William pulled away from her. It was the second time his anger had flared; the last time, the wild-eyed man seemed like he would be dead.
He said, “No. I’m sorry. I don’t want to be angry with you.”
“Always something you want.”
“What?”
“It’s always about something you want, isn’t it?” Her words were familiar.
“Please, Cathy. Just tell me what’s going on.”
She said, “I told them you were going to see Dennis on Saturday.”
“Who did you tell?”
“Your business partners.”
His heart crashed in his chest; thumping began in his temples. “Who did you tell?”
“I don’t know his name. He came to the office after Christmas and threatened me.”
“Small man, accent, dark wavy hair?” Cathy nodded. “Two men with him?” She nodded again. “Did they hurt you?”
Cathy opened her dressing gown and lifted a breast from her bra. The nipple was livid, the underside of the breast green, blue and purple.
“Oh God,” said William under his breath. “I’m sorry. I didn’t think you would ever be affected.”
“They frightened me. I have to tell them things when they ask.”
“What things?”
“The phone rings and he asks me what you’re doing, where you are, where you’re going, what shipments are in the warehouse. That sort of thing.”
“And you tell him.”
“Yes, I tell him.” There was bite in her. “They said they would hurt me again and tell my husband about Dennis.”
“Of course you tell them. It’s not your fault.” William struggled to bring his thoughts under control. “Just do as they ask. Tell them what they want to know. I’ll figure something out.” He hoped it was reassuring enough to stop her from panicking. “It would be better if they didn’t know that you told me. Just carry on as normal.”
“Why would they hurt me?”
“It’s how they work.” It was, again, the wrong thing to say. William thought he was losing control of himself. He was normally in control of what he said, but everything seemed to be getting away from him. “It’s not very likely. The important thing is to do what they say and you’ll be all right.”
“Like being married,” said Cathy.
“Maybe so.” He began walking to the door.
“Aren’t you forgetting something?” she said.
“What?”
“You can leave it on the hall table. Whatever ‘help’ you want to give.”
William took a moment to understand what she was saying.
“Think of it as a performance bonus. Tell the accountant. It might be deductible.”
He reached for his wallet, emptied it on the hall table and left.
He had not before understood Cathy’s vulnerability, or how close she was to being desperate, maybe homeless, or how she had lived with being constantly exploitable. Neither had he understood how it had disgusted and excited him in equal parts. It was not strictly her vulnerability to hardship that excited him. She had learned to embrace those on whom she depended, and in the moment of her embrace the vulnerability could go unseen, remaining outside of consciousness for the duration. Just the willingness could be attended to. It provided a special kind of thrill. Nothing you did with her made you accountable. Gratitude or apology was never needed.
With Cathy he had created the perfect arrangement of service without cost. She was the only asset and he had no obligation for the upkeep, until today, when she asked for money. It made him think of the chain of events he had set in motion. Her life on the edge of prostitution was connected to what he had done. There was no obligation, but the sense of being responsible would not shake off. She had shamed him by asking him to pay for services, and the act of giving her money clarified the nature of the transaction. It would not happen again. So he hoped.
7:15 p.m.
“Who was killed in a fire?” Kelly arrived at the edge of the kitchen, having heard what was not intended for her.
“One of my employees. There was some kind of accident at his house.”
“Did he really burn in a fire?” Kelly’s enthusiasm for the lurid details caused William to start. The image was too close to what might be true.
Julie tucked Kelly under her arm. “People don’t burn to death in fires. The smoke means they can’t breathe. That’s how they die.” It was a better image but still beyond thinking.
William said, “I don’t think we should be talking about it.”
“Mum said you wished you’d gone skiing with me. Wanna go?”
“Yes, I’ll go.”
“Oh good! I’ll get my stuff.”
“You mean now?”
“We can go night skiing at Cypress Mountain. Well, you can ski and I’ll be on my board.”
“I’m not …” William caught the expression on Julie’s face. It said everything about what he always did—what he had become in this house. A promise never quite kept. The guilt of the day swept over him. If he spoke, tears would come. He turned and walked away.
“Where are you going?” asked Julie, the disappointment shaping the question.
The dangerous moment had passed. Disappearing into the living room, he said, “To get my gear. Are you coming?”
There was commotion in the kitchen as the family sprang into action. How would Kelly manage? She seemed confident enough but he did not know how to manage a blind person down a mountain on a snowboard. He should know by now. His ignorance, and his absence from her life, would be exposed soon enough on the slopes. He tried to think about the problem. Julie had once said how it works. Should he lead or follow her down the mountain?
“Don’t worry,” Julie said, arriving in the garage. “She’s done this before.”
It was not his decision to make. Kelly would make her own decisions, and he would have to do what he was told. It was the only way they could make it work between them.
January 4, 2018
William opened the front door to see the two female officers.
“Mr. Koren, I hope you don’t mind us coming by your home.”
“Not at all. How can I help?”
“Can we come in?”
“Of course,” he said, swinging the door wide for them. “Come into the kitchen.” The officers entered and stood in the hall.
The lead officer said, “We don’t want to trail snow and mud into your house. This will be fine.”
“How can I help?” William felt a small twist of discomfort in repeating himself.
“Thanks for telling us about the man falling from the dumpster. We followed up and found a Mr. David Kerrigan in Lions Gate Hospital.”
Alarm flowed through William. “How is he?”
“He’s going to live,” said the policewoman. “But he’ll be in hospital for some time.”
“Has he said anything?” Mistake, he thought. They’ll wonder why I care.
“I don’t know. Someone else will be talking to him when he’s able. Do you mind if we ask you a little more about that night?
“Sure. Glad to help.”
“Just to clarify a detail, you said you stayed with Mr. Kerrigan until the ambulance arrived. We know the ambulance picked him up twenty-seven minutes after they received the call, and you weren’t there when they arrived.” William listened to her, forcing his eyes to stay fixed on hers. “The man who made the call said he saw you, or the person we think must have been you, just before calling and when he went back into the laneway, you’d already gone. So there was half an hour before the ambulance arrived when you weren’t there.”
“That may be true. I left before the ambulance arrived, but I never said I waited. There was nothing for me to do once the ambulance was called, so I left.” William thought it was not convi
ncing.
“Do you mind me asking, was it a good idea to leave the injured man alone?”
“It would only have been a minute or so.”
The officer nodded without expression, but William felt the disapproval. Nothing said, no expression, but clear.
“You didn’t know that,” she said.
“No, I guess not. Perhaps I should have stayed.”
“How long were you at the scene in total?” she asked.
“Five, ten minutes, or something like that, I guess.”
“Would you mind me asking why you didn’t call the ambulance?” It was the second time the officers had asked if he “minded” being asked. The two officers’ faces were entirely passive.
“What do you mean?” he said, offering a little resistance.
“Sorry, Mr. Koren, we don’t mean to suggest you did anything wrong, but we just have to tie up the loose ends. It’s just that, if you arrive at a scene like that and find someone is badly injured, the first thing to do would be to call an ambulance. So we need to ask why you didn’t.”
William scrambled for an explanation. “Well, I’m not sure I have an answer for you. It was such a shock to see it happen, I must have forgotten.”
“You forgot,” she said.
“I can’t explain it. I did spend some time checking to see if he was alive and moved the garbage bags away from him. He wasn’t breathing well so I cleared his airway. Not sure how long that took. Didn’t look at my watch.” It was a cheap remark.
“Well, that would have taken a few minutes, anyway.” The officer smiled at him as if that was just enough.
William sighed relief. “I’ve just remembered something. When I was at Dennis’s house, I got wet when I slipped on the floor. Remember? There was a flood at his house. I had taken my phone out of my pocket so it didn’t get wet and left it in the car when I went to help the guy. Sorry, it just slipped my mind.”
“Okay, between the shock, the first aid and leaving your phone in the car, ten minutes could easily go by and it explains why you didn’t call the ambulance.” She smiled, and William thought three excuses were too many. “That’s all we need to know. Thanks very much for your time.” The officers reached for the door handle.
He said, “Sorry for making that complicated. I should have remembered the phone. I think that may have been why I left quickly.”
“What do you mean?” the officer asked.
“I was soaking wet and freezing.” William smiled at the two officers and wondered why he had raised it.
“Thanks for mentioning it. Just one more thing,” said the officer. “You were heading home from your meeting with Mr. Mansion, is that right?”
“Yes.”
“The ambulance reported picking up Mr. Kerrigan in the laneway south of Third Street. It seems like a way off the route from Mr. Mansion’s house to yours.”
“I was dropping in on work before going home. I couldn’t remember turning the alarm on, so I thought I would check it.” She was not convinced. “I wasn’t far away.”
“That’s helpful,” the officer said. “There’s always something to do running a business.”
“It’s never-ending.”
“Thanks again for your co-operation. Good night, Mr. Koren.”
The door closed on the officers. William was sickened, rattled to the ends of his fingers, and his body swayed. Only his grip on the handle stopped him from sinking.
“Why would you go to the office soaking wet?” Julie drifted in from the kitchen. William turned to face her. “Well? It’s an interesting question. The police must be thinking about it right now.”
He could not answer and her gaze shamed him.
She said, “I thought you’d got wet in the snow helping that man. And why would you stop and help someone when you’re in that state? You haven’t stopped to help anyone as long as I’ve known you. So, why did you?” A long pause separated them until Julie relented. “I don’t care about that really. Save it for the police. I want to know why you didn’t tell me you’d gone to see Dennis, when you told me you were going to the office? And how did you get wet talking to Dennis?”
“I was going to the office after seeing Dennis.” He thought it was thin but might be enough.
“Why didn’t you just say that?”
“Because I was going to fire him, and I didn’t want a conversation about it.” William felt his confidence returning.
“What did—”
“That’s the conversation I didn’t want,” he interrupted.
Julie took her time to respond. “I don’t care what you want or don’t want. You were there before the fire. You didn’t tell me you’d gone there even when you knew he was dead.” The word thudded against his chest. She stepped forward as if to fasten blame to him. “You’re hiding something. Lying to me, lying to the police, pretending to be a hero.”
“I never said I was a hero.”
“Oh, my mistake. That changes everything! What are you then?”
He could, if he chose, overpower her with words or volume, squashing her contempt and sweeping the challenge aside, but the breath of momentum he had felt a moment before had gone. He need only turn away and walk, dismissing her relevance to all he would do, jettisoning accountability for all that he had done. It was in keeping with his past, but something had changed, preventing him from moving. It was not the lies that held him. It was that question, never before asked or heard with such clarity. The hissing in his ears started buzzing and his scalp shifted.
“I don’t know,” he said gently. There was nausea building with the noise.
“What don’t you know?”
The light from the kitchen became unbearably bright. “I don’t know …”
Julie’s body lifted and turned sideways as if floating away, until she rushed toward him and cradled his head, shouting muffled words he could not make out. There was a sudden stop, pain in his shoulder, and then he was looking up at the ceiling. Julie looked down at him, silhouetted by the kitchen light. The glow closed around her until she was gone.
* * *
William twisted his neck to see the mountains in the distance, across the water over which they flew. He said, “The fire didn’t get us.”
“No thanks to you,” replied Owl.
“But I’d fall if I let go.” William hesitated and asked, “Why didn’t you drop me and save yourself?”
“It is not what I do.”
“What do you mean?” asked William.
“We are what we are. We do what we do.”
“What should I have done? Should I have let go and saved you?”
“If that is what you are.”
“I don’t know what I am,” said William.
Owl said, “My mother was an owl, my father was an owl, I am an owl. It is all I can be.”
“My mother and father were Doukhobors.”
“Then you are a Doukhobor,” said Owl.
“No, I’m not. I don’t want to be a Doukhobor,” said William. “Even if my parents were.”
“You are ashamed?”
“I’m not ashamed!” said William. “The Doukhobors are good people. I just don’t want to do what they do.”
“Very odd,” said Owl. “Not ‘shame,’ ‘good’ people, but you want to be only what you do, and not what you are.”
“I don’t understand. Am I only what I do? So what’s that?”
“You are a cyclist, holding on to your hat.”
“That’s not fair. I’m more than that,” said William.
“Really? What more are you?”
10
New Denver, August 2, 1959
Breakfast was over and already the air was hot. Noise and chatter tumbled out of the dining room with the children and into the yard. Some looked to the lake to occupy them, despi
te the chill of the Slocan water. Others would spend their time marauding in packs, open for fun or mischief, whatever could be found.
Pavel had thought it would be a day to laze away, soccer with friends, talking with Nina, but it was a visiting Sunday, which meant it would be otherwise. She would be anticipating her auntie’s arrival. As with all the children, visits from home meant she would not be right until hours after family had gone. Her mind would be at home and her body in New Denver. It was never easy to have them apart. For Pavel, it had been easier since the arrest of his father. Mind and body were mostly together in New Denver, and home was hardly thought of. It had become a dream left behind on the pillow.
Pavel had expected an excitable morning, but something was not as it should be. The children knew more staff than usual were present, but at this moment, none could be seen. The invitation to get on with the day and the urgency to make beds and behave had not been heard. Nina arrived at his side.
He said, “Not sure what’s going on today. Have you heard anything?”
“Nothing,” said Nina.
It was usual on Sundays to be more relaxed, but today the children felt a difference and limbo descended on them. Gradually the realization of being uncontained by staff caused inhibitions to fall away and a buzz began. Boys teased girls, jostling grew to careering into each other, competing for the ball became a life and death struggle, and laughing became near hysteria. Anger started when a little girl, felled by a random kick of the ball, began crying. The boys laughed and the girls stood square to them, threatening retaliation, bursting with defiance against their brothers and circling the fallen child.
Matron MacDonald and her staff emerged from the office and headed for the dining room. Some smiled; others did not. They gathered children as they approached the dining room, attracting the attention of everyone. Pavel anticipated all visits being cancelled. It would send children’s minds into a spin and inflame every disagreement between them, but it had never been done like this.
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