“The file contains an accurate record of all that went on, as far as I know.”
But the truth, Domenic, does it contain that? Shepherd’s look seemed to ask. “So there will be nothing coming back to bite us? They were tense times, Domenic, a lapse here or there would be understandable.”
Jejeune let his silence stand as his answer.
“Very well, then. But just remember. There’d still be a fair reservoir of goodwill, if it ever became necessary to call upon it.”
If anybody was to fill in some of those empty spaces between the facts, you mean, thought Jejeune. He stared around the room. The sunlight seemed to have reached every corner, even those that were normally in shadow.
His mind went back to a conversation of a few weeks earlier, in this very office, when frost still rimed the fields beyond the window and the light outside was pale and flat: “It’s to be a new start between us, Domenic.” Shepherd had a knack of making such pronouncements sound like the consensus of a long-debated position. She’d looked over her glasses at this point, pausing as if to consider how far she wanted to take her explanation. “I’m aware of all that’s gone on, why you were chasing around Elvery when you should have been backing up the team on a gun call.” She’d smiled at him. “No one came to me, in case you were wondering. I made it my business to find out. I was actually quite a good copper at one time, believe it or not.”
She’d been referring to the breach of duty for which she had transferred Jejeune, a decision she had only rescinded at the last moment. At that early stage in their reconciliation, it had still been difficult ground for both of them. But he hadn’t been surprised when she brought it up. It needed to be covered if they were to repair the damage between them. “I understand your need to protect Lindy from what you perceived to be a genuine threat, but since it wasn’t Ray Hayes in Elvery, I’m suggesting we draw a line under this incident and move on. However, there are to be no more secrets between us, Domenic. Everything out in the open from this point on. Agreed?”
Jejeune remembered looking at the barren fields outside, stretching to the horizon beneath the low winter sky. “No more secrets,” he had repeated at the time, hoping it would be true.
7
Jejeune turned his head quickly, just in time to see a family of Grey Partridges scuttle away under a hedgerow. The passenger seat of Danny Maik’s Mini would never be one of his favourite spots anyway, but with the way the car was agonizing over every bump in the road, and its right-drifting tendency requiring Maik’s constant correction, the vehicle was inspiring no great confidence today. Like many accomplished drivers, Jejeune wasn’t the best of passengers, and the cramped quarters, plus the inevitable barrage of dated music, such as this particularly angst-ridden offering called “Why When Love Has Gone,” meant he often spent long portions of their drives regretting his decision to leave the Range Rover behind. In fact, about the only upside to having Maik drive him like this was the opportunity to do some risk-free birding from a car. And in that regard, he conceded, a covey of partridges wasn’t a bad way to start the day.
Maik’s expression was set somewhere in the space between contemplation and resolve. How many times had he made journeys like this, wondered Jejeune, knowing what was to follow once they delivered their news? And for what, in this case? They could not ask about enemies or potential motives in a son’s death they could not yet even confirm. They could bring only the possibility of loss, an uncertainty that was a pain all of its own, beyond sadness, beyond grief. He sighed. He was not looking forward to the next half-hour or so, though he conceded it would have been immeasurably worse without Danny’s reassuring presence.
Maik wheeled the Mini into a narrow driveway off the lane and shut off the car engine, simultaneously putting both Domenic Jejeune and The Isley Brothers out of their misery. Patches of once-white plaster showed through on the front of the house where the stucco covering had fallen away. Alongside the drive lay a scruffy patch of dirt partitioned into rows. A vegetable garden, Jejeune guessed, awaiting the arrival of planting weather. Despite the age and disrepair, there were signs of pride in the home: a neatly brushed front step, crisp white lace curtains in the bay window, even the row of bricks neatly outlining the garden’s perimeter.
A woman was standing in the open doorway. She looked like she had been there a long time, even though they had not called ahead to tell her they were on their way. Perhaps she stood here every day, holding a vigil for her missing son.
As they got out of the car, the strains of a wheezy birdsong reached them from a nearby hedgerow; Greenfinches, celebrating the imminent arrival of spring; a new chance to breed and raise young, to nurture them, watch them grow. Jejeune hoped he and Mrs. Kowalski were not tuned to the same wavelength.
“You are police?” she asked, not raising herself from the door jamb as the two men approached. “You have come with news of my Jakub?” Her question was not elevated with hope.
“Should we go inside?”
“It is a nice day here,” she said, turning her head to indicate the garden. “Here is where I wish to hear your news.” She was pale and gaunt, almost to the point of looking malnourished. But she brushed her straw-coloured hair back from her brow with a dignified gesture, and Jejeune saw strength in the hollow features.
“The body of a man was discovered two days ago,” said Jejeune. “It has not been possible to identify him yet, but a weapon was found beside the body. The gun is registered to your son.”
“This body, this person, it is the one discovered at construction site? The one who was burned?” A stab of pain flashed across her features. “My poor Jakub,” she said mechanically.
“As the inspector said, ma’am, we have not established the identity of this person at this time. We are trying to …”
“It is him. I have known this since he disappeared. We can go inside. I have no wish to see this day anymore.”
She led them indoors to the small, sparsely furnished living room and sat down in a threadbare armchair. She leaned forward slightly, clasping her hands in front of her and resting her forearms on her knees. Sorrow etched itself into the lines on her face. But there were no tears.
Jejeune had taken a seat on the sofa opposite the woman in the cool, shadowy room, but Maik remained standing. From his vantage point, he could see the sunlit garden outside. It seemed to belong to a different world.
“Does Jakub’s father live here?” asked the inspector. “Jakub had no father — only a man who made a girl pregnant and then ran away. Tchórz,” she said, “Coward. Jakub was raised by his grandfather. As a girl, I was a disappointment to my father, but he loved my boy with his whole heart.” A shadow of sadness swept over her face, and again her lean features tightened with pain.
“Your father is not here with you both?”
“Gone,” she said. “Many years now. In Poland. He never came here. Jakub and I had only each other in this place.” She waved a hand around to embrace the house, perhaps all of the world. “This is why I know he would never go away without telling me. He would never leave me.”
“When was the last time you saw Jakub —?” Jejeune’s question stopped abruptly and Maik knew the DCI had barely prevented himself from adding “alive.”
“He left this house on Tuesday. It was late afternoon. He was going to Tidewater Marsh. He said he may be able to make money there.”
“What is your son’s job?”
Maik noticed Jejeune wasn’t prepared to yield to the past tense yet. The woman had hope, and even if she didn’t hold onto it herself, it was not the DCI’s place to take it away from her.
“Many jobs,” said the woman, shaking her head sadly. “Jakub had a good mind as a child. He could make plans. His grandfather and I thought he might become an engineer one day. But he did not want to follow this path. He liked money. He would work for it if he had to, but he liked it best when he could get it easy ways. There are many people in our society like this, I think.”
“Why does your son own a gun, Mrs. Kowalski?” Maik’s tone found the perfect pitch, as always, compassion balanced with an efficiency that suggested he required this information to help locate the missing man.
“He was a hunter. Birds. He was an excellent shot. Licensed even by the government.”
Jejeune seemed to stiffen slightly at this information, but a flicker of something outside drew Maik’s attention away. He crossed to the window and peered out into the garden. He saw nothing, but when he returned his attention to the room, he could tell that something had changed. His DCI wasn’t ready to ask his questions yet, though. He was still letting the pieces fall into place. Maik recognized the need to step in for the moment.
“How did your son become such a good marksman? Was he in the army?”
She shook her head, lowering her eyes into her lap to stare at her hands. “We lived on a farm, far from the city. Vegetables we could grow, but the only meat we ate were the birds Jakub and my father brought home. My father taught Jakub to shoot. He taught him everything. And then he sent his precious grandson away, to England, to a better life.” She cast her dark eyes up and looked at Maik. “Do you know how much you must love someone to say goodbye to them forever, because you believe it is better for them? But we would lay down our lives for those we love. Surely to sacrifice our happiness is nothing.”
“Does your son hunt for bounty, Mrs. Kowalski?”
Maik spun his head and looked at his DCI. Even after all this time working with Jejeune, the DCI still had the ability to come up with questions for which there seemed to be no point of reference at all.
Paulina Kowalski nodded. “Ducks, the foreign ones. When he heard the government was paying hunters to kill them, Jakub applied for a licence. He was a good shot,” she said emphatically. “Always at the head. No suffering for the birds. No wounding, no dying from injuries.” She paused. “It is better this way.”
Maik nodded in understanding; a man who recognized that there were different ways of killing, even if the result was always the same. But why would the government sponsor the killing of any birds, humanely or otherwise? Jejeune apparently had no need to ask.
“And this was at Tidewater Marsh?” he confirmed.
Paulina Kowalski nodded again. “A pair of these ducks had been reported there. He went to find them.” She paused and drew in a breath. “This was the last time I saw him.”
Maik’s attention had been drawn to the window again, to faint shadows outside that seemed to be changing for no reason. Behind him, he heard his DCI’s delicate preparation for another inquiry, the most important one they would need to make today.
“We were wondering about your son’s health,” began Jejeune, slowly. “If you have the name of Jakub’s doctor and his dentist, that would be very helpful.”
Though the DCI had couched the matter as delicately as possible, there was slight tightening around Mrs. Kowalski’s lips that suggested she may have detected the real reason for the request. She reached across to a small address book on a table and withdrew two business cards. “Jakub had the same doctor as me, but not the same dentist. I must see a specialist now. I have many problems. My doctor says my diet lacked nutrition when I was young.” She gave a bitter smile. “I lacked many things when I was young.”
“Gun!”
Maik’s shout froze Jejeune for a heartbeat, and then he and the sergeant simultaneously burst into action. Jejeune dived towards Mrs. Kowalski, catching her in the chest with his shoulder, flipping the armchair back towards the wall. Maik had already dropped, and was rolling across the floor. But not towards the cover of the upturned chair, behind which Jejeune and Mrs. Kowalski now lay. Maik was moving in the other direction, away from safety, in the direction of the door.
“Sergeant!” called Jejeune. But it was too late.
Police safety protocols stood no chance against Maik’s instincts, which were to face the line of fire, drive out into it, attack it. He drew himself up into a crouch and burst through the doorway into the garden, spinning into a low roll as he emerged. Jejeune braced himself for the sound of gunshots, but none came. Leaving Mrs. Kowalski huddled behind the chair, he began inching across the floor. He squatted low and pressed his back against the wall beneath the window. He was breathing heavily and he inhaled sharply to give himself the chance to listen for sounds outside. Silence. Turning, he cautiously raised his eye level up to the window and peered out. He was still hunched against the explosion of activity he expected at any moment. But there was only stillness. The sunlit garden was empty, the shadows undisturbed. On the driveway beside the Mini, he could see the bulky, unwounded form of Danny Maik getting up slowly and bending to pick something up.
Maik returned to the room as Jejeune was helping Mrs. Kowalski to her feet. A photograph had been knocked from a wall in the commotion, but there were no other signs of damage in the tiny living room. Maik hefted the chair to its upright position and eased the woman once more into her seat. “Sorry, ma’am,” he said gruffly. “False alarm. All this talk of guns, I suppose. Made me a bit jittery. But the coast is clear. There’s nothing to worry about. Can I get you a cup of tea? Help settle the nerves? I know I could use one myself.”
Jejeune looked for a long moment at the man made so jittery by all this talk of guns. But he said nothing. He set the broken photograph on a side table and continued to reassure Mrs. Kowalski in low, measured tones until Maik returned with the tea. As he handed her a cup, Jejeune asked again whether she had been hurt by his rugby tackle, but she assured him she had not and brusquely brushed off further questions. She seemed impatient now and keen to have them gone. Perhaps this shock had opened up her defences, and she was ready to disappear into grief over the fate of her son, of which she seemed so certain. The men bowed to her wishes and left.
Outside, Maik took a moment to look up and down the quiet country lane before the two men climbed into the Mini. The sergeant unfurled his hand to reveal the soft black sponge cap he had retrieved from the driveway. “Off a mic. One of those with a long arm.”
One that could look like a rifle at first glance, thought Jejeune. “Media?”
Maik shrugged. “Can’t think of anybody else who might be interested. I heard a motorbike leaving in a hurry on the far side of the hedge, but I didn’t get a look at it.”
“Worth checking CCTV, you think?”
“Possibly, but if they know the area well, there are plenty of lanes and back alleys where a bike could avoid cameras. I’ll tell uniforms to be on the lookout, but my guess is that they’re long gone by now.”
Jejeune looked at the foam mic cover carefully. The media may well have an interest in a police visit with a woman who had almost certainly just lost her son, but how had they found out about it so quickly?
The same question played on Danny Maik’s mind, as they drove back to the station. It was only much later that afternoon that he thought about the other question that had interested him. The one that concerned the licensed killing of foreign ducks.
8
Jejeune was leaning on the railing, staring up at the heavens, when Lindy rounded the corner at the rear of their cottage. She paused, unwilling to trespass upon his meditations. The flawless marble moon hung suspended over the dark sea, its reflection shimmering like a half-forgotten memory.
Jejeune sensed her presence and turned. She handed him a glass of wine and joined him at the railing. “Then on the shore of the wide world I stand alone, and think. Till Love and Fame to nothingness do sink,” she quoted. “I don’t suppose your paltry Canadian education covered Keats, did it?”
“What’s a Keat?” asked Jejeune, playing along. “I was just thinking about those lunar features you were mentioning; the Sea of Tranquility, and the other one …”
“The Bay of Rainbows. There’s the Island of Winds, too, and the Sea of Serenity, the Lake of Solitude, and dozens of others. Incredible, aren’t they? I always imagined they were named by somebody staring up at the night sky l
ike this, armed with a glass of Chablis and an imagination as wide as the universe itself. In reality, it was probably some spotty wonk in the bowels of a lab somewhere. I suppose I’ve never bothered to find out because I’ve always preferred my version. If the truth is going to disappoint you, I say why bother with it. Just make up one of your own.”
A light wind came in off the water, rustling the pampas grasses Lindy had arranged in the huge planters at either end of the patio. Non-native vegetation, thought Jejeune, or perhaps merely exotic. A ribbon of low clouds drifted gently across the horizon, skirting beneath the moon. They stood side by side, sipping their wine, looking out over the sea and the night sky, united in their silent awe of the world and its wonders.
“Still no news, then?”
Jejeune shook his head. It was the code they used for Damian’s situation; the shorthand they had settled on as the indecision had dragged on from days to weeks, and now to months.
“Shepherd offered to make some semi-official inquiries, but …” He let his point fade away on the evening breeze. The Colombian authorities wouldn’t be hurried into a verdict just because a DCS with the North Norfolk Constabulary was now making it her business to get involved, not even a DCS as formidable as Colleen Shepherd. The Colombian judiciary had been deliberating Damian’s case for this long, and even if Jejeune still chose to interpret that as an encouraging sign, there was no reason to believe they were in any hurry to come to a decision.
“If it ever gets sorted, do you think a family reunion would be on the cards? After all, you think he’s already back in Canada somewhere, right?”
A Tiding of Magpies Page 5