Maid of the Mist (7 page)

'Translating,' Corrigan said.

Her brow crinkled. 'Translating what?'

'What do you think?'

'Do you know where he lives?'

'I could tell you if I knew you better, but at the moment I have my reservations.' He smiled.

'You
can
trust me,' she said. She smiled winningly, but not winningly enough. Corrigan shook his head. Another time, another place. 'Ask around,' he said. 'You're the reporter.'

She looked at him. The smile had become a scowl. 'OK,' she said, 'I get the message.' She crumpled the five dollars in her hand and dropped it into his lap. 'I'll survive,' she said, and got out of the car.

Pongo looked up. He was a pitiful sight. 'I want you to understand,' Corrigan said, 'that I have no idea who you are, and I haven't a fucking clue what your songs are like. On that basis, shall we proceed?'

Corrigan pulled out a chair and set it down in front of him. He straddled it. Stirling remained at the door. There were tears on Pongo's face and snot above his top lip. His eyes were poisoned rabbit red and his gums were bleeding. He was one step down from miserable, coke-miserable, or lack-of-coke-miserable. Diet Coke. 'I wanna make a deal,' he said.

'A record deal?' Stirling said from the door.

Pongo buried his face in his hands. His shoulders started to shake.

Corrigan reached forward and slowly eased the hands away from Pongo's face. 'Son, there's a little girl has died. She fell out of your car. And you had an awful lot of drugs in that car. Do you mind telling me what kind of a deal you had in mind?'

'I can't tell you. They'll kill me.'

'Of course you can.'

'I can't!' Pongo sat back on the bed and wiped something green and stringy away from under his nose with the sleeve of his white jumpsuit. 'And even if I did, they'd kill you. So what's the point?'

Stirling rolled his eyes. 'Just tell him,' Stirling said. 'You told me.'

Corrigan sighed. 'Son, do you want me to call your lawyer?'

Pongo sprang forwards. 'God-fuck
no.
He's part of it.'

'Part of what?'

'Can't you get me the FBI?
Please?

'Son, we are not getting the FBI for you. This is Canada.'

'K-A-N-A-D-A,' Stirling said from the door.

Pongo shook his head against his hands. Then his eyes appeared above his fingers. 'I can't go to prison,' he whispered, 'they'll kill me.'

'I didn't say they'd kill you,' Stirling said, 'I said they'd
fuck
you.'

'You don't understand!'

Corrigan shook his head. 'Plainly not,' he said. He turned for the door.

'Wait!'

He stopped.

'Can we make a deal? To keep me out of prison. To let me stay here. I like this cell. It's good.'

'It doesn't work like that, son.'

'C'mon!' He was having trouble catching his breath.

'Just take it easy, son.'

He took a deep gulp of air and then let it slowly out. 'You mean,' he said, 'if I offered you something big, so incredibly big it was bigger than the biggest thing you ever thought of, you couldn't cut me a deal?'

Stirling clicked his tongue. 'If it was bigger than the biggest thing we ever thought of, sure we could cut you a deal. If it was that big.'

'Mark . . .' Corrigan said.

Stirling stepped forward and slipped into Corrigan's vacated seat. 'Hey . . . c'mon, Pongo, don't spoil the show, tell him about the convention.'

Pongo snorted up. It wasn't pleasant. 'I didn't mean to kill the girl,' he said, his voice weak and high, 'it was an accident. I really didn't. But I can't go to prison. I can't. I have such plans, big plans. I wanna write a proper album. Proper songs. Songs that mean something. I don't want to be the fucking corporate entertainment at my father's convention.'

Corrigan leaned back against the door and folded his arms. 'Who's your father?'

'The Old Cripple.'

'The Old Cripple?'

'The Old Cripple.'

'Who the fuck's
the Old Cripple
?' Corrigan said.

'He's a superhero for the disabled,' Stirling said. Then said: 'Tell him.'

Pongo shook his head despairingly at Stirling. That's why I need the FBI! If he hasn't heard of. . .'

'Son . . .' Corrigan began.

'I know! No FBI. OK, OK!' Pongo's nose cracked audibly as he wiped it on his sleeve again. He tried to steady his breathing again. 'My father,' Pongo said. 'The Old Cripple. Everyone knows him as the Old Cripple. He's running a convention in town right now. Horticultural convention.'

'Town hasn't smelt so good in years,' Corrigan said.

'Except, it isn't flowers they're conventing about.'

'Conventing?' said Stirling.

'What is it, son?'

'It's drugs.
Drugs.
A drug convention.'

'Like medical and pharmaceutical?' said Corrigan.

'Like heroin and cocaine and acid and Ecstasy and every fucking drug in the world.'

'Oh, right. I see.' Corrigan looked at Stirling.

'He's serious,' Stirling said.

'Uhuh.'

'I swear to God. Every major drug baron in the world is here. They're carving up the world. Signing deals. I swear to God. They do it every year. Different location.'

'I think,' Corrigan said, 'we might have noticed.'

'I'm telling you the truth. I swear. I mean, I mean . . . Jesus . . . it's not the sort of thing you make up . . .'

'Unless you're coked up and facing murder one.'

'For fuck . . . I mean . . . c'mon . . . c'mon . . . I can prove it. . . I mean, I can name names, I can do that. Get a pen, get a pen . . . get paper . . . get paper . . .'

He was starting to lose the thread.

Corrigan sighed. They'd have to get a statement out of him one way or another; perhaps giving him paper would get him started. They'd have to contact his people, his father, whoever he was, maybe his record company, get him a lawyer. Before dinner there'd be a suit from New York or LA organizing bail.

Stirling got him paper. 'What're you playing at, Mark?' Corrigan asked as he hurried back.

'I think it's brilliant,' said Stirling. 'He's fucking deranged.'

He made a great show of putting the paper down and brandishing a pen. 'Right then,' he said, 'there you go. Get some of those names down; we'll soon get this convention sorted out, then we'll see what we can do about these charges.' He stopped and scratched his head. 'Of course, if they really were international drug dealers, they wouldn't be staying here under their real names, would they?' He winked across at Corrigan.

'Of course not!' Pongo exclaimed. 'But they're here. Here! Right here! Shit, shit . . . OK. . . the names . . . the names . . . I'll give you some names. You check them out, you check them out and then tell me whether I'm crazy. I know you think I'm crazy, but I'm not crazy. You'll see.'

He sniffed up hard, then bent suddenly to the paper and started to scribble. Stirling looked across at Corrigan and winked. 'How many names you reckon you'll have for us, Pongo?'

Pongo didn't look up. 'Don't know. Maybe twenty, thirty.'

'Not a very big convention, then.'

'Shit, man, those are only the names I can remember! There's a hundred and fifty of them
at least.'

'Tell me,' Corrigan said, 'do you see drug barons everywhere you look?'

'Yes!' He continued to scribble furiously. 'I just want to make my music. I don't want to go to gaol. I give you this, you let me go, OK?'

Stirling nodded thoughtfully. 'We can't just cut you one like that, Pongo, we have to check this out.'

Pongo's face sagged a little and he stopped writing. 'I can wait here while you check it out, can't I? I like it here. It's safe. I didn't mean to kill the girl.'

'We'll see what we can do.'

Corrigan opened the cell door, allowing Stirling, smirking, through first. Just as it was closing Pongo said: 'Be careful.'

Corrigan paused a moment. 'Why?' he asked.

For a moment Pongo's face assumed a seriousness Corrigan had not noticed before; his voice was deeper and his gaze steady. 'Don't underestimate the importance of this convention to the people involved. It can only take place in conditions of utmost secrecy. People have been bought off. People have disappeared. If you try checking this on a police computer, you will disappear as well.'

Corrigan nodded. 'Well if we can't check it,' he asked, 'how can we possibly know if you're telling the truth?'

Pongo nodded thoughtfully. 'You'll just have to trust me,' he said.

Corrigan closed the door. He kept his silence as they walked along the corridor, waiting for Stirling to justify calling him in like that. But when they got to the stairs they just paused for a moment, looked at each other, then burst into laughter.

They had coffee and they had biscuits. It was noon and Stirling was
still
perfecting his press statement. Corrigan felt sorry for Pongo. Sorry for anyone who could get into that state. His career, whatever it had been, was clearly over. Once the media got hold of him, they wouldn't let go. He almost felt inclined to go out and buy a Pongo CD to see what all the fuss would be about.

Almost.

Drug convention in Niagara.
He couldn't even remember the last time they'd had a drugs bust in the town. There hadn't yet been any evidence of crack cocaine, though just a couple of hundred miles across the border it had reached epidemic proportions. Coke wasn't really a Niagara land of a thing either. Which, he supposed, made it the perfect place to have a drugs convention.

Like most police forces they turned a blind eye to the odd bit of dope, but whatever few dealers there were had enough sense to keep their heads down. He was partial to the odd joint himself. Just to relax. To take some of the pain out of his shot legs. To lie back on the deck of the
Maid of the Mist
with Maynard and enjoy the Falls and talk shit. He never actually bought it, of course. He had an understanding with Maynard. Corrigan buys the drinks, Maynard supplies the draw. It wasn't even a regular occurrence. Once a month, tops.

He looked across at Stirling, mouthing the words of his laboriously written statement. He waved the cigarette box at him. Stirling declined.

'Whatever way you look at it,' Corrigan said, 'you have to give Pongo full marks for imagination. A convention of drug dealers masquerading as horticulturalists. Ironic or what?'

'Ironic drug dealers,' said Stirling. 'Now there's a first.'

Corrigan had a sheet of paper before him as well. Pongo's list of international drug dealers. He crossed to the computer that sat on a desk by the window and switched it on. It gave him immediate access to a huge data bank of information on criminal activity in Canada and the United States. It was rarely used.

Stirling, watching, said: 'What're you doing?'

Corrigan smiled, a little self-consciously. 'Just running a few of Pongo's names through, see if they check out. He gets his drugs from somewhere, we might get a bust out of this as well.'

He started to type.

'Frank?'

'Mmmmm?'

'What if it's not all bullshit? What if he's right?' Stirling had put his pen down and was looking thoughtful. 'I mean, obviously he's wrong, but
if,
if he was right, and you type those names in, what if we disappear, like he said?'

Corrigan laughed. 'I thought it was only cokeheads got paranoid?' He turned back to his typing. He'd finished the first name. His finger moved to the send button. It hovered.

He looked across at Stirling.

'Just a thought,' Stirling said.

Corrigan sat back. 'You know,' he said, 'if you think about it, drug barons must have conventions. They must do. It stands to reason.'

Stirling shrugged. 'Suppose so. They have to make deals, just like any other business. Find out what's new. I don't think there's like a
Drug Dealers' Quarterly
or anything, is there?'

Corrigan snorted. His finger reached for the button again.

'Y'know,' Stirling said, 'if you want, we could check it out ourselves. Pretty easily. Just take a walk down to the Skylon Brock, ask a few questions.'

'You're serious?'

'Partly.'

Corrigan sat back from the screen. 'I suppose we can't do anything with Pongo until he settles himself a bit. We can't let the press see him like that or they'll tear him to shreds.'

'That's not our responsibility.'

'I know, but it's only fair.'

'What's fair got to do with it? We're police.'

'So what will we do? He doesn't even want us to phone his lawyer.'

'I don't know. I suppose we
could
walk down there, get some proper coffee, have a look round.'

Corrigan pulled at a lip. 'As long as we don't tell anyone.'

Stirling smiled. 'God, who could we tell?'

Corrigan erased the name from the computer screen. He could check them out later.

They took a walk along the river. It was bitingly cold.

'Must be difficult,' Corrigan said, 'being that young, having all that money. Women throwing themselves at you.'

'I could live with it.'

'Could you?'

'For a couple of weeks anyway. Then I'd go home.'

They arrived at the Skylon and pushed through the doors into reception. It was busy. There was a sign saying: SKYLON WELCOMES INTERNATIONAL HORTICULTURAL CONVENTIONEERS. There were four or five carts full of flowers, and behind them babes in various national costumes giving out samples to conventioneers.

Corrigan didn't know what he was looking for. He had attended a thousand conventions. Niagara was that kind of a town. Conventions turned up every conceivable type of person. If you were looking for someone suspicious or studious or creepy or high-flying or nerdy or anything, you'd find them. There were guys who prompted a nudge from Stirling, guys who looked like drug dealers, kind of smooth and bejewelled, but they might as well have been flower dealers into daffodils.

Corrigan accepted a complimentary red rose off a girl in a red skirt and red t-shirt. 'So,' he asked her, 'much crack cocaine available today?'

She smiled and said something in Spanish and moved on. Corrigan shrugged at Stirling. They approached the desk.