The man nodded drunkenly and then slurred, “And a right fancy Benz truck. Hedgehog numbers his fleet.”
One of Ray’s talents lay in blending into a situation and pivoting it to his advantage. It was what made him such a good journalist. He belonged in any manner of congregations of the destitute or working class. So when he eventually found Hedgehog? and his men, reeling in a dinghy from the bopping waves, he knew how to fit in. He turned up a full smile, and with a poor grasp of English and a twinkling eye, he offered himself to their shady enterprise.
“I could always use manpower,” Hedgehog said. “Got several fellows who sound just like you. Make you feel at home.” Ray was aching to ask what work he would be doing, what they were transporting, but this ragtag crew seemed the type that would lift and haul anything for a few bucks.
So, under a sky brightening with stars, he joined men with haggard, unhappy faces as they moved cargo from a tugboat and onto a truck that seemed worth far more than any of these “workers” could afford.
“Fancy automobile,” Ray sneered to a tall, wiry man.
“Boss here, Hedgehog, says in order to be legitimate you have to look legitimate.”
Ray yawned. He’d barely slept on the overnight train from Toronto, he’d spent the night before on a bench, and as the hours ticked by, it looked less and less likely that he’d find a bed before dawn.
“There’s one more!” a man from the deck of the boat called. Ray saw that the men who pulled shift after shift of this grueling work night after night—probably without even as much as a nap before their next job—were groaning and yawning.
Winning easy admiration, he jogged over and stole up the ladder swinging from the side of the bobbing vessel.
The man was standing on one side of a long rectangular box. “Bit like a coffin!” the man joshed. “Probably jam or something, mate. No need to worry.”
Ray wondered why jam would need to be undocked in the cloak of darkness, but he merely smiled and prepared for the count-off.
“One… ” the other man said as Ray fit his hands over the sides of the crate. “Two… ”
On three they heaved up, but in doing so, the damp wood creaked and the bottom fell through with a thud. Ray and the man flung the beams and planks away to discover a heavy canvas bag.
Bile rose in Ray’s mouth. He knew what he would find inside. The tell-tale shape and weight meant one thing.
He looked up at his companion, and they shared a solemn nod.
They pulled back the canvas to reveal a gray corpse, its stench overpowering them, the features bloated from days on a boat. Ray’s companion emitted a string of curses before finally ending in a hasty, pleading prayer for the poor dead fellow and leaving Ray with the body while he reported it to the foreman.
Ray tried to see it as Jasper or Merinda would. What a story this would make, he thought, adrenaline pumping. Then he recollected himself and looked over the corpse’s bulky, veined hand, hard to make out in the dim light.
It was when he turned away to call for help from the docks that a tiny piece of something caught his eye in the spreading light. It must have toppled out of the canvas. He leaned down and pinched it between his thumb and forefinger.
A piece of something that was all too familiar.
He slipped it into his pocket, looking around to see if the slight action had been noticed. But no one seemed to care about the body at all. Ray looked beyond the corpse’s greenish-gray face and over his stiff limbs down to bare feet. Near the right foot something glistened, and Ray reached over, flinching his fingers a bit before grabbing it. It was an empty, sticky bottle. Syrup, by the looks of it. The label was faded, but he could still make out the logo—he’d seen it a thousand times. Spenser’s.
Ray hid it under his vest and looked over the lake toward the horizon. This crate was from Toronto. The bottle came from Spenser’s Department Store. Ray could have laughed if the entire thing wasn’t so dreadfully morbid. He came to Chicago to help Viola and stumbled upon a Toronto news story instead.
Ray wanted to see what they did with the body. More still, what they were importing that could possibly come from Spenser’s Department Store. It could, of course, have been a fluke, but with all of the corruption he was accustomed to in his city’s hierarchy, he wouldn’t be surprised if the trail led here.
Hedgehog’s voice came from behind him. “Job is done for the night,” he said, pressing a few greasy bills into Ray’s hand in a wad. “But I’m impressed by you. You’re wiry but strong, and you didn’t even bat an eye at that poor bloke, which means you’ve got the temperament I’m looking for.”
“I figure what isn’t my business isn’t my business. As long as I get paid.”