In the Shadow of the Glacier

by Vicki Delany

  The crowd was slamming their bodies together, dancing or just hopping up and down with arms moving in the air. The hall smelled of beer and sweat, clothes pungent with smoke, tobacco and pot, and cheap perfume liberally applied. The audience cheered as the singer howled and the band broke into “Highway to Hell.” Smith looked at Duncan. He was smiling at her. “This is such fun,” she said. “Thanks for coming with me.”

  “Thanks for inviting me.” She couldn’t hear what he said, but she could read the words on his mouth.

  She turned back toward the stage, lifted her arms high, and moved them to the beat of the music. She could feel as much as see Duncan eying the curves under her purple shirt and smiled to herself. It felt good. Both to be admired and to smile.

  By the time the concert ended her heart was racing and her feet ached. The crowd spilled out into the night, laughing and telling each other how great the show had been. Duncan took her hand, and she didn’t pull it away. A police cruiser was parked in the alley beside the hall, lights off. Dave Evans stood beside it, watching the place empty. He didn’t see her. He’d called her at home on Wednesday and stammered out thanks for saving him and Mrs. Reynolds. As thanks went, it sounded as if someone were holding a gun to his head, but she appreciated the call nonetheless. Maybe he’d no longer be so quick to dismiss her as a product of token hiring. Nah.

  “You bought the tickets,” Duncan said. “How about something to eat?”

  “I’m famished.”

  He pulled her hand. “We’d better hurry, the Mess Hall’ll be packed.” She tottered after him on her high heels. Fortunately the town’s favorite wings joint was only a block from the hall. She wouldn’t be able to walk much further than that. These shoes cost her three hundred bucks, and they’d sat in the closet since Graham’s death.

  They squeezed into a table for two in a dark corner. They ordered a large pizza and a platter of hot wings and pints of beer. Duncan told funny stories and Smith laughed. He tried to get her to talk about her job, but tonight she didn’t want to go anywhere near work.

  He got up to go to the washroom and she watched him push his way across the floor, where people were packed together like penguins on a shrinking ice floe. If she’d been on duty, she might have done a count of heads, to check if the place was in excess of the numbers allowed. But she wasn’t on duty, and so she nibbled on the last wing. Duncan stopped to talk to someone sitting at the counter. She thought about her first date with Graham. They’d climbed the two hundred steps down to Wreck Beach in Vancouver. It had been late in November. The beach was empty, the fabled nudists all gone home, no one camping out waiting for the next big political protest. They’d held hands as they jumped over the corpses of giant trees—refugees from logging camps, scattered on the beach—and splashed barefoot in the icy surf.

  The happiest day of her life. Come back to the moment. Duncan wasn’t Graham, and she wasn’t looking to hook up with anyone. Not now. Not yet. Perhaps not ever.

  An obese man was sitting on a bar stool beside the person Duncan was talking to, blocking her view. He climbed down from his seat and lumbered away, and Smith had a clear look at the man talking to Duncan.

  Claude Derochiers. Well known troublemaker, small time thief, all-around pest. What would a minor criminal like Derochiers have to talk about with Duncan?

  Stop right there, Smith. You are not working and even if you were, who Duncan talks to in a crowded bar is not grounds for suspicion. Even a scumbag like Derochiers might have friends, family.

  Duncan shoved Derochiers in the chest, hard, and walked away. Okay, maybe not friends.

  Derochiers tossed a bill on the counter and left. He didn’t look toward Smith, sitting quietly in the corner.

  “Ready to go?” Duncan smiled down at her.

  “I am. It’s been a long week.” She unhooked her bag from the back of the chair.

  The street was quiet as they walked toward the truck. “What’s happening with the peace garden business?” Duncan asked, slipping his hand into hers and giving it a squeeze.

  “Once the American TV guy left town, and Brian Harris and Robyn Goodhaugh were tucked away in custody, the fuss died down. With no one to stoke them up, and the town keeping mum on their decision, a lot of the outsiders left.”

  “So, it’s over.”

  “Not at all. The council delayed announcing their decision, but they have to do so someday. We’re hoping they can spit it out without making too much of a fuss. If we’re lucky there’ll be a major news story breaking at the same time. Maybe Brad Pitt’ll come after Angelina Jolie with a hatchet, and our town’s troubles won’t get much coverage.”

  “I’m sorry I missed the demonstration. I saw you on TV. You looked wonderful.”

  “You couldn’t even tell it was me.”

  “I knew it was you, Molly.”

  She pulled her hand out of his on the pretext of straightening her hair. “Isn’t it a lovely night?”

  And it was. The sky was clear, but there was no moon. Stars danced on the river like diamonds tossed onto a black velvet cape. From somewhere up in the mountains a wolf howled. It might have been a dog, but she preferred to think of it as a wolf. A pinprick of white light moved across the sky, a small plane, alone in the darkness.

  Duncan flicked the remote to open the doors of the truck, and Smith got in. He put the key into the ignition but didn’t turn it. Silence enveloped them.

  “Wanna come back to my place,” he said at last, watching the slow-moving river, “for coffee or something?”

  She’d been debating all night what to do if the question were asked. Should she? He seemed like a nice guy; he obviously liked her very much. He wasn’t Graham. But Graham, she reminded herself, was dead. Graham would want her to be happy.

  “Coffee’d be nice.” She ran a finger across the mound of her left breast.

  “Great.” He threw the truck into gear and backed out of the parking bay with unseemly haste. Good thing a car wasn’t coming.

  “Can we stop off at your place first?”

  “Why?”

  He pushed the truck up to the speed limit and kept his foot on the gas. They hurtled toward the bridge leading out of town. A black shape against the black sky.

  “I’d like you to get your gun.”

  “What?”

  “Maybe not the gun. I bet the department frowns on that sort of thing. But if you could put on the belt, it would look super with that blouse. And the handcuffs, bring the handcuffs.”

  Chapter Thirty-one

  A small blue Japanese compact leaned on its horn as Duncan left the bridge and turned far too widely into the turn.

  “Sounds like a plan.” A bucket of cold water dumped on Smith’s early, hesitant stirrings of ardor. She tried to throw her voice low, sexy, interested in his suggestion. At least he was taking her home. Whereupon she’d run into the house and lock the doors and set Sylvester on him.

  They drove down the dark highway, river on the right, mountain on the left. Smith looked in the passenger side mirror to see the lights of town fading into the distance.

  “Get the truncheon, and the boots,” Duncan was saying. “Those boots really do it for me.”

  And she’d thought her three-hundred-dollar heels were sexy.

  The truck jerked. They flew forward and fell back. It jerked again. Duncan struggled with the steering wheel as if he were taming a stallion at the Calgary Stampede. He pulled off the highway and coasted to a stop. The engine died.

  “This isn’t a trick, Molly, really. I know it’s like a joke or something to have the car break down on a dark road on a first date, but I didn’t do anything.”

  Smith believed him. They hadn’t got to her gun belt and boots yet. She pointed to the control panel. “See that ‘E’ there, Duncan, and the needle pointing below it. You’re out of gas.”

  He hit the steering wheel.

  “Go get some. I’ll wait here.” Her cell phone was in her bag. By the time Duncan walked t
o town and back, she’d have called her dad and be safely home. Like the time she’d left a high school party because they were drinking and a boy had tried to grab her breast. She’d called her dad to come and get her. Her parents had been so proud that she’d done the right thing.

  “I don’t have anything to carry gas in,” Duncan whined.

  “I bet you do. Something’s rattling around in the back. Let’s check.” She jumped out of the truck. Damned thing was so high she almost needed a parachute.

  He was there before her. “No need to look,” he said. “There’s nothing in there. You go get the gas. They’ll have containers at the station. I’ll stay here and guard the truck.”

  “No one’s going to pinch your truck, Duncan. And if they try, well they can’t get far, can they?”

  The headlights were still on. Although they pointed straight ahead they shone a bit of light behind the truck, reflecting off beads of sweat that dotted Duncan’s forehead and upper lip.

  “Why don’t we check it out anyway,” she said, reaching for the cover over the truck bed. “Can’t hurt.”

  “Don’t touch that.”

  This was getting seriously weird. “Why not? Don’t you want to see a cop in action? Let me have a peek and I’ll let you watch me play with my gun.”

  His face slackened, and his pale tongue touched his lower lip, like a reptile taking scent of its surroundings. His grip relaxed, and she tore the cover back from the truck bed. All she could see was a jumble of bicycle wheels.

  Understanding washed over her. Trips to Vancouver, the expensive truck, confrontation with Derochiers. “Duncan,” she said, “what have you been doing?”

  “It’s none of your business, Molly. Forget you saw this. You’re off duty, right?”

  “You’re snatching bikes when I’m about to come by. You’re playing me as if I’m some kind of musical instrument. You think I can forget this? Go to hell.” She headed for the passenger seat and her bag and cell phone.

  He hit her, hard. She grabbed the door handle, missed and went down.

  “God,” he said, “you are so hot.” He dropped to his knees and stuck his hand up her shirt. Clammy hands groped for a breast. “I want you, Molly, so much.”

  She threw an awkward, backward punch into his stomach. He released her with a cry and she jumped to her feet. He stood. His breathing was deep.

  “Give it up, Duncan. I’ve got you for theft. Don’t add assault to the charges. I’m going to get my bag and my phone and make a call, okay?”

  “I’m sorry I touched you. Let’s forget about it. Look, the only reason I’ve hung around Trafalgar is you, Molly. I don’t make squat at your parents’ store, and the tips from the fat middle-aged women I take out on the river are a joke. I need extra cash, and figured if I pinched some bikes, you and I could have fun at the same time. It wasn’t my fault, you know, that I got kicked off the university football team, things just got a little out of hand, but after he got the charges dropped my prick of a dad cut me right off. Why don’t you call CAA, and we’ll both wait here. How’s that sound?”

  “I’m not going to forget I saw those bikes, and I really don’t care how hard done by you are. Back off, Duncan. Do it!”

  He took a step backward. The road fell sharply away into a ditch clogged with dead branches and knee-high weeds. She kept one eye on him and reached onto the floor of the truck for her shoulder bag. She couldn’t find it by feeling around, and had to turn her eyes away. As she touched the bag, he grabbed her ankle and pulled. She tumbled out of the truck, fingers holding nothing.

  Her face slammed into the side of the truck. “You will not call the cops on me, Molly. I’m sorry I tried to kiss you. I won’t do that again, promise.” He held his hand on the back of her head. “I’m going to let go, okay? You can sit up and we can talk.” The pressure eased. A branch broke under Duncan’s foot.

  Smith turned around. “Let me make the call, Duncan. You don’t have a record, do you? You said your dad got charges dropped?” What those charges were for, she could guess. Football team, things getting “a little out of hand.” Dad intervening to make it all right.

  Duncan shook his head. The moon was rising over the tops of the forest behind him. “A few small charges, but I’ve never been convicted of anything.”

  So good old Dad had finally had enough, and cut his son adrift. “Then you’re looking at a short sentence,” she said, “maybe not even that. They might give you probation if my mom testifies that you have a good job. But you assault a police officer, or restrain her, and that’s a whole other story.”

  “You’re not a police officer now, Molly. You’re my girlfriend.”

  She swallowed her indignation at the idea that he figured he could get away with beating her up because tonight she was his date. “You know I’m a cop. Makes all the difference.”

  A car approached, illuminating his face. Then the light was gone. How could she ever have considered sleeping with him?

  She stood up, keeping her back against the warm metal of the vehicle. “I’m reaching into the truck, Duncan. I’m getting my phone and calling for help. You let me do that, and I won’t tell them that you hit me and groped me.” She lied without a qualm. “Bike theft’s nothing. You’ll probably get probation.” Not if I have anything to say about it.

  She’d seen her bag, half under the seat. She kept her eyes on Duncan while her fingers felt for it.

  He fell to his haunches. “They won’t find out about that guy, will they, Molly?”

  “What guy?” She wrapped the strap of the bag around her hand.

  “I just punched him. I didn’t even know he was dead till I heard about it on the radio the next day.”

  “Oh, fuck. You’re telling me you killed Montgomery.”

  Duncan straightened up with such speed she wasn’t ready. He knocked her backward into the truck and threw the weight of his body onto hers. He pressed something into her throat. For a moment she thought it was a knife, but it was only the broken end of a branch in his hand.

  He stepped back, the branch against her throat. With one hand he unfastened his belt. “I didn’t actually kill him,” he said. “He had a heart attack or something.”

  Duncan hadn’t noticed Montgomery’s brains leaking out of his skull?

  “I don’t want to hurt you, Molly. I’m going to leave you here and go. I can snatch a car and be across the border in half an hour. Turn around.” He grabbed her arm and flipped her. Her face smashed into the hard metal of the truck.

  She spat blood. Keep them talking, that’s what she’d learned in police college. “Tell me about Montgomery. It was a clean killing, but we thought it was an accident.”

  “Jerk saw me snatching a bike. He wanted me to, like, put it back. As if.” He pulled at her bag and the strap broke. “You won’t be needing this.” She heard it crash into the undergrowth. He pulled her arms behind her and wrapped one end of his belt around her left wrist.

  Another car. It slowed down, and she could see the driver checking them out. Then he pressed the gas and drove away. They must look like nothing but a couple who couldn’t wait long enough to get to a motel and were having a quickie up against the truck.

  “I started to leave, but he pulled out a phone. He was gonna call the cops. I couldn’t have that, so I put the bike up against the wall, said he could have it, started to walk away. Then I turned and punched him good. Too damned stupid to go down, he grabbed at my head. So I hit him again. He was dumb to keep fighting, wasn’t he?”

  “The dumbest. Why’d you stop him? I was the beat cop that night, I’m guessing you knew that. I’d have been the one on the scene.”

  “I wasn’t ready to end our game, Molly. We were still having fun.”

  Yeah, great fun. “What’d you hit him with? We’ve been looking everywhere for the weapon.”

  Duncan chuckled. “I had a propane cylinder in my pack that I needed to fill. I’d just gotten off a trip.”

  “Clever.”


  “I’d like you to come with me, Molly. But I guess that’s too much to ask.” He looped the belt over her other wrist.

  “Too fuckin’ right.” She drove the stiletto-sharp point of her four-inch heel into his groin.

  He screamed like a vampire in the night woods, and his grip collapsed. She whirled around, shaking her arms, trying to get that belt off. He hadn’t tied a knot yet, so it fell away. She grabbed one end and swung the length of leather at Duncan’s head. The impact was as loud as a gunshot. A line of red burst across his face as if she’d drawn on it with a fat crayon.

  “You bitch,” he said. She swung the belt again, aiming for an eye. He ducked and she staggered toward the ditch.

  Duncan ran.

  Smith recovered her footing and took off after him, holding the belt as a weapon. But she wasn’t in police boots. The thin heel of one sandal broke, almost taking her to her knees. She staggered to a halt and kicked off the shoes. She ran on, barefoot.

  Pain sliced through her feet. She concentrated on taking deep, cleansing breaths, reaching inside for something to push the pain aside, to keep her moving. But she knew that she’d soon fall to her knees.

  “Don’t be a fool, Duncan. You can’t get away. Don’t make it worse.” If he went into the woods, she’d not be able to follow, not without shoes.

  Duncan turned but kept running backward. River to one side, mountain to the other, ahead of him the highway took a sharp turn. “Think of me, Molly,” he yelled. “Because someday soon I’ll be coming back for you.”

  Lights found the leaves and branches of the tall pines. Yellow eyes blinked in the undergrowth. A car was turning into the corner.

  Smith yelled, “Look out!”

  Brakes screamed. A cry. A dull thud.

  An SUV heading out of town had struck Duncan full on. He crumpled to the roadway like an overcooked gingerbread man.

  The driver tumbled out of her vehicle. “Oh, my god. He came out of nowhere. He was just there. I couldn’t stop in time.”