Twenty—Two

"I know this is probably not a good time, but can you spare a few minutes? I’d like to ask you some questions about Fleur,” I said to the woman.

Maybe I was being inconsiderate, but I felt finding the missing girl was just as important. Besides, there was nothing she or any of us could do about Claire. Either she’d been in her car when it plunged into the river or she hadn’t.

The woman wavered.

I continued, “With Becky’s murder, her parents are very worried she might be in trouble too. So anything you could tell me about your dealings with Fleur might help in finding her.”

She firmed her lips and glanced at Doris, who was blotting her tears with a Kleenex. Finally she said, “Okay, as long as it doesn’t take too long. Doris, do you mind calling around and seeing if you can locate Claire? Pray to the Creator we do.”

“I should forewarn you,” I said. “I wasn’t able to reach her when I tried her cell about ten minutes ago.”

The two women exchanged worried looks, which mirrored my own uneasy concerns.

“You might as well come to my office,” the woman said as she started down the hall. But before she’d gone too far, she stopped and turned back to me.

Offering her hand, she said, “By the way, my name is Mary Eshkakogan. I’m the executive director of the Anishinabeg Welcome Centre.”

Although her office was considerably more spacious than either Claire’s or Paulette’s, the furniture was comprised of the same dreary institutional castoffs, albeit with fewer scratches. One wall was filled with the flowing lines of Benjamin Chee Chee’s flying geese. He was an artist I recognized from my mother’s collection. While two of the framed pictures were definitely copies, I noticed an edition number at the bottom of one of a mother goose tending to her gosling, which suggested it might very well be an original print. According to my mother, who was interested in such things, a Chee Chee original was a valuable rarity, because the artist died before he’d had a chance to produce a sizable body of work.

The message light was blinking on Mary’s phone. Her brow creased with concern as she glanced at it before turning her gaze back to me. Her short, dark auburn hair gave her a professional, no-nonsense look, as did her forest green suit, the tailored neatness of which was in sharp contrast to the considerably more casual attire of the Centre’s other staff. The turquoise and bone choker and silver North-west Coast Indian bracelet and earrings did serve to tone down its businesslike severity.

She must’ve noticed my perusal, for she smoothed her skirt and said, “I’m meeting with one of our key sponsors this afternoon, hence the spruced up attire, but I tell you, these pantyhose are killing me. Give me a pair of slacks any day.”

“I’ll second that. I haven’t worn a skirt in years, just to avoid the itchy things.” I smiled. “Look, I’ll be quick.”

I remained standing to show I meant what I said, while she sat in the chair behind her desk.

“You said Fleur had come to you looking for a job. Do you mind telling me when this was?”

“Towards the end of June. She came to me highly recommended by her chief.”

“You mean Eric Odjik?”

“Yes, do you know him?”

I nodded. “I live next to the Migiskan Reserve.”

“Sadly, our two positions for summer help were already taken, otherwise I would’ve hired her. She seemed a very capable young woman.”

“Do you know where she was living at the time?”

“Before I go any further, I should ask you what your relationship is to Fleur and why you want to know about her?”

I repeated what I’d told Paulette, and that seemed to satisfy Mary. “Poor child. Such a tragedy that she’s missing. In my mind she didn’t seem a typical runaway, so I can’t help but think something has happened to her. That’s what I told the police.”

“That’s our worry too. But the police refuse to believe us. They’re treating her case as a runaway and doing nothing.”

She shook her head. “I’m afraid Fleur is just a statistic. Did you know that there are more than five hundred and eighty missing aboriginal women in Canada, sixteen in our area alone. In most cases nothing is being done to find them. Tragically, when they are finally found, they are invariably dead, as happened recently to Becky Wapachee, who used to be a client at our Centre.”

“Yes, I know about Becky. Apparently Fleur was last seen with her.”

“Oh dear, I hadn’t realized. But I doubt they would’ve been friends. They had absolutely nothing in common.”

“So you don’t know anything about Fleur living with Becky?”

“I find that hard to believe. Becky was living a rough lifestyle, hardly the kind that would attract a smart, well-educated, young woman like Fleur.”

“Apparently this is what Claire told the police, that’s why I wanted to talk to her.”

She sighed but didn’t voice what we were both thinking. Claire wouldn’t be around for me to question.

“As I told the police, since we didn’t have a job for her, I didn’t have her fill out an application. So we have no record of her address.”

“Do you know if anyone, besides the police, came around asking for Fleur when she went missing?”

“I remember Eric dropping by looking for her. But I hadn’t realized she was missing at the time.”

“And not her father?” I asked. “I understand he came to Ottawa to look for his daughter after he and his wife hadn’t heard from her for some time. I would think the Centre would be a good place to start.”

She nodded. “He certainly didn’t speak to me, but ask Doris. If anyone knows if he was here, she would.”

She glanced at her flashing message light.

“Just one more question and then I’ll go. Can you remember when Eric came looking for her?”

“I think it was only a week or so after the job interview. He thought she’d got a job and had come to see how things were working out. As I recall, he was quite surprised to discover she wasn’t here. I guess because he hadn’t heard from her, he assumed she’d got a job.”

Her phone started to ring. As she reached for it, I thanked her for her time and turned to leave.

As I headed out the door, I heard her answer the phone then the words, “Can you hold the line a minute, Paul?”

She called out, “Meg, go see George, the director of our Jobs Program. I sent Fleur to talk to him about possible job opportunities.”

It took George a few minutes to resurrect his memories, but when he did, he was able to provide me with the names of two businesses to which he’d sent Fleur. One was the Dreamcatcher Bistro, the restaurant where I’d been to meet Claire, and the other was a spa. And no, he hadn’t passed this information on to the police, because they’d never asked.

“Besides,” he said, “I was away on vacation and didn’t know Fleur was missing until I got back after Labour Day.”

I groaned in exasperation. If the damn police had gotten off their butts and taken the time to discover what I’d easily learned in the past hour, Fleur could very well be sitting safe at home by now. Instead we were fearing the worst, and I was trying my best to uncover what should’ve been found out weeks ago.

Feeling somewhat discouraged, I headed back downstairs to Doris and found an empty reception desk instead. After waiting several long minutes for her return, I finally gave up and headed outside to my truck. I figured she probably wouldn’t remember if Jeff had come to the Centre looking for his daughter. Besides, knowing whether he had or not wouldn’t help find Fleur.

I climbed into my truck intending to drive straight back to the Dreamcatcher Bistro in the hope that they had hired Fleur. As I started to back up, a tap on the passenger window made me stop. Paulette’s broad face peered through the pane.

“Good, I caught you,” she said as I rolled down the window. “I just remembered something. You should speak to Becky’s best friend Monique. If Fleur and Becky did become friends, she would know.”

Apparently Monique had also been a one-time client of the Centre, and like Becky, she’d stopped coming. Paulette referred to her as another of her lost souls. Unfortunately, she couldn’t provide me with an address. But she told me the most likely place to find Monique.

“She usually hangs out at the corner of Cumberland and Murray.” She paused. “You’d probably find her there any time after nine p.m. And if she’s not there, wait. She’ll be back after servicing one of her johns. You see, it’s her usual corner.” She pursed her lips grimly. “I tried so hard to help her. I just don’t understand why these girls prefer hooking to getting a decent job.”

Then shaking her head sadly, she said, “I know it’s the drugs, always the drugs.”

She wished me good luck and promised to call if she remembered anything else that might be useful.