“Yes.” She made a mark in her notebook. “Am I to infer,” I said, “from the fact that you’re re-interviewing everybody, that you aren’t making much progress?”
“I’d say that was a safe inference,” Mabel agreed. “We canvassed residents of the condos with a view of the seawall and the path between the Broker’s Bay Marina and the Burrard Street Bridge. No one saw anything. Baz and I talked to dozens of people on the seawall and the promenade, asking them if they were in the area between eight and eleven Tuesday evening and, if so, did they see anything. Nothing. Our best lead was Anna Waverley, but while she can’t prove she was home alone after nine-thirty, there is the problem of motive. She doesn’t seem to have one. We can’t find any connection between you or Bobbi and the Waverleys.” She raised her eyebrows. “Is there one?”
“Actually …”
“What?”
“There might be a kind of indirect connection. My brother-in-law bought some art from Samuel Waverley’s gallery. He’s also met them socially at charity events.”
“What’s your brother-in-law’s name again?” I told her, plus Mary-Alice’s home phone number. “Anything else?” she asked.
“Does the name Walter P. Moffat mean anything to you?”
“Sure. I know who he is. Wally-the-One-Term-Wonder. I wasn’t one of his constituents. I wouldn’t have voted for him even if I was. Why?”
“I found out last night that he buys art from Waverley, too.”
“So do a lot of people, apparently, including the chief constable and the mayor. What’s your connection to Moffat, besides being a former constituent?”
“I was supposed to meet him Tuesday evening to discuss photography for an exhibition catalogue, but his manager cancelled the appointment earlier in the day.”
“La-di-da,” Mabel said. “Keeping pretty highfalutin company these days, aren’t we?”
“He’s more impressive on TV than in person.”
“That’s not saying much. What about Bobbi? Could she have known Anna Waverley or her husband?”
“It’s possible. Bobbi and I are close enough, I guess, but there are still some aspects of her private life she keeps private. But I didn’t get the impression that the name meant anything to her. Have you spoken to her father?”
“Oh, yeah,” Mabel replied sourly. “He’s convinced it’s your fault, that someone was out to get you, and Bobbi got in the way. What about that? You’ve had more than your share of trouble in the four years I’ve known you. Vincent Ryan was a nasty piece of work. Any man who would hire a psycho to rape and murder his own wife wouldn’t be above this sort of thing.”
“Ryan didn’t like to get his own hands dirty,” I said.
“He tried to kill your former girlfriend, Carla Bergman, didn’t he? And he did shoot that guy on the boat.”
“I don’t know if he was trying to kill Carla or not. As for Frank Poole, I’m not sure Ryan really meant to kill him. He may have been just trying to protect Carla. He wasn’t exactly firing on all cylinders at the time. Besides, if it was Ryan, or thugs hired by Ryan, why the charade of hiring me? They could have grabbed me on my way to or from work any time they wanted. And why, when Bobbi showed up instead, assault her? The same goes for anyone else who might have it in for me for real or imagined reasons.”
“But if you can think of anyone …?”
“I’ll let you know, of course.”
Mabel stood up. She was a big, powerful woman, whose every movement was so effortless it seemed to belie the existence of gravity. “We’re pretty much dead in the water. Sorry. Poor choice of words. There’s not much we can do till Bobbi wakes up. Then maybe she’ll be able to tell us what went down on that boat. Assuming she remembers. I’m told that retrograde amnesia isn’t uncommon in cases involving head injury. In the meantime, we’re focusing our investigation on the faux Anna Waverley, whoever she is. But I’m afraid we haven’t got much to go on there, either.”
We shook hands and she left. I went back inside.
Mary-Alice, Wayne, and I had, in the course of the day, managed to get everything positioned more or less where it belonged, but the place still looked a shambles. We knocked off at five. Mary-Alice and Wayne went off together in Mary-Alice’s little white BMW while I locked up and walked home, where I showered, had something to eat, then drove to the hospital. I was grateful that neither Greg Matthias nor Norman Brooks was there. I sat with Bobbi until seven, talking to her about the move, telling her that she’d better get the hell better soon and do her share of the work, since she was so keen on the idea in the first place. The tube had been removed from her throat, but she was still catheterized and had an IV in her arm, electrodes taped to her chest, and an oxygen feed under her nose. As I talked to her, she muttered and twitched occasionally, setting off a flurry of bleeps from the monitors, and from time to time her eyelids fluttered, but she did not wake up. I wanted to shake her, but I didn’t, of course.
I left the hospital at seven and drove toward home. I didn’t go home, however. Instead, I turned west on 4th Avenue and drove toward Point Grey and the vast green of the University of British Columbia Endowment Lands. At seven-thirty I was parked on Belmont above Spanish Bank and Locarno Beach Park, a few metres up the street from a sprawling ranch-style house — the home of Samuel and Anna Waverley.
It wasn’t the biggest house on the block, not by a long shot, but it was big enough. Appropriately, it had a vaguely Spanish look, stone and stained wood and glass, with a terra cotta tile roof and deep eaves. A nice house, I thought, that I might be able to afford in my wildest dreams, but not otherwise. It was surrounded by mature trees on a good-sized lot, modestly landscaped with rock gardens and a water feature, but uncharacteristically devoid of topiary, which was abundant on the adjacent properties. The house next door to the Waverleys’ had a small cedar clipped into the shape of a poodle with puffball legs, chest, and tail. The things people will do to innocent trees and animals …
There was no car in the Waverleys’ wide cobbled drive in front of the attached three-car garage, but as I sat wondering what I was going to do, a dark green Volvo Cross Country went past me and turned into the driveway without signalling. Brake lights flashing, it stopped in front of the garage, driving lights bright on the stained-wood doors. A woman got out, leaving the door open and the engine running, and aimed something at the garage. A remote door opener, I presumed. When nothing happened, she leaned into the car, turned off the engine, then swung the door shut. The car horn bleated and the lights flashed as she walked away from it toward the front door of the house. She was wearing an athletic top, shorts, and high-tech runners. Her upper body was slim, almost petite, while her hips and rump were nicely rounded, legs elegantly tapered. Despite what Witt DeWalt had said, I thought her centre of gravity was fine just where it was.
Now what? I wondered. I couldn’t sit there long. It was a fairly exclusive neighbourhood. Sooner or later, most likely sooner, someone would get worried and call the police. Maybe they wouldn’t wait until they were worried. So I started the Liberty, put it in gear, and drove into the wide driveway, parking beside Anna Waverley’s Volvo. The boxy Liberty and the sleek Volvo looked good together, I thought, as I walked to the front door. Maybe they would mate.
There was a little box with button and a speaker grill by the front door. I pressed the button. A far-off chime sounded, like church bells. A moment later a woman’s voice crackled from the speaker.
“Yes?”
“Mrs. Waverley?” I said. “Mrs. Anna Waverley?”
“Yes, I’m Anna Waverley. Who are you?”
“Mrs. Waverley, my name’s Tom McCall. I’d like to speak with you, if you don’t mind.”
“You don’t have to shout into the speaker, Mr. McCall.