Flush

by Sky Curtis

  Cindy had unwrapped another butter tart and answered me with her mouth full, “Sure.”

  I wanted to snatch it out her hands and inhale it.

  I put my phone on speaker. When England answered I could immediately tell he was out and about. The sound of seagulls cawing nearby came through loud and clear. Was he down at the lake? Derrick Johnston, the sports reporter two desks over, looked up at the sound. I turned the volume down.

  “Jack England.”

  He had such a nice voice, sort of deep and rumbly. A little raspy. Cigarettes? Scotch? “Hi Jack, Robin MacFarland here—”

  “Yes, I know. I have caller ID.”

  Well, at least he’d picked up. In the distance I could hear a foghorn. So, he was at the waterfront. What was he doing there? “I was wondering if we might get together and talk about a few things.” I tried to sound irritated.

  “Look,” he was shifting the phone to his other hand, “I’m sorry about the other night. I was at the end of my rope and you were sort of in the way.”

  Cindy was waving at me madly, encouraging me to get him to meet.

  “So, where do you want to meet?” Now that was pretty aggressive. Hooray me!

  He dug his heels in. “What’s this about, anyway?”

  “Don’t be so suspicious, Jack, I thought you might like to get together. Smooth things over. You know…” I let my voice trail off, trying to sound like I was interested in him. And maybe I was. He took the bait.

  His voice lowered a note or two. “How about that same Starbucks you were at with Radcliffe, you know, the night he was killed.”

  So, England knew Radcliffe was dead and was offering me bait. He wanted to know what I knew. I swam by his hook. “Killed? He’s dead? But we were going to get together next week. On Tuesday. For dinner. I can’t believe this.”

  “Sorry to bring you bad news.” He didn’t sound sorry. “Sure, let’s get together. How about in half an hour?”

  “Half an hour?” Cindy was shaking her head, no, no, no, and mouthing the word “tonight.”

  Darn. I’d have to cancel the wine and pizza night with the gals. “Impossible. I’ve got some deadlines right now. Tonight would be better, say around eight-thirty.”

  Jack scoffed, “Deadlines? Like what? Before the bloom fades off the rose?”

  Was he insulting my job? Or me? Fuck him. I had had enough of that sneering and dismissive treatment from Trevor for thirty years. Never again was I going to get involved with a man who got delight from putting me down.

  But wait, I wanted something. Information. So, I swallowed my fit of pique and went along with his petty joke. “Oh, the stress of being the flower show reporter,” I said with mock distress. “Anyway, how’s eight-thirty tonight for you?”

  “Okay. See you then.” He clicked off before I said goodbye.

  Cindy gave me a thumbs up and said, “Good job. Your first real confrontation as an investigative reporter. You did great. You got what you wanted and he has no idea what it is exactly that you want. Perfect, Robin. Just perfect.”

  I said ruefully, “Yeah, sure. I have a meeting, but I have no idea what I want. Both the police and Doug think there might be an international crime ring connection. The theft of fresh water.”

  Cindy tilted her chair back and looked at me intently. “Radcliffe involved in that? I don’t think so. He’s too, just too, too … shallow.”

  Now that was a pretty good word to describe him. She was right. He didn’t have the depth to pull something like that off. Now I had an ally. “I doubt it too, but that’s what Doug wants. I don’t know what I want.”

  “Sure you do. You want to find out what England knows about Radcliffe. Why he was following him, if he was. Did he see anything the night he was killed? Where did Radcliffe go after he saw you? That is, if England even followed him.”

  I thought back to when England had left me on the street. Yes, he had gone off in the same direction as Todd. And at a good clip. Maybe he had been following him, like he’d said. But then, he was a journalist, and some journalists were known to lie to get information. “You could be right, Cindy, he probably was following him. He said he was. Not that that means anything. It would be good to know where Radcliffe went after I saw him, if he didn’t go home.”

  Cindy was unwrapping her third butter tart.

  “How can you eat so many of those things?”

  “Easy.” She broke it in half and plopped it in her mouth. “I love to hear my fillings sing.”

  “You’ll give yourself diabetes,” I said, hoping my jealousy was disguised as concern.

  She shrugged and went back to whatever it was she was working on. I snuck a glance at her screen and read the word “heroin.” A drug thing, then. Researching. Right now I had bigger concerns. How on earth was I going to unearth the name of the captain of the ship that had taken the pump for the deep water cooling system into the middle of the lake? Doug wanted to know so that meant I did too. My knowledge of ships was a big fat goose egg.

  As my eyes travelled over the department to Doug’s office for inspiration, I saw standing outside the glass doors of Editorial the same apple-cheeked rookie I had hoodwinked a few hours ago to get into Todd’s snow white condo. He tapped on the glass and made a writing motion with his hand on top of a file he was holding. My statement? Must be. I got up and went to the door with a pen in my hand.

  “Sorry about this morning.” I apologized to the young cop, “I had to get into Radcliffe’s apartment. I hope you didn’t get into too much trouble.”

  “No ma’am. Won’t happen again, though. Sign here.” He pointed to the bottom of a page as he handed the file to me, smiling, sort of.

  I leaned against the wall outside the glass doors and took my time reading over what I had said at the police station, flipping the pages slowly while the uniform shifted from foot to foot. I wasn’t going to hurry. You never knew when something would come back and bite you in the ass. But Stapleton had accurately recorded what I’d said so I signed it, sending the cop on his way.

  When I got back to my desk I Googled everything I could think of to get the captain’s name: Everwave boat captain; ship capable of lifting heavy machinery; cranes on boats; vessels, Toronto. That last search gave me information on varicose vein clinics in Toronto, probably a cross-reference with blood vessels. Not what I was looking for, or not yet. Maybe in a few years.

  The futile search did give me an idea. I could simply walk along the waterfront and look around for boats with cranes on them. And then, once I found those ships, I could get the logs and see who was the captain and when. I could find out from Everwave exactly when the pump was installed, and then Bob’s your uncle! I could match up the dates with the log and know who the captain was. It sounded like a plan.

  Cindy looked over at my Google searches. “What are you trying to find out?”

  “The name of the captain of the ship that took the pump out into the middle of the lake. Just a few people know the location. If there’s a conspiracy to steal Lake Ontario water, he could be part of it. I’m counting on there being very few boats in the harbour that have cranes. When I find the boat, I’ll find the captain. I’ve Googled everything I can think of, but not a single hit.”

  “Robin?” She sounded like she was talking to a child.

  “Yes?”

  “Call Research.”

  “Research?”

  “We have a whole department that finds out that kind of information.”

  “Research.” I said, looking at her dumbly.

  Cindy gave me the number. “Call them. You’ll have your answer in ten, twenty minutes.”

  I had never had access to the Research Department before, being a Home and Garden reporter. Being an investigative reporter, if only briefly, certainly had its perks. I dialed the number. A bright young thing answered, “Alison Trent.”<
br />
  She sounded very Lawrence Park and I pictured her in round glasses and a prudish suit from Fairweathers. Long blonde hair parted in the middle and nails polished a demure pink. Her voice sounded somehow familiar, but I couldn’t place it. Maybe she was one of my daughter’s friends, from high school or something. I introduced myself as a journalist working on the Everwave article.

  “I thought that article went out?”

  “Yes and no. One went out, today in fact, but now the CEO of Everwave has ended up dead. So now there’s a new story. Maybe a crime ring killed him. Maybe for our fresh water. Or maybe it was suicide. Or an accident. Even a natural death.”

  “So exciting. How can I help you figure out the mystery? What do you need to know?”

  She was one of those fast-talking kids, the kind where you have to strain your ears to catch what they are saying. Why did kids today speak so quickly?

  I maliciously spoke even slower. “I need to know the name and address of the captain of the ship that ferried out the deep water cooling system pump into the middle of the lake.”

  “Which lake?”

  I certainly hadn’t been expecting that question. But it showed that she was on the ball. There were hundreds of lakes in Ontario to choose from, so it was fair enough. “Lake Ontario.”

  “Oh, okay, and the system? What did you say it was? I caught the first bit, but not the second. Deep lake what?”

  I repeated the description, “Deep lake cooling system.” I could hear her scratching the information down on a pad. So, although she was up to date on speed-talking, she was still using a notebook. Unusual for a kid. “A boat took out a pump and I need to know the name of the captain of the boat. He is one of just a very few people who knows where the pump was installed. The boat probably had a crane.”

  “Do you have a time frame for this?”

  “I guess not when the lake was frozen.” Wasn’t I a brainiac?

  Alison took a deep breath, “Actually, Ms. MacFarland, Lake Ontario rarely freezes over. In the past almost two hundred years there have been only five recorded complete freezes, well, since 1830, anyway.”

  “Oh.” Silly me. “And call me Robin, Alison.”

  “Sure, Robin. It’s my guess we’d be looking for a ship that went out in June, July, August, or September, no high winds, warmer weather. I’ll start my search there.”

  “Thanks, Alison, I appreciate you helping me.”

  “No worries. I’ll get back to you. What’s your cell?”

  I gave Alison my number and hung up. So, a Research Department. That would be so helpful.

  I got my tablet out of my bag and went over the questions that had arisen in my meeting with Doug. As I scanned through them I saw that there were a few more questions that Alison could help me with. I called her back.

  “Alison Trent.”

  Again her voice sounded familiar. How did I know it? “Hi, Alison. Sorry to be a pest—”

  I could hear her sigh. “Listen, let’s be clear about this from the start, Ms. MacFarland—”

  “Robin.”

  “Okay, Robin, sorry. It is my job to find out information for the journalists at the paper. I get paid to do it. I like doing it. I might be new at it, only a couple of years in, but I am pretty good at it. So, don’t hesitate to call and ask. It’s my job. I love information.”

  So Alison was a nerd. I could picture her, pushing her glasses up her nose with an impatient finger. “Thanks, Alison, nice to work with someone so passionate and honest.”

  “Honesty is important.”

  “Well, there are a couple more questions I need answering. I need to find out what buildings are being cooled by the system. I also need some background info on a guy named Richard van Horner. He is VP of Everwave. When and where he was born, his address, stuff like that. He knew where the pump was, so maybe he’s involved in a plot. I need to know how much the ship’s captain was paid, if you can find out. If not I will track him down, once we have a name for him. You know, to see if he’s being bribed. Also, is there is any way to find out who was on the ship as well? That would be good to know.”

  “Easy peasy,” said Alison, “I’ll get right back to you as soon as I get you some answers. Sounds like an interesting article.”

  I thanked her and then went more carefully through my list of notes from my meeting with Doug. The questions would lead to discovering a motive for the killing, if, in fact, his death was a murder. I wondered when the autopsy would be done and what it would reveal. The other two things Doug wanted me to do was to go over Todd’s profile from the dating site and also to write down everything I could remember from the very brief exchange at Starbucks.

  I decided to start with his profile. That seemed easiest as it would be right there in black and white. I signed into the dating site and found, almost to my horror, that five men had sent me smiley faces. FIVE. I moved my chair closer to my computer so no one in the office would see what I was doing, and quickly glanced at their profiles. The first guy, “Mr. Cuddly Bear,” had written down as his body type, “Some extra pounds.” It was an understatement. The second, “Romantic4U,” had oily, straggly, grey hair down to his shoulders. The third profile, “Zoom to the Stars,” had pictures of the guy sitting on his Harley. A Hell’s Angel? The fourth, “Lovetowalk,” had only one picture of him, walking his dog, and then three pictures of his dog. Really? I wanted to go out with his dog? I had my own dog. But the fifth, “Anormalfellow,” looked okay. Nice smile, nice thick hair, not thin, not fat, so I read through his profile carefully but came to a full stop when he said he was looking for someone to spend six months of the year in New Zealand with his family. Get real. Six months? My kids would be devastated. Besides, my idea of going Down Under was a little more thrilling than that. I deleted them all and looked for Todd’s profile.

  In one of those momentary lapses in memory that were becoming worryingly frequent, I couldn’t remember what he had called himself. Let’s see. I had just told Doug. Was it “Dancing Starfish?” No, that was the greasy-haired guy. What was it? I couldn’t remember. Didn’t Todd’s have something to do with sailing? God, I missed my mind. And then I remembered: “Mr.Sail Away.”

  I plugged “Mr. Sail Away” into the search bar and clicked enter. It didn’t come up. I must have remembered incorrectly. So, then I plugged in “Sailaway,” then “Sail Away.” Still nothing. I was sure I had remembered correctly. But then, maybe not. My memory was pretty shot these days. So I settled down into doing a long search. I typed in what I thought was his age range, the distance from my postal code, and other definers for a search that would lead me to Todd. I pressed enter and saw with dismay that there were thirty-seven matches to my parameters. I went through each and every one, slowly and carefully.

  No Todd.

  His profile had completely disappeared. It had been deleted. I felt a wave of fear wash over me. It was there last night. I remembered looking at it around midnight. Probably after he was killed. So, who had deleted it? How did they get his password? Why had they deleted it? What was on his profile that had got him killed? Something was off here. An international crime ring wouldn’t be interested in a dating profile, would they? Well, maybe. Probably not. And I knew it wasn’t a suicide. His profile was down and the temperature in his room was up. We’d made a plan for next week, for heaven’s sake. He wasn’t depressed at all. And, the worst question of all: what had I learned from his profile that put me in danger?

  18.

  BY FOUR IN THE AFTERNOON I WAS TOAST. What a day. My synthetic lunch was bouncing around in my stomach. A murder scene. The cops. My first alcohol busting treatment. And now I couldn’t have have wine and pizza with Cindy and my friend Diane tonight because I had that stupid meeting with Jack-off. I’d have to text Diane. I had been looking forward to spending a night with my gal pals. Cindy had disappeared somewhere, probably following up her gang s
tory. I started to send a text but was sidelined by a message from my daughter Evelyn, Lynnie for short. Know any cosmetic surgeons? I groaned. I’d deal with that on Sunday during our family dinner. Every Sunday, like clockwork, my kids were attracted to the family home like iron filings to a magnet.

  It was time to write everything down. At least the office was quiet. By late in the day many of the journalists and admin staff had gone home, having started very early in the morning. I stabbed the enter key on my computer and the screen flashed into life. I was typing out all the details I could remember about Todd’s profile and my meeting with him in Starbucks when the phone rang. My caller ID said it was the Express Research Department.

  “Hi, Ms. MacFarland—”

  “Robin, Alison, please call me Robin.”

  She laughed awkwardly, “Hi, Robin, I got most of the info you wanted. Sorry I took so long.”

  “No, no, that was fast work, Alison. Okay, shoot. I’m ready.” I brought up a blank page on my computer screen and put the earphone into my phone so I could type while she talked. Although there weren’t many left in the newsroom, I didn’t want to disturb the remaining few with my speaker phone. Plus, I didn’t want to be scooped.

  “Okay. Some of the customers of the deep lake water cooling system are the Toronto-Dominion Centre, the Royal Bank Plaza, RBC Centre, the Metro Toronto Convention Centre, and the Air Canada Centre. So far these are all the downtown customers in the financial district. It isn’t a definitive list, and I couldn’t find out who the rest of the customers were, but at least there are a few to start with. I got all the rest of the information you needed.”

  “Thanks Alison, I doubt the customers are that important anyway, I’m not thinking this was a corporate problem. Most likely the murder, if it was murder, was not motivated by an outside business. Those hits are usually done execution style, you know, down on the knees and a quick shot in the back of the head.”

  Really? Did I say that? Who was I kidding? I had never investigated a murder in my life. My information came from cheap paperback mysteries that I read at night, half cock-eyed with wine.