Flashback (20 page)

'Name?' Irv doesn't waste time.

'Eric Hanson, born Kowalski. He lives with a woman called Hanson who works at CBC. The address is Apartment 3065, 413 Delaney, do you know it? Seems to me that used to be a parking lot.'
 

'Not the last two years, it's a chi-chi condo now, lake views and all that good stuff. What's he done?'

I filled him in and he asked a few questions, until he had the facts shuffled in his own way. Then he said, 'What are you doing?'
 

'I'm waiting for the Tracy woman to come round. She might be able to tell us something, although there's no guarantee that the guy who beat her up has anything to do with the case. I just figure he might.'
 

'Anything else about Hanson might be useful?'

'Yeah, he was driving an old Ford, licence number 197 HKH, registered to a guy called Patton, in Scarborough. That might help.'

Irv noted the number and then said, 'Even if you find him it still sounds like a long shot. What are the OPP doing?'

'They're trying to trace Jeffries and Waites' wife, widow now, I guess. But from what I make of it, those two're holed up somewhere, could be they've got the blinds drawn and they're jumping on one another's bones, not knowing what's going on, or maybe they're part of this and they're hiding out.'
 

'And what do you want out of Hanson? Haven't the OPP called out detectives to check him out?'

'Maybe. But I want to know how come he roped in the Kershaw kid for his gang. That can't be pure coincidence.'

'You think Kershaw did the killings?'

'It's a good bet. Waites could have sprung Kershaw and asked him to kill his wife. Kershaw killed the wrong woman. Then somebody, maybe Kershaw, killed Waites. All that would make its own kind of sense, but I can't understand why this Hanson kid would drum up a gang that just happened to include Kershaw's son, and use the gang to make trouble in Murphy's Harbour.'
 

Irv was silent for a long time but I didn't add anything, At last he said, 'So it figures that Hanson is part of the scam, whatever it is, maybe a trick to keep you occupied while Kershaw does his thing.'
 

'Sounds screwy, I know, but there has to be a pattern here.' I hadn't mentioned Kershaw's old threat to me but Irv has a long memory.'
 

'What I remember of Kershaw, he was planning to get even with you when he got out, that right?'

'They all say that.'

'Yeah.' Irv was thoughtful. 'But they don't all walk away from day passes at the same time that a whole other thing is going down where you live. I'd watch your back for a while, old buddy.'
 

'Sam does that for me, but thanks for the warning.'

'Yeah, well, I haven't had lunch yet so I'll grab a couple hours, go talk to this Hanson, or his lady if I can't find him.'

'Thanks, Irv. There's times I miss having a load of other guys on the team.'

'You wouldn't miss this bullshit,' he said devoutly. 'I haven't seen the sun all week, been hanging over a bunch of books since last Friday, that's eight days nonstop.'
 

'Your own fault for getting an education,' I kidded and he laughed and hung up.

I was busy for the next hour, parcelling up my evidence, the swabs and fingerprints from the Tracy case, and arranging to ship them to the forensics centre in Toronto. Then I drove out to Kinski's gas station from which George's car had been stolen the night before. Paul said he would hand the package to the express company driver and asked if I'd found George's car. I told him yes and he shook his head. 'Goddamn Indians. Ask me, you can't trust any of 'em.'
 

'No harm done,' I said. 'I found the car, not a scratch on it. Those kids yesterday ripped up the seats and stole the tape-player, this wasn't touched.'
 

He'd been expecting a full agreement but he grunted and left it at that. I went from there to the Horns' house. George's car was in the driveway but I could see Phillip painting the house, doing a neat job on it, not slopping the paint or getting himself messy. And the house was growing brighter by the minute.
 

He stopped when he saw me and waved with his brush. 'Hi, Chief, whaddya think?'

'Looks good,' I said. Sam had come with me and Phillip came down the ladder and patted him on the head. Then he looked up at me and asked the hard question. 'I just found out that my lawyer is Mrs Horn's son. Did you know that?'
 

'Yes.' Tell the truth and shame the devil my father used to say.

He shook his head ruefully. 'Jeez. Am I dumb! I thought he was doing me a favour.'

'He was. All the charges have been dropped. I was just talking to your mother.'

'What did she say?' He was nervous again now, his acne blooming.

'It's all over. She isn't going to interfere. She said she'd pick you up when you called that the job was finished.'

'I don't think I'll get it done today,' he said. 'Mrs Horn says I can stay here tonight.'

'How do you feel about that?'

He was angry now, at himself. 'I feel like a jerk. That's how. These people are nice.'

I laughed. 'You're not the first guy to feel that way. I was a hell-raiser myself at your age.'

'Yeah?' He seemed relieved. 'Like, what did you do?'

'I took my dad's car on a joyride when I was fifteen. Went off the road and dinged the hell out of it.'

Now it was his turn to laugh. 'What happened?'

I shook my head. 'The old man was one of a kind. He was madder'n a snake but he didn't hit me. He made me work with him until we'd got it back into shape. Then he picked up some parts from God knows where and helped me build a dirtbike to ride until I was old enough to drive.'
 

'He sounds like a great guy.' The boy looked wistful. 'You still see a lot of him?'

'He was a miner. The stope collapsed on him and his partner the year I turned eighteen.'

The boy's eyes filled with tears. 'Aaah, hell.' he said.

'Listen, I wanted to ask you a couple of questions, about these other kids you were with. You mind talking?'

'No. I already spoke to the OPP guys.'

'OK. I've found out that Eric, the sparkplug of the gang, he's an actor, he's older than he looks, twenty-eight. I figure he's trying out for a part in a movie and he put the gang together for some kind of experience, research, whatever.'
 

He thought about this without speaking for a while. 'I'm trying to remember how it was,' he said at last. 'Like, I was hanging around the beach, scoping out the girls, you know. Only none of them would talk to me. I was from somewhere else. They were all local. You know how it is.'
 

I nodded and he went on, 'So anyway, there were three of us guys, I guess I was the oldest. We hung around together and then this Cy kind of tagged on.'
 

'Had you seen him around before?'

'No. He just turned up one day and hung around. He made us laugh. Said the broads were all a bunch of dogs, we'd likely get AIDS or herpes if we went with them.'
 

The police text on the genesis of gangs came back to me. A company of rejects. Bull's-eye. 'So how long was it before Eric showed up?'
 

Phillip thought for a moment. 'Not long. Next day, I guess. He drove up in an old clunker, that Ford we were driving, remember? Cy started calling him names and Eric karate-kicked him, knocked him over. Then he picked him up and asked if we'd like a beer. So we said sure and he took us in his car and bought a two-four and we all had a couple bottles. That was the first day.'
 

'Then what happened?' It sounded more and more as if Cy had been an accomplice. The karate kick could have been an actor's trick, delivered on cue, with no force but seen as terrible if the guy on the other end fell over. I didn't think Hanson knew martial arts. He hadn't seemed competent on either of the occasions I had tangled with him.
 

'That was two days before we came up here. The next day we kibitzed around on the beach at Wasaga, like, we broke up the volleyball game and just generally acted like goofs. Then Eric said this was boring. Why didn't we head off somewhere and have some fun.'
 

'And that was when you drove up to Murphy's Harbour? Did you stop anywhere else on the way?'

'No, except to buy some beer. Like, I was bored with the drive. There's all kinds of places we could have stopped but Eric said he was looking for the perfect place. And he pulled in here.'
 

'Did he say why Murphy's Harbour was perfect?'

'Yeah. He said there was just one cop here, we wouldn't have any fuss with police.'

So he'd done his homework. 'Was Cy his number two man?'

'No.' Phillip ducked his head. 'No, like, Eric said I should be his lieutenant. He said I was smart and Cy was dumb.'

'And what did Cy say about that?'

'He kinda sulked but the other kids called him crybaby so he just shrugged and said, OK, go on, see if he cared.'

'Did it ever occur to you that the two of them, Eric and Cy, had set this thing up between them?'

Phillip thought hard about it, rolling his lower jaw forward the way some people do when they're concentrating. 'Come to think of it, yeah. The day after Eric kicked him, Cy took his shirt off and there was no bruise on his chest, where the kick landed. The kids saw it and they all said he was—' he hesistated and said—'you know, a pussy, that Eric hadn't hurt him at all. But now you say it, maybe Eric really hadn't hurt him, maybe it was all some kind of show they were putting on.'
 

'Eric is an actor,' I told him. 'He's a professional. He gets paid to make people believe he's telling the truth when he says things.'
 

'Then maybe it was all a show,' Phillip said bitterly. 'And I fell for it and killed poor old Muskie for a coupla goddamn phonies.'
 

'I went and killed people in a war for a bunch of goddamn phonies,' I told him. 'But you can see why I want to find Eric, or Cy.'
 

'I'll think about it,' he promised. 'If I think of anything that can help you I'll let you know.'

'Good. It's important, Phil. I'm counting on you.'

It was one-thirty when I left him and I drove back into town and had a hamburger and Coke at the restaurant, then went back to the office to check the Fax machine.
 

The authorities at the prison had sent the photograph of Kershaw. It was less than perfect but it gave an idea of the general look of the man, together with a physical description. I pasted it down on a sheet of paper and typed, '
Wanted for escaping from custody and for theft. Believed to be in this area. If seen, do not approach, ring the police station at Murphy's Harbour or the OPP at Parry Sound
,' and put both phone numbers below.
 

The bank has a photocopier so I went in and made a couple of dozen copies. The manager took one and taped it to the wall where customers would see it and didn't charge me for the other copies. Then I made a circuit of town, leaving one in at the stores and bars and the marina and campsites and the two locks.

Around four o'clock I was finished and came back to the office and telephoned Holland. He told me Ms Tracy was still out but he had some results from forensics in Toronto. Waites had a trace of cocaine in his blood and an alcohol level that suggested he'd taken about two drinks. Death had been caused by the stab wound to the chest which had severed his aorta. The cut to his throat had been made first. It was bad but, given immediate treatment, he might have survived it.
 

'Anything on the fingerprints?'

'Nothing helpful. Whoever used the glass in his room is not on record. The only thing they'll say is that the guy who made the prints has smallish hands.'
 

'Does that fit with what you know about this Jeffries character?'

'I hear he's around five-nine and kinda scrawny. No idea of his hand size.'

'I'd sure like to talk to him. I wonder where in hell he's got to?'

'Well, he's not been seen down Ellis Lane. My guys turned it over down there. A couple of people had seen the grey car there, the wagon. It was seen eight a.m. yesterday morning and was gone by two in the afternoon.'
 

'I wonder if he went down there as soon as he left Parry Sound? Maybe had a rendezvous with another car and changed it there.'

'Yeah, well, how would the other driver have left? You figure someone would deliver a car and then walk away? The grey wagon was left there, remember.'
 

We both had ideas at the same time. I said, 'Maybe I could bring Sam up to the Jeffries house and pick up something with his scent on it. Then I'll have Sam track around at Ellis Lane. He might be able to show something we've missed.'
 

'Worth a try, I guess,' Holland said without enthusiasm. 'I was thinkin' maybe those kids have switched the licence plate on the grey wagon. I'm going to put it on the air that guys should check the licence of every wagon they see.'
 

'Right. Might be worth doing the same thing with Ms Tracy's Mercedes. If Kershaw took it, he'll change the plates for sure.'

'I'll get on it,' he said.

'Good. Meanwhile I've got a Metro Toronto detective checking on this Hanson character, see if he can shed a little light on what's happening.'
 

'Oh, that was the other thing,' Holland concluded. 'The package in his room was PCP, angel dust, and the same thing was found in his blood.'
 

We thought about it some more and promised to call each other if we got anything new. He also promised to send a man down to the Jeffries place and bring a pair of his shoes to the station in Parry Sound so I could get Sam looking for him.
 

When we'd finished the call I hung up and called Irv Goodman. He was pressed for time. 'The inspector wants my findings on these books by the morning, that's why I didn't call back. I was going to call around eight, when I'm done here. But I did find out two things.'