Someone was approaching the door and when it opened, Larysa was looking at an exhausted, sallow face. There was confusion in the woman’s eyes. “Can I help you?” she asked.

“I am lost,” said Larysa.

The woman opened the door more fully and Larysa brought the weapon up and fired it. Two long, thin darts flew out of its mouth on the ends of two wires and penetrated the woman’s blouse. She threw her head back and stiffened. A sound as long and thin as the wires rose from the woman’s lips. Then, just as suddenly, the power left her, and she crashed in a heap in the front hallway. Larysa pushed the woman’s insensate body backwards into the house and closed the door. It had been open for all of ten seconds.

] 7 [

Wednesday, August 10, evening

The Queesik Bay Police Service (QBPS) served the Queesik reserve as well as six communities between Mayfair and Fort Leonard. The band force was actually larger than Port Dundas’s, despite having a smaller catchment. They were well funded and their jurisdiction was absolute: anybody who committed a crime within band territory would be arrested and charged according to the QBPS’s own statutes. It was mind-boggling to Hazel how much independence band police had. But one thing was incontrovertible: petty crime was as rampant on the reserves as it was anywhere, but major crimes were much lower, and reoffending was rare. Sometimes when the subject of band police came up at the detachment, she couldn’t tell if the resentment she heard was because Indian police were better funded and had better resources or because they closed more cases.

“Will you look at this?” she muttered to herself. She was sitting in the public area in front of the intake desk at the Queesik Bay Police Service in a comfortable plastic chair with excellent back support. It was an open-concept headquarters: intake was a curving desk with two elevated chairs behind it, each one containing a uniformed officer either taking calls or dealing with the public. Both officers were young men in crisp light-blue uniforms.

The station house stood on its own beside the concentration of buildings at the heart of the reserve. There was also a hotel, a large convenience store, the social services office, a hospital, a garage, and the casino. She knew that a minor network of roads snaked off the two-lane blacktop that cut through the middle of the reserve, and that more than ten thousand people lived here. There was a community centre and a skating rink, and the Triple-A team that played in that arena a couple of times a week in the winter provided the best live sport in the county. None of the buildings were more than twenty-five years old, and from what Hazel could tell, the HQ had been built within the decade. Inside, it bustled with activity: behind intake the whole operation was visible within a generous atrium. Thick orange light poured down into it as the sun set behind the building. There were officers seated in ergonomic chairs at semi-circular desks on which sat new computers. She noticed a few officers walking around with electronic tablets in their hands, which they tapped on with plastic styluses.

She waited ten minutes and then was shown into Commander LeJeune’s office. It was a compact room behind a glass partition, with a native woodcarving on the desk and a drum hanging on the wall. There was another officer present: this was Reserve Constable Lydia Bellecourt. Both she and LeJeune stood when Hazel entered and she shook their hands in turn. Bellecourt was a very tall, young Ojibway with astonishingly long and sleek black hair constrained beneath her cap. LeJeune gestured for them to sit, and then she handed both Bellecourt and her guest file folders on which the tabs read, “07/08/2005: Wiest, H. P. WM, DOB 06/11/1959.”

“I know RC Bellecourt already faxed a copy of this up to your Detective Wingate, but I thought we might all need a clean copy. What with the urgency of your visit.”

“That’s … thoughtful of you, thank you,” said Hazel, finding it hard to strike the exasperated tone she’d planned on deploying. “I do have to say, however, that although I admire the procedural efficiency, I was a little surprised that the autopsy was done on the reserve when the victim was a resident of Westmuir County.”

“We had permission from the victim’s wife, DI Micallef.”

“But what about us? What about the OPS? We didn’t deserve a heads-up?”

“All of the reports were faxed to your detachment as soon as they were completed. I’m afraid paperwork can take a long time. We try to be thorough.”

“Well, all I know is that a man is found dead on reserve property and before the body is even cold, you’ve done your autopsy and let people wander back and forth over the scene. There’s no evidence collection, no pictures of the site, and no witness statements. You have a pretty little police station, but I’m not sure you know what you’re doing in it.”

“Oh dear, you’re quite upset, Detective Inspector,” said Commander LeJeune. “But let me reassure you, we followed all the applicable protocols in Mr. Wiest’s death. His next of kin was notified and consented to the autopsy in our jurisdiction. Normally it’s a matter of some urgency, as you know.”

“There’s a proper hospital fifteen minutes away that could have done that and it would have been in the right jurisdiction to determine whether the death looked suspicious.”

LeJeune had folded her hands over the report. “We have a proper hospital. One, in fact, better equipped than Mayfair General. In any case, there was no evidence of foul play, no defensive wounds, no material witnesses to his death, and no suspicious matter near the site. Therefore, there was nothing to photograph – except for the dead man’s body, which we did do, please check page three of your documentation – and no reason to canvass beyond the smoke shop. And no one in the smoke shop saw or heard anything suspicious.”

“I beg your pardon,” said Hazel, working up to the desired tone, “but when a healthy man of forty-six dies in the parking lot of a native smoke stand – especially if he’s a nonsmoker – there’s a reason to canvass right there. Or do you discover bodies in the parking lots of your reserve so often that it’s normal to you?”

The commander paused before answering. “When people die of natural causes in your town, Detective Inspector, do you start rounding up the usual suspects?”

She’d decided for the time being to leave out what Deacon had discovered. “Your whole investigation presumes an awful lot, Commander.”

Constable Bellecourt stepped in. “Detective Inspector, there was nothing at the scene to suggest anything more than a tragic, but accidental, loss of life. I did take names when I was on the scene and I was ready to do follow-up, but the autopsy confirmed that he’d died of a heart attack brought on by an anaphylactic reaction.”

“Well, maybe you needed to dig a little deeper,” she said, brandishing her copy of the police report. “Henry Wiest lived in Kehoe Glenn. He was a well-known businessman in the area, owned a hardware store, and had, literally, hundreds of personal relationships through his store. No enemies, no troubles, in perfect health.” She was going to keep the information about the old gambling problem and that little packet of cash to herself for the time being. “Yet he collapses and dies in a parking lot down the road from here when he has no reason to be there. Do you think the Eagle Smoke and Souvenir Shop would have called Henry Wiest down from Kehoe Glenn to change a lightbulb?”

“Maybe he did smoke, Detective. Maybe he didn’t want anyone to know.”

“Then why not stop at the first shack outside of Mayfair on his way back home? There’d have to be a dozen places to turn off on Highway 41 for cigarettes before entering the reserve, and there are four other smoke shacks before the Eagle. Maybe they were selling something special or unique.”