Dan exploded. “What?”
Larry went on as though he hadn’t been interrupted. “… as well as a question of intent to spread the HIV virus. I’m sure you know what I’m talking about. If a test shows you to be HIV-positive, you could be up on charges of attempted murder.”
“Who’s going to order me to take an HIV-test?”
“You know very well that it’s within the jurisdiction of any court, should the matter come to that.”
There was silence on the other end. Dan felt his heart galloping a path through his stomach, but he wasn’t going to let a lawyer get the better of him. “Don’t try to bully me, Mr. Fiske. And don’t insult my intelligence. I’m obviously smarter than you.”
“Really?” Fiske’s voice dripped disdain. “How do you figure that?”
“Simple — because I’m not a lawyer. And if anything, I’m the one who should be worried about catching something.”
“Yes, Mr. Sharp. You probably should be very worried. I’ll leave you with those thoughts.”
The call clicked off.
“Son-of-a-fucking bitch!” Dan snarled. His hand shook as he forced himself not to bang the receiver down. His mouth was dry. He tried to marshal his thoughts. Things were definitely getting out of hand. And worse, what he’d assumed about being hired to find Craig Killingworth was totally false. The mystery was spreading, with no sign of who wanted Killingworth found.
Dan thought back to the report. Craig Killingworth had disgraced himself in his hometown and in the eyes of his family, then got on his bicycle and — what? Been hit by a car and died? Committed a crime and scrammed? Or simply started a new life for himself without looking back? All of these were possible. Sometimes locating a missing person seemed like taking a multiple-choice exam. Other times it felt like digging through the rubble to find something you only suspected was there, if it wasn’t in one of a thousand other places.
Sometimes, with a few known facts, it was like a recipe. Put in all the ingredients, including a few conjectured ones, stir round and round, and voila! — a cake — though in this case a particularly inedible one. Dan smiled at his analogy. He’d try it out on his boss one day. When he’d cleared himself of the filing cabinet incident. When his boss regained a sense of humour. Okay, maybe not. And — oh yes! — don’t forget the missing ingredient: I have to advise you that the Killingworth family would take exception to your decision if you choose to take on that request. That was the icing on the cake. Maybe Lucille Killingworth did not want her husband found. Why? Did she have something to hide?
Dan looked over the information Sally had left on his desk. He turned to his computer and checked flight schedules then pressed the intercom button. His boss answered. “Good morning, Daniel.”
“Good morning, Ed. It’s about the Killingworth case.…”
“I haven’t had time to think about who I might be able to spare.”
“It’s okay,” Dan cut him off. “I don’t want you to replace me. I’ve decided to stay on with it. If that’s all right.”
He heard his boss give a confused chuckle. “Yes — by all means. It’s fine with me. More than fine.”
“Good,” Dan said. “In fact,” he checked his watch, “I’m off in about three hours to catch a plane to B.C. to follow up on a lead there.”
“Fascinating. Enjoy the weather.”
“I’ll be sure to do that.”
Eighteen
Islands in the Strait
From the windows of the plane, the green span of Lion’s Gate Bridge glinted in the sunlight. Below, the city was a quilt of urban crosshatches rolled up against the mountains and edged down to the sea. For the first time in weeks, Dan felt a sense of relief. Maybe it was just the rush of flying, the release of escape. Flight brought a sense of endless possibility, of life lived elsewhere than the city he’d planned and failed to leave every year for the last ten years. (Then again, he reminded himself, it always felt a little like failure to think he might actually leave it for good.) Or it may have been his proximity to Trevor, the Mayne Island Hermit, whom he hadn’t yet made up his mind to see. It wouldn’t do to get Trevor’s hopes up if things were suddenly to take him elsewhere. The vicissitudes of fate did not smile favourably upon chance love affairs in strange cities. The gardener he’d come to find might prove not to be here after all, putting an abrupt end to his trip. Still, a call at least was in order: Hello, I’m here. Goodbye again. But what was the point?
Beneath them, the Earth turned while the plane resisted gravity. For the moment he was a pirate, an Old World explorer circling the new one, with endless opportunities stretched out below. And in those limitless seconds of suspension, right up until the moment the wheels touched ground and life resumed its expected course, it seemed as though anything could happen.
They were over the Strait of Georgia. Below, the Earth lay fractured in a myriad broken pieces. Mayne Island was one of them, a soft bed to land in. The dying light gave the islands a magical cast, their dismembered outlines surrounded by silvery moats and darkening shorelines.
Surrey, on the other hand, was anything but magical. It was tawdry and squalid, though unlike other urban disasters this one wore its squalor with a sort of hometown pride. B.C.’s moderate climate and reputation as a haven for drug users had created an underclass of addicts and an attendant criminal fringe element. The push to ready Vancouver for the Olympics had unsettled its transient population, and many had migrated to the tidal plains to the south.
Picking up his rental car at the airport, Dan watched a wreck of a man scouring the asphalt for cigarette butts. The ride got grimmer the closer he got. Surrey made the unseemly parts of Toronto look like a picnic basket on a checkered tablecloth. He stopped for directions at a 7-Eleven. A Native woman approached him holding a can of Schlitz, tab clicked open. She held it out, her expression childlike. “Drink?”
“No thanks.”
“What’s your story, honey?” she asked.
“No story — just looking for directions.”
She smiled hopefully. “You want directions to my place?”
Dan shook his head.
“I got beer,” she said.
“I can see that. Thanks anyway.”
His hotel lobby was bright and cheerful, but the effect ended there. A doughy young man handed Dan his keys and pointed down a dim hallway with a carpet one shade away from dog vomit. It bulged when he stepped on it, as though he were walking on something alive. Irregular stains indicated either an errant house pet or water leakage. He looked up. Sure enough, the ceiling bore telltale signs of dripping.
At first glance his room appeared fine, apart from a faint odour of wet fur that permeated everything. Dan opened his suitcase and hung up his clothes. Jet lag was hitting him in the back of the neck. At home it was already past midnight. He stripped off his shirt and pants and lay on the bed in his underwear. He looked up at a sudden sound. Ten feet outside his window, a very large woman appeared on a balcony and began to pull laundry from a line. She was backlit, dressed in a shift that emphasized her shapelessness. Dan crept sheepishly over and drew the curtains.
He thought of Bill and laughed, imagining his distaste at being stuck in such a place. Then he thought of Trevor again — so near, yet so far. He toyed with the idea of calling but decided against it. He watched part of a movie and a bit of news, then turned off the television and slept.
The neighbourhood would have been hard put to say it had seen better days. Nor did it look like it ever would. It was a shameless,