LITMIR.BIZ

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door seemed locked when she first pushed against it, but then it gave a few inches, reluctantly, as if a huge weight was pinned against it. A fresh odour of feces wafted through the crack, and alarm galvanized her. Straining, she shoved the door back enough to squeeze through and stumbled over a huge limp object on the floor. She gasped at the sight.

      Modo lay on her side against the door. At first glance, Janice thought she was dead, until she saw her eye move to meet Janice’s.

      “Modo!” Janice dropped to her knees at the dog’s side. Modo mustered a cocked eyebrow and a faint thump of her tail. The heat in the room was sweltering and the air rancid. Janice glanced around quickly and saw soiled patches in the rug, but no sign of food or water.

      “My God, you poor baby!” Janice hurried into the kitchen to fetch a bowl of water, but Modo was too weak to stand or drink. Janice began spooning water into the dog’s mouth. The dog flicked her tongue feebly, but Janice knew it was not enough. She had to get Modo out of the stifling room and into a vet’s care immediately, but the dog weighed at least a hundred pounds. It was a job which required a strong man. Much as she hated to admit it, her neighbour was the only one who came to mind. That was the trouble with years of rarely meeting another living soul.

      As she grabbed a phone book to look up his number, she suppressed a tremor of fear. Something was very wrong. No matter how obsessed and paranoid Matt had become, no matter how distorted his ideas, he would never have left Modo behind to die.

      * * *

      As he rounded the block to the station, Ottawa Police Inspector Michael Green glanced at his watch in dismay. Almost six o’clock. Up ahead, southbound Elgin Street was still blocked solid with the last of the commuters exiting the downtown core. Police headquarters loomed on his right, a concrete bunker built in what Green had heard aptly described as the Brutalist style. Short on aesthetics, but no doubt designed so that a Scud missile could barely make a dent. The bunker was incongruously plunked amid the red brick Victorian townhouses of Centretown, a stone’s throw from the yuppie pubs of Elgin Street and the flowerbeds and recreational paths of the Rideau Canal. Even more incongruous was its spectacular view of the Museum of Nature, which sprawled like a Scottish baronial castle in the middle of a grassy square. Only a moat was lacking, although the constant traffic swirling around it up Metcalfe Street did a passable imitation.

      The view, however, was only enjoyed by the lucky few whose offices lined the north side of the building. Offices on the south side, if they’d had windows, would have looked over eight lanes of elevated expressway, complete with exhaust, noise and a constant stream of cars heading across the city. The theory was that police units responding to a call could reach even the farthest outskirts of the city in less than half an hour.

      Except at six o’clock, Green grumbled as he saw the tide of cars inching westward in the stifling afternoon sun. The damn meeting with the RCMP had shot the entire afternoon, and while he was wasting his time learning about the latest policy initiative, a dozen fresh cases had probably landed on the various crime desks under his command. It was proving a busy summer for criminals in the nation’s capital, for hot weather brought on the usual spate of domestics to add to the standard fare of drug-related assaults and armed robberies. Green needed to ensure that no new crises or screw-ups had surfaced while he was learning to play nice.

      Yet he’d promised Sharon he wouldn’t be home too late. She had just started a long stint of day shifts at the hospital, their son was getting yet another molar, and the air conditioning in their new home had succumbed to the heat for the third time this month. As flexible and forgiving as she was, today was not a day to put those qualities to the test.

      Five minutes, he promised her silently as he pulled into the circular drive of the station, flicked on his hazard lights and ducked through the glass doors into police headquarters. As his eyes adjusted to the cavernous gloom of the foyer, he made out the tall, angular figure of a woman at the reception desk at the side of the room. Encased head to toe in a shapeless brown shift, she was pressed to the window, punctuating her tirade with short jabs of her finger.

      Green glanced through the reception glass and groaned when he saw the florid face and triple jowls of Constable Dan Blake. Blake had thirty years on the force, during which he’d never advanced beyond beat cop, due to a lack of even the minimal requirement of intelligence, fitness and sobriety. He was an anachronism in modern policing, who regarded the hijacking of police work by youth, education, women and minorities with undisguised contempt. Green, as a universityeducated Jew and, at forty-one, still young for an inspector, was not on his list of favourites.

      The feeling was mutual, however, and Green gave a curt nod as he headed past on his way toward the elevator. A sudden smirk creased Blake’s jowls, and he flicked a pudgy finger in Green’s direction. The woman swung around instantly.

      “Excuse me!” she cried, leaping into Green’s path. “I want to report a missing person, but no one will take me seriously!”

      Green stopped and shot Blake an angry glare just in time to see the man suck his smirk back in and hustle out of the cubicle. “Sorry, Inspector Green,” he said, without the faintest hint of scorn. “Miss Tanner is concerned about a friend. Ma’am, if you’ll come back here—”

      The woman didn’t budge. “Inspector? Finally, someone near the top!”

      She was flushed and breathless, her eyes fixed on Green with desperate hope. With his five minutes ticking away, he seized on the nearest platitude. “Have you filed a missing persons report with—”

      “Of course I have,” she retorted. “It went into a computer database somewhere, and I’m sure that’s the end of it. They said I’m just a friend, so how can I even be sure he’s missing.”

      “Well,” Green equivocated, “is his family concerned? Has any one else reported him missing?”

      “That doesn’t matter! I know he’s missing, and not by his own choice. Something bad has happened to him.”

      Green caught Blake’s quick rolling of the eyes and felt a spike of anger. “Constable Blake, would you doublecheck that the officer who took Ms. Tanner’s report is aware of all her concerns?”

      Before Blake could react, she clamped her bony hand on Green’s arm. Her nails, he noted, were chewed to the quick. “But you’re an inspector. His boss, right?”

      “Inspector Green handles major criminal investigations,” Blake added, ever helpful.

      “I see,” she retorted, snatching her hand back. “This isn’t big enough for you, is that it? This is a major crime, I’m telling you. Something has happened to Matt. He didn’t just leave.”

      “I understand your concern,” Green replied, “and Constable Blake is going to follow up. But unless there’s evidence of a crime—”

      “What a ridiculous catch-22! How can there be evidence of a crime if you refuse to investigate?”

      “The officer on the case—”

      “—is a thick-headed twit!” She turned an unhealthy mottled pink, and her eyes sparked.

      “Inspector Green is certainly no thick-headed twit, Miss Tanner,” Blake interjected with a barely stifled grin. “He’s one of the sharpest knives in the drawer.”

      Green’s combination of brains, imagination and pure pigheadedness had earned him a fair reputation on the force, but coming from Blake, it was hardly a compliment. Green was just formulating an appropriate retort when Ms. Tanner renewed her grip on his arm.

      “At least hear me out, Inspector. Let me tell you the evidence I have that worries me, and then tell me what you think I should do next.”

      The woman was shaking with apprehension, but her eyes met his with defiance and determination. Not unlike his own when he was on the scent, he conceded with reluctant admiration. Even at six o’clock, after a long, draining day, she deserved more than a patronizing pat on the head. Perhaps giving her five minutes of his time would soothe her fears and get him out of here faster than all the bureaucratic

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