by John Niven
‘I . . . there . . .’ I flailed around, trying to remember Sammy’s body, ashamed of myself for not being able to recall every inch of her, nausea within me again, my hand covering my face. ‘On her right arm, there’s a brown birthmark on the inside of the forearm. Like a map of Italy.’
Manuel nodded and stood up. ‘If you’re ready then.’
The morgue itself: a large room, cold, as it must be, with a bitter chemical smell. Manuel led the way and Danko walked behind me, almost as though they were guarding me, as though I might crack and make a run for it and for a second the thought crossed my mind: sprint out of here, get to the airport, get on a plane, disappear.
But, once you become a parent, these options are removed from the menu. I thought of my son – at home, hopefully sleeping now – and this actually made me calmer. At the very least you must be stronger than Walt. There was someone who would be even closer to the vortex of pain than I was. (Sam’s parents’ too. That call would have to be made soon. They’d have just arrived. I pictured them unpacking in their suite, or maybe already out by the pool or on the beach when the call that would destroy their lives arrived.)
There were three stainless-steel autopsy tables in the middle of the room. On the furthest away one lay a black rubber body bag. Manuel turned to me and said, ‘If you’d just wait here, Mr Miller.’ He turned back to the table and I heard the riiiip of a zipper being pulled along.
This could all still be a mistake.
I allowed the thought I had been quietly nurturing to have a brief final flourish in my mind before Manuel stood aside and I saw he was gently holding a forearm out of the bag, the hand flopping out, the fingers curled inwards, towards the palm.
The coral-pink nail varnish.
I nodded. ‘That’s Sammy.’
Before I knew what I was doing I reached out and took her hand – it was already cold, the fingers stiff and clutching – and I found myself thinking of the last time I had held her hand on a hospital table, somewhere above us, in this very building: all your attention focused on Sammy, because you are not good with gore, saying ‘Push, baby, push, c’mon, you’re doing good’ and not looking the other way at all until you heard the crying and the midwife was nudging you and holding out a bloody green towel with a tuft of black hair jutting up from it. There were supposed to be more kids but it didn’t seem to happen and then Sam was complaining of stomach pains. After the operation as she wiped away a single tear and smiled, she said, ‘Walt’s perfect. He’s enough.’ ‘Walt’s enough,’ you agreed.
Lost in this, Danko and Manuel respectfully silent, my eyes travelled upwards, across her wrist and onto the faint, coffee-coloured map of Italy. Then I was doubling up, folded in half by an agonising, dry rush of vomit. Because, unable to help myself, I had peered upward, beyond the birthmark, further up Sammy’s arm and into the dark space of the body bag. I saw something smooth and white at the top of the arm and I knew it was bone, that the skin had been flayed off her upper arm.
Then I was on my knees, Danko steadying me as I convulsed, Manuel quickly sliding a plastic bucket in front of me as it all came up: a torrent of duck, spinach and rice, all in a stinging, acidic broth of bloody wine, pumping into the bucket, the agonised sound of my vomiting reverberating around the large, cold room.
21
BACK IN THE anteroom I carefully sipped the paper cupful of water they’d produced from somewhere, my hands still trembling. After what felt like a long time I spoke quietly. ‘I need to call Sammy’s parents. They’re in Hawaii.’
‘We can do that if you’d rather,’ Danko said. I looked up, realising that it was just the two of us in here now, and shook my head. Old Sam. The media. This would be huge news. Walt.
‘Mr Miller,’ Danko began, ‘I need to ask, do you and your wife have any enemies?’
‘Enemies? I, well, Sammy was a newspaper editor. You piss a few people off sometimes but . . .’
‘It’s just, the nature of this attack, the severity, it seems almost . . . personal.’
He let it hang for a moment. I looked at him and said, ‘Sergeant, just tell me. If there’s anything else I should hear, just tell me.’
‘This won’t be easy to hear.’ He cleared his throat. ‘We found needle marks and bruising in the crook of the left elbow, consistent with the recent insertion of an IV drip. There were also ligature marks on both legs and the right arm, suggesting attempts had been made to staunch the bleeding.’
I was just looking at him at this point.
‘The blood work confirmed that high levels of saline and sodium thiopental – an anaesthetic – had been administered in the hours before her death.’
‘I don’t under—’
But I knew. I knew where he was going. But I just kept looking at him, making him say it.
‘It seems like someone kept her alive while they tortured her for some time.’
And now real fear kicked in on top of the horror.
I was going to go home and get the loaded gun from my desk drawer and stick it down the front of my pants and get Walt and get on a plane and get the fuck out of here. I was going to call Mike Rawls and tell him to come and get me and Walt and not to leave our side until whoever had done this to Sammy was locked up. Thinking of Walt, of protecting him, refreshed me, shot a jolt of electricity through me.
‘I need to call Sammy’s parents,’ I said, standing up. ‘Then I want to go home. Right now.’
22
‘ROGER THAT,’ THE pilot said as Regina unspooled quickly below us; my stomach lurching up into my raw throat as the brilliant intersections and sodium lights of downtown quickly gave way to the sparser blocks of light of the suburbs, then just the acres of white below us, the flatness of Saskatchewan, just the glow of the odd farmhouse. Suddenly, with a bang and the feeling of being smacked hard across the sky, the helicopter was blown hard to the right, reeling sideways, the rotors whining in protest as I was thrown across the small cabin and into Danko. ‘Jesus Christ,’ I said.
‘Hang on back there,’ the pilot said, shouting over his shoulder, the instruments glowing green and orange around him, the black night in front of him studded with white tracers of snow. ‘This is gonna be pretty rough. Storm’s moving around a lot.’
I clung on tight to the strap hanging by my window as the helicopter buffeted around, the pilot trying to climb, to get up above it.
I replayed the short conversation I’d just had with Old Sam. His life had been an idyll before that moment: the two of them lying on loungers, the Pacific sun warm on their faces, the splash of swimmers and the clack and clank of waiters setting down food and drink, the smell of suntan lotion and grilling seafood.
Then the manager – whom I’d personally insisted find Mr Sam Myers and take him somewhere private to receive the call – leading him off to an office, or to their suite, and then Old Sam gruffly saying ‘Yeah?’, probably convinced that this was some business nonsense that could have been delayed or delegated. (Though he is good with neither.) Then I was telling him what had happened, omitting the very worst of it, but it still sounding mad and fantastical and just unreal as it came out of my mouth. Silence at first and then a sound I had never heard before – Sam Myers crying.
‘Hang on!’ The pilot shouted. We were dropping now, struggling to hold our line against the snow, which seemed to be coming in horizontally, and I could see our house in front of and below us, just visible through the blizzard, the lights in the wall of windows along the kitchen blazing. Another bang and the helicopter almost swung around 180 degrees. ‘Fuck!’ the pilot said, the panic in his voice scaring me more than anything so far. He was struggling with the joystick, trying to keep us level, to keep the nose pointed into the gale. I could see Irene at the window, silhouetted, watching, as we dropped the last thirty, twenty feet, and then a soft crumping from under us as the helicopter came down into the snow, which was much deeper than when we’d left, sinking down up to its belly, up to the doors. The three of us –
Danko, the pilot and me – all exhaled as one.
‘Nicely done, Matt,’ Danko said, leaning over and putting a hand on the guy’s shoulder. He was flipping switches, killing the engine, the rotors already starting to power down above us.
‘I’m gonna stay here and talk to control,’ the pilot said. I saw now in the instrument glow that his face was bathed in sweat. ‘I don’t know if we’ll get back through that again tonight.’
Irene held the sliding door to the kitchen open for us, looking at me with concern, apprehension, as we came in. The kitchen was warm and filled with cooking smells.
‘I put a lasagne from the freezer in the oven,’ Irene said. ‘I didn’t know if you’d be –’
‘Is Walt sleeping?’ I asked.
‘I doubt it. He only went down ha—’
‘Sammy’s dead, Irene.’
Her hands flew to her face, covering her mouth as though she might scream. ‘She was murdered.’ She did scream then, stifling it with her hands. Danko and Hudson stood behind me, hats off, looking at their boots as Irene came towards me, crying, shaking her head, and we embraced, her big, red, perfumed hair tickling my nose. I was conscious of the breadth of her shoulders.
‘Oh God, oh dear God, Donnie,’ she sobbed into my neck. ‘How? Why would –’ She slumped down into a chair, crying into a tea towel. I crossed the room to the cupboard where we kept the liquor and took out a bottle of brandy and some glasses.
‘What happened?’ Irene asked, breathing hard, dabbing at her eyes with the towel.
‘I’m going to go and talk to Walt. Get it over with.’ I was already pouring myself a huge slug of Rémy Martin. ‘Maybe Sergeant Danko can . . .’
Danko nodded as, just then, his radio crackled into life. ‘Sorry,’ he said, holding up a finger, then, into the radio, ‘Go ahead.’
‘Yeah, she’s moved right around between us and Regina.’ Matt, the pilot, crackly and metallic. ‘We don’t have enough fuel to fly far enough around. No way out of here tonight, I’m afraid.’
‘Roger that,’ Danko said.
‘I’m gonna run some checks. Get a little rest.’
‘Sorry,’ Danko said, turning the radio back down. ‘Looks like we might have to impose on you for the night, Mr Miller.’
‘Donnie’s fine. And don’t worry, we’ve plenty of room.’ I drained my glass and poured another. ‘OK.’
As I headed out of the kitchen, down the hallway towards Walt’s room, I could hear Danko talking to Irene, starting to tell her about Sammy leaving the office unexpectedly that morning. I looked out of the window, towards the pool house, and thought of Herby. Thought of something out there in the storm, stalking us. Stalking what was left of my family. I glanced down the long hallway that ran off to my right, leading to my office, and remembered the gun. I’d get it in a minute, after I’d talked to Walt. I gulped down the brandy, set the glass on the window ledge, and walked on down the hall.
Walt was sitting up in bed with his new phone. He put it down guiltily as I entered. ‘I was just –’ he began.
‘It’s OK,’ I said, sitting down on the edge of his bed, aware as I did so that I was suddenly slightly drunk, but that the drink was coming nowhere close to taking the edge off my nerves. My vision was swimming. The only light in the room came from the powder-blue night light, plugged into the wall socket by his bed. Walt’s fear of the dark. Will he ever get over that now? There were clothes and toys strewn all over the room; cars and guns and swords and helmets, totems Walt would be outgrowing soon, teenage years now beginning somewhere around ten or eleven. There, on his bedside table, was a plate with crumbs and a mug with a film of hot chocolate in the bottom. Sammy must have brought it to him the morning before, before she left for work. Would it have been the last motherly duty she performed for the boy? Did she kiss him as she placed it there? Chastise him for still being in bed? These thoughts piled in too quickly, on top of each other, and I found that I had to put my face in my hands and breathe deeply, and before I knew it, I was crying and reaching for Walt’s hand.
‘Daddy,’ Walt said. ‘What’s wrong? Is it . . .’
‘Mummy had an accident,’ I said. ‘She . . . she’s dead, son.’
With those words I ended Walt’s childhood.
He started blinking rapidly, a nervous tick he has. His eyes were darting around the room, refusing to meet mine, panic setting in. ‘Where is she? When will she come home?’
‘She’s at the hospital. She isn’t coming home, Walt.’
I’m really crying now, scaring him even more.
‘No!’ Walt says fiercely. ‘I want to see Mommy!’
I flash on that white nub of bone.
‘Oh, son. You can’t . . .’
‘NO!’
I pull Walt to me as his tears begin, hot against my neck.
We held each other, crying softly for a long time, until I became aware of a gentle knocking at the door. ‘Come in,’ I said thickly and Officer Hudson came in holding a glass of chocolate milk, milk I knew was laced with Valium. ‘Hi, Walt,’ she said. ‘I brought you a drink.’
She sat down next to Walt on the bed. ‘Ow!’ She winced as she sat down and adjusted her black police-issue waistcoat. ‘What’s wrong?’ Walt sniffed.
‘Look,’ Hudson said. She unzipped the waistcoat and showed Walt a metal panel hidden in the lining.
‘What’s that?’ Walt asked.
‘It stops bullets. Like Superman.’
Walt knocked his fist against the metal, fascinated.
‘Knock knock,’ Hudson said.
23
‘SHE’S VERY GOOD,’ Danko said softly, as I poured us both another brandy. ‘Hudson? One of the best I’ve worked with at this sort of thing.’ I nodded, looking at the snow sheeting sideways past the windows, the wind audible even through the thick glass. The helicopter was half buried now. Irene moved around in the background, gathering cutlery and plates. It was nearly ten o’clock. ‘Donnie,’ Danko said after a moment, ‘if you want to be on your own . . .’
‘No, it’s OK. I just . . .’ I was hollow, all adrenalin burned off. Talking to Walt had taken about everything I had in me.
‘Did you speak to Sammy’s parents?’ Irene asked quietly.
‘They’re trying to get on the last flight out of Hawaii tonight. Gets into LA around six tomorrow morning. They probably won’t be here until tomorrow night.’ Irene nodded. I pictured Sammy’s parents on the flight, lost in grief in first class.
The door opened and Hudson came in. ‘He’s asleep.’
‘Thank you,’ I said. ‘Did . . . did he say anything?’
‘Not much. He wanted to see my gun. He was exhausted.’
Silence. The wind. The hum of the oven.
‘Sorry,’ Hudson said. ‘Is there somewhere I could get some rest? Been at it since five this morning.’
‘Sure,’ I said getting up. ‘I’ll –’
‘You sit down, Donnie,’ Irene said, passing behind my chair, touching my shoulder. ‘I’ll show Officer Hudson one of the guest rooms. I put the pilot, Mr –’
‘Matt,’ Danko said.
‘I put Matt in the room down the end.’
‘Thanks, Irene.’
‘Goodnight,’ Hudson said.
‘Please,’ I said, turning back to Danko, ‘if you want to turn in too, go right ahead.’
‘I’ll stay up and finish this, if that’s OK?’ He raised his brandy tumbler. ‘Maybe have some of that lasagne.’
‘Sure.’ I was glad. I wanted conversation, distraction. Anything to keep me from picturing what I knew I was going to be picturing as soon as I was alone. Tortured her. I realised I was going to be picturing that every day for the rest of my life. Walt too, once he was old enough to understand everything that happened. To google his mother’s name and read the newspaper reports online. I shook my head, shaking those thoughts away, and sipped my drink. Danko looked around the huge kitchen and said, ‘Very nice place you have here, Donnie.’
‘Don’t be,’ Danko said. ‘Funnily enough, it’s a fairly common reaction.’
‘Have you done a lot of this kind of thing?’
‘More than I’d have liked to.’ He shook his head, repeated it. ‘More than I’d have liked to.’
‘It must be hard on you guys too.’
‘Well, you get some folk just can’t do it. I used to work with a fella, Ellison, was it?’ He scratched his silvery stubble, thinking. ‘Yeah, Joe Ellison. He –’ Danko stopped and looked up at me. ‘Sorry, you sure you want to hear about this stuff?’
I nodded and reached for the bottle.
‘Well, we had to go and tell this couple their daughter had been killed. RTA, north of here, near Moosejaw. We were partners, but we hadn’t been working together long. This was some years back, you understand. Anyway, I’d done the last one we had, talked to the family? So it was his turn and he didn’t want to do it. “Come on, Joe,” I said. “Fair’s fair. I did the last one.” So, we got in there, and as soon as folk see you unexpectedly they’re thinking the worst of course, and he says, “I’m afraid we have some bad news concerning your daughter.” And this woman, straight away, she just says, “She’s dead!” And Joe says, “You’re right!” and he bursts out laughing.’ I laughed. ‘Yeah. He just couldn’t handle . . . the intensity of the whole thing. Boy, we got torn to pieces by the Captain on that.’ Danko shook his head as I topped us up.
The door opened and Irene came back in, humming with womanly efficiency, wearing oven gloves as she headed for the stove.
‘I guess it’s just too much for some people to handle,’ Danko said. ‘Laughing like that? Just a kink in the old fight or flight mechanism.’ He sipped his drink and spoke over his shoulder to Irene. ‘Boy that smells good, ma’am.’ Irene came over and stood behind him, smiling, still wearing the oven mitts. ‘I guess that brandy’s sharpened my appetite up. I –’
