The Way the Crow Flies

by Ann-Marie MacDonald

  Jack says, “What about this—war criminal? Is that what you said?”

  “Yeah, I don’t know,” says Blair. “Henry Froelich says he saw this character in London a couple of weeks ago, same car, same dent, right down to the bumper sticker and a number or two on the plate. Told the police about it, that’s how come I know. Said this fella was a Nazi. Knew him in a camp in the war.”

  “Poor bastard.” Jack’s heart is pounding but his tone is even.

  “Yeah,” says Blair, and sips his coffee. “So he doesn’t know who it was waved, but he knows it was an air force type ’cause of the hat.”

  “Then they’ll find him.”

  Blair shrugs. “I don’t know. All sounds a bit funny to me. Like they’re after frying bigger fish, what with looking for some damn war criminal. What would he want with a child?”

  “They’re just doing their job, they got to follow up every lead. Every stranger in the area,” says Jack, reaching for his hat. He has a foul taste in his mouth.

  Blair gets up to see him out. They walk to the front door.

  “I don’t want to disturb Sharon. Would you say goodbye for me?” Blair nods. Jack puts on his hat, glancing, as he does so, at his watch. Twenty past ten.

  “Jack, I want to thank you for everything.” Blair offers his hand; Jack shakes it. “You know, I was only supposed to be up here for a year.”

  Jack nods. Waits.

  “I can’t help thinking, if we’d never come here—” He breaks off, takes three or four quick gasps, but manages not to cry. He says instead, with a force and bitterness that shock Jack, “I hate this goddamn useless country.” He squints, his chin trembles and he smacks away tears first with one hand, then with the other, and gets hold of himself. “I’m sorry sir, I didn’t mean that.”

  “Blair, I’m sorry. We all are.”

  Jack walks quickly from the PMQs. It was Froelich. Jesus Christ. And why is he calling Fried a war criminal? A Nazi? Froelich was in a concentration camp—the number on his arm proves that; Fried was a scientist in a rocket factory; how is it possible they even crossed paths? And yet Froelich called out the name of the factory, Dora. He wants to put a rope about my neck. Jack recalls how Fried looked when he spoke those words: blanched.

  The sun is glaring again today, its harsh light unmitigated by heat. Jack marches up Canada Avenue; he has five minutes. He’d assumed the police were asking for alibis today from all male personnel, but now he’s certain that what they’re really after is that bloody Ford Galaxy and Oskar Fried. He will phone Simon right after his interview and break the news. He’ll also ask Simon why a perfectly reliable man like Henry Froelich would identify Fried as a war criminal. Jack reminds himself that he is hardly in a position to demand explanations; this mess is his fault. If I hadn’t used that godforsaken car for my own convenience…. He knows what Simon will say: make it disappear.

  He crosses the parade square, heading for the curling arena. Steve Ridelle is standing outside—Jack didn’t know he smoked. They exchange a brief, grim hello, and Jack recalls that Steve officially identified the body, assisted at the autopsy. He pushes through the big double doors, feels the chill off the ice and hurries up the steps to the recreation director’s office, but the door is closed. The police are running ten minutes late and there is a man waiting ahead of him: Nolan. They nod. Today Nolan’s silence does not seem out of place.

  At recess there is not as much noise as usual and some girls are in little groups, crying. Madeleine leans against the crossbar of the teeter-totters and feels strange, as though she were looking at her friends from far away. Another space has opened up; only now is she aware that she is missing something—something Auriel and Lisa and the other crying girls take for granted. And she wonders if anyone else has noticed: the crying kids are normal, and she is not.

  “Wing Commander McCarthy, how do you do, sir, I’m Inspector Bradley.” The inspector is seated behind the rec director’s desk. In a corner of the office, a uniformed police officer stands poised with a notebook. “Sir, I don’t want to take up too much of your time, can you give me an idea of your whereabouts last Wednesday afternoon?”

  “Sure, I would have been right here at the station, in my office most likely.”

  “Did you leave your office at any time, sir?”

  “I think I stepped out to the PX at one point.”

  “Did you leave the station at all?”

  “I can’t say I did, no.”

  From the corner of his eye, Jack can see the constable writing down his answers. Inspector Bradley says, “Have you been out driving in the area recently, sir?”

  “I’ve been back and forth to London once or twice, and my wife has—”

  “So you’ve been on Highway 4 in the past week?”

  “Oh sure.”

  “You see, we’re hoping that someone may have noticed something or someone unusual in the area. You understand that we’re looking for a killer.”

  Jack nods.

  “Do you have children, sir?”

  “I sure do.”

  “It’s vital that we hear from anyone who was anywhere in the environs of the station that afternoon. Sometimes people see something and they don’t realize its significance; that’s my job. Of course, I can’t do my job without the help of everyone here. Did you see anything, or anyone at all, when you were out on Number 4 last Wednesday?”

  “No, I—I wish I could help you, inspector, but the fact is, I was right here all afternoon.”

  “Thanks for your time, sir, and again, sorry to trouble you.”

  “Not at all. Good luck.” Jack starts to go.

  “Wing Commander McCarthy.” Jack turns, his hand on the door. “Please tell no one about the content of this interview.”

  “You got it,” says Jack. And leaves.

  He stops outside the phone booth next to the PX and takes a deep breath. Simon isn’t going to like this. He enters the booth and hesitates—what if someone sees him making a phone call immediately after his interview with the police? He glances over his shoulder to make certain there is no one to see him feeding the phone with enough dimes to cover a call to Washington.

  “Major Newbolt here, give me First Secretary Crawford, please.”

  Jack waits. People come and go from the PX; cadets enter the arena, skates slung over their shoulders—no one takes the slightest notice of him.

  Simon’s voice startles him—“Jack, call you right back.” They hang up and Jack waits again, feeling conspicuous. He flips through the phone book—Exeter, Clinton, Crediton, Goderich, Lucan—looking for what, if anyone should ask?

  A tap on the glass. It’s Vic Boucher. “Mind if I make a quick call, Jack?”

  Jack vacates the booth too promptly. “Go right ahead, Vic, I was just looking up—looking for riding stables, for Madeleine.”

  “Oh yeah?” says Vic, digging for a dime, stepping into the booth. “The wife said either cabbage or lettuce, and darned if I can remember which.”

  Jack smiles, hands him a dime and says, “Lettuce. They never want cabbage.”

  Vic dials and Jack checks his watch—Simon will get a busy signal and call back, that’s all. And there’s time; chances are, while the police are interviewing personnel, they’re not out looking for the car. He wonders if they have contacted the RCMP. Froelich must have given a description of Fried—will police sketches go up at post offices across southern Ontario? Christ.

  While Vic speaks intently into the phone, Jack’s mind returns to Fried. What did you do, Oskar? Jack had asked. My job. How could that have included crimes against humanity? The Germans used forced labour in their factories during the war: Volkswagen, Zeppelin—Auschwitz itself was part munitions factory, Krupps etc…. It makes sense that there would have been forced labour at Dora too. Froelich could have gone from one to the other. Still, Fried’s “job” would have been entirely technical, and while some workers did die, the intention would have been to keep them alive and healthy enough to
do their jobs.

  Vic hangs up and squeezes out through the folding door, grumbling heartily. “Sonofagun, how did you know it was lettuce?” The phone rings. He raises his eyebrows. “You expecting a call?”

  Jack chuckles at the joke before he registers that it was one. A good reflex. How do people train for this type of work? Or are they born liars? Liars with unshakeable loyalty.

  The phone rings a second time. Vic reaches back into the booth and picks it up. “Hello, dis place,” he quips, then hangs up. “Nobody there.” And leaves. Strolling toward the PX.

  Jack re-enters the phone booth and resumes peering at the Yellow Pages. The phone rings. Vic turns, his hand on the door of the PX. Jack catches his eye, shrugs, picks up the phone and puts it right back down on its cradle. Vic disappears into the store.

  The phone rings again and Jack grabs it. Simon says, “Bit of a snafu?”

  “A lineup, that’s all.”

  “What’s shaking?”

  “Si, it was my neighbour who recognized Fried, he’s calling him a war criminal.”

  “Christ.” Simon sounds almost contemplative. “When did he tell you this?”

  “He didn’t, I found out by accident—Si, is there any truth to it?”

  “All I can tell you is, I cleared him for security myself.”

  Jack is already relieved but he has to ask: “Then why was Fried so scared he could be hanged?”

  “No doubt that’s exactly what would happen if word of his defection got out and the Soviets got hold of him.”

  Of course.

  It’s time for Jack to grit his teeth and make his report. “Si, the police are looking for Fried in connection with the murder of McCarroll’s daughter.”

  Silence. Then, “How, by name?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Is there any truth to it?”

  Jack is unprepared for the question. “No, he was—I left him at the apartment—the fact is, Simon, it’s my fault.” He explains how the car was identified when he drove it to Exeter and passed Froelich’s son on the highway on the afternoon the child went missing. “Now the police hear the words ‘war criminal’ and figure there could be someone in the area capable of … this kind of thing.”

  “Fantastic,” says Simon, as though surveying a marvel of engineering.

  “They don’t know it was me driving. I waved at the boy but the sun was on the windshield, all he saw was my hat.”

  “That’s one for us, then.”

  “Simon, I’m sorry.”

  “My fault, mate, I ought never to have agreed to the bloody car in the first place. Ought to have trusted my instincts.”

  “Don’t worry, I’ll make it disappear.”

  “I take it your neighbour doesn’t know that you know Fried?”

  “No one does.”

  “What did you say his name was?”

  “Froelich. Henry Froelich. He hasn’t the faintest. I got all this dope by accident from McCarroll. The police told him. That’s why I was able to head them off when they asked what I was doing last Wednesday.”

  “Well, at any rate, McCarroll’s been good for something.”

  The comment pings like a pebble from a speeding tire but Jack presses on. “What about Fried?”

  “What about him?”

  “Where do we go from here?”

  “You don’t go anywhere, your job’s done.”

  The sun splinters the booth as if through a magnifying glass, heating the interior. Jack squints. “Well, I thought what with McCarroll out of commission…. Should I drive Fried to the border? What do you want me to do?”

  “Not your problem, mate.”

  It’s over. Jack should feel glad. “I’ll give him a ring after we hang up.”

  “I wouldn’t,” says Simon. “His phone may be tapped at this point.”

  “I’ll drop down to London and check on him tomorrow then.”

  “I’d rather you didn’t.” Jack swallows his disappointment silently. Simon has every right to question his competence at this point. “Ditch the car and it’s mission accomplished, lad, over and out. I’ll take it from here.”

  “Simon, when you’re passing through—”

  “Several drinks are in order.”

  Jack walks from the phone booth feeling oddly bereft. Fried will cross into the U.S. and Jack will never hear of him again. Fried will have a new name and a new life. He will use his talents to help the USAF space program rival that of his old colleague, Wernher von Braun at NASA.

  Jack hurries to the accounts office and gets a cash advance of one hundred dollars. Then he heads toward the ME section to sign out a staff car. It’s entirely possible Froelich is mistaken—after all, he must have suffered terribly during the war. Every face from that time must conjure up horror.

  “Did you decide on some lessons?”

  Jack looks up. Vic Boucher, laden with grocery bags, a lettuce poking out the top of one of them, is standing with Elaine Ridelle, likewise encumbered with groceries and a baby carriage. They are watching him, expectant. What is Vic talking about? Lessons…. Something rumbles from the back of his mind, coming closer, like a dump truck carrying the information he needs. “Yeah, I found a place on Number 4, out Goderich way. Hicks’s Riding Stable.” Too much information.

  “Have you spoken with McCarroll today?” asks Vic.

  Jack feels the redness creeping into his face. “I’m going to look in on them later. Drop off Sharon’s boarding pass.” He changes the subject, bending to look in the carriage. “What’ve we got here?”

  The baby looks as though he has just swooned into sleep, fingers splayed and stirring slightly beneath his chin, whitish residue on his puckered lips—a flower.

  “He’s a bruiser.” Jack grins. “Looks like Steve.”

  “Well that’s a relief.” Elaine winks.

  There is no way not to register her cleavage now that she’s nursing. Jack feels himself stir, stiffen a little, and sticks his hands in his pockets. Elaine is a flirt but harmless. His response is harmless too—a polite nod to Mother Nature. What is more stimulating than a woman pre, during, and post pregnancy? It makes the world go round. He says, “Well, I better go do a tap of work.”

  He takes his leave and walks down Nova Scotia Avenue, back toward his building. He is losing valuable time but he doesn’t want Vic Boucher watching him drive off in a staff car. He thinks longingly of his wife. He has an impulse to head straight home.

  When he gets to the next corner, he looks over his shoulder to see that Vic is pulling away in his orange van and Elaine is following, pushing her pram. Jack does an about-face and cuts between the barracks where he lived so many years ago as a pilot in training, and heads for the ME section.

  He looks at his watch, calculating how much time he will need, for he knows where he must take the Ford Galaxy if it is truly to disappear.

  The tinted windows of the staff car take the edge off the bright hard light. Jack touches the brim of his hat to the guard and drives out through the main gates, past the Spitfire, and turns north on the county road.

  He does not enjoy lying, and the thought that the police are wasting time chasing a phantom war criminal when they could be out finding whoever did this thing is making him feel unwell. He passes through the old Village of Centralia, then picks up speed toward Exeter.

  On the other hand, whoever did kill the child is probably long gone by now. A drifter. Unless it’s some sick bastard living alone out here on one of these farms. As he surveys the fields on either side of the road, it crosses his mind to wonder if the locals know something, and whether the police are questioning them. The civilian population. There could be a homegrown pervert among them, some known village idiot who might not prey on a local child, but might consider the transient children of the air force station easier game.

  The first streaks of green have begun painting the naked soil. In gullies and along the roadside there remain scabs of dirty snow, but the cows are out and t
heir brown hides have the look of summer already, as though they themselves were a source of sun and heat. Up ahead a tractor lumbers along the shoulder, raising early dust. He wonders if the police have gone door to door up and down these endless driveways. Who lives here, really? They are his neighbours; who are they? Would the police treat this investigation differently if the girl were not an air force child?

  It’s eleven-thirty. With luck he’ll be home before dark.

  The Kinsmen, the Rotary Club and the Royal Canadian Legion welcome Jack to Exeter on a freshly painted sign. If the Ford is not where he left it, at least he can be sure the police haven’t got it. He half hopes it has been stolen—a thief would be unlikely to come forward with evidence of his own crime in order to help solve another. Crocuses are up around the cenotaph, and two folding chairs have reappeared out front of the barbershop, setting the scene for a summer-long game of checkers. He follows the main street out past the edge of town and pulls in and around the back of the old train station, to see the blue Ford Galaxy, gleaming, untouched but for its dented rear bumper. So much for any hope of a convenient thief. He pulls into the shadow of the boarded-up building and steps out into the winter of the noon shade. From the trunk of the staff car he takes a box of tools, a crowbar and a jack. He brings them to the Ford, gets in, removes his uniform hat, jacket and tie. He is banking on the idea that the police will not put out a bulletin for the Ford until they have finished questioning personnel late this afternoon. By that time, he will be on his way back home and this car will be as good as scrap—halfway to its next life as a washing machine. If he is pulled over, he has Simon’s telephone number. And if, in spite of everything, the lid blows off the entire mission, well, c’est la guerre. Don’t shake hands with the Devil before you meet him.

  They have found Claire’s bike. Madeleine can see it in the trunk of the OPP car parked in the driveway of the little green bungalow. Mr. McCarroll is standing on his front porch. One of the policemen takes it out of the trunk and holds it up. Mr. McCarroll nods.