Last of the Independents. Sam Wiebe

you tell where they’re heading?” Mrs. Loeb said.

      “They are two shadows in the darkness and the rain. They are moving through the darkness and the rain towards a green light.”

      Her eyes settled on Mrs. Loeb’s.

      “I’ve been given a glimpse,” she said. “It takes time and patience to interpret what comes through the conduit.” She patted Mrs. Loeb’s hand. “I know you’re eager. This will take some time. But I’m willing to make your daughter my highest priority.”

      Mrs. Loeb nodded gravely, thankfully.

      “I believe two sessions a week would be the most productive. I will consult the literature and try to find out exactly who is trying to contact us.”

      “What will that work out to a week?” I asked. “A thousand dollars? Is there a punch card for a free session with ten of equal or greater value?”

      Madame Thibodeau never looked at me. “Some people,” she said to Mrs. Loeb, “simply can’t understand or won’t accept the science of what I do.”

      “What science?” I asked her. “Cold reading and five minutes on the web searching the kid’s name would’ve given you every detail you just fed us.”

      Mild annoyance stoked to anger. “My gift is to ask questions of the spirit world.”

      “I don’t dispute that, just that the spirit world answers you.”

      “I can sense your frustration,” she said.

      “Not exactly a divine revelation, is it?”

      Madame Thibodeau said, “When you dropped those cards a moment ago, I knew your heart wasn’t open to this experience. No doubt you expected me to use the information and pretend it came to me supernaturally. I don’t know what your name is and I don’t claim to be clairvoyant. As I explained, I am just a woman who is open to what pours forth from the conduit. People who are deaf to it can’t help but be jealous, but I sense frustration from you, also. You have exhausted your abilities and the poor girl is still missing. I can’t guarantee a result, but isn’t it only fair of you to let Mrs. Loeb decide whether or not she wants to employ someone with a different set of skills? Aren’t you letting your jealousy and prejudice stand in the way of what’s best for Cynthia?”

      The Loebs looked at me, anxious for a response. Madame Thibodeau drew herself up in her chair and rotated some of her bracelets. Feline satisfaction seemed to radiate from her, but her face remained meek, her eyes imploring me to relent, to forgive, to apologize. Her words were not without effect. She’d used the same word I’d thought of back at the park. Exhausted. It was true. I felt a trickle of shame in my blood.

      I said, “You’ve got some inarguable points there. You’re perceptive. I appreciate that quality. I like to think of myself as the same. And I am frustrated.”

      She smiled sympathetically.

      “I don’t claim to be a great detective. Most detective work is drudgery. It’s reading through a transcript for the umpteenth time in the hope that something jumps out, some overlooked clue. I’m also prejudiced against anything that takes a leap of faith. I hear you say to a woman who’s lost her kid, ‘I see two figures in water, give me five hundred dollars,’ well, the hackles go up.”

      Madame Thibodeau began to protest but I held up my hand. My turn.

      “Ten minutes before we walked in here I told them how this would go down. I explained to them what a cold reading was. How you’d single out the mother ’cause she’s emotionally vulnerable, easy to manipulate. I told them you’d say something cryptic, wait for our response, then build on it. Fact is, the morning Cynthia Loeb disappeared there wasn’t a raindrop in sight. But you built your story on that, keeping it just vague enough so you’d have an out.”

      “I never said her daughter disappeared during a rainstorm.”

      “You never said anything substantive. You’re a fraud, how could you?”

      I stood up. The Loebs followed suit.

      I’d like to think my speechifying left the Madame torn up inside and repentant, but all I’d succeeded in doing was tearing off the last scrap of pretense. Our eyes met. I also like to think that beneath the mutual disdain and scorn, we shared an admiration, or at least an honest appraisal of the other’s nature. But all of that might be romanticized, two worn-out hookers trying to claim emotions they had no right to.

      “You’re a bastard,” she said.

      “Pretty much. Mrs. Loeb would like her money back.”

      Looking up at us, Madame Thibodeau took the envelope and passed it to Mrs. Loeb, but not before withdrawing two of the bills. “Cost of doing business,” she said, smiling.

      I looked at Mrs. Loeb, who nodded, her stoic good cheer already returning. She knew she was getting off cheap.

      “That should at least buy one fortune,” I said as the Loebs headed out of the parlor. “Any sooth for me before I leave?”

      The Madame remained in her seat staring at the portraits of Robert Borden on the currency, an absent glaze to her eyes. Without looking up she said, “How ’bout, ‘beware the ides of March?’”

      “Ah, it was worth a try,” said Mrs. Loeb. She dropped me on the corner of Beckett Street. As I climbed out of the car, she killed the engine to rummage through her purse, coming up with the envelope which she offered to me. I waved it away.

      “Your money’s no good.”

      Ben had climbed into the front seat. Leaning with his elbow out the window of the Town Car he said, “That was a bravura performance, Mike. Really restored my faith in you.”

      “Shucks,” I said. “Pissing off the clairvoyant is easy. They never see it coming.”

      He shook his head at the cornball joke. “It’s always the ides of March you have to beware of, never the nones or the calends. The calends are my favorite.”

      “The calends are under-utilized,” I agreed.

      Alone in my office I made tea and answered an email query about my fee structure. I made the calls that needed to be made and fired off emails to people who deserved them. During our Staples spree I’d picked up a scanner, and I spent time making digital copies of the Szabo documents, including Django James’s birth certificate and baby footprint.

      It was dark out and the usual Hastings Street crowd was gathering under the awnings at the end of the block. Sex trade workers, homeless persons, a whole lot of substance abusers, some of whom encompassed both the other categories. We are all of us whores of one kind or another.

      I worked until nine. When the mundane chores had been knocked off, I stood out on the balcony with the dregs of my tea and thought hard about the Szabos and the owners of Imperial Pawn. Ramsey and his daughter knew something. Theirs wasn’t a silence built around staying away from the police at all costs. If you run a pawn shop in Vancouver it’s inevitable you deal with the law. It could be gang-related: it’s hard to make a store owner talk when the person they might finger has friends who enjoy playing with matches.

      I wondered if Gavin Fisk sweated Ramsey or his daughter. I wondered if he gave a shit. About the Szabo case, about anything. I hoped he made Mira happy.