Jewel Trade - Act 1 Vicki and Henry approached the museum's entrance. The lines to get in were long; the new exhibit of a medieval Chinese ship found off Vancouver Island was hugely popular. Henry steered them away from the queue. "We can go right in," he said. "I'm a member."
"Yeah, but I'm not," Vicki said, eyeing the long line.
"It's all right. You're my guest." Henry grinned at her.
As they mounted the stairs, Vicki said, "I didn't know membership allowed you to bring a guest."
"Mine does," Henry said mysteriously. They reached the ticket-taker, and Henry withdrew a card from his wallet and smiled at the bespectacled and overweight woman. This woman looked at his card and glanced at Vicki. "She's with me," Henry said.
"Good evening, Mr. Fitzroy," the woman said, her manner changing from professional disinterest to almost fawning. "So nice to see you." Her second glance at Vicki was appraising.
When the two of them were within the main hall and well out of the woman's hearing, Vicki asked, "Did you just use some hoodoo on that woman?"
"Hoodoo?" he replied, sounding faintly insulted. "I don't have hoodoo—"
"You have charm. I know." Vicki looked around. "Let's go to the special exhibit. I've seen all the regular ones."
"It's that degree you have in History," he said. "It gives away your essentially romantic nature."
"It was a minor in History. Hardly a degree. And you ought to know how rarely history was ever romantic."
"Ah," he said, leaning in close to her ear, "but a love of history almost always is. Trust me, I'm an expert in these matters."
"I'll trust you might be an expert in history. So, tell me," she said, as they passed beneath the banner saying 'The Chinese Discovery of North America,' "did the Chinese find the New World before Columbus?"
"How would I know?" Henry replied innocently. "We didn't have CNN International."
End Scene
Mike walked through the door of "Vicki Nelson, Private Investigator," barely managing the doorknob because his hands were full of Chinese takeout containers. He nodded at Coreen. "Vicki in?"
"Hi," Coreen answered, nodding, her heavily made-up eyes fixed on Mike's food. She came out of her seat and followed him into Vicki's office.
"Hey Vic," Mike said, setting the food down. "Hope you haven't had dinner."
"'Lo, Mike," said Vicki. "Chinese. Do we have a murder to solve?"
"Funny you should ask," Mike said. "We do, but I don't think we're ready to solve it yet. This," he indicated the food, "is a bribe."
Vicki nodded approvingly, opening a container. "It's a step up from donuts, I'll give you that. What are you bribing me for?"
"You just bribe with donuts 'cause you're cheap."
"Hey, you like donuts." Vicki picked up a pair of chopsticks.
"I want you to take a case. You'd be a police force contractor. I have permission to pay your fee."
Vicki dug into the Mu Shu Beef, and raised her eyebrows at him. "You'd have to have gotten that authorization from Crowley," she said. "Still can't solve the hard ones without me, can you?" She popped food in her mouth.
Mike waited until she was done with her mouthful of beef. "Actually, it's your partner we want."
Vicki plopped the box down on the table and jammed her chopsticks into it. "What? What for?"
Coreen opened a box and reached for chopsticks. "Put that down," Vicki said. "We haven't accepted this bribe yet."
"It's just dinner," Coreen replied.
"It's the principle," Vicki said, her gaze locked on Mike. "What do you want Henry for?" Her tone held a warning, and even Coreen looked up at the two of them. The last time Mike had wanted Henry it had been to give him to Mendoza.
"Hear me out," Mike said, spreading his hands. "We've had a rash of young men going missing. Young men of a certain age. Henry's age."
"Henry's age," Vicki said with a set to her jaw. "You mean 488?"
Mike gave her an impatient look. "I mean his apparent age. The missing have all been young, but adults, so Major Crimes wasn't involved."
"Why is Homicide involved?"
"Now there's a body. The first kid to vanish, Luc Johnson. He was found in an alley near the museum, which is also the general area the men have all been in when they vanished. Crowley authorized a set-up and we sent Evans in as bait. Did you know Evans?"
"Don't remember him."
"Well he looked the right age and he vanished, too. Wearing a wire and a tracker. We've lost a cop, Vicki. He could be dead already, or he could be being held. Two other guys are still missing, too."
"This hasn't been in the news," Coreen said with horror.
"It wouldn't be at first," Vicki told her absently. "That would tip them off that we know where it's happening."
"You know what our next step has to be," Mike said. "We can't sit on it any longer. We hold a press conference, let the public know there's a danger and cordon off the whole area. Maybe shut down the museum. It's the only thing nearby."
"And Crowley won't risk any more cops."
Mike looked uncomfortable. "I pitched the idea of using Henry as a last ditch effort before we have to go public. I said he has training, he's experienced, he's been working with you, yadda yadda. I got Crowley to go for it."
"Because the force wouldn't be risking anyone they actually care about," Vicki said.
"Hey, that's not fair. Not to them or me. You know the force has to care about every citizen of the city, and I know Henry is no lightweight who could be taken down by some thug putting a bag over his head."
"Thank you, Detective," said Henry from behind them.
All three other people in the room jumped and chorused, "Don't do that!"
Smiling slightly, Henry strode forward to stand at the desk and look down at the food. "But Chinese food is not the currency I deal in." He looked sidelong at Mike.
Mike's mouth fell open, "I—am—not—" he said.
Vicki and Coreen exchanged wide-eyed glances. Henry smiled broadly. "I didn't think you would," he said. "So, I'm curious. What did you think would induce me to work for you?"
"Now wait," put in Vicki. "This proposal is for a contract with the firm, and I am senior partner in this firm. You," she said to Henry, "don't go making side deals, and you," she addressed Mike, "do your negotiating with me. Is this clear?"
Both men looked at her with varying degrees of bemusement.
"I'm not working for him," Henry said.
"No one says you have to. But let's at least hear the offer. If I know Mike, he didn't come empty-handed, and I don't mean Chinese food and my fee."
Henry moved away from the desk, Coreen fading back to let him pass, and stood with his back to them.
"Hello," said Mike. "Still here in the room."
"So what else is on the table?" Vicki asked him.
"Computer records," Mike said. "I ran you, Henry. I know how empty your trail looks. No school records, no medical records. You just appear out of nowhere. What's more, what there is, is out of joint. You look about twenty, but you've been a resident as an adult for almost twenty years. I can be in a position to make you a history in almost every government database."
Henry turned around. "I don't have a problem with documents, Detective. I have four centuries of experience as an artist. You think I can't forge any document I need?"
"How long will documents matter? It's the digital age, Fitzroy. How are your hacking skills coming along? You need a digital existence. I'll give you one. That's my offer."
The two men looked at each other for a long moment. Henry glanced at Vicki. "I suppose good police relations are valuable to a PI," he said.
"Don't do this for me," Vicki said.
Henry gave her a small smile. "Why would I change now?" He looked back at Mike, his smile fading. "What do you need?"
End Scene
Henry and Vicki paid Mohadevan a visit at the morgue. She was in the back laboratory performing an autopsy, but an assistant let them wait in the main room with the body of Luc Johnson. Florescent lights lit the room which, in daytime, was lit by diffuse daylight from a wall of curtained windows.
"Cause of death: ammonia poisoning," Vicki read from the report. "Well, that's different."
Henry pulled back the sheet and looked at the young dark-haired man. An autopsy seam ran down his torso. "Should he look this pale?" Henry asked.
Mohadevan entered the room, her smock and gloves splattered with red and yellow liquids. She snapped off the gloves and shot them like rubber bands into a waste bin, removed the smock and picked up a salad in a plastic container from a nearby desk.
"Hello, you two," she said. "I heard you were on this case." She took a bite of the salad and joined them. "Mr. Johnson isn't telling me much about where he's been, I'm afraid."
"Ammonia poisoning?" Vicki said again. "You can call it a homicide from that?"
Mohadevan nodded. "He has bruising that indicates a struggle. See these chemical burns around his nose and mouth? The ammonia was inhaled, not ingested, and in a concentration that could only happen from prolonged exposure to an industrial-strength dose of the chemical."
"How prolonged?"
"Days. First it made him unconscious and very sick, then it gave him irreversible brain damage."
"Still, he could have fallen in a fertilizer factory or something and passed out."
"Do you really think this was an accident?" Henry asked Vicki, sounding surprised.
Vicki smiled sheepishly. "Just habit. Playing Devil's advocate with the coroner."
Mohadevan smiled around another mouthful of salad. "Sometimes coroners operate on instinct, too," she said. "Though for the inquest I'll cite the bruising and the fact that the body was found in an alley nowhere near a fertilizer plant."
"Should he look this pale?" Henry asked. "I know you remove the blood, but . . ."
Mohadevan sighed and gave him one of the quizzical glances she often gave Vicki's new partner. "Ammonia poisoning. That's my story and I'm sticking to it."
Vicki looked up. "Rajani? This is us, remember?" She waved a hand between herself and Henry. "What else have you got?"
"It's in the report," she said, "though no one would know what to make of it. The protein molecules of his hemoglobin have broken down."
Vicki shook her head uncomprehendingly.
"The protein that makes red blood cells red. The molecular bonds are broken throughout his body. You're right," she nodded to Henry with another curious look. "Even with his blood removed, residual hemoglobin should give his skin more color than this. But something has destroyed the energy holding those protein molecules together."
"What could do that?" Vicki asked.
"And leave the body intact? Nothing I know of."
"What does hemoglobin do?"
"It binds with oxygen and carries it where it's needed to keep a person alive."
"So this molecular energy is gone," Henry said. "This man has had his life force taken?"
Vicki gave him an exasperated look.
"You could say that," Mohadevan agreed. She ate another mouthful of salad. "I'm saying ammonia poisoning."
End scene
Henry left the museum at closing time with a crowd of people, separated from them and strolled alone along Bloor, through dark parking lots, across grass and behind buildings. He wore a radio transmitter and carried a small transponder on him. Police officers in unmarked cars were sprinkled throughout the area around the museum. Vicki and Mike sat in a car in the alley where the body had been found.
"So, this partnership still working out for you?" Mike asked.
"He's useless in the day and I'm useless at night. We're a perfect team."
"Is that self-pity I hear from Vicki Nelson?"
"I was going for ironic juxtaposition."
Henry began singing a bawdy sea shanty under his breath. The words came across the police channel clearly.
Next came a company Of the Prince of Wales' Hussars They piled into the whore house And they packed along the bars.
"Did you tell him we're not the only ones hearing this?" asked Mike. "Every car on this assignment is picking him up."
Many a maid and mistress And wife before them fell. But they never made the waitress From the Prince George Hotel.
Vicki struggled to stifle her laughter. "He knows that," she said. "What's the matter? You don't think the guys will like it?"
One day there came a sailor. Just an ordinary bloke. A-bulging at the trousers. With a heart of solid oak.
Mike sighed and looked at his watch. "Two more hours of this. Man, I hope someone vanishes him quick."
At sea without a woman For seven years or more. There wasn't any need to ask What he was looking for.
Vicki sipped her coffee and looked innocently out her window.
The evening ended uneventfully. No one tried to attack Henry and after three hours they called a halt. One guy could only believably spend so much time making circuits of the same area.
Mike drove out of the area to the pre-arranged meeting place and he and Vicki got out of her car to meet Henry beneath orange-toned halogen street lights. "Well, that was fun," Henry said. "This police work is so invigorating."
"We'll try again tomorrow night," Mike said, nodded to Vicki and headed for his own car. Henry slid into the driver's seat.
"Hard to know whether to be relieved or disappointed, isn't it?" Vicki said.
Henry started the car and turned back toward the museum. "I like walking in the night," he said. "And it's not so certain we got nothing out of it."
"What do you mean?"
"Someone watched me every time I came down one alley. They were on the fire escape behind a wall."
"Oh yeah? Why didn't you tell Mike?"
"I don't like Mike." Henry passed the mouth of an alley and parked. He adjusted the rear-view mirror in order to see behind them, and Vicki toyed with the side mirror, though her night vision was too poor for it to matter. "I thought we might try it your way."
"My way? You mean wait for the bartender to lead us right to the girl?"
Henry's smile flashed in the gloom. "I knew you were smart."
"You really have some things to learn about playing on a team."
"I'm on your team."
"And we're playing on Mike's right now. So you won't mind if I tell him what you find out."
Henry shrugged. "Tell him whatever you like."
"Fine."
"Fine."
They didn't have long to wait before a single figure, a woman, small and slim-figured, exited the alley. "That's her," Henry said. The woman walked half a block to a darkened business, a bakery, and entered by a side door.
"What was she doing in an alley all evening?" Vicki mused.
"Shall I follow her into the bakery?" Henry asked. "Maybe she lives above it. I don't mind."
"Down boy," Vicki said. "I've got the address. I'll talk to her tomorrow."
End Scene
Vicki learned from Mike that the bakery was owned by a Tibetan man named Tsepon Gyaltsen. The owners of local businesses in the area had all been questioned following the disappearances, including him. Mike was unimpressed with their lead. After all, a woman had a right to spend the evening on a fire escape if she cared to. It didn't mean she was watching Henry. Mike and Dave had a meeting with the Director of the Royal Ontario Museum, so Vicki visited the bakery alone.
The bells on the door jingled as she entered, and the smell of fresh bread greeted her. The small front shop was lined on two walls with glass cases displaying the baked goods, leaving a narrow passage behind for the employees. A break in the cases led to a door into the interior of the house. The register stood at the far left on a counter, with a young Asian woman standing near it. The left wall of the store was for small tables, and at one of them sat an elderly Asian couple and a young man. The woman held a glass of water for the young man, urging him to drink, but the young man merely stared into the distance, his head tipped at an angle, oblivious to her.
Seeing Vicki's notice, the elderly man gave the woman a shake of his head, and she put the water down. They both watched as Vicki approached the register. The young man reacted to nothing.
"Hi," Vicki said to the young woman. If she was the same woman she and Henry had seen the night before, Vicki couldn't tell; her night vision was too poor. "My name's Vicki Nelson. I'd like to speak to Mr. Tsepon Gyaltsen, please."
"He's not available. I'm sorry."
"Then I'll talk to you. I'm working with the police. I’m investigating a homicide. Can you tell me where you were last night after 9:00?"
"Me?" The young woman's gaze flicked desperately toward the people at the table. "I—I was here."
"You live here?"
"Yes."
"Then I'm sure there are others who saw you here last night."
"I'll—get my uncle," the woman said. "He's down at the ovens."
Vicki smiled tightly. "You do that."
The young woman went through the rear door. Vicki looked around at the bakery. The old man and woman stood and cleared away their small paper plates, while the young man stared at nothing. Then, never looking at Vicki, they coaxed the young man to a standing position, and then urged him toward the rear door, one of them on each arm as he shuffled. They passed into the interior of the building, leaving Vicki alone in the store.
Vicki drummed her fingers on the counter. She'd always believed that being nosy was a big help to detective work.
She followed everyone else into the interior of the house. Just inside the door she found a hallway that stretched ahead of her, and a staircase on the right. She heard voices down the hallway, and a few steps took her to stand before an open door. The two elderly people and their young charge were in a large bedroom, the couple fussing over the young man, urging him to sit. The woman saw Vicki and spoke in an alarmed tone, in a language Vicki assumed was Tibetan. The man whirled.
"What's wrong with him?" Vicki asked.
"Nothing is wrong!" the man answered. "Go away." He shut the door in her face. To her right, the young woman and a middle-aged man wearing an apron approached.
"What are you doing here?" the man demanded.
"Thought you might want someone to keep an eye on the till out there," Vicki said calmly. "Mr. Gyaltsen, I presume?"
"Go, go!" He made shooing motions with his hands. "Back in the store."
Vicki obliged, the other two following her and talking in low tones. Out in the bakery store, Vicki turned to face the man. Three more people had entered the store in Vicki's absence, and the young woman moved behind the glass cases to wait on them.
"Mr. Gyaltsen, my name is Vicki Nelson and I'm assisting the police in investigating a homicide."
The other talking in the room ceased.
"I've already spoken to the police," he said.
"You were questioned about the disappearances. Young men going missing in this general area of town?"
Gyaltsen said nothing. Behind him, the face of the old man appeared in the entranceway to the house.
"One of those men has been murdered. His body was found not too far away from here. Now it's a homicide case. Would you tell me, please, where you and your family were three nights ago after about six o'clock?"
The old man's face disappeared. The other people in the store left without making any purchases. The young woman watched them go then drifted closer to Vicki and Gyaltsen. Gyaltsen also watched them go before replying. "We visited the ROM that evening, officer," he said tightly.
"I assume you can prove that?"
Gyaltsen looked rattled. "We were with some friends. If I am suspected of something, I believe the security monitors at the museum will show us all there."
"No doubt," Vicki said. She pulled out a card. "Call me if you think of anything that might be helpful." She glanced around. "The number, if the print is too small to read, is 555-5337." She repeated the number loudly, pointedly calling into the interior of the house. She smiled at Gyaltsen. "Thank you for your time."
"They're definitely hiding something. I didn't even need my lie detector to see how nervous everyone got when I said I was looking into the homicide."
"What do you mean, your lie detector?"
"Henry. He can tell me if someone's heart speeds up at something I say."
"Oh," Mike said.
"You guys questioned the baker before. Do you know what's up with the autistic guy?"
"What autistic guy?"
"Well, I don't really know he's autistic, but there was a, like, twenty-year-old man, totally out of it. Two grandparent types didn't leave his side, and the three of them hustled out of the room when I started asking questions."
"Nope. Wasn't there before. We questioned everyone in the house. Probably a recent immigrant. Gyaltsen's been in this country for forty years, but I bet he still has family in Tibet. Did you see the girl?"
"Maybe. There was a girl who could have been her. Henry would know."
"I bet he would."
Vicki ignored the sarcasm. "How about you guys? Any luck with the museum director?"
"Not much. He's not aware of anything unusual around the museum. The only thing new in town is this Chinese exhibit. I'm going to talk to its curator in a few hours. A guy named Chumbay Jokssari. Want to come? Dave's got a doctor's appointment."
"Is that a Tibetan name? Doesn't sound Chinese."
"You could be right. I'll run him."
"Let's meet with him tonight, instead. I think Henry may have some pull with the museum."
"No, Vicki, I'm not waiting for Henry. Do you do anything without him anymore?"
"Hey, you're the one who said the department wanted him."
"As bait, that's all. Meet me downtown if you want to come."
End scene
Vicki was on a city bus when her cell phone rang again. "This is Vicki."
"Ms. Nelson?" asked a female voice. "My name is Mary. You were just at my uncle's bakery."
Vicki sat up straighter, cursing the bus's engine noise. She plugged her other ear with a finger. "Hello, Mary. Good to hear from you. What have you got to tell me?"
"I'm afraid—I'm afraid they're going to find another body. I want this to stop. Can we meet?"
"Sure. Can you come to my office?"
"No, I can't. I can't. Meet me at the main library in special collections, room A. Three o'clock."
"Mary, I want this to stop, too. Can you tell me something before there's another death? Help me stop it."
"I can't. And—you wouldn't believe me. Maybe I shouldn't have called. I'm sorry."
"Mary, wait! Please! You called me for a reason. You didn't go to the police, you called me. You'd be surprised what I can believe. I'll meet you. Please come. But give me some idea now. Something to help us stop any more deaths. No matter how crazy it sounds. You can do it."
"Have you ever heard of the wish-fulfilling jewel?"
"The wish . . .?"
"The wish-fulfilling jewel. They have it at the ROM. I have to go." The connection died.