Ten Days in Summer

by Susan Calder

  Paula scanned the garage. “By fall you’ll fix or dispose of all this?”

  “First dibs go to family, second to friends. Leftovers from the sale get shipped to charities.” He pressed a button to close the garage door. “You wouldn’t recognize this room come fall. Enough space to park the truck and car through the winter.”

  They exited the door to the backyard with its trim grass. A rear extension to the house included a mud room, where Garner unzipped his paint-spattered coveralls. Underneath he wore jeans and a red checked shirt. His wife appeared in the door frame, dressed in jeans and green checks. He and Rosalie led Paula to the other part of the extension, a sunroom that was decidedly un-Becker. Not a scrap of clutter marred the intriguing mix of antique and modern furnishings: a country rocking chair and leather sofa, a Queen Anne coffee table, a braid rug, and three end tables of different heights and woods. Somehow everything fit. Paula asked if they were all ‘finds’ he had repaired.

  “Except the children’s pictures.” Garner pointed to the displays on the side walls. “The frames come from the sales, of course.”

  Some frames were ornate, others plain. Again, the mixture worked. Boys and girls smiled in school photos and vacation shots. Paula paused in front of a photo of two boys running through waves toward the camera.

  “Our sons on Vancouver Island,” Garner said. “We rented a cottage one year.”

  “How many children do you have?”

  “Four, two of each. Nine grandchildren. Ten. I keep forgetting our grandson born last month.”

  “Can I interest you in lemonade and veggies and dip?” Rosalie asked.

  “Don’t go to any trouble,” Paula said.

  Rosalie mounted the two steps to the kitchen separated from the sunroom by a pine railing. Were the cherry wood cupboards full of reclaimed pots, dishes and utensils? While the house was 1940s vintage, the kitchen looked as if it had been remodelled within the past ten years. Granite counters, an island and tile floor. Paula asked if the stainless steel appliances were ‘finds.’

  “I lucked out from a poor couple getting divorced,” Garner said. “They’re a high-end set.”

  Rosalie carried down the tray of food and drinks. “We’re so sad about Caspar.”

  “Did you know him, too?” Paula asked.

  “He’d come to the house now and then, and I’d always see him at the sales. This morning I kept looking for him and then remembered.” Rosalie’s eyes behind her glasses dampened. She set the tray on the coffee table. “Do you want me here?”

  “It’s not necessary,” Paula said. She wasn’t meeting them about their insurance claim, and one on one was better for investigative work. If Garner said anything questionable, she or the police could talk to his wife separately later.

  “I doubt I could add anything,” Rosalie said. “If you don’t mind, I’ll scoot back to the basement so I can finish my polishing before dinner.”

  “She handles the silver, china, costume jewellery,” Garner explained as Rosalie left. “Also the mending and curtain alterations.”

  “You guys are really into this,” Paula said.

  Garner poured the lemonade into the plastic floral glasses. “It’s become our hobby, I dare say our passion, since I retired.”

  “What work did you do?”

  “Teaching. High school chemistry for thirty-seven years. It was a good career, but I always preferred working with my hands. When I was in high school, my folks said: you’ve got the ability, go to college.”

  “We parents are like that.”

  Paula chose the rocking chair that looked out to the garage and yard, a southern exposure like Caspar’s. The picture window let in a brightness that was a world away from Caspar’s dark hermitage. Breezes flowed in through screens. Paula rocked on the chair, which was padded with a thick, comfortable cushion that Rosalie had likely mended and adapted to fit this seat. “If Caspar had spruced up his finds like you two, his apartment could have looked like this.”

  “His parents did before they got too old.”

  “Were they into garage sales?” Paula got her purse from the floor. “Mind if I take notes on my tablet?”

  “Go ahead.”

  As with Cynthia, Paula sensed the recorder might make Garner conscious of what he said. He could rightly ask why she was interviewing him about his friend’s insurance claim. If the police hadn’t talked to Garner yet, he might not be aware they were treating Caspar’s death as suspicious.

  “The Becker seniors cleaned people’s homes,” Garner said. “That’s how it all began. Their employers gave them castoffs, which the Beckers used themselves or sold to their neighbours. Word got around, and eventually folk from all over Calgary turned up to shop. It gave them a good little business on the side. As I know from garage sales, a lot of rejects are almost new and in perfect shape. The owners want something more fashionable, or they’ve gained weight or bought a dress on sale they never liked. Or there’s a small stain they can’t remove. Rosalie knows a hundred tricks for these, and so, I gather, did old Mrs. Becker. Or there’s a small split seam, and they’re too lazy to take out a needle and thread.”

  “Or don’t know how to use one.”

  “Same deal with appliances and gadgets people buy these days. Caspar’s father had a knack for fixing toasters and kettles and washing machines. He showed me the ropes for these.”

  “When was this?”

  Garner licked dip off a carrot. “I’ve been asking myself: when did I meet Caspar? It must have been around the year 2000 when I started dropping by his house. The parents were fading, but the old lady was still sharp. In her prime she’d had a nose for value, Caspar said. Once she took a ring an employer gave her to a jeweller who specialized in antiques. He offered her two hundred dollars. She haggled him up to three hundred. That’s 1960s dollars. It may not seem like a lot, but it adds up over time.”

  “Was this how they made enough money to buy the property?”

  “It was the gravy; their cleaning business the bread. The business had an excellent reputation among the city elite, who could afford to pay good wages. And they had higher quality items to cast off, bringing the Beckers more gravy.”

  A thought crossed Paula’s mind. While cleaning homes, the Beckers would have been in a position to steal from their employers. She made a note about this. No point in engaging Garner in speculations that might make him defensive about his friend.

  “I assume you and Caspar met at a garage sale,” she said.

  “My own, in fact.” Garner’s cheeks dimpled with his smile. “He wandered by our fall sale one year. Miserable, cold weather. Low turnout. He and I got to talking, and he bought a few items. I asked him along to an estate sale taking place the next weekend since Rosalie was too busy with something or other to go with me.”

  “Is that why you blamed yourself for getting him into the sales?”

  “Who knew it would become an addiction?”

  Paula sipped some lemonade. Delicious. Definitely not from a can.

  “Caspar and I couldn’t have been more different than this rocker and sofa,” Garner said. “But for some reason we hit it off. I invited him to Thanksgiving dinner. It led to me stopping by his place over the winter. I had a sense he was lonely and wanted company.”

  “Even with his parents and brother, Kurt, living upstairs?”

  “In all the times I was there, I never met the brother. I don’t think he and Caspar had much in common. My impression was the brother spent most of the time at his office downtown, even slept there some nights.”

  “How often did you see Caspar in the few months before he died?”

  “At the sales this May and June? Half the weekends, I’d say. At his apartment? Every week or two.”

  “To talk shop?” she said. “When was he last here?”

  “We invited him for Easter ham. He said he was busy.”

  “Doing what?”

  “Nothing more than his usual, I expect. Rearranging hi
s finds, sorting them—”

  Paula’s cellphone rang. She pulled it out of her purse. Florence Becker. At last. Paula longed to return the call before Florence slipped away, but it was best not to disrupt this questioning. She apologized for the interruption and switched the cell off.

  “If I were a young man, I’d learn to fix those for resale.”

  “I understand Florence worked in the family cleaning business,” Paula said.

  “Florence.” Garner mumbled something, his mouth full of vegetables and dip. “She was the brother’s first wife.”

  “How soon after Caspar’s mother’s death did Florence move into her apartment?”

  “My impression was she looked after them to the end and pretty much stayed on.”

  “Why did she let Caspar clutter up her apartment with his stuff?”

  “Did she? From the bit I saw of her, Florence struck me as a tough broad who wouldn’t put up with anything she didn’t want.”

  Paula added this comment to the picture of Florence she was forming. “I need to know what in her apartment belonged to Caspar. Anything damaged by smoke would be covered as his insured contents.”

  “I can’t help you with that. I didn’t go upstairs.”

  “Did you ever meet Johnny, Caspar’s nephew who lives with her during the summer?”

  “Caspar talked about him, and I’d see his truck in the driveway, but I never saw him around. I gather he slept late in the morning and was out cavorting much of the rest of the time.”

  “What did Caspar say about Johnny?”

  “Mainly that he liked to cavort.” Garner grinned, his mouth spotted with dip.

  “Have you met Cynthia, his niece?”

  “Caspar gave me her number and Florence’s in case I came by one day and found him passed out in bed or on the floor.”

  Paula looked up from her typing.

  “He didn’t phrase it quite that way, but when you’re older and living alone, you start to consider these things.”

  Garner was seven or eight years younger than his friend and had a wife who would be there if anything happened to him.

  “When I heard about the fire, I called Florence and Cynthia,” Garner said. “Neither phoned back. That’s why I came by the house the other night.”

  “You must have run into Brendan, Caspar’s brother’s son by his second wife. Brendan lived upstairs year-round until two years ago.”

  “Kids can be selfish.”

  She drank more lemonade, waiting for Garner to explain.

  “Would it have killed Cynthia to invite her uncle over for the occasional meal? Caspar subsisted on cereal and bread. Too much trash on his stove for cooking, and he used his oven for storing his boots.”

  “How come?”

  “So he knew where to find them in winter. Florence or his nephew Johnny could have asked him up to watch TV. Caspar didn’t have a single set in working order.”

  “Brendan…?”

  “He went off to an eastern school, and not once did he come home to visit his uncle or phone him, as far as I know.” Garner’s round face grew red from anger or intensity. “Brendan meant more to Caspar than those other two. He grew up in that house. Caspar treated him almost like a son.” Garner banged his glass on the coffee table, spilling lemonade to the rug.

  Paula grabbed a napkin and squatted to blot the stain. “We should add water to take out the stickiness. Do you have a sponge?”

  Garner got one from the kitchen. He handed it to Paula. “Rosalie has a soft spot for this carpet. We’ve had it ten years. I keep seeing ones at the sales that would look sharper, but Rosalie always kiboshes them.” He leaned over to examine her work. “That’s about as good as you’ll get it. Rosalie’s cleaner will do the rest.”

  Paula held on to the coffee table to raise herself from her crouch. Garner wasn’t the only one getting older. “About Brendan—”

  “I’ve enjoyed this reminiscing about Caspar. It feels good to get it off my chest, but, like I said, I don’t know about contents Caspar took upstairs, if that’s how you wanted me to help with the fire insurance claim.”

  Garner had given her good responses. Rather than push the personal questions further, she’d leave their conversation amicable and innocent. What could she ask that might give her an excuse to return if she wanted? “You were inside Caspar’s apartment?”

  “Usually I preferred outside due to the musty odour. When it was cold or rainy out, we’d talk in his den, the only room with space to swing a cat.”

  “Caspar’s contents were all ruined by smoke,” she said. “Our pictures don’t show what’s buried under the top level of items or in sections not lining the pathways. Would you have any photos showing his living room in an earlier state?”

  His bushy brows knit.

  “You and he might have tried out a camera that one of you bought at a garage sale.”

  “Hmmm. Good thought.” Garner reflected. “But I don’t recall us doing that.”

  “Do you remember any particular items?”

  “The living room, underneath.” Garner closed his eyes, as though mentally excavating. “Tables from dining room sets. A kitchen one, basic 1960s Formica. A sofa. At least two. Or three. A number of TV sets.”

  “None worked.”

  Garner’s eyes blinked open. “They dated back to the ’70s, when sets had tubes, and would have no value today. Caspar intended to repair them—he was mechanically inclined, like his father—but never got around to it. Ditto the old computers he picked up.”

  “Did the one in his den work?” She had noticed it in a police photograph.

  “It must have, since he was always printing off papers. That computer and the printer were reasonably new, I think, maybe ten years old.”

  “That’s ancient in computer years.”

  “Chairs. A dozen or more. Those are easy to pick up at sales. People are always getting rid of them.” Garner closed his eyes for a few seconds. “I’m drawing blanks. It’s been a long day shopping and working in the garage. You’ll have to catch me when I’m fresh.”

  “No rush.” She fished a business card out of her purse. “Why don’t you start writing things down as they come to you and contact me when you complete the list? This will help a lot with the insurance claim.”

  He studied the card. “Your office is in the East Village? How is all the new development affecting you?”

  “We’re moving to new premises in Inglewood in a week.” She glanced at his roomful of finds. “We have a stock of ’70s office furniture to dispose of, if you’re interested.”

  “Not my usual game,” he said, although his eyes lit up.

  “There’s one more question I have to ask for insurance reasons.” She stared at him across the coffee table. “Was Caspar depressed lately?”

  Garner’s eyes flickered behind his glasses. “Not that I saw. You mean, you’re suggesting he …?”

  “Hoarding can be associated with depression.”

  “He seemed the same as always the last time I saw him.”

  “Which was …?”

  “At a sale the Saturday before the fire, two weeks ago.”

  “What did you and he talk about?”

  “A crokinole board that was missing a few posts. When I passed on it, Caspar took the board home, saying he had some metal pieces that might do the trick. I doubt he got around to the repair job, and I’m equally sure he wasn’t thinking then of suicide.” Garner stood up. “You haven’t tried Rosalie’s dip.”

  Paula touched her stomach. “Saving myself for dinner.”

  They walked through the kitchen to the dining and living rooms, both elegant versions of the sunroom; eclectic styles, eras, woods and upholstery that strangely harmonized. Rosalie emerged from the staircase to the basement, saying she’d heard their footsteps overhead and had come up to say goodbye. Paula thanked her for the vegetables and lemonade and paused in front of the fireplace to admire a painting of a juggler.

  “Our so
n has his eye on that,” Rosalie said. “We’re ready for something new and will give him the juggler when we find a painting we love as much.”

  “It must be fun to change your décor all the time for so little money,” Paula said.

  “That’s part of the appeal,” Rosalie agreed. “At this stage we mainly do it for the kids. All four have homes with beautiful, inexpensive furnishings. It frees up their money for things like holidays and piano lessons. We found a grand piano at an estate sale. One of our grandsons is quite talented.”

  “If Caspar had done the same for his nephews and niece, they might have cared about him more,” Garner said.

  Rosalie patted her husband’s arm. “Then he wouldn’t have been Caspar.”

  * * *

  In her car Paula discovered that Mike had phoned while her cell was turned off. She nabbed Florence first.

  “You asked to meet me?” Florence had a deep voice for a woman. “I’ll be here all day tomorrow.”

  “In your apartment or—?”

  “Been waiting for years to dig in and clean.”

  What had stopped her?

  “Come by at two-thirty,” Florence said. “If you’re able armed, I might put you to work.” Her tone had no hint of levity.

  “I enjoy a good clean-out,” Paula said to connect and because it was true. If Florence was odd enough to invite her to pitch in, she’d do it.

  Paula phoned Mike and got his voice mail. By the time she reached Edmonton Trail, he returned her call. Updating him on her weekend could take a while. She pulled into a strip mall parking lot and summarized her meetings with Cynthia, Brendan and Garner, whom Mike hadn’t heard about. She gave him Garner’s contact details.