The Suspect (26 page)

But he closed the lid and contented himself with caressing the initials, embossed in gold, until the bus had reached Langdale and been loaded onto the ferry and disgorged the driver and most of the passengers to seek refreshment in the cafeteria or the sea wind on the sun deck or the spectacular views from the glass-enclosed lounges.

Then he opened the box again, and took out the letters, and unfolded the top one.

You bring it on yourself Audrey, you know you do.
 

CHAPTER 32

July 29, 1984
Dear Mr. Alberg:
I think I'm dying. I say this with some astonishment but with little dismay. I've been very lucky. No awful disease has claimed the last months of my life; as it did Myra. I don't even feel any real symptoms, just a gradual seeping away of something important.

If you get this letter—WHEN you get this letter—you'll know I'm right. I'll be dead. It's a peculiar feeling, I'll tell you, writing this, imagining you in my head and not knowing when you'll get to read it. It could be you'll be all gray-haired and stooped over then, though I doubt it. Could be you'll be dead yourself before it ever gets sent, though I doubt that even more.

I wonder if Cassandra has told you by now about my talk to her. My "confession. ” She asked me to write to her from Vancouver but I couldn't. She's written to me (those librarians, they're worse than policemen or reporters, the things they know about getting information), but I haven't answered her. I couldn't. It didn't seem right, somehow.

Anyway, if she hasn't told you I'm telling you now. I don't think I would have bothered, except that you gave me those letters. I think you did it because you wanted to help me a little. It was a compassionate gesture, and for that I thank you.

I've done a lot of not good things in my life. I've done some terrible things in my life. But you know, Mr. Alberg, what the worst one of them all might have been? I've been giving it a lot of thought.

I stopped writing, there, for a minute, just to think it over again, it's such a peculiar idea. But I think I'm right. I think the worst thing I ever did was not to let Carlyle be my friend.

Isn't that odd? Isn't that peculiar?

But I think that's what it was, all right.

I liked you, Mr. Alberg, despite it all. I know it was a hard time for you. Mounties like to get their man, and all that crap.

But just think how much harder it would have been—M1GHT have been—if I'd planned the whole thing. I'm a pretty good planner. You might never have figured it out at all. And wouldn't that have been a whole lot worse for you?

George Wilcox
 

CHAPTER 33

Alberg folded the letter and put it back in the envelope. It had been sent to him at home. He had read it sitting at the dining table in his living room, on a day in mid-August. The old man hadn't outlived Carlyle Burke by much, he thought. A little over two months.

He got up, now, and went to the big window that looked out onto the road and his hydrangea bushes, smothered in huge blue blossoms. It was five o'clock on a hot, sunny afternoon.

He went to the telephone in his kitchen and put through a call to his daughters in Calgary.

"Hi,” he said, when Janey answered.

"Daddy!" she said. He tried to listen dispassionately, objectively, but he couldn't help it; he heard joy in her voice whether it was there or not, and put his head in his hand and let the tears come. '

"Where are you?" she said excitedly.

"Gibsons,” he said, and cleared his throat.

"Oh. I thought you might here. In Calgary. " Surely he couldn't have mistaken her tone; surely there was real disappointment there.

"No, I'm here. At home. I just wanted to hear your voice.”

There was a short pause. "Daddy?" she said "Are you all right?"

He started to say sure, fine, put on his hearty reassuring-father act but it wouldn't come, it just wouldn't come.
 
"Not really, sweetie," he said. "A friend of mine died. I'm a bit sad." He lifted his head from his hand in amazement. A friend?

"Oh, Daddy," she said. "I'm so sorry." Another pause. "I wish I were there. I'd give you a hug and try to make you feel better. Like you used to do with us."

"Did I?" he said, astonished.

"Of course you did." He waited, holding his breath, but she didn't even add, in that dry, detached tone that struck him to the bone, "Whenever you were available, that is.”

"I love you, Janey," he said.

"And I love you, Daddy."

"When are you coming out here?" He tried a fatherly chuckle, meant to reassure her.

She put her hand over the receiver and mumbled something to someone in the room with her. Oh, Christ, he thought, she's got her boyfriend in for the night. He tried to blank it from his mind.

"Just a minute, Dad," she said, and then Diana was on the phone.

"Labor Day weekend," said Diana.

"Labor Day weekend what?"

"We're coming out there," she said.

"Out here? We? You mean you and Janey?"

"Of course I mean me and Janey. Who else? You want to see Mom, you've got to make your own arrangements. I take that back," she said quickly. "Yeah, we'd like to come out for the long weekend. Okay with you?"

"Okay with me," he said, smiling.

When he'd hung up the phone he leaned heavily against the kitchen counter. What was he: father, friend, cop, what? He slumped there for a long time, trying to figure it out.

Eventually he became aware of an unfamiliar sound. He cocked his head, trying to identify it, then sprang away from the counter and hurried through the door into the sun porch. He peered through the screen, and there she was. Gently, slowly, he opened the door, and the cat undulated through the opening. She stood looking up at him, meowing.

"It's over there," he said, pointing.

She followed his gaze and ambled over to the blue bowl, and he watched her, and became horrified. He went to her and crouched down, examining her without touching her. She was bloated around the middle.

As she lapped contentedly from the blue bowl, lifting her head every now and then to glance at him, unafraid, even friendly, he looked her over more carefully.

When she finished eating she looked around, spotted the cardboard box full of clean rags and stepped delicately inside, turned around several times and arranged herself contentedly. He thought he heard her purr.

It occurred to him that she was there for the duration. He went into the kitchen and, without letting himself think about it, called the library.

"Cassandra?"

"Yes.”

"It's Karl. Karl Alberg.”

"You're the only Karl I know.”

He tried to think, looking into his porcelain sink, rust-marked.

"I got a letter from George Wilcox," he said. "He's dead.”

"I know,” said Cassandra after a minute. "I got one too. And a package?

"A package? Not the bloody parrot.”

"No. Some jewelry.”

He remembered a wide gold bracelet, and a large ring, and thought of the crystal pitcher.

"My daughters are coming out here,” he said. "For the Labor Day weekend?

"That's nice," she said politely.

"One more thing.”

"What is it?"

"I've got a cat here. Did I ever tell you about this cat?"

"No, you didn't. We didn't know each other very long," she said.

"Yeah, well, it's a stray. It goes away for a while, comes back for a while, goes away for a while."

"Are you at work?”

"Work? No. I'm on a day off."

"Okay. Go on."

"Well, it's come back. The cat."

"It that bad or good?"

"It's good. I've been waiting for the damn cat since April. Been leaving milk out every night and everything. Damn cat never showed up."

"But it's back now."

"Yeah. I think it's pregnant.”

Silence.

"It's very big around the middle."

Silence.

"I don't think it's going to go away again. Until after it's had its kittens."

Silence.

"Cassandra?"

"Yes?"

"I don't know what to do."

"Well what do you expect me to say, for God's sake? Cats have kittens, that's part of being a cat."

"Yes, but it's my goddamn responsibility!" he shouted. "And I don't know what to do!”

Silence.

"Karl?"

"Yeah."

"There are lots of books in the library. I'm sure there's one here that will tell you how to help a cat have kittens.”

"That's a very good idea," said Alberg thoughtfully. "I don't know why I didn't think of it myself." He grinned. "I'll be right down.”