The Bone Seeker: An Edie Kiglatuk Mystery (Edie Kiglatuk Mysteries)

by M. J. McGrath

  ‘Do you really think Klinsman will come after us?’ Willa asked. He’d been silent on the flight and had said almost nothing since.

  ‘He won’t find us here,’ Edie said, reassuringly. She wondered what his father would say when he found out what his boy had done. He’d be proud, she thought. For most of his life Willa had wandered, unsure of a direction for himself. Finally he’d found his moral compass, his position in life. From there he could go anywhere in the world.

  From the other side of the table, Edie saw Gutierrez eyeing her sceptically.

  ‘I wouldn’t underestimate Klinsman. He’s absolutely loyal. He’ll do whatever he has to do to keep the Defence Department’s secret under wraps.’

  ‘Assuming he even knows about it,’ Derek said.

  ‘Oh he knows, because I told him.’ Gutierrez flipped her hair back. ‘But he refused to believe me, said the department would never knowingly put his men in jeopardy by sending them out to clean up land it knew to be radioactive. He thought I was cooking up some story to get him on my side.’ She was sliding the gold crucifix around her neck up and down on its chain. ‘Es un tonto, he’s a fool.’

  Derek pushed his plate away. The wind had eased a little now and piles of hailstones were stacked up against the windows, blocking the light from outside.

  ‘We should get some sleep, decide what to do in the morning.’

  Gutierrez nodded in agreement. She pushed back her chair, stretched and said goodnight.

  Turning to Willa, Edie said, ‘You go ahead. Take the bed. I prefer the floor anyway. I’ll come in a minute or two.’

  Her ex-stepson stood and headed quietly towards the room. As she watched him swing through the door then close it gently behind him she was hit by a strong stab of regret for what might have been. Joe alive still, she and Sammy together, the four of them a family. Then the vision was gradually replaced by the unwelcome reality. Her survival depended on facing up to that too.

  She reached out and squeezed Derek’s arm. For a moment they sat and listened to the wind tearing around the house.

  ‘You did a great thing today,’ she said finally.

  He turned and gave her an exhausted smile.

  By the time she went into the bedroom Willa was already asleep and gently snoring. She lay down beside him to be close to the warmth of his body. She supposed that his actions today would make it impossible for him to return to the Rangers and it hurt her to think that he’d given up the life he loved so much when it had taken him so long to find it. But it made her proud that he had. She found herself gently stroking his hair. One eye opened slightly.

  ‘Go to sleep, Kigga.’

  She nodded and shut her eyes. She couldn’t ever remember another time that he’d called her by the nickname his brother had coined and her heart swelled so much to hear it that for a while it was hard to breathe.

  • • •

  She was still lying on the bed next to Willa when she woke. It was quiet out now, the cyclone over. She stretched and rubbed her eyes then crept over to the door to avoid waking him. She poked her head out and saw Derek sitting on the couch with the blankets strewn on the floor, scribbling furiously on a piece of notepaper. Closing the door behind her, she padded over and sat down beside him.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Her hair, which she’d unbraided so it would dry overnight, lay in a great cascade around her head. He smiled then reached out and pushed it back from her face. Something passed between them, then was gone.

  ‘Making one of my lists,’ he said.

  He passed it to her, stood and went over to the window. On the paper he’d written down the snippets of evidence they’d accumulated about Glacier Ridge in the past two weeks, which pointed to the probability that the federal government had knowingly conducted at least one large-scale nuclear test on Ellesmere Island in the knowledge that it would probably cause birth defects and fatalities in the population of Kuujuaq; that it had covered up the evidence and was still covering it up; and, it seemed, was prepared to frame innocent men for murder and, possibly, even kill, to keep it covered.

  When she finished reading, she followed Derek over to the window. He’d pushed open a gap in the blinds and was peering through it, one hand on his service weapon. Outside the mosquitoes danced in the clear air and a raven flapped its way above the shoreline. Heaps of unmelted hailstones were piled like gravel against the houses. The wind had blown icebergs down from Greenland and the current had scooped them up and swept them into Frobisher Bay. Now a great armada of aquamarine ice stood becalmed on the horizon, waiting for the wind to set it a-sail again.

  ‘I don’t understand how anyone could want to leave this place,’ she said.

  At the high tide line a soft trail of something white and grey lay on the green-grey shingle. At first Edie thought it was hailstones. Her eyes wandered up the beach.

  ‘Do you see what I see?’ Scattered along the shale were the bodies of dozens of snow geese, early migrants whose journeys had been cut short by the cyclone which had boomeranged them, dead or dying, back to their summer quarters.

  ‘Looks like the north wasn’t quite ready to give them up,’ Derek said.

  She turned to look at him. ‘You want goose for breakfast?’

  Derek’s face broke open into a smile before he remembered where they were and why they were there.

  ‘We shouldn’t go out right now.’

  But Edie was already at the door to the snow porch with her fingers on the handle.

  ‘It’s OK, I can be invisible when I want to be.’

  Derek smiled softly. ‘Now that I’d like to see.’

  • • •

  Willa woke to smells of frying poultry. Moments later, Gutierrez emerged too. They sat down around the table, clutching mugs of hot coffee and shaking off sleep. Once she’d composed herself, Derek handed Gutierrez the list he’d made. She read it a couple of times, moving her lips to the words.

  ‘We really should call Chris Tetlow on the Arctic Circular. Blow this thing open.’

  Edie brought over the pan and parcelled out the goose meat onto four plates. Gutierrez took one look and pushed her plate away.

  ‘Legally, they’d be able to justify putting us in jail,’ Gutierrez said. ‘They could say that we were obstructing an investigation. It wouldn’t be true, but they’d probably get away with it. Dead babies though? That’s harder.’

  ‘This is the Barrenlands,’ Edie said. ‘Babies die and people bury them. The deaths weren’t even officially recorded until fairly recently. All we have, if Chip Muloon hasn’t already taken them, are the records of the annual ship supply, a few incomplete historical police observations and the testimony of a couple of dying elders who put it all down to evil spirits.’

  ‘Plus Muloon’s report,’ Derek added. ‘Which he’s not exactly likely to give us. We go to the Arctic Circular now, we’re handing the Defence Department the opportunity to deny everything or write it off as just some remote and trivial fragment of a Cold War past.’

  ‘The past is never just the past,’ Willa said.

  ‘We know that because we’re Inuit.’ Edie picked up Gutierrez’s plate and put it down beside her stepson. ‘But the south is still another country.’ Connected, maybe, but different. An idea came to her.

  ‘Martha Salliaq died because Markoosie and Nora Pitoq couldn’t have a child. And they couldn’t have a child because the radiation to which they’d been exposed had made them barren. So we start with Martha.’

  They were interrupted by the burr of an ATV engine. Derek went to the blinds and poked them open with his weapon.

  ‘Jesus Jones.’

  He turned and in an urgent voice said, ‘Edie, check the back door. If there’s anyone outside, come back and barricade everyone in your bedroom. If it’s clear, I want all of you to leave. Quietly. Don’t wait for me. Just run.’ The ATV engine died. ‘It’s Makivik, and he’s brought Klinsman.’

  43

  Derek watched as the two men rea
ched the steps. Neither appeared to be carrying a weapon, but he couldn’t be sure. Pulling back from the window he stood against the wall behind the inner door, clasped his handgun a little harder and checked that the safety was off. The inner door had no lock, no bolts, nothing. He counted the number of steps in his head. Eight, nine. The two men had to be near the door to the snow porch now. He listened for the sound of it swinging open. A sudden upsurge of adrenalin-fuelled rage hit him right between the eyes. Bill Makivik had been one of his closest allies. What did the bastard think he was doing?

  There was a whooshing sound on the other side of the door and he realized that someone was wiping their shoes on the mat. For a moment he felt baffled. Then he tensed again as the door sprang open and Makivik walked in, closely followed by Klinsman.

  Derek shot out from behind the door and swung round, pointing his weapon directly at Klinsman. For an instant Makivik smiled but the moment he saw the gun the smile disappeared.

  ‘Now, Derek, you got the whole wrong idea,’ he said, raising his palms in the air.

  ‘Wrong or not, it’s the only one in play right now so I suggest you get down on the ground and put your hands over your heads.’ Derek gestured to the floor. The men slowly did as they were told. With one eye still on Makivik, Derek went over and drew the policeman’s service handgun from his holster.

  ‘C’mon. If I wanted to kill you I coulda done it last night, saved myself some bannock bread and a world of trouble.’

  Derek patted down the colonel. Didn’t seem like he was holding.

  Klinsman lifted his head a little and said, ‘Reach into my inside pocket.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Just reach into it,’ Klinsman said.

  • • •

  From the corner of his eye Derek saw Edie edge around the kitchenette and he realized with a spike of irritation that she’d gone against his instructions again. Not only that, but the crazy woman had an axe in her hand. He waved her over, gave her Makivik’s gun.

  ‘Put the damn axe down and cover for me.’ He bent down and with his weapon at Klinsman’s head slid his hand inside the man’s jacket. His fingers hit an edge and drew out a roll of paper, stapled on the long, left side. He unfurled the paper and read the word ‘Classified’.

  ‘What’s this?’

  ‘Read it,’ Klinsman said.

  And so, with his weapon still aimed at Klinsman’s head, he read:

  Preliminary report into the medium- and long-term health consequences of the Glacier Ridge underground nuclear test of 19 July 1973

  by Chip Muloon

  Derek looked down at Klinsman. The man’s eyes rose to meet his.

  ‘Believe it or not, I finally had enough of the lying and the bullshit,’ he said. ‘So can we get up now?’

  • • •

  With Klinsman and Makivik sitting peaceably at the table, Edie went to fetch Willa and Gutierrez from where she’d left them, hiding in an outbuilding in the back yard, and brought them back inside the main house.

  ‘I’m looking forward to this,’ Gutierrez said, taking a seat.

  ‘As a matter of fact so am I,’ Klinsman offered. He seemed jumpy and tired but at the same time the stiffness with which he’d always carried himself had gone, as though he’d been relieved of more than the Defence Department’s secrets.

  ‘Up until yesterday I was a loyal military man. Now, I guess I’m just another whistleblower. But it feels fine. It feels surprisingly good, actually.’

  ‘Who else knows?’ This from Derek.

  ‘Right now, just us,’ Makivik replied.

  ‘I’m expecting you to have a lot of questions,’ Klinsman said. ‘I’m happy to answer anything that doesn’t require me to give away operational details. I’ll do whatever I can to bring those assholes at the department down but I won’t put any more of my men in harm’s way.’

  ‘Would you like hot tea and some fried goose legs before you begin?’ Edie said.

  ‘I can recommend the tea,’ said Gutierrez.

  Mugs were fetched.

  ‘Go ahead and shoot, colonel,’ Derek said. ‘We’ll ask questions later.’

  Klinsman’s brow creased. ‘When you called me with the news about the girl, I followed procedure and notified my superiors at the SOVPAT HQ. These kind of events are rare but they’re hardly unknown around military encampments and I was told to give you guys whatever assistance you needed.’ Not long after that, he went on, the Defence Department called to say that they were intending to send a couple of officials to inspect the victim’s body.

  ‘They said it was routine procedure and I believed them. Maybe that was naive. But I’m a soldier not a politician and I’ve been around long enough to know that this kind of situation can blow up in your face. I knew it needed to be contained. But the move to take over jurisdiction of the case came from the Defence Department, not from the military.

  ‘At that point, it didn’t occur to me that the department had another agenda. All the evidence seemed to suggest that Namagoose and Saxby had killed the girl. You thought so too as I recall, sergeant.’

  Derek coughed. ‘The investigation did point that way, yes.’

  Klinsman frowned, troubled by some memory of the event, then continued.

  ‘But it was obvious pretty early on that the department wasn’t gonna leave the military police to do their job. There was all kinds of interference.’

  ‘Who were you dealing with at the department?’ Gutierrez asked.

  Klinsman bit his lip and grimaced. ‘I feel like a fool for saying this. It doesn’t matter what he was called because I don’t think he was using his real name. He said he was the military–civilian liaison at the Defence Department and worked directly under the Minister.

  ‘The fact was, I was really stretched. This was my first SOVPAT and everything was kicking off. I had five hundred military personnel and dozens of exercises to coordinate across the forces. I radically underestimated how hard the terrain up there is. Mountain exercises where there aren’t even any reliable military maps. I, I . . .’ His shoulders slumped.

  ‘There must be a paper trail,’ Gutierrez went on.

  Klinsman looked pained and shook his head. ‘My liaison only ever called on an encrypted line. By that time I was seriously doubting that Privates Namagoose and Saxby were responsible for Martha Salliaq’s death. I questioned them over and over and their story never varied. After a few days the military police shipped them out to Ottawa. It wouldn’t surprise me if someone at the department wasn’t behind that.’

  From the corner of her eye Edie saw Derek look her way. A mosquito whined nearby and Klinsman flapped it off with his hand then pulled himself upright and said in the tone of a broken man, ‘It might surprise you but I have tried to be a man of principle.’

  No one said anything.

  ‘What about Muloon?’ Derek asked.

  Klinsman swung around to Edie. ‘Weren’t you two . . . ?’

  Edie blushed. She still felt like a fool for falling for the man. Lean features, ice-blue eyes. It sounded like something from a romance novel.

  ‘Muloon was a Trojan Horse. We exchanged a few friendly words before this whole thing blew up, but I only realized he wasn’t what he said he was some days ago, after he turned up at the security gate demanding to be let inside. The number he gave me to call and check his credentials went straight to the Minister’s office. Even then I was only told he was working on some sensitive research for the department. I had no idea it had to do with nuclear testing.’

  Gutierrez threw her hair back and made a sound somewhere between a snort and a laugh.

  Klinsman shrank a little in his chair. He rubbed a hand over his face.

  ‘I guess this may sound like an excuse, but I was following orders when I picked you up. The transfer to Alert – I had no idea why they wanted you up there and I never would have allowed it if I thought your lives were in jeopardy.’

  ‘You’re right,’ Edie said, ‘it does sound li
ke an excuse.’

  ‘The military is built along family lines. We have blood ties. Perhaps it took me longer than it should have done to realize that the Defence Department wasn’t part of the family.’

  Edie shook her head in disbelief.

  ‘Your departmental “family” didn’t give a shit about exposing your men to radiation.’

  ‘That’s one of the reasons I’m here,’ Klinsman said.

  ‘Two of your men are in jail for a murder they had nothing to do with.’

  Klinsman sighed. ‘And that’s the other.’

  Gutierrez’s head shot up and Edie realized that in all the chaos of escape they hadn’t told her who was really behind Martha’s death. At the news Gutierrez’s face crumpled. She put her head in her hands for a moment. When she looked up her features were hard and vengeful.

  ‘You saw the killer’s body on the beach,’ Derek said to Klinsman.

  ‘Did he fall or was he pushed?’

  ‘Does it matter?’ Derek said.

  ‘I don’t suppose so.’

  There was a disturbance outside. The two policemen went to the window and looked out. Makivik turned back first.

  ‘Kids,’ he said.

  Derek remained standing by the window. ‘Who else knows you’re in town?’

  Klinsman shook his head. ‘Other than the pilot who flew me here and you, no one. I told my next-in-command I’d been called away for an urgent meeting in Yellowknife. He might check the flight plan and see that I’ve come to Iqaluit, but I doubt it. I gave the pilot time off. He’s already on his way down south. It’ll be a day before they realize I’ve gone AWOL.’

  Klinsman asked for a glass of water. Willa brought it. The colonel studied his face for a moment.

  ‘You’re the Ranger who teaches at the rappel camp.’