The Birthday Lunch (17 page)

“An estate auction on Sunday?

“It happens.”

Lily had gone to some trouble, serving tea from a tray in the living room, using the china cups and saucers her nursing friends had given her at her wedding shower. Absent was Laverne’s wedding present to Lily and Hal, the Sevres teapot she had bought in France.

Lily asked how things were going at school. Laverne told her how much she enjoyed seeing the fresh faces of her rural students who had been up early to do the chores. Laverne has always preferred rural students, who in her experience are
unspoiled and used to hard work. She told Lily that motivating spoiled town students continued to be a challenge. “How rewarding it is to tutor my Vietnamese student,” Laverne said. “He is a bright boy and bound for university.” The mention of Xuan Pham was deliberate, providing Laverne with an opportunity to introduce Alan Harrington into the conversation.

“Hal told me about the church sponsoring the family of boat people,” Lily said. “Good for Alan for persuading the congregation to take that on.”

Laverne said, “By the way, have you seen Alan since the afternoon he and I were painting by the river while you went for a swim?”

“Not lately,” Lily said. She offered Laverne a raisin bun.

“I know you have seen him since you met at Fox Hill.”

Lily frowned. “Really? Where and when was that?”

“In the driveway six weeks ago. You were sitting beside Alan in his van.”

“Where else would I sit?” Lily said in that annoying, offhand way she sometimes used. “Yes, I remember now. I was leaving the library and he offered me a lift.”

“Alan is a kind man,” Laverne said.

“Yes. He’s done a great deal for the boat people.”

Lily’s guilelessness was so convincing that Laverne began to question what she had seen through the kitchen window. She remembered seeing Alan kiss Lily on the cheek—that much was certain. But she had not seen Lily return the kiss.

“I suppose you know Alan is getting married,” Lily said. “In the spring, I believe Hal said.”

Laverne’s teacup rattled in its saucer.

“You didn’t know.”

Laverne dipped her chin.

“According to Hal, he’s marrying the widow of a friend.”

Laverne quieted the teacup with one hand while Lily took the other. “I’m sorry, Sis. I didn’t realize how fond you were of him.”

Stripped of her defences, Laverne fled downstairs. The news of Alan Harrington’s marriage dashed the hope, faint though it was, that some day their friendship would develop into something serious and enduring. Worse still was that her sister had opened the door to the private place where Laverne stored matters of the heart and having seen what was inside, would feel sorry for her. Laverne could not bear anyone, especially her married sister, feeling sorry for her. For that reason she had never told Lily how downcast she had been when Alan failed to show up in the meadow a third time for what Laverne had come to think of as a painting rendezvous.

Laverne had never told Lily that before she had introduced her to Hal at Petite Riviere, Hal and Laverne occasionally played singles on the Bridgewater tennis courts. These games were never prearranged and depended on whoever happened to show up at the courts. Athletic and handsome in his tennis whites, Hal was cocky enough to expect he would win, and he usually did. After one of these games, Laverne invited him to join her at Rissers Beach for a staff cornboil and he accepted. Laverne waited for an hour in the Rissers Beach parking lot for Hal to show up but he never did. Weeks later when she saw him again on the tennis courts, he offered neither an excuse nor an apology and they never played singles again.

Laverne’s reticence about sharing disappointments and matters of the heart may have had something to do with the fact that before she left home for normal school, her father took her aside and said, “From now on, you solve your own problems. Don’t bring your troubles home to me.” Stung by what Laverne thought was her father’s rejection, it was years before she concluded that Lou’s edict was a clumsy attempt to help her stand on her own two feet.

Before she left home for nursing school, Lou issued the same edict to his younger daughter. He needn’t have bothered. When it came to troubles, Lily was private and pragmatic. She did not tell her father or her sister that she had broken off her engagement to the Boston doctor because she had caught him two-timing her with his office receptionist. And after she married Hal, she did not complain about the financial difficulties, or the ups and downs of married life. What was the point? No marriage was perfect. Besides, who understood the vagaries of love?

Matt stares out the airport window watching the eighteen-seat turboprop emerge from the clouds, taxi down the runway and come to a stop. The metal staircase is wheeled to the plane, the door opens and Trish is the first to disembark. Tall and slim, a thick red braid halfway down her back, she strides across the tarmac toward Matt. A hug and a lingering kiss, then the first question: “How are the kids?”

“They’re fine, Matt, just fine,” Trish says. She spends most of her waking hours with the kids and does not want to
talk about them now, but Matt can never hear enough about the kids. Trish obliges with their son’s latest attempt at running away, leaving out the fact that when she caught up with Dougie, he was standing beside the swift moving creek.

Matt lifts the familiar red suitcase from the conveyer belt and says, “Wow, it’s heavy. What have you got inside?”

“Wake food: cherries and dark chocolate,” Trish says. Black Forest cake is one of her specialties. Working from home, Trish supplies the Bavarian Restaurant in Bragg Creek with Black Forest cake and a variety of pastries.

“Cake for the wake,” Matt says. “Who told you about the family wake?”

“Your sister.”

Matt rescues the second suitcase and carries both suitcases outside. As they walk to the parking lot, Trish says, “I told Claudia to leave the meals up to me.” Matt leans sideways and kisses her ear.

Trish and Matt met at the Banff Springs Hotel where they both had summer jobs: Matt as a waiter, Trish as a pastry chef. He was in law school and she was a recent graduate from a culinary college program in Calgary. By July they were sleeping together in her bed and by September they were living in a two-room apartment in Halifax. When they could afford it, they spent weekends in Sussex with Lily and Hal in the rented house on George Street. From the beginning Trish was fond of Matt’s mother and appreciated the fact that unlike her own mother, Lily was a live-and-let-live person who, unless asked, never gave advice. Also, unlike Trish’s mother, Lily was a good listener. Trish is also fond of Hal who, like her own father, is a
gregarious talker she has learned to tune out. After she and Matt married and moved West, Trish missed Lily and Hal, who she did not think of in-laws but as friends. She and Matt bought the Bragg Creek house and were caught up in work, kids and Trish’s extended family. When their first born, Jenny, was a baby, Matt and Trish brought her to Fox Hill for her first Christmas but they have never brought Dougie back east. You always think there will be time for another summer, another holiday.

Trish says, “We should send Hal and Claudia plane tickets so they can spend Christmas with us. Your aunt too if she wants.” Trish hasn’t seen Laverne since the wedding in Halifax and asks how she is.

“Who knows or cares how Laverne is?” Matt says.

“What brought that on?”

Matt shrugs. “Why would I care about someone who betrayed my mother?”

“Your aunt betrayed your mother?”

“This morning Laverne was having breakfast upstairs with us when Curtis Parlee, the truck driver who killed Mom, showed up at the house to apologize. Laverne interfered and said that she had seen the accident, that Mom had walked in front of the truck, which is an outright lie. She said the accident wasn’t Curtis’s fault. Curtis was going twice the speed limit and couldn’t stop but she said it wasn’t his fault. ‘Curt,’ Laverne called him. He had been a student of hers.”

“She may have been suffering from shock.”

“All of us are in shock,” Matt says. “This afternoon I went to see Larry McIntyre, you remember Larry …”

“Of course.”

“I asked him to help file an accident insurance claim.”

“Isn’t it too soon to file?”

“It’s never too soon. Dad needs the money and it will take months for the claim to work its way through the system and I wanted to get it going before I leave. Larry’s secretary typed up the witness statements and tomorrow I will get them signed.” Matt reaches for Trish’s hand. “Now that you’re here, I won’t feel like I’m leaving everything to Claudia. She’s the one who has been keeping everything on track.”

The low cloud cover has brought an early dark, which is why neither Matt nor Trish see the moose standing on the pavement until they are five or six cars lengths away. Matt has seen moose before on this wooded stretch of road but only during rutting season, not at this time of year. Weak-eyed and befuddled, the young male stands about fifty feet ahead of their car. Matt dims the headlights and waits him out. A truck approaches from the opposite direction and comes to a stop close enough for the moose to see its dark shape. Even so the moose is unwilling to leave the pavement and stands, ears twitching until there are six vehicles behind Matt’s rental. Fortunately, none of the drivers sound their horns or try to pass.

“Poor moose,” Trish whispers, “he must be terrified.”

“No doubt he is, but he can’t hear us through the windows.” Matt says.

“I know but …”

“The moose isn’t the smartest animal,” Matt says, “I’d say his IQ is about the level of your horse’s.” Matt often teases his wife about the Appaloosa she boards at Elkana Ranch.

“Well, he finally smartened up enough to get off the road,” Trish says as the moose saunters down the embankment and breaks into a run on the narrow strip of grass alongside the road. With his wife beside him, Matt is in no hurry to go home and he eases the car onto the gravel shoulder. While the line of vehicles behind them passes, Matt tells Trish that his uncle is coming from Florida to attend the reception on Sunday.

“Your father’s brother.”

“The doctor. Welland and Dad haven’t seen one another in years. I don’t know why. Dad always referred to his brother as the clever one.”

“When was the last time you saw your uncle?”

“I haven’t seen Welland since we moved from Dartmouth twenty years ago.”

It is ten o’clock when the Mazda pulls into the driveway. The downstairs windows are framed in black but the lawn is splashed with upstairs window light. Matt parks the car near the veranda.

“You go ahead,” he says to Trish. “I’ll bring the bags.”

Hal and Claudia are waiting at the top of the stairs. Hal embraces his daughter-in-law. Trish holds him close and says, “Oh Hal,” which makes him cry, and taking out his handkerchief, he wipes his eyes. Trish hugs her sister-in-law. “We were worried,” Claudia says. “What took you so long?”

“There was a moose on the road.”

“Are you hungry? Because if you are …”

“Thanks, but I had a meal in Halifax.”

“We’ll have some wine and cheese,” Matt says, and carries the larger suitcase into the kitchen.

An hour later, Claudia is alone in the kitchen when the telephone rings. She is relieved the family has gone to bed and she won’t be asked who is calling.

“Hello, my beauty,” Leonard says.
My beauty
: words that belong to Claudia’s other life. “How are you?”

“I don’t really know.”

“Well then, can you tell me what’s been going on?”

Claudia tells Leonard that her mother is being cremated, that the burial will be on Sunday afternoon followed by a public reception; that afterwards there will be a family meal at home.

“Is it all right with you if I attend the reception?”

“Leonard, you never knew my mother. Why would you want to attend the reception?”

“To support you, of course.”

The same old Leonard, always ready with a suave response. No wonder he has a long track record of bedding women.

“Leonard, my family and I will be concentrating on honouring my mother and I don’t want any distractions.”

“I promise I won’t distract you,” Leonard says.

Claudia is too tired to insist Leonard stay away and when he asks the time and place of the reception, she says, “Between two and four at Adair’s Motel. Adair’s is on Main Street across from Kirk Hill Cemetery. We’re going to bury Mom’s ashes there before the reception.”

“I’ll leave here before noon.”

“I’ll ignore you,” Claudia says.

“That’s all right,” Leonard says. “Seeing you will be enough.”

Again, those beguiling words Leonard says so easily and Claudia finds difficult to resist.

“Good night,” she says, and hangs up before he can prolong the conversation. It is only when Claudia is in bed that she remembers she forgot to tell Leonard that she will not be accompanying him to Nuremberg next month.

Even with the help of trazodone and the comfort of having his children nearby, Hal cannot sleep. Staring into the dark, he counts the gentle pings of the living-room clock. Twelve o’clock and here he is wide awake trying to make sense of what happened in the kitchen this morning, trying to make sense of why the truck driver came to the house and said he was sorry he hit Lily. Didn’t the truck driver know that an apology was no excuse for killing someone? Didn’t he know that the last person Hal and his family wanted to see was him? As if that wasn’t enough, Laverne had put her hand on the truck driver’s jacket and told him that it took courage for him to come here and apologize. Why would she say this after he had killed her sister? And why would she tell him that the accident was her sister’s fault when the driver had already apologized because he knew it was his fault?

Hal isn’t excusing himself for his own mistakes. He knows it was his fault for agreeing to live in the same house with
Laverne; he knows that if he had not agreed to co-sign the mortgage with Laverne that Lily would still be alive. It was Lily’s idea that she, Hal and Laverne buy the Old Steadman House. Hal is still troubled by the fact that the sisters had talked about buying the house before Lily mentioned it to him. Two months earlier, Hal had been squeezed out of his job with Merck and was in no position to raise the down payment on his own. Even so, he was reluctant to pass up the opportunity to buy a house listed at a low market price because it required considerable repair. While Lily listened, Hal spent most of a week pacing the floor, talking about the pros and cons of buying the house.