Stranglehold

by Rotenberg, Robert

  Amankwah let go of Abdul’s arm and sat up.

  The camera swung to the side to show the message painted across the ice surface in graffiti-style letters: HAP IS A MURDERER.

  “A spokesman for newly elected Mayor Charlton says this outrageous . . . ”

  Amankwah heard a click. A garishly coloured spaceship flew across the screen.

  “Fatima, give me that clicker,” Amankwah said. Fully awake.

  “No, we want cartoons,” she said.

  “Cartoons, cartoons,” Abdul chanted.

  They started running around the room singing together: “Cartoons, cartoons, cartoons.”

  “Okay, okay,” Amankwah said. “You can watch cartoons in a minute, but this is Daddy’s business. Give me the clicker right now.”

  “Can we eat our cereal in front of the TV too? Mommy lets us,” Fatima said.

  “Just today, but I need that clicker right now.”

  She surrendered it.

  “Go get your cereal.” Amankwah frantically switched back to the news channel.

  Clyde Newbridge was speaking at the other end of the square at what looked like a hastily prepared news conference. His face was red with anger.

  “Could there be a better example of why Hap Charlton was elected mayor?” Newbridge said. “This is exactly the type of criminal behaviour he is determined to wipe out.”

  “We have heard reports that similar messages have been spray-painted in landmarks all around Toronto,” one of the reporters said.

  “Art? This isn’t art, it’s vandalism. Plain and simple,” Newbridge retorted.

  “Does the mayor have any comment?” another reporter asked.

  “Yes. This is garbage. To say nothing of outrageous slander and falsehood.”

  “Do the police have any idea of who is doing this?” a third reporter asked.

  “No comment,” Newbridge growled.

  The reporters’ questions continued as a voice-over, while a series of still photos came up on the screen. Picture after picture of the same graffiti message on Toronto landmarks: the CN Tower, the Eaton Centre, the Rogers Centre, the Air Canada Centre, the Royal Ontario Museum, the Scarborough Civic Centre, the Hockey Hall of Fame.

  Every message had a tag at the bottom: AARON 8.

  Jennifer Raglan’s son had come back with a vengeance, Amankwah thought, staring at the screen in disbelief.

  “Daddy, you only have regular Cheerios, not Honey Nut,” Fatima said, rushing back in.

  He hugged his daughter. “At Daddy’s house, you get to put on your own honey.”

  “Oh,” she said, “that’s a good idea.”

  He kissed her on the top of her head before she scurried away.

  He reached for his home phone and looked around for his cell.

  81

  KENNICOTT’S CELL PHONE RANG WITH A SPECIAL RING TONE HE HADN’T HEARD FOR months because he’d programmed it exclusively for calls from Ari Greene. He stared at it in disbelief. What the hell was Greene doing phoning him in the middle of the trial? On a Saturday morning no less, when he was half awake.

  He let it ring three times. He could think of a million reasons to ignore it. Let it go to voice mail.

  On the fifth ring he answered it. “Ari. Why in the world are you calling me?”

  “Daniel, if you never speak to me again in your life after today, I’ll understand completely. But right now you have to do something.”

  “Have to?” Kennicott felt the same anger toward Greene he’d felt when he’d testified at the bail hearing. Except now there was no reason to hold back. “You have the nerve after the way you deceived me, you used me, you made a fool of me, to tell me what I have to do?”

  “I can’t argue with you. Do you have the DVD?”

  “Fuck you.”

  “From the Coffee Time.”

  “You think I didn’t know what DVD you’re talking about?”

  “Daniel, I’ll give you back your brother’s file. I’ll resign from Homicide. I’ll do anything you want. Just look at the end of the DVD. Go to thirty-two seconds after Jennifer disappears from sight.”

  “You called me this early on a Saturday morning in the middle of your trial to tell me to watch the video of an empty sidewalk?”

  “If it stayed empty, I wouldn’t be calling you,” Greene said. “Until they fire me, I’m still a cop.”

  Kennicott looked across his bedroom at the TV screen. The DVD was already loaded. He’d been watching it last night.

  “You are too dedicated not to have brought a copy home with you,” Greene said.

  “Okay,” Kennicott said. “I’ve got it on. What are you telling me to do again?”

  “Look at Camera Four, the outdoor one. Fast-forward to 10:01:12. Then pause it.”

  Kennicott didn’t say a word as he hit the button and watched the images fly past. But he could feel the anger in him ebb.

  “I’m there, the street’s empty,” he said. “What’s the point?”

  “Go slow for the next three seconds.”

  Kennicott hit the button.

  Bit by bit, he saw a front bicycle tire come into view, then the whole bike, and the rider, who was walking beside it. He was wearing a familiar-looking T-shirt. Thanks to the bright spray-painted colours, it was easy to read what was written there: AARON 8.

  82

  AMANKWAH HAD BOTH PHONES GOING, HIS HOME AND HIS CELL, TEXTING AND E-MAILING. He had to get hold of his sister to take the kids. He had to contact Howard Darnell to tell him what Aaron was up to. He had to get hold of Barclay Church, who’d made it clear many times that if a big story hit, he wanted to be in the loop. And he had to find Nancy Parish. For sure she and Ted DiPaulo and Ari Greene would want to know about this.

  His sister was a software engineer and thankfully lived with her BlackBerry attached at the hip. She got his text right away. She was pissed off, but on her way over.

  Barclay Church answered his cell phone on the first ring. Either the man never slept, or he had no life, or both.

  “Mr. Double A. What a spectacular morning. We so seldom get blue skies like this in England. Looks like our new mayor has angered a local artist,” he said. “Tut tut.”

  “You saw the news.”

  “The news never stops. That’s why we’re all addicted to it.”

  Amankwah quickly told Church how he’d made contact with Darnell during the trial and gained his trust. How his older son, Aaron, had been shipped down to New Mexico for drug rehab but had escaped and got back to Toronto a few days ago. That his son’s name was Aaron and his tag was Aaron 8.

  “The plot thickens,” Church said. “Excellent work.”

  “This is for your ears only. I promised Darnell I wouldn’t print a word without his permission.”

  “That promise has to be rock solid. You and me and no one else.” All of Church’s usual flowery sarcasm had disappeared. He’s a pro, Amankwah thought.

  “In fact I don’t think you should have told me,” Church said.

  “Normally I wouldn’t,” Amankwah said. “But my gut tells me this whole thing is going to blow up. The case against Greene fell apart in court yesterday. The mayor’s got his first big event planned for this morning at the Scarborough Civic Centre. He’s going to be power-washing away graffiti.”

  “Yes, at eleven so he can make the noon news,” Church said. “I want you to be there.”

  “Okay, but send another writer and a photographer.”

  “Done. We pay you for your instincts.”

  Next Amankwah called Nancy Parish. There was no answer at her home. He called her cell. She sounded very tired when she answered.

  “Awotwe?” she asked. “Why are you calling so early?”

  “Only would do it in an emergency. I think you should turn on your TV.”

  “Well, wait a second.”

  He heard the sound of sheets ruffling, then footsteps, then a door shut. “Awotwe,” she whispered. “What’s this all about?”

  “N
ancy, I feel terrible calling you like this.”

  “As you probably guessed, I’m not exactly at home.”

  “Someone’s been spray-painting ‘Hap Is a Murderer’ all over the city.”

  “What?”

  “The tag is Aaron 8. It’s Aaron Darnell.”

  “Wow. I thought he was in the States.”

  “You didn’t hear this from me,” he said. “But the kid escaped from his southwestern boot camp a few days ago and is back in the city.”

  “I’ve got to call Ted. Thanks, Awotwe.”

  Next he called Howard Darnell.

  “Aaron has emerged,” he said.

  “I know. My daughter told me already. It’s all over the social media. What should I do?”

  “Sit tight, and keep your kids home.”

  “That’s what I planned to do. Call me the minute you have news.”

  “Of course.”

  Just as Amankwah hung up, his cell phone rang. He took one look at the display and answered it immediately.

  “Hello,” he said. “What can I do for you, Detective Greene?”

  83

  GREENE HAD BEEN IN THE TORONTO STAR OFFICES A FEW TIMES YEARS AGO, WHEN HE WAS dating a sports reporter who eventually moved to San Diego. The building was located at 1 Yonge Street, at the base of the longest road in the world, as a sign on the outside of the building proclaimed. Amankwah was waiting for them just inside the front door. This early on a Saturday morning, the sidewalks were empty.

  “Thanks for coming down on such short notice,” Greene said. He’d called Amankwah and told him about what he’d seen at the end of the Coffee Time video. “We really appreciate it.”

  Amankwah shook hands with Greene and Daniel Kennicott, who stood beside him.

  “Not a problem.”

  “I doubt you expected to see the two of us together when you woke up this morning,” Greene said.

  Amankwah grinned. “Nor did I expect to see that Aaron Darnell had spray-painted ‘Hap’s a Murderer’ across half the city.”

  “He must have ridden his bike all through the night. When you think about it, probably the best way for him to get in and out of places fast.”

  “We have to be fast. I need to get up to Charlton’s event at the Scarborough Civic Centre. This story is going viral.”

  Amankwah signed Greene and Kennicott in at the front desk and in a few minutes they were in the archives room in the basement.

  “What was the date you wanted?” Amankwah asked as he went into the stacks of old newspapers.

  “September second, 1985,” Greene said.

  “Here it is,” Amankwah said a few minutes later. “It’s a front-page story written by Zach Stone. Guy’s been around forever.”

  Greene held his breath as he looked at the headline: JUDGE CHARGED WITH INDECENCIES, COMMITS SUICIDE.

  “Indecencies,” Amankwah said, chuckling. “The Star wouldn’t be so discreet today.”

  Greene’s eyes were fixed on the story. Disgraced provincial court judge Jack Nakamura, recently charged with propositioning a police officer in his chambers whom he mistook as a prostitute, has jumped to his death off the Bloor Street Viaduct.

  Amankwah and Kennicott read it over his shoulder.

  The story described how Jennie Raglan, an attractive young police officer on the morality squad, had been the police officer involved. Her partner had stayed outside the door in case something happened, and had entered on a prearranged signal and arrested the judge. Her partner’s name was Clyde Newbridge. The officer in charge of the case was Hap Charlton.

  “Jumping Hap,” Amankwah said.

  “What?” Greene asked.

  “That’s Zach Stone’s nickname for Charlton. I always thought it was because Hap’s such a restless guy. Now I know better.”

  “Jumping Hap, Jumping Jack,” Greene said. “It was his idea.”

  “And Newbridge was in on it too,” Kennicott said. “To think I had him help me arrest you.”

  Greene kept reading.

  “ ‘This was all a police setup,’ Nakamura’s son Oscar told reporters from the steps of the family home. ‘My father wasn’t afraid to stand up to the police, and that’s why they targeted him. It’s a disgrace.’

  “ ‘It is understandable that the family would be upset,’ Detective Hap Charlton said, when asked about the family allegations. ‘But nothing could be further from the truth.’ ”

  Greene put the newspaper down. “Charlton targeted Nakamura because he was the only judge at Old City Hall who had the guts to call the cops liars. This was back when the holdup squad was regularly beating confessions out of prisoners. Whacking them with phone books so they wouldn’t leave any marks.”

  “And Raglan was the bait?” Kennicott said. “But why is this all coming back now, after so long?”

  “Because Aaron was in trouble and Hap knew it,” Greene said. “Hap had a problem with Newbridge. His and his two buddies were out of control, beating up pimps, extorting prostitutes for sex. No way Hap could win the election if that became public or if the old story came out of how he drove a judge to suicide. Especially a former war hero.”

  Kennicott nodded. “And Newbridge was coming unglued, because Carmichael and his gang of defence lawyers kept collecting more and more incriminating evidence from their clients. It looks like Raglan was in on this too.”

  Amankwah looked at Greene. “I’m sorry, Ari, but she was. I’m working on a story about her that’s going to come out at the end of the trial and there’s some shocking news in it.”

  “What?” Greene asked.

  “Raglan was the one who withdrew all of the charges against Newbridge and his Trio gang.”

  I know you will be shocked by what I was forced to do. It felt to Greene as if someone had at last pulled a curtain away from a window, letting light into a dark room.

  “You sure Jennifer was doing that?”

  “I put all the allegations into a chart, and there it was, clear as day. Raglan pulled eighty-three charges for the three Trio cops.”

  The price of love is so very high.

  “Why did she do it?” Kennicott asked.

  “We don’t know,” Amankwah said. “That’s going to be my headline: ‘The Mystery Died with Her.’ ”

  “No, it didn’t,” Greene said.

  “What to you mean?” Amankwah asked.

  Greene pulled Jennifer’s letter from his coat pocket and showed it to them. As they read it, he explained to Kennicott how the lawyer on the Danforth, Anthony Carpenter, gave it to him the day he was arrested.

  “We searched you,” Kennicott said. “Where did you hide it?”

  “I didn’t. I saw you and Lindsmore and Newbridge on the street, so I had Carpenter mail it to a friend.”

  “Good thing you did,” Amankwah said. “Otherwise Newbridge would have seen this, and told Hap.”

  “Raglan was planning to go public on the Thursday,” Kennicott said when he finished the letter. “That was the day we followed Darnell when he drove Aaron to Buffalo. He told me the next day that the date had been arranged two months in advance.”

  “Jennifer was waiting for Aaron to be safely away before she told the world that Charlton was using her son to blackmail her into withdrawing the charges against Newbridge and the two other cops.” Greene looked Kennicott right in the eyes. “For Hap, killing Jennifer was the only way to keep the lid on it. He found out about our affair, and I was easy to frame.”

  “Even if he knew about you and Jennifer, how would Hap have known she was about to go public?” Amankwah asked.

  Greene and Kennicott looked at each other knowingly.

  “Hap has his finger in every pie,” Greene said. “Maybe he found out about Aaron going to the States. Maybe some reporter got wind of Jennifer wanting to call a press conference. Maybe he bugged her phone or her house or both. One night I snuck out on my bail to investigate something, and who shows up out of nowhere? Hap.”

  Kennicott nodded. “I
was coming home from work last night, and Hap was waiting for me in front of my house. And now that I think about it, he was shaking me down for information about Aaron.”

  “That’s Hap,” Greene said. “We’ll probably never find out how he knew, but I’m sure he did.”

  “Amazing,” Amankwah said. “What a story.”

  “So Aaron is spray-painting ‘Hap Is a Murderer’ all over town,” Kennicott said to Greene, “because he was the witness you caught a glimpse of running out of the courtyard. He took off on his bike before you could find him.

  “Aaron must have figured out about Jennifer and me and was following his mother. But Charlton got there first and Aaron saw her being murdered.”

  “Do you actually plan to arrest the mayor?” Amankwah asked.

  Kennicott looked at Greene. “We need to talk to one more witness.”

  What was he thinking? Greene wondered.

  Kennicott turned to Amankwah. “Can you get me recent photos of Charlton and Newbridge. We need to hurry if we’re going to make it to the Scarborough Town Centre by eleven.”

  Smart Daniel, Greene thought, realizing what he had in mind. Very smart indeed.

  84

  KENNICOTT SLOWED HIS CAR AS THE TRAFFIC UP AHEAD CAME TO A STOP. HE LOOKED OVER at Greene. The irony wasn’t lost on either of them, he thought. Here they were, at 10:20 in the morning heading east on Kingston Road, stuck in a traffic jam.

  They were on the part of the street where it opened up to six lanes, three in each direction, with very few exits. Almost exactly at the point, half a kilometre west of Scarborough Golf Club Road, that Ted DiPaulo had pointed out to the jury.

  Kennicott looked over at Greene. “This look familiar?”

  Greene met his eyes, then surveyed the traffic in front of them more closely. “Get into the left lane. That red light up there is Markham Road. It’s your last chance to get off before you get totally stuck. Turn left and keep going north to Lawrence, then go east again.”

  Kennicott put on his blinker and nudged his way into the left-turn lane. “If you weren’t caught in traffic the way DiPaulo suggested to the jury yesterday, what were you going to say on the stand on Monday?” he asked.