Black Fly Season (40 page)

When he hung up, he swivelled around to face her.

‘I bet you’ve come to talk about the inter-agency ball game’

‘Sorry,’ Delorme said. She pulled out the photo of Beltran. ‘You said you’d been working a lot of drug stuff, lately. Have you run across this character?’

Jerry took the photo from her and held it at an angle to catch the window light. ‘I can’t say for sure. What do you want him for?’

‘Cutting up Wombat Guthrie, for one.’

‘Really?’ Jerry looked closer at the picture. ‘Well, there’s one guy it might be.’

He reached into his desk drawer and pulled out a buff-coloured folder. There was a stack of eight-by-ten black-and-white photos inside. He fanned them out on the desk like a deck of cards and selected one. It showed a group of young men sitting around outside a diner. Three of them seemed to be watching the fourth man, who had very long hair and was dressed all in white.

‘Rosebud Diner,’ Jerry said. ‘Reed’s Falls. We’ve been keeping an eye on that place for a few weeks now. We think there’s a lot of dope moving through the people that hang out there. We have theories, but we’re not a hundred per cent sure where they’re getting it from and we don’t know where they stash it. Take a look at the guy with the long hair.’

Delorme picked up the photo. ‘But this guy’s an Indian, no?’

‘Calls himself Red Bear.’

‘Yeah, we had a tip from a junkie there was an Indian hanging around with Leon Rutkowski.’

‘Guy’s not from around here, I can tell you that. Rumour is he’s from Red Lake, and I’ve been checking on that.’

‘I recognize the other guys,’ Delorme said. ‘Leon Rutkowski, and Toof Tilley, may he rest in peace. And the guy on the right is Kevin Tait.’

‘You’re kidding. Related to our former Jane Doe?’

‘Her brother. He has a prior for intent to traffic out west. We think he’s the reason Terri came here in the first place.’

‘We’ve been wondering who the hell he was,’ Jerry said. ‘I might even think you guys are pretty good, except I got the fax that said Terri Tait is missing again.’

‘I’ll get to that.’ Delorme was holding the two pictures side by side. ‘The Indian guy could be Beltran. It’s hard to be sure, though.’

‘I think we’ve got a better picture in here somewhere.’ Jerry shuffled through the glossy images. ‘Here we go.’

This one was a two-shot. It showed the longhaired man and Kevin Tait. Tait was laughing, but Beltran - and there was no doubting his identity now - was looking dead serious. The same high cheekbones, the same broad brow. And, most of all, the almost transparent eyes.

‘I hope this doesn’t disappoint you, Jerry. But it looks like your Indian is actually a Cuban.’

‘That’s interesting …’

Jerry swivelled away from her and stared up at the ceiling for a few moments. Delorme waited. Finally, Jerry swivelled to face her once more. ‘As it happens, I called the chief of the Red Lake band. I didn’t tell him I was a cop. Told him I was a banker checking background for a loan. And the chief vouched for the guy. Called him Raymond Red Bear. Said he was born and brought up right there on the Red Lake reserve.’

‘Why would he go to all that trouble? I heard status cards are easy to fake.’

‘They are. Which is why you might need someone to vouch for you. Might even pay someone to vouch for you. Sometimes it can be useful to have First Nations status,’ Jerry said. ‘For purposes of employment, for example.’

‘Very funny, Jerry. What exactly are you talking about?’

‘Up until fairly recently, the Viking Riders used to get their dope from Montreal. Then they made the mistake of disagreeing with the Hells Angels.’

‘No more dope.’

‘No more dope from Montreal. But, being bikers and dedicated entrepreneurs, they worked out a deal with some Native Americans just across the Michigan border. Started early last summer. They fly the stuff across Lake Huron, up the French

River to Lake Nipissing. If you do it right, you never leave Indian territory.’

‘A good way to keep it out of everyone’s jurisdiction.’

‘You have a dirty mind, Detective Delorme. That’s what I always liked about you.’ Jerry held up the photo. ‘Nice touch for him to dress up like a Hollywood Indian. Should set us back a couple of hundred years.’

‘So Beltran comes on like an Indian, complete with a status card and a chief in his pocket, and he takes over the Viking Riders import business.’

‘That’s our theory.’

‘And now you’re going to tell me where we can find Beltran, right?’

‘Sorry. We don’t have surveillance on him yet. We’ve just been watching the Rosebud.’

‘Well, I’ll tell you the other reason we’re looking for Beltran. We think he’s got Terri Tait and he’s going to kill her.’

Jerry grabbed the phone and punched the intercom button. ‘I’m going to get an all-points on him, Lise. Minute we hear anything, you will too.’

Sooner or later, whenever a case got unwieldy, Cardinal ended up in the boardroom with the files. He was in there now, sorting through the stacks of material the other detectives had assembled. He’d been going over the forensics and scene photos from Arsenault and Collingwood. And now he was weeding though Delorme’s supplementary reports. Every fragment of information they had was spread out on the table before him.

They had put out the all-units pretty fast, but so far there had been no sighting of Terri Tait. So now here he was sequestered with the files, in the hope that they would provide him with a solid idea of where to look for her.

The eyestrain was getting to him.

He slouched back in his chair and looked around the room, at the photos lining the walls. There was one of Chief Kendall being sworn in; his uniform would never fit him that well again. And there was one of Cardinal himself, bundled up like an Inuit at the snowy mineshaft on Windigo Island. Then the picture of Jerry Commanda in

front of the gate at Eagle Park. Eagle Park was a charity camp on the south shore of Lake Nipissing that had once served handicapped kids and wards of Children’s Aid; Jerry had been out there directing a successful search for a missing twelve-year-old. The camp had closed long ago after a complicated financial scandal - a kerfuffle, as Jerry would call it. On top of the gate, a wrought-iron eagle flexed its iron talons, black wings spread as if about to take off.

Cardinal turned his mind back to the files. His Toronto leads had dried up. Beltran’s last-known address proved to be a dead end; he had pulled a midnight flit, leaving the landlord holding the bag for six months’ rent on a huge apartment in the Manulife Centre. Cardinal had even called his former neighbours, none of whom had anything useful to add. Beltran had been an unexceptional neighbour, wished you good day in the elevator, kept to himself, and didn’t cause trouble.

Cardinal opened another of Delorme’s files. One of the many pleasures of working with Delorme was that her reports were both coherent and detailed. But even with her copious notes from the hospital, and the anthropologist, and the Crisis Centre, there was nothing you could sink your teeth into. Nothing that told them where Raymond Beltran might be, or Terri Tait for that matter.

Cardinal sifted through Delorme’s reports once more. Even when she came up empty, as she had

at the Crisis Centre, she was conscientious about writing it up. She had even filed the drawing she had taken from Terri’s room.

Cardinal wasn’t sure about Terri Tait’s talent as a struggling actress, but she showed considerable aptitude for drawing. The feathers on the bird were all nicely highlighted, and the arch of the wings, just so, gave the image a certain Cardinal

looked over at the far wall. The picture of Jerry Commanda at Eagle Park. He snatched up the drawing and held it next to the photograph.

Two seconds later he was in Chouinard’s office.

The detective sergeant lined up the drawing next to the photograph on his desk. Cardinal watched his eyes swing back and forth from one to the other. Chouinard tapped on the desk with his pen as he considered. Finally, he said, ‘They’re the same. I’d say this means she was there. The question then becomes, what do we do about it?’

‘Eagle Camps had two locations on the lake. One on the south shore and one up by the French River. They both have those gates with the eagle on top.’

‘We don’t have enough people to send to both. Which one do you think is more likely?’

‘The south shore is closer to where Tilley and Guthrie were found. On the other hand, the north shore is closer to where they ripped off the Viking Riders. It could be either one.’

‘And neither is in our jurisdiction.’ Chouinard paused in thought, his pen beating a rat-tat-tat on

the desk. ‘All right. You take the south shore. But you take Alan Clegg with you.’

‘Delorme should be in on this.’

‘She’s out visiting OPP, closer to the French River. That’s their territory anyway. She can head out there with Jerry Commanda. I’ll pull together a SWAT team here. Whichever one of you calls in first with paydirt, we’ll be ready.’

Rush hour was over. Once they got beyond the malls, Cardinal put the pedal to the floor.

‘You trying out for Formula One?’

Cardinal looked over at Clegg. He had a friendly smile on his face, not criticizing.

‘The guy we’re looking for cuts people up for a living. I don’t want that to happen to Terri Tait.’

‘Assuming he’s got her.’

‘It’s safer than assuming he hasn’t.’

Corporal Clegg adjusted the passenger seat and sat back. He folded his hands on his lap and watched the scenery shoot by: the rock cuts, the Trianon Hotel, the Ottawa turnoff. After that it was hills and trees.

‘So, how long you been a cop?’

Cardinal shrugged. ‘Let’s just say I could retire on full pension if I wanted to.’

Clegg laughed. ‘And you don’t want to? Guys like you always make me think of those people who win the lottery, I mean big time. They have a job changing lightbulbs in a high rise or something

and here they win twentyfive million and they’re not gonna quit work.’

‘Your pension’s twentyfive million? Must’ve been some boost in the RCMP budget this year.’

‘We get by.’

Cardinal made the turn on to Nosbonsing Road. It had been paved since the last time he was out here. They passed a handful of farms, then the road narrowed and they were bumping through the woods, the flashing wall of trees broken up by the odd driveway and mailbox. Flies spattered on the windshield.

‘So, how do you want to handle this?’ Clegg said.

‘We’ll play it by ear. First thing is to establish whether or not the place is in use. If yes, then establish whether there’s anyone there just at the moment. If it looks like our guy is here then we radio back and they unleash Armageddon. If he’s away, we search the place for Terri Tait. How’s that sound?’

‘I’m with you a thousand per cent,’ Clegg said. ‘Sounds like fun?

Delorme had been on her way out the OPP’s front door when Chouinard had called. Now she was in Jerry Commanda’s car somewhere just outside Sturgeon Falls.

‘Jerry, can’t this thing go any faster? There may be a life at stake here.’

‘I’m pretty sure we’re gonna come up empty,’

Jerry said, pressing the accelerator. ‘After all that financial kerfuffle, camp got bought by some hotel outfit. Not sure what they’ve done with it, though. If anything.’

‘If it’s sitting empty, it might make an ideal spot for drug dealers.’

Jerry shrugged. ‘If they like black flies.’

Kerfuffle, Delorme was thinking. Only Jerry could use that word and not sound like a librarian.

‘This is pretty close to the house where Wombat got ambushed,’ she said. ‘Can’t be more than a couple of kilometres.’

Jerry made a sharp right, spraying gravel.

‘Cardinal’s checking out the other camp with a guy from the RCMP,’ Delorme said.

‘Oh, yeah? Who would that be?’

‘Corporal named Alan Clegg.’

Jerry turned on to an even smaller road. Branches whipped at the roof of the car.

‘I’ve dealt with him a couple of times.’

Delorme scanned Jerry’s profile, finding nothing legible there. Jerry tended to do that a lot, say something with implications and just leave it hanging, as if you should know what he was thinking.

‘And?’

Jerry shrugged again. ‘He seemed to know an awful lot of nothing about what was going down in your neck of the woods. I don’t know why they posted him in Algonquin Bay.’

‘Because of the Viking Riders being so close is what Musgrave told me.’

Jerry gave a little crooked smile. There was the sound of gravel kicking up against the car. ‘I sometimes wonder about Musgrave,’ Jerry said.

‘Oh?’

‘Musgrave moves in mysterious ways.’

‘Jerry!’

‘What?’

‘What are you getting at?’

Jerry looked over at her, impassive. ‘Clegg never seemed to know as much as he should, that’s all. Made me uncomfortable, talking to him. Couldn’t fathom why Musgrave thought he was the right stuff.’

They rounded a bend, and then the construction site came into view. Some of the cabins were still standing, but the rest of the clearing was the province of bulldozers and graders. A chainlink fence surrounded the site. Delorme counted twenty workers.

Off to the right, a wrought-iron eagle spread its wings over an old wooden gate.

‘That’s the picture Terri drew,’ Delorme said. ‘She drew exactly that eagle, right down to the feathers.’

‘Well, we can ask the foreman a couple of questions,’ Jerry said, ‘but somehow I don’t think this was the Eagle Park she was at. Why would the guy be showing up in Reed’s Falls if he was staying way the hell out here?’

‘This camp is much closer to the reserve than the other one.’

They drove over deep ruts toward an office trailer that sat in the shadow of a huge sign that said in French, Future Site of Northern Lights Spa Resort.

The foreman was a chunky rhomboid of a man with a Wild West moustache that didn’t suit him at all. No, he told them, there hadn’t been any strangers around the place. No, there had been no suspicious activity of any kind. They had been working the site for two months now and the only people to set foot on the property other than construction people were exactly two cops, and he was looking at them right now.