Still Waters (19 page)

“He's got excellent taste,” Morgan observed. “He smells what they call ‘the portion of the gods,' the infinitesimal seepage of great wine through old cork. I think we'll have to sample a few before it's all gone.”

Miranda smiled. The wine fell under her jurisdiction, not his.

Rex moved on, abandoning his digging project. His focus shifted to the pump room, but when he got inside he seemed disinterested, as if it wasn't what he had expected.

“It's the noise,” said McGillivery. There was an audible hush of electric motors, the soft rush of water surging through enclosed spaces. “It muffles the scents. My God, is all this necessary to run a fish pond?”

“They're koi,” said Morgan. “Highly valued. The proof is the expense you see to maintain them.”

“What do you think he thought he'd find?” said Miranda, not sure whether the word
thought
was appropriate.

“Rex? Hard to say. He's picking up too much. He can't process it all. He gets bits and pieces, but no overall pattern. He'd show me if he could —”

“Searching for the master narrative,” interjected Miranda. “The story of the stories. He's probably getting undisturbed scents down here from generations, a hundred and fifty years or more, everything from trysts between servants to the depravity of children playing games of fear and retribution.”

“Normally called hide-and-seek,” Morgan said. “You're in a mood.”

“Yeah,” said Miranda, surprised that it showed. She hadn't had the opportunity to tell him about the previous night's revelations. She was in no hurry; she had a lot to assimilate. “Let's get back into the light. I don't like it down here. It's all too obsessive.”

As soon as they re-entered the passageways, Rex starting dashing about again. He went down to the tunnel door and back, then to the wine cellar door, where he lingered briefly, then back to the door into the garage, which he scratched at and abruptly abandoned, then back once more, pushing his way out into the den with the others, striding ahead of them outside into the sunlight.

Rex trotted over to the pool, rested his forepaws on the top of the raised wall, and gazed down at the koi swimming below him quite calmly, having recovered from his intrusion. He cocked his head to one side, quizzical, the observer observed, his work in the cellar already forgotten.

Morgan was puzzling over the way Rex had avoided contaminating the crime scene when they went up to the study. The dog carefully stepped around the specific area where the body had been. Did his handler give him a command, or did he just know? He asked McGillivery, and the man explained he had used the word
steady
, and that was all it took.

“Would it work for me?” asked Morgan.

“What do you mean?”

“If I gave the same command.”

“If it made sense. There would have to be something to avoid.”

“Okay, here's where Griffin was laid out on the ground. You try it first.”

McGillivery moved so the dog would have to cross over the site where the body had been to reach him when he was summoned. On command, after the handler said “Steady,” Rex came directly to him, stepping through the phantom corpse as if nothing were there. “There must have been a groundsheet under the dead man, something to obscure the scent.”

Morgan insisted they go back to the study, while Miranda stayed by the pool.

When they returned, Morgan explained. “He wouldn't walk across where the body was, and when I tried it, same thing. He refused to cross over. When I asked McGillivery to vary the command from ‘Steady' and say ‘Rumpelstiltskin' instead, Rex carefully sidestepped the spot and moved to his side. He wasn't about to violate the crime scene.”

“Good show,” said Miranda.

McGillivery seemed amused. He walked around a bit. “Sorry, folks. We just didn't have a grasp on what you wanted us to find.”

As dog and handler disappeared through the walkway and up the steps to street level, Morgan said, “He's an olfactory psychic, you know. He can smell the past. It's not his job to make any sense of it.”

“What's this all about?” Miranda asked when she realized he wasn't going to volunteer an explanation for testing Rex or McGillivery — she wasn't sure which.

“What?”

“Don't be coy, Morgan. The business about walking on bodies that aren't there. It's all a bit eerie.”

“I was just wondering. It's something I've been reading.”

“You've been reading?”

“Griffin's notes. The dog grasped the situation, but the words were irrelevant. He obeyed ‘Rumpelstiltskin,' he obeyed me. It wasn't the words. He smelled death. He knew from his training not to intrude.”

“And?”

“Griffin was right.”

“And?”

“Nothing.”

“He's a nice guy,” Miranda said, meaning McGillivery. “Nice dog. Why would you name a dog Rex? What about Lassie or Rin Tin Tin? What about Prince?”

“I said that.”

“What?”

“Prince. Seventeen percent of American dogs are called Prince. That's thirty-four percent of the males.”

“Did you make that up?”

“Nope. Eleven percent are called Rex, six percent are called Rusty. Of the males.”

“What's the most popular name for a bitch? Ellen?”

“Six percent. Did you know that forty-seven and a half percent of statistics are bogus. His real name is Schnitzel.”

“Who?”

“Rex. That's what they call him at home.”

“Schnitzel? I wonder what his registered name is?”

“Schwangau's Baron von Schnitzelgruber. He calls himself Dog.”

“How do you know that?”

“We communed. Some dogs have four names. Fish and cats only have three. I took him for a swim in the pool.”

“You didn't.”

“His idea. And in the process of nearly drowning he told me his name was Dog. That was his final message to the world. Did you know males can't climb over ice ledges or walls? Their penises get caught.”

“I didn't know that. I'm lucky. I don't have a penis.”

“You're not a dog.”

“Dogs, oh. Told you I'm lucky.”

They sat on the low retaining wall, and Miranda produced the gourmet sandwiches. The coffee was cold, but the sandwiches, which cost more than dinner for six at McDonald's, were crumpled, with roast beef
and bean sprouts and crusty whole-wheat bread and horseradish mustard from a family recipe passed down through millennia.

“I bought the sandwiches at the Robber Barons. As long as we're hanging out in Rosedale, we might as well take advantage.” She fished around in her purse, withdrew a wrinkled bag, and announced, “
Petit pain au chocolat
for dessert.”

They spread out their lunch on the stone between them, amused by the fish that converged at the surface, begging for crumbs.

“Did you feed them?” she asked.

“Yeah, when I got here.”

“I called Mr. Nishimura.”

“Who?”

“Your friend from the koi place. He's on his way down.”

While they ate, she told him about Jill. She had informed Children's Services but insisted she would take responsibility herself, for the time being, as long as Victoria, the live-in, was there. Jill trusted Victoria. The girl asked about a funeral. She knew there had to be arrangements. She wasn't sure how to do it. She didn't think anyone would come to a funeral. She was on record as Elizabeth Jill Bray. She was born in Toronto. No father listed, no next of kin. Molly Bray was born in a crossroads village up past Elora. Detzler's Landing. A general store, a mill, and a post office at the back of a service station. Miranda had driven by but never stopped in, cutting north from Waterloo County to cottage country to visit friends.

“How on earth do you know these places?” Morgan asked. “I've never heard of Detzler's Landing. Must be on a river, on its own little lake with a name like that. I'm city. I know Canada from one end of Toronto to the other.”

Morgan waited for a laugh, and she complied. She had heard it before.

“Old Sunnyside in the west to the Beach down east,” he continued. “Everyone calls it the Beaches, but it was always the Beach. North to Steeles Avenue. Yonge Street, the longest street in the world. And to the south the lake — no, the United States. That's where the world was real.”

He still had her attention. Now that they were alone she wanted to talk, but needed even more to listen to his familiar words, his voice. She didn't want to talk until she was ready.

“Living here,” he said, “it was like being a smudge on a giant balloon, and inside the balloon was the United States of America, and we couldn't get in. We could peer through from the surface, but we couldn't get in. So when I finished university, did I go to the States? No, I went to Europe, and do you know why?”

“Because you couldn't get in without bursting the bubble?”

“I have no idea why. I am not American, but I needed to get away. I am American, and I needed to get away.”

“You were reading too much Samuel Beckett.”

“They don't know they're inside the bubble-balloon.”

“I've never felt very Canadian,” she said. “No patriot fervour, no national angst. Nationalism is like a bad dye job. It's probably better if your roots are showing.”

“And I felt badly for stretching a metaphor! Let's take a run up to Detzler's Landing tomorrow.”

“Okay.”

“Let's take the Jag.”

“Don't be ridiculous. It's … okay, let's take the Jag.”

“Okay.”

“Do you think I'm going grey?”

“Let's see. No, some lovely pale highlights.” He tousled her hair.

They ate for a while, quietly, old friends having a picnic. Morgan watched her watching the fish. He felt he had been unfaithful. He wanted to take her in his arms and hold her, he wanted to be “masculine” and protect her, and he knew if he tried she would laugh at the cliché and say he was the one who needed looking after. Then he would laugh and say something about women who nurtured, and they would both sputter into embarrassed silence.

So he said nothing and she, feeling she would love to lean against him in the midday sun, said nothing. She felt strong with him; the revelations of the previous night were gradually integrating into a coherent emotional pattern.

He felt sad, not for what he had done, but for the distance between them, and for the closeness, and for how the two didn't seem to resolve.

As if she were reading his mind, she asked, “Did you go home with Ellen last night.”

“Yes,” he said.

“Oh.”

“Oh?”

“I thought she might —”

“What?”

“Take you home.”

“Take me home! What am I — some kind of door prize? I got a ride as far as her place.”

“You don't have to tell me about it.”

“You asked. What am I supposed to do? Say no, I'll walk?”

“I don't care.”

“You don't care what?”

“You can sleep with whoever you want.”

“Thank you.”

“She's a slut. You want to be careful.”

“She's your friend.”

“My friend is a slut.”

“You ever sleep with her?”

“I'm a woman, for God's sake.”

“So?”

“No. If I had, I wouldn't tell you.”

“So you might have?”

“No, Morgan. She's aggressively heterosexual.”

“And what about you?”

“Not aggressively. You're a jerk.”

“I didn't sleep with her. I just went in for a drink.”

“I don't care — why not?”

“What? Because.”

“Because why?”

“Miranda …”

“I don't care.'

“I didn't.”

“Good.”

“Well, it's been a relief getting this off my chest — the fact that I didn't sleep with your former best friend.”

“She was never my best friend. Adults don't have ‘best' friends.”

“Former not-best friend.”

“Lost your sex drive?”

“No.”

“You sure?”

“It's about delayed gratification, Miranda. At my age patience is an aphrodisiac.”

“Or an excuse.”

He looked at her. Her smile was enigmatic, flirtatious, or derisive. It could go either way. “Miranda …” he said with wary affection. “Miranda …”

“You could do better than her, Morgan. Do you want the rest of your croissant?”

A voice called from the walkway, and a man emerged out of the shadows. He walked toward the pond, his eyes intent on penetrating the surface reflection.

“Hello, it is Mr. Nishimura,” he said without looking at either of them. “My goodness, Detective Morgan, you are right. They are nishikigoi, very wonderful.” Reluctantly, he turned to Miranda. “I am Mr. Nishimura. We talked on the telephone.”

She stood, took his proffered hand, and bowed slightly from the waist. “Thank you for coming, Mr. Nishimura.”

He bowed deeply. “It is a most honourable occasion.”

She bowed again, wondering how far political correctness had to go.

The man remained upright and grinned. “Eugene Nishimura,” he said in a voice cadenced in irony.

She laughed. “Well, Mr. Eugene Nishimura. Do you even speak Japanese? Where are you from?”

“Your Mr. Morgan saw through me immediately yesterday. People who pay great sums for fish want all the trimmings. I'd dress like a geisha if it sold koi.”

“And your life history, Mister Nishimura?”

“Toronto, like Detective Morgan. Parents both born in an Alberta internment camp. Keep calling me mister and we'll leave that in the past. My grandparents were from British Columbia, same town, all four of them — Tofino. They fished before the war. On a clear day they imagined they could see their ancestral homeland across the Pacific. My great-grandparents were, or some of them were, from Niigata Province. Thus, I have a genetic link to the koi ponds of Japan. And what about you?”