were waiting for the toxicology report from Toronto.
As to the number scrawled on the window, all Arsenault could say was that the five was similar to the five carved into the wood in the Flint case. “Both are perfectly closed at the top. But sorry, folks, we can’t be sure when the window marks were made. Going by the other dust patterns in the tower, they could have been made any time in the past three or four months or so.”
“Tell us about the clothes,” Chouinard said.
“The down vest is new. But it’s a popular brand available across the country. More than a hundred different outlets.”
“Could she have bought that herself?” Chouinard asked.
“Possible,” Arsensault said, “but it isn’t what she wore to meet her lover. That was a medium-weight trench coat that was dumped in a Sally Ann donation box. Sharp-eyed volunteer found a credit card receipt in the pocket and recognized the name. Unfortunately, the coat hasn’t generated any more leads. No hairs, nothing we can follow up.”
“The vest looked like the right size to me,” Cardinal said.
“And the point of this observation?” Loach wanted to know.
“If the killer bought it for her, it means he got very close. Possibly he was even inside her place. I think we should pursue the clothes, even if there are a hundred outlets. It’s an older man buying a woman’s item, probably somewhere not too far from here. We could get lucky.”
“I’ll tell you what,” Loach said, “why doesn’t everybody just listen up for a second and we might make some real progress.” He got up and went to the lectern that was sometimes used for seminars. He slotted a flash drive into a laptop. “This was left on my voice mail last night.”
There was some throat clearing. Sound of a microphone being jostled, rubbing against fabric. Music playing in the background-lots of strings, something classical. Then the voice, an older man with a strong French-Canadian accent.
Officer Loach, I saw you on da TV de udder night and now ‘ere you are again and I just gotta call and congratulate you. So you fine your second victim at last-you must be ver’ proud. I wondered ’ow long it would take you. I was worry I might ’ave ‘id her too good. Of course, it wasn’t you who discover da body. Dat would have require some intelligence. Forty-five years ol’ and nudding but a small-town cop, you’re not exactly da sharpes’ knife in da drawer. You got lucky with dat forestry guy.
But not lucky enough, my frien’. Because me, I am not finish. I don’t know about you, but I’m ’aving a lot of fun. And I can give you twenty-five different reason you’ll never catch me, even if you live to be ninety-five. So I’m going to ’ave more fun-a lot more fun, maybe sooner dan you tink.
The atmosphere in the room had changed. Everyone had shifted position, sitting forward now.
“Obviously a major development,” Loach said. “Let’s listen to it one more time.”
He fiddled with his trackpad and started the playback again. When they had listened all the way through, he shut his laptop.
“Like I say-major.”
“It certainly is,” Cardinal said, “assuming it’s real.”
“Are you saying it isn’t?”
“I’m just saying we have to be sure.”
“He comes up with the numbers 25 and 45 by accident? Where’s he get those, if it’s not real?”
“Well, one of them refers to your age, right?”
“I’m forty-six, not forty-five, or ninety-five, thank you. And how’s he get the 25? I don’t think that’s coincidence, and we haven’t mentioned either of those numbers to the media.”
“You’re forgetting your Montrose case in Toronto. You were in the news a lot with that. I’m willing to bet more than one of those stories mentioned your age.”
“Well, that’s true,” Loach conceded. “I was forgetting about that.”
“Let’s cut to the chase,” Chouinard snapped. “Do we think it’s real or not?”
“We can’t know for sure,” Cardinal said.
“Exactly,” Loach said. “Which is why I’ve already sent it to the RCMP profilers. In the meantime, we’re gonna throw everything we have at this. The caller’s French Canadian, obviously, with a strong accent-and we’re gonna go right back to the next of kin and places of employment and get the names of any contacts with FC accents.”
“People can fake accents,” Delorme pointed out, “and that one’s pretty extreme.”
“Which doesn’t mean it’s fake,” Loach said. “Maybe you don’t hear it the way we do.”
“French Canadians have a genetic defect? We not only talk funny, we’re born deaf too?”
“I’m not even going to answer that,” Loach said. “This is a hot lead and we’re going to hit it with everything we’ve got.”
Cardinal appealed directly to Chouinard. “D.S., we’re better off focusing on something more solid. The sedatives, for example-they had to come from somewhere. We’ve got to run down drugstore thefts, veterinarians, hospital inventories. And the clothes, too. Older guy buying outdoor gear for a woman-someone might remember.”
“Excuse me,” Loach said. “We have a man’s voice. We can run that voice right by the people closest to the victims. Someone’s gonna recognize it.”
“It’s too much of a leap,” Cardinal said. “Except for the two numbers, which could be coincidence, he doesn’t say anything that isn’t common knowledge. Also-let me finish-also, it doesn’t jibe with previous behaviour. We know the killer followed or observed these two women very closely, without being observed himself. The crimes themselves were well planned and well executed.”
“Not true. We have a recognizable vehicle. People have seen him. We’re pretty sure he has a fake hand, for Chrissake.”
“Point is, this is a quiet, concentrated, methodical person. Now all of a sudden he picks up the phone and calls us? Why?”
“To taunt us, obviously. Same as with the numbers themselves.”
“Do they really qualify as taunts?” Cardinal said. “They’re not in-your-face like the phone call.”
“Think what you want. I’m running Lacroix, and the people on my team are going to get names-and recordings-of any French-Canadian males known to the victims. Work, relatives, professionals, I don’t care. And we’re gonna get voice prints.” He put the cap back on his flash drive and stood up. “Arsenault, see what you can do to this recording to bring up that music in the background. Those violins or whatever-I’d like to know exactly what that is.”
“Beethoven.”
Everyone turned to look at Collingwood. He blushed and spoke into his chest. “Quartet in C minor, opus 18.”
Loach pointed at him. “He always talk this much?”
“Bob was raised by a family of raccoons,” Arsenault said. “We’re happy when he talks at all.”
Cardinal went to his cubicle, sat down, and stayed there exactly fifteen seconds before he got up again and went to Chouinard’s office.
“Don’t even bother,” Chouinard said.
“D.S., we’re going off on tangents. We can’t have the case split up like this. Put me in charge of the whole thing.”
“No. You look after Flint, Loach is looking after Lacroix.”
“It’s the same killer. It should be one case, one lead.”
“Normally I would say you’re right, but this department is a little too complacent for my taste. I think a little competition could do us a world of good.”
“I just don’t want anyone else to get killed.”
“No one wants anyone else to get killed. Close the door on your way out.”
Giles Blunt
Until the Night
From the Blue Notebook
Wyndham emerged from the lab and lugged his computer battery to a sled that was already heaped with equipment. Gordon had evolved a kind of mobile observation post that he painstakingly assembled and
