REG should have been three sheets to the wind. He’d demolished three pints and was well into his fourth. An unfiltered cigarette was tucked behind his ear, awaiting the point when he would saunter outside to smoke it and then return for the rest of his pint. The pub was “no smoking” along with every other establishment of any type at all in Ottawa, the province, and the entire country by now.
But Reg was nothing if not adaptable.
By this time, Dougald was long gone, headed for home and an early night after one Guinness. Marjorie had left after two glasses of white wine, fully restored to bright-eyed ironic chatter that had had us all in stitches. JP lounged on the banquette, with his arm draped across the back, sheltering his girlfriend, Michelle. She, too, had been on the house white plonk. Slender, very French, about twenty, dressed all in black with dyed red and blue hair and lots of silvery rings piercing her eyebrows, she was staring uncomprehendingly at Reg.
“It’s easy, love. I come from steak and kidney …”
“Mais, c’est une …” She turned to JP for help.
He tried to think.
“Une tourtiere, une … yes, a pie!”
“Right, mate, a pie, but it’s a steak and kidney pie, right? So in rhyming slang we say steak and kidney, which rhymes with Sydney, which is my city, see? Sydney, Australia …”
Michelle still looked dubious, but laughed anyway.
“Okay, here’s another one, also to do with pies. If your boyfriend isn’t telling you the truth, what is he doing?”
Michelle scrunched up her nose and smacked JP soundly on his arm.
“Owwww! Pourquoi …?”
“He is telling me … lies!”
“Right! So we would say, he’s telling you porkies.”
“Porkies? He is … telling me … a pig? Your are saying he is calling me a pig?”
Michelle hit JP again, a little harder.
“No, dear, a porkie is short for pork pies. He’s telling you porkies: pork pies … rhymes with lies. Get it?”
Michelle looked at JP, and they both looked at Reg.
“You are bad, you are making me hungry!”
We wrapped it up from there. Reg had taxi fare to his Centretown apartment. JP hadn’t indulged in any alcohol, downing instead several Perrier and lime drinks so he could drive Michelle’s old Civic across the river to a restaurant there. They’d probably end up dancing in Gatineau bars until at least 2 a.m.
I walked back to Britfit, went in, reset alarms and lights, and after washing up, headed up to the loft.
There had been so much to do to bring the shop back up to scratch when I’d bought it from Dougald that I’d commandeered the loft as a place to sleep. Many evenings it had been too late to make the trek home after hours of setting up the bays, painting walls, sorting tools and inventory, creating two offices out of one with studs and drywall, and all the other tasks required.
I lay back on the folded-out single bed in the loft. Jerry had followed me up, circled around on the bed, then settled down near my right side purring loudly. I scratched behind his ears, as was fully expected.
“You little twit. You didn’t catch any mice this week, did you? I’ll dock your pay.”
I thought about the car Rodney Morrison had been found in, now below me in the shop.
I’d given the others a short version of the story. Former colleague’s car, on lease to the department I used to work for, basically in for a clean-up and service. I would handle it tomorrow morning, with Dougald’s help if necessary.
JP wondered what all the white powder was on the driver’s door and dashboard. I provided the suicide details and said the police powdered the car for fingerprints, presumably just to make sure.
They were taken aback by the suicide part.
“Look, on that, I’ve been asked to keep that part of it quiet. No need to upset the family any more, right?”
They all nodded. Reg tapped his index finger on his heavily red-veined nose.
“Say no more, Guv’nor.”
They all knew I had worked in government. Under the occasional curious questioning, I’d indicated that, while I was not trying to be mysterious, I was still bound to circumspection by various Acts and Oaths of Secrecy. All public servants are, theoretically, even after leaving the federal service.
Dougald remembered the car from the time he worked on it in January.
“Don’t like these. Doesn’t know if it’s a Ford or a Jaguar.”
It was hard to disagree with him. This model was mostly a Ford in terms of platform, suspension, and basic running gear. But buyers of this car still expected it to exude the panache of a Jag, so it was finished to a high specification in appointments, among other things.
Tate left after sorting out the work order forms with Marjorie and calling a taxi on his cell phone.
“You were in Arizona in January, weren’t you, Conn?” Marjorie asked.
“Yes. Do you remember who brought it in?”
“It was just a guy. Definitely not the Tate pillock from today – someone older. I can’t really remember. Dougald and I were here. It was quiet, a few days after New Year’s Day, and I was just catching up with some filing.”
She pondered a bit more.
“His ID looked right – Bob something – he had the rubber stamp in his briefcase for the work order. He was very polite, I remember that. Ordinary looking … kept his toque thingy on his head, big glasses. Picked the car up the next day. Sorry, can’t remember much more.”
“Had anyone phoned ahead of time to book it in?”
“No, he just showed up with it.”
She had looked worried.
“Is something wrong? Dougald was just fiddling with the long-term jobs …”
“No, Marj, it’s fine. It’s nothing. January is slow, and obviously it was all on the up and up. We got paid all right. That’s the main thing.”
Customers sometimes just show up with their cars without phoning, usually in a panic, because the car is overheating badly or serious noises have suddenly developed. That didn’t seem to be the case here, though, which was one more odd thing about this car.