It was Donna Vaughan, looking uncharacteristically nervous. She apologized profusely. “Can I come in for a while? Please say yes. I think someone’s following me.”
Cardinal looked past her at the garage.
“I don’t think he saw me come in here,” she said. “But I’m scared. I thought there was someone following me in the car, after I left the hotel-I just put it down to paranoia. But then, just now, as I was parking, someone pulled over a little ways behind. When I got out of the car, I heard him behind me.”
Cardinal picked up his keys with his left hand, keeping the revolver in his right.
He held the door open for her. When they were inside, he said, “Did you get a look at him?”
“Not really. Mid-fifties maybe? Long dark coat.”
“What about his car?”
She shook her head. “I didn’t see.”
“Where was this exactly?”
“On Travis-I think it’s called Travis. Near the corner. I saw a gun in his hand-I mean, I thought I did. I was totally freaked at that point.”
“And you think you lost him.”
“I hope so. I made a sudden rush toward a house as if I lived there and went back between it and the next house. I could see your building through the trees, so I just walked through the back. Got a lot of snow in my boots doing it.”
“You’re still driving the Focus?”
She nodded. “You’ve got a good memory.”
Cardinal hit the elevator button. “Get out on the ground floor and go sit in the lobby. I’ll come back in through the front.”
The elevator door opened.
“Maybe I should come with you.”
“Wait in the lobby.”
He went out through the pedestrian door beside the vehicle entrance. There was no one in sight. He looked for Donna’s tracks in the snow between the trees on the far side of the driveway. No one ever came through that way; there was only the one set of tracks. He went back to the driveway and turned up Travis Street, walking a hundred yards or so before he saw her car.
He bent to examine the doors, the windows. No signs of tampering.
The sidewalk was mostly slush, nothing that would hold prints. He walked farther up the street, shifting his glance back and forth from the parked cars to the houses. There were three vehicles. The first was covered in a month’s worth of snow. The hood of the second one was cold to the touch, and the third was a pickup-surely she would have noticed if it had been a pickup following her-also cold to the touch. He stopped at the end of the block and turned around. Once again on the way back he watched for movement among the houses, the cars, for anything at all, but there was nothing.
He went back to his building and in through the front door. Donna was in a corner chair that could not be seen through the glass doors. She stood up when he came in. “Did you see anyone?”
Cardinal shook his head. “Now maybe you could tell me what you’re doing here. How did you find me?”
“They said you’d just left the office. I thought I could catch you before you got home.”
“Why would I want to talk to the press when I’m off duty?”
“I know, I know. Look, I’m freelance-I have to push, okay? I’m sorry.”
“You look pretty shaken up. Maybe you better come in for a minute. Just don’t make it a habit.”
“I won’t. God, I’m so embarrassed. Helpless female.”
The elevator door opened and Donna went in ahead of him. She was hunched and tense, the former brassy confidence quite gone.
Cardinal pushed the up button. “How did you know where I live?”
“I was going through your local paper’s morgue. I came across an unrelated story about your run-in with your co-op board. Some ventilation issue?”
“Awfully thorough, aren’t you? What are you looking me up for?”
“Local colour, obviously.”
“That story didn’t give the building address.”
“Are you kidding? There was a picture of you standing in front of it. You can see this building from the government wharf.”
The door opened at the third floor and they got out.
“You look like you could use a drink,” he said when they were in his apartment. “Whisky okay?” He hung their coats up and went into the kitchen. He called out, “Ice?”
“Please. Quite a view you have here.”
Cardinal poured two whiskies and brought them into the living room and handed her one. She took a sip and looked at the glass. “What is it?”
“Rye. You prefer something else?”
“No, it’s good. I’ve never had it before-must be a Canadian thing. What are those lights over there?” She pointed at a spray of silvery pinpoints across the bay.
“Area of town called Ferris. Who do you think was following you?”
“God, I don’t know. I hope it’s just a random perv and not some bloody Russian.”
“There’s no sign of anyone at all.”
“Hey, he was maybe twenty yards behind me-I didn’t imagine the guy.”
“I didn’t say you did.”
She drank down the rest of the whisky. “Now I’m second-guessing myself. Do you suppose it’s possible he wasn’t following me?”
“That’s the most likely scenario.”
“Could I really be that dumb?”
“You wouldn’t have to be dumb-you’re writing about guys who kill people like you. Can I get you another?”
She handed him her empty glass. “I could get used to this stuff.”
Cardinal went into the kitchen and poured two more.
“In fact,” she called after him, “I could get to like your whole country. Everyone’s so polite here, it’s like they’re all on Valium-except you. The way you drew that gun. I thought I was a goner.”
Cardinal brought the drinks out and handed her one and sat on the couch. Donna was sitting in his favourite chair, a recliner that she had tipped back to its halfway position. She had small feet, and socks that were perfectly white.
“What else did you find out from the Lode? I assume you didn’t spend all your time looking me up.”
“Local stuff on the fur biz-the Web was useless. A couple of things may interest you. Did you know the fur auction used to be run by a different group than the guys currently in charge?”
“I did. The first group couldn’t make a go of it.”
Donna reached for her bag on the floor beside the chair, a manoeuvre that caused her to reveal a good deal of cleavage. She struck Cardinal as a cold person in some ways-dry, analytical, obsessed with work-but he also had the sense of enormous emotion held in check, though as to which emotions he had no clue.
Donna sat back up and flipped open her notebook. “A man named Rivard-Donald Rivard-is quoted in this article from a couple of years ago saying, ‘It’s not just the low prices. Certain people, the big buyers, have a way of holding on to their cash. We have to warehouse the fur and they take their sweet time paying us. Meanwhile we have to pay all the trappers, not to mention our staff. You can’t make a living on promises.’”
Cardinal nodded. “We know about Rivard.”
“Well, if you don’t buy the Russian mob-it’s a possibility, right?” Donna sat forward and the recliner reformed itself into an upright armchair. “And now you have another murder on your hands-more people to interview, more leads to chase down. Give me a little help here. A name or two.”
“Sorry. Investigation in progress.”
“We went over all that. I won’t publish a thing until you have a conviction. I swear.” She got out of the chair and came to the couch and straddled him so that her knees were on either side of him. Before Cardinal could say