Stanton- The Trilogy

by Alex MacLean

  He waited a moment longer before he turned away and left. Back in his car, he looked up at Cathy’s dark window. Through its slick glass he could see drawn blinds.

  Allan opened the glove box and took out a pen and notebook. Then he wrote:

  Hi, Cathy,

  I know the hour is late, but after your call, I got worried about you. I stopped by in case you were in need of a friend. Call me anytime. Hope you’re OK.

  Detective Allan Stanton

  He tore out the page, took it inside the building, and slid it under Cathy’s door. Back in his car, Allan switched on the ignition. The digital numbers that lit up in the dash read 1:17 a.m.

  He let out a long sigh and wondered if he’d get back to sleep tonight.

  22

  Halifax, May 11

  1:20 a.m.

  The taxicab pulled up to the curb in front of a red brick Colonial. From the backseat Cathy Ambré looked out the window. The neighborhood was an affluent suburb. Its street was awash with fancy homes, square hedges, and freshly manicured lawns. Some of the homes bloomed with light. Others, dark and quiet, bespoke the late-night hour.

  “Wait here,” she told the driver. “I’ll be right back.”

  She opened the door and stepped outside. Torn by uncertainty, she paused, looking over the roof of the car at the house. Her instructions were firm and uncompromising. Her home phone must never be used when calling. No one must know of this visit or this location. She must go to the back door. She must be alone.

  With faltering steps, she walked through the cool mist. She didn’t feel right coming here.

  An outside light was already on. She rang the bell and became aware that she was trembling. In the kitchen window someone drew aside the curtain. When it closed there came the rattle of a safety chain, and then the door opened.

  The man who answered looked younger than his age. He was gimlet eyed and had swept-back blond hair. In the glow of the overhead light, his face seemed bloodless. He wore a blue tracksuit with no socks.

  His tone was unwelcoming. “You know I don’t like people showing up at my house.” He looked past her, checking the backyard. “It can rouse suspicion.”

  Through her nervousness Cathy swallowed. “I’m sorry. But I’m desperate. And I didn’t know where else I could turn.”

  The man gave her a droll look. Hand on the door, he regarded her with something like disgust. There was an air of haughtiness about him. Whenever she was in his presence, she always felt worthless, uncomfortable.

  “I haven’t seen you in a few weeks,” he said. “Thought you found someone else.”

  Almost inaudibly, she answered, “No.”

  The man gave her a querying glance but didn’t press the issue. He turned and walked to the kitchen cabinets. Watching him, Cathy braced herself. When he came back, she saw a small, clear reclosable bag in his hand. Inside was a clump of dirty powder.

  She asked, “Is that from the same batch your boy sold me a few weeks ago?”

  “The very same.”

  As she stared at the bag, she felt herself turn to lead. Like a flash point, the sudden image of a doctor dressed in a white lab coat sparked in her mind. He looked to be perhaps sixty and had gray hair, translucent blue eyes, and an amiable face. Standing at her bedside, he folded his arms. The thin stretch of his lips lent a suggestion of fatherly patience bordering on disappointment.

  “Toxicology results came back positive for a mix of morphine and cocaine in your blood,” he explained. “I suspect the discovery of the morphine might be misleading. Were you speedballing?”

  “Heroin, yes,” she said. “But not cocaine.”

  The doctor came closer, resting a hand on the sheet next to her. “The toxic level of the cocaine was dangerously high. We attribute the cause of your heart attack to that.”

  This confused Cathy. Weary, she tried to pull her thoughts together. She turned her head on the pillow, replaying the last moments in her memory. The street dealer had given no indication the heroin was cut with another drug. He told her the purity of the grade was high, to be careful with it.

  Ashamed to face the doctor, she whispered, “I didn’t know.”

  “I suggest you not try it again,” he said. “You’re lucky to be alive. That might not be the case next time. Your heart simply won’t take it.”

  “Do you want this or not?”

  Startled from thought, Cathy blinked. The man in the doorway was holding out the bag. Cathy swallowed and reached into the pocket of her jeans, withdrawing a small wad of bills. After counting them, she gave the man some money. With awkward fingers, she took the bag from him.

  “I have some premium grade coming in from South America next week,” he said. “Even higher purity than this. You’ll have to take small doses. Call one of my boys from a pay phone. They can set up a meet.”

  Cathy could only nod. With some reluctance, she looked into the man’s face one last time. She wanted to tell him off, call him a peddler of human misery.

  Instead, she turned away and drew a breath. She stared down at the bag of powder in her hand. Old friend. Old enemy.

  Pain crossed her face. With a shudder she stuffed the bag into her pocket. The door closed behind her. Then the outside light went dark.

  As she walked back to the cab, the drizzle became a shower.

  “Take me home, please,” she told the driver as she climbed into the back.

  Slumping in the seat, she shut her eyes. The crushing weight of what she had just done bore down on her. She felt pathetic, a disgrace, sick at how she had betrayed herself and others. The lost woman she had once been had returned to claim her.

  The cab jerked with sudden acceleration. Gripping the armrest on the door, Cathy gritted her teeth. There came a tightening in her chest, nausea in her stomach.

  After a few moments, she opened her eyes. Beyond the rain-streaked window, she watched the flavor of the neighborhood turn seedy, dilapidated, an eyesore on the city. At the next corner, the cab stopped.

  Over the hiss of windshield wipers came the driver’s voice. “That’ll be fifteen, ma’am.”

  Counting her money, she realized she would have less than ten dollars left to her name after she paid the fare. None of it mattered now.

  After receiving her change, she got out of the cab. Hunched forward, hands thrust into her pockets, she walked slowly toward the front steps of her apartment building. As she climbed them, her legs felt shaky. Before she went inside, she paused briefly on the stoop to look at her reflection in the door. Maybe it was only an illusion, but through the small beads of rainwater running down the glass, Cathy couldn’t see the tears running down her own face.

  23

  Halifax, May 12

  10:01 p.m.

  The bleakest of nights.

  Allan knew it was going to be a bad one when he read the address on his pager. Returning here felt like déjà vu, though the circumstances were different this time. Sitting in his car, he didn’t want to go inside.

  Around him, the night was deep and still. Rain had fallen all day, ending only a short time ago, and beneath the wash of streetlights everything had a glassy sheen. There was a hiss of tires as a truck rolled by. In the rearview mirror, Allan watched the taillights recede into the urban maze. He looked through the passenger-side window at the apartment building with foreboding, uncomfortable about what he might find inside.

  He sighed.

  He left his car and crossed the street, flashing his badge at two officers standing guard outside the building.

  Time.

  Why was it important? He looked at his wristwatch. 10:06 p.m. As he climbed the front steps of the apartment building, he felt a coat pocket for the shape of his notebook. He realized he hadn’t recorded his arrival time. How could he have forgotten such a detail?

  The glass of the entrance door caught his reflection in the red-and-blue strobe of nearby police cars. It stopped him for a moment.

  Funny, he thought, how tired he l
ooked. Nearly as exhausted as he felt.

  Slowly, he gripped the metal handle. Before going inside, he steeled himself.

  He went up to the second floor and maneuvered his way through a crowd of curious tenants. Many were in nightclothes. Their eyes seemed transfixed on an open doorway down the hall. Outside it, an officer was standing guard. He was young, leanly muscled. His body was erect, his eyes keen. Beside him stood another man, squat and pear shaped. A fringe of gray hair circled his bald crown.

  Haltingly, Allan approached the two men and took the officer out of the earshot of others.

  “Give me the details,” he said softly.

  “The subject is a young woman,” the officer said. “Early to midtwenties. We haven’t established identification yet. Looks like your classic overdose, Detective. There is drug paraphernalia on site.”

  “Drugs? Who called it in?”

  The officer gestured toward the pear-shaped man. “Mr. Carlson. The landlord. He got a call earlier from the elderly neighbor across the hall. She became worried about the tenant living here after she noticed the apartment lights on for the past couple of nights. She came over several times and knocked, but there was no answer.

  “She called Mr. Carlson, and he arrived at nine twenty. And after receiving no answer, he let himself in.

  “The call came over my radio at nine thirty-five. I arrived at nine forty. EHS came on the scene three minutes after me.”

  “Who called EHS?”

  “Mr. Carlson.”

  “Did you check for vitals before their arrival?”

  The officer gave a grim expression. “I never touched the body. There was no need.”

  For a moment, Allan hesitated. He found himself wishing to get away from all this.

  He asked, “Did the ambulance crew touch or move the body?”

  “No, sir. I told them they weren’t needed, so they left.”

  “Where’s the subject?”

  “The first bedroom on the left.”

  “Has the medical examiner been notified?”

  “Yes. Should be en route.”

  “Okay. Thank you.”

  After turning to a blank page in his notebook, Allan walked over to the landlord and introduced himself. The man accepted his extended hand with a lifeless grip.

  “Gerald Carlson,” he replied.

  “You found the subject?”

  “Yes.”

  “Can you show me some identification?”

  The landlord gave a slight nod toward the first officer. “I already went through this with him.”

  “Sorry, but now you need to go through it with me.”

  A red flush appeared on Gerald’s face. He reached into a back pocket and withdrew a leather wallet. From that he produced his driver’s license and handed it to Allan.

  He wrote down the details.

  “Tell me everything.”

  Gerald cleared his throat. “Well, earlier this evening, I got a call from Mrs. Layton from across the hall...”

  “What time did Mrs. Layton call you?” Allan interjected.

  “About ten to nine.”

  “And what did she tell you exactly?”

  Gerald folded his arms. “She told me she became nervous after realizing the lights had been on for the last two nights.”

  “You have a key to the premises?”

  “Yes.”

  “What time did you arrive?”

  “About nine twenty.”

  “Was the door chained when you unlocked it?”

  “Yes.” Gerald pointed to the carpeted floor just inside the open doorway, where pieces of a broken chain and a splinter of wood lay. “I called in three times. Waited probably a couple of minutes. Then I shouldered the door in.”

  Allan’s gaze wandered into the apartment. Down the hallway he saw Sergeant Malone standing in front of an open doorway. Flashes of a photographer’s camera reflected on the jamb.

  Allan swallowed and said, “You should’ve called us first.”

  Fleetingly, the man touched his forehead. “I wasn’t thinking at the time.”

  “You placed the call to 9-1-1?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you use the phone on the premises?”

  A brusque nod. “I did.”

  Allan winced. “What time was this?”

  “Nine thirty, nine thirty-five.”

  “What lights were on when you got here?”

  Gerald watched Allan’s pen moving across the page. “The living room, the kitchen, and the one bedroom.”

  “The bedroom where the subject was located?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you touch the body?”

  “I checked for a pulse. She was stone cold.”

  Allan handed back the license. “Okay, Mr. Carlson. Thank you. That will be all for now.”

  “Do you want to talk to Mrs. Layton?”

  Briefly, Allan paused to take in the elderly woman standing outside her open doorway across the hallway. She was perhaps in her late sixties, had a nimbus of white hair, and was so thin that he found it painful to look at her.

  “No need,” he said and walked into the apartment.

  With faltering steps, he approached Malone, who passed him a clipboard. Allan timed into the scene.

  “After these past four days,” Malone remarked, “I’m looking forward to the next four off.”

  “In need of a little R and R?” Allan gave back the clipboard. “A few beers and barbeques on the back deck will help.”

  A faint smile started at the corners of the sergeant’s mouth. “Damn straight.”

  “So what do we have?”

  “Straight-up suicide, Detective.”

  The words, Allan found, jolted him. Although it was something he had feared when the call had come across his pager, it still took him by surprise.

  In a tight voice, he asked, “How’d we come to that conclusion so soon?”

  Malone moved out of the doorway, looking to his right. “She left a note.”

  Allan followed the sergeant’s gaze. There, on top of the dresser, was a neatly folded sheaf of paper. Jim Lucas shot photos of it. When he noticed Allan, he lowered his camera and picked up an unsealed envelope beside the note.

  “This is addressed to you, Detective.” Jim held it up, pausing.

  Before taking it, Allan checked his pockets for latex gloves and realized he had forgotten them in the trunk of his car.

  Goddammit, man, he thought, wincing at his own carelessness.

  Jim got him a pair, and Allan put them on.

  The face of the envelope had Allan’s name scribbled across it. He stared at it for a long moment.

  Malone asked, “You knew the subject?”

  Allan didn’t look up.

  “Only briefly,” he answered quietly.

  He turned up the flap on the envelope and saw inside the note he had left Cathy Ambré only two nights before. For a moment, he didn’t take it out. When at last he did, his fingers felt clumsy. Beneath his words, the young woman had written:

  Thank you, Detective Stanton. I was surprised to find your note when I got home. We must’ve just missed each other. Honestly, I thought about calling you. I really did. But I’m afraid that I’m beyond anyone’s friendship or kind words right now. I’ve tried to pick up the pieces of my life and move on, but I’ve found it to be harder than I could have ever imagined. I know that might be difficult for you to understand. There are so many things about me that you just don’t know. You were right when you said a doctor never treats his own illness. I simply couldn’t treat mine either.

  I wish you all the best. The world needs more people like you.

  God bless,

  Cathy

  P.S. Please find my sister.

  For a moment, Allan didn’t move. Then he handed the note and envelope back to Jim for processing.

  “We found the bathtub full of water,” Sergeant Malone was saying. “There is a razor blade on the rim.”

  A
llan half listened. He began to move toward the bedroom, numb.

  “We can only surmise what her intentions were,” Malone added. “Had she decided to shoot up before ending her life in the bathroom?”

  Only when Allan stood in the open doorway did he see Cathy Ambré. She lay supine atop the bed, arms flung out across the sheets. Her face was turned to one side. Her mouth was partly open. Her eyes were closed, as if asleep. Beside her was a drug user’s paraphernalia—a short length of rope used as a tourniquet, a box of alcohol swabs, cotton balls, a lighter, a spoon with a tinged underside, a needle and syringe. On the floor next to the bed lay a tiny clear bag, its inside marred with a talcose residue.

  “Are you receiving treatment?”

  “I went cold turkey...”

  “It’s still hard to do without professional help...”

  “I can do it. I will do it.”

  Slowly, Allan shook his head.

  Why? he mourned. Why did you do this to yourself?

  Emotions, he realized, were jeopardizing his train of thought. He forced himself to step back, observe things professionally. His eyes hunted details. Drawn blinds veiled the outside world. The lights were on in the bedroom and living room. Two nights ago when he had stopped by, the apartment was in darkness.

  When had Cathy come home?

  The bedroom itself was plainly furnished—a bed, a crucifix above it, a night table, a dresser with mirror. The single window faced Brewer Street. The overhead light cast a yellow tone on the floral wallpaper.

  Harvey Doucette was busy measuring key distances.

  “It’s safe to come in, Detective,” he said, glancing over. “It won’t take long to wrap up things here.”

  Allan stepped inside. He didn’t move directly to the note on the dresser. He walked around the perimeter of the bedroom instead, looking along the floor. He opened the blinds to check the window. Locked.

  After turning to a blank page in his notebook, he stood off to one corner and began to rough out a sketch of the room. When it came to drawing the crude stick figure of Cathy Ambré, he found it awkward.

  He moved to the dresser and picked up the note by one corner. The handwriting reflected the jagged scrawl of grief.