The first chapter of the mystery, The White Ribbon Man, introduces the detective, Detective Sergeant Jack Cosser. If you have been following this blog at all, you know that there were other attempts at a beginning. Gradually this character has assumed his place. The revision is almost complete now. And here are the first paragraphs of the first chapter of my upcoming mystery novel, The White Ribbon Man.
On a gray Sunday in November when
just a touch of frost in the air heralded winter, Detective Sergeant Jack
Cosser hoped to spend quiet time enjoying the last of what had been an
unusually long fall season. He had considered reading a new mystery or maybe
driving a short distance out of Toronto to some peaceful spot for a stroll. He
could not muster the energy to go and work out at the gym, nor to try to find
someone for a fast game of squash. Maybe his partner on the most recent case,
Simon Reid, would be interested. But he could hardly call an off duty police
officer and expect him to be happy to give up a quiet Sunday morning. Reid
might not know it was to allay Jack’s unease, something that had not diminished in the days and weeks since
he and his wife, Marion, had separated, but he would know it was an unwanted interruption.
Cosser
glanced at the mirror over the sofa and saw a man of medium height with brown
hair with a slight wave in it. He thought his fair reddish skin suggested he
probably had freckles in his youth and a short tree trunk of a neck seemed
almost to sit on top of his shoulders. In spite of everything, he thought he
did not look too terrible. Or not, at least, in a way anyone else would notice
in spite of dark circles under his eyes and a worried frown that he tried to
erase by smiling. A lopsided smile that did not improve his appearance, he
thought.
Not a
tall man, probably not more than five feet nine or ten, it was said he was
nonetheless an imposing figure. His ruddy cheeks suggested he enjoyed his
liquor, but it was also part of having fair skin. Oh, vanity, he thought. But
how would he ever court Marion again if he looked as if he were falling to
pieces? And, of course, he was not. Just take the recent case that had gone
cold for years. An old one for which evidence had surfaced about a year earlier
and when it was assigned to him to follow up, he had been able to find the
person who had perpetrated the crime and this had led to an arrest when the man
had admitted his guilt in the old rape and murder. So there had not been
massive publicity that went with a trial. Just a couple of articles when the
man was arrested and then confessed. He was now finally in prison. Cosser felt
good about that one, satisfied that one more criminal was finally off the
streets.
Although nothing made up for his domestic situation.
He did not like it and he was lonely.
There, he had acknowledged to himself the gnawing feeling that overtook
him once he left his work and tried to relax at home. A trial separation. Then
there was no end to the trial, just this ongoing reality of his existence in a
tiny apartment in an old brick house just a few blocks from the smaller house
where they had lived together. And then the divorce papers that he had wanted
to tear up, but if divorce was what Marion wanted he had thought he ought to go
through with it. After all, what point was there in trying to preserve a
sterile relationship with someone you did not even live with any longer? But
suppose she still loved him? Suppose. Oh, he had to stop that. He had to get
some sleep. He lay down on the floor and started to do push ups. Afterwards he
had a shower. When he finally sat down at the kitchen table, wearing the
bottoms of a striped pair of flannel pyjamas, he thought that some time soon he
would talk to Marion. He would ask her if-
After all, it would not be the first time that a couple married again.
From the window across from him, he could see a small
park in the Annex where Jaime still went to play at times. She was too young to
go on her own, but either he or Marion took her there. He loved the delight on
his daughter’s round, chubby face when he pushed
her on the swings or she slid down a slide. But unfortunately it wasn’t his Sunday to have her with him.
He picked up a book,
lying open on the floor beside him, and started to read where he had left off
the last time. It was a mystery novel. You would think in his line of work he
would read something else and often he did. Matthew Fox’s Original Blessing and some
of the books that had come after it. And heaven knew how he even knew about the
books he picked up, but Invisible Man
by an American called Ellison. Tonight it was a mystery called The Last Detective. He liked the
curmudgeon in charge of the investigation, a British cop who eschewed computer
technology. You could not last long in this business these days without using a
computer, but he liked the way this cop was able to focus differently because
he had come from another era. Not one replete with cell phones and faxes and
all the gimmicks that the last twenty or so years had given to the world and to
police investigations. Not that Jack did not use all of that same gimmickry
himself, it was just that there had to be a place for human ingenuity. And, he
thought, also for the human spirit.
