Grave doubts qam-1

by John Moss

  In London, the Chamber of Horrors affair was already forgotten. Once the tabloids realized the Canadian involvement, they lost interest. Few Britons knew the notorious Dr. Crippen had practised in London, Ontario, where he refined his lethal techniques before dispatching so many English women to their untimely departures. Canada is too culturally bland to inspire much interest, even in murder, thought Morgan, wondering whether it was the fickle British or Canadian diffidence that made it so.

  In Toronto, the Hogg’s Hollow murders had slipped from the public mind into the irretrievable past. Despite the fact that the bodies were of recent vintage, the whole affair was smothered by a general indifference to the city’s colonial heritage: it was as if they really had been long-dead lovers, not unfortunate strangers visiting a modern metropolis.

  In Owen Sound, and all the way from Meaford in the east to Southampton in the west, and north to Wiarton, the reputation of Officer Peter Singh had spread like a rumour. Even his parents were now firm supporters in his choice of career, despite his father’s earlier disappointment that he had not gone into the military, or at least the RCMP.

  In Beausoleil the deconsecrated church was once again a cultural curiosity. The significance of the frescoes had been greatly enhanced by renewed secular interest in Sister Marie Celeste. The true pilgrims came only in the dead of night and eventually stopped coming even then, but museum curators and art historians were received by appointment during the day.

  “Whoa, Morgan! Where are you going?” It was Miranda, stepping out the door of Starbucks just over from police headquarters on College. “Talk about a man lost in thought.”

  “No,” he said. “I wasn’t thinking about anything. My goodness, I’ve walked all the way down from Lawrence Avenue. Holy smokes, that’s a walk.”

  “I knew you’d be coming. Yossarian called. Said you were determined to walk the length of Yonge Street. Thank God you turned south. Come in for a coffee — take a break from your travails and travels. I’ll buy you a cappuccino.”

  “How long have you been waiting?”

  “I figured you’d walk the distance, so I didn’t come over ’til maybe twenty minutes ago.”

  After they settled in with their coffees, Morgan asked, “What’s up?”

  “Well, I had a call from Sergeant Sheahan.”

  “Who?”

  “OPP. In charge of the investigation at Beausoleil.”

  “So, what’s Sergeant Sheahan got to say?”

  “Nothing. That’s the point. Nothing, nada. They found DNA traces at Shelagh Hubbard’s. Our Hogg’s Hollow bodies were processed at the farm, for sure. Beyond that, nothing. They’re virtually closing down their investigation. That’s what they mean when they say ‘leaving it open, pending further developments.’”

  “Yeah. So where does that leave us?”

  “With a mystery of unknowable proportions.”

  “They’re the worst kind.”

  “Or best. The most mysterious mysteries are best.”

  “For whom?”

  “There’s got to be something to connect with,” said Miranda. “If it won’t deconstruct, it’s indecipherable. There has to be a way in.”

  “My dad used to say, ‘If it ain’t broken, you can’t fix it.’”

  “A wise man.”

  “And Ellen Ravenscroft once said ‘The hardest autopsy is when nothing seems wrong.’”

  “Except the patient is dead.”

  “Yeah, the client.”

  “Is that what they call them? ‘Clients’?”

  “I dunno,” said Morgan. “But ‘patient’ implies recovery.”

  “‘Client’ implies payment for services rendered.”

  “Dead people. Let’s say they call their clients ‘dead people.’ And they do get paid, just not by the dead people. By taxpayers.”

  “I do not like to think I pay Ellen Ravenscroft’s salary. I prefer knowing she pays mine.”

  “Miranda?”

  “Yes?”

  “Why did you waylay me here? I could have been to the harbour by now.”

  “And then what?”

  “I would have turned around and begun to walk north.” He sipped his coffee. “Let’s go back to our theatrical analogy. Shelagh Hubbard was creating drama, recording the scenes she created; killing was an extension of the authorial imagination.”

  “Okay,” said Miranda. “Then someone else cleverly reduced her to one of the characters in a narrative that swallows up hers. A meta-narrative.”

  “And disposing of her as an aesthetic diversion, her killer subsumes her achievement, such as it was, into his or her own.”

  “We sound more like literary critics than detectives, Morgan.”

  “Okay, but if we see the whole thing, her grisly machinations in London and Toronto, and her disappearance, her death, and the Gothic disposition of her body, all as part of the same story, one continuous narrative by several authors, where does that lead us?”

  “Exactly. Where? A single text; so what?”

  “How did she die?”

  “Poison.”

  “Where?”

  “At her farmhouse.”

  “How did the blood get in her car?”

  “The killer, her killer, put it there. Drained a bit during embalming, kept it fresh.”

  “Same story as if she had written it, to this point. The killer wanted her death to be gentle, her car to be found. They wanted us to think she had staged her own abduction. Left the heat on in the house. Moved the bicycle. Arranged all the details, even the blood. Why?”

  “To buy time.”

  “Exactly. To buy time. Why? To merge their stories, to make her an inextricable part of the revised script. To process her corpse, to encrypt it beneath the altar.”

  “There’s no altar. The chancel. But why there? To implicate Alexander?”

  “To subsume her in a story larger than her own but under the killer’s control, to give it the mythic status of Sister Marie Celeste. Why the odour of violets?”

  “To make her seem like a saint.”

  “Or! To make sure her body was discovered.”

  “In a saint’s grave.”

  “Exactly,” said Morgan. “A diabolical irony: drop a depraved killer into a saint’s tomb. With flamboyant finesse.”

  “Why?”

  “Why not? Whoever is devising the plot enjoys the perversity.”

  “Remember,” said Miranda, “the literary thing — the writer getting off on his own creation — it’s only an analogy. The killer as a killer is real.”

  “Whose creation is not yet complete. It’s not over, so we wait.”

  “That could be dangerous,” Miranda said, and she smiled.

  “Yes,” said Morgan. He didn’t smile. chapter fourteen

  Penetanguishene

  Miranda left police headquarters early to miss the Friday traffic. Morgan was working at home, but when she called him he wasn’t answering. This didn’t mean he was out — he could have been in the bathroom or he was just being perverse. Sometimes when she left a message, he would pick up midway through, explaining he was screening his calls. From whom? Whoever. But she was used to checking in with him. She felt reassured if he knew where she was. She turned outside the building and looked back up at it, thrilled at how articulate architecture can be, enjoying the fact that she worked within this splendid postmodern extravaganza where glass and multi-hued granite the colour of the Canadian shield create shapes in the eye that celebrate through artifice the natural world. She loved working in a building that spoke so eloquently of great things over small, like a medieval cathedral. Not, she thought, like skyscrapers, which celebrate the tyranny of commerce and trade.

  Feeling quite pleased with her train of thought, she wheeled around into Morgan’s arms.

  “Admiring the scenery?” he asked, steadying her, then standing back. “It’s a great building, isn’t it? Powerful, psychologically accessible. Just what a cop shop should be.”


  “I left a message on your machine.”

  “Okay, so tell me.”

  “I’m in a rush. You’ll hear it when you get home.”

  “I can listen from here. I’m clever that way.”

  “Well, I said, ‘Hey, Morgan, see you on Tuesday. Alexander’s invited Rachel and me up for the weekend. He’s nearly finished, he wants to show off. So we’re taking the Jag, top down, and going camping. She’s got three days, we’re going to set up a tent, there’s a campground outside Penetang. He invited us to pitch it in his parking lot, but, like, it’s not all about him. I haven’t camped since I was a student. We’re going to have fun. You too. Have a good weekend. Bye-bye.’”

  “That’s it?”

  “That’s it.”

  “Press erase and you’re gone.”

  “I’m gone. Outta here. You take care.”

  “You taking your cellphone?”

  “We’re going camping, Morgan. Living in a tent for the weekend.”

  They chatted for a couple more minutes, then she wheeled away, blew him an ironic kiss, and went striding along the sidewalk toward the subway. He watched her go and for an instant he felt lonely. After she descended underground, he turned and entered the ambiguous embrace of steel and granite.

  When she got home, Miranda had a quick shower and called Rachel to see if she was ready. They had both packed up the previous night, conferring by phone about just what to bring in the event of hot weather and cold, rain or shine, mosquitoes and sunbathing. She drove to Rachel’s with the ragtop up and together they tucked it away. Miranda tied a kerchief around her head and Rachel pulled a Metro Police ball cap out of her kit that she put on backward at a rakish angle, so the band cut across high on her forehead with a feathering of hair poking beneath it.

  They told Alexander they wouldn’t be there until Saturday, so they drove straight to the campground and set up their tent on a rocky knoll overlooking Severn Sound. It was a tent Miranda had purchased specially for the occasion — a good quality all-season tent, in case she ever wanted to try winter camping. It was cozy without being cramped, and as long as there was a breeze, it wouldn’t be too hot with the zippered doors open and the flaps of the vestibule set to catch the currents of air.

  After a picnic supper, they chatted in the waning light of the evening. The mosquitoes came out in force but were easily discouraged by the flapping of hands. Miranda talked about her mother and about her sister in Vancouver who had kids and a career and patronized Miranda for being in police work. At least when she was with the Mounties, she had a certain panache, but with the Toronto Police, according to her sister, well, she could have been a lawyer if she’d set her mind to it. Rachel described her own family life, growing up with three brothers and two sisters. “My parents were influenced by our Catholic neighbours. Everyone around there had big families. It was a form of self-defence. If you can’t out-buy the buggers, outnumber them. That’s what my father used to say. Never was clear who ‘the buggers’ were.”

  Rachel’s father was still alive, in his fifties, but her mother was dead. “Just wore out, my dad says. But does he ever miss her. We all do.”

  “I miss my dad, too. I was just hitting puberty when he died. It was like everything changed, you know, everything. Sometimes I wonder if I really remember him, or if it’s a fantasy I’ve constructed to take his place.”

  “That’s what all memories are,” said Rachel. “They’re stories we tell ourselves to keep the past alive. I remember my mamma differently every day.”

  “Wanna go for a swim?” said Miranda.

  “Skinny dip?”

  “Sure. It’s dark enough; and it’s cool enough that the mosquitoes are pretty well gone, and the water’s gonna feel warmer. Georgian Bay is notoriously cold, you know.”

  They edged their way down the smooth stone to the rocks by the shore, stood up in the light of the moon, stripped off their shorts and tops, giggled like girls, and slipped out of their underwear. Each lowered herself carefully into the frigid water, quietly so as not to attract attention. They could hear voices and see several campfires glowing against the dark landscape, and the water rippled with dazzling striations of moonlight. They swam away from shore in companionable silence until they couldn’t make out what people were saying, then floated on their backs, sculling with fingers at their sides, so that only their faces and breasts and their toes broke the shimmering surface, and the rest of their bodies were swallowed in the impenetrable black of the water beneath them. Sometimes as they arched, their pubic hair caught tangles of moonlight, and in the cold their nipples stood proud. Each looked at the other sideways from time to time, lifting her head so that her body sank into the darkness, admiring the gleam of wet skin. After fifteen minutes or so, without exchanging a word, they began manoeuvring back to the rocky shore.

  The air was cold when they stood up, but the smooth stone by the tent still glowed with the residual warmth of the sun. They lay down side by side on towels, shivering from the air, their backs warmed by the stone. Rachel reached over and clasped Miranda’s hand and together they stared into the depths of the night. The moon washed the sky clean of all but the most brilliant stars as it shone through a thin veneer of cloud covering. Tomorrow would be rain.

  Shortly after midnight, the rain began, waking them both from sound sleep, beating on the tent fly in a sustained fusillade as wind whipped against the flimsy dome structure that had seemed snug and secure when they dowsed their flashlights and settled into their sleeping bags only hours before. They sat up together, surrounded by shuddering darkness and the crackling shriek of the thin yellow membrane that shielded them from the fury of the elements.

  “Oh, my God!” Rachel shouted over the din. “We’re gonna be blown away.”

  “Or the tent’s gonna tear into ribbons.”

  “Or we’re going to float into the lake. My God, can you feel the water flowing beneath us? No wonder no one else pitched a tent here. Pine needles in a depression on the rock. Great place for a tent, you said. It’s a pool — we’re practically floating.”

  “Look on the good side,” Miranda shouted. “It’s not leaking.”

  “Not yet. Is it guaranteed?”

  “It’s a North Face, guaranteed for a lifetime.”

  “Against acts of God?”

  “It’s in the fine print.”

  “That’s a relief.”

  “I’ve gotta pee, all this water swirling around — ”

  “Pee in a cup.”

  “We don’t have a cup. Kitchen gear’s outside, probably washed away. I’m gonna batten down the tent lines, anyway. Rather drown than be airborne.”

  The words were swept from her mouth as she crawled across Rachel and unzipped the inner door, then extended her upper body out into the tiny vestibule and slid the zipper on the outer door open. The material flapped violently against her face as she crawled out into the wild night. She stood up, the wind and the rain beating against her, plastering her pyjamas instantly to her skin in a clammy embrace. Diffused moonlight filled the sheeting air with a sublime evanescence and the whitecaps on the sound rolled gloriously against the shore, smashing in waves of thunder. She stood tall, and felt her skin burn in the furious onslaught, and grinned, catching rain-laden wind in her teeth.

  She leaned down and shouted into the tent, which Rachel had zipped tight behind her. “You gotta come out here! It’s beautiful.” The outer zipper lowered a palm’s width and fingers appeared in the slit, wiggling it wide enough for a voice to pass through.

  “You’re nuts. No way.”

  “Rachel, it’s magnificent. Come out here.”

  Slowly, the zipper edged downwards, then with a sudden movement Rachel leaped from the tent, grabbed Miranda, and hugged her, shivering against the storm, shocked by her own audacity. Then she released her hold and they stood side by side, pyjamas drenched, facing the luminescent lake, addressing the storm with silent grace as it swarmed roaring around them. They looked at ea
ch other and grinned, water streaming over their features, disguising them as sea nymphs. Miranda reached for Rachel’s hand and clasped it in hers. It was a magical human moment in the midst of natural chaos.

  When they began shivering too vigorously to endure, they gathered small boulders and placed them against the sides of the tent and on top of the pegs anchoring the guy lines. Miranda walked shyly to the side and as the wind whipped strings of rain against her she squatted and peed. Then they crawled back into the tent, pushed their sleeping bags into a corner while they stripped off their sopping pyjamas and dried off with beach towels. The floor of the tent was spongy from the water pooled underneath, but only damp; there was no seepage. Next, time, Miranda thought, I’ll bring a sleeping mat like the guy was trying to sell me.

  Miranda tossed their wet pyjamas out into the vestibule and when she zipped up the door, there was a momentary hush in the storm, then it picked up with renewed fury. They wriggled into their clammy sleeping bags. Before either zipped up, Miranda leaned over and kissed Rachel on the lips. They held the embrace for a long time, then Miranda slipped back into her own space. Both of them knew this was a turning point — that somehow they were destined never to be more intimate than at this moment, and that morning would bring with it an enduring friendship. Miranda smiled to herself, feeling strangely relieved. She turned her head to look at her friend. The wind howled wildly outside and the rain rattled against the shuddering walls, and in the diffused light of the hidden moon she was surprised to see that Rachel had fallen asleep.

  When they pulled up in front of the Beausoleil church, they were taken aback to find that Alexander’s van was not there. The front doors were locked but they walked around the side to go in through the sacristy. There was an imposing padlock on the sacristy door, but Miranda knew that a bit of a shake would open it. She had watched the pilgrims come in and out the back way, and clearly Alexander was content to provide them access, although he had explained on the phone that none had returned since not long after the discovery of Shelagh Hubbard in Sister Marie’s crypt. He was mildly complaining, since now he had to clean up after himself.