บท 9: Chapter 9
Jim drove through the reserve with only half his mind on the job. Staff had wanted him to take time off, but the thought of sitting in their home without Leigh was too much for him. He would drive down to Thompson to visit, but Dr. Hallace told him Leigh wasn't ready for visitors yet. The blood tests showed she had none of her medications at all in her system.
The only thing she would say to the doctors was that the voices escaped from her head.
Jim turned down another street. In a lot of ways, the reserve was like the Grid. There were no fancy houses here and some were in bad shape, but there were others carefully kept. If he looked for them, Jim could see gang tags on public buildings, but the graffiti wasn't as overwhelming as in Spruce Bay.
As a whole, the reserve wasn't as bad as Jim expected it to be. He chastised himself for his prejudice, but still found himself as a higher level of alert than he was in Spruce Bay. Old assumptions die hard, he told himself as he took deep breaths and made himself relax yet again.
At least there were no roving gangs of children here. The Chief had designated an old building as a youth center and some volunteers kept it running from early morning to late at night. It only closed for school hours. Jim heard that the kids could do everything from skinning a beaver to speaking Cree with an elder to learning computer skills. What would it take to do something similar in Spruce Bay?
An old truck pulled out on the road ahead of him and sent gravel rattling against the front of his vehicle. Jim flipped the lights on and waited for them to stop. Instead the other truck sped up and swerved back and forth on the road before it left the road completely. Jim didn't hear a crash so when he reached the spot where it turned he shone his floodlight on the trees. A path led into the woods. It didn't look fit for a truck, but the tracks of the other vehicle vanished into the dark.
Jim was still debating whether he should follow when he heard a faint crash.
"Dispatch," Jim said, "SB 7, just outside of the reserve. A truck fled into the woods at kilometer 6.5. I'll leave a marker on the road. I heard what sounded like a crash. I'm taking the truck in to have a look."
"Ten-four," dispatch responded, "I'm sending back up. Check in every five."
"Ten-four," Jim turned the wheel hard and eased the big police truck onto the trail. The other vehicle must have been much narrower. Jim wasn't sure he'd make it between the trees. The branches scraping on the sides of the truck made him wince. It sounded like the voices that Leigh described; malevolent and wordless.
The truck jerked and bucked as it crawled over ground that would have made quads work hard. Jim clenched his teeth to keep from biting his tongue when a wheel dropped into a hole.
He stopped and put the truck in park to check in with dispatch. Back up was still twenty minutes out. Jim started ahead again until the trail rounded a corner. Two trucks sat under the trees. The smaller truck must have been the one that fled. It had struck the big black truck. Jim parked and pointed the floodlight toward the trucks. Footprints led from the smaller vehicle's open door into the woods. He couldn't see if there was anyone in the passenger seat.
Jim climbed out of his truck and took out his flashlight. His other hand rested on his holster. How many shifts was it since he last did this? He sidled along the path to look in the small truck - empty. Jim gave a sigh of relief then moved around to look in the black truck. A contorted blue face screamed at him from the front seat.
He didn't realize he was moving back until he bumped into a tree. His stood flashlight in one hand and his gun in the other. Dispatch calling him to check in broke the spell and he holstered his gun.
"Ten-Four," he said, "I'm OK, there was a motor vehicle collision, the driver and maybe a passenger fled on foot."
"Any injuries?"
"There's a body, but he was dead before the crash."
"Repeat," dispatch said.
"I said there is a corpse here. It looks like he's frozen, so he's been here a while."
"Ten-Four, backup will be there momentarily."
The backup arrived shortly after. Quads growled coming in the trail. Somehow Rob maneuvered a quad around Jim's truck and parked so a second set of headlights illuminated the scene.
"Get photos of the tracks," Rob ordered John who had parked behind the truck and was carrying his bag to the scene.
"Sorry, Sergeant," Jim said, "I should have thought of getting pictures."
"Sure, but you didn't walk all over and muck up the scene either." Rob slapped Jim on the shoulder. "We don't expect you to be super-human, that doesn't come until you make Sergeant." Jim relaxed laughed with Rob. "Show me the body, after John gets his photos,"
Jim pointed to where he'd walked and that the small truck was empty. Only one set of prints disappeared under the trees.
"You'd think they'd have at least peeked into the other truck," Rob said.
"They must have thought I was chasing them," Jim's heart had slowed and let his brain function. "We won't know for sure until we get a closer look, but I wouldn't be surprised if the crash knocked the body over. From his position, he could easily have died sitting up behind the wheel."
"You know that from one glimpse?" Rob raised an eyebrow.
John gave a wave that it was OK to approach the black truck.
"Once you look in there," Jim said, "I think you'll agree that a glimpse would be more than enough. I almost emptied my gun at the poor blighter."
Jim walked up with Rob and took his second look at the body. It wasn't much easier for knowing what he would see.
The body lay on the seat; face contorted in pain or fear, and frozen in place. Jim could see frost now that forced himself to look closer. He saw something else that hadn't registered the first time. The body was naked. Every part of it except his black hair was blue white. The victim looked like he was barely into his teens.
"What is a dead, naked kid doing in Jack Tanist's pickup truck on a quad trail in the woods?" Rob said finally.
"Good question," John said, "It's a good thing the cops are here to answer it."
"Here's another for you," Jim said, "How are we going to get him out?"
The answer to the second question turned out to involve several more quads, a tow truck, three winches and the rest of the night and most of the next day.
Jim tried to focus on the keyboard so he could finish writing his report. He thought wistfully of his bed.
"Jim," Staff Sergeant McCauley said, "Go home, get some sleep. You can finish the report next shift. Better yet, take the next shift off and go visit your wife."
Jim looked at her, then at the computer. He saved what was mostly gibberish.
"Thanks, Staff." He tried to focus his eyes.
"Marie," Staff said, "could you take a moment and drop Jim off at home?"
"Sure thing," Marie said.
Jim didn't remember getting home, but he woke up with his uniform hung over the chair and shivering from the cold. He pulled the covers over him and went back to sleep. He dreamed of a frozen blue kid chasing him with the ax that had been used to kill Jack Tanist.
Jim woke as the sun was setting. He made coffee and took a long shower. Too late to drive to Thompson, tomorrow would have to be soon enough. He'd beg his way into the ward. Instead he dressed in his uniform and walked to the detachment.
"What are you doing here?" Carol said, "Staff told me you were taking a personal day and going to Thompson.
"I just woke up," Jim said. He tried to stifle a yawn. "It's too late in the day to drive to Thompson. I thought I'd go tomorrow, but I don't want to sit in the house all evening alone."
"Hi, Jim," Staff said as she stuck her head out of her office door. "Come here, I want to bring you up to speed. Bring a coffee."
Jim poured two cups of the black fluid that passed for coffee in the detachment and went to see what the Staff-Sergeant wanted.
He put the coffees on her desk and sat in the vacant chair. John was in the other chair.
"We got a hit on the print from the ax," Staff said and put a photo on her desk. "Meet Sam McCrey, aged fifteen, burglary, assault, etc. etc."
"He's the kid in the truck," Jim said.
"That's right," John said, "preliminary guess at cause of death is drug overdose."
"Leigh's meds?" Jim forced his hand not to close tight on the mug.
"Doesn't look like it. The doc is thinking a very pure heroin. It would look like an accident except for the whole missing clothes thing."
"If he had a lot of blood on him, he might have wanted to just get out of the clothes."
"True." Staff leaned back in her chair. "But it was cold that night. I don't think he would drive out into the woods naked to take drugs. Even if he did, where are his clothes?"
"Probably ashes in a burning barrel," John said.
"Likely," Staff said, "We'll see if anything shows up in autopsy. In the meantime, it's looking less and less likely that Leigh was involved directly in the murders. She remains a person of interest - there is a definite connection between her and Jack Tanist. Your theory about Leigh's meds is looking good. Maybe Jack decided to get into the drug business and a competitor didn't like it - too early to say yet."
"So, I have some good news to tell Leigh when I see her," Jim said, "Assuming she knows me."
"Don't worry about that," Staff said, "While you were asleep, the hospital called. Leigh's rational and she's been asking for you. You can call tonight and go visit tomorrow. Take Marie with you. I want to get a statement from your wife now she is in a better frame of mind.
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