Tampered (23 page)

After coffee on Sunday morning, Gus Oliveira helped Art Greenwood into the Lincoln's passenger seat and secured the seat belt. Then Gus folded the portable wheelchair and stowed it in the trunk. All the while, his crooked-toothed smile was missing, even when he waved goodbye.

“Half of me feels terrible about this,” Art confided, as Phyllis backed out of her parking spot. If the mission they were embarking on was successful, Gus's life might never be the same. He and Gloria might even be incarcerated. “Gus deserves our loyalty. He's always so good to us, which makes me feel even sorrier for him today than usual.”

“How could you possibly feel sorry for him? That blasted mustard of his is probably teeming with bacteria. Causing all the fuss around here. And the deaths. And by the look on his face, he knows it.”

“Dr. Wakefield says the mustard's probably okay.”

“If it's not the mustard, then it's Gus's recycled, back-door salami. Really, Arthur. How could you bring yourself to eat such stuff? Week-old sandwiches on mouldy bread?” She shook her head in disgust.

They'd been through this before, but Phyllis wouldn't let it go. She was convinced that Gus had been diving in Dumpsters for Camelot's provisions.

“He works so hard around the place,” Art countered, “fixing every little thing that's on the fritz, making sure we're safe and comfortable. But Gloria doesn't give him a lick of credit.”

“She
is
the boss, Art. And a marriage works best when the husband knows his place.”

This wasn't the first time Art reckoned it was just as well Phyllis had remained a spinster. Was that a smirk on her lips, or were they pressed together in anxious anticipation of the tricky left turn between the six-foot snowbanks? The combined workings of Mother Nature and the city's snowplow crews made negotiating the Eaglescliffe loop devilish by car, and impossible by scooter, from December to April. But there was no way Phyllis would ever consider giving up her driver's licence or the Lincoln, even for the winter season. And thank goodness for that. Her car — officially an antique at thirty-seven years of age — was a symbol of the continued independence of everyone who rode in it. Especially when the sidewalks were rutted with ice and snow.

“Besides,” she continued, “you said yourself they may be up to something highly illegal.”

“Have you thought about getting the muffler fixed?” Art asked, changing the subject. With Phyllis, that was always the best strategy.

“I rather like the noise,” she huffed. “It's full of conviction. And doesn't affect the vehicle's performance.”

Her deafness must be getting worse. Either that or she'd turned off her hearing aid before starting the engine.

Art tried a different tack. “I'm surprised Terryberry is open today,” he said.

“They only just reversed their Sunday closures. They're still closed on Fridays and Mondays. Disgraceful, really. If we're going to foster a knowledge-based economy, libraries have to open their doors every day of the week.”

“Are you sure no one will see what we're doing on the Internet? Don't the librarians —”

“Stop fussing, Arthur. No one will bother looking at our screen. And we need no help from the library staff. I've been using Google and Wikipedia there since they first came out.”

“And no one will know who is doing the searching?”

“For heaven's sake.
We're
not proposing to do anything illegal.”

Half an hour later they were seated at a terminal in Terryberry's computer room. Phyllis had charmed, or perhaps browbeaten, the teenager restacking the shelves into leaving his post and lifting Art's wheelchair from the trunk. If the lad had balked at first, he was all smiles the moment he spotted the Lincoln. He'd peppered Art for details about the car as he pushed him through the slush, up the ramp, and through the front door. Any answers Art didn't know he made up on the fly, which kept the boy chatting all the way to the computer room. Phyllis finally dispatched him with her Latin-teacher look and repeated assurance that they needed no help connecting to the World Wide Web.

“How do you suggest we start?” Art asked Phyllis after they'd removed their coats and she'd draped her mink over the back of a chair.

“You tell me. You're the man with the ideas. I'm just here to work the computer as your amanuensis.”

He opened his scribbler and set it on the desk beside his pen.

“You won't need those,” Phyllis said. She pointed toward the end of the room. “We can print anything important on their machine. Only five cents a page.”

All the same, he knew he would want to take a few notes. The charisma of electronic wizardry was no match for the comfort of pen and paper.

Phyllis tapped the keyboard, and up came the Google logo, faster than turning a page in a book. Computer speeds and consistency never ceased to amaze him — as reliable as telephone land lines connected to the touch-tone service he'd perfected, but a hell of a lot more versatile, and in living colour.

“So?” she said. Her Latin-teacher look hadn't faded since she'd dismissed that helpful boy, and she looked all the more intimidating in her luxuriant fur hat.

Art's mind went blank. The empty search box taunted him like an exam question. “I . . . I've never done a search before. Earl has always —”

“Don't look so worried. It's quite simple, really.” Phyllis moved her chair to give him a better view of the screen. “One just has to go step by step. Tell me again what makes you think Gloria's nephew is not what he's cracked up to be?”

“First, it was his English. A man lives his entire life in Portugal, yet speaks with a perfect Canadian accent? Impossible. Then I saw the Argylls tattoo. That's a Hamilton regiment. What's he doing with that?”

“Maybe he spent his early childhood in Hamilton and has a friend in the Argylls.”

“Did you see those two military types at Raimunda's reception yesterday?”

“I didn't like the way they barged in. It was unseemly.”

“They made a beeline for poor Zol,” Art reminded her, “and marched him out the door. He looked quite shaken.” Art's tongue felt dry as he imagined what might have transpired.

“Must be drugs,” Phyllis pronounced. “Perhaps they wanted his professional opinion on what they discovered in that raid up near Kilbride. Amphetamines, I believe they were making. In an old barn.”

“I'm sure it wasn't drugs. They looked like a pair of MPs — buzzed haircuts, broad, stern, no nonsense.”

“Members of Parliament are all fake smiles and glad hands. They don't pair up and go marching into funerals.”

“No, no. Not MPs as in politicians. Military police. The only current connection I know of between Camelot Lodge and the Canadian Forces is that Argylls tattoo on Joe's bicep. It says something like
Jason Argylls Forever
. If the MPs were asking about Joe and his tattoo at his grandmother's funeral, his buddy Jason must be in big trouble. A deserter. That's what MPs are interested in when they're making inquiries off the base. Deserters. Jason must be hiding out somewhere, like Ronnie Biggs.”

Phyllis paused for a moment. A frown creased her forehead. “The train robber?”

“The bugger hid in Australia and Brazil for decades. Even made trips back home to England, but only with the help of his friends and family. And always in plain sight, bold as brass.”

“Caravaggio did the same.”

“Who?”

“Sixteenth-century painter. Killed one man, then another, and spent the rest of his life on the run in Italy and Malta. With the collusion of his family and high-placed patrons.”

“They finally locked him up.”

“No, no. He died free but poor. Some sort of fever.”

Art couldn't suppress a little smile. “I meant Ronnie Biggs. They nabbed him and sentenced him to thirty years. But they're talking about releasing him, now that he's a harmless old codger. And dying of cancer or something.”

“What's Joe's name? If he's Gloria's nephew, it isn't Oliveira.”

“Medeiros. Joseph Medeiros. I've heard him spelling his name when ordering pizza from the telephone in our sitting room. It's spelled —”

“For goodness sake, Arthur, I know how to spell it.” She adjusted her fur hat then clicked rapidly at the keyboard. “We'll put
Jason
,
Joseph Medeiros
, and
Argylls
into the search box. If Jason went AWOL from the Argylls as you surmise, and Joe is mixed up in it, there might be a newspaper story about both of them.”

Up flashed a list of ten titles, with the words
Jason
,
Joseph, Medeiros
, and
Argylls
highlighted in random order. Art ran a finger down the screen and read the titles one by one. There was nothing remotely military in the list; just community newspaper stories about softball games (it seemed a fellow named Joseph Medeiros was a star player), details of a place called the Argyll Centre in Edmonton, Alberta, and a faculty listing from the University of Illinois Department of History.

Phyllis cupped the mouse with her hand. “Let's see what's on the next page of listings.”

“How many entries did Google find?”

She pointed to the top of the page: 1,270.

“We can't look at all of those. They'll be turning out the lights and kicking us out before we're half-finished.”

“You're quite right,” Phyllis said. “We need to refine our search strategy. Let's try
Argylls
,
AWOL
, and
Jason
. Leave Medeiros out of it.”

She clicked at the search box, typed in the new terms, and pressed the Enter key.

A new list flashed up. Just fourteen websites in total, but all of them gibberish, mostly lists of words starting with the letter A. And an invitation to something called Facebook.

Phyllis fingered her pearls and gazed past the computer for several moments. When she looked at Art, her eyes were probing. “Are you sure the name was Jason? You barely got a glance at that tattoo. Did you even have your glasses on? Maybe it was Jack or Jake you saw. Or even Adam.”

Art felt foolish. Perhaps his eyes, or his memory, had deceived him. “I could have sworn it was Jason.”

“Let's delete the name. If it's not correct it will act as a confounder.”

She clicked on the search box, deleted
Jason
, and put in
Hamilton, Argylls, AWOL
, and
deserter
.

The first two listings were Government of Canada non-military websites. The third riveted with possibilities:
Hamilton native AWOL from military base in Sarajevo. Corporal Jayson Dasilva missing after accident
.

“My word,” Art said. “Can we have a look at that . . . link, is it?”

“I knew you had the name wrong. See — it's Jayson with a Y.”

Phyllis did something with the mouse, and a page from the
Hamilton Spectator
filled the screen.

Beneath a September 18, 2003, headline, the item was short and lacked detail. It did say that Corporal Jayson Dasilva, of the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders of Canada, known affectionately as the Argylls and based in Hamilton, Ontario, had been charged with impaired driving and dangerous driving causing death after a motor vehicle accident in Sarajevo in August 2003. An unnamed woman and two children died at the scene. While confined to barracks awaiting a preliminary hearing and potential court martial, Corporal Dasilva disappeared. Military sources among Canada's peacekeeping forces in Bosnia and Herzegovina remained confident it was only a matter of days before he was located and detained.

“Goodness,” Art said.

“But that news is almost six years old. Anything could have happened by now. He could have been tried and acquitted, or found guilty and already served his sentence.”

“Or he's still on the run,” Art said. “Can we keep searching? There must be updates to the story.”

Phyllis erased the contents of the search box and inserted
Jayson Dasilva
,
Argylls
, and
Sarajevo
.

Up came a short list: four entries from the
Hamilton Spectator
and three from Canada's national dailies.

“Pick that one,” Art said, pointing to the third entry. “It has the most recent date.”

Another page from
The Spec
flashed onto the screen. January 4, 2004. Sources from the Argylls confirmed that Corporal Jayson Dasilva, age twenty, remained at large. His whereabouts was unknown. It seemed to Art that the brevity of the report indicated the Canadian Forces' embarrassment that one of their number was AWOL five months after being implicated in the deaths of three civilians.

“And that's the most recent update the Web has to offer?” Art said.

Phyllis took them back to the list of newspaper articles. They read each item in detail, but found no news more recent than January 2004, five years ago.

“Any bright ideas are most welcome at this point,” Phyllis said.

“Too bad there weren't pictures with those stories. I'd at least like to see what this Corporal Dasilva looks like. Do you suppose he's the guy in the toque and sunglasses? Did he and Joe fall out and now Joe is threatening to expose him?”

Phyllis grabbed the mouse and zipped the arrow to the top of the screen. “Of course. I should have thought of that. One needs to search separately for images. I do it regularly for my art history class. My pension doesn't stretch to the purchase of the recommended textbooks.”

The screen filled with four rows of assorted images — photographs and cartoons the size of postage stamps. The photos were too small for Art to identify any of the subjects, and the captions beneath them too brief to make any sense.

“You can analyze Renaissance paintings from photographs this small?” he asked. “Phyllis dear, are you sure you're studying art history, not philately?”