Blood Wine by John Moss

at him as he swung around, took a stride back towards the house, stumbled, and as he was rising to his feet the entire escarpment exploded into a blistering, deafening inferno. For an instant the house was outlined in flame, as if it were hovering against a fiery backdrop, then it smashed into a billion points of light as the shock waves hurled Morgan and Miranda and the blond woman down the slope toward the emergency crew huddled on the ground against the blast, with the burning sheds behind them.
    Nothing seemed to move for a suspended instant, until the cicadas resumed their urgent thrumming; then the entire scene burst into a flurry of activity. It was like a war zone in the aftermath of a bombing raid. Flames billowed against the oncoming darkness and smoke curled in mindless strands through the thick, acrid air. Men and women, some still dressed from work, scurried around, drowning smouldering fires, gossiping, trying to figure out what had happened. Told there were two deaths, a body in a tank in the wine-shed debris, and old Mrs. Peter Oughtred in the inferno where the house had been, they summoned the Fire Marshal from Niagara-on-the-Lake, and the OPP officers took charge.

6
    The Rocking Chair
    T hree hours later, Morgan and Elke Sturmberg were sitting in an interrogation room at Police Headquarters in Toronto. They looked like they had been soaked in a red-wine marinade.
    â€œMiranda’s on her way,” said Spivak. “They’re just getting her bandaged up. She’s got a change of clothes in her locker. You want coffees, I’ll get you coffees.” He sidled out of the room, letting the door swing sharply closed behind him.
    Morgan smiled across the table at the young blond.
    â€œDon’t confess to crimes you’re not proud of,” he said. “We’re being observed. Of course, they know I know we’re being observed, so maybe they’re not bothering. Sometimes a room like this is just a good place to talk.”
    â€œDo you ever torture people here?” she asked.
    â€œFor confessions? No, not often.”
    â€œGood,” she said. After a moment, she declared, “I remember pretty well everything, but I don’t remember driving to Toronto. Why would I go to Miranda’s?”
    â€œIt’s a mystery,” said Morgan. Then looking up at the mirrored wall, he said, “Spivak, where’s the coffee?”
    The door opened and Miranda hobbled in on her own. Then Eeyore Stritch came in, carrying three coffees precariously balanced, and set them on the table.
    â€œI’m gonna live,” said Miranda as she sat down.
    â€œGood,” said Morgan. “Saves me the trouble of finding a replacement.”
    â€œDetective Quin,” said Eeyore Stritch in a funereal tone once they got settled. Miranda braced herself for whatever was coming. “The hand, the man in the vat, he wasn’t the one.”
    â€œThe one what?” she responded.
    â€œThe one who raped you.”
    Miranda flinched. Nobody had used the word rape . Philip may have got her into bed under false pretenses, but that fell into the realm of seduction. As for the semen deposited by his killer, that had somehow seemed more an infusion, absolutely disgusting but not sexual assault. She was, as she told Morgan, fucked. Rape seemed something else, demanding at the very least the awareness of the victim.
    â€œIt wasn’t him?” She was baffled.
    â€œWe did a rush job on the DNA. It shows the man in the vat and the man who — did that to you — were different people.”
    â€œWhy did you assume they weren’t?” said Spivak, who had just come into he room. He knew by the ensuing silence he had asked a compromising question. “Explanation?” he demanded.
    Miranda fished into her purse for the gold ring and dropped it with a resounding clang on the table.
    â€œWhat’s this?” said Spivak.
    â€œThe waiter at the Imperial Room