Stain of the Berry (29 page)

I lowered myself to a crouching position and began a closer study of the area. At best, I was hoping to find a way to sneak up behind Richie, to catch him unaware, but I soon concluded it would be difficult, even in the thickness of night, to sketch out a route I might follow and still remain undetected. I considered a nearby clump of trees to my left and wondered whether or not I could make it from here to there without being spotted. Instead I noticed something else. There was something moving in those trees.

My eyes strained to see what my brain was trying to convince me was there. I was finally able to discern the black-on-grey shapes of at least two people. Then I heard a noise. My eyes whipped to the right.

There, next to a huge rock, was another person. And over by a collection of maple bushes-another one!

My face felt hot as my brain screamed a taunting warning: You're surrounded, sucker!

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How had Richie Caplan managed it? He couldn't have known I would be at the show tonight. Or could he? Had his roommate figured it out somehow and warned him? Nevertheless there we were, Richie and I, along with his posse of rapscallions ready to have a second go at me. Including Richie there were five of them this time: Richie by the log cabin in front of me, two more in a clump of bushes to my left, one behind a rock on my right, and another further off in a maple grove. What to do? I swatted at another mosquito and rubbed the spot to stop the itching as I considered my options: fight or flight?

There's the big-ol'-jock-dummy part of me that always hollers: "Fight, you wus!" and the big-ol'-wus part of me that yells back, "Catch me if you can!" I couldn't be sure whether any of these guys had spotted me yet. If not, then I had one more option available to me: do nothing. I could sit there, clinging to a tree, and wait them out. Sooner or later they'd get tired of waiting for me and head off for their lairs or dens or wherever badasses live.

Another mosquito bite, at the ankle bone this time where it'll itch forever. That did it! I wasn't going to sit there like some kind of blood buffet.

I began with another scan of the facts. By this time, my eyes had adjusted nicely to the dark and I could see the figures a little more clearly. The guy by the log building wasn't moving, but the two guys in the clump of bushes to my left certainly were-back and forth, back and forth, back and...hey...wait a sec...what the hell is going on here? I recognize that! It appeared that Richie's hoodlums were, yup, they were having sex.

Out of the corner of my right eye, I caught some movement and turned just in time to see big-rock guy amble over to maple-tree guy. Was this to be more sex? What was this place? The two men spoke for a short while, sneaky like-or so I decided, given the circumstances-after which big-rock guy pulled something out of his pants pocket and handed it to maple-tree guy; maple-tree guy looked at it, then pulled something out of his pants pocket and handed it to big-rock guy, and big-rock guy took off and then maple-tree guy took off. That's what they call a drug deal. I shifted my gaze back to the dumpers but they too had disappeared. Not much for aftersex chat, I guess. I checked on the figure by the building; he was still there. I stared at him and could have sworn he was staring right back at me. And he must have been because about then he started coming right for me. Fight or flight? Big dummy or big wus?

I held my ground.

The man who approached me was not Richie Caplan. He was wearing a snug T with cut-off sleeves-more to show off powerfully built arms and shoulders than to keep himself cool-and full length jeans (must have had spindly legs). In the low lighting I took him to be about forty, attractive in a buttoned-down-professional-gone-wild-for-the-night kind of way, except for his perfect helmet-head hair, and a too-small mouth. And I knew exactly what was going to come out of it: "How are you tonight?" or

"Do you have a light?" or "You got the time?"

"Wazzup?" he asked instead.

I had to stifle a laugh. He'd obviously been watching too much YTV circa 1990s. I gave him a friendly smile, told him I was peachy cool, and walked away.

Kim Pelluchi lived in a gaily painted wartime house on 7th Avenue not far from City Perk, a popular neighbourhood coffee joint I'd been to several times. Except for the two who'd moved to New Zealand, Kim was the only Pink Gopher I'd yet to have any contact with. It was after 11 p.m., and I was a little weary from my foray in Kinsmen Park, but I'd had no luck getting in touch with her at any other time of day, so there I was, sitting in my car outside her house plotting a good cover story for when I knocked on her door. Mary Kay representative? Nah, my car wasn't even pink. Election enumerator? Had possibilities.

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I caught a flash of movement in my rear view mirror.

Nope, nothing there.

Girl Guide cookie seller?

A thump.

Still nothing.

Nosy neighbour? Maybe. How about Russell Quant, intrepid private detective? I had about settled on that when I heard another thump. What the hell?

I turned in my seat to check if perhaps a cat had hopped up onto my trunk.

Then all hell broke loose.

I had no time to react. They had planned their ambush well. The next thing I knew, the Mazda's door was wrenched open and I was being pulled forcibly from it and slammed into the dirty, hard pavement. All I could make out was a jumble of feet, mostly in trainers, some in flip-flops, as they shuffled around me in great agitation, the male voices grunting and calling out muffled instructions to one another like, "Get him down," "Get his hands behind him," "Where's the blindfold?" Gulp. Flight! Flight! I've changed my mind, I choose flight! Let me up, goddamn you!

At least one of the bunch was following instructions and I was dutifully blindfolded with what I think was a man's shirt and my hands were tied behind my back. Someone yanked me to my feet and began pushing me along in front of the group. They neglected to warn me about the set of steps I was meant to scale, causing me a painful crack on my lower left shin before I figured it out myself. I was being taken into Kim Pelluchi's house. No need for a cover story after all.

"Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit," I heard a female voice warble as my captors shoved me inside the house and down into a half-sitting-half-lying position on a saggy-cushioned sofa.

"What's going on here?" I called out to whoever cared to listen.

For a second there was stunned silence, then a man's voice, "Who forgot to gag his mouth? Where's the friggin' gag?"

Oh for crying out loud. "Come on, guys! No gag, okay? How are we gonna communicate if I can't talk?"

"We don't want to communicate with you, you piece of shit!"

Piece of shit? I had never been called that particular name before and, as high school as it was, it stung.

Ridiculously, the singsong verse of "Sticks and stones can break my bones but names can never hurt me"

filled my head. I didn't want to test its legitimacy, particularly the sticks and stones part but really, who the heck wrote that stupid song?

"What are we going to do now?" the woman questioned her cohorts. "Call the cops?"

Interesting. The kidnappers were turning themselves in?

"And tell them what?" a voice that sounded very familiar answered. "We've already talked to the cops.

We can't prove anything, so they can't do a thing."

"But now we've caught him," she replied, her voice at a reedy pitch of anxiousness.

"Yeah, sure, caught him doing what? Sitting in his car outside your house. It proves nothing." Same guy.

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I just about had it, he sounded like...

"But he was chasing you! You can tell them that!"

There we go, it was Red Cap a.k.a. Shakespeare's Orlando a.k.a. Richie Caplan a.k.a. bastard creep jerk.

It was time for me to get into this verbal fray. "What is going on? Why don't you untie me and we can discuss this. There's no need for this blindfold, I already know it's you, Richie and you, Kim. And the other guys are the same ones who jumped me at the Exhibition." I was guessing on the last part.

I took it they were deliberating my request with their eyes as I heard no voices until male number 2

finally came out with, "Forget that, man. I don't want him seeing who I am."

Male 3 and 4 quickly concurred.

"Why?" I asked. "What are you planning to do with me?"

"We're gonna teach you a lesson, you shitass punk!" Male 3,I think.

I didn't like the sound of that. "Lesson about what?" I wanted to know. "Yes, I was sitting outside Kim's house tonight. I've been trying to get in touch with her for days. And yes, I was chasing you tonight, Richie, but only because you were running away from me. I just want to talk."

"Talk? Talk about what? Talk about how you can't wait to scare the shit out of us again? Huh? Is that what you want to talk about? Talk about how you're going to keep on ruining our lives? Is that what you want to talk about?" This from a frustrated sounding Richie.

"I haven't done any of that stuff. You've got the wrong guy here. I'm not who you think I am. I'm not the boogeyman."

"There! If you're not the boogeyman then how do you know about him?"

"Besides," added 3, "we know you've been after these guys."

"It's a mistake," I told them. "Yes, I've been looking for Richie and Kim. I've been looking for all the Pink Gophers."

"The Pink Gophers? What do they have to do with any of this?" Kim asked.

And herein was the problem. Since the choir disbanded for a prolonged break, no one knew what had been happening to the others. Most of them had gone their separate ways and not kept in touch. They each believed the "boogeyman" was only their problem, their own horrifying reality, when in truth, all of the Pink Gophers were under attack. The question was, why? And by whom? They thought it was me.

"I was hired by Tanya Culinare's family," I said.

"You were hired by her family?" Richie said as if repeating it somehow made it more unbelievable.

"Why?"

"She's dead."

That bought me some silence.

The next thing I felt was a hand unfastening the shirt that covered my eyes. And not a moment too soon; one of the collar buttons was really beginning to cut into my skin. When the blindfold dropped into my lap, I saw before me five frightened faces, Richie, Kim and males 2, 3 and 4 (who I was happy, for the 124 of 163

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time being, to have remain nameless-just easier that way). Kim was a pleasant looking gal in her late twenties with thick dark hair and Raisinette eyes that stared out from behind artsy, dark-rimmed glasses.

The guys were wearing nondescript jeans and wrinkled shirts and Ts, while Kim was in head-to-toe black.

We were in a cramped living room, and judging by the bolts of fabric and proliferation of sewing notions scattered about, I guessed Kim or someone who lived there was a seamstress.

"How about my hands?" I suggested hopefully.

"Maybe later," Richie said with a still-distrustful glint in his eyes.

"How do we know he's not lying?" 3 wondered. Good question, nimrod. "We should call her."

"Call Tanya?" Kim said.

"Yeah. Who's got her number?"

They exchanged glances. No one had her number.

"It doesn't matter," Richie mumbled. "It's true. She'd dead."

"Wait a minute," Kim began. "A girl jumped off that building on Broadway a couple weeks ago. I think that was where..." She looked at me. "Was that Tanya?"

I nodded. "It was."

"Oh my God. Poor Tanya. Oh God." She glared at Richie, aghast. "You knew about this? You knew she was dead? Why didn't you tell me?"

He nodded ever so slightly. "Duncan told me."

Interesting. Duncan didn't know about Tanya until I told him over the phone before I flew to Vancouver to find him. Richie and Duncan were obviously in close contact.

"And? Why didn't you think to tell me? Why?" Kim was demanding to know.

"Kim, I'm sorry, it's just that I knew you were already freaked out about everything else that was happening. I didn't want to get you more scared. I thought it was this guy." He indicated me with a point of his chin. "Duncan told me about him. I thought I could take care of it. I started following him, and then me and the boys took care of him at the Ex."

Yeah, right. You got run off by a wailing gnome named Jane Cross. Forget that part of the story, did you?

"You're a fucking gay actor!" she yelped at him. "Who do you think you are, Puff Daddy?" She turned on males 2 through 4. "Get outta here! Scram, you losers!"

I have to say she was right about those guys. Now that I was seeing them in the light of day without their faux gang-wear, all they had going for them was the intensity of rangy youth but little real threatening presence at all. Yet, they had been protecting their friend against a frightening predator (or so they thought), so I had to give them props for that. They looked at Richie and he at them.

"Go!" she screamed, falling next to me on the couch, burying her face in her hands and beginning to weep.

"Can Richie stay?" I suggested in a gentle voice. "I think it's important that I ask both of you some questions."

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"Whatever," she burbled as she pulled her face from her hands and removed her glasses to wipe away the tears.

"I'll see you guys later, and thanks," Richie said to his com-padres as they filed out of the front door, looking more relieved than anything. Once they were gone Richie sidled up to me and I righted myself and turned my back to him so he could untie my hands. Even though the binding wasn't tight, my wrists felt sore and I rubbed them to promote normal blood flow.