Hard Winter Rain

by Michael Blair

  She shook her head. “It wasn’t rape, really. I mean, I didn’t say no or anything. I just asked him to wait till I could, um, take precautions. In those days the pill wasn’t as easy to get as it is today, especially if you weren’t married. After the first time with Randy I’d started using a diaphragm. I only wanted a couple of minutes to go to the bathroom. But he couldn’t wait.”

  Or wouldn’t, Shoe thought. “Does Bill know he has a daughter?”

  “Yes. I told him as soon as I knew. He wanted me to get an abortion, of course, and offered to pay for it, but I couldn’t do that. So I let him talk me into telling Randy the baby was his. I felt bad about lying to him, but I didn’t know what else to do.” Her voice was thick and tears glittered in her lashes. She carefully dabbed at her eyes with a bunched-up red paper napkin. “I’m sorry I lied to you,” she said.

  “I understand,” Shoe said.

  “I just didn’t want there to be any secrets between us,” she said.

  Her cheeks were flushed from the cognac and her eyes were heavy-lidded. Shoe was suddenly acutely aware of the ripeness of her mouth, the depth of her bosom as her breasts rose and fell with each slow breath, and his own involuntary physiological response.

  “I called him today,” she said. “To ask him if he knew where Annie was. He said he didn’t...” She hesitated.

  “You don’t believe him?”

  She shook her head. Strands of dark hair came loose, looping over her eyes. “I don’t know.” Sitting up, she removed the rest of the pins and fluffed her hair with her fingers. He became aware of the scent of her, warm and musky, like sun on skin.

  “Do you recall Bill ever mentioning a woman named Claire Powkowski?” he asked.

  “No, I don’t think so. Who is she?”

  “She helped him get started after the war and was his partner until she died in 1959, shortly after Bill became engaged to Elizabeth Lindell.” He hesitated for a moment, then said, “She was also his lover until the mid-fifties.”

  Barbara shook her head. “I don’t recognize the name,” she said. There was still a little cognac in her glass, but she leaned forward and placed it on the coffee table. “I think I’ve had enough of this,” she said, hair falling over her eyes. She brushed it back. “Would you excuse me for a minute,” she said, standing up.

  “Certainly,” he said, standing with her.

  She made her way to the bathroom, a little unsteadily, he thought. He resumed his seat. Perhaps it was time to say good night, before things got out of hand. He was tempted to stay, though. It had been a while since he’d been with a woman, let alone a woman as attractive and, if he was reading the signs correctly, as available as Barbara. However, he could never be certain she wasn’t offering herself out of gratitude, and he had no desire to join the ranks of men who, like Bill Hammond, had used her as a convenient means to scratch a biological itch.

  He heard the toilet flush, and a few seconds later Barbara came out of the bathroom. Her hair was brushed and her colour was high and when he stood as she drew near he detected the scent of mint on her breath. Another button of her blouse was open. She smiled shyly. He wondered if she’d inserted a diaphragm while she was in the bathroom.

  “I should go,” he said. Her face fell. “Thank you for a very pleasant evening.”

  “I—I was hoping you’d stay,” she said, voice low and husky, expression hopeful.

  “I don’t think that would be a good idea,” he said, even as his pulse quickened and he began to grow aroused.

  “I don’t expect—it doesn’t have to be—I mean, there wouldn’t be any strings,” she finally managed to say. “Or—or don’t you—you like me?”

  “That’s not it at all,” he said. “You’re a very attractive and desirable woman. But—you don’t owe me anything.”

  “Yes, I do.” Her mouth quivered and tears formed in her lashes. Her mascara was dissolving, streaking her cheeks.

  “Your friendship is enough.”

  “I—I’m—I’m sorry,” she stammered, wiping her eyes, smearing her makeup. “I’m not used to men who don’t have ulterior motives. It makes me—I want you to stay even more now.” She looked at the mascara on her fingertips. “Oh, god, I must look a fright.” She excused herself again and went back into the bathroom. She didn’t shut the door this time, and when she emerged, the black was gone from around her eyes, but they were still red-rimmed.

  “I’m sorry,” she apologized again. “You must think I’m such a ninny.”

  “Not at all,” he said.

  “You’re right, though,” she said with a weak smile. “I’m disappointed, but you’re right. Let’s get to know each other better before, well, jumping into things.” She took his coat and hat down from the hooks by the front door, helped him on with his coat, then handed him his hat. “Will I see you again?” she asked. “I haven’t frightened you off, have I?”

  “No,” he said. “We’ll see each other again.”

  “Good,” she said, standing on her toes and kissing him on the mouth. “Good.” She opened the door.

  “Good night,” he said. He went out into the hall.

  “Good night,” she said. She smiled at him and closed the door behind him.

  He waited until he heard the thud of the deadbolt and the rattle of the chain lock, then went down the stairs. As he left the building and walked through the rain toward his car, he didn’t feel the least bit proud of himself. Why couldn’t he have given her what she had obviously wanted and taken her at her word that there wouldn’t be any strings? Instead, he’d left her with a false sense of hope for something more. Or was it false hope? He hadn’t lied when he’d told her he found her attractive and desirable, but the attraction he felt was purely sexual. But so what? He’d had sexual relationships in the past without feeling guilty about it. Why start now?

  No answer was forthcoming.

  In his self-absorbed funk, he didn’t see Del Tilley at the wheel of the blue Cavalier parked across the street from Barbara’s apartment building. Nor did he see Tilley get out of the car, dash across the street, and go into the vestibule, where he pressed the button above her mail slot. When the door release buzzed, Tilley pulled open the door and climbed the stairs. When he got to her apartment, the door was slightly ajar.

  “Did you change your mind?” he heard her call.

  When Shoe got home, the light was blinking again on his answering machine. He pressed “Play.” When the tape had rewound, he was relieved to hear Muriel’s voice. “Start shopping for that sailboat,” she said. “As of the end of the month, I’m available to crew for you. Call me when you get home and I’ll tell you all about it.”

  It was nine-thirty. He called her, but her line was busy. He tried again a few minutes later after changing out of his damp clothes. She answered on the third ring.

  “I hope the offer’s still open,” she said.

  “What happened?”

  “In sixteen years,” she said, “he’s called me every name in the book. Nag, bitch, ball-breaker, harpy. He even called me a stupid cow once. Sticks and stones,” she added, a shrug in her voice. “And let’s be honest, I do nag and I can be a bitch sometimes. But he’d never used a racist epithet before. It was the final straw.”

  “I’ll talk to Jimmy Young,” Shoe said. “I’m sure he can find something reasonable. Maybe Patrick’s Hunter is still around.”

  “He got a strange phone call today, too,” she said. “From a woman named Barbara Reese. She claimed she was an old friend of his. At first he didn’t want to speak to her, but he changed his mind. The call didn’t last long, though. Do you know her?”

  “She’s Randy Jenks’ widow,” he said. “Bill Hammond’s former mistress.” He told her about the fifteen-year affair, her pregnancy and marriage to Randy Jenks, and the baby girl she put up for adoption. “That’s why she called him,” he said. “To ask him if he knew where she was.”

  “And does he?”

  “He says not. She isn
’t sure she believes him.”

  “My god,” Muriel said. “Do you think it’s true?”

  “I can’t imagine that she’d lie about it,” Shoe said. “She, ah, didn’t want there to be any secrets between us,” he added uneasily.

  “She’s in love with you?” Muriel said softly.

  “She’s grateful to me,” Shoe replied. “She’d lost both her jobs. I helped her find another one.”

  “I must say, you’ve had an eventful day.”

  “There’s more,” he said, and he told her about his afternoon meeting with Ramona Ross.

  “Is there a connection between Patrick’s murder and this Claire Powkowski?” Muriel asked.

  “If so,” Shoe said, “it’s a tenuous one.”

  chapter twelve

  Wednesday, December 22

  At nine-thirty on the morning of the shortest day of the year, the first official day of winter, Shoe pushed through the heavy glass doors into the executive reception area of Hammond Industries. Muriel was not at her desk. Perhaps, he thought, she had decided to stay home after all, but he saw that her computer was on and a cup of tea stood cooling by the keyboard. He briefly considered waiting for her to return, but instead went straight into Bill Hammond’s office without knocking.

  “What are you doing here?” Hammond demanded gruffly from behind his desk. There was something in his eyes that Shoe had never seen before. It was fear. He reached for the telephone. “Do I need to call security?”

  “No,” Shoe said. “I’m not staying long.”

  “What do you want?”

  “I saw Barbara Reese again last night. She told me about your daughter.”

  Hammond laughed, a gruff, humourless bark. “She’s still stringing that line, is she? It’s the oldest game in the book, for crissake. She got knocked up and tried to claim the kid was mine. It wasn’t. She was a tramp. Who knew how many men she spread her legs for? If Raymond had found out, though, he’d’ve had my balls for bookends, so I gave her some money and told her I’d make sure she and the kid were taken care of if she agreed to keep her mouth shut and marry Jenks.”

  “She’s lying then?”

  “Of course she’s lying. She’s a whore. Whores lie. It’s in their natures. But, Christ, I never met anyone who liked sex the way she did. She’d do it at the drop of a hat, any way, anywhere, with anyone.” He shook his head slowly. “If she looks a tenth as good as she did thirty years ago...” He grinned lecherously. “Did she offer you any of it?” When Shoe didn’t answer, Hammond shrugged. “As it was, Jenks didn’t believe the kid was his any more than I believed it was mine. He was an abusive bastard, though, so when she asked me to help her put the baby up for adoption, I did.”

  “Do you know what happened to her?”

  “The baby? No, of course not. Why should I?”

  “No reason,” Shoe said.

  Hammond fell silent, eyes unfocused, and for a dozen seconds or so he was somewhere else. Then he shook himself like a dog coming out of the water, an ancient and arthritic dog, and returned to the present. He looked at Shoe. “Is that it?”

  Shoe hesitated.

  “What, for crissake?” Hammond snapped.

  “I had a long talk with Ramona Ross yesterday.”

  “Bully for you.”

  “You remember her now?”

  “Nice legs, big tits? So what?”

  “She thinks you killed Claire Powkowski. She told me Claire was jealous of Elizabeth and threatened to reveal your relationship to Raymond Lindell unless you called off the engagement.”

  Hammond snorted contemptuously. “That’s a load of crap,” he said. “Claire couldn’t have cared less if I married Elizabeth. Do you remember once telling me that all whores were greedy and stupid?”

  “I believe the term I used was ‘street whores.’”

  “Which describes Claire Powkowski perfectly.”

  “According to Ramona Ross, she helped you get started in the trucking business.”

  “She put up some money,” Hammond conceded. “In return, I gave her a piece of the company. But in the end she was still a whore. When I tried to buy her out, she tried to blackmail me into paying her ten times what her share was worth. It was an empty threat, though. She had no intention of killing her own golden goose. Claire was greedy and stupid, but not that stupid. I told her to go ahead and tell Raymond anything she wanted, see how far it got her. And while she was at it, I told her, mention the name Patricia Johnson.” He paused, waiting expectantly.

  “Who was Patricia Johnson?” Shoe asked.

  Hammond’s grin was feral. “Patricia Johnson was the whore who made regular visits to the suite Raymond kept at the Hotel Vancouver.” He stared at Shoe for the space of a few heartbeats. Then he said, “Are you through?”

  “Yes,” Shoe replied.

  “Then get out,” Hammond said with a wave of his hand.

  With a flick of his wrist, Hammond dismissed a quarter-century of Shoe’s life. Shoe felt as though he’d been gutted, surgically opened up and hollowed out, afraid that if he spoke he would hear echoes in his head. So without a further word, he turned and walked out the door.

  Muriel looked up from behind her desk as he exited Hammond’s office. Her face was pinched and her mouth was turned down at the corners. “There you are,” she said. She smiled, but it was a strained smile, quickly gone.

  “What’s wrong?” Shoe asked.

  “The woman I was training,” she said. “She quit. He told her she looked like a bulldog with gas. She called him an insensitive bastard and ran out crying. When I told him that I agreed with her and had half a mind to leave with her, he started ranting about how I was a traitor and accused me of plotting against him with you and Patrick and Charlie Merigold. God, I don’t think I can last the rest of the month.”

  “Don’t try,” he said. “Let’s go.”

  She looked uncertain. “If it was just him,” she said, “I wouldn’t hesitate for a second, but there are other people to consider. I’d feel like I was abandoning them.”

  “There’s nothing you can do for them,” Shoe said. He got her coat from the closet next to her workstation.

  “I feel awful about leaving like this,” Muriel said as she began collecting personal belongings from her desk and putting them into a Gap shopping bag. When it was full, Shoe assembled a cardboard file box and she began removing photographs, cassette tapes, books, and magazines from her credenza. “That’s it,” she said, closing the doors of the credenza. She put the lid on the file box.

  Shoe held her coat for her, then picked up the Gap bag and the file box and carried them out to the elevator. Ten minutes later they were in his car, heading east on Pender.

  “So now what?” Muriel said. She looked as though her cat had just been run over by a truck.

  “Let’s go shopping for that sailboat,” Shoe replied.

  She managed a fleeting smile. “Seriously.”

  “Seriously. I don’t know.”

  He took her home and carried the shopping bag and file box into the townhouse for her. She made tea and they drank it in the kitchen at the small round table by the sliding glass doors that led to the walled patio that was her back garden.

  “How are you for money?” Shoe asked. “If you don’t mind me asking.”

  “Money is about all I’ve got to show for the last sixteen years of my life,” she said. “That and a big rump,” she added glumly.

  “I’ve always thought your rump was one of your best assets,” Shoe said.

  “Why, Joe, what a nice thing to say.” Her smile turned crooked. “I think.”

  In the soft northern light through the patio doors, Muriel’s fine silken hair gleamed and the smooth, flawless skin of her face and neck glowed as if she had been carved from perfectly textured antique ivory.

  “What?” she said. Shoe realized he’d been staring.

  “What are your plans for the future?” he said. “Like for the next twenty or thirty years.”


  She cocked her head slightly to one side. “Besides growing old and fat, you mean?”

  “Besides that,” he said.

  “I haven’t given it a lot of thought.” She paused, black eyes shining, then said, “Do you have a suggestion?”

  “I was wondering if you’d consider spending them growing old with me.”

  She looked at him across the top of her teacup for what seemed like a very long time, a slow flush spreading from her throat to her cheeks. He was about to apologize for embarrassing her when she put down the cup and smiled. “I might,” she said. “Right now, though, I’m more concerned about the next few hours.”

  “How so?” he asked.

  “There’s an old Chinese proverb,” she said. “‘The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.’ You’ve proposed the journey.” She stood and came around the table. Taking his hand, she urged him to his feet. She looked up at him. “But we still have to take that first step.”

  She led him up the stairs.

  As Shoe left his office, William Hammond sighed heavily, sank back in his big chair, and closed his eyes. Although he couldn’t see Claire Powkowski’s face, he could hear her voice in his mind, sharp and clear, as though she were sitting next to him.

  “Go ahead and marry the bitch,” she’d said. “But if you think I’m going let you screw me out of what’s mine, think again.” She’d then torn his cheque in half and thrown the pieces on his desk.

  “So name a price,” he’d said. “All whores have their price.”

  She named a figure.

  “That’s ridiculous.” He picked up the pieces of the torn cheque and dropped them into the wastebasket. “God knows why,” he said, “but I’m feeling generous. I’ll write you another cheque for half again this amount. That’s three times what your share in the company is worth.”