Читать книгу Nightshade - Tom Henighan - Страница 11

Five

They sat on a bench above the river, at the edge of the wide plain that extended beyond the museum — the Plains of Abraham, complete with running track, picnic tables, and observation platform. Joggers circled the track and some kids kicked a soccer ball, nearly lost in the middle of the wide greensward. A couple of ancient residents chatted and steered their poodles toward the Grand Allée, headed, no doubt, for late afternoon tea or coffee in one of the nearby cafés.

Annie Sergeant kept her restless gaze on Sam long enough to let him feel it. He found her very attractive — skinny but shapely and strong looking, with short blonde hair, piercing blue eyes, and a whipcrack voice that was stimulating rather than hectoring. As she spoke, she turned her paper cup round in her thin hands, as if she were moulding something in clay — her spirit, or her soul, perhaps. He was intrigued; he thought she looked terrific in her green sleeveless boat neck dress. She didn’t drink coffee, she’d explained, and hated cafés. She liked herbal tea, running, rock climbing, and contemporary female vocalists. She had mentioned the names of a few singers, but Sam had heard of none of them. She was only vaguely aware of Mahler and Shostakovich.

Now she was trying to make a point about the perils of being a lab scientist in the twenty-first century.

“You’ve got to understand the problem,” she insisted. “Every researcher who works with animals is in danger these days. There’s an awful lot of nuts out there. They’d murder human beings rather than see a rabbit’s belly cut open. That’s why we try to keep a low profile.”

He shrugged. “You wouldn’t think tree research would cause any problems. You don’t actually cut them down, like the lumber companies, do you? And the trees wouldn’t scream if you did. I can’t believe that Daniel Summerways would turn violent to protest against some pretty vague genetic modification of the forest growths. Hell, there are so many more important things to get incensed about.”

“They’re irrational, those people — that’s the main point,” she countered. “You can’t use two plus two logic when you deal with them. I’ve seen them in action. One of our Boston labs was bombed. A well-known researcher working on malignant growths was beaten up. It was an eco-fanatic that got Dr. Charlie, I’m sure of it. Maybe it was the Indian guy, maybe not. But it’s up to you — and the Quebec police — to find the bastard.”

Sam nodded, almost dutifully, and when she shifted on the bench, swinging her body around, closing her eyes and inhaling the clear air, his glance rested for a few seconds on her well-tanned, wiry arms and shapely legs.

She was an intriguing package, he thought, with her intensity, her honest wrinkles, and quick hands. In the past he had worked for women like this, women on the other side of thirty-five, attractive, experienced, restless, always looking for something intangible. But recently there had been fewer of them. Perhaps it was a disappearing species. In any case, he’d been feeling deprived — of complex female contact — and decided that this interrogation might just have a sequel. He even regretted that Paul and Ginette had him booked solid for dinner. Paul had suggested — no doubt with a sly sense of humour — that he should turn his charm on Annie, but Sam knew, and was glad, that some practised charm, perhaps intentionally, was being turned on him.

“Tell me,” he cleared his throat and tried to strike a note that suggested neither official interrogation nor idle curiosity, “did you always want to be a scientist?”

“Does it really interest you?”

“Sure.”

“Okay … Yes, pretty much. My mother and father were both science students and I was an only child. My father became a chemist, a pretty successful one. I grew up in California, and I got into sports — swimming and running especially — but when the chips were down I opted for chemistry.”

“Your father worked at a university?”

“No, he worked for a private lab. His specialty was analysis of new food products.”

“When did you first meet Dr. Linton?”

“About two years ago.”

“Is that when you became part of the Arbor Vitae group?”

“Yes.”

“Your specialty is plant chemistry? And you’re on the AV corporate board as one of the main stockholders and stakeholders?”

“Yes on both counts. And believe me, as great a shock as Charlie’s death has been to all of us, we’re going on with this.”

“Are you on good terms with all the others — Bob Ballard and Jane Linton, for example?”

She stood up, faced Sam, and began doing some arm stretches and knee bends, in very slow motion. Beyond her were the wall and the steep drop to the river, so that when Sam looked up at her, her head and shoulders were outlined against the sky. Smilingly, she told him, “I get on very well with Bob, but Jane is another story. Who the hell could get on with her? She’s a narrow-minded, grasping bitch.”

Sam laughed. She sat down again beside him, a little closer than before. “Do you know anything about Bob Ballard’s Washington connections?” he asked.

“His what?”

“You must know that there’s some interest from official Washington in your project. Someone connected with the U.S. Department of the Environment possibly, or a White House crony?”

She shrugged her shoulders. “I wouldn’t know anything about that. Where do you get this stuff? You must have been talking to Jane.”

“Do you know who Frank Rizzo is?”

“Sure. A businessman who contacted Charlie. Mafioso type, but suave. We all went over to his place on the Îsle d’Orléans last week. Pretty special hangout. Beautiful house and gardens, lots of weird characters by the swimming pool. Charlie invited him to join us at the party the night of his death. I didn’t exchange more than a few words with Rizzo that night, but I talked to Bob about him. He seemed to think he might be useful.”

“How?”

“Investing in the firm in some way. Oh, don’t worry. Bob’s aware of Rizzo’s shady side. We aren’t going to be taken in.”

“Can I ask you what you did, and when, on the evening of the murder. I know you’ve already made a statement.”

“Sure. I went to the private party Charlie Linton set up. Everyone except Jane was there — Bob, Meg, Simon, Chen, Rizzo — and a few other guys. I stayed late, until around one o’clock, then I turned in.”

“Did anyone leave or duck out for any substantial period of time?”

“I certainly didn’t. I was there the whole time. I think Chen took off for a while, late in the evening, and of course Meg left early, as always. Simon wasn’t there very long either. Charlie was in and out the whole time, and I think he left around nine or ten and didn’t come back, although he said he would.”

“Did you see Jane Linton that evening?”

“No, I didn’t, though Charlie mentioned that he was meeting her in his room.”

“Was that why he left around ten?”

“I have no idea.”

Sam got up, walked over to the stone wall, and turned to her.

“Were there any policy disagreements between Charlie Linton and Bob Ballard, or between Charlie and you? Any disputes about the way Arbor Vitae should go?”

Annie Sergeant thought about this for a moment. “I wouldn’t call them disputes. But it’s true, Charlie and Bob differed on how to market their discovery. Charlie was worried that if the big international firms, the U.S. firms in particular, got hold of it, they would do some things he didn’t like. He was a Canadian, as you know, and a big Canada booster, and he wanted to try to develop the project here, maybe getting the government to pass some laws to prevent potential abuses. Bob Ballard disagreed, and, frankly, I think Bob was right. Charlie was too naive. We certainly need some American investment. And now we have to deal with Jane, which is even worse.”

“Even worse? Charlie was hard to deal with, then?”

“Charlie ran his own show. He didn’t confide much in people. He was an idealist, but idealists are often single-minded and difficult. Idealists can do bad things, very bad things, and still keep the glow of virtue.”

“What bad things did Charlie do?”

Annie stood up. She looked perplexed. “How would I know? I’m speaking generally. I only met him a few years ago. He was a good colleague, and always pretty decent to me. He may have had his reasons, but he was decent — as a colleague at least. Besides, he was always under pressure, I think, from that terrible wife of his.”

“Why are you so down on Jane Linton? Did you have some kind of trouble with her?”

“Look, Sam, I think I’ve answered you pretty squarely. Can we knock this off now? It’s getting late and I’d like to get back to the hotel. We can talk again later, if you need to.”

“That’s fine. I have to move on, too.”

She turned, hesitated, and with a glance at the wide plain stretching back to the city, said, “Nice running track. I might come out here tomorrow. I don’t suppose you run?”

“Only when someone’s chasing me.”

“I might chase you — at least as far as dinner. I like wrestlers as well as runners. Are you interested?”

“I’m interested, but I can’t make it for dinner. How about a drink later tonight?”

“Sure. Come over to my hotel, if you want. They have a pretty good bar. It’s the Ben Franklin on the Rue des Glacis. Apparently, the old kite-flying bugger came up here from Philadelphia to try to get Canada to fight the British.”

“The first of many American foreign-policy mistakes.”

“Spoken like a loyal Canuck.”

“Spoken like a California-born American.”

She gave him a sharp look. “Oh? I’ll have to hear more about that. Over those drinks, possibly.”

“I look forward to it. I’ll ring your room when I get there.”

She gave him a little wave and walked away. He liked the way she moved, loose and free, with her body swinging nicely in the stylish dress. From a distance she might have been a twenty-year-old, but it was no disappointment to get closer either. He wondered how close they might get. He thought he had detected quite a bit of interest in her quick glances, the intimate inflections of her voice. It had been a while since he had felt any real tension with a woman, at least the positive–negative kind that can lead somewhere.

* * *

In the lobby of the museum, he called Daniel’s flat. Clara answered. She sounded angry.

“Yes, you can come by. In fact, I want to talk to you. Our mutual detective friend has gone and had our apartment searched without permission. You were with him, Sam, weren’t you? What the hell’s going on?”

“I’ll be right there,” Sam told her. He walked out to the Grand Allée and got a taxi. There was no sign of Annie; she must have gone back into the museum. Her green dress was still vivid in his mind. She’s not exactly Maid Marian, though, he told himself. I have to be on the lookout for a sucker punch. This self-admonition came out as a mumble and the taxi driver glanced at him questioningly in the rearview mirror.

Minutes later they pulled up at the house on Sainte-Geneviève. Clara came down the steps to meet him. She didn’t look happy.

“I just called Paul to complain,” she said. “I can’t get hold of him. What the hell does he mean by searching the apartment?”

Sam took hold of one of her arms and gently steered her back up the stairs.

“Can’t we have a drink and talk about it? I want to fill you in — both of you.”

“That’s fine, but Daniel isn’t here. I have a notion he’s taken off. He’s obviously feeling pressured by the police. I knew this would happen if they leaned on us.”

“They haven’t pressured you. It’s all been pretty routine up to now.”

“Spoken like a white, middle-class person.”

In the improvised studio, Clara poured a couple of whiskies, and Sam tried to reassure her.

“Paul had the apartment searched because his sidekick asked him to. This Eddie bloke, who seems okay, was in charge of it. They would have had to do it anyway, and Paul trusts Eddie to keep things straight. He was trying to protect you, in fact.”

“I wish he’d phoned me up. The police seem to think that the law doesn’t matter if they’re dealing with Native people. I don’t know where the hell Daniel’s gone, but I’ll bet he’s on his way back to Ottawa. That’s just the wrong move, as you know.”

“Well, Paul will take the rap for his exit. That’s the second skip-out of the day. He’s not going to be happy at all … Where would Daniel go?”

“Who knows? Maybe to the Gatineau. Maybe even farther west.”

“Didn’t he leave a message, a note or something?”

Clara got up and finished her whiskey, then poured herself another glass. She looked about ten years older than she had that morning. Or was it just the contrast with the breezy and confident Annie?

She walked over to the big work table at the end of the improvised studio and fumbled amid the bottles and brushes. “This was all I could find,” she told him.

She handed Sam a wrinkled scrap of paper. On it he read a single word: Weesakayjac.

Sam looked up at her. “You obviously know what that means.”

“I have a vague notion, but I’m not going to tell you. And I’d like it back, please. I don’t want this mentioned, not even to Paul.”

“You make the rules hard for me,” Sam told her. He sensed her distance from him and her lingering anger. “But I won’t tell Paul, just yet — although later I may have to.”

He handed her back the piece of paper. Clara poured herself another whiskey. “Want one?” she asked, but he shook his head.

“I have to go to dinner with Paul and Ginette. I need to be able to think straight. You really believe Daniel’s gone to Ottawa?”

“I’m not sure of anything. But just so you know the score, Sam, and don’t think Daniel’s some kind of paranoid with a martyr complex, let me tell you a few things about his background.”

She sat down across from him, holding the whiskey on her right knee, gazing at him with eyes that had suddenly taken on a glassy intensity.

“You should know that he grew up in the Sandy Lake region of Ontario during just about the worst time in its history. The Native groups there had been undermined by the growth of white society, and despite a lot of glossing over and good intentions on the part of the bureaucrats in Ottawa, there was poverty, disease, a plague of drunkenness, and in general a loss of morale as the old way of life disappeared.”

“The old story,” Sam said gloomily.

“Exactly … Daniel’s uncle was a powerful chief, but his father was an artist, a painter, who was attacked spiritually by some of the shamans for what he revealed in his paintings. Later, when Daniel was only ten, his father was murdered in a barroom brawl in Kenora. His mother died soon after and he was sent to one of the residential schools. I don’t have to tell you what that involved. In his early teens he ran away and was helped by his uncle’s relatives to resettle, but he was never part of the old community. He worked in the mines, and somehow learned to paint, but his alcoholism nearly killed him. Then one day he had a vision in the woods near Ghost Point, and he began to find some solace in the old beliefs, gave up booze for dope, and started selling some of his work in North Bay, Sudbury, and even Toronto. When I met him a couple of years ago he was doing pretty well as an artist, but he was a very lonely guy. We’ve had some good creative times together.”

Sam stood up and walked over to the work table. A jug lamp gave off a low, enigmatic light. It seemed impossible that the confusion of paint tubes, brushes, manikin heads, labels, trays, and Coke bottles — the junk of a life and culture intrinsically alien to the artist — could be turned into a vision of order, a critique of what was worst in the world around him. And yet the alchemy seemed to have worked, and, unless Clara was deceiving herself — which was unlikely — it was working at the personal level, too.

“Daniel’s had a few clashes with the authorities, I take it,” Sam said. “That can’t have been reassuring.”

Clara made a face and shoved her half-empty whiskey glass away. “Look, Sam, Dudley George was murdered in Ipperwash in 1995. So far as I know, he was unarmed and part of a peaceful Native protest. That’s 1995, not 1895! That kind of stuff should be ancient history. But somebody got nervous and a tragedy resulted. Most Native people, especially those who make it in white society, are wary of the police and the authorities. It’s not paranoia; it’s just common sense, based on bitter experience.”

“You think the Quebec police want to pin something on Daniel?”

“I don’t know. In some ways I think he feels safer here than in Ontario. But the lakes north of Ottawa, the Gatineau region, have become a second home for Daniel. That’s probably where we’ll go — if he hasn’t taken off already.”

Sam glanced at his watch. “Look, Clara, I’ve got to go out with Paul and Ginette. Don’t do anything rash. Don’t make any complaint just yet, even if you’re tempted to. Just find Daniel for me, if you can. I need to talk to him. If he’s in Ontario, that might work out very well, since I have to head back to Ottawa tomorrow or the next day. I think we can help Daniel. I’m sure we can.”

“I hope you’re right.” She smiled. “And that’s why I retained you. That’s what they say, isn’t it — retained.”

“I suppose so. And by the way, I’m ready for a small down payment.”

He walked across the where she stood, reached out and drew her to him. He kissed her and she took his kiss politely, tenderly, and without much passion, exactly as he had given it.

“I’m lucky in my friends,” he said.

“I hope so,” Clara said, “and I hope we are, too, Daniel and I.” She reached for the whiskey, took a sip, then cradled it in her hand as she led him down the hall to the door.

“I’ll think about Weesakayjac,” he shouted back, as he tramped heavily down the stairs.