“Tell me something. You said you were staying in a motel by the lake. I don’t suppose you remember the name of that place yet, do you?”
“No, I don’t, as a matter of fact.”
“Reason I ask, we don’t seem to be able to locate that motel.”
“This is northern Ontario, right? There’s lots of motels by lakes.”
“Here in Algonquin Bay there are exactly twelve. We’ve talked to all of them and none of them remember any red-haired young woman who suddenly disappeared.”
“So, it was a different motel. A different lake. What do I know? I haven’t lived here for a long time.”
“There are no motels on the other lakes. See, here’s what I think’s going on—you tell me if I’m wrong: I think you came back here to find your brother. I think he’s still here and you intend to find him. I think you remember exactly where he was. You don’t want to tell me, and I can only assume that’s because he’s involved in criminal activity. I don’t care about that, you understand? That isn’t what I’m interested in right now. I just want to get whoever tried to kill you off the streets.”
“Detective, last week I got shot in the head. My memory is not what it should be. Why can’t you accept that?”
“Dr. Paley says it’s unheard of for a person with your injuries to remember some things and not others. It all comes back at once, not in these convenient little packages you’re offering up.”
“Dr. Paley doesn’t know what I think or what I remember.”
“And that’s very useful when you want to hide something, isn’t it?”
“You should know. You’re the detective.”
“Well, here’s something you should know, Terri. Whoever put a bullet in your head just did the same to someone else. Only this young man wasn’t as lucky as you. He got two in the head from the same gun and he’s dead, Terri.”
Cardinal was not at all sure it was the right move to make just then, but he turned from her and went to the front door. He snapped open the locks and went outside.
Follow me, he silently urged her. You must be desperate to know. Follow me.
He opened his car door, but before he could get in, she called after him.
“Wait!”
She came running down the front steps in bare feet.
“Detective, wait!”
Cardinal got in the car and started the engine.
Terri threw open the passenger door and got in beside him.
“Who was it?” Her pale skin had turned even paler. “The guy who was killed. Who was it?”
“We don’t know that yet.”
The green eyes were bright with panic.
“Oh, God, you have to tell me! How old was he? What did he look like? Was he thin and sort of gangly?”
Cardinal opened his briefcase and pulled out a forensic photo. The smashed head, the pool of blood.
Terri covered her mouth.
“Is it your brother?”
She shook her head, still covering her mouth. Cardinal hoped she wasn’t going to vomit in his car.
“This guy was mid to late twenties. About five-foot-five. Light brown hair.”
She let go of the breath she had been holding. “It wasn’t Kevin. Kevin’s younger. And he’s nearly six feet tall.”
“It could’ve been you or your brother,” Cardinal said gently. “Whoever did this made absolutely certain with this guy. The gun they’re using is malfunctioning and it looks like they finally figured that out. When the bullets didn’t kill him they busted him over the head with a baseball bat. The next time I get called to a scene like that, I don’t want it to be your brother, and I especially don’t want it to be you.”
Terri was sitting back against the seat now. She looked exhausted.
“You don’t want me to ask any more questions, I won’t ask any. But get your shoes and I’ll take you someplace safe.”
Terri stared straight ahead.
It’s now or never, Cardinal thought. She’ll either come with me now or I’ve truly lost her.
“Not the hospital?” Her voice was barely audible.
“Not the hospital.”
34
“WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?” Delorme said, the moment Cardinal got back to the station. “We’ve been buzzing you.”
“I’ve been over at the Crisis Centre,” he said. “I found Terri Tait.”
“You found Terri Tait.” Delorme raised one eyebrow. The little check-mark injury was fading. “How did you find her?”
“School records. I also looked up her brother, Kevin Tait. Turns out he did two years for intent to traffic in heroin, and I think he’s here in town.”
“That’s why she’s been holding back on us. She doesn’t want her brother to end up doing serious time.”
“Why were you buzzing me?”
“We got an ID back from Forensics. They got a match on the teeth. Have you ever run into a character named Morris Tilley? Also known as ‘Toof’—which is why odontology was able to identify him so fast. He had an extra incisor.”
“Don’t know him.”
“Of course not. You, you don’t work the small stuff. Seems we’ve pulled Morris Tilley in at least three times, maybe more, mostly for theft under. He’s also been known to sell dope, mostly grass. Morris Tilley’s problem is he’s a hundred-percent weed junkie. We haven’t heard from him for nearly a year, though.”
“Maybe he decided to go straight.”
“Hah, hah. He didn’t have any means of support other than dope or pool hustling.”
“Have you notified the parents yet?”
Delorme gave him her sweetest smile; that always meant something unpleasant was coming.
“Parent,” she corrected him. “I was hoping you’d come with me.”
The Tilley home was located on Main West behind the Country Style parking lot. Owing to the national obsession with donuts, this parking lot was the fastest-expanding piece of real estate in town, devouring in its quest a limestone convent, several small stores and a brace of Edwardian houses. The Tilley address was fifty yards west, amid a block of red-brick houses that had recently sprouted ugly storefronts: Deirdre’s Beauty Shoppe, Polar Air Conditioning and Prent & Pilaggi Attorneys at Law.
It sometimes happens that a violent crime will lead police to a good address, a household of well-mannered people with degrees from the best universities; Cardinal had been to one or two such scenes himself. But they’re rare. Morris Tilley’s household was the more common variety.
His mother let them into the front hall. It was a dark, close space and the air had the slightly mouldy, old-fabric smell of the lowest-end thrift shops. Mrs. Tilley herself was a small, sparrowlike woman in faded flowerprint who squinted at them behind pointy glasses.
Cardinal introduced himself and Delorme.
“Mrs. Tilley, are you the mother of Morris Tilley?”
“Yes. Is Morris in trouble again? He doesn’t mean to get into trouble. He just doesn’t think, you know? He gets excited about something and then he just gets carried away. And that marijuana never did anything good for him. Other mothers complain that their kids are addicted to video games or their computers, and I would give anything if Morris would take up an interest like that. I mean, he discovered marijuana when he was twelve and he’s been in a fog ever since. But he doesn’t mean any harm. Really, he doesn’t. He’s a good boy. Man, I mean. Though he’s still a boy in lots of ways. What’s he done now? Nothing serious, I hope.”
“I’m afraid we have some much worse news, Mrs. Tilley. Perhaps you’d better sit down.”
“Yes, of course. Let’s go in the living room.”
The thrift-store smell was even stronger in the living room. A brown vinyl rocker listed to one side, and the overstuffed couch appeared to have been savaged at both ends by a Bengal tiger.