The Borrowman Cell

by Ingrid Betz

  “I thought you’d forgotten.”

  “Forget dinner out when you’re paying? Not a chance. Nice?” Darlene tilted her head to show off her fancy French updo. “I got Trish to do it for me.”

  She kicked off her shoes and ran lightly up the stairs. Soon Peter could hear the radio turned up high and Darlene singing along with Diana Krall in a breathy voice while she flitted back and forth between the en-suite and the bedroom.

  “Will you be long?” he yelled, leaning against the newel post at the bottom of the bannisters. “Our reservation’s for six-thirty, don’t forget.”

  “Five minutes. Eight max,” she called back, appearing for an instant on the upstairs landing. Slim as the young girl he’d first met; the sight of her undressed never failed to turn him on. She was wearing a new bra and panty combo he’d never seen before: peach-coloured lace, and as far as he could tell, barely there. This augured well for the evening. Tonight he was going to formally present Darlene with tickets to the cruise she’d set her heart on. To make sure the occasion was suitably romantic, he’d invited her out to dinner downtown at Michael’s on the Thames. “A surprise,” was all he’d told her. He patted the pocket of his sports coat, assuring himself one more time that he’d transferred the envelope he picked up at the travel agent’s from one jacket to another. . Eight minutes max meant ten at least. Peter loosened his tie and headed into the dining room to pour himself a fifth of Scotland’s finest from the cut glass decanter on the sideboard. Returning to the hall, glass in hand, he sorted through the mail he’d dumped on the marquetry table when he got home. Stuck in among the flyers for pizza and carpet cleaning and invoices from hydro and Bell, was this month’s visa bill. His mood dimmed. The cruise would be on it for sure, he thought, taking out his penknife to slit open the envelope. And not just the cruise, but the various shore excursions Darlene had insisted were absolutely necessary for the enjoyment of the trip. The privilege of viewing crumbling nineteenth-century fortifications and the poverty of the local citizenry up close did not come cheap. Added to the total would be the flight to Miami and back—another rip-off, when you thought of the way the airlines crammed you into seats too small for a twelve year-old and left you gasping for food and drink. All this after frisking you like a convicted criminal before even allowing you on board.

  He drew out the wad of paper and unfolded it.

  Even though he’d known what the final figure would be, seeing it in print still came as a shock. His eyes darted to the minimum payment due. That he could just about manage, although it meant he’d be working to pay off the total for a year—heck, two years. Still, if the cruise saved his marriage, it would be worth it. With any luck, the North American bear bile industry would take off, in which case his money worries would be a thing of the past.

  Of course this was assuming he was able to convince Marigold to come back to work. Without her he’d be up the creek. He’d worked up the nerve to suggest the possibility to her earlier this week. She hadn’t completely shut the door on the idea.

  Arriving at the hospital for his daily visit, he’d found her propped up in a wheelchair, her hair freshly washed and curling free over her shoulders. She was wearing a brown velour track suit; a gift from the staff at the Humane Society. A hopeful development, he thought. At the nurse’s suggestion, he’d wheeled her into the sunroom at the end of the corridor. The afternoon surge of visitors had yet to materialize and they had the place to themselves. A few mismatched chairs stood idly about. Half a dozen plants, left behind by patients, clung gamely to life on the sill lining the rain-spotted window.

  Cautiously, he brought up the subject of her future. “Mrs. Patel is keeping the flat for you.”

  “So you said.” Marigold looked at him dubiously. “Do you think that’s a good idea? What if I can’t manage the rent? ”

  “Don’t worry your head about it. We’ll figure something out. Did I tell you, last time I stopped by it looked like she was feeding Big Red?” he said. Marigold rewarded him with a wan smile and he seized the moment.

  “It’s way too early yet, I realize. But could you ever see yourself coming back to work at Cormier Lab?”

  She took a long time to answer. Her face, bleached pale under its sprinkling of freckles, wore a pinched look he didn’t like to think about even now.

  “I don’t have a lot of options, do I?”

  “I wouldn’t say that,” he protested, driven for once to be honest. “Plenty of labs would be glad to get you. On top of which, businesses aren’t allowed to discriminate these days. Just because you … you’re…”

  “Say it, Peter. I’m a cripple in a wheelchair.”

  He flushed. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

  “It’s all right. That’s the way I see myself.”

  “Don’t, Mar.” Genuine anguish filled his throat. “Don’t put yourself down. I can’t stand it when you do.” They sat in silence, while she stared blinking at a rag-tag bunch of starlings lifting off from a dead treetop and he contemplated the dog-eared magazines on the coffee table. In the end he’d said, “Just think about it, is all I’m saying. If you don’t want to, I’ll understand. I’ve got an ad ready to put in the paper. After all, you’ll be getting a disability pension—it’s not as though you have to work. ”

  “Don’t I?” she said in a strained voice. “What would I do instead? Spend the rest of my life sitting and brooding in this contraption? This…” the palms of her hands moved compulsively over the arms of the chair as though she’d already been in it much too long, “this prison? That’s what it is, Peter. What it feels like. A prison.”

  “God, Mar.”

  Her tears came then, thick and fast; it was the first time he’d seen her cry since the accident. Helplessly, he rose from his seat and hovered, not knowing what to do, what to say. Wanting to wrap his arms around her, but hindered by the damned chair and some feeling he couldn’t identify.

  “And what was it all for? They probably had the taps back in before I even got to the hospital. So what did I accomplish, really? No, let me talk.” Marigold held up her hand. “I have to say it. What can any of us accomplish in the face of evil? Small fleeting deeds of kindness. Little temporary acts of mercy. That’s all we’re allowed.” She dashed the tears from her cheeks like a child. “Take me back to my room, please.” Peter, who had never understood what people meant when they said their hearts were breaking, thought in that moment he knew.

  He stuffed the visa bill back in the envelope. If Darlene saw it, she’d demand to know how the hell he could afford a sum like that. What was he planning to do, rob a bank? He hadn’t told her about his contract with the Chinese company; he didn’t trust her not to blab about it to one of her clients. Or to that Gary Whatshisname who’d been so pushy about the cruise. Or Chip, a new name at the car dealership that had been coming up with increasing frequency lately. Frowning, he pushed back the sleeve of his sports coat and checked his watch.

  Never mind ten minutes max, it was now twelve. He poured himself another finger of whiskey and wandered about with the glass in his hand, too full of nervous anticipation to sit down. Diana Krall was long gone and a CBC type was reading the six o’clock news. Further details were coming to light in the story reported earlier concerning the death of a Chinese man up near Algonquin Park. He could have sworn he heard the words “Mushroom Company” before the radio went abruptly silent. Darlene had switched it off. Peter put down his glass. He was starting to sweat, he could feel his shirt clinging damply to his back. He turned to the stairs. “Are you coming now, or what?”

  “What are you shouting for? I’m here.”

  And here she was indeed, descending the staircase in a glittery pink dress that gave her the slightly tarty look which he found so appealing. Skirt short to show off her young girl’s thighs, stiletto heels, shiny jewellery dangling at her ears, wrists, and ankles—and the expensively-scented woman in
side this flashy packaging belonged entirely to him. At least for tonight she did, while gratitude claimed her. Hopefully longer, if he played his cards right. He groaned softly. “You know I’m crazy about you, don’t you?”

  She reached up, pinched his cheek, and pulled the knot of his tie tight. Sharp as cat’s claws, each polished fingernail was the colour of ripe plums. “As long as you keep proving it, I’m happy. Are we going?”

  “Your chauffeur awaits.”

  She looped the silver chain of a miniscule pink clutch over one bare shoulder and watched him pick up his car keys from the hall table. Her eyes narrowed at the sight of the glass standing on the pizza flyer.

  “You couldn’t wait till we got to the restaurant?”

  “Just a splash. To get in the mood.”

  “Typical. You can’t enjoy yourself without being drunk.”

  He sensed his pleasure in the occasion slipping away. “Come on.” He locked the door behind them and ushered her down the steps to the car. The half-heard item on the news nagged at him. “I’m not drunk. I’m fine. For God’s sake, don’t start lecturing.”

  “Who’s lecturing? You always say I’m lecturing when I’m just pointing out the facts.”

  “Well, don’t.”

  “You sure I shouldn’t drive?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay. Don’t blame me if you get arrested and they take your license away.”

  Why did she always have to do that? Make him feel like a small boy caught in the wrong? He waited while she settled herself in the passenger seat and fastened her seat belt. Her skirt, which looked fine when she stood, he could see now was indecently short. Anything to attract a man, he thought bitterly. Every other man besides him.

  Let it go, he told himself. Pulling out of the driveway, he switched on the car radio, hunting for another station that brought news. The only news he could find was a local report on the upcoming municipal budget. How it was going to be a choice between potholes or a rise in property taxes.

  Darlene clicked her tongue and reached out to change the station. “I thought tonight was supposed to be special. Fun for a change.”

  “It is.”

  She was right. Although he wished she hadn’t switched to country music instead. All this stuff about cheating and hurting, it cut too close to the bone. At the corner of Baseline he spotted a variety store with a newspaper box outside. He’d just stop and pick up today’s London Free Press; the story might already be in there and in more detail than he’d get elsewhere.

  “What now?” said Darlene, as he drew up to the curb and threw off his seat belt. “I thought we were already late.”

  “Whose fault is that?” Peter shot back and slammed the door before she could answer.

  He had to wait for a lull in the traffic before he could sprint back across the street and get in the car. As he waited he scanned the front page. “Popular UWO Zoology Professor dies in hospital,” he read. Some fellow named Borrowman he’d never heard of. Then he saw it, what he’d been afraid of seeing, a late-breaking item datelined Algonquin Park: “Illegal Confinement of Black Bears Discovered in Abandoned Gold Mine.” The print flickered and he had to blink before he could read on. “Police investigating the shooting death of a Chinese scientist have uncovered a clandestine operation to harvest the bile of black bears. The capture of animals for such purpose is in direct contravention of the Ontario Fish and Wildlife Conservation Act….”

  He stood there for so long with the world falling apart around him—the Lab, his hold on his wife, the means to support Marigold, everything disintegrating and swirling down the black hole of a newly-opened drain—that Darlene lowered the window and yelled out at him.

  “Are you coming? Or you just going to keep standing there gawping into space like an idiot?”

  28.

  EARLIER THAT DAY THERE’D BEEN a thunderstorm. The London streets were washed clean for Borrowman’s funeral. He would have liked that, thought Paul St. Denis: an environmentalist knowing that nature had marked the occasion of his passing. He parked the SUV beside the O’Neil Funeral Home on William Street and picked his way across the rain-slick tarmac to the Chapel.

  The number of mourners in attendance surprised him. People from the university, he supposed, the public side of John’s life about which he knew very little. He found an empty seat at the back. He recognized John’s daughter, very smart in a belted black raincoat, glancing around cat-eyed as she walked up the aisle and pretending not to know him when he nodded. Arm in arm with her was a slender woman with pewter-coloured hair he’d never seen before—the wife who’d escaped to Toronto?

  St. Denis looked for Verena Vitek, in case the authorities had granted her a pass, but they had not. She’d phoned him up at the lake, from wherever it was she was being held for trial.

  “I didn’t think you’d hear it from Elaine.” Her Canadian father, she called Borrowman.

  “I told you it would end badly, little girl.”

  “Don’t say that. We accomplished what we set out to do,” she countered stubbornly. A cell was freedom in a way, she said. It left no room for baggage, only for self.

  A strange custom when you thought about it, consigning a human body to fire. He’d prefer being put in the earth himself. After the service he shook hands with the boys. Raymond and what was the name of the other one—Donny? They looked lost and uncertain. He could see they were making an effort to keep it together. Briefly he imagined his own son in their position. A few years to go yet, before it came to that. The older one asked if he’d come back for the reception.

  But St. Denis had made other plans. He’d looked up the Norman Avenue address in his customer file and typed it into his GPS. Would he be able to persuade her to accept an invitation to lunch, he wondered? He didn’t suppose a woman in a wheelchair got out much.

  If she even remembered him.

  He walked around to the back of the house and rang the bell. Marigold Green opened the door, her face a pale star swimming in the darkness of the room. After a moment she unhooked the chain and wheeled her chair forward just as the sun broke through the clouds. St. Denis was reminded of the first time he’d seen her, hair spilling out from under a sleeping bag and curling like copper flame over the weathered grey boards of the wharf.

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  My thanks go to Inanna Publications for taking a chance on The Borrowman Cell. And to my editor, Luciana Ricciutelli, for her sensitive, much-needed input, for which I am extremely grateful.

  Born in Montreal, Quebec, Ingrid Betz grew up in a pioneer setting, in the Laurentian Mountains. She was educated in Quebec and at an international boarding school in Germany. She has published five previous novels: The Mourning of the Dove; The Girl From Finer Trading; The ButterCup Dream; That Saturday Feeling; and Eve and Adam. A number of her short stories have won prizes. Ingrid Betz has two grown children and lives just outside London, Ontario with a cat named Henry, in a house surrounded by fields, woods and wildlife.