I remembered the thing I had touched inside the Ocean Reaper’s cabin. The thing that had been wet and warm and soft.
The old wharf rat was sitting in the doorway of his floating Airstream, reading a newspaper. I said, “Did you happen to recognize the man who ran away from Fred’s boat just now?”
“I didn’t hear nothing and I didn’t see nothing!” the old fellow shouted angrily. “Ain’t I gonna get no peace today?” He spat into the water and went inside. I went back aboard Fred’s boat.
The Ocean Reaper’s pilothouse was an untidy clutter of unwashed coffee cups, old newspapers, decaying paperbacks and rumpled wet-weather clothing. An empty beer bottle was balanced atop the ship’s compass. A soiled brassiere dangled from a steering-wheel spoke. A steep stairwell led down to the accommodations. I put a hand on the railing. Looking down I saw part of a red-sleeved arm protruding from a bunk. As I descended, the whole of a bloodstained T-shirt appeared. Then I was looking at a familiar bearded face. His eyes stared sightlessly into space. It was Fred Eade. He had been shot.
My cellphone didn’t work properly down below. I went up on deck and called Ribblesdale. A woman with a voice I didn’t recognize answered the phone by saying, “Calvert Hunt residence, Georgiana speaking.”
I said, “This is Sergeant Seaweed, Victoria PD. May I speak to Sarah Williams?”
“I’m sorry, Miss Williams is not at home.”
“Mr. Service then.”
“Excuse me, I’ll check to see if he’s in.”
A minute dragged by. Georgiana came back on and said, “Mr. Service doesn’t appear to be at home either. Is there any way I can help?”
“Yes,” I said. “Georgiana, would you mind having a look to see if the white Jaguar is on the property?”
“I beg your pardon. What did you say?”
“The white Jaguar. I want to know if it’s on the grounds or in the garage.”
Another minute passed before Georgiana said, “I’ve just had a quick look. The Jaguar is parked in the garage.”
I said, “Sorry, Georgiana, but this is very important. Are you quite sure that neither Mr. Service nor Miss Williams are on the property at this moment?”
“Quite sure. I’ve just said so, haven’t I?” she said testily. “I’m far too busy for this. If you don’t believe the things I say, come and see for yourself.”
Georgiana slammed the phone down.
≈ ≈ ≈
Bernie Tapp arrived promptly. Men in blue uniforms roped the whole area off and the serious crimes squad began its investigation. Bernie waited on the float with me, delaying his questions while a first-aid man examined my bruised shoulder and recommended ice packs.
Bernie had a newish corncob. He reamed it out and filled it from a leather pouch while I described how I’d found Fred Eade’s body. I told him about the green Toyota Corolla and gave him its licence number.
I said, “I’m pretty sure the driver is a guy called Sidney Banks.”
Bernie took out a spiral-bound notepad and started writing. I told him about meeting Eade in Mom’s Café.
“One more thing,” I said. “Remember Frank Harkness?”
Bernie thought for a moment. “The drug kingpin who went down in a plane crash? Sure, I remember him.”
“Frank Harkness was married to Marcia Hunt.”
Bernie’s eyes widened.
I said, “I have proof that Frank Harkness was alive years after his plane went down. He was arrested by Washington State police in 1983.”
“Arrested for what?”
“Homicide.”
Bernie nodded. “That figures.”
A technician appeared on the Ocean Reaper’s deck and beckoned Bernie aboard.
I said, “Right now, my guess is Harkness is doing a lifer somewhere in California. I’ll be checking into it.”
Bernie’s pipe had gone out. He sucked a few times and then pulled out his matches. Instead of striking the match he put everything back into his pockets, shook his head and went aboard the Ocean Reaper without a word.
I went home.
≈ ≈ ≈
I was in my cottage, holding an ice pack to my bruises, when my house phone rang. A woman said, “This is me.”
Her voice was nervous, low-pitched. I heard background voices and music. I guessed she was calling from a bar. I said, “Hello.”
The woman said, “You don’t know who I am, do you?”
“Should I?”
“I’m Fred Eade’s woman. You’ve seen me once at least.”
A picture of the cheerful, raffish blonde that I had seen with Fred Eade in Mom’s Café came into my mind. I said, “You’re Patty Nolan. Where are you calling from?”
“Never mind that.” She was nervous and irritable. “I got a message for you. Information.”
“I’m listening.”
“It ain’t that easy. I got all the trouble I need and don’t need no more. How do I know I can trust you?”
“Does this have to do with Fred’s murder?”
“Yes and no,” she wailed hysterically. “Maybe it has, I dunno. It must have.” She wept softly for a moment. “I need money,” she sobbed. “I’ve got nothing to live on, not a cent. I know you and Fred were working on a money deal. You were gonna pay Fred for information about Marcia?”
“That’s right. What do you know about it?”
“Fred was my guy, I know everything he knew, we worked together.” She choked back more tears. “I need that reward money bad, mister. Are you talking cash?”
“Yes. We can make a deal immediately, in my office.”
“Where’s your office?”
“It’s the neighbourhood cop shop, across from Swans pub. You know where that is?”
“Sure,” said the woman.
“Will you come?”
“This ain’t a set-up? I had nothing to do with Fred’s killing.”
“It’s not a set-up.”
“All right, I’ll be there in a few minutes. If I smell a rat, I’ll be outta there, understand?”
She hung up. It was nearly seven o’clock.
Fifteen minutes later I was in my office, listening to footsteps approaching along the corridor. The door opened and Constable Halvorsen walked in. She had on a strapless green dress that fitted her like a second skin, alligator shoes and a matching leather handbag.
“On your way to dinner?” I said.
Her eyes narrowed suspiciously.
I said, “I listened to your telephone message. Your boyfriend Norbert wants to take you out and I thought … ”
“Norbert’s not my boyfriend!” she snapped. “I don’t have a boyfriend.”
I was pleased to hear it. I didn’t say anything. I’d been screwing up all of my male-female relationships lately and I didn’t want to screw up with her.
She sat on the edge of my desk, swinging one shapely leg and looking like something out of Vogue. “I didn’t expect to find you in here, but since you are, I have something to tell you.”
I raised my eyebrows.
“Well,” she said, getting up from the desk and crossing to the door, “I complained about your methods, but that’s before I knew you properly. I’ve been finding out that you have a lot of friends on the street, that’s all.”
“Thanks, Halvorsen,” I said to her retreating back. She went out, closed the door, opened it again, poked her head through the opening and said, “Denise. Call me Denise. And by the way, I don’t have a manfriend, either. If Norbert calls again, tell him I’m busy.”
≈ ≈ ≈
Patty Nolan was late. Over an hour had passed since our telephone conversation.
Chantal was outside on the street, walking her strut, signalling johns. From her hips downward, all she had on were black net stockings and high heels. The johns were middle-aged men driving family sedans, young men driving old Volkswagens. They drove around and around — down Pandora, left at Wharf Street, up Fort to Government Street, then another left until they reach
ed Pandora again — driving the hooker circuit, checking talent. Prostitution has been going on here for a century and a half. Hookers arrived in Victoria right after the gold miners, in 1858. Back then, johns walked or rode in horse-drawn carriages. Prostitutes stood under street lamps lit with whale oil. Every few years, Victoria’s chief magistrate goes on a morality crusade. Under pressure from the top, futile police activity ensues. Hookers go underground and bide their time. When the pressure eases — as it always does — johns come out to play again and hookers go back to work again.
Chantal noticed me standing at my window and waved. I was watching something on the roof of the building across the street.
When Chantal heard the gun go off, she thought it was a firecracker. Then she saw that my office window had smashed into a thousand pieces. She saw me fall.
Chantal began to scream, but I didn’t hear her.
CHAPTER NINE
I had been hit by a burst from an ak-47 assault rifle. One bullet grazed my temple. Another passed through the flesh of my right shoulder and clipped the collarbone. Technicians from the Serious Crimes Unit found empty shell cases on the roof of the building across the street, and they dug 17 rounds of 5.45 mm ammunition out of my office’s drywall. I was lucky; Kalashnikov’s pretty little gun is lethal at 1,350 metres.
After a screaming ambulance ride to the Royal Jubilee Hospital and a session in Emergency, I was removed to Intensive Care and guarded round the clock by uniform-branch constables.
Alex Cal and Jiggs Murphy had alibis. Bernie Tapp arrested them anyway and gave them a tough grilling until their lawyer showed up.
A manhunt failed to turn up Fred Eade’s former companions — Patty Nolan and Sidney Banks. Sidney Banks was a petty crook with a rap sheet a mile long who had done a couple of stretches in Wilkinson Road. Once for B and E, another for a convenience-store robbery.
This all bypassed me. When I regained consciousness a pair of white-coated interns were beside my bed, speculating about possible retrograde amnesias, concussions, potentially disastrous post-traumatic neuroses and a lot of other things that I didn’t understand. One thing I knew. My injuries couldn’t be serious because I felt no pain. I opened my eyes and raised a hand to touch the bandages around my scalp. A series of explosions occurred between my ears. I passed out again.
The next time I woke up, my room was in near-darkness. I thought I’d gone blind until a shadowy outline moved in a corner. When I croaked, somebody pushed a button on the wall and crossed to my bed. I concentrated. Bernie Tapp’s ugly mug swam into view.
“How am I doing?”
“You been shot up pretty good, pal. But like I told the medics here, you’re too mean to die before you collect your pension.” He grinned down at me. “I just rang for a nurse. You need anything?”
“An Aspirin. Maybe two.”
≈ ≈ ≈
Dr. Cunliffe dropped by and checked my charts. He said, “I spoke to the specialists. They expect your headaches to disappear in a few days, don’t anticipate any long-term ill effects. Your collarbone seems to be healing nicely. How does your head feel?”
“I think the surgeon sewed a couple of riveters inside there. Two angry men with hammers.”
“That bad, eh?”
“Worse. When do I get out?”
“Three or four days if you like. You’ll need in-home care for a while.”
Nursing staff kept my visitors to a minimum, but investigators from Serious Crimes came by a few times. Charles Service snuck in with Sarah Williams for one brief visit. Sarah brought flowers. Service delivered grave nods and sad shakes of his distinguished white head. Denise Halvorsen sent flowers and a huge get-well card signed by 100 street bums.
Meanwhile, I didn’t know which was worse: residual headaches or my sister’s nagging.
Linda stood by my hospital bed, arms folded across her chest, tapping the floor with one foot and saying angrily, “I suppose you’re satisfied now. Here you are in a sickbed, you could be dead, and you probably don’t even have term insurance! Don’t you know that if your skull was normal flesh and bone instead of solid wood you’d be history? Do you know it’s a miracle you weren’t blinded permanently? And what do you think about that, smart guy?”
“Nothing.”
The tempo of Linda’s breathing increased and her eyebrows nearly vanished into her hairline as she added, “And who are all these cards and flowers from? Are they from people who’d take you home and nurse you from death’s door like I have to?”
“Why don’t you read them and find out?”
“I suppose I must, you being too sick to move a muscle,” she said, getting angrier with every word. “You big dumb animal. Well, there’s a card from Chantal somebody. Another from Sarah somebody. A stupid note from Denise somebody. And here’s a nice note from a Mr. Service. When are you going to settle down with one woman? Then I wouldn’t have to run around picking up the pieces of your life, blood being thicker than water! All these women are probably no better than common streetwalkers. I’ve seen some of the women you hang out with. You make me so mad, you big galoot! Who’s Mr. Service anyhow? And Denise? Who’s she supposed to be? Why don’t you meet some decent girl for a change and settle down and get married instead of running all over, chasing women and carrying on?”
Linda’s husband, Dick, was behind her, shrugging his shoulders and winking sympathetically until Linda wheeled around and saw him.
She said, “So, smart guy. Why don’t you finish packing Silas’s things so we can take him home?”
“Sure, honey,” Dick said.
Spinning on her heels to stare at me again, Linda said, “I suppose you know how stupid you look, one side of your head shaved bare where the doctor had to patch that big dumb brain box of yours, two black eyes. And your shoulder all smashed up.”
“I know,” I said. “I’m sorry, Sis.”
Linda sniffed and started to cry.
≈ ≈ ≈
Linda and Dick’s house overlooks Colby Island on the opposite side of the Warrior reservation from mine. I moved into their spare room and tried to be invisible. The fishing season had closed, so Dick had taken a contract to repaint suites in a James Bay retirement complex to keep busy. Every day Linda made breakfast for the three of us. After breakfast Dick drove off in his pickup truck, while Linda went across to her clerical job in the band office.
Chief Mallory, Victoria’s top policeman, dropped by to see me, kitted out in his full-dress regalia. As usual he spent half an hour retelling stories about the great times that he and my father had enjoyed when they were young together a million years ago, killing grizzlies and trophy bighorns and 200-pound Tyee salmon.
When the chief ran out of exaggerations and I could get a word in edgewise, I asked if anybody else was pursuing the Marcia Hunt inquiry. Apart from absently twirling his moustache, he acted as if he hadn’t heard. Then he coughed and said, “For financial and other reasons, Victoria is rethinking the entire neighbourhood policing experiment.”
This was serious. I said, “What, permanently?”
“Ah, well, my boy,” he said evasively. “That’s not entirely my decision. Victoria’s police budget is set by others and isn’t bottomless. But to be frank, Silas, we’ve had the odd complaint about your methods … ”
I tried to interrupt. Chief Mallory raised his hand to shut me up. “But you’re an invalid and mustn’t trouble yourself about these things. Concentrate on getting well. We’ll talk again.” He gave me a wink and trundled off in his chauffeured limo.
The next visitor was Bernie Tapp. I was sitting in Linda’s yard, studying a book on Canada’s western birds, when Bernie showed up. The Eade murder was still a big mystery. Bernie had found out that the green Toyota Corolla had been stolen from a West Vancouver shopping mall.
Bernie said, “I’m just a bit curious, pal. Why did somebody shoot you?”
“I don’t know. Alex Cal and Jiggs Murphy are the obvious suspects. But maybe it was the gu
y who bumped off Fred Eade.”
“Fine, same question. Why would the guy who rubbed out Fred Eade want to do the same to you?”
“I still don’t know.”
Bernie said, “Somehow, there’s got to be a tie-in between Harry Cunliffe’s killing, Marcia Millions and Fred Eade.”
“I think so too, but if there is a tie-in, I haven’t yet found it.”
“But you’re looking. Maybe Frank Harkness is a key link?”
I nodded.
Bernie said, “While you were out of action I took it upon myself to call California Corrections. Asked them about Frank Harkness. For some undetermined reason they haven’t been too co-operative. Some cockamamie bullshit about prisoner’s rights. So we took it up the ladder. Still nothing.”
I didn’t respond immediately, and for some reason Bernie thought I was holding something back. His frustrations began to show. Abruptly he said, “What’s that book you’re reading?”
“Nothing.”
“Looks like a bird book.”
“That’s what it is. I picked it up at Munro’s.”
“So it’s not nothing,” he exploded. “It’s a bird book! Are you ashamed of having a bird book? All kinds of people have bird books.”
“Well, at least now I know the difference between a hawk and an eagle.”
“How about vultures? You got pictures of vultures in there?”
“What kind?” I asked, turning to the index.
“The kind that hangs around back alleys and bars.”
His own unwavering glare reminded me of eagles. I said, “What’s up?”
“I’m talking about that Ruger Blackhawk you found in Waddington Alley. Ballistics did a good job on it. A bullet from that gun was extracted from the dead body of an Edmonton street hustler three months ago.”
“What? Pimps battling for turf?”
Bernie nodded.
“So,” I said, “what next?”
“What I did, I brought Jiggs Murphy in and asked him where he was when the Edmonton pimp got shot. Murphy told me he was in Calgary at the time. I couldn’t shake him.”
≈ ≈ ≈
It was time for me to get back on the horse. Charles Service wanted to see me and I had questions for Dr. Cunliffe.
Seaweed on the Street Page 15