Maiden Lane. Michael Januska
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was a groaning, like from the joints of a sinking ship. Three Fingers was stretched across a mosaic of fracturing ice. His feet were growing numb as the sheets and shards supporting him sunk below water level. More cases of whisky slid across the floor and slammed into the footwells. And then in one silent, breathless gulp, the Huron went down with the automobile.
“Chain!” yelled Thom.
The boys threw off their hats and coats and ran out onto the ice. Thom was the anchor, then Lapointe, Mud, Gorski, and Shorty.
At first there was no sign of Three Fingers, just the sound of the air gurgling out of the sinking T, which had abruptly halted, nose down, its rear wheels sticking up out of the water. Seconds passed, and then a hand gripping a hunting knife reached up through the floating chunks of ice and stabbed the lip of the hole. Three Fingers pulled himself up. He was yelling at Shorty and pointing at something down below.
“No,” said Shorty, “forget the booze.”
But it wasn’t the crates of whisky that Three Fingers was on about. There was a sandbar, and tangled in its weeds was something else entirely.
Shorty was within a few feet now, crawling on his belly with Gorski gripping his ankles when the Huron went down again, this time intentionally. Shorty was preparing to reach for him when a figure surfaced, a ghastly, half-decayed body nearly frozen stiff. Three Fingers then sprang up, gasping for air and, bracing himself against the sunken T with one hand, reached for the knife still standing in the ice with the other. Shorty grabbed his arm while the Huron held on to the body. The boys slowly dragged them ashore.
There were a few oh my God’s.
“What the hell?” said Lapointe.
“You nearly got yourself killed,” said Shorty.
“Not to mention the rest of us,” said Mud.
“L-ook,” said Three Fingers, “l-ook at his t-teeth.”
Most of the flesh was gone from the corpse’s face, but those long, jagged dentals were undeniable.
“Jesus,” said Shorty, “it’s Jigsaw.”
Mud kneeled down to take a closer look, turned to Three Fingers and said, “How did you know?”
“He g-grabbed my l-leg.”
The others exchanged glances.
“He didn’t,” said Gorski.
“But why did you drag him up?” said Shorty.
“Did you think you could save him?” said Mud.
“Forget him; he’s miles past dead,” said Thom. “Let’s fix on saving the Indian.” He and Lapointe threw one of the Huron’s arms over each of their shoulders, and that was a good thing because Three Fingers was about to fold like a card table. They helped him into the fishing cabin that stood near the mouth of the creek. Once inside, they stripped him of his wet clothes, wrapped him in his coat and a couple dirty blankets, and sat him in front of the little potbelly stove. Thom got it going with some matches and loose bits of the interior. The cabin was about the size of a cell at county jail, but nowhere near as sturdy. Holes in the walls were stuffed with rags and newspaper. The stench was the only thing holding the place up. It smelled of stale cigar smoke and sour mash.
Outside, standing over Jigsaw’s frigid remains, the other boys got to putting their hats and coats back on, wrapping themselves up a little tighter, taking extra care to tuck their gloves deep into their coat sleeves and fasten their buttons up to their necks.
“Why the hell did he have to drag him up?” muttered Shorty, and then he turned away, squinting in the direction of the hole in the ice. It looked like the T hadn’t sunk any deeper. Yeah, he thought, must be a sandbar. And now the whisky was there for the taking — by anyone crazy enough. Goddamn.
Lapointe came running out of the cabin, stabbing the air behind him with his thumb. “Hey, I think the Indian’s snapped or something. He’s muttering all kinds of stuff that don’t make any sense.”
Gorski and Mud immediately went over. Shorty followed.
Three Fingers had his feet resting on top of the stove. He was thawing out. “It w-was like he was w-waiting for me … to c-come for him … t-tangled in the w-weeds.” He was sitting in the only chair in the place, looking up at them, still shaking and shivering but somehow managing a smile. “Always the l-last place you l-look, right?”
Shorty could feel Gorski’s eyes turn on him but he refused the invitation.
“What’s he on about?” said Lapointe.
Shorty ignored Lapointe. “Let’s not start with that,” he said to the Huron.
“I know what he’s talking about,” said Gorski.
“What?” said Thom.
Shorty sighed and Mud shouldered his way over to the window to stare at a pane of glass that was greasy on the inside and frosted on the other. It wasn’t much of a view. He knew what was coming and wasn’t interested in hearing any of it. Gorski took this as his cue and proceeded to tell the tale for the benefit of the new guys.
There was a long-standing rumour that the late crime boss Richard Davies had brought a fortune in cash and bonds down with him from Montreal, and kept it locked away somewhere in the Border Cities. It was his working capital, the stuff he was going to use to bribe, buy, and build his little empire. Thom and Lapointe had heard about Davies and how he was taken down last summer — gunned down, that is, along with Jigsaw — but they hadn’t heard anything about any lost fortune. Gorski made it sound like something out of a Rider Haggard novel.
Three Fingers sat up. He was starting to feel his legs again. “He knows something,” he said, pointing at the door. “He knows something.”
“Who?” scoffed Shorty. “Jigsaw?”
“Think about it,” said Gorski.
Mud turned away from the window. “I don’t think you’re gonna get him to talk.”
“Maybe we should frisk him.”
“You volunteering?” said Shorty.
“No,” said Gorski, “I —”
“I’ll do it,” said Thom, the son of a pig farmer. He went back outside and the others, except for Three Fingers, followed.
There was a dusting of snow on the body now, like confectioner’s sugar on death’s dessert. He carefully picked up Jigsaw’s remains, cradled them in his arms, and set him down on the fish-cleaning table that stood between the cabin and the creek.
“You sure he’s dead?” said Mud.
Jigsaw got cut, blown apart, and sewn back together again so many times in France, he looked like a living rag doll. He had seemed indestructible.
“Yeah, he’s dead,” said Shorty. “It’s been almost half an hour and he hasn’t said a word. Remember how he liked to talk?” What Shorty was remembering was how Jigsaw used to take pleasure in mocking and berating him.
Thom found a knife in one of the drawers and started cutting into Jigsaw’s stiff, tattered clothes, first his mackintosh and then his suit jacket. Thom handed the sections with pockets in them over to the boys to thaw and inspect.
“What are we looking for?” asked Lapointe.
“We’ll know when we find it,” said Gorski.
The process would have brought tears to the eyes of Jigsaw’s tailor.
“Nothing,” said Thom. “No surprise, I mean look at the rips and tears in his clothes. The fish, the reeds, the rock have been picking and scraping away at him for … how many months?”
“Keep working,” said Gorski.
Thom looked at Shorty, who silently