I sit back, winded. “People have your kind all wrong. Techno-nerds aren’t supposed to be men of action.”
“They’re not. Women are. At least this woman is. What do you say? Every Sherlock needs his Watson, and my passport’s an overage virgin.”
Chapter 18
She has the good grace to blush a little when I stare at her.
“Don’t read anything into it,” she says. “These days I reserve my passion for travel, or, anyway, the dream of it. Separate rooms, buddy.”
“Sharon, I honestly wasn’t thinking that.” The truth of which surprises me; for months now, my determination to repay my debt to Kevin has run neck and neck with moving my friendship with Sharon to the next level. The events of a single day have turned the world on its ear.
“I believe you,” she says. “I keep forgetting there’s a gentleman or two left in the world.”
I press that advantage. “I can’t bring you. This scheme’s dangerous.”
“Are you saying it’s no place for a woman?”
I’ve blown it. The line between gentleman and male supremacist is thin.
“What I mean is, it’s bad enough for one. Two would be pushing luck over the edge. One way, we’re a threat to a ruthless gangster; the other, to a corrupt police chief. I’d never forgive myself for hauling someone else into that situation.”
“Don’t be silly. If that happens, they’ll probably kill you. So you won’t have to feel bad for long.”
“That’s not funny.”
“I suppose not. It’s just so much like a movie I’m having trouble believing it’s real.” She shakes her head. “Look, if you’re going, so am I, and that’s that. What do they speak there, French?”
“That’s Quebec.”
“Too bad. I was hoping to get something back on my investment in Rosetta Stone.”
“What about your job?”
“I haven’t taken a vacation in two years. Jim can do without me for a week.”
“That’s a risk.”
“Ray, I’m more worried about growing so old I can’t take that kind of risk. A job’s a job. How often does an adventure like this come along?”
“What we’ve got isn’t even a lead, really. Chances are we’ll crap out.”
“So we take in a hockey game.”
“It’s not hockey season.”
“Hunt grizzlies, then. Anything that doesn’t involve a precision screwdriver is fine with me.”
“Sharon, this isn’t a lark.”
“I know that.” She’s sober suddenly, and I know that by expressing my own concern I’ve lost whatever ground I might have gained.
“This could be a wild goose chase.” A Canadian wild goose chase; though I don’t say it.
“It could be. Either way, it’s the finest thing any man ever did for a friend.”
I’ve lost the argument but am feeling more and more invested in the war.
“What can two people do in an amateur investigation that one can’t?”
“Take turns driving, for one.”
“Drive? If I go at all, I was thinking of flying.”
“That’s okay, if you want the Mounties to meet the plane when it lands; or worse, a couple of gorillas hired by Adder. It’s too easy to monitor airport traffic. You can’t fly under a phony name, and if that is where the Moores have gone, you’d be leading the enemy right to them. Not to mention, you can’t cross into Canada by air with your enhanced driver’s license.”
“It would take days. Howard’s sure to know I’ve gone, and then he’ll put out a dragnet.”
“‘Dragnet’; does anybody say that anymore?”
“He does. Crooked or straight, I’ve got a hunch he’s old school. I’ve seen his tough side.” I pick up a cheddar bite, then put it back. My appetite’s gone. “You said take turns driving, for one. What’s the other?”
“Sit by the phone waiting for the detective agency to call and pound the pavements like Nancy Drew. One person can’t do both.”
“I have a cell phone. What do you do, spend all your free time streaming Turner Classics?”
She sticks out her tongue. “A phone you should be careful about using. Let’s see just how far it is to Saskatchewan.” She produces her own phone.
“Can I get you anything else?”
I almost knock over my glass of Pepsi at the waitress’s sudden reappearance.
“Just the check, please.”
Sharon’s still deep in research when it comes. She looks up finally, ready to report; but the waitress is there with the check, so I hurriedly hand her my credit card so Sharon can tell me what she’s found.
At least I got to be the one who paid. I’d been afraid Sharon would insist on splitting it on principle.
“Good news and bad news,” she announces. “I was afraid it was one of those western territories bordering on the Arctic. It’s just across the Montana border. We can cross it in a couple of days.”
“What’s the bad news?”
She looks up from the screen. “The province is about the size of New Zealand.”
Part Two
The Ends of the Earth
Chapter 19
The trek across the northwestern corner of Montana—through the rural stretches, anyway—blurs together into a collage of roadside stands, arrowhead emporia, historic stagecoach stops, cowboy hats, tight Wranglers, poly-blend shirts, and straight Buck Owens on the radio. Colorfully named cities abound—Superior, Poison, Cut Bank, Chinook—but like any other town, they are ringed with Wendy’s, Best Buys, PetSmarts, and auto dealerships, nary a pair of steer horns in sight.
We overnight at a Ramada the first night, occupying separate rooms, but the next we’re turned away from all the chain places because of a fly fishermen’s convention. We end up just outside a dusty town called Chester, at a cluster of bungalows with faux barn siding, the knotholes painted on.
In cabin six of the Wickiup Motor Lodge, the head- and footboards of the twin beds are shaped like wagon wheels, the base of the lamp on the table between is a ceramic saddle, and cowboy and Indian toddlers cavort on the curtains.
“This is howdy hell,” I say.
“What?” Sharon calls from the bathroom, where she’s changing into her pajamas.
I raise my voice to be heard through the closed door. “I expect Wyatt Earp to come in anytime, to check the red-eye in the minibar.”
“There’s a minibar?”
“What do fishermen have to convene about, anyway? I thought the whole point was to wade out into the middle of an icy stream, cast for trout, and revel in the peace and solitude.”
“‘Revel,’ really?”
“Well, whatever they call it. For what we’re paying for this dump, we could stay a night in a Hilton, with room service and satellite.”
“It’s not so bad when you split the cost.”
We’re dividing everything equally, including gas and Big Macs.
“Ray?”
“Yes?”
“You’re not going to be one of those travelers, are you?”
“Okay, I’ll stop.”
“I’m coming out.”
Which is my signal to switch off the lamp. She hurries to her bed and dives under the covers.
“Are we having an adventure yet?” I ask in the dark.
“Who said nothing’s an adventure when you’re living through it?”
“Indiana Jones.”
And for some reason we start giggling and don’t stop until we’re both too exhausted to stay awake.
The border crossing the next morning is uneventful. A very polite Canadian customs guard with an American accent looks at my license and Sharon’s passport, asks the reason for our visit (“Pleasure,” we answer simultaneously), and waves us across. “Enjoy your stay.”
“No stamp.” Sharon pouts.
“I’m just happy he didn’t call his boss. For a couple of hundred miles I’ve half-expected a state trooper to pull us over on orders from Chief Howar
d.”
“Or Marshal Mercer. Don’t forget the feds.”
“Thanks. I feel much better now.”
“Relax. We’re not breaking any laws. Even if Howard had told you to stay put, he doesn’t have the authority to enforce it. It’s still America.”
“No, it isn’t. Canadians don’t even call themselves Americans.”
“I don’t know why. So far I haven’t seen anything to convince me we’re not still back home.”
Which is true. Despite my worries about the Moores, I’d been looking forward to great stretches of tall pines, a glimpse of a bear or a moose. Miles past the border, we’re rolling along a four-lane highway, passing and being passed by ordinary passenger vehicles and Bekins moving vans, looking at Golden Arches, Chase Manhattan banks, and Holiday Inns, on our way to Regina. Next door to Moose Jaw, with its echoes of the Yukon gold rush, Regina is the provincial capital and the likeliest place to find a detective agency with all the bells and whistles required to track down our friends.
“I’m starting to miss the Wickiup,” I say. “At least that place made an effort not to look exactly like downtown Spokane.”
“It’s also hot. What’s that say, seventy-five?” She’s looking at the digital thermometer above the rearview.
“At least Gabby knew enough to ask Tiffany Thurgood what to pack. I should’ve left the flannel behind and packed shorts.”
“In two miles, turn right onto Queen’s Highway One East.”
The shockingly loud, robotic female voice makes me swerve over the dividing line. “What the hell is that?”
“GPS.” Sharon gestures with her phone. “Of course, if you prefer, we can always stop and ask Paul Bunyan for directions.”
“Sharon!”
“What, I can’t make a jo—” She looks up from the screen, sees me staring at the rearview mirror. She turns to look out the back window, at the cobalt-blue Cadillac three car lengths behind us.
Chapter 20
“Is that him?” she asks. “Adder? But, how—”
“He must have followed me all the way from my house.” I look beyond the big car. “I don’t see the federal car. He must have shaken them.”
“Can you shake him?”
“I’m not an Indy driver. He’s closing the distance!”
“Speed up!”
But the Cadillac accelerates faster than my compact. It seems as if the square radiator grille might fill the mirror. Then—
It pulls out to pass.
I see now there’s someone seated on the passenger’s side. I duck. “Head down!”
But instead of a gun poking through the window, I see a head of white hair pulled into a bun, and behind the wheel a man twenty years older than Adder, wearing a plaid hat with a feather in the band. The car slides past us and drifts back into our lane.
I sit back, drenched. “False alarm. It’s just an old couple out for a drive.”
“Next time it might not be.”
I’m keyed up. My neck is sore and my eyes are watering from scanning the landscape for classic blue Cadillacs, of which Canada seems to be in good supply. And who’s to say he hasn’t changed wheels? I can’t scour every vehicle on the road for a glimpse of a man I’ve seen only once. I need the security of four walls and a roof.
“Why don’t you look up our hotel?” I ask Sharon.
“Right now I’m researching detective agencies, looking at reviews.” She taps a finger toward the screen, not quite touching it. “The Crane Organisation seems to be the General Motors of the sleuthing industry. Organisation’s spelled with an s.”
“We won’t hold that against them. Are they in town?”
“Their headquarters is in Saskatoon. That’s another 120 miles.”
“Oh.”
“But wait, they’ve got a branch here: Sixth Avenue North.”
“That’s encouraging. A place with branches must be doing something right. Right?”
“I’m seeing lots of positives on their site.”
“Where’s our hotel?”
“In Regina,” she informs Siri. “The York Windsor.” A chime sounds. She looks up, grinning. “Fourth Avenue. North.”
“Let’s go to Sixth first.”
“I felt sure you’d say that.”
We pass Fourth. The next avenue is First.
“What am I missing?” I say. “Do numbers up here run another direction?”
“You wanted different.”
“I did. Be careful what you wish for.”
Here’s Sixth, out of order and so unexpected I almost pass it. My tires squeal as I make the adjustment.
The Crane Organisation identifies itself with a square sign slowly revolving on a post in the grass strip between the sidewalk and a modern low-slung building with a beveled roof, like a strip mall. The sign’s design is reassuring. I park between a nondescript station wagon and a sleek Econoline van, which my imagination packs with state-of-the-art surveillance equipment; of course, it may belong to a soccer mom.
“What’s the matter?” Sharon pauses, hand on her door handle, to look at me sitting motionless with my hands still gripping the wheel.
“What do we know about those positive reviews?” I say. “Maybe Crane’s own people posted them. This is like shopping the Yellow Pages for a brain surgeon.”
“Ray.” She releases her grip on the handle and reaches across to grasp my arm. “We’re here. We might as well go in. I’ll signal if my instincts jibe with yours.”
“What’s the signal?”
She grins again and pats me on the arm. “You look across, I’m not still sitting next to you? That’s it.”
Chapter 21
The reception area is set up like a doctor’s waiting room, with a tiny short-haired receptionist seated at a waist-high counter separated from visitors by a sliding Plexiglas panel; a glorified kitchen pass-through. Her smile belongs in a toothpaste commercial.
“Have you an appointment?” Her accent is flat, Midwestern; another thing about Canada that hasn’t lived up to my preconceived notions.
“No.”
She looks up above my head, as if for spiritual guidance. I assume there’s a clock mounted on her side of the partition. “I’ll see if I can get you in. Name?”
“Ray Gillett. This is Sharon Kowalski.”
She shifts her attention to Sharon, the smile broadening. “Ah! Polski!” A stream of language follows. Sharon’s answer is monosyllabic.
We turn toward a row of plastic scoop chairs bisected by a composition table scattered with American magazines. “What did she say?”
“Her people came from Cracow. Either that, or she’s related to the dead Pope. All I know of the lingo I got from my dad when he called his cousins. I can’t believe I finally put my passport into play just to visit Wisconsin.”
We sit forty-five minutes, Sharon flipping through a health magazine, while I glance around nervously. In that time, two people enter from outside—a comfortable-looking couple in their fifties, who speak quietly with the receptionist and are shooed into the back—and one person leaves—a pudgy young man in a sport coat and tan Dockers, moving with the assurance of someone who spends a lot of time there. No sign of a trench coat. I scoop up a magazine at random and open it. It’s for kids.
The receptionist cradles a phone and slides open her window. “Randy will see you now.”
I look up from a third-graders’ quiz about trampoline safety. “Randy?”
“End of the hall, last door on the left.”
Randy.
I surrender the last of my illusions, so I’m not disappointed when we pass through a wide-open door into an antiseptic office decorated in pastels, with a small chipboard desk, fabric-paneled walls, a couple of low-slung chairs for visitors, and not a blackjack or a bottle of Old Grand-Dad in sight. All it needs is a plastic model of a human eyeball on the desk to complete the resemblance to an ophthalmologist’s consultation room.
“Hi! Randy MacBride.”
The man who rises from behind the desk, hand outstretched, belongs to the same generation as the guy who went out minutes before, with red hair badly in need of brushing and a band of freckles bisecting his moon face. He, too, wears a sport coat, green plaid over an oyster-colored polo shirt buttoned to the neck. His grip, at least, is solid, and from appearances he doesn’t hold back when shaking Sharon’s hand. His gap-toothed smile reminds me of Dave Letterman, only without the smarm.
I introduce us both. “Thanks for seeing us.”
“I should be thanking you, by golly. I hate these slow days.”
By golly.
He asks us to sit, seats himself, and offers refreshment; elaborate politeness is one Canadian stereotype that seems to hold true. He inquires as to how far we’ve come—I guess he’s detective enough to guess we’re Yanks—and how we like his country. We make the expected replies. Then he shifts positions behind the desk, and I sense a sort of shield sliding down between his amiable expression and the brain behind it. “Now, what can Crane do for you?”
We’ve had ample opportunity to work on our story: the truth, basically, but with certain omissions.
Our friends the Moores are missing, apparently in haste and leaving behind their cell phones; the daughter had asked about Saskatchewan in the last call she made; and although the local police have issued a missing-persons alert, we decided to take some time off and follow the Canadian lead on our own.
“‘Lead.’” Randy MacBride permits himself a slight smile, but makes no further comment. “When did you say they disappeared?”
“Saturday,” I say.
He glances at a mechanical date calendar on the desk. “Two days ago.”
“If today’s Monday.” I’ve lost track of the days.
“It is.” And the sudden lack of the folksy accent in his tone is joined by yet another shield sliding down behind the first, this one solid steel. “The truth now, if you please, Mr. Gillett, Miss Kowalski. All of it this time, complete and unabridged. Except, of course, for the obvious lies, eh?”