by Giles Blunt
He made himself a chicken curry and ate it in front of the television, watching the news and then flipping channels for a while. There was nothing on so he went down to the basement and did some woodworking. He was building a set of wide shelves for Catherine’s darkroom—nothing difficult, but he had to be careful with the router when he was cutting the grooves. Catherine’s darkroom was one of the first things he had built in the house, a long time ago, now; he was running out of projects.
Woodworking was Cardinal’s only hobby. He liked the smell of sawdust, the feel of wood in his hands, and he enjoyed the satisfaction that came from completing a project, even a small one like shelves. In law enforcement, satisfaction was an elusive commodity.
Cardinal and Catherine often worked in the basement at the same time, Catherine in her darkroom, Cardinal at his work table. They kept a dusty boom box down there and took turns choosing the music. Other times, Cardinal would be building something and he would hear her footsteps overhead in the kitchen. Alone together. That was how he thought of those times. We’re alone together, and sometimes it seemed more intimate than sex.
There were no footsteps overhead now, and Cardinal hadn’t bothered to put any music on. He wasn’t really enjoying the carpentry, either. With Catherine gone, it wasn’t the same.
The phone rang. Cardinal switched off the router, turned off his work light and went upstairs to the kitchen.
“What took you so long?” Catherine said when he picked up. “You had to hustle her out the back door?”
“Hey, sweetheart. I was hoping you’d call me back last night.”
“Sorry,” Catherine said. “We were out photographing these old grain silos on the waterfront. They look fabulous in the moonlight. And the old Canada Malting factory. It was fun, and I think the class learned a lot. How’s work?”
“One murder, one attempted murder.”
“Goodness. They must have you working late.”
“Pretty late. Kelly called you last night. She said it was just to chat, but I think she needs money. Naturally, she wouldn’t accept any from me. Couldn’t get off the phone fast enough.”
“Oh, John, don’t let it get to you. She’ll come round. You know she will. Anyway, I can’t be thinking about that right now, I’ve got too much on my mind.”
That was not like Catherine. Normally, she was never more concerned and attentive than when they were discussing their daughter.
“I wish you were home,” Cardinal said. “Or I wish I was there. It’s too quiet here.” At least he could say that without being accused of undermining her.
“Well, I can’t come home, John. I’m in the middle of some really important stuff here.”
“I know that, honey. I’m glad it’s going well.”
“The thing about these waterfront pictures, we’re getting a lot of stars in them, a lot of moon. It’s made me reconsider a lot of things. I mean, unless you’re an astronomer or something, you pretty much take them for granted, but I’m really thinking about them now. I think I may be beginning to understand them. For the first time.”
He could hear the clink and clatter of mania in her tone. A train of thought jumping the tracks of reason.
He said something soothing—“That’s good, sweetheart”—but in his mind he was praying. Please just let her make it through the next couple of days. Please let her make it home.
“When you photograph stars in relation to the buildings, you can feel their motion. You can sense an intention almost. You remember that time we saw the northern lights?”
“You mean in Newfoundland? Yes, of course.”
They had seen the northern lights many times in Algonquin Bay, but never the way they had seen them in Bonavista Bay. Half the sky shimmering with curtains of light—emerald, chartreuse, vermilion. Suddenly, Cardinal had understood the meaning of the word awe.
“Well, it’s like that. The midnight sky isn’t a place at all. It’s an unearthly book. We can’t read it yet, not really. But you can sense it’s readable.”
A long time ago, Cardinal and his wife had worked out a code. It was during one of Catherine’s best periods. She’d had a couple of years of solid ground, and she was firmly in her sane character, which was many things—smart, funny, generous—but, above all, sweet-natured. She was one of the world’s naturally agreeable people.
Cardinal had taken advantage of the opportunity to make a deal with her.
“Cath,” he had said, “I hope you won’t be upset by the request I’m going to make, but I think it’s important.”
“Then I won’t be upset by it,” she said. She had been peering at contact sheets through a loupe. She looked up at him across the table, a little nearsighted from the change in distance.
“I’d like us to work out a phrase. A code. A sentence. I don’t know. Something. Something I can say to you when it seems clear to me you’re on the edge of an episode. I don’t mean when you’re just excited. Or when it’s iffy. I mean when I’m pretty sure you’re going to lose it but you don’t seem aware of it.”
Catherine’s eyes clouded and her face sagged a little. Cardinal could read every shade of pain in his wife’s features, just as he could read every shade of joy. Nothing hurt him more than to bring her pain. He thought she was going to get angry at him. Here he was spoiling a happy evening.
“I think that’s a perfectly reasonable suggestion.” Catherine tilted her head back to her contact sheets.
“You’re not angry?”
“No. It hurts a little. But it’s okay.” Her hair cascaded over her face. Her voice was slightly muffled. “What did you have in mind?”
“I don’t know. Something normal sounding, but that we both agree on what it means.”
And so they had worked it out. Shifting the phone in his grip, Cardinal used it now. “Honey, I think we’re looking at some heavy weather, here.”
Heavy weather. That was the phrase. A couple of times it had worked. Just as often, it didn’t.
“No, we are not looking at heavy weather, John. Everything is perfectly fine.”
“I’m telling you what I see. Not what you feel.”
“This is not heavy weather, John. Jesus. How can you say that to me? Damn it, John. Every time I go away or do anything the least bit independent.”
“Please take it easy, hon. Can’t you just lie down and relax for a while and take an honest—”
She slammed the phone down.
Cardinal took a shower and got into bed. The true crime book lay unopened on his night table. He couldn’t be sure what to do about Catherine just now. If he showed up in Toronto, it would undermine her completely in front of her students. If he did nothing, she could rapidly get worse. Please let her stay sane. Please let her make it home all right.
22
“I’M OUTTA HERE, DAVE. Really, man, I’m into poetry, not violence. Yes, I like dope. Yes, I like free dope even better. But killing people—hey, I’m against it. Totally and unequivocally against it.”
Letterman’s face broke into the famous gap-toothed grin. Just the guy next door, it said. I would never ask you anything dangerous.
“Come on, Kevin. If you really wanted to go, you could be out of there any time. Why are you still hanging around these two psychos?”
“I need time to think, Dave. These guys are not just gonna let me walk away. I know too much. I have to come up with a way to move on without upsetting them. Easy for you to sit there and ask questions—you haven’t been through what I’ve been through. You didn’t see your friend—okay, Toof wasn’t a friend exactly. Your associate—you didn’t see your associate shot in the head and then beaten to death with a baseball bat. Believe me, you’d need a hit, too, if you’d seen what I saw. Thanks for having me on the show, Dave, but there’s things I’ve got to do, here, so adios, amigo.”
Kevin suddenly wasn’t sure if he’d been imagining the chat with Letterman in silence, or if he’d been speaking aloud. He was standing outside, in the bushes behin
d Leon’s cabin, and the flies were eating him alive. He told himself to keep it together. You can’t be talking to yourself when you’re pulling a raid on Leon’s personal sales stash. Leon is no longer just a business associate; Leon is a fucking evil entity, man. And so is Red Bear.
So why am I doing this? Why take this insane risk? Well, he knew the answer to that: Because I’m a stone junkie, and I need to get high. Need with a capital N, thank you. As in, I’ll die if I don’t shoot up right now.
The cabin was dark; Kevin took a few steps closer. Leon was over in Red Bear’s cabin. Crazy bastards were spending more and more time together. Kevin’s plan was to liberate a pinch of Leon’s stash and transport it as efficiently as possible to his own pleasure receptors. It was the only way he was going to get through this moment, which was surely the darkest of his life. He wouldn’t touch the motherlode.
The motherlode, their main dope supply, was locked up in a tiny, windowless shed made out of cement blocks further along toward the beach. Leon was in charge of security, and he kept the keys with him at all times.
Kevin stood still, listening. No sound from the cabin. Mind you, there was no sound from Red Bear’s cabin either, so who knows what they were up to. He remembered the blood streaming down Toof’s back, and the grotesque way he had staggered, his body no longer getting coherent messages from his brain.
“Move,” Leon had said when he was finished with Toof. “I’m driving.”
He tossed the baseball bat into the trunk of the Trans Am and got behind the wheel. Kevin got in on the passenger side. The seat was still warm from Toof’s body heat.
Leon took it slow getting away from the construction site. The Trans Am was low-slung; no point taking out the oil pan in some backhoe rut. But excitement made his eyes shine and his cheeks glow, as if he had just won an important race.
“Man, did you see that fucker stagger around? Talk about not knowing when to give up. Two bullets I put in his head, man. Two bullets. And he’s still up walking around. Did you see that?”
“Uh, yeah. I saw that.”
“Hey, I didn’t get any blood on the car, did I? You see any on the dash?”
“Dash looks fine.”
“What about the seat? Lean forward a second.”
Kevin leaned forward.
“Naw, I think we’re good. No muss, no fuss. Fucking gun wasn’t much use, way it turned out. Clocked him a good one with the bat, though. Knocked that one into the bleachers, man. Knocked that one out of the park.”
As Toof had staggered near the car, the blood had poured from his bullet wounds in red strings, like hair.
“Fucker had it coming, man. He knew the score. You don’t talk to anyone about our business. No one. I was clear on that point, Kevin. What about you? Have you been talking to anyone? Telling people we ripped off the Viking fucking Riders?”
“Uh, no. I haven’t been talking to anyone.”
“Exactly, man. Me neither. That’s the problem with Toof. There’s no talking to that guy. He’s too fucking dumb. Toofus-Doofus.”
“Yeah,” Kevin said. “Toofus-Doofus.”
Leon looked over at him. Eyes bright.
“Scared ya, I bet.”
“You definitely caught me by surprise there, Leon.”
“Yeah, you were scared shitless, man. Admit it.”
“I was scared shitless. You’re right.” I still am, I still am, I still am.
“Don’t worry, Kev. You get used to it. Just listen to Red Bear, man. That guy knows what he’s talking about. You get used to things. And it’s okay. You do what you have to do. Toof knew the score, Kev. He made his bet and he lost.”
“Lost big.”
“Only justice,” Leon said. “Mouth like that could get us all killed.” He turned onto Highway 11, and then it was blast-off, dual exhausts roaring and the Trans Am hurtling south.
“Justice,” Leon said again. “Way it should be.”
Addicts learn early on to keep all their options open. That was why Kevin knew that Leon kept his private inventory under a floorboard in his cabin. It was also why, one time when Leon had stepped out for something, Kevin had unlatched his window from the inside. It was still too cool at night, out here by the lake, to sleep with the windows open. And they didn’t have screens. An open window was an invitation to the flies that were buzzing around Kevin’s head and neck.
The unlatched window was at the back; he wouldn’t be seen from Red Bear’s cabin. Kevin forced the window up eight or ten inches. He pulled himself through and lowered himself, hands first, to the floor.
He went straight to the floorboard under Leon’s bed and pried it up. There were enough glassine envelopes full of dope to knock out an army of elephants, but Kevin took only one. He replaced it with another he had prepared that contained nothing more lethal than icing sugar. Some junkie would be in for a disappointment.
Toof’s face. The rolling, bewildered eyes. The sound of his skull yielding to wood. Kevin would never forget that sound. The memory made his legs quake so bad he had trouble climbing out the window. He dropped to the ground outside and nearly broke his ankle.
He moved quickly through the bush, back toward his own cabin. He did not want to run into Leon—the new Leon. He knew there was violence in Leon’s past. Leon had hinted at it a couple of times. And Kevin had seen him beat the hell out of that guy in the pub. But now it was as if Red Bear had roused some black-hearted creature previously dormant within Leon. The entity.
Kevin outran the flies back to his own cabin and shut the door. Got to get out of here. Definitely. But first, let’s get myself a little calm, a little clarity.
He pulled out the spoon he had hidden in the wall and cooked up the smack with his Ronson. He drew the milky stuff into his syringe, and this time there was no question where it was going. He cinched his belt around his bicep, pumped up a fat vein and plunged the needle in. When he loosened the belt, the dope hit his brain like a fifty-megaton orgasm.
After a few minutes, he hid his paraphernalia and climbed into bed. He curled up, clasping his hands between his knees. Bliss rode every nerve in his body. His belly felt awash in opium and molten chocolate.
“Kevin, will you come back with me?” Terri’s voice sang in his ear, and Kevin wished for the hundredth time that his sister would get married and leave him alone.
“Kevin, will you come back with me?” Her green, green eyes imploring him. He could feel himself bathed in her love and concern.
“Oh, Terri,” he moaned. “Leave me alone, will ya?” But the dope was making him giggle.
Waves of pleasure rolled through his body in languid swells. His mind was the translucent blue of a Bahamian sea. Guilt and fear could not survive in this heaven.
Almost lost against that blue ocean was a tiny, dark figure, like an insect crawling across a TV screen. But it was a man, a tiny man, waving to Kevin as if from the wrong end of a telescope.
Kevin smiled. Good news, the guy was giving him. Even though he couldn’t quite make out the words, he knew it was good news.
The tiny man was calling. Waving and calling in the blue. It was as if the tiny man was a castaway, and Kevin was a passing jet. He couldn’t make out the face, but he knew it was Toof.
Toof was calling to him from that blue immensity. Toof was telling him not to worry. It wasn’t so bad being dead. In fact, it was okay. No need to be afraid, Kevin. No need to be upset. Old Toof was fine, man. Everything was fine.
23
“YOU’RE CERTAIN HE’S DEAD?” Red Bear said. “I don’t want any surprises down the road.”
“He’s dead all right.” Leon turned the stereo up a notch, a top-of-the-line Marantz. And R.E.M., man, experience counts for a lot. You couldn’t beat those old bands. “Had to finish him off with a baseball bat, though.”
“Are you all right with it?”
“Yeah, I’m okay.” Leon shrugged. “The girl was a little tougher. I’m getting more used to it.”
“And thi
s time you did it somewhere else, I hope. You didn’t go back to the falls again.”
“Naw. We drove way out near West Rock.”
The two of them were lying fully clothed on the huge bed Red Bear had had trucked up from Toronto. Teak or something, a four-poster with tons of fancy carving. He had a way with physical objects, Red Bear. Lamps with silky scarlet shades bathed the room in red light, giving the place a certain atmosphere, like a movie set.
There was a massive oak dresser by the window, with crystal candlesticks and a set of silver hairbrushes that Red Bear used to make his hair shine.
They had smoked a couple of joints. For some reason, Red Bear didn’t have any problem with weed. It was just the hard stuff he didn’t want them using. Good smoke, too. The music twisted and stretched and drooped in the air like taffy.
Red Bear turned on his side and gripped Leon’s bicep. “Thank you for being so loyal, Leon. I think you know loyalty means a lot to me.”
“Yeah. Me too.”
Red Bear stared into his eyes. Leon couldn’t take it for very long; he had to look away.
“I got a question,” Leon said. “About the girl, and now with Toof.”
“Ask me.”
Leon had never before let a man touch him. Somehow, with Red Bear, there was nothing queer about it, nothing effeminate.
“How come you didn’t do them the way you did Wombat? You didn’t make them suffer. Didn’t cut them apart.”
“You sound disappointed.”
“Maybe.”
Red Bear pointed to the ceiling. “The moon. The moon is not waxing just now. It’s waning. A sacrifice must always be done when the moon is waxing.”
“How come?”
“If you kill them when the moon is waning, their spirit will have power over you. That is the opposite of what you want.”