Читать книгу Mister Jinnah Mysteries 3-Book Bundle - Donald J. Hauka - Страница 7

The Schuster house on Vancouver’s West Side had been built by a railway baron at the turn of the last century. A huge, sprawling white building, it had a rotunda and circular drive and its facade was lined by white pillars crowned by Corinthian capitals. It escaped calumny as an eyesore by virtue of a huge expanse of green lawn, vast, carefully tended gardens, and an extremely high hedge that obscured the house itself from the view of the neighbours. Access was strictly controlled via a high, century-old wrought-iron gate made to discourage all but invited guests. Later tenants had added an intercom system linking the gate with the house. Sam Schuster had completed its current hi-tech look by having a security camera erected atop one of the formidable iron spires. This made the Schuster house and its grounds impenetrable to all but the most determined of intruders. It would take a Ninja or perhaps a U.S. Navy Seal to infiltrate this fastness. That or Hakeem Jinnah at his most shameless.

Jinnah had driven in the satellite-guided Love Machine to the tree-lined boulevard in front of the house wondering just how hard it would be to gain access to Schuster’s widow. He was slightly dismayed at first, but when he saw the video camera at the gate, he laughed. He drove off and returned a half-hour later, parking brazenly in front of the gate and in full view of the camera. He climbed out and walked with a swagger carrying a huge flower arrangement featuring white lilies and red roses. He pressed the intercom and whistled, apparently completely relaxed. The intercom buzzed and a voice crackled over its tinny speaker.

“Who is it?” said a woman’s voice.

Jinnah assumed a subservient look and adopted his best “just off the boat from Bombay” accent.

“Pardon me, Madame,” he said, laying the accent on thick and raising his voice. “But someone is sending you flowers here.”

There was a pause and Jinnah knew he was being scrutinized electronically. To add to the effect of a recent immigrant to these shores, he started humming an Indian pop bangra tune just loud enough to carry over the intercom. Sanderson would be ashamed of me on several counts right now, thought Jinnah. Too bad — if it worked.

“Come on up to the house,” said the woman over the intercom. “Stand back.”

“Thanking you, Madame,” said Jinnah, stepping back as the gate swung ponderously open.

Jinnah walked up the drive with his heart soaring. He was in. It was possible the Widow Schuster would slam the door in his face, but he had taken the precaution of wearing his steel-toed, reinforced boots, which he kept in reserve for his most difficult interviews. All the way up the winding drive, Jinnah noted the marvelously manicured lawns without a blade out of place, the ornate gardens overflowing with flowers more suited to the English countryside than the West Coast. When he came around the corner past a massive boxwood hedge and spied the house, he took in a sharp breath. Sam Schuster had lived well before he died. Very well. The impression of wealth was cemented by the two cars sitting under the cover of the portico in front of the main entrance. One was a huge, pink Cadillac — this year’s model. The other was a fire-engine red porsche. Jinnah was both impressed and envious as he rang the doorbell. Maybe, just maybe, if the Orient Love Express was a huge success …

His revelry was interrupted as the door abruptly opened. In the rectangular frame stood Paula Schuster. She was still draped in black, like a monument, but her pillbox hat and veil were missing. At this range, up close, the pouches under her eyes really showed. She looked at the arrangement without betraying anything other than perhaps exhaustion.

“Who are they from and where do I sign?” asked Paula Schuster.

“You don’t have to sign anything, Mrs. Schuster,” said Jinnah, handing her the flowers and reverting to his usual deep, mellow voice. “They are from the Vancouver Tribune newspaper and myself. My name is Hakeem Jinnah.”

Paula Schuster, who had taken the heavy arrangement from Jinnah, reeled back a step, her face a study in surprise and horror. Then she launched herself at the door with her free hand, bringing all her slender weight to bear on it.

“Go away!” she shouted, trying to slam the portal shut.

Jinnah’s practiced right foot was already inside the door jam and in any event, his left arm was more than enough to check the door’s progress before it tested his boot.

“Mrs. Schuster, I have come to talk to you about your husband’s death —” he began calmly.

“I don’t care!” she shouted, struggling ludicrously to maintain her grip on the flowers while trying to close the door on Jinnah. “Get out of here before I call the police!”

“I can understand that you are upset,” continued Jinnah, as if Paula Schuster hadn’t spoken. “But I think it is in both of our best interests to talk, hmm?”

“I have nothing to say to you!”

Paula Schuster dropped the flowers used both hands on the door.

“You’re trespassing!”

“Mrs. Schuster, I just want to know one thing,” said Jinnah, now using both his hands to keep the door from slamming on his foot. “It’s about the body in Sam’s trunk.”

Paula Schuster stopped pushing on the door and looked at Jinnah as if seeing him for the first time, her eyes wide with amazement.

“The what?” she said in a small voice.

“The body and the dent someone made removing it. Before the fire.”

Mrs. Schuster scrutinized Jinnah’s face minutely and for a moment, he felt a bit like a share prospectus being gone over by a securities regulator.

“You said your name was Jinnah?” she said, clearing her throat.

“Yes, ma’am,” nodded Jinnah. “Here, let me get these for you.”

Jinnah darted inside and scooped up the flowers. He was in the foyer now and Paula Schuster showed no signs of protesting. Jinnah tucked a leaf that had fallen off one of the lilies into the mass of green twigs and stems. Several of the roses were drooping and their petals were loose.

“There we are,” he said, holding the arrangement out to her. “No harm done.”

“You’re the reporter who wrote about the police looking for a suspect in Sam’s murder,” said Schuster in a flat, emotionless tone. “The figure at the scene.”

“Mrs. Schuster, you have my most sincere condolences on your husband’s death,” said Jinnah, dripping with sincerity. “Truly. I apologize for the cheap trick I used to gain access to you just now. It was inexcusable.”

Paula Schuster took the battered floral arrangement from him and closed the door.

“These look like they could use some water,” she said, her voice tired. “You’d better come in too,” she added.

Jinnah could not help smiling. For a change, his boots had not been tested. He followed Mrs. Schuster as she trailed falling leaves, petals, twigs, and bits of baby’s breath from the entrance lobby and into the living room. Jinnah was struck by the contrast between the outside of the house and its inside. Mrs. Schuster’s taste in interior decoration — if indeed it was her own — owed nothing to the classical English country look of the mansion. It was from the nouveau riche school of the hideously expensive combined with a trendy colour pattern that clashed with what Jinnah had imagined should have been an austere, dark wood paneling and throw-rug inside. There was none of that here. The living room itself was dominated by a huge wall-television. The fireplace was gas, not wood, although the sprawling mantle above it probably was oak underneath the thick layers of paint applied by various owners. Currently it was a sort of fuchsia colour that Jinnah disapproved of. He did find the over-stuffed, pink leather sofa quite comfortable, however, and had no hesitation in sinking down into its soft cushions at Paula Schuster’s request. The recently widowed woman did not seat herself. She placed the flower arrangement down carefully on a large, teak coffee table, its ornate carvings of pagodas and Buddhas protected by a thick glass top. Jinnah shifted himself, getting snug, while Paula Schuster repaired the damage to the flowers, plucking at the leaves and buds with long, slender fingers that trembled slightly.

“Have you been in this line of work for long, Mister Jinnah?” she asked calmly.

“No ma’am,” Jinnah smiled. “I’ve only just started in the flower business.”

To Jinnah’s disappointment, Paula Schuster didn’t get the joke. She didn’t even look at him while she spoke. She continued to fix the flowers, pulling out a piece of baby’s breath here, righting a lily there, pausing to see if it created the right effect and then rearranging everything yet again.

“I meant reporting on crime. Murder, death — that sort of thing.”

“I am sorry, Mrs. Schuster. Yes, of course. For nearly twenty years.”

“It must be difficult, dealing with death every day.”

“It takes a toll,” Jinnah admitted. “But I take some comfort in knowing it is as nothing compared to what people like yourself suffer.”

“So you have interviewed many … bereaved relatives?”

“And not a few killers, ma’am.”

Jinnah was beginning to feel vaguely uncomfortable. There was something surreal about this conversation being carried out in the most reasonable tone while this woman meticulously rearranged the battered flowers, staring intently at the greenery and avoiding his gaze. It was like discussing the etiquette of murder with Martha Stewart Dying.

“You wouldn’t have any idea, perhaps, who killed my husband then, would you?”

Paula Schuster spoke very carefully, choosing her words with the same precision that she worked on the flowers. Jinnah was prepared for this. The bereaved often asked such questions. It was all part of the “why did he have to die?” syndrome.

“Mrs. Schuster, I was about to ask you the same thing,” said Jinnah softly. “It is very seldom that people are murdered by complete strangers. In most cases, it is someone they know. Do you know of anyone who had sufficient motive to murder your husband?”

Paula Schuster’s fingers slowed in their elaborate dance among the leaves and petals. She frowned slightly.

“I suppose it might have been the two men who put Sam in the trunk two weeks before he died.”

Paula Schuster said this while staring determinedly into the heart of her floral handiwork. Then she looked right at Jinnah’s face. If she was hoping to see if she had prompted a reaction, she must have been gratified. Jinnah was used to anguished wails, angry questions and furious denials, but this bland pronouncement startled him. His eyes widened as his mouth contracted into a tight “O.” He couldn’t hold back a cry of surprise.

“You’re kidding!” he said. “What two guys?”

Paula Schuster continued to study Jinnah’s face like a questionable share offering. Jinnah didn’t like it. With her long nose twitching up and down as she spoke and the bags under her eyes, she reminded Jinnah of some kind of hound. A blood hound.

“You said you wanted to ask about the body in the trunk,” said Paula Schuster. “Didn’t you know it was Sam’s?”

Jinnah realized they had reached the crucial point where the conversation would either terminate or turn into an interview. He decided to force the issue and took his notebook out of his jacket pocket, pulling the pen stuck in the tight, metal coils at the top of it out and holding it firmly in his hand.

“Mrs. Schuster, there is much I don’t know. I don’t know, for instance, why the police seem to be so determined to prove your husband committed suicide. I don’t know what his business dealings had to do with his death. Neither does the public. They want answers. Are you willing to go on the record?”

Paula Schuster looked down at the flowers and plucked at a loose leaf, frowning.

“I don’t know if I should be telling you this,” she said, selecting her words carefully once again. “But two weeks before Sam died, he told me he’d been kidnapped.”

Jinnah damn near fell off the sofa. He realized he was leaning forward, anxious, hanging on this woman’s every word. Now, in a single sentence, she had changed the entire complexion of his thinking. There was far more at work here than he had imagined.

“Two men, you say,” Jinnah repeated. “Where? When?”

“The police said we shouldn’t say anything. That it would … not be helpful.”

“They tell everyone that, Mrs. Schuster. They don’t like sharing information unless it suits them, hmm?”

Paula Schuster rested her hands lightly on the flowers’ stems and stalks. She looked deeply into the heart of the leafy mass, head tilted to one side.

“It was the last Friday in April. Sam said they took him at gunpoint as he got into his car.”

“Were there any witnesses?”

“No. Sam was in the underground parking lot of the building where his office is … was. It was late afternoon. Nobody around. I think they knew that …”

Her voice trailed off. Jinnah felt the need to reassert control over the interview.

“What did they want, these two men?” he asked, quietly, but firmly.

There was a long silence as Paula Schuster’s eyes seem to sink deeper and deeper into the green bower her hands had created in the heart of the flower basket. She appeared to be groping for just the right words, as if she were looking into a pool of language that was getting murkier and murkier, fishing without success with her long, skinny fingers.

“They wanted money, Mister Jinnah,” she said at last, very slowly. “They wanted Sam to give them access to the accounts where the twenty million he’d raised to complete the Jakarta deal was sitting. They threatened … they threatened to burn him alive if he didn’t — I’m very sorry!”

Paula Schuster had been squeezing the thorny stems of the roses with both hands, driving the up-thrusting barbs unconsciously into her flesh. The blood had flowed from her fingers, mingling with the tears, smearing the bags under her eyes red as she tried to sop up the briny liquid. Then she’d rushed from the room, sobbing. Jinnah stood up and called out the doorway.

“Mrs. Schuster? Can I help? Hello?”

His words echoed in an empty house. There was no reply. Jinnah waited a moment, then shrugged and looked about the room. The mantlepiece caught his eye. The whole of its considerable length was cluttered by family photographs, cards of condolence, knick-knacks, bric-a-brac. He took a closer look. Among the cards was a wedding picture. Sam in a powder-blue tuxedo hugging his bride, encased in white lace and satin, both looking happy, healthy, maybe ten years younger. And yet, Sam was distinctly mousy. Jinnah studied the man’s face carefully. Here was a moment when Schuster should have felt supremely confident and fulfilled and he looked like — what? A scared accountant? Marriage had that affect on some men, but normally before the ceremony, not after, Jinnah thought. How could anyone describe this man as charismatic?

Jinnah was still standing near the mantle with his back to the windows when he heard Paula Schuster reenter the room. He whirled around, sheepish.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “Just looking. Are you all right?”

Paula Schuster nodded. Her face was washed and two pink handkerchiefs were wrapped around her hands, stained with blood.

“I apologize, Mister Jinnah,” she said in her flat, businesslike tone. “It’s just a scratch. Do sit down.”

Jinnah returned to the couch and sat leaning forward, taking notes. Paula Schuster abandoned the flowers and sat on a chair at a right-angle to the sofa and beside him.

“A horrible threat,” Jinnah said. “Most horrible. How did he escape?”

“He didn’t, really,” she said, looking down at her hands. “Sam said they drove around for hours, threatening him. But he refused to do what they wanted. Finally, they tied him up, shoved him into the trunk of the car and drove around some more. Sam thought maybe another hour. Then the car stopped and he thought, ‘Well, this is it.’ He really thought they would … you know, do it. But then nothing happened for the longest time. Sam waited. Then he heard someone outside, fiddling with the car. He managed to bang on the lid of the trunk loud enough to be heard. It was a tow truck driver. He used a crowbar to pry the trunk open, you see.”

Jinnah nodded. This was more like it. Information. Statements that fitted with Aiken’s facts. Something to work with. Not mirrors and shadows.

“Where had they left him, Mrs. Schuster?” he prompted.

“On the university endowment lands, in one of the parking lots. They were about to tow the car away. It was lucky for Sam.”

“Did he know these two men?”

“He said he’d never met them before. Didn’t recognize them anyway.”

“Then how would they have known about the money?”

Paula Schuster fixed Jinnah with a stare that said: “Oh, please!”

“You raise twenty million dollars, Mister Jinnah, people hear about it. There are some very bad people working in this field, you know. All they have to do is hire a couple of thugs to do their work for them, you see.”

“So you’re saying persons unknown hired two gorillas, also unknown, to intimidate your husband into giving them the investment money he’d raised to take over Imperial Indonesian Petroleum,” said Jinnah. “Is that it?”

Paula Schuster nodded. Jinnah turned this proposition over and over in his mind. He became aware of an urgent need to have a cigarette. He noticed several ash-trays scattered about the room and smiled.

“Mrs. Schuster, do you mind if I smoke?” he asked, reaching for his pack.

“As a matter of fact, yes,” she said, putting her hand to her chest. “I’ve not been able to light up since … since Sunday.”

Jinnah felt acutely embarrassed. How could he have even thought of asking? Somehow, things were not going quite right here. He should have been happy. He was getting an exclusive interview with Sam Schuster’s widow. He had a story that would blow Grant and anyone else, for that matter, off the front page. But there was something missing. His inherent instincts were not tingling.

“Of course, so stupid of me,” he said hurriedly. “Forget I asked. Returning to the possible scenario you were painting: is it not more likely that someone close to your husband did this thing? He was involved in some, how shall I put this, unfortunate ventures in his time.”

“Mister Jinnah, let me be honest with you: in the past, Sam swam with the sharks. But that was the eighties. Everyone was doing it. Junk bonds, worthless penny mining stocks. He cut his teeth on that. But he’d changed. When he was wiped out the last time — well, I wouldn’t exactly say Sam got religion, but he did things on the up and up. It cost him some friends though, you see.”

Yeah, friends like Cosmo Lavirtue and Neil Thompson, thought Jinnah. He noticed that, as she spoke, Paula Schuster stared down at the handkerchiefs wound around her hands. She first unwrapped the left hand and tugged it more snugly around her wrist, then her palm and finally finished up by tucking the pointed edge in around her knuckles: as if she were folding a linen serviette in an especially ornate manner. She repeated the process with her right hand and sat there, quite composed, with her hands in half-clenched fists. To Jinnah, it was disturbingly like facing a boxer wearing pink gloves. And then it hit him: she was boxing with him, using his own reticence to press her to her own advantage. She wasn’t sitting here by mistake. She could have easily insisted he leave, screamed and called the cops, but she had chosen to talk when he mentioned the trunk. The conviction was forming in Jinnah’s mind that perhaps Paula Schuster was using him like a share offering after all: hoping to get a decent return out of him. He stiffened.

“Mrs. Schuster, as long as we are being honest with each other, hmm?” he said with thinly veiled aggressiveness. “It makes far more sense to me that one of your late husband’s close associates, angry that he had lost big-time when he last went under, murdered him for revenge. What do you say to that?”

Paula Schuster looked up. It was at this moment Jinnah noticed that, bags beneath them aside, they were very pretty eyes: large and blue. He was not so romantically naive that he did not check to see if she was wearing contacts, however. She wasn’t. The deep azure wells glinted as she spoke.

“Mister Jinnah, that doesn’t explain the two men and the kidnapping!” she said, departing for the first time from her calm, flat monotone.

“Indeed, it does, ma’am,” said Jinnah. “I mean no disrespect, we are simply exploring possible scenarios, hmm? But listen: anyone could have hired those two monkeys. Why not someone well-known to Mister Schuster? Someone like, say Cosmo Lavirtue or Neil Thompson?”

“Cosmo would never do a thing like that. Nor would Thompson,” said Paula Schuster quickly, eyes flashing again. “I mean, why would they?”

“They were the two biggest losers in their last joint-venture, that’s why,” said Jinnah. “They were tied in with the Jakarta deal as well.”

“What makes you say that?”

“Mrs. Schuster! Cosmo Lavirtue arrives with a rent-a-crowd protest at my newsroom this morning demanding a retraction and apology for a story that could ruin the deal and cost everyone their money. Mister Thompson shows up at my cousin’s share launch and gets into an argument with him about it while you watch, oblivious to all else. Now why would they do that if they weren’t in it up to their eyeballs?”

“Because despite everything, Cosmo was Sam’s friend!” said Paula Schuster. “And Thompson has nothing to do with IIP.”

She sat there panting on the chair. Jinnah noticed how her nostrils flared when she was angry. He liked it. It was a sign they were getting to something close to the truth. But the progress was short-lived. Paula Schuster composed herself and the mask of calm suffering and fatigue slowly descended back onto that reluctantly animated face.

“Listen, Mister Jinnah,” she said. “I wasn’t oblivious at your cousin’s launch. You tell me: what are you two selling?”

Jinnah considered this carefully. He almost said “a commodity,” but hesitated. “Commodity” had too many other unsavory connotations.

“A service,” he said finally.

Paula Schuster shook her head and smiled sadly.

“No, you’re not. You’re selling a dream. That’s what Sam did best. He was a dreamer, Sam. Most of the time, the dream came true. Never, ever did I think I would find myself in a nightmare because of him.”

Jinnah saw her face starting to slowly dissolve. He tried to head the tears off.

“So your marriage was happy then?” he asked forcefully, changing the topic.

Paula Schuster was taken off guard by this. Her face assumed that tired look.

“Yes. Sam gave me everything I could possibly want.”

“No children?”

“We didn’t want any.”

“And the bankruptcies? The long hours at work, hmm? The disappointments?”

“Mister Jinnah, I’m sure you work long hours in your business and have your ups and downs. And then there’s your — shall we call them sidelines? I’m not talking total bliss here — of course not. But on balance, we had a good life together, you see.”

“A lot happier now you stand to inherit ten million dollars, perhaps?”

Paula Schuster didn’t answer. She turned away and sat with perfect posture, hands neatly folded in her lap, staring out the window. Jinnah sensed the interview was, for intents and purposes, over. She had given everything she was willing to give and, had she known it, a bit more. Jinnah folded his notebook and smiled softly. He decided to make a parting joke at his own expense.

“Sidelines?” he said good-naturedly. “What do you mean, my sidelines?”

“The people at your cousin’s launch seem to think you are quite the businessman in your own right, Mister Jinnah.”

Jinnah stood up and gave a stiff little half-bow.

“They are right, Madame” he said smoothly. “I deal extensively in the truth. I wish you good day.”

Paula Schuster saw Jinnah to the front door and said good-bye. Before heading back down the walk, Jinnah took in the two cars by the front entrance. He memorized the licence plates, humming them, forming them into a tune in his head for easy storage and retrieval when he returned to the Tribune newsroom. They were recorded irrevocably in a neat, tidy folder in the files of his mind by the time the heavy gate closed behind him and he climbed back into the satellite-guided Love Machine. Not that he was going back to the Tribune directly. He had one last important stop along the way. He disabled the computer link and drove humming to himself. It was time to see what Sergeant Gus Graham had to say about the kidnapping of Sam Schuster.

Jinnah bearded Graham in his den, gaining access to his office in the Vancouver Police headquarters by telling the receptionist he had a story that might bring down the entire department. Graham appeared at the front desk, concerned and scowling and beckoning Jinnah to follow, taking him up to the second floor for a quiet chat.

“This had better be good, Hakeem,” Graham said as they rode up the elevator.

In his office, Graham was truculent when faced with the facts.

“She’s feeding you a line of bullshit,” he fumed. “That’s complete, utter crap!”

“So you deny Sam Schuster was kidnapped and you deny there is a police report to that effect in your records?” Jinnah asked, looking carefully at Graham’s face.

The Sergeant flushed red.

“That’s not what I said! I said her story that Sam Schuster was murdered for that venture capital is bullshit!”

“So you admit Sam Schuster was kidnapped two weeks before his death and the two men involved threatened to burn him alive unless he handed the funds over, hmm?”

Graham closed his eyes and exercised, in his opinion, considerable restraint in not having Jinnah taken down to the cells for trespassing.

“There is a report to that effect in our records, yes,” he admitted. “But what I am also telling you, Hakeem, is that we have good reason to believe that there is no connection between the two incidents. Sam Schuster committed suicide: full stop.”

Jinnah found himself getting increasingly agitated.

“You know, Sergeant Graham, I’m getting a little tired of the line of bullshit you’ve been feeding me. First you lie to me about Chan seeing someone at the scene —”

“We didn’t lie,” Graham had protested. “We merely obfusticated!”

“— then you let me track down and interview a known axe-murderer —”

“He hasn’t murdered anyone — as far as we know.”

“— then you feed Grant this shit about the insurance policy and even set him up with your main man in Commercial Crime!”

“If you’d listened to me, maybe I would have given you the tip instead, Jinnah!”

The two men glared at each other.

“You’ve lied to me too many times!” Jinnah said after a tense silence.

“Jinnah, please,” Graham pleaded, standing up and placing his hands on his desk. “Please — trust me on this one. If I could tell you what’s up, I would. But it’s too sensitive right now. If you publish this information, it wouldn’t —”

“Be helpful?” Jinnah had said, leaping to his feet. “Jesus Christ, Sarge! Give me a real reason. Just one!”

Graham had sat back down, eyes glistening, moustache moist and trembling.

“Trust me, that’s all I can say.”

“Not good enough,” Jinnah said, turning to leave.

“Remember what the Duke of Wellington said to his mistress when she threatened to name him in her memoirs, Jinnah.”

Jinnah paused at the door.

“What was that?” he asked, not bothering to turn around.

“Publish and be damned.”

“Ye shall know the truth, Sergeant Graham and it shall set you free,” Jinnah replied and left for the relative safety of the satellite-guided Love Machine.

So it was that Jinnah found himself driving along the streets of Vancouver, smoking and cursing, listening to the radio for any news about the killing or Sam Schuster or, for that matter, the Orient Love Express. He heard nothing of interest. Finally, he took out his cell-phone and called Sanderson in the newsroom.

“Ronald, I want you to do me a favour —”

“Not now, Hakeem!” Sanderson cried, sounding harried. “You won’t believe what that bastard Blacklock wants me to do now —”

“If you need to borrow a set of knee-pads, ask Grant — although his are probably nearly worn out.”

“Don’t be disgusting! I have to go out on a rescue operation!”

As it happened, Jinnah was driving along Cornwall Street, past the south side of English Bay, looking at the deserted lifeguard towers. The beaches themselves were crowded for it was warm despite the heavy clouds overhead.

“It’s a bit late in the year for missing snowboarders, isn’t it? Or has another fishing boat disappeared?”

“Be serious! I have to go out to a motel in Surrey with this mother —”

“I don’t want to hear about your sordid sex life —”

“— and help her rescue her daughter from a notorious pimp!”

“So what?” Jinnah grunted. “You’ll have a photographer with you. You’ll be perfectly safe.”

“Hakeem, I’ve never done this sort of thing before in my life!”

“There’s always a first time, Ronald. Now, my friend: what time are you setting out on this Herculean task?”

“Eight o’clock. Are you offering to come with me?”

“No,” Jinnah admitted. “But since you’re not leaving until eight, you can do two things for me: first, find out where Blacklock is going tonight —”

“Hakeem!”

“— launching, shall we call it, Operation Lard Ass —”

“Jinnah!”

“— and second, what is the line story?”

“Jinnah, are you totally, completely and utterly self-centred? You refuse to help me in my hour of need and then you have the gall to command me to — the line story?”

“Yes, Ronald, the line story.”

There was a pause. For a moment, Jinnah thought perhaps Sanderson had fainted.

“Ronald, are you there?” he asked, worried.

“Just reading the list, Hakeem,” Sanderson’s voice sounded tired and defeated. “The line story was supposed to be something about Schuster’s business dealings in Indonesia. It has Grant’s name beside it.”

“Son of a bitch!” swore Jinnah, swerving to miss a pedestrian. “I’m sorry, Ronald. You said supposed to be?”

“Now there is some doubt, apparently, as to whether Grant can get the story.”

The doubt had been planted in Grant’s mind by the securities investigator handling the Schuster file. Richard Kurster was a small, compact man with thin, grey hair and tiny, grey eyes who wore Dick Tracy trenchcoats and sported a fedora. He liked to think he projected the image of a veteran G-Man, but in truth, he was often mistaken for a car salesman. This impression was cemented by the scent of Old Spice aftershave and too much mousse holding his bad comb-over in place. Kurster was Grant’s rough equivalent to Jinnah’s Sergeant Graham: the seasoned investigator who tried to manage and manipulate the media to his advantage while the reporter tried to outguess and outmanoeuvre him at his own game. But Grant had not known Kurster nearly as long as Jinnah had known Graham and he was unsure if the securities man was bullshitting him about the sudden “complications” regarding Schuster’s death as they sat in the offices of the Vancouver Securities Commission.

“You’re telling me your story has changed,” said Grant, ever-aggressive, vaguely abusive, bordering on rude.

“I wouldn’t use the word ‘changed’ here,” Kurster said patiently. “Rather, I would describe the picture as becoming somewhat more clear — and more complicated.”

“You’re quibbling over semantics,” growled Grant. “First you tell me Schuster made off with about ten million of the money he raised to buy IIP, then toasted himself for the insurance after you guys got wind of the scam.”

Kurster leaned back in his chair, putting his hands on his head, covering his growing bald spot, but mindful not to squash his carefully constructed hair.

“Early evidence suggested that indeed might be the case,” he agreed. “But certain information has come to our attention that puts a slightly different complexion on the investigation.”

Grant played with his pen, turning it over and over in his fleshy fingers, tapping it loudly on his notebook. A display of impatience and disbelief. He added to it his usual bellicose and belligerent questioning. This was his style: bully and brow-beat the truth out of the man.

“You can’t expect me to run a story that quotes Securities Commission investigators as saying: ‘Trust us.’ You gotta give me something, Dick!”

“The phrase, ‘Trust us’ has not been used,” Kurster pointed out. “I would put it this way: the investigation has reached a delicate stage.”

Grant rolled his eyes and exhaled noisily. He snapped shut his notebook. Kurster was playing poker. It was time to see if he was bluffing. Grant resorted to the time-honoured reporter’s ploy of a personal appeal. He dropped the role of interviewer and assumed that of friend and boon companion: no mean feat, given his interviewing style.

“Listen, Dick,” he said, imitating Kurster’s body language by putting his hands over his head, pressing his greasy, blond hair flat. “This is pointless. Off the record: tell me what the hell’s going on. Have you guys just reached a dead-end?”

Kurster smiled a tight little smile and sat up, arms folded across his chest.

“Off the record? Just between you and me?” he asked.

“My lips are sealed. Shoot.”

“You did not hear this from me,” said Kurster. “You will go to jail before you reveal me as a source.”

“Agreed.”

“It’s like this,” said Kurster, picking up a sheaf of paper from his desk and slowly sorting through it. “The authorities in Jakarta have found details surrounding the transaction in question that put a new light on things.”

“You’re still prancing around with words,” said Grant, leaning forward. “Straight goods: what’s up?”

Kurster eyed Grant closely, assessing both him and possible outcome of what he was about to say. Grant knew his obtuse friend was merely grappling for a diplomatic way of letting him know what was going on. Speaking straight did not come naturally to Dick Kurster, but neither did allowing Grant or any other reporter to print stories critical of the Securities Commission. It was one of the reasons why he remained employed.

“The preliminary evidence suggests that someone other than Schuster was involved in the transaction in question,” Kurster said. “Someone close to Schuster himself. Someone with … how shall I put this? With interests other than those strictly monetary? Do I make myself clear?”

Grant turned this over in his mind for a moment. Someone close to Schuster. Interests other than those strictly monetary. He ran through the list of players in his mind and the face of Cosmo Lavirtue immediately swam into focus.

“What interests?” he asked Kurster. “Personal interests?”

“My lips are sealed,” said Kurster with a grin. “Unfortunately, someone else’s lips weren’t.”

The implications in Kurster’s leering tone were unmistakable.

“You’re telling me someone close to Schuster was fooling around with his wife? Is that it?” asked Grant cautiously.

“It is possible that the arrangement was the other way around, Mister Grant,” grinned Kurster. “But no, clearly that is a possibility that has come to the attention of the authorities both in Jakarta and Vancouver.”

Grant put a hand to his forehead and closed his eyes. This wasn’t good at all.

“If we head down this road,” he said, eyes still closed. “I can see a couple of problems. Problem one, if there’s an affair involved, it makes it much more likely Sam Schuster was murdered, right?”

“I can’t fault your reasoning. And we’re still strictly off the record.”

“But what about the insurance policy?”

Kurster leaned back in his chair again, pressing his hands together, fingertips pushing against each other with light pressure.

“One may theorize — and it is merely theory at this point — one may theorize that a man who has reason to fear for his life might take out such a policy, just in case.”

Grant groaned. He opened his eyes and stared at Kurster, appalled.

“Dick, I got no story.”

“Yes, you do,” said Kurster. “Look, it’s simple. I can’t tell you anything, but there are other sources.”

“Like who?”

“Like the police.”

“I don’t know that many cops. Besides, they’ve handed the thing to the Commercial Crime team.”

“You could always get that hot-shot cop reporter pal of yours to make a few calls. What’s his name? Jinner?”

“Jinnah,” Grant said stiffly. “Forget it. I’ll make my own calls.”

Grant stood up. Kurster showed him to the door.

“I wish I could be a bit more helpful, Gerald, but you know how it is — wouldn’t want to jeopardize the investigation, would we?”

“Yeah, right,” Grant said, pausing at the door. “Listen, Dick, one more thing, just between you and me?”

“Shoot.”

“If I run the name Cosmo Lavirtue past the cops, would that jeopardize the investigation?”

Kurster had looked vaguely impressed.

“That would be irresponsible, rampant speculation without any basis in official information and I would be forced to denounce it in the most strident manner if asked by other media to confirm it.”

Grant smiled a little.

“So it wouldn’t be wrong then?”

Kurster answered with a lecherous grin and patted Gerald Dixon Grant on the back. That was all the confirmation Grant had needed.

Unfortunately for Grant, it wasn’t enough for Blacklock. The editor-in-chief took one look at his story on Grant’s screen and spiked it electronically.

“What’s wrong with it?” Grant railed.

“Nothing, if you want to endure a very long, very successful libel suit, Mister Grant,” Blacklock replied. “Cosmo Lavirtue would be able to retire off the proceeds.”

“But he’s the one, I’m sure!” Grant spluttered. “Kurster as much as told me —”

“Nothing on the record,” Blacklock said, hitting the send key, shipping Grant’s prose to the purgatory of the hold cue. “You don’t even have a quote from the constabulary to back this up.”

This stung Grant. He’d assumed that all he had to do was phone up Sergeant Graham, tell him he knew all about Cosmo Lavirtue and the affair with Schuster’s widow and the policeman would spill his guts. But for some reason Graham — who had been so helpful just a day ago — had not been co-operative.

“Reporters!” he had hollered down the phone at Grant. “You all think you know so much! Why don’t you just go sit in the seventh circle of hell reserved for your kind?”

Grant didn’t know that Graham had just had Jinnah walk out of his office.

“I couldn’t get hold of anybody!” Grant lied. “Where the hell is Jinnah?”

“I have no idea,” Blacklock said, rising heavily to his feet. “Now if you’ll excuse me, Mister Grant, I have important matters to attend to.”

Blacklock huffed and wheezed his way over to the city desk where Peter “Permafrost” Frost was waiting for instructions regarding the front page.

“Grant is a no-go,” he advised Frost. “Put the stuff from Sanderson on front for second edition.”

“You’re sure he’ll have something for second?” Frost asked.

“He’d better! For first, plug it with that up-country story about the Kelowna explosion. We have decent art for that.”

“Right-o, chief,” Frost said. “What about Jinnah?”

“I wouldn’t expect anything from him tonight,” Blacklock said, putting on his coat. “If there is any sort of an emergency, you may consult Mister Church. I shall be incommunicado.”

“Where you off to, chief?”

Blacklock’s mouth twisted as if he were anticipating the taste of a mouthful of rancid meat.

“I am attending the opera with Phil,” he said, making the name sound like the word “land” had proceeded it. “Apparently, we’re sponsoring this alleged event. Yet another sporadic attempt on our part to encourage the jejune arts scene in this provincial backwater.”

“What’s on?”

“Faust. Apropos, no?”

“Enjoy yourself if you can,” Frost said.

Blacklock snorted and charged out, pausing just long enough to give Crystal a dirty look that mystified the young woman. Sanderson noted his chief’s passing at 6:30 p.m. and called Jinnah on his cellphone.

“Lard Ass has left the building,” he informed his colleague. “Entering Phase Two of operation.”

“Excellent, Ronald! I shall head for the designated rendezvous point.”

“It’s only the bloody parking lot, Hakeem!”

“Quiet, my friend! We are not on a secure line! Stick to the code.”

“Oh, for God’s sake, Jinnah!”

“Ronald, this operation must be carried out with military efficiency, hmm? For the greater good?”

“And your glory?”

“Just call me when Junior approacheth the throne.”

“Roger, wilco, over and out,” Sanderson had said, not without a certain amount of irony, which was completely lost on Hakeem Jinnah.

Jinnah had not been totally idle while waiting for Blacklock to leave. He’d made several phone calls, one of them to the corporal he knew in the traffic section and another to the office manager of the building where Sam Schuster had rented his office. The manager confirmed the kidnap incident and added a few paragraphs of colour: how Schuster had seemed shaken by the incident but still kept to his regular schedule, working hard on some big deal or other. But it was the call to the traffic section that struck gold.

“You’re kidding me!” Jinnah said to the corporal in question.

“No, I’m not and if you tell anybody — anybody! — I told you, it’ll be my ass!” the corporal replied.

“Don’t worry, corporal,” Jinnah promised. “They will have to torture me before I tell.”

“I get first right of refusal on that offer,” the corporal said and hung up.

Jinnah sat in the parking lot outside the Tribune building, smoking and writing his story in his mind. Timing, he thought over and over again. The timing of this operation has to be just right. He could rely on Sanderson, he knew that. But could he rely on Permafrost? He was the weak link in the chain. Well, Jinnah would see what stuff the senior assistant city editor was made of soon enough.

As Jinnah went through perhaps the fifth mental rewrite of his story, his cellphone rang. He jumped, even though he’d been expecting the call. It was Sanderson.

“Junior approacheth the throne: hurry!”

“Affirmative! Stall if necessary!” Jinnah cried and vaulted out of the satellite-guided Love Machine.

He fairly sprinted the short distance from the middle of the employees’ parking lot to the street dividing it from the building. His cigarette-ravaged lungs protested at this mild exercise and Jinnah was tempted to wait for the elevator, but he was delayed critically by the guard at the back entrance. By the time he’d shown his ID and signed in (Him! Hakeem Jinnah!) he had no time to wait for the slowest elevator in Vancouver. Gasping for breath, he took the stairs two at a time to the third floor. He paused in the stairwell, gulping air, trying to catch his breath, before proceeding to the newsroom. Timing was important, obviously, but Jinnah did not care to rush in breathless. He believed in making a grand entrance in full command of his internal organs as well as his faculties. After a moment, lungs had co-operated long enough to allow him to walk sedately down the hall, turn right, and throw open the double-doors of the back entrance to the newsroom like a gunslinger swaggering into a particularly tough saloon.

To his immense relief, Sanderson engaged Junior Church in conversation near the library exit on the far side of the room. He caught Ronald’s eye and gave a curt nod. Sanderson made his apologies and let Church go just as Jinnah approached Permafrost at city desk.

“Peter, my friend,” he said smoothly, spreading his arms along the length of the desk beside the hard-working editor.

“Forget it, Hakeem,” said Permafrost. “I’m out of smokes.”

“What a wit! No, I actually seek to solve your problem.”

“The only problem I have is highly paid reporters who fail to deliver the goods,” said Frost impatiently, eyes glued to his screen. “We’re all very busy here. What is it?”

Out of the corner of his eye, Jinnah saw Church exit. He had about two minutes.

“I have the line story, my friend,” he said quickly. “About Sam Schuster —”

Frost whirled about and looked for Church in vain. He gave Jinnah a blank look.

“Yes?” he said guardedly. “Do tell.”

“I have proof that Sam Schuster was murdered. I have an exclusive with his widow who tells of his kidnapping and brush with fiery death just two weeks before he was incinerated. It’s front page stuff, Peter!”

Permafrost knew it was front page stuff — if it was true and not just some bullshit Jinnah was spinning.

“You have the widow—” he began.

“And the cops confirming it, on the record,” added Jinnah hastily. “Better than that —”

“Grant tried to file a piece of shit today that had one of Schuster’s pals screwing his wife as a motive,” interrupted Peter. “You got that angle too?”

“Which name did he come up with?” said Jinnah quickly, squaring this new information with his own suspicions.

“Some guy named Cosmo,” said Frost.

“Ah!” cried Jinnah. “What an extraordinary coincidence. That’s whose car was parked in the driveway of the Widow Schuster’s mansion while I was there. Cosmo Lavirtue. Stock promoter.”

Peter looked at Jinnah shrewdly. He smiled, slightly.

“How do you know it was his car?” he asked.

“Because a cop ran the plate for me,” said Jinnah. “We don’t have to make the accusation — just the plain statement of fact.”

“That way you don’t have to share a byline with Grant.”

“More importantly, we don’t get sued.”

Frost looked at Jinnah for what seemed an eternity. Finally, he sighed.

“Y’know, that’s fabulous,” he said at last. “But I gots this teensy, weensy problembo — I gotta ask permission to change the front page.”

Jinnah was, on the inside, screaming. Haste, haste! But he had to feign nonchalance or all was lost.

“So call Blacklock,” he shrugged.

“He’s incommunicado at the opera,” said Frost. “Junior’s in charge.”

“Is he on his cellphone?” said Jinnah idly.

Frost gave Jinnah knowing look.

“Yes,” he said slowly. “He just left.”

Jinnah looked at his watch. There was still time.

“Call him now, Peter! Right now!”

Frost reached for the phone and dialed the number. Jinnah could hear the recorded voice: “We’re sorry. The cellphone customer you have dialed is out of the service area …”

“Seems he’s incommunicado too,” said Frost, looking at Jinnah in a conspiratory manner. “He did say he was headed for a Grizzlies game.”

“Damn! What a shame!”

Jinnah tried to sound sincere and failed. He knew perfectly well that Junior Church was at that moment driving his Volvo out of the executive underground parking lot and that the massive, concrete bunker was a dead-zone for cellphones. Frost knew it too. Everything now depended on Permafrost’s news instincts.

“Shame, that,” Frost said mildly. “Junior out of commission, Blacklock incommunicado, deadline looming …”

“Nevertheless, there’s the story. Someone must make a decision.”

Jinnah held his breath. Did Frost have the intestinal fortitude to change the front page?

“Well,” said Frost. “I’m supposed to run wire on this Kelowna gas explosion —”

“Bullshit!” cried Jinnah. “It’s been on radio and TV all day! We have an exclusive here! Everyone will be chasing it!”

“And for second edition, we’re to run whatever Sanderson gets out of Surrey.”

“I fail to see how you can run a dose of the clap on the front page. This is supposed to be a family newspaper.”

Frost grinned. His fingers flew over the keyboard. He had the layout of the front page on his screen.

“We need art,” he said. “The explosion photo is holding up the whole front.”

“You have room inside for the wire, don’t you?” prompted Jinnah.

Peter Frost looked at his watch. Hell yes, the story on page five could be bagged. It was just another gratuitous Viagra piece anyhow and this was real news. Blacklock would have a shit-fit and Junior wouldn’t be happy, but what was the worst they could do to him? Bust him back down to reporter? Hardly. Nobody wanted Permafrost’s job. He lifted up his head over his terminal and called to the night news editor.

“Hey, Reilly!” Permafrost shouted. “Bag the Viagra piece on five. I need to move the Kelowna wire on the explosion there.”

Reilly, the grey-haired night news editor, looked up from his screen and over the top of his glasses at Frost.

“Oh?” he said, his voice a querulous Irish brogue. “And what may I be askin’ is goin’ ter take its place then?”

“An award-winning exclusive by Jinnah on Sam Schuster’s deadly love-triangle,” said Permafrost. “We can mug Schuster, his wife and … what was his name, Hakeem?”

“Lavirtue,” said Jinnah, his voice deep and resonate with the feeling of triumph. “Cosmo Lavirtue. But you don’t have to use mugs to hold up page one. I have better art than that.”

“Oh? What, pray tell?”

Jinnah reached inside his jacket and drew out of the inner pocket the object that had sat there like a lead albatross all afternoon and into the evening. Frost looked at it and raised his white eyebrows.

“What’s this and where did you get it?” he asked, guessing both answers.

“Sam and Paula Schuster’s wedding picture and you don’t want to know,” replied Jinnah. “Don’t worry — I’ll wear the mantle of responsibility for this one.”

“No, you won’t,” said Frost. “I will.”

And, he thought to himself, it will be worth it to see the look on Connie’s face in the morning. Permafrost only hoped that his new pal Phil approved.