The Darkening Archipelago

by Stephen Legault

  “Yes.”

  “Stoboltz gave you access?”

  “No.”

  “Archie, how did you come to see what Stoboltz likely considers a trade secret?”

  “I’m not prepared to say, Lance,” said Archie, smiling.

  “You’re playing a dangerous game, my friend.”

  “You think so?”

  “I know so, Archie. I don’t know what you and Cassandra Petrel are trying to get at, but I can tell you that Stoboltz is a very serious company. Very serious.”

  “They should lighten up. So should you, Lance. You’re going to have a heart attack before you’re thirty.”

  “Laugh if you want, Archie. You’ve been warned.”

  The line went dead.

  Archie put down the phone and turned his head to look at the harbour. Ravens circled overhead. Was it a murder of ravens? No, that was crows.

  “I’m on a roll,” he said out loud. “Why stop now?” He snatched the phone and dialled another familiar number, this time with a Vancouver prefix.

  “Stoboltz Aquaculture, how may I direct your call?”

  “Erik Nilsson, please.”

  “Erik Nilsson’s office.”

  “Is Mr. Nilsson available?”

  “Who can I tell him is on the line?”

  “It’s Archie Ravenwing.”

  There was a momentary pause. Archie pictured the c eo of Stoboltz’s Canadian operations contemplating whether to ignore a gadfly named Ravenwing or not.

  “Hi, Archie, how’s it going? It’s been a while.”

  “Yeah, it’s been a few months. I was feeling lonely, thought I’d give you a call, Erik.”

  “How can I help you?”

  “Can you tell me what you’re doing collecting sea lice in Tribune Channel?”

  There was a moment’s pause. “We’re monitoring the impact of sea lice on both wild salmon and our penned Atlantic salmon. I would have imagined you’d be happy about that.”

  “I am happy. Very happy. When were you going to tell us?”

  “The Aquaculture Advisory Task Force was told last month, Archie. Greg was there.”

  “He doesn’t pass this sort of thing on to his constituents.”

  “Maybe he doesn’t have as good a relationship with the media as you did, Archie. The thing is, we’re not exactly ready to have a public discussion about it. It’s early days yet.”

  “Let’s level here, Erik, what gives? Why the sudden interest in sea lice?”

  “Same reason you and Dr. Petrel are interested, Archie. We want to be good corporate citizens. Contribute to the body of knowledge. Plus, it’s to our advantage to understand more about how the lice affect livestock.”

  Ravenwing smiled at the use of the word. Livestock. It was jarring to hear a word he usually associated with cattle applied to salmon, even if they were non-native Atlantics. “The lice don’t affect your fish, isn’t that what you keep saying?”

  “So far, but who knows about the future.”

  “I’ve seen your data.”

  There was a pause. “Really? That’s interesting.”

  “Interesting, yeah, if you consider results that show the sea lice you’ve collected are nearly twice as virulent as the ones Doc Petrel and I have collected. What the hell is happening up in Tribune Channel?”

  “I’m not really ready to discuss that, Archie.”

  “Think that maybe the media would be a good place to have this conversation?”

  “I don’t appreciate you threatening me, Archie. We’ve always worked to keep this civil, haven’t we?”

  “You’ve got information in your possession that shows that sea lice are getting stronger somehow. That they’re having a larger and larger impact on salmon smolts.”

  “It’s isolated, Archie. It’s a single capture point.”

  “I want to see all your data. Cassandra and I need to have access to it.”

  Erik Nilsson was silent. “Okay. I’ll ask Dr. Thurlow to drop in the next time he’s heading to McNeill. Okay?”

  “I want to see it before the month’s out, Erik.”

  “Archie, you’ll see it when Thurlow can get over to present it in person. If I hear anything about this from the media, I’m going to ask the RCMP to investigate how you got the data in the first place, are we clear?”

  “Clear.” Archie hung up and took a deep breath.

  16

  Longview, Alberta lay along the banks of the Highwood River where it cut a deep canyon through the layers of sedimentary rock that folded into rounded foothills. South of the town, the river burrowed into the stone and snaked eastward toward High River. Nancy Webber was about to close the circle, in more ways than one, she thought. She drove up the highway from the south, distracted and pushing a hundred kilometres per hour when she saw the lights behind her.

  “Fuck,” she muttered, slowing as the first buildings of the tiny town swept past. She pulled over to the side of the road as the cruiser parked behind her, and a man who must have weighed three hundred pounds eased himself out of the driver’s seat.

  Her cellphone rang.

  The constable approached her and tapped on the window, which she rolled down.

  “Driver’s licence and registration, please,” he said, breathing hard.

  Her phone rang again.

  She reached into the glove box and produced the necessary documents, along with her driver’s licence from her wallet. She snatched up the phone on the fourth ring.

  “Webber.”

  “It’s Sergeant Reimer, Nancy.”

  “Funny you should call right at this moment. I’m getting a speeding ticket.”

  “That is funny. Where are you?”

  “Town of Longview.”

  “That’s a local. RCMP don’t patrol in the town.”

  “All the same to us chickens,” she said.

  “Pardon?”

  “The fox or the chopping block,” said Nancy, looking in her mirror at the patrol car.

  “I’ve got something for you,” said Reimer.

  “Can I call you after I empty my wallet here?”

  “Sure.” The line went dead.

  Ten minutes later Nancy was seated in the Four Winds Café, a cup of strong, black coffee and a menu in front of her. She ordered toast from the waitress, picked up her cell, pressed call return, and waited.

  “So, what do you have?”

  “You understand that this is deep background. You can’t print this.”

  “It’s not really for a story anyway, but if I do decide to write this one up, I’ll get it through official records.”

  “Okay. Well, I’m only telling you this because you could have hung me out to dry in Oracle and you didn’t. We’re even.”

  “What is it that needs this much lead up?”

  “I talked to the staff sergeant in Claresholm yesterday. He told me a tale of sadness and woe.”

  “Go on,” said Nancy, cradling her phone to her ear while she spread peanut butter and jam on her toast.

  “It seems that all was not well on the Blackwater ranch.”

  “Tell me something I don’t know.”

  “If you shut up I will,” said Reimer.

  “Sorry.”

  “All was not well. It’s not in the official record anywhere, but I guess Cole Blackwater used to show up for school pretty busted up sometimes. I mean, he was a boxer and everybody knew it, but he looked like he took a pretty good beating from time to time. Broken nose, black eyes, that sort of thing. Lost a tooth once. That’s not the sort of thing that happens in the ring.”

  “Mother says it was Walter who laid into him. His older brother.”

  “You believe her?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I know Walter. I met him at a law enforcement training day in the spring. He’s a warden at Waterton Lakes National Park. We do an annual firearms training for them. Unless he’s changed a lot since he was a boy, he doesn’t strike me as the sort. Oh, he could lay a
good beating if he wanted to. The man is still rock solid. But he doesn’t have the disposition for it, unless he’s a psychopath and is just putting everybody on. But if that was the case, he’d have some arrests on his jacket, you know, for assault and the like, but there’s nothing. He’s clean as a whistle.”

  “You checked.”

  “I’m trying to be thorough. So Cole shows up pretty beaten up at school. Could be boxing matches with other boys, or maybe a little schoolyard roughhouse, right? Well, I can’t say this for certain, but my guess is no, it’s not. My friend on the desk at Claresholm thinks it was the old man.”

  “Yeah, that listens,” said Nancy, taking a bite of toast.

  “Yeah, it lines up. The old man has a record. A pretty long one. No convictions, but lots of arrests. Small-town stuff, you know, some fisticuffs here and there. Settled out of court a couple of times, paid his debt in labour and the like. My friend at the Clarseholm detachment says that Blackwater stayed out of trouble after the sons came along. But Cole started showing up at school pretty beaten up when he was like twelve or thirteen.”

  “You say that’s not on record?”

  “It’s a small town. Everybody knows everybody else. No secrets.”

  “Right,” said Nancy. It doesn’t need to be a small town not to have any secrets, she thought.

  “Okay, so that’s Cole. So when the old man supposedly pops himself four years back, Cole just happens to be home at the time, first time in years, you understand. Like first time in two decades. People start to ask the same questions you’re asking.”

  “Was there an investigation?”

  “God, no. The old man’s prints were on the rifle and the branding iron. No latents from Cole. They did look that far. And the old lady confirms that Cole was in the house when they heard the blast.”

  “She could be lying,” said Nancy, lowering her voice, looking around her. “She strikes me as being pretty protective.”

  “Fat lot of good it did Cole.”

  “Yeah.”

  “But,” added Reimer, “you know how that sort of thing goes.

  The old lady likely overlooked the whole thing. She didn’t want to get into it. Didn’t want to believe that her husband was beating her son right under her nose.”

  “She said that Walter got the better of Cole while they were training.”

  “Well, you and I know that’s not the case.”

  “Okay, so you’re saying that it’s pretty likely that Henry Blackwater was laying a beating on Cole on a pretty regular basis. And that there were pretty strong suspicions when the old bastard blew his brains out that Cole had more than a passing interest in seeing him dead.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Where does Walter figure in all this?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I met him last night,” said Nancy.

  “Where?”

  “At the ranch.”

  “You really got balls, don’t you?”

  “You know it. I went out for dinner and when Mrs. Blackwater and I were having coffee afterward, in walks Walter. He was pretty surprised to see me. I guess Cole had told him about me. Anyway,” she said, “we went for a walk this morning and had a chat. He’s a real likeable guy.”

  “Likeable, and unlikely to punch up his brother, it seems to me.”

  “Yeah, he seems to care about Cole a lot. Maybe that’s guilt.”

  “For what?”

  “For letting his father beat the snot out of his little brother and not doing anything to stop it.” Nancy looked around the café. She was alone.

  “Well, it doesn’t help to say this, but I will. Not much a teenager can do to stop a fully grown man from taking out his anger on another boy. Walter’s a big lad, but old man Blackwater was a real bruiser. Did you know he fought for the overseas title in 1944?”

  Nancy shook her head. “How did you find that out?”

  “Got a friend on the base at c fb Suffield with connections.”

  “I’m impressed. And a little humbled. How did he do?”

  “Draw. A black man named Bombshell Bismarck who was in the artillery was the other boxer. He outweighed Blackwater by some forty pounds and towered over him by four inches.”

  “Jesus. You think that old man Blackwater felt jaded by that and started reliving his glory days back on the ranch?”

  “Who knows? I’m no shrink. I did ask about his service record. Apparently Blackwater landed at Juno Beach —”

  “On D-Day?”

  “Yeah. Pretty impressive. Says that he suffered ‘unidentified wounds’ and was shipped back to England. Missed all the action.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Seasick.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “That’s what my friend at Suffield thinks, anyway. It’s not in his military record. He went on to do mop-up work in northern Europe, but missed most of the fun in France and Germany.”

  “That would piss a guy off, especially if he was a hothead spoiling for a fight.”

  “Seems consistent with that we’ve learned.”

  “That’s some good detective work, Sergeant. Thanks.”

  “No trouble. We’re even now.”

  “That we are.”

  “So that’s pretty much what I know at this point. I don’t know if you’re any further ahead.”

  “I don’t know that I am either, but this does shed some light on Henry Blackwater,” said Nancy. She’d taken her cheque to the counter and paid it with a five-dollar bill. She stepped out onto the gravel in front of the Four Winds. “But, I think in the long run I might be farther behind.”

  “How so?”

  “I think I’ve got two brothers with good reason to pop their old man instead of just one.”

  “So long as you know that’s your problem, not mine,” said Reimer.

  “For now,” said Webber. “Well, thanks for this. Now I think I owe you one.”

  “I’ll collect, trust me.”

  Nancy hung up and went to her car. She opened the door and sat down, but left the door open. The weather was warm, the wind out of the west. It blew dust into little swirls that skipped across the road like tornadoes in training, bouncing their way between the freshly painted walls of the Longview Hotel and the rusted-out auto-repair shop next door. The sky above was streaked with oblong clouds that Nancy thought looked like spaceships. It was warm, nearly fifteen degrees, and the birds sang as if there would never be another snow again.

  Walter Blackwater had said it was a chinook.

  “Chinook. Isn’t that just in the winter?”

  “Well, technically speaking it still is,” said Walter Blackwater. They stood at the top of the ridge above the ranch, the naked branches of aspens bending in the steady wind. Nancy leaned into it a little. “But chinooks can blow year-round. They are just more dramatic in the winter. They melt all the snow. Turn a winter deep-freeze into a thaw over night.”

  “You really are a park ranger, aren’t you?”

  “Warden. We call ourselves wardens in Canada.”

  Nancy nodded, looking west toward the ridges that made up the Whaleback, a thirty-kilometre chain of hills that looked like the spine of a long, beached whale. Below, hidden by the folds of the Porcupine Hills, ran Highway 22. After that, the hills rose and fell until they pressed up against Livingstone Ridge, the front range of the Rocky Mountains. Beyond its jagged back she could see more mountains, blue and grey in the morning light, their crowns and leeward slopes still plastered with spring snow.

  “That’s the Continental Divide,” said Walter, pointing to a triangular shaped peak on the horizon. “That peak is called Tornado Mountain.”

  Nancy nodded again, pulling the warm, dry air into her lungs. “This is a beautiful place,” she said. “It must have been amazing to grow up here.”

  “The landscape couldn’t be beat. Cole and I would sometimes disappear into these hills for a few days — take off when we got off the bus after
school on a Friday — and show up for dinner on Sunday, sunburnt and full of bug bites and scrapes and bruises. Scared the hell out of our mother. Caught hell from our father for letting our chores go. It was worth it. Yeah, it was a pretty great place to be a kid.”

  “You’d catch hell from your dad?”

  “Dad was pretty much giving us hell all the time, so it really didn’t matter what it was about. I don’t think he knew how to deal with us boys.”

  “How’d you take that?”

  “Don’t know what you mean.”

  “I guess I just mean that must have been hard.”

  “Yup, he was a tough old man. He served, you know? World War II. Before Cole or I were born. But I heard that he had a pretty rough time overseas. He never really talked about it.”

  “Was he angry about something?”

  “Henry Blackwater was angry about everything. Angry and frustrated as hell.”

  “And did he take it out on you?”

  “Cole caught the worst of it. I guess he’s told you. The old man liked to use him as a punching bag sometimes.”

  “Cole told me,” Nancy lied.

  “I never seemed to get under the old man’s skin, you know? Somehow Cole always did.”

  “He’s good at that. It’s a skill. Hell, I’ve slugged him a few times,” said Nancy, sitting down and leaning against an aspen.

  Walter squatted and plucked a piece of dried grass and put it in his teeth. With his stained Stetson, Wrangler jeans, and canvas coat he looked like someone out of an ad for Alberta beef. Nancy looked at him. Walter was smiling at her joke.

  “I’m sorry. That was crass,” she said. The sun had crept along its arc and now spilled light like liquid honey across the convoluted folds of earth before them. In the darkness of the dales little could be seen, but along the brightly lit ridges the naked shapes of aspens and the twisted forms of pine trees were easily distinguishable. The whole Livingstone Range was bathed in the radiance.

  “There’s nothing a little boy could do to deserve what our old man gave us. Gave Cole.”

  “It was pretty hard on you, wasn’t it?”

  Walter looked across at Nancy. She was watching the sun on the distant mountains. “It was. Pretty hard. I felt impotent. I couldn’t stop him. I couldn’t stop him from hurting Cole. And I was stupid enough to believe that he wouldn’t hurt our mother, so I didn’t even think to try and stop him from doing that.”