These fusspot thoughts are, thankfully, interrupted by Lotis, walking beside Arthur with her phone to her ear, nudging him, drawing his attention to Gilbert Gilbert. Though said to have been driven to madness, there he is, shoulders back, head high, walking up Robson Square to the Law Courts, returning to his clerkish duties.
“Good on you, Gilbert,” she calls, raising a fist in salute to his gritty spirit. Gilbert walks on, expressionless, eyes distantly focused, too embarrassed to acknowledge them.
Lotis snaps her phone shut. “I’m getting the big stall. Daisy doesn’t want to get involved, that’s her lawyer’s hidden message.” B.K. Shrader, a sly divorce practitioner with a reputation for seducing the more attractive of his clientele.
“Phone him back, I’ll talk to him.”
Arthur doesn’t want to force Desirée Flynn to court, but if he is to prove Flynn guilty, he must impale him on the sword of scienter, guilty knowledge of the lesbian affair that smashed his marriage. Was he motivated by powerful jealousy–or by failure, the ego-shrivelling awareness that his wife had found a better lover in a woman?
As they enter the El Beau Room to lunchtime buzz and clatter, Lotis passes the phone to Arthur, who exchanges greetings with Shrader, parries, joshes. “B.K., you still hold the record of eight decrees in one day?”
“Nine, but who’s counting. I’m slowing down, the body can’t keep up with the demands of my grateful clients. Thought we got rid of your ugly face–and it’s a lot uglier than it used to be. Who’s the little dessert treat beside you? Must be your junior, what’s her name…Nookie. Rudnicki.”
Arthur stops dead, the dessert treat running into him. He stares at the phone–where’s the hidden camera? The phone speaks. “Look up.”
Arthur sees him at a balcony table with, presumably, a gay divorcee, plump and pink-lipped. He’s waving his phone, a crooked grin on his lumpish face. It’s a mystery how a fellow like him attracts women. It must be the scent he gives off, the gonadotrophins, they cloud women’s sensibilities. (What scent vents from Arthur? Something fusty, old books, worn boots, and potting soil.)
Lotis will wait at the bar with her busy phone. She has lots on her plate, including the breach-of-contract claim against Garlinc. Arthur shook hands with Clearihue. Lotis witnessed that, and will sign an affidavit. But they face a formidable problem: by ancient law, land sales must be evidenced in writing.
Upstairs, Shrader offers Arthur a chair, then encourages his companion to touch up her lips in the ladies. “No, Arthur, I won’t give you Desirée Flynn, and I won’t break client privilege by saying what I know. Except what’s already on the record–our pleadings allege, inter alia, rages, beatings, murder threats. If she was scared to death of Jasper before, how do you think she feels now, with you painting him as a jealous, vengeful, murderous son of a bitch?”
“Nonsense. If he goes scot-free she’s forever in danger. She’ll feel safe only if he’s convicted of murder. I don’t ask for anything dramatic. She doesn’t have to testify that Flynn threatened to kill anyone, just that he was suspicious about her goings-on with her therapist.”
“What the fuck are you doing in that court? Defending or prosecuting? If you’re prosecuting, you got it backwards, you’re supposed to lay a charge first. You’ve got reasonable doubt coming out your yin-yang, you don’t need Daisy. She doesn’t need the lurid publicity, she’s camera-shy.”
“I can get an order forcing her into court.”
“Give her a break, Arthur.” Drawing close. “She has a new life. The lesbian adventure is over. She’s going on thirty-four, an age when chances start to run out, even for the gorgeous. She’s engaged to a widowed pharmacist with three kids. It looks like she can finally grab a little happiness out of life. Why steal that from her?”
He has a point. Compel her to testify, shove her before the cameras, force her to wade through the jostling throng, subject her to whispers about lesbian lovers–engagements have foundered on less. It’s not Arthur’s role to subject anyone to that. He rises as Shrader’s client returns, lips glistening. “Okay, I’m persuaded. I’ll leave her be. But, between us, did he know about the affair?”
“What do you think? He’s a cop.”
Arthur bids them adieu. Gone is his daydream of thrusting a Perry Mason-like forefinger at the perp, bringing him to his feet to confess in trembling vibrato, I did it and I’m glad. He will stop playing his hubristic role as accusator, he’ll be generous, entrust the job to the state. Daisy may not escape attention, but let the regular authorities make their polite inquiries first.
He rejoins Lotis, who hands him her phone: it’s Brian, exultant, enjoying a smoke before lunching with an inspector and a Crown attorney. “The cat is among the pigeons. The Faloon rape was closed out eighteen months ago, and a notice filed to destroy exhibits, including two vaginal swabs in a zip-lock bag. The record is initialled by the exhibits custodian–a civilian, the cops don’t trust one of their own to do this job–but Flynn’s initials appear too, as a witness. My informant suspects scalawaggery, the document smells of having been backdated.”
“I assume Buddy has been apprised of this.”
“Yup. I’m getting vibes that Jasper had been making the Force uneasy for some time. Assault complaints by his wife, handled outside the court system. Threats. It’s why they bundled him off to Alberni. Some serious stalking was going on when he came back for that two-week stint. That’s why you’ve got Inspector Taylor of ACU sitting in the orchestra pit. After lunch, I’m coming in from the cold. See you then. Ciao.”
Arthur orders a bloodless Caesar and a sandwich. It’s one o’clock. Hubbell is showing Margaret through his apartment. She sees the unmade bed, the rumpled sheets. What does she think of the pillow pictures? I can’t imagine how they get into position number three, Hubbell. Arthur phones 807 Elysian, and there’s no answer. They’re letting it ring…
The Owl figured Jasper might cut ass out of town after this morning’s shellacking, but here he is, the Known Individual, Flynn of the Mounted, still in boots and saddle. Maybe he just couldn’t get away, maybe someone was frozen onto his tail all through lunch, for instance the man in the shiny shoes to Faloon’s right.
This afternoon’s performance is sold out again, you can see people lined up outside. Claudette and Holly are getting on like kissing cousins in the back row, two tough broads from the sticks. Even though the whole courtroom knows he boffed them both, Claudie isn’t pissed off, she’s too kind and forgiving, it’s guilt-making. A wedding next month. Did he actually agree to that? What’s marriage going to feel like for a dashing boulevardier like the Owl? Is it the right step for a man of great hidden wealth? Sebastien Plouffe, Sebastien Plouffe, I love you…
Here comes the jury settling in, here comes Father Time, and here’s the disgraced copper going back into the stand. Faloon, who by now has read the transcripts twice over, is puzzling out Flynn’s MO. Maybe he got advance word that the Owl and Doctor Eve made dinner reservations at the Breakers for March 31, making it an excellent night for murder. A bonus, a gift on top of the fact he had the DNA, the gob on the swab.
He probably didn’t come straight into Brady Beach, instead hid his Cormoran behind one of the outcrops and rowed his dinghy in. Maybe he had time to prowl the town. Maybe he saw that drunk condo guy. Saw Faloon! Saw him sneaking down from the Breakers. Saw him bury the zip-lock.
If thirty-one large has gone to the Sergeant Flynn Retirement Fund, easy come, easy go, it’s chickenfeed. There’s a thousand times more buried in Cimitière Saint Pierre.
Here comes peppery Miss Rudnicki, breezing into the courtroom like a movie star, settling in beside her learned master. The Owl always enjoys the way Beauchamp snaps his braces when he stands to cross-examine, it means he’s ready, he’s racked.
Flynn looks like he fuelled up at lunch, maybe a beer or two to help relax. He tries to interrupt Beauchamp with an excuse about the print on the fridge door, but he’s cut off by the judge, who has gauze o
r something in his mouth, you get a glimpse of white sometimes.
Beauchamp begins again. “Let’s try to reconstruct your movements on the eve of April Fool’s Day. You went off shift, joined an officer for a drink, stopped by the detachment…”
“To sign off on some paperwork.”
“Thank you, let me finish. And you arrived home at eight o’clock. Correct?”
“About that.”
“And then what?”
“Oh, I may have unfrozen a steak dinner, watched some television. I was pretty beat. Hit the sack early.”
“Can you give me the name of one person who might have seen you between 8 p.m. and dawn the next day?”
Flynn frowns, struggles, like it’s almost there, a name of somebody, but no, he can’t bring it home. “No.”
“Ever sat around with your mates and speculated about the perfect murder?”
“I don’t get your meaning.”
“I’m sure we’ve all done it. A parlour game. I would imagine police detectives are more prone than most to indulge.”
“Can’t say I’m interested in parlour games, Mr. Beauchamp.”
“It’s always something the murderer leaves behind that does him in, isn’t that the case? A footprint, a hair, a bloodstain–you’ve seen it all. But a tranquilized victim gagged on her own garment leaves no telltale bullets, no knife wounds, right? No blood, no clues.”
The judge can’t take any more of what Faloon thinks is called rhetoric. “Don’t answer that question, witness. It is not a question. It is a speech with question marks.”
“My question is, sergeant, did you ever consider that scenario?”
“Don’t answer.”
“Milord, this issue is at the very heart of the defence.” Bellowed, he actually causes the old boy to jump.
“Are you accusing this officer of murder?”
“Your Lordship will forgive me if I haven’t made that abundantly obvious.”
“Staff Sergeant Flynn? Then this is a serious matter. But I see Her Majesty’s consul isn’t moving a muscle.” The judge turns his black, vacuum-cleaner eyes to Mr. Svabo, but they can’t suck him up off his chair. He’s just watching, arms folded. “Proceed then. Proceed.”
The great man has recovered from yesterday’s reversal with Angella, a rare stumble, but what a trouper, the good don’t stay down. “Sergeant, do you understand my question?”
“I don’t sit around in my off hours contemplating how to get away with a crime. I want to get away from crime.”
Flynn got off a good one, he had too much time to think. Mr. Beauchamp reacts by speeding up his questions. He puts it to the witness that he never went to bed that night, the witness denies. He waited for darkness, then took off in his boat. Denied. At Brady Beach, he anchored out, rowed in. Denied. He had some ground-up rochies on him. Denied. He had the swabs. Denied categorically.
“I’m a little vague on the specifics of your plan, sergeant. Were you hoping to catch her before she went to bed? To share a glass of wine, to talk, to complain about her unprofessional conduct, her seduction of your wife? And did matters then get out of hand?”
Flynn just looks at him.
“Or did it play out this way–there was a light on in the cottage, you saw through the windows that no one was home. You tugged the door open, you looked about. In the fridge was an open bottle of Chablis. You doctored it and hid. Outside? In the loft? Did you take a chance on the loft? I think so.”
Flynn doesn’t even try to get a word in, he keeps looking at the judge, waiting for cues to respond. But the old chief has turned sideways, arms folded like he’s disgusted with Mr. Beauchamp, Mr. Svabo, the whole trial. The jury’s got to be wondering why the prosecutor isn’t tearing his hair out. It’s as if he knows something.
Mr. Beauchamp bends to his assistant, who says something nice to him, and he pats her hand. She shuffles through some transcripts.
“I’m going to put a narrative to you, sergeant, and ask you to comment when I’m done. Doctor Eve returned to Cotters’ Cottage about midnight, still embarrassed by the romantic faux pas with Holly Hoover. She went to the fridge, she needed a drink after that. She made a fire, had a shower, wrapped herself in a towel, poured another glass, and settled down to the little writing table by the fireplace. She pulled out her letter to Daisy, many pages long by now, to add another postscript, about her evening’s doings, dinner at the Breakers, a chance meeting with a woman of the night.”
Not only does Mr. Beauchamp have the whole joint mesmerized, he looks a little mesmerized himself, it’s as if he’s forgotten he’s in a courtroom and is talking to himself. Sort of like the Owl talking in his sleep. He’s squinting into space, jiggling a pencil like a baton.
“Why has she begun writing to Daisy again, after a long lull? Because events have changed. The affair had been furtive, difficult, and finally had to be abandoned. But ephemeral Desirée has since split from her husband, so why were they apart? Yes, this letter to Daisy was a work in progress, begun during the hike. She would have carried on about her disastrous affair with Ruth. And of course this is the same letter Ruth sneaked a peek at.”
This provokes a nod from the assistant prosecutor, who for obvious reasons is called Ears by the other lawyers. He’s stopped eating his pencil, he’s being swung over by the honey-tongued lawyer.
“No doubt Eve added a note to Daisy about the quarrel, to tell her she was free of Ruth.” He nods to himself, still flicking that pencil. “This is the letter, of course, that mysteriously disappeared from the cottage. Along with a little grey address book with Daisy’s address.”
Miss Rudnicki is looking surprised, as if it’s the first time she’s seen her boss kick it into high gear. The Owl’s seen it many times. He did a foolish thing last night with this rookie throat, told her where the Topeka money was hidden. Did he trust her? Not a hell of a lot. She’s a lawyer with no fixed address. But in the end he drew her a map of where the cedar-root hollow is. If Flynn hasn’t already filched his hard-earned thirty-one grand, Miss Rudnicki can have it.
“Eve doesn’t finish her final postscript. The fire, the wine, the lateness of the night have conspired to make her suddenly quite woozy. She stands, wobbly, makes her way to the bedroom, falls onto the bed. She doesn’t know what’s going on, she wonders if she’s ill.”
For no reason that Faloon can figure, Mr. Beauchamp is now beamed onto Ears. But it’s like he’s still talking to himself, like he doesn’t really see Ears, who is just a leaning post for his eyes, a vacant spot in the room.
“She hears the stairs creaking as the intruder steps heavily down from the loft, she struggles to her feet as she sees him, a bear of a man, making his way swiftly to her. A quick, expert blow to the solar plexus.” Mr. Beauchamp’s fist darts forward, and Ears jerks back.
Mr. Beauchamp looks around, it’s like he has just returned to the living and is startled to see everyone here. But maybe it was an act, that talking-to-himself stuff. “Wasn’t it about a week ago, Mr. Stubb, as the pathologist was on the stand, that you were conscripted to play the role of helpless victim?”
“That’s right,” Ears says nervously.
“And do you remember Jasper Flynn coaching Mr. Svabo?” Ears nods. The scene is kind of eerie or surreal, the judge and prosecutor taking the day off work, it’s like they’ve given up, surrendered the courtroom.
Faloon turns to see Mr. Pomeroy at the door, bringing an extra chair. But not for him, it’s for a lady with him, thin, snow-white skin, real good-looking for middle age. Faloon thinks he’s seen her on television…Mr. Beauchamp’s wife, that’s it.
Pomeroy sets her up at the back, then takes one of the reserved seats for lawyers.
The great defenceman doesn’t notice any of this because he’s reading the croaker’s testimony aloud, about the victim’s lower abdomen being bruised, and how a hard shot could’ve incapacitated her.
“I won’t ask Mr. Svabo to repeat his graphic performance of straddling
the victim and kneeling on her wrists, but that’s exactly how it happened, isn’t it? The prosecutor put it dramatically enough…” Another line from the transcript. “‘And her horrible nightmare ends when he stuffs the panties down her throat.’ Is that how you remember it, sergeant?”
“I wasn’t there.” Sounding like he has to honk something out of his throat. “You don’t have it right, Mr. Beauchamp.”
“Yes, pardon me, I have missed something. Your firearm. Your service revolver, I presume. What is it, a Smith 9 mm, I believe.”
Flynn clams up again, combs his fingernails through his mighty ’stache.
“Eve Winters chipped a front tooth.” Mr. Beauchamp raises his voice so loud you can almost hear the fixtures rattle. “Because she bit on the gun barrel! Because you used it to ram her panties down her throat!”
Flynn suddenly tenses and cranes forward, like he’s going to bolt out of here. But no, he’s looking to his left, the door of the judge’s chambers, it’s opening, someone’s coming through it. It’s that sad sack, the humiliated clerk, Gilbert.
Faloon jerks upright. Emergency. Red alert. Gilbert’s got a heater and he’s pointing it at the Chief Justice with two shaking hands. Flynn jumps up, roaring. “Everyone down!”
Gilbert takes a step back, swings the piece around, it’s a snub, a belly gun, and as Flynn lunges at him, crack, he fires. Flynn’s big body jerks as the bullet hits, but his momentum knocks Gilbert down, who disappears under him, only his hands and feet showing.
Is Faloon hallucinating? Did he just see Jasper Flynn get one in the chest? All the people yelling and shrieking and running for the exit tell him he’s not in some sleepwalk nightmare, this bedlam is real.
Mr. Svabo has picked up the snub, and a couple of sheriffs are clawing Flynn off Gilbert. The jury is being hustled out, but one of them doesn’t want to go, he’s protesting, he doesn’t want to be dragged away from this action movie. Though it looks like the last reel for Flynn, the way he’s so still.
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