The River Killers (29 page)

“Danny, you're awake.” She took my hand and squeezed it. “You're looking better than the last time I saw you.”

“Even with the egg on my face? I'm assuming I didn't get shot by a party-pooping neighbor. Our bad guy was supposed to go after Crowley's files and the computer, not try to whack me.”

“We all miscalculated. They thought we didn't care about the files and the only person who might be able to make sense out of them was you. So, eliminate you and eliminate the threat. I don't think the bad guy would show his face in public, so I'm guessing they hired a pro, some kid trained in the drug wars. Jerome spent two days going over mug shots. Nada.”

“I'm worried about Bette.”

“Theoretically, they don't know she's working on the files. Just in case, though, we've got her wrapped up like a mummy. She took a leave of absence and she's working on Crowley's computer full-time. And Jerome and Heidi provide her companionship.”

“Heidi?”

“The bodyguard division also strives for gender equity. If Jerome keeps getting shot, we'll beat our target date.”

“He didn't have a lot of time to negotiate. Consensus might not have been achievable.”

“Yeah, I know. He did good. Preserved a prime asset.”

“Prime asset?” Mark coughed. “There's an extra syllable there. I'll let Christine and Fergie know you're awake.”

He ambled out the door, and Louise looked at Jerome. “Can we have a minute?”

“I'll be by the elevator.”

He closed the door behind him, and Louise leaned over and kissed me. Her fingers ran over my face, like she was trying to see me through her fingertips. She kissed me again, gently but not casually. I responded as best I could, but she pressed me back against the pillows.

“I was really worried, Danny. You're going to have to stop getting shot.”

“Okay, it's not all it's cracked up to be anyway.” She nestled her head lightly against my shoulder. I managed to raise one hand to the back of her neck. The pain was worth it. After not long enough of this activity, the door was flung open and Dr. Blissfully Infallible graced us with his presence.

“Ah, Mr. Swanson.” Louise could have been a prosthesis for all the notice he took of her. She stood slowly, gave me a wry smile, nodded at the doctor, and left. He glanced at my charts. “How are we feeling this morning?”

“I don't know about you, but I'm feeling kind of shitty. I can't move without causing major pain, and in about half an hour I'm going to be really really bored. How long do I have to stay here?”

“Hmmmm.” He felt carefully around the dressing on my chest, then slid his hand between the pillow and my back. “Any pain here? Here?”

He used his stethoscope to eavesdrop on various organs, and then straightened up. “You're fairly simple. You're also lucky that I was available. We had to cauterize two large arteries, and we'll need to monitor them for bleeding. We'll also need to watch for fluid buildup in the trauma cavity. But if there are no complications, and if you make satisfactory progress, I'll release you in three days.”

He made some final notes on my chart and strode from the room.

I resolved to make satisfactory progress and was immediately rewarded. A nurse came in and showed me how to use the remote switch to raise and lower my bed. She also swung a small
TV
into position and handed me the remote for that. I lowered my bed and turned on the
TV
. A baseball game was on. The pitcher was leaning in for the sign and the catcher was wiggling his fingers between his legs. I fell asleep before the pitch was delivered.

It would be difficult to describe the boredom of the next three days. No-Neck Jerome replaced High-Top Jerome, and I was able to teach him to play crib. He could not, however, be convinced to play for money, and that took all the excitement out of the game.

Whenever golf came on, I'd call Rugby Pants Jerome to watch. “Look at those slacks, Jerome. Hound's-tooth! With a plaid shirt. Isn't this exciting? Right after this, we can watch figure skating and see what they're wearing.” Jerome would grunt and leave the room and I'd be bored again.

Louise would come by in the evenings and we'd rub noses and cuddle. She refused my requests to import cheeseburgers, saying, “You are what you eat.”

“I'd rather be a sizzling all-beef patty than a bean salad.”

“Unfortunately, you're not very well done.”

“I served nine months in a high-security womb. Any more and I'd be an elephant.”

“Your ears seem to have done the extra time.”

“Other parts of me as well.”

“Certainly not your memory. You've forgotten what happens to people who brag.”

“What?”

“Nothing.”

She left me alone with my thoughts, facing my last night in hospital. There'd been no progress on the case. Tommy was chasing the gunman, cashing in
IOU
s from every miscreant and snitch he'd ever known, to no avail. Our hopes and dreams were pinned on Bette, but so far she had produced nothing but frowns and irritated silences.

My thoughts wove in and out through thickets of unanswered questions. More and more, they circled around the West Vancouver lab. Something there called to me, something that was central to everything that had happened. God knew what it was, but I had to find out.

My mobility was limited at the moment. It hurt too much to walk more than a few steps, but that wouldn't last forever. As a last resort, I could dip into the store of major-league painkillers I'd been accumulating.

At noon the next day I was sprung, out, free. Low-Top Jerome drove me back to the place on West Sixth. There were still flats of beer stacked in the kitchen, remnants of my aborted moving-in party, but the place was spotless courtesy of, I guessed, the Jeromes. And, delight of delights, sitting in the breakfast nook was my very own honey bunny bun, Staff Sergeant Karavchuk.

“Staff Sergeant, it's good to be able to see you.”

“Good afternoon, Mr. Swanson. I imagine you must be glad to be able to see anybody. You came within a few inches of leaving our mortal company. Tommy is on his way over. We've got to discuss a few policy decisions.”

“Coffee?” Low-Top Jerome busied himself with the coffeemaker, and I took a seat beside Louise. Under the table she massaged my knee as I waited for my energy level to come up to the maintain basic functions mark. Jerome gave me a cup of sugary coffee and that helped.

Tommy arrived after a few minutes and was profuse with his apologies. “Danny, I feel so bad about you getting shot. I thought we had all the bases covered. I just never thought they'd try to clip you. However, we're going to have to be super careful from now on, especially with you civilians that are involved in this.”

“Relax, Tommy. I set myself up. Remember? And I didn't see it coming either.”

“What Tommy is trying to say, Danny, is that you're not responsible for us. We're responsible for you. Tommy's got twenty good years on the force, but if a civilian gets whacked on his watch, he might as well requisition a plastic helmet because he'll be back on bike patrol.”

“I don't know if you should even stay in this house, Danny. We might be better off putting you on the shelf somewhere. We've got places that don't even show up on property records.”

“Hey, you guys, I'm not ready for witness protection yet. I feel perfectly safe with Jerome. Those guys need a chance to earn their medals.”

“Danny! No one else will be getting any medals in relation to anything that happens to you.”

“Okay, okay. I'm happy on the shelf, ain't misbehavin', saving all my love for you. But you've also got to think about Bette, Mark, Christine, and Fergie.”

“Louise probably told you that we've got Bette locked up. We're thinking about your crew, but I can't see how they're any threat to the killer. I'm going to get Jerome to run them through self-protection one-oh-one, but they should be okay. What do you think?”

“I think you're right. But we thought
I
was going to be safe. And some people would be cruel enough to call that a miscalculation. It's hard to figure what the bad guy perceives as a threat. I guess the decider is that the crew wouldn't sit still for any elaborate babysitting. They're a pretty self-confident bunch. All we can do is warn them, and like you say, give them a few lessons in what to watch for and how to conduct themselves.”

“And on a positive note,” Tommy said, raising one finger to make his point, “the bad guy, or guys, have exposed themselves a bit. Sanderson was the only one you told about Crowley's stuff, so that confirms to me that he's involved in the hit on you, and therefore the other killings.”

“And if
DFO
gossip is right,” I replied quickly, “and it usually is, Sanderson is Fleming Griffith's creature. And I've always thought Griffith was up to his scrawny pallid neck in this.”

“So, back to you, Danny,” Louise said, squeezing my knee again. “At the very least, we're going to pull you out of this house and hide you somewhere. It'll be comfortable and you'll have some freedom of movement, but we've got to take the bull's-eye off your back.

So it was that Jerome and I and my new stereo were exiled to Main Street, about three blocks from the train station.

But first, because there was an outside chance I could
ID
the shooter, I spent two hours looking at pictures of unpleasant individuals who would very likely not ever be salesman of the year. After that predictable lack of success, Jerome drove a fatigued Danny Swanson to our new digs.

•  •  •

We had one of two apartments on the second floor above an industrial laundry. The other apartment was not occupied by F. Wang, who was “visiting relatives in Hong Kong.”

The place was alarmed well enough for a
Globe and Mail
editorial. Starting on the ground floor and up the stairs, along the hall, and obviously in the apartment proper, there were sound, motion and infrared heat detectors. The panel that armed and disarmed them all was partly manual and partly on a timer system. I tried real hard to absorb Jerome's explanation.

By the time we'd set up the stereo and listened to
James Brown Live at the Apollo Theatre
while eating the combination dinner number four from the Golden Palace, I was yawning rudely. I took the bedroom farthest from the fire escape and, after swallowing a single painkiller, crawled gratefully into bed.

As I drifted toward sleep, my thoughts returned to the West Vancouver lab. I saw it from above, a large building, secluded, on the shore of an ocean. It was dusk and then dark. Now I was inside, in a windowless room. I couldn't find the light switch but there was something, something . . .

I woke to the smell of coffee brewing. By the time I'd showered, I also smelled bacon frying. I was thinking seriously of dumping Louise for High-Top Jerome when he appeared at my bedroom door. Clad only in dingy briefs and waving a spatula, he invited me to breakfast. As he turned away, I was interested to note that his back was hairier than my chest. I decided to remain heterosexual. Lucky Louise.

But breakfast was good. Jerome was not in my immediate line of sight, and even if he occasionally hove into view, freshly squeezed orange juice will excuse a multitude of sins, if not go so far as to influence gender preference.

My phone rang, so I answered it. “How's life in the nursery?” It was Bette.

“I don't mind being coddled. It's like having four wives to look after you,” I replied.

“But you've got no freedom,” she said impatiently. “They control your every move.”

“Like I said . . .”

“I'm afraid I'm going to lose it and tell Heidi to go mind her fucking goats.”

I tried to calm her down. “You're a step up for the girl. What's new?”

“Bad news. Griffith's in town. He's been trying to contact me.”

I felt a rush of fear. “For Christ's sake, whatever you do, don't talk to the guy. You're supposed to be on holiday. You're out of cell-phone range and not monitoring your e-mail.”

“That's not like me. He'll get suspicious.”

“Let him get suspicious.”

“The thing is, Danny, he scares me. I've pulled out bits and pieces from Crowley's computer, and I see Griffith in a whole new light. He's not just another ambitious, amoral bureaucrat. He's a digestive system. I don't know if he has goals or aspirations. He just feeds on people for no other reason than that's what he does.”

“He's like a shark and sharks have blind spots.” I felt like a Little League coach giving a pep talk. “Griffith is obviously worried if he's left his comfortable office in Ottawa, but there's more damage here than he can deal with. He's bleeding and he doesn't even know it.”

“Better him than us,” Bette replied. “Anyway, I told Louise that I'll have all the info off the computer by this afternoon. I'll talk to you later.”

I took a moment to consider the state of play. Griffith was worried about me. I was sure he'd passed that on to our bad guy and that had led to my near-death experience. They weren't sure how much I knew, but they feared what I might find out by going through Crowley's journals and his computer. It was unclear if they knew what Bette was up to, although they were probably suspicious. And they were abandoning the operation. Why else would the bad guy have burned the monitoring station in Codville Lagoon?

I wondered if Griffith might be a little bit upset with his henchman. The attempted hit on me, aside from being botched and drawing extra heat, was not well thought out. The killer was exhibiting symptoms of panic, and maybe that was why Griffith had come back to the West Coast, to assert proper command and control over the operation.

I needed to talk to my sweetie. “You feel like driving me over to
HQ
?” I said to my breakfast companion, who was now, mercifully, dressed.