Blood Count, page 19
Annie produced an assortment of salads.
“Listen, guy,” she said, “Meals on Wheels is supposed to be for senior citizens. You may act like an old fart at times, but age-wise you don’t qualify for the service.”
“There’s progress on the health front,” I said. “I’m beginning to feel the blood course through my veins.”
“When it reaches your feet, let’s step out for a dinner.”
“Tomorrow night,” I said. “A real blowout, I promise.”
Annie lined up the salads on the kitchen counter.
“How’s it going with the paper chase?” she asked.
“I’m in need of your assistance.”
“My analytical powers? My critical faculties? My natural instinct? What?”
“Your contacts,” I said.
“Aw, you really know how to bring a girl back to earth.”
“Your input is key, honestly,” I said. “Want a drink before we get into it?”
“Do you?”
“Maybe a mild Bloody Mary.”
Annie made the drinks, light on the Tabasco, heavy on the lemon, and sat at the kitchen table.
“The first piece of information I need,” I said, “is subsidiary but useful. Did David Rowbottom’s ministry hand out grant money to Bart the Bulge?”
“That’s a matter of public record.”
“So I’m told.”
“Except not on Saturdays. The Ministry of Culture and Communications is closed.”
“That’s where I hoped one of your contacts might come in,” I said. “Someone you can phone who keeps files on such matters?”
Annie dipped a finger in her Bloody Mary and tasted it. “Mm,” she said. “Sure, I know two or three people who might be worth a shot. But I doubt if any of them would recognize Bart by his nom de strip.”
“Tell them to look under Santucci. Bartley Santucci.”
“Santucci. Gotcha,” Annie said. She started to stand up.
“Before you hit the phones,” I said, “there’s more.”
Annie stayed put.
“Everything you see before you,” I said, waving a hand over the stacks of documents on the tables, “this defines the Paulie Ross empire. He presides over twenty-six, I think it is, twenty-six or twenty-seven companies in the same number of commercial areas.”
“He isn’t just a run-of-the-mill drug overlord, the type I might recognize from reruns of Hill Street Blues?”
“Probably got started that way,” I said. “Probably made his original stake in cocaine or gambling or prostitution, but now he’s more or less legit.”
“What are these commercial areas he’s more or less legit in?”
“Parking garages, the enclosed kind,” I said. “He’s got them right across the province. Let’s see, a linen supply business. And he rents out video games to bars and restaurants. Distributes magazines. I suspect they’re magazines that run to acres of bare female flesh. He’s big in hotels, in towns too small for a Ramada or a Best Western. The kind of hotel that sells gallons of beer in the public rooms.”
“Okay,” Annie said, “that’s enough on lists.”
“You have the picture?”
“I do,” Annie said, “and what I want to know, is there a smoking gun?”
“Not in the enterprises I just described,” I said. “But there might be a whiff of gunpowder over here.”
I picked up a single sheet of paper. “Paulie Ross’s land holdings,” I said.
“Apart from the property his hotels sit on, his parking garages, et cetera.”
“Oh, right. His independent land holdings, more accurately,” I said. “Two pieces of real estate.”
“The chateau out in the sticks off north Bathurst Street and what else?”
“You’re fast off the mark today, lady.”
“Get on with it, Crang.”
“Six thousand and thirty-three contiguous acres,” I said. “All in one parcel, and I gather from the legal description of the property, the township and county and so on, it’s located somewhere in the neighbourhood south of Peterborough.”
“Where does that get us?” Annie asked.
“Unless I’m mistaken, smack in the middle of David Rowbottom’s riding.”
“You’ve been boning up on the fine geographical points of provincial politics?” Annie asked, showing some slight surprise.
“Birks Robinson mentioned where Rowbottom’s riding is,” I said. “Birks is wrong about some things. Like he’s probably overestimated Hubert Wax, being so definite about Hubert as the killer and everything. But I don’t think Birks is apt to get confused about a simple fact like the whereabouts of David Rowbottom’s riding.”
“You’d still like me to verify it with one of my myriad contacts?”
“Please.”
“Glad to,” Annie said, “but I wasn’t aware I had a contact in provincial politics.”
“The guy on the radio, on Metro Morning,” I said. “Remember, when you used to do the movie reviews for the program, there was the reporter who had the beat over at the legislature?”
“Jerry. He still has the beat.”
“He was kind of sweet on you.”
“I never noticed that.”
“It’s the sort of detail I always notice,” I said. “Phone Jerry and talk ridings with him. And while you’re at it, while he’s on the line, ask if there’s anything special cooking around the legislature on garbage.”
“Garbage?”
“Yeah,” I said. “Any important decisions coming up, maybe a bill going through the voting process, big deal moves of that nature.”
“On garbage?”
“Sure, you know, the detritus people put out for collection in green plastic bags twice a week.”
“I know what garbage is.”
Annie picked up a pen and a couple of sheets of blank paper from the table and went into the bedroom. I heard her dial the phone and talk into it, not the words, just the murmur of her voice. My system seemed to be absorbing the Bloody Mary without complaint. I examined the salads on the counter. Salmon. Tomato. Green. Chicken. Bean. My stomach didn’t seize up at the prospect of digesting them. I cleared the kitchen table of most of the documents, set two places for lunch, and waited.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Annie came back from the bedroom fifteen minutes later.
“Bartley Santucci a.k.a. the Bulge received an arts and communications grant last spring,” she said. “Fifty thousand.”
“Lucky Bart,” I said. “At the rate he cranks out the movies, that sum ought to finance a dozen features.”
Annie consulted what she’d written on one of the sheets of paper. “From Jerry,” she said, “I got the exact boundaries of Rowbottom’s riding.”
She handed me the piece of paper. “What’ll you do?” she asked. “See if the description you have of Paulie Ross’s property fits inside the riding boundaries?”
“Exactly.”
I went back and forth between Annie’s notes and the legal description in the title search of the Ross property that the student at Tom Catalano’s office had meticulously transcribed. I compared the two, isolated one inside the other.
“Verified,” I said.
“Paulie Ross owns a large chunk of David Rowbottom’s riding?”
“Six thousand and thirty-three acres of it,” I said, “What else from Jerry of Metro Morning?”
“He wondered why a movie reviewer was asking questions about a homosexual cabinet minister.”
“How curious was Jerry?”
Annie thought for a minute. “Not very,” she said. “I passed it off as research. I mean, I am a movie person and Rowbottom is culture and communications.”
“What about the garbage?”
“Jerry acted like me asking about that was more on the suspicious side, but he didn’t grill me or anything.”
“Good,” I said. “Now, would you please tell me if something is brewing at the legislature in the garbage area?”
“Where does garbage come into the picture, anyway?”
I sighed. “Think of what Albert said in the Lincoln the day we were escorted out to the Ross mansion for the tête-à-tête. Albert said, ‘Garbage dumps is gonna be big.’”
“Recycling depots. Joey B. corrected Albert. Not garbage dumps. Recycling depots.”
“Sweetie, under either designation, what did Jerry tell you on the telephone ten minutes ago?”
“His term of choice is garbage dump.”
“Annie.”
“As opposed to recycling depot.”
I folded my arms on the table and rested my forehead on them.
“Just teasing, honey,” Annie said. “Jerry had good material. At least, not knowing precisely why I was asking the questions I was asking, I think it’s good material.”
I raised my head.
“May I refer to my notes?” Annie asked. “This is complicated for a simple go-between like myself. A mere researcher.”
I shifted around in my chair. “Are you enjoying yourself?” I asked Annie.
“Well, you must admit you were a little peremptory, the way you asked me to do the dirty work on the phone.”
“You’re right.”
“My stalling around, that was just taking a tiny measure of revenge.”
“Okay, I apologize for the peremptoriness.”
“Well.” Annie ran her eyes over the notes she’d made. “It seems there is something going on in the upper minor leagues of garbage in Ontario.”
I waited in respectful silence.
“Down in the eastern part of the province,” Annie went on, “Brockville, Belleville, about a dozen towns and small cities down that way, they’ve got a common problem. Too much refuse and no place to stow it. The dumps are overflowing, a stink is in the air. So for the last two, three years, they’ve been co-operating, these communities, in trying to find one massive dump that’ll accommodate all their tons of old chicken bones, orange peels, and eggshells.”
“A single locale, right.”
“But,” Annie said, “politics keeps rearing its homely head. This is all according to Jerry. Every time the city fathers of Brockville, Belleville, and the rest think they’ve found a site for the big dump, someone locally, some group of concerned citizens, generates their own stink, and the plans get canned.”
Annie paused and took a deep breath. “Hence,” she said, “with things hitting the crisis stage, garbage piling up by the minute, the issue has been kicked upstairs. A senior body, the guys at the top, somebody has to make a decision, designate a site, and enforce the selection. Now then, guess who the body is that’s arriving at the choice of dump?”
I opened my mouth to answer.
Annie leaped in first. “Never mind,” she said. “You’ll just get it right and spoil my fun. The decision maker, the bunch who’s going to hand down a verdict any time next month, is … ta-da … the provincial cabinet.”
“Of which,” I said, “David Rowbottom is a member in good standing.”
“A guy who may be connected somehow or other to a shady customer named Paulie Ross.”
“Who,” I picked up, “happens to own a piece of property in Rowbottom’s riding large enough to welcome the refuse of practically the whole of eastern Ontario.”
Annie leaned across the table and lifted her eyebrows at me. “Interesting, wouldn’t you say?”
“Absolutely fascinating.”
Annie straightened up. “What use do you see yourself making of this train of coincidences or connections or whatever?”
“Getting a little leverage.”
“Who from?” Annie asked. “I hope not Paulie Ross.”
“Uh-uh. He’s too formidable.”
“And has too many henchmen.”
“My sentiments precisely,” I said. “No, I’ll lay it on David Rowbottom’s desk.”
Annie hesitated. “I was going along swimmingly, following all the twists and turns, but I think I just went off the rails.”
“I’m operating on the principle, shake a tree and something might fall out of the branches.”
“That’s a principle?”
“Well, maybe a modus operandi,” I said. “What I’ll do, I’ll waft a breath of this possible scandal past Rowbottom’s nose. Let him know I’m wise to Paulie Ross’s six thousand and thirty-three acres in his riding, the cabinet decision upcoming on the garbage dump, all that inside dope, and it might scare a revelation of some sort out of him.”
“A revelation about who killed Alex?”
“That’s the end we’re aiming at. You never know, I could squeeze Rowbottom for a secret.”
“I’m beginning to see the light,” Annie said. “Rowbottom must know something about the murder.”
“Or know someone who knows something.”
“One thing,” Annie said, “the last time you went on one of these fact-finding missions, you were the guy who ended up getting pounded on.”
“This’ll be in safer territory,” I said. “Rowbottom’s own office. First thing Monday morning, I’ll beard the lion.”
“In his den.”
“Right. Confront him boldly.”
Annie raised her glass.
“I’ll drink to that,” she said.
We clinked Bloody Marys.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
The Ministry of Culture and Communications was in a building on Bloor near Bay. That put it a leisurely half-hour walk from my place. I left on foot about eight forty Monday morning, north through the university campus and past the Royal Ontario Museum. The sun was warm on my shoulders, and after most of three days in bed, the spring was back in my step.
The building at Bay and Bloor was twenty storeys tall with a postmodern arch outside, revolving doors in a glass archway, and a high lobby that the architect had invested with artsy touches. The floor was terrazzo, partly covered by two enormous Scandinavian-looking rugs. There were round columns running up to the ceiling and cacti in planters along the walls. The information desk, in the middle of the lobby, had a marble face and a slanted silver panel that listed the occupants. Rowbottom’s office was on the twelfth floor. The elevators were to the left of the desk. I rode up.
The foyer on twelve was deep in maroon carpeting. Dead ahead, a pretty, dark-haired receptionist sat under a splashy 1950s abstract expressionist painting.
“My name’s Crang, to see the minister,” I said. “I have no appointment but I’m not a grant seeker or a loony who’s wandered in off the street.”
“No appointment?” The receptionist maintained her gorgeous smile.
“Pass my name up the line,” I said. “It’ll catch someone’s ear.”
The receptionist picked up a white phone and punched a button.
“I have a Mr. Crang here,” she said in a low voice. “He’d like to see the minister. No appointment.”
She waited, dark head down.
“C-r-a-n-g, I think,” she said into the receiver, and looked up at me.
“Right,” I said.
She listened and after a few seconds hung up the phone.
“Martha doesn’t know who you are,” she said to me.
“Makes us even. Who’s Martha?”
“In charge of the executive assistant’s appointments.”
“Aim higher.” I twinkled my eyes at the receptionist. “The minister himself. Trust me, he’ll recognize the name.”
The receptionist was still smiling. “I’ll try,” she said, “just because it’s a slow morning so far.”
“Not because of the winning look in my eye?”
“I thought a bug had landed on your pupil for a minute, there.”
“That’s called a twinkle.”
The receptionist tapped her fingers on the phone buttons, and in the low voice again explained my presence on the twelfth floor.
“Really?” she said into the phone. She hung up and looked at me. “Mr. Brander will be right out.”
“Mr. Brander?”
“The minister’s executive assistant.”
A door opened behind the receptionist, and a slightly over-weight young guy with slicked-back hair came out.
“Ray Brander, Mr. Crang,” he said to me, shaking hands. “Please come in.”
I followed Brander through the door and down a long corridor. Brander had a gliding way of walking. We turned right and went straight through an open door into a large office with a large desk. David Rowbottom was sitting behind the desk. He didn’t get up.
“I’ll see Mr. Crang alone, Ray,” he said to Brander.
Brander looked hurt but left the room without whimpering. He shut the door on his way out.
Rowbottom’s office had an open, airy feel. It had two large windows, and the rest of the wall space was busy with paintings. I recognized a Harold Town, Louis de Niverville, and Gordon Rayner.
“You got enough pictures in here to open a law firm,” I said.
“What sport do you think you’re playing, Crang?” Rowbottom said.
“I’m trying to find out who killed Alex Corcoran,” I said. “And it’s no sport.”
“You set fire to a bar last week and assaulted an innocent citizen.”
“Oh, hey, good thing Hubert Wax doesn’t work for a newspaper,” I said. “He’d make a lousy reporter.”
I sat down in an armchair.
“What gave you the idea Hubert had anything to do with the murder?” Rowbottom asked. His blue eyes were at peak glare.
“It wasn’t a what that steered me Waxer’s way,” I said. “A who. Birks Robinson.”
“I should have guessed,” Rowbottom said. “Birks has an overwrought imagination.”
