The Evil Men Do
Detective John Robichaud Mysteries
by
H Paul Doucette
Digital ISBNs
EPUB 9780228611912
Kindle 9780228612070
Web 9780228611929
Print ISBNs
BWL Print 9780228612087
LSI Print 9780228612100
Amazon Print 9780228612094
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the publisher of this book
Dedication
For Maureen as always
Acknowledgements
BWL Publishing Inc. acknowledges the Province of Alberta for their Provincial Operating Grant for Publishers, for its financial support,
Prologue
June 1941. Year two of the War.
It was a warm summer night and Stella Marchand was out past her curfew with two of her girlfriends, Cathy and Mildred. They were dressed in skirts and blouses that showed off their youthful figures, shapely legs and budding breasts to the best advantage. They all wore make-up borrowed from friends or older sisters and applied to mask their youth. No one looking at them, especially in the diminished light of the night, would have thought they were teenagers — the youngest being only sixteen and the oldest, eighteen.
On this particular night, the teenagers were walking along Gottingen Street past Fort Needham. Men dressed in various uniforms crowded the sidewalks; hanging out around the small park at the end of Young Street. They cruised through the men along with other women. As they walked, the girls were greeted with numerous cat-calls, and whistles, several even tried enticing them to stop awhile for a ‘chat-up’. However, they continued walking; enjoying the attention.
It was nearly eleven o’clock when Cathy, the youngest girl, said maybe it was time they should be heading home. She sounded a bit nervous, looking around at the nearby men and women; some who had obviously been drinking. There were several couples kissing and other things. The girls had stopped walking a while ago and were sitting with three men; two were young sailors wearing black navy uniforms; the third man was in civvies. The sailors appeared to be around eighteen or nineteen. One was sitting next to Stella with an arm around her shoulders, the other was trying to move closer to Mildred. The third man was in his early twenties and sounded foreign, maybe English, or Irish.
“Seriously,” Cathy said, standing up. “We should be going.”
“Oh, don’t be such a poop,” Stella said, giggling. She had taken a drink of the alcohol the men had in a paper bag and it had affected her a little. She was enjoying having these men doting on her and the excitement that seemed to fill the city these days. Besides, she was a woman — almost — like those she liked to watch in the films.
“Yeah, here,” the older man said, offering the bag to Stella. “‘Ave a pull an’ relax.”
He held out the paper bag to Cathy. She shook her head and took a step back from him. Something inside her was warning her to leave.
“Look,” she said, ignoring the man. “I’m leaving. Are you two coming with me?”
The third girl, Millie, who was sitting quietly by, stood up and went to Cathy’s side. Both girls looked at Stella.
“Aw, come on, Cathy,” Stella said to her friend. “It’s still early and I’m having fun.”
She sat up and it looked as if she might go with them.
Cathy shook her head.
“On second thought,” the older man said, sensing the girl might go. “Wouldn’t want ya to git in trouble with yer momma an’ poppa,” he said in a mocking tone. It got the intended reaction.
Stella glared at him for a moment then reached for the bag with the bottle inside, taking it from his hand. She raised the open bottle to her mouth and took a deep swallow, sputtering and coughing as the liquor burned its way down her throat. The effect was almost immediate.
“C’mon Stell,” Cathy pleaded.”
“Yeah, let’s go,” Millie said.
“You go if you want. I’m staying,” Stella said defiantly.
“Okay. Stay,” Cathy said angrily as she and Millie turned and walked away.
Stella watched her friends walk away down the street, pushing their way through the crowd. After a moment she started having second thoughts, but she was rebellious about the chiding from the older man.
“‘Ere, have another drink, pet, an’ fergit ‘bout them,” the man said. “They’s jus’ kids.”
“That’s right,” Stella said, taking the bottle and another drink. She noticed it went down a lot easier this time.
“Listen,” he said, “let’s git another bottle, an’ git away from this crowd an’ have us a bit a real fun. I got a car.”
“Okay,” she said, feeling her head starting to spin.
“I can’t,” the sailor who was sitting next to Millie said, standing up. “I gotta get back to the ship. I’m on watch at midnight. Jus’ drop me at the gate.”
Stella got in the car with the man and young sailor. It was one of those old two door types she saw in a lot of gangster movies. She sat between them on the front seat. After stopping at a house on Creighton Street where the older one went in picked up another bottle, they drove down to the dockyard where the sailor got out. Then the other man headed for the west end, finally arriving at a secluded spot on the Northwest Arm.
The driver steered the car off Purcell’s Cove Road into a copse of trees across from the Revolutionary War prison on Melville Island and turned the motor off. He kidded with her as he inched the car into the trees, giving her more to drink. She accepted the bottle and swigged more of the sweet tasting liquor unaware she was drunk for the first time in her life. Stella failed to notice they were well away from any houses or where anyone passing by would see them.
She was only vaguely aware of the man kissing her and his hand on her breast. At some point, she realized he had his hand on her thigh under her skirt. Somewhere deep inside her drunken mind she sensed something was wrong. When his hand touched the bare skin at the top of her nylons reality kicked in and she tried to resist him with a growing sense of panic.
“‘Ere nona that. Jus’ relax an’ enjoy yourself,” he mumbled in a thick voice as his hand finally reached its destination.
She instinctively tried to cross her thighs.
“I said stop it,” he snapped. “Be good an’ it’ll go easier on ya an’ ya never know, ya might like it.”
Stella’s panic increased and she resisted all the harder. A sharp pain in her face stunned her when he pulled his hand out from under the skirt and punched her.
“See what ‘appens when ya don’t behave,” he snarled.
He pushed his hand back under her skirt again and up to her panties. This time he reached higher until his fingers reached the waistband. He grabbed a handful of the cotton material and roughly yanked them down to her knees.
“Oh God...” she cried, weakly. “Please don’t...please...” This can’t be happening!
He ignored her cries as he tried to pry her legs apart, but she refused to let him. Her actions only angered him more and he punched her again, twice, this time hard enough to push her deeper into the fog of alcohol and pain. Stella was dimly aware of hearing a voice.
He shifted position, pushing the girl’s body down onto the seat. He grabbed the underwear still around her knees and yanked off, raising one of her legs up onto the top of the seat.
Ten minutes later the man stood outside the car doing up his pants. He lit a cig
arette and leaned against the car; the only sounds were the soft moans from inside the car and his pounding heart pulsing in his ears.
He looked in the car at the moaning and battered young girl, suddenly feeling a little sick to his stomach. “Jesus Christ. What’ve I done?” he muttered aloud, turning away.
He took one more drag on the cigarette then flicked it away. He looked back into the car while absentmindedly taking out another cigarette. Looking away again, he lit up, trying to clear his head so he could decide what to do.
He finally made his decision; he opened the back door then reached in and pulled the girl’s unconscious body off the front seat. He managed to get the limp body onto the backseat then he closed the door and went back to the driver’s seat, sliding in behind the wheel and starting the car.
Fifteen minutes later he stopped in an unlit area around the city airport next to a tall row of bushes. He got out and went around to the other side of the car and opened the rear door. Grabbing the girl under her arms, he dragged her unconscious body out of the car and shoved it behind the bushes. When he finished, he quickly headed back to his car, got in and took off. He was shaking; fear and a feeling of disgust souring his stomach
* * *
The night air was cool and clear under a late spring sky. A good night for Jason Rafuse to be out on his routine patrol. He liked cruising his beat at this hour of day. It was quiet just as he liked it. As he drove his patrol car slowly down Coburg Road to Armdale, checking the buildings on either side of the road as he went, he thought about his wife and new baby at home, knowing he would be with them in a few hours.
He had recently been transferred from foot patrol to car patrol after almost a year working the downtown beat. He was happy to be reassigned to the night cruiser patrol and the back shift. This meant he didn’t have to deal with drunken servicemen and civilians, the fights, the prostitutes and other illegal activities anymore, at least not too often. This section of the city was mostly residential and off the beaten track; the downtown and waterfront area being the center of the action.
He was heading around the bend in the road where Chebucto Road led into the access road for Purcell’s Cove and Herring Cove roads. This was the end of his patrol area. There was a small wooded area at the junction that was sometimes used by couples looking for an out of the way spot to have sex.
He slowed down and scanned a large area of bushes edging the road with one of his mounted searchlights. That was when he spotted something odd sticking out from under a section of the bush. He eased the car to the shoulder, keeping the light beam directed on the spot and got out. He had his flashlight in his hand as he stepped on the grass and approached the area. He was about ten feet away when he saw the woman’s legs.
“Miss,” he called out, stepping closer. “Police. Are you alright?” Nothing.
Rafuse stepped up to stand at her feet. She was missing a shoe and her legs were bare. When he reached the area behind the bush, a young woman was lying on her back, her dress torn, and exposing her breasts, the bottom part bunched around her hips. She wasn’t wearing any underwear.
She moaned moan and he shone the flashlight on her face. What he saw made him retch. It looked as if she had been repeatedly punched; her lips were split and bleeding and one eye was swollen shut.
“Sweet Mother of God,” he muttered aloud. He quickly removed his jacket and laid it over her then ran back to the car. He reached for the microphone.
“Car twelve callin’,” he said into the device.
“Twelve, go ahead, over,” a metallic voice said through the speaker.
“Patrol car twelve here, Constable Rafuse callin’ in. I got a woman down. Looks like she’s been attacked, maybe raped, over,” Rafuse said in a controlled voice, though he was far from feeling that way..
“Where are you, over?”
“At the airport on Chebucto Road near Connaught, over.”
“Is she dead, over?”
“No, but she needs an ambulance, over.”
“Right. Stay on site. Will send ambulance and backup, over and out.”
Rafuse put the microphone back on its hook and then turned on his roof light. He went back to where the woman lay and with his flashlight, scanned the surrounding area for any signs or bits of evidence. He found several patches of grass that looked as though someone had been dragged there recently but not much else. He went back to the woman who was starting to move a little.
He bent down and put a hand on her shoulder.
“Take it easy there, miss,” he said softly, holding her down gently. “Help is on the way.”
As if on cue, he heard a siren in the distance. A few minutes later, an ambulance turned the corner from Connaught Avenue and pulled up behind his squad car. The attendants were out and moving toward him with a gurney just as an unmarked car pulled in front of his car and two men in suits got out. The attendants quickly began to check the woman.
“I’m Detective Holloway,” one of the men said. “Whaddya got here?” he asked, as he took in the situation.
“Constable Jason Rafuse. I was on my usual patrol when I spotted something didn’t look right and pulled over to check it out. That’s when I found the woman there,” Rafuse said, indicating the spot where she lay. “I checked her and found she was still alive and called it in.”
“Okay. Did you touch anything?”
“No sir. I did cover her up with my jacket. She was exposed...her clothes were torn.”
“Anything else?”
I took a quick look around an’ found several patches of grass that looked like someone had dragged over it recently over there.” He pointed the beam of his flashlight to an area about ten to fifteen feet away.
“Good work. We’ll take it from here. We’ll need you to write up a report on everything you did from the time you found her and bring it to us at the end of your shift,” Holloway said then joined his partner, who was bent over the woman. He reached down and picked Rafuse’s jacket off the woman and passed it to him as he headed back to his squad car.
* * *
It was a clear day and the seas were unusually calm for a change. Normally, a ship’s crew sailing the northern reaches of the Atlantic would have welcomed such conditions but not now. This was perfect weather for U-boats and land based air attacks. Instead of soaking up the sun, the crew was on high alert for any signs of the enemy.
The first wave of attacks came around mid-afternoon, sending the thirty ships in the convoy into evasive maneuvers. The planes were based in Norway and covered the norther sea zone. The air was filled with the sounds of Heinkel HE 111 bombers and falling bombs. They came out of the sun as they always did, dropping their deadly payloads on their zig-zagging targets below. Some found their marks, dooming them to the deep. After what seemed a lifetime, the raid ended. The surviving ships resumed their courses while two of the escort ships went in search of survivors.
The ship was lucky; the two bombs intended to sink her, fell into the sea and exploded within yards of her on both sides. The concussions from them had caused damage to parts of her engine room as well as springing several hull plates, popping the rivets along the seams. The crew was able to jury-rig repairs, saving her.
Days later, the damaged freighter steamed through the submarine nets that stretched across the harbour mouth from Maugher’s Beach on McNab’s Island to Sleepy Cove under York Redoubt
Her name was Alice and she flew the flag of Australia on her aft jack staff. Two harbour tugs waited on the other side of the nets to take her lines and bring her to the shipyard where men waited to board and begin repairs. It had been a rough crossing for the twenty-year-old vessel, but she had survived.
She was secured alongside a navy frigate that had taken a direct hit on her superstructure from either a bomb or a deck gun. Almost immediately the Alice was secured, and several men with tools and parts from the yard boarded her and headed to the engine room.
It was two days later, and the repairs were ne
aring an end. Below in the engine room, several men were replacing the last of the damaged parts when the accident happened.
The engine room was close, hot and noisy, and smelled of oil, steam and old bilge water. Several men dressed in soiled dungarees and oil stained singlets worked around two Scotch Marine boilers, adjusting valves and wiping down gauges; one stood with his hands on a large wheel attached to a pipe on the side of one boiler while another man bent down looking into the firebox watching the fire burning inside.
Fifteen feet down a catwalk, a man wearing a cap and jacket with two zig-zag blue bands around the cuffs, stood looking between the boilers. He was the third engineer; a Glaswegian named Carlyle, a ruddy faced Scot with florid cheeks and bushy mutton chop whiskers covering most of his cheeks. At the moment, his attention was focused on the two men bent over a pipe, working on a valve that ran from the boilers.
“You men done yet?” Carlyle yelled to the two workmen down at the end between the boilers
“Aye,” one of the workers called back as he stood up and wiped his brow. “Dat otta do it. Open ‘er up.” The other workman stayed bent over the valve.
Carlyle turned and signalled the man holding the wheel, gesturing with a circular motion to open the line. The man gave the wheel three quick turns.
Then all hell broke loose.
A surge of high-pressured steam flowed into the pipe and hit the new connecting valve like a sledgehammer. Suddenly, there was a loud bang and then the area where the two men were working was engulfed in a cloud of scalding steam. Carlyle heard the screams from the two men working on the valve over the hissing of the escaping steam. He immediately turned to the man at the wheel and yelled, “Jesus Christ, shut it down...shut it down.”
The man spun the wheel, shutting down the flow of steam.
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