The Murder Stone (8 page)

On the other side of the terrasse, also in the shade, Clara could just see Bert Finney. He seemed to be watching his wife, though it was hard to tell. She looked away just as his pilgrim eye caught hers.

Sipping her cool drink she grabbed a handful of thick hair, wet with perspiration, and peeled it off her neck. Then she flapped it up and down, to air out the area. Only then did she notice Peter’s mother watching, her faded pink and white face crinkled and lovely, her Wedgwood eyes thoughtful and kind. A beautiful English rose inviting you to approach, to bend closer. Too late you’d realize there was a wasp buried deep, waiting to do what wasps do best.

Less than twenty-four hours, she said to herself. We can leave after breakfast tomorrow.

A deerfly buzzed around her sweating head and Clara waved her arms so wildly she knocked the rest of her sandwich off the stone wall and into the perennial bed below. The answer to an ant’s prayers, except the ones it fell on.

‘Claire hasn’t changed,’ said Peter’s mother.

‘Neither have you, Mother.’

Peter tried to keep his voice as civil as hers, and felt he’d achieved that perfect balance of courtesy and contempt. So subtle it was impossible to challenge, so obvious it was impossible to miss.

Across the scorching terrasse Julia felt her feet begin to burn in their thin sandals on the hot stones.

‘Hello, Peter.’ She closed her mind to her smouldering feet and crossed the terrasse, air-kissing her younger brother. ‘You’re looking good.’

‘So’re you.’

Pause.

‘Nice weather,’ he said.

Julia searched her rapidly emptying brain for something smart to say, something witty and intelligent. Something to prove she was happy. That her life wasn’t the shambles she knew he thought it was. Silently she repeated to herself, Peter’s perpetually purple pimple popped. It helped.

‘How’s David?’ Peter asked.

‘Oh, you know him,’ said Julia lightly. ‘He adjusts to anything.’

‘Even prison? And here you are.’

She searched his placid handsome face. Was that an insult? She’d been away from the family so long she was out of practice. She felt like a long retired parachutist suddenly tossed out of a plane.

Four days ago, when she’d arrived, she’d been hurt and exhausted. The last smile, the last empty compliment, the last courtesy wrung from her in the disaster that had been the last year, during David’s trial. Feeling betrayed, humiliated and exposed, she’d come back home to heal. To this cosy mother and the tall, handsome brothers of her magical, mystical memory. Surely they’d take care of her.

Somehow she’d forgotten why she’d left them in the first place. But now she was back and was remembering.

‘Imagine,’ said Thomas, ‘your husband stealing all that money, and you not knowing. It must have been horrible.’

‘Thomas,’ said his mother, shaking her head slightly. Not in rebuke for the insult to Julia but for saying it in front of the staff. Julia felt the hot stones sizzling beneath her feet. But she smiled and held her ground.

‘Your father,’ Mrs Finney began, then stopped.

‘Go on, Mother,’ said Julia, feeling something old and familiar swish its tail deep inside her. Something decades dormant was stirring. ‘My father?’

‘Well, you know how he felt.’

‘How did he feel?’

‘Really, Julia, this is an inappropriate conversation.’ Her mother turned her pink face to her. It was said with the tender smile, the slight flutter of those hands. How long had it been since she’d felt her mother’s hands?

‘I’m sorry,’ said Julia.

‘Jump, Bean, jump!’

Clara turned and watched as Peter’s youngest sister leapt across the manicured lawn, feet barely touching the ground, and behind her ran Bean, beach towel tied at the neck, laughing. But not jumping. Good ol’ Bean, thought Clara.

‘Whew,’ puffed Mariana, stepping onto the terrasse moments later, sweat pouring off her as though she’d run through a sprinkler. She took a corner of a scarf and wiped her eyes. ‘Did Bean jump?’ she asked the family. Only Thomas reacted, with a dismissive smirk.

Clara’s bra itched in the heat and humidity. She reached down and tugged it. Too late, she looked over. Peter’s mother was again watching, as though equipped with a special radar.

‘How’s your art?’

The question took Clara by surprise. She’d assumed it to be directed at Peter, and had occupied herself by trying to pick off the tomato seeds now baked to her breasts.

‘Me?’ She looked up into Julia’s face. The sister she knew the least. But she’d heard the stories from Peter and was quick to put up her guard. ‘Oh, you know. Always a struggle.’

It was the easy answer, the one they expected. Clara the failure, who called herself an artist but never sold. Who did ridiculous works like mannequins with bouffant hair and melting trees.

‘I remember hearing about your last show. Quite a statement.’

Clara sat up straighter. She knew many people managed to ask the first, polite question. But it was the rare person who asked a second.

Perhaps Julia was sincere.

‘Warrior Uteruses, wasn’t it?’ asked Julia. Clara searched her face for ridicule but found none.

Clara nodded. True, by economic measurements the series couldn’t be considered a success, but emotionally it had been a triumph. She’d considered giving a Warrior Uterus to Peter’s mother as a Christmas gift, but decided that might be a step too far.

‘Didn’t we tell you?’ Peter walked over, smiling. Never a good sign at a family reunion. The more devious they got the more they smiled. Clara tried to catch his eye.

‘Tell us what?’ Sandra asked, sensing something unpleasant approaching.

‘About Clara’s art.’

‘I’d like another beer,’ said Clara. No one paid any attention.

‘What about it?’ asked Thomas.

‘Nothing,’ said Clara. ‘Just lots of crap. You know me. Always experimenting.’

‘She’s been approached by a gallery.’

‘Peter,’ Clara snapped. ‘I don’t think we need to talk about it.’

‘But I’m sure they’d like to hear,’ said Peter. He took his hand out of his slacks pocket and it turned inside out, marring his otherwise perfect appearance.

‘Clara’s modest. The Galerie Fortin in Montreal wants to do a one-woman show. Denis Fortin himself came to Three Pines to see her work.’

Silence.

Clara’s nails dug into her palms. A deerfly found the tender pale skin behind her ear, and bit.

‘Marvellous,’ said Peter’s mother to Clara. ‘I’m absolutely delighted.’

Clara, surprised, turned to her mother-in-law. She could barely believe her ears. Had she been too harsh all this time? Judged Peter’s mother unfairly?

‘So often they’re too thick.’

Clara’s smile faltered. Too thick?

‘And not made with real mayonnaise. But Chef Veronique has outdone herself again. Have you tried the cucumber sandwiches, Claire? They’re really very good.’

‘They are good,’ agreed Clara with maniacal enthusiasm.

‘Congratulations, Clara. What good news.’ The voice was masculine, jovial and vaguely familiar. ‘Felicitations.‘

Across the lawn a powerfully built middle-aged man in a funny hat took easy strides towards them. Beside him was a small, elegant woman wearing the same floppy sun hat.

‘Reine-Marie?’ Clara peered, hardly believing her eyes. ‘Peter, is that Reine-Marie?’

Peter was staring almost slack-jawed as the couple hurried up the steps.

‘Oh, Clara, what wonderful news,’ said Reine-Marie, taking her friend in her arms. Clara smelled Joy, the fragrance by Jean Patou, and felt the same way. It was like being saved from torture at the last moment. She pulled back from the embrace and stared at Reine-Marie Gamache, to make certain. Sure enough, the smiling woman was there. Clara could still feel the glares behind her, but it didn’t matter as much. Not now.

Then Armand kissed her on both cheeks and squeezed her arm affectionately. ‘We’re thrilled for you. And Denis Fortin.’ He looked into the fieldstone faces on the terrasse. ‘He’s the top art dealer in Montreal, as you probably know. A real coup.’

‘Really?’ Peter’s mother managed to sound both dismissive and disapproving. As though Clara’s coup was unseemly. And certainly this display of emotion, of elation, was unseemly. This was a rude interruption of a private family affair. And, perhaps worst of all, unmistakable evidence that Peter socialized with the people from the broom closet. It was one thing to play bridge when stuck in a remote lodge with them. That was simply being well bred. But it was quite another thing to choose their company.

Gamache walked over to Peter and shook his hand. ‘Hello, old son.’

Gamache was smiling and Peter stared as though at something extraordinary.

‘Armand? But how in the world did you come to be here?’

‘Well, it is an inn after all.’ Gamache laughed. ‘We’re here celebrating our anniversary.’

‘Oh, thank God,’ said Clara and stepped towards Reine-Marie. Peter also made to move towards them but the clearing of a small throat behind him stopped his progress.

‘Perhaps we can talk later,’ suggested Reine-Marie. ‘You need time with your charming family.’ She gave Clara another quick hug. Clara was reluctant to let go, but did, and watched as the Gamaches strolled across the lawn towards the lake. She felt a trickle down her neck. Reaching up to wipe the sweat away she was surprised to see blood on her fingers.

SIX

Finally, after a luncheon that lasted a thousand years, Clara was able to get away, and the first thing she wanted to do was go on the hunt for the Gamaches.

‘I think Mother would prefer us to stay here.’ Peter hovered on the stone terrasse.

‘Come on.’ She gave him a conspiratorial look and held out her hand. ‘Be daring.’

‘But it’s a family reunion.’ Peter longed to go with her. To take her hand and race across the perfect lawn, and find their friends. Over lunch, while the rest of the family either ate in silence or discussed the stock market, Peter and Clara had whispered urgently and excitedly about the Gamaches.

‘You should’ve seen your face,’ said Peter, trying to keep his voice down. ‘You looked like Dorothy meeting the Great and Powerful Oz. All stunned and excited.’

‘I think you’re spending way too much time with Olivier and Gabri,’ said Clara, smiling. She’d never actually smiled at a family reunion before. It felt odd. ‘Besides, you looked like the Tin Man, all stunned. Can you believe the Gamaches are here? Can we sneak away and spend some time with them this afternoon?’

‘I don’t see why not,’ said Peter, hiding behind a warm bun. The prospect of killing a few hours with their friends instead of enduring the family was a great relief.

Clara had looked at her watch. Two p.m. Twenty more hours. If she went to bed at eleven and woke up at nine tomorrow morning that would leave just – she tried to work it out in her head – eleven more waking hours with Peter’s family. She could just about make it. And two hours with the Gamaches, that left just nine hours. Dear Lord, she could almost see the end coming. Then they could return to their little village of Three Pines, until another invitation arrived, next year.

Don’t think about that.

But now Peter hesitated on the terrasse, as she secretly knew he would. Even over lunch she’d known he couldn’t do it. Still, it had been fun to pretend. Like playing emotional dress-up. Pretending to be the brave one this time.

But in the end, of course, he couldn’t do it. And Clara couldn’t leave him. And so she walked slowly back inside.

‘Why’d you tell your family about my solo show?’ she asked Peter, and wondered if she was trying to pick a fight with him. To punish him for making them stay.

‘I thought they should know. They’re always so dismissive of your work.’

‘And you’re not?’ She was pissed off.

‘How can you say that?’ He looked hurt, and she knew she’d said it to wound. She waited for him to point out that he’d supported her all these years. He’d put a roof over their heads and bought the food. But he stayed silent, which annoyed her even more.

As he turned to face her she noticed a small dot of whipped cream, like a whitehead, on his cheek. It might as well have been an aeroplane, so odd was it to see anything unplanned attached to her husband. He was always so splendid, so beautifully turned out. His clothes never wrinkled, the creases crisp, never a stain nor a fault. What was that thing on Star Trek? The tractor beam? No, not that. The shields. Peter went through life with his shields raised, repulsing attack by food or beverage, or people. Clara wondered whether there was a tiny Scottish voice in his head right now screaming, ‘Cap’n, the shields are down. I canna git them up.‘

But Peter, dear Peter, was oblivious of the small, fluffy, white alien attached to his face.

She knew she should say something, or at least wipe it off, but she was fed up.

‘What’s wrong?’ Peter asked, looking both concerned and a little afraid. Confrontation petrified him.

‘You told your family about the Fortin gallery to annoy them. Especially Thomas. It had nothing to do with me. You used my art as a weapon.’

Cap’n, she’s breakin’ up.

‘How can you say that?’

But he sounded unsure, something else she rarely heard.

‘Please don’t talk about my art with them again. In fact, don’t mention anything personal at all. They don’t care and it just hurts me. Probably shouldn’t, but it does. Can you do that?’

She noticed his slacks pocket was still inside out. It was one of the most disconcerting things she’d ever seen.

‘I’m sorry,’ he finally said. ‘But it wasn’t Thomas, you know. Not any more. I think I’ve grown used to him. It was Julia. Seeing her again has thrown me.’

‘She seems nice enough.’

‘We all do.’

‘Twenty more hours,’ said Clara, looking at her watch then reaching up and rubbing the whipped cream off his face.

On their way up the footpath the Gamaches heard a voice calling to them, and stopped.

‘There you are,’ puffed Madame Dubois, holding a basket of herbs from the garden. ‘I left a note at the front desk. Your son called from Paris. Said he’d be out this evening, but he’ll try again.’