  “No, I’ll use my special unit. Thank you, MacKenzie. I hereby spare you the Yukon. Go finish your work.”

  York waited until his aide was gone, then reached for his special phone, the one he had “cleaned” every day. It was answered on the fifteenth ring.

  “This is York. Can you talk?”

  “Yes,” said Sebastien. “Briefly.”

  “The body of a murder victim in Santa Cruz, California, has been identified as that of Guy Porique.”

  “Yes?”

  “Horrible business. I need someone to get out there quickly, make the identification, and recover the body. I don’t want that body to get in the wrong hands. Can you handle it?”

  “Not personally. I will see that it’s done.”

  “I depend on you.”

  “With good reason.”

  York hung up.

  “Frog,” he said.

  The French-language papers in Montreal gave the story front-page play, and it came quickly to the attention of Leon Macoutes, who brought the newspaper with the largest headline to Paulette as an artist might a finished piece of work, or a cat might display his first slain mouse.

  She did not share his enthusiasm, but she was not overly unpleasant. She in fact grunted, which with her might be taken for an expression of approval.

  “Alors, this will take all the pressure off,” he said. “They will be expecting nothing, suspecting nothing. Paulette, we have improved our chances one hundred percent.”

  “Peut-être. I want to know now exactly what Porique plans to do. Everything. All the details. He is completely cut off now, hein? He no longer exists. He is completely in our hands. He is ours and he must do as he’s told. Go to him now, Leon. Impress that on him. Tell him we’re tired of him being such an asshole.”

  “I was going to see him anyway,” Macoutes said, lying. “I will make your views known. They coincide with my own.”

  Feeling a freedom he did not actually enjoy, Macoutes and a sallow-faced leather-jacketed companion foreswore the anonymity of public transportation and used Macoutes’ motorcycle for the ride to Porique’s flat. Waving to Robert, the lookout Macoutes had assigned to the street, they bounced the big American machine onto the sidewalk and ran up the stairs, Macoutes clutching the newspaper he had shown Paulette. He pounded on the door.

  “Hey, intellectual, open up! I have news!”

  He pounded again.

  “Ouvrez! Come on, you bastard! I have news! You are dead!” He pounded until his hand hurt, then stepped back, waiting. “He is not supposed to leave here unless it is to meet with me,” he said to the other, who nodded, as though this were revealed wisdom.

  Macoutes dug in the pocket of his jeans and produced a key. “I had this made,” he said, with a grin. “He doesn’t know.”

  He swung the door open so hard it banged against the wall. Nothing seemed amiss. There were cigarette butts in the ashtrays, two glasses and a nearly empty wine bottle on the table. Looking into the kitchen, he could see dirty dishes in the sink. Everything seemed the same as at his own place.

  But it was too much like his own place. Glancing quickly around the room, he realized what it was. There were no books. Porique had taken his books. He hurried into the bedroom, slamming open the closet door. On the empty shelf was a folded note.

  “I will contact you when it is time,” it said.

  “Merde!” said Macoutes, crumping the note into a ball and flinging it at the wall. “Paulette will kill me.”

  “Robert may know where they went,” said the other.

  Robert knew nothing. He had observed the woman go out and return with groceries and had seen no sign of them since. They went to the alley in the rear in search of André, the other lookout. He was not there. Except for a dirty, parked van, the alley was empty.

  “Maybe he’s taking a pee,” said Robert.

  “André!” shouted Macoutes. “André! André!” The echoes brought nothing.

  Inside the van, the man at the recording equipment shook his head.

  “Stupid bastards. Next they’ll be stopping a police car and asking after Andre,” he said.

  “We should have taken them out weeks ago,” said his older companion.

  “The fat one knows what he’s doing. String them along.”

  “Where will Andre turn up?”

  The man by the recording equipment shrugged. “The river,” he said. “The fat one is partial to rivers.”

  Porique and his woman were in his borrowed Volkswagen, driving as fast as the aged little car could manage, well out of Montreal on the four-lane Laurentien Autoroute, heading northwest toward Ste. Agathe des Monts. They had been grimly silent leaving the city, fearful of the still-pervasive menace of the Papineau Fils and Harry York’s secret police, and sickened by what they had read in the newspaper about the California murders. Once past the suburbs, they had begun to talk, mostly about the murders at first, wondering who the poor victims might have been but not at all as to who might have killed them.

  “Where shall we spend the night?” she asked, finally. “At Mont Laurier?”

  “If we keep driving, at the cabin. It’s about an hour south of Mont Laurier on a good road.”

  The advancing storm front that had darkened the western horizon brought a strong, gusty wind, compelling Porique to keep both hands on the wheel. Otherwise, he felt himself relaxing, as he hadn’t in weeks. He stole glances at her, pleased at her beauty. He allowed himself the indulgence of thinking their new circumstance an indefinite one, of putting from his mind what ultimately lay at the end of that good road south of Mont Laurier. The approaching storm itself seemed welcoming, comforting, promising sanctuary on the other side.

  “Let’s stop in Ste. Agathe,” she said. “I want to buy a few things.”

  “There should be food at the cabin. Do you want cigarettes? Something to drink?”

  “Yes. Let’s get some Scotch. And I want a proper nightgown. And I want to buy some hair coloring.” She looked at him. “I want to go back the way I was, Ric. I’m tired of looking like a bloody whore.”

  “D’accord. I won’t mind that at all.” He took her hand, running a finger tip over her ring.

  “The Papineau Fils won’t be expecting me to change back,” she said.

  “No. We won’t have to worry about Papineau Fils for a while.”

  He moved his hand to her knee. He let his mind slip into happy thoughts of burning logs in the cabin’s stone fireplace, of warm whiskey, of nudity, of a bath. He hungered for cleaniless as much as for all the other pleasures.

  “I can’t stay with you long, Ric, if you want me to do what you asked in Ottawa. She’s not going to hold that job for me forever.”

  “I know. Je le regrette.”

  “Unless you want to drop this thing.”

  “No.”

  “Or put it off for a while.”

  “I can’t. Harry York has made me a prisoner of his timetable.”

  A car that had been slowly gaining on them from the rear began to worry him. He eased back the accelerator, slowing. If it were trouble, what would he do? Slam on the brakes and pull off the road? Should he take out his pistol? He reached beneath the seat. It was where he had set it.

  “Why won’t you tell me what you’re going to do, Ric?”

  “Because I haven’t
entirely decided.”

  “I know what’s going to be in those lunch packages. You’ve decided that much.”

  The car was white or light brown, quite large, an American make he couldn’t yet recognize.

  “I haven’t decided that much. I haven’t. Perhaps, after all, when it comes to it, I will decide not to go through with this, not to do anything.”

  It was a white car, with two men in the front seat. It came close, filling the Volkswagen’s small mirror, then vanishing as it roared into the passing lane and hurtled on down the road, the two men, arguing volubly, ignoring them entirely.

  “But I will do what is necessary, when I have it straight in my mind what that is.”

  They bumped along in silence for a while. The white car disappeared from view, and then there were no cars, just the vast space of Canada. The storm front was much closer, and lightning flashes were visible.

  “Ric. You’re not a bloody fanatic, are you? There is a difference between that and what you are, isn’t there? I know you so well. I love you so damn much. But I can’t answer that question to my own satisfaction. You’re not going to just throw our lives away in some act of contempt? I don’t want to die just to save the goddamn whales and beavers.”

  “I am not a fanatic, Manon. I am an extremely rational man.”

  “I don’t want to die, Ric. Not now. Mother church or no, I don’t want to die any time soon for any reason.”

  “No one is going to die,” he said, falling silent again as he thought about that, as he had thought about that over and over and over again, for weeks.

  15

  It was raining in Vancouver, the quiet, easy rain that comes and goes throughout most Vancouver days, a measure or two more than mist, hardly enough to blur the surface of the windows. Alixe stood before theirs, transfixed by the sprawling view of city, sea, and mountains that was darkening with the fading of the day. They were in the Four Seasons, arguably the best hotel in Vancouver. They had taken only one room this time, in part so they could register with Alixe’s credit card and her presumably less conspicuous name, in part because they no longer felt any need to conceal the intimacy of their relationship. Neither one of them felt the slightest embarrassment about any aspect of it.

  Showers sat on one of the beds, staring at the telephone he had set opposite him on the other. Joyce was not with them, having taken a room at O’Doul’s Motor Inn not far away. They were to meet for dinner, to discuss a not very successful day.

  “I’m going to call Marie-Claire now, Alixe. I can’t put it off any longer. The poor woman must be going out of her mind.”

  “Tell her to tell my parents I’m all right.”

  “That wouldn’t be very seemly.”

  “No, but that shouldn’t matter with Marie-Claire.”

  “I just hope she’s calm.”

  She wasn’t. At the first sound of Showers’ voice, she flew into hysterics. “Where are you? Where are you? Mon Dieu, Dennis! What are you doing? What is going on?”

  “I’m in Canada, Marie-Claire. I’ll be back in a few days. Everything is all right.”

  “Everything is not all right! Mon Dieu! I was almost killed! Killed, Dennis! Lila was, oh, it was so horrible. Where are you, in Ottawa?”

  “No, I’m not in Ottawa. I’ll be back in a few days. We’ll clear up everything. I’m all right. Alixe is all right. She …”

  “Alixe! That wretched girl. Is that why you did it, Dennis? Tried to kill me. Run off with that, that, whore! She’s a whore, Dennis, whore, whore, whore! And you’re a murderer! You tried to kill me! So horrible …” She began sobbing, loudly, uncontrolably. Showers, pained, sat listening for a long moment, and was about to hang up when someone else came on the line. Arthur Jordine.

  “Where in God’s name are you, Dennis? When are you coming back?”

  “I’m in Canada. It doesn’t matter where.”

  “It certainly does too matter! The police are looking for you. The department in in an uproar. And now you’re in Canada. What sort of chaos are you going to cause there?”

  “None. Don’t tell anyone where I am. I’ll be back soon. I’ll call tomorrow. Is Marie-Claire all right? She wasn’t injured?”

  “Just psychologically. She was terrified. Your doctor came by. He prescribed some sedatives, though I’m not sure how much good they’re doing.”

  “Give her some wine. That always calms her.”

  “Dennis, I must know where I can reach you.”

  “Take care of her, Arthur.”

  Showers pushed the receiver button down with his finger, then slowly replaced the receiver itself. He sighed. “Well, that’s over, for now.”

  “Come here and see Canada.”

  “One more call.”

  Judy Sadinauskas did not answer her direct office line. Cursing himself silently, Showers remembered the late hour it had become in Washington, and dialed his secretary’s home, a high-rise apartment she shared with another girl in Rosslyn just across the bridge from Georgetown. Again, there was no answer. He glanced again at his watch, then sought the name he could not remember, the name of a bar, a singles bar she frequently went to after work during the week. Games. Gamble’s. Gambler’s.

  No. Gambolers!

  A Canadian telephone operator found the number in Washington for him and rang it. Four rings were followed by a sudden scratchy din and the faintly intelligible voice of what sounded like a harried, irritable bartender.

  “Miss Judy Sadinauskas, please!” said Showers. “A blond girl! It’s urgent! Calling from out of the country!”

  The bartender growled something and his voice disappeared, but the din remained. After some three minutes, Judy came on the phone.

  “Is it you, Mr. Showers? They said ‘out of the country.’”

  “I’m in Canada, Judy. Vancouver. I just found out what happened to my car.”

  “The police think you’re responsible. They were by the office this afternoon, and very obnoxious. They even asked if I thought you were having an affair.”

  “As a matter of fact, I am, but it has nothing to do with what happened.”

  “I can’t hear you, Mr. Showers. There’s all this noise.”

  “I said I had nothing to do with the bombing! That bomb was meant for me. If Lila hadn’t borrowed the car, my wife would be dead right now.”

  “Are you in trouble, Mr. Showers? I mean, aside from with the police.”

  “Yes I am. I hadn’t really thought about it, but I suppose I am.”

  “Is there something I can do to help you?”

  “Don’t tell anyone you talked to me, or where I am. Is the department doing anything about this?”

  “Oh, yes. Mr. Jordine went immediately to the secretary, and I believe they contacted the White House.”

  “Find out what they’re doing; find out whatever you can. I’ll try to call you tomorrow.”

  “I’m sure they have the office phone tapped by now. And my apartment.”

  “Can I call you at this number tomorrow night? At the same time?”

  “I think it would be wiser to change bars, Mr. Showers. I’ll go to … to Sully’s. On Capitol Hill. The same time.”

  “Thank you, Judy. Oh, Judy. That Mr. Laidlaw from the CIA. You remember him?”

  “Yes.”

  “Try to get a hold of him …”

  “Louder, Mr. Showers. They have the juke box on again.”

  “I said contact Laidlaw! Tell him I want to talk to him! Soon! Get a phone number, a safe phone number!”

  “I will, Mr. Showers. Be careful.”

  “You be careful, too, Judy. Tell Laidlaw I want him to look after you. Do that, Judy!”

  “All right. Good night. Till tomorrow.”

  “Good night.”

  He hung up the phone and returned it to the nightstand. Then he just sat, staring bleakly past Alixe at the dark cityscape.

  “You asked me to come to you there,” he said. “Would you mind terribly much coming here?�
�

  She turned, her arms folded across her chest.

  “You are so polite, Tobias Showers. You’re always saying, ‘would you mind terribly much,’ or, ‘I’m so terribly sorry,’ or ‘please excuse me.’”

  Arms still folded, she came to the bed, and sat down on the edge.

  “We’re in love,” she said. “We are in love. Why must you treat me with all this diplomatic protocol?”

  “I’m sorry, I …”

  “See, there you go again.”

  “It’s just my way. I’m …”

  “‘Sorry.’ I can suffer it when you’re this way with waiters, doormen, and cab drivers, though I can’t understand why you insist upon being polite to people who can be so rude.”

  “Because there are people who are deliberately rude to waiters, doormen, cab drivers, maids, and sales clerks. Vicious, cruel people who compensate for their insecurities or unsatisfied social ambitions that way.”

  “Dennis Tobias Showers, the Robin Hood of manners.”

  He turned his head.

  “I’m sorry,” she said.

  After a long silence, they both laughed.

  “Are we in love, Toby?”

  He put two fingers to his lips, then with them touched her breast. They lay back on the bed, but lay still.

  “Look at this room, Toby Showers. It must be the most expensive room in this expensive hotel.”

  “As befits you, mademoiselle.”

  “I’m happy to stay in any old sort of a place, you know. You should see the place I stayed the summer I spent in Corsica. You should see where I stayed when we went to the Republican convention in Detroit in 1980.”

  “A hotel with no doorman.”

  “In Corsica, one week, it was a hut with no door.” She rose up on one elbow. “We don’t need this, Tobias. Our spending money this way could be dangerous. It makes us that much more obvious. It could constrain us severely. Your credit cards are risky to use, and mine could become risky, too. I didn’t bring that much cash. What then?”

  “I never meant to be using your money.”

  “That’s not what I mean. I’m just asking why everything always has to be deluxe with you. Why you always have to be Dennis Tobias Showers, diplomat. Blue blazer, gray flannels, red-gold-and-blue-striped tie. Even now, when you’re for all practical purposes a wanted criminal.”