a ridiculous catch-22! How can there be evidence of a crime if you refuse to investigate?”
“The officer on the case—”
“—is a thick-headed twit!” She turned an unhealthy mottled pink, and her eyes sparked.
“Inspector Green is certainly no thick-headed twit, Miss Tanner,” Blake interjected with a barely stifled grin. “He’s one of the sharpest knives in the drawer.”
Green’s combination of brains, imagination and pure pigheadedness had earned him a fair reputation on the force, but coming from Blake, it was hardly a compliment. Green was just formulating an appropriate retort when Ms. Tanner renewed her grip on his arm.
“At least hear me out, Inspector. Let me tell you the evidence I have that worries me, and then tell me what you think I should do next.”
The woman was shaking with apprehension, but her eyes met his with defiance and determination. Not unlike his own when he was on the scent, he conceded with reluctant admiration. Even at six o’clock, after a long, draining day, she deserved more than a patronizing pat on the head. Perhaps giving her five minutes of his time would soothe her fears and get him out of here faster than all the bureaucratic obfuscation they could fling at her.
Normally, he would have taken her into one of the interview rooms, but he hoped to save some of his precious five minutes by checking his desk while he listened. When he had her ensconced in his little alcove office, however, he realized that five minutes would barely get her off the ground. Janice Tanner prattled as if she hadn’t had anyone to talk to in six months. Which may have been partly true.
“I’m agoraphobic, you see,” she began, once she’d folded and unfolded her large hands several times. “I don’t usually tell people that unless I have to. I mean, unless I’m about to bolt from a theatre or something. But in this case, it’s how I met Matt—Matthew Fraser, the man who’s missing. He’s agoraphobic too, and we were in this therapy group together. Once a week Tuesday afternoons, at the Rideau Psychiatric Hospital. For most of us, especially in the beginning, just getting to the group was half the cure.” She gave a little laugh, then must have misinterpreted Green’s frown of impatience as puzzlement, for she asked him if he knew what agoraphobia was.
Even if his wife hadn’t been a psychiatric nurse, Green would have known, for in twenty years on the force, he had encountered just about every human frailty, but before he could intercept her, she launched into the topic.
“It’s more than just fear, it’s pure, paralyzing panic. It hits you unexpectedly in a mall, in a coffee shop, in the street outside your front door, and pretty soon you panic at just the thought of going out. In the group, we talk about ways to survive the panic, and we give ourselves little homework chores to do—open the front door, walk around the block, make a phone call to a store—”
“I understand, Ms. Tanner, but what makes you think something has happened to Matthew Fraser?”
“Well, you have to know the whole picture. The group supported one another, that’s the thing. We egged each other on. Most of us haven’t many real friends, so we grew close. We went together on the bus rides, to the mall—”
Green tried again. “And you did this with Mr. Fraser?”
“Several times a week, like clockwork. Routines are good for agoraphobics, because they help us get mentally ready. With Matt, it began by accident.” She blushed. “Well, not quite by accident on my part. I discovered he took his dog for a walk every morning really early, before most people are up. Usually he’d walk down by the Lemieux Island Bridge, where he’d found a deserted little beach. Modo liked to retrieve from the water, and Matt would sit on the beach tossing sticks in the river.”
“Modo?”
“Quasimodo, his dog.”
In spite of himself, Green smiled. The story was beginning to take on colour. “The man has a warped literary sense of humour. Either that or an ugly dog.”
“An ugly dog.” A smile softened her tense features briefly. “I began joining him in the mornings, and soon I persuaded him to walk at Dow’s Lake too, where there are a lot more people around.”
“Did your relationship progress beyond walks?”
She shook her head, turning blotchy again. Not for want of desire on her part, he thought. “We’re just friends,” she murmured. “He’s a lonely man.”
“Can you give me a physical description of him? Age, height, weight?”
“I told the other officer I thought mid-thirties, five-ten. Sort of medium everything. Longish brown hair that looks like he cut it himself at the bathroom sink.”
“Good looking man?”
Green’s skepticism must have shown, for she stiffened. “What’s that got to do with it?”
“Perhaps there are other women friends?”
She shook her head emphatically.
“Other friends, period?”
“You’re missing the point! Matt is a social recluse! There are no friends.”
“What about family?”
“No family that didn’t cut him off years ago.”
“Why?”
Her anger deflated. “I’d rather... I’m not sure.”
He felt a tweak of curiosity. Secrets drew him like magnets. “I can’t help if you don’t tell me everything you know.”
“It’s not that. It’s just I don’t know what was real and what ghosts were just in his imagination.”
Ghosts. Oy veh, he thought and hastened to steer her back toward reality. “So what leads you to believe something has happened to him?”
“First, he missed the group, and then he didn’t show up for our walk.”
“What day was that?”
“Last Wednesday.”
“So he’s been missing six days. Did you call him or check his work?”
“Well, I don’t know if he works, and I didn’t—at least he never told me where he lived.”
Green sat back, his skepticism even stronger. He felt he was going in circles, wasting precious time. “So he never told you where he works or even where he lives. Sounds like a man who likes to keep people at a distance. Maybe he just doesn’t want to see you as often.”
“No, Inspector, it’s more than that. I went to his place today—”
“I thought you didn’t know where he lived.”
The blotches on her face deepened, but she drew herself up, salvaging her dignity. “I followed him once, but that’s irrelevant. The apartment stank. There was half-eaten food rotting in the kitchen where he left it.”
“Any signs of a
