by Lou Allin
“Thank you so much. We’re enjoying the island. Is it always this cold, though? We had to buy sweatshirts.” The woman gave a mock shiver and a friendly grin.
Holly pointed to a map. “We’re temperate rainforest. By definition that means cool, but this summer’s unusual. Go up island away from the winds if you want more heat. The Cowichan Valley is called the Warmlands for good reason.”
Suddenly self-conscious about her unnecessary panic, the woman brushed hair from her brow. “We’re from the San Joaquin Valley in California, and it’s an inferno down there. What a relief to escape the smoke.”
*
After the family left, Ann took a large sip of green tea, wincing at its bitterness. Recently she had changed from half-moon reading glasses to contacts, which cut the age difference between the corporals. Today she even wore a pastel lipstick and a bit of powder. The short cut of her sleek brown hair suited her. A new exercise regimen with a dose of yoga had smoothed pain seams from her face.
But Holly knew that she had her bad moments. The former supervisor had told Holly never to call Ann after supper, when she might be mixing alcohol and painkillers. Many people with similar injuries took advantage of disability pensions. Ann soldiered on and never made excuses.
As Holly returned minutes later from a bathroom break, a call came in on the radio. Ann listened carefully. “It’s Chipper,” she said, picking up a pen and notepad and asking a few questions. “He’s down at Bailey Bridge. They’ve found a body.”
“A drowning?” Holly asked. Summer wasn’t a period of intense storms, but unwary tourists were caught in the occasional riptide or rogue wave. Ocean swimming was bitter cold. Even the surfers and parakiters wore wetsuits. She hoped it wasn’t a child. No one had been reported missing, but this was prime boating season. Recently two people had perished in quiet Sooke Harbour. Alcohol was often the guilty third party.
“Not this time. Up the hill beside the creek. Must be one of those drifters camping under the bridge.”
“Was it a fall? A fight?” Maybe she should have tried to get the men to relocate. Such a narrow line between proactiveness and bullying. This wouldn’t look good if headquarters got sticky about her loose protocol on public lands. “You told him what?” she heard her superiors ask.
“Going by the scene, Chipper suspects drugs.” Fatal overdoses had doubled on the island last year, but were still much lower than Vancouver. Addicts ran a calculated risk. Lower population, less chance of getting damaged goods.
“I don’t understand. Bill said…” Her voice trailed off. What about that fresh shiner? Maybe he was the victim. But he’d said he never trucked with hard drugs, and she’d watched him carefully for signs of nervousness. Steady as Sir, the giant rock on Muir Beach.
“Who’s Bill?”
“Bill Gorse. An older man I met down there. Resident peacekeeper, he fancies himself. Sets strict rules for drinking and drugs. He mentioned a couple other men, but they weren’t around.” Derek Dunn, was that the name? Had he come back from selling that camcorder? And what about Joel Hall?
She arrived at the scene ten minutes later. Chipper gave her a wave and came over with several notebook pages. This wasn’t the first body they’d found, but she hoped never to be so callous as to be unmoved by death. It was her job to protect, but if too late for that, to serve in the ceremonial offices with every possible dignity. Even so, death had its hierarchy. Traffic fatalities were on the bottom of her list. Mangled remains which demanded a strong stomach and a gentle hand for survivors. What might she find here?
Chipper was out of breath, and a sheen of sweat covered his brow, perhaps from climbing up and down the path beside the creek. “Ann said that the ambulance should arrive any minute. Boone, too,” he said. Boone Mason was their local coroner. British Columbia had an idiosyncratic system, dating back a century, employing thirty-two full-time and seventy-five part-time people on an ad hoc basis. Anyone with a strong medical, law enforcement or legal background could certify a death. Recommendations to prevent future accidents were also within purview of the mandate. It was Boone’s call to request a Medical Examiner for an autopsy in case of a suspicious death. He had been a private investigator in Vancouver before a knee blew on him. He lived with his deaf cat in a spacious doublewide in a nearby trailer park.
Holly paused in the theatre of her responsibilities, looking at Act One, Scene One. A family of four stood by their loaded Grand Caravan with a dusty Ontario: Yours to Discover plate and a moulded plastic gear carrier open on top. The little girl of around seven was crying, her face buried in her mother’s lap. An older boy sat looking at a small metal tag glinting in the sun while his father read a road map. Hapless tourists, or they wouldn’t be stopping here at high tide when the beach was inaccessible. Perhaps they were admiring the distant rollers or counting the many fishing boats peppering the bay. The first of over two hundred cruise ships had entered the strait over a month ago.
Chipper held up his notebook, printed in his usual meticulous style. “I’ve got all the names. Plates, home numbers. Driver’s license ID, the works. Plus I made a preliminary outline of the scene. Though my drawing’s not—”
“Where is the body? And what are those people doing hanging around here? Are they witnesses?” Holly asked quietly. A cold trickle was making its way down her spine like mercury falling in a thermometer. She felt a twitch of annoyance at Chipper’s priorities. How secure was the scene? Normally he loved stringing yellow tape.
“B-b-but they found the victim. Farther up the creek.” He pointed up a path half hidden by leafy salal.
“Surely not the kids. They look pretty young for long hikes.”
“They were geocaching.”
“Geo…what?” The geo she got, but was it catching or cashing?
Chipper grinned at being a step ahead. He spelled the word. “I just heard of it. Apparently it’s a game with an Internet site. You need a GPS.”
“For kids? Sounds sophisticated, not to mention expensive.” Then again, what did she know about the costs of raising a family? It sounded cheaper than outfitting a couple of boys for hockey.
“Maybe ten years ago. Now even Canadian Tire carries units at a reasonable price. Then you go online and search for treasures according to their coordinates.”
“Treasures…what kind of—” Were people leaving valuables in the bush? Clueless townies fumbling around in the hinterlands surrounded by the perils of nature was an ugly picture. It didn’t take much to get lost in thick and mountainous terrain with a disorienting canopy hiding the direction of the sun. Even in small East Sooke Park, a missing hiker had been forced to spend the night.
Chipper gave a small frown with his tilde-shaped brows, turning his back on the family and lowering his voice. “Not real treasures. Cheap little stuff that kids like. A pin, a toy, a balloon, a stick-on tattoo. When you find the cache, you can take something and leave something. Write in the logbook. It’s actually pretty cool.”
Holly observed the family from a distance, keeping her voice low. “What’s that metal thing the boy has? Please don’t tell me he found it at the site.”
He made an effort not to laugh in what should be a sober moment and put a hand on her forearm. “Relax, Holly. It’s called a travel bug. They brought it from Ontario to place in a cache. They’re numbered so you can track them all over the world. It’s like a parallel universe, another dimension.”
She was getting distracted by the details, verging on short-tempered being left out of the loop. Death and games had no business interacting. “Okay. Sorry. Humour me and slow down. Does this have anything to do with the body? Was the victim geo…caching?”
“No sweat on that. The vic…the man looks like a regular here at the bridge. The game explains why this family was in the area, that’s all. Good thing they weren’t farther back, because a cougar and cubs were reported in the bush along Tugwell Creek, and bears are always around.” Black bears, not grizzlies. The smaller brother was m
uch less dangerous, both in size and temperament.
She nodded, flexing her shoulders, reminding herself that being in charge carried stress as well as prestige. “I need to talk to them. They probably want to get on with their vacation. Meanwhile, don’t let anyone else pull in to admire the view. Say you’re conducting an investigation.” Number ten in the one hundred useful ambiguous phrases for law enforcement.
“I can put up neon cones or crime-scene tape. There’s some in the trunk.”
Chipper was a by-the-book man, but this time she didn’t agree. “Then everyone will stop to gawk. Be firm, but try not to provoke interest.‘Investigation’ could mean anything. Vandalism. Stolen goods.”
He made his face as bland as a pail of chocolate milk. “Okay, Guv.”
After tossing him a wry look, she walked over to the family and introduced herself. Frank and Chrissy Jones were from Sudbury.
“Mr. Jones, can you take me to…” She mouthed “the body” so as not to alarm the children.
He gave her a blink and a subtle nod. “You guys stay here. I’m going with the officer. Mom will give you a drink. And kids, I’m real proud of you. Remember that helping the police is important.”
If only all parents thought like that. Holly knew the value of an upbringing stressing the right attitude. Some wouldn’t turn in their child if he torched a school.
As Chrissy handed out juice boxes from a cooler, Frank led Holly up a narrow path by the stream into the rainforest.
Spared from the axe, giant red cedars and Douglas fir sent their branches up to three hundred feet into the air. Bigleaf maples were festooned with grandfather-beard mosses. In the dry weather, the forest colour had lost some of its lustre, and banana slugs napped in the moist patches under leafmould. Horse droppings showed where a few locals exercised their animals. Every now and then they passed a massive barkless stump with two deep holes six feet up the butt. These were cut for springboards, a pioneer practice which boosted up the axe-or saw-man to spare him the thickness. Before power tools, a ten-foot-diameter tree had taken a day to cut. Now the monsters, if any were left, were felled in minutes by a chainsaw. Whimsical people put piles of cobblestones in these holes, turning the stumps into wooden goblins. Moss asserted its dominion, and an occasional red huckleberry grew on top like a natural flower pot. The British navy had been cutting masts on the island before Confederation. A tree eight hundred years old would have been alive at the time of the Crusades. Now heli-logging was tracking the last giants into formerly unreachable corridors. Joni Mitchell was right about a tree museum. If Holly had been Minister of Forests, she’d ban taking anything over three feet in diameter.
“How far is it?” she asked, beginning to flag at his manly pace but too proud to show it. From the looks of his strong and sinewy legs, the Boston Marathon shirt he wore was well-earned.
Frank had a pleasant voice. “Only another five minutes.”
“Are these caches always located in out-of-the-way places?”
“The object of caching is to offer a challenge, but without bushwhacking where kids might get lost. The cache is never in plain sight, though. Logs are good, big rocks.”
“And you get the coordinates online?” When she looked at nature, she saw a different world. The heavy ground cover of salal, blackberries and huckleberries. A spaghetti plant, aka goatsbeard, dropped its fragile strands. The hard brown-and-cream carapace of a shelf fungus jutted from a dead aspen. “Can’t be easy to get a satellite reading with the thick canopy.”
Frank nodded. His head was nearly shaved. A cyclist, too, perhaps. The van had a rear carrier with a lightweight racing model. “It was easier in Victoria. Royal Roads campus had several. There was even a pub tour for grownups. We’re going west and heading around Lake Cowichan on the loop. But here sometimes you can’t get a fix. So you’re told to walk so many paces.” He showed her a print-off. People had related their experiences. They had names like Moss Troopers. Island Rovers. Virtual Dogs.
“And these caches look like…” Asking questions was her job. It wasn’t prudent to pretend to know everything. Listening was a primary tactic of interrogation.
“This is wet country. Generally a waterproof container is used. Tupperware works best, but sometimes only a big coffee can in a garbage bag.” He used his hands to approximate the size and shape.
“Sounds like fun for kids. Parents, too.”
Frank nodded, brushing a spider web from his face. “Much healthier than sitting at a mindless video game. This gets the whole family outside. And while they’re in the car, they’re planning ahead.”They had come about three hundred feet along the winding, narrow path. On one side a steep bank led to the rocky creek. High tide backed into the freshwater streams.“Over there,” Frank said. He stood down by a mossy log in a small clearing, watching his feet lest they trample evidence. Like most of the world, he had probably seen his share of forensics shows.
Gesturing to him to stay put, Holly walked up to the body, looking from side to side at the surroundings and stepping carefully. With shaggy brown hair streaked grey at the temples, the man looked younger than Bill, but his skin was weathered from outdoor living. He wore faded, ripped jeans, a plain sweatshirt with one sleeve rolled up and scuffed runners. Lying on a comfortable bed of bracken, he had one hand over his head in an almost demure posture as if to shield himself from sun. Her eyebrow lifted as she scanned the area, creating a mental grid. “Make haste slowly,” Ben had advised, quoting her the Latin like the good Catholic boy he’d been at fifteen when he’d nearly entered the priesthood. “What you do often can’t be undone.” She was not the coroner, but merely here to secure the scene, whatever Boone might decide about an autopsy.
At first sight, it seemed like a slam dunk. Near the body was a classic collection of drug paraphernalia, a clear bag with white-powder residue, spoon, plastic lighter, a water bottle and a faded plastic pencil case stamped “007” with the original Sean Connery in action mode with his Walther PPK. What a strange collectible for a loner. His hairy arms wore an embroidery of needle marks. Lab tests would probably reveal an overdose. Was this the man Bill had said he hadn’t seen recently? Or the panhandler? And speaking of Bill, where was he?
The equipment was a HIV/AIDS minefield. It would have to be carefully removed. Nearby was a rolled-up sleeping bag and a small backpack, both of which looked new. She blinked as a tiger lily lifted its orange Turks head to a shaft of sun, before a cloud shadowed the path. Then came the pad of heavy feet and heavier breathing.
“Christ on a cupcake, are you trying to kill an old man, making me haul butt up here? Why not just put a gun to my head?” a gruff voice with a hint of humour asked. It was Boone, his stomach surrounded by suspenders and broken-down brogues on his feet. His teeth clamped an empty corn-cob pipe in homage to his former addiction. A battered leather doctor’s bag dropped onto the ground. He rooted through it and snapped on a pair of latex gloves.
Holly turned to Frank and introduced them. “Thanks for your cooperation, Mr. Jones. You and your family can leave now. We have your contact numbers if any questions arise. It was a sad introduction to the island for you.”
Frank gave a quick nod. “Glad I could help. Almost went into police work myself, but the wife would have divorced me. It’s duller but safer being a math teacher.”
“Good luck up at Cowichan. There’s a record-breaking Sitka Spruce just off the road near Harris Creek. It’s on the tourist maps.”
As Frank jogged off, Holly took a log for a seat and watched Boone do his job. Easier on the eyes and nose than an autopsy but not half as interesting.
He gave a series of hmms as he completed a mental checklist. “No blood, no apparent wounds. Eyes are getting cloudy. Rigor’s just set in, and liver mortis indicates this is where he died,” he said, having moved the body and loosened the clothes to check underneath. “A bit of bruising on his knuckles. Right hand. Might not mean anything.”
Judging by the rubber tube, he’d bee
n injecting his left arm, so that fit. Was he the one who gave Bill a punch? “Squatters have been camping under the bridge. I talked to one earlier about a panhandling situation,” Holly commented.
Then he rotated the head and peered into the mouth. “Looks like he’s been living outside, no frequent showers, shaves, or shampoos, but he’s had some dental work in the distant past. Silver fillings, nothing fancy. A few teeth missing. Fights. Falls. Poor nutrition. Gum disease. To be expected.” He took a temperature and nodded to himself. “Cool back here in the woods. I’d say he died sometime last night, if the rigor isn’t lying. We’re lucky the damn bears didn’t get to him, nice chunk of steak like that.”
“An overdose? With all of that gear, it seems obvious.” She swept a hand over the scene.
“Sometimes the most evident answer is the real one. Don’t look for no zebra in a herd of horses.” He picked up the plastic bag. “Hardly anything left. His last fix. Poor sod went out with a bang…or a whimper. Dropped dead on the spot. Just enough time for an uh-oh. Give the immediate area a sweep in case he’s tossed sharps into the bushes. Kids come here, I imagine. Ride their bikes up the creek trail.”
“Yes, and now there are caches in the area.” She explained the concept.
He was looking inside the pencil case. “Extra syringe. Cotton pads.” He opened a tiny bottle and sniffed. “Bleach. Primitive sterilization but better than nothing.”
“That pencil case looks ancient.” When someone’s possessions were boiled down to whatever they could carry, the items provided an often poignant flash of humanity. Had he been holding fast to this item from childhood? Bought it at a second-hand store? Innocence mixed with the most sordid of experience. “Any ID?”
“Getting to that, missy. Hold your horses. Don’t act like you have something better to do here in Lotusland North.” He slipped a thin leather wallet from a pocket and opened it, pooching out his large lower lip. “Driver’s license. Ontario. How about that?” He cocked his head. “Looks like our man is Joel Hall. Whoa. Here’s a CT credit card in the name of Phillip Blunt. Twenty bucks. A lottery ticket for last week. Super Seven. Not enough numbers circled to win.”