call it a challenge, rather than trouble. And you didn’t really bring it; you just appeared at the right moment.” To Clara he said, “But don’t you worry about anything. We’re just finishing up our little chat with Daniel.”
Clara, not reassured, shook her head. “It always begins with a little chat, doesn’t it?”
Sam followed Paul and Clara into the apartment. To the right was a kitchen, and other rooms lined a hallway, which opened at the far end into a broad sitting room with very high ceilings and picture windows, providing glimpses of a garden below, and rooftops and sky above.
Three men, one of whom was Daniel, were waiting at one end of the room. It was a large space, at that moment flooded with sunlight. It had been decorated with original paintings and sculptures, objets d’art, oriental carpets, and the like, but just then was littered, Sam noticed, with most of the miscellaneous apparatus of an artist at work. Two or three big tables had been pushed together and were covered with drop sheets, paint-smeared and torn, as well as paint tubes and brushes, knives and rags, bottles, bits of metal and wood, a couple of cameras, and a curious array of everyday objects — Coke bottles, the hubcaps of old cars, shop signs, headless naked manikins, hockey sticks, and unwieldy looking garden tools.
Daniel, in jeans and a white T-shirt, was sitting on what looked like a barstool in front of one of the tables, his thick body slouched forward, as if someone were leaning hard on his back. He moved gingerly, like a man who’s just started training. He eyed Sam nervously, rubbed his pockmarked cheeks, and mumbled a rather subdued “hello.”
Sam walked over and shook his hand.
The two other men, both wearing light summer suits, and standing on either side of Daniel, hardly moved. Each of them seemed locked up tight in his own space; in fact, there seemed to be no connection at all between the three of them, physically or otherwise.
“This is Lieutenant Dionne,” Paul explained, pointing to the older, slightly balding man on Sam’s left. “He filled me in on the case just an hour ago, after I heard from Clara. I’m the official guy now. And this is a visitor, an observer, from south of the border, Tim McCarthy of the FBI.”
At the reference to the FBI, Sam found himself suddenly on guard. He shook hands with both men. McCarthy squeezed his hand a little too hard and said: “Private detective? I thought they were only in the movies.”
“Sam’s an old friend,” Paul explained, “and a very good investigator.”
“And I’ve hired him,” Clara said, striding across the room and throwing open one of the big windows. As soon as he entered, Sam had noticed the heavy reek of pot.
Paul laughed and inhaled with a mock fervour. “Ah, fresh air! But it’s okay, Clara, this isn’t a drug bust. That smell doesn’t bother any of us, I’m sure.”
“It doesn’t bother me,” McCarthy said. “But we don’t think much of it back home.”
A low growl and indistinguishable monosyllable issued from Daniel, which Paul ignored. Instead, he attempted to joke with McCarthy. “You know, when you guys down there loosen up on the marijuana, the U.S. might have an artistic renaissance.”
The FBI man laughed. “We’d have a lot of other things, too.”
Sam didn’t like McCarthy’s laugh. It was a laugh that stayed in the throat and didn’t seem to touch the belly or the heart. In fact, as far as first impressions go, he didn’t like McCarthy one bit. A well-built Irishman with heavy eyebrows and cold, penetrating dark eyes. The kind of guy who, even in the best restaurant, would look at his food suspiciously, who would reply in monosyllables to harmless airplane chatter until his neighbour gave up and read the newspaper, a guy who would be very slow to praise anything or anyone. Who as a kid wanted to please Daddy, and never did. A guy who had never had a dog.
“Look, Daniel,” Paul said, “we’ve been putting you through the wringer here. Why don’t you let Clara take you out for a coffee? We’ll compare notes and talk to you again later, after we’ve had a chat with a few of the others over in the hotel. Just don’t disappear on me. I’ll probably have more questions.”
“I’d like to go over to the gallery,” Daniel said. “There are a few things I have to check out.” He spoke in a low, flat voice and hardly looked at any of them. Clara came over and stood beside him.
“That’s all right, then,” Paul said. “Attend to your exhibition, but don’t talk to anyone about the case. I may come back before dinner. You’ll be here, I take it? Ginette is playing a concert tonight, so you won’t see me this evening. But do me a favour and stay in touch. I’m sure to need more information after I visit that bunch in the Winthrop.”
“I’d like to see your exhibition myself,” Sam said. “I’ve heard a lot about it.”
Daniel nodded, the picture of indifference. His face looked puffy and pale, his round, dark eyes uncertain. Clara had taken hold of his arm, as if she were about to lead him out. Sam, irritated by what seemed the man’s introversion or passivity, added, “I’ll stick around with Paul a while, but I may see you over there later.”
“Okay, fine,” Daniel said. Clara gave Sam a look; she seemed to be trying to convey something, but Sam wasn’t sure what. After she and Daniel had left, Paul turned to Dionne and McCarthy.
“Well, any thoughts on our artist friend’s involvement in this?”
Lieutenant Dionne shrugged his shoulders and said something in French.
“Eddie is suggesting that we summarize what we know so far,” Paul explained to McCarthy. “It’s a good idea. You’ve been on this from the beginning, Eddie. Can you give me and our friends here a quick run-through?”
Lieutenant Dionne pulled out a small black notebook, glanced at it, cleared his throat, and began:
“On Saturday morning about ten o’clock, Professor Charles Linton, a professor from McGill who was attending a scientific meeting, was found collapsed in his room on the twelfth floor of the Hotel Winthrop, close to the Place D’Armes. He was pronounced dead by a physician shortly afterward.”
“Which physician?” McCarthy asked.
Dionne, confused, gave him an odd look. “No idea. Is it important?”
McCarthy shrugged his shoulders. Dionne glanced at Paul, who nodded. The lieutenant continued:
“Lab results showed atropine poisoning, administered by means of red wine, it seems, though no bottle or glass was found. He may have ordered the drink in a downstairs bar. Time of death was between midnight and 1:00 a.m. So far as we know, the last person to see him alive was his ex-wife, Jane Linton. They had drinks in the hotel bar late Friday night. She left him about 21:00 hours. He told her he was going straight up to his room, but he did visit the bar again much later, around 23:30 hours. We found a chit that says so. We’re checking room service as well. We also found sperm on the body, but no vaginal mucus. He’d masturbated that evening, probably.”
Eddie looked up to make sure they were taking this in, then continued:
“Other participants in the conference were staying in the hotel. Chief among them are Dr. Robert Ballard, an associate of Dr. Linton in the Arbor Vitae Corporation, and his family, and Drs. Kenny Chen and Anne Sergeant — she’s at the Ben Franklin — who are both senior scientists and
