by Scott Mackay
“I don’t know what I’m going to do about that,” said Nowak. “I gave you a warning and you deliberately disobeyed me.” Nowak let a second or two tick by, his silence emphasizing the gravity with which he viewed the situation. “I’ll have to talk to John Ling about it. I may even have to talk to Chief e.” He turned to Gilbert. “But before I do, I’m required to write a Letter-of-Incident to Human Resources. Then Human Resources will send recommendations.” A vein now stood out on Nowak’s temple. “I’m not sure what they’ll say. They might recommend suspension. They might even want me to transfer you out of the squad. At the very least, they’ll recommend I cancel your next merit raise.” The staff inspector’s voice hardened. “Then I’ll have to talk to John Ling. Ling may opt for your immediate termination. That’s his prerogative. Because we can’t be doing this, Barry. This is bad news. I can’t have a lot of loose cannons running around behind my back. We have to act as a unit. Especially on a high-profile investigation like the Boyd case.”
Nowak folded one of his fingers, indicating he was about to get to his second point. But before he could, Lombardo jumped him.
“Tim,” said Lombardo, “Barry just saved your ass.” His brow was one dark line. “Does it even matter to you if we get the right perp or not?” Lombardo shook his head, up on a moral soapbox. “Or is it just a matter of numbers to you, clearing the board as fast as you can so you can make us look as good as possible?” Lombardo sighed theatrically. “Barry hands you the real perp on a platter, and all you talk about is his next damn merit raise.”
Nowak let his remaining raised finger sink slowly to his desk.
“Joe,” he said. “Barry handing me the perp on a platter, as you call it, and the insubordinate way in which he went behind my back aren’t linked as far as I’m concerned. They’re two separate issues. They come under two different policies.”
These words straightjacketed Lombardo. Joe sat there wanting to fight, but Gilbert gave him a cautioning glance. The boss was the boss. You had to listen to the boss when the boss talked about insubordination. And while Gilbert found Nowak’s tenacious adherence to policy at times inflexible, at least the staff inspector could always be counted on to be consistent.
Nowak’s head swiveled smoothly toward Gilbert again. Beneath the surface of his pale gray eyes, Gilbert saw a flicker of emotion.
“My second point, Barry,” he said. He gestured at the reports. His shoulders eased, as if now that they were talking shop again, they could put personal discord behind them. “You have a good circumstantial case against Phil Thompson here. I’m the first to admit that. You’ve got motive. You’ve linked him to the crime scene in a convincing way. But if we’re going to pull an about-face on Judy Pelaez, it’s got to be airtight or else Roffey’s going to have a field day, and that will just make Ling madder. I need something that will place Phil in the actual apartment at the time of the murder. More than just this taxi driver’s statement. Especially because some of the other evidence points to other suspects.”
“Yes, I know,” said Gilbert. “I came to the exact same conclusion. And that’s one of the reasons I’ve come to you at this point. Without your input, we can’t go any further.”
Nowak tapped his finger twice more against the table. “How so?” he asked.
“Evidence indicates there was a struggle before the murder,” said Gilbert. “A jar of coins was thrown. So was a decorative plate.”
Nowak nodded. “I’ve seen both pieces of evidence,” he said.
“Nigel Gower has Boyd’s fingerprints on the coin jar, and a strong set of miscellaneous latents on the plate that he hasn’t identified yet. The impressions are deep, which makes sense if the plate was thrown. Joe told me yesterday that Nigel’s now searched all the Canadian fingerprint databases, including the RCMP’s, and has come up with nothing. But Nigel hasn’t yet put in a request to AFIS down in the States, the FBI’s Automated Fingerprint Identification System. I believe the miscellaneous latents on the plate belong to Phil Thompson. He’s never been fingerprinted in Canada. But while on tour in Denver in 1979, he lit his guitar on fire and threw it into the audience. He was subsequently charged with reckless endangerment and battery. Which means he was fingerprinted down there. Which means his prints are on file with AFIS.”
“I see where this is going,” said Nowak.
“In order to authorize an AFIS search, I need the staff inspector’s signature. If we send our request down today, we could have our hits as early as tomorrow, especially if we limit our search request to the parameters of Phil’s Denver arrest.”
When Gilbert got home later that evening, he found Regina and the girls wearing bathing suits in the garden, waging war against the fescue and the crabgrass again.
Nina spotted him on the back deck, dropped her little metal gardening claw, and beelined straight for him. She threw her arms around him.
“Dr. MacPherson phoned,” she said. “My latest test came back negative. You were right. We don’t have to worry, Daddy. I’m not going to die. And I’ve learned my lesson. I’m never going to practice unsafe sex again.”
He winced. “Why don’t you practice no sex at all?” he suggested. “There’s something to be said for abstinence.”
Though at the moment, as he looked at Regina in her bathing suit, he couldn’t think of what it was.
Still, he was relieved about the whole thing. His wife and girls went back to their weed pulling. He watched them. Sometimes the world did what it did, and there was nothing you could do to stop it. He felt lucky that things had turned out this way. He couldn’t always protect his wife and daughters, but he could always love and cherish them, no matter what the world threw at them.
Nowak slid the AFIS fingerprint report onto his desk and nodded serenely.
“It looks good,” he said. “The prints lifted from the plate match Phil’s AFIS set. On nine points of similarity, too, one above our guideline. I guess that means you and Joe can work on Phil’s arrest warrant. I’ll draft Judy’s release papers.”
Gilbert sighed. “You know what?” he said. “I’d sooner hold off on Phil’s arrest warrant just now. He’s not going anywhere. He’s too busy rehearsing for his tour. Let’s just wait.”
“Wait for what?” asked Nowak. “We’ve got everything we need.” He tapped the AFIS report. “What more should we wait for?”
“We should wait for Dr. Blackstein to give us his final ruling on the manner of death,” said Gilbert. “All we have is his preliminary one. Let’s take another few days. Let’s wait for the final report. I called Mel earlier today, and he says he’s expecting the toxicology results back any time now. I don’t doubt that Boyd died as a result of strangulation, but if it turns out to be respiratory failure due to a drug overdose, and we go ahead and arrest Phil, we’re going to look bad. Judging by the way you feel about the Pelaez arrest, Tim, you don’t want that.”
Nowak stared at Gilbert for nearly five seconds.
“Thanks, Barry,” he finally said. He lifted a document from his desk. “Carol typed this up for me this morning. It’s your Letter-of-Incident. I was going to file it with Human Resources this morning. And I was going to phone John Ling this afternoon.” The staff inspector ripped the letter in four pieces and dropped it into the wastepaper basket. “But I think we’ll let things quietly slip by. Once I tell John Ling what you’ve done for the case, I’m sure he’ll feel the same way.”
Twenty-Two
On the way to work the following Monday, Gilbert saw Phil Thompson’s picture on the front cover of NOW magazine. NOW magazine, free, distributed in newspaper format from vending boxes all over the city, was the entertainment bible to Toronto’s Generation X: a smorgasbord of personal ads, club and concert listings, and movie, theater, and restaurant reviews. Every issue showcased a local talent. This week, NOW showcased Phil Thompson.
Gilbert pulled over to the curb and grabbed a copy from the corner vending box. In the picture—a poster-sized one—Phil wore a suit
, an earring, and a string tie. His Jesus-length hair flowed over his shoulders, and he gazed at the camera with calm importance.
Gilbert flipped to the feature article.
After a long hiatus, Phil Thompson is finally back Phil Thompson Unplugged is now platinum, and the former Mother Courage guitarist will embark on a twelve-city North American concert tour next month. His hit single, “Old Dance Partner,” is number seven on the Billboard Chart, and it looks like it’s going to climb even higher.
Gilbert shook his head. Just when things were looking up for Phil, things were looking down. Gilbert wasn’t sure Phil deserved it. Phil had been terribly wronged by Glen Boyd. He tossed the paper on the passenger seat. He pulled out into traffic. Phil, after twenty years of trying, was finally back on the charts. But that wasn’t going to make one bit of difference when Gilbert went to arrest him.
At work, Gilbert found the results of the toxicology test waiting for him on his desk. He hesitated before looking at them. He hoped for a twist. He felt sorry for Phil Thompson because of all the things Glen Boyd had done to the man. He felt be had a lot in common with Phil Thompson. They both had old scores to settle with the concert mogul, and they both knew what it was like to suffer because of Glen Boyd. He wanted to pull out findings in the toxicology report indicative of an accidental overdose. He wanted the results to exonerate Phil so that the guitarist’s born-again musical career might stand a chance. He hoped this opening of old wounds might turn but to be nothing more than a big pointless kerfuffle, a last bitter joke played by a dead man. But these wishes, he knew, were just another example of his bias creeping into the case, and he quickly suppressed them. He mustered a stiff professionalism. He opened the toxicology report and read. His shoulders sagged.
While a high concentration of cocaine, Prozac, and morphine had been found in Boyd’s bloodstream, the amounts, even when combined, weren’t fatal, and therefore, the ruling on the manner of death was homicide, namely, strangulation.
Gilbert’s lips stiffened and his eyes narrowed. He gripped his mouse and clicked the arrest warrant template to his screen. He filled in the blanks. Boyd, throughout his life, had victimized countless people: all the dreamer rock musicians he had bilked; all the women he had left broken-hearted or otherwise sexually duped; even his landlord, if the credit agent coming to the door on the night of the murder had been any indication. Gilbert typed in his own name in the spot marked ARRESTING OFFICER. But Phil Thompson was perhaps Boyd’s biggest victim: Palo Alto, the solo album fiasco, and now Stacy. In regard to Boyd’s own culpability, and in a purely vigilante sense, justice had been served. Gilbert typed in Phil’s name, then sketched in the details of the crime. Yet in the strictest legal sense, Gilbert had no choice but to serve this warrant.
He extinguished his last bit of bias.
People simply couldn’t go around killing people, no matter how much they had been victimized.
Gilbert drove with Lombardo later that day to Phil Thompson’s residence, the renovated church.
They found Phil and Stacy in the backyard drinking iced tea. The sky was sunny and the flowers bright. A small fountain, made of tan-colored stone, splashed playfully in the back. A starling, as dark as gun metal, high-stepped through the grass back there, stopping every now and again to peck the ground.
“Philip Thompson,” said Gilbert, “you’re under arrest for the murder of Glen Anthony Boyd. Could you please put your hands behind your back.”
The former Mother Courage guitarist gazed at Gilbert and Lombardo serenely from under the cool shade of the gazebo, at peace with himself, as if he had just spent the last week at a meditation retreat. He stood up, leaned over, and kissed Stacy.
“Give Clifton, Simhi, and Lynn a call,” he said. “I might as well get Danny to represent me, now that I’ve dropped everything against GBIA. Look after the place. Don’t let anybody touch those tapes.”
“They’re safe with me,” she assured him, and gave his hand a squeeze.
Phil turned to Gilbert. “How long does the bail process take?” he asked. “It’s been a long time since I’ve been arrested.”
“A few days,” said Gilbert. He thought of Justice Wayne Oulds. “If Daniel Lynn’s your lawyer, maybe sooner.”
“He is. Thanks. Are you going to arrest Stacy, too?”
“We’ve decided against that,” said Gilbert.
Phil gave him a glance; in another life they might have been friends. “Thanks,” he said again.
Phil put his hands behind his back. Lombardo cuffed him.
“Lead the way,” said the guitarist.
Gilbert led him away from the gazebo—away from the woman who rocked like AC/DC, his Sunshine and his ICC, his Beatles, the woman, who, in the end, had become as much a victim as Judy, Regina, Magda, and Morningstar.
A FEW DAYS LATER, Gilbert and Regina caught coverage of Glen Boyd’s funeral on the evening news.
Over a thousand people attended.
The camera panned and zoomed, selecting this musician or that musician, rockers from times gone by, yesteryear’s flower children, headbangers, and punks. At the center of it all was a tiny woman, the bluest bird in the world, dressed entirely in black, legendary folk goddess Judy Pelaez. Delta and Morningstar flanked her—giant children compared to their mother. The veil did little to hide the peculiar grin on Judy’s face.
“Why’s she grinning like that?” asked Regina.
Gilbert stared at the grin. What did that grin mean? Was Judy finally happy? Did she grin because she at last had an unassailable right to Boyd? Out of all the hundreds of women who had slipped between Boyd’s sheets, did Judy Pelaez finally feel she had beaten them all? Or was it just plain relief? Maybe now that Boyd was dead she wouldn’t be the bluest bird in the world anymore.
“I don’t know,” he said.
A quick-edit switched to eight pallbearers—former Diodes bassist Ian Mackay was among them. They maneuvered Boyd’s walnut casket through the throng on the church steps to the waiting white hearse. Gilbert glanced at Regina. She seemed upset by the funeral.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
Her lips pursed in mild distress. “I’ll never forgive myself for what I did to that baby in Marseilles,” she said. “Or for what I did to you. As for Glen…I don’t know…he should have had the good sense to stick with Judy.”
Gilbert rested his hand on her knee. “He wasn’t a one-woman man,” he said. Read sexual predator, he thought, but didn’t mention this to Regina. “That’s just the way he was.”
In a related story, Gabriel Pavey, the courthouse correspondent, reported the latest on Phil Thompson’s legal status.
“CFTO News has learned that former Mother Courage guitarist Phil Thompson will enter a plea of voluntary manslaughter in the strangling death of concert mogul Glen Boyd. Thompson’s defense attorney, Daniel Lynn, has been meeting with Crown Prosecutor Marie Barton most of the afternoon, and they expect to have the deal finalized before they go home tonight. This comes on the heels of the widely publicized arrest of folksinger Judy Pelaez.”
A segment with Staff Inspector Tim Nowak came on. A bouquet of microphones rose toward Nowak’s chin. Tall, serene, and unruffled, he spoke calmly to the gathered reporters.
“The Metropolitan Toronto Police Force sincerely, apologizes to Judy Pelaez, to her family, and to her many fans for her arrest. When we arrested her, we acted in good faith, with the evidence we had in hand, and on the advice of the Crown Prosecutor. We booked Ms. Pelaez on what we thought was a compelling and prosecutable case. We did so solely in the interests of public safety. Chief Fantino will send Ms. Pelaez a personal letter of apology. Our lawyers are working on an out-of-court settlement which we believe will generously address any perceived damages. We regret this unfortunate incident, but don’t see how we could have acted any differently, given the circumstances and the information we had at the time of Ms. Pelaez’s arrest.”
Gilbert grinned. This was Nowak’s specialty: sa
y you’re sorry but never take the blame. It would frustrate the hell out of Ronald Roffey.
Curious about the details of Phil Thompson’s plea bargain agreement, Gilbert phoned Daniel Lynn the next day.
“The plea was in exchange for a lighter sentence,” explained Lynn.
“Did you take him to Justice Oulds?” asked Gilbert.
“Yes.”
“And Marie Barton was okay with that?”
“Justice Oulds was one of Marie’s professors at law school,” said Lynn. “She had no objection.”
“So what’s the deal?”
“Six years, which means he may get out in as little as thirty months.”
“Good,” said Gilbert. But he still wanted more detail. “Did he actually tell you what happened that night? How it ended up with Boyd dead like that?”
“The story goes that Phil and Stacy went to GBIA after Stacy was discharged from the hospital,” said Lynn. “Stacy went home while Phil went upstairs. Phil was naturally furious when he found out what Boyd had done to her. He doesn’t get angry often, but when he does, he’s a mad dog. He got there, and Boyd was using the scarf as a sling for his broken arm. They argued. They pushed. Glen threw a big jar of coins at Phil. Phil lost his temper. He threw the plate at Glen, then went at him with the scarf. He says he wasn’t intending to kill Glen. He just wanted to scare him. He says he was hardly pulling on the scarf at all.” This, then, explained the slight trauma, thought Gilbert. “But obviously he was pulling hard enough and long enough to murder the poor man.”
Gilbert thought about it. “The whole thing’s so sad,” he said.
“I know,” said Lynn. “That’s why I advised a plea. I didn’t want to make it any sadder by trying to fight it. It was by far the wisest course for Phil.”
“Too bad Phil was making a comeback,” said Gilbert.
“Yes.”
