by Gail Bowen
“Big Sky Inn,” a male voice said, “Kelly speaking. How may I help you?”
“I’d like to speak to Maryse Bergman, please. She’s an employee.”
“Maryse is no longer with us.”
“As of when?”
“As of this morning. She walked off in the middle of her shift without a word of explanation to anybody.”
“Do you have a home number for her?”
“It’s against company policy to give out the phone numbers of employees.”
“But she’s no longer an employee.”
He laughed. “You’ve got me there, ma’am. Hold on.”
He gave me the number, but when I dialled, all I got was Maryse’s voice mail telling me that she’d been forced to relocate and her friends would hear from her soon.
Too restless to work, I headed for the cafe in the Lab Building where Ann Vogel and her group hung out. It was empty, and the metal accordion screens had been pulled across the serving area. It seemed everyone but I had left for the weekend. I’d started back to my office when I heard someone call my name. I turned and saw Kristy Stevenson, the archivist who had sung at the vigil for Ariel.
“Have you got a few minutes?” she asked. She was wearing a lavender-blue silk blouse; the colour matched her eyes, but her oval face was pale and miserable. “I hate this Friends of Red Riding Hood stuff,” she said. “I keep thinking of the lines from that song by Beowulf’s Daughters that you used in your talk.”
“Darkness is our womb and destination, Light, a heartbeat glory, gone too soon,” I said.
“Well, no one at this march has any interest in turning back darkness. Ann Vogel and her gang are getting ready in the library quadrangle, and it makes me sick.” Kristy bit her lip in frustration. “Joanne, I’ve loved libraries since I was a little kid. That’s why I chose to be an archivist, making certain that all the pieces of the puzzle were there for anyone who was seeking answers.”
“People like Ann Vogel don’t need archives,” I said. “They don’t even need libraries. They already have the answers.”
Kristy’s eyes flashed with anger. “You bet they do. Simplistic ones. Women who don’t share their views are bad; books that don’t reflect their philosophy are bad; art that doesn’t mirror their reality is bad; literature that doesn’t tell their story is bad. Why would they need a library?”
We had reached the glass doors that opened onto the quad. Outside, perhaps a dozen women were working on placards: attaching wooden pickets to poster-board, filling the blank faces of the signs with words or with painted sunflowers or ferocious cartoon wolves. The finished placards were propped against a low wall to dry, and their messages were designed to foment: NEVER FORGET; WOLVES BELONG IN CAGES; ARIEL WARREN – THE BEST AND BRIGHTEST; REAL MEN DON’T KILL; REVENGE THE RED RIDING HOODS; MURDERERS DESERVE WHAT THEY GET.
“There seems to be a certain lack of focus,” Kristy said dryly.
“No lack of firepower, though,” I said. “I’m going to go out and ask them to tone down the rhetoric.”
Ann Vogel was on her knees stapling rectangles of poster-board back to back. Despite her falling-out with Solange, Ann appeared to be sticking to the combat look: head-to-toe black, and hennaed hair shirred to a buzz cut. When she recognized me, she stood and waved her staple gun in mock menace. “You’re not wanted here,” she said.
“That makes us even, because I don’t want to be here,” I said. “So I’ll just ask one quick question. What if you’re wrong about Charlie, too?”
Ann narrowed her eyes. “What else was I wrong about?”
“Kevin Coyle,” I said. “I talked to Tom Bradley, he’s the head of…”
“I know who Tom Bradley is,” Ann snapped.
“Good. So you’ll know that, while the idea of a trustworthy man may be an oxymoron to you, it’s not to a lot of other people. When Tom says that Ben Jesse believed the charges Maryse Bergman made against Kevin were false, I believe him. Other people will, too.”
Ann tilted her chin defiantly. “Kevin Coyle deserved what he got,” she said. “He’s unfair to women. He marks us too hard. He’s dismissive of the answers we give in class.”
“Oh, for God’s sake, Ann. Kevin’s unfair to everybody,” I said. “He marks everybody hard, and he’s dismissive of everybody. That doesn’t make it right, but that’s the truth. He’s an anachronism. When I was an undergraduate, the universities were full of profs like that.”
“We don’t have to take that kind of crap from men any more.”
“I know,” I said, “and amen to that. But I still don’t get it. Why did you target Kevin? He’s rude, he’s abrupt, he’s probably misanthropic. But he’s not a misogynist. Why did you get Maryse Bergman to lie about him? Why did you go after him?”
“You never get the point, do you?” She looked around to check if anyone was in hearing range, then she lowered her voice. “We needed an example. If we showed how bad he was, everybody would see that we needed women in the department.”
“There were women in the department,” I said.
“Women like you,” she said. “Women who were no better than men. Look at what happened yesterday. You’re given the honour of going to a funeral for a Red Riding Hood.”
“For Ariel Warren,” I corrected her quietly.
“Whatever. But when Ariel’s killer crashes the party with his father, you just leave with the men. Now you tell me, what does that make you?”
“A loyal friend?” I said.
“A traitor,” she said. “Not just to Ariel but to all women, and no matter what Maryse is saying now, what we did then was for all women. Our department needed gender parity.”
“And that was worth risking a man’s career?”
“It was worth everything,” she said.
“ ‘The last temptation is the greatest treason: to do the wrong deed for the right reason,’ ” I said.
She looked at me sharply. “What?”
“Solange has defected from your group, hasn’t she?”
“She had issues,” Ann said coldly. “And I have signs to make, so if you’ll excuse me…”
“I’ll excuse you,” I said. “But I won’t forgive you.”
She stepped close to me and placed the staple gun so that the business end was flat against my cheek. “Go fuck yourself,” she said. Then she turned on her heel, strode over to a stack of placards, and began stapling them to pickets.
Very scary. As I walked back into the library, I thought with gratitude of the solid complement of police officers who would be accompanying Ann on the march and who were charged with the duty of keeping her and the other Friends of Red Riding Hood from discovering just how scary they could be.
CHAPTER
13
Taylor and Bruce and Benny were waiting for me on the front step when I got home. Taylor had a new skipping rope, and she was making a lazy crack-the-whip movement with it through the grass so the cats could chase its iridescent rainbow handle. All three were blissed out, and I thought, not for the first time, that being a cat must be one of the alltime great gigs.
Taylor held out the rope to show me. “I got this for helping with garbage patrol.”
“Very fancy,” I said. “I used to get a new rope every spring.”
She looked at me with amazement. “Can you skip?”
“Can Wayne Gretzky score goals?”
“I don’t know,” she said, “can he?”
“Not so many any more,” I said. “But I haven’t retired. Why don’t you give Bruce and Benny a rest and let me have a turn?”
The moment I began to skip, the tensions of the day dropped away. Salvation through muscle memory. Taylor watched, saucer-eyed, as I not only skipped, but rattled through my store of old skipping songs.
When Angus pulled up, he took in the scene, jumped out of his car, and yelled, “You go, Mum.” And I did. I skipped until there wasn’t a breath left in my body and my heart felt as if it was about to exit through my ches
t wall. By the time the kids gave me a round of applause and I quit, my ears were singing, but I’d banished my memory of Ann Vogel and her staple gun, and increased my odds of getting through the evening.
“Okay,” I panted. “Show’s over. I’d better go in there and act like a mother. Taylor, since you’re the headliner today, you get to choose dinner. Make it simple. I’ve already done my star turn.”
“Sloppy Joes the way Nik Manojlovich makes them on TV. He’s so funny.”
“Good choice,” I said. “I can manage Sloppy Joes. Besides, they’re portable, and I thought we’d watch the news while we ate supper tonight. I want to tape you winning your prize.”
At 5:30 on the button, we were sitting in the family room with plates filled with Sloppy Joes, potato chips, and raw vegetables balanced on our TV tables, the perfect fifties family – minus the father. Unfortunately, our television wasn’t showing “Leave it to Beaver” or “Don Messer’s Jubilee.” The news began with brief accounts of the investigation into Ariel’s murder and the battle that had erupted between the Friends of Red Riding Hood and their popular host, Charlie D. There was a live shot of the concrete and glass boxes that housed the station’s deep-discount neighbours, then the camera closed in for a tight shot of the CVOX call letters, lingering on the lascivious Mick Jagger tongue that wagged from the red-lipped open mouth of the O. The first of the buses that had been scheduled to arrive in time for live coverage pulled up, and the Friends of Red Riding Hood piled out.
In all there were perhaps twenty-five protestors, and the NationTV reporter, a dark-haired beauty named Jen Quesnel, struggled to keep the report lively as the Friends handed out their placards and milled about, trying to decide on their next move. As Jen reported that the turnout was surprisingly small, Ann Vogel muscled her way into camera range and began a chant that was picked up by the others. The words were simple and cruel. “Show us your face, Charlie D. Show us your face.”
But nothing happened. Not even a bird disturbed the eerie calm at the entrance to the radio station. No buses arrived carrying reinforcements, and the meagre crowd of protestors, embarrassed by the ragged quality of its cry, grew silent. Caught in the middle of what was clearly a non-event, Jen Quesnel began to wrap up her story.
Throughout the newscast, Eli had been as motionless as if he were carved in stone. Now he relaxed. “It was a bust,” he said. “And I’m glad because what those people are saying is really shitty.” He darted a glance in my direction. “Pardon my language.”
“No pardon necessary,” I said. “What they’re saying really is shitty.”
Eli laughed. When he was happy, his face became animated and open. It was a sight in which I always took pleasure, but that night the pleasure was short-lived.
Suddenly, he leaned forward, his eyes riveted once more on the screen. “Charlie’s coming out,” he said. I turned my attention back to the television in time to see Charlie walk through the front doors of CVOX. He was alone, and he moved deliberately from the shadow of the building into the light. A slight figure in bluejeans and a T-shirt, he stood with his hands clasped behind his back. He made no attempt to cover his face or hide it.
Jen Quesnel ran over to him with her microphone. They exchanged glances, then she said, “So, Charlie, people want to hear what you’re thinking right now.”
Before he had a chance to answer, Ann Vogel leaned into the microphone. “Tell the truth, Charlie D. Tell the truth.”
Charlie shrugged his thin shoulders. “You already know it,” he said. “I loved a woman. She’s dead. The beauty in my life is gone. I don’t care what happens next.” Charlie turned to the crowd. “I’m here,” he said, raising his arms in a gesture of surrender. “Do what you want.”
For a few seconds, the camera stayed on Charlie; then it moved to Ann Vogel for a reaction shot. Her face registered disbelief, then anger.
“This is a trick,” she said. “We won’t let you get away with it.” She turned to her supporters. “Will we?” But her dispirited followers were already straggling towards the bus.
Jen Quesnel looked into the camera. “Apparently the Friends of Red Riding Hood have decided on a change in strategy. That’s it from our location at CVOX. Now back to Kathy in the studio.”
Kathy did an item on a house fire in the inner city, then one on the robbery of a convenience store. After the announcement from the City’s Department of Parks and Recreation of the dates for the opening of outdoor swimming pools, it was our turn. Bev Pilon and Livia Brook were on the screen.
“Hit record on the VCR,” I said to Angus.
He grimaced in exasperation and waved the remote control in the air. “I already have, Mum.”
Beside Bev’s polished Technicolor sheen, Livia looked wan and schoolmarmish, but NationTV did include Livia’s anecdote about Ben, and they spelled her name right. They spelled Taylor’s name right, too, and I squeezed my daughter’s hand when I saw that she had asked to be identified as Taylor Kilbourn. As she explained her work to the interviewer she was poised and polite; equally important from my perspective, her turtleneck was spotless, her kilt untwisted, and only one of her braids had come undone. In all, it was a virtuoso performance, and the phone began to ring the minute it was over.
The first call was from Mieka in Saskatoon. “I hope you taped that,” she said. “Maddy was hollering, so I missed the first part, but Taylor looked sensational and her painting is terrific. Mouseland! Any other day, Uncle Howard would have been bursting his buttons.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Any other day.”
Mieka’s voice was concerned. “Mum, what’s going to happen to Charlie?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I expect he doesn’t, either. When I hear from Howard, I’ll fill you in. Now, Taylor’s at my elbow, longing to hear you tell her how fabulous she was, so I’m going to hand you over. Give everybody a hug for me.”
As soon as Taylor hung up, the phone rang again. My younger daughter chatted happily for five minutes, then handed the receiver to me. It was my old friend Hilda McCourt, calling to say she was proud of Taylor and worried about Charlie. The third phone call was from Ed Mariani, who was also proud and worried. By the time the fourth call came, my Sloppy Joe was lukewarm and soggy and I’d had enough interruptions.
“Leave it,” I shouted, but Taylor had already answered. She held out the phone to me.
“For you,” she said brightly.
It took me a moment to identify the voice on the other end. Bebe Morrissey was a woman who didn’t waste time on preamble, and obviously she worked on the assumption that once you’d met her, you wouldn’t forget her.
“I need to talk to you,” she said.
“Bebe, can I call you back? We’re just in the middle of dinner.”
“Don’t put me off,” she said. “This is important. On the news tonight, that little kid with the drawing was your daughter, right?”
“Right,” I said. “But why is that important?”
“I’m ninety-five years old, and I need to make sure I’ve got everybody straight in my mind,” she said irritably. “Now, the bottle blonde who gave your kid the flag and the pin was that right-winger, Bev Pilon.”
I smiled to myself. “Right,” I said.
“And the other one, the pasty-faced one, was – hang on, I wrote it down – Livia Brook, head of the department of Political Science.”
“Right again. Look, Bebe, I don’t mean to be rude, but my dinner is stone cold. Why don’t you let me nuke it, eat it, and call you back?”
“Because I live with a silent killer, high blood pressure, and by the time you call back, I could be dead. Now listen, I’ve made a serious mistake. Remember when I told you I saw Ariel Warren having that fight with her mother?”
“I remember,” I said; then, in an attempt to speed her along, I provided Bebe with a quick recap of the incident. “After Ariel said that she had to do what she thought was best because she only had one life, her mother said, ‘You have two lives
because I gave you mine.’ You and I agreed that it was a pretty ugly thing to say to your own flesh and blood.”
Bebe cackled triumphantly. “Except – and this is my point – the woman who said that wasn’t Ariel’s flesh and blood. It was the other one, with the pasty face.”
“Livia?” I asked.
“Yes,” Bebe said, “Livia Brook, head of the department of Political Science. She was the one who told Ariel that she’d given her her life.”
The pieces of the puzzle rearranged themselves, falling into place to reveal a truth that was as ugly as it was inescapable. Livia had been the woman Ariel had feared, the woman who, while insisting that all she wanted was Ariel’s happiness, had been unable to accept Ariel’s choice of a life that didn’t include her. Livia was the woman who had done “terrible things.” Unbidden, a memory surged into my consciousness: Ann Vogel in the Political Science office bragging about her role in getting Solange her job. Ann had said, “What Livia and I did wasn’t pretty, but it was necessary,” and Livia had silenced her. At the time, I had believed Livia was trying to put an end to a quarrel; now, it was clear that her motivation was far from altruistic. She had, I realized, been trying to shut Ann down before she said too much.
For a beat, shock froze me. Then I felt the lash of panic. This wasn’t over. Solange wouldn’t let it be over until she found the woman Ariel had feared. The fact that Solange had been looking for Maryse Bergman suggested that the pieces of the puzzle were coming together for her, too.
By now, I knew Solange’s home and office numbers by heart. When there was no answer at either place, I grabbed my car keys.
Angus had just rewound the tape, so that Taylor could see herself again. “I’m going to make a quick trip to the university,” I said. “There’s something I have to check on.”
“What’s up? You haven’t even finished supper.”
“Just stick it in the fridge for me, will you, Angus? I’ll get it later.”