Congested streets. Impassable intersections. Every manner of truck and more damned trucks. A chorus of blaring horns. The sun in his eyes and he’d forgotten his shades. Cinq-Mars was impeded further by a multitude of stop signs and seemed destined to hit every red light. He finally pulled over at a phone booth set back from a corner. Extra honks for that move as he bore through a pedestrian tide. He hung his badge on his lapel pocket on the off-chance a zealous uniform – were there any left? – wanted to ticket him. A lucky day: half the phonebook was intact; the section that survived chronic vandalism suited his purposes. Letters M through Z included a list of United Church congregations. He noted the address of the one he’d been directed to visit.
The phone being handy he called his new partner.
Geoffrion was summoned, he could hear his slow shuffle, then, ‘Hey, boss, what’s up?’
Boss. The appellation would take some getting used to.
Geoffrion reported that he was hitting it off with his new quartier captain. Delacroix had brought him into his office for coffee, toast and jam, then shown him the ropes. Surprising – and suspicious – news. Out of character for Delacroix. More than had been done for him. The contrary, he’d been given a hard time. Of course, he had arrived savagely hungover, flubbing his chance to make a good first impression.
Cinq-Mars had yet to be invited into the captain’s office for toast and jam.
He asked his new partner to check the rap sheet on Johnny Bondar. Currently incarcerated. Touton had scribbled a note that his first name could be on the books as Jan, a Ukrainian take on John. ‘I’ll check back in twenty minutes.’
When he did call again, from a different booth, he was pleasantly surprised that his new partner had successfully pulled up the man’s sheet. Reports of his incompetence were overblown. ‘He’s in jail under Johnny. Not even John. He’s Johnny.’
‘What’s he done?’
‘Car theft. Priors for assault. Hired one time to bust up a polling booth. Another time he trashed a mom-and-pop store. Short-changed, maybe.’
An unremarkable record that demonstrated he was not strictly independent, that he freelanced for others. He was connected.
‘The car thefts,’ Cinq-Mars wanted to know. ‘Joy-riding or business?’
‘In it for the bucks. Nabbed the last time in a chop-shop. Caught rubbing out VINs. Sixth arrest for a car heist, third conviction. He got forty-two months.’
Major time for minor crime, in the overall scheme of things. Hard to figure why anyone would be riled up about his release.
‘Thanks, Nord.’
His new partner proved to be thorough. ‘Parole hearing this Thursday.’
Confirmation to act quickly. ‘The robberies today, anything similar elsewhere?’
‘Getting to it next. Like I said, the boss took up my time.’
‘Is he concerned about me at all?’
‘Not my take. Seems a little pissed that we lost the case to homicide. He made a joke. Said we should’ve ditched the stiff in a sewer to keep the robbery our own.’ Cinq-Mars wasn’t sure he’d heard his boss joke before. Maybe he had to be eating toast and jam. ‘He grunted when I mentioned you weren’t in. Is he used to your jitterbug?’
He could argue that his excursion was no song-and-dance, although he might then need to explain what he was up to in detail.
‘Catch you later, Nord.’
‘I’ll see what I find that’s similar, burglary-wise. It’s been a unique morning.’
Unique captured the essence of his day. He was now on his way to urge a minister not to help a prisoner win favor with a parole board. Likely, the minister would ask him why. Not a question he was prepared to answer, nor had he devised a decent lie to cover his tail.
Cinq-Mars drove his VW Bug into Park Ex. The church, which he’d passed a thousand times without really noticing, was on Bloomfield Street. Easy to miss. Remarkable only for being small. It blended with its surroundings to the brink of being invisible.
Parking was tight; he got lucky, found a spot around the corner on Avenue Ogilvy. Not unaccustomed to visiting parish priests, both personally and professionally, he counted on them living next door to their church. Walking closer, he recalled that the same did not necessarily hold true for Protestants. The minister might live in an adjacent manse, or miles away. The minister might rent, going out of his way to be just plain folks. A wife and kids to boot. Sure enough, no home was attached to the wee church. The detective’s expectations sank. Now he had to hold out hope for an office on the premises.
Cinq-Mars located a side-door. Locked. Protestants! He rang the bell.
He showed his badge and identified himself to the woman who answered – the church secretary, he assumed, but you never knew with Protestants, she could be the minister’s wife. The pleasant, freckle-faced woman greeted him warmly. He told her that he was there to speak to Reverend Alex Montour. ‘Certainly! Come on up.’ He followed her up a short stairwell, around a corner, down a hallway, and into an office. When she sat behind the only desk in the small vestry and relaxed her forearms upon the surface, he suddenly realized the depth of his error. Growing up with priests, he had never encountered this. He’d heard about it, but this was a cultural chasm far removed from his Quebec–Catholic roots.
‘You’re Reverend Montour,’ he said, to make sure.
‘I am.’ Noticing his plight, she grasped that the concept was new to him. ‘We exist now. Women clergy.’
‘Not in my church you don’t.’ He laughed at his own misjudgment. ‘I can’t see it happening either. Not in this century. Or the next.’
‘Sad but true. I won’t get up on my high horse, Sergeant-Detective. Catholic women have taken orders as nuns for centuries. Protestant ladies? They make tea.’
Her remark struck him as generous.
‘Your name – Alex – threw me off,’ he admitted. ‘It should’ve occurred to me that Alex can be a woman’s name.’
‘It’s thrown people off before. Short for Alexandra, in my case.’ She lowered her voice, as though to convey a subterfuge. ‘When I was invited here, most parishioners expected a man to walk through the door.’ She was beaming with the pleasure of her tale. ‘Please, Sergeant-Detective, have a seat. I take it this is not a personal visit.’
Thinking on the fly, his strategy evolved quickly. He had no lie to promote, and given that he couldn’t be convincing, he opted for a version of the truth.
‘I’m here with a request that’s come through to me from others. Ah … I’m sorry for my ignorance, how do I address you? In my church an ordained woman might be Mother Superior, or Sister. That doesn’t apply, I know.’
She smiled. ‘Some say Reverend, some prefer Pastor, if they feel a title is necessary. If it doesn’t offend your sensibilities too much, I’m content with Alex.’
Cinq-Mars rocked his head slightly. ‘I’m old-school. Maybe if you call me Émile. I’m not used to Sergeant-Detective. I’ve had the rank for less than a day.’
‘Congratulations! Let’s go back and forth, Émile. Find whatever’s comfortable.’
‘I’ll try. I have a request I really don’t comprehend. I’m only the messenger, charged with persuading you to do something you may not want to do.’
‘How odd.’
‘Exactly. What I can tell you is that the charge to me comes from a superior I trust very much. I am to argue strenuously should you disagree with the proposal. I’m supposed to be convincing. The consequences of failure, I’m told, are dire.’
She clenched her lips. Then said, ‘You argue well. I’m almost ready to agree with you, although I haven’t the foggiest idea what you want.’
‘My fogginess may exceed yours. Reverend Montour, I understand that you’re preparing to appear before a parole board on behalf of Johnny Bondar this week. Is that correct?’
‘On Thursday. Yes.’
‘My task is to beseech you not to go. Please, stay home.’
Cinq-Mars thought he could hear a pin drop in the ensuing silence. As the moment expanded and grew prolonged, he heard a clock ticking more loudly than any falling pin might hit a floor. A muffled burr came in from the adjoining room – he suspected a small refrigerator as the culprit. From busy Bloomfield Street – one-way, well-traveled – came a cacophony amplified by the silence in the vestry. Children’s ecstatic squeals, tires on the pavement, a bus lurching to a stop. Behind the foreground racket the thrum of a city. No pin could drop here and be heard, yet the silence felt all-encompassing, on the verge of deafening.
Reverend Alex Montour finally spoke. ‘You want to keep Johnny in prison. Why?’
Damn that question. ‘It’s believed, by men of integrity, who possess critical knowledge that I don’t, that his release will have serious negative consequences.’
‘Such as?’
‘In this case, I’m ignorant of the matter. Only that his release could precipitate an unfortunate, perhaps tragic, result.’
‘For whom? The police?’
‘Perhaps the police. Perhaps the public. Perhaps for Mr Bondar himself.’
‘That latter point I dispute.’
‘On what basis? We don’t know—’
‘On the basis that remaining in prison will probably kill him. I’ve visited Johnny in jail, Sergeant-Detective.’ He was back to being Sergeant-Detective now, he noticed. ‘Have you been inside St Vincent de Paul?’ He had, in fact, visited that penitentiary. His memories of the place would only lend weight to her side of the discussion. ‘Not to put too fine a theological point on it, but that institution is hell on earth.’
‘It’s unpleasant,’ Cinq-Mars agreed.
‘Unpleasant?’ She took a moment to corral her thoughts. ‘The first time I went in there, I returned home and was physically ill. To be graphic, I regurgitated my lunch. The second time nearly sent me into a free-fall depression. It’s filthy and vile. Men are not merely incarcerated there, Sergeant-Detective, they are slowly reduced to rubble. Men who were once violent and terrifying at least had some life to them. Now? Bags of bones. Their brains reduced to pus. A few haven’t sat upright in years. If I cannot get Johnny out of there – no doubt he’s an imperfect person; heaven knows, I have no clue what constitutes a “model prisoner” – but if I cannot get Johnny out of there, I will find it impossible to sleep at night. I won’t be able to minister to my so-called flock. Johnny is eligible for parole. He can be home Friday. I will do everything in my power to see that parole is granted.’
If only he had arrived with a lie to support his side. Too late to foster one now.
‘All I can do,’ Cinq-Mars remarked, ‘is try to find further information to help change your mind. In the meantime, I’m urging you to reconsider.’
‘No, I’m sorry—’
‘I have never known such a request to be delivered with this degree of urgency and alarm, Alex.’ He added her name to see if it helped. It didn’t. ‘Johnny Bondar represents a significant danger, perhaps to himself, more likely to others. I say more likely, because who would take an interest otherwise within the police department? Consider, please, that his release may be a grave danger to others.’
‘He steals cars. Is an officer worried about his Cadillac?’
The sarcasm was not appreciated. Cinq-Mars accepted that he deserved it, given that he had no alternative line of reasoning to present.
‘I’ll see what the dog digs up,’ he grumbled, and rose.
‘Thank you for coming in, Sergeant-Detective.’ She offered a forced smile.
‘Perhaps we’ll talk again soon, if I have more information.’
‘I cannot imagine that you will change my mind,’ she warned, rising also.
Cinq-Mars’s problem was that he could not imagine it, either.