“Somebody shot at you, Ed? Jesus Christ, did you identify him?”
Before this piece of information dropped, Hook and McCurdy were discussing the Terminal League, and how the Asahi will fare against Collingwood.
“Identify? Calvin, I just told you I didn’t see him. It was a sniper.”
“Are you sure you didn’t imagine it, Ed? Into the powder perhaps? Some of the eucaine Patterson is so keen on?”
“As I told you, Calvin, snorting eucaine rots the nose. My system was clean as a whistle—a drop or two of whisky was all.”
“Still, you only heard what you thought was a shot.”
“Okay, fine. I heard something like a shot. Yes, I know, it could have been a car backfiring—except that it came from above and I heard a metallic ping nearby. When I looked in the direction of the ping, it looked as though something had grazed the lamp-post next to my ear. Calvin, I’m losing patience. Do you think a man doesn’t know when he’s been shot at?”
Usually they do, Hook has to admit. The two men pass the bottle back and forth twice. McCurdy’s flimsy evidence hovers in the air like a fart.
On the screen, a man with sad eyes and a waxed moustache, draped with gold braid and a chestful of gongs, inspects a line of troops; this is followed by an item in which a representative of the Catholic Legion of Decency denounces the moral degeneracy in Hollywood movies, along with a series of stills depicting underdressed women.
“Is this another item about Italian fascists ogling girls in gym wear?” Hook has trouble making sense of newsreels. Increasingly, they resemble the dreams he has on bad nights, when he wakes up screaming.
“No, Calvin. The ladies are in California. The Fascist is Greek.”
“Ah. Thank you, I’ve been meaning to bring that up.”
“About women’s hemlines?”
“No, the lift operator at the hotel.”
“What does he have to do with anything?”
“Mr Sark is Greek. It took me a while to realize that. And yet he claims to have been wounded at the Somme.”
“And how is that implausible?” The reporter takes a delicate swig from the bottle, then passes it back.
Hook sighs at the persistent ignorance of the folks back home.
“Come on, Ed, think: Greece was neutral. The country joined up at the last moment to cash in on reparations, hardly lost a man. The Greeks are a sneaky race, always plotting behind your back.”
“I suppose people say that about Indians as well. And of course the Jews.”
“Not necessarily. Oppenheimer was the most popular mayor the city ever had. He could have run dead and buried and still been re-elected.”
“Oppenheimer was an exception, Ed. There are always exceptions.” Hook wipes the neck of the bottle with one hand before taking a slug; with McCurdy’s personal habits, you never know what germs he might have picked up.
“Getting back to your original point, Calvin, how do you know that Mr Sark is Greek? Did he tell you that himself?”
“I know Greektown well. They have their own way of speaking English, as do Orientals. They ask questions as if they’re statements, and vice versa. They don’t know how to use the word the. Not to mention another thing about Sark—”
“You’re going to complain about his smell are you, Calvin? Like you do with your assistant?”
“No, it’s what he said about the Ross rifle. He praised a rifle that blows up in your face.”
“Ah. Even I know about the Ross rifle.”
“A dead giveaway, really.” Hook lights his third Ogden’s. He remembers men whose faces were blown apart by their Ross rifles. The wounds healed eventually, but the faces were hardly faces anymore.
“The only true thing I know about Sark is that he was a sniper.”
“How can you tell?”
“They acquire a certain look, and he has it. Surely you don’t think he shot at you? You don’t even know him.”
“Some louts who didn’t know me from Adam gave me a dreadful thrashing just a few weeks ago—over a column I could scarcely remember writing. Maybe I spoke disparagingly about elevator operators at some point. I understand Greeks hold grudges for generations.”
“You can’t offend Sark; his English isn’t good enough. Besides, he has contributed to the investigation, if you can call it that. He’s the only witness to Cunning’s habits who might be willing to open his beak.”
It is always surprising to come out of a matinee and find that it’s light outside—enough light that McCurdy decides to take a shortcut home. South on Carrall, he turns down the alley joining Hastings and Chinatown.
Alleyways tend to echo, so the muffled curses coming from down the way were more than audible. Were McCurdy on the ball—and he should have been, having had the boots taken to him before—his first instinct would have sent him scampering back to Carrall right away.
But no, his mind was on something else. Now he is standing between two trash bins looking at two bruisers in greasy serge suits who are in the process of robbing a portly man with a bleeding nose; and by the time he can make out their faces, they are looking right back at him—with the look of men who don’t like being interrupted.
For the second time in a week he has walked into a violent situation, but he doesn’t freeze in fear this time; instead, a more familiar instinct activates in his brain: to bluff. Seemingly on its own, his mouth begins to move and, remarkably, words issue: “Gentlemen, in a spirit of fairness, I thought I should warn you that the police are on their way.”
Bruiser One lets out a snort, while Bruiser Two produces a barrel flask of amber liquid from the victim’s inside pocket.
“Go feck yourself four-eyes. We are the police.”
The bottle smashes at McCurdy’s feet, splattering his trousers with sour whisky and broken glass.
Having first stopped off at his hotel to change, McCurdy enters the Hotel Vancouver, proceeds to the lift and waits to one side until the doors slide open; after checking to see that there will be no other passengers, he hops into the car at the last moment.
Barely glancing in his direction, the lift operator closes the cage and awaits instructions.
“Tenth floor please.”
“Certainly, sir. Tenth floor.” The lift operator’s gloved hand pushes the rheostat handle.
The reporter attempts an intimidating look (which isn’t easy with glasses) and decides to get right to the point. “I believe you are Mr Sark?”
The elevator whirrs by each floor. “Yes sir, that is my name.”
“Mr Sark, I have a question: Did you shoot at me?”
The lift operator eases back on the handle. He seems amused. “Shoot at you, sir? Why would I shoot at you?”
“You’re missing the point, Mr Sark. I’m not asking about your motive. I’m asking whether you did it. The why will come later.”
The lift operator turns to face him, shoulders thrust back; his crystal eyes have narrowed slightly. “And you, sir? Who are you?”
“Ed McCurdy of The Evening Star. I’m writing a feature for the Saturday edition. It’s about fraudulent veterans taking jobs away from men who served their country. I thought you might like to comment, Mr Sark—whose real name is, I believe, Sarcos.”
The lift operator abruptly pulls back the rheostat lever and the car comes to a halt between floors, more abruptly than necessary.
“Where you get that name?”
“It’s in your file. A matter of public record, if one bothers to look it up.” (McCurdy maintains a firm gaze, despite the fact that there is no such record; he made a guess based on scanning the telephone directory under the BAview exchange.)
“And what else is on my file, sir?”
McCurdy notes that the doors are still shut. The air is thick with something other than tobacco breath. The lift operator glares at him like a dog assessing a prowler, and it occurs to McCurdy that a man could do considerable damage with that wooden arm, now that they are alone together in a little box.
Out of caution, his mouth starts to qualify his last statement: “By file, of course I don’t mean literally, but as a sort of metaphor.”
The lift operator looks him straight in the eye; it is like having one’s brain poked with an icicle. After a disconcerting pause, he pushes the rheostat and the car continues upward.
“What do you say is this metaphor? You interest me.”
“Of course. You don’t use metaphors in Greek, do you? Sergeant Hook told me to watch for that.”
Our man relaxes slightly. “Is this the policeman asking for Mr Cunning?”
“Yes. We’re old acquaintances. We sometimes discuss this and that. Your name happened to come up in the conversation.”
“Why did you not tell me you are friend of Hook? What is this about shooting at you?”
“I was shot at, outside the Lumberman’s Club.”
“This is another of your metaphors?”
“I wish it were. Mr Hook has described you and your war experience. The word sniper came up.”
“That is a bad word to many people.”
“If the shoe fits.”
“What is this about shoes?”
“Were you indeed a sniper during the war?”
“The important answer to your question is no, I did not shoot at you. Proof is you are still alive.”
McCurdy doesn’t have a ready reply for that.
“Will you be getting off here, sir?”
“No, we can return to the lobby now.”
“As you wish.” He pushes the rheostat lever and the lift begins to plummet.
“By the way, Mr Sark, I have a small favour to ask—I could use your help with something.”
“I am not surprised.”
They meet before dusk, beneath the street lamp in front of the Lumberman’s Club. McCurdy is, by means known only to himself, more alert than usual and has an enhanced ability to see in the dark.
Sark is clearly not enthusiastic about the project. “Please pardon, Mr McCurdy, but this seems like you are doing blackmail.”
“That’s putting it a bit strong, Mr Sark. Everything you say to me will be off the record. You can take my word for it.”
“I believe your word more easily than I believe your newspaper. Now please explain this shooting.” He looks at his pocket watch. “I have one hour only. I am on double shift.”
McCurdy takes up a position beside the lamp-post so that the elongated scar in the metal is about even with his ear. “This is the spot.”
“And from where did you hear this shot?”
“I wouldn’t know a shot from a blown tyre. What I heard was a metal object striking the post, exactly here.” He slides his forefinger along the metallic gash.
“Stand where you are, please.” The lift operator takes a pencil from his pocket, places the pencil sideways over the scar, then with one eye closed he sights along the pencil and down Hastings Street East. After a moment, he stands and points as though about to cry land ho!
“Do you see there?”
“See what? Where?”
Sark points with his good arm: “There. Flat roof. Building with Coca-Cola signs all over. That is where your shot was fired, my friend—if there was shot. Now we go take a look.”
McCurdy is not eager to venture onto a roof with a Greek sniper. “Is this entirely necessary?”
“You have shot rifle, surely?”
“No, I didn’t get the chance. I was rejected.” He points at his lenses with two fingers. “The eyes, don’t you see.”
The lift attendant gives him an exasperated look. (A man who has never shot a rifle!) “It is surely amateur shooter who would miss at that distance. We check and see if he has left us souvenir.”
They walk east and across the Main intersection until they are standing across the street from the building in question, a three-storey brick shoebox next door to a barbershop, with the Pastime Confectionery on the ground floor, two floors of apartments and a flat roof.
“There is fire escape behind. Come. Be brave, is not so high.”
They head down a cobbled alleyway cluttered with bottles, tin cans and ancient newspapers. Electrical wires sag like clotheslines overhead; young spruce trees shoot up between the bins through holes in the cement, like a resistance group infiltrating the occupiers.
Halfway down to Gore Avenue, McCurdy sees a woman standing beneath a lamp, in a cloche hat that obscures all but her chin. She is smoking a cigarette, like a cinema woman of the street.
He takes out his notebook and writes: War or peace, everyone has a costume. Service workers as actors, playing a version of themselves…
Sark nudges his arm. “Write later, please. Not now.”
As they pass, she makes no attempt to solicit. McCurdy wonders if he looks like a plainclothes copper.
The lift operator turns and lifts his hat: “Good evening, Selene.”
“And to you, Dimitri.”
“I hope is going well for you.”
“Slow, I think,” she replies. “People are sad tonight.”
“Ah yes, Selene. There is much to be sad about.”
“No more than usual, surely.”
“Maybe so, maybe not. But sometimes it seems so.”
Her eyes turn in McCurdy’s direction. She takes a drag of her cigarette and smiles with carmine lipstick. “Come and see me sometime.”
They continue down the alleyway. “I can’t believe she actually said, ‘Come and see me sometime.’”
“Selene watches too many photo plays. Is not a good thing.”
“I take it then that you two are… acquaintances.”
“We are in same neighbourhood, this is true.”
Sark abruptly turns to the fire escape on his right. “This is the one.”
“How do you know?”
“Is next to Horse Shoe Barber. Bruno cuts my hair.”
The fire escape has rusted badly. With any surface exposed to constant rain, the slightest chip will spread like a skin disease, and in this case the supports seem to have cancer.
McCurdy tests the floor at the first landing to avoid crashing through the iron grid. Above him the lift operator is climbing without having to grip the railing. (McCurdy’s palms are scraped to bleeding.)
He has never liked heights. He would rather poke his eye out with a stick than climb a mountain.
At the edge of the roof, Sark kneels down carefully to inspect the surface, then silently points to a faint footprint in the tar.
Of course. Tar retains heat. The last week has been unseasonably warm.
The lift operator drops to a crouch—either for a better look at the footprint or as a precaution against other snipers. “Your friend has small feet,” he remarks, then follows an almost invisible trail across the roof to the southwest corner, where there are more tracks in the tar, as though the shooter—if that’s who it was—deliberately left a physical memory of himself in action.
Sark drops to one knee to examine a gouge from the toe of a boot, a dent the shape of a knee, and another small footprint just ahead. He runs one hand along the top of the ledge: “No marks of elbows. Was short person.” He runs his finger along an elongated dent in the tar.
“Short? Do you mean in height?”
“Tall person uses elbows as tripod. Short person uses ledge itself.”
“So I take it you have shot from the roofs of buildings.”
Sark holds up his white-gloved wooden hand. “You think war injury made me civilian again, nice medal, nice peaceful life? Is so Canadian. Nice soft politics, no shooting necessary.”
Peering over the knee-high ledge, McCurdy imagines the path of a bullet, shot through the air toward the Lumberman’s Club.
The lift operator stands up to stretch his back, shaking his head with weary contempt. “What did I tell you? Is complete amateur. Maybe shoots squirrels for practice. Now…”
He crouches again, scans the perimeter, then zeroes in, the way a spotlight focuses on a target. He steps forward, crouches, then straightens up with a copper object in his fingertips.
“It is from a thirty-oh-six. Not a Mannlicher-Schönauer, and not your terrible Ross rifle.” He seems amused. “A Springfield. Mr McCurdy, I think your enemy is American.”
“Mr Sark, I think I owe you a drink.”
They sit at the corner table McCurdy favours for private conversations. On its scarred and burnt surface Sark places the bullet casing on its end like a miniature umbrella stand. (McCurdy has already taken the lift operator through the customary membership application; Sark is now an honorary, one-armed lumberman so that Truman can relax.)
McCurdy returns from the bar with a double whisky for himself and a tumbler of ouzo on ice for his guest.
The lift operator raises the glass into the light, savours its anise aroma and watches the liquid around the shards of ice turn milky, as though a genie were about to appear above the glass.
“Is hard to find ouzo here. Some make it at home, but that is vodka and licorice, not ouzo.”
“With the Liquor Commission in charge, it could just as well be licorice and antifreeze.”
“This Liquor Commission. What is that?”
“A government department that tells us what to drink and what not to drink.”
“Ah. Generals are now doing this in my country also.” The lift attendant takes another gentle sip.
“Mr Sark, I don’t wish to stir up bad memories, but where did you fight?”
“Is not especially interesting. One of those shitty, vicious little wars between shitty, vicious little countries. Who has even heard of Thrace? At first we were in all the newspapers. But when Great Powers go to war, what war can compete for attention?”
“You fought the Serbs, was it?”
“And Bulgarians. Serbs and Bulgarians are homicidal beasts. We kill them whenever we can.”
“That sounds like a good policy. Where were you wounded?”
“At the advance. Constantine wanted Sofia like Paris wanted Helen. But Sofia was not Helen, did not appreciate his advances. At Kresna Pass we were ambushed by 2nd and 4th Armies firing from above us all at once. My arm was taken. Then wars ended and we went home to fight among ourselves. I was on Lieutenant General Gargalidis side…” He shrugs as though nothing more need be said—and more ouzo slides down the neck.
“Gargalidis sentenced to death, and I am immigrant to Canada. My sponsors Uncle Gustave and Uncle Nick had job for me on paper but not real job, so I look. I know how to wear uniform, whichever country no matter. I am veteran, whichever war no mention. And lift operating is perfect work for one-armed men.”
“Do you have plans to return home?”
“Someone must shoot General Pangalos first—a better shot than your friend on roof.”
McCurdy proposes a toast: “To inaccurate snipers and one-armed men.”
“And death to all dictators!” the lift attendant says with surprising intensity, then drains his glass and pushes back his chair to leave.
“One thing more before you go,” McCurdy says. “I still need to know about Gordon Cunning. About his—”
“Mr McCurdy, it is hotel policy—”
“Officer Hook thinks Mr Cunning was murdered. I thought you’d want the investigation to be as brief as possible.”
Sark looks at his pocket watch. “I have shift coming. If I may offer one advice: your sniper may be amateur, but he has more than one bullet.”
“We mustn’t assume the shooter is a he…”
Sark shakes his head sadly. “In these times, I fear that is true.”
Newson Crosses the Floor
Max Trotter
Staff Writer
The Vancouver World
As of yesterday morning, MLA Victor Newson has broken with the Liberal Party and will be sitting as an Independent. The result is that the situation in Victoria has become volatile in the extreme.
Following last election, seats at the British Columbia Legislature numbered as follows: Liberal 24, Conservative 17, Provincial Party 3 and Labour 3. With a Liberal Speaker of the House, Government and Opposition were at an even split. Just one vote on the Conservative side and the government would be defeated.
Hence, as he is now sitting as an Independent, General Newson will wield the power of life or death over former colleagues. Should he join the Opposition on a single non-confidence vote, the government will fall. The general can act as executioner or kingmaker by raising his hand.
When asked whether he has lost faith in the premier, Newson replied, cryptically: “No man named Gulliver ever survived the war.”
Indeed, since his return to Victoria, Premier Gulliver is increasingly seen as a liability in the Liberal quest to rebuild their support. Officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, admit to increased caucus pressure for the premier to resign.
In the meantime, there emerges a public groundswell of support for Attorney General Stalker.
When asked about it, Mr Stalker’s deputy and spokesman, Bertram Bliss, replied: “The Attorney General’s response is that the challenges facing his ministry should be more than sufficient for any man.”
Dearest Millie,
I tried my best, but as a spy I am a dismal failure!
I formed what I thought was a clever plan. Yesterday evening, I returned to the Legislature. I told the security guard that I had left my glasses on my desk and was nearly blind without them.
Since he had seen me in the building before and I had a key to the office, he let me enter. He even steadied me when I pretended to trip over the doorsill.
In the darkened hall, with nobody going up or down the halls and the stairway, for a moment I couldn’t find our office door; I stumbled about until I managed to find the door, push the key into the lock and slip inside. As with rest of the building, the office was dark, except for street lights leaking in from the street. Having anticipated this part, I retrieved the kitchen matches I had filched from Miss Carr’s stove.
Dropping to my knees, I unlocked and pulled open the drawer, and looked at one sheet from the file—when, at that moment, I heard a set of keys rattling in the hall, and a man’s voice!
Someone was about to enter the office!
Millie, my heart pounded with such force that I thought I might die on the spot! I replaced the sheet, blew out my match, silently closed and relocked the file cabinet and crept along the carpet looking for someplace to hide, until I found my writing desk and crouched inside the knee-hole.
As the visitor opened the door, I waited for him to switch on the lights—then surely they would see me if they weren’t blind! I was about to stand up and tell my prepared story about looking for my glasses—and why was I looking for my glasses in the dark? I was in a dreadful pickle!
But for some reason he did not switch the lights on. I was safe, for the time being.
Then they spoke, very quietly—which was when I realized that there were two of them, and that one was female. This was followed by the shuffling of feet, as they entered Mr Crombie’s office.
There followed a long silence. Thinking back, I expect that they might have been kissing!
Holding my breath, I crept out from under my desk and looked toward the office but saw nothing. Then they began to speak in regular voices, and I could hear them perfectly while they proceeded to do certain things I could not envisage, let alone describe. And I swear that the male voice belonged to Mr Crombie:
Daisy, I’m afraid this business with Forrest will end badly. If there were no other factors at work, fine, but people are watching. Weasels in the press can sense that we’ve been up to something, even if they don’t know what it is.
Have you gone soft, my love? I thought you had more gumption than that. What happened to the man who would be king of Grouse Mountain?
I’m in the real estate business, I’m willing to take risks, but this is beyond the pale.
Has your ambition gone to sleep? Has the fire gone out? If it has, are your feelings for me just as feeble?
No Daisy, don’t even think that. But it isn’t as simple as you say. Forrest isn’t alone. He has men working for him.
Olson and Flood? They’re not working for him, take it from me.
But what if—
What if we fail? Stick with me, dear, and we won’t fail…
There was a long, long silence with only shuffling sounds. I had no idea what they were doing. Then another curious exchange occurred:
Oh darling, you are—
(Slap!) Don’t call me that.
I’m sorry.
Did I give you permission to call me that?
No, Miss Tyler, you did not.
Now lean over the table.
Yes, Miss Tyler.
What I heard next was a sound I recognized from when I was a child and Father was cross with one of us. It was the sound of a stick striking someone’s bottom!
For a while I shut my eyes and covered my ears in embarrassment, then I resumed listening. As I remember it, here is what I heard:
There you go. Now do you want to please me?
Surely you know that I always want to please you.
That’s what I like to hear.
Oh darling...
I warned you not to call me that.
My mistress.
That’s better.
When finally they opened the office door and closed it behind them, I confess that I simply wanted to get out of the building as quickly as possible. I hadn’t the courage to go open the drawer and view the files. Out of cowardice, I missed my second chance.
What I did see looked like a ledger of income and expenses having to do with Mr Taggart—on the income side, some names were familiar—Reifel, Celona—while the expenses side included a firm of detectives and various officers with the Provincial Police. Without context, I realize that all this is probably meaningless.
Millie darling, I hope you will forgive me, for I am new at this. I hope you will trust that next time I shall be less of a disappointment, and that I shall remain—
Your loving friend,
Gracie
Mildred folds Gracie’s letter and places it on her bedside table, wondering what can possibly be going on. Obviously Mr Crombie and Miss Tyler, like Jack and Mrs Spratt, have discovered areas of compatibility both sexually and financially, and Miss Tyler is, so to speak, holding the reins. And yet, it is not uncommon for two people to enter a relation with quite different plans; from tracing her career, it seems obvious that Daisy is a woman who never did anything except for money.
Which leads to her connection with the local Klan. While washing her face, Mildred thinks back on her research in preparation for Mrs Crombie’s book club party—including her husband’s fortuitous investments in real estate. Surely a man like Crombie wouldn’t use his own money if he could help it.
Having turned her steamer trunk into a makeshift dressing table, she sits cross-legged on the floor and, in unforgiving daylight, takes stock of a face she finds all too ordinary and by no means pretty. By dusting with powder, darkening and shaping the eyebrows and applying a risqué shade of lipstick, she manages to achieve a certain drama—an art that Daisy Douglas Tyler seems to have mastered.
Dressed now, Millie stands before the dresser mirror (her room is too small for a full-length view, but no matter, for there is not much shape to assess) while following the money back to its most probable source.
The Klan. If one adds up initiation fees, as well as the price of merchandise such as robes, swords, bibles and the like, by now there must be a considerable amount of money in Klan coffers—and Vancouver’s underworld contains plenty of men who know how to break into a safe.
A woman like Daisy isn’t about to settle for bank interest. So what has been done with Major Forrest’s “locally invested funds”?
A subject of interest to Mr McCurdy, she expects. And to her as well, in a different respect.