Grave Secrets (26 page)

“May I help you?”

Ryan flashed his badge.

“Detective Andrew Ryan.”

“I’m Patrick Feeney. I run the center.”

Feeney looked at me. Metallica did the same. I half expected the four of them to jam into “Die, Die My Darling” in high, cracky voices.

“Tempe Brennan.” I identified myself.

Feeney nodded three times, more to himself than to us. Behind him, the boys watched with expressions ranging from curiosity to hostility.

Two girls appeared in a doorway across the hall. Both had fried blonde hair and looked like they ate a lot of potatoes. One wore jeans and a UBC sweatshirt, the other a peasant skirt that hung low on her hips. Given her poundage, it was a bad choice.

Feeney struggled to rise. As one, Metallica reached out to help him. He crossed to us, walking with feet widely spaced, as though bothered by hemorrhoids.

“How may I help you, Detective?”

“We’re looking for a young woman named Chantale Specter.”

“Is there a problem?”

“Is Chantale here?” Ryan said.

“Why?”

“It’s a simple question, Father.”

Feeney bristled slightly. Out of the corner of my eye I saw peasant skirt disappear. Moments later, the front door opened, then closed.

I slipped from the kitchen and hurried to the parlor. Through the window I could see that only Mr. T and the statue remained on the steps. Peasant skirt was talking to them. After a brief exchange, Mr. T flicked his cigarette, and the three headed west on de Maisonneuve. I waited to allow a safety zone, then set off after them.

The Montreal Canadiens had lousy luck with their early accommodations. From the 1909 to the 1910 season, the hockey team was headquartered in Westmount Arena at the intersection of Ste-Catherine and Atwater. When that rink burned to the ground, the Habs returned to their roots on the east side of town. Following another fire, the Mont-Royal Arena was thrown together, and the boys slapped pucks there for the next four years. In 1924, the Forum was built directly across from the old home ice. Construction took just one hundred and fifty-nine days and cost $1.2 million dollars. In their opener, the Canadiens trounced the Toronto St. Pats 7–1.

Hockey is sacred in Canada. Over the years the Forum acquired the aura of a holy place. The more Stanley Cups, the holier it grew. Nevertheless, the day came. Management needed more seats. The Habs needed better locker rooms.

The team played its last game in the Forum on March 11, 1996. Four days later, fifty thousand Montrealers turned out for the “moving day” parade. On March 15, the Habs hosted their opener in the new Molson Centre, defeating the New York Rangers 4–2.

It may have been the last game the bums won, I thought as I hurried along de Maisonneuve.

The old Forum sat empty for a while, forlorn, abandoned, an eyesore on the western edge of the city. In 1998, Canderel Management bought the project, brought Pepsi on board as title sponsor, and began a massive face-lift. Three years later, the building reopened as the Centre de divertissement du Forum Pepsi, the metaphor changed from spectator sport to food and entertainment.

Where scalpers once hawked rinkside seats, and stockbrokers and truckers jockeyed for beer, under-thirties now sip Smirnoff Ice and bowl on sonic alleys. The Pepsi Forum Entertainment Centre contains a twenty-two-screen movie megaplex, an upscale wine store, restaurants, an indoor climbing wall, and a big-screen altar paying homage to the good old days.

Mr. T, the statue, and peasant skirt turned left on rue Lambert-Closse and entered the Forum on the Ste-Catherine side. I trailed them ten yards back.

Sighting on the statue’s hair spikes, I dogged the trio through a handful of bowlers and moviegoers milling about the lobby. I watched the spikes ascend the escalator to the second floor and disappear into Jillian’s. I followed.

Tables and booths filled the right half of the restaurant, a bar occupied the left. Though there were few diners, every bar stool was filled, and a dozen drinkers stood in twos and threes.

When I entered, the Clémence trio was making its way toward a young woman at the far end of the bar. She wore a black lace blouse, long black beads, and fingerless black gloves. The lace securing her topknot looked like an enormous black butterfly perched on her head.

It was Chantale Specter.

On seeing her friends, Chantale smiled, jerked a thumb at a man on her left, and rolled her eyes.

I looked at the object of her disdain.

It couldn’t be.

It was.

I reached for my cell phone.

RYAN ARRIVED WITHIN MINUTES

“Who’s the goof with the hair gel?”

“A reporter from Chicago named Ollie Nordstern.”

“What’s he doing here?”

“Having a beer.”

“What’s he doing in Montreal?”

“Possibly trying to find me. Nordstern’s researching a piece on human rights work. I talked to him in Guatemala City, and he’s been dogging me ever since.”

“Dogging you?”

“Calling my cell, leaving messages at the lab down there.”

Ryan was staring at Chantale.

“Is something dripping from her eye?”

“Probably a tattoo.”

“What’s Nordstern’s interest in the Specter kid?”

“Maybe Chantale’s his quarry, not me.”

“Wayward ambassador’s daughter.” Ryan snapped his fingers.

“Ticket to a Pulitzer.”

We both looked at Chantale. She was huddled with her friends now, back to Nordstern.

“Ready?”

“Let’s do it.”

Mr. T was in vigilante mode, thumbs belt-looped, incisors working a wad of gum. He spotted us at ten feet and tracked us like a serpent hunting a kill. The others remained focused on their conversation. Nordstern remained focused on Chantale.

Ryan circled, picked up Chantale’s mug from behind, and sniffed the contents.

Everyone fell silent.

“I’m sure we all have proof of age.” Ryan bestowed a fatherly smile. Officer Friendly looking out for the kids.

“Fuck off,” said Mr. T. In the light he looked older than I’d estimated on the porch, probably in his early twenties.

“Metalass?” I asked.

His eyes crawled to me.

“Tempered steel. How ’bout yours?” He rapid-fire drummed on the bar with his palms. Chantale jumped slightly.

“Do you use the screen name Metalass?”

“Nice tits.”

“I know you mean that in a caring way.”

“Maybe we could have a cappuccino some time.” Mr. T scratched his chest, and a smirk lifted one side of his mouth.

“Sure,” I said. “Once you’re allowed visitors, I could do it as community service.”

A nervous giggle.

“The fuck you laughing at?” Mr. T swiveled toward peasant skirt.

Ryan slid behind Mr. T and levered one arm behind his back.

“What the f—”

“Let’s not forget our manners.” Officer Friendly’s voice had chilled.

“This is fucking police harassment.” A vein throbbed in Mr. T’s neck. When he tried to pull free, Ryan applied upward pressure.

Chantale made a move to rise. Placing one hand on each shoulder, I eased her back onto the bar stool. Up close I could see that the tattooed tears were fake. The uppermost was curling outward along one edge.

Nordstern regarded the moment expressionless.

“My colleague asked a legitimate question,” Ryan said into Mr. T’s ear. “We’ve been calling you Mr. T, but we find it embarrassing. Makes us feel old.”

No response.

Ryan tweaked Mr. T’s arm.

“Fuckin’ police brutality.” Through clenched teeth.

“You’re handling it well.”

Nordstern began folding a napkin into smaller and smaller triangles.

Another tweak.

“Metalass.” It was almost a yelp.

The couple beside Nordstern bailed with their beers.

“I doubt your mama put Metalass on your birth certificate.” Ryan.

“I doubt your mama could read and write.”

Another tweak.

“Fuck!”

“I’m getting impatient.”

“Take a Prozac.”

Ryan tweaked harder.

“Leon Hochmeister. Get the fuck off me.”

Ryan released Hochmeister’s arm.

Hochmeister bent and spit his gum on the floor. Then he jerked backward, rolling his shoulder and rubbing his biceps.

“You need to learn some new adjectives, Leon. Maybe try one of those thesaurus software programs.”

Hochmeister placed upper incisors on lower lip, began the F word, changed his mind. His eyes simmered, Rasputin in a Mohawk.

Ryan turned to the statue.

“And you are?”

“Presley Iverson.” Iverson had a look of bemused curiosity on his face.

Peasant skirt.

“Antoinette Gaudreau.”

“Do I have the pleasure of addressing Dirtdoggy, Rambeau, Bedhead, Sexychaton, or Criperçant?”

“The Crier,” said Iverson, spiraling his palm in self-presentation.

“Cri perçant.
Piercing scream.”

“Very poetic.”

A pink bubble emerged from Iverson’s mouth. When it collapsed, he began working the Bazooka for another go. Ryan looked at Gaudreau.

“I don’t use e-mail that much.”

“And when you do?”

Gaudreau shrugged. “Sexychaton.”

“Thank you, kitten.”

Gaudreau looked as sexy as a baleen whale.

“You can’t just bust the fuck in and rough people up.” Hochmeister was regaining his self-assurance.

“Leon, that’s exactly what I
can
do. And another thing I can do is haul your skinny ass to the bag for aiding a minor in flight. Think your name might turn up some interesting reading material?”

Leon’s fingers stopped massaging his arm. He looked at Chantale, then up at the ceiling. When his chin came down, sweat glistened along the line between Mohawk and forehead.

“We know nothing about that shit.”

“What shit is that, Leon?”

“That shit he’s talking.”

Out of the corner of my eye I saw Nordstern freeze.

“Who’s ‘he,’ Leon?”

Hochmeister tilted his head in Nordstern’s direction.

“Neither does Chantale.” He jerked a thumb at Nordstern.

“This asshole’s as psycho as you are.”

“Why’s that?”

“He thinks Chantale’s cool to some chick got dropped in Guatemala City.”

“Leon!” Chantale hissed.

“A bit off the subject of your human rights story,” I said to Nordstern.

Nordstern’s eyes peeled off the napkin and lifted to mine.

“Maybe.”

“Where are you staying, sir?” Ryan asked.

“Please.” Nordstern crumbled the napkin. “Don’t waste your time or mine. My info and sources are strictly confidential.”

Nordstern tossed the napkin onto the bar and looked at me.

“Unless we can find some mutually beneficial arrangement.” His voice was oily as a drilling rig.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

He studied me a long time before answering.

“You don’t have a clue what’s really going on.”

“Is that so?”

“You’re so far off track you might as well be on Ganymeade.” Nordstern stood. “You’re not even in the right galaxy.”

“Last I checked, Ganymeade was still in the Milky Way.”

“That’s good, Dr. Brennan.” The reporter drained his glass and set it on the bar. “But I’m not talking astronomy.”

“What are you talking?”

“Murder.”

“Whose?”

His eyebrows rose, and he waggled an index finger like a metronome.

“Secret.”

“Why?” I asked.

Again the finger.

“Grave secret.”

I realized Nordstern was slightly drunk.

“Secrets of the grave.”

He tried to hold his grin, but it faded, as if by its own will.

“I’m at the St. Malo,” Nordstern said to Ryan.

To me, “Call when you want the answers to some very grave secrets.”

I watched Nordstern cross toward the door. Halfway there, he turned and mouthed one word: “Ganymeade.” Then he touched two fingers to his forehead, and disappeared through the door.

“That motherfucker is crazy,” said Hochmeister. “We meet again, I’ll tear him an asshole the size of Cape Breton.”

“Leon, I’m going to say this just once. Go home.” Ryan held up a hand. “No, I won’t be that specific.” He pointed one finger at Hochmeister’s nose. “Go away. Go now, and you and your friends can spend the night watching Archie Bunker reruns. Stay, and you’ll spend it without your shoelaces and belts.”

Iverson and Gaudreau shot from their stools like they were spring-loaded. Hochmeister hesitated a beat, then brought up the rear, an alpha male in a baboon retreat. When they’d gone, Ryan turned to Chantale.

“What did Nordstern want?”

“Is that the prick’s name?”

Chantale picked up her beer. Ryan took it from her and set it back down.

“Ollie Nordstern,” I said. “He’s a reporter with the
Chicago Tribune.
”

“Really?”

Good question, I thought. I’d accepted Mateo’s explanation, never questioned Nordstern’s legitimacy.

“What was he asking about?”

“My plans for Sundance.”

“Chantale, I don’t think you realize how serious your situation is. You’re in contempt. The judge can slap you right back in jail.”

Chantale kept her eyes on her lap. Black wisps fell around the dead, pale face, hiding all but the tip of her nose.

“I don’t hear you, Chantale.”

“He wanted to know about those dead girls.”

“The ones I mentioned at the jail?”

She nodded and the lace butterfly bobbed.

I remembered Nordstern’s odd question at FAFG headquarters.

“During our interview, Nordstern asked about the septic tank case,” I said to Ryan.

“How did he know about it?”

“Beats me.”

Again, the same thought in both our minds: Did Nordstern suspect a Specter–Paraíso link?

I turned back to Chantale.

“How did Nordstern find you?”

“How the hell should I know? Probably hung around outside my house.”

“And followed you to Tim Hortons.”

“Isn’t that how you found me?”

“Had you seen him before tonight?”