Taking out a cigarette, Jinnah lit up a smoke, sending a tiny blue cloud into the air. His knees were beginning to ache, but he continued squatting there, visualizing what had happened. Robert and Kathy Chan were at the top of the driveway when the car erupted into flames. Robert had managed to make it quite close to the vehicle and Sam Schuster before the gas tank ruptured and ignited, sending a second blast scorching over the flat. Certainly the long, scraggly grass and the dandelions all around where the car had been were blackened and withered. Chan was a brave man, whatever his wife might think. A little closer and he might have joined Schuster.
Jinnah straightened up and walked along the far edge of the black square. Here at the front of the stain there were more footprints still. He finished his cigarette and threw it to the ground, grinding it into the drying soil, frustrated. He closed his eyes and inhaled deeply. His smoke-deadened nose could still scent the growing warmth of the late-morning sun on the soil; the green of the trees and the bushes; the damp, sea smell of the river here close to its mouth. He could also smell the oily, pungent, lingering scent of gasoline. And something else? He opened his eyes and sniffed. Kerosene? No, creosote. He looked towards the river. There was a suggestion of a crumbling dock on the bank leading out into the river and beyond, rafts and rafts of log booms. That must be where the creosote smell was coming from, wafting up from the blackened pilings. Curious, Jinnah took a few steps towards the river. He had only gone a few feet when he almost stumbled and fell over with surprise. He righted himself just on time.
“Name of God!” he muttered and squatted down once more.
There in front of him was a single footprint pointing away from the fire scene and towards the river. Jinnah whirled around and looked at where Robert Chan would have been when he saw his shadowy figure. Jinnah was standing to Chan’s right — exactly where the so-called trick of the light would have been.
“Smoke and mirrors, eh?” he crowed aloud.
It was a large print, well-preserved by the drying weather and with a distinctive tread, but easily missed by investigators amidst the riot of indentations littering the scene. To Jinnah, it looked like it had been made by some sort of boot with rows of tiny spikes on the sole. It was deep, suggesting it had been made by someone running away from the scene of the fire. Jinnah followed the probable line taken by the boot’s wearer, but there were no other markings to guide him. He made an educated guess that he’d find more near muddy ground of the ruined dock and sure enough, he found them again after a few metres. They turned sharply left, forming a ragged line on soft, muddy bank, then disappeared entirely.
Jinnah looked up-river in the direction the prints had been headed. Here had once been the heart of the mill, long since dismantled. All that remained was a row of crumbling cedar shacks by the lip of the river, their shake roofs covered by thick, green moss. Jinnah frowned and walked towards them. Here there was a carpet of decaying bark, wood chips, and sawdust. There were no obvious tracks. But his inherent instincts were tingling and he had no doubt he was headed in the right direction. The right direction to find what hadn’t really formed in his mind yet. Evidence of some kind. He already had enough to call Graham and taunt him into giving him some sort of info, otherwise the tale of these footprints of a killer would be appearing under the banner of “an exclusive Tribune investigation.” There might be a discarded gas can in the shacks, or bits of rope of the type used to bind Sam Schuster. Jinnah certainly didn’t expect to find the killer waiting there to confess to him. There were three shacks, all of them on rotting log foundations, all leaning precariously close to the river’s brown-green current like an uneven row of teeth. Jinnah looked at them carefully. The first two had no doors and their window-frames were empty. A cursory glance showed there was nothing inside. The third had its door intact and there was plastic where the windows had once been. He was about to step inside when he saw something at the side of the shack that made him stop suddenly. There, laying on its side as if it had just been tossed there was a red, plastic Jerry can. The smell of gasoline was quite strong. He took a step towards it. Just then, a voice behind him nearly caused his heart to stop beating.
“What’cha doin’ there?” it barked.
For a terrifying instant, Jinnah thought he really had stumbled upon the killer. It happened on occasion that they came back to the scene of the crime, over and over again, to relive the thrill. But Jinnah’s common sense told him this was extremely unlikely and, in any event, he was not an obvious threat to anybody. How could this man know he was looking for Sam Schuster’s murderer? There were a dozen good reasons why he might be here. Jinnah turned around slowly and deliberately.
“Ah, my friend! Let me —” he began smoothly.
And stopped dead. There in front of him was a tall, gaunt, scarecrow man. He wore the ragged uniform of a working man fallen on evil times — tattered green work shirt, tartan vest dirty and smeared with oil and grease, wool pants that might once have been brown almost black with sooty grime, and mud-caked boots. He had the ubiquitous dark cap that doubtless sported the logo of a trucking firm or tool outfit on its crest, but its form was obscured by filth. All other observations, however, seemed secondary after Jinnah looked the man in the eyes — or eye, rather. A jagged scar line divided his face right down the middle. The right side was the picture of a man in his late fifties who has worked hard in the elements all his life: weathered, drawn; eye with a dark and intense aspect. But it was the left side of his face that gave Jinnah pause. On the opposite side of the scar line was a twisted, sunken cheek, pale and sallow. The socket of the eye was empty, glazed over by scar tissue. He stood not five feet away.
He was also carrying an axe.
Jinnah was speechless.
“Whatcha want?” rasped the scarecrow.
What Jinnah wanted at that moment was a safe and graceful exit, but he certainly didn’t want to seem rude. Suddenly, of all those dozen perfectly sound and reasonable reasons why he might be here in the middle of what was, after all, nowhere (urbanly speaking), none immediately sprang to mind. Well, the best defence was a good offence. Take control of the situation, he thought.
“I saw the gas can —” Jinnah began.
“What about it?” the man said curtly.
His voice was low, rough, and sharp, like a river running over a gravel bar. He advanced slowly towards Jinnah, axe rising almost imperceptibly in his right hand.
“Well, there’s been a fire here recently, hasn’t there?” Jinnah said, nervously eyeing the axe, for this Tin Man needed no oil to loosen his limbs.
“I know why you come now. Better come into the shack,” he pronounced.
Jinnah looked over at the shack, which had transformed from a charming riverside shanty to the Bates Motel. He considered his options. If he ran, the man could bury the axe in his back with ease. On the other hand, he could have done that while Jinnah’s back had been turned in the first place, transfixed by the gas can. He had said he knew why Jinnah was there. Did he want to confess after all? Jinnah’s inherent instincts struggled with his congenital cowardice. In the end, he decided to accompany the man inside the shack. At the very least, he wouldn’t be able to swing the axe right over his head in the confined space. Jinnah bowed stiffly and threw an arm in the doorway’s direction.
“After you, my friend,” he said.
The man grunted and moved sideways, keeping Jinnah in view at all times as he slid into the shack. Jinnah followed. The small space inside was full of junk. Cans, empty and full, were piled everywhere. There were stacks of newspaper on the floor, covering the small counter on the far wall and almost obscuring the tiny table in the right hand corner. The stench of rotting garbage was overpowering. Jinnah almost gagged as his host pointed a crooked, bony finger at the ceiling by the door.
“See that?” he barked.
Looking