A Colder Kind of Death (21 page)

That night I slept deeply and dreamlessly. The next morning I woke up to fresh snow and a sense of hope. It was Advent Sunday. As I made the coffee, I remembered our old minister saying that the first Sunday in Advent always
reminded him of a song from
West Side Story
. When I stepped into the shower, I knew exactly how he felt. “Something’s coming,” I sang and, as I soaped up, I thought it was about time for something good to come whistling down my river.

Angus was the altar boy at church, and as he lit the candle, I felt my heart beat faster. To celebrate the start of the Christmas season, we went to the Copper Kettle for brunch. At the buffet, Taylor and Angus competed hotly to see who could heap the most food on their plate. As I watched them tottering back to our table, plates piled high with roast beef and ribs and perogies, I was so embarrassed I wanted to sink through the floor, but they told each other jokes all through lunch and laughed so hard that the owner of the restaurant gave them each a free dessert. “You two are good for business,” he said. When we came out of the restaurant, Taylor decided to dance all the way down Scarth Street because she was so happy. As I watched her twirling around in her snow-suit and her boots, I knew my something good had already come. You could always count on Leonard Bernstein.

Monday after class, a student called asking for an appointment and, as I checked my calendar, I saw there were only twenty-four shopping days till Christmas. I made a quick list of people I was buying presents for and headed for the mall.

Inside the Cornwall Centre, it wasn’t hard to feel the holiday spirit. Beside the fountain in the centre courtyard, a three-storey tree soared towards a skylight; in front of the toy store, Santa was ho-ho-ho’ing on his big red chair inside the North Pole; and every loudspeaker in the mall was blaring “Silent Night.”

I was coming down the escalator in Eaton’s when I saw her. She was in the accessories department, comparing two scarves. She seemed so absorbed that, for a split second, I thought I might get away unscathed. But just before the
escalator got to the main floor, Julie Evanson looked up and saw me. There was no escaping her.

She was wearing her platinum hair in a new and becoming feathered cut, and her cherry-red wool coat fitted her trim figure like the proverbial glove. The look was strictly Liz Claiborne, but I knew Julie had made the coat herself. As she had told me many times over the years, she made all her own clothes. She also told me that, with a figure like mine, which must be difficult to fit, I’d find I’d look much smarter if I made my own clothes, too. That was Julie.

“Christmas shopping, Julie?” I said.

She smiled her dimpled smile. “All my shopping’s done, Joanne. And wrapped.”

“Mine, too,” I said, crossing my fingers the way my kids did when they told a lie.

“I guess shopping kept you busy when everyone thought you’d murdered that girl.”

“Not everyone thought that, Julie. The police didn’t. That’s why I’m standing here now.”

She looked thoughtfully at the scarf in her hand. “That poor girl,” she said. “Choked to death. It was good luck that you got off, wasn’t it?”

“It wasn’t luck,” I said. “It was justice. I didn’t have anything to do with Maureen Gault’s death.”

She shrugged. “So you say. But try as I might, I can’t forget the little chat I had with Maureen the day you and I met in the Faculty Club.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I just told you. I had a fascinating tête-à-tête with Maureen Gault the day before she was killed. She was coming out of the elevator in the Arts Building. You know, the building where you have your office,” she added helpfully.

“I know where my office is, Julie. What did Maureen tell you?”

Julie frowned. “I’ll have to make sure I remember exactly what was said. After all, Maureen isn’t here to defend herself, is she? On second thought, maybe it would be better if I didn’t say anything at all.”

I started to leave. “Suit yourself,” I said. “I’m too old for this crap.”

She reached out and touched my sleeve. “I don’t remember you as being profane, Joanne. But I guess I can’t blame you for being anxious about what Maureen might have said to me before she died.”

“Julie, please.”

“All right. It was a brief encounter. I was on my way to your office to see if you’d buy some tickets to the fashion show. I was just passing the bookstore in the Arts Building when Maureen Gault got off the elevator. I recognized her, and went up and introduced myself.” Julie dimpled. “I said I was a friend of yours. You’re not the only one who can stretch the truth, Joanne.

“Anyway, Maureen said, ‘When you see her, tell her I’m looking for her.’ Of course, I asked why, and Maureen said, ‘I want to ask her if she’s feeling different about any of the Seven Dwarfs these days.’ ”

I remembered the crude X’s someone had drawn over the faces of Andy Boychuk and my husband the day Julie ran into Maureen. There didn’t seem to be much doubt anymore about who had wielded the felt pen. “Did she say anything more?” I asked.

“I forced her to say more,” Julie said proudly. “I asked Maureen point-blank what she knew about the Seven Dwarfs. At first she seemed angry at the question, then she laughed and pointed to one of the displays in the bookstore window. They hadn’t taken out the Hallowe’en decorations yet, and there was a skeleton propped up against a stack of biology books. Maureen jabbed at the window in front of it
and said, ‘There’s your answer, blondie. I know where the Seven Dwarfs hid their skeleton.’ ”

Julie must have seen the fear in my eyes. “Just a figure of speech I’m sure, but in retrospect, it does seem chilling, doesn’t it?” She looked at her watch. “Four o’clock, already. How the minutes fly when we’re with friends.”

She thrust the scarf she was holding into my hand. “Here, Joanne, you take this. All those colours. It’s more the kind of thing you’d wear.” She turned on her heel, and steered her way effortlessly through the other shoppers in accessories. I felt as if someone had run me over with a truck, but then Julie had always been the queen of the hit-and-run artists. The scarf she’d thrust at me was still in my hands. Julie was right. That brilliant swirl of colour was the kind of thing I liked. When it came to insights that could wound, Julie had a knack for being right. She also, much as I hated to admit it, had a knack for finding out the truth. As poisonous as she was, I had never known Julie to lie.

I put down the scarf. Christmas shopping was over for the day. I had to find out if Julie had stumbled onto some ugly truth about the Seven Dwarfs.

When I walked past the North Pole on my way out, I could hear the soft, anxious voices of the young mothers waiting with little girls in fussy velvet dresses and little boys in Christmas sweaters and new corduroy pants. “Don’t forget to smile,” the mothers said. “Don’t forget to tell Santa what you want him to bring you. There’s nothing to be afraid of …”

Jenny Rybchuk had stood in a line like that with her son. Where was she now? When her father said, “Now, I got no more daughter,” what had he meant? As I drove up Albert Street, I could feel the anxiety beginning to gnaw.

I didn’t wait to take my coat off before I dialled Howard Dowhanuik’s number in Toronto.

He was furious. “A skeleton! Don’t you know better than to listen to Julie? Christ, Jo, after all these years …”

“Howard, as awful as Julie is, I’ve never known her to lie.”

“Maybe she’s turned a corner since we knew her.”

“I don’t think it’s that simple. Howard, Maureen Gault was murdered the day after Julie saw her. What if the skeleton Maureen was talking about wasn’t figurative? What if she really did chance upon something about the Seven Dwarfs? Do you have any idea what she might have been talking about?”

“No, I don’t, and to be frank I’m pissed off that you think I would. Jo, I may lack finesse and I may be a little crude, but I’m an officer of the court. We take an oath. Do you think I could know about a stiff being stashed somewhere and say, ‘Oh well, one of us was responsible for that murder, so I’ll overlook it’?”

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“You should be,” he said. Then his voice was kinder. “That goddamn Julie makes us all crazy. Just forget it, Jo.”

“I’ll try,” I said.

But I couldn’t. I dialled Craig Evanson’s number. When Manda answered, I hung up. After enduring the hell of a bad marriage for twenty years, Craig had found a great wife and a great life. He didn’t need to revisit his past. Besides, there was a chance Howard was right. It was possible that Julie was just making me crazy.

I went upstairs to change my clothes before dinner. I pulled on my blue jeans and a long-sleeved T-shirt Mieka had bought years ago at a concert. The Go-Go’s. Another blast from the past. When I reached down to pick up my sneakers, I saw the corner of the ballerina-covered box under the bed, and I felt the panic rising.

“Where are you, Jenny,” I murmured. I picked up the telephone and dialled the number of my new friends in the classified department. This time I wasn’t fancy with the ad:

‘
URGENT
: I must speak to Jenny Rybchuk or anyone knowing her whereabouts. Joanne Kilbourn.’ I left both my office and my home numbers. I didn’t want to take a chance on missing her.

The ad appeared in the late edition of Tuesday’s paper. Wednesday morning as I pulled onto the parkway on my way to the university, I noticed the silver Audi behind me. When I turned into the university, the Audi stayed with me, but it sailed by when I drove into the parking lot in front of College West, and I forgot about it. Two hours later, as I started home, it was there again. The Audi’s windows were tinted. Whoever was driving it had an advantage over me in our game of hide-and-seek. I looked for it when I stopped for groceries at the
IGA
, but it had disappeared. When I drove home, the Audi was behind me all the way, but it was nowhere in sight when I parked in front of our house. The first thing I saw at home was Taylor balanced on the railing on the front porch with a string of Christmas lights in her hand and a look of grim determination on her face. At that point, the Audi slipped to the back of my mind where it stayed the rest of the evening.

Peter called after supper to say he was coming home Saturday to study for his mid-term exams. Taylor, who had been standing beside me, holding her kitten and listening to my half of the conversation with Peter, looked at me expectantly when I hung up. “Now is it time to get out the Christmas stuff?” she asked.

“It’s time,” I said. “Come on, we’ll go downstairs and dig out the decorations. But you’re going to have to keep that cat out of harm’s way till we’re done.” I looked at the animal in Taylor’s arms. It wasn’t a ball of ginger fluff any more; it was starting to get a rangy adolescent look. “T,” I said, “when are you going to decide on a name? You’re supposed to do these things when the animal is young enough to learn.”

She rubbed the spot under her cat’s neck thoughtfully. “I keep changing my mind. Angus says I should call him ‘Dallas’ after the Dallas Cowboys. What do you think?”

“Dallas? It sounds okay to me.”

Taylor shook her head. “I hate it.” She moved the cat into his favourite carrying position, with his body against her chest and his head looking back over her shoulder. “Come on, kitten, let’s go put you in our room.” As she walked out the door, I caught the cat looking at me in a defiant teenager way, and I knew he would make me pay for banishing him.

Taylor and I spent the rest of the evening decorating. We were just winding fake holly around the staircase rail when the phone rang. It was Inspector Alex Kequahtooway.

“I thought I’d call and see how you’re doing, Mrs. Kilbourn.”

“I’m fine,” I said. “How are you?”

“Fine,” he said. “Mrs. Kilbourn, I was wondering what you were doing Friday night.”

I felt my heart sink. “Friday night? I don’t remember. Inspector, what’s happened?”

He laughed. “Nothing’s happened, Mrs. Kilbourn. It’s not last Friday I’m interested in. It’s this Friday. I was wondering if you wanted to go to the symphony with me. They’ve got some hot-shot guest violinist and he’s doing a Beethoven sonata. That day in my office, you said you liked Beethoven.”

“I do,” I said.

“Well?” he asked.

“I’d love to,” I said.

“Shall I pick you up at about seven?”

“Seven would be great,” I said.

The next day as I drove to school thinking about what I’d wear on Friday night, I noticed the Audi again. I’m a cautious driver, but I tried a few tricky manoeuvres to see if I was imagining that the Audi was following me. It was right
with me all the way to the university turnoff. When I got to my office, I called Alex Kequahtooway. He wasn’t at headquarters, but I left a message, and when he called back a half-hour later, I told him about the Audi. He said he’d look into it. When I drove home after class, the Audi was gone, and I thought it might be handy dating a cop.

Friday night, Inspector Alex Kequahtooway was on my doorstep at the dot of 7:00. I’d had my hair cut at a new place that cost three times as much as my old place, and I was wearing a black silk dress so chic that even Julie Evanson would have approved.

Alex Kequahtooway did too. “You look great,” he said, as he held out my coat for me.

“You look pretty spiffy yourself,” I said.

He smiled. “I guess if the compliments are over, we can go.”

The kids came down to say goodbye, and we walked out to the curb where the taxi Alex had arrived in was waiting. It was a gorgeous night, warm for December, and starry. We had the idea at the same time. “Let’s walk,” we said in unison. Alex sent the cabbie on her way with a Christmas tip generous enough to make her smile. I ran back to the house, put on my heavy boots, and we started for the park. As we walked through the snowy streets, we didn’t talk much, but it wasn’t an awkward silence. When we rounded the corner by the Legislature, Alex climbed through the snow onto a little spit of land overlooking the lake. He held his hand out to me to follow. There was a full moon, and the ice on the lake seemed to glow.

“When I was a kid, we used to walk on the lake by the reserve all winter. Christmas Eve we’d walk across to church, then we’d come back, and all my aunties would make pies. That’s what I remember about Christmas. Lying in bed, smelling pies baking, and hearing my aunties laugh.” He turned to me. “What do you remember?”