by Lou Allin
Holly smiled at the picture. “No pith helmet?”
“Do knee socks and shorts count? You know the kind. He didn’t feel that beggars belonged in his dream vacation spot. He’d had enough of that sightseeing in Vancouver and Victoria. ‘Are there no workhouses?’ he asked. ‘Then throw the bastards in jail.’ I don’t know how I kept my big mouth shut.”
“We rarely enforce vagrancy laws out here, unless assault’s involved,” Holly said. “Sounds like a malcontent who expected Disneyworld.”
They heard loud music coming from the parking lot as a car door slammed and bootsteps came toward the door. “Morning, ladies, I mean officers.”
Constable Chirakumar (Chipper) Knox Singh gave them a winning smile as he entered. At over six feet in his light-blue custom-made turban, he was Bollywood handsome, a trim beard adding a few years to his boyish, café au lait face. Chipper had entered the force nearly twenty years after Baltej Singh Dhillon had become the first Sikh to wear the turban as a member of the RCMP. Nearly two hundred thousand disgruntled Canadians took the case all the way to the Supreme Court and lost in a landmark decision. The five symbols, including the turban and a symbolic wooden dagger, were becoming familiar to people in the land of multiculturalism. She suspected that he took some grief for his career, and that as they got to know each other, they’d swap stories. She remembered the Playboy cartoons and tampons taped to her rookie locker. It was a broad and dangerous path between waving the white flag and showing some ovaries, so to speak.
Chipper placed his hat in the closet, opened his jacket at the neck and took a seat at his desk, swinging around to face them, the lightest scent of sandalwood drifting their way. “The traffic’s heating up out there, even with gas prices. Guess if you blew two hundred thousand dollars on a diesel RV, what’s a few more bucks?” The provincial government’s two-and-a-half-cent carbon tax, returned in a one-time, chump-change rebate, had seemed negligible when the oil prices soared and now was as irrelevant as a male mosquito.
Holly gave him a nod. In contrast to the more serious Ann, Chipper had at twenty-eight a sunny personality. The fact that he awarded her more respect than did many silverback males gave her confidence in their generation. Women had only been accepted into the force in officer positions in the late Seventies. One had recently climbed to the top in the B.C. forces. “Any contributions for our provincial coffers?”
“A Ducati motorcycle passed me where I was set up with the radar near French Beach. He was doing 150 kmh. Sweet ride, though.” He kissed his long, tapered fingers and mimed a handlebar flourish. “Wish I could afford one. Dad would be fine with it, but I doubt Mom would agree.” Chipper lived at home with his parents over their small store in Langford, closer to Victoria. Speaking of coddled, his mother still starched and ironed his shirts and made his lunch.
“You caught him before he could exit the gene pool, taking someone along, no doubt. Good job. The next all-you-can-eat pizza buffet is on me.” The long and winding road to Port Renfrew attracted motorcycle runs every weekend, especially at the Gordon’s Beach strip, where the speed limit rose to 80 kmh. She didn’t look forward to scraping someone off the pavement on a hairpin turn where the highway had been patched one too many times. The latest cheap-fix method of smearing asphalt on the cracks not only crossed drivers’ eyes but left slippery spots for even experienced riders.
“Back atcha, Guv,” he said, suppressing a wink and knowing that she preferred it to Ma’am, which made her feel older than Ann.
Holly told him about the report on Bailey Bridge. Chipper nodded. “Reg told me that the place attracts in the summer. Last year they were pretty quiet, though. We had a cold, wet summer, so not many came out. This year, with the sunny days, they’re back in business. I’ve only stopped by once. An older guy runs the show. He called me over to take in a teenager sloshed to the eyeballs at noon. We had a bulletin on the kid, turns out. A runaway from Nanaimo. Lucky he barfed before he got into the backseat.” He steepled his hands in a prayer gesture.
“Guess we’d better schedule regular drive-bys,” Holly said, making a mental note.
Chipper stuck out his lower lip and shook his head confidently. “I know that creek. Another month, and it will be dry stones. Everyone will have to move on.”
“Problem solved, but I need to check it out. I’ll take the car,” Holly said. They were limited to an older Impala with a Sooke decal on top of the trunk for air identification, and an ancient Suburban for winter driving in the high hills where snow could lurk. Keeping it full of gas was like pouring water into a sand dune.
*
She drove east from the sheltered enclave of Fossil Bay. Still tenanted by many former loggers and fishermen, its grid of streets had attracted a new crowd. Spying lower prices west of Victoria, retired boomers from Ontario and points east bought its more modest houses and occasional doublewides. The old clapboard grade school from the turn of the century had been refurbished and took students from Otter Point. Shopping was marginal, only a gas station cum convenience store and Nan’s restaurant. Recently a few home businesses had opened, a hair salon, dog kennels, wood salvagers, or personal services like Marilyn’s.
Holly rolled past the unmarked town limits and headed to Bailey Bridge, only too aware of the hazards of gaping at the world-class scenery as a gravel truck rolled around the blind curve, taking the centre line under the laws of physics. She eased off the gas and felt her heart skip several beats.
At this time of year, Bailey Creek was one of the last still flowing in salmon country. It would be a different matter in spawning season. “The persistence of Nature,” said romantic philosophers, but nothing seemed more brutal than battered cohos pushing their way up their natal creeks, flopping shadows of their former iridescence. Short of an emperor penguin wintering five months without food on ice floes with a lone egg incubating between his feet, their ritual sacrifices were heroic.
“Please protect our resource,” the signs at each spawning creek asked. On one side was an entrance to a public beach accessible only at low tide, and on the other, Bailey Creek followed circuitous paths up into the hills. She left the Impala in the sandy lot and headed under the bridge. A generous hollow of concrete held an assortment of shelters on the alluvial plain. The campsite was self-limiting, as Chipper had indicated. But though the rains had ceased, the fruit was oncoming. The salmonberries were emerging, which would draw hungry bears, tired of their spring-grass feed and down for the summer roaming the temperate rainforest. Later would come thimbleberries and finally the hardy Himalayan blackberry with thumb-thick thorny branches.
A grizzled old man with a handsome carved walking stick bearing a fierce eagle on the handle levered his body from a tippy lawn chair and approached her. He wore cut-off jeans, a t-shirt and flip-flops. A healthy tan testified to days outdoors and a shiny metal peace sign hung around his neck, though his salt-and-pepper hair was cut military short. Aging draft dodger? His arms were lean and muscular, though he wore a knee brace. In one discordant note, his left eye, irritated and red, sported a purple bruise. “Morning, officer. Fine day, isn’t it?”
She held out a hand and introduced herself, tucking her cap under her arm. “And you are, sir?”
“Bill Gorse. Formerly of Gorse and Broome.”
This made her arch an eyebrow at mention of two of the island’s most tenacious plants. “Sounds like an old family company.” She wondered if he were joking, like the Dewey, Cheatham and Howe firm in the Click and Clack Tappet Brothers radio show across the pond in Washington State.
“Pshaw,” he added, emphasizing the “p” as her father had when he was in his Gay Nineties period. His sigh was palpable and self-effacing. “It’s a law firm. Still is, for those not partial to corporate ethics. My late father, the Major, and two brothers. I squandered my youth with the family compact, but my nose couldn’t take it. When they started chasing the dollar by representing goddamn mining polluters up north, I said adios. Wrecked Muse Lake with th
eir diesel spills and got off with a paltry five-thousand-dollar fine.” He flicked at a midge, whirling in its vortex. “Couldn’t stomach it. Anyhow, now that we know each other, what can I do you for?”
A lawyer with principles. So much for the jokes sending them to the bottom of the sea to poison the sharks. Why didn’t he pursue the prosecutorial side? Perhaps he was a true maverick and regarded the law itself as an ass. “There was a report of panhandling here.”
He gave an unimpressed cackle then coughed into his hand. “Thought you were into something serious. This is yee-haw land, not the prissy streets of Victoria.” The local area was notoriously casual, the home of bearded Santas driving ancient Westphalias, llama and alpaca shepherds, and small organic farms. The elderly ladies in Sooke and Fossil Bay had mid-afternoon coffee at home instead of tiffin at the Empress Hotel with the blue-rinsed bluebloods. Unless they worked in the city, few people in the Western Communities went to Victoria without a shopping mission.
Holly gave an apologetic shrug. “It was reported, Mr. Gorse. I have to check it out. What’s the story?” So far he’d been the only person she’d seen, but the gear indicated signs of others. She tried for concerned, not intrusive.
He tapped his chest, a few curly grey pelt hairs peeking from his v-neck. “Listen. I’m the old fart boss around here. I try to make a few rules so’s we don’t get into each other’s faces too much. No stealing. Can the noise after ten. Pick up after yourself. Don’t shit where you live, in every sense of the word. Not much different from that guy’s book about kindergarten rules.”
Suppressing a smile at the candor, Holly saw a neat pile of crushed beer cans in a clear plastic bag. “What about drinking or drugs?”
“Hell, drinking’s legal last I heard.”
“Not on the street. We have open-container laws.”
He planted his feet and folded his arms. “We’re not bothering anybody, not about to take a piss against a building. This is where we live. And it’s public land, belongs to the people. Doesn’t say ‘no camping,’ does it? Be reasonable.”
Holly shifted her feet, feeling like a bully. She glanced at her watch. According to the schedule, she had this sunny afternoon off for a change. With the small population, the three-man post kept hours only between eight a.m. and six p.m. Any emergencies were routed to Sooke, a detachment of fourteen with round-the-clock service. “You’re being a wee bit evasive about the drug question. Do I take that as a yes?”
His lined face grew sober and he scratched at his ear, where a silver loop dangled, giving him a pirate look. “I can’t see that you have probable cause for a search, and I wouldn’t be surprised if you turned up some wacky tobaccy. Personal use only. Hard drugs I don’t tolerate.” It was a cliché that the law in Canada ignored pot smoking, but Holly held up a placatory hand and adjusted her posture to official, not combative. She didn’t want this to escalate. No needles or paraphernalia were in view, and no children would be hanging around under Bill’s watch. “No worries, then. If you’re not bothering anyone, stay as long as you want. But let’s get to my reason for coming, the panhandling complaint.” She arched an eyebrow in a 60-40 serious look.
Bill sat down with a grunt on an overturned blue recycling box and flexed his knee. “I’ll tell you straight. Any guy around here pulling any of that crap answers to me. I don’t want problems with the law. We mind our own business. That one asking tourists for money like some bridge troll, I told him to quit it. Next morning he showed up with a camcorder. Said he won it in a card game at the Legion, the liar. It was a high-end Sony.”
Her interest was piqued. One strand led to another in law and society’s tangled webs. She gave a light laugh. “Nobody gambles with camcorders. Probably he stole it. Is he around?”
“Went to hock it, ask me.”
Holly frowned as possibilities tumbled through her mind. “It’s too far to Victoria. More likely he sold it to a kid on the street, or for nothing at a junk shop. What’s his name?” She took out her notebook.
“Says he’s Derek Dunn. I don’t ask for IDs. Hell, sometimes I change my own middle name. Dick used to be an ordinary handle. Now…” He reached down for a bottle of an over-the-counter painkiller, shook out a few, and showed her one. When she blinked, he washed it down with water from a plastic jug.
Dating a fresh page, she wrote down the name and got a brief description, including a shortened right index finger which Derek said had been cut in a table-saw accident. “Thanks for the information. I’ll check on it. For the record, how many…people are staying here now?” She could see at least four makeshift tents of tarps, branches, and plastic sheeting, more for privacy than rain protection, since it was dry under the bridge. All she could smell was the briny tang of the ocean. Where did they take their garbage? And where did they do their business? In the woods? She’d peed on her shoe in the bush more than once. If it were a crime to drop trou in the deep and dark, ninety per cent of the province would be in jail.
He said, “Varies a bit, more on weekends. I draw the line. Should have been a social worker. If a kid tells me he’s been abused, I know where to send him. A youngster didn’t even start shaving came last week. Said his parents were okay with his travelling, but I sent him packing. So…there’s three, counting Joel Hall.” He nudged a thumb toward a sleeping pad on cardboard beside the concrete bridge support. “Haven’t seen him since last night when we had a bit of an altercation. Could be he’s found a lady friend with a soft bed. He’s past fifty but a charmer when he wants to be. You want to hitch into town, any guy with a pickup will stop.”
Holly gave the scene a final scan. Recently a surprising legal decision had cities scrambling. When the B.C. Supreme Court ruled that since the number of shelter beds was “insufficient” for the area’s needs, the homeless had earned the right to erect tents and sleep overnight in parks. Officials were outraged, since they had just spent tens of thousands cleaning up a camp hidden deep in the dense bush of Mill Hill Park, a wild green space in a millionaire community. The next week, a number of homeless people in Victoria had pitched camp in legendary Beacon Hill Park, managing to squash rare flowers. In a renewed game of push and shove, the city responded by counter-ruling that no fires would be tolerated and that tents had to be taken down by seven each morning. The issue of impromptu bathrooms went unmentioned. In the moral outrage and confusion that followed, suddenly another forty-five shelter beds materialized. Out here, far from civilization and away from most eyes, things were different. As long as they kept relatively out of sight, cleaned up their mess, and remained peaceful, people were left alone. They weren’t displacing lawn bowlers or frightening carriage horses in front of the legislature.
“Thanks…Bill. I appreciate your honesty and sense of responsibility,” she said, shaking his hand. “But there is one final important thing.” Timing was critical in policing, and she had learned this technique from her father’s Columbo tapes.
His light green eyes crinkled in suspicion. “What’s that, officer?”
“The dry season is well underway. You’ve seen those signs prohibiting open burning. Even in provincial parks, fires aren’t allowed. We may be rainforest, but the undergrowth gets like tinder. A cigarette butt tossed out a car window can do it. And with those winds off the strait…” She gestured to a colourful para-sailor skittering down the bay.
He gave a cooperative nod. “I hear you. But we gotta boil our water, like for coffee. We don’t want to get sick. It’s hard to haul plastic gallons around. We don’t exactly get deliveries from Culligan.”
“Understandable. Just keep it under the bridge and very small. Leave plenty of clear space around.” As cars whizzed overhead, she looked up at the noisy belly of the bridge. “Sparks won’t travel far under here. A small propane stove would be easier for cooking, though.” She wondered about the black eye but didn’t want to press her advantage. Men were more likely to let the hormones surge. Women had their ranks among the homeless, but they wouldn’t str
and themselves so far from services and safety. Even so, in Vancouver during a savage winter, a woman had burned to death trying to light candles for warmth under her overturned shopping cart.
She left him with a card. “Not that you have a cell phone handy, but any problems or questions, we know each other now.” “Have a good day” wasn’t a phrase she could tolerate. “Glad we could talk” made more sense.
*
Her shift over, Holly continued east, passing Gordon’s Beach, a thin strip of land with a dozen tiny properties on limpet lots, from tumbledown shacks to half-million-dollar Hobbit houses with rounded doors, mullioned windows, and driftwood sculptures. The Beach Box. Four hundred thousand dollars worth of cute. She turned up from West Coast Road onto Otter Point Road then turned left again, climbing into the hills. In the nineteenth century, nearly every acre of the island had lain under timber-company rule, one western god of commerce. Then came the settlers with their agriculture. Only twenty years ago, the street had been farmland, parcelled off in lots of a third of an acre. One bonus was that everyone on the dead-end road knew everyone else’s business. When the police blotter in the weekly Sooke News Mirror listed action, Otter Point Place never made the Hall of Shame. She passed a llama farm, a pottery, and several B&Bs before slowing as two horses clopped down the narrow verge, their young riders wearing equestrian helmets. Some kind soul usually arrived with a shovel and biffed the road apples into the berry hedges as fertilizer.
At a time when she had recently tasted independence in her seven years with the force, Holly found herself living at home, a modern reality for which she made no apologies. With housing prices skyrocketing, few rental opportunities, and relocation every three or four years, she had little choice but to move in with her father. Paying him a nominal fee for bed and board eased her conscience. As well, she mowed the lawn and took out the recyclables and garbage. He cooked. She cleaned. Fair trade.
