Don't Forget You Love Me

by Rosemary Aubert

  The more difficult it began to seem to get to him, the more determined I became. As I had sat in my car in the parking lot of the hotel, I had come to the conclusion that it was probably a good idea to run things by Matt. To ask him whether the police had made any progress in finding out who shot at me and Aliana the day we were having coffee. And I wanted to show him the note. Above all, I wanted to ask Matt if there were any way I could talk to the other three cops.

  I was almost about to give up on Matt when I looked up and saw an officer I knew had been a special friend of Queenie’s. Over the years, her relationship with the police had climbed all the way up the scale from being shooed away from the doorways in which she had once slept to having lunch with the chief at a special function at which she’d been given a medal for her work among the city’s disempowered.

  “So sorry to hear about Queenie,” the officer said. “You here to see Matt?”

  “Yes, but I’m having a little trouble….”

  “I’ll call him for you.”

  I waited a few minutes longer before Matt showed up. I had expected to be asked up to his office but what happened instead was that he came striding down the massive central steps of the Headquarters lobby, charged toward me and asked me what he could do for me.

  It was clear that my old pal didn’t really want to see me. Matt and I been good friends for years, working together on a number of cases. But now Matt was cold and distant and formal, as if I were just some pesky citizen demanding something from the police that an ordinary citizen had no right to demand.

  I could tell that he wanted to conduct our conversation right there in the lobby. “What is it, Ellis? What can I do for you?”

  “Matt,” I began, “I’ll only take a minute of your time, but there are a couple of things I want to run by you and…”

  He glanced at his watch. “I’m pressed for time. What exactly is it?”

  “Can we go upstairs? I’m uncomfortable talking about these things here….” I gestured broadly toward the lobby into which another group of school children on another sort of tour had just marched.

  He let out a sigh, a gesture I’d not associated with Matt before, and nodded toward the stairs, which we managed to negotiate before the crowd of kids beat us to it.

  I sat in the hard chair in front of the sterile desk and got right down to it. “I have a couple of things on my mind, Matt. For starters, I’m sure you’re aware that Aliana Caterina and I were sitting near the window of a Tim Hortons when somebody shot at…”

  He didn’t even let me finish. “Ellis, I’m sure you understand that we are investigating that incident, just as we would investigate any shooting. However, I know you can appreciate the fact that since no one was hurt, we are handling it as a misuse of firearms issue rather than attempted murder or anything like that.”

  “But…”

  “Look, Ellis. I’m sorry you were involved in such an incident. But the fact is that there are so many occurrences of gunshots these days, that you’d have to line up with everybody else who claims to have heard, seen, or even been threatened by a gun.”

  I was shocked at Matt’s attitude. But it got worse. When I showed him the note I’d found on the car, he laughed and said, “Sounds like good advice to me.”

  I got up and turned toward the door. I’d had enough. I felt as though someone had kidnapped the Matt I’d always known and left this officious imposter in his place.

  But as I reached the door, I felt Matt’s hand on my shoulder.

  “Look, Ellis,” he said. “I’m so very sorry about Queenie. I can’t begin to understand what you must be going through right now, but I think the best thing you can do is to forget about police work at the moment. Leave all this to us. Don’t be trying to solve mysteries right now when, I’m sure, everything must seem like a mystery to you. Don’t worry about the gunshots. We’ve got squads of people working on things like that. And as far as the note goes, it was probably just a coincidence. Some nutbar in the parking lot. Happens all the time. If you really want to hear my advice, it’s this: Go home. Take it easy. Wait until your life gets normal again. I’m sure that if you do that, you’ll forget all about your detective work.”

  Before I had a chance to respond, he went on, “Listen, buddy, I know you’re trying to find out what happened to Queenie’s friend. I wish I could help you, but you have to understand my position. There’s an ongoing investigation regarding the death of that man and we can’t have any tampering with witnesses.”

  To accuse a former judge of attempting to influence a witness was a grave insult, and I knew that Matt knew it. But I also knew that Matt would never have said such a cruel thing carelessly. I figured somebody must be on Matt’s back bigtime.

  “I can tell you this much, Ellis. I have a feeling that PIC is going to come to a quick decision on this one.” He hesitated and lowered his voice, “And in the past, quick decisions have almost always been in the favor of the accused.” He went back to his desk, jotted something on a slip of paper, stood up. “Look, give this guy a call. He’s over at forensics. He’s the examiner in the case.” He handed me the number. “Sorry, man. I’m out of here. I’ve got a meeting.”

  As I made my way back to my car, I realized that I’d learned something very valuable from the interview with Matt after all. That Matt suspected the PIC investigation would soon be over. And that that meant I would get a chance to talk to the four accused about the case. They would no longer be accused. They would just be four good cops who did their job with unfortunate results that no one could foresee.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  As was becoming my habit, I stopped at the village on the way home. As I approached on the path down, I could hear the raised voices of two men arguing, the crushed voices of the down and out, but not of the drunk or drugged because the village had strict rules about sobriety.

  As I got closer, I realized the men were arguing about some small point—who said what, who showed someone disrespect—the inconsequential subjects of the arguments of the bored or otherwise discontented. But I knew that among the clients who lived there, even mundane arguments could escalate into deadly conflicts.

  I carefully avoided the two, seeking among the village buildings to find Jeffrey. When I found him in the main building, he was deep in conversation with a client. Not wanting to breach the confidentiality with which they were obviously speaking, I turned around immediately. But Jeffrey saw me, excused himself from his work and called out, “Dad! Don’t go. We have to talk.”

  He disengaged himself from the man with whom he’d been speaking and came toward me with both hands outstretched.

  “Son, I…” I knew I had to apologize for the way I’d acted the last time we’d been together, but Jeffrey stopped me with a smile and a nod.

  “I’m really glad you came down, Dad. I’ve been meaning to call you.” He waved toward the client as the man walked out the door.

  “What’s up?”

  Jeffrey drew in a breath. “There were some people down here again the other day, a man and two women. They said they were from a committee struck by the city to examine possible problems with below-standard housing.”

  “Below-standard housing? What the heck is that supposed to mean?”

  “They said they’re concerned with wooden structures—that there are buildings in our compound that are constructed of inferior materials.” He hesitated as if he were afraid to say what was coming next. “They said there’s a new ruling. It’s called ‘condemn and confiscate’. It would give the city the go-ahead to expropriate property in sensitive areas, property that doesn’t meet standards. It’s intended to protect environmentally-endangered areas—like the whole valley of the Don.

  “What does that have to do with us?” I could feel my ire beginning to rise, but I watched it. I didn’t want to display any anger in Jeffrey’s presence, even anger directed at somebody else.

  “Well,” Jeffrey said, taking his time as if he wanted to be s
ure to say exactly the right thing, “apparently there are councilors who are preparing to argue that all buildings of whatever nature should be removed from this section of the valley.”

  I made a broad gesture intended to take in the entire village—the main building, the building that housed the kitchen, the fifteen small wooden huts where the men—and sometimes women—slept, the washrooms. “This is not City-owned land. It is private property.”

  “Dad, zoning laws apply to private property, and I don’t need to remind you that governments can expropriate land whenever they see fit.”

  “They actually talked about expropriation?” I had a hard time keeping my voice steady.

  Jeffrey reached out and touched my hand for a second. “No. No, Dad. Calm down. They didn’t threaten. Like the others who came down, they said they were on a fact-finding mission.”

  “Typical government double-speak! What other nonsense did they spout?”

  “They said that private citizens are invited to appear at an upcoming meeting of City Council—date to be announced--in order to give their views on the issue.”

  “Yeah? And exactly which private citizens do you suppose they have in mind?”

  Jeffrey shrugged.

  “There’s no way I can do it, Jeffrey,” I told him. “There are still people down at city hall who haven’t forgotten my days of disgrace—and there are enemies of Queenie’s, too, people who thought it was absurd that the city should support a woman who had once been among the most raggedy of the street people and was now asking for funding in order to run a shelter.”

  “We have a friend at city hall.”

  “Is that some sort of a catch phrase: a friend at city hall? I wouldn’t joke about it. If one or two of those councilors got on their high horse, we could be looking at a lot of trouble.”

  “No, Dad. It’s not a joke. We really do have a friend there, someone who’ll take our side if there is a real debate. Somebody with a lot of clout.”

  “Who?”

  “Look,” he answered. “Let’s leave this for now. They haven’t even set a date for a council meeting. And you’re right. Our holdings are private and our buildings are sound—no matter how modest.” He looked me in the eye. “You said I had to keep you posted on everything. Well, I’m just letting you know they came down here.”

  “Okay, Son,” I said, “that’s fine. Be sure to let me know if you see them again.”

  “Will do.”

  I turned to leave, but Jeffrey stopped me with an offer of coffee and I couldn’t refuse. I took a seat while he manned the coffee machine.

  Beside the chair in which I sat was a small table and on the table were arrayed the day’s newspapers with Aliana’s paper, the Toronto Daily World on top.

  I picked it up intending to leaf through to see if I could find her byline, but before I even got past the first page, I saw a headline “below the fold” as they say. It read, “Investigation of four Toronto Cops Halted.”

  I read the article as fast as I could get my brain to work. For the first time, there were real details about what had happened that night. The four had been called not to a possible crime scene but to a “medical emergency” in front of the mental hospital. They had turned up because two of the four were regularly assigned to that beat and the other two were nearby in their cruisers. It was true, the article stated, that the four police officers had found it necessary to physically subdue the homeless man and that they had spent the better part of half an hour restraining him.

  But it was also apparently true that aside from minor scrapes and bruises and the spraining of two of his fingers, the patient had suffered no injuries from this encounter. In fact, the reporter stated, the police officers had not apprehended the homeless man but had instead turned him over to three duty nurses who had led him under his own power back into the hospital.

  The article continued, “At some time during the night, the elderly patient succumbed to a heart attack. PIC, the Police Investigative Commission that examines allegations of police misconduct, concluded that the officers had had no direct connection with the death. However, the coroner’s office is reported to still be investigating the case.”

  At first I felt an immense sense of relief at this news. It meant that I could now interview the four cops. But then it occurred to me that there was no longer any reason why I should want to. No murder. No killer to find. No case.

  As I sipped the coffee my son gave me, I felt as if I were relaxing for the first time in many weeks. We chatted. I asked him how my daughter-in-law Tootie and my grandchildren were doing. “Fine, Dad,” he said. “Everybody is just doing great.”

  I asked him if he saw his sister, Ellen. He frowned a little and said she seemed always to be too busy to come over for dinner but that her husband and her son, Angelo, kept him informed of her duties as a crown attorney. He said that there were rumors going around that Ellen might follow in her father’s footsteps.

  “What does that mean?” I asked, genuinely puzzled.

  Jeffrey laughed. “The bench, Dad. The bench.”

  The very thought of my little girl possibly be named to the bench in the near future filled me with concern. It was not an easy calling, as my shadowed life had proved. But, I had to admit, pride soon replaced concern.

  I would have left the valley a happy man that night, had I not overheard yet another altercation among a few of the valley inhabitants on my way out.

  Listening in for only a few minutes, I learned at once that the village was divided into two camps—those who believed that the four cops really didn’t have anything to do with the Juicer’s death, and those who thought the cops were “saving their own,” that is, that some kind of cover-up was going on.

  I made my presence known and took the risk of asking the men what the general consensus was. A couple of them clearly considered me an intruder, but I had a few friends among them, too, men with whom I’d often discussed matters having to do with the news and the city and even their lives.

  “Well,” said one man, “I think you could say we’re six of one, half dozen of the other on this thing. Half of the guys down here think the cops are liars…”

  “Which would make them killers,” someone interrupted.

  “No news there,” came another voice.

  “Take it easy, Dude,” the first man said. “One of them cops is Mark Hopequist.”

  “Yeah? So? He’s a fag. A useless sissy.”

  “Which means he ain’t likely to kill anybody. Especially the Juicer.”

  “Another useless bag of shit,” his opponent answered.

  “What about this Mark Hopequist?” I asked. “What kind of a guy is he?”

  “Not so bad, especially for a cop. He’s tough on people who are mean to the homeless, like teenagers and tourists and rich ladies. He never gave nobody a homeless ticket, that’s for sure. And also, he ain’t no liar like some cops I know.”

  A few others joined the discussion. They didn’t hesitate to say that most of the people in the village hated cops. As far as they were concerned, the Juicer was murdered by somebody. He never had any heart condition, and the way Queenie kept at him about eating the right food and exercising “all the time,” he hadn’t been likely to.

  As we stood around talking, a cold wind suddenly rose. “Hey, someone said, “that’s winter blowing in.”

  And it was. Not only the winter of cruel weather, but the winter of my return to the realization that despite what the newspaper had revealed, I was not in any way excused from the obligation of my promise to Queenie.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  As I climbed out of the valley that afternoon, I had the uncomfortable sensation that someone was watching me.

  In the old days, I could climb into and out of the valley at any time of the day or night in the light or in the dark without thinking twice about it.

  But now I was over seventy, and although my time living rough meant that my life had been more physical than the liv
es of others my age, it also had also taken its toll.

  So now I navigated the rough path with some difficulty in the gathering dark. I stopped a couple of times, and each time, I thought I heard someone else stopping just a second or two after I did. If whoever or whatever was making this sound was behind me, then I knew I’d reach the top of the ravine before my pursuer. This idea gave me some comfort, but not much.

  When I did reach the top, I heard a sudden rapid scurrying. A little rabbit, mostly brown but with a bit of white here and there, rushed up to meet me, rustling through the dry autumn leaves.

  I smiled at the little thing and marveled that it could make so much noise. But not enough noise to hide the fact that something—or someone—else was also scurrying away.

  ***

  Alone at the kitchen window of my spacious apartment, a window that looked out over the valley, I thought about the people in the village at their supper.

  Though I had never been what anyone would consider a gourmet cook, I had had to be quite creative in feeding myself when I was homeless in the valley. I remembered some of the awful things I’d had to eat in those days: squirrels, snakes--and some of the meals Queenie and I had enjoyed in very much more recent days: steaks, broiled fish, Italian delicacies.

  It suddenly occurred to me that, despite frequent invitations from friends and family, I hadn’t tasted a decent home-cooked meal in a long time. My fridge was empty because I’d thrown out the remains of meals I’d fixed but hadn’t had the appetite to eat.

  So I headed for the grocery store, checking the parking lot of my building for any intruders, since I couldn’t seem to get the idea of a possible pursuer out of my mind.

  I was home within twenty minutes and I managed to recreate a viable facsimile of one of Queenie’s best dishes, a vegetarian chili made with four different kinds of beans and three kinds of tomatoes.

  I set the table, served the food, picked up my fork...