The Fields of Grief. Giles Blunt
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toner’ll often pick up prints – not as good as dusting powder. They have to be pretty good prints for it to work. Take a look.’
A photograph scrolled out of a slot. Cardinal reached for it.
There was a small dark thumbprint to the left of “John’s birthday”, which now appeared in white. There was a short straight line across the whorls where Catherine had cut herself in the kitchen years ago. Catherine’s thumbprint, where she braced the notebook on her lap. She was alive. She was thinking of me, planning for my birthday, imagining a future. Cardinal coughed to cover the cry that threatened to escape his throat. The impression of the suicide note was now complete, clearly inscribed in black toner. By the time you read this …
It’s her handwriting. You know it’s her handwriting. Why are you putting yourself through this?
‘Okay,’ Cardinal said. ‘So we know the suicide note was written on top of the later page, which makes sense. The later pages should have been blank when she wrote the suicide note. But can you tell if the ink on the later page, I mean the ink of the birthday note, is on top of the impressions left from the suicide note? Or underneath them?’
‘Oh, I like a man who thinks dirty,’ Hunn said. ‘Let’s pop it under the microscope. If the white lines of the birthday note are interrupted by black, that means the indentations were made at a later time than the ink.’ Hunn peered into the microscope and adjusted the focus. ‘Nope. We got black interrupted by white – ink over indentations.’
‘So the suicide note was definitely written before the birthday note.’
‘Definitely. I’m assuming you know when the mysterious John’s birthday occurred?’
‘Yeah. Over three months ago.’
‘Hmm. Not your usual sort of suicide, then.’
‘No. Can I keep the picture you took?’
‘Oh, sure. That way the original doesn’t have to be handled so much.’ Hunn pulled the original out of the ESDA machine and put it back in its folder.
‘Do one more thing for me, Tommy?’
‘What’s that?’
‘Pour some of that fairy dust on the suicide note too.’
‘You wanna check it for earlier impressions as well? You already have the birthday thing.’
‘I’d really appreciate it. My brothers in arms up north aren’t exactly on the team on this one.’
Hunn looked at him, pale blue eyes calculating. ‘Okay, sure.’
He repeated the routine of humidifying the note, securing it under plastic, charging it. Then he poured the powder over the plastic.
‘Looks like lots of impressions from notes earlier in the notebook. We can stick it under the microscope and be certain which ones came first, if you want.’
‘Look at this,’ Cardinal said. He pulled out the photo curling from the slot. The suicide note was now in white. But there was something else at the top of the photo, in the centre, outlined in black toner.
‘Quite a bit bigger than the other one,’ Hunn said. ‘And no scar. I’m no ident man, but I’d say you’re now dealing with a very different pair of thumbs.’
A little later Hunn walked him down to the elevators, where they waited in silence a few moments. Then the bell pinged, announcing the arrival of the elevator. Cardinal got in and hit the button for the ground floor.
‘Say, listen,’ Hunn said in the tone of one who has been turning something over in his mind. ‘That stuff isn’t connected to you, is it? I mean, personally? You wouldn’t be the John in the notebook, would you?’
‘Thanks for all your help, Tommy,’ Cardinal said as the elevator doors closed between them. ‘Much appreciated.’
Travelling back to Algonquin Bay the same day meant Cardinal and Kelly spent a total of eight hours together in the car. The ride back was quiet.
Cardinal asked Kelly how things had gone with her friend.
‘Fine. At least she hasn’t turned into a vegetable like Kim. She’s still involved in art, and she seems to have some idea of what’s going on in the world.’
Kelly twisted a strand of her blue-black hair as she stared out the window. Cardinal remembered how his own friends had changed at that age. Many had lost interest in him when he became a cop, and a lot of his Toronto associates wrote him off when he moved back to Algonquin Bay.
‘You never know about people,’ Catherine had said. ‘Everybody has their own storyline, and sometimes it doesn’t include us – usually when we wish it did. And sometimes it does include us – usually when we wish it didn’t.’
And what about now, Catherine? How do I deal with your being gone?
‘Like a cop,’ he imagined her saying, with the little half smile she gave whenever she was teasing him. ‘The way you handle everything.’
But it doesn’t help, he wanted to cry. Nothing helps.
They passed WonderWorld, a vast amusement park just north of Toronto with a fake pointy mountain and gigantic rides. Kelly asked him how things had gone at Forensics, but Cardinal mumbled something noncommittal. He didn’t want to see the look of pity and frustration in her eyes.
When Orillia was behind them, she said, ‘I suppose this means dinner at the Sundial?’
‘Unfortunately not,’ Cardinal said. ‘Sundial’s closed.’
‘My oh my. The end of an era.’
They had to settle for bland little sandwiches at a Tim Hortons.
It was dark by the time they got home. The hills and the trees were silent, a salve to the ears after the endless clatter of Toronto. Colder, too. A half-hidden moon lit tendrils of cloud that hung motionless over the water, the lake itself shiny and black as patent leather.
When Cardinal opened the front door, he stepped on the corner of a square white envelope. He picked it up without showing Kelly.
‘I’m going to take a shower,’ Kelly said, taking off her coat. ‘Nothing like a day in the car to make you feel grubby.’
Cardinal took the envelope into the kitchen, holding it by the corner. He switched on the overhead light and peered at the address. He was pretty sure he could make out a pale, threadlike line running through the M and the R of Madonna Road.
Cardinal had not noticed on his previous visit how thoroughly Dr Bell’s office was set up for the comfort of his patients. The large sunny windows, with their gauzy blinds bright as sails, the floor-to-ceiling walls of psychology and philosophy texts with their reassuring smells of ink and glue and paper, the worn Persian rugs, everything about the room conveyed stability, permanence, wisdom – qualities that psychiatric patients might feel lacking in their own lives. The place was a refuge from the mess of life, a cocoon that invited safe reflection.
Cardinal sank into the couch. He noted the boxes of Kleenex discreetly placed at either end, and on the coffee table – as much Kleenex as at Desmond’s Funeral Home – and he wondered how many times Catherine had sat here and wept. Had she also talked about her disappointment in her husband – who didn’t pay her enough attention, was not kind enough, or patient enough?
‘“How she must have hated you,”’ Dr Bell read from the latest sympathy card. “‘You failed her so completely.’” He looked at Cardinal over tiny reading glasses. ‘What was your reaction when you read that? Your immediate reaction, I mean.’
‘That