Blackfly Season

by Giles Blunt

  “Have you considered what a competent defence attorney might do with this information in the event of a trial?” Arsenault didn’t take off his sunglasses this time. He stared at Cardinal, and it was like being examined by a huge fly. He mimicked a defence attorney: “Dr. Chin, would you tell the court—do you have any hobbies? Do you keep any pets? A tapeworm. I see. And where do you house your pet worm? In your intestine. How quaint. And is it true you take it out for walks?”

  Cardinal said, “Chin doesn’t do court. You can’t be at the beck and call of judges and prosecutors if you’re a full-time academic.”

  He found a space in the parking lot and they made their way over to the science building. The last of the sun made the brick glow burnt orange. A fresh, watery breeze blew from the lake, and there was the sound of wind through the trees. The campus was intensely green just now.

  A group of girls emerged from the student centre, chattering at high volume and with great urgency.

  “Geez,” Arsenault observed, “they get younger every year. College students actually look like children to me.”

  “They are children.” Cardinal’s own daughter was only a couple of years out of college.

  They followed signs to the biology department and, after some trial and error, found Dr. Chin’s office. Cardinal rapped on the door.

  “If you’re looking for Dr. Chin,” a young man with very thick glasses told them, “he’s in Bio Lab Three, downstairs.”

  Dr. Chin was supervising student projects, bending over an array of Petri dishes as he gripped a male student’s arm, shaking him. “Don’t rush it. Sometimes the fastest way to get your answer is to move very slowly.”

  “Dr. Chin?”

  The doctor stood up and flipped his ponytail over his shoulder. “Who are you?”

  “I’m Detective Cardinal, Algonquin Bay Police. This is Detective Arsenault from our ident section.”

  “Really. How pleasant.”

  “Can we talk someplace else?”

  Chin beckoned to an older student a few desks away, a man with rubbery features that gave him an unhealthy, boneless look.

  “This is Dr. Filbert,” Chin said. “It won’t hurt him to meet our local detectives. Dr. Filbert is a former student of mine and now my unfortunate post-doc. I keep him around solely for purposes of torture.”

  “You make me wash test tubes that haven’t even been used yet.”

  “Post-docs don’t wash test tubes,” Chin said. “Dr. Filbert is prone to exaggeration. Nevertheless, I’ll allow him to join us if he promises to behave.”

  “What about the students?”

  “They can survive without us for a few moments, I think.”

  Chin led them to an adjoining lab and hung his white coat on the back of a chair. He was slender, even skinny; at five-six or -seven, he couldn’t weigh much over one-twenty. Cardinal wondered about the tapeworm.

  Chin sat at a desk equipped with a large magnifier. “All right. Show me what you have.”

  Arsenault handed the professor a vial.

  Chin switched on the magnifier and held the vial under it.

  “Very interesting. You have a nice collection of maggots here. Nice work,” he said without looking up. “Good label.”

  “My partner calls me Avis,” Arsenault said. “I try harder.”

  “Okay, you’ve got a body found outside. Probably in the woods. Somewhere pretty cool, right? Maybe hidden among rocks? Near water, too, I think.”

  Arsenault looked at Cardinal and back to Dr. Chin. “You can really tell all that?”

  “Simple. You’ve got Calliphora celliphoridae vomitoria. It’s common in wooded areas.”

  “Gotta love that name,” Filbert said. “Did you know Linnaeus named it?”

  “Not everyone is a fly geek, Dr. Filbert.” Chin was still staring at the vial under his magnifier. “You also have Phormia regina. That’s a blowfly that you’re going to find absolutely everywhere. But you’ve also got Calliphora vicina. That tells us what, Dr. Filbert?”

  “Vicina is another blowfly. It only goes places that are shady and cool.”

  “That’s why Dr. Filbert gets the big grants,” Dr. Chin said. “Justice Department, no less. They wouldn’t give me dick, pardon my French.”

  “Justice loves DNA,” Filbert said cryptically.

  “I’m not seeing any other species here. Is that all you have?”

  Arsenault handed him three more vials. Chin examined them one after another under the magnifier. “Okay, now you have Cynomyopsis cadavarina. Shiny bluebottle. You only get this fly in advanced stages of decay. You’ve also got rove beetles and staph beetles, short for Staphylinidae. They feed on maggots.”

  “Normally, you’d expect a lot more species than that at an outdoor site,” Filbert said. “Especially in the late stages.”

  “The body was behind a waterfall,” Cardinal said.

  “Hah!” Chin waggled a finger. “The flies couldn’t find it. Couldn’t smell it. Makes perfect sense.” He rolled his chair back from the magnifier.

  “Can you give us anything on time of death?” Arsenault asked.

  “What am I—Mr. Wizard? Obviously I have to put these under a microscope to be absolutely sure what they are. And even then, for court purposes, you’re going to need them to hatch. That way you nail down the species beyond a doubt. But you’ve got third-instar Cynomyopsis and you’ve got rove beetles; you’re looking at about fourteen days since time of death.”

  “Can you narrow it down any more than that?”

  “Come back next week, gentlemen. I’ll be able to tell you a whole lot more.”

  The double doors of the lab were swinging closed behind them when Arsenault suddenly stopped. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I gotta ask.”

  Before Cardinal could prevent him, Arsenault yanked open one of the doors. “Hey, Doc. I gotta ask you something. Rumour I heard.”

  “Arsenault,” Cardinal said. “For God’s sake.”

  “What rumour would that be, Detective?”

  Arsenault appeared to think a minute. “Is it true that blackflies always come out before Victoria Day?”

  “In this region? That’s not a rumour, Detective. That’s a fact.”

  “Well, thanks for setting me straight. It was bothering me.”

  “Very amusing,” Cardinal said once they were in the parking lot. “Really, you could sit in for Conan O’Brien sometime.”

  “I gotta tell Delorme,” Arsenault said. “The look on your face.”

  12

  DELORME HAD OTHER THINGS on her mind. The body removal service had come and gone (with appropriate expressions of horror and disgust), and the remains of Wombat Guthrie were now in transit to the Centre of Forensic Sciences in Toronto. That left the rest of the evidence to gather up.

  With the help of Ken Szelagy and Bob Collingwood, she was collecting gum wrappers, bits of foil, cigarette packs of various ages and conditions, a rusted Dr Pepper can and countless cigarette butts. There were bits of Kleenex, the odd heel print, a handful of beads and a postcard depicting the citadel at Quebec City. This Delorme retrieved from under a rock.

  On the back, written in French in a feminine hand: Dear Robert, Quebec is a fantastic city. Wish you were here with me. I’m missing you all the time.

  “Hey, Bob,” Delorme said to Collingwood. “This a letter from your girlfriend?” She held it up for him to see. Collingwood, whose sense of humour had been surgically removed at birth, shook his head.

  Delorme slipped the postcard into an evidence bag and tagged it.

  A few minutes later she discovered a condom underneath a bush. Even wearing latex gloves, she wasn’t about to touch that one. She picked it up with a pair of ident’s tongs. “Probably belongs to the same guy as the postcard,” she said. Collingwood looked up for a moment, then went back to sifting dirt with a sieve.

  “Collingwood, did anyone ever tell you you talk too much?” Delorme dropped the condom into an evidence bag.


  Half an hour went by, then Collingwood offered up a single syllable: “Hair.” He held a pair of tweezers in the air; Delorme couldn’t see anything else.

  “How long?”

  He shrugged. “Twelve, fourteen inches. Black.”

  “Good. Let’s hope we can eventually connect it to a person.”

  Another half-hour.

  “So, you don’t make anything out of these drawings?” Szelagy said. Ken Szelagy, the biggest man on the detective squad, was usually the most talkative. But today he was fascinated by the cave wall, and it had been keeping him uncharacteristically quiet. “You don’t find something creepy about all these weird birds and snakes? Don’t you think they mean something?”

  “Yes, I think they mean something,” Delorme said, “to whoever drew them. But personally I don’t make anything out of them because I’m not into astrology or whatever they’re about, and until we find someone who is, I’m not even going to hazard a guess.”

  “What’re those things?”

  Delorme was dropping some bits of shell into a Baggie. “They look like seashells to me.”

  “Kinda colourful ones. Makes you wonder how the hell they got out to the middle of the woods.”

  Delorme slapped at a fly and missed. “Well, someone brought them here. The trouble is, we’ve no way of knowing if it was the killer or just some innocent hiker.”

  “Yeah. That’s the trouble with all this stuff. But about all these arrows and tomahawks the guy scratched on the wall, I’m thinking we should ask a certain person of the Indian persuasion.” He jerked his chin toward the mouth of the cave.

  Delorme turned around and saw Jerry Commanda standing there, hands on hips, his slim build silhouetted against the waterfall. With the quiet roar of the water, Delorme hadn’t heard him approach.

  “Who bought it?” he said.

  “Wombat Guthrie,” Delorme said. “You know him?”

  Jerry nodded. “Wombat Guthrie was a noxious individual from the time he was three. It’s amazing he lived as long as he did. You called me in from Reed’s Falls to tell me this?”

  “I didn’t call you, Szelagy did. What’s so hot in Reed’s Falls?”

  “Drugs. It’s always drugs. I wish people would take up a new vice.”

  “You know we have your picture up in the boardroom now?”

  “That must be the nude shot. I asked Kendall not to do that. Now I feel so cheap.”

  “Reason I called, Jerry.” Szelagy indicated the cave wall. “We can’t make head or tail of these hieroglyphics. Figured maybe you could help us.”

  Jerry stepped up to the wall and peered at the markings. He stood there for a long time, hands folded behind his back like a math teacher checking a student’s work. “Interesting,” he said. “Very intriguing.”

  Szelagy looked at Delorme and back to Jerry, waiting for more. When nothing came, he said, “What’s intriguing? Why is it intriguing?”

  Jerry squatted to look at some of the marks near the bottom of the wall. “Fascinating,” he said. “I haven’t seen petroglyphs like this since… well, I can’t remember the last time.”

  “See, I knew it was some Indian thing,” Szelagy said to Delorme. Then, to Jerry: “What’s it say? Can you translate? This is great.”

  “I think so.” Jerry pointed at the first three rows of arrows. “See here? This is a reference to space. And over here, he’s referring to time. Yes, absolutely. It says, ‘Meet me at Tim Hortons, three o’clock on Saturday.’”

  “Get the hell outta here,” Szelagy said. “No way it says that.”

  Jerry shrugged. “Could be saying Starbucks. My hieroglyphics are a little rusty.”

  Delorme shook her head. “Very good, Jerry. Thanks for making the trip.”

  “Oh,” Szelagy said. “I get it. You’re making a joke. You don’t know what these symbols mean?”

  “Haven’t the foggiest,” Jerry said. “I know that may shock you. I mean, since it has bows and arrows and all.”

  “Hey, I didn’t call you just because you’re Indian,” Szelagy said. His face was turning red. “I called because you used to know all sorts of Aboriginal stuff. I remember you used to be always carrying big fat books about Native history and that.”

  “Well, those marks don’t mean anything to me. I’ve never seen anything like them. Bows, arrows, hatchets, but other than that is there any reason to think it’s even Indian in origin? I’m not saying it isn’t. I’m just saying I wouldn’t know. It’s not Ojibwa stuff, I can tell you that. And probably not any of the central or eastern people. But if it’s from out west or from somewhere in the States, I wouldn’t know.”

  “Who would know?” Delorme said quietly. “If it was your case, who would you take it to?”

  “You could try our behavioural sciences unit in Orillia. They keep up on all the Satanism and supernatural crap the serial killers go in for. Ask for Frank Izzard. He’s a smart guy.” Jerry caught a blackfly in his fist and flicked it away. Then he turned and headed back down the hill.

  “One thing you can say about Jerry,” Szelagy said when he was gone, “he’s his own man. Real different sense of humour.”

  13

  CARDINAL WENT HOME THAT NIGHT to an empty house. The message light was flashing on the phone, and when he hit the button it was his daughter, Kelly. She was twenty-six, a painter and lived in New York City. Her message said she was just calling to chat—to Catherine, she meant, not to Cardinal—but most likely she needed money.

  He warmed up some shepherd’s pie from the fridge, opened a Creemore and sat down at the kitchen table with the Algonquin Lode, but found he couldn’t concentrate on the articles. He would read a few lines and then skip ahead to another story, another photograph.

  It’s funny, he thought, fifty years old you pretty much consider yourself a grown-up. Independent. In fact, a lot of the time he wished Catherine would take a trip somewhere. He liked the idea of waking up alone, eating breakfast alone, cong home alone. Solitude, in his imagination at least, always seemed so attractive. An effect of the movies, he supposed. You watch a solitary character onscreen, even just going about their daily routine, it always seems so interesting, so important. But the reality was that when Catherine was away, Cardinal felt restless and dissatisfied, anxious even. Was she looking after herself? Taking her medication? Why can’t I leave it alone?

  The little lakeside house with its wood stove and its angular rooms was cozy, comfortable. And the location out on Madonna Road ensured that—much of the time, at least—it was blessedly quiet. But tonight the quiet irritated him. He missed the sound of Catherine fussing with her plants, playing Bach on the stereo, chatting to him about photography, about her students, about anything at all, really. And as for Kelly—well, Kelly wouldn’t have called if she’d realized her mother was away.

  When he had finished his supper, Cardinal called the Delta Chelsea Hotel in Toronto. They put him through to Catherine’s room but there was no answer. He had tried to get Catherine to buy a cellphone but she wanted nothing to do with them. “A cellphone?” she’d said. “No, thank you. When I’m alone I want to be alone. I don’t want to be getting phone calls.” He left a message saying he missed her and hung up.

  She was probably out with some of the students; she had mentioned wanting to get photographs of the waterfront at night. Cardinal hoped she wasn’t having a drink with her class. Alcohol did not mix well with the medication. It tended to make her a little manic, and then she’d stop taking the lithium. After that, the fragile connections that tethered his wife to reality would break loose until she came crashing to earth and a bed in the psychiatric hospital. It had happened more times than he cared to remember, but he couldn’t keep her on a leash and he couldn’t be her babysitter. Luckily, when she was well, Catherine was level-headed and knew what she had to avoid.

  Cardinal stared at the phone. He wanted to call Kelly, but knew she didn’t want to speak to him. This provoked an inner slide show of memories from when
Kelly had been young and they had lived in Toronto: Kelly knee-deep in a creek in one of Toronto’s many ravines, a squirming frog raised in her triumphant little fist. Kelly on the observation deck of the CN Tower, tiny arms outstretched as if she could lift the vast blue basin of Lake Ontario to the sky. Kelly inconsolable at age fourteen over the wayward heart of some youthful, athletic cad.

  Catherine had been in hospital for much of Kelly’s growing up, and Cardinal and his daughter had become very close. Raising a little girl mostly on his own had been fraught with difficulties, but Kelly’s happiness had become the paramount object in Cardinal’s life. Eventually Catherine had been lucky enough to go under the care of Dr. Carl Jonas at the Clarke Institute. He was a long-haired, pink-faced man with a salt-and-pepper beard and a pungent Hungarian accent who had the knack of finding the right balance of therapy and medication quicker than anyone else.

  But there had come a time when Catherine had sunk into the worst bout of depression Cardinal had ever seen. A case of the blues had lingered too long, and then she had taken to her bed and nothing Cardinal did could raise her spirits. Soon she was unable even to speak. It was as if she had been lowered into the depths in a bathysphere, the sides threatening to crumple under the stupendous pressure of her sorrows. And Dr. Jonas had been away in Hungary for a year on a teaching assignment.

  Catherine had been trundled from one clinic to another and she had got no better. On the verge of despair—and hounded by Catherine’s American parents, who were possessed by a fierce love for their daughter combined with the Yankee certainty that a non-American thing was an inferior thing—Cardinal had had Catherine admitted to the renowned Tamarind Clinic in Chicago. The bills were breathtaking, so extreme that at first they had seemed a joke, then the stuff of nightmare. There was no way Cardinal could ever pay them on his salary; he and Catherine would never own a house, never get out of debt.