Читать книгу Cordi O'Callaghan Mysteries 4-Book Bundle - Suzanne F. Kingsmill - Страница 16

When I got into work the next day I met Martha in the hall staggering under a pile of books as she tried to open the office door with no free hands. I didn’t make it in time to catch the pile as it toppled over. I leafed through Jemima Puddle-duck as Martha picked up Winnie the Pooh and Brer Rabbit. Martha was not married and she’d never talked of any children.

“Martha, what are you doing with these?” I asked.

“The local daycare needs some more books, so I scrounged up some of these from the students here,” she said with a shrug.

We walked into her outer office and I dumped the books on Martha’s desk and let out a big sigh. Martha cannot stand big sighs followed by silence, so I knew I had her attention.

“This thing’s getting stranger and stranger, Martha. I can’t figure it out. Nothing fits.” I quickly filled her in on my conversation with Shannon.

When I was through Martha chortled and said, “When I was a kid I used to do those big thousand-piece jigsaw puzzles.”

I looked at Martha in exasperation. What the hell was she going on about?

“It was a wonderful feeling getting those last few pieces, but one day my kid sister put one puzzle in the wrong box. One was a mountain scene with a stream and the other was a mountain scene with a stream but all different — same colours. I couldn’t get the puzzle. It didn’t make sense because I didn’t know what the final picture looked like. When I finally realized what had happened I was able to fit the pieces together.” Martha’s eyes were twinkling like a gurgling mountain stream. “You have to figure out what the problem is before you can start fitting the pieces together,” she said triumphantly as she plunked herself down in her chair. I pulled up a stool and straddled it.

“Okay. You find a dead body. Killed by a bear. Someone moves that body from the death scene. There’s no forensic entomologist at the scene — except you — so the cops don’t collect proof that the body’s been moved. You do. Then your life is threatened, your lab is fumigated, and all the insects taken from Diamond are stolen. Coincidence? Unlikely. Someone went to a lot of trouble to prevent you from finding out the body had been moved. That is your first question. Why was the body moved?”

I remained silent, wondering what she would come up with.

“Okay. We know, or at least we’re pretty sure because of the tranquilizer gun, that someone was with Diamond when he died. It wasn’t his trank gun, and Shannon told you he wouldn’t have had a chance to get another. Suppose whoever it was got scared, tried to save Diamond, but accidentally shot him with the trank gun. Then panicked and fled.”

“Who moved the body then?”

“They came back and moved the body because the place he died would identify them somehow.”

“Why go to all that trouble? Why not just go to the cops with the whole story and muscle it out? It’s not a criminal offence to try and help someone.”

“Maybe they were too ashamed.”

“Yeah, right. It’s got to be something more,” I said.

“Maybe he was in partnership with someone and they’d discovered something worth a lot of money, a gold mine or something. When the bear attacked them, his partner, after failing to save Diamond, moved the body so that no one would come snooping and find the gold. Then they snatched your disks to cover their tracks.”

I was musing on the merits of Martha’s theories, particularly the last one, when the phone rang. Martha answered and handed it over to me.

Duncan’s voice came booming over the line. “Did you know they found the bear about a day after the body was found?”

“How do you know? I don’t remember seeing it in the papers.”

“Apparently before they could get a team together to go and comb the area, one of the loggers phoned and said they’d shot a bear near Diamond’s permanent camp. The wildlife people went up to take a look but the loggers apparently burned the body to keep other wild animals away. Can you believe it? The wildlife guys were furious and thought maybe it was just an attempt to hide a bear-poaching job, but the loggers’ story held and they didn’t find a pelt. Apparently one of the loggers had recently been raked by the bear and his friends had saved him. He had the scars to prove it. Of course, it was too late to be able to prove it was the bear that got Diamond, but the wildlife guys were convinced by the scars. Two rogue bears in one area is hard to stomach.”

When I didn’t say anything to this piece of news Duncan asked, “Are you still there?”

“Yeah, sorry, I was just thinking about something else. Was there a flare gun among Diamond’s belongings?”

“Hang on a sec.” I could hear a file cabinet opening and the rustling of papers and then he was back on the line.

“Let’s see … No, no flare gun. Should there have been?”

“Apparently, yes. When I talked to his girlfriend she said he never went into the bush without his flare gun.”

“Nope. There was no flare gun found, but there was something else you didn’t see which might convince you that perhaps you’re blowing things way out of proportion.”

At least he’d softened it with the word perhaps, I thought as he continued.

“Seems Diamond was quite careless. One of my report pages was with my secretary the day you came. Diamond’s trousers were drenched in fish oil — not the kind found with fresh fish. This was an oil, like sardines, which would fit with what you said about sardine cans being found there.”

My mind raced back to that lonely and deserted campsite, and I said in puzzlement, “Yes, but why would a man who hauls up his food pack, complete with toothpaste, wear trousers saturated with fish oil that is bound to be a dinner gong for any bear in the area?”

“So he ate sardines for dinner and spilled it. Do it all the time myself. Those tins are such a bitch to open.”

I shook my head at the phone. “Doesn’t make sense.

He comes across as an experienced camper. He knew the dangers. Why didn’t he wash his pants?”

“Maybe he didn’t have another pair.” When I snorted, Duncan changed tack.

“There’s no accounting for people’s lapses. Haven’t you ever forgotten to look both ways before crossing the street and narrowly missed getting flattened? Awful yeasty feeling in your mouth when it happens.”

After we disconnected I stood in my office staring at the wall thinking about Diamond, then roused myself, said goodbye to Martha, and headed off to the library. I didn’t get away from work until prime rush hour. I sat stuck on the bridge over the Ottawa River and watched four kayaks darting in and out of the rapids while I thought about forensic entomology, which, of course, directed my thoughts toward Jake Diamond and my disks.

What had really happened to him up there in the woods? Had there really been someone with him that day? Had they shot the dart at the bear to try to save Diamond and jabbed him instead? Were they partners in some illegal scheme that forced the partner to move the body? Was there an illegal still up there in the woods, or were they poaching and didn’t want the police to find the evidence? Was that why the body was moved? And if so, how was this going to help me find my disks? I had to find out if there had been someone with Diamond when he died. If there was, I prayed they’d be able to lead me to my disks, if I played my cards well enough. Problem was, I wasn’t sure if I held any cards at all.

Clouds were rolling in from the west and it had started to rain as I pulled my car up in front of the barn and jumped out. Ryan’s motorbike was parked outside his studio, and the red light wasn’t on — he wasn’t in the darkroom. Great. I could try to get him to help me with the disk Shannon had given me. I took the metal stairs two at a time and rapped on the door before barging in.

Ryan gingerly took the disk from me and turned it over in his hands as if it was contaminated.

“Cordi, who else has this disk been conversing with?”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake, Ryan, how would I know? You have a virus detector, don’t you? Besides, it’s a Mac.”

He grunted, and reluctantly pushed the disk into his hard drive. The computer hummed and hawed but no bells and whistles came up alerting us to some nasty infection being transported by the disk. When the disk’s icon, labelled “Stuff,” had mounted on the computer Ryan double-clicked on it. There was one folder on the disk, named “Logging.”

Ryan opened the folder. It contained files of all Diamond’s logging information, briefs, letters, and records of all logging events up in the Dumoine area for the past forty years. There was also a file that turned out to contain his calendar of events for the past year, some articles on data falsification, and some letters to colleagues.

“Let’s check his calendar,” I said, hoping something would jump out and make everything right again, but knowing it wouldn’t. Why couldn’t I be an optimist like Martha?

Diamond had been meticulous at keeping track of all his appointments, times and dates. Ryan went back to March and started scrolling from there.

“Ryan, stop!”

I took the mouse from him and scrolled back and forth, highlighting two separate entries a month apart. The first said, “Speak with Don re: paper. Is Roberta involved?” The second, a month later, said, “Clear day for Don and the Dean re: ethics, paper.” The second entry was scheduled for five days after Diamond died.

“What do you suppose that means?” said Ryan.

“Don Allenby and Diamond were collaborating on a paper together. Roberta told me Diamond had asked Don to postpone publication. He was very disappointed and so was Roberta because she will be one of the authors — quite a plum for a master’s student.”

“You think there was something wrong with the paper? Diamond’s got a folder here on data falsification and other illegal activities. Holy shit, that’d ruin Allenby’s career if he made up his data. Maybe it’s the student?”

Ryan clicked open the essay, which talked about how the public trust had been undermined by scientists faking their data, but that it was essential to be sure before accusing someone because their careers could be ruined.

“Jesus, Cor, if one of his students falsified data, no one would touch them again. That breast cancer study in Montreal by some guy — I can’t remember his name now. Remember how it played in the media? Data falsification is career-ending. If this guy’s student was doing something shady and Diamond found out, then his death has been very beneficial for her. Fake data. You’d be dead in the water.”

I took the mouse from Ryan’s hand and scrolled through the documents.

“He’s got stuff here on that fish in the Mediterranean,” I said. “The one they said was extinct, until some fisherman landed a live, breathing specimen.”

I continued searching the files.

“He’s got a whole folder on all his old papers. Jesus, he was prolific. Look: artificial insemination of captive cats, predator-prey relations, pregnancy in lynx, an overview paper on extinct and endangered species … Hey, here’s something on the Puerto Rican crested toad. They thought it was extinct, too, until a toad hopped out of a crevice one day. Remember that?”

I idly wondered how many more species, thought to be gone forever, would prove us wrong, just like the toad and the fish. I clicked on a file labelled “Lynx,” but the computer beeped and prompted us for a password.

“Wonder what’s so special about that one?”

Ryan shrugged, and I went back to Diamond’s calendar and began scanning all the months before his death.

“Take a look at this.”

I pointed at the screen.

“He had regular meetings with a guy named Jeff. Look at that — three, four times a month, but the entries end in May.”

“I thought you said his helper’s a guy by the name of Patrick, not Jeff.”

I reached for Ryan’s phone in my growing excitement, forgetting any fears I might have had about a cold call, and called Patrick, but I got no answer, so, since I was on a roll, I tried Shannon. She answered on the sixth ring.

I went straight to the point.

“Diamond was apparently going to meet with the Dean. He had an appointment five days after he died. It looks as though it had something to do with one of Don’s students. Do you know anything about it?”

“Um, I don’t know. I mean, I’m not sure. Jake was really upset about something — maybe it was Dr. Allenby. I don’t know, but whatever it was, I don’t think it was really great, you know what I mean? He wouldn’t eat my lemon meringue pie one night — can you believe it? He always loved it, but he said he was so angry about a paper he couldn’t touch anything.”

“Do you know what paper it was?”

“Paper? What? Oh. Oh, I see. He never told me much. Could have been any paper. He marked lots, and he wrote some stuff himself that got published in those magazines no one reads but the scientists. God, they’re really boring, but you see, I didn’t find his work really interesting, so I don’t really know.” She paused and then added sadly, “I guess I should have taken more interest.”

I made some reassuring noises and then asked her if she knew if Jeff was the same guy Patrick had mentioned to me.

“Yeah, sure. Jeff was a pilot friend of Jake’s. Actually, he introduced us. Jeff was an old flame of mine, sort of. I used to go up to his lodge near Dumoine and help with the cooking. I met Jake there. He liked to come and see Jeff’s birds and stuff.”

“Birds?”

“Yeah, Jeff bred wild birds — rare ones — and other animals, too. He had lots of land and Jake loved to go up there. He died last month, in a fire. Broke Jake up. Me too.”

“They were good friends?”

“Oh yes. They were real buddies, and Jeff also helped Jake with his biology stuff.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, being a pilot and all, Jeff took Jake out to kind of fly over where Jake wanted him to.”

“You mean aerial surveillance?”

“Yeah, that’s it. I think they’d fly over his study site looking for the cats with all this special equipment.”

“Did you ever go with him?”

“He never asked me. Not that I would have gone. I’m kinda afraid of heights, but he could have asked.”

“There’s a locked file named ‘Lynx’ on the disk you gave me. Do you know anything about it?”

“Sounds like his research file, although why it’d be on his logging disk, I don’t know. He always password-protected his research files. He usually kept his research at the university.”

“Do you know if he had any favourite passwords?”

Shannon laughed. “Yeah, sure. It pissed him off that he even had to use a password for his documents. He never really believed it was necessary, but he did it anyway because Davies was on his case about security and stuff.” There was silence at the end of the line, and then she said, “He made it as easy for himself as he could. He almost always used his mother’s name, Leah, with a two-digit number after it. Sometimes he used his cat’s name, Paulie, or other family names … I figured I’d really made it when he trusted me enough to tell me. I’m the only one who knows, besides Patrick. Anyway I’d try the Leah one first and try numbers from eleven to ninety-nine. He never used three digits. If that doesn’t work, ask Patrick. He should know.”

I wrote the names on a piece of paper and handed it to Ryan.

“One last question: Did Diamond like sardines?”

There was a long pause and then, “Sardines? Yeah, he loved sardines.”

“Were they part of his diet in the bush?”

“Hardly. Not when he could get fresh fish from the lake. Sardines are so smelly — they attract too many animals. He wouldn’t likely touch them out there with a ten-foot pole.” There was a pause and then she asked, “Why, were there sardines in the tent too?”

“Not in the tent, no.” Thoughts were tumbling around in my mind taking shape, coalescing. I rang off, and as I stood there lost in thought, Ryan exclaimed, “Bingo. We got it! Leah22.”

There were six main folders labelled “lynx/cat” with a three-digit number after each one and another main file labelled “wild card.” There were reams of data in each of the cat files detailing everything about the lynx, including pregnancy. The notes were meticulous and boring. The measurements and physical characteristics of each cat were recorded at the top: weight, length, length of pregnancy, and so on, and all with the nauseating detail of a thorough researcher. It was mind-numbing and a little chastising. My research was not this thorough. But at least he was human. I noticed that he’d forgotten to record the weight and length for the sixth cat. In one of the folders there was a paper on captive breeding and artificial insemination techniques for lynx and a reference to four captive reared cats — Dana, Simba, Sian, and Myth — who were bred successfully, it seemed. I smiled. So Diamond had had a sentimental streak. He’d given these cats names rather than numbers. Another folder titled “radio-collaring” had the notes and observations and surveillance records on six cats. All cats had been under surveillance from at least May on, except one from April on. I skimmed through dates of surveillance and rough maps with dots all over them, wondering what I was looking for. A pattern? An indication of what he was doing just before he died?

On impulse I put a call into Patrick again and this time got him on the first attempt. The sound of his voice sent shockwaves through me, and I realized my hands were shaking. Disconcerted, I stammered out my hellos and identified myself, silently cursing my sudden attack of nerves. Or was it nerves?

“I’ve just got into a disk of Diamond’s that Shannon gave me and I wanted to ask you some questions I couldn’t answer.”

“Fire away.” I tried to picture him on the other end of the line. Was he smiling? I wished I had something to say that wasn’t just business, but I couldn’t think of a thing in my muddled state of mind, so I asked him what I had called to ask him in the first place.

“You said the other day that you accompany Diamond on his tagging expeditions. Do you also accompany him on surveillance flights and ground surveillance to track the animals’ movements?” God, I sounded so bloody official. What was he thinking of me?

“No. Not usually. It’s very time-consuming, but I do help sometimes. We radio-collared the last cat in May. Let me just boot up here and check.” I heard the telltale ping of a computer turning on and shortly after Patrick was back, “Yup, May. I helped him with that and went out on surveillance a couple of times in late April and early May but then he said he didn’t need me for any surveillance in May and June anymore and I was happy with that. I had a lot of my own work.” He paused, his tone suddenly guarded. “Why are you interested in this?”

I wished I could see his eyes. I couldn’t read anything from his voice.

“I’m wondering if whatever he was working on just before his death might have something to do with why his body was moved and why my larvae were killed and my disks stolen.”

Patrick grunted into the phone but politely said nothing. I cleared my throat, wondering what I was looking for, knowing he was wondering that too. “Diamond’s data lists six cats that were surveyed in the six months before his death. Do you —”

Patrick interrupted, “What was on that disk Shannon gave you?”

The sharpness of his tone put me on the defensive, and I felt the beginnings of panic welling up inside me that surprised me. I really didn’t want this guy angry at me. I wanted him to like me.

“What she told me was on it: all his logging stuff. But then there was also a folder on his research.”

“I think we’d better meet. Before I answer any of your questions I want to see that disk. At the same time I can show you the film.”

There was nothing for it but to agree. The coldness of his voice made it clear that I’d get no further on the phone. We arranged to meet in two days’ time at his lab.

I hung up, part of me pleased that I would see him again, part of me frustrated because he had every right to the disk and the information on it and I didn’t. Part of me upset because I hadn’t liked the coldness in his voice and I wanted to warm it up in the worst way. This guy was really affecting me.

Ryan was in the darkroom, so I fooled around, trying to find the password for the last folder. I tried Leah all the way to 99 and then repeated it with the name of Diamond’s cat, Polly. No luck. Ryan came out of the darkroom with some negatives and laid them out on his light table as I was making a copy of the disk.

“What did you lose?” I asked, dreading the response. I’d delayed asking the question for so long I was sure it would be all bad.

“What?”

“You know, the film you lost at the rapids. How many pictures did you lose? Ballpark damage.”

“I didn’t lose any.” His words echoed off my thoughts like a boomerang and came winging back at me with menacing meaning.

“What do you mean you didn’t lose any?”

“I checked my records and every shot I took is accounted for.”

I stared at Ryan. He took meticulous records of each of his pictures, noting the f-stop, ASA, lighting, everything, all neatly numbered, and he wasn’t missing any?

“Then that film that we found?”

“Wasn’t mine,” said Ryan.