Troop 18 Page 7

  A muted yell reminded her Constable Zeb was pulling up the rear of the troop. Andy’s hand reflexively went to the radio strapped to her waist, her thumb flicking at the power button to make sure it was on. No code came through, so she figured Zeb was encouraging Cadet Petit to hustle it up the hill. It was Saturday morning, the cadets’ own time even out here at Camp Depot. So the sixteen troop members, including the plodding powerhouse Bertrand Petit, were on this run of their own volition. When Andy had shown up in the quad this morning and announced she was leading a run if anyone was interested, she wasn’t surprised when the entire troop had joined her in their matching navy blue jogging suits twenty minutes later.

  As she ran, Andy considered her drive back from Vancouver the night before. She had arrived back at the main house just before midnight, as expected. She’d spent two hours on the phone with Jack while she was driving, listening to all the information he’d managed to dig up from his various sources.

  Apparently Kate had asked to meet in Superintendent Heath’s office ten days ago. Heath’s appreciation for Kate saving his granddaughter’s life had included the promise of a position with E-division if she wanted it. Apparently she did. Andy tried to sort through that with Jack: arguing, listening, rationalizing. And in the end, she had to admit, hoping. It wasn’t a very comfortable place to be. As she drove the last few hours in silence, Andy wasn’t sure how long she could navigate the pitfalls of hope. Two more days, she reminded herself. Just two more days.

  The clearing came into view, and Andy slowed her pace, listening to the troop behind her do the same. Foster and Awad had run right behind her the whole time, and she could tell they itched to go faster, to lengthen their strides until they were flying. They were runners—not joggers, not fitness buffs, not even simply athletes. Andy recognized two people whose bodies and minds were built to run, not unlike herself. They hadn’t broken rank, though, staying in line behind Andy as she kept an even, slow pace.

  The last fifteen feet to the look-out had to be climbed with fingers wedged into wet rocks and toes mashed up against the smallest ledges. Andy went up easily and stood at the top, offering a hand if anyone needed it. Foster was next, and he climbed it easily too, his dark eyes revealing very little as he stood on the other side of the path, offering his own hand up to his troop mates. Andy stepped back, receiving the message loud and clear. If anyone was going to help the troop, it was going to be from within. As Andy watched various cadets reach out for the last boost over the rocky ledge, it confirmed for her everything she’d been thinking about this troop of cadets.

  Andy took a sip of water from the bottle at her waist, holding it in her mouth until it was warm enough to swallow, hoping to avoid a stomach cramp on the way back to camp. She stood back and watched the cadets exploring the outlook. Angela Hellman, the varsity athlete from Ottawa, and Michael Awad were egging each other on in friendly tones, daring each other to climb up to the next outcrop while Hawke Foster silently and easily scaled the ledge.

  A few cadets sat with their legs dangling over the edge. Petit’s massive frame dwarfed the young Newfie girl, Shandly. Between them was Jacob Frances, the fourth generation RCMP recruit. Andy surveyed him carefully, intent on watching those cadets who had yet to make an impression. Cadet Frances was one of these, and Andy found this curious. He was the oldest recruit at thirty, just a few years younger than Andy.

  After reading his file, she’d expected the man to be cocky and very sure of his place among the troop. Both his age and his pedigree seemed to point him toward a leadership role within this group, but that didn’t seem to be the case. Andy studied him. His head was shaved, adding to the impression that he was very thin, though his broad shoulders made Andy think of someone lean and tough. But other than his build, Andy found him to be flat. He melded seamlessly into the background of this small troop. In fact, she couldn’t remember actually having made eye contact with the cadet. He was also one of the slower members of the troop, always at the back of the pack with Petit. Andy had to wonder if this was another show of the pack mentality. No cadet left behind.

  The rest of the troop milled about in small groups, sitting and chatting, ribbing each other as only people who have spent an intense four months together can. Cadet Prewitt-Hayes stood off to the side, chatting with two other cadets, both from Ontario. Every now and then, the right mark would look up and scan the troop, accounting for each member. Zeb and Andy were included in this scan as if they couldn’t be trusted to not separate one cadet from the pack. Andy wasn’t stupid. She knew that tactic wouldn’t get her anywhere. But she was interested in shaking things up a little.

  “Who’s up for a race on the way back down?” Andy called out to the cadets. “Losers make breakfast for the winners.”

  Andy watched as they tested this suggestion, as if looking for the trap. They surveyed each other with quick eye movements.

  “Petit better be on the losing team,” said Greg Shipman, the farm boy from Alberta. “He’s the only one who can cook.” The rest of the troop seemed to relax a little at these easy words. Andy guessed she had just found one of the main influences on the group. Not a leader, but a human litmus test, a mood indicator for the recruits.

  “I’ll try to slow down, just for you guys,” Petit answered drily in his rough Quebecois accent.

  “Constable Zeb, you take half the troop back down the path we came up on. I’ll take the other half on the rest of the loop.” Andy pushed the empty water bottle into her belt and turned her back. She was halfway down the steep, rocky outcrop before she heard anyone behind her. She knew it was Foster without having to look. That kid seemed to want to be constantly on the move.

  At the bottom of the ledge, Andy watched the troop descend and divide themselves into two groups. It should have been a simple rough divide of people with some friendly teasing, talking smack across enemy lines. But they were strangely silent as they grouped themselves between Andy and Zeb. Almost grim and uncomfortable at being separated.

  “I like my coffee black and my bacon crispy,” Andy called over to the other team, pretending she wasn’t scrutinizing and drawing conclusions about the troop’s every move. “Let’s go!”

  Andy didn’t run full out, too aware of the varying levels of fitness of the eight recruits at her back as well as the uneven terrain. But it did feel good to let loose a little, to run instead of plod along in formation. Still, she could feel Foster breathing down her neck like he wanted to fly. Nearing the halfway mark back to camp, Andy looked over her shoulder and caught his eye.

  “Take them in, Cadet Foster,” she said and moved to the side, giving him room to take the lead.

  Andy saw the look of surprise in his eyes, but then he caught sight of the open path and surged ahead, leaving Andy and the rest of the troop to pick up their pace.

  They were, in fact, the first group in, already cooling down in the quad when Zeb led the other eight, winded cadets out of the forest. Sure enough, Petit and Frances were trailing behind. Andy made a mental note to check out their physical requirement exam results. It wasn’t a team effort, and she was curious how Frances had scored on that. Maybe his role in the troop was to keep Bertrand Petit from falling too far behind.

  The other instructors joined them for breakfast, the kitchen cabin slightly smoky from the overcooked bacon. It actually felt like camp, the troop’s earlier hesitation gone as they pushed at each other, demanding breakfast of the losing group. Only the medic, Melanie Stinson continued to look annoyed, picking at her scrambled eggs with evident distaste. Andy couldn’t wait to stick her on the first bus out of Kamloops on Monday morning.

  Andy wrapped her fingers around the china cup of strong coffee and watched the cadets. Right now they seemed perfectly typical, no red flags, no cause for alarm. The losing group rolled their eyes as they served the winning cadets, Petit flipping bacon and sausage onto plates, Prewitt-Hayes with two jugs of juice refilling glasses, her usual look of intensity present even for this sma
ll job.

  Andy turned to Sergeant Trokof, the only man still impeccable in his uniform on this Saturday morning. “What’s on the agenda today?”

  “The cadets have been given the option of going into Kamloops, bus leaving here at one o’clock and leaving town again at nine. Anyone not on the bus will have to walk back, a good hour and a half run, I believe. Cadets have been warned they will be searched leaving and coming back again.”

  Andy looked down the table at the other instructors. “I was talking to Kurtz and Tara last night, and they’re saying we should take turns getting a night off from camp. One of us can stay down at the main house, get fed and have a good night’s sleep. Any takers for tonight?”

  “If they have a bath, I will say yes to that,” Les said, happily biting down on a triangle of toast.

  “A bath and a hot tub,” Andy said.

  “And no kids?”

  “Not one.”

  “Cheers,” Les said, holding up her coffee mug before taking a sip.

  The instructors watched as the medic pushed back her plate and left the camp kitchen without a word.

  “Did you talk to the TO about finding a replacement?” Constable Meyers said in his quiet, assured voice. “Ms. Stinson says she’s more of a city person. She’s unhappy being in the middle of nowhere.”

  Andy swallowed a hot sip of coffee before answering. “She won’t have long to wait. Dr. Kate Morrison will be joining us Monday morning.”

  This name clearly meant nothing to the men in the group, though Andy caught an openly surprised look from Les Manitou. Andy let the awkwardness twist in her stomach so it wouldn’t have to show on her face. At least she liked Les.

  “I take it she will be an improvement on our disgruntled medic, then?” Trokof said.

  “Definitely. Any bets on who’s going into town today?” she said, quietly enough that the troop wouldn’t hear.

  “All of them,” Zeb and Les said together.

  Of course, Andy thought to herself, as the instructors gave each other knowing looks. Of course it would be all of them. Andy took another sip of coffee, letting the conversation angle off on another tangent. She wished Kate was here right now, so that they could pass each other significant looks. Kate could just read her mind as she’d done so many times before, knowing the trajectory of her thoughts without having to say anything out loud. Andy wondered if that could possibly have changed in the last few months, wondered if anything had changed. Or everything. That thought was impossible, and Andy swallowed it with the last dregs of hot coffee. Impossible.

  Chapter Five

  By late Saturday afternoon, Camp Depot was quiet. Andy stood outside the mess cabin and surveyed her surroundings as she’d done the first night. She mentally checked off the list of tasks they had accomplished today: water tank filled, garbage secured, wood piles re-stocked. Before they’d left for their excursion into town, the cadets had even hacked at the edges of the crumbling basketball square and bent the hoop back into its original shape.

  As evening slowly descended on the quiet camp, Andy offered to walk Les down to the main house for her night off, telling Trokof she’d be back in time to make them dinner. He waved her offer away, saying he had a book and a fire and would make himself some tea and toast when he felt hungry. Andy pulled her hat on and zipped up her jacket, shaking her head as she and Les started down the path in the afternoon light.

  “Strange to know he’s actually human, isn’t it?” Les said conspiratorially as they made their way through the trees. The air was cool and damp. Rain had threatened all day but never materialized.

  “Yes,” Andy admitted.

  “Kind of rocks your whole universe, knowing the drill sergeant has tea and toast on a Saturday night,” Les added, and Andy laughed with her. Les’s dry, near constant humour reminded Andy of Kate.

  They walked in companionable silence, listening to the crows and blue jays above them fly hurriedly across the sky, as if sunset had caught them by surprise.

  “What do you think the cadets are doing right now?” Andy said, curious about her impression of the troop.

  “Same thing we did on our Saturday night off, probably,” Les shrugged. “Drink beer and talk incessantly about life after Depot.”

  “Do you think so? Do you think they talk about their medal ceremony day and where they’d like to be posted around the country? They could barely stand to be divided into two groups for a twenty minute run this morning.”

  “I don’t know, Andy. This troop has got me stumped. On paper, they’re like any other troop through Depot. Some are bright, some are fit, some are naïve. They were devastated when we lost JT. We were all devastated.” Les’s voice wavered slightly. “Yes, they were different after losing their troop mate. But we expected that. What we didn’t expect was the silence and the lies. Something’s going on with this troop, something…destructive.” She stopped again, shook her head in evident frustration then looked up at Andy. “All I know is that they’re fiercely loyal to each other, and it would be a shame if we lost the whole troop.”

  They continued through the rapidly darkening woods, the combination of wet moss and loose stones forcing them to pay attention. Once they were down the wooded slope and on more even terrain, Andy picked up the thread of conversation again.

  “Every group has a weak link. Who is Troop 18’s?”

  “Fitness? Petit. Academics? Tie between Awad and Russo. Following orders? Foster. Confidence? Shandly. Firearms? Frances.”

  “Wait, Frances? Really?” Andy knew it was a stereotype to assume that because Jacob Frances had RCMP genealogy, he was automatically a good marksman. Still, she was surprised.

  “According to Zeb, that boy is shaky as hell.”

  “Nerves?”

  Les frowned at the question. “Maybe. Talk to Zeb about it. Some days Frances is top of his game. Others he looks like he wished he’d never heard of the RCMP.” Les gave Andy a sudden, sidelong grin. “Although I can still remember days at Depot when I felt like that. Jesus, that was a rough six months.”

  Andy thought back to her own Depot days with Troop 36. It had taken them a couple of weeks to gel, to feel like a troop of cadets instead of thirty-two individuals jockeying for position. By the end of the twenty-four weeks, they were tight. They knew each other’s strengths and weaknesses. You couldn’t hide from your troop mates. And by the time they were given their postings, you knew you could work with any one of them, even those you secretly felt relieved about when their postings sent them to the other side of the country.

  “Does anyone not get along?” Andy said, thinking of the three cadets, Marchiori, Trace, and Bollinger who she had prayed she wouldn’t be posted with. All of them were large, slightly dim, macho guys who detested the fact that anyone knew they even had weaknesses.

  “No, not as far as I know. Foster’s a bit of a loner, but even he’s never far from the group. The two who dropped out early, Creighton and Tenley, I would say they never really fit in. But they were only in it for a few weeks.”

  “What about the two who got caught with drugs?”

  “Tight,” Les confirmed. “One of them, Mercier, was a real clown. Everyone loved him. Jessup was young, same as Shandly. More of a follower, I’d say.”

  “And how did the troop react when Mercier and Jessup had their contract removed? What happened?”

  “We talked to them individually about what they knew, we talked to them as a group, and then the drill sergeant went at them for a good hour after that. Troop 18 was stoic. They showed us absolutely nothing. It was…” Les paused, as if trying to find the word. “It was almost creepy. If we thought they were tight before then…”

  Another silence, each sergeant lost in her own thoughts as they kept walking, damp night air settling on their faces in a fine layer of barely-there mist.

  “Lincoln thinks it’s drugs,” Andy said into the silence.

  Les immediately shook her head. “But they’re all clean, and why would they
risk selling? Or if someone did, why would they continue to risk it? And why would everyone else risk getting kicked out just to protect someone else? It doesn’t make sense.”

  Andy silently agreed with Les. But too much evidence pointed to drug use or some kind of drug distribution to disregard it.

  “When are the results in from the last drug test?” Les said.

  “Not until Monday, and we’ll have to take the next round into Kamloops by Wednesday,” Andy said as they rounded the last bend out of the trees. Down below, the main house shone its diffuse, warm light. A line of three hydro poles lit the path to the edge of the meadow, the rest of the surrounding grounds gradually deepening into darkness. Andy realized she was going to have to borrow a flashlight from Kurtz.

  “I know it’s none of my business and I really shouldn’t ask,” Leslie said tentatively. “The camp doctor arriving on Monday, Dr. Morrison…I thought I understood that you two were together?”

  Andy kept walking as uncertainty and elation pounded through her stomach. Thirty six-hours. Kate would be here in thirty-six hours.

  “I shouldn’t have said anything,” Les said apologetically, twisting her hands together in a nervous gesture.

  “No, it’s fine,” Andy assured her. “If I had a simple answer I’d give it to you.” She was thankful they were walking side by side in the near dark, and she didn’t have to control her expression. “How do you know about Kate?” Andy said, desperately wanting to drop the subject but still curious.