A Tiding of Magpies

by Steve Burrows

  Shepherd adopted a softer tone, but there was no hint of remorse in it. “While I’d personally welcome the opportunity to remove Curtis Angeren from our orbit for a very long time, I’m not about to sacrifice my career by rushing into anything without a very good reason. Come to me when you’ve got one, and we’ll talk.”

  “The thing is,” said Jejeune, “I believe people may be looking at Kowalski’s involvement in this operation from the wrong perspective. Perhaps it was someone else who was running it and Kowalski simply got in the way.”

  Looking at him now, Shepherd was as sure as she could be that Jejeune hadn’t voiced this idea to the Home Secretary. “You have someone in mind, I take it.”

  “Teodor Sikorski has a poet’s soul. He’s a lover of natural justice. He would enjoy the idea of taking money from these criminals and using it to assist the kind of people they had victimized in their home country.”

  There was an uneasy silence in the room. “I’m not at all sure I follow your line of reasoning on this, Domenic,” said Shepherd. It reminded Des Gill of a similar comment she’d heard recently. I’m not following your logic here, Domenic. And that’s not good for either of us. He’d received the benefit of the doubt that time. She wasn’t sure he would again now.

  “I think Sikorski has a condition called pronoia,” said Jejeune. “It’s the opposite of paranoia. These people truly believe the world is set up in their favour. And why not; he’s intelligent, handsome, charismatic. It would be easy for a man like that to convince a group of admirers to go along with his plans, not ask any questions, and turn a blind eye when needed. Only Jakub Kowalski never bought into the collective mindset. Perhaps he refused to become part of the operation, even threatened to report Sikorski. It must come as quite a shock for someone with Sikorski’s condition to finally discover not everyone has your best interests at heart. It might even seem like a betrayal. It was almost certainly Sikorski who told Kowalski about the Ruddy Ducks at Tidewater Marsh. A deserted marsh with restricted access would be a convenient place to kill someone once you’d lured them there. And Sikorski was, by his own admission, the last person to see Kowalski alive.”

  Jejeune paused and looked at the room significantly. But the silence told him they were still not buying it. Even Danny Maik was having trouble holding eye contact with his DCI. There were just too many gaps, too many conditionals; might and perhaps, and almost certainly, from a DCI who normally seemed so sure about everything.

  “There’s the money, too,” said Jejeune emphatically. “This not-so-anonymous benefactor who is pouring so much of it into Wawel. If Sikorski is not getting his funds from this operation, where are they coming from? The man’s an academic. They don’t get paid well enough to amass personal fortunes, let alone seemingly inexhaustible ones.”

  “I suppose we just assumed it was old family money,” said Holland, shifting uneasily in his seat, “that he really was from Polish nobility. You know, this Count business and all that.”

  “And we assumed this why?” asked Shepherd, grateful to finally be able to fasten her queasy, ill-defined sense of unease onto something tangible. “Because it was easier than doing proper police work, perhaps? Can we please now go back and run a proper financial background check on Teodor Sikorski, one that has less to do with lazy assumptions and more to do with verified facts?”

  She gave Jejeune a troubled look. “We can see where this goes, Domenic, but I’ll be expecting progress sooner rather than later, or at the very least some indication we’re on the right track. Because on its own, I’m not sure Sikorski’s love of natural justice is going to be enough. The CPS are not known for their poetic souls.”

  The implication was clear. Through his past ability to weave a solid conviction from the most tenuous of threads, Jejeune had earned some leeway. But Shepherd’s look suggested even her indulgence of Jejeune’s extravagant theories had its limits.

  Suspicion is insidious. It could have been the tang of all the other secrets floating around the room, but whatever it was, as the meeting ended and everyone rose to go their separate ways, Maik stared after his departing DCI with particular interest. Danny Maik had never before had reason to question Domenic Jejeune’s motives, and he wasn’t sure he did now. But that was the point; he wasn’t sure. There were times he really enjoyed his DCI’s ability to conjure new suspects seemingly out of thin air. This wasn’t one of them. Jejeune seemed to be trying to magic away a prime suspect in this case and replace him with a phantom one. And he was ignoring a valid motive along the way. When the three men met at the golf course, the DCI had emphatically rejected the idea of making any deals with Curtis Angeren. But Jejeune had pointedly kept any mention of Ray Hayes out of his report to DCS Shepherd, and Maik knew the scare with Lindy in the marketplace had only heightened his fears about a genuine attack by Hayes. All of a sudden, Jejeune was going to great lengths to find somebody other than Curtis Angeren to blame for the murder of Jakub Kowalski. Perhaps Angeren was as innocent as he claimed, but bringing him in to find out seemed a perfectly reasonable approach, and any time Danny Maik was siding with Tony Holland over DCI Jejeune, it was a sign that something was wrong. Whichever way Maik chose to look at things, the fact was, by introducing this new line of inquiry about Sikorski, Jejeune couldn’t have done more to deflect suspicion away from Curtis Angeren if he’d worked out a deal with him to do exactly that.

  30

  Danny Maik and Lindy stood together on the driveway of the cottage, leaning against the opposite sides of Lindy’s Nissan Leaf. She was working from home for the next couple of days, and since Danny was considering buying one, it seemed an ideal opportunity for him to borrow her car and try it out. Especially since his Mini was out of commission once again. The only condition had been that Danny pick her up first from a boozy baby shower at a friend’s house and drop her off at home.

  “So you’re seriously considering going enviro-friendly, are you? Poor Danny,” she said with a lopsided grin. “I mean, I was bound to succumb to his constant barrage of eco-twaddle sooner or later. But to browbeat a nice, decent bloke like you into guilt over our environmental sins,” she shook her head in mock despair, “I tell you, Danny, those greenies have a lot to answer for.”

  Maik smiled and thanked her again for the loan. Even in the sober condition that was a long way from where Lindy was now, he knew it was often her way to claim she’d been coerced into something kicking and screaming. In truth, he suspected there was very little Lindy Hey did that she wasn’t completely committed to. And that would include driving an eco-friendly vehicle.

  “You know there’s no audio system in these, right?” She allowed herself a giggle at his shocked look. “Relax, Danny. I’m joking. Play all the Motown you like in there. This car could do with a bit of romance.” Perhaps even take Lauren Salter out for a drive. If she had said it, she would have blamed the wine. But she knew the damage would have already been done. Talk about the love that dare not speak its name. Lord Alfred Douglas had nothing on poor soon-to-be Sergeant Salter. But then, Lindy supposed there were lots of loves like that. Perhaps, for some people, it was just safer that way.

  With one last expression of appreciation, Maik got in the car and drove off. Lindy stood alone in the pale moonlight, watching the car disappear down the driveway. Though she knew Danny was not a man for sentimental attachments, she suspected he’d long had a soft spot for his Mini. But since the catastrophic damage it had suffered in the accident a few months earlier, one problem after another seemed to have befallen it, and she’d seen Danny’s gradual acceptance that he was going to have to let it go. Now he was in the final stages of getting ready to part with it, gearing up for it, as it were. A sober Lindy would have given the pun short shrift, but this version, who’d perhaps already had one glass of wine too many, found it strangely amusing.

  She looked up at the creamy moon, curled on the dark velvet blanket of the night sky like a sleeping child. “Are you shining on Canada, too, I wonder?”
she asked, tottering slightly as she craned back for a better look. Not yet, perhaps. GMT minus 5, she reminded herself. “So what can you tell me about it then, Mr. Moon? What do we know about the vast Dominion of Canada?”

  Surprisingly little, as it turned out. She could manage the prime minister’s name, and the nation’s capital. The provinces and territories she might have been able to cobble together, given enough time and a glass or two less of white wine. But beyond that, it would be off to the internet for anything more than the most superficial facts about Domenic’s former home. Not long after she’d starting seeing him, she had unfurled a large map of the world on her desk at work. Canada took up most of the top left-hand quadrant. And a great deal of it seemed to consist of empty space. Of the regions themselves, Lindy had only the broadest idea. Quebec, the French bit always punching above its own weight, was inevitably going to find a place in her heart. Newfoundland was where God had come up with the blueprints for heaven, according to Damian. The Maritimes were supposed to be enchanting, the Prairies mesmerizing, the Rockies … okay, we get the picture. “But what do we know about Ontario, Mr. Moon?” she asked, gazing up dreamily. “What can we say about that?”

  The moon smiled down benignly at her, but didn’t want to get involved. Fair enough, she’d answer the question herself. Though Ontario undoubtedly had a couple of urban centres dotted about, as far as she could tell from Domenic’s accounts, mostly it seemed to consist of birding areas, possibly even all interconnected, for all she knew. The names came to her effortlessly on the still night air; Point Pelee, Long Point, Carden Alvar. Lindy wasn’t even sure what an alvar was. All she knew was, whenever Dom spoke about it, he got the same look on his face as when he held those Leica UltraHD bins at that birding fair last year. She almost would have preferred him to be looking at another woman. Jealous of the optics? Careful, girl, you’re starting to lose it. Time for a drink, I believe. Just one more, to finish off the night.

  She went inside and poured herself a generous measure of wine. She was half-tempted to slump in the chair beside the fire and sip her drink there, waiting for Domenic to return from who knew where. But she’d got Canada in her blood now, and she wanted to delve a bit more deeply. It was a gorgeous night, quiet and still, and her pale, silent friend was waiting out there to continue their conversation. She wouldn’t disappoint him.

  She went outside again, glass in hand. She was slightly unsteady now; the devil’s trident of fatigue, night air, and alcohol were making their presence felt. She’d no idea why she had drunk quite so much at the baby shower. She loved her friend, and her baby, and was happy for both of them. She enjoyed the company of everyone else there, too, even the inevitable banter about ticking biological clocks and the rest. But tonight there had been an uneasiness within her, a feeling she hadn’t been able to shake. As a last resort she’d decided she would try to drown it in Chablis. Not the worst way to go, if she was being honest. It had worked, too, for a time, but she could feel the beginnings of her disquiet starting to creep back up inside her again now.

  She leaned against the wall of the cottage and looked up. Fugitive grey clouds had begun shifting across the sky, closing in on her friend like doubts. I behold, upon the night’s starr’d face, Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance … Another Keat for you, Dom. Lindy closed her eyes, and cradled her glass to her chest. She began swaying gently, allowing her thoughts to drift to that once-forbidden hope, a visit to Canada.

  She wanted to see them for herself, these birding sites that had entangled themselves around Domenic’s heart. She wanted to understand why they meant so much to him, what enchantments they held. Admittedly, there were other places he’d mentioned that she was less in a hurry to visit. The Nonquon Sewage Lagoons, for example, or Skunk’s Misery. Let’s face it; any place where even skunks found the mosquitoes intolerable was never likely to make it onto Lindy’s bucket list. And although she was sure the Cerulean Warblers you could see there were every bit as stunning as Dom claimed, he’d made the mistake of telling her these pretty blue birds happened to winter in the Caribbean. So she’d wait and see them there one day, if it was all the same to him. But perhaps she needed to see these unappealing-sounding places too, fit them into Dom’s past like jigsaw puzzle pieces, to help construct her picture of who he used to be. Would it help her better understand the man he had become? Possibly, but that wasn’t her purpose. If she was going to take Dom on full time, it would mean taking all of him, and that included his past.

  So why, all of a sudden, these doubts? Why this extra glass of wine in her hand, when she already knew she’d had too much? She took a sip and gave up fighting the truth, letting it come to her in a rush, relief and guilt all tangled together in the sweet, dry taste in her mouth. Because you’re scared, Lindy. Because you’ve been waiting for this for so long now, to go to Canada with Dom, to see the sights, to meet his family, and now it’s actually coming to pass, you’re not sure if it’s what you want to do at all. She looked up at the moon once again, and she could tell he knew. He was looking down at her now; a half-closed unblinking eye, staring right into her soul. “No secrets from you, are there, Mr. Moon,” she said, raising her glass. She closed one of her own eyes and tilted her head slightly, as if peering back in this way might help. Lacus somniorum. Though she wasn’t sure of its exact location, she knew it was up there somewhere. The Lake of Dreams. She had dared to plunge in, and now she was wondering if she should head back to the shore.

  C’mon, Linds, she told herself, it’ll be fine. Start with something simple. Hi, I’m Lindy. I’m hoping to be Dom’s better half. During the non-birding times, of course. God, what if they were all birders? Dom’s brother Damian was, after all. Perhaps it was genetic. She didn’t bother to try to feign interest with Domenic anymore, but with an entire household full of them, a rigorous indifference might be more difficult to maintain. It might even seem impolite. But to pretend interest? After all, what did she really know about birding? For all the place names she could recite, what could she say about these areas, or why they were important to the birding world? Suppose the talk turned to the Presqu’ile autumn shorebird migration, for example. The words might as well have been interchangeable for all the sense they made to her. No, she couldn’t pretend interest where there was none. Her integrity was part of what made her who she was. It was what Eric liked about her, remember? He even told her so, once.

  Could she even be another Lindy if she wanted to, one who sat politely, lips buttoned, knees together, no smirking? No, she couldn’t, even if the risk of being herself had never been so high, the potential cost of being Lindy so great. She drew a deep, shuddery breath and looked up at the moon again. No, she would just be herself, and everything would turn out fine. Eric would be proud of her decision to keep her integrity intact, after all. She thought about her boss now, how happy he seemed these days, how contented. He’d hardly been able to take his eyes off Colleen Shepherd all afternoon when they’d been here celebrating Damian’s news. Neither one of them seemed in any great hurry to take their relationship any further, but that was okay. They were clearly happy enough with where it was. Perhaps it was all that could be hoped for between two strong-willed individuals who had made their way independently in the world for so long. Any kind of a deeper relationship might be a bridge too far for them now. But it wasn’t too far for Lindy and Dom. The future was theirs for the making. They had their careers, their home, their love. All that was missing was the next step, whatever they chose it to be. But whatever it was, it couldn’t be this, an idling state of suspended animation that seemed to be not only without a clear destination, but with no discernible road to even get to one. “It’s all your fault, you know,” she told her pale friend, looking up, “filling people’s heads with notions of romance and undying love and eternal devotion.” Lindy didn’t need a love worth dying for. One worth staying alive for would do her fine.

  She swallowed the rest of her wine in a single flourish and turned to go
back inside. She wouldn’t wait up. Wherever Domenic was tonight, he was probably in a better place than she was. But tomorrow was another day. And when they sat down for breakfast in the morning, he would never know the doubts she’d felt tonight.

  “That is,” she said, looking up at the moon one last time, “as long as you can keep a secret.”

  31

  Darkness is no threat to those who control it. Domenic Jejeune had made a conscious decision to do without the overhead bulbs, relying on the thin beam from his penlight to manoeuvre between the bulky shapes littering the room. He paused for a moment and listened to the still, hanging silence of the deserted offices. Pale light from the street outside filtered in through the glass door behind him and a second silvery trail came in from the side window. Jejeune played his light quickly over the desk beside the window, near the wall. When the magazine had returned to these premises after the reconstruction, Lindy had been offered the chance to take a different spot, anywhere other than the desk she had been sitting at when the wall beside her was blown out in a violent explosion. Predictably, she had refused, quietly defying the forces of fear, challenging herself to confront the demons that had haunted her for weeks after the blast. This was her place, she was telling the world, and nothing was going to force her to give it up. Jejeune allowed himself a small smile at the thought, even as he drew the beam away from the desk and shone it on a path further into the darkness.

  He made his way into the office at the back; the one with the door facing out on to the larger room, so all that happened could be seen, heard, noted. Along the far wall of the office was a bank of three filing cabinets; old, battered behemoths from another age, redolent of ink-stained hacks with shirtsleeves rolled up and cigarettes dangling from the corners of their mouths. The Newspaper Room, like so many things now, a mere shadow of its former self, hovering like a work of fiction in the minds of those who had once experienced it. The keyholes at the tops of the cabinets were so rusted Jejeune doubted he could have inserted a key even if he had one. But he eased the top drawer of the first cabinet open and it slid out obediently. He held the penlight between his teeth and began riffling through the files. He withdrew two folders, skimming through the contents quickly, noting what he needed to before laying them on the top of the cabinet, so he could shuffle through the drawer once more, searching for other files.