Maid of the Mist (2 page)

'Rawlins, shit! Get back in the fuckin' car!'

He ignored Pongo. His legs were jelly, but he walked, walked like a zombie towards her, the crushed little girl. His fault.
His
fault. She was just some dumb waitress working late because she needed the money. Dammit, he knew she wasn't as old as she'd said. She didn't look no more than thirteen.
Thirteen.
And he'd killed her as surely as if he'd thrown her out of the Caddy himself.

Pongo was out of the car now, yelling after his driver. He stamped his silk-slippered feet. Rawlins was walking up to the bitch like he could do something about it and with every step Pongo's career was disappearing down the plughole.

Pongo turned back to the vehicle. The driver's door was open, and Godfuckit if Rawlins hadn't taken the keys as well. Pongo knew for sure he was fucked now. He climbed into the back and scrambled around locating every stash he could remember, then he walked to the side of the road and opened them up to the wind.
Fuck it.

He turned and looked back up towards where the body lay. He sniggered. At least she'd died happy. And he sniggered again, because the Coke lorry driver had been stupid enough to stop too; he wasn't laughing at that, but at the sign in huge letters on the side of his truck: COKE ADDS LIFE. Not in this fucking case it doesn't.

The Coke man and Rawlins were standing together, a little to the side of the body, and looking up at the windscreen. Pongo giggled. They were examining the damage, they didn't care about the young thing squished across the road. Talking insurance.

As Pongo started to walk towards them, with every intention of offering the Coke man cash to drive on, a police car pulled up. Maybe the Coke man had CB'd them. Maybe they were just passing; whatever, that plan was out the window. Pongo was still about a hundred yards off – cocaine certainly wasn't speed, he felt like he was walking uphill through snow, and in a sense he was – and he could see that there was just one cop. He'd joined Rawlins and the driver in looking up at the windscreen.

Whatever happened to compassion?
He would write a song about the death of compassion.

Still, if even the cop was primarily interested in the damage to the vehicle, maybe he could be bought off too. Be more expensive. As much as a million, but shit, the Old Cripple could stump up that much, no problem.

The cop didn't even turn as he drew level. Pongo gave a little smile: it was undoubtedly a tragic accident, but there was no reason why he shouldn't also enjoy the look of shocked recognition when the cop did finally realize whose presence he was in. The Artist Formerly Known as Pongo. He would probably ask for an autograph, and then pretend not to be disappointed when he scrawled 'The Artist'.

Rawlins, the Coke driver, the cop: their eyes, their heads, were moving in tandem, mesmerized by the beat of the windscreen wipers. Pongo followed their gaze and for a bored moment didn't realize what he was seeing.

And then he saw what they saw, and he screamed. Caught in the blades, moving left, right, left right, was the little girl's nose.

When Inspector Frank Corrigan called his grandfather to tell him he was going to settle in Niagara Falls, his grandfather shouted: 'What the hell do you want to live in Africa for?' down the line, his voice so strong and caustic that he sounded like he was guldering in the next room, not three thousand miles away in Ireland.

This was way before Lela, of course. This was in the Nicola period, which started about six months after he arrived in town, transferred up after getting shot in both legs dealing with a bank job in Toronto. There's no need to go into
that
too much beyond saying that it was not a good time for him. He was depressed. He drank. He went and wrote something stupid: his signature on the marriage licence, and
that
was the start of the Nicola period.

Of course it didn't seem stupid at the time. It seemed wise and adult and romantic and the way it was meant to be, right up to the point where he was living alone in the darkest, dingiest apartment on Garner Road. Nicola had nailed him for some pretty good alimony, but they still got on OK. She gave him unlimited access to his daughter at weekends. All four of them – that's her new guy, Born Again Bobby, as well – even got together for dinner sometimes. Not too often, as Bobby didn't drink and Corrigan most certainly did. The table chat would invariably get heated, then plain angry, with Nicola somewhere in the middle trying to act as peacemaker even though she knew she should throw Corrigan out for doing it to her again.

That's where he was, causing trouble, cradling the child, drinking a beer, half-watching Canada
vs
Team USA in the final of the Ice Hockey World Cup, the night Maynard Dunn, crewman on the
Maid of the Mist
and occasional drinking partner, called, all excited. Maynard's big voice boomed, 'Hey, Corrigan, we just pulled a woman from the water . . .'

And then the line went dead and there was little Aimie grinning up with her finger on the button. 'Aw for Jesus . . .'

Corrigan bundled her on to the ground and stared at the phone – Bobby smirking at him the whole time – waiting for Maynard to call back, but guessing he wouldn't because he'd be pissed at Corrigan hanging up on him. Nicola eventually got him the phone book, but by the time he tracked Maynard down it was too late; there was no reply.

Bobby was pretending to watch the hockey but the supercilious smirk remained in place and Corrigan had a sudden urge to slap his fat face. He could think of better ways of spending a Saturday night than looking at something blue and bloated, though looking at Bobby wasn't that much less repellent and besides, he'd probably get more interesting conversation out of the corpse.

Bobby was stressed out because he was a manager up at the Sir Adam Beck Generating Stations. He wasn't personally responsible for sucking out the 54 million litres that came from the Niagara River every minute to light up Ontario, but he acted like he was. Bobby was personally responsible for good relations with the employees, and right now the unions were out on strike. There had been threats and accusations and some bastard had released 1.8 million litres of raw sewage into the river just to further muddy the whole situation.

No wonder they're on strike, you big fat balloon, you're an overbearing, self-righteous, judgemental bastard. And my wife chose you instead of me.

Corrigan said he had to go. There was no big campaign to make him stay; even Aimie just gave him a bored
You'll be back
stare and went to sit on Bobby's knee. This annoyed Corrigan as much as it pleased Bobby, but he said nothing. He tousled her hair on the way past and when the door was closed behind them he surprised Nicola with a kiss on the lips from which she extracted herself just milli-seconds into
lingering.
This gave him a nice, warm, if very slightly bitter feeling as he stepped down on to the drive and then looked up at her on the porch.

'Sorry,' he said, with a little shrug of his shoulders. He meant for being argumentative, but she thought he meant for the kiss.

She gave him a little smile. 'That's OK,' she said softly. They looked at each other for a few more moments, then he turned to the car and she shouted after him: 'Are you OK to drive?'

He looked back up. 'Do you want to drive me?'

She smiled and shook her head. He leant against the car. 'So how's it really going with Moses the Lawgiver?' he asked.

The smile faded. 'Don't start, Corrigan.'

'I'm not starting anything. You look like you've lost weight.'

'What're you saying, he
made
me lose weight?'

'No! Just an observation. An unconnected observation. You look good.'

'Thanks, Corrigan.'

'What'd he do, lock you in a cupboard and feed you through a straw?'

'Corrigan . . .'

Corrigan scuffed a foot on the grass. 'I don't like the way he's moving in on Aimie,' he said quietly. 'Does he ever hit her?'

'No!'

'I mean, does he chastise her when she's bad? I'll bet he doesn't, and that's why she likes him and doesn't like me.'

'Corrigan, she
loves
you. You're her father, you'll always be her father.'

'And you were my wife, and you said you'd always be my wife.'

'I thought there was a body up at the Falls.'

Corrigan nodded. 'Well at least she isn't going to run out on me,' he said, and climbed into the car. He regretted it immediately. He rolled the window down and smiled weakly up at her. She hugged herself and managed to return the smile.

'You'll drop by tomorrow.'

'What?'

'The house. There's people coming to see the house.'

'I'll do my best.'

'It's your house, Frank.'

'I know. I'll do my best.'

'Don't do your best, Frank. Just do it.'

He nodded once, but it was neither a nay nor a yeah.

'You look like you've been to see the Fat Man,' Maynard said cheerily, turning from the group of crewmen he was chatting to as Corrigan approached.

Corrigan rolled his eyes. 'He's got some sort of sinister hold over her. He's brainwashed her. Drugged her. Subjected her to weird sexual practices. You know it. I saw her reading the fuckin' Bible for godsake. I don't want my daughter exposed to that kind of environment.'

Maynard laughed. 'Still, rather a fat Christian than a loser like you.'

Corrigan managed a little sneer and changed the subject. 'So,' he said, 'tell me about the stiff.'

'A stiff? Who said anything about a stiff? The woman's alive.'

'Oh,' said Corrigan.

The first woman to go over the Horseshoe Falls – as opposed to the smaller, less impressive American Falls a stone's throw down the river (although it would have to be a pretty small stone and a really strong arm) – and ignoring for the moment the legend of Lelewala, was Annie Edson Taylor, a sixty-three-year-old schoolteacher from Bay City, Michigan, who on 24 October 1901 stuffed some pillows into a metal-hooped barrel and climbed in. Her assistants sealed the top of the barrel then pumped in what they believed would be enough air for a week, using a common bicycle pump, before towing her out into the river.

At just after 4 p.m. the barrel went over the edge and instantly disappeared into the curtain of falling water. Seventeen minutes later it floated out from behind the Falls and got dragged ashore. Out staggered Annie Taylor, somewhat delirious but utterly triumphant, convinced that not only fame awaited her, but also fortune. She died in the poorhouse.

At least old mad Annie had had a barrel.
This
woman, whoever she was, if she'd gone over without one and survived, could be worth a fortune in the right hands. The only other person who'd gone over without protection was a seven-year-old boy called Roger Woodward, who'd been swept over after falling out of a boat. It was 1960 and values were different; he was written about all over the world and probably hadn't made a cent.

Corrigan was thinking films. TV. A book. Several books. Newspaper serialization. Why not? Everyone else does it. Befriend her. Sign her up. Shit, he was going to arrest her anyway; get her to write it all down then flog off her statement to the networks. Corrigan tutted, shook his head. Were things really that bad?

Yes they were.

A damp friggin' apartment.

A permanent hangover.

Life's a bitch, then you die.

He looked at his watch. A little after 11 p.m. Maynard had phoned at 10.20. It was a wet, miserable Saturday night and most of the country was watching the hockey. There'd only be skeleton crews on most of the Toronto or Buffalo TV stations. Maybe he'd just ask for her autograph and inquire how she managed to hold her breath for so long.

They rode the lift to the
Maid of the Mist
dock in silence. The Falls illuminations had been switched off at eleven so there was nothing to see, but the sound was thunderous. Corrigan loved it. Loved the power of it. Sometimes he thought he didn't genuinely like Maynard at all, he just liked the excuse to come down here and see him and
feel
the Falls. Since he'd come to Niagara, Corrigan'd been out on the boat nearly two hundred times. Sometimes pressed in with three hundred Japanese tourists, them all decked out in the identical little blue macs they got free to keep the spray off, sometimes with just Maynard, late at night, cruising into the mist.

Maynard punched him on the arm and nodded forward. Corrigan explained about Aimie cutting off the call. Maynard shrugged. 'So what's the crack?' Corrigan asked.

Maynard stopped, looked towards the Falls. 'We pulled a woman from the water. She's alive. Wasn't even wearing a fucking lifejacket.'

'A suicide?'

'Who gives a fuck? She went over. She survived. We got a call from a tourist up on the Parkway, says he's seen a body in the water, just as the lights were being switched off. That's all we need, night like this and Canada one up in the second quarter, but hell . . . we get the
Maid
out there and spend fifteen minutes cruising up and down. Finally we see her, floating face down, and drag her in. Thought we just had another floater, but then she coughs up half the river and there she is good as new. Pretty beat up, but good as new.'

'So what'd she say?'

'Nothing. But get this: she's wearing a Native American dress.'

'She's a fuckin' Indian?'

'A Native American.'

'Uhuh. I'm Irish. You're American. She's a fuckin' Indian. That's all we need, an Indian protest. It'll be the friggin' environment. Or they'll be pissed off about not getting a casino on the reservation.'

Maynard shrugged. The rain was growing steadily heavier. Corrigan shivered again. Maynard spent half his life in the Falls' mist; dampness was second nature.

'So,' Corrigan said, 'she's in hospital.'

Maynard shook his head. 'I got Annie Spitz to take her. Keep her away from the vultures, y'know? Gave her a call, explained my situation, within five minutes she was down here, lawyer in tow, signed the Indian . . .'

'That's Native American to you . . .'