Accusation

by Catherine Bush

  The last tape — someone walked along the hall outside Sara’s suite, it was late, a swish of footsteps. At dusk, from the window of a car, the gate to Raymond Renaud’s house drew close, and the watchman, the same cautious man who had been at the gate when she had pulled up with Alazar, swung the gate’s metal bars open. There was no sign of the little brown dog in the yard, only three boys and Raymond kicking a soccer ball. Two wooden chairs marked goal posts, and skinny Moses, arms wide over his head, danced between them as beautiful Yitbarek did a jig and waved for the ball, the game breaking apart when the vehicle entered and the boys and Raymond turned to greet it.

  Everyone followed the smallest of the boys — Bereket? — as he carried the soccer ball into the house, a jostle of heads and backs making their way down a hall that led into a kitchen.

  The kitchen: Bereket tossed the ball onto the floor, and in the dimmer light, a new version of the game started up, the ball kicked beneath the table, boys’ arms flailing to a chorus of shouts and huffs, Justin as well as Raymond joining in. It wasn’t clear why Juliet was shooting this, the light so dim as to make the tape unusable. Perhaps Juliet didn’t know this yet. Or something about the rocky, handheld graininess and spirited bedlam of the swooping, blurry figures appealed to her. On the monitor in the edit suite, everything clamoured to be read as a clue to what was really going on: the eager boys, the photographs of the circus stuck to the fridge, jars lined up at the back of the counter, dirty glasses by the sink, the direction of Raymond’s gaze, his gestures.

  The boys set the table, Raymond directing them from the stove, beneath an overhead light. Forks and knives, please. The boys themselves now quieted and dutiful. Juliet, who had grown up with a brother and a slew of uncles, likely found nothing unusual about being the only woman in the room. In the frame, she struck a match against the side of a matchbox and leaned toward the centre of the table to light three candles in a soapstone candelabra, as Justin, holding the fridge door open, asked how many bottles of beer he should take out. It seemed the camera had been mounted on a tripod in the corner of the room and left to run.

  A new shot: the boys had disappeared from the table, the candles burned to knuckles, the table a glowing disarray of dishes, glasses, bottles, a pot with a wooden spoon sticking from it, and Raymond flattened his hand upon the wooden surface and said, Anyone can learn to juggle. Anyone. I swear it. I’ll teach you. Tomorrow.

  We’re leaving tomorrow, Juliet said, her face flushed.

  A boy appeared in the doorway beyond the table, not Yitbarek or Moses, but the one whom Sara thought was called Bereket. In shorts, without a T-shirt, he came forward and climbed without hesitation into Raymond’s lap, Raymond helping him settle, hand to the boy’s bare waist as the boy wriggled himself into a comfortable position, Raymond’s hand smoothing then coming to resting on the boy’s bare thigh. The boy picked up a pen from the table, Juliet’s face half-visible, watching him, everyone still happy in the glow of the candlelight, and the boy began to draw on a crumpled piece of paper, his body pressed against Raymond’s, Raymond’s arm around him, drawing him close, hand still resting on the boy’s thigh.

  Sara stopped the tape: the boy, in Raymond’s embrace, bent over his drawing, Raymond’s stilled expression, Justin’s arms passing a pile of dirty plates to Juliet. When Sara restarted the tape, Raymond turned to Juliet, and said, Will you turn that damn thing off.

  You said there was nothing, nothing that made you uncomfortable.

  Nothing at the time.

  Sara had written to Juliet as soon as she got home after watching the final tape, could have called her, decided she’d rather talk to her in person, unease walking through her sinews and along her bones. Raymond’s face: what had she seen in it? His hand on the boy’s bare waist. His leg. His hand left there. He’d pulled the boy close. Asked Juliet almost violently to turn the camera off.

  I’ve watched all the tapes. Can we meet for a drink? she’d asked Juliet in an email, and in less than a day Juliet had written back to say yes.

  When Sara swung through the door of the Parkdale bar, Juliet was already seated in one of the wooden booths, tending a glass of white wine, her pink wool coat folded on the bench beside her. She looked older somehow, and chastened. She’d lost a kind of hopefulness. She waved, in her black cardigan, her throat wrapped in a chiffon scarf.

  As soon as Sara pulled off her gloves and leaned over to kiss her, Juliet did say, I’m sorry I never phoned you back when you called to tell me about Raymond Renaud’s suicide. Her gaze broke away. I was upset.

  She didn’t say: I didn’t mean to imply you’re in any way responsible for his suicide even if you feel you are.

  When Sara returned from the bar with a half-pint of lager, Juliet began to talk with some intensity about Max’s upcoming solo show of photographs. They’re beautiful. I didn’t understand the project in the beginning. I couldn’t see what made them his photographs since he’s taking them from web-cams, but the surveillance cameras are recording the images even when no one is looking, and the images vanish unless he sees them and saves them. He blows them up and makes you look at them. They’re usually landscapes because that’s what he’s interested in. There aren’t usually people in them or you can’t really see the people, so like intersections, streets, the view from an icebreaker in the Arctic Ocean, which is totally haunting. They’re impersonal until he makes them personal. Anyway, I’ll invite you to the opening and you can see for yourself.

  The last tape, Sara said. Thanks by the way for dropping them off at my place. The scene in his kitchen, after dinner, when he’s sitting with the boy in his lap, why didn’t you mention it to me at any point these last months? When I asked — you said there was nothing that made you uncomfortable.

  Nothing at the time.

  So what did you feel when you saw him and the boy like that?

  At the time I thought — how can I even say this now? It felt familial. And he said something like that, something about how he felt parental, and he was surprised by it. Juliet stared into the bowl of her wineglass.

  What happened after he asked you to turn the camera off? He sounds almost angry. You turned it off.

  No, Justin turned it off. We all got up. I don’t know. Bereket went to bed. The rest of us cleaned the table and washed dishes.

  Did he seem agitated or like he wished you hadn’t seen that?

  I just thought he was tired of being filmed all the time.

  Did you not want me talking to Justin about this?

  I don’t know. Now he’s travelling.

  Where did the boys sleep?

  In their own bedroom. There was one bed they all slept in. It isn’t proof of anything.

  I agree. It isn’t.

  I know it doesn’t look good. But I didn’t want to prejudice you. I didn’t want you prejudging him. I wanted you to go and see what you found. I thought if there was anything to find you’d find it. And you did, I guess. And then I didn’t want to make that kind of film. You weren’t the only one to say I should do it. But I didn’t want to tell that kind of story and I really didn’t want to tell it about Africa.

  That kind of story.

  I should have seen something. Something, something was going on in front of me. I should have picked up on it. He shouldn’t have been doing that. I don’t know how far it went, but even what I saw is wrong and I should have said something.

  Of course, Sara thought, Juliet hadn’t wanted to show her the tape, given how she was inculpated as witness to whatever it was.

  I don’t understand why you didn’t try to get hold of the teenagers afterward. Even now. You know them a little. Why not ask them —

  Because what’s the point? Whatever happened, it’s in the past. He’s dead. I know when you first told me about the circus, you didn’t mean it to be like this. At least whatever he was doing, he isn’t doing it any longer.

  When did you start to doubt me?

  What are you talking about?


  Was it before the trial or after? Because you did start to doubt me. Lose trust in me. In Montreal. Maybe you didn’t want to, but you did.

  Colour was rising in Juliet’s flustered face. I don’t understand what this has to do with the circus. Why bring it up now? Are you talking about what happened at the trial?

  She didn’t say: You’re wrong. I never doubted you.

  How was it possible to speak of such a matter without sounding as if she were blaming Juliet or accusing her of something? This was a problem. Naturally Juliet became defensive. Yet something had shifted in Juliet all those years ago and continued to lurk between them, not spoken of, yet subtly distorting and disturbing all this time. Juliet had tried, especially in the weeks and months right after the trial, to cover it up with frantic efforts at friendliness, appeasements of dinner and gifts, until Sara had bolted, first to the McKibbens’ house, then overseas. Once they had both, independently, moved to Toronto, Juliet had kept trying to make amends, or that’s what it had felt like.

  Had Juliet’s doubt begun in the weeks before the trial when they had sat in her bedroom or at the kitchen table, and Juliet had listened to Sara go over and over her version of what had happened at the Y and after, in preparation for speaking on the stand. Juliet had gone to meet Paul Kastner, Sara’s lawyer, at his request, to rehearse her own small court appearance. Sara had told him, she may be nervous. This had been her own source of unease: that Juliet was too nervous to make a good witness. Since Sara was banned from setting foot there, her membership revoked, Juliet had visited the women’s change room at the downtown Y and made note of its details for her. Juliet had done so much. They had gone together to a Reitman’s on Sainte-Catherine and Juliet had helped Sara choose an outfit to wear in the courtroom — demure grey suit and neutral pantyhose — and plain black pumps from Aldo. A costume, nothing like the sweaters and jeans and leggings and secondhand dresses and grimy black boots and ratty old sheepskin coat that Sara ordinarily wore.

  Perhaps her own performance on the stand had tipped Juliet into doubt. Something about the way she spoke, what she’d said or hadn’t said: she had seemed too sure of herself or not sure enough. The undeniable fact of that hour or so between her leaving the Y and meeting Graham back at the apartment when she’d wandered unaccounted for on Sainte-Catherine, and there had been no ubiquitous store security cameras in those days to monitor her entrances and exits. Graham’s refusal to testify. Maybe, to Juliet, Colleen Bertucci’s version of events had become the convincing one, or had been convincing enough to upset her belief in Sara. If the wallet had been in Colleen’s unlocked locker, yes, Sara had had the opportunity to steal it. The effects of Sara’s cross-examination. The difficulty of proving something in the negative. That the police had found no evidence of the stolen goods in her possession might simply mean that she had dumped or fenced them.

  All Juliet had to do on the stand was attest to Sara’s good character. Juliet had dressed to look sombre yet pretty in an antique black dress and little black cardigan, intent on displaying a hint of the bohemian. In fact, Juliet looked terrified, her hands gripping the sides of the wooden podium. Yes, she said, Sara was a responsible person. She was studious and dependable and always paid her rent on time. It hadn’t been a given that the prosecutor would want to cross-examine Juliet, but she had. This made Juliet appear even more terrified. What kind of coat does Sara Wheeler wear, can you describe it? What does Sara Wheeler spend money on? Does she have much money? One last question, Mme Laberge said in her accented English. What colour are Sara Wheeler’s eyes? Paul Kastner objected to this, how was it relevant, but the judge in his ravenlike wisdom let the question stand.

  Juliet looked then like she was clinging to a raft while lost at sea. This was impossible to forget. How strange, Sara thought from the courtroom bench where she sat beside Paul Kastner, she doesn’t know the colour of my eyes. Had she loved Juliet Levin? Not sexually, but in other ways yes, moved by Juliet’s kindness and loyalty. Juliet’s eyes were brown. But there were those, Graham, for instance, whose eye colour Sara was suddenly less certain of. Friends, intimates. The realization was unnerving. Blue, Juliet said, but her rising voice made her response a question. Then she broke down in tears. I don’t know, she said. I really have no idea. Of course it was a small thing, although Juliet’s hesitation shook the credibility of all her testimony, as the prosecutor must have hoped for.

  It wasn’t that moment as much as how Juliet behaved after the trial that had felt so revealing. Her evasiveness and her refusal to acknowledge her evasions. People look through eye colour, not at it, Sara had said, yet Juliet did not want to talk about the trial other than to make effusive apologies for her own part in it and say how glad she was that Sara had gotten off. Her awkwardness made Sara long to put immediate distance between herself and Juliet, get as fast as possible out of the Esplanade apartment.

  Doubt: once it enters your mind and body, how difficult it is to get rid of it. If not impossible. In the edit suite, Sara had watched Raymond gather the boy onto his lap and from that moment doubted him.

  Maybe I shouldn’t have brought up the past, Sara said to Juliet, as, behind the bar, the bartender in his grey wool hat danced along to the music. Maybe that was selfish. It’s all so long ago and if you did doubt me, I forgive you.

  How strange, she thought, after all these years, that this would prove to be their point of rupture. Juliet looked frozen, as if forced to stare at something she didn’t want to see. If that’s what you thought, I’m sorry, she said.

  It was unlikely, even if they were to run into each other, that they would ever make plans to get together again.

  The orphans’ Christmas dinner at Soraya Green’s was weeks ago, as was the Christmas phone call to her parents, her mother worried about her father and her father consumed by the Russian elections and the state of Boris Yeltsin’s heart. One night in January, after an impulsive late-night movie with a couple of others also toiling after hours at work, Sara arrived home to a blinking red light on her answering machine and, when she pressed the play button, out poured Rafael Nardi’s voice.

  Hello, darling. I tried you at the paper, on the assumption you might be there, but I guess you’re out gallivanting. I assume you’ve heard, but perhaps you haven’t, your gang here has had their refugee claim denied. That came down yesterday. It’s in the papers here today, not much detail. Insufficient evidence, it seems. Not clear what will happen to them now. I told you, didn’t I, about meeting Louise, through Alice, who’s been teaching them English. Louise used to be a gymnast, she’s a trainer now, and she’s got them access to a gymnastics club in Footscray, where they can practise, which I gather is better than wherever they were practising, and it seems they’re intent on keeping up their circus skills. They don’t have money so she’s getting up early to let them in before anyone else is using the place, and letting them stay late, and helping to ferry the younger ones about and generally spending a lot of time with them. Their English is getting better. She says they’ve begun to talk about what they went through, how domineering he was, how punishing the pace, how they felt trapped, about not being paid. Any minute, I’m sure your machine’s going to cut me off. Anyhow, quickly, they talk about having a hard time, being terrified, and they’re desperate to stay, but she also let on, this, obviously, in confidence, that none of them has said anything to her about or alluded in any way to any sort of sexual abuse, which doesn’t mean it didn’t happen, but I pass this on.

  There were no other messages. Sara stood for a long moment, letting Rafael’s words settle, wanting to cast them off but feeling them settle. Then she began to hunt for the portable phone, which was not on its stand, not on the little table where the answering machine was, no sign of its small dark carcass in the kitchen when she tugged on the pendant light and glanced about, the pulse of her blood like running footsteps. The phone wasn’t in the living room or on her desk upstairs, it was on a shelf behind her desk. Rafael wasn’t home, the bas
tard, the line ringing as Sara stepped onto the landing at the top of the stairs, three doors open around her, the dark like smoke.

  Sem Le was in a meeting, said his secretary or receptionist or whatever she was. He was still in a meeting when Sara tried again, an hour or so later, far from sleep, still dressed, at the mess of her desk, the screen an infernal moon, where, four and a half months before, she’d read for the first time about the allegations the teenagers had made against Raymond Renaud.

  And again: I’ll keep trying if he’s there. Is he there?

  He’s busy. He’s just back from court.

  This won’t take long, I promise.

  It was as if Raymond were in the room, watching her from his white wooden chair, making up his own mind about her. He was draped across the ceiling, across the sky above her head, so that she couldn’t look up without seeing him, yet when she put out her hand it went right through him. She couldn’t see into him, he who as a child had longed to be seen.