The Best King of All
Toronto! Pantelli, Talbot and I craned out the window to see the CN Tower. At one thousand, eight hundred and fifteen feet high, the Tower is the world’s tallest freestanding structure.
We agreed that the Tower resembled a long ballpoint pen with a hula hoop about two-thirds of the way up. Part of the hoop was actually the observation deck, with a floor made of glass. Awesome. We all intended to take barf bags up.
Laugh-cough from the other end of the cell phone I was holding. I’d been describing the tower to Ardle, who’d recovered enough to sit up in his hospital bed.
“Don’t talk about barfin’, Miss Carnegie Hall,” he begged. “I bin through enough o’ that after unsteady Freddy pancaked me with his Buick. Hey, you say the stamp is safe?”
“It was safe all along. When Freddy yelled at me to hand it over, I faked a cough and stuck it under my tongue.”
“Whoa, Nellie! Mike ’ud be proud o’ ya. I’m proud o’ ya. Heck, you’d be a great con artist, Miss Carnegie Hall. Why, you an’ I could—”
“Never mind, Ardle,” I said disapprovingly. What was it with people trying to recruit me to the underworld all of a sudden? “Besides, Jonathan says he has a job waiting for you—as a security guard. On the theory that it takes a thief to catch a thief, you’d be ideal at knowing when valuables, in a museum, say, are in danger.”
“A museum?” echoed Ardle, horrified. “What a rotten way fer a guy to become honest. Though, I gotta say, it can’t be as tough as cuttin’ out smokes has bin.”
“I’m not sympathizing with you about that,” I said firmly. “It’s time you stopped resembling Pigpen.”
To someone beside him, Ardle protested, “Aw, lady, not orange juice…I tell ya, this healthy, moral livin’ ’ull be the end o’ old Ardle.”
Mother came on. Let’s just say her voice was not fraught with good humor. “Dinah, before I list the many, many things you’ve done to deserve a lifetime’s grounding, I want to know who Calvin Blimburg is.”
“Calvin—? He phoned you?” I clapped my hand to my head. I must’ve given the mysterious Calvin our home number instead of Madge’s cell one.
“Yes, this Mr. Blimburg is a counselor with Alcoholics Anonymous. He helps people get rid of their addiction problem. He said you left a strange, threatening message on his voice mail.”
“Oh, wow. Oh, wow.” I shut my eyes and felt tears oozing out from between the lids. Dad had been phoning AA. He’d been seeking help.
Mother wailed, “Dinah, I was so embarrassed! I can’t have you phoning strangers and—”
“Mother,” I gulped, “I love you so much. I have something really nice to tell you about Dad, but I want to wait till I see you. Will that be okay?”
“Something nice about—Mike?” Mother’s voice became young and warm, the way it must’ve sounded when she and Dad sat in their Commercial Drive café, talking about the possibilities ahead of them. “Well…all right. Yes, that’ll be okay.”
The Gold-and-Blue slid into the city. Talbot told me more about Edward the Eighth and what happened after he quit his throne.
I was still thinking about this when, on exiting the train, I collided with Madge.
“Ow, Dinah!”
On the Union Station platform, porters jostled to help Madge down.
“Here, allow me, miss!”
“No, allow me—to give you a hand and my life’s devotion.”
At the next set of train doors down from us, a beaming, head-bandaged Jonathan Hector appeared, with a small steel briefcase chained to his wrist. Inside: the King Edward the Eighth stamp.
Three armed guards, with Hector The Protector Insurance in bold red letters on the backs of their white uniforms, were waiting at the bottom of the stairs for Jonathan.
I waved at him. “I told Ardle about the security guard job,” I called. “He was—well, mildly enthusiastic.”
“There might be a job for you too, Dinah. A singing role in Cavaliers, Roundheads and Werner the Talking Dog. I’ll speak to the director about it.”
“But didn’t you say they’re about to start filming?” I yelled back. “It might be a little late to—”
“Not when you consider that I’m giving them a special discount on their insurance.” Jonathan was winking. Then he stepped down to join the guards, and they moved off in the crowd.
I prodded Madge in the back. “There are fire regulations about blocking exits.” Suitcase-laden people were crowding up behind me, including Talbot with his guitar and Pantelli with his toilet-paper box full of leaf samples.
With a haughty sniff, Madge permitted herself to be helped down to the platform. I peered round to see why she’d hesitated for so long.
Jack!
He stood glaring at her. She was glaring back. Ah, I thought. A showdown over the other woman, Veronica LaFlamme.
The way he was glaring at Madge, though. It was a mixture of exasperation—and utter adoration. A tiny doubt entered my mind. Could I have been wrong? But no, those e-mails spoke for themselves.
Jack shouted at Madge, “What’s the idea, telling me our engagement’s off? Since I got your phone message, I haven’t been able to work, eat or sleep. I changed my flight to a red-eye just so I could arrive early at this station and pace. In fact, I’m ready to start pulling pillars down with my bare hands just so I can make my pacing path clearer.”
“What a disturbed young man,” a woman murmured behind me. “It wasn’t bad enough that barf hurled through my window at me early this morning, just when I was trying to snap a picture of blue corn!” She hurried past Jack.
Madge replied to Jack with cold dignity, “I tried to reach you, Jack. But you were always unavailable. With that LaFlamme woman, I suppose.”
Jack looked bewildered. “I was deep in a forest, out of e-mail range, with a conservationist group. We were trying to track down a possible spotted owl sighting. The one time you got through to me by cell, the connection broke.”
Then Jack paused, rewinding her comments. “The ‘LaFlamme woman’? Veronica LaFlamme?”
“I see you’ve conveniently remembered,” Madge returned. Her eyes brightened with tears. So he wasn’t even denying it! On Madge’s behalf, I scowled at him.
Talbot and Pantelli waited on either side of me. I could see Talbot was uncomfortable being in on a private quarrel. I didn’t have to glance at Pantelli to know his reaction: delight. He came from a big family whose members were always arguing—and enjoying themselves hugely while at it.
Pantelli now inquired cheerfully of Madge and Jack, “You two breaking up?” Setting down his suitcase and leaf-sample box, he began shot-putting peanuts into his mouth.
Jack stepped closer to Madge and proceeded to glare eyeball-to-eyeball at her. “Do you know who Veronica LaFlamme is, Madge? Do you? Here.” And out of his back jeans pocket he withdrew a folded-up newspaper. “I was planning to ask you about this civilly, over lunch, away from,” he cast a foul glance at Pantelli, “the small-fry set.”
He unfolded the newspaper, the previous day’s Vancouver Sun. A photo of Jack was on the front; beside him beamed a short, fat, middle-aged woman with corkscrew curls. Underneath, the headline Head of Environmental Party Asks Young Activist to Run for City Council in November Elections.
My tiny doubt ballooned to whale size. “Uh-oh,” I murmured to Talbot and Pantelli.
“That’s Veronica LaFlamme?” Madge squeaked. “And those secret meetings you were having with her—the news that you were going to break to me—”
Jack placed his hands on her shoulders and regarded her solemnly. “I wouldn’t agree to run for council unless it was okay with you, Madge. It’ll make our lives even busier at a time when we’re still in school and about to get married, besides.”
Tears were spilling from Madge’s blue eyes—but tears of happiness now. “Oh, Jack—I think you’d be a fabulous councilor, the best Vancouver could possibly have! I don’t know how I could have thought that yo
u would…It’s just been so stressful, what with Mother and your sister telling me I had to do this and that for our wedding, cramming in more and more guests—more tofu…”
Jack tipped her chin up. “Nobody is going to tell anybody anything, because you are going to marry me. Nobody else is going to be involved. No out-of-control wedding, no twentieth cousins twice-removed from Tuktoyaktuk.”
“But—”
“As soon as we get back to Vancouver, Madge.”
And there, in Union Station, he kissed her. For a lo-o-o-n-n-n-g time.
Talbot, Pantelli and I edged away. “That’s some smooch,” Pantelli observed. “Man, I could have finished the Young Dendrologist’s Encyclopedia by now.”
Talbot took me by the elbow and swung me round. “You better think about what happens when Madge and Jack, having turned sixty-five, finally end their smooch,” he advised, not unkindly. “They may start pondering just how this LaFlamme mix-up happened.”
Pantelli nodded, his eyes gleaming. “Yeah, Di. Bustin’ into Jack’s e-mail,” he said and drew a finger across his throat.
But I wasn’t feeling too worried. True, Madge and Jack would be furious. They’d get over it, though. That was the thing about having loved ones. About belonging. You knew, no matter what, that they accepted you.
I checked on the smoochers. Note that I said I wasn’t feeling too worried. Slightly concerned, yes.
They were still smooching. Phew! Off to one side, Toronto police officers were escorting Mrs. Chewbley off the train. In spite of being handcuffed, she nevertheless managed to transfer two chocolate creams from her pocket up to her mouth. Cheeks bulging, Mrs. Chewbley raised her handcuffed wrists and flapped her hands at me in a wave. And shrugged. So ends my chase for the king, the piano teacher seemed to be saying.
I can’t say I liked Mrs. Chewbley, not with all the dangerous cups of tea she’d gone around plying people with. But at least, as a villain, she was a good sport.
I had a feeling her son wasn’t going to be. Head Conductor Wiggins had heard from the police about Freddy. Two broken legs, a broken arm and a fractured hip, and Freddy had still been crawling into the cornfield after the envelope. In the prison ambulance, he’d fumed about “that little pipsqueak” and said some other words Mr. Wiggins refused to tell me.
I squinted. Past Mrs. Chewbley and the police, Ryan and his mom were heading out of the station. “Ryan!” I shouted—and paused. I wanted to yell something encouraging, but what? He had such challenges ahead of him that any of the usual messages—good on ya; all the best, huh?—I could fling at him would sound silly. Besides, he was too smart a kid for those.
Ryan couldn’t tell where I was shouting from. He glanced left, right and even up.
“End-of-smooch alert,” Talbot advised.
Jack and Madge were marching toward me with quickening steps. They kept glancing at each other, then at me, and each time their faces grew more thunderous. I thought I knew how Charles the Second had felt, waiting in that tree for the Roundheads.
Then my mind went to a different king. All at once I had an idea for what to tell Ryan.
“I’m going to make one of my trademark speedy exits,” I informed Talbot and Pantelli.
“But I was looking forward to this,” Pantelli objected.
Talbot laughed. “Don’t crash into anything,” he told me.
I zoomed past the station’s limestone columns to catch up to Ryan and his mom. I had to keep looking up for Ryan’s mother because most of the people around me were taller than I was. (Like, sigh, what else was new?)
“Oh, that girl’s admiring the vaulted ceiling,” a woman remarked, riffling through her guidebook. “Soft gold tiles—so majestic! Edward the Eighth officially opened it. ‘You build your stations like we build our cathedrals,’ he remarked. Such a witty king. Always knew the right thing to say…Ooo, here’s a photo of him. So handsome. So graceful.”
Not that king, I thought. Not that one.
Distracted by the woman, I forgot Talbot’s warning and collided with someone. The someone lost his footing momentarily, then bounced back.
“Beanstalk!” I exclaimed as the assistant head conductor curved over me in a disapproving C. “Sorry, I mean Assistant Head Conductor, er—”
“Head conductor is what you mean,” Beanstalk smirked, straightening himself. “With Mr. Wiggins’s abrupt retirement, I’ve been promoted. And though Gold-and-Blue policy is to value all passengers highly, I must say, Miss Galloway, that I am not sorry to see the last of you.” He wagged a long finger at me. “One disturbance after another! I—”
“But we might see each other again,” I said cheerfully. “Madge, Pantelli, Talbot and I are heading back to Vancouver by train too.”
Beanstalk’s forefinger flopped. His already naturally pale face blanched even more.
“Y’know,” I mused, starting to walk away, “up to now I’ve always had problems with authority figures like you, Beanstalk. Maybe this time will be different. I’m going to make a real effort.”
There was some sort of mangled cry behind me, but I couldn’t pay attention to it. Ryan and his mom were leaving the station; Mrs. Zanatta was waving down a cab…
“Now what’s so life-and-death, Dinah?” Mrs. Zanatta asked, trying not to smile. “Or maybe I should say, what isn’t life-and-death with you?”
We were at the curb outside the station, on Front Street West. Tall office buildings jutted up around us like asparagus spears, blotting out the sky. Cars stuck in jams honked. Masses of anxious-faced people wedged together in packs hurried by on the sidewalk. Toronto seemed at once grayer than Vancouver and more exciting.
Ryan was about to hurry on to the rest of his life too—and he had as much right to the feeling of belonging as I did, or anyone else.
His new doctor would help. But nothing would be easy. It never was, for anyone. Sometimes you got through the rough parts by singing and sometimes by just being too dang stubborn to give in to them. Or sometimes you didn’t get through them and drank yourself silly and wrapped your car around a tree. And that was it. Kaput.
I had a story for Ryan that might make a difference to him. You never knew.
I sat down on the sidewalk. I was still wondering how to word what I had to say. It was occurring to me, for one thing, that Jonathan was wrong about shadows. You shouldn’t try to banish the past, because it was part of you. My dad, his dying. Like it or not, I wouldn’t be Dinah Galloway without those.
And I wouldn’t want to be. When I sang, I was singing into the shadows as well as everywhere else. Maybe I’d tell Jonathan this one day.
But with Ryan I had to keep it simple.
Sing? Ryan mouthed.
“Not this time. Another time, though. Soon,” I promised and laced my fingers through his. “Remember how Talbot told us that everyone was searching for a stamp? That on this stamp was a glamorous king, Edward the Eighth, who was smooth and clever?”
Ryan nodded.
“Right on. Well, Edward couldn’t have cared too much about keeping his crown because he gave it up. And everyone was sorry. It was kind of like having a fun TV personality go into retirement.”
I shoved my glasses up my nose, the better to gaze firmly through them at Ryan. This next part was the important one.
“So then Edward’s younger brother George became king. George the Sixth. A lot of people thought George would be an embarrassment because he was shy and awkward, and,” I paused for emphasis, “he stuttered.”
Ryan’s mouth formed a long O.
“Yup,” I said. “A king who stuttered. And you know what? He was the best king ever. In spite of his stutter, he forced himself to give wonderful, inspiring speeches on the radio that got his country through the horrible Second World War. George the Sixth was courageous too. He and his family stayed on in London all the time the enemy was dropping bombs on the city. He refused to leave.
“Maybe George the Sixth wasn’t smooth-talking,” I finished. “But smoo
th doesn’t count for a lot when things go wrong. It’s what’s here,” I pounded my heart, “that’s important.”
Ryan’s O was lake-sized now. “A st-stutterer?” he blurted. Then the O spread into a wide smile. He exclaimed, without stuttering at all, “That’s Dinah-mite!”
Mrs. Zanatta was mopping at her eyes with a tissue. These grown-ups! To distract Ryan, our architect-in-the-making, from her silliness, I pointed up to the CN Tower. Even past these tall, spear-like buildings you could see it.
“Wow,” Ryan said of the Tower, which stretched on and on, like the possibilities everyone should have.
Other books in the Dinah Galloway series
The Spy in the Alley
The Man in the Moonstone
The Mask on the Cruise Ship
The Summer of the Spotted Owl
Visit www.orcabook.com for more information
on these books.
Shadows on the Train Page 14