The forensic team had moved the big, angular sculpture off a sideboard in Gerald Blaise’s study. In its place were the contents of his hidden safe: three spiral-bound notebooks in differing sizes, two stacks of paper, a cash box. It contained ten thousand dollars, bundled in large notes. There were legal documents, including title papers to the condo, and a copy of his will. There was also an old large brown envelope.
“Everything in her safe is the usual,” said an Ident technician, “A will, investments, a jewellery box. They both owned the condo. He left a couple of charitable donations, to an actors’ fund and to PTC to fund an award in his name. And some cash to provide for the care of his cats. But all the rest goes to his wife.” Budgie Torrance was going to be a rich woman.
Roxanne and Izzy flipped through the notebooks. The largest but thinnest of them itemized the art he had bought. Gerald had been unusually careful, for him, in his record keeping, when it came to his collection. It seemed that each work of art was listed by date, the name of the person or gallery he’d bought it from, and the amount he had paid, but the writing was a large scrawl, almost impossible to decipher. The numbers were clearer. They could see there were a few early purchases but the record began in earnest about ten years ago, when he had inherited his aunt’s fortune. The big envelope contained papers relating to that inheritance, including a record of the sale of her house. There was an old faded photograph. It had been a large, gracious pile, standing in its own grounds in a well-to-do Toronto neighbourhood. “Look, he got over a million for it,” said Izzy, “Back then.” Real estate values had soared in the past decade. It would have made more a few years later.
The second notebook contained scribbled notes. They could see dates at the tops of different pages. Was it a diary?
“Can you read this?” Roxanne passed the book over to Izzy.
“Barely.” Izzy peered at the script. Roxanne sighed. They might need a handwriting expert to decipher it, and that would take time. If Gerald had secrets, would they be recorded there?
The third notebook was a small blue address book. It was old, but looked like it was still in use. You could figure out what some of the names were if you knew what you were looking for. Roxanne recognized some of the capital letters. There was a ‘T’ followed by a ‘B’ that looked recent. Was that Tim Baldwin’s contact information? It looked like it might be. Was this a general address book or was it more particular? Was this where he had listed his various amorous dalliances through the years? If so, Gerald had been an active man.
“It’s too bad we don’t have a last name for that girl yet, the one he was seen with at Professor Dyck’s party. Wonder if she’s in it,” said Izzy.
Roxanne’s phone buzzed. Inspector Schultz. She went outside the apartment into the hallway to take the call. He didn’t talk for long. The city police had been in touch with him about this joint investigation. Some guy called Jenkins was in charge at their end.
“I’ve talked with him,” she said.
“Well, make sure he doesn’t dump their workload on you,” he said. “You’re investigating the Blaise murder. His is separate. Isn’t it?”
“The two dead men knew each other, sir. The two killings may well be related.”
“Right. Okay,” he grumbled. “I’ll talk to the city and get back to you.” And he hung up. The elevator bell rang. The doors slid open and out stepped Margo Wishart.
“Here you are, Sergeant!” Margo was breathless. She had been hurrying. “Sorry I’m late. I heard the news about Thom Dyck. I can’t believe it! It’s true he was killed? It’s the talk of the whole university.”
Roxanne remembered that she had arranged for Margo to come and check out the art on Gerald Blaise’s walls. “How well did you know him, Dr. Wishart?”
“Thom? He was just another prof. I was on a couple of committees with him. Seemed nice enough. Worked hard.” They walked back into the condo, Margo unwrapping a scarf from around her neck, getting her breath back, her eyes already scanning the paintings on the wall.
“Come see. We found a notebook. With a list of what he had bought, we think.” Roxanne led Margo into Gerald’s study. “It’s hard to read. You know Izzy, right?” Margo did, from the old Interlake case and from living in the same area. They’d bumped into each other a couple of times at the local grocery store.
“Hi there,” said Izzy. “We haven’t had lunch yet. Will I go pick up sandwiches?” Izzy was hungry. It was two in the afternoon already. Margo was still looking at paintings on the walls, fascinated by what she was seeing.
“Look at these! He had good taste.” She reluctantly pulled her eyes away. “Where’s that book you mentioned?”
Izzy passed Margo the notebook, grabbed her jacket from the back of Gerald’s desk chair and went to get food. Margo sank into Gerald’s comfortable reading chair. Roxanne flipped through the little address book, trying to decipher it.
“Well,” said Margo. “Will you look at this? It’s kind of like a diary.” Roxanne stared. Izzy had passed Margo the wrong notebook. Margo was holding the middle-sized one, the one they had thought was illegible.
“You can read that?” she asked.
“Sure. It’s not that difficult. It’s just a bad italic.” Margo closed the book. “I’ve seen worse. I suppose I shouldn’t be looking. It’s private.” She was right, but Roxanne was dying to know what it said, and she knew from past experience that Margo would be discreet.
“That’s okay. We can’t read it,” said Roxanne. “What does it say?”
“It’s scribbled notes. He seems to have written in it most days. Goes back about a year. Would you like me to transcribe it for you?” Margo opened the book again. Then she glanced back up at Roxanne over the top of a page, eyes bright with interest. “But you don’t want me knowing too much about this case, do you?” Margo’s curiosity had led her into serious trouble before, when she had become involved in the Interlake case, last February.
“We need to know,” said Roxanne. “We’ll pay you for doing the work. Anything you find out has to remain confidential.”
“Well, of course, Sergeant.” A dimple deepened in each of her cheeks.
“You could call me Roxanne.”
“And I’m Margo. Since we’re going to be working together again,” Margo teased. “Do you know who Tim is?” She had flipped the book open at Gerald’s last entry. “It sounds like Gerald was planning to move to B.C., to live with him.”
“Read it.” Roxanne listened while Margo Wishart read out the latest entries in Gerald’s diary.
“It’s dated almost three weeks ago,” said Margo, “And it’s very scrappy. But he’s noted a couple of properties for sale in Victoria and another in Vancouver. He gives the prices. The Vancouver one costs a hundred thousand more. There’s a row of question marks after one of the Victoria ones. He writes, ‘Good wall space. Ocean view.’ Then: ‘Would Tim want to live here? Use Denman as summer/studio? Vancouver easier by ferry?’” She raised her eyes from the page. “Do you think he was planning to leave Budgie Torrance after all these years and go live in B.C. with this person called Tim?”
“Does he actually say that?”
“Not really. Here’s the most recent entry that mentions Budgie. ‘On phone with B tonight. Big row about Mb.’ I think that’s Macbeth. ‘Wants a rethink, hates her costume. Wishes I wasn’t directing. This is the last time I work with her. Ever.’ It doesn’t sound like he’d told her, though. Oh, here she is again.” This entry was another few pages back.
“‘Went to Regina. Decent opening. B in good form. Think she’s having it off with Sam Geddes. Good for her.’” Izzy reappeared, carrying a couple of paper bags. One contained wrapped sandwiches, the other, bottled juices. Margo continued to read aloud. “‘Drove home next day. Three more whole weeks without B. FaceTimed with Tim. Booked ticket for Nov. 3, day after Mb ends. Can’t wait.’”
“Sam Geddes, Globe Theatre,” Roxanne said to Izzy, who was already unwrapping a ham and cheese bun.
“I’ll look. Soon as.” Izzy bit into a fat bun. Margo opened a can of orange juice. She nodded towards the diary.
“I don’t suppose I can take this home? I could work on it tonight and send you the transcript tomorrow.”
Roxanne shook her head. “No, but we can make you a copy. You should really have a look at what art is on the walls after you’ve eaten. While we’re here. You’ll probably be able to read his inventory too.” She passed Margo that notebook.
Izzy opened the Globe Theatre website on her laptop, chewing while she did. Sam Geddes had been acting in the same play as Budgie. He lived in Saskatchewan, was in his middle years, smiled for the camera.
“He might have a car,” she said. “Budgie could have borrowed it and driven to Winnipeg and back. Five, six hours max? She would have been finished work by eleven that Wednesday night and they probably didn’t need her back at the theatre until seven on Thursday. Twenty hours, Regina to Winnipeg and back. It’s enough time.”
It was possible, but it still seemed like a long shot. The murder didn’t seem premeditated and driving all that distance to do the killing required forethought. Margo helped herself to a chicken salad sandwich and continued to read the diary while she ate. Izzy closed her laptop and looked though the papers that had been found in the safe. Roxanne sat at Gerald’s desk and glanced through the address book again. She wished she could decipher it. She opened it at the B section and passed it to Margo.
“Can you see Alison Beck’s name?” she asked.
Margo scanned the page and shook her head. Maybe this really was a listing of his lovers, past and present. She flipped it over to the letter D. “Thom Dyck’s name is here,” she said.
Budgie Torrance barged in the door, interrupting them.
“Have you got keys for me? The locksmith said he left them here.”
“Try the caretaker,” Izzy suggested. Budgie didn’t leave.
“Tamsin Longstaff is livid,” she reported with some satisfaction. “The whole of PTC will have to be rekeyed. Gerald’s master key could open up everything.” She looked at the open safe, the notebooks and papers scattered around the room.
“You can’t keep that stuff,” she said. “Without asking. It’s mine.”
“You and I need to talk. Now,” said Roxanne.
“Don’t think so.”
Margo Wishart tactfully got up to leave the room but she didn’t close the door. She stood, examining a painting on the wall just outside, all ears.
“Can’t.” Budgie’s determined little chin jutted out. “I’m on a break. Have to get back.”
“We’ll let them know you’re detained. Shall we use your own study?”
Budgie picked up an unwrapped sandwich from the desk, the one intended for Roxanne. She grabbed a bottle of cranberry juice as well.
“Oh, well. Might as well eat while I’m here.”
Roxanne wasn’t fooled. She could see Budgie checking out what Gerald’s safe had revealed. Didn’t she know what was in it already? Izzy had her phone to her ear, letting Tamsin Longstaff know that Budgie was going to be with them for an hour or so. Roxanne signalled to her to follow and opened the door to Budgie’s boudoir. Margo Wishart checked off a painting, pencil in hand, and watched them go, over the top of Gerald’s inventory book.
Once inside, Budgie walked straight to the large wicker chair. She took her place in it like a queen on a peacock throne. She unscrewed the juice bottle and drank from it. Placed it down on a side table. Roxanne closed the door firmly behind her.
“What’s it all about this time?” Budgie said, and unwrapped the sandwich.
“You know that you inherit most of your husband’s estate?”
“All of it. He left everything to me, I left everything to him. That was the deal.” She bit into corned beef with mustard. Roxanne took the wrought iron chair with the cushioned seat, in front of a mirrored dressing table. It was scattered with used cosmetics, a hairbrush, some costume jewellery. She faced Budgie.
“You’re the person who benefits most from Gerald’s death.”
The door opened and Izzy slipped in. She closed it behind her and stood, listening.
“You’re thinking I maybe killed him? Dream on, Sergeant. I was in Regina, remember?”
“You performed in a play on the night of Wednesday, October 4th,” said Roxanne. “And again, the following evening. What did you do in between?”
Budgie chewed some more and swallowed, taking her time. “Went out to eat after the show, probably. Like always. With some actors from the cast. Got back to the hotel, slept late. Exercised. Need to keep in shape, you know. Went online.” She turned her attention back to her lunch.
“One of the actors was Sam Geddes?”
Budgie looked up at Roxanne. “Sure. Lovely man. A dear friend.” She wasn’t at all fazed. She appeared amused that they knew about him. “Look, Sergeant, I couldn’t have done it. Gerald died during the night, right? Whoever left his body out there in the back of the car didn’t do it in daylight. And there’s no planes during the night from Regina. I couldn’t have made it here.”
Izzy had checked the airlines. Budgie was right about that, but she still could have made it to Winnipeg.
“You could have driven.” Izzy folded her arms and leaned against the door. “Your play was done by ten. You could have been here by five in the morning, easy. Maybe earlier. Nobody on the road and it was a clear night. You could have driven fast. Left here by seven. It would still have been dark. You’d have got back to Regina by noon. Enough time to catch up on some shut-eye before you had to be back at the theatre in the evening.”
Roxanne watched Budgie’s face become an impassive mask.
“I don’t have a car.”
“But Sam Geddes probably has.”
“Ask him,” Budgie Torrance stated flatly.
“Gerald was thinking about quitting his job.”
“No, he wasn’t!” Budgie retorted. “Who is telling you all this garbage? That’s just a rumour. He was going to stay on for five more years. Retire on his twenty-fifth anniversary.”
“He wanted to move to B.C.”
“Sure. Maybe. But not right now. When he was sixty-five.” Did Budgie believe that or was she pretending again? She was good at that.
“He was seeing a young sculptor called Timothy Baldwin.”
“That right?”
“Was he planning to leave Winnipeg? And you? Go to live with Tim Baldwin in B.C.?”
Budgie sat forward and grasped each arm of her big chair. Suddenly, she looked like a bird about to take flight.
“No way. I told you. He did his thing, I did mine. We always came home to one another. I was his rock, Sergeant. The only person he could really trust.”
Alison Beck had said something similar. How many people had Gerald convinced of that?
“What relationship did Gerald have with Professor Thom Dyck?”
“Thom Dyck? What’s this got to do with him?”
That question had caught Budgie off guard. The news of his death couldn’t have reached her yet.
“Thom and Gerald had a fling, but that was about three years back, when we were doing All’s Well That Ends Well. Thom was assistant directing. Not much good at it, but it suited Gerald to have him onside. Got him onto the board of the theatre right after. Helps to have friends in high places.” She drank some juice. “I’ve got to eat. We won’t get another break until six. That Jazz Elliot is a total slave driver.” She lifted her bun again and smiled. She could change her manner in an instant. When Budgie wanted to she could be just as engaging as her charming husband. She lifted the sandwich to her mouth again.
“I have bad news,” said Roxanne. “Professor Dyck’s body was discovered this morning.”
Budgie paused mid-bite. “He’s dead?” Her eyebrows arched in surprise.
“Stabbed.” Roxanne watched Budgie flinch. “Where were you today before the police and the locksmith arrived here?”
Budgie Torrance thought for a moment, then rose to her feet. She put down what was left of the sandwich and smoothed her skirt. It was short, worn over her usual black tights. “I don’t think you are allowed to ask me questions like that without a lawyer present, Sergeant.” She spoke the words as if she was delivering lines from a play. “I need to call someone.”
“Don’t go anywhere without informing us,” Roxanne said to her retreating back. Izzy stood aside to let her pass. She saw Budgie raise her phone to her ear as she left.
Margo Wishart was sitting at the dining room table, the large Inuit carving behind her, Gerald’s inventory notebook open in front of her.
“I’ve discovered something,” she said once the door had swung shut. “I think two more pieces are missing. Both by local artists, both paintings. Worth several thousand. One by Bruce Foot, quite large. Another by Ivan Waters. I can’t see them anywhere.”
“The Annie Chan was big too,” said Roxanne. “Whoever took them must have been able to transport them away from here. They’d have needed a vehicle.”
“Some of the collection is new, bought within the last few years.” Margo continued. “Most of it Canadian. He liked figurative work and abstracts with some emotional clout. Dramatic pieces. But then there’s that.” She indicated the large green soapstone carving behind her. “It’s a Cape Dorset carving. That one is museum quality. And he has some other Indigenous work. There’s a nice Morrisseau. Two Baker Lake prints. An Odjig. They’re older. They’re awfully good. He has a nice Kurelek as well.” She pointed at a winter prairie landscape, a child skating.
“Worth a lot?”
“Shall I find out for you?”
“That might be useful. Thanks.”
Roxanne looked out the window. It faced onto the alley. She watched Budgie Torrance strut across the back lane towards the theatre, then her phone buzzed. “I need to get this.” She stepped out into the condo hallway. It was the worker from the Youth Centre.
Tracy Ross had said she was taking Zeke home, he told her. She’d taken him up north. He mentioned a reserve community in the northern Interlake. He did have a cellphone number for her. She called it.
“This is Tracy. I’m in the bush. Can’t talk. Back in a week or so,” said a recorded message. Roxanne found Izzy and Margo back in Gerald’s study, searching through papers.
“He had to have this collection insured,” said Margo. “There are over fifty pieces. It’s got to be worth a small fortune.”
“His accountant will know.” Izzy waved a financial document.
It was after four-thirty. Rush hour had started. They began to clean up. Roxanne needed to go look after her son and his cousins. Her sister had a meeting to go to. She’d promised.
“I need to get up the road, too,” said Margo Wishart. “Send me the copy of that notebook soon, will you?” she said to Izzy as she left. “I’ll get going on it right away.”
Roxanne managed to connect with Inspector Brian Donohue later that night, after Finn had gone to bed.
“Heard that there’s another body,” he said. She told him how Professor Dyck had been found that morning, lying dead in a city park and therefore out of RCMP territory. But obviously, the cases were linked.
“I’m going to have to work alongside a city DS called Cooper Jenkins,” she complained. “Do you know him?”
Brian laughed. “Coop Jenkins? He’s still around? I was on a committee with him years ago. One of those guys that needs to be out there, working cases in person. Not happy at a desk. He’s still a sergeant, eh?”
Roxanne liked working out in the field herself. She wasn’t ready to sit behind a desk yet, either. But this was her first year as sergeant. She had a few years to play investigator before she tried to move up a rank.
“He calls me Foxy Roxy,” she said.
“Could be worse,” Brian said. “Surprised nobody’s thought of it sooner, with the hair. Hey, are we going to be able get together soon?”
She felt a twinge of guilt. It had been a couple of weeks now. “You know how it is,” she stalled. “A case like this. And I have to find time for Finn. I haven’t been at the gym for days. I’ll never make next year’s marathon if I don’t get back to it soon.” Roxanne liked to run. She was getting out of shape. “But maybe on the weekend?”
“Dunno,” he said. “I’ve got stuff happening. We should talk.”
“Okay.” She was distracted by a text coming in. Coop Jenkins. “Maybe early next week?”
Cooper Jenkins had written Meet tomorrow? My office? 9?
Sure, she texted back as soon as she’d hung up.