A Tiding of Magpies

by Steve Burrows

  Shepherd regarded the sergeant carefully. For someone who claimed he had no details of Jejeune’s plan prior to entering this room, he had made an assessment of his own contributions remarkably quickly. That Maik was prepared to sacrifice his free time, and likely his sleeping hours, as well, wasn’t lost on Shepherd. Or Jejeune. The DCI was fighting hard to keep his expression impassive, but even he couldn’t suppress a flicker of gratitude for the sergeant’s gesture.

  Shepherd tried again, as forcefully as she could, while still trying to sound reasonable. “We have to tell Lindy, Domenic. Surely you see that.”

  But Jejeune was shaking his head before Shepherd even finished speaking. “For this to work, Hayes has to believe it is real. He has to see Lindy’s reaction in her unguarded moments, eavesdrop on her conversations with her friends. He’ll need to be utterly convinced. And the only way that can happen is if it’s real for Lindy, too. She can’t know about this, any of it.”

  Shepherd paused. Her position didn’t require her to point out the other consequences, but her compassion did.

  “It brings up the other consideration, Domenic,” she said carefully. “The personal one.”

  “It’ll be fine. Once this is all over, everything can go back to normal between us.”

  Shepherd exchanged a glance with Maik. Even he seemed to recognize his fellow emotional Neanderthal was on dangerous ground here, but it was Shepherd who spoke. “I’m not at all sure it can, Domenic. The lies, the deceit, those will be difficult things to forgive. Before you start down this road, it’s important to accept that things might never be quite the same between the two of you afterwards.”

  “No, it’ll be fine,” repeated Jejeune adamantly. “Lindy will understand. She’ll see that this was the only way.”

  Shepherd looked at him, partly in sadness, partly in pity. The irony, she realized, was that they were in Lindy’s territory now. Shepherd had never realized to what extent his girlfriend must guide him in these matters, and how utterly lost and rudderless he was without her by his side. But she could see now that nothing would change his mind. Finally she gave a short nod. “Regardless of my own misgivings, I realize I can’t prevent you from doing what you intend to do personally, and it’s for that reason only that I’m even prepared to entertain this idea. I’ll check Sergeant Maik’s progress daily, but I’ll expect up-to-the-minute updates about any new developments. And in the meantime, if there is any hint of imminent danger to Lindy, or even the slightest suggestion of unease on her part, or the sergeant’s, I’ll bring her in to formally advise her of the nature of the threat against her. Is that clear?” Her expression suggested she would be willing to wait for as long as it took to get a formal acknowledgement from Jejeune.

  She nodded curtly when she received it. “Good. You can set the wheels in motion with Giles. I imagine Sir David would be willing to weigh in on your behalf, if necessary. I’ll get things started on your paperwork. About three weeks, you said?”

  “Four.”

  Shepherd looked at him. “Just so I’m not completely in the dark, what have you told Lindy about the car?”

  “As much of the truth as I could,” said Jejeune. “That we received a credible threat that someone had sabotaged one of the cars parked at the Polish Community Centre. That our investigation showed the ignition wiring had gone straight to the battery stack, and as soon as anybody pushed the starter, they would have been fatally electrocuted.”

  “She will undoubtedly assume it was one of Angeren’s lot, targeting someone from the Polish community,” said Shepherd, pursing her lips distastefully. “Even more so if they vehemently deny it.” She looked at Maik. “I presume the garage is in no hurry to advertise the fact that someone stole a car from their lot.”

  “I may have mentioned that their discretion would be appreciated while we conducted our investigation, when I was over there checking out the CCTV footage.”

  Shepherd waited.

  “Nothing,” said Maik. “Someone in a hoodie. No face, no build, no identifying features.”

  “So are you saying it may not even have been…?”

  “It was Hayes,” said Jejeune flatly.

  To Shepherd, Jejeune’s declaration would have simply sounded like the conviction of a man determined to protect his partner. But Maik knew it was more than that. It was certainty. Domenic Jejeune had proof of Ray Hayes’s guilt. And for Danny, that was where the problem lay in all this. He could accept that, as a person, Lindy was nothing more to Ray Hayes than a means to an end, so that part of Jejeune’s plan might work. He could accept, too, that Simon Giles would eventually agree, however reluctantly, to the deal Jejeune was proposing. But the existence of the evidence meant that things wouldn’t go the way Jejeune was now selling them to Shepherd. They couldn’t. And Jejeune, he was sure, knew that, too.

  He had no idea why the DCI had not turned the evidence over, or even why he had taken it in the first place. Maik had seen it as the Leaf was being winched from the marsh; a small filigree bookmark clipped to the visor. He had been the last person to drive the Leaf, and the bookmark had not been there then. Ray Hayes had left it as a calling card, something to let Jejeune know he had come for Lindy, and he had killed her. But it wasn’t there when the vehicle recovery team towed away what remained of the car. Somewhere in the chaos of getting Lindy safely onto dry land and away in the ambulance, Domenic Jejeune had removed the bookmark from the visor. And kept it.

  54

  The door to their bedroom was slightly ajar, and Jejeune observed Lindy through the gap for a long time. She was propped up on pillows, her faithful laptop on her drawn-up knees. Beside her on the bedsheets lay a pad of yellow lined paper onto which she occasionally scribbled a note. As she bent forward, her blonde hair fell across her face. She unconsciously drew it back to tuck it behind her ear, revealing the massive blue-black bruising on her forehead. She was muttering to herself and running through her repertoire of gestures when deep in thought — gnawing on her bottom lip or tapping the pen absently against her lips. Jejeune’s heart almost stopped beating at the picture of unaffected beauty.

  He touched the door and it swung open. Lindy looked up and smiled.

  “I really need to get up, Dom. There’s still so much to do, and I’m feeling fine. Honestly.”

  “The doctor expressly ordered bedrest,” he said. His voice sounded detached, normal almost. Not at all the voice of a man on a mission to kill something beautiful. “What are you doing, anyway?”

  “Trying to decide what clothes to take. Canada’s weather seems to go up and down like an EKG graph during the time we’ll be there. It’s seems to have been particularly unpredictable over the past few years. Say,” she said, smiling at him, “you don’t think the planet’s going through some sort of climate change thing, do you?”

  Jejeune’s forced grin was its own alarm.

  “What’s wrong, Dom? If you’re worried that I won’t be ready for this trip, don’t be. I’ll be fine, probably all healed up long before your hand, I imagine. You look done in. Is it bothering you?’

  “It’s fine. A little,” he said.

  “Well, don’t go taking any sick days off just now. If you save them, perhaps Colleen Shepherd will let you tack them on to your holiday time.”

  Every reference to the trip was another shard of ice plunged into Jejeune’s heart. There was such anticipation in her eyes, such joy in her voice at the prospect, he couldn’t stand it. He felt the will to do what he had to seeping from him and he knew he had to act now. If he waited, he’d find ways to talk himself out of it, convince himself that there was another way to ensure her safety. And there wasn’t.

  “Lindy … this trip.… There’s a few things I need to work out.”

  “I know. A couple of extra pairs of socks, or your scope? If you’d agree to take a bigger case, you might have room for both, you know.” But even now, Lindy sensed that there was something else in the remark. It couldn’t be what she imagined, what she
had feared all this time. Not now, Dom. She stared at him from the bed, unable to speak, unwilling to do anything that might turn this moment, her life, into tiny fragments of shattered glass.

  “Things I have to work out alone. I don’t know how long it will take.”

  For a fleeting moment, Lindy willed herself to miss the import. It was an abstract problem, something that might involve informing Shepherd, asking for a bit of extra leave. Alone. The realization passed through her like an electric current, juddering against her insides, twisting them into water. She felt as if she could no longer support her own weight, even though she was lying in bed. The pressure of the blankets was unbearable. She slouched back against the pillows.

  “Oh …”

  She looked at him, at the emptiness in his eyes, the nothingness. What had happened to him? Where had he disappeared to?

  “It may not be for too long.” He faltered. “I suppose what I’m saying is, I don’t know when I’ll be back.”

  Domenic had resolved to say nothing more. He knew words could not repair the damage he had caused; they could only do more harm. But Lindy looked so empty, so crushed; he searched for something to console her. “There are things …” He faltered to a stop. Things. Things even he didn’t understand. A swirling mist of guilt and remorse engulfed him.

  “It’s the boy, isn’t it? He was the one who kidnapped that girl. Don’t look at me like that. It’s hardly my fault if you assume I’m sleeping when you and Danny have your quiet phone calls. I understand, Dom. You’ve always believed if you hadn’t gone birding that day, if you’d stayed around, where they could have contacted you, you could have saved his life. Only things are different now, aren’t they? They’re so much worse. Because if you had saved him, you could have worked all this out. You would have been able to put it all together and tell everybody what really happened, given them the right answers, so they wouldn’t have to live with these make-believe versions of events they’re stuck with now. But guess what. They suit them, their versions of the truth. They’ve helped them to find their own peace in all this. So maybe you did make a mistake, Dom. It’s something we mere mortals have to deal with every now and again. Welcome to the human race. But it doesn’t mean it ended badly for everyone.”

  “No, it’s not that.” But perhaps it was a part of it, too, somewhere in the back of his mind. He was no longer sure what lay behind his motives. All he knew was that he had to drive on, to complete this, finish it.

  “Well, what then?” Lindy was shouting now, in frustration, in fear. “Do you think you don’t deserve the rewards you got for rescuing Carolyn Gresham, because she was never really in the kind of danger everybody believed she was? Because this boy you’ve been feeling guilty about for so long, this victim who turned out to be a criminal, intended to let her go all along? And so all the praise you received, the promotion, all of it, you got it all under false pretences. Is that it?”

  Was it? His mind was reeling so much he hardly knew what his reasons were anymore. He stared at her blankly, knowing he could offer her nothing.

  “Perhaps if I came with you, we could …” But she knew now, looking at his face, that they couldn’t.

  “I’m sorry,” he said.

  Anger began to rise inside Lindy at the casual way he’d told her, the cowardly equivocation about whether he might return. I’m going to bugger off and leave you, but if you wouldn’t mind hanging around, you know, just in case…. She had never hated Domenic, but she despised him now, loathed him. She wanted to leave, to get away, to be in a different room. But she knew the only thread holding them together was her presence here. If she left, their relationship would slip away, like a helium balloon, drifting ever further out of her grasp, until all that was left was a tiny, indistinguishable speck that finally disappeared into nothingness. So she remained seated in the bed, helpless, tethered to this moment, to him, even as she crumbled away inside.

  “So that’s it then, is it? You get to go off and nurse your ego, because your sense of infallibility got a bit banged up, and me, and this place, and your job, and all those lovely people at work who care about you, we all get shoved under the same bus. Well, that’s just great, just so long as you get to indulge yourself in your private little heartbreak, you sad, selfish bastard.”

  Sad? Oh yes, Lindy, as sad as he had ever been. He was crushed by his sadness, destroyed by it. And yet still having to pretend it didn’t matter. But selfish? Was it selfish to want to protect her, to save her from being used by Hayes as the weapon in his war against Jejeune? Paulina Kowalski’s words came to him again. We would lay down our lives for those we love, to sacrifice our happiness is nothing.

  Lindy could not know about the sacrifice he was making. If he told her his plan now, she’d avow their love from the rooftops in defiance of Ray Hayes. She would insist that they stay together, fight Hayes, dare him to break them apart. But it would be there every time she walked out of the house, along a street, around a corner; that shadow of uncertainty, of knowing Hayes had tried to kill her, not once but twice, and that he would someday try again. Jejeune thought about Carolyn Weller, a woman imprisoned by her fears in her tiny walled garden. He couldn’t permit that for Lindy. It might be the last good thing he ever did, but if he could let her remain who she was, it would be enough. Was it selfish of him to want this version of Lindy to survive, this free spirit with her glorious, uncontaminated innocence? If it was, then yes, Lindy, he was selfish. Guilty as charged.

  “I’ll go away for a few days,” said Lindy finally. “I’ll leave tonight.”

  “You shouldn’t … I’ll leave,” he said. “You can stay here.”

  “I’m going away.”

  Away where? Somewhere safe? Away from Ray Hayes? But he knew she wouldn’t say. She wouldn’t give him the chance to come after her and say he’d made a mistake. She would go away and he would be gone by the time she returned. In the meantime, he would find somewhere to go now, to be away from her until she left. Only then would he return to start packing what he needed. Needed? There was only one thing he needed. And he knew he could not have that any longer. Because, as of now, his relationship with Lindy Hey was over.

  55

  The brightly lit interior of the airport terminal held all the welcome of an ice hotel. Jejeune had long felt there was probably nowhere else that a person could be so surrounded by humanity and still feel so isolated. Everywhere he looked, people were joined in acts of intimacy; warm embraces, solicitous fussing, or just strolling along side by side. And he was alone.

  It was understandable. Only three people knew of his travel plans, and none would be making a journey down here to see him off. One had no wish to. Another had willed herself to believe it was a short-term leave of absence only; Four weeks, Domenic. And not a day more. Agreed? The third person was setting in motion a plan that was doomed to fail.

  The tannoy announced Jejeune’s Toronto-bound flight and he moved towards the security checkin to begin his own part in this plan: abandoning Lindy. He had allowed himself one tiny glimpse into her new, post-Dom world before he left. She was staying with Emma, she of the penchant for Hot Boyz, he thought with a small smile. It hadn’t been much of a stretch for the detective in him to find out, even as distracted and distraught as he was. Emma was a good fit for the purpose; boundless outrage to fuel Lindy’s own resentments, encouragement that all of this was Domenic’s fault, and reassurance Lindy had nothing whatsoever to reproach herself for. You did everything you could to make that relationship work, Linds. Always. And Lindy would agree with Emma, for a short time. It would keep her angry, keep her away from the cottage, from that place where a man had stood at the foot of her bed and told her he was going away, even as he watched her sorrow sweep over her, engulf her in a wave of pain so deep and wide it was almost palpable. And did it all without flinching. At least on the outside.

  And he tells you while you are lying in your sick bed, Linds, a sick bed that he put you in! That’s beyond cold. Th
ere’s calculated cruelty in that. I don’t know what got into him, but you’re well shot of someone who can sink to that level. Yes, Emma, she was. But he loved Lindy, and he had to protect her. And there was no other way.

  The airport crowd swirled all around him, buffeting him with its indifference. He felt like he might spiral off into its vortex at any moment. He needed an anchor, something to draw him back from this abyss, the sight of a single hand upstretched, waving; Lindy, hopping jauntily from one foot to another for a better view over the crowds. It’s okay, Dom, I get it. I know why you had to break my heart. It’s because you love me, so much you were willing to pay the ultimate lover’s sacrifice: separation. The only way you could protect me was to leave. I understand that now. And I forgive you.

  But there was no hand, no wave, no terminal-illuminating smile. Lindy wouldn’t be coming. So he was left only with the reality of his situation. The first part of the plan would fall into place easily enough. Teodor Sikorski had been called on to help, now that his own financial legitimacy had been established — a vast family fortune of impeccable provenance. Of his noble bloodline, there had been no mention. Jejeune doubted it had been investigated at all. But that was okay. The people at Wawel needed a nobleman to be their benefactor, a hero to protect them and care for them. It harmed no one if Sikorski remained a Count, regardless of his real pedigree. Jejeune gave an involuntary smile as he thought of Lindy’s words about the moon’s features on that evening a lifetime ago: If the truth is going to disappoint you, I say why bother with it. Just make up one of your own. Sikorski had agreed to scour his network of Polish exiles to find information on newly arrived illegal immigrants. Only one would be needed. And once Sikorski had found him, Jejeune had no doubt this man with the poet’s soul, this lover of natural justice, would be able to persuade the person to do what was required. For a man who could convince artists and academics that there was dignity and honour in wrenching invasive weeds out of the soil by hand, getting a criminal to name Curtis Angeren as the man who’d made the arrangements to bring him in illegally would pose no challenge at all.