The city of Thunder Bay is located on the Canadian shore of Lake Superior on what the eighteenth-century French maps called Baie du Tonnerre—Bay of Thunder, a name that I liked way better.
“Where are you from, kid?”
“The Bay of Thunder.”
I mean, seriously.
I followed Minnesota Highway 61 for forty miles to get to the border and Ontario Highway 61 for another forty miles to reach Thunder Bay, which was cobbled together in 1970 with the merger of the communities of Fort William, Port Arthur, Neebing, and McIntyre. It covered more than 330 square miles, which made it nearly three times as large as the Twin Cities if that’s how you measure size. Yet while the Cities had built up, Thunder Bay had built out, so it was mostly flat. I didn’t see a single building that was more than five stories high and precious few that were three or four.
About 120,000 people lived in the city and surrounding municipalities. Enough to support eight pawn shops and nineteen antiques, collectibles, and thrift stores. I started at the far end of the Bay of Thunder near a place called Amethyst Harbor and worked my way back toward the United States.
The owners of the first two stores watched me like I was a black kid shopping at the Mall of America. Yet, if they were anxious that I was checking their inventory against the list and photographs that I carried in a manila folder, they didn’t say. I gave them a nod when I left and they nodded back without smiling.
Come to think of it, Eileen wasn’t smiling either when I retrieved the folder earlier that morning at the Law Enforcement Center. It was the only time that I hadn’t seen her smile and I nearly asked what was wrong. I didn’t because on the list of things I was involved with in Grand Marais that were none of my business, that was near the top.
The owner of the third store appeared deeply concerned by my behavior, though, and I wondered if he had been involved in some nefarious undertaking in the not-too-distant past. He did however, smile when I left his store without accusing him of committing a criminal act.
A couple of stops later, I found myself in downtown Thunder Bay. I parked in front of a pawn shop and walked inside. The store was retail-friendly, with bright lights and shelves and counters arranged to provide the discerning customer with a pleasing shopping experience. Think Marshalls or TJ Maxx.
There was a young woman with the outdoorsy face of a farm girl manning the cash register. She seemed disturbed by my manila folder and quickly summoned her boss. He met me at a glass counter loaded with jewelry and asked what I was doing. I told him.
“Are you OPP?” he asked, meaning the Ontario Provincial Police. “Are you a Horseman?”
“No,” I answered to both questions. In the United States, it’s illegal to pretend to be a cop. I didn’t know if that’s also true in Canada, but I wasn’t about to push my luck.
“Then what are you doing?”
I explained myself in as few words as possible while emphasizing that the merchandise I was searching for had been stolen in the United States.
He smirked at me as if the number of morons he’s met over the years had just increased by one.
“You’ve come a long way for nothing,” he said. “I don’t know what goes on down in the States, but we”—by that I think he meant all of Canada—“don’t buy stolen property. This ain’t no Hollywood pawn shop. A kid comes in with an electric guitar, I’m gonna ask him to play a tune. Customer has a Samsung Galaxy, I’m going to ask to see the charger. A guy says he wants to sell something off the books, I give him a thirty-second head start before I call the police. Whaddya think?”
I pointed at a gold ring with a square silver setting and a diamond in the center of the square. According to the victim’s statement, “This was an old ring that belonged to my father, couldn’t say what it was worth.”
“What about this?” I asked.
“What about it?”
I showed him a photograph of the ring.
“Shit,” he said.
I kept looking and discovered a bracelet and earring set with gold cat heads, a 14K yellow-gold chain with a heart-shaped ruby pendant, and an 18K gold-over-silver chain butterfly pendant with amethyst and diamond accents.
“I don’t know what to say,” the shop owner said.
“Do you have a purchase ticket with the name and address of the seller?” I asked.
“I do. Of course, I do.”
“Let me see it.”
He hesitated before replying. “I can’t show that to you.”
I dropped the only name I knew.
“You can show it to me or you can show it to Detective Constable Aire Wojtowick,” I said. “She’s with the Criminal Investigations Branch of the Thunder Bay Police Service.”
The shop owner hesitated some more.
“I can all but guarantee that the person who sold you this stuff is an American,” I added.
That seemed to do the trick. The shop owner showed me his paper. All of the stolen jewelry had been sold to him by Christopher Weathers of West Fifth Street in Grand Marais.
Never heard of him, my inner voice said.
“I checked the name he gave against his passport,” the shop owner said. “This is for real.”
“Do me a favor, will you? Set all this stuff aside for now.”
The shop owner said he would. He asked if the police service would be contacting him.
“Eventually,” I said.
I don’t know if he believed me or not. I do know he was using his phone when I left the shop.
Probably calling a lawyer, my inner voice said.
There were eight other stores within walking distance of one another, so I left my Mustang where it was and began investigating on foot. My next stop was an antiques store where I discovered a Roman silver denarius coin with the head of Emperor Severus Alexander set in silver bezel as a pendant, a Roman bronze sestertius coin of Severus Alexander also set in silver bezel as a pendant, a Roman silver Republic denarius coin set in gold bezel, and two Roman bronze coins attached to earrings.
The owner of the antiques store didn’t want to believe that he had purchased stolen property, either, but detailed descriptions provided by the victim, including dates between 150 and 300 A.D., convinced him. I had to drop Detective Constable Wojtowick’s name again to get a look at the purchase ticket.
Won’t she be happy about that?
The coins were sold to the antiques store by the same man—Weathers of Grand Marais. I found more merchandise in a pawn shop three stops later, this time sold by a man named Gerard Roach, also of Grand Marais. At my final stop I hit the mother lode—Eddie Curtis, with an address on Margarets Road, Grand Portage, MN, United States of America.
So it was Curtis behind the burglaries, I told myself. And probably Montgomery. And Deputy Wurzer—what did he have to do with it? Did he have anything to do with it?
I glanced at my watch—yes, I still use a wristwatch instead of consulting my phone every five minutes—it was a little past one P.M.
That didn’t take long. So, you have what you came for. Now what?
It was a good question. I wasn’t entirely sure how things worked between the two countries, how evidence gathered in Canada could be used against miscreants in the good ol’ USA or even if it could, for that matter. I decided to contact my friend Aire Wojtowick, although “friend” might have been a slight exaggeration. It had been nearly four years since I was last in Thunder Bay and that was to investigate a murder that turned out not to be a murder but rather part of an elaborate extortion scheme. While I couldn’t recall her exact parting words to me, I remembered their meaning—keep your crap the hell outta my country.
By then I had completed a loop twelve blocks long and a couple of blocks wide through downtown Thunder Bay, so I was now approaching my Mustang parked in front of the first pawn shop from behind. That’s when the alarm systems in my head began firing all at once.
It was an unconscious thing; it took a beat or two for my brain to catch up with my instincts. When it did I saw a tan-colored two-door Toyota with Minnesota license plates parked one block away with clear sight lines to my car. It was occupied. I flashed on Eddie Curtis and the car that he had been driving when Deputy Wurzer stopped him on Marina Road in Grand Portage.
Most people when their fight-or-flight impulse is triggered will try to convince themselves that there is no danger; they’ll tell themselves that they’re just being paranoid. That’s why they don’t cross the street when they should or get on elevators when they shouldn’t. For example, I could have easily talked myself into believing that there were a thousand tan-colored cars that looked like Curtis’s in Minnesota and this was just one of them. Except, I wasn’t in Minnesota. I spun around and started walking in the opposite direction. I walked quickly. If I was wrong, fine, I told myself, I was wrong.
I managed ten yards before throwing a glance over my shoulder. Three men were getting out of the Toyota. One of them was Curtis.
You’ve been made.
“McKenzie, stop,” Curtis said, in case I was still unsure.
I think I might have cursed out loud, but I honestly don’t recall.
I started running.
They started chasing.
“You chicken-shit!” Curtis shouted.
Sticks and stones.
I was looking for a business, a store, a restaurant loaded with lunch-hour customers, with witnesses; a location where my pursuers would be less likely to pick a fight. After all, there is safety in numbers, a man once said. The Bank of Montreal branch office on the corner seemed promising. Someone there might even be induced to call the cops since I couldn’t. My phone company didn’t provide service in Canada.
I veered toward the bank.
That’s when I heard the gunshot.
I thought I felt a bullet whizzing past my ear, but that might have just been my natural paranoia. I had no doubt, though, that I’d never make the bank. Suddenly, all I could see was the three-story redbrick parking ramp standing directly in front of me.
A second gunshot.
Are you fucking kidding me, my inner voice shouted. You can’t shoot people in Canada.
There was a sign at the front gate of the ramp. MAXIMUM 5 KM/H. I think I was going faster than that when I ducked beneath the red-and-white-striped booth arm and made my way inside.
Curtis and his friends slowed behind me. I’m not sure why. Maybe they were afraid that I was planning to ambush them with the nine-millimeter SIG Sauer I had left in my room at the Frontier Motel because you can get up to five years just for carrying a concealed firearm in Canada—which partially explained why the United States averages 12,000 gun-related homicides every year and they have about two hundred.
I had no intention of lingering, though. What was I going to do? Hide behind a car? Crawl beneath an SUV and wait for them to find me? Instead, I dashed up the sloping incline to the second floor of the ramp.
There weren’t as many cars as I hoped, but there were enough. I saw a Lexus and slammed into it the way a lineman might attack a blocking dummy. Its security alarm went off. I kept running until I encountered a BMW. And a Nissan. And another BMW. Soon the concrete ramp was echoing with the screeching sound of car alarms.
If you can’t get to a crowd, maybe you can get a crowd to come to you.
I sliced between two parked cars to a low concrete wall. I could see the ramp on the level below me. I decided it wasn’t too far of a jump—despite my innate fear of heights. I scampered over the wall and leapt onto the hood of a Honda Accord. Its alarm system went off, too.
I quickly made my way toward the exit. Let Curtis think I was hiding in the parking garage, I told myself, while I zigged and zagged to a safe location where I could explain my dilemma to the local constabulary.
Only they were smarter than I gave them credit for. Two of the gunmen had followed me into the parking garage, yet the third had moved along the street, positioning himself outside where he had a clear view of the exit.
Now what, smart guy?
I heard running footsteps in between the whoop-whoop-whoop of the sirens. I cut back across the ramp and wedged myself in the tiny space between the front grille of a Honda Ridgeline pickup truck and the low wall. The sound of footsteps became louder. I didn’t see who made them.
Yeah, but did they see you?
Voices shouting to be heard over the car alarms.
“Where did he go?” someone asked.
Okay, they didn’t see you.
“Did he leave the ramp?” someone else asked.
“No.” The voice started soft, but became louder as the speaker left his post outside the exit and entered the garage. “McKenzie has to be around here somewhere.”
“He must be hiding between cars or under a car. You go that way. We’ll go this way.”
“He could be hiding inside a car.”
“Eddie, we don’t have time for this.”
“He’s right. We gotta get out of here. The Mounties.”
“And then what? He knows who we are.”
“Eddie…”
“Keep looking. Hurry.”
I propped myself between the wall and the truck’s front grille and pulled my legs up so Curtis and his minions wouldn’t be able to see my feet if they searched beneath the Honda. I supported one knee on the bumper and braced the other against the wall, while I folded my body so that it would be hidden by the grille. It was hard; I was doing a complex yoga pose without ever having done yoga before. I figured my chances were better, though, if I stayed put rather than trying to make a run for it. Something I learned hunting pheasants in farm fields with the old man all those years ago. I rarely saw the birds hiding among the cornstalks. It was only when they attempted to fly away that they were in danger of being shot.
I listened intently.
Footsteps came and went.
Voices, only I couldn’t hear what was said.
One by one the sound of the car alarms died away.
Silence. It seemed louder than the sirens had been.
Someone shouted my name. He told me what he was going to do to me.
Someone else shouted what I could do to myself—something that I wouldn’t have thought was possible until I had folded myself between the pickup and the wall.
More silence.
Another siren. And another.
Outside or inside, I couldn’t tell.
Give it a few minutes before you take a look, I told myself.
I waited longer than that.
My muscles cramped.
I let them.
My head ached.
I ignored that, too.
Her voice startled me.
The hand I was using to keep myself perpendicular slipped and my forehead whacked against the truck’s headlight.
I looked up into her eyes.
Detective Constable Aire Wojtowick was another woman who made me reevaluate my dating criteria. While Perrin Stewart was big from side to side, she was big from top to bottom. Well over six feet and solid without a hint of doubt in her eyes. If LeBron James ever encountered her on a basketball court, he’d say, “Excuse me,” and dribble in the opposite direction. Her people were from Slovakia, which surprised me. Given her golden hair and blue eyes you’d swear she was a product of Sweden. Or Minnesota.
“Hello, McKenzie,” she said. “Miss me?”
“As a matter of fact…”
I uncurled my body and stood. My legs protested when I took a step. I didn’t want Aire to know that, though. My forehead ached, yet I refused to rub it.
“What brings you here?” I asked.
“I was in the neighborhood when I heard that there was a running gun battle on the streets of Thunder Bay. Are you out of your mind?”
“It wasn’t me. It was three others. I have one name and the description of a car. If you contact the Canadian Border Service…”
“Are you sure there were only three?”
“Yes. A man named…”
“I have them in custody. Now I have you, too. My work here is done.”
We both headed for the exit of the parking garage.
“Wait a minute,” I said. “I was the one being chased. Check your traffic cams. And witnesses. There have to be witnesses.”
“Are you armed, McKenzie?”
“Of course not. Not in Canada. Wait. How did you find me?”
“Our parking ramps have cameras. How ’bout yours?”
“It depends on how old—if you saw film then you know I’m telling the truth.”
“You haven’t told me anything yet,” she said. “Like what the hell you’re doing in Thunder Bay.”
“I was going to call you. I really was.”
“A couple of pawn shop owners beat you to it. You used my name to conduct your inquiries? How dare you, McKenzie?”
“I can explain all this, Aire.”
“You’d damn well better. And it’s Detective Constable Wojtowick to you.”
“It’s going to be a long story.”
She gestured at my face. “I notice you’ve been bruised.”
“That’s part of it.”
By then we had reached the exit of the ramp. There were half a dozen black-and-white Thunder Bay Police Service vehicles blocking traffic and at least twice that many officers. I liked the red patches on the shoulders of their black uniforms and the red bands on their hats. So European. Aire was the only one dressed in plainclothes.
“Are you still the junior member of the Criminal Investigation Branch?” I asked.
“I’ve moved up to middle management. Are you still tilting at windmills?”
“From time to time.”
We walked past a few of the cars. The trio that had attacked me had been cuffed and stuffed into the backseats of separate vehicles. I wondered if they were also the men who punched me out on the beach across from the Frontier Motel and decided I didn’t really care one way or the other. I recognized Curtis.
“Let me talk to this guy,” I said.
“Hell no.”
“It might give you some insight into what’s going on.”
“Oh, you’re going to give me plenty of insight, McKenzie. Guaranteed.”
“Detective Constable.” I used Aire’s title on purpose. “In my country we have a thing called an excited utterance. It’s defined as a statement made by the declarant when the declarant is startled by something. It’s admissible as evidence.”
“Declarant—that’s a lawyer’s word if I’ve ever heard one. Forget it.”
“Detective Constable.”
“Do you honestly think he’s going to take one look at you and confess all his crimes?”
“His name is Eddie Curtis. He’s a Native American. Ojibwa. First Nation up here. I’m pretty sure he was running a burglary crew out of Cook County in Minnesota. I know for a fact that he came to Canada to kill me.”
“For a fact?”
“More or less.”
“What is it with you Americans that whenever you think beyond your own borders it’s to screw things up for the rest of the world? All right, McKenzie. Five minutes.”
We approached the officer standing next to the vehicle. He actually tipped his hat at Aire.
“Ma’am,” he said.
“Did you read him the caution?”
“I did, ma’am. I don’t think he appreciates where he is.”
“Let me give it a try.”
The officer opened the car door and Aire leaned inside. Curtis stared at her, a blank expression on his face, his hands cuffed behind his back.
“You are under arrest for discharging a restricted firearm in public and about a dozen other crimes we haven’t worked out yet, including attempted murder,” Aire said. “Do you understand? You have the right to retain and instruct counsel without delay. We will provide you with a toll-free telephone lawyer referral service if you do not have your own lawyer. Anything you say can be used in court as evidence. Do you understand? Would you like to speak to a lawyer?”
Curtis didn’t reply.
I squeezed between Aire and the door frame.
“How you doin’, Eddie?” I said.
“Fuck you, McKenzie.”
“What are you doing here, Eddie? Who sent you to kill me?”
He didn’t answer.
“You have the chance to do yourself some good, Eddie. I’d take it if I were you.”
“I have the right to remain silent.”
“Actually, you don’t,” Aire said. “There’s nothing in the charter that says you have the right to remain silent. I mean, you can. Anything you do or say may be used as evidence against you. But it’s not a right. Nor do you have the right to have an attorney present during questioning. Nor do we have to stop talking to you even if you have nothing to say to us. This is Canada. We do things a little differently up here.”
“What are you saying?”
“Eddie,” I said. “Look at me. Eddie.”
He looked.
“This isn’t the United States. Our laws won’t protect you here. My advice, cooperate.”
“I—I want a lawyer.”
“As soon as we get you to jail you can call a duty counsel who will assist you until you can secure representation,” Aire said.
“Like a public defender?”
“I suppose.”
“Okay, then.”
“Who sent you Eddie?” I asked.
“Fuck you, McKenzie.”
“Change of subject—where are the paintings?”
“I am so goddamned tired of hearing about those fucking paintings. I ain’t got nothing to do with them. How many times do I have to say it? If it wasn’t for those paintings you wouldn’t have been nosing around and I wouldn’t be here now.”
“Then why did you kill David Montgomery?”
“I didn’t kill Dave. Don’t even think of putting that on me. I’m telling you, I have an alibi for that; is what I told that fucking deputy when he pulled me over on the rez like he owned the place. I had nothing to do with it. Dave wasn’t even part of my crew. Okay, sometimes he’d tell me things like about this woman whose windows he replaced who had ancient Roman coins that she turned into jewelry and I’d slip him a couple bucks. Other than that, he was just some asshole dating my sister.”
“I’m sure she’s very proud of you.”
“Fuck you.”
“Good luck to you, Eddie. You’re going to need it.”
I stepped away from the vehicle. Detective Constable Wojtowick closed the car door. She spoke to the officer.
“Did you hear that part about his crew?” she asked. “About the Roman coins?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Make sure it’s in your report.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Together Aire and I started walking down the street.
“Am I in custody?” I asked.
“Do you need to be?”
“I was just wondering if you were going to take me to the police station or if I could drive myself.”
“Do you remember where it is?”
“Balmoral Street across from the car dealership?”
“Where’s your car?”
I pointed down the block to where it was parked outside the pawn shop.
“Is that a Mustang? Not having a midlife crisis, are you, McKenzie?”
“It was a gift from my girlfriend.”
“Nice. McKenzie, I’m going to ask you a lot of questions in front of a camera. Then we’re going to transcribe your answers and you’re going to sign it after swearing that every word of it is true.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“For now, though—what are you doing in Thunder Bay?”
I gave her the edited version.
Aire’s response was to stare at me.
“I don’t understand,” she said. “Your Sheriff Bowland could have done all that himself.”
“What do you mean?”
“What do you mean what do I mean? The man contacts my office. He sends us an incident report along with the list of stolen items. Me or one of my people check the pawn shops like you just did and secure the stolen property. Next, we contact a judge and have an arrest warrant issued for the suspects who sold the stolen property. These suspects, they can only be prosecuted in Canada. If they’re in the States, we can’t touch them. We’ll contact the CBS and have a checkmark placed next to their names, though, so if they try to enter the country again, bingo …
“’Course, they can’t be prosecuted in the States, either, at least not for selling stolen property in Canada. We would pass on everything that we have and that should be enough for the sheriff to secure a warrant to search the suspect’s house, car, whatever; see if he can build a case, that way. Take the suspect’s fingerprints if they’re not already in the system and try to get a match at the crime scenes. At worst, the sheriff will be able to put eyes on him.”
“I guess he was put off by all the paperwork, one country’s law enforcement agency cooperating with another,” I said.
“What paperwork? There isn’t any paperwork beyond what I just told you.”
“Do you mean to tell me that a sheriff’s department in the United States reaching out to a police service in Canada isn’t any different than working with Wisconsin?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never worked with Wisconsin.”
“C’mon.”
“What?”
“That doesn’t make sense. Deputy Wurzer told me…”
“What?”
I gave it some thought and decided. “Maybe it does make sense.”
“McKenzie…”
“Nothing. Nothing, Detective Constable. It’s just—you’ve given me a lot to think about.”
“While you’re thinking, I have another question for you.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“What paintings?”