Michael Slade - Headhunter

DeClercq walked over and placed it on her desk.

"He'll pick it up after his evening lecture," the secretary said.

"Would you tell him that I'll expect him tomorrow any time after nine?"

"Right. Does he know how to get there?"

"Genevieve's my wife. I believe he's been over before."

"Oh, right," the woman repeated, and then DeClercq had left.

Once back at Headhunter Headquarters, the Superintendent had asked Inspector MacDougall if he could round him up a sandwich and following that had sat down and unpacked the box of books.

By the time that MacDougall had entered the office later that night with the wiretap transcripts just sent over by Tipple of Commercial Crime, Robert DeClercq was struggling just to keep his eyes focused. He welcomed the break.

"We might have some good news," the Inspector said. He handed the wiretaps to the Superintendent. "We just got a printout from Headquarters in Ottawa. Interpol might have traced the identity of the bones. A German national named Liese Greiner left Switzerland eight months ago for a camping trip in North America. She never returned, and hasn't been heard from since early August. She was by herself. Six years ago she was badly injured in a car accident and suffered a number of bone fractures. Interpol sent the X-rays. Joseph is going over to the morgue to compare them with the North Van skeleton."

"Good," DeClercq said. "Anything else come up?"

"The autopsy on the nun proved negative for sperm. Perhaps our man was interrupted by the Sister going up the path to close the gate."

"Probably not. She'd have seen him lighting the pumpkin."

"A Corporal named Tipple at Commercial Crime thinks he's got Grabowski's pimp on some of his wiretaps. The target is a guy named Steve Rackstraw who calls himself the 'Fox.' Land fraud. Corporate rip-offs. That sort of thing. Evidently an unknown male known as the 'Weasel' started turning up on the tapes. Tipple later pegged him as John Lincoln Hardy. He's a cousin of Rackstraw. There's also another guy known as the 'Wolf floating around on the taps. He's Rackstraw's brother. Tipple culled out some of the calls and sent them over. You've got them in your hand."

"How's Chan coming along with the computer enhancement?"

"One or two more days and he'll have the sweep sheet ready. He wants the psych profile in order to feed it in."

"He'll have it tomorrow. I'm reading up on it now."

"Right," MacDougall said. "I'll leave you to what you're doing." He left the room.

Ten minutes later the Superintendent had just completed pinning the wiretap transcripts from Commercial Crime up on the corkboard wall when MacDougall once more knocked at the open door. DeClercq turned around and saw the envelope that the Inspector held in his hand. His heart lurched. In his other hand MacDougall was carrying a portable tape recorder.

"Another one?" DeClercq asked, a flatness to his voice.

"The nun," MacDougall answered. He held out the manila folder.

Inside the Superintendent found a Memorex tape and a Polaroid photograph. The picture was of another head slammed on the end of a pole, same white background, nothing more, the head of the nun still wearing a black, white-banded cowl. A wave of nausea spread through DeClercq's stomach at the sight of the rolled-back eyes. A thin trickle of blood seeped from the corner of one of them.

"It was left in Christ Church Cathedral under one of the pews. No one saw it placed there," Jack MacDougall said. "I've had it dusted. No prints, except the Father here."

Beyond the door DeClercq could see a Roman Catholic

priest, his face etched with a troubled look of deep concern. "Play it, Jack," he said.

The Inspector set the recorder up on the Superintendent's desk. Both men listened.

They heard a guitar, party chatter, whistling in the background, and then words:

The police walked in for Jimmy Jazz

I said, he ain't here, but he sure went past

Oh you're looking for Jimmy Jazz

"Good God," MacDougall whispered.

Sattamassagana for Jimmy Dread

Cut off his ears and chop off head

Police come looking for Jimmy Jazz Jazz Jazz Jazz

"Who the hell is that?" DeClercq asked in astonishment. The Inspector shrugged. "Damned if I know," he said.

"Well let's find out fast."

So go look all around, you can try your luck brother

And see what you found

But I guarantee you that it ain't your day

Chop! Chop!

Tuesday, November 2nd, 1:12 a.m.

"Rock music!" Scarlett exclaimed. "Headquarters!" Spann replied.

The two of them looked at each other in total disbelief. It was now after 1:00 a.m. on a weekday morning, the empty hours of the day, a time when a cop might expect to find the squad room proceeding at half-speed, perhaps the occasional sound of a typewriter pounding or small talk among the members on night patrol, but certainly not the time or place for rock and roll to assail his or her astonished ears. This was just too much.

They had spent the afternoon and the entire evening on a pub-crawl of Vancouver's skid road beer parlors hoping to find John Lincoln Hardy or the Indian who might have contact with him. They were both dressed in grubby clothes, jeans and soiled T-shirts, Scarlett with the stubble of one day's beard shadowing his face. Over the past thirteen hours they had watched more scores of junk and grass and speed and acid and coke and angel dust go down than went through the courts in a year. They had seen the gypsy switch pulled more times than they could count. And they had overheard more blow jobs and around the worlds and just plain straight lays negotiated than went on at an accountants' convention — and that was saying a lot. They had felt the insidious sleaze of each successive hangout soil their expectations, but by the end of the day they had not seen hide nor hair of either hunted man.

Now they had called it a night.

They had driven back to Headhunter Headquarters, had parked the unmarked squad car outside the building, and had hauled their tired behinds up the front walk, through the doors, and come upon a rock and roll party in progress. Punk rock blared from the speakers:

Don't you bother me, not any more

I can't take this tale, oh no more

It's all around, Jimmy Jazz

J — A — Zee Zee J — A — Zed Zed Zee Zee…

The youth who sat directly in front of the speakers was maybe eighteen years old and a throwback to the fifties. He was dressed in black jeans, black winklepicker shoes, and a black leather jacket with several silver chains adorning it. His hair was greased and swept up in a ducktail. Scarlett looked for the rattail comb sticking out of his back pocket. Sure enough, it was there.

Around him, the other listeners were not quite so cool. Several of them were wearing the RCMP uniform, DeClercq and MacDougall excluded, and all had a short military cut to their hair. They all looked straight, while the bopper looked stoned. The bopper had the floor.

"The name of the cut is Jimmy Jazz. The name of the group is The Clash. Third cut. Side one. Off the double, London Calling. Great disc," he said.

"When was it put out?" Robert DeClercq asked.

"1979. Epic Records."

MacDougall asked: "What's Jimmy Jazz?"

"I've no idea," the youth said, shaking his head. "Dope, I guess. Isn't that what you guys are usually looking for?"

"Not this time," the Inspector replied. "Where can we get the album?"

"Any record store. The Clash are very big time. If you want I'll lend you the copy we got at the radio station."

"Please," DeClercq said. "And I'd like it tonight."

Scarlett and Spann skirted one side of the group of music lovers and made their way to the second floor. The reason that they had come into the building was to take another look at the corkboard visual. As they reached the top of the stairs Rick Scarlett said: "Punk rock, huh! Puke rock's more like it!"