A Green Place for Dying

by R. J. Harlick

  “You gotta tell her, child. Bring you harmony. Stop drinking.”

  “But I’m afraid to. She’ll disown me.”

  “What Creator want, it happen. But if she good mother, she say okay.”

  She reached over to pour herself another cup of pine tea, which was by now very cold. She refused my offer to make a fresh pot.

  “You gotta tell Eric too.”

  “I can’t. That’s why I wouldn’t marry him. My former husband turned against me after my mother told him her version. Can you imagine what Eric would do if I told him the truth? Any regard he has for me now would turn to hatred, and that I couldn’t bear.”

  “No matter. He very important to you. No harmony until you tell him. But Eric, he good man.”

  Her face softened into a sympathetic smile. I saw no loathing, no accusation hidden in their dark depths. “Come child, sit by me.”

  She fanned the smudge around me in a cleansing wash as I collapsed onto the furs beside her.

  “It okay. You good people too.” She hugged me, which brought on more tears.

  While she chanted, I laid my head on her lap and felt the soft caress of her hand as the rest of my guilt drained away.

  Chapter

  Thirty

  I returned home exhausted and emotionally drained. Driving into Somerset to buy vodka never even entered my head. I had only energy enough to feed Sergei and myself before crawling into bed, where I slept without dreams or nightmares and woke the next morning feeling as if it were the first day of the rest of my life.

  But no, this was too easy. I shouldn’t be able to get rid of my guilt by a simple confession. I should have to atone for what I’d done, for the lies I’d told, for killing my brother. I should be punished.

  I thought of Marie-Claude and her way of trying to handle her guilt. I’d tried suicide too, when I was sixteen. I’d reached the point when I could no longer endure the thought of being my brother’s killer, so I’d swallowed a bottle of Aspirin. Fortunately, although I hadn’t thought so at the time, the bottle had been less than half full, and my sister Jean found me before the effect became irreversible.

  After several months at a psychiatric institution and many years of therapy, I was declared fit to get on with my life. But strangely enough, at no time did I ever admit to the lies I’d just revealed to Summer Grass Woman. In fact, I now realized that I’d buried them so deep that only in the last few years had they gradually made themselves known.

  Summer Grass Woman was right. I had to confess to my mother, but I was worried about the effect it would have on her precarious health. She’d had congestive heart failure. Although she’d survived a scare earlier in the summer, the doctors had warned my sister and me not to upset her. After living most of my life with my brother’s death on my hands, I certainly didn’t want to add my mother’s.

  I wasn’t sure what to do. I knew I couldn’t do it over the phone. I needed to do it face-to-face at her bedside in Toronto, but I should probably clear it with her doctors or even seek the guidance of her minister, and if they felt there was little danger, I would confess and accept the punishment she demanded. If they considered it too risky, I would still confess to my sister, for she’d been as much affected by our brother’s death as my mother. Even if my mother didn’t mete out a punishment, I would do it myself. I would give what would’ve been my brother’s share of her sizable fortune to charity.

  However, before I could go to Toronto, I needed to accomplish two things. One was to try to fulfill my promise to help find Marie-Claude’s daughter. I prayed I would find her safe, so that her mother wouldn’t have to live with the kind of guilt that I had.

  The other thing was to confess to Eric then firmly shut the door on him, even move away from Three Deer Point if need be, for I wouldn’t be able to bear the cold condemnation I would see in his eyes whenever we happened upon each other. But to admit my guilt, I needed him in front of me, alive and well. Although I knew I had to reveal the ugly truth, seeing him safe and unhurt would be paramount. Summer Grass Woman had said what the Creator wanted would happen. If Eric were found dead, I would know that the Creator had passed sentence on me.

  Even though I felt confident that Will had set the police wheels in motion, I couldn’t sit back and wait. I had to do what I could to find him. One thing I could do was to go back to the various people in Ottawa who’d seen Eric in July and determine precisely when they had. A couple had mentioned early July, but Paulette had said later in the month. I would start with her. If she’d seen him after Becky was killed, we could rest a little easier knowing that his disappearance wasn’t linked to her death.

  But Paulette’s voice greeting stated she would be away for the next couple of days, so I left a message asking her to get back to me as soon as she could with the precise date of Eric’s visit and anything else she remembered about it. To emphasize the urgency of my request, I added that he was missing, and apart from her no one had seen him since mid-July.

  I had better luck reaching the executive director, Mary. Since she was a friend of Eric’s, I thought there might be a chance he’d been in contact with her. But she hadn’t seen him since that time in early July, around the fourth or fifth, she thought. She’d had no communication with him since.

  “In fact,” she continued, “he was supposed to come to the July twentieth board meeting and never made it. He didn’t let me know either.”

  The day before Becky was killed, I thought with sudden dread. Will had said the coroner’s date of July twenty-first could be plus or minus a day or two.

  “We’re very afraid something has happened to Eric.” I brought her up to date on the situation and ended by asking, “Can you think of anyone who might know where he is?”

  “Not offhand. I didn’t really know him all that well. We only ever met over Centre business. But for him to miss meetings without prior notification is unheard of. I’m with you. Something is seriously wrong.” She didn’t bother to hide the alarm in her voice. “Have the police checked the hospitals yet?”

  “They’re working on it. Would you know if he was involved in any kind of a project or investigation that might be considered dangerous?”

  She sighed. “Possibly. His main reason for coming to the July board meeting was to discuss the findings of his investigation into the high number of native woman that have gone missing in our area. I think I mentioned to you that the number is now at sixteen, which represents about two percent of the city’s total aboriginal population, a very high percentage in contrast to the general population. So far, four have been found dead.”

  “You think this could’ve gotten him into trouble?”

  “Possibly. For the past year he’s been looking into the different cases to try to get a handle on the situation. Although he suspected a few disappearances were tied to domestic disputes, he felt that in the majority of the cases there was something more sinister at work.”

  “Such as?”

  “He didn’t say. But he did tell me that he’d begun to see a pattern. The women were young, in their late teens and early twenties. The disappearances happened in June or early July. And I think in all cases the girls were considered very pretty.”

  “Like Fleur.”

  “I’m afraid so. And like Fleur, they were alone in Ottawa without family. In all cases it had taken their families weeks, even months to realize their daughters were missing.”

  Just like Fleur. “So by the time the families contacted the police, the trail was too cold to follow,” I suggested.

  “I gather in one case it took almost five months for the mother to alert police.”

  “I guess these parents didn’t really care what was happening to their daughters.”

  “I know it bothered Eric so much that he contacted some of the families. In some cases it had to do with parents caught up in their alcoholism, and in a couple the parents were dead and the remaining relatives were glad to be rid of the girls. A sad comment on our community, I
know, but it happens. Here at the Welcome Centre, we try to help these girls and the boys too.”

  “Lost souls, Paulette called them.”

  “Yes, some of them are, but many of these kids go on to lead good lives. Please don’t get me wrong, there are many more good and caring parents in our community than bad ones.”

  “I know. And don’t think you’ve cornered the Market on bad parents. I find it curious, though, that all these girls came from family situations where communication was minimal if not nonexistent. I’m wondering if we couldn’t read something into this.”

  “I’m sorry, I don’t follow.”

  “Maybe they were targeted specifically because of this.”

  “Are you saying someone kidnapped these girls?”

  “Well, it’s a possibility, isn’t it? They wouldn’t be missed until long after they were taken. Maybe Eric had also come to the same conclusion.”

  “He didn’t say, but I know what you mean. Young, pretty, alone, these girls are prime targets for the sex trade. And I have suspected that some of these missing girls probably disappeared into the drug/prostitution world, but voluntarily, if one could say becoming an addict was voluntary. But I think you’re suggesting something more organized might be involved, like a prostitution ring.”

  “The fact that they all disappeared at about the same time of year might point to something organized. But what?”

  Then I had a horrid thought. “What if a serial killer is at work?”

  “Surely you don’t believe that?”

  “I sure hope not. But after what happened out in B.C., it’s possible. Did Eric mention anything about the murders, whether he’d discovered any similarities?”

  “No, no he didn’t. As far as I know, he was just looking into the missing girls. He said he had a few more leads to pursue before he was prepared to make his results public. He also told me to keep it to myself.”

  “Do you know what those leads were?”

  “No idea.”

  “When did he tell you this?”

  “About a month before the July twentieth meeting.”

  “Why didn’t you mention this when I talked to you the other day?”

  “I assumed that Eric had already passed his findings on to Fleur’s parents. But now you’re telling me he couldn’t have. That’s why I’m mentioning it to you now.”

  “Do you know if Eric mentioned any of this to the Ottawa police?”

  “I’m fairly certain he didn’t. He said he would need something concrete before he could take it to the police. I do know that whatever he’d discovered troubled him greatly.”

  “But he gave you no hint of what it might be?”

  “No.”

  “If you don’t mind, I’m going to let the police chief at the Migiskan Reserve know about this. It could help with his investigation. I will probably have to give him your name in case he wants to talk to you. Is that okay with you?”

  “I’m happy to do whatever it takes to find Eric. And by the way, we’ve just had sad news about Claire.” She paused as if choking back tears. “They found her body. But more disturbing, the accident didn’t kill her. A bullet did. The police believe she was shot just before it happened. In fact, they’re saying the shooting caused the accident.”

  Chapter

  Thirty—One

  I hung up feeling as if I’d been punched in the stomach. Although I’d only met Claire one time, I was stunned by the disturbing way she’d died. Murdered while driving her car, probably without warning or even knowing she’d been shot. For a few terrifying moments, she would’ve known something was dreadfully wrong. I hoped she was dead before her car made that horrifying dive into the river far below. I also couldn’t help asking myself, would she be alive today if she hadn’t been driving to the restaurant to see me?

  Although Mary wasn’t able to provide more details, the mid-morning radio newscast reported that the police were unable to say at this point in their investigation whether it was a random drive-by shooting or whether Claire had been specifically targeted. They were asking witnesses to contact them. The newscaster went on to say that there were several reports of motorcycles racing away at about the time her car swerved into the bridge, which immediately brought to mind the motorcycles that had almost driven me off the road a good fifteen minutes or so before I reached the bridge. But I’d been more intent on keeping my truck on the road than looking at them, so I would be useless as a witness.

  Mary had also mentioned that though Claire’s funeral would take place at her home reserve in the Yukon, the Welcome Centre was planning a circle of mourning, and I was more than welcome to attend. Although I could hardly be counted amongst Claire’s friends, I took being invited as a compliment. It was Mary’s way of saying I’d been accepted into Claire’s broader aboriginal community.

  I was in the process of dialing the police chief’s number to let him know about Eric’s missing women investigation when Teht’aa walked through the kitchen door. Too used to seeing her in the standard country garb of jeans and T-shirts, I was taken aback by her smart attire, her interview suit she called it, a sombre charcoal-grey jacket and knee-length skirt with a prim and proper white silk blouse. Hardly the kind of conservative attire I associated with Teht’aa.

  “I’m just getting back from Ottawa,” she said, pouring herself a steaming mug of coffee while Sergei nudged her thigh for a pat. “Any word on Dad?” The dark circles under her eyes spoke of a difficult night.

  “I’m calling Will as we speak.”

  I got his voice mail, so I left a message.

  “So, did you get the job?”

  “You’re looking at the new Ottawa reporter for APTN News.”

  “Wow, super congratulations!” I hugged her, glad that she finally had a job, even though it would take her away from Migiskan.

  I just hoped it was the right job. She’d walked away from the last one after it became apparent the job wouldn’t live up to its billing. She’d only been hired because she filled the aboriginal checkbox. They hadn’t expected her to actually work. But since APTN was Canada’s nationally based Aboriginal Peoples Television Network, she shouldn’t encounter the problem there.

  “But I didn’t know you had TV reporting experience.” I dropped down into a chair at the kitchen table and motioned for her to do the same.

  “I don’t. They’re going to train me. Part of yesterday’s interview was a screen test, which I passed with flying colours.”

  She flashed the kind of smile that would indeed light up TV screens.

  “I’ll be on probation for three months, reporting on what’s happening in Ottawa in aboriginal affairs, and if all goes well, I might have a chance at my own show. Apparently in January they’re starting up a weekly half-hour show on what’s happening on the aboriginal scene in the nation’s capital. The person they had in mind had to pull out, so they’re looking at me. Ta … dah!”

  She flung up her arms and flashed another pearly white smile.

  I had no doubt that she would be a magnetic presence on screen, I just wasn’t too sure about her reporting skills. But that probably didn’t matter. Others would prepare the material. She would only have to read.

  “So when do you start?”

  “They wanted me to start this coming Monday, but when I told them about Dad, they delayed it a week. Only problem is once they learned he was missing, it immediately became a news item. I hope that’s okay with Will.”

  “It couldn’t hurt. In fact, it’ll spread the word much broader and faster than the police can. If someone does know something about his disappearance, they’ll get in touch with the police that much faster.”

  I didn’t want to dwell on the obverse. If we received no response, would we have to assume he was dead?

  “Teht’aa, I have a question for you. Did you know that just before he disappeared, your father was looking into the high number of cases of missing women in the Ottawa area?”

  “Yes, I did. Do
you think it’s related?”

  “I don’t know, but the Executive Director of the Anishinabeg Welcome Centre told me Eric had uncovered a disturbing pattern in a number of those cases. I thought he might have mentioned something to you.”

  “I know they worried him, but I thought it had more to do with police inaction than anything to do with the actual cases. Did she say what it was?”

  I told her about the similarities. “It could point to the same perpetrator, like a kidnapper for a prostitution ring, or much more scary, a serial killer. Did he talk about the ones who were murdered?”

  “Surely you can’t be thinking all those missing women have been killed, including Fleur?”

  “I don’t know what to think, but four, including Becky, have already been found dead and twelve are still missing. Something has happened to them. Maybe it’s murder. We can’t forget about the fifty or more missing women that ended up in bits and pieces at that pig farm out west.”

  “Meg, you’re making my skin crawl.” She winced. “But there are enough rednecks out there that consider Injuns good only for hunting and screwing, so I could see it happening. You think Dad might’ve uncovered something that’s got him into trouble?”

  “It’s possible. Let’s hope it’s nothing worse than trouble. Do you know if any of the material he was working on is at your house? It might help us figure out what’s going on.”

  “I think most of it’s on his laptop, which is with him, but there might be some stuff on his desk. Let’s go have a look.”

  She jumped up from the table, added her empty mug to the other dirty dishes in the sink, and headed out the back door with Sergei trotting behind.

  I started to follow, but the phone rang. “You go on ahead,” I shouted to her retreating back.

  It was Will returning my call. After filling him in on what I knew about Eric’s investigation, I asked him if he’d known about it.