Malabarista Read online

  “Of course. My apologies.” Fibre reached across his desk. Lane noted the reflection of the doctor’s Rolex on the desktop.

  “Good to meet you.” Keely shook Fibre’s hand and smiled.

  “There is some information to share with you.” Fibre looked at Keely. “With both of you.”

  “Is it about the threats aimed at Keely?” Lane asked.

  “Partly. The printer used for at least one of the letters is consistent with printers used by the police service. However, no DNA or fingerprints were found on the letters or the envelopes. We are working to find out if there was any evidence left on the components of the pipe bomb or on Ms. Saliba’s car. By the way, did you see your photograph in this morning’s paper? Both of you are quite photogenic.” Dr. Weaver looked at Lane. “We did have more success with the reconstruction of the face of Andelko Branimir.” He leaned over and clicked an icon on his computer. He turned the screen so that Lane and Keely could see the images.

  “There are many similarities between the unique features of the victim’s skull and the pictures on both sets of identification. Also. . .” Fibre created an outline of the skull’s features and dragged it onto the photo from Andelko Branimir’s driver’s license. “When I superimpose either of the photographs on the outline, they match. There is a very high probability that the skull, Branimir, and Goran are all one and the same.”

  “It confirms what we’ve suspected so far,” Keely said.

  “An accurate supposition,” Fibre said.

  Let’s get back to the matter at hand. “So the person who has been sending the threatening notes and who planted the pipe bomb has been careful to leave no evidence behind?” Lane asked.

  “Very.” Fibre turned the computer screen back around.

  Lane got up. “In a way, that supports my theory that it’s someone from the department who has at least some knowledge of how evidence is gathered.”

  “There is one other thing,” Fibre said, reaching inside his desk and pulling out a small paper envelope. He opened the top and eased its contents onto his desktop. “This was found in a pocket of the leather jacket that was with the Branimir remains.” A silver spider pin lay on the glass tabletop. It was the approximate size of a loonie. Fibre used a pair of tweezers from his drawer to turn the insignia over. The word TARANTULA was engraved on the back. “It took some time to clean it up, but this was what we discovered.”

  Keely said, “The Tarantulas. That’s what Goran’s unit called itself.”

  Lane smiled at the doctor. “As usual, Colin, you’ve helped us with some solid evidence.”

  Fibre turned red from cheeks to forehead. “We’ll keep working on the remains of the pipe bomb to see if there was any evidence left behind.”

  Lane sat next to Arthur in the waiting room. Half a grey wall separated them from the hallway. Two hours ago, the waiting room had been overflowing. Now the only other people remaining were two women who sat side by side staring at a poster of flowers on the wall.

  “Let me do the talking,” Arthur said.

  “Yes.” That must be the tenth time you’ve said that in the last hour.

  A nurse appeared. She was blonde, tall, and broad-shouldered. She pointed at the pair of women. “Your turn.”

  She has a very soothing voice. “We’re next, then,” he said.

  Arthur sighed. “When this is all over, could we go on a holiday?”

  “Where?”

  “Somewhere where the food is fabulous, the view is amazing, and we can put our feet up or go shopping, depending on the day.” Arthur put his hand on Lane’s.

  “With or without kids?” Lane asked.

  Arthur looked at his partner. “Do you think they’d want to come with us?”

  Lane shrugged. “We could ask them.”

  “We’ve never had a holiday with kids. It might be fun.”

  “Or it might be — ”

  “— a disaster.”

  They heard the squeak of approaching shoes. The nurse appeared. “Mr. Merali?”

  “Yes.” Arthur stood.

  Lane followed them down the hall and into an examining room. The nurse held up a blue gown. “Change into this, please. It ties in the front. Dr. Dugay will be with you shortly.” She closed the door and left them alone.

  Arthur took off his shirt, and Lane hung it up. Arthur changed into the gown and sat on the examining table. The white paper cover crackled.

  Lane sat down next to the door. Arthur looked at the wall.

  There was a double tap at the door, and the surgeon strode in. Dr. Dugay was over six feet tall, had unruly sandy brown hair, and wore a white coat and a smile. He checked the file in his hand. “Mr. Merali?”

  Arthur nodded. Dugay glanced at the file. He tapped a few keys on a computer keyboard, and an x-ray image of Arthur’s chest appeared on a flat screen. “It’s nearly in the middle of the breast, so that leaves us with some room for margins.”

  “Margins?” Arthur asked.

  He’s choking on the words.

  “We usually use two-centimetre margins when we remove a tumour.”

  “Then?” Arthur began to cry.

  “We do radiation and sometimes chemo, depending on what we find and what the biopsy results are. There are other factors as well.”

  Arthur wiped his eyes and looked at Lane. “You talk.”

  “Arthur would like a double mastectomy,” Lane said.

  Dugay turned, surprised to discover another person in the room. “Mr. . . . ?” The surgeon held out his hand.

  Lane stood. “Lane. Arthur and I are partners. He may not be able to talk right now, so I may have to ask or answer any questions.”

  “Partners?” Dugay looked at Arthur.

  Arthur nodded. Lane saw the doctor’s eyes open a bit wider. “Oh.”

  He gets it now. Let’s see what happens next.

  “A double mastectomy is certainly one way to go,” Dugay said.

  “Arthur’s sister died of breast cancer almost two years ago. With a family history like that, we’d prefer not to take any chances.”

  “I understand,” Dugay said. “Do you want me to explain the options available?”

  Arthur shook his head. “No.”

  “We went through all of the options with Arthur’s sister,” Lane said. “Right now, it’s the waiting that’s causing him the most anxiety. He’s confident he’s made the right choice. How soon will the surgery be?”

  “If you like, as soon as next week. There has been a cancellation. We have an opening if it’s not too soon.”

  Arthur wiped at his eyes. Lane waited for an indication from him. Arthur nodded.

  “A week would be fine,” Lane said.

  “Is working late on a Friday night your idea of fun?” Lane asked.

  Keely stood next to him, watching the crowd through binoculars. From the parking lot, they could look down on the road and the crowd. Thirty-Third Avenue was blocked at both ends by traffic barriers and patrol cars. The side streets were similarly closed off. The two sides of the road were lined with restaurants, retailers, and coffee shops. People gathered at the intersection or walked between display tables set up along one side of the street. A breeze billowed the tent fabric shading many of the tables. The setting sun made the colours richer, thicker.

  Keely looked at her watch. “It’s almost eight.”

  Both turned at the sound of a sassy trumpet announcing an arrival to their left. A figure on stilts walked into the intersection. The crowd looked up at the performer. The slick red fabric on one arm of the malabarista contrasted with the white fabric on the other. The colours met somewhere near the malabarista’s navel. A magpie’s nest of synthetic scarlet hair drew everyone’s eyes to the performer’s face.

  “Mladen,” Lane said.

  “Leo’s behind him,” said Keely, still surveying the scene through her binoculars.

  The music stopped. Leo, dressed in black, placed an equipment bag over a manhole cover at the centre of th
e intersection. He reached inside, pulled out three blue balls, and tossed them up one at a time to Mladen, who began to juggle. Leo started to play his trumpet again, moving around in a circle, gradually increasing the circumference, pushing the crowd back. That task complete, he went back to the bag and made a big deal about putting on surgical gloves. Mladen spread his feet, obscenely hung each ball between his legs, and dropped them one at a time. Leo caught them and placed them back in the bag. The crowd roared its approval.

  Next, Leo pulled three shafts, each a metre long, from the bag. He attached glass globes on each end and turned the globes on. After all three objects were assembled, he held them up. The globes had minds of their own, randomly changing colour from red to green to white.

  Mladen impatiently tapped his foot, and Leo tossed the batons up one at a time. Mladen twirled and flipped each into the air. As the sky darkened, the spinning globes became blurs of colour.

  Leo picked up the trumpet and began to play a passionate Latin tune that had Mladen moving to its rhythm, the crowd clapping, and children pushing to the front so they could dance. Mladen tossed the batons to impossible heights, catching them only to throw them higher. Each time a baton flew into the air, it became a miniature fireworks wheel. Then, with a bounce, he launched the batons into the air, threw his arms up, flipped forward, tucked in his knees, rolled, and landed back on his stilts in time to catch the falling batons.

  Leo changed tunes. Mladen performed a backflip, not noticing that a child had pushed his way out from the crowd into the performing area. Just as Mladen shifted his weight to his right leg, the toddler tripped, fell forward, and ran into Mladen’s left leg. The child rolled behind him as Mladen’s leg swung up like an empty swing.

  The crowd held its breath as Mladen fought to remain upright. He flipped the three batons into the air, regained his balance, avoided the child, and caught the first two batons. The third was out of his grasp and exploded on the pavement.

  Leo continued to play as Mladen turned, bent down, and looked at the boy. The crowd moved closer, blocking the detectives’ view.

  “What’s he doing?” Lane asked.

  “Can’t see,” Keely replied.

  The crowd roared its approval and began to clap. They were still clapping as Lane and Keely made their way down to the intersection and waited for the audience to disperse.

  Part of the crowd gathered around Leo to drop money into his hat. When they finished, Leo cradled his hat and smiled up at Mladen, who was talking with a woman holding the boy who had tumbled into Mladen’s leg.

  Leo moved closer to Mladen, who leaned on the trumpeter’s shoulder and undid one stilt before lifting the other and dropping to his good leg. He sat down and unstrapped the other leg.

  “Thank you for being so understanding,” the mother said.

  “No problem.” Mladen smiled, until he spotted the detectives.

  The mother looked at the detectives. “Did you see that?”

  “Only part of it,” Keely said.

  The woman shook her head. “You really missed something great! And all he was worried about was if my son was all right.” She dropped a large bill into the hat and left the intersection.

  Lane watched Leo and Mladen transfer the money from the overflowing hat into a bag. “A good night?” he asked.

  Leo packed their gear, including the ruined baton, into the bag. Then he strapped the stilts to the outside of the bag. Mladen picked up bits of glass and dropped them into the palm of his left hand. “A very good night.”

  “We’ve been having trouble tracking you down,” Keely said. “Could we take a minute to talk, please?”

  Nice move, Lane thought.

  Mladen hefted the bag with his right hand. He walked over to a nearby garbage can and dropped the bits of glass into it. Leo hung the trumpet from his neck and tucked his crutch under his armpit. Mladen looked at Lane and then at Keely. “I’m hungry.”

  They followed him to a nearby deli. They sat outside at a picnic table. Mladen and Leo ordered Montreal smoked beef sandwiches.

  “Coffee?” Lane turned to his partner.

  “Water.” Keely gave Lane an apologetic look. “I can’t sleep if I drink coffee this late.”

  “They have the best Montreal smoked beef in the city.” Mladen wiped the sweat from his forehead with the sleeve of his black T-shirt.

  “How do you guys get around?” Lane asked.

  “Bus, C-train, bike. Tonight we might splurge and take a taxi,” Leo said.

  “My neighbour said you talked to him,” Mladen said.

  “That’s correct,” Lane said.

  “Ask your questions,” Mladen said.

  “When was the last time you saw Andelko Branimir or Borislav Goran?” Keely asked.

  Mladen looked up as the waiter brought their drinks. The malabarista took a long pull on his soft drink. Leo opened his bottled water and tipped it back.

  “I don’t know this Andelko,” Mladen said, “but when I was a boy, Goran came to my town with his militia. They called themselves Tarantulas.”

  “Did you know Borislav Goran before that?” Keely asked.

  “He was a policeman before the war.”

  “When did you see Goran in Canada?”

  Mladen shrugged. “Never.”

  “Did you see his wife, Safina Goran?”

  “No.” Mladen looked to his left. The waiter brought two plates with sandwiches, pickles, and coleslaw. Mladen picked up half of a sandwich and seemed to inhale it. In less than thirty seconds, he was licking his fingers and starting to work on the other half.

  Lane sipped his coffee. He appears to be telling the truth. Let him finish eating, then ask the question.

  Keely looked at Lane. He gave her a barely perceptible shake of his head, then turned sideways and watched the crowd thinning as the darkness deepened. He waited until he heard the sound of a straw sucking the bottom of an empty cup, then turned to face Mladen. “Why didn’t you join?”

  Mladen lifted his mouth from the straw. “Join?”

  “The fighting.”

  Leo glared at Lane. Keely’s eyes narrowed.

  “Why didn’t I become a murderer, you mean?”

  Lane nodded. “That’s correct. Why didn’t you become a murderer?”

  Mladen looked toward the dispersing crowd without seeing it. He set the cup down. Lane tucked his feet under his body and held onto the edge of the table, bracing himself in case Mladen reacted as he had last time.

  Mladen focused on Lane. “Before she died, my mother told me. . .” He took a breath. “‘Take care of your sister.’ Then she grabbed my hand. I thought she was going to break my fingers. ‘Promise me you won’t become a monster like those men, like that Goran,’ she said. After she died, we buried our mother. Then my sister and I left our town and went to the city.”

  If he’s lying, he’s very good at it. “How can we get in touch with you if we need to?”

  Mladen gave them his phone number at work. “I get home late every night,” he said. “In the summer, Leo and I make our money at the Stampede and festivals like this one. This is our busy time.”

  Ten minutes later, Lane and Keely were driving down Fourteenth Street hill to where it bottomed out and crossed Seventeenth Avenue. “I’d like to talk with Jelena again,” Keely said. “And this time, could we talk to the daughter too?”

  Lane thought for a moment. “Sunday might be the best time. Her business is open every other day. You want to set it up?”

  Keely nodded. “Okay. And. . .”

  “What?”

  “I’d like to ask for a sample of the daughter’s DNA.”

  “How come?”

  “If Goran was the monster the evidence says he was, there may be another suspect.”

  SATURDAY, AUGUST 25

  chapter 11

  Revelations from

  Bishop Paul About Former

  Police Chief Smoke

  Bishop Paul has revealed some of the inner
workings of a controversial local men’s club. In an interview yesterday at his office, the bishop said that he became “concerned when I learned about the activities of some of the members.” Paul referred to what was called a Scotch drinkers’ club frequented by Calgary’s former Chief of Police Calvin Smoke. The club met once a month at a local restaurant. One of the regular members, Dr. Joseph Jones, has been charged with murder and possession of child pornography.

  Wayne Pike, the owner of the restaurant, has been charged with trafficking after the discovery of more than five kilos of cocaine in the trunk of his Mercedes.

  Bishop Paul said, “Chief Smoke would often talk about police politics and investigations as the evening wore on. It was upon reflection that I realized that Jones and Pike would pay particular attention at these times.”

  When asked if he was trying to distance himself from his affiliation with the Scotch drinkers’ club and recent allegations, Bishop Paul replied, “God will judge my actions.”

  Acting Deputy Chief Cameron Harper responded to Bishop Paul’s allegations with, “The investigation into the activities of former Police Chief Smoke is ongoing. The allegations are serious, and we are in the process of verifying them.”

  When asked if the Calgary Police Service has received a black eye because of the activities of the Scotch drinkers’ club, Harper said, “Of course we have.”

  “How’s it going with Dr. Alexandre?” Loraine held her son Ben on her knee. They sat in one of the chairs on Lane and Arthur’s deck. The boy was already half her height.

  “So you and Ben were just in the neighbourhood and dropped in to say hello?” Lane asked, then thought, Why are you being so suspicious? Roz got up and hid behind the flowerpot.

  “Your emotional response is a sign that things are coming along. In fact, I’d even say that things are going well.” Ben stuck his fist in his mouth, then pulled it out. His eyes opened wide after he gagged. Loraine swiped her fingers along her tongue and patted down a rebellious lock of Ben’s blond hair. The hair stood back up again after she finished.