by R E Swirsky
CHAPTER 58
Thursday 14:20 Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
Geordie Hammersmith sat comfortably in a wicker chair on the rear deck of his large home overlooking the Ottawa River. He sucked lightly on his Cuban cigar, just enough to capture the citrusy taste at the back of his throat. Senator Leboeuf sat beside him; a small table rested between them. Both men were oddly quiet.
Leboeuf rarely accepted an invite from Geordie, but Geordie knew he’d come this time. After such a close call, there was no question he would come.
Geordie pushed the bottle of Pyrat Cask 23 rum towards Leboeuf. “Go on, have another,” he said and nodded.
Leboeuf smiled. “I think I will.” He dropped two ice cubes in the empty glass and drowned them in rum.
A small boat putted along upstream on the river between the tall maples that lined the property on either side by the river. Neither men said a word until the boat was upstream and out of view.
“This one was dangerously close,” Leboeuf said.
Geordie nodded and puffed in short bursts before replying. “Jack and Lucas know how to take care of things. Nate had no idea what was really going on around him.”
“You rode him pretty hard, I heard.”
“I had to. He shouldn’t have been anywhere near this one from the start. I am just glad he called you and not someone else.”
“Yes, it was very fortunate. Harvey can be…how do you say…persistent? Yes, very persistent at times.” Leboeuf swirled his rum before bringing it to his lips. The burn was smooth and worth every penny.
“Asking a man like him to back off from the start would have been a grave mistake. That’s why I suggested we take this route when you called. I think we did well on this one.”
Leboeuf raised his glass. “I am in full agreement.” He paused a moment. “Do you think Metcalf ended up getting our message after all of this?” he asked.
“I’m not so sure. Kaito may have buggered this one up.”
“How so?”
“By getting too close to Metcalf and then opening his damn mouth to Nate about what he was about to do. No one would have been the wiser had he stayed away from Metcalf and kept his damn mouth shut.” His lips went tight and his face fell into a full pout. “I was so damned upset when you told me he called Nate.” His hands went in the air as if choking an imaginary enemy. “I wanted to throttle him right then and there.”
Leboeuf stared out across the water. “Why do you suppose he told Nate? It can’t be just because they were friends, can it?”
“I wouldn’t want to hazard a guess. Possibly…but what’s worse, no one expected him to deviate so far from the plan by chasing Metcalf down like he did after taking care of the girl. This was probably the most damaging aspect.
“I really had no idea what the hell he was up to by then. I just wanted him stopped before he went too far.”
“At least he stopped.”
“Yes he did. But he wasn’t in good shape at the end. Seemed to be having some kind of breakdown. Maybe that’s why he called Nate.”
“What makes you think Kaito was having a breakdown?”
Geordie chuckled. “Jack was with him in the end.”
Neither man said a word for the next five minutes. They watched as a few other boats drifted past.
“The problem now is…” Geordie began, “…I think Metcalf believes this was all Kaito’s doing. After all of this planning, resources, and time we put in, I suspect we may have taken his daughter out for nothing. Instead of perceiving his daughter’s death as a warning, he may now think her death was Kaito’s doing and Kaito’s alone—simple revenge for what happened to his own daughter at the hands of Garrod Shaw.”
“I thought you had him baking before this started. It was what we agreed to a few months ago.”
“I did have him placed in the cooker. Metcalf’s not as clean as he pretends to be. Just another goddamned hotshot lawyer. We sent him a number of anonymous calls, emails, and envelopes with information related to various clients of his—just ones we thought had some shady activity floating around—but we had nothing solid. We poked and prodded him enough with what we could until he became edgy. Once he was agitated enough, we tossed in Kaito’s name. Of course he was already involved with Shaw and he knew who Kaito Hui was. It confused him, which is what we wanted, but looking back now, giving him Kaito’s name like that may have been a mistake. Next we heightened his paranoia by sending him random photos of his three daughters over a number of weeks.”
“Photos? What kind of photos?”
“The usual type. Just random shots. One was taken at a mall. Another at college.” He laughed. “Even caught one of his underage girls in a bar. Harvey was livid but he wasn’t about to go to the police. He had nothing. He didn’t know who was sending him the messages or photos, or why. It could have been one of any number of people. And then to finish, we sent photos of a number of his clients. Shaw and our Russian friend were included in that little group.
“When his daughter Lucinda died, Harvey most likely suspected it accidental—his wife did for sure. But once the deaths of Shaw and our Russian surfaced the very same day, Harvey would have known her death was no accident, just as he was sure the others were no coincidence.”
He paused and watched as a small boat came into view on the far side of the river.
“At least that’s what we were hoping he would assume because of the photos we sent. Going public was out of the question for him. If it came out to his wife that he had received anonymous photos in the mail of his daughter just weeks prior to her death, she would have ended their marriage right there. The controversy would have been very public and damaging to his reputation.
“He lost one daughter and we hoped he knew why: Back away from challenging our constitution and stay the hell away from defending these criminals on legal maneuvering. It’s all we wanted!” he shouted boisterously and then retracted himself. ”Sorry about that,” he laughed. “But we hoped he would stop defending those he knew were guilty or risk losing another daughter. He may even have thought he was next on the list.”
“Ah…” Leboeuf replied. “Sending the photos of his clients was brilliant. No way to miss that connection.”
“Simple stock photos, nothing you or I couldn’t obtain from any newspaper or online. It was blunt but to the point. We never identified who we were, we don’t do that. And as a result of Kaito’s behaviour, approaching him like that at the funeral, I’m still worried Metcalf thinks this was all Kaito acting alone.”
“Uh, yes. Disturbing to say the least.” Leboeuf sipped his rum. A soft breeze blew off the river.
“You see my problem now?”
Leboeuf nodded. “I do. It does give him reason to stop worrying after today.” He sipped his rum and gave a worrisome look over at Geordie. “Any of the others get wind of any of this?”
Geordie puffed his lips out and shook his head. “No, not a word. They know only what was discussed when Kaito was first assigned Shaw and our Russian friend last December. They know nothing about Metcalf, nor about Jack and Lucas being involved in any operation these past few weeks.” A frown crossed his old face and his wrinkles doubled up. “This is a very dangerous game we’re playing, going rogue like this.… If it was anyone other than the four of us running wild like this, I’d…I’d…I don’t know what I would do. I wouldn’t stand for it.” He paused. “So what does that make me?”
“We’re not rogue. All four of us are well principled. The Order’s governing body is simply too large these days, and it’s nearly impossible to find consensus on new targets. When’s the last time anyone new was added to the list?”
Geordie nodded his agreement. “The pace has slowed.…”
“Metcalf needed a push and we gave him one. Well…we tried to, at least.”
The frown on Geordie’s face deepened.
“Remember how it was back in the beginning?” Francois said. A smile crossed his face. “A weekend of skiing at Val David, feasting
on Marcel’s creations at La Sapiniere, and all the while making decisions about who makes the list over drinks and a game of pool in the bar. It’s just so damn complicated these days.”
Geordie laughed and waved a finger. “Yes, but we were a lot younger back then. Maybe even reckless.”
“Surely you’re not saying it’s better now?
He laughed and puffed away a few times. “No, I’m not. But I’ve come to think we’ve swung much too far the other way now.”
“So what can we do about Metcalf?” Leboeuf asked. “Push him again?”
“Not much chance of that, I’m afraid. The rest still won’t go along with moving him onto the list, and I doubt we’ll find someone like Kaito again who is willing to cross over like he did for us at the first opportunity. That’s exactly the kind of candidate we try to screen out. We were lucky to uncover this flaw in Kaito.”
“Then answer me this: Where exactly did we go wrong with Kaito?”
“Well, I’d say we simply underestimated his pain about what happened to his daughter. It ran deeper than anyone could’ve imagined.” Geordie stood up and held one finger in the air. “Finding out his daughter committed suicide was pure chance. He told no one, not even his friend Nate. It was one of those secrets…” He stared out across the water for a moment and then turned to Leboeuf, “…you know, the kind that festers deep down in one’s soul.” He pounded one fist on his chest.
Leboeuf only grunted his understanding. He knew the kind.
“So how did you come across this information if it was buried that deep?”
“One of our new junior guys—smart guy, early twenties, green under the ears, thinks a box is round and all of that kind of stuff—he caught Kaito’s lie when we were unearthing everything about his past. It was a simple thing, really. Kaito said she drowned in their backyard pool. This kid’s a whiz, sharp and thorough. I like him. He checked phone records of the day she died and found no calls to emergency services. No 911 call, no ambulance, nothing.”
“Is that really so odd?”
“In a pool drowning? Our whiz kid thought so. It turned out Kaito made only one call that day and that was to his wife. But his wife.…” He puffed heavily on his cigar and released a column of smoke that was quickly stolen away in the light breeze. “She made numerous calls.”
“Oh?”
“All calls were to a single doctor, a psychiatrist as it turned out. Seems his daughter was under the care of a psychiatrist when she killed herself and that’s why no 911 call was made. When we put it to Kaito, he caved immediately and told us everything. His daughter was abducted when she was only ten, and for three years had been severely depressed and suicidal. When he told me the abuser was Garrod Shaw, I goddamned near keeled over.”
“But this connection was risky, no?”
Geordie sat back down and splashed more rum into both tumblers. “You have to understand that Kaito hated both of these men, Shaw and Metcalf. Bringing Kaito in to our group was about as done a deal as I had ever seen before we even dug into his past. He was clean, sharp and eager, and very willing to contribute financially. He came with cheques in hand, and it was only a matter of weeks before he was ready for a field team. Shaw was already a target and I saw no reason not to give Shaw to him. Most of the work is handled by our field men anyway, and the men under Kaito on this were all well seasoned. They made up our best group, I’d like to think.”
Leboeuf erupted in laughter as he pointed at Geordie. “And you! You had me believing every word as you tore into poor Nate and undressed him about his friend at La Sapiniere!”
“Bah…” Geordie waved his hand in the air briefly and thrust his finger into his chest. “Few know what goes on in here.”
“You even had Lucas questioning whether you were serious. Jack seemed a little too argumentative.…”
“I can seem a ruthless bastard if it gets me what I want.” He chuckled briefly. “I pulled Jack aside before you all showed up out there. I asked him to push hard on his position against Metcalf. The risk of Nate uncovering what we were up to worried me. Bullying him like that was the only way I knew to keep him on his toes while distancing us all from anything to do with Kaito in case Nate began to suspect what was really going on.”
Leboeuf raised his glass in a toast to Jack. “Well, let me say, he did well. He had me convinced he was serious.”
“Jack…the artist.” He laughed again. “He paints a good picture, doesn’t he?”
“But Metcalf wasn’t ever a target.”
Geordie chewed on the end of his cigar. He smiled at Leboeuf. “You know…Kaito hated both of these men so much. It was Kaito who asked me if Harvey Metcalf would ever be considered a target. I never even mentioned his name.”
“No!” Leboeuf exclaimed.
“What could I say? I told him he wasn’t a target and to drop it. He persisted and regurgitated everything I hated and distrusted about Harvey Metcalf, but I kept my privilege. And then Kaito hinted at taking the daughter out, at least that’s what I thought he meant. He said we didn’t have to take Harvey out, we only needed to give him a push. And the way to push Harvey is through his daughters. I wanted Harvey bad…we all did. Why he suggested the daughter is obvious now. We all discussed going off the record on this and, well, from there, you know the rest.”
Geordie sat back down. He watched a few boats go up and down for a number of minutes. He smiled again and a twinkle flickered in his eye. He turned to Leboeuf.
“You know…” he said. He waved one finger in the air again. “There still may be a way we can finish this with Metcalf. I mean properly. Kaito may have even helped us out on this.”
“How so, after what he did?”
Geordie’s boney finger waved about as he talked. “Kaito may have given us more of a push now that I think about it. Whatever happened between Kaito and Harvey at that graveyard was personal. Whatever was said or not said…” he paused and raised one eyebrow. “We don’t even need to know what it was about. Now look where Kaito is tonight.”
Leboeuf frowned. “What are you suggesting?”
“One more envelope, anonymous of course. I want it to include all the victims in the order they perished.”
Leboeuf smiled and raised his glass. “Clever,” he said. “He would definitely understand that Kaito was not the one behind it.”
Geordie responded and raised his glass. “And know that someone is still out there—that someone is still watching.”
