ONCE IT WAS over he had to make damned sure nobody was going to come looking for
him. He had to find the perfect place. Well, yeah, there was such a perfect
place, he thought sardonically. And it was right under his nose. The old boiler.
Fill'er up with acid and in no time there's nothing left. But he knew that was
ridiculous. Where would he get all that acid from? His mind scanned other
possibilities. Zip her in a sleeping bag and dump her somewhere? Bury her? But
of course none of that was going to work. Her body had to be found. That was
part of the plan. The tricky part.
Now that she was dead Alvin couldn't
stop thinking about her.
"You can't marry your own sister,"
his father had laughed at something the ten year old had said.
"Well if I can't, nobody else will,"
Alvin had replied spitefully. His father had frowned and walked away. And Alvin
had felt totally abandoned. Then he went and picked a fight with his sister who
was a mere year and a half younger. It always made him feel better just to know
that he was able to reach out and pinch her or pull her hair and that she would
always be there. And that their connection would never be broken. As youngsters
both the Tepper children had thought they would live to a ripe old age, in good
health, and with plenty of money. But now Alvin was left completely alone, in
good health, and wealthier than ever.
On the second day of spring Ida
Tepper's body had been found. She had been bludgeoned to death.
For years Hardon Hall had flaunted
its fire-trap status, defying fire codes, complaints and tenant petitions.
Whether that was due to bribes or bureaucratic incompetence or some other
cunning on the part of the landlord, no one ever knew.
Kevin Hardon, slum
landlord extraordinaire, was the owner, though the building was hardly in a
slum. It was located in the most prestigious part of Ottawa. If not right in the
heart of the Glebe, at least just a tiny stretch north of the heart, just shy of
the quagmire of downtown Bank Street.
And so it came as
a great surprise when Dan Scott, the Fire Prevention Officer, turned up
unannounced. Something must have gone terribly wrong -
terribly right, depending on whose point of view it was.
At ten o'clock in the morning the inspector started a meticulous
poking around in the bowels of the old monstrosity with building superintendent,
Jerry Arsenault, leading the way. The day was bright and lovely but the spring
sunshine was unable to penetrate the corridors and back stairs of the ancient
building. The two men made their way through pitch darkness. Dan Scott was alert
and business-like, but Jerry's whole body sagged with