She Felt No Pain (15 page)

The woman took the picture, her hand shaking. She gave a brief nod then swallowed the last of the beer and put down the bottle. “I need something stronger. These kind of days don’t happen very often.” She got up and went to the cupboard.

Judy returned with a glass and a fresh bottle of Captain Morgan Dark Rum. Twisting off the cap with adept fingers, she poured herself two inches, blinking as she swallowed it all in one gulp. “God, what would Mother say?” she said with a laugh. “Roll over in her grave if she had one. She’s out there on the roses instead. Six feet tall like she always wanted to be.”

Another siren sounded, going the other way. Holly let the woman monitor herself. It didn’t help to hurry anyone. This was their show. Her job was to keep them on track and get the facts, in either order. “His name?” she prompted.

“Joel, Joel Clavir.” The tones were hushed, almost wistful. At one time they might have been a prayer, not a curse.

Holly’s pen stopped as she snapped to attention. “Pardon me?” Cylinders of a lock were falling into place. The name Clavir was very unusual, and this was a small community. Marilyn and Joel were in a similar age group. A former husband? A bitter divorce and a lifestyle change? Or a brother. In any combination, another piece of bad news for the woman. She was a magnet for tragedy.

Given time for thought, Judy barely restrained a hiss. “Yes, Joel. He turned up like a bad penny after all these years. But let’s be honest. We never would have made it.” She gave Holly a quizzical look. “How in god’s name did you know to come looking for me?”

“He was carrying your picture. From a high-school year—”

“That sentimental old fool. Who would have thought?” She gave a reluctant sniff. Her small chin started to wobble. Then she poured a solid triple and downed it like milk. Holly thought about saying
Hey, take it easy.
She didn’t want the woman blitzed out of her head and unable to think straight. But Judy put the bottle back in the cupboard, a good sign, and sat down again. “I’m not totally stupid. That’s enough for me. It’s gonna give me reflux, and I’m out of Zantac.” She tapped at her breastbone and gave a small burp. “’Scuse me.”

Holly considered saying that she was sorry about the loss, but somehow it seemed like history. “So you and Joel...”

“Joel and I were a pair in high school. Mr. Personality. Smile like the sun. Had us laughing day and night. And could he dance. We were going to get married when we graduated, at least that’s what I thought. You should have heard his line. Men. It’s bred in the bone, I guess. Then he left me high and dry. Never trusted one after that. Well, maybe this one. ’Cause I raised him to respect women.” Her gaze went to a framed picture on the table. A big strong man in his thirties, arms folded in confidence, standing by a late model car. Hills and mountain in the background. She touched it lightly with her finger.

“Are you saying...I mean were you—”

“Pregnant. Sure, they had birth control then, but Sooke is a small town. One doctor for all of us. The condom broke. Hey, it happens.” Judy gave a bitter chuckle and threw her arms up. “Nature, what a joker. When you’re ripest for sex, it’s all out of control.”

Holly nodded womanly support. “You wouldn’t be the only one.” She looked at the picture. “Nice dog. Malamute.”

“My son, Shiloh. Against all odds. But I did get a job as soon as I delivered. God, I must have juggled plates and washed dishes in every restaurant from here to Victoria, any one on the bus line. It was tough. My parents had no money. Dad hurt his back on a hali boat. We ate a lot of macaroni. Mom bought peanut butter by the gallon. Made our school lunches, and we damn well better eat them.”

So Holly had her identification. She could get this case off the books if... She held her breath. “Clavir is an unusual name. Did Joel have a sister?”

Judy smiled and waved her hand. “Sure, that’s Marilyn. I see her around town at the stores every now and then, not that she comes into the restaurant. Junk food isn’t her thing. She’s okay, not snooty. I kind of like her. No fault of hers that her brother was an asshole. She went into massage therapy and has a nice little place. Sort of woo, woo, but hey, if it works...”

Holly sat up a few degrees to signal to herself that she needed to leave. There was bad news to deliver. “I’m glad that you’ve provided identification for Joel, but I have to wonder why he came back after all these years. Was it to see you? And why now, of all times? Had he kept in touch?”

“He could have been on the moon for all I know. That bastard never sent me a friggin’ buck. He had no idea I worked here until I saw him ripping into the dumpster when I went out with the trash. Gave him a piece of my mind, all the things I’d wanted to say. Know what?” She eased back and took a deep breath. “It didn’t make me feel any better. He was just a pitiful character. Like an old whore. His looks and body were gone. Only a mother could love him, as the saying goes.”

“So why—”

“Why did he come? For nothing but his own benefit, I can tell you that. Maybe he wanted to score off his sister’s lottery win. It was in the papers. People turn into jackals.” She shivered to add to the effect. “Catch me winning, I’d move to Maui in a heartbeat.”

Holly remembered that ironic piece of fortune. “Good point. We know he’s been in and out of jail most of his life. Theft, drugs, assault. Who knows what he got away with?”

“Assault maybe, but nothing worse. He wouldn’t have the guts. Joel was sneaky, but he was a coward. I should have seen that, but you know what it’s like when you’re a teenager. Love is deaf, dumb and blind.”

They went back outside, and Judy coughed at the smoke, banging theatrically at her bird-like chest. “Damn. Can you do something about that? I have to keep my windows closed some hot days. Isn’t it illegal this time of year? I saw the sign at the Fire Hall reading Danger: High.”

“Everyone’s still burning off the trash from the storm last winter. I don’t like it either. But it’s not my jurisdiction, I’m afraid. Call the Fire Department. They’re the enforcers.” The area, still largely rural outside the core, was in conflict about burning laws. Closer to Victoria, the rules were strict. Out here, people felt like they had a right to burn even garbage. And then there were the enormous piles dozed up and left in clear-cuts. In the dry season, there was a moratorium for the companies. Even a spark from a dozer could start an inferno.

Back in Fossil Bay, Holly stopped by Marilyn’s, but the car wasn’t in the drive. She tried her cellphone. “Marilyn, please call me. It’s Holly,” she said, leaving no message because of the sensitive subject. With the work beginning at the wellness centre, perhaps she was out there supervising. A third body blow after Shannon and Brittany. She hoped that Marilyn had close friends. She hadn’t mentioned any parents. At her age, perhaps they were no longer alive. As Holly headed back to set up a speeding check at Jordan River, a call came over the radio at the giant lighthouse. “Another weird one,” Ann said. “We have a complaint about a dognapping at the RV park. Go figure.”

It was a new one, all right. Boomer the beagle belonged to a former Vietnam vet who lived on Fossil River Road near an RV camping park. His dog made the rounds every afternoon in search of an occasional hot dog. This time, Boomer had been grabbed by a tourist family.

“I’ll check it out. By the way, we have an ID on our victim.” She told Ann about her talk with Judy.

Ann whistled. “Marilyn’s brother? She never mentioned him, not that she got that personal with me. She’d always tell me to relax and breathe deeply, not gab during a massage.”

Shortly after, Holly reached the RV park on the river flats. The people camped next to the dognappers, a couple from Calgary, told her what they had witnessed. The man put up his hands defensively. “I didn’t learn about Boomer being a local until later. This guy, his wife, and kid from Switzerland, said that they had found the dog and were going to take him camping for a month up island.”

“Take him camping? Then what?” Holly asked.

He shrugged. “Leave him off at a pound or something. Say they
just
found him.”

“Do you have any idea where they went?” She had learned the license of the rental Cruise Canada Class A. She could hardly initiate an Amber Alert or an All-Points Bulletin.

He scratched his head and looked at his wife. “Port Renfrew, then Lake Cowichan? That sound right, hon?”

His wife agreed. “They had a map which showed the rec sites. Basic and cheap. Must be five or six around the lake. Can’t say which one they picked.”

Back in the car, Holly glanced at the time. Five p.m. Friday. The Cowichan detachment wouldn’t appreciate chasing after dogs, and the rec sites had no phone access, often only a camper host who collected the money and was paid with a free site. Tomorrow, other overdue personal plans could piggyback upon the trip. She could still hear Auntie Stella’s voice: “Your mother and I have waited long enough.”

E
IGHT

P
ort Renfrew, a tiny fishing town of a few hundred, hadn’t changed much since Holly’s last visit in high school. Then it was all bush roads requiring four-wheel drive. Now bridges had been refurbished by the forest companies, and roads had been surfaced to urge tourists to take the Great Circle Route. Marilyn was still not answering her phone, and when Holly passed on her way out of town, the Audi was missing from the drive. Business on the mainland again? As Holly had suspected, a check on Joel Clavir had yielded nothing. Off the island, he’d never gone by his real name, having left his life behind in more ways than one.

Botanical Beach had often called Holly to its unusual shores. At low tide, the marine life on the protected rock-shelf beaches drew international attention from scuba divers or rubber-booted strollers. But she passed Rennie with Pandora Peak in the distance, turned north, crossed two bridges at the San Juan River, and headed east on Harris Creek ML (Mainline) toward Fairy Lake. The miniature bonsai island close to the highway, a popular picture, brought cars screeching to a halt.

As she travelled in and out of clear-cuts across the high hills, the sights reminded her that over ninety per cent of the island had been logged once, twice, if not three times. In her heart she almost welcomed the recession and the lowered demand for wood. Maybe the government would wake up and stop exporting raw logs, a self-defeating concept.

She left the San Juan watershed and headed up in a cloud of dust toward Harris Creek and the legendary spruce. The giant Sitka stood a few hundred feet in, as old as the first of the Tudors. The new fence gave little protection against harm by some fool with an axe. Noble giant companions sat nearby in the cathedral grove. In this accessible area, the largest trees survived on a combination of water sources, or the whims of a beneficent timber company officer. “Hello, old friend,” she said, pouring a libation of club soda over the fence.

An hour later, having crossed Robertson Creek, turning at Mesachie Lake, and passing Honeymoon Bay, she found the Swiss family on majestic Lake Cowichan at a rustic site with no more than a water tap and outhouse.

She hoped that the sparkling blue lake was as clean as it appeared, yet with the many creeks flowing in from cut areas, appearances were unreliable. For over a century, companies had bought or leased the land for peanuts, supposed stewards of the renewable resource. Every now and then, as in the Clayoquot Sound initiative, the world paid attention and saved a few trees. Some land was being returned to the First Nations, but they were attracted to jobs too, and some had been tempted to welcome mining ventures on the vulnerable territories.

Fifteen dollars a night attracted frugal families. Four or five cars were parked in the camping areas with one tent trailer and several tents. Kids were splashing in the shallow waters, their happy cries bouncing off the natural sink.

The Cruise Canada RV with a red-and-white flag stood out. A clothesline was strung for towels and bathing suits, and under the awning shaded by the huge trees sat a couple in their late thirties. Their young boy, possibly ten, was playing with a beagle with a ragged ear. Boomer. Holly had put on her uniform for emphasis but not the stifling vest. Already she was taking chances Ben wouldn’t approve of.

“Officer? Or are you a...ranger?” The man’s tone was respectful. The dog got up, trotted over, and jumped onto her pants, leaving dust marks.

“
Otto, komm hier
.” He waved it over, and the dog came, tail wagging. A shiny blue collar was around its neck. At his request, the pale boy clipped on a leash and took it back to a picnic table, where he gave it a piece of cheese.

Holly was surprised that the dog had mastered German so quickly but supposed that the universal hand gestures did the trick. She introduced herself. “I’m afraid that back in Fossil Bay, you may have taken someone else’s dog...by mistake.”

With broad shoulders and a Teutonic lantern jaw, the man looked like he was accustomed to getting his way by mere posture. “That cannot be so. We found Otto a couple of days ago. He had no collar and was to us a...stray as you call it?”

“He’s not a stray, and he must have slipped his collar.” Her language was neutral and her smile polite but not overly friendly.

“Miss, officer.” He bent forward, lowering his voice. “My boy has many health problems. Life for him has few pleasures. He loves the dog.”

Holly softened for a moment. “I can see that, but Boomer’s people love him, too.”

His wife muttered a few words to him, and he bit his sculpted lips, swallowing a retort. Did he imagine he’d be sent to jail? “We don’t want any trouble.”

Sensing tension, the boy started to cry. “
Bernd. Nein
.” The mother put her arm around him as tears streaked down his face.

Holly let the boy give Boomer a final hug, then loaded the mutt into the rear seat and drove off. This was a no-win situation for everyone.

Heading back east around the north side of the lake, and seeing the mile marker for Youbou, she felt nervous about seeing Auntie Stella again. The old woman might imagine that Holly’s resources would allow her to begin the long trail to Bonnie. That simply wasn’t the case. Not only had years gone by, but investigatory processes weren’t for her personal use.