River City (7 page)

“—and the murder in the park, sir. Same case.”

They’d reached the door to the league offices. “All right, Miron. I want you to stick around and take care of my shotgun. Can you do that?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Don’t shoot your foot off.”

“I’ll take the shells out, sir, if that’s all right.”

“All right. Here’s the rest of the ammo. If the rioters come up in that elevator, you have my permission to reload and blast away.”

“Yes, sir,” the young man said.

Touton shook his head in dismay. Then he thought he’d better say something. “I’m kidding.”

“Oh,” Miron said. “Okay. I got you.”

Touton stepped over glass and tried not to touch the cracked door to the modest office. A crowbar was on the floor. The foyer was surprisingly small, with insufficient room to swing a cat—or a hockey player his stick. Players had to come here for their disciplinary hearings, and Rocket Richard would have been here only a day ago to plead his case. Touton stepped through to the corridor that led to the warren of adjoining offices, and Detective Sloan spotted him.

“What’s up?” Touton asked.

“This is big,” Sloan said.

“It better be,” the senior officer let him know, but he could see the excitement in Sloan’s eyes and caught it in his tone of voice.

“All right, from the top, there’s been a break-in.”

“How’d they get in? We’ve got guards on every door.”

“Through the windows,” Sloan told him. At forty-seven, he was considerably older than Touton, but having neither his war record nor his success as a cop, he had become junior to him in rank. His hair was thinning. His face was pinched, as if by adversity. His complexion was pale, as though he rarely experienced sunlight. No matter the time of night, he always had such a smooth jaw that Touton doubted he could properly grow a beard, although he could use one, as his chin was weak.

Touton pushed the tip of his hat back, its usual angle when he was indoors, especially if he was mulling something over. “Are you telling me they flew in here? Because I’m willing to partner you up with that dumb patrolman I met downstairs. Oh … let me guess. You’re the one spreading the rumour they swooped in by helicopter.”

“Give me a break, Armand. Come on. We don’t have everything yet, but it sure looks like they got up on the roof somehow, then lowered themselves
down to this level by ropes. We know they broke in through the windows—that’s a fact. They committed a burglary, took what they wanted and left by the windows also, but this time a few floors down. Then they dropped themselves to the ground by ropes when our guys weren’t looking.”

“Our guys weren’t looking. Of course not. What else did they have to do tonight to keep themselves occupied … twiddle their thumbs?”

“Armand, they were guarding the doors. They weren’t looking up. Who would? They were watching the street. Coming down, the crooks concealed themselves behind the columns. It’s ingenious. They almost made a clean break.”

“Almost?”

“Let me show you this first.” He led Touton down a narrow corridor, through an office where cops were murmuring amongst themselves, then into a small antechamber that housed the vault. The heavy steel door sagged open and the wall had been blackened from a blast. Touton took a closer look.

“They blew it open?”

“Dynamite. That crude.”

“Who heard this? And don’t say ‘nobody.’”

He already knew what the man would answer. The building had been emptied for security reasons. The walls were as thick as fortress ramparts. In none of the rooms he had just walked through had there been any windows, and there were none in this one.

“Nobody,” Sloan said.

“What did they get?” Touton asked him.

Rather than answer straight away, Sloan took a deep breath.

“What?” Touton tried to imagine what the dilemma could be. “The Rocket’s stick? A Howie Morenz puck? The Stanley Cup? What?”

“The Cartier Dagger.”

“What’s that?”

“You should know,” Sloan told him. “Not me.”

“Why should I know?”

“Because you’re French. Campbell’s coming over. He can tell you more about it.”

“Clarence Campbell? The mob will kill him if he’s spotted.”

“I told him that. He wanted to come anyway. So I sent a patrol car.”

“That’s good.” Touton shook his head. “If it was me I’d’ve put a bag over his head.”

“If it was me I’d just shoot him,” Sloan said. “But that’s another story.”

“Good point. I hope you sent a couple of guys we can trust.”

Both men smiled. Sloan showed him the smashed glass display case in which an invaluable antique knife resided most days. The case was a couple of feet long, and, like the panelling in the elevator, made of a bright mahogany with polished brass trim. The broken glass was thick and scattered in pieces on the floor.

“Usually, during the day, the case is kept in Campbell’s office. On display. Even then, it’s locked, and secured to the desk it’s on, and the desk weighs a ton.”

Touton was thinking about something else as he took to examining the heavy door blown partially off its hinges. “Usually, there’d be people up here, right? If not in this office, on the floor. If not on the floor, then in the building. Night shift workers. Cleaners. Lawyers preparing a case. People working overtime on a big project. That sort of thing.”

“That’s right.”

“So if this is some sort of big-time heist—”

“Which it is.”

“—then the bad guys took advantage of the riot to break in …”

“I believe that,” Sloan agreed.

“ … then how did they know there’d be a riot?”

“I believe that, too,” Sloan contested, one step ahead of him.

“You believe what?” Sloan was making no sense.

“Somebody might have started the riot in order to steal the Cartier Dagger.”

This was news. Touton had assumed that, in the coming weeks, numerous commentators would be taking a stab at explaining the riot. The frustration of hockey fans, the fury of the French who felt victimized yet again by the English, the social upheaval of a nation wrestling with its postwar restraints, the wrath of the poor—the rationale would be discussed and debated, yet no one was likely to suggest that the entire matter had been a ploy to blow the doors off a vault.

Recovering, Touton said, “Tell me about the knife.”

“An old relic owned by Sun Life. It’s worth millions. For once, ‘priceless’ is a word that fits. Originally, it belonged to Jacques Cartier himself—some Indian gave it to him. It’s on loan to Campbell for his work at Nuremberg, but just on loan, because, like I said, it’s worth millions—or more. He can keep it here as long as he’s NHL president.”

“What’s in it for him?”

“He gets to look at it whenever he wants, I guess. It’s a handsome knife.”

“How do you know?”

“I’ve seen it.”

“When? Where?” Touton drilled him.

“Tonight. Across the street in the park. The dagger is stuck in the heart of a murder victim. Up to the hilt, right through the breastplate. It’s still there right now.”

Touton looked at Sloan. His own excitement was rising, and he wanted to suppress it. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” he said slowly.

“Come across with me. See for yourself.”

“Lead the way.” Touton pulled his hat lower, indicating that he was headed outside, but also that he meant business.

Before they could manage the foray, Clarence Campbell got off the elevator. He was still in the company of the three women with whom he had attended the game, one of whom had received more than her share of tomato splatter. Apparently, the three were not about to leave his side anytime soon, nor would they consent to being left alone by themselves. They were spinsters, and he was a bachelor in need of their care in this, his darkest hour.

The hockey league president held his fedora at his left side, his right hand in his coat pocket. A relaxed posture. Only wisps of hair covered his pate, and his face sagged into his jowls. He had a stout middle. He did not seem to be the sort of man to be keeping the company of three women, but one was his sister and all three were rather dowdy in the style of their day, despite wearing half-veils that hung from their hats, and earrings and bright lipstick. Their coats bulged beneath their waists from the fabric of their dresses and crinolines.

Campbell paused—stopping so suddenly that one of the three women inadvertently stepped into him while she fiddled with her purse. The sight of a shotgun-toting cop at the entrance to his office had shocked him. He took a breath, apologized to the lady who had bumped into him, and carried on.

“Is that really necessary?” he asked the man in blue.

“I’m holding it for someone, that’s all,” Miron replied, somewhat bashfully as he tipped his cap to the ladies present. “It’s not loaded, sir. I’m not planning to shoot anybody with it.”

“That’s heartening, Officer.” He stepped past the policeman and entered the crime scene just as Detective Sloan and Captain Touton emerged.

“Did you
have
to suspend him for the playoffs?” Sloan asked without thinking. “I mean, he’s the Rocket, for crying out loud.”

“Sloan,” Touton said, and the cop shut up. Then he said, “Mr. Campbell.”

“It’s good to see they have Montreal’s finest detective on the case, Captain Touton. The dagger is infinitely valuable. It goes beyond the probable millions it’s worth. An historic relic.”

“We’ve found the knife, sir,” Touton revealed.

“You have! Oh. That’s good news. What a relief. Where?”

“It’s across the street. In the park.”

“The crooks went to all this trouble just to toss it away in the park?”

“We’re still sorting it out. Do you know why anybody would do that?”

Campbell shifted his hat from one hand to the other as he shook his head. “Beats me. People steal things. That happens. But who steals something of value, then throws it away? I’m stumped.”

Touton nodded. “We’ll have to confiscate the knife for a time, sir. Material evidence.”

Campbell did not offer immediate compliance, and instead squared his shoulders. “I’d feel much more comfortable if I received the dagger back tonight, Captain.”

“That’s not possible, sir. Anyway, your vault’s been blown open. You can’t keep it safe.”

“I see. May I have a look inside? At the damage?”

Usually, Touton would keep civilians out, but this man was the president
of the NHL and had been a war crimes prosecutor. In that latter sense, they had both fought the Germans, and had both worked on the right side of the law. “Go ahead, sir, only, please, don’t touch anything. I know it’s your office, but wait until the boys are done. They’re dusting for prints right now.”

“Thank you, Captain. Your fast work on the dagger is appreciated.”

“Lady Luck got us the knife back. Our investigation is only getting started. Now, sir, another matter, when you’re ready to leave—”

“Certainly, Captain.”

“Sir?”

“I’ll accept your escort, if that’s what you’re offering.” He smiled. “I have the safety of my ladies to consider. I won’t be walking around the streets of Montreal anytime soon. If I do, as we both know, I won’t get far.”

As though he’d been on slow simmer, Sloan barged in again. “Five games, for instance. That would’ve been a reasonable suspension—pretty severe. Five games would’ve taught the Rocket a lesson. I could live with that. But the playoffs—”

“Sloan,” Touton said quietly.

“If you went to a tavern to break up a fight, Detective,” Campbell argued back, “and you arrested a fellow who’d taken a baseball bat and smashed it three times across another man’s back, and you’d had to deal with his violence before, what sentence would you expect him to get? Jail time, or a tap on the left wrist?”

“That’s different,” Sloan complained. “This is hockey, not a public tavern.”

“If the Rocket had missed and hit the guy’s head, he’d have killed him. Or maybe he did miss … maybe he was hoping to hit the guy’s head. What sentence would he get for murdering a man on the ice? Or would you recommend that he be let off for that, too, that we just call it hockey?”

“That’s different.”

“Sloan,” Touton hissed.

“Why is it different?” Campbell pressed on. “If people go to a hockey game, or sit in a tavern, they don’t expect to see one man try to hack another man to bits.”

“It’s the Stanley Cup!”

“Sloan, out the door and shut up!” Touton burst out, rather more loudly than he had intended. The detective looked at his superior, then broke off and angrily strode back to the corridor. Touton was stepping around the women to join him when he turned to face Clarence Campbell. “Sorry about that. Like everybody else—”

“No problem, Captain. I understand it’s not a popular decision.”

“It’s your job, I suppose,” Touton sympathized. Then he shook his head, and added, “But I don’t know … the playoffs,” as he went out the door.

In the corridor, Touton shot Sloan a glance, but chose to speak to Miron first. “Come with us. Bring the shotgun.”

Sloan said, “What? Is the shotgun for me? Look, Armand, sorry about that in there. It just rots my socks, you know?”

“If you were investigating a murder scene, and you knew who the murder weapon belonged to, who would you suspect for the crime?”

Being older, Sloan was not usually put in the position of being tested, and he felt momentarily flummoxed. He particularly did not enjoy being dressed down in front of a uniform. “The guy whose weapon it was, of course, but—”

“So what’s different about this case?”

Sloan was still confused, even as he pushed the call button for the elevator.

“No, wait, you don’t think—”

“I didn’t say that.”

“Clarence Campbell … he’s—”

“What? A Nuremberg prosecutor? A big-shot? League president? Therefore beyond suspicion? Okay. That’s fine. But it’s still his knife in the heart of the victim.”

“My God,” Sloan whispered as the elevator doors opened and the three men stepped in. “You don’t think—”

“I don’t, actually. I think his alibi is airtight. He’s been busy. Fourteen thousand people were trying to kick his butt. They were joined by another fifty thousand. I don’t see him getting here fast enough, although it would have been possible. I also don’t see him breaking through upper-storey windows or climbing down to the street by rope. That’s pretty funny, actually, when you think about it. On the other hand, he is under attack. Who knows how nimble
that makes him? But my point has nothing to do with Clarence Campbell being a suspect or not.”