by Alex MacLean
Allan took out his spiral again. Below the time of his arrival at the scene, he wrote down the officer’s badge number and name, Craig Ellis.
“What time did you get here?”
Ellis consulted his own notepad. “Five fifty-one. The call came in to dispatch at five forty-five.”
“Did you touch anything?” he asked.
“No, sir. I only went close enough to the body to see if the victim required medical attention.”
“Did anyone else disturb the scene?”
“No.”
“Did you see anyone in the area as you arrived?”
Ellis shook his head. “No one. Just Mr. O’Dell.” He gestured to the guard standing several feet away.
“Has Coulter been notified?”
“Yes. He’s en route.”
Allan felt the eyes of the guard, watching.
Voice hushed, he asked Ellis, “Has Mr. O’Dell given you a full statement?”
“Yes, he has.”
“Good. I’ll read your report when you pass it in.” Allan thanked the officer and walked toward the guard.
“I’m Detective Allan Stanton,” he said, reaching out.
“Greg O’Dell.”
Through their handshake, Allan could feel a tremor in the guard’s grip.
“Did you witness the crime?” he asked.
Greg glanced at the victim. “No. I found Brad this way.”
“Can I see some identification, please?”
He produced his wallet and fumbled out his driver’s license.
“What’s your relationship with the victim?” asked Allan, taking notes.
“Strictly work related.”
“Not friends outside of work?”
“I’m married with three kids. It’s hard for me to have time for buddies in my life.”
Briefly, Allan appraised him. “Did you work together as a pair?”
“More of a team. We always kept in touch by radio. If something went down, we were only a click away.”
“Was Brad married?”
“No. Long-term relationship. He always remarked about how his girlfriend referred to them as partners.”
“Were there problems between them?”
“He never mentioned any.”
“Prior to discovering his body, did you see anyone leaving the area?”
“No.”
Allan returned his driver’s license. “Did Brad radio you at any point to report trouble?”
Frowning, Greg looked down at his shoes. “Not exactly.” He ran his fingers through the stubble of his brown hair. “He was about to check on someone in a truck.”
Allan scribbled in his spiral. “I know your thoughts might be a bit cloudy right now, but try to be as detailed as you can. And please, try to leave nothing out...”
10
Halifax, May 9
3:46 a.m.
Stars speckled the night sky. Low on the horizon, the large moon was a dim smudge. The cool breath drifting in from the harbor was a welcome reprieve from the bizarre heat wave the province had languished through the last week.
Greg O’Dell wondered if there was something to this global-warming hoopla.
He raised his wrist to his face, checking the time. 3:46 a.m. Just over two hours, and his shift would be finished. The security firm he worked for was contracted out to provide after-hours protection to many waterfront businesses.
Greg stood in Sackville Landing, near a sculpture of a huge rolling wave. Constructed of ferro-cement, the wave was twelve feet high and painted bluish green. Ahead of him, beyond the docks, the black water coruscated with light.
It was quiet here, serene with the murmur of the harbor. The atmosphere of the waterfront was much different in the daytime—a beehive of locals and visitors. There was a rich history to see—a reflection of old, the promise of new. Eighteenth- and nineteenth-century architecture blended with modern buildings encased with glass.
Greg carried a flashlight in his right hand. After flicking it on, he played the beam around. Lampposts lent the dock a touch of light, but their pale glow seemed only to deepen the shadows.
Slowly, Greg crossed the landing, making his rounds again. As he stopped close to the water, his two-way radio suddenly crackled to life.
“Copy, Greg.”
He recognized the voice as belonging to his coworker, Brad Hawkins. Greg pulled out the radio from his belt and pressed the talk button. “Go ahead. Over.”
“Better watch your back,” Brad said. “There’s a suspicious person sneaking up behind you.”
Greg turned his head without moving his body. In the periphery of his vision, he saw a shadowy figure approaching. He swung around, lifting the beam.
It was Brad himself. He came into the light with a broad grin on his face. Both hands rose in feigned surrender.
“Don’t shoot. I come in peace.”
Greg managed a smile. “Good thing we don’t wear guns.”
“I wouldn’t be so bold if we did.”
Greg chuckled. “Pretty quiet night, eh?”
Brad nodded, putting his radio away. “Not too many Saturday nights like this. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a good thing.”
“Yeah, it is.”
“Come on,” Brad said. “We should finish up.”
Together, they made their way through the waterfront, checking doors and windows. To cover more ground, the two men split up. Brad went back the way they had come. Greg made his way to Historic Properties on Upper Water Street, where many waterfront warehouses built by the city’s earliest settlers still stood. Today, they were renovated into boutiques, cafés, and pubs.
The streets were empty. A car or two passed by. There was no one on the sidewalks.
Halfway through his rounds, Brad’s voice came over Greg’s radio again.
“Copy, Greg.”
“Go ahead. Over.”
“I’m going to check out a truck sitting here on the waterfront.”
Greg looked at the time. 5:01 a.m. “What’s your location?”
“I’m coming up to the Impark lot by ECTUG.”
“Anyone around?”
“No one outside that I can see. The dome light is on in the truck. Only see one person inside that I can tell. Could be someone beside him.”
“Is the person male or female?”
“Male. Probably drunk and came down here to sleep it off.”
“Do you want backup?”
“No. I can handle it.”
“Copy that. Any problems, radio me.”
“I will. Over.”
Greg continued his rounds. When he finished at Historic Properties, he walked toward Lower Water Street. He tried the doors and examined the windows at the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic. All secure.
The time was 5:28 a.m. Brad still hadn’t radioed back.
Curious, Greg decided to check on him. He took out his two-way.
“Copy, Brad.”
Waiting for a reply, Greg breathed in. Slowly, he began counting to himself. When he reached fifteen, he got on the radio again.
“Brad. Are you there?”
Still no reply. Something was wrong. Brad always answered his radio.
Greg wondered if the battery had died. He knew the Impark lot was close. Radio in one hand, flashlight in the other, he started walking.
Dawn was breaking quietly over the horizon. Through the fading dark, vague shapes began to take on distinctive qualities.
Greg reached Sackville Landing once more. A short distance away, he could make out the profile of the ECTUG building outlined against the sky, the peculiar silhouettes of two tugboats moored at the dock.
“Copy, Brad.”
Silence.
Greg came to the tugboats first. The Impark lot was straight ahead.
“Brad. Are you all right?”
Abruptly, Greg stopped. He became very still. There was a sound. Holding his breath, he clicked the talk button on his radio, once.
Again.
> A third time.
It was there, all right. Even over the creaking tugs and the pounding pulse in his ears, it was there. Somewhere close by came the faint crackle of static from a two-way radio.
“Copy, Brad.” Another sound made Greg shiver. Out of nowhere, his own disembodied voice carried back to him.
Brad, or at least his radio, was nearby. For a moment Greg stood there, peering about. In the open expanse, it was hard to pinpoint the location.
Maybe Brad was playing another practical joke. Like earlier.
Greg looked at his watch again: 5:38 a.m. So close to quitting time.
He approached the Impark lot. Only when he reached it did he see the dark mass lying in the middle of the pavement.
From this distance, he couldn’t make out any features. Then the beam of his flashlight found it. Greg froze. The mass, illuminated now, became a human body. Immediately, Greg knew the uniform as well as he knew his own.
“Brad.”
Fear rising, Greg ran to the body.
Head west, feet east, Brad Hawkins lay facedown in complete stillness. There was a pool of blood beneath his mouth that looked sticky to the touch. His eyes were fixed open. Greg moved the light across them. The pupils showed no response.
The back of Brad’s jacket looked wet. There was a small slice in it between the shoulder blades. The radio he had never gotten to use was still in its case on his belt.
Some vestige of discipline told Greg not to touch the body. He stood and took a step back, struggling to comprehend. He threw the beam across the parking lot. Several feet away, shards of glass sparkled across on the pavement. A broken flashlight lay nearby.
Greg reached into his jacket and took out his cell phone. He swallowed and clumsily pressed numbers on the keypad. The ringing became a male voice on the other end.
“Nine-one-one. What is your emergency?”
Greg looked at his partner once more.
“I’d...” He stammered, unable to get the words out.
“Sir?”
He cleared his throat. “I’d...I’d like to report a murder.”
11
Halifax, May 9
6:55 a.m.
Allan reflected on Greg’s story.
“Did Brad describe this truck to you? A make? Color?”
“No, just that it was a truck. Really narrows it down, eh?”
“It doesn’t help much. And you don’t recall seeing a truck leaving the scene or passing by when you went searching for Brad?”
Greg looked thoughtful. “No. It would be something I’d notice at that time of night. We catch people loitering down here all the time. Young couples making out. Hookers and their johns. Drunks fresh out of the bars, unable to drive home. Teenagers smoking up.” He paused, a finger to his lips. “Check Brad’s pad. We record everything.” He reached inside his jacket and brought out a notebook with a black cover. “It’s like this one.”
Allan took the notebook. As he examined it, he realized that it was very similar to the one he carried himself. The notebook was spiral bound, with a flip-up cover.
“Your company supplies these?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“And you’re sure Brad had his when he started his shift?”
Greg nodded. “Oh, yes. I saw it.”
“Do you remember having trouble with anyone recently?”
“No. The men we find with the hookers are more embarrassed than anything. Some of the drunks and teenagers mouth off to us from time to time. But they all leave without incident after we threaten to call you guys.”
“Had either of you checked the parking lot earlier in the night?”
“A few times.”
“You, personally?”
“Yes.”
“You don’t remember seeing the truck?”
“No. Earlier the lot was full. But it emptied out right after the bars closed.”
“Thank you.” Allan returned the notebook. “You’re free to go. Once you’ve had time to calm down, you might remember something else. If that happens, please give us a call.”
For a moment, Greg looked over at the body of Brad Hawkins. When he turned back, Allan saw that his eyes had suddenly become wet.
“I hope you catch whoever did this,” Greg said weakly and then walked away.
He didn’t look back.
Allan watched him briefly and then focused on the Ident crew as they walked toward the scene. It consisted of two men—Jim Lucas, an African-Canadian who had a bald head and sported a shadow of a goatee. Topping six-four, he had the muscular contours of a linebacker. Then there was Harvey Doucette, born and raised in Montreal. He was tall and rangy, with a crew cut and a projected air of calm.
Until they forensically cleared the scene, no one else would be allowed inside. The path used by the first officer would serve as their entry point. After reaching the body, the two men set up a privacy screen to hide it from prying eyes. Then, fanning out from the body, they began to search the lot for evidence. They moved with slow deliberation, inches at a time, examining pieces of debris that could serve as useful pieces of evidence.
Each man had a job to do—Harvey placed evidence markers next to objects for retrieval, while Jim took long- and close-range photographs. Neither man spoke much. Their movements were without sound, ghostlike figures in a dreamscape.
Standing several feet away, Allan could see the victim’s eyes were locked open. On the pavement below his mouth was a small puddle of blood he had regurgitated at the moment of death.
Spiral in hand, Allan turned to a fresh page and began a rough sketch of the crime scene, using a stick figure as the victim. At the bottom he included a legend to identify each object of evidence by number. The body. Fragments of glass. A broken flashlight.
Dr. Coulter’s black van arrived at 7:15 a.m. The medical examiner was a short man, clean-shaven, with salt-and-pepper hair and keen blue eyes. There was an air of composure about him; seldom did his deadpan expression ever change.
His assistant was Lawrence Sodero, a trim, bright-eyed man in his midthirties. He wore wire-rimmed glasses and had an Ivy League haircut. To Allan, Sodero seemed a bit of a preppy and a little weird.
Like the Ident techs, both men were dressed in protective coveralls. Once Ident gave the okay, Coulter walked into the scene. Sodero followed with the gurney.
As Coulter reached the body, he set down a black bag he’d been carrying. He would touch or move the body as little as possible. He knelt by the head, checking the jaw and eyelids for stiffness.
“Body is still flaccid,” he noted. “Death was recent.”
Allan walked over. “We have a statement that puts the time of death somewhere between four fifty-five and five thirty.”
“I’ll try to narrow it down the best I can.” From the black bag, Coulter removed a digital thermo hygrometer and recorded the environmental temperature and humidity.
Next, he took out a probe thermometer, not unlike one used to check meat in an oven. Straddling the body, he inserted it through the abdomen and into the liver, waited a moment, and then pulled it out. He recorded the temperature in his notes.
Meticulously, he examined the surface of the jacket where the blade had gone through.
“There’s a single stab wound to the victim’s back. There could be more. At this point, I won’t know of additional injuries until the autopsy.” Eyes narrowing, he picked up part of the jacket at the shoulder, looking hard at something in the fabric.
Allan moved closer. “What is it?”
“There’s a blood impression on the back of the left shoulder. Looks like a swipe mark, as if the suspect had wiped off the murder weapon.” Coulter looked up, his lips a straight line. “A final dishonor to a dishonorable crime.”
“Could you check the pockets? We’re looking for a notebook.” Allan held up his own. “Similar to this.”
Coulter and Sodero gingerly rolled the body, turning the dead man onto his back. Cautious of needles, Coulter
lightly patted each pocket before dipping his fingers inside. The jacket pockets were empty. From a pants pocket came a set of keys, some loose change. From another, a black wallet. Coulter opened it to reveal cash and credit cards.
“I guess we can rule out robbery,” he said. “There’s no notebook on the body, Detective. Only a pen in the breast pocket.”
Allan scratched his chin. Unless the search of the scene produced the notebook, he’d assume the killer made off with it.
He stood off to the side as Coulter tied paper bags over the dead man’s hands to protect any surface trace evidence, such as locks of hair or skin tags, in the event he had struggled with his attacker. Before putting the body into a black bag, he and Sodero wrapped it in a clean sheet of polythene and secured it with tape.
Allan watched them heft the body onto the gurney. They wheeled it to the back of Coulter’s van and slid it inside. In quick succession, they slammed the doors shut.
Allan called over to them, “What time’s the autopsy?”
“Soon as we get back, Detective.”
“I’ll stop by later. See what info you have for me.”
Coulter lifted his hand in a wave. “See you then.”
Someone else called out, “Detective.”
Allan turned to his right and saw Jim kneeling over something at the edge of the parking lot.
Jim waved him over.
Approaching, Allan asked, “What’d you find?”
“Blood.” Jim pointed down to a series of red drops. “A fresh trail of it.”
Together, the two men followed them. Spaced roughly two feet apart, the blood moved across the remainder of the parking lot toward the tugboat wharf then past the ECTUG building, where it came to a halt at the end of the wharf. The bleeder had obviously stopped there for some time. The last drop was much larger than the rest, over an inch in diameter. That suggested blood dripping into blood.
“The trail ends here,” remarked Allan, peering out at the Halifax harbor.
The smell of sea salt was strong. Under the climbing sun, the water sparkled. Gulls circled the public boardwalk nearby. Beneath the sound of lapping water came their faint cries.
Jim kneeled down and began measuring the drops. His camera dangled from a strap around his neck.
