Slow Recoil

by C. B. Forrest

  Now McKelvey sat on the stool at the bar, trying to line up the bits and pieces. It was now obvious that Davis Chapman—or whatever his real name was—had used the immigrant resource centre to get Donia Kruzik set up. Davis Chapman worked in some capacity for the “government”. Donia had been found murdered in Tim Fielding’s apartment. Donia’s boss, Bojan Kordic, had been murdered. Tim Fielding had stepped into the middle of something that was beyond the experience of McKelvey’s time on the force. What was the objective here, the motive?

  As McKelvey sat thinking, his eyes glanced to a man sitting at a small table beneath a black and white portrait of James Joyce. This was the same bearded rounder he’d seen in the bar a couple of times over the past week. The man was not doing a very good job of hiding the fact that he was looking at McKelvey.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  Maxime had fallen asleep on his bed at the Royal York after making contact with his office in Lyon. The time difference, about five hours, meant that his support staff had to be available at all hours of the day and night. Such was the life of a young officer looking to make the grade. Maxime had certainly paid enough dues to earn his tenure. When he lifted his head from the floral bedspread, the digital clock read quarter past nine. At first he wasn’t sure if it was morning or night. The curtains were sufficiently multi-layered to block out all natural light. He blinked and reached for his wristwatch on the night table. As he slipped it on his wrist, he was happy to note that it was still evening.

  He had dozed off in his jeans and his dress shirt. He paused in the bathroom long enough to wet his hair and splash some water on his face. He smiled as he recalled the brief conversation he’d had with someone at the Toronto airport upon his arrival. He had been looking for the toilet. The young woman had smiled and said, “The washrooms?” Yes, he supposed he would need to wash as well, but what he was really interested in was a toilet. La toilette. It was all just a matter of nuance, he thought. Much like police work or being in love. Or, he hoped, being a father.

  He put his coat on and headed down the hallway to the bank of brass-fronted elevators.

  McKelvey sat there at Garrity’s for a long time thinking, looking but not looking at the bearded man sitting alone. He had a last swallow of his fourth beer and got up. He was halfway to being full-fledged intoxicated. Everything on him, pressing down, these traps of his own setting. On his way past the bar, he leaned in and asked Huff if he still kept that umbrella under the bar.

  “Sure,” Huff said, and smiled. “Are you expecting rain on the long trip home?”

  McKelvey took the umbrella and tucked it along the inside of his left arm. He gave Huff a wink and headed out of the bar. On the street, he walked briskly past his building then ducked down the alleyway between the condo and the sushi restaurant beside it. He waited a beat. Then he heard it, as he’d somehow expected, his cop’s instinct still firing on a few cylinders. The door to Garrity’s opening, letting the soft Irish music bleed into the street. Footsteps. He waited, the umbrella in his hand like a night stick. He hugged the side of the building and listened. It sounded as though someone had paused at the door to his condo. Then they continued on, closer now, steps from the mouth of the alley. McKelvey let the dark figure pass by just a few steps before he turned to look down the alley, and he was there, right there, the same rounder from Garrity’s with his shaggy black goatee and his oilskin crop coat.

  “Looking for me?” McKelvey said, and he stepped from the bricks of the building, the umbrella still hugging his forearm.

  “Your name McKelvey?” the big man said.

  McKelvey didn’t hesitate—not when someone on a dark street was asking your name. He stepped in, swinging the umbrella out and upwards the way they’d been trained to do with their police batons, a tool he’d used on the streets and in the housing projects, an extension of his will. The curved wood handle caught the stranger hard on the side of his jaw, and he went down, sloping sideways like a buffalo felled by an arrow. As he hit the sidewalk and teetered there, McKelvey became aware of the man’s sheer bulk, the heavy upper body and thick shoulders, and it summoned images of prison weight pits. McKelvey understood he had no chance against the man if he allowed him to get to his feet again, so he came in quickly from behind and put the umbrella under the man’s neck, then pulled back hard with a knee to the back for leverage, choking him.

  “You looking for me?” McKelvey said. “What, did I arrest you ten years ago and you want to square things away, is that it? Who the fuck are you anyway?”

  The man was on his knees, and he used one hand to fight the pressure of the umbrella at his neck, and with the other he reached back and fought for purchase against McKelvey’s leg. The man’s grip was strong. McKelvey felt his foe’s energy surging with the adrenalin, knew he would pull up from the sidewalk within seconds. And then, toe to toe, it would be McKelvey who would find himself on the losing end of the equation. He pulled back with all of his weight, and the man’s arms flailed, then he was pulling up, this great wildebeest rising from the concrete.

  McKelvey was shucked off like a kid wrestling with his father, and he fell backwards, the umbrella gone from his grasp. He looked up at the city sky, dark and glowing with halos of street lamps. It was happening so fast, this action, and it occurred to him briefly that he was about to die here on the street in front of his building. From the corner of his eye he saw a third figure coming in, running across Front to the alley. The man was of small stature, but he bent low at the waist and came in with his hands held by his jawline as though he’d had some boxing lessons. He walked into the rounder’s heavy swings like a log being pushed into a wood chipper, and the punches from the bigger man either failed to land or had no effect. The new stranger came in with his chin tucked into his neck, and he delivered two or three hard jabs, pistons of bone, and the rounder was dropped for the second time, flat on his ass on the sidewalk.

  The smaller man went to jump in with his foot, but McKelvey called him off. The man stepped to the side, and his face, for the first time, was washed with the yellow light of the lamps. McKelvey’s mind clicked. He’d seen this man before. Yes. That was it. It was the man who had knocked on his door looking for Giuseppe just that afternoon. He was sure of it.

  He turned his attention to the rounder. “Who are you?” McKelvey asked.

  The big man sat up, rubbed his jaw, and turned and spat a little blood on the sidewalk. He brought fingers to his mouth, fiddled inside, and pulled out a tooth.

  “I used to run with the Blades,” the man said, catching his breath. “Pierre Duguay sent me on a mission…he wants you to know… ”

  “Wants me to know what?” McKelvey said. He had picked up the umbrella and was tapping it against his palm like a nightstick. Old habits.

  “He’s not gunning for you. He won’t be sending anyone. He considers your business closed. I guess it was important to him that you know there won’t be anybody coming for you.”

  Pierre Duguay, the former head of the fledgling Toronto chapter of the Blades, who was right now awaiting trial. The ex-con was easily looking at a ten- or fifteen-year sentence for violating the conditions of his previous parole when he’d broken into McKelvey’s home, drawn a handgun and fired.

  “I had to be sure I had the right guy,” the rounder said, and he pulled himself up. “And after what you did to Duguay, fuck, I didn’t want to get shot or anything. You’re a piece of work, man.”

  “You can tell Duguay the feeling is mutual,” McKelvey said. “And listen, I’m sorry about your tooth.”

  “Fuck it,” the rounder said. “But just so we’re square, you do know that you’d be fucken dead right now if it wasn’t for Duguay.”

  “Agreed,” McKelvey said.

  McKelvey watched the big man swagger down the sidewalk as though this sort of thing was simply a part of day to day business. And it was, at least in the world of bikers and underground crime. As for McKelvey, he’d had more than enough excitement for one day. His
heart was just starting to find its natural rhythm again. He was suddenly sober, acutely aware of the cool evening air and the smells of the city, the world around him.

  “I’m seriously too old for this shit,” McKelvey said.

  “You handled yourself—how do you say—adroitly,” the man said. He put his hand out and said, “Maxime Auteuil. Interpol.”

  McKelvey put a hand against the bricks of the wall and drew air through his nostrils. Interpol. Jesus, what next? He fought off a wave of nausea, unwilling to vomit in the street more than once in any given day.

  “You knocked on my door earlier today,” McKelvey said.

  Maxime smiled. “Ah yes,” he said. “One of the first tricks I was taught while working the beat in Marseille. In these housing projects where nobody has eyes or ears. It is effective only if you have visual identification of the suspect. In your case, I knew you lived in the building, but I did not know your name. And so I knocked on every door and asked for a different occupant. Until I knocked on your door and saw your face. It is a pleasure to meet you, Mr. McKelvey.”

  “What do you want with me?” McKelvey said.

  “I believe we can help each other,” Maxime said. “Concerning a certain woman whose alias is Donia Kruzik.”

  He had McKelvey’s attention now.

  “Can I buy you a drink, Mr. McKelvey?” Maxime said.

  “I should buy you a drink,” McKelvey said. “Your timing was impeccable.”

  They went back to Garrity’s. McKelvey set the umbrella on the bar.

  “I won’t even ask,” Huff said.

  “A Jameson’s on ice for me,” McKelvey said, “and—”

  “A red wine, please,” Maxime said. “Pinot noir, if you have it.”

  They moved to a back table. McKelvey took a drink of the whiskey and saw that his hand was shaking. He exhaled a long sigh. His heart was still palpitating, and he was a little dizzy. He felt as though he had reached, and more than likely exceeded, the limits of his physical capabilities. An old man in a young man’s game. Maxime took a drink of his red wine, rolled it in his mouth, swallowed and shrugged.

  “So,” McKelvey said. “First off, my thanks for jumping in. Looks like you know how to handle yourself. You move fast.”

  “I am glad I was walking by at the right time,” Maxime said. “Growing up we learned how to fight in the streets a little bit, you know, and then when you’re a cop in Marseille, well, you are ready for anything. My father followed the fights a little bit, professional boxing. He was always telling me I reminded him of this little champ named Willie Pep, small but fast. I saw you earlier today with the wine bottle. That was fantastic. You have had quite a busy day, yes?”

  “So you were staking me out. What does Interpol want with a retired Toronto cop?”

  “I had my friends at the Intelligence Command Centre back in Lyon do a little legwork, as you say over here,” Maxime said. “They need all the work they can get, these computer cops with their soft hands. Yes, we have a new generation of coppers, Mr. McKelvey, happy to play their video games.”

  “You checked up on me,” McKelvey said. “Interpol can do that sort of thing? I always thought you guys were like the British Bobbies, unarmed and with no real authority.”

  “With the proper co-operation, anything is possible. I found some areas where I believe we share a common philosophy in our approach to police work, Mr. McKelvey.”

  McKelvey swallowed a mouthful of the amber Irish whiskey. “Call me Charlie,” he said. “And let me see your ID. If you don’t mind.”

  Now he felt like Peter Dawson asking to see McKelvey’s business card. Maxime reached into his jacket pocket and produced his wallet. It contained a couple of credit cards, then he flipped a section and revealed his identification beneath a plastic window. It looked authentic enough, though McKelvey had to admit he had no idea what he was looking for. In his own career he had worked with the RCMP, a few state police departments on cases that crossed jurisdictions, but he had never worked with Interpol.

  Maxime slipped his wallet back into his pocket and said, “You are not afraid of getting your hands dirty in the pursuit of a righteous cause. I am very sorry about your son, but I can appreciate the lengths you went to in order to, how would you say—shine a light on the darkness. I think you, of all people, will appreciate the delicate dynamics of what is at play here.”

  Maxime paused for a sip of the red wine. He made a face when he swallowed it, as though it were just barely palatable. McKelvey used the pause to break in.

  “I’ll be straight with you, mostly because I don’t have the time to fuck around. My friend is caught up in this thing, whatever this thing is. The only mistake he made was falling for this woman, this Donia Kruzik, and now he’s been framed for her murder, and I believe he’s been kidnapped. I’ve done my best to dog this thing down, but there’s a connection I just can’t make with these people.”

  “And there is no shame in that, Charlie, because it would take a hundred policeman a hundred years to make that connection. As I said, there are delicate dynamics at play. We are talking about the ripple effect of war. There is a righteous cause, to be certain, and there is a thirst for international justice. This spans many continents, dozens of characters. You and I may agree with the pursuit of a righteous cause, but our—”

  “What are you talking about?” McKelvey interrupted. A headache was coming on like a tight band being twisted around his skull, and he was squinting through the pain. “I’ve been straight with you. I told you, I don’t have the luxury of time. What is this whole thing about?”

  Maxime moved his wine glass aside and leaned in, his head tilted a little to the left, and he said, in a low voice, “What I am talking about is a killing squad.”

  McKelvey took the last swallow of his drink to buy a moment and process the information. He swallowed, but the whiskey seemed to have no power or taste to it. “A killing squad,” he repeated. “Here, in Toronto.”

  “We believe they number around one dozen around the world. The core group, that is. We have tracked this for two years now. We know they are operating in Canada, the U.S., Britain. They were formed with the consent and support of a rogue element within the security and intelligence branch of the independent government of Bosnia-Herzegovina in the dying days of the war. They have one goal: to locate and eliminate those members of the Serb paramilitary unit they hold responsible for the mass execution of men and boys at Srebrenica and the surrounding villages in the summer of 1995. There are two caveats for membership in the league. First, you must be a direct blood relative of a victim. Second, you agree to end your identity when you sign up.”

  “Who’s in charge of this league?”

  “An individual known as ‘The Colonel’. He funded the establishment of a paramilitary unit during the war. The unit’s job was to disrupt enemy activity to the greatest extent possible. They were highly effective.”

  McKelvey felt weak. He saw where things were headed, understood he had enrolled himself in a new school. Suddenly the connections began to click into place.

  “Our security guys must be aware. CSIS, the Mounties,” McKelvey said.

  Maxime sat back. He took the wine glass and turned it by the stem. “That’s where things get very delicate, Charlie. You see, one of the lead operatives we have been tracking happens to work for your government.”

  “Davis Chapman,” McKelvey said.

  “Very good. Yes. He goes by various names. Turner is the current name he is employing for this stage of the operation.”

  “And what about Donia Kruzik? What’s her role in all of this?”

  “She is—or was—a member of the league. It’s not her real name, of course, we are still digging where that is concerned. But we believe she was assigned, along with her colleague—the man you threw the wine bottle at—she was assigned the names of two former soldiers who are living here in Toronto. I suspect her role was to seek these targets out, to shadow them and record thei
r routines in preparation for their assassination.”

  McKelvey nodded, letting the information sink in. So Tim and Donia had simply made the oldest mistake in the book—they had fallen for one another under less than ideal circumstances. Love during a time of war was a dangerous undertaking. And then McKelvey had stirred the hornet’s nest by poking around her apartment, by tracking the man from her apartment to Jarko’s Automotive then the immigrant support centre. If he had minded his own business, if he had taken Fielding out to cry in his beer instead of acting like some private detective, they would all be none the wiser. Fielding would be at home asleep, and McKelvey would be wrapped in the covers with Hattie.

  “I was too late today,” Maxime said. “Bojan Kordic was assassinated.”

  “Who’s the other target?”

  “A man named Goran Mitovik. Former platoon leader. A very nasty man. Both he and Bojan are wanted for war crimes by the international courts. I have a red notice for both men, as authorized by the Secretary-General of Interpol.”

  “Your interest here is in arresting Kordic and Mitovik?”

  Maxime finished the last of his wine and pushed the glass aside. “My interest is in bringing those men back to face justice by the international court, and also to close down this vigilante operation. How do you say, two birds with a single stone? As you know, Charlie, one death only begets another death. These people are still fighting a war that ended almost six years ago. What was done is done, Charlie. There can be no justice in murder.”

  “I assume you’re working with the local authorities on this? Or the RCMP?”

  Maxime shook his head. “The RCMP is aware of my presence here, but this is where I believe you can appreciate my approach. Like you, Charlie, je suis un loup seul—a lone wolf. I have been working on this case for two years now. I want to close the file, put the bad guys away, and put an end to the Colonel’s work. And then I will retire and leave this job to the young people. C’est tout.”