Prisoners of Hope

by Barbara Fradkin

  Janine had met Benson at one of her hospital foundations, where it appeared both of them were on the board. It had been a fast romance, culminating four years ago in an extravagant wedding up at the country house in Georgian Bay. Duncan Saint Clair had hired an entire cruise ship to bring the guests up from Collingwood and to put them up for the weekend.

  Twin girls had been born six months later and a boy two years after that. Shortly before the birth of the twins, they had moved into their current Rosedale home, a wedding present from her father. So Daddy had bankrolled not just the super-wedding but also the super-house, Matthew thought. What was he trying to buy? A steadying hand for his wild child? A shot at respectability? The good doctor had brought impressive genes, ambition, and work ethic to the table, but little else.

  Matthew Googled Duncan Saint Clair and was greeted by an avalanche of hits even greater than his daughter’s. The family had originally made its money in mining and steel up in the Parry Sound area, but had long since diversified into mining and real estate holdings all over the world. Duncan had been a man of enormous energy and appetite. He travelled everywhere on business and played as hard as he worked. There had been a string of liaisons, but only one wife — the mother of his girls — who was reputed to be mentally unstable. Years ago he had banished her to a life of secluded luxury and round-the-clock care in the Cayman Islands. He’d raised his daughters alone, albeit with a large domestic staff who no doubt did most of the grunt work.

  Duncan Saint Clair’s death two years ago had been widely reported, and eulogies had poured in from global high-flyers. He had died in a sailing accident in the Fiji Islands, where he was vacationing with a group of friends. He was only sixty-six years old, a man struck down at the top of his game, according to the friends who were with him.

  To the delight of Toronto’s people-watchers, his will had caused quite a stir. He had left the island mansion and much of the control of his portfolio to his older daughter, leaving his younger daughter Candace with his city house — worth millions — and a generous monthly investment income. Her share of the portfolio, however, was mostly tied up in trust for possible offspring. It seemed Daddy trusted her taste in men even less than Janine’s.

  Matthew was so absorbed in his note-taking that he failed to notice the server hovering until the woman discreetly slipped his empty coffee cup onto her tray. “Can I interest you in an afternoon tea, sir, and perhaps a pastry?”

  Matthew glanced at his phone in surprise. It was nearly five o’clock. Too late now to stir up some gossip in the Rosedale neighbourhood. Families would be readying for dinner and their evening commitments. Rosedale gossip would have to wait for another day. With a smile, he headed to the pub across the street for a beer and some spicy wings and settled down to Google Danielle Torres.

  Chris and Amanda had returned to their cottage, packed a late picnic lunch, and taken out the kayaks George had left them. They passed such an enjoyable afternoon puttering among the coastal islands that Amanda barely gave the murder and the fugitives a moment’s thought. Much of the land was unspoiled First Nations territory, where the only human presence was the occasional fishing boat trolling down the channel. The sun was warm and the water so serene that it was difficult to imagine only two days earlier, a painful, ugly death had occurred.

  They returned to the cabin as the sun was slipping behind Franklin Island, and Chris headed for the kitchen. When she pulled out the bag of potatoes, he poured her a glass of wine and shooed her out.

  A girl could get used to this, she thought as she took her mystery novel outside and settled into one of the red Muskoka chairs to enjoy the sunset. Only after they had finished Chris’s delicious meal of steak and barbequed vegetables did her thoughts drift back to the tragedy of Benson Humphries’s death. When the mosquitoes drove them back inside, she used her phone to create a hotspot so she could check for news on the investigation.

  “Oh!” she exclaimed. “Matthew has sent me a whole pile of background notes on Benson and Janine.”

  He came to sit beside her as she read. Matthew’s notes were point-form, full of abbreviations and non-sequiturs, but the gist was clear.

  The information about Janine’s charity work took her by surprise. Amanda had regarded Janine as a spoiled, self-indulgent socialite born into a wealthy, privileged life who had never known hardship, but it seemed as if she’d embraced the philanthropic role that wealthy society ladies had performed for decades, perhaps even centuries.

  “Maybe she’s not such a bad girl after all,” Amanda said.

  Chris rolled his eyes. “She gets all the spotlight and all the credit. I bet everyone else does all the work.”

  Amanda nudged him playfully. “You cynic, you.”

  “Occupational hazard.”

  They returned to the notes. “Well, well, well,” she said a few moments later. “Janine was three months pregnant when they got married.”

  “Hardly shocking these days. Friends of mine had their daughter as their flower girl.”

  “I know, but when that much money is involved … and it means they didn’t have much time to get to know each other and make sure they were really suited.”

  Chris read over her shoulder. “Looks like her father was the one really pushing for it.”

  “Judging from what we’ve learned about Janine, I bet Benson was a big improvement over the previous men she’d dragged in.”

  “She sounds like a chip off the old block, though. I’ve known guys like Duncan. The world is their playground, and they leave a swath of broken hearts wherever they go. Proud of it, too.”

  She made a face. “In a perverse way, maybe that’s why he left her control of the estate. He thought she’d be as wild and ruthless as he was.”

  Matthew was deep in the middle of a sexy dream and loath to leave it when his cellphone’s ringtone blasted through the boozy fog of sleep. He groped for the phone, squinted at the caller, and groaned.

  “Gotcha!” Dave Walters crowed.

  Matthew deciphered the time: 3:45 a.m. “This better be good. Epic, in fact.”

  “A little respect is due. I’ve found your nanny’s husband.”

  Matthew struggled upright in bed. The blind that hung crooked over his bedroom window was no match for the neon restaurant sign across the street, and an eerie red and green glow lit the room.

  “I’m impressed,” he said. “I Googled Danielle Torres and got sixty-four thousand hits. Realtors, actors, and who knows what. So I ordered another beer and called it a night.”

  “Danielle Rodriguez Torres, that’s the name you want. She was born in Manila on June 2, 1988. On December 24, 2010, she married Fernando Peña Torres, and on January 4, 2012, they had a son, Raoul. The Philippines has a good education system and good literacy rates, but their pay is crap compared to the west. Danielle had been working as a school teacher in Manila, but in February 2013 she took a job making three times that much as a nanny in Dubai —”

  “When her son was barely a year old?”

  “Yeah. Not uncommon in the Philippines, which exports more nannies around the world than any other country. It’s a big part of the country’s GDP, and the workers support whole families back home. Dubai is a huge employer of foreign workers. She tried for three years to get a position in Canada and got her visa to work for the Saint Clairs in May 2016.”

  “What were her husband and son doing all that time?”

  “According to my sources, until recently, living with her mother in Manila.”

  Five years separated from her son, Matthew thought. Almost all her kid’s life. “Any word on him moving to Canada?”

  “I’m getting to that. Unless you’re footing the bill for me to fly to the Philippines, I have to rely on dubious local sources. People are nervous to talk. Nobody trusts this new government, and they don’t want to draw attention to themselves or get their friends in trouble. And in Fernando’s case, even more so. Last month his brother was shot in the street by police i
n one of the regime’s so-called extrajudicial executions. Apparently he’d never used drugs a day in his life; his only crime was being poor.”

  Matthew grimaced. In an effort to rid the country of drugs, the Philippines’ president had sanctioned the shooting of suspected dealers without bothering with arrest and trial. Over ten thousand had been killed, some of them innocents caught in the crossfire. “That would ratchet up Fernando’s desperation, for sure.”

  “Yeah. Word has it that Fernando’s been in hiding ever since, possibly living in that squatters’ village in the big Manila cemetery. I did manage to reach his old supervisor at work by pretending to be a Canadian visa officer. The supervisor was surprised I was calling. Fernando already has a visa, he said. His wife is waiting for him there, and she’s made lots of money. He’ll make a good Canadian, this supervisor assured me. Honest, works hard, wants a better life for his son.”

  “Did you happen to find out how he got this visa? And what kind it is?”

  “Well, that was going to be tricky, since I was the visa officer. I did ask him if he knew when Fernando applied and whether it was online. I said something about getting our wires crossed. He said Fernando just told him two weeks ago. Came in all excited to quit his job, said it had cost him lots of money, but he’d found a lawyer who helped him sort out all the confusing paperwork.”

  Matthew’s heart sank. A “lawyer.” Right. Probably one of those scammers who masqueraded as immigration consultants and charged hundreds of dollars for fraudulent or inaccurate documents.

  “Did he know whether Fernando had already left the country?”

  “Well, my good man, for the vague promise of ‘My door is always open,’ this is all you get. I think it’s pretty damn brilliant. I haven’t lost my investigative edge, even after two years of sloth.”

  “And I’m duly impressed. I mean it, Dave. We should get together. Escape that crazy skyscraper hell you call home and come to Canada. We’ve got wide open spaces, skies that are still blue, lakes you can swim in …”

  “All that clean living. My body couldn’t stand the shock! In any case, you can take up the trail from here. The man and his son were winging their way to your clean paradise. You can find out if they got there.”

  “Can you do me one last favour?”

  “Jesus, Goderich! I give you the moon …”

  “Can you email me a photo of this man and his son?”

  Amanda stretched languidly, curling her toes and reaching her arms over her head. The sheets were a sweaty tangle scented with musk and sex. She took the coffee Chris held out.

  “A girl could definitely get used to this,” she murmured.

  He chuckled. “Which part?”

  “All of it. All of you.”

  He slipped in beside her, balancing his own coffee. “Kaylee is still reserving judgment.”

  Amanda propped herself up on her pillows and snapped her fingers at the dog, who eagerly left her perch on the windowsill and jumped up on the bed to snuggle between them.

  “We’ll make it up to her,” she said. “I’m thinking of a hike in Killbear Provincial Park today.”

  He glanced at her, and his expression of wary hope made her laugh. “Even if I was tempted, there’s nothing we can do until Matthew finds out about Danielle’s husband.” On her bedside table, her cellphone rang. She glanced at it. “Speak of the devil.”

  “I hope I didn’t wake you up,” Matthew said, sounding amazingly wide awake for such an early hour.

  Amanda cast Chris a mischievous smile. “We’re on our morning coffee.”

  “Okay, good. Did you read the notes I sent you last night?”

  “They were very enlightening.”

  “Well, I’ve got more.”

  She listened while he relayed the information from his source in Hong Kong. “They may be on a plane heading over to meet up with her as we speak.”

  “Part of it jives with what the daughter Kaitlyn said she overheard,” Amanda said. “Danielle spoke to someone on the phone a few days before Benson’s death.” She paused to sip her coffee, savouring the delicious jolt of caffeine. Strong and smoky. This man was definitely a keeper. “Can you use one of your contacts to find out whether they’ve arrived in Canada?”

  Dead silence. Then a chuckle. “Darling, I love you, but do you know how many flights come into Pearson Airport every day? More than a thousand, from dozens of airlines.”

  “I know. I just thought maybe you had some friends in border services or the police. You seem to be able to pull the most amazing information out of your hat.”

  “Even I am not that much of a magician.” He sighed. “I can just see my epitaph: ‘Last seen stationed outside the arrivals gate at Pearson International, clutching a tattered photo of a young Filipino man.’”

  “Now you’re talking!” she exclaimed. “Seriously, Matthew, I do appreciate all that you’ve done. At least we know he and Danielle were in touch, and she was intending to meet up with him. So she may have been on her way to the rendezvous when she cracked up the boat, rather than running away from the murder. It gives me some leads I can follow up here.”

  Chris had gone into the kitchen, where the sizzle and fragrant aroma of butter and eggs arose, but now he returned to stand in the bedroom doorway, scowling.

  “Amanda, don’t,” Matthew said. “Just don’t. Much as I hate to say this, just enjoy your time with Chris.”

  “They’re not mutually exclusive.”

  “Neither are murdering your boss and going to meet your husband.”

  “I don’t like the sound of this,” Chris said once she’d reported Matthew’s latest news. They had taken their breakfast outside, and, with the help of lavish bug spray, were enjoying another spectacular Georgian Bay morning. A few boats puttered up the channel in the distance, but otherwise the lake was peaceful. “It sounds like they’ve given up going through legitimate channels. The poor man probably bought a fake visa. He might be turned back before he even gets on the plane.”

  “It might not be completely fake,” she said. “More likely the charlatan sold him a visitor’s visa, which to the average Filipino who’s never travelled before might look perfectly valid, but it won’t let him stay in the country. He needs Confirmation of Permanent Residence, which he can only get after Danielle has her own permanent resident papers and applies to sponsor him. Danielle at least knows that, because she consulted a lawyer. So she knows he’s going to be in the country illegally.”

  “You know how many foreign nationals with expired or incorrect documentation are floating around our country?” Chris asked. “The government doesn’t even know, because it doesn’t keep track of who has left, but possibly as many as half a million. A lot of them are in Toronto. The government has no resources to police this unless someone reports it. Very likely Danielle and her family will just go into the underground Filipino community, where they can live for years without trouble.”

  “But what about health care? And school for the son?”

  “Fake documents. There’s a whole underground economy, and once you’re plugged in, there are plenty of employers happy to hire undocumented people because they get hard workers willing to do crap jobs. Plus they don’t have to pay decent wages and benefits or conform to labour laws.”

  “So she will continue to be exploited.”

  “As long as they stay under the radar, it’s probably still better than their life in the Philippines.”

  Reluctantly, Amanda had to admit he was right. Even apart from the Philippines’ lethal war on drugs, she’d seen the desperate working conditions in much of the developing world. The long hours, the near-slave wages, the complete lack of benefits, and the unsafe conditions even for ordinary jobs like factory work. All for pittance in pay. She also knew who benefitted: consumers in the West demanding ever cheaper goods.

  Kaylee was ranging over the shoreline chasing the tiny fish that collected in the pools. Amanda watched her idly for a moment, lost in thought, and
then looked up to study Franklin Island across the channel. “I wonder where Ronny fits into all this? He and Danielle were obviously close enough that he helped her with the lawyer’s appointment and her escape from the island. And I’ve been thinking about him. He was trying his best to do a good job for me, and he knew his safety standards.”

  “Amanda, he left you stranded in the middle of a storm!”

  She nodded. “I know, and that still makes me mad. But I don’t think he would have ditched me unless he had a really compelling reason.”

  “Even if he did, he could have sent help for you afterward!”

  “Unless he thought I could call for help from the top of the hill. He may have been buying him and Danielle time to get to the mainland. Maybe all the way to Toronto.”

  “You’re giving that asshole more credit than he deserves.”

  She knew he was right but couldn’t shake the niggle of worry at her core.

  Chris stroked the nape of her neck. “If he helped her travel all the way to Toronto, she’ll probably ditch him as soon as her husband shows up. I’ll bet he’ll turn up back here in a few days, probably with his tail between his legs, depending whether his original motive for helping her was….”

  “Lust?”

  Chris laughed. “Yeah.”

  The niggle wouldn’t go away. Ronny had plenty of oppor­tunity to send a reassuring word. Even a simple text to his father. “But he needed a boat to get them at least to Parry Sound, where they could catch a bus to Toronto. His father says none of his friends lent him one. George is trying to act cool, but I think he’s worried sick.”

  “More than that, the cops have interviewed all his friends, and no one has heard from him.”

  “At least that they’re admitting to the cops.”

  Chris grew sober. “Amanda, I know you don’t want to admit Danielle might have killed Benson Humphries, but the whole scenario is looking more and more suspicious. Because if she did kill him, then all this other stuff, including Ronny hiding out, makes sense.”