April Fool (42 page)

“The boys are pretty good at all sports.”

“I'll bet they have a proud mother too.”

“Well, I guess so, yes.”

“But she's not at home with you.”

“We're separated.”

“And in the process of divorcing, I understand.”

“Mr. Svabo!” Kroop cries out, demanding that this lifeless prosecutor get on the ball. Buddy complies by objecting to these personal matters, but without much heart.

Arthur reminds the court that Flynn was introduced as a man of integrity. “The Crown has put Flynn's character in issue. And with all due respect to the court, I intend to test it.”

Kroop has no answer. “Please don't be all day.”

“Am I right, sergeant? You're being divorced?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Nothing to be ashamed of, it happens to the best of us. When did your marriage start falling into trouble?”

“It hadn't been working well for a few years. We stuck it out for the boys. It, ah, got worse last summer.”

“Were you seeking help for it?”

Flynn has been holding himself from playing with his moustache–Arthur once kidded him about it during a break–but gives in, working it, buying time, as if any response might imperil him. “Frankly, I felt the problems were hers.”

“Were either of you seeking help last summer?”

“Not me. I can't speak for her. Don't know what she did with her day, except she worked part-time at a drugstore.”

“Ah, and where would that be?”

“I don't know. Down on Marine Drive.”

Lotis is back, at Arthur's ear. “Still waiting for Daisy's lawyer to phone. I'll get a list of Marine Drive pharmacies.” And she's gone again.

“You were posted to Alberni about mid-October?”

“Yes.”

“What about your family?”

“I encouraged the boys to come with me, and they did. Switched schools.”

“And your wife?”

“She, ah, no, she stayed in Vancouver.”

“Desirée.” The name hangs there, in large letters, like a lurid movie poster. Arthur is on overdrive, focused, his personal concerns stowed safely away, no longer rubbing at him. “Desirée, that's her name? Desirée Flynn?”

Flynn fingers the moustache. “Right.”

“But everyone called her Daisy.” Pens working at the press table, a rustling in the back.

“I called her Desi.”

“But she didn't like that name either, did she?” This is a calculated guess, but Flynn seems taken aback, as if Arthur has insider knowledge. Maybe he called her Dizzy.

Flynn looks at the visiting RCMP inspector, then quickly away, and amends, “A couple of her friends called her Daisy.”

“That's what she preferred?”

“Maybe, we didn't discuss it.”

“Dear Daisy. That's whom we're talking about, isn't it? The diamond in the rough with the abusive husband.”

“That…I'm sorry, but that's total nonsense, sir.” It's all or nothing for Jasper now, and he rises to the occasion with dramatics, with sputtering astonishment. “I am grossly offended, sir, if you're suggesting I had something to do with the death of Dr. Winters. I didn't
know
the woman. I had no reason to dislike her.”

“Surely you were aware your wife was receiving counselling from her?”

“I don't know
what
Desi was doing.”

A noisy stirring in the back, as Ruth Delvechio shuffles past her seatmates and out the door, in obvious distress. Buddy is
staring at Flynn with concern, fighting the realization that all along he's been running a bogus prosecution. The jury seems to be falling out of love with Flynn too. But Kroop's in denial, making sulky faces, unable to entertain the notion that a stalwart veteran of a cherished institution has committed an unpardonably evil act.

Arthur confronts the witness with Eve's old appointments calendar, the name Desirée written in twice for July. A tussle with Kroop follows over whether it can be filed as an exhibit, but the defanged jurist relents when Arthur offers to call the deceased's secretary.

He leads Flynn through the chronology: his visit to Faloon, his return to Vancouver to pilfer an exhibit that would falsely incriminate him. Flynn claims not to remember seeing a notice to conclude the old Faloon case. If there was one, the exhibit custodian would have acted on it. Documents would be on file in his office.

A switch, back to Flynn's sports boat. “Did you take your Cormoran inboard for a spin on the night of March 31?”

“No, sir, I did not.”

“Where were your two boys that night?”

“They were, ah, in Vancouver for the weekend. I sent them off with tickets for a Canucks game.”

“They were with their mother?”

“I assume. She has them a weekend a month. The lawyers work it out.”

“You don't talk to Daisy?”

“Desirée and I do not communicate, haven't for months.”

“When did you finish work on that Friday?”

“Close on to eighteen hours.”

“Six p.m., then? Some of us old-timers have an aversion to the twenty-four-hour clock.”

“Five-thirty, six. I had a drink with a female member, and later that evening I popped into the detachment.”

“What time was that?”

“About eight.”

“So maybe you had a couple of drinks with this female member.”

“Okay, two drinks.”

Three or four, probably. To sedate him, lower tension, give him courage, the balls to go through with his plan. “And then you went home.”

“Yes.”

“And how long does it take, going all out, for a fleet craft like yours to get from Alberni to Bamfield?”

“Ninety minutes. I would never run her all out at night, Mr. Beauchamp.”

Arthur is working at a fast rhythm, allegro vivace, snapping each question after the last answer. Flynn is finding little room to sulk, to play at being wrongly accused, but he is far from being broken. Arthur has spun a sticky web, but is it enough? The jury may see this as just another example of a counsel's shifting tactics, accusing almost every witness of being Dr. Eve's assassin.

The clock nears 12:30. Arthur has more punches to throw, but no knockout blow–unless Daisy comes out of hiding. But he'll leave the jury with something to chew on over lunch.

“Officer, help me out with this difficulty. When you and Constable Beasely attended at the crime scene, you went directly to the bedroom.”

“Yes, initially we saw the deceased through the window and so…yes, we went right to the bedroom.”

“The first thing you did after looking for vital signs was to put on latex gloves?”

“That's standard, sir.”

“And you kept them on as you did a cursory check of the cottage?”

“Yes, of course. To avoid contaminating evidence. Procedure is to ribbon a dwelling off after you're satisfied there's no one else inside.”

“And you waited outside for the Identification team to fly in.”

“Exactly.”

“Then explain why your right index fingerprint was lifted from the refrigerator door.”

“It…it was where?”

Arthur recalls to him the evidence of yesterday, the fingerprint specialist who took the lifts in Cotters' Cottage. “‘Known Individual JF, upper refrigerator door.' You are known individual JF.”

“Well, I may have looked inside the fridge…I must've taken the glove off, they can get itchy. I'm sorry, I can't imagine why that happened.”

“Try imagining you were there the previous night. Imagine you wanted a late snack.”

“Don't answer that,” says Kroop. “We'll take the noon break.” The witness stand isn't far from the door to his chambers, where he pauses, studying Flynn, having trouble accepting this man as a bad guy, this wise, gruff cop with his fifty school visits.
We all accept that he's a sterling fellow.

 

32

I
t's 12:30. Hubbell will have picked up Margaret by now, to escort her to the city, to his posh suite where she'll be uncomfortable, it's aseptic, inorganic, unwelcoming. The reunion will be edgy, difficult.

These fusspot thoughts are, thankfully, interrupted by Lotis, walking beside Arthur with her phone to her ear, nudging him, drawing his attention to Gilbert Gilbert. Though said to have been driven to madness, there he is, shoulders back, head high, walking up Robson Square to the Law Courts, returning to his clerkish duties.

“Good on you, Gilbert,” she calls, raising a fist in salute to his gritty spirit. Gilbert walks on, expressionless, eyes distantly focused, too embarrassed to acknowledge them.

Lotis snaps her phone shut. “I'm getting the big stall. Daisy doesn't want to get involved, that's her lawyer's hidden message.” B.K. Shrader, a sly divorce practitioner with a reputation for seducing the more attractive of his clientele.

“Phone him back, I'll talk to him.”

Arthur doesn't want to force Desirée Flynn to court, but if he is to prove Flynn guilty, he must impale him on the sword of
scienter
, guilty knowledge of the lesbian affair that smashed his marriage. Was he motivated by powerful jealousy–or by failure, the ego-shrivelling awareness that his wife had found a better lover in a woman?

As they enter the El Beau Room to lunchtime buzz and clatter, Lotis passes the phone to Arthur, who exchanges greetings with Shrader, parries, joshes. “B.K., you still hold the record of eight decrees in one day?”

“Nine, but who's counting. I'm slowing down, the body can't keep up with the demands of my grateful clients. Thought we got rid of your ugly face–and it's a lot uglier than it used to be. Who's the little dessert treat beside you? Must be your junior, what's her name…Nookie. Rudnicki.”

Arthur stops dead, the dessert treat running into him. He stares at the phone–where's the hidden camera? The phone speaks. “Look up.”

Arthur sees him at a balcony table with, presumably, a gay divorcee, plump and pink-lipped. He's waving his phone, a crooked grin on his lumpish face. It's a mystery how a fellow like him attracts women. It must be the scent he gives off, the gonadotrophins, they cloud women's sensibilities. (What scent vents from Arthur? Something fusty, old books, worn boots, and potting soil.)

Lotis will wait at the bar with her busy phone. She has lots on her plate, including the breach-of-contract claim against Garlinc. Arthur shook hands with Clearihue. Lotis witnessed that, and will sign an affidavit. But they face a formidable problem: by ancient law, land sales must be evidenced in writing.

Upstairs, Shrader offers Arthur a chair, then encourages his companion to touch up her lips in the ladies. “No, Arthur, I won't give you Desirée Flynn, and I won't break client privilege by saying what I know. Except what's already on the record–our pleadings allege,
inter alia
, rages, beatings, murder threats. If she was scared to death of Jasper before, how do you think she feels now, with you painting him as a jealous, vengeful, murderous son of a bitch?”

“Nonsense. If he goes scot-free she's forever in danger. She'll feel safe only if he's convicted of murder. I don't ask for anything dramatic. She doesn't have to testify that Flynn threatened
to kill anyone, just that he was suspicious about her goings-on with her therapist.”

“What the fuck are you doing in that court? Defending or prosecuting? If you're prosecuting, you got it backwards, you're supposed to lay a charge first. You've got reasonable doubt coming out your yin-yang, you don't need Daisy. She doesn't need the lurid publicity, she's camera-shy.”

“I can get an order forcing her into court.”

“Give her a break, Arthur.” Drawing close. “She has a new life. The lesbian adventure is over. She's going on thirty-four, an age when chances start to run out, even for the gorgeous. She's engaged to a widowed pharmacist with three kids. It looks like she can finally grab a little happiness out of life. Why steal that from her?”

He has a point. Compel her to testify, shove her before the cameras, force her to wade through the jostling throng, subject her to whispers about lesbian lovers–engagements have foundered on less. It's not Arthur's role to subject anyone to that. He rises as Shrader's client returns, lips glistening. “Okay, I'm persuaded. I'll leave her be. But, between us, did he know about the affair?”

“What do you think? He's a cop.”

Arthur bids them adieu. Gone is his daydream of thrusting a Perry Mason-like forefinger at the perp, bringing him to his feet to confess in trembling vibrato,
I did it and I'm glad
. He will stop playing his hubristic role as
accusator
, he'll be generous, entrust the job to the state. Daisy may not escape attention, but let the regular authorities make their polite inquiries first.

He rejoins Lotis, who hands him her phone: it's Brian, exultant, enjoying a smoke before lunching with an inspector and a Crown attorney. “The cat is among the pigeons. The Faloon rape was closed out eighteen months ago, and a notice filed to destroy exhibits, including two vaginal swabs in a zip-lock bag. The record is initialled by the exhibits custodian–a civilian, the cops don't trust one of their own to do this job–but
Flynn's initials appear too, as a witness. My informant suspects scalawaggery, the document smells of having been backdated.”

“I assume Buddy has been apprised of this.”

“Yup. I'm getting vibes that Jasper had been making the Force uneasy for some time. Assault complaints by his wife, handled outside the court system. Threats. It's why they bundled him off to Alberni. Some serious stalking was going on when he came back for that two-week stint. That's why you've got Inspector Taylor of ACU sitting in the orchestra pit. After lunch, I'm coming in from the cold. See you then. Ciao.”

Arthur orders a bloodless Caesar and a sandwich. It's one o'clock. Hubbell is showing Margaret through his apartment. She sees the unmade bed, the rumpled sheets. What does she think of the pillow pictures?
I can't imagine how they get into position number three, Hubbell.
Arthur phones 807 Elysian, and there's no answer. They're letting it ring…

 

The Owl figured Jasper might cut ass out of town after this morning's shellacking, but here he is, the Known Individual, Flynn of the Mounted, still in boots and saddle. Maybe he just couldn't get away, maybe someone was frozen onto his tail all through lunch, for instance the man in the shiny shoes to Faloon's right.

This afternoon's performance is sold out again, you can see people lined up outside. Claudette and Holly are getting on like kissing cousins in the back row, two tough broads from the sticks. Even though the whole courtroom knows he boffed them both, Claudie isn't pissed off, she's too kind and forgiving, it's guilt-making. A wedding next month. Did he actually agree to that? What's marriage going to feel like for a dashing
boulevardier
like the Owl? Is it the right step for a man of great hidden wealth? Sebastien Plouffe, Sebastien Plouffe, I love
you
…

Here comes the jury settling in, here comes Father Time, and here's the disgraced copper going back into the stand.
Faloon, who by now has read the transcripts twice over, is puzzling out Flynn's MO. Maybe he got advance word that the Owl and Doctor Eve made dinner reservations at the Breakers for March 31, making it an excellent night for murder. A bonus, a gift on top of the fact he had the DNA, the gob on the swab.

He probably didn't come straight into Brady Beach, instead hid his Cormoran behind one of the outcrops and rowed his dinghy in. Maybe he had time to prowl the town. Maybe he saw that drunk condo guy. Saw Faloon! Saw him sneaking down from the Breakers. Saw him bury the zip-lock.

If thirty-one large has gone to the Sergeant Flynn Retirement Fund, easy come, easy go, it's chickenfeed. There's a thousand times more buried in Cimitière Saint Pierre.

Here comes peppery Miss Rudnicki, breezing into the courtroom like a movie star, settling in beside her learned master. The Owl always enjoys the way Beauchamp snaps his braces when he stands to cross-examine, it means he's ready, he's racked.

Flynn looks like he fuelled up at lunch, maybe a beer or two to help relax. He tries to interrupt Beauchamp with an excuse about the print on the fridge door, but he's cut off by the judge, who has gauze or something in his mouth, you get a glimpse of white sometimes.

Beauchamp begins again. “Let's try to reconstruct your movements on the eve of April Fool's Day. You went off shift, joined an officer for a drink, stopped by the detachment…”

“To sign off on some paperwork.”

“Thank you, let me finish. And you arrived home at eight o'clock. Correct?”

“About that.”

“And then what?”

“Oh, I may have unfrozen a steak dinner, watched some television. I was pretty beat. Hit the sack early.”

“Can you give me the name of one person who might have seen you between 8 p.m. and dawn the next day?”

Flynn frowns, struggles, like it's almost there, a name of somebody, but no, he can't bring it home. “No.”

“Ever sat around with your mates and speculated about the perfect murder?”

“I don't get your meaning.”

“I'm sure we've all done it. A parlour game. I would imagine police detectives are more prone than most to indulge.”

“Can't say I'm interested in parlour games, Mr. Beauchamp.”

“It's always something the murderer leaves behind that does him in, isn't that the case? A footprint, a hair, a bloodstain–you've seen it all. But a tranquilized victim gagged on her own garment leaves no telltale bullets, no knife wounds, right? No blood, no clues.”

The judge can't take any more of what Faloon thinks is called rhetoric. “Don't answer that question, witness. It is not a question. It is a speech with question marks.”

“My question is, sergeant, did you ever consider that scenario?”

“Don't answer.”

“Milord, this issue is at the very
heart
of the defence.” Bellowed, he actually causes the old boy to jump.

“Are you accusing this officer of murder?”

“Your Lordship will forgive me if I haven't made that abundantly obvious.”

“Staff Sergeant Flynn? Then this is a serious matter. But I see Her Majesty's consul isn't moving a muscle.” The judge turns his black, vacuum-cleaner eyes to Mr. Svabo, but they can't suck him up off his chair. He's just watching, arms folded. “Proceed then. Proceed.”

The great man has recovered from yesterday's reversal with Angella, a rare stumble, but what a trouper, the good don't stay down. “Sergeant, do you understand my question?”

“I don't sit around in my off hours contemplating how to get away with a crime. I want to get away
from
crime.”

Flynn got off a good one, he had too much time to think. Mr. Beauchamp reacts by speeding up his questions. He puts it to the witness that he never went to bed that night, the witness denies. He waited for darkness, then took off in his boat. Denied. At Brady Beach, he anchored out, rowed in. Denied. He had some ground-up rochies on him. Denied. He had the swabs. Denied categorically.

“I'm a little vague on the specifics of your plan, sergeant. Were you hoping to catch her before she went to bed? To share a glass of wine, to talk, to complain about her unprofessional conduct, her seduction of your wife? And did matters then get out of hand?”

Flynn just looks at him.

“Or did it play out this way–there was a light on in the cottage, you saw through the windows that no one was home. You tugged the door open, you looked about. In the fridge was an open bottle of Chablis. You doctored it and hid. Outside? In the loft? Did you take a chance on the loft? I think so.”

Flynn doesn't even try to get a word in, he keeps looking at the judge, waiting for cues to respond. But the old chief has turned sideways, arms folded like he's disgusted with Mr. Beauchamp, Mr. Svabo, the whole trial. The jury's got to be wondering why the prosecutor isn't tearing his hair out. It's as if he knows something.

Mr. Beauchamp bends to his assistant, who says something nice to him, and he pats her hand. She shuffles through some transcripts.

“I'm going to put a narrative to you, sergeant, and ask you to comment when I'm done. Doctor Eve returned to Cotters' Cottage about midnight, still embarrassed by the romantic faux pas with Holly Hoover. She went to the fridge, she needed a drink after that. She made a fire, had a shower, wrapped herself in a towel, poured another glass, and settled down to the little writing table by the fireplace. She pulled out her letter
to Daisy, many pages long by now, to add another postscript, about her evening's doings, dinner at the Breakers, a chance meeting with a woman of the night.”