A Criminal to Remember (A Monty Haaviko Thriller) (3 page)

Claire motioned me over to a china booth and I dragged the boys with me.

“What do you think?”

She was holding up a brilliantly white china plate covered in a pattern of tiny red roses and tight curls of green vines.

“It’s beautiful. For us?”

“For my mother. I think it’s almost a match to her old set.”

The man behind the counter cleared his throat and I looked at him. He was small and dressed entirely in brown, an expensive old herringbone wool suit that looked uncomfortably warm.

“If madam would like to give me the makers mark of her lovely mother’s set perhaps I can find an exact match. The one you have chosen there is very rare.” He gestured, “This is only a small sampling of my wares.”

Claire shook her head very slowly, with regret. “No, I think. Too expensive right now. But thank you.” Her smile was enthusiastic and passionate. The man blushed and she said, “You have beautiful things.”

He started to stutter and we left to go look at the Fiji Mermaid or reasonable facsimile of same. Behind us I heard shutters shut and someone angrily say, “Hey.”

Eventually we got to the end of the route through the exhibition which had circled around back to the beginning. There we were faced with the choices of doing the route again or of heading off towards agricultural and art exhibits. Claire and Alex leaned towards the route one more time but Elena and I voted for the new horizons. Fred and Jake agreed with us and off we went.

Past the Deep Fried Twinkie stand there was a display of cop cars, Crown Vics mostly. Cop cars and bomb disposal robots and a real, genuine, antique portable prison. Around the cars were some handsome examples of the city’s finest and a dunk tank featuring a female cop in a water-skiing wet suit and dress hat daring everyone to knock her off her perch.

Elena saw my face and said, “Community relations.”

“And why aren’t you up there?” Claire took a found stick from Jake’s hand before he could do something bad.

Elena looked offended. “I? I am a sergeant. And mean. I don’t have to do that.”

“Anymore,” Alex cut in laconically.

I stood there a little bemused and a young cop came up and asked if I wanted to ride in the back of a cop car. I stared at him while Elena started to cough and Claire stared politely at the sky. Finally I managed to say,“Thank you, no. Been there. Done that. Frankly, it’s lost its lustre.”

He looked puzzled but went off to find other victims and I stared after him. I don’t like cops in general, and in specific, I’ve spent too much time running from them and being shot at by them to feel much affection for them. In my experience cops were either corrupt or blind. The corrupt ones would rip you off and then lie about it in court. The blind ones wouldn’t see anything the corrupt ones ever did.

When I’d been stealing they’d been a serious occupational hazard, and even now there were lots of them who didn’t want to let me forget my past. Last year a corrupt cop with delusions of godhood had set me up towards prison or the grave and had almost caught my family in the crossfire. Eventually Walsh and I had had it out and I had won, barely.

Then I’d been saved by another cop with a strong sense of fair play, but that wasn’t the point.

Elena had done a lot to redeem the whole species for me. But later in the same year I’d been a bystander in a bank robbery that had gone sour and ended up spending time in remand while my lawyer pried me out.

In that case I’d actually stopped the robbery. Out of self-interest, actually, but again, that didn’t matter. I’d been innocent and I’d still been bounced through the legal system one more time.

In retrospect, I had enjoyed the actual bank robbery though. Maybe more than I’d expected.

Which left me with an attitude towards cops that was in transition, and watching them play nice was a little surreal.

Not that I held grudges—I wasn’t built that way, at least that’s what I told myself. They did what they did and I did what I did and, back when we were at cross purposes, bad things happened. No grudges, I kept telling myself that.

Like the midway neon lies, I really wanted to believe them.

Claire was gone when I turned to ask her something and then she came back holding three old and battered major league baseballs. She handed them to me and I must have looked deeply confused.

“Huh?”

Claire took me by the elbow and led me to a white line painted in the dirt. “Very simple. Stand here. Throw balls at target. Knock cop into water. Raise money to stop child abuse.”

The cop on the perch chanted, “C’mon, take your best shot …”

I looked at my wife, who was about to burst into laughter as she patted me. “It’s for a good cause. To prevent child abuse. I mean really, who’s in favour of that?”

An angry teenager pushed past me and windmilled three balls that all missed.

Claire leaned in and said, throatily, “Happy birthday.”

It was my birthday in a few days; I was trying to forget it.

I used to throw lots of baseballs in prison. I used to be really good. Playing baseball was a good way to burn off stress because you could hit something. And, when I was in Drumheller, my best throw was clocked at seventy-six feet per second, which is not bad and it was bang on target too. In prison baseball was a way to deal with rage.

And outside of prison? I wasn’t sure of the role of baseball.

Without thinking I wound up and threw, and it felt like a winner as the ball came off my fingers with everything all loose in my shoulders and back.

The cop had time to say, “We want a pitcher …” when the ball hit the six-inch steel paddle and dropped her into water.

Behind me there were cheers, and I turned to find Elena and Alex with huge cones of cotton candy and Fred standing up in his stroller. “Good one!”

He sounded very mature and Jake echoed him.

I turned back to the tank and the cop adjusted her hat and got back onto the perch. I waited until she was comfortable and let her call out, “Lucky …” before I threw again and the cop was back in the water.

Some days are like that.

When I’d thrown my third ball and turned to go, the angry teenager who’d missed handed me three more and said, “Nail da bitch.” But he said it with a smile.

And I did. Bang-bang-bang. And when those balls were gone Claire was there with three more and a big smile, and when those were gone Elena brought me more.

It was a John Wayne day, everything went perfect. Just like in the war movies when the bad guy leans around the tree into your site. Just like when the girl turns right into your arms at the perfect moment. Just like when the arrow leaves the string and for a second the shooter and the target are the same thing. Just like when you draw the fourth jack and everyone is betting strong.

Just like when you hit the bank on payday.

Throw.

Those were bad thoughts, so I focussed on the positive; I’d been out of prison more than a year and I wasn’t going back.

Throw.

I had a wife and a son and friends, even a job babysitting. All for the first time in my life—I was basically stable and (fairly) honest.

Throw.

Shit, even the cops here were finding this hilarious. Their laughter pulled me partially out of the groove and then I was back in, me and the ball. The ball and me.

Throw.

After about ten dunks the girl in the tank called it quits, laughing, and a fat sergeant in a black Speedo climbed on and clenched an unlit cigar between his teeth as he perched his hat just right on his bald head.

“Ready?”

“You betcha!”

Throw and splash.

I’d never thrown this well before. Claire bought a whole bucket of balls and Elena dragged it over to the line. Elena kissed my cheek and said, “Claire told me it’s your birthday in two days, so happy birthday, and many more.”

And I just kept throwing.

When I stopped throwing it was because my arm was numb, not because I missed. I don’t think I missed once.

As I turned away there were people cheering and they rushed forward to try their luck. I turned and put my face right into the lens of a TV camera and found myself talking into a foam rubber microphone held by an incredibly short blond woman. She was very pretty with a wide smile that made me think of enthusiastic mattress games and no regrets on either side.

“Hi! My name is Candy! And I’m from the station that never sleeps!”

“How utterly wonderful for you.” I matched her enthusiasm with difficulty. I was clutching my right arm in my left, cradling it gently; I could feel a good ache. The ache in the muscle and not the bone. The sweet ache that meant tired and not hurt.

“You just knocked cops into a dunk tank for more than an hour. How does that feel?”

“Sore.” Rule number one about talking to journalists is don’t. Do not talk to them on the record, do not talk to them off the record, and do not talk to them. Do not talk to them.

“Sorry to hear that! Are you burning off some rage?” Long pause and then she added, “Mr. Haaviko?”

That stopped me. “How do you know my name?”

Candy showed bright teeth and brought the microphone back to her face. “Because I do my research. You’ve certainly been in the news enough!”

Behind her I could see Claire and I knew I had to wrap this up quick. “Ah. No, no rage. Just raising money to stop the abuse of children …”

“A Good Cause!” She capitalized it enthusiastically. “So, you don’t hate the police?”

“No.” I tried to back up and she followed, along with her camera guy, a round black man who sweated a lot.

“You’ve been a felon most of your life?”

“True.”

“Yet you claim you don’t hate cops?”

“True. You put news reporters in that same tank and I’ll be down here just as fast. Probably faster. I mean child abuse, who’s in favour of child abuse?” She didn’t get the joke.

Candy smiled again. “So what do you think of cops?”

She was not going to leave me alone. I exhaled. “I like cops. Really.” I didn’t finish the line with “but I couldn’t eat a whole one.” Instead I added, “There’s been four wrongful convictions for murder just here in Winnipeg in your lifetime.”

I named four names from Winnipeg’s past.

Candy’s brow furrowed. “What? Who are they?”

I took a step forward and she took a step back. Around us the cops kept showing their cars and robots and taunting the ball throwers. I went on, “Those are four dead people, people murdered in the past twenty-eight years.”

Candy’s smile never wavered. “What does that have to do with …”

I took another step forward. “In each case the cops arrested someone and put him in jail for a few months or years or decades. Then they had to let them go because the person arrested didn’t do the crime. Think about that.”

Candy didn’t have a response and I kept talking. “Because. Those arrests meant that the murderers got to walk free and clear. And do whatever they wanted. To whomever they wanted.”

Claire came around and took my arm and I smiled at Candy. “I don’t hate cops. They do a very hard job. Frankly, I don’t think about them at all. But when I do I admire and respect them.”

It was a lie but a good one to leave on.

As we walked back to the parking lot Elena just shook her head. “You pour gasoline on fires too? Tease wolverines? Molest sharks? You are a walking disaster area …”

Alex took her hand. “True. But at least he’s not boring.”

Claire was pushing Fred, who had fallen fast asleep. She pulled a blanket over him and stuck her tongue out at Alex. “He’s never boring.”

On the way out the gate Claire looked back at the bright midway and sighed. “And I never even got a prize …”

T
he next morning Claire and I heard the same interview played over and over on three separate radio stations. Each time it was followed by angry callers talking about my behaviour, demeanour, attitude and general lack of respect. We also got nine phone calls from various news agencies trying to get me to comment. Then I got a call from a local right wing radio station that tried to insult me until I got angry but I hung up and finally unplugged the phone.

I stood there for a second and looked around the kitchen. The whole house didn’t feel safe to me yet. A full year ago an enemy had booby-trapped the place with grenades, cyanide, shotgun shells, spring razors, spikes and so on. Clearing it had taken me eleven days on my hands and knees.

Eleven days. And I still wasn’t sure I had gotten all the traps out. It gnawed at the place I was supposed to have a conscience—I would hate to have Claire or Fred hurt through my carelessness.

I had cleared the place to the best of my ability and I was really good.

But no one’s perfect.

Idly I wondered about burning the place down … just to be sure. Claire interrupted me before I could think it all the way through. “Coffee? Eggs? Breakfast was promised. You still worried about the radio and the phone calls?”

I snorted. “Yep. Kept me up last night screaming.”

Claire accepted the eggs I offered and tried to make the best of it. “Well, at least we don’t have cable television. There’s probably an American Fox news spin on it by now. The right wing demigods probably hate you.”

“Well, that’s okay. I can handle a little hate. As long as it’s not coming from Stephen Colbert.”

“He scares you, doesn’t he?”

“Very much.” I offered a single fried egg to Fred along with strips of toast to dip and he began to devour them. While he did so I spun channels on the radio until I got the civilized tones of the
CBC
morning show hosts talking about the weather and the chances of forest fires. I looked back at Fred and then at Claire. “Am I supposed to be giving Fred eggs?”

She looked at me and then at Fred. “Let’s ask him. Fred, should we be giving you eggs?”

He swallowed and said, “Yes. More—ples.”

Claire corrected him. “Please.”

Fred looked at her hard and tried again. “Pleass?”

“Better.”

I gave him another egg and finally got around to my own. “And what are you doing today?”

“Selling houses. Same thing I do every other day. Also probably renting some. Maybe some buying.” Claire had passed her real estate test a few months before and was doing better than fine. She specialized in houses in the North End, the poorer end of town. However, it was the part of the city where bargains could still be found and where the market was still strong. After all, people always needed a roof over their head, no matter what the state of their finances was.