Nightshade: A Sam Montcalm Mystery

By Tom Henighan

Short-listed for the 2011 Shamus Awards

Deadly nightshade – the poison plant par excellence – and in historic Quebec City at an important scientific conference concerning the genetic manipulation of trees it means murder!

Police, RCMP, and a mysterious FBI agent from Washington converge on the scene. But the sharpest eye belongs to Sam Montcalm, a despised "bedroom snooper" from Ottawa whose primary concern is to clear a First Nations activist of the crime. Sam is middle-aged, tough, and sophisticated, yet he’s also a lone wolf who feels displaced nearly everywhere, and his relations with his colleagues, the police – and with women – are always complicated. "You’re a psychic wound without a health card," a friend comments

The story moves to its surprising climax as Montcalm follows the trail of murder back to Canada’s capital and into the Gatineau Hills, his deep sense of cynicism about human nature confirmed as he closes in on the killer and struggles to come to terms with himself.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dundurn
• Release date: Aug 2, 2010
• ISBN: 9781770705241

Tom Henighan

Tom Henighan's numerous works of fiction, nonfiction, and poetry include The Maclean's Companion to Canadian Arts and Culture, The Well of Time, and the YA novel Viking Quest (2001). He lives in Ottawa, and teaches at Carleton University.

Book preview

Blake

One

It was a bright Wednesday morning in July, and Cartier Street reverberated with a pleasant din. Sam Montcalm was almost happy. He swung his sturdy frame around a delivery truck and the early shoppers, trotted on past the bustling market stalls and the restaurants — just preparing for lunch — and finally spotted what he was looking for. It was the place the Berthelets had recommended, right in the middle of the street action, but with an air of sanctuary about it.

CAFÉ LEDUC, the sign said — something to do with the painter — a place without false chic or pretensions, its special ambiance evident in the alert and contented patrons chatting beneath the lazily drooping awnings, while black-garbed waitresses hurried back and forth between the front terrace and the shadowy recesses at the rear. The soft buzz of pleasant conversation made for an alert and reassuring sound, with nothing raucous or harsh about it.

Sam relaxed at once, stepped onto the terrace, and found himself a table beside a steep stairway that led to the upper floors, for the Leduc was a B&B as well as a restaurant-café. A young blonde waitress in a fitted black top and a short black skirt, who made him think of an Ursuline novice, greeted him with a warm smile, and asked him in French what he was having.

He hesitated, then decided on English. I hear your coffee’s good. With a croissant or maybe two, if you have any left.

Her smile didn’t falter. Sure. You want a menu, too?

Why not?

Sam sat back contentedly. He could speak a little French, of course, but these days felt more comfortable in English. Despite his Quebec connections, he had grown up in the 60s and 70s in California and Ottawa, and preferred to pass himself off as a tourist in French Canada.

Now he was on vacation, curious to learn more about his father’s roots in the wilds of Quebec, as the old man used to jokingly refer to his birthplace.

Actually, Charles-Louis Montcalm hailed from a hamlet near the town of Neuville, just southwest of Quebec City. Montcalm senior had worked in Ottawa for Mackenzie King’s cabinet minister, C.D. Howe, but had left government in 1957 at the same time as his boss. Then he’d succumbed to the lure of California and entered a realm of family tragedy that nothing could have prepared him for.

Sam closed his eyes. It had been his world, too, as a child — that sunny California of sea and mountains, hippies, surfers, red Camaros, the Beach Boys, and Richard Nixon. As he got older, up through high school, he had found it an exciting place — one hell of a place, as his Dad had told his Ottawa cronies. But all of a sudden Vietnam came along, then the protests, and Little Teddy (his six-foot-four, pacifist elder brother) began his run from the FBI and oppression. Then it was no longer one hell of a place. It was just hell.

This is as about as far away as it gets, Sam murmured, as if to the waitress who appeared suddenly from nowhere. Embarrassed, he avoided her puzzled glance and gazed around at the animated patrons, the busy morning crowd rolling by on Cartier.

Far away from what? the young woman asked. She set down the coffee and croissants, and gave him that curious, guarded, sympathetic look that he sometimes got from strangers.

You’re all in black, almost like nuns he countered, smiling at her and nodding his head at the other girls zipping among the tables. Does it mean something?

She stood up straight and pondered, pouting her lips. We’re not Goths, anyway … and mostly not novices either. But we do serve the religion of coffee, I guess, she added with a smile, then hastened away in the direction of the bar.

Sam chuckled, impressed; he watched her move, and a few bars of Bach’s frivolous, catchy Coffee Cantata came into his mind. Since Justine had left him nine years ago, he hadn’t had a serious romance with anyone. Of course these café girls were really too young for him, but refreshing, direct, and nice to think about. By contrast, his job seemed to put him in touch with too many crushed and worn out, or desperately cynical, older women, some of them attractive enough, and quite willing to cry on his shoulder — Elena Holland, for one. She had even threatened to come along with him on this trip.

Sam shuddered. Elena and her crowd — the people he worked for — were mostly feature items in Ottawa’s Point-Blank magazine, the scandal sheet and webzine that regularly displayed and mocked the rich, the powerful, and the foolishly notorious. Sam had opened up his detective agency after his father’s death, but he knew exactly what the old man would have said about his work and his clients.

He frowned, and tasted his first croissant. Buttery, chewy, slightly crisp on the outside. No disappointment. He dipped it into the coffee, which seemed to be espresso, although in a large cup. He decided this was an okay place.

Of course, Ginette and Paul had known it would please him. Before they departed for work they had written him a detailed note, one very characteristic of them, containing minute instructions guaranteed to get him through a morning of painless sightseeing. Advice about taxis and buses, places to shop and visit, walks around the old city, instructions for locking the apartment door, and, of course, a mention of the café, with a little sketch map pointing him straight to its front terrace. His old friends were nothing if not meticulous — or maybe they just thought that he couldn’t find his way across the Grand Allée and manage the few blocks to the restaurant without walking into some trouble.

Everything’s been going smoothly, Ginette had told him over drinks, just after his arrival the previous evening. And you, dear buddy, are Mr. Trouble. Remember when we lived in Ottawa and you came to our cottage in the Gatineau for the first time? Everything quiet up there for decades, and two days after you appear, two retired schoolteachers shot to death by some hideous thug. And poor Paul dragged into the case. Then there was the time —

But at that point her husband had intervened to change the subject. Sam knew his friend thought Ginette was moving into dangerous territory. The Past. The Bad Times. His Family. Little Teddy.

Sam helped out by asking Ginette about the music she was rehearsing. Paul was a policeman, but she was a violinist with the Quebec Symphony, and the only one of his friends he could talk to about classical music. As in many things, he was a fish out of water in his generation, for while he could take or leave all kinds of pop stuff, and even most jazz, he doted on classical, everything from Bach to Bartok, and sometimes beyond. He also had a taste for traditional folk (the sixties extrapolations mostly left him cold). After he had found Teddy and held his lifeless body in his arms, he had gone numb for weeks — he couldn’t sit still, couldn’t think straight, couldn’t read, and hardly ate anything. But he put on an old Richard Dyer-Bennet disc and listened over and over to one song. Not only listened, but took it in — memorized its meaning for life. It wasn’t a very consoling song, he knew, but it told the truth:

You got to cross that lonesome valley

You got to cross it by yourself.

There ain’t no one can cross it for you,

You got to cross it by yourself.

Teddy had crossed the valley, and Sam had gone with him as far as he could, but as the song said, it could never be all the way.

* * *

The waitress dropped a menu on his table. She was busier now, and zipped off without a word or a glance. It was just as well. He didn’t want to fall into the category of older males who, tripping around, chat up waitresses, shop girls, and barmaids. He took it as a sign of weakness, one demonstrated everyday by lonely men heading somewhere (or nowhere) — older business travellers, reporters, investigators, athletes, all of whom were happy to kill time by lapping up the friendly chatter of any available ministering angel. The female equivalents of these lonely pilgrims, smart ladies busy with books, magazines, earphones, or stock reports, were used to self-sufficiency. Whatever they might look for when they got in motion, it wasn’t the sympathy of youth.

Sam dipped his second croissant in the now rather tepid coffee. The waitress brought another cup and he ordered sausages and fried eggs. While he waited, he looked around, trying to figure out why there was an energy, an excitement in the air here that he hardly ever felt in Ottawa. Was it just that he was on holiday, or was there really something more intense in the atmosphere of this city, or this street? Did it have something to do with the way Cartier itself was laid out? It was a fairly narrow street with many shops, second-floor apartments, and a few gardens. Various activities were thrust together in just the right way, with people enjoying themselves and going about their business with a certain bright intensity. Oddly enough, the Glebe in Ottawa was not so very different, yet it never, or rarely, seemed this wired up.

"Well, this is my lucky day. I didn’t think I’d find you right where Paul said you’d be!"

The voice burst in on his thoughts. A familiar voice. Sam turned. A slender, well-dressed black woman stood there grinning at him. Only it wasn’t a black woman, it was Clara.

He jumped up, grabbed her and gave her a bear hug. She was lanky and strong, and she smelled familiar, and, he thought, quite wonderful. It was good to feel her so close again.

He held her at arm’s-length and looked at her, then stepped back, pulled out a chair, and waved at her to sit. My God. What in hell are you doing here? Not that I’m sorry to see you, but I thought I’d escaped from the Ottawa scene.

I know. You’re on vacation. By yourself, too, for a change. Paul told me. Sorry to bust in on you like this.

Are you kidding? I’m glad to see you. I’ve started talking to myself again and it’s only the second or third day of my holiday.

Clara laughed. Same old Sam. For some reason this reminds me of the first time we sat down together — remember, in graduate school? You had the same surprised look on your face.

No wonder, you crashed my table then, too. I was trying to figure out how to ace one of my law exams.

I think I upset your academic year a little. I know you upset mine.

You upset me a lot more when you left the country.

Clara shrugged her shoulders and laughed again. I thought I knew what was best for us — for me.

Yeah.

They exchanged a look. Delighted by her presence, enjoying the sight of her familiar face — the high cheekbones, the broad forehead, the lively eyes — he noticed also that she’d aged, gathered a few wrinkles and gray hairs, and sensed, too, that recently she’d been worrying a lot, that something was on her mind. He knew her so well. And it occurred to him: She wants to tell me something, but she’s hesitating. She’s thinking I’m older, too (how right she is!), and wondering if she can still trust me. Why have we been so out of touch for the last few years?

I’ve just realized why you’re down here, Clara. I read about Daniel’s exhibition. I was going to look in on it today or tomorrow. Is everything okay? You look a bit worried.

You noticed. Of course you’d notice. Where did you read about the exhibition?

On the web, before I took off from Ottawa. I’ve been in Montreal for a couple of days, just browsing around St. Denis, buying CDs and looking at some art in the Old Port.

So you haven’t seen the papers recently?

I almost never read the damned papers any more. Great sources of misinformation.

Like I said, I hate to bust in on you, Sam. It’s not just for fun. There’s a problem, and I need your skills. When I heard you were here, I had to see you.

C’mon, Clara, of course I’d love to help you — but nothing I do professionally has anything to offer you and Daniel, unless you two have taken up the swinging life in Rockcliffe, or someone’s blackmailing you on the grounds that you seduce ten-year-olds.

It’s no joke, Sam. I’m afraid it might be serious. Daniel’s under suspicion of murder.

Sam laughed harshly and so loudly that the blonde waitress, en passant, threw him a puzzled glance. Sorry, Clara — but that’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard. I’ve only met Daniel a couple of time and I know he can be fierce about Native rights, art, the environment, and a few other things, but he wouldn’t raise a finger to a fly. What kind of idiotic mix-up is this? And, come to think of it, why didn’t Paul mention it? I’m staying with him and Ginette, and he didn’t even tell me you were here.

He only found out about Daniel this morning. He and Ginette have been on vacation, as you know. I went to his office because I wanted to talk to someone I could trust, and, thank goodness, he’s hoping to take over the case right away. He told me he’d get caught up, and then he suggested I come after you.

Poor Daniel! Well, it was a nice vacation while it lasted.

I’m sorry, Sam. I knew you’d help me. I’ll pay you, of course — although I know you’ll resist. Daniel will be glad you’re here. Would it be okay to go and see him now? We’re borrowing a studio over by the Citadel, a great place on the Avenue Sainte-Geneviève. He’s very anxious to talk to you.

Sure, but you haven’t told me anything yet. Give it to me straight, then we can go see him — we can walk over through the park, can’t we? You can fill in the details as we go.

Sam waved at the waitress, who cruised past the intervening tables and approached them. She was no fool, and appeared to be thinking, what’s going on between this pair?

Please bring a coffee for the lady — and another for me, Sam told her. The cheque, too, if you don’t mind, with the sausages and eggs. We may have to leave in a hurry.

The waitress smiled and moved away. The situation is crazy, Clara said, but here’s the gist of it. It’s all about trees.

Sam shook his head and waited for her to elaborate.

When you checked out that web story you must have noticed that Daniel’s exhibition is called The Trees Remember Sorrow — the title’s designed to sound good in French, too. It’s a protest show and it’s connected with the big scientific conference that’s been going on in the city — papers on ecology, nature, biogenetic stuff, hundreds of them, first here, then more later in Ottawa, where the second stage of the conference is set to be held. The scientists are kicking around some pretty weird ideas. Daniel researched everything. One group in particular, Arbor Vitae, caught his attention, and he wanted to be right here to protest in person, to make sure those guys got the message. He had quite a job persuading the gallery to put up his show to overlap with the conference, but they did. And then, last Friday, the first day of the meetings, he went over and made a stir at the Conference Centre. The police had to haul him away. It made the scientists very nervous. They’re always on the lookout for freaks and weirdos ready to bomb their labs.

Daniel wouldn’t bomb anyone.

They don’t know Daniel. All they know is that a Native artist is making fun of what they’re doing. And this is a guy who hires a couple of trucks to dump trees in front of the Conference Centre — not real trees, of course, but seven imitation trees designed to comment on the dangers, the bad aspects of the new tree research. One’s called ‘The Tree of Life’ — it looks like an apple tree, but instead of apples there are images of children’s suffering faces in the branches. A plaque on it reads DESIGNED AT MIT AND BUILT BY BECHTEL. Then there’s one called ‘The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil,’ with a Native Christ crucified on one side and Dr. Linton raising his hand in blessing on the other. Stuff like that, some pretty bitter, some quite funny.

Who’s Dr. Linton?

Clara wore a puzzled expression.

I’m surprised you don’t know. He’s one of the star scientists at the conference. His lab has worked out a way of genetically modifying trees so that they can grow even amid the worst pollution, and in some cases help absorb and neutralize the polluted materials. He started a company called Arbor Vitae to market the process.

And that’s bad?

Daniel sees it as endangering real trees and taking the polluting companies off the hook. Why worry about polluting the environment, why bother to protect real trees, if you can make super-trees to deal with your problems? There’s also the threat of spreading the genetically modified plants and upsetting the natural forestry growths.

So Dr. Linton doesn’t like Daniel’s protest?

She gave him a look.

"You really haven’t been reading the papers. Dr. Linton doesn’t care much about anything anymore. He was murdered late Friday night or Saturday morning — suffered a horrible seizure in his hotel room and died almost instantly."

The waitress reappeared; Clara paused. Sam swallowed the last of his coffee, and dug into the sausages and eggs. Not good. Not good at all, he said. And what’s with the seizure? Are they sure he was murdered?"

According to Paul, they are. The story’s a bit grotesque. Someone poisoned him, but they did it organically, you might say. An extract of deadly nightshade slipped into his food or drink. The police are working on it. And they suspect Daniel. His protest got their attention, and when they checked out his exhibition, they weren’t reassured. He’s put some heavy stuff in there, although again, a few pieces are quite funny.

They don’t like satirical art? Or humour?

"I don’t know what they like or don’t like. But one of Daniel’s artistic installations — you can see it in the gallery right now — shows a cutout of a ravishingly beautiful woman surrounded by pasted labels of practically every toxic substance sold to unsuspecting consumers around the world, all with their commercial labels, and with some of the advertising slogans that promoted them. The woman is shown nude, holding a skull. She looks as if she’s just stepped out of some academic clothing that lies at her feet. The title of the piece is Atropa Belladonna. Belladonna refers to a dangerous enchantress. And the Latin word atropa, I believe, has something to do with one of the three fates of legend."

Sam grunted impatiently. You’re well-informed. And when you put them together?

You get pretty powerful symbolism — and also the scientific name for deadly nightshade.

Two

They walked between the green park and a long row of buildings that faced it, elegant brick or stone mansions with flower-bedecked balconies, alcoves and stairways, umbrellas and gaily striped awnings. Beside them, no less suave, stood apartment houses approached by tree-lined paths, with discreet front gardens surrounded by wrought-iron fences. Flowers bloomed everywhere, pink and yellow and white; joggers trotted past, well-dressed men and women walked their dogs, and children ran toward the open spaces of the Plains of Abraham.

Lovely spot, Sam said. See that apartment building with the ivy growing halfway up? That’s where the Berthelets live. Bourgeois French comfort at it best. We seem to have landed in a genteel nineteenth-century painting: ‘Children and Sailboats in Central Park’ or ‘Morning Stroll in the Luxembourg.’ You wouldn’t suspect that the Grand Allée and its traffic lie just beyond. Maybe I should retire to Quebec City. I could get an apartment, take my poodle for a walk every morning along these paths, and eye the local beauties. Did you see that charming thing that got out of the BMW back there? Rollerblades already laced on tight, a slinky body wrapped in a cocktail dress worth several hundred bucks at least — morning exercise and the old female game of getting looked at all at one stroke. Eccentric, eye-catching. I certainly didn’t mind looking. People-watching in this city could be fun.

People-watching or girl-watching? Same old Sam, I guess. Come to think of it, though, I could imagine you living here, though never as a senior citizen. I can’t see you as a senior at all! How’s your French these days?

I hear better than I speak. And in case you think I only notice the beautiful ladies, I’ve been marvelling at that ancient, elegantly dressed crone with the cane soldiering along just ahead of us. My guess is that she lives in that next apartment building, the one with the green awnings and the wonderful leaded windows. Looks exactly like her kind of place. She’ll turn any second now and start up the walkway …

They paused; the old lady turned.

You should be a detective, Clara told him.

A detective? You mean a real one who goes after criminals, and doesn’t spend his time spying on bankers who can’t resist ballet dancers or beach bunnies in crewcuts? Fat chance!

Clara shook her head.

You haven’t changed. You know, Sam, after we broke up, every once in a while I tried to remember the colour of your eyes. Just one of those funny things that hit you when you split with someone. Brownish-flecked olive green was the best I could do — I almost called you up to try it out on you, but I thought you would assume it was a come-on. I think what I really remembered was the colour of sadness.

You’re getting poetic in your old age, kiddo. How’s life with Daniel?

Different from my time with you. He doesn’t mind me getting close.

Sam growled quietly and shook his head. Come on, Clara! I took this trip to get away from thinking about myself, about my past life, my so-called problems — which aren’t that terrible, when you come right down to it. Maybe my shrink told me I needed some perspective on things, maybe I’m looking for my roots. I haven’t figured it out yet myself. If I’m going to think deep thoughts about anything, let’s make sure it’s about Daniel’s problems, not mine. If I’m sad, I’m sad. But I’d like to help you. And it would be nice to work on something that has nothing to do with lust or lucre.

Clara reached out and patted his hand; they walked on in silence.

Life with Daniel is fine, she said after some minutes. It doesn’t have much to do with lust or lucre either. Her voice was low, self-reflective; she didn’t look at Sam. "Daniel is an artist. He couldn’t be anything else — he’d go crazy without it. That world inside him is like some

Reviews for Nightshade

[brianewilliams · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

The story had lots of potential - a scientist poisoned at a conference and an aboriginal artist is the chief suspect -- but the author turned it into a parody of the hard-boiled detective mystery story. Some of the dialogue was stilted and wooden. The protagonist was not credible to me and he tended to pontificate. The rest of the characters tended to be cartoonish stereotypes -- the ugly American FBI agent and the young gay drug addict. I read somewhere that the author is working on a sequel to this book. Let's hope it's better than this one.