Jennifer continued. “So, she asked me to divert trawlers to Portsmouth so all fish could be processed before closing year-end. Not long after, she came back to my office and reversed the decision. When I asked why, she said everyone felt there’d be too much spoilage before it got there. That made sense to me. So that was the end of it.”
“Makes sense to me too. But who did she mean when she said ‘everyone’? Who would have a say over spoilage management and catch allocations to plants?”
“I didn’t ask at the time, but I assumed Mr. Jenkins and the plant managers … Possibly trawler captains too, especially regarding spoilage.”
“How many trawlers were involved?” Of course, he knew the answer, but he wanted everyone’s recollections independently.
“That day, three.”
Jennifer had brought with her a binder of all year-end inventories around the world, even though she was only responsible for Britain and Portugal. She had worked the other plants in the past and was thoroughly familiar with the processes and procedures at each one.
For the next hour or so, Jennifer took St. James through inventory records for all plants, inventory adjustments, and the typefaces used for documentation sent to head office. There was no variation between Plymouth’s and Portsmouth’s procedures.
She forwarded emails between head office, plants, and trawlers from her iPad while they talked, as St. James requested.
“Thanks, Jennifer. You’ve been a great help. I may need to call on you again.”
“Pleasure,” she said as she stood to leave.
When she was almost through the door St. James said, “Oh, just one more thing.”
She turned to him. “What’s that?”
“Are you authorized to give inventory instructions directly to plants and trawlers without approval?”
“That’s how you get fired around here,” she said, smiling.
“Who tells you what to say?”
“Karen.”
“Anyone else?”
“Karen is very protective of her staff. She demands the utmost loyalty. She would never allow anyone else to give me instructions. If someone tries, I’m to go to her immediately.”
“Thanks again, Jennifer.”
St. James rang Karen.
“Any chance you could see me for a few moments?” he asked.
“Absolutely. Come on down, as the game show host says.”
So he did.
“How was England?” she asked when he appeared in her doorway.
“Excellent. I was very well received. Everyone was cooperative and forthcoming. I’m very impressed with the efficiency and cleanliness of the plants.”
“Our best managers,” she said proudly.
St. James nodded. “I met Captain Thorne while I was there.”
Van Hoyt suddenly looked concerned. “Oh? How’d that go? He can be a crusty old codger sometimes.”
“He was great. Could use a bath though.” St. James grinned.
Van Hoyt laughed. “Guess there aren’t many ladies to impress at sea. Other than the state of his hygiene, what did you learn?”
“He took me through his logbook for the day of the count. He was upset with the instructional flip-flop on where to take catch.”
Van Hoyt shrugged as if to say, “these things happen.”
“Can you explain the confusion?” St. James asked in a nonthreatening tone.
“Thorne was approximately halfway between the two plants,” Van Hoyt said. “Plymouth was operating at capacity on the last day, and Portsmouth had no fish to process. We were trying to balance the flow between the two. We debated which location to send the trawlers to but in the end decided Plymouth was best to minimize spoilage. Unfortunately, Jennifer jumped the gun and sent instructions before the matter was finalized. If she’d waited, there would have been a lot less confusion. Only one instruction would’ve been sent.”
St. James’s forehead furrowed.
“I see. How many trawlers were in play that day?”
“Three.”
“That clears up the loose ends. Thanks, Karen.”
When he returned to unlock the temporary office, he found a note on the desk from Juanita Mendoza. Nelson would like to see him. St. James strolled down the hall to Graves’s office, and Juanita beckoned him in.
“Go right in, Mr. St. James. He’s expecting you.”
St. James nodded and walked straight into Graves’s inner office.
They shook hands and exchanged pleasantries.
Graves was uncharacteristically relaxed, leaning back in a large brown leather chair behind a matching desk. “I just wanted to see how everything was going, Hamilton.”
For ten minutes or so St. James recounted the steps he had taken on the case, from the head office to England and back. Graves looked surprised to learn that he had been through shareholder files.
“What does that have to do with inventory?” he asked.
“Nothing really. Standard procedure for an overall management review. It’s important to know who invests in the company.”
Graves chuckled. “You mean who has skin in the game, as they say.”
“Something like that,” St. James said without expression.
“Thank you for the update, Hamilton. I appreciate you stopping by.”
St. James wasn’t ready to be dismissed just yet. “I have a couple of questions for you if you don’t mind, Nelson.”
Graves looked surprised again. “Sure.”
“What involvement did you have around the inventory adjustment?”
Graves’s wider eyebrow twitched. “Not much really. Karen briefed me on it a couple of times and I spoke with Cameron about the issue. That was about it. Mostly we relied on the auditors to provide comfort around the amount of the adjustment.”
“Of course, as chairman, you’d be concerned.”
“Very much so. But Karen explained it all in great detail, and I trust her judgment. She’s very thorough.”
“And Cameron? What was his explanation?”
“The same as Karen’s. Except Cameron was a bit defensive. That caused the board to be concerned, which of course led us to engage you.”
“Thanks, Nelson. That’s great.”
St. James had one more interview to do before calling it a day.
He went down to the next office and tapped lightly on the dark wooden door to the chief operating officer’s office.
Henry Jenkins was a short, thin, rather sickly-looking man with thick black glasses that were too large for his face.
St. James introduced himself, and Jenkins promptly invited him to sit in a well-worn green fabric chair just as pale as Jenkins himself.
The office was almost bare; no family pictures or mementos, no indication of who occupied it. If Jenkins hadn’t been sitting there, St. James would have guessed it a spare office.
“Henry, I just have a couple of questions today. Are you okay to chat for a few minutes?”
“Absolutely. Take as much time as you need,” Jenkins said in a mild voice. His glasses slipped and he pushed them back up the bridge of his nose.
“Last year-end there were three trawlers that unloaded at Plymouth, but not before confusing instructions were given to captains about whether to take catch to Plymouth or Portsmouth,” St. James said.
Jenkins nodded. “That’s right.”
“Were you involved in those decisions?”
“No, but I was kept informed by Karen. She told me Portsmouth had nothing to process that day and she wanted everything processed for year-end financials.”
“Then what happened?”
“She switched the trawlers back to Plymouth to preserve quality of catch.”
“Why was she managing this instead of you? The COOs of your competitors make those calls, not the CFOs. Seems most peculiar.”
“Normally I do. But in this case she asked Cameron if she could manage year-end processing to maximize value. Profit is Cameron’s number one focus, and Karen’s the num
bers lady.”
“How did you feel about that?”
“At first I was a little put out, quite frankly. Then Cameron talked to me about it. Only a year-end thing, he said. And I would be back in charge after that. It was no reflection on me, and I should not interpret it that way, he said.” Jenkins shrugged. “So I let it go.”
“Hmm. Still seems peculiar. You could have easily done the same thing as Karen. As COO it’s your responsibility to maximize profit too. You would’ve loaded up capacity just as she did,” St. James pressed, scratching his head.
Jenkins shrugged once again. “That’s what they decided to do, and I chose not to make a fuss.”
St. James checked his watch. 4:10.
Concluding that he’d accomplished what he could for the day, he returned the shareholder files to Anderson’s executive assistant, then made his way over to the Royal York and checked in. By the time he had showered and dressed it was 5:30, and the bar was calling.
The Royal York made the best vodka martinis in Toronto, so St. James’s choice was a no-brainer. Three-quarters of the way through the martini, Dozer climbed onto the stool next to him.
“I’ll have what he’s having,” Dozer said to the bartender, pointing to St. James’s glass.
“Hey, man. How’s the shoulder?” Dozer said.
“Coming along. Worst is over. So, no luck squeezing Gyberson?”
“Just what I told you on the phone. Man’s a human clam. ‘Not as they appear’ is the only thing he said that could possibly be useful. That is, if we knew what it actually meant. I could have gotten more, but I didn’t think it wise to beat the hell out of him in a US police station,” Dozer explained.
St. James smiled. “Might not have gone well for you.”
The bartender deposited a cocktail napkin and a full martini in front of Dozer. Dozer raised the glass, first to salute the bartender, and then to touch St. James’s for a toast.
“What did your guys find following our three CISI people around?” St. James said, anxious to get business out of the way for the evening.
“I have a couple of things to share about Karen and her husband,” Dozer said, pulling a notepad from an inside coat pocket.
“Oh?”
“Yeah, they just bought a new house. It’s in her name alone, not joint, and it’s a good thing it is.”
“Why is that?”
“Greg, her husband, owns a company called Van Hoyt Construction. It’s drowning in debt. Owes the bank $5.3 million, fully guaranteed by him personally. Trade creditors haven’t been paid for over ninety days. They’ve already filed liens on the only two projects he has on the go, both of which have cost overruns and are still not finished. No construction draws left to finish either one. No money to pay trades or to repay the bank. Way I see it, Hamilton, he has maybe a couple of days before the bank pulls the plug. And then he’ll face bankruptcy because of the personal guarantee.”
St. James was incredulous. “How the hell do you find this stuff out, Dozer?”
Dozer gave St. James one of his huge smiles. “If I told you that, then you wouldn’t need me, and that would make me sad.”
St. James laughed. “Okay, what else you got?”
Dozer went back to his notes. “Karen took out a mortgage to purchase the house, again in her name only, for $500,000. She paid $1 million for the property. That still leaves quite a bit of equity.”
“What about movements?”
“Everything the woman does is about the house. We followed her to tile, paint, plumbing stores, you name it. No interaction with Blakie or Graves since we started surveillance.”
“Hmm. Blakie?”
“He and Graves had lunch together a couple of times.”
“Lunch?” St. James said in a startled voice. “Graves and Blakie?”
“That’s what I said.”
“They hate each other. Why would they be having lunch?”
“People do eat you know, Hamilton.”
St. James shook his head. “Not these two, not together.”
Dozer looked pained and his voice rose. “Hey, man, I’m just reporting what we saw, I’m not justifying it.”
“Okay! Okay! Don’t get your knickers in a twist. It’s a surprise, that’s all. I’ll have to think about it,” St. James said in a much quieter tone.
Dozer went back to his notes. “I almost forgot one interesting thing we found.”
“What’s that?”
“Van Hoyt worked with Graves at IBM for a couple of years.”
“I didn’t know that,” St. James said, once again sounding surprised. “Food for thought.”
“Speaking of food, I’m starving,” said Dozer. “Let’s go to the dining room.”
Chapter 58
It was 9:45 p.m. when Dunning pulled himself up from the garage floor, dusted himself off, and quickly picked up the tools he had used to partially sever the brake lines on Hamilton St. James’s newly repaired BMW.
Dunning smiled, proud of his work. Small cuts meant slower leaks, only about a half-hour of driving before the brakes would fail.
No one will know when or where the lines were cut.
Dunning would be long gone. His surgical gloves meant leaving no prints, no way to trace it back to him.
At that moment the elevator doors opened, and a tall woman dressed in black emerged into the parking area. Dunning quickly ducked behind the BMW, accidentally dropping the cutting tool as he went down. The woman froze, startled by the sound of metal on concrete.
“Who’s there?” she shouted in a frightened voice.
Dunning remained silent. Motionless.
Again she asked who was there. No response.
Dunning suddenly darted from the far side of the BMW, head down so not to be recognized, up the down ramp, and climbed into a white 1987 Cadillac idling at the mouth of the parking garage.
Chapter 59
Stern wore a black hood covering most of his face and a green knapsack slung over his right shoulder. Slowly, he crept around the perimeter of the middle-class Washington home, eyes scanning every direction like a lighthouse beacon, ensuring no one was watching.
10 p.m.
The house was dark except for a flickering television screen visible through a side window. There were loud voices inside: two men arguing over something, Stern couldn’t make out what. Thinking he was about to be discovered, he dropped to his knees. Crouching, he slowly moved toward the flickering light, and realized the loud voices were coming from the television; it was playing a police show he himself had watched a number of times.
Shifting his position to the left of the window, he saw a man slouched over in a large black rocking chair, sleeping. Even though the man’s face was turned away, Stern could tell he was middle-aged and had the build of Slate.
Satisfied he wasn’t being watched and was under no immediate threat, Stern duck-walked back to the end of the driveway, dropped down behind Slate’s white Lexus, and pulled a small white metal canister from the green knapsack. With a gloved hand, he wiped dried mud from the car frame next to the gas tank, making sure the magnetic canister attached firmly, metal to metal, with no debris impeding the magnet’s work. He placed the canister and jiggled it to make sure it stayed in place, then pushed a green button on its face, immediately powering a flashing dim red light. Satisfied everything was secure as planned, he stood, looked around once again, and walked quickly down the street and around the block to the nearest bus stop.
Chapter 60
At 8:00 Inspector DuPont answered the telephone to the sound of Miss Barnes’s voice.
“Chief of intelligence here to see you, sir,” she announced pretentiously.
“Didn’t know I had a meeting with him.”
“You don’t, he just arrived. Says it’s urgent and he must speak with you right away.”
“Send him in.”
Seconds later, an average-height man in his early forties dressed in full RCMP uniform entered Pierre’s office and s
tood at attention.
“Good morning, Chief. Please, be seated.” DuPont motioned to a guest chair. “What’s this about?”
“You asked me to keep tabs on the four criminals recently discharged from prison.”
“Go on,” Pierre said.
“We picked up social media chatter from a couple of them, sir. It became clear after a number of exchanges that they’re planning to kill Hamilton St. James and Bill Slate.”
Pierre’s face grew grave. He was quiet for a moment, playing with the end of his moustache.
“Where are Slate and St. James now?” DuPont asked finally.
“Can’t say for certain, sir, but as near as we can tell Slate is home in Washington and St. James is in Toronto.”
“Did the chatter describe how they might do it?”
“Sabotaging cars in some way, but the exchange wasn’t specific on timing or method.”
“You said a couple of them. Which ones?”
The chief referred to his notes.
“Arthur Spance, Jeremy Stern, and Clifford Dunning. There was also a fourth man.”
Pierre interrupted. “That would be Nells.”
“No, that’s not the name.”
DuPont straightened.
“Then who?”
“Man named Calvin Vinner.”
“Sounds familiar.”
“Should, sir. You put him away ten years ago. In our records as a hit man, and a cheap one at that. Does anyone for ten grand.”
“Yes, yes, now I remember. Tall, skinny guy.”
“That’s right, sir.”
“Don’t remember any connection with the other three, though,” DuPont mused.
“There isn’t.”
“Then what do they have in common?”
“As far as we can tell they all hate Slate and St. James.”
“Hmm. Do we know where Nells is?”
“Sources say he works construction in Chicago.”
DuPont nodded. “Get ahold of Slate right away. Tell him what we know. He’ll have Bureau people go over his car with a fine-toothed comb — and before he starts it!”
“Yes, sir, immediately.”
The chief left quickly.
DuPont buzzed Miss Barnes. “Find Hamilton St. James, now!” he barked.
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