The Reluctant Detective

by Finley Martin

  “No. Can’t do that. Ben’s already growling about me getting involved in the PI business. I love him to death, but he’s Old School. He just doesn’t get it. Besides, I’m pretty sure I can get a handle on things. I’ve got a few good leads. The thing is, I don’t want Jacqui in the middle… I don’t want this client to get the idea that he can use Jacqui as leverage.”

  “Where do I come in? You need a babysitter or somethin’? Is that where this conversation’s heading?”

  “I have to get Jacqui someplace where there’s no connection to me and where nobody can find her. Delia McKay, a relative of Billy’s, lives on a farm in Iona. She’s agreed to look after Jacqui for a few days. So I need someone besides me to drive her there… today… this afternoon, in fact.”

  “And I’m the designated driver?”

  Anne looked up. She said nothing, just shrugged her shoulders and looked vacantly across the room. Then she brightened, raised her hand high, and motioned to Jacqui who had just come through the door. The anxious lines on her face vanished.

  “All right, all right, I’ll do it… so long as it’s not too close to supper hour. Have to keep an eye on the cash.”

  Jacqui spotted Anne and waved back excitedly. Mary Anne laughed at the sight of Jacqui bounding gleefully across the room like an unabashed twelve-year-old. Then she snickered. “She’s taking it well.”

  “I haven’t told her yet.”

  “Yikes! In that case, I’ll leave you two alone.”

  “Hi, Mom… bye, Mary Anne!” Jacqui dropped noisily into her chair and let her backpack fall with a disturbing clunk to the floor. “Done! All done!” she said and feigned exhaustion. “What’s to eat?”

  “Anything you want.”

  “Ooooh, lemme see,” she said as if challenged with a dare. “Lobster.” The word rang with an uncharacteristic decisiveness, and she snapped shut the menu.

  “What kind of veggies do you want with it?”

  Agreement was not what she had expected from her mother. As a result, Jacqui’s self-assurance, pushing hard against nothing at all, tumbled into surprise and landed her in the midst of a bewilderment.

  “Maybe not,” she said. “Lobster’s kind of messy. What else?”

  “Anything you want.”

  “Is this some kind of celebration or something?”

  “No… but it is your last day in junior high. You’re a high-school student now. Right? That’s worth celebrating.”

  “I guess. Scallops?”

  “Sure. Let’s make that two scallop dinners.”

  The chatter of the crowd gained strength and momentum as lunch hour progressed. It finally drowned out Jacqui’s report on her morning adventures. Anne didn’t mind the loss, though. Jacqui’s exuberance lent a telling pantomime to her narrative that pleased Anne, and she continued to nod as appreciatively and to smile as warmly as if she had heard every word her daughter had spoken. Still, she could not put aside what she knew would be the unhappy outcome to all this.

  They took their time eating, but by one o’clock the atmosphere of the restaurant changed. The conversations around them ebbed and flowed like unstable breezes. More often now, they could hear the clink of silverware break through the table talk, or they would notice the clatter of plates over the rounds of laughter. Eventually, conversations faded into discrete murmurings, and Anne knew that it was time to tell Jacqui the truth.

  When Anne left the restaurant, tears were streaming down her face. Jacqui’s last words, how could you do this to me, had broken her heart, and the ugly sound of them still rang in her ears. Anne had hoped that Jacqui would understand. She was a good kid – no, a great kid – and she was mature in many ways. But she could not seem to understand.

  At first Jacqui thought her mother had been playing a joke on her. Then, when she realized that her mother was serious, her face deadened, her lips parted, and then they began to tremble ever so slightly. Her face blanched, and her body froze as if she had come upon a snake. It seemed a long time before she found her voice, but, when she did and the words escaped her mouth, they were not recognizable as Jacqueline’s. They were unsteady and choked back, broken and pathetic.

  “I’m sorry,” was all that Anne could reply to Jacqui’s plea not to be sent away.

  Her second plea emerged more coherently. A third followed. Then a fourth. Each one a bit more forceful, and each one a bit more desperate.

  “I’m really sorry, hon. I have no choice. It’s the only way I can keep you safe.” Then Anne stood up, gave Jacqui a hug, motioned to Mary Anne, and walked away.

  Jacqui buried her head in her arms and quietly sobbed. Mary Anne gave Jacqui her privacy for four or five minutes and watched from a distance. Mary Anne had no children. Nor had she much experience with the children of others. And while she could deftly manage a restaurant and efficiently dispatch a squadron of cooks and waitresses and dishwashers, she felt helpless when dealing with anyone’s personal problems. For now she was able to cope by keeping a safe distance and, every so often, sweeping by or hovering near Jacqui’s table like a nervous bird circling a mate’s nest.

  Eventually, Jacqui’s sobbing dwindled into sniffling. She braced her head up with two hands and stared abjectly at the marble pattern on the tabletop. She’s over the worst of it, Mary Anne thought. She gave her a bit more time, and then she slipped into the seat next to Jacqui. She felt obliged to say something, but she didn’t know what. Words of consolation and platitudes she had heard as a child rolled around in her head.

  “Sweetheart? You okay?” she began.

  Jacqui looked toward her and took the tissue she offered.

  A short phrase of comfort formed on Mary Anne’s lips. Then her mouth went dry. She felt faint.

  “You want some dessert?”

  18

  The convenience store on the corner of Filmore and Condon was small and cluttered. The clerk behind the counter was short, round, and dark. He spoke with an accent that noisily and mechanically spat out consonants and buried the vowels.

  “How may I help you, lady?” He smiled as if he were about to close on his first sale of the month.

  “Looking for Carson White – the White family. They live somewhere near here. Know them?” Anne grabbed a loaf of bread, placed it on the counter, and looked over the canned goods.

  “Small brown house there,” he pointed up the street. “See hole in screen door?” Anne nodded.

  “Would anyone be home now? I have to pick up a package.”

  “I don’t know. She work. He drink. Boy come, boy go.” He shrugged.

  Anne carried her bag of bread and two jars of mango chutney to the car, drove half a block, and parked just past the Whites’s house. No one answered her knock on the front door. So she went through a small dangling wire gate on the side and tried the rear doorknob. It turned. Inside the half-open door, she halloed. No answer, not even an echo. She went in.

  Anne passed through the smell of stale beer and sweaty clothes in the pantry and into a heavy lingering scent of frying-pan fat in the kitchen. She made her way up a steep flight of stairs. There were two bedrooms. The bedroom on her right was Carson’s. A grotesque poster of some metal band was taped to his closed door. Inside, under a sloping roof, was a single bed, a small table, a fold-up wooden chair, and a few cardboard boxes, but no valise with money. Anne rifled through the boxes. One was filled with car and motorcycle magazines. The other had stacks of school papers, photocopied handouts, old assignments, and partly filled scribblers. Posters of Harley Davidson motorcycles adorned one wall. Scantily clad models struck erotic poses as they straddled their machines. Below the posters was a heap of machine parts from a 150cc Yamaha.

  A four-drawer dresser stood against a second wall. Jumbles of clothes filled three of them. The bottom drawer was a jumble, too, but under a layer of towels and sweat pants Anne found Carson�
��s stash: trinkets: watches, cell phones, leather billfolds stripped of ID and credit cards, CDs, a coffee can a quarter full of necklaces, broaches, rings, and pendants, mostly cheap gold-plated pieces but a few that would bring a few bucks on the street. Tucked into the edge of a mirror frame over the dresser were bits of paper with phone numbers. She copied the numbers into her notebook and headed downstairs.

  As she navigated back through the rickety fence, Anne noticed a detached garage. She pushed open the door, and quickly searched the junk on the concrete slab floor. Then she climbed the short ladder to the loft. Odd dimensions of board and plank were neatly stacked up. She saw no valise, but Anne did notice that the veil of dust on the landing just above the top of the ladder had been disturbed. Someone had been up there recently.

  Anne had gotten as much as she could from her quick search of Carson’s house, and she dismissed the idea of waiting for him to show up. Instead she drove to the parking lot of a nearby mall and took out her cell phone and notebook. She called the first number she had taken from Carson’s room. A girl answered. She sounded young. The call display read Krystal Conohan.

  “Krystal? Hi! This is Mary MacLean… you know… from Student Council.”

  “Yeah, and?” she said. A note of suspicion tainted her voice.

  “I’m trying to get a hold of Carson White. Do you know where he is this afternoon?”

  “What do ya want him for?”

  “There was a random draw at the Student Council. End-of-the-year activity. Carson won. A $25 dollar gift certificate.”

  “I didn’t hear that announced at the assembly, and I was there.”

  “Yeah, I know. Somebody… I won’t say who… forgot to bring the box with student names to the assembly. By the time we got it, the bell had rung. We were too late. We drew names later. So do you know where he is? We want to get it to him.”

  “Well I don’t know. Try the pool hall on Kent. Or one of those bike shops downtown. He says he hangs with the mechanics… if you can believe him. He’s tight with Sean. Maybe he knows. Anyway, I don’t follow him around.”

  “Sean who? What grade is he in?”

  “Sean McGee. He’s not in school. By the way, how’d you get this number?”

  “Friend of a friend. Gotta go. Thanks. Bye.”

  There was no answer at the other numbers she had gotten from Carson White’s room. She dialled again. This time the number was the Charlottetown Police Department’s. The switchboard routed her call. It rang once before it was picked it up.

  “Detective Sergeant Ben Solomon.”

  “Hey, Ben. Anne.”

  “Where the hell have you been hiding?”

  “Haven’t you heard? I’m a working girl. No time for Dunkin’ Donuts and coffee breaks like you.”

  “Are you keeping out of trouble?”

  “As best I can, but I need a favour. Can you run a partial plate number for me?”

  “I only do things like that as a professional courtesy.”

  “Then be nice… and consider me a professional.”

  Solomon laughed and added, “Tell me whatcha got and I’ll see what bell it rings.

  “Late model Ford F-150, dark blue, Island plate KT71 something something.”

  “That’s it?”

  “That’s it. Oh… and do the names Carson White or Sean McGee mean anything to you?”

  “Nothing on White. McGee. That’s a familiar tale. He runs a head shop downtown. I don’t think he makes a living off it, but some of the boys think he uses it to launder money or fence stolen goods. He belongs to a biker gang. Satan’s Chosen. They’re like little brothers to Hell’s Angels in Halifax. They keep a low profile, but they have a clubhouse of sorts. A bar near the old railhead on Water Street. Why? What’s the interest?

  “Their names came up in a case I’m working. Nothing definite.”

  “Satan’s Chosen doesn’t have the reputation for the dazzling brutality of Hell’s Angels, but they can bite. Best to steer clear of that crew. Okay?”

  “Okay.” There were a few awkward moments of silence between them. Then Anne asked timidly, “No big lectures?”

  “Would it do any good?”

  “Probably not.”

  “I didn’t think so. Sarah didn’t think so either, but you already know my opinion about getting involved in investigations. It’s not healthy. By the way, a job may be opening up here at the Department. A guy on staff is leaving. Going into RCMP. He handled administration. In charge of building management, secretarial personnel. Basically he took care of everything not directly involved in policing. It’s a management position. Good pay, too. Interested?”

  Anne was caught unawares by Ben’s offer. In view of the tenuous situation she found herself in, it seemed like a comfortable door to walk through and a safe place both for herself and Jacqui. It was a job with responsibility, and maybe it could evolve into a career. Most of all, it would be a welcoming escape from the path she was travelling.

  “It… does sound good,” she said.

  “I’ll send over an application.”

  “In the meantime, if you need help or advice… or anything, call. I’ll get back to you on that plate.”

  “Thanks, Ben.”

  “Just don’t make me worry. Three daughters at home. I have an acid stomach as it is.”

  19

  Anne took a chance. There were three motorcycle dealers in Charlottetown, but only one was within walking distance of Carson’s home, and that’s where she headed. The name of the shop was C. C. Rider. Anne flashed a photocopy of Carson’s yearbook picture. The manager ignored it and continued to gently stroke the fender of a black Harley chopper with a soft flannel cloth.

  “You don’t look like a cop,” he said indifferently.

  “I’m not.”

  “What’s your interest then?”

  “I’m a private investigator. I have a client who’s interested.”

  “In a high school kid?”

  “Who said he was in high school? Have you seen him today?”

  “Never saw the kid before. Honest truth.”

  “The truth is, you’re being kind of defensive about somebody you claim you’ve never seen before. That raises my eyebrows. I’ve got friends on the force. I suppose it’ll raise their eyebrows, too.”

  “So?”

  “I watched a program on the Nature Channel last week. Maybe you caught it? It was all about dogs. You know what happens when hounds catch a scent? They don’t stop huntin’ until they catch what they’re chasing or drop in their tracks from exhaustion. And ya know what?” Anne tossed back her head, glanced around the store, and sniffed the air a few times. “Somethin’ smells kind of funny around here.”

  “Look. I got nothin’ to hide, and I don’t need anybody hassling me either. You or cops. It’s bad for business. I’m legit, a hundred per cent. I just don’t like to see some dumb kid get in a jam for no good reason. That’s all there is to it.”

  “What would he get in a jam for?”

  “This I couldn’t say, but he was here two… three hours ago. I can tell ya that. He wanted to buy a bike. He had his eyes on this one. It’s used, but it’s a beauty. I laugh and tell him it’s ten grand. He doesn’t blink. He takes off his backpack and pulls out a fistful of money and counts it out. Surprised the hell outta me.”

  “Where’s the money?”

  “He still has it. It wasn’t Canadian. It was American. It looked real, but I couldn’t take the risk. Who knows where it came from? And where does a kid come up with ten grand cash? Like I said. I don’t need a hassle.”

  “Where’d the kid go from here?”

  “No idea. Maybe get it changed at the bank? Another dealer? Who knows?”

  “What about Sean McGee?”

  “Don’t know him.”

  Anne p
ut one hand on her cocked hip and looked at him with pathetic disbelief.

  “It’s too late for backsliding now, don’t ya think?”

  “Try his shop. Smoke Signals.” He pointed down Kent Street. “Just before Kings Square.”

  Smoke Signals was a head shop, a retail store for cannabis paraphernalia. The shop took up one side of a double, two-storey, wood-frame house. In front of it near the sidewalk stood an antique cigar-store Indian holding a peace pipe. Around his wooden shoulders someone had draped a white serape. A pattern of green marijuana leaves was woven into the fabric. Anne let her fingers float across the smooth wooden features of the Indian’s face as she rounded the corner and entered the shop.

  The display room was rather small. It would have been the parlour when the building had been a residence. The glass shelves on one wall were filled with glass and Pyrex bongs, a smaller version of the Oriental hookah. The glassware was hand-blown in mauve and violet, amber and ruby, emerald and frosted white. The display case held specialty lighters, decorative tins, rolling machines and grinders, roach clips, pipes, and scales. Beads and necklaces dangled from a side wall. Next to them was a rack of T-shirts promoting the resurrection of Bob Marley, the freedom of Marc Emery, and an end to the prohibition of grass.

  Anne took a deep breath and wondered if she had sucked in a lungful of incense or something else. The clerk, a young, long-waisted blonde, had not heard her enter the store and was facing a backroom door and several large speakers next to it. Her figure swayed. Her arms floated gracefully above her head. Her body moved to the pulsing rhythm of an African a cappella group.

  Anne reached across the counter and tapped the dancing clerk on the shoulder. She continued her dance as she turned slowly around. “Ooooh… hey… ya know drums and chants and stuff make me feel so… I don’t know… primitive… and happy… ya know what I mean?” Her eyes were wide with wonder. Her demeanour was euphoric. And she continued to sway and stare at Anne and waited for an answer.

  “Some days I know what some people mean… some days I know what I mean… and some days I know what nothing means… When that happens, it’s just me that’s here… and there is no meaning. Ya know what I mean?” replied Anne, looking at the clerk with as much gravity and earnestness as she could muster without laughing at the absurdity of her own words. Then she waited for an answer.