The River Killers (31 page)

That left only Crowley's journals to examine and it was there that I found it. There were twenty-seven journals, as I've previously recounted, and twenty-six of them consisted of daily observations of his life in Yeo Cove. The twenty-seventh was different. It was undated, and consisted of pasted-in printouts from various databases rather than a linear narrative.

Many of the printouts were in standard spreadsheet layout: rows numbered down the left-hand side and columns headed by letters across the top of the page. On one of the pages, the letters heading the columns were not in alphabetical order. This was unusual and, I thought, worthy of investigation. From left to right, the letters were:

C, E, R, F, D, J, B, G, W, K, I, O, L, H, Y, P, S, M, N, R, A, U, T, X

The numbers given from the time sequences were:

07, 12, 18, 02, 14, 21, 17, 23, 11, 19, 08, 17, 03, 11, 09, 05, 11, 24.

Taking the seventh letter from the sequence, then the twelfth, eighteenth, and so on, I derived a message. BOMEHASTINGSRWDIX. I didn't have to be an
MI
6 codebreaker to figure that out. I leapt up to get Louise just as she opened the door. Fortunately, the door opened outwards so I escaped injury.

“Look at this. We need to get a court order or something.”

I showed her my hasty jottings and basked in what must have been her unbounded admiration. “Who needs
CSIS
? We'll show this to Tommy. He'll know which judge to grovel to.”

Tommy did indeed know which judge to seek permission from and undertook to do so. “The Bank of Montreal at East Hastings. Account in the name of R.W. Dix. I can get a court order to look at it, but it won't be before tomorrow afternoon at the earliest.”

I retain a mental image of the three of us at that moment. Tommy hunched forward in his chair, forearms on his thighs, staring intently at Louise. Louise, very still in her chair, arms folded, eyes straight ahead. I was the third point of the triangle, joined to the others by almost palpable lines of force. The net was closing on the killer, but we couldn't afford any mistakes. Three minds in unison were calculating probabilities and running various scenarios. Nervous energy finally overcame my static state. “I need some fresh air,” I said.” I'll call you guys later.”

I collected my Jerome and he accompanied me on a walk across the parking lot. Deciding that was enough exercise for one day, I got in the car and Jerome drove us back to our hideout on Main Street. Jerome navigated us through the alarm system and I was soon resting on my bed while
TV
noises came from the living room.

I was drifting comfortably toward sleep when my phone canceled the voyage. Fumbling frantically through my pockets, I was thinking only of silencing the damn thing, but when I located it on the bedside table, I thought I might as well find out who to blame for interrupting my nap.

“Hello,” I said, likely sounding less awake than I intended.

“Is that Danny Swanson?”

“Yes, who's this?” The phone number was blocked.

“A friend.”

“Always nice to have friends. What can I do for you?”

“Maybe I can do something for you. I understand you're having difficulty with Mr. Griffith. I have information that could be useful to you.”

“And the price?” I'd read enough detective novels to know that information is never free.

“There's something I need. You could help me get it.”

High-Top Jerome appeared in the doorway, No-Neck Jerome lurking behind him. “Shift change. I'm outta here. Don't let this guy cook for you.”

My innate instinct for concealment kicked in and I mumbled a good-bye into the phone. Trying not to look guilty, I waved at the new Jerome and slid the phone into my pocket. They wandered away and I was left to wonder what the hell had just happened. Who was the caller and why had I hung up on him? Was it our bad guy that I had talked to? Was he preparing to dump Griffith? Would he phone back? I had better tell Tommy and Louise. On the other hand, I didn't want to admit that I'd tried to hide the call and had maybe bungled a potential contact. I'd wait until he called back, get more information, and then tell the others.

Having dealt with that contretemps, I was now free to resume my rest period.

However, sleep is not always restful. I had become a surgeon. The patient, whose face was hidden, was someone important to me, someone I cared about, someone I was desperate to save. The nurse, whose face was also hidden, or perhaps who didn't have a face, kept clamping off blood vessels. I told her to stop, this procedure was irregular. But as fast as I removed the clamps, the nurse added more. The patient was slipping away. I yelled at the nurse to stop and her answer came out of a cold black fax machine.
Policy. It's the new policy. Approved at the last meeting.

I wasn't there,
I screamed.
I didn't approve this. I never approved it.

But the patient's blood stopped and stagnated. Then they auctioned her off to an unseen audience, a limb here and a limb there. I knew I'd never see her again. I wept and everyone laughed at me.
Memo to follow,
the fax machine spat out.
New directive, highest authority, prime mandate, consensus report, departmental approval. Memo to follow.
But the memo never came. And wakefulness, mercifully, did.

By noon the next day, the mysterious caller hadn't phoned back. I was torn between feelings of guilt and stupidity. My Jerome du jour looked at me curiously as I paced around ignoring the Jays game on
TV
. Jerome's phone rang. He listened awhile, snapped an affirmation and hung up. “Tommy got the court order,” he said. “He and Louise will meet us at the bank.”

The Bank of Montreal on East Hastings was much closer to our hideout than to Police
HQ
. It seemed as though Low-Top Jerome and I waited in the car for a very, very long time. We got out when Tommy and Louise pulled in, and the four of us walked toward the bank's entrance.

The sidewalk was fairly crowded and an assortment of people passed by us, no one making eye contact or acknowledging our existence: except for one person. An older guy, white hair and beard, glasses, dressed casually but well, looked straight at me as we passed. He said nothing and gave no sign of recognition, but I was sure that if I had been alone he would have said something to me. Casually, so as not to alert Jerome, I turned my head to keep the guy in view. He turned down a side street without looking back.

Was I imagining things? Had that been a meaningful look he gave me, or did I just have something on my face? The incident slipped from my mind as we entered the bank. Louise went to the service counter and asked for the manager. When he appeared, Louise discreetly showed him the court order. He scanned it with a managerial eye and disdain gave way to anxiety. Indicating that we should follow him, he led the way to his office.

Out of the public eye, he relaxed visibly and apologized for the lack of chairs. Evidently loan supplicants didn't travel in packs. “If I understand this document correctly, you are seeking all information relating to any accounts or deposits of a Mr. R.W. Dix and access to said accounts or deposits.”

Louise smiled her agreement. “It could be a Mrs. R.W. Dix.”

“Yes. If you give me a few minutes, I'll examine our files.”

He left us alone to admire the pictures on the walls, Governors of the Bank of Canada, if I wasn't mistaken. One of them was inscribed, “Fiscally yours, James Coyne.” A collector's item. We fidgeted en masse until the manager returned and reclaimed his position behind the desk.

“Mr. Dix opened a deposit account in 1985. The initial—in fact, the
only
deposit—was eight thousand dollars. The only withdrawals from the account have been monthly rental fees for a safety deposit box, which he rented at the same time. The current balance is two hundred and fifty-seven dollars and six cents.”

Louise held out her hand. “The key?” The manager handed her an ordinary-looking brass key.

“If you'll follow me, I'll take you to the vault.” We all trooped after him as he led us to the rear of the bank. The massive door of the vault stood open and I imagined it closing on my finger. Disguising a serious wince, I peered into the vault. It was a surprisingly large room. Separate aisles held locked drawers of assorted sizes. The manager stood aside and waved us in. “Number 481 is right at the back, on the left, third row from the top.”

Louise went straight to number 481 and opened it. All of us behind her, including the bank manager, jostled for a view. There were no injuries, although I believe the manager's dignity was bruised. Louise donned a rubber glove on her right hand and removed the only item in the safety deposit box—a videocassette.

“If we could go back to your office, I'll ask you to sign a discovery form and a release form.”

I rode with Louise on the way back to the cop shop. She drove and I speculated. I hadn't been this excited since the treasure hunt at my tenth birthday party. I must have been visibly vibrating. “Calm down, Danny. We can't watch it until the techs check it over. It might have prints. It might be defective, or it might not even be a videotape.”

But it didn't, it wasn't, and it was.

Tommy, Louise, and I watched it after Gunther inspected it briefly. The video had been shot by a single stationary camera, mounted fairly high, maybe ten feet up on a wall. The lighting was not great but it was good enough to recognize faces.

The scene we viewed, three of us hunched avidly in front of the monitor, like hockey fans for a Stanley Cup seventh game, was of a mundane room roughly twenty feet by thirty, with cages along the three walls that we could see. Each cage held a rabbit and they all appeared to be sleeping, drugged, or both. Fleming Griffith entered the frame and began removing the unconcious rabbits and replacing them with more active specimens. When he had placed new rabbits in all the cages, the video ended. It had played for about five minutes before lapsing into grainy nothingness.

Louise used the remote to fast-forward a bit, check for footage, fast-forward again, check again for footage, and so on, until the end of the tape. There appeared to be only the five minutes of footage we had seen at the start of the tape. We sat in silence until Louise spoke. “What the hell was that all about? I was hoping to see something that would lead us to a multiple killer and all we see is Griffith playing with bunnies.”

“I don't think Griffith even knows about the video.” I waved at the monitor in a what-the-hell-was-that sort of motion. “It's obvious he didn't know the camera was there. But Crowley considered that footage extremely important, maybe incriminating. He went to a lot of trouble to hide it.”

Tommy shook his head, bemused. “Well, look. Let's call up Griffith, tell him about the video. Threaten to give it to the
SPCA
. That ought to scare the shit out of him.”

We all sat there and thought this over. Then we watched the video again, and still couldn't make any sense of it. Dispiritedly, I looked at Louise. She shrugged. “We need a Plan B. Can you work on that, Danny?”

“I did Plan A. Can't someone else take some responsibility?”

On that less than positive note, I left to do something. Anything.

Back at the hideout, I
engaged myself in the development of Plan B. I liked the title. It summed up our organizational focus, in that we had a plan, and it referenced our flexibility, in that we had responded to events to formulate a second plan, which we styled B. Yes, it was a good title.

No-Neck Jerome prepared takeout pizza for supper, and from the wine list I selected Granville Island lager. After we had dinner and I had offered to do the dishes, No-Neck was relieved by Rugby Pants Jerome. I'd just informed him that Tiger Woods had taken up darts because it was a more challenging game than golf when my phone rang.

“Hello.”

“What did you think of the video?” It was my caller of the previous evening. Thank God, he'd called back. For a moment, I couldn't figure out what he was talking about, but I knew I needed some privacy. I walked casually into my bedroom.

“What video?”

“I saw you outside the bank, Danny. You're a clever boy. I didn't know if anyone would be able to figure out my clues. Congratulations.”

“Who is this?”

“Surprised? Of course you are. Better check my picture on the
DFO
website. It's still there. Under ‘C.' I checked it when I checked yours. I'll call you back tomorrow. And Danny, your friends don't need to know about this yet. You can tell them when we've finished our business.”

I quickly fired up my laptop and went to the
DFO
internal website. I clicked on personnel, bio clips, and down the alphabetical names to “C.” There he was, the guy I'd seen outside the bank, the guy that had stared at me. The picture showed a slightly younger man than the bearded person I'd seen, but it was undoubtedly him. The name at the top of the file was Alistair Crowley.

My mind reeled. Christ, it performed seven jigs and danced the hokeypokey.

The question that crowded to the front of my mental bedlam, elbowed the other questions to the ground, kicked them in the teeth, and stood on their inert bodies, was—who was the dead guy in Yeo Cove? After five minutes of intense thought, examining initial propositions and logical flows, rethinking the conclusion several times, and whacking myself on the forehead more than once, the answer was obvious. It was our bad guy. He had gone up there to kill Crowley, but Crowley had killed him. This put, as they say, a different spin on things.

It also put Louise in a bad light. The constables that had identified the body had been handicapped by the fact that said body didn't have a face, and they had jumped to the conclusion that because it was in Crowley's float house it must be Crowley. That was fairly reasonable, but it was a big mistake, and Louise had bought into it. So had I, for that matter, but I wasn't the investigating officer.