Flights and Falls

by R. M. Greenaway

  Twenty-Five

  WINGS AND THINGS

  ON THE DRIVE BACK TO North Vancouver from Deep Cove, Leith’s phone rang. Dion listened to this side of the call, most of it monosyllables. On disconnecting, Leith said, “JD’s out in East Van trying to bring in Tiffany Tan.”

  “What for? The money?”

  “Yeah. Tan and Foster could hardly pay the rent, yet all of a sudden they were buying a van. We want to know where they got the steady flow of cash. Tan’s at work, though, and refusing to leave. She says she’ll come in at 5:30, but I’m thinking I’ll make things easier for everybody and go see her myself. Want to come along? Child?”

  “That lady was two hundred years old. We’re all children to her.”

  “She didn’t call me child.”

  “You’re more of a lad.”

  They were both grinning, until Dion remembered his upcoming final counselling session, and the knot in his gut tightened. As useful as Sam Kerr’s investigation into his psyche had been, he dreaded their conversations. “I have to be back by one.”

  “We can make it.”

  It had been a while since Dion had last crossed the bridge to Vancouver. The bigger city had once been a hub of fun to him — nightclubs, shopping, music festivals, the PNE. He focused on the present to shrug of the past, and took the Trans-Canada to East Hastings, Hastings to lively Commercial Drive. He managed to find a parking spot not far from the supermarket, and he and Leith completed the last block-and-a-half stretch on foot.

  Inside the supermarket, in the vegetable section, they found Tiffany Tan misting broccoli with a hose. She didn’t stop spraying when Leith asked her to take a ten-minute break to speak to him in the privacy of the store manager’s office. The manager, he told her, had already given the okay.

  “Here’s good ’nuff,” she said.

  So Leith explained what he wanted to know. “Just where the money for the van came from. That’s all. It’s a simple question.”

  “Gift from my dad. Like I told the Viking.”

  “The what?”

  “Constable Sean Urbanski?” Dion said.

  “Sounds right,” Tan said.

  “If we have to speak to your whole family, and Amelia’s, we will,” Leith told her. “We’ll find out in the end in any case, but not without a lot of trouble for everybody across the board, which I’m hoping to avoid here with your help. I don’t think you’re telling the truth, and I have to follow up. That’s all.”

  She shrugged and sprayed a tray of carrots, then moved down toward the celery, bok choy, radishes.

  Leith turned to Dion. “Could you go wait in the car? I’ll just have a word with her.”

  Back behind the wheel, Dion put on his dark imitation-Porsche sunglasses and watched people passing by. His own line of inquiry, which in retrospect was beginning to feel less likely, held nothing but silence and doubt. Gilmartin had not called him to admit that he knew Ken Poole had assaulted Tony Souza and/or invaded Gilmartin’s home and shot him point-blank.

  Maybe, even if he was right about Poole, he should assume he wasn’t. Drop the investigation. It would be so much easier. But the consequences … Ken Poole, free to take advantage of other young officers. If Dion was right about all this, it meant Poole was losing his grip. Maybe next time the victim of his abuse would disappear.

  He closed his eyes behind his dark glasses, and didn’t open them again until Leith returned.

  “It seems Foster supplied the cash,” Leith said, buckling in as Dion fired the engine and joined traffic. “Tan got the feeling Foster wasn’t altogether up front with her. She’d go away for a day, not on a regular schedule, but about once a week, and come back with fun money. She wouldn’t tell Tan what the deal was, but it seems the cash was enough for the down payment on the VW — about four hundred a month.”

  Dion looked at Leith with new respect. “You’re not wet. You got all this out of her, and she didn’t once spray you?”

  “My charm, I guess. There’s something else. Even with the money she was bringing in, Foster was depressed, Tan says. She doesn’t know why.”

  “Sounds like she was selling herself.”

  “Sounds like it,” Leith agreed.

  They crossed the bridge in silence, but for one observation that wouldn’t go into either of their reports: “She’s torn up, you know,” Leith said. “Tiffany. They were close.”

  “I know,” Dion said. “I got that.”

  * * *

  Today, in their last forty-five-minute session, Dr. Kerr spent much of the time giving Dion space to talk. When he ran out of things he thought she wanted to hear, she told him some things she mistakenly thought he wanted to hear. About isolation, self-awareness, endogenous and reactive depression. Dependencies and addictions, the chemistry of the brain, electrolytes, trigger points.

  He fiddled with his key chain, his heart thudding. Eleven minutes left.

  She talked about being honest and overcoming the fear of self-expression. Perhaps try a creative outlet, like painting, she suggested. He said he was doing some photography. And in a way, he was. Since his bad shot of JD on the cliffside, he had taken a few street shots, two of which he had saved into a folder on his laptop. One was a small dog yapping at him by the Starbucks, and the other was a man on a bicycle half disappearing out of frame. All were blurry, none fit for an art gallery, and he didn’t know why they mattered.

  Kerr was interested, but he told her it wasn’t anything to speak of. She gripped the edge of her desk as if winded. “Is there anything you want to say, then?” she prompted. “Anything you want to talk about in particular? Sports, cars, anything?”

  “No,” he said. He made sure to infuse deep satisfaction into his next words. “I feel like we’ve come a long way. You’ve taught me a lot. I feel pretty strong. Pretty good. This has been useful. Thanks.”

  She gave him a leery stare. She extracted a sheet of paper from her file drawer and started circling items from a list of titles, telling him he should read more, find bridges with the rest of the world, perhaps through literature — poetry, fiction, biographies, essays. “The world is full of heroes,” she told him, “and the most immediate form of connecting with those people, other than face to face, is through the written word. You should try it sometime.”

  He took the list from her, folded it into a pocket-sized square, and looked at his watch. Time served. He was done, but for the bottom line. He couldn’t resist asking, hoping to get it over with. “Are you going to tell me the verdict now?”

  She looked at him in surprise. She had put on reading glasses to examine a form in front of her — probably his progress report with its blanks to be filled — but she laid a palm on the paper now. “There is no verdict, Cal. You’re not on trial.”

  “I totally am on trial,” he said. “If you think I’m not fit, guess what the sentence will be.”

  “We’re not there yet.”

  “I hope you round your figures up, that’s all.” He stood.

  She sat back in her big chair and stared at him. “We’ve spent a cumulative eight hours together, and it’s only in the last sixty seconds you open up to me like this?”

  “I’ve been as open with you as I can be.”

  Too offended to bother answering, she started writing, and he wondered if, with his one stupid question, he had just blown all his hard work of being good. He was dismissed, verdict pending.

  * * *

  Late in the afternoon Dion went with Leith to Wings and Things, a hobby store in West Vancouver. Leith told him the place had been recommended by the president of the flying club, Thomas Frey.

  Dion was not hugely interested. Murder by RC had become a sideline, to him, a distraction, a red herring, a false lead, and he was here in this hobby store just keeping Leith company.

  His suspicions about Poole still oscillated, depending on his mood. Or the time of day. In the middle of the night he tended to believe he was right, while in the light of day the doubts crept in.
But if he was right, then Amelia Foster’s crash had nothing to do with the hole in Craig Gilmartin’s clavicle. Gilmartin and Rory Keefer were two different storylines connected only by a chance encounter on the highway. Dion had Amelia Foster’s storyline worked out, too, and it was nothing to do with mini RC fighter jets or drones. She had a mysterious secret life, maybe sex related, as did Rory Keefer. Maybe hide-and-go-seek was the code name for their get-togethers, and Keefer was paying her. Then something went wrong. He had ended up chasing her down the highway and, either by accident or design, he had killed her. Keefer had then been killed in revenge for Amelia’s death by somebody else who had been involved.

  Highly speculative guesswork, of course, but workable. Foster and Keefer were one package, Gilmartin another, and the fact they got combined was nothing more than a mix-up at the post office.

  As for the potshot taken at Gilmartin down by the Quay, Dion decided that it was exactly what everyone had thought at the beginning, a random shot. But it was a random shot that had provided Ken Poole with the smokescreen he needed for a second, fatal shot. Then blame Gilmartin’s death on some faceless hit man. Perfect.

  Yes, for sure, the plane-as-weapon theory was nothing more than a flight of fancy, and the Squamish detachment had gotten it right that Mrs. Vlug had been frightened by a bird.

  Dion looked around the hobby shop with interest as he and Leith waited for the bald man behind the counter to finish dealing with the few browsing customers. He was only along for the ride, but it was a nice enough ride. The place was stacked and stuffed with product and had an oily smell, like an automotive aisle. There was a counter lined with fat, well-thumbed catalogues, paint pots and lacquers and solders on shelves, a balsa wood rack, cabinets filled with miniature gadgets. He looked upward. Bright kites and gliders were strung overhead, and off to one side, solar-powered things wobbled and spun. The door jingled, the other customers were gone, and the bald man was looking their way. “Yes, gentlemen, can I help?”

  The man’s name was Farzin. Leith told Farzin what he was interested in: clientele. “Do you have a mailing list of any sort to keep track of enthusiasts who, say, want to know about the latest lines in any particular field — like remote-controlled micro fighters?”

  “In what?” A cupped ear. “Sorry? What did you say?”

  “Remote-controlled —”

  “Never heard of such a thing,” Farzin said. He waited a beat, then asked, “Maybe you’re meaning radio-controlled?”

  “Sorry,” Leith said insincerely. “I’ve had a crash course in all this, but that’s one thing I must have missed.”

  “I’m pulling your leg. Call it whatever you want. But RC usually means radio-controlled, just so you know.”

  Leith smiled. “As you can see, I have a lot to learn.”

  “We all do, sir,” Farzin said. He plonked on the counter a heavy binder that he said contained the names and phone numbers of people who put in special orders, along with the parts and purchase order numbers. “Goes back for as many pages as the book will hold. Then I throw away.”

  Leith thumbed through the loose-leaf binder full of grubby lined paper. At his side, Dion saw handwritten names, numbers, a column of codes.

  “Wow,” Leith said.

  “That, for instance” — Farzin pointed to a five-digit entry dated two years back — “is a ball-shooter assembly for a 1981 Solar Fire pinball machine. I have contacts worldwide when it comes to special items like this.”

  “You also have a great memory, which makes my job a lot easier. But I’ve got a general question for you first.” Leith described Mrs. Vlug’s devil-tongued ghost to Farzin, and asked if a plane or a drone could fly about dressed up like that.

  “Well, a drone for sure,” Farzin said.

  “You could dress up a drone like a ghost and make it hover at will, from quite a distance?”

  “Of course.”

  “Could you do the same with, say, a micro RC jet?”

  “Much more likely a drone. And you say it made a sound like a swarm of bees? That’s definitely a drone.”

  Leith directed a sigh at Dion, who read his thoughts. Their trickster’s MO was getting complicated.

  Next Leith asked if Farzin had any RC or drone customers specifically interested in outfitting their machines in disguises. Farzin said none sprang to mind. Did he have a lot of repeat customers? Of course. Did he know any of his RC/drone hobbyists by sight? Of course.

  “Don’t have a mailing list or anything like that, for ads or newsletters aimed at your RC crowd?” Leith asked.

  “No, sir. Do I look like I have time for newsletters?”

  “Could you maybe go through the latest entries in this book here and tell me if you can match any of these names with RC airplane buffs? I’m especially interested in a year-round customer.”

  Farzin pored through names till he came upon one entry that made him smile. “This guy comes in quite frequently. Really friendly, nice guy, could talk your ear off.”

  Dion took down the particulars anyway.

  In the end Farzin gave them nine RC fanatics to check out, mostly first names only. “Is there anybody on this list who strikes you as, well, eccentric?” Leith asked.

  “They are all eccentric. It comes with the territory.”

  “But anyone who stands out in your mind as being just a little more off than the rest, say? We’re looking for someone who’s maybe using his or her plane to cause serious mischief in the community. I’m afraid that’s about all I can tell you.”

  “Serious mischief.” Farzin raised an eyebrow. “You will want to look at Lefty Duggan, for sure.”

  “I’m not surprised,” Leith said, “with a name like that.”

  “I had forgotten about him. He used to come in here a lot, last summer. Flash big wads of cash, irritate the other customers. Wanted the best of everything for his planes, got mad if something was not to be had.”

  “Did he ever say anything to alert you that he might be up to something illegal?”

  “No, no. Just had bad written all over him.”

  Dion thought Lefty sounded too good to be true.

  “Came in here alone, did he?” Leith said.

  “As far as I can recall.”

  “How old, approximately?”

  “About seventeen, eighteen.”

  “Any idea what his real name is?”

  “I have no idea, sir. I’m sorry.”

  “Anything else you can tell us about him?”

  “Well, he’s left-handed for sure,” Farzin said with a wink.

  Twenty-Six

  SWERVE

  December 24

  LEFT-HANDED LEFTY DUGGAN was a disappointment, a rude youth whose worst crime was arrogance. The kid came across as rotten enough to be a thrill killer, but Leith discovered he had an alibi for the night in question, namely Europe.

  The Duggan lead was ditched, and Leith and the team began pounding the pavement, making calls, checking out the nine names on the list — or the two hundred and forty-eight names, because the nine from Wings and Things were simply pooled in with the rest of the RC community — the many club members and subscribers to RC magazines and web pages.

  The list was whittled down first through checks on the computer, bringing those with criminal records to the top. Some leads were followed up, others weeded out after a phone call or two. By the end of the week, eighteen names remained, with a focus on five, all male, between the ages of sixteen and thirty-three. All but one of the five had a record which might reflect an anti-social personality. All had been questioned once, and none had a credible alibi for the night in question. Leith divvied the five names amongst his team for some intensive follow-up and sent them on their way, hoping for results, but by no means holding his breath.

  * * *

  JD was assigned a couple of names in the Blueridge area, one of them a Perry Javits, nineteen years old. He’d had some scrapes with the law, but minor stuff. The front door of the home opened t
o JD, and a wheezy little woman with a red face looked out at her. “Perry’s on the living room sofa,” she said.

  In a living room with an enormous fake Christmas tree, Javits was sprawled on the sofa watching a TV show, the loud, violent action-adventure kind of bullshit that was rotting the minds of youth across the nation. Javits looked at JD with incidental interest, but didn’t bother to unsprawl or to mute the noise. He was a long-haired brat, big for his age, his face still filled out with baby fat, but dusted with peach fuzz. He wore an earring, T-shirt, nylon workout pants, and nothing on his feet but mismatched socks. He was chewing gum.

  “Could we talk?” JD said.

  The brat uncoiled, shut off the TV, and answered her questions. He had a thirty-four-inch Delta Ray RC plane, but no longer ran it. “Too much screwing around, so I quit.”

  “When’s the last time you ran it, and where?”

  “Deer Lake, Burnaby, last summer.”

  “Recall what you were doing on December fourteenth and fifteenth of this month?”

  “Nope.”

  “What if you thought about it for a minute, hey?”

  Javits thought about it for a minute, chewing his gum, but still couldn’t remember.

  “Any chance you were travelling around the Sea to Sky Highway in the early morning hours of the fifteenth, out past Horseshoe Bay?”

  Javits shook his head. “Why would I be anywhere in the early morning hours?”

  “Who did you fly it with, Perry?”

  “Why?”

  For the tedious process of corroboration, JD thought. “Because I’m asking,” she said.

  “A pal, I guess.”

  “What pal?”

  “Don’t you need a warrant for this crap?”

  “Not for a few simple questions. What’s the name of this pal of yours?”

  “We don’t hang out no more.”

  “My condolences. What’s his name?”

  Javits seemed to think about it. “John Smith.”

  “Okay, how about the real name?”

  Javits shrugged. “Fine. Scott Mills.”

  “Look, you —”

  “That is his real fuckin’ name!”