discussed the case for a few more moments before Charron reluctantly agreed to a strategy he didn’t fully understand and had grave doubts about.
He didn’t know it, but he didn’t stand a chance against Boisvert, who would never allow himself to lose a battle of wills, particularly against an opponent he considered far inferior. The master of the jab, cut and bruise had no intention of losing this fight, which he sensed might become the most important of his life.
As part of the strategy, Grant was instructed to remain in the house while they quizzed Jake alone at the laneway entrance.
“We’re going to dust for fingerprints,” Charron explained to Grant. “We’ll photograph every room, especially your daughter’s bedroom, and we’ll vacuum every surface. We can DNA even a single hair. I want you to show my men through the house. Make sure they hit every room and closet. Please pay very close attention to everything you see. If there’s anything, anything at all you think is out of the ordinary, stop everything and call me. I’ll be at the gate with your friend Barr and Detective Boisvert, seeing what we can learn there.”
7:32 AM • DAY ONE
Grant was having trouble concentrating. Boisvert’s face flickered in and out of his vision. At times he could recall events with great clarity then, without warning, his mind would play tricks and even the simplest information escaped him. Half way through a sentence he would forget what he had set out to say. And most disconcerting, despite his intense antipathy towards the little weasel-faced bastard, he found himself unable to stop apologizing to him. Several times he was on the verge of tears when his inability to recall every detail seemed to disappoint the detective.
Early in his career, Boisvert had acquired a secret Scotland Yard report, which very thoroughly documented experiments with sleep and sensory deprivation carried out on IRA prisoners during the 1950s. Over the years, he had added certain refinements of his own. During one interrogation, deep in the bowels of Montreal’s Atwater Police Station, well concealed from his fellow officers, he had managed, with ice water and a pair of needle nosed pliers, to keep a suspect awake and more or less conscious for seventy-eight hours. His problem now was that this English bastard, as exhausted as he was, was not stupid. Push too hard and he was likely to have enough smarts left to clam up and demand his lawyer, something Boisvert did not want just yet. To keep Grant talking, Boisvert had to do something he had little inclination for. He had to show sympathy.
“I know this is very difficult for you,” he said, “but Mr. Henry, you’ve told me something of what happened, but only in bits and pieces. This time I want you to explain everything to me, exactly as it happened, and exactly in sequence. I don’t want you to leave anything out. The timing of events is particularly important to our investigation. There may be some things I’ll ask which you’ll have difficulty understanding, but it is all very important if we are to find your daughter. Tell me everything you saw, heard or even thought, from the time you left the radio station after your show last night, until Superintendent Charron and his men arrived here.”
Boisvert switched on his tape recorder and two officers seated behind them at the kitchen counter prepared to take notes.
Grant did not respond immediately, staring coldly at Boisvert as he pushed the mic closer.
From his experience, the detective knew that most subjects entered a stage of resistance at some time, usually fairly early in the process. He also knew the most effective manner of inspiring co-operation.
Very slowly Boisvert extended both his hands and gently covered one of Grant’s.
“I’m sorry I spoke harshly to you before,” he said in a voice approximating solicitude. “To tell you the truth, I find this very difficult. I have a daughter not much older than yours. I understand perfectly how terrible you must feel.” Here he paused and clasped Grant’s hand more tightly. “And I can imagine how terrified your daughter must be right now...God help me, I hope they haven’t hurt her.”
The act and the lies produced the desired effect. Grant sank his head to the table and once more began to relate the events from the time he pulled into his driveway early that morning and confronted horror.
Superintendent Charron, who was standing at the kitchen door, had to stifle his anger as he watched Boisvert’s performance. Boisvert did not have a daughter, he was not even married. For the second time that day the superintendent found himself enveloped in a terrible melancholy.
Boisvert stopped Grant when he began to describe leaving the car behind and running towards the house.
“I know we’ve discussed this before, Mr. Henry,” Boisvert said, making a pretence at patience, “but taking into account the fact there was great urgency for you to reach your home, why do you think you left the car behind, when it would have been much faster driving than running?”
“As I told you before,” replied Grant wearily, “I’m not sure myself. For some reason all I could think about was getting to the house to see if Lee was all right. The thought of going back to the car just seemed impossible at the time. I know it doesn’t make much sense. If I had to do it again, I’m sure I’d take the car. It certainly would have been faster, but I suppose I wasn’t thinking too clearly. Maybe I just panicked.” It was essentially the same reply he’d given before.
At the word panicked, Boisvert looked up sharply and stopped him.
“Panicked...you never used that word before, but you know, it makes me wonder. You told us someone nailed a chicken to your garage door a few weeks ago, did you panic then?”
“It certainly worried me,” said Grant, “but no, I didn’t panic.”
“In fact,” said Boisvert, “I believe you told me you didn’t even report it to police, other than your friend Constable Barr in an unofficial manner. No official report about the affair was ever filed with any police department. Why did that incident bother you so little, but a few weeks later, the same thing is done to your dog and you panic so badly you decide to run almost half a kilometre in the dark with your car sitting right there?”
As exhausted and dazed as he was, familiar alarm bells began to go off. Danger! He could hear his mother’s voice screaming. “Don’t lie to me Grant,” her face twisted and red with rage. “I can tell you’re lying to me,” her hand drawn back, ready to strike. Danger! Long ago, he had promised himself never again!
“Wait a minute,” said Grant; “I don’t have to put up with anymore of this crap. You can take a flying...”
Boisvert knew immediately there was nothing more to be learned here. He dropped the mask.
“To tell you the truth sir,” he snarled, “I don’t believe you are telling me everything. There’s something else going on around here. Something you’re holding back. I can feel it.” He waved off an attempted denial from Grant. “Listen, whatever it is you aren’t telling us, you can be certain I will find out. For your sake, I hope your refusal to tell me everything doesn’t place your daughter in more danger!” Jab, jab, cut and bruise. Blood on the face. English blood!
11:24 AM • DAY ONE
Despite his determination to stay awake, Grant had fallen into a fitful sleep, which was interrupted after less than two hours by one of Charron’s detectives shaking him violently, and shouting in broken English into his ear. “Madame Gratton, Monsieur Henri. Monsieur Henri, Madame Gratton; they got her okay.”
