Lake on the Mountain: A Dan Sharp Mystery

by Jeffrey Round

  “No,” Dan said. “I didn’t.”

  Thom shot Ted a hard glance. “Just be careful you don’t end up in the lake again, all right, Teddy?”

  Ted laughed. “Never fear, I won’t do anything to embarrass you on your wedding weekend.”

  “Thank you.”

  Ted left. Thom waited a beat and said, “Excuse my brother’s atrocious behaviour.”

  “Not at all. He’s been quite amusing. What’s he done, by the way?”

  “To embarrass me?”

  “No.” Dan laughed. “I meant, what films has he made?”

  “Oh, that! He made a few little films — nothing important. He went to some prestigious film school in New York years ago, but he hasn’t really done anything. He starts things but never finishes them.” He paused and sipped his beer meditatively. “My brother’s a drug addict, in case you haven’t figured that out yet.”

  Which explained the buzz and the shades, Dan thought.

  “I suppose since I give him his money it’s up to me to make him stop. There’s nothing like a junkie with money to burn.” He looked off in the distance, a pained expression on his face. “My poor, poor mother — a drug addict and a homosexual for sons, and a philandering husband who ran off with another woman. Bad luck for her. She should have stayed a virgin.”

  Thom laughed softly and took a long pull on his beer. Dan’s gaze lingered on his profile, the perfectly formed chin and brow. Thom had rolled his sleeves up, exposing his rower’s biceps. It was impossible not to find this man attractive. Dan felt sweat gathering between his pectorals, the skin beneath his shirt. He lifted his beer and went out.

  A hazy sunset had accrued by the time Dan returned to the gathering by the lake. Over the mountain, the underbellies of clouds were flecked with pink. He looked up at the house framed against the dying light. He couldn’t recall ever having been in a house owned by the same family for a hundred years. All along the reach were similar places with intricate histories, family secrets — homes with the names and birthdates of forebears embedded in family bibles going back generations. Dan knew its legacy of Protestant industriousness: the women in long dresses with their hair in tidy buns as they worked in the kitchens, the men in black serge over stiff-collars, diligent clerks and tradesmen and day labourers, and the children, seen but not heard, and unsettled by looks that discouraged frivolity. All living life in a way that precluded any indulgence in pleasure, straining after the little that might be allowed them, and looking for salvation in all that was hard-hearted and plain of manner.

  It was this same Presbyterian industriousness that had carved a nation out of wood and stone and given thanks to God, grateful for the newfound flag of freedom as they set up gristmills and established schools and churches across the continent, spreading their long-suffering humanity like the walnuts and oranges left in children’s stockings at Christmastime.

  In some of the nearby houses, there would be remnants of that life still: the polished walnut tables and stiff-backed chairs so you wouldn’t forget yourself and get too comfy, portraits of men with dour glances and whiskers down to their chests echoing words voiced in stoic endurance, their wary glances and harsh whispers directed toward anything that constituted strangeness in their worlds. It was not a charmed existence, this life led by the followers of Knox and Calvin, but it had a certain magisterial appeal, the very essence of morality and probity, a life where men raised themselves up by hard work and right-minded adherence to the Word of God. Hallowed be thy name.

  No communal joyfulness or fervent lifting of voices of the evangelical Baptists, or the hand-wringing Puritanism of the Seventh Day Adventists with one eye on the Second Coming and the other on the ever-present wrath of God. Not the hand-clapping, tambourine-bashing, candle-burning witchery of the Catholics or the Old World, left-behind-for-the-Messiah-already-came-and-wentness, and the one-day-off-the-weekly-calendar Sabbath of misguided Jewry, but the Real Faith, the One True Faith of the new Promised Land. This was the dour, grey-skied heart of Protestant Reform. Johns Knox and Calvin, lead us forward out of sin.

  It was a life where good deeds were done quietly and acknowledged humbly, where praise was rare, and roast beef and Yorkshire pudding were served on the Lord’s Day. Where the axe and plough were put away as vests and topcoats were donned for Sunday dinners with abundant echoes of “We praise thee, O Lord,” followed by a murmured chorus of amens as silverware tinkled and dishes were passed with smiles of appreciation and drink was frowned on till the following evening. All this, followed by a brief respite of merry-making as “God Save the King” was sung in the more prominent homes or banged out on the parlour upright by someone’s elderly aunt, followed by fond memories of — how many decades was it now? So hard to recall! — when it had been “God Save the Queen.” May she forever rest in peace!

  Dan knew the breed well. His childhood had been a late-twentieth century blossoming of this Calvinist faith with its hard-hearted virtuousness. As he walked across the grass, the light sent up its final rays, the eaves returning to shadow as the day retreated. The house looked like a castle from some far-off shore, replete with memories of lochs and bairns and foreign sounding words like bonnie and didnae and wee nyaff, while the glittering descendants of those hard-hearted, well-intentioned settlers twirled and gyrated on the lawn.

  Now and then someone would stop briefly to listen to the hooting of a ferry making a tenuous link between distant worlds as twilight came on, settling over the Bay of Quinte and fading up on the mountain over a lake whose depths and deepest origins remained an unsolved mystery.

  Eleven

  Till Death Do Us Part

  The kitchen was transformed. The beer bottles had been cleared out and the room stood bathed in a perky yellow light, steeped in the aroma of fresh coffee. Daniella was reading when Dan walked in. She glanced up, perturbation written on her face.

  “Good morning,” he said.

  She looked out the window as if she hadn’t considered it. “Yes,” she said, after a moment. “It’s a beautiful day.”

  “Anyone else around yet?”

  “No, it’s just me. Sebastiano and Thom are still in bed. Together.”

  Dan wasn’t sure if the last word had been added for emphasis or clarity. He watched her gaze sulkily out the window, her dark eyes fixed on something that might have been over on the far shore or possibly much farther away.

  “What’s the order of events this afternoon?” Dan asked.

  She turned a gloomy gaze on him. “What does this mean?” she said abruptly.

  “The order of events,” Dan repeated. “What’s happening before the wedding?”

  “Ah!” She brightened. “We are having brunch at eleven then some of us are going to get ready to go on the boat. Nobody told you?” She looked at him with something like pity.

  “No,” he said. “Thank you for telling me.”

  Dan had just sat down with his coffee when Ted slipped into the room, still wearing his shades, his skin the colour of cold porridge. The giggling Jezebel followed, only slightly subdued from the night before.

  “Good morning all!” Ted called out.

  There was a bit of silliness at the coffee maker. Jezebel poured herself a cup and Ted attempted to withhold the sugar from her. She grabbed his wrist and wrested it from him, leaving a red mark on his arm. Their laughter sounded competitive. Dan found himself disliking them. If he’d been in public, he would have found another place to sit.

  “The happy couple not up yet?” Ted said, squinting at the brightness outside the window.

  “Not yet,” Daniella said with a forced smile as she tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.

  Ted snorted. “I’m not surprised. I think he and Sebastiano had a three-way with the best man last night.” Jezebel nudged him and he turned to look at Dan. “Oh, sorry — is he with you?” He grinned. “I was kidding, of course.”

  “You’re quite a kidder,” Dan said, exiting with his cup, their ghostly l
aughter following him.

  It was almost noon when Bill finally showed. Dan had never known him to sleep in. He’d missed brunch but declared in a jaunty voice that all he needed was coffee. Dan looked outside and saw Thom stepping into a car.

  “Shouldn’t you be going with Thom?”

  Bill shook his head. “Nothing so formal,” he said. “Thom and Sebastiano are driving down together.” They looked out in time to see Sebastiano in tails, his hair neatly coiffed, following Thom. “It’s not like it’s a real wedding, anyway.”

  Dan gave him a look.

  “You don’t know Thom,” Bill said defensively.

  “No, you’re right — I don’t.”

  A crowd of well-heeled men and women hovered by the dock, with a few children and at least one Pekinese. A man with a headset was attempting to direct them onto the boat, but no one seemed to be listening. They resisted his directives like teenagers set on being difficult, yet without knowing what they were rebelling against.

  Bill introduced Dan to a thin young man with shoulder length hair standing with a grey-haired older man who was his partner. The younger man, a dentist, seemed particularly giddy. He wore a mock turtleneck with a chain of glittering stones on his chest.

  “Another one! Can you believe it? It’s like the whole world’s getting married! I keep swearing to myself, no more gay weddings! But whenever they ask me, I say yes. I always say yes!” he shrieked, his actions seemingly inexplicable even to himself. He turned to the older man. “Why do you let me, Freddy? Why do you always let me say yes?”

  Freddy’s eyes twinkled, as though he found his partner’s antics infinitely amusing. “But you wouldn’t say yes if you didn’t want to, Derek. I know you. You just wouldn’t do it!”

  Bill turned to Dan and said, sotto voce, “My god! He’s daring. I can’t believe he wore the diamonds!”

  Dan turned to take in the garish necklace. “Are they real?”

  Bill nodded. “You’re staring at half a million dollars.”

  The hilarity seemed to be spreading as all around them people began to say giddy things that seemed to imply their attendance was largely a matter of whim. “I can’t believe I’m even here,” said a matronly woman in furs, without stopping to explain why she found it hard to believe in her physical proximity at that moment.

  The man with the headset went by, his face set to concern. “Please board the ship everybody. The ship is sailing in ten minutes. We need everyone on board.”

  Freddy seemed to find this particularly amusing and broke into giggles. It was only when a blast went off from the boat that the crowd relented, turning in their fabulous finery of furs and diamonds and high-heels like a strange species boarding an ark.

  Bill caught Dan’s eye. “Shall we?”

  Dan nodded and felt Bill clutch his arm. For a moment, he thought of Ted’s insinuations at breakfast. Then he dismissed them, filled with a sudden glow at being Bill’s chosen partner in a very public ceremony.

  “You look terrific,” Dan said.

  Bill had transformed by putting on a tuxedo. What had seemed dowdy in street clothes had taken on a regal tone. He had broader shoulders and suddenly the paunch was gone. The prince replacing the frog.

  “Thank you, kind sir. You’re pretty damn hot yourself.”

  On board, Bill excused himself to perform his obligations as best man. “Thom needs me,” he said, giving Dan a kiss before going off to attend his duties.

  Dan looked around. On one side of the room was the same fashionable crowd he might see at Woody’s on a Saturday night. Well-dressed, attractive, they included an assemblage of real estate agents whose trendy clothes, pricey haircuts, and bone-white smiles proclaimed them one step away from being famous, and who seemed to be enjoying the lifestyle as though they already were. Off in another corner, Dan recognized a couple of design-show hosts noted for their popular lifestyle series. One had a face and the other a body, Donny said. If you found a third with a brain and put them together, they might almost make a whole person. Dan wondered if the stories about their sex lives were true. Where could they possibly have found the time?

  On the opposite side of the room huddled the straights, the divide between the two groups unimpeachable except for one attractive man in a camel-hair coat who seemed to be observing it all with detached amusement. His expression, coupled with his position between both worlds, defied any effort to place him within a geo-sexual context.

  The women were either severe or deferential. Many had never been lookers but they had the money and nerve to dress as though they were, with pushed up bosoms and low cut fronts. They made it clear they traded in social status and husbands almost interchangeably, leaving the financial concerns to the men. Of the men, the younger ones invariably wore flashy ties and smart suits, while the older ones seemed largely the type who drank whiskey and soda and bought out competitors with a nod of the head.

  Occasionally, an oblivious heterosexual male would find himself chatting with someone on the other side, only to realize that an all-male gathering here meant something quite different than at the club. Inevitably, he’d try to make a good show of it, chat a little longer before disengaging himself to rejoin his own side with a nervous backward glance and a forced laugh, so his friends and associates would know he’d been mistaken and was now coming back to the fold. No matter how tolerant and open-minded you were, in a male dominated world where win-or-lose was written over everything, winners still didn’t associate with queers.

  Dan was unsure where he’d stand should he be forced to choose. Perhaps with the ambiguous presence in camel-hair in the middle of the room. A large, sweaty man came up and saved him the bother of having to decide.

  “What school did you go to?” the man asked, wiping his brow with a napkin.

  “Sudbury High.”

  “Sudbury what?” the man exclaimed with a shocked look. “Is that a private school?”

  “No,” Dan said.

  “I thought everybody here went to a private school!” He eyed Dan as though he might be an impostor. “Did you have a choice?”

  Dan shook his head. “No.”

  The man looked around, sucked the ice at the bottom of his glass and said, “Neither did I. I never went to private school.” He made it sound like the greatest loss he’d ever had to endure.

  “We’re probably better off for it,” Dan said.

  “Oh, no!” the man exclaimed. “Don’t fool yourself.” He whirled abruptly and extended an arm that took in the entire room. “These are the people who run our country — or who will be running our country in a few years. Look at them.” Dan obliged the man by turning to look at the crowd. “Amazing, isn’t it?”

  Dan wasn’t sure what he found so amazing. “Politicians are anything but amazing when you get down to it….”

  “I’m not talking about politics!” the man exclaimed. “I’m talking about who really runs things — the entrepreneurs, the business class. This is it, gathered in this room.” He shook his head. “Just imagine! If this boat sank, the country would lose half of its ruling elite.”

  “Do you think they’d be missed?” Dan said.

  The man thought about this. “Maybe not,” he conceded.

  A band started up in another room. An assured voice crooned a line from a forties tune. Trevor caught Dan’s eye and came over. Dan introduced him to the other man, who said a few words before leaving to join the ranks on the far side of the room.

  “I guess he thought I was straight,” Dan said with a bemused grin. “How’s it going? The social register keeping you busy?”

  Trevor laughed. “You know, there are some things that are a given in life. I know, for instance, that I’ll never be half as rich as most of the people in this room, just as I know I could never dedicate myself to the kind of work that would make me that wealthy. And just as I also know,” he glanced toward the room where the music came from, “that I will never like Michael Bublé.”

  “You’re n
ot a jazz fan?”

  “Au contraire,” Trevor said. “I am a jazz fan. But let’s not slag the local talent — it’s beneath us. Besides,” he took a good look around, “there are far more deserving targets right here in the room. Look at these people. Most of them have suits instead of personalities.”

  Bill suddenly reappeared clutching a glass. He looked around with a frown and headed toward Dan. He saw Trevor and paused.

  “Here comes the boyfriend,” Trevor said with a smile. “I’m going to mingle with the lions and tigers. Wish me luck.”

  Bill nodded curtly at Trevor as he left. “Am I interrupting something?”

  “Not at all. Finished your best man duties already?” Dan asked.

  Bill shook his head impatiently. “Apparently I wasn’t needed.”

  “Oh?”

  “I gather I was keeping Thom from getting in one last fuck before the wedding.” He took a gulp of his drink and looked around the gathering. “Quite the dog and pony show, isn’t it?”

  “Who are all the suits?” Dan asked, glancing across the room.

  “Business associates. Thom’s mother made them come.” Bill smiled grimly, his voice louder than necessary. “Interesting woman, Lucille Killingworth. It seems money can buy quite a bit of loyalty in her world. It can even make your colleagues attend the wedding of your gay son and his Latin Lothario.”

  “You’re getting drunk,” Dan said, trying to keep out a note of disapproval.

  Bill looked at the glass in his hand. “Not drunk enough,” he said, tipping the glass back to empty it. He reached out and grabbed Dan’s crotch. “I want you to fuck me silly tonight.”

  A few feet over, an older couple turned their heads then quickly looked away.

  Bill tinkled the ice in his glass, oblivious to the attention he was getting. “I can’t believe he’s marrying that mail-order gigolo.” His voice carried across the room.