Cut to the Quick (29 page)

Hollis realized the ambulance with Manon and Etienne had sped away before Curt had collapsed. No need to alarm her. Let her hang on to her joy for as long as possible.

“Tomas and Curt are at St. Mike's.” She extended her arm with her palm facing Manon—the universal sign telling Manon to wait before she said anything. “Just a precaution, given Curt's heart trouble.” She hoped it was true, but even if it wasn't, she needn't worry Etienne and Manon. “Since you're both fine, why don't I slip over to St. Mike's to see how he's doing?”

“What about Arthur?”

“Arthur's also at St. Mike's. I don't think they caught the woman.”

Etienne struggled to get out of bed.

“Sweetie, calm down. I have tests to run. We're checking you over.” The doctor gently pushed him back.

Etienne resisted.
“She
did it. The woman who left—
she
did it. She was walking away from the porch when I opened the door. It was
her.
She left the bomb.”

The doctor reached into her smock pocket and extracted a cell phone. “Have security come to Emerg immediately,” she ordered.

“I'm sending you and your son upstairs,” she said to Manon. “And I'm arranging for security to wait with you until the police arrive.”

Wide eyes and a trembling mouth replaced Manon's smile.
“Mon dieu,
it isn't over. It will never be over,” she wailed.

Hollis patted her friend's shoulder. “You'll be fine with police protection. I'll scoot over to St. Mike's now. Do you have your cell phone?”

“No cell phones in the hospital,” the doctor said, pocketing her own.

She meant that the plebes couldn't use them—they were fine for medical personnel. “What floor will Etienne be on? May I call the nursing station?” Hollis asked.

The doctor gave her the emerg extension and assured them she'd tell the staff to expect the call.

“I wish you'd stay,” Manon said, grabbing Hollis's hand. “But you must warn Curt and Tomas. They may be in danger— she may be planning something even worse.”

* * *

Rhona was horrified. “A bomb—the anti-abortionists. We should have pushed for the search warrant sooner.”

“Nothing we can do at the Hartmans'. We'll go to Allie's. If she isn't there, the super will let us in.”

Frank stared at her. “What's this about?”

“We told you. We interviewed Allie Jones. She's obsessively anti
SOHD
. When we visited her after the fire, she wouldn't allow us to search her apartment. Her reaction made us suspicious. We applied for a search warrant. It arrived late today,” Rhona said. She flipped through her bag to make sure she had everything they'd need. “We'll call the techies if we find anything.”

* * *

Before leaving to visit Allie, Rhona and Zee Zee withdrew their guns from their lockers and pulled on Kevlar vests.

“If she managed to evade the police, I expect she went home to pretend she hadn't been out all day,” Rhona said.

“I don't think she'll expect us. We're making a pre-emptive first strike. If we're lucky, she may have the same clothes on— we'll send them to the lab for a residue test.”

At the site, they buzzed Allie's apartment. “It's the police. We're back with a warrant,” Zee Zee said into the speaker phone.

“Not until my lawyer arrives,” Allie replied.

“Let us in,” Zee Zee ordered, but Allie didn't respond.

Fortunately, the building had a manned entry hall desk. They flashed their cards, displayed their warrant and asked the concierge, a nervous-looking brunette in her mid-thirties, to let them in.

“Early evening is busy. I shouldn't leave my desk,” the woman protested, licking her lips. Her gaze shifted from Rhona to Zee Zee and back again.

They waited. “There won't be gunshots or anything, will there?” Her lower lip trembled.

Rhona and Zee Zee exchanged glances—who knew?

“Give us the appropriate keys,” Zee Zee said.

The girl removed one from the ring and passed it to them. In fact, she almost threw it at them before she retreated into her glassed-in office as if it was a bunker in a war zone.

Upstairs, Rhona and Zee Zee drew their guns and knocked. “Police. Open the door,” Rhona commanded.

When nothing happened, Rhona inserted the key and pushed. The door swung open. Guns ready, they edged into the hall.

Allie, in a flowered summer dress, her arms akimbo, smiled sweetly at them. “Too much
TV
watching, girls,” she said. She extended her hands. “I don't have a weapon.”

Rhona extracted the warrant from her bag. “We're taking you to the station. Have you changed your clothes today?”

“Why would I do that, and what business is it of yours? But, as a matter of fact, I have.” She paused for a moment, as if giving herself time to invent a story. “I picked this outfit because it's cooler than the one I was wearing.”

“We want you to bring whatever you wore earlier. My partner will accompany you to your room where you will show us what you wore and pick other clothes to take to the station,” Rhona said. She waved the warrant. “We've also arranged for our technical experts to come in and go over your apartment.”

Allie regarded them impassively. “Is this where I call my lawyer?”

When she'd made the call and shown them the clothes, she retreated to the living room sofa, where she sat erect, ankles crossed and hands folded. Rhona and Zee Zee, gloves on, left her perched on the sofa while they searched the apartment.

In the freezer, they found a bundle of fireworks wrapped in plastic and tucked under a frozen salmon slab.

“That explains why the blast did so little damage—the bomb was really a giant firecracker,” Zee Zee said in a low voice.

But beneath the kitchen sink, they found the essentials for serious bomb-making neatly stored in an empty dishwashing detergent box and a large Tim Hortons coffee can.

Zee Zee shook her head and pointed to the can. “This wouldn't do a lot for Tim's image, would it?”

“I think they've become such a part of the Canadian psyche that nothing will damage them,” Rhona said.

“We expected to find something, but it still shocks me,” she nodded toward the living room, “that she would do this.”

“Given what she has here, we can be glad she only used the fireworks. And aren't we glad we caught her?” Zee Zee said.

“We'll leave this to the techies. Let's get her downtown and charged.”

Allie smiled as they led her away.

C
haos
reigned at St. Mike's emergency, where the neighbourhood walking wounded waited for treatment. Their friends and supporters crowded the anteroom. Stretchers lined the halls. The triage nurses worked at full speed.

Hollis surveyed the gurneys in the corridor—no Arthur, no Curt. No Tomas sitting in the waiting room among anxious, murmuring families, women in chadors and street people, drunken or overdosed. She couldn't barge through the door leading to acute care. She also hesitated to enter the area where medical professionals treated the less severely ill or injured. Instead she disregarded instructions fastened to the wall and plunked down on the last empty molded plastic chair. These seats were designated exclusively for those waiting to have their data recorded before medical teams dealt with their problems. Three individuals later, the middle-aged nurse, tired circles under her eyes, beckoned Hollis forward.

“It isn't me. I'm here to find Curt Hartman and Arthur...” She drew a blank. “Arthur who came in by ambulance. He'd been in an explosion.”

The woman ran her finger down a clipboard list. “Curt Hartman is down the hall.” She pointed. “Turn right past the double doors. The charge nurse will direct you. Arthur White is in there.” She nodded to a door leading to the critical care unit.

Curt first. A nurse, busy with paperwork, didn't raise her eyes when Hollis entered. Finally, Hollis cleared her throat. “I'm looking for Curt Hartman.”

“Straight ahead to the end and turn right,” the nurse said without lifting her head.

Hollis passed a parking lot of gurneys. On the first, a man shackled to his stretcher shouted and muttered. On the next, a grossly overweight man lay with tears running from the corners of his eyes. An equally large woman in a multi-coloured sari stood beside him. Her bulk partially blocked the passageway. She held one of his hands in both of hers and made the consoling sounds one makes when words are useless.

Inside the six-bed ward, curtains enclosed each bed. Hollis tipped the first aside. A tiny Asian woman lay curled in a fetal position while an
IV
dripped clear fluid into her arm. Hollis dropped the curtain and peered cautiously behind the next one. A man propped on pillows and coats laboured for breath. A woman dressed entirely in black hunched on the bed beside him.

Pulling back the third curtain, she found Curt. He lay with wires running from his chest to a heart monitor. A whitecoated man bent over him. Tomas stood to one side.

“No heart attack, but given your history, we'll keep you overnight,” the man said.

“Good news,” Tomas said to his father.

“Etienne's fine too,” Hollis said. “Arthur was seriously hurt, but the woman slipped away in the confusion.”

Tomas thought about what she'd said. He shook his head. “If she's out there, Dad is in danger.”

“We have police coming and going all the time. You're safer here than anywhere,” the doctor said. “The staff will keep an eye on you.”

“I'll stay with you,” Tomas said.

“Nonsense,” Curt blustered. “What a brouhaha about nothing.”

“Dad.” Tomas bent down and locked his gaze with his father's. “Dad,
someone
killed Ivan, probably thinking it was you.
Someone
torched your studio, probably believing you were sleeping there.
Someone
exploded a bomb on the porch. Dad, this is not
nothing.
A double negative means it's
something
, something serious. It's time you paid attention. You
will
stay, and I
will
stay with you.” He straightened up and left the cubicle, returning a minute later with a metal chair that he positioned beside the bed.

Hollis said goodnight and threaded her way through the stretchers, ambulance workers, police and waiting patients. On her way down the ramp from the emergency exit, she stopped.

What had happened to Arthur? She'd forgotten all about him. Arthur had gone to Critical Care. She swung around. If he had survived, she had to warn the critical care staff.

“Are you a relative?” The nurse stooping over Arthur's bed asked Hollis.

Hollis shook her head. How would she categorize herself? An enemy, an acquaintance, a victim—she wouldn't use any of those terms. “No. I was there when the bomb went off. Arthur saved my friend's son by grabbing it and throwing it as far as he could.”

She stepped closer to the bed and looked down. Arthur lay very still, except for his chest, which rose and fell almost imperceptibly. Liquids dribbled into his arm from two intravenous bags suspended from an
IV
pole. His pale skin and shallow breathing did not bode well.

“How is he?” Hollis asked.

“He's hit his head and hasn't regained consciousness. His vital signs are good. He's stable. He carried no information about next-of-kin. Can you tell us who to notify?”

“No.”

“It would help us if you could find out if he has relatives.”

“Have the police been here?”

“Why would they come?”

“Arthur can identify the bomber. She's still on the loose.”

The nurse's eyebrows rose. She peered at Hollis over her half-glasses. “You're kidding.”

“Regrettably, I'm not. Arthur may need police protection.” “Lots of that here—sometimes I think we have more police than we do patients. Pretty violent people come in, particularly on Saturday nights. Sunday isn't too bad, but detox is busy. I'll alert the staff.”

“I'll call tomorrow to see how he's doing.” Hollis backed out of the cubicle and headed for the door.

As she parked outside the Hartmans', the hole in the hedge that the bomb had made shocked her, as did the yellow tape enclosing the site. One or two people loitered across the street, staring at the house. And why not—a bomb in this quiet neighbourhood was definitely something out of the ordinary. Eleven o'clock. Poor MacTee. Unable to enter the front door because of the tape, she moved to the back of the house. A flash of gratitude—David had turned on the outside lights. This was not a night to brave a dark and spooky house. Maybe he was still here. She hurried inside.

“Hollis, I'm upstairs in the den,” David called. “I've walked MacTee.”

What a relief. She hadn't been looking forward to taking the dog out. In fact, now that she was back, exhaustion engulfed her. It had been a frightening few hours. She trudged up the stairs. David lounged in Curt's leather chair reading
ARTnews.
He stood up, surveyed her for a moment and stepped forward.

“Bet you need a hug,” he said, and, to her surprise, wrapped her in his arms before releasing her and stepping back. “Tell me what happened. How are Curt and Etienne?”

“Both of them are okay. Arthur is unconscious.”

“Are you nervous about staying alone? Would you like me to stay tonight?”

It would be nice to have someone else in the house, but it would be a responsibility as well. She'd have to offer a drink and figure out where he could sleep. And his hug had made her nervous. “It's a lovely offer, but I'm fine with MacTee.”

David examined her face. “You're sure.”

“I am.”