Death as a Last Resort (17 page)

Maggie, holding her breath as she huddled inside her crate, listened as someone picked up one box after the other, discarding the rejects back onto the pile.

Finally Smith called out, “That'll do.”

• • •

IT SEMED AN ETERNITY before Maggie heard the freight door rattle up again, the overhead lights went out and the door rattled down. She felt René relax beside her, but they waited without speaking a word until they heard the cars depart before they struggled out of their cramped quarters. Their bodies were stiff from nearly an hour of tension and crouching, and their teeth were chattering with the cold in the unheated storeroom. They stumbled back to the stairs and out into the dark night—René carefully locking the door behind him.

“They're smuggling stuff into the country from Egypt, aren't they?” he asked as they piled into the Jeep. “And my father was somehow mixed up in it, too.”

Maggie didn't answer until they were back in the parking lot and she was safely behind the wheel of her Morris. She rolled the window down to speak to René.

“He was either involved in the smuggling or he somehow managed to get his hands on some of the pieces.”

“And after he was killed, those bastards took them back. What do we do now? Go to the cops?”

“We've no proof, René. Anyway, let me discuss this with Mr. Southby before we take any action. And keep this to yourself. Go back to work tomorrow as if nothing has happened.”

“All right,” he answered dubiously.

Still shivering from the cold, Maggie drove home and quickly turned on the oven again to reheat her pot pie before reaching for the telephone.
I've got to tell Nat about Nancy. He must be home by now.
But the phone rang before she could lift the receiver.

“Where the hell have you been, Maggie? I've been calling and calling.”

“Nat! Thank God you called. They're holding Nancy at the Smiths' emporium, but they're going to move her out of there tonight, so we'll have to get there fast.”

“How do you know?”

“I'll meet you there.”

“But . . .”

“I'll explain when I see you.”

When she'd hung up the phone, she turned off the oven again and rushed out to her car.

She was surprised how much traffic there was for nine o'clock on a Thursday evening
,
and it took a while to find a vacant parking spot a block from the Smiths' store. The rain that had begun as she was leaving home turned into a torrent as soon as she started to jog from her car toward the Exotic Eastern Emporium. Nat had managed to park his inconspicuous old Chevy across the street and a couple of stores down, and she could see him, oblivious to the rain, nervously pacing to and fro beside it.

“How do you know she's here?” he demanded when she ran up to him.

“I'll tell you later. We haven't much time. Come on!”

Not waiting to see if he was following, she took off for the intersection of Pender and Seymour and ran down the alleyway that would lead her to the back of the emporium. A truck had been parked a couple of stores short of the Smiths' shop. There was very little room between it and the back wall of the building, but by holding her breath, Maggie managed to squeeze into the gap between them and take a cautious look. The emporium's back door was wide open and the whole area was flooded with light. She could see Rosie and Henry Smith talking to two men beside a dirty brown van, which was pointing away from Maggie toward Richards Street. The engine was running and it looked ready to go.

Maggie backed out as quickly as she could, only to bump into Nat, who had been unable to push his bulk into the narrow space to be with her.

“What's happening?”

“Shh! There's a van and it's about to leave.”

“Is Nancy in it?”

“I don't know.”

“We've got to stop them.”

“But we don't know for sure she's in it. Damn! Come on.” She gave him a push to turn him back the way they had come. With Maggie leading, they raced back along the alley. Maggie prayed that neither of them would trip over something in the dark and go sprawling in the puddles, but apart from being splashed from head to toe, they made it safely back to Seymour and in a matter of minutes they were once again on Pender Street.

“Go get your car while I run along to Richards to see which way they turn when they come out of the alley,” she panted.

“Okay,” he rasped. “I'll be as quick as I can.” But by the time he had opened the driver's door and flung himself inside, he could already see Maggie frantically waving to him from the intersection. Pushing the car into gear, tires squealing, he raced to where she was waiting, and in seconds she had yanked open the passenger door and thrown herself into the seat beside him.

“They turned up Richards,” she gasped as he took off.

“Damn!” He had to brake suddenly to miss a drunk who was weaving slowly across the road in front of him. Fuming, he tapped his fingers on the steering wheel and wound down his window to shout, “Get a move on, for God's sake!”

The drunk stood in the middle of the road and cheerily waved his brown paper bag at him. “Wanna swig?” And he staggered over to Nat's open window.

“Get out of the road, you idiot,” Nat yelled, recoiling from the fumes. “Oh, hell! Maggie,” he said, peering round the corner, “there's no sign of them. We're too late.”

“No, there they are,” she shouted. “They've got a red light.”

“Get out of the way,” Nat roared at the drunk.

“If that's how you feel.” The man drew himself up and walked ever so sedately to the curb.

“It's going to be tough trying to follow a brown van in the dark and the rain.”

“You concentrate on driving and I'll keep an eye on them,” replied Maggie. “But this proved difficult, as the van suddenly turned right onto Davie and into a stream of moviegoers and late diners. She thought several times that she had lost them as she peered through the rain-streaked windshield, only to catch another glimpse of the van under a streetlight ahead. “They're turning,” she yelled suddenly.

“Which way?” He braked for a group who were slowly meandering across the road.

“Granville. They've turned left onto Granville.”

“Where the hell are they going?”

Now Maggie had to really strain to keep them in sight, because although there was less traffic on this street, the lighting left a lot to be desired. “I think they're heading for the bridge.”

“You're right, Maggie. I'll try and get a little closer.” They were just six cars behind when they crossed the bridge and started up the South Granville hill. “They're turning left onto Sixteenth.”

“Yes. I can see them.” The van was only four cars ahead of them now. A few minutes later, he said, “They're signalling to turn right onto Oak.”

After Nat had turned at Oak, Maggie suddenly said, “Of course! He said they were going to take her to ‘the farm'! I bet they're heading for Richmond.”

“I wish we knew for sure that she was in that . . . oh-oh, something's wrong up ahead.” He leaned forward to peer through the wipers. “Lots of lights.” By the time they reached Forty-first, the traffic had slowed down considerably. “Looks like an accident. Keep an eye on the van, Maggie.”

They had to come to a complete stop at Forty-ninth, where two patrol cars with flashing lights and an ambulance blocked the intersection and police milled about in yellow slickers. In frustration, Maggie and Nat watched as the cars ahead of them, including the brown van, were let through one by one, but when it came to their turn, one of the cops suddenly stepped in front of the car and held up his hand to allow the ambulance to turn around for the journey back to the city. There was nothing they could do, and by the time they had crawled past the two-car crash site, their quarry was long gone. They drove on and over the bridge and into Richmond and then pulled off onto a side road. There was no point in going any farther.

“Bloody hell,” Nat fumed. He couldn't hide his anger and frustration. He shut off the engine and turned to Maggie. “I think it's about time you explained why we were following a van that might or might not have Nancy in it.”

So Maggie told him about the phone call from René, getting into the factory, having to hide for an hour behind the pile of boxes, seeing all the artifacts taken out of the crates, and then the arrival of the boss. “But I couldn't see who he was,” she finished up. “We thought one of the men was coming over to our hiding place, so we crawled inside two crates, but I heard him telling Henry Smith to take Nancy to the farm.” Her voice faltered.

“Maggie, why do you do this? I've told you over and over not to go off on these escapades without me.”

“And where would we be if I had waited for you? And the thing is—what do we do about it now? I couldn't very well go to the police and say, ‘Oh, by the way, I broke into Bakhash's warehouse and they are smuggling antiquities into the country and we think they've kidnapped Nat's ex-wife.' And anyway, they took the stuff away with them, so there's no evidence that any of it happened.”

Nat turned the engine back on. “We're going back to your place and we
are going
to call George,” he announced.

“There's only one thing, Nat . . .”

“And what's that?” he said angrily, ramming the car into gear.

“I'm absolutely starving.”

He couldn't help laughing. “Oh, Maggie! You're priceless.”

A half an hour later, they were sitting across from each other in Dan's Diner and digging into club sandwiches and fries, and Nat belatedly realized that he'd missed supper, too.

“So,” Maggie said between bites, “dare I ask how your day in Victoria went?”

He quickly filled her in on his interview with Jake Houston. “The upshot is that if you agree that we go ahead with it, I'm to meet him and his staff tomorrow around noon.”

“In Victoria?”

“No, no. They have an office in Vancouver. I gave it a lot of thought travelling back on the ferry, and I really think it will help us tie up the Dubois case—at least the murder angle.”

“In what way?”

“Because Houston says that Dubois was definitely logging illegally, and he wants to know who his contacts were—especially those within his ministry.”

“Do you think that's why he was killed?”

He shrugged. “I think it's our best hope of finding out.” He signalled to the waitress for more coffee. “But I guess I should have been here with you, looking for Nancy instead of going to Victoria.”

Maggie laughed. “I can just see you hiding behind a pile of cardboard boxes. But I think you're right; we'd better call George. And don't worry—she's definitely still alive, and we're going to find her.” Reaching across the table, she placed her hand over his and gave it a squeeze. “Now take me back to where I parked my car, okay? I'm exhausted.”

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

I
t was still very early on Friday morning when Mrs. Mabel Maggs focused her small binoculars onto the place where the two men had been digging under the birdbath in her neighbour's back garden. She had been watching them since they arrived, and now the early morning light was slowly bringing all the trees and bushes into focus. Eventually one of the thugs—that was a good name for them, she thought—threw his shovel on the ground and kicked the pile of dirt in frustration. She was sure he was swearing. She watched them leave by the back alley but still waited a few minutes before letting the lace curtains of her back bedroom fall into place. Laying the opera glasses on the bureau, she left the room and, holding onto the banister for support, trod carefully down the stairs to her kitchen. “Time for my morning cup of tea.”

• • •

DAYLIGHT BROUGHT MORE HEAVY rain. “It's Vancouver, so what else do you expect?” Maggie told Oscar as they skirted the puddles on the sidewalk. He gave her one of his doggy grins as he gently pulled her toward the park at the end of Fifth Avenue. “You don't care, do you, as long as you get your walk?”

As she dodged the dripping trees and the puddles, Maggie thought about her trip to Bakhash's factory with René, she and Nat chasing the dirty brown van, and George's impending visit. She could understand Nat being upset about her going to Bakhash's factory with René, especially since they still had no idea where Nancy was being held captive. The dratted woman had brought most of her problems on herself, but Maggie knew that they had to find her—preferably alive. She was still pondering the tricky situation when she arrived at the office an hour later and let herself in. There was no sign of Henny, but Nat's door was open and she could see he was on the phone.

“Henny called to say she won't be in until this afternoon,” he called out as he put the phone down. “One of her boys is sick and she's arranged for a neighbour to pop in later to see how he is.”

“I hope it's nothing serious.”

“No. Just a cold. And the kid must be all of sixteen. But you know how Henny is about her family.”

“Yes. I think our Henny runs her household like she does this office.”

“You're going to Houston's Vancouver office today, aren't you?”

“Right after lunch. It'll be a good chance to get to know them and see whether it makes sense to take this on. I should be back by three at the latest. That sounds like George arriving now.”

“So,” George Sawasky said, eyeing the warm Danish pastries that Maggie had picked up from the local bakery, “perhaps you'd better start at the beginning.”

“As long as you're not going to arrest me for breaking and entering,” Maggie said as she passed the plate of Danish to him.

George laughed. “Maggie, if I arrested you for all the breaking and entering that I'm not supposed to know about, you'd be serving a very long stretch. Anyway, as I understand it from Nat, young René Dubois called you at home last night.”