A Year Less a Day (33 page)

“You'll have to take my kids as well,” she teases as she gives Ruth a cheeky nudge. “They'll starve to death without her.”

“First, we're going to dinner,” says Phillips as he hands Ruth her purse, but she turns to her friend.

“I haven't finished cooking ...”

“Get out of here,” laughs Trina, bundling her toward the basement apartment. “Go and gussy yourself up for the nice man while I make him a coffee. And hurry up.”

The restaurant Phillips has selected for dinner is a ritzy Japanese diner just off the waterfront, and they sit waiting for their soup while watching the water-busses buzz back and forth across the harbour.

“You remember I said I wanted to ask you something,” says Phillips with a serious mien, and Ruth confesses that she had forgotten amidst the after-noon's brouhaha.

“This isn't going to be easy ...” Phillips carries on, as if to himself, leaving Ruth wondering if he is about to propose.

Oh, God. This is too soon
, she says to herself.
Jordan's only been gone a couple of months
.

Three and a half months,
contradicts another voice.
Remember the date on the death certificate.

“The fact is, Ruth,” Phillips starts hesitantly, “that I need to talk to you about your mother.”

“My mother?”

Tough luck,
says the voice, but inwardly she lets out a sigh. Not that she wouldn't love to marry him, it is
simply that she is still burdened by Jordan, and the visit to Dr. Fitzpatrick hadn't helped, even if she had told Trina that it had.

“What about my mother?” she wants to know and Phillips puts on his policeman's mantle as he explains that his detachment is looking into the disappearance of a number of women from Vancouver's streets.

“You said that she just vanished,” he reminds her, then swears her to secrecy before admitting that a serial killer could be at work. “Wouldn't you like to know what happened to her?” he asks, but she starts to shake her head, saying, “She wasn't a good mother ...” But it's a line that has run its course and she knows it. “It's been more than twenty years, Mike. I don't know what to think anymore. I suppose I was always angry with her for running off and leaving me.”

“But what if she didn't run off? What if someone had killed her and that's why she never came back?” he asks as gently as he is able.

“It never occurred to me,” she admits, and her mother's character begins to change in her mind when Phillips questions, “Did she physically abuse you?”

“Never ... Not really. Sometimes she'd be mad at me because it was hard to find somewhere to stay with a kid. But I guess I should be grateful that she always tried and didn't just dump me in a home or leave me on some-one's doorstep. She always managed, somehow.”

“What do you remember about her?”

“I've blocked her out for years, to be honest, but I was thinking of her when I was arrested; wondering if she'd ever been in that same cell. I think that was the worst thing about being inside, Mike. Thinking that my mother might have been stripped and shackled just like me; thinking that when she'd come home covered in bruises that she may have got them the same way that I
did. And she didn't do anything wrong either—not unless trying to stay alive is wrong.”

“There are some people who would say that what she was doing was wrong,” he says, carefully distancing himself from the accusation.

“Mike, I know what she did,” says Ruth. “She was a hooker, but what else could she do to survive? She didn't have much education, and her people had nothing. So she sold the only thing she had.”

“Her people?” Phillips questions.

“Coast Salish First Nations,” explains Ruth, flooring Phillips.

“She was a Native?” he breathes in total surprise.

“Yes, Mike. And so am I—well, part Native. Don't say you didn't notice.”

“But I didn't,” he protests. “It never occurred to me.”

Ruth takes a moment to peer questioningly into his eyes before warily asking. “Does it make a difference, now that you know?”

Mike Phillips may be able to plug his tears, but he can't cover the crack in his voice as he lovingly takes her hands. “I fell in love with a woman, Ruth, not a colour or a race. I fell in love with you.”

“Thank you,” she says, gripping his hands. “Though God knows why you would feel that way—knowing what you do.”

“All I know is that you are a wonderful person who doesn't deserve all the crap that's been thrown at you, and I'll do my best to make up for it.”

Ruth smiles through tears of gratitude as their meal arrives, then asks, “What can I do about my mother?”

“We have an idea where she could be, Ruth. Would you give us a small blood sample, so that we can test for DNA?”

“Yes,” says Ruth, unhesitatingly. “Of course I will.”
It is already dawn in Westchester, England, when Mike Phillips takes Ruth back to his hotel in Vancouver and guides her upstairs to his room. And, on the other side of the world, a man rides out of the stable yard at Thraxton Manor unaware that a telephoto lens is tracking him as he gallops off across the field toward the barns.

“It's the best I could do, sir,” says the photographer an hour later as he drops the fuzzy photographs on Donaldson's desk. “I hope it's the right guy. He moved so quickly that I had a job to get a good focus.”

“I don't know,” admits Donaldson, “I've never seen him.” Then he takes a closer look. “What's happening in the background? Do you know?”

A bevy of workmen fixing up the old barns have been caught in the photographer's lens, though he had been so focussed on the galloping horseman that he hadn't noticed.

“It looks as though they're doing the old place up,” continues Donaldson, peering deeper. “I've got a feeling Ms. Lovelace mentioned that he had plans for the place. Anyway, I'm sure she'll recognize him easily enough. Thanks, Bob.”

Daphne has no doubts when Donaldson lays out the photos on her dining room table a little later. “That's him, sir. That's the impostor. Are you going to arrest him?”

“I don't think we have any evidence that he's done anything wrong, Daphne,” protests Donaldson. “He denied being Jackson when Dave asked him. Plus, he happens to own a fair chunk of Westchester real estate.”

“Successful villains don't live in Council houses, Superintendent. You should know that,” she chides lightly.

“But Daphne,” Donaldson remonstrates, “you've absolutely no reason to say that he's a villain.”

“After the way he spoke to me,” she complains with resentment, “and the way he just tossed my furniture polish in the bin—that was a brand new aerosol, Superintendent. And it wasn't one of those cheapie things from ValueSpot either; they don't last two minutes. ‘This is for Thraxton Manor,' I told the Mr. Benson in the hardware store, ‘I only want the very best.' And Jackson, or whatever his name is, just ripped it out of my hand and chucked it in the bin. Honest people don't do things like that.”

“It's not exactly the most heinous crime we've had this year, Daphne,” mutters Donaldson, but she is determined to press her point.

“It may not be much to you, but six pounds is six pounds. And I still say he's a crook.”

“What do you plan to do with the photo now, Dave?” Donaldson asks Bliss, hoping to change the subject, but Daphne rises to make a point.

“I think I need a soothing cup of tea,” she says, crossly. “I assume you'll stay for some Keemun, Superintendent?”

“How could I resist,” says the officer, seizing an opportunity to placate her. “The tea at the station hasn't been the same since you left.”

Daphne hesitates for a moment with the idea of volunteering to take back her old job at the police station, but thinks better of it. “Young women today have never been taught to make tea properly, that's the problem,” she says, heading for the kitchen.

“I'll email the picture to my contact in Vancouver later this afternoon, says Bliss as he takes a look at the time. “It's still the middle of the night there. Mike Phillips knows Jackson's wife. She'll be able to clear this up.”

“Good. So, how much longer are you staying? I
was just thinking that you've never had the pleasure of Mrs. Donaldson's Sunday roast, have you?”

“Thanks, but I should be getting back,” says Bliss. “I was actually going last week until all this blew up, but I'll probably stay for a few more days, just to make sure that Daphne's all right.”

“I can manage perfectly well on my own, David,” Daphne yells irritably from the kitchen. “My hearing is fine, and it's not my fault if people won't believe what I saw with my own eyes.”

“Daphne,” calls Donaldson. “I'm not doubting you for a moment. I just don't have sufficient evidence to get a warrant.”

“He stole my polish,” she carries on as she brings in the tea, though she knows that won't get her far.

“I'll give you the money for that,” says Bliss. “Anyway, lets just wait and see what Mrs. Jackson has to say about her husband, all right?”

Lunchtime brings further news on the Jackson case. Daphne is in the kitchen defrosting the last of the turkey soup when Bliss takes another call from the
Merseyside Mail
office.

“Dave,” gushes the editor, “I've got some brilliant news for Ms. Lovelace. We may have found Sanderson.”

“Really?”

“Yes. She was right. He didn't come back after the sixty-four tour.”

“Where is he?”

“Well, I got a paper in Canada,
The Globe and Mail
, to run the picture with a story, and someone spotted him. Apparently he used to live in Vancouver.”

“Used to?”

“About ten years ago, the woman said, but she moved away, so she doesn't know if he's still there. I'm going to ask a Vancouver paper to run the story next,
but I've a feeling we're getting close. Could you let Mrs. Longbottom know?”

Bliss puts down the phone, calling to Daphne. “You'd better start working on Mavis. I think the Beatles reunion is getting closer.”

“What's that about, David?” asks Daphne poking her head into the room.

“Wouldn't it be weird if he lives right around the corner from Ruth,” Bliss carries on, once he's given Daphne the details. “I mean, you read about these kind of things in the papers and you never quite believe them—adopted twins who've lived next door to each other for fifty years and never knew; that kind of thing.”

Daphne is equally overjoyed. “Maybe we should have a drink to celebrate,” she says opening the liquor cabinet. “The sun is just about over the yardarm.”

“Whoa!” exclaims Bliss. “Why are we getting so excited? Aren't we forgetting something?”

“What?”

“We have no idea if Sanderson is Ruth's father. Her mother might have made up the whole story. And even if she did tell her the truth, what's the chance that it was Geoffrey Sanderson with the mop-top haircut and a guitar case doing a backstage bonk while George was out front being screamed at?”

“Oh, David. You are a wag,” laughs Daphne, but she takes the point. “How are you going to find out?” she asks.

“I was hoping you'd have some ideas. I'm stumped.”

“Well, I think you've done magnificently so far David, but if I could make a suggestion, I was reading the other day about a private investigator who did the old switcheroo with a chap's beer glass in a pub to get his DNA off the saliva. Now it may be the sort of thing that only happens in novels, but it sounded genuine enough.”

“It sounds a bit iffy to me,” replies Bliss. “Though I suppose it might work. But they've got to find him first. Mike will probably be able to help, but let's wait and see what he has to say about the man at the manor first.”

Mike Phillips and Ruth Jackson had more than sleep on their minds when they had gone to bed the previous night and, in consequence, are late rising.

“I'll have to get a move-on,” muses Phillips as he plugs in his computer to check for messages, but Ruth's mind is still on Trina's guinea pig.

“I would never have forgiven myself if the poor thing had died,” she is saying as he pulls up his emails and finds the photograph from Bliss. “What's the matter?” she asks, realizing that her lover has suddenly gone quiet.

Phillips takes a deep breath. “You remember I told you that a Canadian named Jordan Jackson had turned up in England?”

“Yeah. You said not to worry. Why?”

“Well. A friend of mine has sent a photo, and he wants to know if you recognize him.”

Mike Phillips may be feeling nervous as he prepares to open the photo attached to the email message, but Ruth is backing up faster than a lion-trainer with a smashed chair.

“What if it's him? What if I'm still married?”

“Ruth, you've got a copy of his death certificate.”

“Signed by a doctor a month before he died,” she reminds him.

“You don't have to look at it if you don't want,” Phillips tells her as he closely examines the picture evolving on screen.

“Tell me it's not him, Mike. Please tell me it's not him.”

“I never saw him,” admits Phillips. “He'd gone before I arrived. But he could be about the right age.”

Curiosity draws Ruth closer until she finds herself peering at the screen, and Phillips watches her face for a clue.

“Is it him?” asks Phillips, heart-in-mouth at her puzzled expression.

“It could be,” she says vaguely, but she is clearly indecisive. “Possibly.”

“You're not sure?”

“I can't remember what he looked like,” she finally admits in frustration and takes off for the bathroom saying, “What about Trina? She'll know.”