The Storm Murders (8 page)

Mathers let his friend’s anger settle a moment. “Why then?” he asked. “What’s the real reason he doesn’t want the SQ to help investigate the earlier murders?”

“My hunch, you mean? I have no proof.”

“I miss your hunches,
É
mile. When you left the force we were finally rid of them. I thought life would be enjoyable again. But I was wrong. I’ve missed them.”

“Channels,” Cinq-Mars said, ignoring the younger man’s whimsy. “The FBI—or specifically our Agent Dreher—may not want to sift through SQ channels. I understand that, but still, whether it’s convenient or necessary, if they must go through channels they will do so. But the problem for them is this: it becomes tit-for-tat. That’s how the system works. The SQ will expect to work back through FBI channels, be in touch with other key officers, higher authorities.”

Mathers let his eyes wander as he mulled this over. He tried to fathom what Cinq-Mars found so fascinating about the upper rafters. They looked like old beams to him. “Are you suggesting—you are, aren’t you?—you’re suggesting that Dreher is out here taking a flyer on his own? He doesn’t want the SQ involved because he doesn’t want the FBI involved. No tit-for-tat. Is that it? You think he’s gone rogue, or he’s doing all this on his own dime?”

“That’s the new phrase now, isn’t it?” Mathers might miss his partner’s propensity for hunches, but he could still do without the sarcasm. “Gone rogue,” Cinq-Mars repeated. “More infuriating cop lingo to make cops feel like cops. Isn’t it?”

Mathers flapped his coat again. “I don’t know,” he demurred. “Just a phrase.” He waited a moment, then tried again. “So has he? Gone rogue?”

The older man’s interests drifted up into the rafters again, but there was nothing up there, Mathers was convinced, not a blessed thing.

“Possibly,” Cinq-Mars finally indicated. “More likely, he has reasons to not want someone in the Bureau—superiors, peers, underlings, who knows?—to find out what he’s up to. I know what that’s like. Been there myself. You keep your nose clean, Bill, procedure-wise. I never did, as you know, and our agent out there might not either. We represent his way to investigate this case yet keep it under the radar
inside
the FBI. They probably don’t even know he’s in Canada. He’s not packing a piece, did you notice?”

Rather than admit that he hadn’t, Mathers said, “Packing a piece. Cop lingo.”

“Bill, you should’ve noticed. I figure it’s because he didn’t want to announce himself as FBI leaving the U.S., or entering Canada, or re-entering the States. He’s at least semi-incognito, is my bet.”

Mathers caught on to something then. “So that’s why you asked for the payment bonus. To test your theory. To see if he can pull that off.”

“He’s been testing me, Bill. I can do the same back, no? Why not?”

Mathers agreed that he could do that. “
É
mile, you told him that you wanted me to help you. I don’t know if you were serious—”

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Unlike you, I’m not retired. Unlike you, I answer to bosses, and unlike the way you used to be, I can’t just go off on my own within the department.”

“True,” Cinq-Mars conceded, “and I should have asked first. Pardon my manners. But, like me, you’re curious about the case and upset about dead cops. Besides, I’ll need your help, precisely because you’re not retired. First, get the SQ to bring out their dog squad. Their K-9. Most likely they’ll turn up the dead animals but no evidence, but the SQ will feel involved that way, in the loop, and that might keep them onside and allow us to muddle in what is essentially their business. At the very least, the pets will get a decent grave. See, I can only ask for K-9 by going through my connections, and that’ll piss people off inside the SQ. But you can ask, and that’ll make folks happy inside the SQ. See the difference?”

“Okay.”

“Next,” Cinq-Mars pressed on, “after I get the information from Dreher on the previous murders, do your own inquiry into them. Use appropriate protocol for police networks. Ring no bells. Show me what local police and local journalists had to say about the killings. If you find out the names and numbers of the specific investigating officers, pass that along. See? I can’t get any of that without you.”

“Okay. I can do that. What are you going to do?”

“Talk to my wife, Bill. That’s the biggest hurdle here. Then, if she lets me, I’ll talk to the SQ. If I’m going to be the FBI’s man on the ground, then the SQ should know that and hear it in such a way that they don’t get their collective back up. Just because he doesn’t want relations with them doesn’t mean that I have to adhere to the policy. Besides, I can help them out. I know I can. That way, they might help me. If the Bureau wants to be in the shadows, that’s their choice. Or Dreher’s choice. The rest of us are still free to walk around in the light of day. But, Bill. Don’t tell Dreher that I’m willing to work with the SQ. Let that be our secret.”

Mathers took a moment to consider all this. “
É
mile, come on, what are you up to?”

That earned him a wide grin from his former partner. “Bill, did anyone ever tell you that you’re cute when you’re suspicious? I’m retired. Isn’t there a song?
Old men just wanna have fun
. There’s nothing more to it than that. But, Bill, Bill, here’s a head’s up. A farm without farm animals and a bare minimum of domestic pets. The people who lived here did not farm. Whatever comes back about their histories, if anything, get that back to me. I can’t do that without you. This barn, for instance. It’s clean and well looked after because it’s empty and unused. All we know about our dead farmers is that they weren’t farmers. I really hate to cast aspersions about the victims, but that’s suspicious, don’t you think?”

Mathers waited a respectful half minute, then asked, “Are we done here?”

“Yeah. He’s cooled his jets long enough. His blood level’s been raised. He’ll be pumping you for information all the way home, but since you don’t have any, you won’t say peep. Right?”

“Right.”

“So let’s go. Good to see you, Bill.”

“First,” Mathers said, failing to budge. “Tell me what you see,
É
mile.”

“What I see?”

“Up in the rafters.”

Cinq-Mars gazed up there again. “I might want to buy this barn,” he said.

“No,
É
mile. Seriously.”

“Barns can be moved, Bill. Don’t you know that?”

Mathers sighed. “All right. Keep me in the dark. See what that does for you.”

They both turned to leave in unison this time.

“Don’t worry, Bill,” Cinq-Mars told him. “I will.”

“That’s how you know he has secrets. You keep so many of your own.”

The older detective chuckled quite brightly. “That must be it,” he concurred. “You might have something there. My God, you’re finally starting to think like me!”

SEVEN

É
mile and Sandra Cinq-Mars did not get into a lengthy discussion on his job offer—if he could call it that, it seemed strange to do so—upon his return home. She was busy in the barn securing water and feed for the horses, which took longer than usual as he had not been around to assist, and then it was her night to prepare the evening meal. She was well into her culinary creation as
É
mile slumped home. Over his iPod and through the living room speakers he played Chopin, and further fortified himself with a single malt. In a choice between two favorites, the Talisker and the Highland Park, he simply went for the easiest reach and safest bend for his back, which turned out to be the Talisker. Then he sat, sipped, closed his eyes, and opened his ears to the music.

If he was at all in the doghouse, his status was not borne out by the meal. A pasta in cr
è
me sauce, with shrimp, lobster bits, and scallop pieces, the edges of the bowl rimmed by mussels and small asparagus flowers under a drizzle of sauce. Nothing thrown together. Candlelight aided the ambiance and the white wine was pleasant, causing Cinq-Mars to regret that he had carried to the table a serious subject to broach.

Sandra beat him to it.

“So, Mr. Famous Detective, what do the dogs of war want now?”

He buttered a slice of focaccia. “It’s the cop killings and that poor couple.”

“Seriously? The FBI is involved with that?”

“Apparently it relates to something they’ve been looking at.”

“I see.” As a policeman’s wife, a chill went over her at the mention of cops being killed. She didn’t suppose that the feeling would ever dissipate merely because her husband had retired. “So, what, are you like a hired gun now?”

“Hired goon, maybe. Except I haven’t been issued a weapon.”

“East of Aldgate,” she said.

He used to utter the phrase, lifted from a Sherlock Holmes teleplay, but he hadn’t repeated it in some time and was surprised to hear it tossed back at him. Holmes, who did not commonly arm himself, had advised his good friend, “Always carry a firearm east of Aldgate, Watson.” He’d been heading for that part of London, a notoriously violent neighborhood, at the time.

“Two policemen dead,” he explained. “It’s difficult to sit still for that.”

“It’s difficult for you to sit still.” She was trying to make nice, but being anxious about the conversation, her husband failed to catch her tone.

“Sandra, if you don’t want me to do this, say so. I haven’t committed to anything. I told everyone that I need to discuss it with you.”

“Oh, please,
É
mile, don’t make it my burden. Do what you wish to do. Or need to do. You might have thought differently, but you were never a great candidate for retirement. I concede, I hoped otherwise. But you’re more interested in horse-trading than in their day-to-day—oh, don’t deny it, you know it’s true. And it’s still true even though you’re less interested in horse-trading than you used to be.”

He took his time responding and chewed a shrimp. “It’s a matter of looking into the situation to see if I can help. Nobody’s asking me to head up a squad or anything like that.”

“Do you have to sound so disappointed? I’m not fighting you. Seriously,
É
mile. I’m really not fighting. Look.” She showed him her hands, upraised and flat on the table. “Open palms. No fists.” Her smile was tentative, and he returned his own, as if agreeing to cool down. Sandra continued, “Tell you what. Since this is
apparently
a negotiation, at least
you
seem to be treating it that way, we’ll negotiate. Say what it is you want, and I’ll draw up my own demands.”

“Demands,” he repeated.

“If you want everything to go smoothly, expect demands. What’s wrong with that?”

He was amenable, in theory.

They ate peaceably awhile and
É
mile poured wine for both of them again. She said, “Okay. I’ve thought it through.”

“So soon? You know your demands? Okay. Demand.”

Placing her elbows on the table, Sandra knitted her fingers. She looked demure, rather pleased with herself. “Demand number one. Two policemen dead must never become three policemen dead, or two policemen and one retired cop who ought to know better.”

The tension between them of late had dulled his sensitivities. He was finally getting the idea that she was not in a bad mood after all, nor was she mad at him. He cast his eyes over the meal again, the presentation, the candlelight, the fact that she had allowed the Chopin to stay on and filter through from the other room. He was off his game. He should have realized much sooner that things were going his way here.

“Okay,” he consented, and smiled more openly.

“Okay is not good enough. Promise.”

“All right. I promise.”

“And here’s the real kicker,” Sandra proposed. “You’re nobody’s employee. So you’re no longer bound to professional silence. This time around, keep me apprised of the investigation. As you never have before. If that means that from time to time you’re obliged to tolerate my input, you will do so. Now. Promise me.”

He had been drafting schemes to possibly place a salve on their marriage. Now he realized that, even though she had initiated the matter of splitting up, she might be doing exactly the same thing. She was saving them.

É
mile told her, “I promise to tolerate you.”

Which won a smile. “Not exactly how I would put it, but I’ll accept that.” She scooped the last of her main course, mostly sauce, onto her spoon. “Guess what?” Her mood seemed downright flirtatious. “I made dessert.”

He was even allowed to kick his diet for an evening.
É
mile Cinq-Mars was counting this as a good day, with all the potential for a good night ahead of him.

EIGHT

Over the next few days, the region experienced dramatic fluctuations in temperature.
É
mile Cinq-Mars did little more than putter around the farm or study intermittent reports that Mathers sent over by courier. On a Thursday, the weather offered more of the same. A light rain fell through mid-morning and froze across the snowfields in the afternoon, creating a surface glaze by late evening as the thermometer seriously dipped. In the light of a waxing moon pastures glistened and sparkled. Reminiscent of old times, the former detective waited just off the road on what served as a tractor path in summer, the car radio tuned to a classical music station. He was allowing a latent affection for music to grow in his retirement, and he was now fond of educating himself. The clear night, however, brought in distant stations crackling over top of the one he desired, and the first selection on the program, Brahms, did not inspire him, so in the end he opted for quiet.

Which instigated a level of inspiration all on its own.

A barren road, particularly in winter. He had written the directions verbatim, yet a subliminal anxiety warned that he and the other man might have gotten their signals crossed. His counterpart was seven minutes late, so far, with still no sign, way down the road in either direction, of anyone’s headlights.

É
mile restarted the car to generate warmth, blasting hot air for a minute, and turned on the coils under his posterior. In an idle mood, he wondered if heated car seats ever caught fire. He figured he’d smell the burn before his rump ignited. Closing his eyes, he made it a point not to fall asleep, sniffing the air for flaming upholstery to confirm that he hadn’t yet asphyxiated. Distant chicken-barn stink wafted by.