I was draining my Diet Coke when Ollie’s phone rang. The conversation lasted under a minute. I got little from his end. Except that he was irked.
“Snook stonewalled.” Jamming the cell back onto his belt. “Rainwater’s going to ask a judge to cut paper.”
“Now what?”
“Now we wait for someone to screw up.”
* * *
Three hours in my room produced an unplanned nap, a message from Katy saying she had news too important for e-mail, and voluminous information on Chuck Fipke and geological exploration.
Before booting my laptop, I knew that diamonds are carbon transformed by extreme heat and pressure into the hardest, clearest mineral on earth. That because of their rigid tetrahedral molecular structure—a triangular pyramid with four faces—a diamond can be cut only by another diamond or a laser.
I knew that the sparkly little rocks are pricey as hell. And that they create an eyeful of bling.
That was about it.
Every thirty minutes I’d interrupt my research to phone Katy. Each time her phone would roll to voice mail. Uneasy, I’d dive back onto the Internet.
In between dialing, I learned the following.
It takes forty-four to fifty kilobars of pressure at a minimum of a thousand degrees Celsius to change carbon into diamond. I understood the temperature but wasn’t sure the exact nature of a kilobar.
The appropriate combo of heating and crushing existed a few billion years ago at depths of eighty to a hundred and twenty-five miles in rock formations called cratons, dense old slabs of continental plate.
Later, underground volcanoes sent magma—or molten rock—minerals, rock fragments, and occasionally diamonds bubbling up through the cratons. The mixture expanded and cooled along the way to form either carrot-shaped pipes to the surface, or wide flat underground structures called dikes. It then solidified into rock called kimberlite.
Most diamondiferous kimberlites are associated with cratons from the Archean era, an early part of the Precambrian, when the earth was much hotter than today. Much hotter. Many kimberlite pipes lie underneath shallow lakes formed in inactive volcanic craters called calderas.
So. To score diamonds, you locate a pipe rising from a really old craton. Piece of cake, right? Wrong. The buggers are incredibly hard to find.
That’s where Chuck Fipke and Stu Blusson came in. Both knew that the Slave craton, which underlies the Northwest Territories from Great Slave Lake in the south to Coronation Gulf on the Arctic Ocean, is one of the oldest rock formations on earth. And they developed an effective technique to explore it.
Fipke understood the significance of indicator minerals, the traveling companions of diamonds. Those in kimberlite include calcium carbonate, olivine, garnet, phlogopite, pyroxene, serpentine, upper mantle rock, and a variety of trace minerals. Fipke focused on the trifecta of chromite, ilmenite, and high-chrome, low-calcium G10 garnets.
Blusson understood the significance of glacial movement during the last ice age. He reasoned that, after eroding a kimberlite pipe, a retreating glacier would leave a debris path containing diamond indicator minerals. Track the path to its source, he argued, and you’ll find the pipe.
Fipke and Blusson spent a decade scouring the tundra, mapping, surveying, coring, and collecting when temperatures were bearable, analyzing samples in their lab when the weather was too harsh. Everyone in the mining world thought they were nuts.
One day, on his own with a bush pilot, Fipke flew over Lac de Gras, source of the Coppermine River. Spotting an esker, a winding ridge of gravel and sand left by meltwater from a retreating glacier, he ordered the pilot to land on a peninsula called Pointe de Misère.
The esker protected a small lake with a sandy shore containing a dark striation. There he collected sample bag G71, the last in his mammoth, decade-long exploration.
Pointe de Misère was at the Glacial Divide. From where Fipke stood, ice had flowed east to Hudson Bay, north to the northern islands, south into central Canada, and west into the Mackenzie River and Blackwater Lake. He’d sampled the entire expanse stretching west, over two hundred thousand square miles.
Back in the lab, Fipke tried to make sense of the pattern that his samples were producing. Sample by sample, using large, detailed maps, he plotted the results. With scanning electron microscopy, he examined bag after bag.
His conclusion: the indicator trail began at Blackwater Lake, spread east, and two hundred miles northeast of Yellowknife, stopped near Lac de Gras.
He checked the contents of sample bag G71. It contained over 1,500 chrome diopsides and 6,000 pyrope garnets.
Fipke had found his pipe. Or pipes.
He began staking like mad.
More sampling. More analysis. Confirmation.
Fipke named the site Point Lake, partly for geography, partly to confuse the competition. There was another Point Lake northwest of his find.
Next step was to pinpoint the exact location of the diamonds. And that cost money.
With the existence of kimberlite pipes confirmed, Fipke and Blusson were at last able to obtain big-money backers. In 1990 Dia Met, a company founded by Fipke in 1984, and BHP, an Australian mining conglomerate, signed a joint-venture agreement for the Northwest Territories Diamond Project. For 51 percent ownership, BHP would finance exploration in exchange for shares in any future property. Dia Met would hold 29 percent. Fipke and Blusson would retain 10 percent each.
In 1991 Dia Met and BHP announced the discovery of diamonds at Fipke’s Point Lake site. The news sparked the NWT diamond rush, the biggest staking frenzy since Klondike.
Lac de Gras in French. Ekati in the language of the local Dene people. Fat Lake in both.
In 1998 Ekati became Canada’s first diamond mine. The following year she produced one million carats. Today she does $400 million annually and coughs up 4 percent of the world’s rocks.
Fat Lake, indeed.
In 2003 the Diavik mine, owned by a joint-venture partnership between Harry Winston Diamond Corporation and Diavik Diamond Mines, Inc., a subsidiary of the Rio Tinto Group, began operation. The mine, Canada’s second largest, lies 186 miles north of Yellowknife. It consists of three kimberlite pipes on 7.7 square miles on a tiny chunk of real estate in Lac de Gras, locally called East Island. Diavik is a major supplier of the “Jeweler to the Stars.”
In 1997 kimberlite was discovered at Snap Lake, 137 miles northeast of Yellowknife. De Beers Canada bought the mining rights in the fall of 2000. In 2004 permits for construction and operation were granted.
Unlike most diamond-bearing kimberlite deposits that are pipes, the Snap Lake ore body is a two-and-a-half-meter-thick dyke that dips from the northwest shore down under the lake. Thus, Snap Lake is Canada’s first completely underground diamond mine.
Snap Lake mine officially opened in 2008. According to De Beers’s website, by the end of 2010, $1.5 billion had been spent on construction and operation. Of that total, $1.077 billion had gone to NWT-based contractors and suppliers, including $676 million with aboriginal businesses or joint ventures.
The article on Snap Lake concluded with a statement emphasizing De Beers’s commitment to sustainable development in local communities, and pointing out that the Snap Lake mine had signed impact-benefit agreements with the Yellowknives Dene First Nation, the Tlicho Government, the North Slave Métis Alliance, and the Lutsel K’e and Kache Dene First Nation.
Between the lines, I got a whiff of the aboriginal-versus-mining hostility to which Ollie had alluded.
I was trying Katy for the gazillionth time, now genuinely concerned about Birdie, when a loud knock rattled my door. I crossed to it and squinted through the peephole.
Ryan.
Something was wrong.
“CASTAIN’S DEAD.”
Ryan strode past me and began pacing my room.
“What?”
“Someone shot him.”
“When?”
“About an hour ago.”
“Wher
e?”
“Three rounds to the chest. Christ. Does it matter?”
“No.” Having to track a moving target wasn’t helping my comprehension. “I meant where was Castain when it happened?”
“Banging his girlfriend.”
“Stop pacing.”
Ryan never slowed.
“Do they have the shooter?”
“No.”
“But he was under surveillance.”
Ryan snorted loudly. “Rainwater’s idea of a tail was to ping-pong a car between Snook, Unka, and Castain.”
“Jesus.”
“Claims he doesn’t have enough manpower to maintain surveillance in three locations.”
“That may be legit.”
“Why the fuck didn’t he say so? You and I could have taken Snook. Or Sergeant Shithead could have sat on her.”
I ignored that. “So no one’s watching the house on Ragged Ass?”
“You know the annual homicide count in Yellowknife?”
I didn’t.
“Every chump with a badge will want a piece of this one.”
“Is Unka a suspect?” I asked.
“One among many.”
“Where is he?”
“In the wind.”
“What about Scar?”
“Ditto.”
“Shit.”
“Exactly. I’m heading to the scene.”
I grabbed my jacket, and we raced to the Camry.
* * *
Ryan smoked. Didn’t ask if I minded. Just lit up.
I rode with my window down, shivering and breathing as shallowly as possible without getting dizzy.
Castain’s girlfriend was a stripper named Merilee Twiller. Mercifully, she lived not far from the Explorer.
Ollie’s directions took us to Sunnyvale Court, a horseshoe of tiny bungalows on tiny lots. While a few were reasonably well maintained, most were in disrepair, and several were boarded up and abandoned. I guessed it had been a while since the court had lived up to its name.
Twiller’s address was at the far end, on the north side of the curve. The place needed paint, new screens, and a bucket of weed killer. Maybe a bulldozer. Twiller’s next-door neighbor had two garbage pails on his stoop and a car on cinder blocks in the drive.
We arrived to the usual hubbub of activity. The front door of Twiller’s house was open, and every indoor and outdoor bulb was blazing. Blue and yellow Evi Lites dotted the lawn, marking the locations of trace evidence, perhaps bits of Castain.
A sheet-covered body lay on a walk leading to a porch enclosed by a rusty iron railing. Crime scene tape triangled between the railing and two stunted pines in the yard. Portable halogens were focused on it.
More tape paralleled the curb on the opposite side of the culde-sac, a restraint for gawkers out for a glimpse of someone else’s misery. Possibly members of the media.
Ryan was right. It seemed every conceivable member of law enforcement had turned out. I saw cruisers from the RCMP and MED, a hearse, a panel van, and at least a dozen unmarked cars and pickups. Most had flashing lights on their roofs or dashboards. Radios added staticky sputter to the tumult of voices calling back and forth.
Ollie was off to one side, talking to a woman whose dress was too short and too tight for her heavy thighs and the rolls of fat outlining her bra. I assumed this was Merilee Twiller.
Ryan pulled to the end of the line of parked vehicles. An RCMP corporal approached his door. Ryan badged us in. We got out and walked toward Ollie.
As we drew close, I could see that Twiller was in her forties, trying hard not to look it. Despite an overload of makeup, I noted puffy lower lids, networks of deep lines, and starbursts of capillaries on either side of her nose.
Ollie didn’t explain us to Twiller. “You take a look at him?”
Ryan answered for both of us. “Not yet. What have you got so far?”
“Around seven Castain dropped in for a little poontang with the love of his life here.” Ollie flicked a thumb at Twiller.
“You’re a real dick,” she said.
“Castain left around eight. Never made it to the property line.”
“Any witnesses?” Ryan asked.
“The grieving girlfriend says she heard shots, then squealing tires. Didn’t get a look at the shooter or the car.”
“That’s how it went down.” Defensive.
“Where was lover boy going from here?”
“We’ve been over this.” Twiller kept her angry rainbow eyes on Ollie.
“I’m slow. Explain it again.”
“Arty didn’t tell me shit.”
“And you didn’t ask.”
“No.”
“I’m guessing he was heading out to deliver more product. That’s why he came here, right? You’re on the spike, aren’t you, princess?”
“Screw you and the questions you galloped in on.”
“How about I give you a ride to the cage?”
“Because my boyfriend got shot?”
“What do you suppose we’ll find in the house?”
“A shitpot of cat hair.”
Anger bunched the muscles below Ollie’s temples. He knew Twiller was right. She’d have flushed any drugs before calling the cops.
Ollie’s brusqueness was getting us nowhere. I caught Ryan’s eye and tipped my head toward the house. He dipped his chin in understanding.
“How about you show me the vic?” Ryan suggested.
Ollie nodded. Told Twiller to stay put.
I watched them weave through the melee of cops and technicians swarming the cul-de-sac.
“My condolences for your loss,” I said to Twiller.
For the first time, she glanced my way. In the pulsing red light, her mouth looked taut, her cheeks stretched and hollow. “Right” was all she said.
“Can you think of anyone who might want to hurt Arty?” I asked.
Twiller drew her right arm across her belly, rested her left elbow on it, and began chewing a thumb cuticle that already looked raw.
Behind us, I saw Ollie and Ryan join a woman standing over Castain. Under the bright spots, the logo on her jacket was easily recognizable.
In the Northwest Territories, all sudden deaths are investigated by the Coroners Service, a division of the Department of Justice. The service has its main office in Yellowknife and roughly forty coroners throughout the territory. The NWT has no staffed facility for performing postmortems.
I knew that the deputy chief coroner was a woman named Maureen King. I guessed I was looking at her. And that she would order Castain’s body transported to the office of Alberta’s chief medical examiner in Edmonton for autopsy.
“Had Arty argued with anyone?” I asked Twiller. “Made anyone mad?”
Twiller shook her head.
“Received any strange phone calls or visitors?”
“I already told the other cop. We didn’t hang out that much.”
“Was Arty seeing other women?”
“We weren’t going steady, if that’s what you mean.” Twiller swiped both palms down her cheeks. “He didn’t deserve this.”
“I know.”
“Do you? What the hell do you know?”
“I’m sorry.”
Ten yards beyond us, King lifted a corner of the sheet. Ryan dropped to a crouch for a closer look at Castain.
“It’s that bastard Unka.” She said it so softly I almost didn’t hear.
“Excuse me?”
“Unka thought Arty was skimming.”
“Arty told you that?”
“I overheard a conversation. When he’s pissed, he gets ugly.”
“Unka.”
She nodded.
“Ugly enough to kill?”
“He’d gut-stab his mother, then order up pizza.”
* * *
It was past ten when the hearse finally rolled. Ollie stayed to help canvass the neighbors. The hit wasn’t his problem, but he hoped to pry something loose on Scar.
Ryan and
I rode to the Explorer in silence. I looked out my window at the bare trees straining to bud, the patches of last night’s snow struggling to hang on. Felt the frustration they depicted.
Ryan spoke first. “Your friend has the interrogation skills of a slug.”
“He’s not my friend.”
“He was.”
“What’s your point?”
“He was incompetent.” Ryan patted his jacket pocket.
“Don’t smoke,” I said.
Ryan shot me a look but stopped searching for a cigarette.
“You’ve both been acting like jerks,” I said.
“I’d never be that callous.”
“He felt she was holding back.”
“Was she?”
“Yes.”
As we ascended the circle drive, I told him what Twiller had said about Unka.
“You just proved my point,” he said.
We got out of the car and crossed to the hotel.
“It gets to him,” I said, not sure why I was defending Ollie.
Ryan cocked a skeptical brow.
“He gets tired of the violence. Of constantly dealing with skanks who make you want to scrub your whole body with Lysol.”
“You speaking for shithead or yourself?”
Damn good point. I didn’t concede it.
“We both know Castain just bounced Ruben to the back burner, perhaps kicked her from the stage altogether.”
Normally, I’d have made fun of Ryan’s mixed metaphor. Not then.
“This whole thing is just too freaking frustrating.” I started for the elevator.
“We’ll find her.”
I turned.
“But now we’ll have to rely on ourselves,” he said.
“And shithead.”
“And shithead.”
A truce. Of sorts.
Back in my room, I tried my iPhone. To my surprise, it gave a listless flicker. Hopeful that the working bits just needed to dry out, I plugged it in to charge.
Using the landline, I phoned my elusive daughter. She remained elusive. I left another message.
Exhausted, I did a quick toilette, then dropped into bed. But my mind refused to disengage. I wondered about Arty Castain. Who had killed him? Why? Was it really Unka, or was it a major move by Scarborough? Had Castain’s death been the first in a bloodbath about to commence? What secrets had Castain taken to the grave?