she was only an hour west of him, so he would be working. She tried the office, but he was not there, either. The bland inflection in the Canadian voice at Toronto headquarters struck a chord of empathy, and she longed to be home. She wanted to solve mysteries, she realized, not invent them. And not inhabit them from the inside looking out. She sat down on the edge of the bed and saw that one of the two Heyerdahl books was missing. Her mind was muddled, searching for a metaphor to describe the panic swelling inside her; the feeling that Kafka was in charge of the world.
***
When Morgan arrived at Harrington D’Arcy’s office, high in a bank tower near the intersection of King and Bay Streets, he was surprised to find that D’Arcy had vanished.
“I had an appointment with him at nine,” Morgan explained to the receptionist, then to a secretary, then to an administrative assistant, and finally to an associate executive, each of them dressed in expensive clothes, surrounded by the lavish accoutrements of their relative positions, all in a warren of offices so tastefully appointed that the excess seemed somehow an aspect of corporate efficiency. There was nothing to indicate what kind of work was done there, but the place reeked of success.
Each person he talked to declared that they had no idea of their employer’s whereabouts. He was assured Harrington D’Arcy was unlikely to take off for a sail, to work out at his club, or to attend a secret meeting, without his entire office staff being made fully aware. There were apparently no clandestine moments or covert affairs in the life of Harrington D’Arcy. His very private business activities and reclusive social life were apparently tracked and controlled by his staff.
And yet he had disappeared the day after his wife was found dead, when he was wanted to assist in a police investigation into the possibility of her murder.
There was nothing in the office to indicate tragedy; no sign of grief, no particular interest in being interviewed by a homicide detective. No one professed to knowing Maria D’Arcy on a personal basis. She was apparently no more than a rumour in their glass-walled garrison high above the city streets.
As Morgan stood facing the polished marble of the elevator wall, waiting for one of two ornate metallic doors to slide open, and distracted by the emptiness of his experience in D’Arcy’s office, the reflection of a woman moving down the length of the opposite corridor caught his eye. The apparition came into focus beside him as if the woman herself were caught in the cool surface of the marble walls.
When she said nothing, he turned toward her and was immediately struck by the sculptural radiance of her appearance. The austerity of her demeanour could not suppress the astonishing beauty of her features and figure and carriage. At first he thought she was waiting for the elevator. She stood slightly turned, however, so that when he shifted to look at her they were nearly facing each other, eye to eye. In heels, she was almost as tall as he was. Without them, she would still be several inches taller than Miranda. Her presence made him intensely aware of his own physical being.
“I’m told you are a policeman,” she said, her voice as cool and crisp as January.
“Yeah,” said Morgan, shifting his weight. The elevator door opened and neither of them got on. Several people moved past them and the door closed.
“Your name is Morgan, am I right?”
“Yeah, and you are Ms. …?”
“Simmons.”
“First name?”
“Yes.” She did not volunteer to tell him what it was.
“What can I do for you, Ms. Simmons?”
“Mr. D’Arcy was called away on business.”
“And you are the only one here who knows about it?”
“Yes.”
“Why is that?”
“I am his partner.”
He looked at her closely, moving so that she had to back into the full light of the corridor. It was impossible to tell her age. She wore makeup so well it appeared to be minimal. She was groomed exquisitely; her eyebrows arched with a natural grace and the style of her hair seemed somehow inevitable. She could be in her late twenties, she could be in her early forties. His chest constricted and he gazed past her, catching his breath.
“You want to ask Mr. D’Arcy about Maria?”
“Isn’t it an odd time for a business trip, Ms. Simmons? His wife is on a slab at the morgue — what about grief?”
“What about grief, Mr. Morgan?”
“Detective.”
“Detective Morgan. Is there a protocol for grief required by the police?”
“No, but there are conventions and needs. My goodness,” he declared, using his favoured expression and a little nonplussed by her cool civility, “the man is implicated in murder! Even he seems to think so.”
“I doubt it was murder.”
“You favour the suicide theory.”
“People die, Detective. Sometimes by accident.”
“But there’s always a cause.”
“Death can be a creative force, Detective Morgan.”
“Did I hear you correctly, Ms. Simmons?”
“Possibly not.”
The woman offered a depthless smile, the lawyerly equivalent of a dismissive shrug, he supposed. She proceeded with a rhetorical shift that he found amusing, but only because he recognized what she was doing. “I can assure you, Detective, Mr. D’Arcy has not left the country.”
“It’s a big country.”
“I received a call. If you would step into my office, it’s on my machine. I can’t tell you any more than he told me.”
Her office had the same impersonal opulence as its surroundings. The paintings on the walls were originals; they seemed familiar, but there was nothing Morgan actually recognized. There were several pieces of Inuit sculpture, industrial size, several Inuit prints, and a woven wall-hanging.
D’Arcy’s message was simple. “Ms. Simmons. There is a matter of some urgency, I need to be away. If a Detective Morgan calls, assure him I will return.”
Morgan stared intently into the woman’s eyes; they were deep brown. Like eyes in a painting by Vermeer, they revealed so much and nothing at all, they gave no indication of the soul within. Her partner had addressed her as Miss.
“How do you know he hasn’t left the country?”
“I would know if he had.”
“You know where he is, then.”
“I suspect he is in the Arctic, but I do not know that as a fact.”
“The Arctic?”
“Baffin Island. We are putting something together.” She paused. This was a woman unused to explaining
