“Don’t do me any favors.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it. And to prove that, how about another cup of coffee?”
Guttmann is typing out an overdue report when LaPointe enters. He has taken the liberty of going through the Lieutenant’s desk and clearing out every forgotten or overlooked report and memo he could find. He tried to organize them into some kind of sequence at first, but now he is taking them in random order and bungling through as best he can.
LaPointe sits at his desk and surveys the expanse of unlittered surface. “Now, that looks better,” he says.
Guttmann looks over the piles of paper work on his little table. “Did you find out anything from Dr. Bouvier, sir?”
“Only that you’re supposed to be a remarkable young man.”
“Remarkable in what way, sir?”
“I don’t remember.”
“I see. Oh, by the way, the Commissioner’s office called again. They’re pretty upset about your not coming right up when you got in.”
“Hm-m. Any call from Dirtyshirt Red?”
“Sir?”
“That bomme you met last night. The one who’s looking for the Vet.”
“No, sir. No call.”
“I don’t imagine the Vet will be out on the streets before dark anyway. He has drinking money. What time is it?”
“Just after one, sir.”
“Have you had lunch?”
“No, sir. I’ve been doing paper work.”
“Oh? Well, let’s go have lunch.”
“Sir? Do you realize that some of these reports are six months overdue?”
“What does that have to do with getting lunch?”
“Ah… nothing?”
They sit by the window of a small restaurant across Bonsecours Street from the Quartier Général, finishing their coffee. The decor is a little frilly for its police clientele, and Guttmann looks particularly out of place, his considerable bulk threatening his spindly-legged chair.
“Sir?” Guttmann says out of a long silence. “There’s something I’ve been wondering about. Why do the older men on the force call us apprentices ‘Joans’?”
“Oh, that comes from long ago, when most of the force was French. They weren’t called ‘Joans’ really. They were called ‘jaunes.’ Over the years it got pronounced in English.”
“Jaunes? Yellows? Why yellows?”
“Because the apprentices are always kids, still wet behind the ears…”
Guttmann’s expression says he still doesn’t get it.
“…and yellow is the color of baby shit,” LaPointe explains.
Guttmann’s face is blank.
LaPointe shrugs. “I suppose it doesn’t really make much sense.”
“No, sir. Not much. Just more of the wiseass ragging the junior men have to put up with.”
“That bothers you, eh?”
“Sure. I mean… this isn’t the army. We don’t have to break a man’s spirit to get him to conform.”
“If you don’t like the force, why don’t you get out? Use that college education of yours.”
Guttmann looks quickly at the Lieutenant. “That’s another thing, sir. I guess I’m supposed to be sorry that I got a little education. But I’m afraid I just can’t cut it.” His ears are tingling with resentment.
LaPointe rubs his stubbly cheek with the palm of his hand. “You don’t have to cut it, son. Just so long as you can type. Come on, finish your coffee and let’s go.”
Leaving Guttmann waiting on the sidewalk, LaPointe returns to the restaurant and places a call from the booth at the back. Five times… six… seven… the phone rings, unanswered. He shrugs philosophically and sets the receiver back into its cradle. But just as he hangs up, he thinks he hears an answering click on the other end. He dials again quickly. This time the phone is answered on the first ring.
“Yes?”
“Hello. It’s me. Claude.”
“Yes?” She does not place the name.
“LaPointe. The man who owns the apartment.”
“Oh. Yeah.” She has nothing more to say.
“Is everything all right?”
“All right?”
“I mean… did you buy enough for breakfast and lunch?”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
There is a silence.
She volunteers, “Did you call just now?”
“Yes.”
“I was in the bathroom. It stopped ringing just when I answered.”
“Yes, I know.”
“Oh. Well… why did you call?”
“I just wanted to know if you found everything you need.”
“Like what?”
“Like… did you buy a razor?”
“Yes.”
“That’s good.”
A short silence.
Then he says, “I won’t be back until eight or nine tonight.”
“And you want me out by then?”
“No. I mean, it’s up to you. It doesn’t matter.”
A short silence.
“Well? Should I go or stay?”
A longer silence.
“I’ll bring some groceries back with me. We can make supper there, if you want.”
“Can you cook?” she asks.
“Yes. Can’t you?”
“No. I can do eggs and mince and things like that.”
“Well, then, I’ll do the cooking.”
“Okay.”
“It’ll be late. Can you hold out that long?”
“What do you mean?”
“You won’t get too hungry?”
“No.”
“Well then. I’ll see you tonight.”
“Okay.”
LaPointe hangs up, feeling foolish. Why call when you have nothing to say? That’s stupid. He wonders what he’ll buy for supper.
The dumb twit can’t even cook.
The secretary’s skirt is so short that modesty makes her back up to file cabinets and squat to extract papers from the lower drawers.
LaPointe sits in a modern imitation-leather divan so deep and soft that it is difficult to rise from it. On a low coffee table are arranged a fine political balance of backdated Punch and Paris Match magazines, together with the latest issue of Canada Now. The walls of the Commissioner’s reception room are adorned with paintings that have the crude draftsmanship and flat perspective of fashionable Hudson Bay Indian primitive; and there is a saccharine portrait of an Indian girl with pigtails and melting brown comic-sad eyes too large for her face, after the style of an American husband-and-wife team of kitsch painters. The size of the eyes, their sadness, and the Oriental upturn of the corners make it look as though the girl’s mother plaited her braids too tightly.
Along with the popular Indian trash on the walls, there are several framed posters, examples of the newly established Public Relations Department. One shows a uniformed policeman and a middle-aged civilian male standing side by side, looking down at a happy child. The slogan reads: Crime Is Everybody’s Business. LaPointe wonders what crime the men are contemplating.
The leggy secretary squats again, her back to the file cabinet, to replace a folder. Her tight skirt makes her lose her balance for a second, and her knees separate, revealing her panties.
LaPointe nods to himself. That’s smart; to avoid showing your ass, you flash your crotch.
The door behind the secretary’s desk opens and Commissioner Resnais appears, hand already out, broad smile in place. He makes it a habit to greet senior men personally. He brought that back with him from a seminar in the States on personnel management tactics.
Make the men who work FOR you think they work WITH you.
“Claude, good to see you. Come on in.” Just the opposite of Sergeant Gaspard, Resnais uses LaPointe’s first name, but does not tutoyer him. The Commissioner’s alert black eyes reveal a tension that belies his facile camaraderie.
Resnais’ office is spacious, its furniture relentlessly modern. There is a thick carpet, and two of the walls are lined with books—and not only lawbooks. There are titles dealing with social issues, psychology, the history of Canada, problems of modern youth, communications, and the arts and crafts of Hudson Bay Indians. No civilian visitor could avoid being impressed by the implication of social concern and modern attitudes toward the causes and prevention of crime. No ordinary cop, this Commissioner. A liberal intellectual working in the trenches of quotidian law enforcement.