The House on Creek Road

by Caron Todd

  “Just like normal, eh,” Will said. He stood, holding one end of his chain high above his head. “How’s that, Great-grandma?”

  Eleanor wiped icing sugar from her hands before coming to Will’s side. “That’s perfect. Let’s lay it out in the hallway so it doesn’t get tangled.”

  Liz glanced at the clock. They were all waiting for Tom and Jennifer to return with Eleanor’s tree. Tom had refused to tell anyone where he’d found it. All he would say was that it was the best tree ever, and growing in a spot so hard to reach the two younger children wouldn’t be able to manage the hike. Of course Will and Anne were indignant about that. Liz suspected Tom wanted to have a bit of an adventure with his oldest daughter, after all the weeks of conflict about the kittens. They had left a few hours ago, with sandwiches and reindeer-shaped shortbread and a big carafe of cocoa. From the length of time they were taking she thought Tom must be following their father’s tradition. His excursions for Christmas trees had always turned into a day in the woods, with a snow fort and a campfire.

  Pam lowered her voice and leaned close to Liz. “I’m glad you’re not mad at me anymore.”

  Liz glanced at Anne. “I wasn’t mad at you, Pam.”

  “You were. Not just at me.”

  Anne’s cranberry chain rested on the table. She would hear the whole story some day. Maybe it wouldn’t be a bad thing if she heard the apology.

  “We’ve been friends all our lives, Pam. When you and Tom got married, I was so happy that we’d be family, as well.” There was a wobble in Liz’s voice. She stopped to get control of it. “I’m sorry you got caught up in all the blame I threw around.”

  Pam’s eyes were damp. That was something that almost never happened. “I can’t believe we’ve never talked about this. Maybe you’d rather not now. Liz…I’ll always wish I’d tried to stop it. We could have just gone up there and got him, dragged him home. Tom and I talk about that sometimes.”

  Brian had been too old to go to the party at the gravel pit, and Emily was too young. Liz hadn’t ever thought, not even for a second, about how that night might have touched the others. “We all made mistakes, a whole slew of them.” She didn’t know what else to say.

  Will bounced in from the living room and slid all the way to the kitchen door. “They’re here! The tree’s here!”

  Tom and Jennifer came in red-faced and laughing, hair full of static from wearing wool hats. Anne and Will watched quietly, clearly aware they’d missed a big adventure. The tree was huge. It reached right up to the ceiling, but the spaces between its unpruned branches made it look almost lacy.

  Fortunately Martin arrived with Pat and Nell in time to help Tom settle the tree into its usual corner. The stand wasn’t up to the job on its own, so they tied the top of the tree to a hook screwed into a rafter. They needed a ladder to attach the lights and drape the cranberry chains from branch to branch.

  “The star will hide the hook and the rope,” Pat said. She looked through boxes until she found it, wrapped in layers of tissue paper. It was just cardboard, painted gold. Liz’s grandfather had made it when his children were small.

  Liz blinked back sudden tears. This was the last, the last of more than a hundred trees and a hundred Christmases.

  Pam’s arm came around her. “We’ll just have to remember, that’s all.”

  Remembering wasn’t enough. Memory distorted things. It made them better or worse or cockeyed. It made her ache. She wanted real things happening. She wanted to be part of them, not watching from a hazy distance.

  She couldn’t stay. It was a crazy idea. She’d have to sleep on it, and then sleep on it again. The ghosts were receding, though, and most of her memories were happy ones. It was just that the worst one was such a bad one.

  She wasn’t sure any more if she had run away from Three Creeks or to Vancouver. Whichever it was, it might have been the right thing to do at the time. She just had to figure out if it was the right thing now.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  ANGLE PARKING WAS STILL ALLOWED on the main street in Pine Point, and it was free. Liz pulled in between a minivan and a pickup truck, almost directly in front of the drugstore. Thinking of all the packages she hoped to be carrying by the time she finished shopping, she slipped her wallet into her coat pocket and her purse under the driver’s seat.

  As soon as she stepped out of the car, she heard singing. Not the words, just the tune. “Away in the Manger.” Down the road she could see a choir in front of the Town Hall. Must be the Brownies and Cubs and 4-H clubs. She used to wonder which of her uniforms to wear. Even during the coldest of winters all the children’s groups got together for carolling and then crowded into the bakery for free hot chocolate. She remembered stirring hers with a candy cane, the peppermint flavor melting in.

  She stood beside the car, half smiling, until the last notes of the song died away, then headed into Pommerue’s drugstore to pick up her grandmother’s prescription. When she turned to leave, she bumped into a man standing solidly in her way.

  “Oh!”

  “Sorry.” He was about her height, but broad, and he had a pleasant voice. Almost too pleasant, if there was such a thing. “My fault,” he said. He didn’t move, though. “Have we met? You look familiar.”

  “I don’t think so.” Sometimes people had seen her picture in the back of one of her books. She waited for him to move, and finally he did, with a sudden apology as if he hadn’t realized he was between her and the door.

  Now the carollers were singing “The Holly and the Ivy.” Liz went into the stationer’s beside the drugstore, and the carol faded. When she came out with a new set of charcoal pencils for herself and a box of watercolors for Jennifer, they’d moved on to “O Little Town of Bethlehem.” It was one of her favorites, so she strolled along the sidewalk and didn’t go into the toy store until they were done.

  By the time she reached the Town Hall she was loaded with packages. She spotted Jennifer and Will in the group and hoped the bags holding their gifts were hidden in the mound she carried. Jennifer saw her and stopped singing to whisper to the girl beside her. They both waved.

  In front of the choir, a hollow bell for donations hung on a pole that looked like a shepherd’s crook. A few words scrawled on the accompanying sign said, “Five turkeys still needed.” Rearranging her parcels, Liz managed to pull a twenty dollar bill from her pocket. She folded it twice so it would fit into the slot. As her hand came away it collided with someone else’s hand.

  It was the man from the drugstore. He smiled. “Small street.” He pushed his money into the bell. “Between us that’s three turkeys. Oh, what the heck.” He slipped some more bills from his wallet. “There. And a little extra for cranberry sauce.”

  “That’s very generous.”

  “I’m usually a miser. Must be the kids’ singing.” He looked at her with an interest she couldn’t interpret. “I don’t suppose you’d like to go into the bakery with me for coffee? I need to warm up.”

  Liz didn’t particularly want to have coffee with a strange man. This wasn’t Vancouver, though, as her grandmother often reminded her. It was Pine Point. And the bakery was a public place. “A quick cup would be nice,” she said, hoping she hadn’t hesitated long enough to make him uncomfortable. “I’m afraid I don’t have much time.”

  The bakery was busy, but they found a small table and hung their coats on the backs of their chairs. Because she’d watched him empty his wallet, she insisted on paying for their drinks. Every now and then while she waited at the self-serve counter she glanced his way, telling herself she wasn’t really keeping a distrustful eye on him. Each time she looked he was reading a flyer that had been stuck between the napkin dispenser and the salt and pepper shakers. He didn’t seem at all interested in making off with her Christmas shopping.

  When she finally got through the line, she set a tray with two coffee cups and a plate of cookies on their table. “Sorry for the wait.”

  “We’re not the only ones wantin
g to warm up today. Thank you—for the drink and for agreeing to have one with me. I don’t know many people around here yet.”

  His name was John Findlay, and he was new in town. He’d transferred from Winnipeg. Hardware, he said. His company wanted to start some rural branches. Envisioning bins of nails and bolts and other things she didn’t know how to fit into the conversation, she left it at that. She resisted an impulse to invite him to meet Jack. Just because they’d both moved to the area from the city didn’t mean they’d get along.

  After a few minutes, she decided not asking him was the right choice. Like Jack, he was reserved, but in a different way. As she found out more about Jack’s life with his uncle she realized he’d learned to keep to himself, not as a form of protection, but simply because he’d spent so much time alone. John Findlay was polite, even talkative, but he gave no hint what he was really thinking.

  When their coffee was done he gripped her hand warmly, her left hand as if they were Boy Scouts, and held it tightly while he told her how pleased he’d been to meet her. She was glad to get out onto the street, into the fresh air. Next time, Pine Point or not, she wouldn’t have coffee with a stranger.

  REID COULDN’T BELIEVE IT when Croker told him. He’d bumped into Elizabeth Robb on purpose, introduced himself using a fake name and had coffee with her. At the end of the meeting he’d given her one of those overly sincere two-armed handshakes and committed an amazingly dim-witted act. He’d applied a tiny listening device to her watch. His reasoning was that with Jack now having the old guy over twice a week to check for bugs, they’d never be able to listen in at his house. But if the woman carried a bug with her it was unlikely to be uncovered, and they just might hear something. Croker acknowledged they’d mostly hear her talking to her grandmother. Still, it was a chance. That Croker. Always an optimist.

  It was going to be Reid’s job to camp out nearby with a receiver. “The idea is, it won’t fall off her watch, she won’t notice it, and we can get close enough to receive the signal? It just doesn’t sound likely.”

  “It’s a state-of-the-art bug.”

  Reid couldn’t keep his tongue bitten. “That’ll be a big help later, when we’re all standing in a lineup behind glass. She can point you out. ‘That one, Officer. That’s the oddball who waylaid me just before the whole thing blew up in his face. Yes, the one with access to state-of-the-art surveillance devices.’”

  Croker didn’t take well to the criticism. “I don’t recall the part of our contract that deals with you questioning my judgment.”

  Reid had to grind his teeth together to keep from saying the rest of what was on his mind. “Fine.”

  “Fine?” Croker repeated, way too quietly.

  “You’re right. It’s your plan. You’re the only one who can judge the best course of action.” Croker looked disappointed at how thoroughly he’d backed off. Maybe he was just as frustrated as Reid was. Maybe he was itching for a good, cathartic fight. Itch away, buddy. Just find another scratching post.

  To get closer to the action Croker had checked into a Pine Point hotel, and no goons had been invited on the trip. Now he was keeping a low profile.

  LIZ TUCKED HER PARCELS into the bedroom closet and went downstairs to find her grandmother. Eleanor had been spending a lot of time by the tree, so Liz looked in the living room first. She was there, with the lamps turned off and the tree lights plugged in. Lines of tears ran down her face.

  “Grandma? What’s wrong?”

  Eleanor wiped a hand over her cheeks. “Nothing at all.”

  Somehow, Liz hadn’t expected that people cried any more after a certain age. Wasn’t it all wisdom and peace and calm detachment once every hair on your head was truly white? She wasn’t sure what to do.

  “It’s nothing,” Eleanor repeated. She managed a smile. “Vanity, maybe.”

  “There’s not a vain bone in your body.”

  “You don’t think so? I’ll tell you what’s bothering me, then, so you can change your mind. It’s that ridiculous photograph. Me, sixteen, a dress of curtains.”

  “I love that photo.”

  “Oh, so do I.” It was out of its box, on the table beside the sofa. Eleanor held it out to Liz. “Look at that skin. It’s not just the lack of wrinkles. It’s the fullness, the texture.”

  “My skin doesn’t look like that anymore, either, Grandma.”

  “It’s hardly fair, is it? I sometimes wonder where it went. All that time. The Depression. A World War. A man on the moon. People living in space now, for months at a time. But where did this girl go?” She tapped the photograph. “I’m being greedy, I suppose. You see what a hypocrite I am? After treating you to a fine lecture about responsibility and self-respect, I’m still hanging on with all my might to my house and my dining-room table.”

  “Of course you are!” Liz wrapped her arms around her grandma, carefully, because she felt so fragile. “I have a surprise.”

  “Well, it’s the season for surprises.”

  “I’ve decided to stay. To move back to Three Creeks.”

  Eleanor pulled away. “No, you haven’t.”

  “I have.”

  “You cannot give up your life in Vancouver to be my caretaker. I won’t allow it—”

  “And I wouldn’t dream of it. You don’t need a caretaker.”

  “Then it’s Jack?” Eleanor sounded hopeful.

  “It’s both of you. But it’s me, too. I need to come home. I’ll call Mrs. Andersen tomorrow. This house is the heart of the family, Grandma. This house, and you. And neither of you are going anywhere.”

  SEVERAL DAYS AFTER REID started listening in on Liz Robb’s life, Croker told him to come to his hotel room to give a report. He had a sunken-eyed look, as if sleep had been in short supply. Reid couldn’t keep his thoughts to himself, no matter how wise it would be to do so. He was the one moving from an old, stinky barn to a nice, cozy snowdrift and back again, receiver in hand. Croker had room service from morning to night.

  “I’ve heard paper rustling and tape tearing,” he said, feeling reckless. “I’ve heard five hundred cups of tea being poured, some rather tuneless carol humming, and I know what she’s giving the whole family for Christmas. She’s found just the right balance. Thoughtful, but not so much that anyone will feel beholden.”

  Croker just looked at him.

  “Jack hasn’t discussed the code with her,” Reid went on. “He hasn’t mentioned in passing where he keeps it. He hasn’t recited his algorithm on bended knee.”

  Croker rubbed his hand over his eyes, hard, pulling the skin. “This has to be over. You understand? It isn’t some game. You started this, you called me. Now we’re both beholden. And that’s not a good thing.”

  This was a different Croker. He was supposed to be a scary guy, not a scared guy. It made Reid’s stomach queasy. “I don’t know if it does us any good…he’s picking her and her grandmother up for some concert tonight. A Christmas concert at the school.”

  AN ARTIFICIAL TREE stood in the lobby, not quite straight in its stand, its branches disappearing under gold and silver garlands. All Liz could think of was an aging, tipsy vaudeville queen with too much rouge and too many feather boas.

  When she was a student at the old gym-less, stage-less Three Creeks Elementary, the Christmas concert was held at the community center. Each year a real tree had welcomed people at the door, and someone, she’d never learned who, had whisked by in a sleigh, metal runners gliding over the snow, bells jingled by a team of trotting Clydesdales. If they weren’t on stage performing, they could see the sleigh go past the windows. They’d never thought, “Oh, but it should be reindeer.” They’d just looked at each other, eyes full of unsayable things, enjoying the shivers that went through them, listening as the sound of the bells died away.

  The whole town still came, though, and the children, performing in skits they wrote themselves, were as sweet and excited as ever. When Anne crawled catlike around Jennifer’s feet, and young Will tripped over J
eremy’s hockey stick on Dave’s imaginary creek, Liz wished her parents had been able to come. It was odd to think that this was the first of many concerts she would attend. Next year she might even help with the backdrops. Maybe one day she’d sit here watching her own children hang stockings by a cardboard fireplace, or gather around a plastic doll lying in a bed of hay.

  As it had when she was six years old, in grade one, and thirteen in grade eight, and all the years in between, the concert ended with a medley of carols started on stage by the children and joined by the audience. They finished with “Silent Night.” Liz reached for Jack’s hand.

  “All right?” he whispered.

  A little blurry-eyed, she nodded. “I have something to tell you.”

  He raised his eyebrows in question.

  “Later.”

  “Good or bad?”

  “Good, I think.”

  The curtains closed on the stage full of children, and after a long standing ovation, the lights came on. Everyone crowded into the school’s lobby, finding coats and keys, and looking for ways around clusters of chatting people. As usual, the Robbs were meeting at Eleanor’s so the children could put their letters to Santa up the chimney. A line of headlights wound their way from town, up Creek Road. Liz sat beside Jack in his truck, wondering when she should tell him her news. There were two things she wanted to say, but each time she got close, she changed her mind. It was a big step. Two big steps. What if they were bigger then he intended?

  Jack braked, then turned into his driveway. They were stopping to pick up his cappuccino maker.

  “Will you come in?”

  “Just for a minute.” Not that he needed her help, but she had something of her own to do.

  Liz hung her coat on the rack and added her boots to the pile behind the door. As she straightened up, Jack’s arms came around her, ribbed wool against tweed. He brushed her hair away from her neck and tried to find skin to kiss.