River City (97 page)

That Paul came in last was another surprise, until he explained himself. Traditionally the most social among them, he was constantly pulling people together for a beer, then coaxing them to stay out as long as possible. By Anik’s count, he’d never been late for a get-together
ever.
Yet Paul was finding his element. He studied photography, and dreamed of creating artistic work through a camera’s lens. The kidnappings and the army’s advance had changed his approach. Now he wanted his camera to record life as it was being experienced in the moment. He wanted his snapshots in the news.

“One way or another, we’ll get through this,” Anik suggested. “Then you won’t have any more big moments.”

“Send me to the next crisis, then. War, earthquake, famine, plague, I don’t care. I want excitement, you understand? I’ve acquired a taste for it. I’m hooked.”

They believed him. He had discovered his true vocation and glowed with a new enchantment. Anik assessed, at that moment, that among them she’d trust only him, only Paul.

Touton contacted his young protégé through his squad car’s two-way radio. The message was to go at full speed to an address in the industrial north end, adjacent to an expressway.

“Full speed?” he inquired back to the switchboard operator. He meant the question to be rhetorical. He was unaccustomed to personal messages being sent over the air to him and replied somewhat dumbly. The woman took his question seriously and got back to him with Touton’s response.

“Lights flashing.”

He zoomed.

He arrived at a dreary ten-storey warehouse and rag-trade building within seconds of his boss, their front bumpers nearly colliding as they braked severely. Other officers had already arrived and were just lounging around, but when Touton extracted his pistol and dashed into the building, they suddenly did the same. Through the melee, Cinq-Mars caught up to him inside.

“You two,” the captain barked. “Guard the elevator. More guys are coming. When they arrive, tell them to start evacuating everybody out of the building. The rest of you, we’re taking the stairs.”

The old man was puffing by the fifth floor, but he didn’t relent. On the sixth, they went into the corridor where two RCMP detectives tried to block their progress.

“Captain,” one said, “there’s no way around this. It’s not legal.”

“Ask yourself two questions. You guys are already here. The RCMP does not call in the Montreal police to help them with an illegal task. So. Who called me here? When you answer that question, then ask yourself why.”

The Mountie thought it over a second, then stood aside as Touton and his ten men went down the corridor. They stormed through broad doors and Cinq-Mars raised his pistol.

“Police! Don’t anybody fucking move!”

The six guys inside had been expecting trouble. They carried semi-automatic weapons leisurely at their sides. The man who answered had a thick Spanish accent, but his French was good.

“We already told those Mounties. This warehouse is under the control of
the Cuban Embassy. This is Cuban soil. You must leave. You have no right here. You are in violation of international law.”

The man was small, with a snide look on his face, and watching him, Cinq-Mars deduced that he was treacherous and experienced. A soldier.

Touton looked around the room. He saw what he’d been told he would find. His fellow officers were clueless as to the meaning of this raid, and one man visibly went pale as he checked things out. Cinq-Mars took it in at a glance, then knew that this fight was serious. He could easily die here.

“Who are you?” Touton demanded.

The man shrugged, made a gesture as though he was inventing a name, and said, “Miguel.”

“Miguel, there’s one thing you have to understand. Those other officers left. But we will not leave. The guns you have here, the dynamite, the explosives, the grenades, have no business being on Canadian soil—”

“This is officially Cuban soil—”

“I don’t give a shit!” he yelled, and suddenly the Cuban was less arrogant. He understood that he faced a problem now where the rules of diplomacy might not protect him. “You brought explosives and bomb-making material into a country that is combating an insurrection. I was a soldier once. I am speaking to you at this moment as a soldier, not as a cop. You are not going to be permitted to blow up my city and the citizens in my city and I don’t give a sweet fuck about your goddamned diplomatic immunity or international-fucking-law. Is that clear to you?”

“My guys are better armed than yours.”

“Then some of us will die and some of you will die, but you, Miguel, will be the first. You’ll have your international incident then. But no Cuban or terrorist will have access to this material.”

The standoff was secure. No one had a next move. Cinq-Mars heard the door open behind him and looked back. Half a dozen Mounties entered, including the two they’d spoken to in the corridor. They now carried semiautomatic rifles, too.

“I told you men before,” the Cuban said to them. “You have no right here.

This is Cuba!”

“We were cops then,” the ranking officer told him. “We’ve resigned our commissions. Maybe that’s temporary—we don’t know yet. Now we’re just a bunch of hard-assed boys with stolen guns. You got to leave now, or we will help this man blow your heads off.”

Miguel didn’t budge. His eyes surveyed the officers. Occasionally, he glanced at his own men. He was getting no help here, and seemed to be waiting.

A phone rang and everybody jumped.

One of the Cubans answered. He indicated that it was for Miguel.

“Excuse me,” the man said, and went to the phone. He said, “Si,” and then only listened. After he hung up, Miguel returned to his position facing the policemen.

“What does Castro say?” Touton asked.

Miguel cleared his throat. “If there is any mention of this in the papers, we will deny it and cause an international incident that will embarrass your government. If you do not agree,” and he indicated his own men, “we must die here. Many of you will die also, probably all of you if something explodes.”

Touton looked around. None of his men budged. “Well,” he said, “we’re staying. And I don’t see any reporters around, do you?”

“It has to be more official than that.”

“I got this,” the Mountie who had talked to them earlier said, and he left the room. He was gone for seven minutes, and during that time the men just stared at one another, too fearful to blink, ready to shoot. Each man feared for his life and stared at the man across from him that he might soon kill.

Then the Mountie returned.

“What does Trudeau say?” Touton asked him.

The Mountie raised an eyebrow. Then he said, “It’s been taken care of.” They waited, eye to eye.

When the phone rang again, nobody jumped. Miguel answered it himself. “Si,” he said. Then he listened. Then he said, “Si,” and hung up.

Miguel did not look at the policemen—not so much as a glance. He left the room, and his confederates followed. As each man arrived at the exit door, he set down his heavy weapon, then left.

When they were gone, the Mountie said, “Gather ‘round.”

The policemen—city cops and Mounties—formed a circle around him.

“There’s enough explosive in this room to bring down a bridge. In a crowded place, thousands would die. There’s enough here to do that over and over again. Your country will never know to thank you, but I thank you. And now we’re duty bound to keep this among ourselves. It’s not going to be in the papers because there’d be more shit to pay than any of us can afford. Captain Touton was right. This comes down from Trudeau himself. If what we did here today gets leaked, I’ll arrest every last one of you, and if that doesn’t give us the one guy who talked, then you’re all fired. I don’t care who you are. I can, and I will, deliver on that promise. Plus, that’ll be only the beginning of your troubles. Captain Touton—thank you.”

The two men shook hands.

“If you don’t mind,” the Mountie said, “we’ll take care of this now.” “I don’t want to be around here.”

Nobody said another word until they got outside, where Émile Cinq-Mars, who was both a religious man and someone who rarely swore outside of a hectic moment, calmly said, “Holy shit.”

Touton exhaled a deep breath.

Cinq-Mars looked at him. “Are we at war?”

Touton was digging for his smokes. “If we are, we’re the only ones who know it. Fuck. This is what Trudeau’s talking on TV about—his ‘apprehended insurrection,’ he calls it, what he’s telling the people he can’t tell them about. Now he still can’t tell anybody, not unless Castro dies first.” He turned suddenly towards the others and barked a final command for this operation. “Everybody, out of here before somebody wonders what we’re doing. Cinq-Mars, come with me for a second.”

They moved to a corner of the building, then a little farther to get out of the wind.

“Here,” Touton said, and he handed the younger man an envelope. “The arrest lists you wanted. Both names were on it, both have been removed.”

“Thanks.”

“And here.” Another envelope emerged from the man’s coat pocket.

“Don’t lose it.”

He did not need to look inside to identify the contents. The envelope carried the weight of a dime. He could feel only a small, thin, hard fragment. The stone chip from the Cartier Dagger.

“Thanks again.”

“Stop fucking thanking me,” Touton told him, “and do something.”

“Can’t you climb it?” she asked.

“Not with all my stuff,” he said. “Fuck your stuff,” she said back. “What do you mean? I need my stuff.” “One camera. That’s all you need.”

Paul had never thought so. He needed his tripod and light meters, assorted lenses and filters, his telephoto for sure, the zoom, a bag of film, the extra camera bags, a flash wand, light reflectors, his—

“Just climb up the fucking tree and take the fucking pictures when somebody fucking shows up. Stop being such a prima-fucking-donna.”

A radical idea. Paul climbed with a single camera around his neck. Anik waited nervously below.

“Pssst!” she hissed.

“What?” he asked, curled on a limb.

“Toss me down a smoke.”

“What,” the prime minister inquired, “do we have?” He sounded hopeful, yet wary.

“Nothing.”

“Don’t say ‘nothing.’ Whatever you say, don’t say ‘nothing.’” “Sir, we have very little so far.”

“Why do people say I’m in power? The press should report, honestly, that I’m now the least powerful man in the country.”

“Sir, the army has control of the streets—” the commissioner pointed out. “—and the kidnappers control me.” “You don’t mean that, sir.” He didn’t. That was true.

“If I may say so, Mr. Prime Minister, we’re making progress on many fronts.”

“Progress?”

“We know a few of the kidnappers. Except for one, we can’t find them.”

“And you call that progress.”

“The police are drawing the net closer.”

“If they don’t know where to look, how can they draw the net closer?” “It’s only a matter of time.”

“Who said we have time? A Quebec cabinet minister is dead, and where’s James Cross? You’re closing
in,
but you don’t know where
in
is. What if that cell or another cell kidnaps somebody else? What if Laporte’s killers strike again? For that reason alone, I can’t have the commissioner of the RCMP come into my office to tell me that matters are at a standstill.”

His secretary rang through on the intercom. Someone had arrived to see him who was not on the agenda.

“Who is it?”

“A police detective from Montreal.”

“Name?”

“Émile Cinq-Mars. He says he wants to talk to you.” He’d heard that name before. Lately, he’d heard a lot of names. “Ask him to go through channels. Follow protocol, for heaven’s sake.” “Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.”

“Take down the name of his superior officer before he leaves.”

The prime minister returned his attention to the police commissioner. “What are your plans?”

“Mr. Prime Minister, Laporte’s body, the car, the discovery of their hideout, then finding Lortie, that business. What was bungled was bungled, but each clue brings us a step closer.”

“Cross was abducted by a different cell,” Trudeau reminded him.

“A lead that concerns one cell may help with the other. We are working every lead to its limit.”

The prime minister shook his head as the intercom lit up again. “He’s insisting, sir,” his secretary said. “Don’t we have a Mountie outside?”

“We do.”

“Ask the Mountie to escort him out. If he’d like a direct command from the commissioner, he’s with me now.” “Yes, sir.”

The voice returned a moment later. “The Mountie is escorting him out, sir, and has acquired help to do so. The officer insists that he has something you must see before you make a final decision.”

“I’ve made my final decision.”

“You don’t have to see him. So he claims. Only what he has to show you.”

A belligerent cop. Even the commissioner was smirking, to decry the lack of discipline in the more primitive forces.

That name. He remembered. He’d heard it from Father François.

The prime minister clicked the button to speak. “Hold on.” He looked at the commissioner and shrugged. “Go out and collect whatever it is I’m supposed to look at, will you?”

“Sir—”

“If it’s a waste of time, we’ll see that the officer is disciplined.” “Yes, sir.”

The top officer in the land accomplished the rather modest errand in short order, and returned with an ordinary business envelope marked fragile and folded to a third its size and sealed. Whatever lay inside felt weightless and small.

“Curious. I wonder what it is.”

The commissioner stood waiting to find that out himself. “How’d he strike you, this Cinq-Mars?”

“Young,” was the commissioner’s first reaction. But he conceded, “Intelligent. It’s odd. He’s too young to have a gold shield. He says it was given to him by Captain Armand Touton in order to conduct a special line of inquiry on the FLQ. But he’s still a Montreal cop. You know what that means.”

Trudeau ignored the slur. “We owe Touton for the Cubans.” “It’s curious, sir.”