Cal Rogan Mysteries, Books 4, 5 & 6 (Box Set)

by Robert P. French

  Jen asks. “After their mother’s death, they reconnected with their father. Do you know anything about that Father?”

  “Not a lot. By that time the Church had moved me out here to Vancouver. I went back to Sainte-Foy to officiate at poor Clarisse’s funeral and that was the last time I saw Annalise face-to-face. So I really don’t know much about her later relationship with the father. By that time, Denis had also moved out to Vancouver to work at UBC’s computer science department. It was about the time his father showed up here that he stopped taking his schizophrenia medications. I don’t know if the father was the cause but I wouldn’t be surprised.”

  I can’t think what to ask him next. I look at Jen to see if she has any ideas but she just shrugs. I hand him one of my cards and ask him to call me if he thinks of anything that might be relevant.

  As he rises to show us out, he asks, “Do you know his friends Ghost and Tommy?” When I answer, he asks, “How are they handling his death?”

  “With alcohol,” I say and the question triggers a thought. “I promised them I would arrange a proper funeral for him. I’m sure he would want to be buried by you, Father, I’d be happy to pay if you could make the arrangements.”

  The thought of giving Denis a proper resting place seems to bring some solace to the old priest and we discuss the details before Jen and I leave.

  But when we do leave, I still have the nagging feeling we’re missing something.

  “It looks like we’ve drawn a blank.” Jen is not a happy camper.

  “Don’t worry,” says Stammo. “It’s like this in every case. Just when you think you’re stuck, something shows up. Take the rest of the weekend off and see what Monday brings.”

  “On Monday morning, I have to be back at my desk in Ottawa. My boss thinks I’m off sick, remember? I was just hoping we could find the connection between Annie and Denis’ deaths. But we don’t really have anything.”

  Adry, ever positive, says, “Well at least you found out how to send a letter to a homeless man.”

  Jen smiles, “Yeah, I guess so.” She sighs and the smile slips from her face. “I might as well go back to my hotel and check out. I’m going to see if I can get a flight back this afternoon. It’ll give me tomorrow to get over the jet lag and work out how I’m going to tell my bosses that Annalise was having an affair with the Minister of National Defence and explain to him how I know that without telling him about my unauthorized trip here. I’ll come by and see you guys before I leave.”

  After she goes, I ask Adry to add our two new pieces of information—the facts that Denis and Annalise were twins and that their father was Sir Samuel Fetherstonhaugh—to our file.

  Time to switch gears.

  “Nick, we need to go over your plans for getting Susan Grey off the hook that David Fox has her on.”

  “Don’t sweat it Rogan, it’s all set. As soon as I get the call from Tusk I’ll put it all in motion.”

  “I know. I just think I should be there with you.”

  “No. Adding a new face might scare him off. Don’t worry, here’s how it’s going to go down.”

  As he goes over his plan, I quiz him on the details and I have to admit that he’s covered all the bases. It doesn’t completely stop me worrying. What if—

  “Guys! Come and look at this.” Adry’s excited yell cuts off my thought.

  Stammo wheels towards the reception area and I follow. “Whatcha got?” he asks.

  She gives us a big smile. “After you gave me the information about Denis and Annalise’s father, I put it in the file and thought I’d do some digging. Guess what I found?”

  She laughs at our blank faces and angles her screen so that we can see the Wikipedia page she has open. It is titled Samuel V. Fetherstonhaugh and to the right is the picture of an unsmiling face with a severe expression.

  “Jeez. I wouldn’t want him as a father,” Stammo grunts.

  “What did you find Adry?” I ask.

  “Look at the first line. It says, ‘Sir Samuel Fetherstonhaugh was a Major in the British army and a member of the Most Noble Order of the Garter.’ That was what Denis meant in the hint file when he said ‘garter is the key’. It wasn’t about a woman’s garter or a garter snake, it was a reference to his father. Maybe his father’s name is the key to decrypt the document that was on the memory card.”

  The stunned silence only lasts for a moment.

  “Well done Adry!” I say.

  “Atta girl!” yells Stammo.

  “Email me the link to that page please,” I say. As soon as my phone beeps, I open my email and forward the link to Damien Crotty with an explanation.

  “In a minute we may know what was so important about that document that Denis decided to encrypt it,” I can’t keep the glee out of my voice.

  My phone beeps again.

  “That was quick,” Stammo says.

  The email wipes the glee away. It’s from Damien, or rather from his email autoresponder. I have gone hiking for the weekend and will be out of cell range until Sunday night. I will reply to this email on Monday.

  “Damn,” says Adry. “I really wanted to know.”

  “Crap!” Stammo says. “Who the hell goes hiking in the first week of December?”

  Then it hits me.

  “You know who can probably decrypt it?” I say. “Jen. She’s a CSIS intelligence officer. She must have software to decrypt stuff. I’ll call her.”

  As I pull the phone out of my pocket, it rings. I tap ‘Accept’. “Hi, Ghost,” I say, “I’m in a bit of a rush. Can I call you back.”

  “Oh, yeah, I suppose. It’s just that one of the guys I gave that drawing to has seen him.”

  “The drawing of the big guy who took Wily out of the Balmoral?” I ask.

  “Yeah, him. My buddy Dougie Blake thinks he saw him downtown. You remember Dougie, right Rocky?”He chuckles. “Him and Roy was always arguing about stuff. Like the time—”

  I cut short what could be a long story. “When did Dougie see him, Ghost?”

  “A couple of minutes ago. He jus’ called me.”

  I can feel the adrenaline kick in. “Where was he?”

  “I toldja, downtown.”

  Curbing the urge to scream, I say, as calmly as I can, “Whereabouts downtown did Dougie say he was.”

  “Oh…” A pause. “I never asked him, Rock. Sorry.”

  “Just give me his number.”

  He rattles off the number of Dougie’s mobile then asks, “I still get the hundred bucks, eh?”

  “Yes, Freddie too. I’ll call you back soon.”

  I hang up and dial.

  “Who’s this?”

  “Hey, Dougie. It’s Rocky Rogan.”

  “Hello Rocky. Haven’t seen you in ages, how’s Roy?”

  If Dougie doesn’t remember that Roy’s been dead for some three years, I’m not sanguine about the chances of him having actually seen the person who most likely beat Wily to death. “Listen, Dougie, this is really important.” I cut to the chase. “Where are you standing, right now?”

  “Right outside where I saw that guy in the picture Ghost gave me.”

  With all the patience I can muster, I say, “And where exactly is that?”

  “Oh, yeah. Right.” He chuckles. “I’m on Hornby. Right outside the Devonshire. It’s where the guy went in.”

  The electricity shoots up my spine and I can feel the hair on the back of my neck standing to attention.

  What’s Wily’s murderer doing in Jen’s hotel?

  I’m not as fit as I used to be. When I got no reply from Jen’s phone, I decided it would be quicker to run the three blocks from our office to the Devonshire than to get my car out of the parkade, thread my way through downtown Vancouver’s lunchtime traffic and then find a place to park near the hotel.

  Good theory. Except that it’s five blocks not three and I’m standing at the Devonshire’s check-in desk trying to catch my breath.

  “I urgently need to talk to one of you
r guests,” I pant, “Jennifer Halley.”

  “I’m sorry sir, you just missed her. She checked out about ten minutes ago.”

  Damn.

  “Was there anyone else looking for her? A big guy, kind of tough looking.”

  “Oh yes. Only he wasn’t looking for her. They checked out together.”

  My mind revs, trying to process this information.

  “He was staying here with her?” I ask.

  “I assume so. They came to the desk together.”

  This doesn’t make sense.

  “Do you know his name?”

  She checks her computer. “The room was booked in her name and there’s no mention of another guest.”

  “Do you know if they checked in together?”

  “I have no idea.” She checks the computer again. “She was booked in by one of my colleagues early on Thursday morning.”

  “Would it be possible to speak to your colleague?” I ask. She looks unsure. “It’s really important.” I can hear the pleading in my voice. So can she.

  “Just a minute.” She smiles as she picks up her phone and dials. After a moment she says, “Oh hi. This is Melanie at the front desk, I need Jack Novak’s phone number.” She listens and scribbles down a number, says, “Thanks so much,” hangs up and dials.

  She frowns. “I’m afraid his phone’s not on at the moment. I’m not allowed to give you his number but if you give me your number, I could try again later and get him to call you.”

  I thank her effusively as I hand her my card.

  My mind’s in turmoil as I head for the door. I have some big questions buzzing around in my head. I pull out my phone and go to the recent calls list.

  He answers on the second ring. “Who’s this?”

  “Hi Dougie, it’s Rocky again.”

  “Hi Rocky, I was just gonna call you.”

  “That’s great Dougie but I need to ask you something. After I spoke to you did you hang around outside the Devonshire?”

  “Nah. The doormen there doesn’t go for the likes of me hanging around their swanky hotel.”

  “So you never saw that guy leave there.”

  “Nah.”

  Damn.

  “But I’ve seen him again.”

  “When?”

  “Just a minute ago. That’s why I was going to call you. After I spoke to you I was walking down Howe and when I got to Hastings, I crossed the road and there he was walking down the street with this good-looking woman.”

  “Fairly tall? Short, dark hair and blue eyes?”

  “Yeah, that’s her.”

  “Did you see where they went?”

  “Nah. They just got in a grey car and drove off.”

  “Did she look like she was being forced into the car?”

  “Forced? Nah. She was laughing at something he said.”

  Nothing makes sense. This isn’t good.

  “You didn’t see what make of car it was did you Dougie?”

  “I can’t tell one car from another. They all look the same to me, these days.”

  I sigh. “Ok, man. Thanks. I’ll make sure you get a bonus for this.”

  “Oh, yeah. Ole Ghost said there’d be a hundred in it for me.”

  “Yes for sure. You’ve been great.”

  “So let me ask you something, Rocky,” he says and the tone of his voice has changed, and not in a good way. “How much extra for the license plate of the car they drove off in?”

  My heart misses a beat. “You got the license plate?” He grunts affirmatively. “I’ll give you an extra fifty.”

  “Make it a ton and you have yourself a deal.”

  “Deal. What was the number.”

  “How do I know I can trust you? When you were on the streets you did some hinky stuff.”

  He’s not wrong. “Where are you Dougie? I’ll come and get you and give you the cash.”

  “That tiny little park just opposite where Hornby runs into Hastings.”

  “Stay there, I’m on my way.”

  I hang up, push through the doors of the Devonshire, take a right turn and start to jog north on Hornby.

  If Dougie’s right, and it’s a big if, then Jen is working with the guy who killed Denis Lamarche.

  She’s been playing us.

  I check my watch. Six minutes to get to Hornby and Hastings with a stop at the bank to get the cash. The lights are against me and the traffic on Hastings is too heavy for me to run across. I can see the ‘park’. It is a strip of land, the width of a building, that runs between the Vancouver Club and the Terminal City Club, two establishments frequented by Vancouver’s elite. Shakespeare would have enjoyed the irony of meeting a homeless man between these two bastions of wealth.

  The lights change and I sprint across the street.

  There’s no sign of Dougie in the park.

  There are just a few people hurrying through on their ways to or from lunch. I peer through the windows of the upscale Mink coffee shop; Dougie’s just ornery enough to go in there. But he didn’t. Ahead, I can see the flashing red lights of an ambulance. I stride towards them and as I approach the steps leading down to Cordova, I see him. He’s lying, prone and motionless, at the bottom of the steps. He’s being attended to by paramedics. Beside him is his shopping cart, on its side, all his worldly possessions strewn down the steps and on the ground.

  I run down the steps, taking care not to trip on Dougie’s stuff. “Is he OK?” I ask, realizing, too late, that it’s a dumb question. The paramedics ignore me. They are trying to attach a collar to immobilize his neck.

  “Do you know this man sir?” I turn to the familiar voice. Surprise seeps onto his face. “Hello, Rogan.” It’s Sarge, a long time member of the VPD. We have history. Latterly, none of it good. “What are you doing here?” he asks.

  “I was supposed to meet him here. He had some information for me. What happened to him?”

  “Fell down the steps apparently.” His eyes drill into mine. “So you knew him.” I can’t tell if it’s a question or an accusation. I nod and give him Dougie’s name which he scribbles in his notebook.

  The paramedics have affixed the collar and are strapping a board to his back.

  “Looks bad. Who saw it happen?” I ask.

  Sarge inclines his head. “Lady over there.”

  He is indicating a tall woman wearing a worried expression and a hijab. “Mind if I talk to her?” He shrugs, so I walk across to her.

  After introducing myself, I ask, “Did he just fall?”

  “Was he a friend of yours?” she asks, sympathy and concern written on her face.

  “Yes, kind of.”

  “I’m sorry. I think your friend might have been drunk.”

  “It’s after ten in the morning, so he almost certainly was.”

  She gives a shy smile. “I was heading back to work. As I approached the steps I looked up and saw him glaring down at me. He shouted something about ‘terrorists’ and took one of his hands, his left hand actually, off the shopping cart and shook his fist at me. It made him lose his balance and he fell, pulling his cart after him.”

  “Was there anyone near him when he fell?”

  She thinks for a moment. “No, I don’t think so.”

  “Thanks,” I say. “I’m sorry he shouted at you.”

  “Since the Ottawa bombing,” she smiles ruefully, “he’s the third. I’m just sorry that he fell. I hope he’s going to be all right.”

  The unconscious Dougie has been strapped to the board and they are lifting him onto a stretcher. “Thanks again.” I smile at her. “You’re very kind. Ignore the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune. People like Dougie don’t know any better.”

  “Thank you for that,” she says.

  I just smile and nod and head over to the ambulance. “Which hospital are you taking him to?” I ask the taller paramedic.

  “St. Paul’s,” she says.

  “Any idea when he’s going to regain consciousness?”

  She
just shrugs as she slides the stretcher into the ambulance. She climbs in and closes the back door.

  I stand and watch as the ambulance pulls away from the curb taking with it our one lead to the murderer of Denis Lamarche. It’s firmly locked inside Dougie’s head.

  12

  Nick

  It’s over twenty-four hours since I talked to Tusk in the biker bar and there’s been no contact. Our one hope of getting Susan Grey off the hook does not look as promising as it did when we planned it all out in the office yesterday morning. When I call Etienne Grey on Monday, he is going to be—

  Adry’s laughter cuts into my thoughts. “Come and see this, Nick,” she calls out. I wheel away from my desk and just as I get to the reception area, Rogan backs through the glass doors pulling a Costco cart full of junk. Adry gets up from her desk and holds the door open for him. “Been shopping, Cal?” she asks giggling.

  He’s not amused.

  But I am. “Been blowing your paycheck on luxury items have you, Rogan?” He gets the cart into the reception area and it hits me. “Phew! Did something die in there?”

  “I’m keeping it for the one person who might have a clue as to where Annalise and Denis Larmarche’s murderer might be.”

  His words bring me down to earth again. “What happened when you got to the hotel?”

  “We’ve got some stuff we have to work out. Come on, you too, Adry.”

  He gives us a run down of his trip to the Devonshire hotel and his failed meeting with some character named Dougie.

  When he finishes, I look across at Adry and she’s sitting there with her mouth open in disbelief. “Jen knows the guy who killed Denis Lamarche?” she says.

  Rogan just nods.

  “Shit!” I say. “I was sure she was one of the good guys.”

  “Me too,” he says. “But Dougie said she was laughing at what the big guy was saying as they got into his car.”

  “Why would a CSIS intelligence officer be involved with a murderer?” I ask.

  “In the States, the CIA has got involved with some pretty sketchy characters from time to time, maybe we’re just catching up.”