Seven Days Dead

by John Farrow

  “Ora, what do you mean?” Maddy asks. She makes the effort to remain perfectly calm. “What did my father know?”

  “Only two things. That’s all. At the end, your old man was sure of only two things in this world. One was, you were on your way home to see him, and the other was, you know, that he was going to die. So that’s what I told the copper. Was that wrong? It helps with your alibi, don’t you think? That you were on your way to see him, and your old man knew it, and he knew that he was going to die.”

  Maddy falls still awhile.

  Ora bounces up. “Okay! No jobs here! Feel free to let the house go all messy! Don’t do the dishes! Don’t vacuum! Then you’ll have to hire me again! Remember. I don’t come cheap, but I’m worth it!”

  Out she goes, and Maddy remains alone and tired on the sofa, contemplating life on this island that she so loves. Why did it always grate against her here, why did life’s capricious and renegade nature always find a way to seek her out for special attention while she was here when all that she really ever wanted—all that she ever wanted—was to be left alone?

  FIFTEEN

  Initially, to Émile’s chagrin, but very much to Sandra’s delight, they discover that once a week the village of North Head is animated by a lively, open-air market. Folks who might otherwise never say boo to one another arrive from every island nook to barter, converse, and frolic. As reluctant as Émile has always been to devote a minute, let alone precious holiday time, to shopping, the atmosphere of the market is enchanting and gathers him into its eclectic fold. Soon he’s indulging a secret pleasure to his heart’s content, as the people watching is terrific. All the better that the milling throngs embody a motley mix of haberdashery, of varied cultures and interests.

  Old-timers, now done with their lives at sea, and older women devoted to grandchildren the rest of the week but released to their own joys for a morning, come by. Kids high on the jukebox of colors and talk and indeterminate noise run loose and shove and holler. Scatterings of young women push baby carriages. Other folk—not all, but some in distinctively peculiar dress—who hail from an island hamlet known as Dark Harbour, broker trinkets and knitted clothing and show a propensity for jocularity and sly, ribald chatter amid dour men sharing flasks. And girls flaunt their tresses as various jumbles of both talkative and taciturn adolescent boys check them out while pretending a greater interest in passing cars. They all converge and meld as though swept along by a tidal bore.

  Émile discovers a coterie of vagabond seniors, who live modestly, the majority in trailers and vans, who park themselves on the island for the summer and drift to Florida come fall. Snowbirds who are not well-heeled, but they’ve adjusted to their circumstances, having figured out the means to make their wandering pay and enhance their latter years with adventure. They also sell items to the tourists, such as polished walking sticks for the Grand Manan trails, shawls for the cool sea air, bric-a-brac souvenirs, jewelry made from beads, stones, and beach glass for the ladies, and spiffy hats for the men. A former schoolteacher sells potions and a former plumber barters the world’s best glue. Émile buys a walking stick for twenty bucks that he knows costs no more than two bits’ worth of varnish to produce and is happy to do so. He’s charmed by the instrument and also by the spry old guy in his eighties who sells it to him.

  All around, voices are merry and the time happily festive.

  Émile catches sight of Sandra tucking purchases away in her bag, including foodstuffs and books, knickknacks and clothing accessories. He’s happy that she seems so delighted. If he’s not mistaken, she’s bought fudge, and he’s especially glad about that. The warm sunny day contributes to the mood, but the potpourri of wares, the wild mix of people, a seasoning of sixty-year-old transplanted hippies from another time and weathered local fishermen, perhaps also from another era, market gardeners and craftsmen and tourists from every which place, kids and old folk combined, everyone under the influence of good cheer, puts an exclamation point on the fun of the hour. Sandra sees him noticing her and smiles back.

  She hopes that he didn’t see the fudge, a surprise.

  “Hello there,” a voice addresses Émile Cinq-Mars. He expects another hawker in his ear when he turns, but the man is not standing behind a stall, and anyway seems too well dressed. An ascot, for starters, with a monocle tucked into the chest pocket of a pinstriped vest. Like him, he’s a buyer, not a seller, or at least someone who’s wandering through, and he’s vaguely familiar. The man issues a reminder. “Yesterday. Car crash. For want of a better word.”

  “Right,” Émile recalls. “You drove that poor lady into a ditch.”

  The fellow, who’s thin and nearly as tall as Émile, knows instantly that he’s kidding and laughs him off. “My mission in life,” he adds. “Drive anyone not behind the wheel of a Mercedes right off the road. Claim my proprietary rights to all asphalt surfaces.”

  “How’d she get on at the hospital?”

  “None the worse for wear. Apart from her nasty abrasions. I, meanwhile, was nearly talked into an early grave. Once she gets going, hold on. I hit the martinis pretty hard after I got home. I’m surprised to make it out this morning.” As he speaks, his white eyebrows are animate. Thin to nonexistent on top, his hair gathers in a longish wave at the base of his neck. His narrow visage is rimmed with liver spots. He exhibits an air of good humor, intelligence, and, Cinq-Mars concludes, money. “Sir, I must say that I want to thank you. Yesterday you came along at an opportune moment, as our dispute was at risk of becoming acrimonious. You took charge and found a solution. I was about to lose my cool. I was only trying to help but making a royal botch of it, and the truth is, you did both the lady and me a good turn. As I told my wife, whoever that masked man was, he’s done this sort of thing before.”

  “Guilty,” Cinq-Mars admits. “Cop. Retired.”

  “Ah! I thank you, for the loan of your expertise, Officer. Professor Jason DeWitt, sir. Pleased to make your acquaintance once again.”

  “Émile Cinq-Mars.” At that moment, Sandra comes over, and he adds, “My wife, Sandra, whom you met yesterday.”

  The dandy tips his cap and repeats his own name for her. “I have a summer home on the road up to Seven Days Work. You’re visiting?”

  Sandra shares where they are staying and he points out that they’re “practically neighbors,” inviting them up for an afternoon cocktail on a day of their own choosing. “It’s the only constant in my life. Late-afternoon drinks overlooking the sea the moment the sun dips below the yardarm. You’ve no doubt heard about our murder. Wretched business. Having a policeman come visit will be reassuring, and informative, I might imagine.”

  In other words, Émile interprets, in a manner of speaking he’s being asked to sing for his supper. Or for a drink. He accepts the man’s card and promises to call, although Sandra wants to know, as they move off, “Are we going?”

  “House on a cliff, up high. We might. For the view.”

  “I’m game if you promise to talk about more than murder.”

  “Solemn vow. I am not interested in this island’s body count.”

  “You can be induced.”

  “My will is nothing if not strong,” he quips.

  Returning to their Jeep, Émile takes the bag from Sandra as it has some weight. He tramps along with it over a shoulder while his newly acquired walking stick in his opposite hand stabs the pavement. He’s feeling like an alien in a new land, and enjoying the sensation. At the car, a closer inspection of her merchandise confirms the fudge.

  “Émile!” she admonishes. “Get your nose out of there this instant!”

  Another purchase though, a secondhand book, instigates his curiosity. “Seriously? You? Numerology?”

  “It caught my eye.”

  “Hunh.”

  “Oh, don’t make a federal case out of it. Something for me to dillydally with over the summer.”

  “What federal case?”

  She wants him off the subject. “What’s nex
t for our day, Émile? What are you up for?”

  He brandishes the polished, curvy walking stick, thick yet light and gnarled with knots. An object of exquisite beauty. “Look at me. Put my boots on and I’m set for a hike.” That’s what lured them to this island, the magnificent walking trails across the cliffs overlooking the sea. “What say you?”

  She was hoping he’d suggest it.

  * * *

  Coming away from the flurry of the market, the solitude of the trail feels all the more pronounced. Keen early risers have gone ahead, while others wait to have lunch before embarking on the trek, so in between those groups they have the path to themselves. They’ve studied trail maps and guidebooks, and know they will be led over the top of Seven Days Work, with its astral views of the Bay of Fundy. Rising straight from the sea, it can be scaled from its base by only the most skilled and daring of rock climbers, and only then with strategy and care. The sheer, towering rock face exhibits the geographic ages of the earth—the planet’s oldest exposed rock is present here—and from the top a stunning view. Then comes Ashburton Head, followed by the Bishop.

  “Wait a minute,” Sandra stops to say, snagged by a thought. On her left, a peaceable meadow is lit by wildflowers and graced by a following breeze. To her right, the waters of the bay sparkle far below.

  “What is it?”

  “That murder took place along this trail.”

  “No problem. The scene’s clean by now,” her husband assures her.

  “Then it’s not the murder that’s made you keen to hike?”

  Émile expresses mock alarm. “Sandra, since when are you so suspicious of me? Perish the thought, okay? We’ve talked about this trail once a week for the past three months. Besides, it’s a beautiful day and I’m keen to hike.”

  “Okay. All right.” She doesn’t sound convinced.

  “What do I care about a silly murder? Am I the investigating officer?”

  “Not yet.”

  “No yet about it. I’m not interested.” To drive his message home, he resorts to French. “Pointe finale.”

  She’s not swayed. “You protest a little too much maybe” is her final note.

  Early along the trek, they encounter Pete Briscoe. Well off the trail, he spots them first, throws down a shovel, and literally gallops through the tall grasses to intercept them. He says he’s burying his dog in a spot he can find again in the future, thanks to a stand of nearby pines. They’re both inclined to leave him to his ceremony although he seems anxious to talk.

  If they introduced themselves a day ago, their names are forgotten now, so each of them revisits the ritual.

  “I’m glad to run into you again, Sandra,” Pete Briscoe says. “You, too, Émile.”

  Cinq-Mars quashes a smile. The way he came across the meadow makes his phrase quite literal. “Why’s that?”

  “To thank you! I don’t think I did. I was a wreck yesterday. But thank you. For finding Gadget, then caring enough to look for her owner. That was really great of you. Not many tourists would take the time out of their day to do something like that for a poor man like me. I was hoping to say a proper thanks.”

  “We have animals ourselves, Pete. Dogs. Cats. Horses galore. We know that losing one is difficult.”

  “I was drunk.”

  Cinq-Mars doesn’t know if the man is trying to excuse himself or explain his grief, although either way there is no need. “I see.”

  “Hungover when we met. The day before, drunk. At sea. In the storm. I admit it. That storm was all I needed. So me and a lot of the boats spent the night on the water, and some of us—I was one of them—partied the night away. Not much else to do. I don’t know how it happened, but it was my fault. I was drunk and I know better than to tie one on out on the water. How Gadget went over the side, I don’t know. A wild night, I should’ve made sure she stayed below or in the wheelhouse. I lost my best friend and it’s my fault. The truth is, I have to face that fact. I do. That misery. I wasn’t at my best yesterday. A man should say thank you for what you did and I plumb forgot. Not forgivable, but I hope you will anyway.”

  Émile is feeling mildly embarrassed listening to the discourse. The more assurance he offers, the more Pete Briscoe protests. He gives up trying and accepts the other man’s supreme and eternal—apparently—thanks.

  “You’re welcome,” he says.

  “You should come up to the Whistle,” the fisherman suggests, an invitation.

  “I’ve read about it. A lookout?”

  “Walk or drive up to the top of Whistle Road. People get together at sunset, before and after. Have a few pops, you know.”

  “I see.”

  “But that’s not the whole point of it, the drinking. Only a part. There’s no bars on the island, see. We drink in our houses and we drink at the Whistle. Watch the whales swim by, watch the sun go down, tell a few stories. Oh, I tell a lie. We go through a lot more than a few stories. A ton! Our talk is better than what’s on the boob tube, that’s a home truth, so come by, the both of you, listen in. You’ll enjoy yourselves.”

  “We might do that,” Cinq-Mars tells him. Sandra gives him a look, as he seems to be accepting every invitation that’s coming his way, not his usual nature.

  “I gotta get back to burying my poor pup. It’s hard to find a place that’s not solid rock up here.”

  Sandra speaks up for the first time. “I thought you buried Gadget yesterday.”

  Pete Briscoe turns back, nods. “I planned to,” he concurs. He tightens his forehead in thought, which effectively binds his unibrow into a single line of fur. “Too upset. I couldn’t bury a penny yesterday if you dug the hole yourself and all I had to do was drop in a coin. So nope. Had to get a better hold of myself, you know? Do it the right way. Do what’s best for Gadget.”

  “Why up here?” Émile inquires. Briscoe won’t notice, but Sandra detects the suspicion in his voice.

  “Do you know a more beautiful place on earth? Wouldn’t mind my own ashes tossed off this cliff, when the time comes. When I’m out in the bay, what do I see but Seven Days Work? In fog, Seven Days Work comes up first on the radar. Now when I see this cliff, I’ll see Gadget. I’ll know she’s up here, having a romp. She loved the boat, but she loved running here the most. Rabbits! She never cared for fish, they scared her, but she loved chasing rabbits. Now she’s free to, all day and all night long.”

  He seems set to blubber again.

  “It is a beautiful resting place,” Sandra agrees.

  “The oldest rock on earth, they say. Grand Manan was at the equator when the Americas, and Europe and Africa, were all one continent. Did you know that? Seven Days Work was at the middle of the earth at the dawn of time. Different planet then, hey? Now we’re flung off to nowhere. Gadget will lie here. At the middle of the old world, on the oldest rock in existence, with the best view a man or dog can see.”

  A speech worthy of a funeral, a good point of departure. The couple voice their good-byes and carry on with their hike.

  They are quiet along the trail for a distance before Émile compliments her. “Good question,” he remarks.

  Sandra has no clue what he means but thinks about it for another forty yards before she mentions, “I didn’t ask any questions.”

  “Even better.”

  She thinks about that as they cross over a stony patch and pick up the worn trail again. “What do you mean, Émile?”

  “Without actually framing it as a question,” he explains, “you asked how come he’s burying his dog today and not yesterday.”

  Accustomed to her husband thinking things through on different levels, she tries to do the same, but nothing surfaces. “So?” She takes his hand. They walk side by side before the trail narrows once more.

  “Anytime a man leaves where he is, to run over and speak to you when there’s really no need, that means he doesn’t want you to be where he was, he doesn’t want you to know what he was doing. Which is fine. People do private things. And yet, you saw h
im yesterday. He was distraught, but that motivated him to bury his dog yesterday, like he said he would do. The state he was in, nothing was going to prevent that. What or whom he’s burying today is beyond me. Not his dog though. Gadget’s in the ground already. Maybe up here. Or elsewhere. She’s already in the dirt.”

  Sandra can’t help but look back over her shoulder, but the bluff where Pete Briscoe has been digging is out of sight due to the gentle contours of the land. “Should we go back? Spy on him?”

  Émile laughs. “Listen to you. Detective Wife.”

  “Well. It could be serious, no?”

  “And none of our business. If somebody is reported missing, we’ll know where to look. I’ll suggest Pete to the authorities. But if someone is being buried, chances are, he or she is already dead. Nothing we can do. And yes, I’m kidding. If I thought for one second that he’s burying a person, I’d intervene. Still, you saw him yesterday, and today. He’s not the kind of man who hides his emotions or even tries. He’s nervous today. He doesn’t want us to know what he’s up to. Mischief, I’d say. Is he a man out burying his neighbor on a whim? Or even his neighbor’s goat? Not likely.”

  “Then what? Best wild guess.”

  “A picture of an old girlfriend, who left him ten years ago after an aging rock star got her pregnant and she wanted to keep the baby. He’s finally done with her emotionally. Your turn.”

  “Hmm. A souvenir from a current love affair that he needs to keep secret because the woman is his mother’s best friend and twice his age.”

  “More to his mood. You win.”

  Sandra keeps thinking it through seriously. Often she chides her husband for his investigative instincts, but this stuff excites her, too. “He’s hiding something he stole, or a time capsule, or he’s digging for buried treasure, or concealing a secret. You’re right, though. Even if I don’t know any killers, to my knowledge, I’m pretty sure he’s not one. At least, he hasn’t killed anybody lately.”