CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Denise Halvorsen was puzzled, but she waited until Lou refilled our coffee cups before saying, “I still don’t understand it all. Tell me again why Charles Service set up those phonies?”

I said, “Service knew that the Hunts would never allow Frank Harkness to inherit their wealth. But Service figured that if, after Calvert Hunt died, he produced a poor, sick, brain-dead woman and ‘proved’ that she was Marcia, then he would apply to be declared her legal guardian. It was all set up. He was the Hunts’ trusted lawyer and I doubt there’d be any serious objections from anyone. Service could continue to loot from Calvert Hunt’s enormous wealth. Service’s plan was well thought-out. The evidence that he provided to the phonies was real. The things in that fishing box were items that Service had taken from Marcia’s old nursery. The master stroke was that rose, tattooed on the phony’s shoulder. Nobody would recognize this imposter, but they wouldn’t deny her claim.”

“Maybe. But what if the real granddaughter showed?”

“There was only a slight chance of that happening. The legitimate Marcia had turned her back on Victoria, and besides, neither Joan Alfred or Alison knew anything about the Hunt family or its money. Joan had no wish to investigate her brother’s past. There was too much ugliness. No, Service’s scheme was perfect, a mixture of good planning and good luck. And think of the payoff for him. By his own admission he’d been looting Hunt for years. With phony heiresses parked at Foul Bay Road, the looting would have continued.”

“All right. How about dna testing? Service couldn’t fake that.”

“Good question. dna wasn’t a factor when Service set the scam up originally. It must have given him a few sleepless nights.”

Halvorsen said, “So it was greed that drove Service?”

“No. Cocaine was driving Charles Service,” I said. “He was a complicated man. He probably loved Iris Naylor. That didn’t prevent him from jilting her to romance Sarah Williams. And when Service stole those paintings, he couldn’t bear to destroy them.”

“But he killed the son of his friend!”

“Harry Cuncliffe’s chance discovery of Alison in Reno was going to destroy Service utterly. He panicked. Harry paid the price.”

Outside Lou’s café, Chantal patrolled in the rain, twirling a big umbrella. I said, “But the story ended well for Calvert Hunt. When he met Alison and Joan he was overjoyed. Marcia’s death was one thing. Discovering that he has a granddaughter has given the old man a new reason to live. It’s also given him a chance to give Alison the love he ought to have given Marcia.”

“So, a story with a happy ending.”

“Happy for some people. Not for Iris Naylor. She really loved Service. It’s going to be a long time before she recovers from the shock of knowing she loved a murderer.”

“Sarah Williams. What about her?”

I took a sip of coffee. I said slowly, “I’m not sure what kind of relationship Service had with Sarah. His death doesn’t seem to have disturbed her too much.”

“And that young Native man, Jimmy Scow. He served years in prison for a crime he didn’t commit.”

“Jimmy’s been vindicated and he will be fine now. He hired Sammy Lofthouse to sue the city for wrongful arrest. I understand they’re arranging an out-of-court settlement.”

“Well, you did a great job.”

“Yeah? Well I was highly motivated.”

Denise went out.

That’s when Gottlieb came in. He leaned over my table and said testily, “She can run, but you can’t.”

“Gottlieb! I’m pleased to see you.”

“Lying prick. I’ve been looking for you all week. What’s the matter? Do you want this earth dwarf theft kept in the family? Or do I have to call Stolen Property?”

“Stolen Property? What are you going to say to them? That you tricked some poor sap out of a million bucks and got sore when he returned the compliment?”

“I paid good money for that manikin,” Gottlieb said in rising tones. “Do you have any idea how much it cost me to get that wall fixed?”

I told him to sit down. Gottlieb didn’t want to sit down. He wanted to hit somebody, preferably a Coast Salish neighbourhood cop.

Lou put a quarter in the Wurlitzer. Frank Sinatra started singing “Nancy (with the Laughing Face).” Lou knows it always makes me blue — I don’t know why he does it.

Gottlieb said, “Sheesh, Silas. Your hand’s all swollen. What happened?”

“Broken bone. I jammed it in a door.”

“Or between somebody’s thighs.”

“Gottlieb,” I said. “That’s vulgar.”

“Vulgar? I’ll tell you what’s vulgar. You and that thieving bastard Gregarious George are vulgar. You make a right pair. George won’t talk to me either. I saw him on the street yesterday. He saw me coming and took off. Just like that Halvorsen dame.”

“So you saw George. But what exactly did you see?”

Gottlieb pondered for a moment. He said thoughtfully, “George was sober. Clean and sober. Funny. It never registered till this minute.”

“That earth dwarf, it’s changed George’s life. Twice,” I said. “First it turned him into a drunk.”

“Once a drunk, always a drunk.”

“He’s just got himself a seiner job. George is going commercial fishing up in the Queen Charlottes.”

“That’s if George isn’t in jail, sharing a cell with you,” Gottlieb said. He lowered his voice and hissed, “I’m not kidding, Silas. If I don’t get that dwarf thing back, I’m raising a big stink.”

“George hasn’t got it anymore. He couldn’t give it to you even if he wanted to. Which I can assure you he doesn’t. But as it happens, I know where it is.”

“Where is it?”

“If I tell you, will you listen politely?”

“Sure. I’m a businessman. There’s no sense getting litigious if you don’t have to.”

“It’s a long complicated story.”

“Well I ain’t got all day, so cut it short.”

“I came into a windfall recently,” I said. “Four thousand that I found in an alley. That’s nothing to a man like you, Gottlieb, but it’s a big deal to me. I wasted some of it on a noble or a childish impulse, depending on your point of view. The rest of the money, well, for a while I didn’t know what to do with it.”

“You should have asked me,” Gottlieb said.

“I asked Chief Alphonse. The chief suggested I spend the money on a Black Tamahnous ceremony for Gregarious George. I thought that was a great idea. We sent for Little Sam.”

“Little Sam, the medicine man?” Gottlieb said sarcastically.

“That’s the one. He’s small, but he’s big. We gave Little Sam the money and told him what we had in mind. Little Sam’s had a lot of experience in these matters. But working with guys like Little Sam, you’ve got to be patient. What happened was, Little Sam decided to fast.”

“Fast my ass,” Gottlieb said. “You’re talking fast but you haven’t told me nothing yet.”

“Little Sam has a place where he goes to visit his tamahnous, up near Spectacle Lake. After going without sleep and fasting for two days and two nights, Little Sam saw a red woodpecker, a powerful spirit. The earth dwarf had sent it to him. Little Sam tried to catch the woodpecker, but the woodpecker flew away past Little Sam’s right hand. Not the left hand, note, the right hand. It was a sign. Little Sam told Chief Alphonse. Chief Alphonse put the word out. Every Salish chief from Seabeck to Comox showed up in the Warrior longhouse to see what would happen next. We had two special invited guests as well, Effie Yokwats and Jimmy Scow.”

“What did happen next?” Gottlieb said.

“Nothing much. Not at first. To strengthen himself for his ordeal, Little Sam ate two soft-boiled eggs and drank one cup of coffee. Little Sam then sent for Gregarious George. George showed up as pissed as a newt. Little Sam asked George if he was ready to stop drinking. George said he wanted to, but he was sick, he couldn’t help himself. Little Sam took George’s hand and the pair of them spent the best part of an afternoon alternately bathing in the sea and doing sweat-lodge medicine. When Little Sam thought that George was ready, he led him naked into the Warrior longhouse and made him sit close to the fire. After some dancing and rattle-shaking, Little Sam and Gregarious George went out on a lengthy medicine-ghost journey with your earth dwarf.”

“They took my earth dwarf on a lengthy journey?”

“In a manner of speaking. Little Sam prefers to say that the earth dwarf took them on a journey. The point is, Gottlieb, that earth dwarf belonged to the land of the dead. Its home was in the east, across a river. Did you know, Gottlieb, that there is a fork in the road to the land of the dead?”

“No. I do know there’s a fork in Lou’s cutlery drawer.”

“The left fork is a short road. It’s the one travelled by people who die suddenly. Here’s something else you may not know. Salish dead people are all ghosts.”

“That explains a lot.”

“Dead people live the same kind of life as people do here on earth, except everything is backward. When it’s day here on earth, it’s night in the land of the dead. When it’s high tide here, it’s low tide there. And so on. Ghost houses are the same as ours, ghosts hunt and fish and eat things just like we do. Little Sam told us that Gregarious George had died two years ago but had never been buried. George’s body stayed here, but his spirit had gone to the land of the dead and brought back the earth dwarf.”

“George told me that he found the earth dwarf on a beach.”

“Whatever. It was time for the earth dwarf to go back home where he belonged. Because Gregarious George had made such a lengthy business of dying, it would now be necessary for him to take the long right fork to the land of the dead. The big question was, would George come back alive? Nobody knew. In the entire history of the Salish people the only similar case involved a Snohomish boy, back in the 1890s. He came back alive.”

“You’re pulling my leg, Silas.”

“Think so?”

“You’re pulling somebody’s leg. Maybe your own.”

“That’s provocative, Gottlieb.”

“You tell George that if I do catch up with him, he’ll be leaving the land of the living.”

“Are you going to be polite or do I leave here and go home?”

“What have you got to go home for?”

I scowled at him.

“I’m sorry, Silas. I guess I’m a bit uptight. Keep talking.”

“To get to the land of the dead, Little Sam and George and the earth dwarf had to cross two rivers, the first very swift, which was bridged by a fallen tree. The side from which Little Sam and George approached the second river was slow-running but a mile wide. The farther side had a high bank on which Salish ghosts live. This river was crossed in a canoe. Men and women ghosts were having a Red Tamahnous potlatch and enjoying themselves at the top of the bank. Little Sam and George wanted to join these ghost people, but when they tried to climb up the bank they kept slipping back. Ghost people lowered ropes to help them. The earth dwarf went first and got up safely. When Little Sam and George tried to get up the bank, the ghost rope kept breaking. The ghost people shouted to Gregarious George, ‘Does your wife know that you came here today?’ George said, ‘No.’

“The ghost people told George to go back home to his wife and stop drinking. They did not want him in the land of the dead just yet. All they wanted was the earth dwarf. George could come back to the land of the dead when he was older.”

“So that’s where my earth dwarf is?” Gottlieb said. “In the land of the dead?”

Now Frank Sinatra was singing “Fly Me to the Moon.”

“That’s right,” I said. “That earth dwarf is on private Salish property. It’s the only privacy we have left. Ask anybody.”

Gottlieb went out of the café, shaking his head and muttering.

I was just about to get up and leave myself when Patty Nolan came into the café. She was as surprised to see me as I was to see her. I invited her to sit at my table, and after some hesitation she did so.

I asked her how she was doing. She grinned at me and said, “I’m broke, Sammy Lofthouse is riding my ass for money and I don’t have no place to stay. Otherwise, things are great.”

“Need something to eat? It’s on me.”

“Sure. They do an all-day breakfast here?”

I waved at Lou. When he came over he refilled my coffee cup. Patty ordered bacon and eggs with sourdough bread and decaVeinated coffee.

I said, “If you had money, what would you do with it?”

Patty didn’t hesitate. “Get the hell out of Victoria. This place is jinxed. I can’t sleep on Fred’s boat no more ’cause I keep seeing him. Dead. I imagine him lying there dead, you know?”

“What about Hornby Island? Hockey Harkness would love to see you again.”

“That’d be great. Hang out in the fresh air. Pick oysters. Who knows? I might even find a place of my own on Hornby, make a new start. Stranger things have happened, right?”

I took Charles Service’s crumpled blank cheque out of my wallet, wrote Patty’s name and some numbers on it and folded the cheque in two. I shoved it across the table and said, “Here’s a cheque for you, Patty. Don’t look at it till I leave. You’ll find out if it’s any good when you try to cash it.”

I paid for Patty’s breakfast and went out.

≈ ≈ ≈

I was standing on Black Rock. Below me was the sea, and the Warrior Reserve, and all that was left of once-great forest. Douglas firs and hemlock trees and red alders and willows grew thickly up the slope, concealing our longhouse and my little cabin. Lights twinkled in the darkness, branches swayed in an onshore wind. Ted Crow Chance’s big seine boat rode at anchor in the bay — a shadowy outline against the loom of Colby Island. Ted’s diesel had thrown a crank so he was still uselessly tied up while the rest of our Native fleet — 20 boats — had sailed north.

I stripped off my clothes and dived off the rock. The inky water was icy cold. I started swimming and kept at it until I stopped thinking about anything except physical survival.

At midnight I fell into bed and slept.