A Door in the River Read Free

loved.”
    “Thank you for coming, Hazel. You know it was your father’s generation that set the example for Hank, once hewas ready to come around to it. His dad, yours, all those nice old guys who used to curl together at the bonspiel … they were the template. I wonder what this place is going to be like when their influence is finally gone.”
    “Well, it’s up to us to keep it alive. Henry was the best example of it, though.”
    Cathy half smiled at Hazel. “Thank you for saying that.”
    Hazel gave the mourning woman a huge hug. Then, gently, she said, “Do you mind if I ask you something, Cathy?”
    “Like what?” Hazel’s tone had put her on alert.
    “I’m just wondering if Henry smoked.”
    “Oh, he quit years ago. But he bought the occasional pack. I sometimes found them.”
    “Do you think he would have gone down to Queesik Bay to buy a pack of cigarettes?”
    “Hazel …”
    “I know,” she said, “Sorry. Force of habit.”
    She squeezed Hazel’s hand and turned her reddened face to the next well-wisher. Hazel went back to her car. She drove home with the radio off, thinking. Why had Henry Wiest parked far in the back of the smoke shop? There was a drive-through there if he’d wanted to be subtle about it. But he’d parked. So maybe he hadn’t gone for smokes. She sincerely doubted that he’d gone for souvenirs, either.

] 2 [
    Late afternoon
    Things were changing at the Port Dundas Police Department. Years of talk about amalgamating some of the region’s smaller shops was turning into a reality, and the Port Dundas detachment was about to experience that in the form of Ray Greene returning to his old shop as the new commanding officer. Supposedly this was the beginning of a renaissance for Port Dundas: the detachment was going to grow, become more central to Westmuir operations. She wondered what Ray was going to be called. Probably superintendent. It made her skin itch to think of it. He’d been gone for almost a year, after quitting the force over Hazel’s methods, as his CO, and now he was coming back, not as her deputy but her boss. Ray himself had informed Hazel of Commissioner Willan’s decisionin person back in May: he was going to be installed in January. So she had five months, five more months to do things her way.
    After the gathering at the Wiest house, she called down to Queesik Bay to get a copy of the band police report on the discovery of the body, and a copy of the autopsy. The report was faxed up from the reserve police department. It was detailed and unprovocative. Under the details of time and place, the reporting officer, a Lydia Bellecourt, had written:
I responded to the location at 12:35 a.m. in regards to a report of a body in the rear of the parking lot behind Eagle Smoke and Souvenir. Upon arrival at the time noted above, a customer of Eagle Smoke and Souvenir, full name LOUIS PETER HARKEMAS , directed me to the location of the body, which he first saw when he was parking his car and his headlights illuminated it. He reassured me that no one had touched or moved the body from when he first saw it. The victim was found lying on his back, on the gravel of the rear parking lot, between a red, 2003 Ford F-150 pickup with the licence plate AAZW 229, and a grey 1997 Volkswagen Jetta with no plates. The victim was dressed in jeans, a blue shirt, and was wearing black Blundstone boots. The victim had vomited.
I ascertained that the victim was not breathing anddid not have a pulse, whereupon I radioed QBAS to state that the victim appeared to be deceased and that in addition to life-saving equipment that had already been dispatched, a coroner would be needed. The ambulance arrived on the scene at 12:41 a.m. and pronounced the victim dead. The coroner, CALVIN BRETT , arrived shortly afterwards and did his own exam and wrote his report on the scene (#38174490). He estimated the time of death at between 11 p.m. and midnight. A driver’s licence and an Ontario Health