“Another cop. Don’t wanna talk to you.” Wilson started to get up.
“Sit down!” Drumm banged his fist on the table and Wilson sank back into his seat. Drumm was angry and frustrated because he knew this stupid slug of a kid hadn’t killed Arthur Billinger or Daniel Levine. Too stupid to plan Levine’s murder, too out of shape to lift a body up in a garage. And it was impossible to picture him worked up enough to bash someone thirty times with a baseball bat.
“I didn’t mean to stab him,” Wilson mumbled. “I already said it a hunnerd times. Turned around and seen him there. He scared me. Just poked at him and ran away.”
“We’re not here to talk to you about that,” said Drumm.
Wilson stared at him dully. “What?”
“It’s something else,” said Lori. “And if you help us out, we can maybe make things a little easier for you.”
“What?”
Drumm sighed. “We want to talk to you about Arthur Billinger. He was your French teacher in grade eight.” Wilson was staring at him uncomprehendingly. “Mr. Billinger. Your French teacher at Prince Albert Senior Public School. Do you remember?”
“Oh, Mr. Billinger! Yeah, I remember him.” Wilson’s face changed. “He was kilt. I seen it on TV.”
“That’s him,” said Lori. “So you remember him?”
“Sure.” Wilson frowned. “But he’s dead. I didn’t kill him!”
“We know you didn’t, Matt,” said Drumm and he rolled his eyes at Lori. “But we’re trying to find out who did. Do you remember grade eight French?”
“What? Yeah, I guess.”
“What do you remember?” asked Lori.
Wilson thought. Then he smiled with a lopsided grin. “Wrestling! Me and Tiny Tim would wrestle some after school.”
“Wrestling?” Lori asked. “You were on a wrestling team?”
“Nah, not a team. Me and Tim, we’d just horse around in the classroom after school. Mr. Billinger let us. Sometimes he’d do it too.”
Drumm looked at Lori, then at Wilson. “Let me get this straight: you’d get down on the floor and wrestle? In the classroom?”
Wilson stared at him. “Not on the floor. On the desk. With our arms.”
Drumm sat back. “You arm wrestled. That’s what you remember?”
“Yeah.”
“Who’s Tiny Tim?” asked Lori.
“Tim. He was big.” Wilson looked at Drumm. “Bigger than you. He could beat everybody in the class. ‘Cept Mr. Billinger.”
“So Mr. Billinger wrestled with some of the kids. Is that right?” asked Drumm.
“Yeah, like I told you.”
Drumm paused. “Matt, did you like Mr. Billinger?”
Wilson shrugged. “He was okay, I guess.”
“We hear he had a homework club that he ran,” said Drumm. “You know, like after school or before school. Where he helped kids out.”
Wilson looked doubtful, and then he nodded. “Yeah, I remember that. A few of us went.”
“You went to Mr. Billinger for homework help?” Lori was surprised.
“Yeah, couple of times. But I quit.”
“Why did you quit?” she asked.
“Too hard.” Wilson shrugged. “I wasn’t so good at school. But I liked wrestling.” He grinned.
“Who else was in the homework club, Matt?” asked Drumm. “Was Tim?”
“Nah, not Tim. Least, I don’t think so.” Wilson’s brow furrowed and he blew air into his cheeks making his cheeks even fatter. “This is hard!”
Lori said, “Close your eyes and try to see the classroom. In the homework club. You were there. Who sat beside you?”
Wilson snapped his fingers. “Johnnie!”
“Johnnie who?” asked Lori.
Wilson stared at her and shrugged his shoulders. “Don’t know.”
“Anybody else?” asked Drumm.
“Huh?”
“Anybody else in the homework club you remember?” Drumm had a powerful urge to reach across the table to try to shake some sense into Wilson but he restrained himself.
Wilson looked doubtful.
“Close your eyes, Matt. Try to remember,” said Lori. “Who do you see?”
“Ken? No, that’s not right. Started with a ‘k’ though. Kevin? Something like that.” Wilson opened his eyes. “And Dave. I remember Dave.”
“Any girls?” asked Lori.
“Girls?” Wilson grinned again, the lopsidedness of it startling the two detectives. “Yeah! Sara! I liked her.” He looked at Lori. “This is fun, remembering stuff.”
“So you remember Sara,” said Lori. “And you liked her, right?”
“Yeah.”
Drumm asked, “Can you get her last name? Or Dave’s?”
Wilson’s face clouded over. “I don’t remember things so good.”
“You’re doing fine,” said Lori. “You’ve helped us a lot.”
“Last names?” prompted Drumm.
“Can’t remember.” Wilson was sullen again.
Drumm and Singh questioned Wilson for another ten minutes but they learned nothing further of any interest.
On their way out of Donlands, Drumm said, “It’s a good thing you were with me. You brought out the best in him. You have a knack for making a suspect feel comfortable.”
“Thanks. But you would have got the same information.”
“No, I don’t think I would. You’re being too moderate.”
Lori laughed. They were in the parking lot, standing beside Drumm’s car. “Thanks again. Nobody’s ever called me that before!”
sixty-nine
“Do you still have your high school yearbooks?” Lori asked.
She and Drumm were sitting in Parabola, a small self-serve café located close to Donlands. She had insisted that they stop for a meal, even though Drumm wanted to grab some take-out and rush over to Prince Albert school as fast as possible. Thirty extra minutes would make no difference, she argued.
“God, no,” said Drumm. He took a sip of coffee. “Do you?”
“No. I’m not sure what happened to them.” She shuddered. “Who’d want to remember high school, anyway?”
“We could go back and ask Mr. Wilson if he has any public school yearbooks from Prince Albert,” said Drumm. “I forgot to ask him that.”
“Somehow I doubt he has any,” said Lori. “I think your other idea is better. But how many elementary schools produce yearbooks anyway?”
“We’re about to find out,” said Drumm. “I think we have a good chance, though. The school I taught at had one every year, as I recall.”
Drumm finished his coffee, waited for Lori to finish her soda water and then rose, leaving half of his club sandwich on the plate. “I don’t know how you can live on just a salad,” he said, as Lori stood up.
She put on her coat and said, “I have to watch what I eat. Especially when we’re on a case. I don’t have the time to get my workouts in like I should.” She led the way out of the café. “Come on, let’s go back to school.”
Prince Albert Senior Public School was one of the older schools in the city. It was a two-story, red brick building with a strip mall on one side and an arena on the other. There wasn’t a lot of grass to be seen around it, unlike most public schools in York; this building was surrounded by asphalt and concrete.
Like most secretaries Drumm had ever met, Mrs. Abel was middle-aged, friendly and efficient. She listened to Drumm’s explanation and took them right into the principal’s office.
“You want to see our old yearbooks? We must have them somewhere.” The principal was sitting behind her desk, thinking. Lenore Santangelo was her name, and she was tall and thin, likely in her fifties, with short greying hair and a rather horsy face.
Drumm relaxed in his chair and glanced at Lori. “I was hoping you would have them. How far back do you think they go?”
“Oh, forever, I should think. What’s this about, though?”
Lori answered. “It’s a murder investigation, Mrs. Sa
ntangelo. And we’re in a hurry. Please show us where they are.”
The principal took a key ring from her purse and stood up. “Yes, certainly. I’m not sure where they might be, but Mrs. Gregson will know. She puts the yearbook together every year. Come with me, please.”
They followed the principal down a hallway to what was clearly a junior classroom, with rows of hooks laden with coats, and footwear neatly arranged under wooden benches. On the wall by the door was a bright pink sign that read, “Mrs. N. Gregson, Grade Six.”
The principal knocked on the door, opened it and went in. The two detectives waited impatiently outside; they could see clusters of desks with older students busy at some craft. Most of the pupils were so engaged in the activity that they didn’t even notice the interruption. Mrs. Santangelo was back out in a minute with a smile on her face.
“Got them. They’re in a storeroom. Follow me again, please.” She led the way down another hallway and they found themselves at a door behind the gymnasium. Mrs. Santangelo unlocked the door, entered and turned on the light.
“Geez, what a mess!” Drumm exclaimed. The room was stacked, floor to ceiling, with boxes, old desks, AV equipment, chairs and all the miscellaneous stuff that a school accumulated. There were shelves along two sides, all crammed with boxes and stacks of paper.
“This used to be a shower room,” the principal said. “It’s just storage now, as you can see.” She moved decisively to the left. “Nancy said they were in some boxes over here. And there they are.” She pointed at a number of cardboard boxes, all clearly labelled, “Yearbooks”. “I’ll leave you to it, shall I?”
“Yes, thanks,” said Lori, who was already moving towards the boxes.
Mrs. Santangelo excused herself and Drumm retrieved two chairs from a nearby pile, dusted them off and set them down in front of the boxes.
“2001-2002, correct?” asked Lori. She’d already emptied one box and was starting on another.
“That’s it.” Drumm took another box and started rummaging through it. “Would have been nice if the boxes were labelled with the years.”
“Got it,” said Lori. She was holding a slim blue volume with a cardboard cover. The Prince Albert Victorian, 2001-2002, it was labelled. “Oh, cute. But it’s pretty flimsy, isn’t it?” She started paging through the book.
Drumm moved his chair so he could see as well. “Public schools usually just photocopy the pages, and use construction paper for the covers. Or something similar. The photos will be crappy as well.”
“Let’s hope the clubs will be in here,” Lori said.
“They will be.” Drumm was positive. “Let’s hope they’re labelled.”
Lori continued to turn the pages. There were numerous examples of student writing and then they came to the class photos.
“Which class would Billinger be with?”
“He won’t be,” said Drumm. “He was a French teacher, on rotary. He had no homeroom. But he’ll be in the staff photo.”
The staff picture was the last one and they gazed at it, trying to find Arthur Billinger in the grainy photo.
“Him?” Lori was pointing at a tall man in the last row,
“I’d say so, yes. He looks a bit like Vincent Price. Keep going.”
“Who?” Lori turned another page and came to one marked, “Teams and Clubs.”
“Never mind. Ah.” Drumm was almost purring in satisfaction. The club and team photos were labelled.
“It’s not here,” Lori said.
“No, dammit,” said Drumm. “I shouldn’t be surprised, should I? Who wants a picture of themselves admitting they need extra help? Especially in eighth grade. Let’s look back at the class photos.”
Lori leafed through the yearbook until she came to the eighth-grade photos. In 2001-2002, Prince Albert had been a grade 5-8 school; there were three eighth-grade classes. All the photos had the student names underneath.
“Here he is,” said Lori. “Matt Wilson. Mrs. Higgins was the teacher.”
“I’ll take your word for it. I don’t recognize him at all. And…?”
“They’re all here. Sara Liccio, Tim Arnio, David Bowness, John Forrest, Kyle Mollett.” Lori looked at Drumm. “Not Ken or Kevin, Kyle.”
Drumm took the yearbook and looked at it closely. “Geez, these pictures are terrible. You can hardly make out faces at all.” He scanned the list of names. “I don’t see any other Tim or Sara or John or another K boy.”
“None of those guys look like the sketch, Nick.”
Drumm closed the book and stood up. “No, they don’t. But we’ve got what we need.” He waved the yearbook back and forth. “We’ll bring this along.”
Drumm and Singh left the storeroom and went out into the hall which was now full of noisy students banging lockers and talking loudly.
“Ow,” said Lori, covering her ears. “How did you ever stand it?”
“I didn’t,” said Drumm. “It’s why I became a cop. Come on, let’s go get this guy.”
seventy
Their two phones buzzed almost simultaneously as Drumm was pulling into the Police Services parking lot. Lori checked hers first.
“Kinsky’s dead.” She looked somber.
“Great.” Drumm got out of the car. “A hospital visit and another death. Can this day get any better?” He looked up at the sky, where dark clouds were hiding most of the light. “At least it isn’t raining hard.”
“Or snowing,” said Lori.
Back in the Violent Crimes Unit, they were stopped by Detective Morgan, whose face was even redder than usual. “Did you hear? Kinsky didn’t make it.”
Drumm nodded. “So now we have a triple murderer. Does Chappell know?”
Morgan nodded. “I’d try to stay out of his way if I were you.” He punched Drumm lightly on the shoulder and moved away.
Lori was already at her desk. Drumm found a forensics report on the Kinsky attack waiting for him in his office. He scanned it quickly. Nothing had been found in the alley. No unknown hairs or anything else found on Kinsky’s clothes. Blood alcohol level of 0.12. Kinsky shouldn’t have been driving that night, obviously. Drumm threw the report down. Useless, and it would have to be updated now anyway. An autopsy would have to be done, to find out the exact cause of death. Not that there was much doubt. Death by brutal assault.
Lori came into his office. On his desk, one by one, she put down five photocopies of MTO driver’s license photos, and the artist’s sketch. “John Forrest, Tim Arnio, Kyle Mollett, David Bowness, and just for fun, Sara Liccio.”
Drumm bent over and studied them. “Him.” He stabbed his finger at one of the photos.
Lori nodded. “I agree.”
“Thank God we don’t have to call him Mr. Muscles anymore,” he said. “John Forrest is much better.”
“Wojtek and Buleman did a good job,” said Lori. “They got him pretty closely, didn’t they?”
Drumm had picked up the photocopy. “So, he’s twenty-three. Five foot four, one hundred sixty-three centimetres. Geez, that’s short, isn’t it? How many guys do we ever come across who are that little? I wonder what this prick’s shoe size is.”
“I’ll find out. And everything else too.” Lori turned and left Drumm’s office.
Drumm sat and thought, pondering. They now had a name and an address. Lori would be back soon with his life story, his job, marital status, passport number, financial situation and everything else about Mr. John Forrest. Johnnie, Matt Wilson’s friend from grade eight. Arthur Billinger’s pupil. Likely triple murderer.
He would need to tell Chappell, of course. And then they would pick Forrest up. There should be no problem with that. An arrest warrant would come later.
Drumm stood up and went out to Lori’s desk. “I’m going to see the Staff Inspector,” he said. “And I hope to God he sees it as we do.”
Drumm found Chappell on the phone in his office. The Staff Inspector waved him to a seat while he concluded his conversation.
Chappell
hung up. “You heard about Kinsky?”
Drumm nodded. “Yes. Very unfortunate. I gather he didn’t wake up and make any statement at all.”
Chappell said, “No, he didn’t. Sit down. Please tell me you have some good news.”
Drumm smiled and sat. “I think I do.” He explained about the yearbook search and the identification of John Forrest. “This is our man, I’m sure of it.” He folded his arms and stared at his boss.
“Finally,” said Chappell. “Have we got enough for an arrest warrant?”
“I’m not sure. We can link him to Danny’s on the night Kinsky was there. He matches the description of the man in the corner that the waitress saw.”
“She wasn’t definite, was she?” Chappell was sceptical.
“No, she wasn’t,” said Drumm. “But we also have him at Danny’s watching Billinger and Levine. The bartender was definite about that. Buleman gave a good description of him and this Forrest matches it.”
“It’s not enough,” said Chappell. “We won’t be able to find a judge to issue an arrest warrant.” He held up a hand as he could see Drumm was about to protest. “There’s no way. But you’ve got plenty enough to pick him up for questioning. Reasonable grounds, for sure.”
“Alright,” said Drumm. “Lori’s running him right now, seeing what else we can find. I’ll let you know if anything interesting turns up.” He stood up. “I’m going to take Lori and a couple of patrol cars. Morgan and Oliver, too, if that’s alright.”
“Bring him in, Nick. And be careful. If it is him, he’s already killed three times, at least. I don’t want any more foul-ups, especially after what happened to McDonald.”
seventy-one
John Forrest was single and lived in a small bungalow on Beech Street. Lori had used Google StreetView to see that his was the fourth house along on the north side on an otherwise unremarkable road. She noted that there was an alley running behind the street, likely for garbage collection.
Forrest had no record with the police that she could find, not so much as a parking ticket. He was employed as a loans officer at the Toronto Dominion Bank. She had found nothing remarkable about his financial records. He had some credit card debt and a substantial mortgage on his property, which he had purchased a year before. He appeared to be a solid citizen minding his own business.
A Striking Death Page 20