When my eyes got used to the gloom, due to there being only two small windows high up on the side walls, I stepped farther inside, looking around. Our ancient family tractor was there, still connected to the rusty grass mower. In front of that, against the far wall, I could see the chopping block, the ax embedded in it, as if Marc had just left to take a barrow full of wood to the shed or to grab a quick sandwich back at the house.
Clark had told me he’d parked Marc’s black pickup on the far side. As I turned to finally look, it was difficult to see Marc’s name crudely painted on the fibreglass shell over the truck’s bed.
I found the car keys right where my brother said they’d be. I was surprised, however, to find the passenger-side door wasn’t locked. Upon examination, the whole vehicle was unlocked. Clark had told me differently.
A cold chill shot up my spine, and I took a good look around to make sure someone wasn’t hiding in the shadows. All seemed normal, but it was clear the pickup had been tampered with. In all likelihood, someone had been looking for something to steal, and certainly Marc had carried a lot of expensive tools in his truck, but when I lifted the back window and pulled down the tailgate, most of the familiar ones seemed to be there. Some of the bigger power tools weren’t, but I assumed they would have been in the house when it had caught fire. The last time we’d spoken, Marc had told me he still hadn’t installed the windows or the staircase.
I began my search in the cab.
The glove box was stuffed with an assortment of local maps, a number of receipts, and other junk you’d expect, all jumbled together. I laid everything out on the seat, carefully flattening crumpled bits of paper to see if they offered any clues.
I’d already done this once before.
Marc had never been what you would call neat, but he’d been surprisingly upset the time he caught me going through receipts on the truck’s seat to get them ready for tax season. Usually, he was very grateful when I helped organize his handyman business for him.
“Mar, I am a big boy. I know how to take care of myself. Please leave my things alone.”
“I just figured I could take them back to Toronto next week when I see my accountant.”
“I don’t feel like doing it now.”
“That’s why I’m doing it. You know damn well you’re not going to get around to this until the last moment and then you’ll be all frantic.”
Marc angrily began grabbing handfuls of paper and stuffing them back in while I stood there fuming. I’d only been trying to help. As the last handful disappeared inside, he slammed the glovebox shut and stomped off to the house.
It was one of the only arguments we ever had, and I suspected now that maybe he’d had something to hide.
Twenty minutes of sorting the mess in the glovebox yielded absolutely nothing of significance. I crawled around in the back of the truck and only came up with a few more crumpled receipts for my efforts. There had to be something, and this was the most logical place for it to be. Marc had always used his truck as his office.
Hands on hips, I sighed, realizing I was getting cold, but I didn’t want to just give up. I again returned to the cab and stared in. Then it struck me that I hadn’t looked under the seats.
Both of them pivoted forward by means of latches, perhaps so it would be easier to clean underneath. After skinning my knuckles releasing the one on the passenger side, I stomped around for a moment, shaking my hand and cursing, then leaned into the cab and slammed the seat forward. It hit the dash, bouncing back and locking again, so I was right back where I started. If I hadn’t been so tense, I probably would have laughed at myself.
Reaching under the seat again, this time the latch moved easier. I tipped the seat forward carefully, balancing it to rest against the dash, and leaned in to look underneath. There were six more crumpled, dirty receipts, all of them from Quebec, Montreal’s west end to be exact, and none of them for anything remotely connected to building supplies.
Taking them out into the sunlight for a better look, I decided to go back to my car and check them against some old agendas I’d brought along from Toronto. I opened the door and sat crosswise on the seat, reaching behind me for my purse. A few minutes later, I had the whole story: all the receipts were from times when I was out of town for extended periods.
What that Austrian reporter had sussed out came back to my mind. I knew very little about Marc’s past, other than he’d grown up in Trois-Rivières in eastern Quebec, moved with his family to Montreal when he was nine, had no siblings and that, like me, both his parents were dead.
“I never got along well with my relatives, Mar. Too judgmental and I cut off any contact with them after my father passed away. We never speak. End of story.”
Obviously, when I was safely out of the way, he was making the three-and-a-half-hour trip to Montreal and keeping it to himself. What was he doing there and who was he seeing? What else had he kept from me?
And what else was I going to find? I hadn’t even searched the log house yet.
That evening, back in Ottawa again, I convinced my sister to come and talk with me. What waited for her upon walking into my hotel room was a coffee table covered in neat stacks of various documents, photos, and receipts — the complete results of my day’s efforts.
First, though, she took both my hands in hers and said, “Marta, I am so sorry I was cross with you yesterday evening. It was out of line.”
“I know you meant well.”
“It’s just ... It’s just that I think you need to face up to a few harsh — What’s all that on the coffee table?”
It was hard not to smirk. “I drove to the farm today to have a look around.”
“You did? You’ve never been back since it happened, have you?”
“Not until today.”
“Was it because of what I said to you last night?”
“Not really. I was planning to go there anyway. I was just hoping you’d come along. You know, moral support and all that. Today hasn’t been a very comfortable one for me.”
Narissa sighed heavily. “And I went and got angry with you.”
I kissed her cheek. “Don’t worry about it.”
She picked up one of the receipts. “And these papers? You were looking for this stuff?” Narissa seemed completely baffled.
“In a nutshell, I went there in the hope I’d discover how much I didn’t know about my late husband.”
“And what did you find out?”
I picked up my coat from where I’d dumped it earlier over the back of a chair. “I’m starving. Let’s talk about all this over dinner. We can look at this stuff later if you want.”
We carefully avoided discussing anything of con-sequence on the drive to a nearby restaurant, but as we each enjoyed glasses of white wine while waiting for our appetizers, I began talking. Verbalizing it all brought the reality of Marc’s deception home to me. I should have felt angry, betrayed. But by the end, I was only incredibly numb.
“There’s someone back in Montreal,” I finally told Narissa. “I don’t know who it was, but he was visiting there three or four times a year — and she was female. I found receipts for toiletries and such. Girlie stuff.”
Narissa frowned. “An aunt, his mother, a sister? I only hope that he lied to you about his relatives because that would mean —”
“He had another woman,” I said, finishing her thought.
“Oh, Marta. I am so sorry. After all you’ve been through, this is just too much to bear.” She reached across the table and squeezed my hand. “Are you going to be all right?”
“Surprisingly, I’m better than I would have imagined. It never even crossed my mind that he might be two-timing me. At first this afternoon, I was puzzled, then I got angry, really angry, now I’m just feeling hurt and, well, more than a little bit of a fool. If it hadn’t been for that damned reporter in Paris, I probably would have gone scurrying back to Lili for more help and let the whole thing drop. Now....”
Narissa lo
oked more than a little uneasy. “Now what?”
The waitress interrupted my answer as she brought our food. I’m sure she didn’t recognize me in the slightest, but Gerhard had always drummed into my head that I must always be circumspect with personal conversations in public places.
Once she was out of earshot again, I leaned forward, not sure that I should even be saying out loud what I was thinking, based on my sister’s reaction the previous evening.
“I have to find out the truth about Marc, Narissa. I won’t be able to let this go until I do.”
As I expected, my sister tried a holding action. “Do you really think that’s wise? What good is it going to do? You’ll probably wind up making yourself even more miserable. Let it go. Walk away from this chapter of your life.”
I pursed my lips, a forkful of curry halfway to my mouth. “You’ve been talking to Lili.”
Narissa did have the good grace to look embarrassed. “Yes. How did you know?”
“She’s already used most of those phrases on me.” I smiled. “If you really want to deceive people, you have to at least change the phraseology.”
“You’re not angry?”
“I know you mean well, but you have to trust that I know what I’m doing. If nothing else, I must have closure. If anything is going to drive me crazy, it will be not knowing what’s really going on.”
“I don’t like your use of the present tense. Am I to take it you’re still clinging to the possibility that Marc is alive?”
I pushed my meal aside. Why eat it if I wasn’t paying any attention to what it tasted like? “I don’t like your use of the word ‘clinging.’ I am not clinging. I just want some answers. Wouldn’t you rather that I, through some outrageous fluke, actually saw Marc in Paris? The alternative is that I’m still suffering from mental problems. Is that what you want?”
Narissa looked down. “Stated like that, no.”
“Look, at the very least Marc played me for a fool. When I’m in Montreal, I’ll have the perfect opportunity to find out he still had a mom, or a sister, an aunt, or even a lover he didn’t want to tell me about. End of story. I walk away a little bit wiser. Maybe he is dead and what happened in Paris was a leftover from my depression. But what if I really did see him? What if he’s still alive? I have to know.”
I think the thunderbolt hit us both at the same instant. Narissa says that my eyes suddenly got big. I know hers did.
If Marc was still alive, whose meagre remains had been found in the ruin of the house?
Neither of us finished our meals, and we didn’t talk much more. Only when we got back into the car did Narissa speak about it.
“You’re going to Montreal for that master class tomorrow.”
“Yes, and I’m keeping the rental car to drive there.”
“You’re going to look around, aren’t you?”
“Yes. There was a 514 area code phone number scribbled on the back of one receipt. I’m going to see where that leads me. I also picked up some photos from the log house when I was searching there today. I may visit some of the stores where he bought things and I’ll need to show people what Marc looked like.”
“Look, Marta, if you’re determined to go through with this, maybe you should hire a professional.”
“And risk having word of what’s going on leak out? No thanks! My reputation is tarnished enough as it is.”
Narissa undid her seat belt and hugged me tightly. “Then promise me you’ll be very, very careful — and that you will keep in touch. I couldn’t bear it if something happened to you!”
“You make this sound like I’m going on a secret mission to Soviet Russia. Don’t worry. Like I said earlier, I’ll probably just wind up feeling like a fool.”
Next morning, I’d barely gotten through the door of the familiar old stone building on Sherbrooke Street West that housed the music school of McGill University when two very old friends pounced on me.
“Marta!” they shrieked like undergrads, instead of the serious and notable musicians they both were.
“Chloe! Lainey!” I shrieked as loudly as they had. “Oh my God! How good to see you both!”
Chloe pulled back after kissing my cheeks. “Our famous friend makes it to town so seldom, you didn’t think we’d let an opportunity like this slip by, did you?”
“Lainey I might expect to see since she’s head of the performance department in this joint, but did you get kicked out of the symphony, Chloe? Don’t you have a rehearsal or something?”
“Sure, but they’re working on some dreadful new string work we’re premiering tomorrow evening, and the other piece on the program is Beethoven’s 8th. I’m going to get a call on my cell as soon as they take a break. It’s only a few minutes over to Place des Arts by cab. I’ll make it.”
“You know, Chloe, one of these days you’re going to cut it too close,” Lainey warned.
“Relax, girlfriend, it hasn’t happened yet.”
“The day of reckoning approacheth,” I intoned right on cue, and then we all laughed at the old catchphrase we’d used far too often in the old days.
Chloe had always reminded me of a pixie: everything slightly on the small side, dark hair, delicate features, huge eyes, and extraordinarily pretty. Being barely over five feet allowed her to sneak up unawares on lumbering male percussionists and then crucify them with her awesome technical ability. She has the fastest hands I’ve ever seen. Lainey, on the other hand, was nearly my height, blonde, had long wavy hair, and had always been very slender. One of her boyfriends used to call her “Lanky Lainey.” It fit. I’d always been the odd one out in the looks department.
The three of us had entered the faculty in the same year. Three female percussionists with big personalities had been a bit overwhelming for the normally male instrumental bastion. Shunted off on our own by the older students, we’d quickly branded ourselves “Chicks with Sticks” and told everyone we weren’t percussionists, but “percussionistas.” My two friends had been deeply hurt when I’d jumped ship for the opera department. Years had passed, and Chloe Smith had nailed the timpani chair in the Montreal Symphony while Lainey Martin had formed a renowned all-female percussion group using our old name. A year earlier, tired of endless touring, she’d disbanded the group and taken the job at McGill. They were lucky to have her. She was a Québécoise — something I hadn’t known when we first met, because her English was so perfect and her name sounded Anglo. She was also incredibly competent and dedicated.
“Everyone in the school is so thrilled to have you here,” Lainey said as we made our way to the new wing of the building, a gift of a very generous benefactor who’d been honoured by having the entire school named after him: the Seymour Schulich School of Music.
Having attended the McGill Faculty of Music, I was finding it a bit difficult to adjust to the new moniker, but everyone else seemed comfortable with it.
“They’re already there and waiting for you,” Lainey continued. “That’s why we were in the lobby. You cut it pretty fine.”
“But then she always did,” Chloe added with a smile, “and never missed a cue.”
I shrugged. “Traffic. I thought leaving two and a half hours for the trip from Ottawa would be enough.”
The morning’s classes were being held in the new recital hall, named after the benefactor’s wife. The place looked about half full, and considering the hall seats two hundred, I was gratified there was such a turnout for little old me.
Since we were now five minutes late, a very quick round of introductions to the VIPs in the front row was carried out, and I felt sure I wouldn’t remember a single name after another five minutes had passed — except for one person: Julie Bouthot, my old voice teacher. I hugged her quickly in order to hide my shock at how much she’d aged since I’d last seen her six years ago.
She pulled away and held me at arm’s length. “You are looking better than ever, Marta,” she said. “I am so happy you have gotten over your recent troubles. And I am h
earing good things about your singing, very good things.”
“You know how the press can be,” I said, deflecting her compliment.
“In Paris, I certainly do. A good review there is worth a dozen in any other city.”
“Marta,” Lainey said in my ear, “we have to move along. The sessions are all quite full.”
“I’ll talk to you later,” I said squeezing Julie’s hands. They felt bony, and her whole body seemed shrunken. “Lunch today or tomorrow?”
“I may not be able to stay that long. I get tired quickly these days.”
“I’ll call you then. I’m not leaving town without having a good chat.”
Julie smiled. “I’d enjoy that.”
The head of the opera department, someone new since I’d been a student, introduced me to the audience and we got down to work.
It was strange in the extreme to be sitting on a high-backed chair on a stage in my old school, just as Gerhard had done so many years ago when a young upstart soprano in the audience stepped onstage.
I generally don’t do master classes. I’d wondered at the time I was asked if the dean might be headhunting for a new teacher, since many had gotten the idea that I’d retired from the stage.
The three-hour morning session flew by, and I was struck over and over by how dramatically the level of accomplishment at the school had risen since I’d attended — and it had been pretty high then.
Lunch was hosted by the dean, a very likeable man filled with great enthusiasm for his job, charming and with a very ready wit. His assistant, an equally likable blonde woman and obviously very competent, sat next to me, talking about all the changes at the old school since I’d last been through.
Masques and Murder — Death at the Opera 2-Book Bundle Page 7