by John Moss
“Probably from newspaper gossip, then.”
“It’s been in the papers more than once, you’re the smart one and I’m just along for the ride.”
“It’s because you’re so handsome, Morgan.”
“Thank you.”
“It’s the fallout from dealing with higher-class murders, we sometimes appear on the society pages. Don’t you remember, we’re the sleuths of Baker Street, Sherlock and Holmes. The same columnist makes much of my capacity for rational thought. It’s annoying, she’s implicitly saying that women aren’t very bright and I’m the exception that apparently proves the rule. I’m kind of stuck with clever, logical, brainy, beautiful, the way you are with shambling, unkempt, dishevelled. Whatever, we have to live with our own mythologies. Maria seemed to think I would be able to reveal the secrets of their sacred text. And I was! But, lest I become excessively smug, it should be noted I merely replaced an enigma with a conundrum, the coordinates of a cave on Gibraltar. St. Michael’s. It is a place, from what I can figure out, that is quite accessible to the public at large.”
“Maria Pilar passed on the wrong book, intentionally,” Morgan repeated. “If she didn’t know about the other one, that it was more than a family keepsake, how did they?”
“Matteo and Maria? Probably from their grandfather, Matteo Akarikitea. Although they had no idea what it said, they knew it was a message from the past. Not unlike Rongorongo, Morgan, a message of importance that no one could read.”
“And given that you are a semi-famous forensic investigator, given that you’re actually quite clever, and by your own admission relatively attractive, given that your trip to the island was assured, it was not that difficult to get you and the right book together.”
“Someone sent my gentleman friend, Mr. Ross, to exchange copies, and to see that the book and I were safe until I’d delivered its secrets. Paradoxically, I think Ross believed the book was more valuable undeciphered, and probably with me either dead or safely out of the way.”
“Someone sent him? Not the D’Arcys?”
“Someone in league with the D’Arcys. It wasn’t the D’Arcys who paid for my exotic return.”
“That sounds sinister, in league with the D’Arcys.”
“It was, and it is.”
The morgue was within walking distance. They lapsed into silence and moved along quietly together as Miranda struggled to deal with Matteo’s death. At her side, Morgan occasionally rustled against her as he walked too close. When they got there, they went right through to the autopsy room. This was familiar territory, where their work and the coroner’s merged.
Ellen Ravenscroft looked up from the corpse splayed open in front of her. “Miranda Quin! That’s got to be one of the shortest sabbaticals on record. Bad trip?”
“And how are you, Ellen? Up to your arse in cadavers?”
“If you can’t say arse with conviction, love, better say ears or ass. Good to see you’re okay.”
“Why would it be in doubt?”
“You’re here, not there?”
“Just checking on your security system!”
Morgan interrupted, “We were just passing by.”
“Good grief, love, surely you’ve got better things to do with your life. Any leads on the D’Arcy woman?”
“We were wondering the same thing,” said Miranda.
“Well, on this end, there’s not much to say. Her husband ended up in the drawer next to hers. They had to put him somewhere until clearance came through, then the lawyer turned up with the paperwork and off they went, the three of them, to the crematorium.”
“Gloria Simmons?”
“In person, Miranda. For the mister, there was no reason to hold him. He came with a note from the Mounties, he was just passing through, a shipping clerk’s idea of family togetherness. For the missus, the suicide note set her free.”
“On whose authority?” Morgan asked.
“Your superintendent’s.”
“So we’ve come to a dead end,” said Miranda, smiling at the medical examiner. Miranda felt indebted in a minor key for being let off the hook after saying arse. It was not a word she used, she didn’t know why she had, and Ellen had graciously dismissed it as uncharacteristically vulgar. She wasn’t sure why they were there.
Morgan wasn’t sure why they were there, either. It seemed the logical next step as he introduced Miranda to the case. Yet there was nothing, he realized, that could not have been picked up in the coroner’s report. He began to suspect he had wanted to bring the two women together; he was silently making a statement. To Ellen, that things were back to normal, Miranda was home. To Miranda, that nothing had changed. All this was manifest in his mind only as an uneasiness that he covered with a boyish grin that neither woman understood, since Miranda presumably knew nothing of what had happened, while Ellen seemed to have forgotten that anything had.
“Okay,” he said abruptly, “we’ve got to go.”
Miranda shrugged and followed him through the door. Strange, none of the usual flirting, no double entendres or risqué allusions. Maybe they had all grown up a bit. It was never too late.
“That was pointless,” said Morgan as they cut over to Yonge Street.
“Your idea.”
“Nothing is pointless,” he countered, as if he had missed his own declaration.
“You sound like a Samuel Beckett monologue.”
“Thank you.”
They walked on in silence for a while, then Morgan spoke, “Why would D’Arcy’s body end up with Ravenscroft?”
“Clerical indulgence, that’s how she described it.”
“No. I’ll bet if we checked the papers — no, maybe she’s too smart.”
“Speak in whole sentences, Morgan. And yes, she is too smart, but you’re coming on side, you suspect Ms. Gloriasimmons LLB. The Mounties released the body to her. I imagine they were happy to get rid of what amounted to material evidence in a crime they wanted buried, so to speak, and she organized the family reunion before she had them cremated. A corpse with papers is inviolate at the morgue; what better place to store him until she could make arrangements? No undertakers asking questions. Just Ellen, processing an in transit package. Then straight to the crematorium. Case closed.”
“Cases, plural. We seem to be dealing with a proliferation of deaths.”
“So you agree, Gloriasimmons killed D’Arcy.”
“Miranda, we were there on a rescue mission. I was doing my Farley Mowat impersonation, I didn’t see anything. Even if I was certain she did it, there’s no proof. I’d be used as the primary witness for the defence. Let’s take a taxi.”
“Where?”
“To Harbourfront. You wanted to meet Rove McMan.”
“What kind of whales were they?”
“Whales? Bowhead, I think. What difference does it make?”
“If, Morgan, if there actually were whales? I’m just wondering.”
When they arrived at the RTYC ferry terminal, they were greeted by an eager young man in grey flannels and a blue blazer.
“Jacket and tie, sir? The lady is very well dressed, my compliments ma’am. But you, Mr. Morgan, are forcing me to bend the rules again. You are taking advantage of our relationship.”
“Miranda,” said Morgan, “this is Edwin Block. He is a mortician in the making.”
“Death is our business,” the young man said cheerily. “For Mr. Morgan and me, death is our business.”
“Mine, too, I suppose,” said Miranda.
“Are you a mortician, ma’am?”
Miranda grimaced.
“Oh gosh almighty, I’m sorry,” Eddie Block exclaimed while looking over her shoulder to see that newer arrivals were appropriately attired.
“For what?” she said.
“For you, like, being a policeman. For my inappropriate compliments. We haven’t actually started classes yet. I’m just practicing how to make personal contact and be quietly gracious. It’s in the book.”
“The mortician’s book?”
“Yes. Mr. Morgan helped me get into the course. I would like to become very successful and buy my own yacht and sail out of the Royal Toronto. They take undertakers, you know.”
“It never hurts to have one or two.”
Once the ferry pulled away from shore, Edwin Block sidled up to Morgan, grinning sheepishly at Miranda, who stood beside him.
“Mr. Morgan, you told me to keep an eye open and I have.”
“Good man, Eddie. What’s to report?”
“Well, Mr. McMan has been taking things of great interest to his boat, he’s outfitting his ketch for an ocean voyage.”
“He is?”
“Self-steering gear, an antique binnacle. Backup for all the electronic devices. A bolt of sailcloth. A case of Scotch. If you’re a sailor, you just know what he’s doing.”
“Thank you, Eddie.”
“And that woman has been over several times. You know, the supermodel, high heels, perfect hair.”
“Gloria Simmons.”
“Mr. D’Arcy’s friend and associate.”
“Thank you, Eddie.”
When they disembarked at the club wharf, Miranda caught the young man’s eye as she walked past. “Good luck with the undertaking school,” she said. She mouthed the words so he could understand, despite the shuffling noises of other passengers who were squeezing by where he was poised at the gangway like an apprentice Charon on the shores of Hades.
“And good luck to you, miss, in all your endeavours,” he responded with a solemn and practised smile.
11
Murder is Sometimes Necessary
The Tangata Manu rocked gently on a surge that worked its way up the narrow channel from a passing freighter. Weeping willows draped over the water, screening out the sun except for a few random slivers falling like light through a shaken mantilla. Ducks squabbled along the embankment. The hollow slip-slap of halyards against masts rattled up and down the column of boats moored in parallel with sterns to the shore.
“Long way from Mission Control,” Miranda observed. “If it were me, I’d never untie from the dock. The clubhouse is soulless, pretentious, and architecturally derivative. This is nice, right here. Ducks and willows. Beautiful boat. Why go to sea?”
“Like Mallory said about Everest, because it’s there,” said Morgan.
“Everest, of course, killed him.”
The words drifted up from an open stern hatch, followed by a determinedly affable Rove McMan. “Detective Morgan, I was expecting you. Do come aboard and bring Detective Sergeant Miranda Quin along with you.”
“My fame precedes me.”
“I don’t follow crime in Toronto unless it’s exceptionally lurid. I’m Rove McMan.”
“I suspected as much,” she said as they clambered aboard, taking off their shoes without being asked when they stepped onto the weathered teak deck.
Morgan leaned comfortably against the tiller, and, gazing up at the club burgee fluttering gently in the shrouds, he thought perhaps he had followed the wrong calling.
“You’re not surprised that I knew you were coming, Detective Morgan, Detective Quin?”
“I expect our mutual friend let you know,” said Morgan.
“Gloria Simmons, yes.”
“She’s not my friend, I’ve never met her,” Miranda protested.
“She gave the impression you were all acquainted,” said McMan.
“Did you know Matteo is dead?” Miranda asked him directly, apparently drawing the question out of the blue.
He seemed suddenly distracted. He stared at his own distorted reflection in the gleaming brass binnacle that had been newly mounted in the cockpit, then slowly looked up into her eyes and allowed a gentle smile to move across his face before lapsing into an inscrutable expression of apparent indifference. “I don’t think I know anyone by that name,” he said, glancing over at Morgan, then back to the binnacle.
“New equipment?” Morgan asked. “You’re planning a trip?”
“I am.”
“To Rapa Nui,” said Miranda, as if the destination was not in doubt.
“Are you a sailor?” he asked her.
“Nothing smaller than a cruise ship,” she said. “Do you know the Island Queen?”
“I’ve heard of her.”
“Matteo asked me to come and see you.”
“Why?”
“So you do know him.”
“I did.”
“And?”
“And nothing. He’s dead.”
“He said to give you his best.”
McMan caught her eye and smiled sadly. “Too late.”
Morgan shuffled over to the companionway and gazed down into the interior. Then he turned and addressed Rove McMan, “Tell us about your relationship with Gloria Simmons.”
“No relationship. She was Harrington D’Arcy’s law partner. Not much of a sailor.”
“Which is the ultimate criterion of good character.”
“Something like that.”
“She’s been over to see you twice since Maria D’Arcy’s death,” Morgan declared with casual certainty.
“Three times, if you’re actually counting.”
“Waving money?”
Rove McMan sat back against the warm mahogany of the cockpit combing. He leaned forward again. “I don’t need money.”
Morgan left his unspoken question hang in the air. In Morgan’s eyes the teak and mahogany, the bleached cotton sail rolled on the mizzen boom, the sheets and halyards, lines and shrouds, all seemed to be arranged around the man as authentic extensions of his personality. If ever there was a sailor, this was him.
McMan responded to the question Morgan’s silence implied. “She does want something, no question, and I certainly don’t have it. But apparently you do.” He turned to Miranda. “You have something she wants very much and she is determined to get it. At any cost.”
“That’s a bit dramatic,” said Miranda.
“You tell me Matteo is dead,” he said. “Te Ave Teao is dead. The D’Arcys are dead. Doesn’t that tell you how serious this is?”
Morgan interrupted. “Whatever happened on the island, that island, you’re saying it threatens us here?” With a sweeping shrug of his arms he took in the idyllic setting around them.
“Only Ms. Quin. She seems to be the only person alive who knows the secret.”
“My God,” said Miranda. “It’s not a distinction I relish.”
“Ms. Simmons has a way of getting what she wants,” said the sailor. “She wanted you to know she wants whatever it was you found in the book.”
“That sounds like an open threat. You understand what she’s after?”
“I do, more than most. That’s why she came to me. I’m not threatening you. I’m warning you. ”
“And if I told her, then what? Nobody seems to know its significance.”
“I do,” said McMan.
Miranda and Morgan both leaned toward him in the cramped cockpit, waiting. Rove McMan, however, seemed no more inclined to share his own secret knowledge with them than he had been with Gloria Simmons. Instead, he issued a directive, “If you have it written down, I would urge you commit it to memory. Have someone you trust with your life do likewise. That’s your insurance.”
“You think she’d try to kill me?”
“In the flicker of an eye.”
“And what would she do if she got it out of me, though God knows she won’t.”
“Kill you. Either way. She will destroy the message, erase it, and eliminate the mind that knows what it is. You are familiar with her, Detective Morgan. You can confirm that she is an indomitable force.”
“Not that familiar.” Fragments of memory and conjecture were flying off in tangents in Morgan’s mind, and an entirely different set of memories and their implications were swirling in Miranda’s, avoiding resolution in both.
“So, this is what I want you to do,” said McMan. “I want you to tell me.”
> “Tell you what?”
“The coordinates. I know that is what the book revealed to you in the cave.
“The cave. So you were talking to Matteo.”
“Now, I do not want to know the coordinates just now. If it were to be known that I knew, I might be made to disappear, myself. It’s all too easy to be swallowed up at sea without a trace. No, what I want is for you to tell me, do I sail east or do I sail west?”
Miranda stared at him, dumbfounded. The Tangata Manu rocked gently against the tension of spring lines, creaking with personality.
“You’re a likeable man,” she said. “But we’re not best friends. I might have told my partner the coordinates, but why you?”
“Because,” he said. “It is important. You were sent to Rapa Nui on a mission.”
“I went there to write a murder mystery set in Toronto.”
“And you were successful in your mission, and you came home safe and sound. But the struggle is not over. My friends have died. There are others. I don’t know what those coordinates signify, but they are important enough to die for, or to kill. It seems it is up to me to go there, to find whatever is hidden, and return it to the island. So, this is what I want. Tell me, do I sail west to Rapa Nui or do I sail east? When it is time, you will direct me more precisely. If the Tangata Manu goes down, you will have to take my place.”
“No,” said Miranda. “I can’t imagine why. But yes,” she looked at Morgan who seemed to be on side, “you should sail eastward.”
“Damn,” he said.
“What?”
“West would have made for an easier voyage. You’re taking me through the Suez. The Gulf of Aden. All those damned pirates.”
“Why not around the Cape?” said Morgan.
Rove McMan looked at Miranda for direction.
“No,” she said. “Not around the Cape.”
“Through the Strait of Gibraltar, then, that’s all I need for now.”
“And if I don’t get in touch?” Miranda inquired, immediately revising her query. “How am I supposed to reach you?”
“I’ll let you know where I am,” he responded, then turning to look at Miranda straight on, with an intensity she found unnerving, he said, “I suggest you find Ms. Simmons before she finds you.”