SAVING HARRY a gripping crime thriller you won’t want to put down

by Dan Latus

  The clincher for me was the thought that nothing terminal was likely to happen to Harry until, or unless, Petrov got to him. So we had time, enough at least to check out the situation before calling Greta. Johanne was right. It would be better for us to do something instead of just sitting here.

  ‘This building,’ I started. ‘How do you know about it — and that Petrov has something to do with it?’

  ‘It’s a long story,’ she said. ‘Too long for now. Come on, let’s go. I’ll get the spare key for the truck.’

  ‘The Audi—’ I began.

  ‘The truck’s better, Frank.’

  So off we went, Johanne driving, me thinking that the fact she had used my name represented some sort of progress in our relationship.

  Chapter Sixty

  ‘About this building,’ I said again, as we set off from Coal Harbour. ‘What makes you think Petrov is connected to it, and how do you know about it?’

  ‘Like I said, it’s an old fish cannery. The industry has gone through a lot of amalgamation and centralisation in recent decades, and this little cannery is one of those that got left behind and abandoned.’

  That didn’t answer my questions, however true it was.

  ‘How do you know about it?’ I pressed.

  ‘Harry and I did some research.’

  I took a wild stab. ‘About submarines, by any chance?’

  She threw me a quick glance and nodded.

  Harry, I thought ruefully. Once again, he’d told me only part of it, what he was prepared to let me know. I felt very frustrated.

  Still, he was what he was, or what he had become in adult life. I just had to accept that. It was disappointing, but I knew I shouldn’t be too critical. Keeping things to himself as much as possible was probably how he had managed to survive as long as he had. He hadn’t been able to change the habits of a professional lifetime even for me. Perhaps it was only with someone like Johanne — or only Johanne herself — that he could do that. It would be the same for her as well, no doubt. Again, I thought what a good match they seemed.

  ‘You were right about what you told Greta,’ Johanne said. ‘We knew drugs were being brought in through our little harbour.’

  ‘And presumably you followed the vans, to see where the stuff went next?’

  She nodded.

  ‘Then you discovered Petrov was involved?’ I suggested, taking a wild guess.

  ‘Well . . .’

  ‘Wait a minute! Did you already know Petrov was operating on the island?’

  ‘Why else do you think we came in the first place?’

  That floored me for a moment.

  ‘I understood from Harry that you came because of your personal history — the Holberg connection?’

  ‘There was that too. But it wasn’t the original reason. We first came because Harry had been checking on movements involving the militia, back in Ukraine. He realised something was going on here. So we came to check it out. It was somewhere I’d always wanted to come anyway,’ she added.

  So Harry hadn’t lied about that at least. Not totally.

  ‘It took time,’ Johanne continued, ‘but eventually we worked out what was going on here. Petrov had built himself a nice little business — a nice little earner, as I believe you Brits would put it,’ she added, throwing me a wry smile.

  It was hard not to shake my head in disbelief. I had learned more from Johanne in ten minutes than I had from Harry in our several days together.

  In particular, I had learned at last of a good reason for Petrov to be on Vancouver Island. That had been niggling away at me for a while. His determination to chase Harry down just hadn’t seemed to be enough somehow.

  ‘What about the submarine? Whose is it?’

  ‘It’s an old Russian submarine that Moscow made available to Petrov, complete with crew.’

  ‘A “volunteer” crew, presumably?’

  ‘Oh yes,’ she said, throwing me a wry smile. ‘It had to be deniable.’

  ‘Very generous of Moscow, all the same.’

  ‘Well, there was self-interest involved too. It was a sweetener, and a reward. Petrov and his militia have been important to them. The other thing, we believe, is that occasionally they use it themselves to get people in and out of North America incognito. Possibly for other purposes too.’

  ‘Coal Harbour being a handy back-door route, I suppose?’

  She nodded. ‘Nobody would think of it, would they?’

  I had to agree with that. ‘Yet you did nothing about it? You didn’t even tell anyone?’

  ‘It wasn’t the right time. We had too much going on ourselves, more important stuff than that. Besides, we had established a safe retreat for ourselves here, and we liked it. Nobody except us knew about it. For the time being, we wanted to keep it that way.’

  She shrugged and added wryly, ‘I guess we stuck our heads in the sand and hoped it would all go away — or that someone else would deal with the drugs trade without us being involved.’

  ‘Was that when and why you moved to the log cabin? You wanted to put it out of sight, and out of mind?’

  She nodded. ‘Pretty much, yes.’

  After a moment, she added, ‘It doesn’t look good, does it? But at the right time we would have done something about it.’

  I shrugged. If she was looking to me for absolution, I couldn’t give it. Yet nor was I going to be judgemental. These people had been living a life I could come nowhere near to understanding.

  All the same, I was pretty damned annoyed to have discovered another way in which Harry had deceived me. He had known far more than he had told me about what was going on at Coal Harbour. It was extraordinary how much he had kept me in ignorance. Harry Stone, master of deception!

  No wonder he hadn’t seemed quite as surprised as me to hear that Petrov was on the island. It wasn’t unprecedented. He knew the guy came here from time to time. After all, he had a lucrative business venture to oversee.

  I have to admit I was bitterly disappointed that Harry had said nothing of this to me, but I knew I just had to swallow it. My indignation, outrage even, would have to be left for another day. My top priority was still to save Harry. That’s what I had signed on for. But if he survived, and I survived, I would have it out with him.

  My immediate worry was that Petrov could be halfway here by now, and once he arrived, Harry wouldn’t be long for this world.

  ‘Frank?’

  ‘Hmm?’

  ‘I said it doesn’t look good, does it?’

  I sighed and gave her a wry smile she couldn’t have seen in the dark.

  ‘Well, the pair of you were already doing your best to save the world. You couldn’t do absolutely everything, could you?’

  ‘Thank you, Frank,’ she said, sounding relieved.

  This time my smile was more one of amusement.

  ‘Now let’s go save Harry,’ I suggested.

  Chapter Sixty-One

  On the way, I did some fast thinking and roughed out some ideas that were the outline of a plan. I could do that now I finally knew what had been going on around here. In a few minutes Johanne had filled in so many gaps. Suddenly, I had the full picture, the one Harry had never felt able to give me. God knew why. Habits of a lifetime, I suppose. Secrecy. Need to know. Information is power. All that, and perhaps more.

  Well, now I knew. I knew what Harry knew.

  Harry had at least hinted at much of it in the time I’d been here. He had told and shown me things I hadn’t been able to piece together into anything coherent. He’d told me about his undercover work, for example, and what he had taken from Petrov. Shown me the submarine and so on. But I still hadn’t got it. But I had now. Most of it, at least.

  I was just a bit slow on the uptake, I thought ruefully. Perhaps Harry was as disappointed in me as I was in him.

  At the core of the story was Petrov, of course. As well as everything else he was, and represented, back in Donbass, Petrov was a businessman. He had a highly lucrat
ive import trade going on here, seemingly in partnership with criminals from mainland Vancouver’s Chinese community.

  Ketamine was what it was about. Made in China and sold on the Vancouver market. I had no idea how the business had originated, and I didn’t care. It was nothing to do with me. That was for the likes of Greta Campbell to sort out in due course. All I was interested in was rescuing Harry and nailing Petrov.

  ‘Do you know when the submarine is due next?’ I asked Johanne.

  ‘What’s the date today?’

  I told her.

  ‘In two to three days then. They have a regular schedule.’

  Perfect timing! My plan might work.

  ‘What are you planning?’ Johanne asked.

  ‘Sorting out something for the Canadians to try without starting World War Three. It just might work. If you’ll excuse me, I want to do a voice attachment I can send on my phone to Greta Campbell.’

  Chapter Sixty-Two

  Port Hardy was spread around an inlet on the east side of the island, just across Queen Charlotte Sound. As I said before, it was a ferry port with an important service to Prince Rupert. The town itself was on the landward side of the inlet. The main ferry terminal and some of the commercial and industrial facilities were several miles away on the far side. That was where Johanne took us.

  She pulled into a big car park that was half full of vehicles of every description, but particularly trucks like ours.

  ‘On foot from here,’ she said. Then she pulled out a pistol and checked it, further undermining her credibility as a civilian, in my eyes.

  She looked pointedly at me. ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I’ve got one too. Harry gave it to me.’

  ‘Know how to use it?’

  ‘Probably not as well as you, but I’ve pulled a trigger a few times in my illustrious career.’

  ‘Oh? What do you do?’

  ‘Security stuff. PI work, that sort of thing. I’m freelance, so I pick up whatever comes in, if I like the sound of it.’

  ‘Done anything like this before?’ she asked, with a sniff.

  I had the impression she was worried I wouldn’t be able to handle what we were about to get into, which was almost an affront to my manhood.

  ‘Johanne, Harry wouldn’t have asked specifically for me if he’d had any doubts about my ability. Don’t you worry about me.’

  She didn’t seem convinced, but she nodded and opened her door anyway. I followed her out of the truck.

  ‘So, how far are we from the plant?’ I asked.

  ‘Five hundred metres.’

  With that, we set off.

  The night was pitch-black. Thick, low cloud and a bit of the usual drizzle saw to that. One or two wagons passed us, on their way to the ferry terminal. Otherwise we saw nothing else moving, and neither people nor lights until we were close to the abandoned cannery. Then I could see that there were a few lights on inside the building complex.

  ‘Any idea what it’s like inside?’ I whispered.

  ‘Not really. We never got that close.’

  ‘So you don’t know if the machinery has been stripped out of it?’

  ‘I think it probably has. We saw notices put up by a salvage company. I would think they’ve been dismantling the place for some time.’

  I was wondering if we would find a big, empty space or lots of clutter. Clutter would be good. It would give us plenty of cover.

  ‘Are Petrov’s people doing the dismantling?’ I asked.

  ‘No idea.’

  Perhaps not, I thought. If he had acquired the building, it was more likely that he would have brought in a specialist salvage firm to clear the space. Industrial machinery would be worth something, in the right hands.

  Either way, a tough chain-link fence about six feet high had been erected around the perimeter of the property. I tested it to make sure it wasn’t electrified or equipped with monitors and we climbed over it, managing to evade the single strand of barbed wire running along the top.

  We found ourselves in a big, open compound festooned with an assortment of abandoned fittings and equipment. In the dark, it took us a few minutes to negotiate the obstacle course, but eventually we came up against the metal wall of the main building.

  Since Johanne knew no more than me about the layout, I suggested we simply follow the wall until we reached a door or window that would let us inside.

  Suddenly, the need for a careful, quiet approach was rendered academic. We froze, as the whole plant area became bathed in bright light. A couple of minutes later I heard the blast and roar of a helicopter coming in to land.

  Chapter Sixty-Three

  I was in no doubt about what was happening. This was Petrov’s grand arrival. There was no time now to wonder what Greta Campbell was doing, or where she was. We had to get to Harry before Petrov did.

  First, though, I sent Greta the brief text I had prepared earlier as a precaution. It just said where we were, and why. It might help — if it reached her.

  Then I got on with the immediate job. The illumination exposed us, but it also made our progress easier. We moved fast and soon found a door that was unlocked. As we let ourselves into the building, mercifully, some of the roar and blast from the descending helicopter was shut out and it was possible for us to speak to each other again without shouting.

  We were inside the main building on the site, among a vast tangle of abandoned machinery and sundry steelwork. The salvage and reclamation efforts had not even made a start on the inside. Perhaps it never would. It was probable that Petrov didn’t have long-term plans for the place.

  The part of the building we were in was no longer in use for any purpose whatsoever. It was nothing but a giant scrapyard. We made our way cautiously towards the far side, where there were lights and signs of movement, things happening.

  We were in time to see Petrov and a couple of other men mounting an ironwork staircase that led up to a set of offices on a mezzanine floor at that side of the building.

  I paused, and Johanne and I held a whispered discussion. We were of one mind. Harry must be up there somewhere. We would go in fast and hard and try to reach him before they knew we were coming.

  As well as the staircase Petrov had used, there were two other staircases serving the same purpose. We split up and took one each, following different routes to the upper storey, where there was a long row of doors to what I assumed were disused offices.

  As I reached the top of the staircase I had chosen, it was soon obvious where some of the action was. The noise all came from one open doorway about halfway along the landing. Even before I reached it, Petrov and another man came out and headed back down the main staircase without seeing me.

  I briefly considered attacking them right away — just shooting the bastards — but I managed to restrain myself. My priority was saving Harry, not killing Petrov, and the noise from the open doorway suggested Harry wasn’t done for yet.

  It was bad, though. I saw that as soon as I reached the open door and glanced inside the room. Harry was there, but he was a terrible mess. He was tethered, hanging by his arms from hooks in the wall. Two men were taking turns to hit him hard in places where it would hurt a lot and do serious damage. By now, he seemed incapable even of screaming.

  Petrov would have started it, and the men he had left with Harry were continuing where he had left off. I winced and then steeled myself. It looked as though they were intent on beating him to death. The end wouldn’t be long coming either, if they kept this up.

  The only positive thought I had was that Harry wasn’t dead yet. They wouldn’t still be hitting him if he was. As for the memory stick he’d been carrying, I didn’t even think about that. All I knew was that this had to be stopped.

  Without even pausing to pull the gun Harry had given me, I launched myself into the room and slammed into one of the men from behind. The kick to the back of his legs made him collapse to the floor.

  The other one turned, saw what had happened and swung at me. I pul
led back, dodged the blow and stepped aside as he followed through, tripping him in the process. My boot caught him in the head as he went down. A second kick stopped him getting back up again, possibly ever.

  That was when a third man, one I hadn’t noticed until then, hit me on the head with something hard. He hadn’t had time to position himself properly and exert maximum force, but I still went down. I was stunned, dizzy and momentarily defenceless. Certainly too dazed to do anything about the figure looming over me.

  But I was awake enough to hear the gunshots that stopped him in his tracks and brought him down on top of me.

  Johanne! I’d forgotten about her. I rolled out from under the body she had shot, staggered up onto my knees and then my feet.

  Johanne had her back to me now, having taken up position in the open doorway, guarding the approaches, pistol in hand.

  ‘See to Harry!’ she called over her shoulder, tossing me a serious-looking knife she pulled from somewhere about her person. ‘Get him down!’

  Blinking away the doziness and grimly bracketing the new pain in my head with all the others I had gathered that evening, I stumbled across the room to where Harry was hanging. He was slumped, head down, and barely conscious. His breathing sounded ominously harsh, but he was still breathing.

  I spoke to him sharply, urgently, as I sawed at the cords binding him. I cajoled and entreated, offering words of encouragement and hope. The lack of response was worrying, but I was in too much pain myself to think about it. I just focused on cutting the damn rope.

  I got one wrist free. His arm fell heavily against me as I started work on the other one. When I got that one free as well, Harry simply collapsed on top of me. I staggered under the dead weight and we both fell to the floor.

  As gently as I could, I rolled him over and got him settled in the recovery position. But I knew it wasn’t enough. Harry was in desperate need of serious medical care.

  Two shots that Johanne suddenly fired were answered by a fusillade of gunfire that brought bullets screaming and ricocheting all around us. Harry’s eyes opened briefly at that point. He saw me, seemed to recognise me, and muttered something unintelligible.