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Willy and the Watch

HE WOKE BEFORE THE ALARM went off. Most every morning he woke with resolve that today he’d find his bearings and start walking into the light of normality. But today was different, and he felt defeated before he opened his eyes. When he did look, the sky was pitch black and the clock radio said six thirty. He rolled, fumbled for the light switch, and under its fuzzy blare checked the Smiths. It told him it was 4:02. The TV was still on, now playing a morning talk show just loud enough to not raise complaints from the other guests.

With two hours before shift, he showered and shaved and dressed with care, and went downstairs to the Super 8 diner, picking up a newspaper from the stand by the door. News in the north was never hot off the press, since delivery took a while, but it kept him current enough with the city. The restaurant was empty except that his favourite place, the sole window booth, was occupied by an old native man smoking what looked like a giant doobie.

Dion stopped by the table and could smell cheap, harsh tobacco. He gestured with his newspaper at the red pictogram placard on the wall, a crossed-out cigarette in a circle, and said, “Sir. It means no smoking.”

The old man looked up. He wore a rough-looking scarf around his throat and a canvas coat that sagged open. His hair was white and chaotic, and his eyes looked damaged. He gazed at Dion directly and said something, a full and complex sentence with not a single English syllable thrown in. It sounded like chit-chat, so the man was either partially blind or incompetent, not seeing what stood before him, a white man wearing a hefty gun belt and full patrol uniform. Not someone to chat with, especially if you were native.

“No smoking,” Dion repeated. “Okay?” He crossed the room, took a table of second choice, and waited for Ken the Korean-Canadian waiter/proprietor to come and take his order. He asked for eggs over easy and dry toast, nothing on the side, and coffee, then added with a gesture toward the smoker as he told Ken, “It’s your restaurant, and you know the rules. Enforce them, would you?”

Ken dropped an ashtray in front of the old man and said, “Put it out, Willy.” He went off to the kitchen to start cooking, and the old man named Willy crushed out the cigarette, sending up a stink like a dumpster on fire, directing more gibberish at Dion across the space between them. Again there was no hostility there, just babble, like English spoken backward, this time ending in a question mark. Only one word stood out as recognizable to Dion’s ears, the name Johnny.

“I don’t speak your language,” he said, loud and slow. He flattened his paper and tried to read the stale news.

The next time he looked over, Willy was turned away, looking out at falling snow. Dion looked down at his wristwatch and compared it to the Dairyland wall clock facing him. He unstrapped it and held it to his ear, shook it and listened again, and what he heard chilled him, a fatal arrhythmia.

Ken set down a breakfast plate with a clatter. “Watch problems?”

“The beauty of old stuff like this,” Dion told him, almost viciously, “is it’s fixable.”

“Good jeweller over at the Copperside.”

Dion thanked him, but he wasn’t really listening. He already had someone in mind, a guy who could fix anything. Except microwaves.

* * *

The fix-all’s address took Dion farther into the wilderness than he had expected, across that spine-tingling chasm that Jayne Spacey had shown him on her tour, and along a road of hard-packed snow with rock wall on one side and forbidding woods on the other, but by the time he’d figured out how impractical the errand was, it was too late, and he had arrived at his destination, a mobile home on a cleared bit of land all fringed by woods.

A hand-painted sign was posted out front, roadside, attached to the wooden fence. It said, “Northwood Repairs Incorporated,” with an “NRI” logo shaped into a wrench and spewing yellow flames. The yard was full of old shop signs, car parts, the bones of appliances, some grouped in categories and others heaped untidily amidst weeds and snow. Dion parked his car in the open space in front of the trailer, stepped up three aluminum stairs onto an aluminum landing, and rapped on an aluminum door, then stepped back to make room for the door to swing outward. While he waited he looked about, trying to imagine who would buy a piece of land like this, set in shadow, damp year-round. A great breeding ground for mosquitoes come summer. If summer ever reached this bitter land.

He had given up waiting and was crossing the soggy grounds back to his car when the aluminum door shrieked behind him, and the man with the scar was up on the mini-landing, scowling down. Rourke was wrapped in a striped terrycloth robe in burgundy and blue, and looked like he had a backache the way he stood gripping the door frame, yellow-grey hair sloped messily to one side.

“Sorry,” Dion called across the yard. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“Well, you woke me, so now tell me what you want.”

“We met yesterday, but actually —”

Rourke interrupted with a snap of his fingers and pointed at Dion like a warlock casting a curse. “That’s right, the cop with the writer’s cramp. What’s this then? More goddamn pointless questions? What size goddamn shoes I wear, which way I goddamn vote?”

Dion brought the Smiths from his pocket and held it out. “It’s running slow. I thought you could take a look at it for me. If you have time.”

“Very smooth,” Rourke blared. “Give it up, Mountie. We all know what’s going on here. I’m way up there on your suspect list, and if you haven’t figured out that I’ve figured it out, you’re stupider than I gave you credit for. That’s the only reason I went down to see you yesterday, to save you the satisfaction of dragging me in yourselves. Cops,” he spat. “You’re all cut from the same cloth, two-faced, underhanded, self-pandering bunch of dipshits. I’ll be writing some letters, you better believe it.”

Dion listened through it all and then thrust the watch back into his jacket pocket, as it had dawned on him that he’d made a mistake, and a clumsy one: Scott Rourke was in no frame of mind to be fixing things. The missing girl was a close friend, and he’d have no room for anything else at the moment but worry, and all Dion could do now was apologize and back off. “Of course,” he called up. “I’m sorry. You’re not open for business at a time like this. It honestly never crossed my mind. Sorry.”

He moved again toward his car, but Rourke brought him to a stop with a shout of, “Hang on now.” He’d flung the door wide so it caught and held. “How about some answers? Where are we at? You got any leads? We all have a right to know.”

Dion stood on the grass, car keys in hand, his mind already elsewhere. What time did the Copperside jeweller open, for one. The repair was hardly an urgent matter, but he needed to know, as soon as possible, if the thing could be saved. He tuned in and realized Rourke was still bellyaching at him, asking questions he couldn’t answer. He cut in sharply, saying, “I’m just a temp, and you’re going to have to direct your inquiries to the office. You need that number again?”

“No, I got the number,” Rourke snapped.

Dion squinted into the sky, which had stopped pelting snow but was a solid chalky white, maybe just holding back. He looked again at the pissed-off man in the bathrobe and said, “I’ve heard there’s a jeweller at Copperside. Is he any good, d’you think? With watches?”

“He’s a charlatan,” Rourke said. “And a thief. You want a watch fixed around here, you gotta come to Scottie.”

“Right, and I did, but you’re not taking on work right now, which I perfectly —”

“Did I say I wasn’t taking on work? Death and taxes. What d’you have there, a fucking Rolex?”

“It’s a Smiths,” Dion said. “I’ll pay extra. This watch means a lot to me.”

Rourke walked back into his aluminum palace but left the screen door locked open. Dion stepped in, shutting both doors behind him. He had been in a lot of trailers over the course of his career, all shapes and sizes. They were like condensed houses, with plenty of plastic and tin stripping, but kind of appealing, some of them. “Everything you need and not a bolt more,” he said as he followed his host down a narrow, dingy corridor, giving a wall panel a thump with his fist.

“You got that right.” Rourke led the way to the end of the trailer, the living room fuzzy with morning light, where his in-house workbench was set up. “I’m happy here. It’s home, anyway. Home is where the heart is, they say. Have a seat while I look at this watch of yours.”

Dion gave him the watch and sat on a kitchen chair near the workbench. Looking around at the clutter, he saw that Rourke was a packrat but kept the place in fairly good order. A glut of old snapshots was tacked to one wall, and he looked away in case there were images he really didn’t care to see. Next to him on the bench stood a trio of bright toys. A little tin black man pushing a wheelbarrow, a duck driving a red car, and a yellow school bus.

Rourke followed his gaze. “Job for the second-hand guy. Clean and tune. Puts bread on the table, okay?”

“Are these worth something?”

“Not a heck of a lot. Except the duck. It’s well preserved, and it’s got historical significance of some kind. Don’t ask me what.”

The collar of Rourke’s bathrobe sagged as he leaned forward, showing a bony chest. He studied the Smiths draped over his hand and gave a low whistle of admiration. “This is a fantastic watch. The last of the great British military line. Nice. But it’s in shitty shape. Where’d you steal it?”

“A friend gave it to me. Long time ago.”

“You shoulda boxed it up and kept it in your attic. Might be worth something now.”

“It’s worth more on my wrist.”

Rourke looked at the back of the watch, hunting for access. “Don’t expect miracles. You put it through a few wars, have you? Rain, snow, gunfights, and the odd dunk in the bathtub. It’s old, older than I’m used to dealing with. I’m not saying old is bad, necessarily. But in this case you might be better to just —”

“I’d rather have it fixed.”

“I mean, for the cost of repair you could get yourself a real nice —”

“Oh Jesus, open it up and do what you have to do.”

Rourke grinned at him, the grin bent out of shape by his horrific scar. “This friend of yours, was she good-looking?”

This friend of his was Looch, in fact, a big loudmouth cop going prematurely bald. Lucky Luc, Luciano Ferraro, hilarious guy, sorely missed. Dion crossed his arms and said, “His name’s Luciano. We go way back, and I can’t read time unless it’s off this watch. Are you going to fix it or not?”

“I tell you what. Leave it with me, and I’ll see what I can do. Though to tell the truth I’m kind of up to my arse in projects right now as it is.”

“What, wind-up toys?”

“And three lawnmowers due for overhauls. Yes, lawnmowers. In a couple months they’ll be all the rage.”

Dion was having second thoughts. What he should have done was pick up a cheap substitute, get the Smiths fixed when he was back in the city, however many years down the road that might be. There in the land of plenty he could take it to a professional, get it done right. He said, “I’m just here for the short term. I could be gone tomorrow. We’d better just forget it.”

“No, you leave it with me tonight. I’ll see what I can do. You picked the worst day of the year, you know, what with Kiera.”

“I realize that. Thank you. I appreciate it.” Dion checked his wrist, already forgetting it was bare, and his heart skipped a beat. He stood to go. “Better get to work.”

They walked back down the shipshape corridor to the exit, and in passing what must be a bedroom door Dion heard a woman’s sigh as she tossed on squealing bedsprings. He glanced back at Rourke, who said, “You can mind your own damn business.”

Outside, the sky had grown lighter, no longer snowing. Dion stood on the deck, found his keys, and started down the steps. Rourke remained out in the fresh air by his screen door, saying, “So now I’ve done you this big favour, you gonna do me one back and keep me in the loop with Kiera?”

Dion turned to give him a businesslike smile, in no position to start throwing out promises. “I’ll do my best.”

“Bah,” Rourke said.

At the side of his car, Dion remembered the one question he had to ask in order to tie off the loose end on an overdue report he should have submitted yesterday. Or at least try to confirm if it had any basis in the real world. He turned back to Rourke in the doorway. “Your friend Rob Law, is he married?”

“No. Why?”

“I heard he’s married to a native woman.”

“You’re talking about Charlie?” Rourke glared northward. “They weren’t married, but it was in the plans. She took off in the fall, back home to Dease. Rob’s like me. Can’t keep his women.”

Took off in the fall. The words jolted Dion six months back, to that blowsy afternoon with Penny at the Smithers fairgrounds. He had waited in the following days for reports of young women gone missing from that particular time and place. None had, and his fears had faded. Rourke’s words now brought back an illogical drift of anxiety.

“Charlie…?”

“West.”

Inside the trailer a phone rang, and Dion, one leg in the car, looked up in time to see the screen door swing shut and through its mesh the shadowy figure of a woman with long, wild hair approaching Rourke, her hand outstretched. He hesitated, considering this could be the missing singer, but screen and main door were both closed now.

Scott Rourke had mentioned someone he lived with, a Ms. Doyle. That’s who it was, no mystery. He sat behind the wheel and wrote in his duty notebook, Charlie West. Then he realized by the clock on the dash that in about two minutes he would be late for work, and the drive back was at least twenty. He fired up the engine. One step sideways and two steps back.

* * *

Leith had two main roads to pursue, as well as a few minor alleys. One main road was the Pickup Killer, and another was Fling. This morning he would be focusing on Fling because of a tip that had arrived at the crack of dawn. The tip came in the form of a middle-aged waitress who worked at the Catalina Cafe and had overheard an argument between Kiera Rilkoff, Frank Law, and Mercy Blackwood sometime last week, a few days before Kiera’s disappearance. Most of the loud words were between Mercy and Kiera, with Frank just sitting on the sidelines. The waitress recalled a few lines verbatim, from the argument: Mercy called Kiera a waste of time, and Kiera called Mercy a frog. “A frog?” Leith had asked, cupping an ear.

The waitress insisted that was what she heard, frog.

An interview of Ms. Blackwood was on Leith’s to-do list anyway, if only to firm up some background info, so now he would ask about the argument as well, kill two birds with one stone. But first he would get Frank’s take on it.

Frank Law showed up when the grey of dawn was just flooding over the mountains and promising another day of half-light in the Hazeltons. Leith had a cramped and cluttered workstation in the main room. He sat Frank down here, gave him a cup of coffee, flattened his notebook, and wrote down the opening particulars. Leith had been accident-prone his whole life, so his body was conditioned to fast healing — that was his theory, anyway — and already his wrist was good enough that he could take his own notes, which spared him further contact with Constable Dion, whom he had come dangerously close to shooting yesterday. He told Frank about the overheard argument at the Catalina and asked for an explanation.

“Argument?” Frank said. “What argument?”

Leith refreshed his memory for him. “You were in a booth on the south wall of the restaurant. You were seated next to Kiera, and Mercy Blackwood sat across from the two of you. Mercy and Kiera were arguing. Quite loudly. There was some swearing.”

Frank looked tired and uninterested. “Okay.”

“You had coffee. Kiera had tea and a cherry Danish. Mercy didn’t order anything but brought her own drink in a Thermos.” All this the waitress had recounted for Leith this morning before her early-bird shift. She didn’t like the drink-in-the-Thermos part, and no, she admitted, she didn’t like Mercy Blackwood. “Mercy accused Kiera of wasting her time, and Kiera called Mercy a frog. Mercy’s not French, is she?”

Frank’s mouth hung open. His short, rakish beard was becoming just plain scruffy. “French? I don’t know, maybe.”

“Seems kind of a racist thing for Kiera to say, doesn’t it? Does she have a thing against the French?”

“Who doesn’t?”

“And why would Mercy say Kiera’s a waste of time? That’s pretty harsh.”

Frank said, “I don’t remember much. Probably they were arguing about the demo, which wasn’t going well.”

“I don’t get that, why it wasn’t going well,” Leith said. “You guys have been playing together for years. You’re popular, have a lot of fans. What wasn’t clicking?”

Frank shrugged. “We’re trying for a recording. Kiera’s a show girl. Without an audience egging her on, she’s kind of … flat. Me and the others, we tried all kinds of tricks to get her spun up, and she tried, but it just doesn’t seem to work.” He hesitated. “That’s what they were arguing about, I guess. Mercy thought maybe I should do lead vocals, Kiera would sing backup. And we’d ditch my songs and try something else. None of which Kiera accepted for a moment.”

His eyes shifted about, a man thinking of things he didn’t want to discuss, and Leith considering harassing him further on the issue. But really, it was all sidetracking. Scott Rourke, for all his rattiness, had a point when he said to stop wasting time talking to people. It was a monster they should be looking for.

* * *

Next in line was Fling’s manager. Maybe it was the aggressive ring of her name, but Leith had envisioned a battleaxe, and Mercy Blackwood was anything but. She was a reedy, intelligent-looking woman in her late thirties, possibly, with a fine-featured and pleasant face, intense grey eyes, and grave manner. She wore black slacks, brand-new looking snow-boots, a fine-weave grey sweater, and a puffy white parka with fake fur trim. For the pretty librarian look, she wore gold-rimmed spectacles.

“I’m glad to finally meet you,” she said and held out a hand in a jerky sort of way, as if she had doubts about physical contact. “I’ve seen you from afar.” She didn’t smile. He shook her limp hand and invited her to remove her coat and sit. She kept the coat on, saying it was chilly, but placed herself primly on the hard wooden chair next to Leith’s desk. He could see how out of place she was. He recalled she was from Vancouver, up here to care for a dying relative, who had then died. He also recalled she was primed to sell her dead relative’s house and return to the city ASAP, where she quite clearly belonged.

She watched him and waited, still and expressionless. To break the ice, he said, “I hear you worked with Joe Forte and the Six-Packs, way back when. They had a great thing going while it lasted. Too bad about Forte.”

She nodded, still not a sign of smile on her attractive face. She said, “They were the first group I worked with, went from bar gigs to the Commodore. Amazing talent. I learned a lot from that experience.”

And made a lot of money, too, Leith thought. “Who did you work with after that?”

“Lemon Heart,” she said. “Goldie Weatherstone, who you may know better as Goldie Hawkins. The Midlanders, you know, Jerry Robinson and his fellows? That’s about all. Once I got on with the Midlanders, I worked with them exclusively, as I had worked with the Six-Packs.”

It all sailed over Leith’s head, names that meant nothing to him except possibly the Midlanders, a fairly big name on the music scene. He said, “And now you’re here in the Hazeltons representing a little country rock band called Fling. Why?”

“Terrible name,” she said. “I want them to change it before it’s too late. But they’re quite stuck on it. I’m here because I had to give up the Midlanders. Medical issues. Plus I had to care for my grandmother.”

He was reading her face as she spoke, and thought he saw traces of fear and dismay. Not surprising, considering what brought them to this room. Or maybe it was just physical discomfort. Or, like Fairchild had suggested to Constable Dion, culture shock. Whatever it was, she looked miserable. He offered coffee to warm her up. She declined.

He asked her to tell him about Fling, where they were going, what the plans were, that sort of thing.

She studied him for a moment in a cool, analytical way, before answering. “I’m not sure you care to know, but I’m only up here for the short-term. Or that was the intention. It’s a full year ago I first chanced to see Fling perform, at the high school auditorium, the Valentine’s dance. I had to get out of the house, away from Granny. Do something. Move. You know? Anyway, back to Fling, I guess you’d say I was smitten, or more like swept up in the moment. They shook the auditorium, and the audience loved them. Sometimes the music is secondary. That can be worked on. Personality and verve, you either have it or you don’t. They did. Do. You will find her, won’t you?”

“We’re doing our best,” he said.

She looked doubtful, and he could understand why. The whirring gears of the investigation, based in Terrace, were all but invisible to residents of the Hazeltons. A chopper flew by now and then, shiny trucks arrived, strangers reined someone in, asked questions, and were gone again. Meanwhile, Leith and his team looked like plods, and frankly, Leith was worried they were. He said, “How do you find working with them, Frank and Kiera?”

“Lovely,” she said. “Both of them. Very down-to-earth, but gung-ho.”

“They were thrilled when you took them under your wing?”

“Thrilled is the word,” she said, and there she should smile, he thought, and still she didn’t. She said, “There are difficulties, of course. They’re lovers, for one thing, which complicates things. They’re both stubborn. And I hate to say it, but they’re not reliable. I foresaw problems, but I guess I underestimated their unreliability.”

“Things are not going well, I take it,” Leith said.

“Things need fixing,” Blackwood said gloomily.

“Can you elaborate for me?”

She gave him another studious gaze, with no reply at the end of it. She said, “People are saying it’s the Pickup Killer.”

“That hasn’t been crossed off,” Leith admitted.

“I’ve also heard it said the killer lives right here in the Hazeltons.”

“That’s possible too.”

“And he’s responsible for all those missing girls from Prince George to Prince Rupert.”

“Highly unlikely,” Leith said, and that was true. The profilers had crunched the data, what little there was of it, and concluded the Pickup Killer was not responsible for the atrocities that had plagued Highway 16 for so many years, as yet unsolved. This killer was localized, new to the area, employed in Terrace, maybe, but could live elsewhere. The profilers believed he lived within a two-hour drive of Terrace, which encompassed both the Hazeltons and Prince Rupert. Leith banked more on Prince Rupert, his own home base, but the Hazeltons remained under close observation. The population of the area was scant, and he had probably looked at the name of every male in the area at least once over the last two and a half years. Nobody had jumped out at him or held his attention for long.

Mercy Blackwood sat silently now, pondering him. He had received nothing of value from her so far and didn’t expect much from his next question either. He said, “I have to ask you, Ms. Blackwood. I’ve been told you were heard arguing with Kiera, on February the fifth, which is eight days before she went missing. I need to know what it was about.”

She frowned in a worried way, casting her mind back. “Yes, I guess we did raise our voices somewhat.”

“What was the problem?”

“Disappointment, clash of ambitions, reality checks. Unhappily, nothing was working. The Vancouver label pulled out because the CD just wasn’t good enough, which I should have known, and I feel bad about that. We’re brainstorming, trying to get back on our feet. My suggestion was a radical change of direction. Kiera didn’t do well in a studio setting, for some reason, and I thought the best route was to try new songs and new lead. A new persona, really. Frank could take lead vocals and Kiera could sing backup. That was my plan, and they both said hell no. So there you go. I wished them luck, said I would hang in through the making of this second demo, and then I would leave them to find their own way from there. And that’s where we stand.”

Everything she said lined up with Frank’s version so far. Leith said, “Worst case scenario, Kiera doesn’t come back, will you continue working with Frank and the others?”

“Too soon to say. Frank can go places on his own, if he puts his mind to it, and I’ll work him through it, if that’s what he wants to do. We’ll see.”

Leith’s notebook told him he’d come to his last query, and it was a touchy one. “D’you have any French in you?” he asked.

“French,” she echoed. “Me? No. I speak some French, but that’s as far as it goes. Why?”

“During the argument Kiera called you a frog. I’m wondering why.”

Her cool grey eyes didn’t leave him for a moment. She was one of those maddening interviewees who kept their emotions tucked neatly away, surprise, anger, and amusement. “Frog,” she echoed. “Wow. I don’t recall that.”

He said, “Also, you called her a waste of time. Sounds like quite a battle.”

Now, finally, she showed herself; her brows went up and she almost smiled. “Ah,” she said. “I recall now, yes. I was fed up with her stonewalling all my ideas. I flung up my hands and said she was a perte de temps. She said, what? I translated, waste of time. I guess ‘frog’ was the meanest comeback she could think up on the spot, followed by bitch and cow. Well, I’ve been called worse over the course of my career, working with artists, you know.”

For the first time she grinned.

* * *

Jayne Spacey glanced up, and her face was smooth and sweet. She didn’t look angry, but she was, and even the indoors felt frigid now to Dion. She hated him; he could feel it as he walked up to her at her computer with his apologies. She stopped typing to listen to what he had to say and continued to look smooth and sweet, but the chill kept spreading.

“I didn’t want to get into the middle of it,” he said. “Sorry.”

“Well, I must say you have great comedic timing. Shane and Megan couldn’t stop laughing. Sure, I’d like you to go to hell, and you know what? That’s where you’re going, judging by the things I overheard them saying about you.”

“Who saying?”

“Those who matter,” she said. “But chin up, baby. I hear security guards are in high demand, and it’s better than minimum wage. No thinking required. Briefing in fifteen, by the way, and the boss has made a note that you’re late. Better have caught up on your reports. She’s a stickler for the twenty-four-hour rule.”

Those who matter would be Giroux, he knew, and Leith. Or was it Sergeant Bosko from the Lower Mainland, a presence that had bothered him from the start, back at the dinner briefing at the Catalina, when Bosko spoke of his latest posting, North Vancouver, Serious Crimes. What was a man of his stature doing here in the sticks? Just hanging around, helping the locals with a missing persons investigation, just for the hell of it?

No chance. Sergeant Bosko had bigger things on his mind.

Dion was back at his own station, a temporary set-up jammed between filing cabinets and a fax machine, and he got to work on his last, overdue report. His time was coming to an end; he could see it approaching like banners of war fluttering on the horizon. At least he could get this report in. Late and full of typos, but better than nothing at all.