Barrington Street Blues (45 page)

“I thought they changed that. It's not a sin anymore.”

“
They
are just telling you that to make you feel good about yourself.
He
hasn't changed. He is unchangeable. Immutable. Eternal.”

“There now, Father. At least I haven't missed the sermon.”

“Get used to early mornings. I'm thinking about having the men's choir sing the early Mass, in Latin.”

“Every week?”

“Negotiable. But don't let me keep you; you still have time to catch the eleven o'clock. The reason I called —”

“Saving my soul was not the reason?”

“Ah, no. I wondered whether you saw the piece in the paper yesterday
about our friend Sarah MacLeod. She's also known as Sybil Kraus.”

“Right. No, I didn't see the article. She was charged with fraud, and I meant to follow it up.”

“No need. I'm on the case. She entered a guilty plea in return for an absolute discharge. She was desperate for food for her foster home, which was not registered with the authorities. There's a bit of a row with the government about that. She and Warren Tulk have been taking in young people from the streets, promising them anonymity, protecting them from abusive parents, vengeful pimps, and God knows what all. She has so many under her roof she can't feed them. The place we saw out in the country is a rescue mission, not a house of corruption. Or of correction.”

“She hasn't been meting out punishment to them?”

“No, she says she's changed her ways. She offers them unconditional love — what Christian love is supposed to be, but so rarely is. She does insist that they make their beds, help with the dishes and other chores, and read a chapter of the Bible every day. Now, about the Colosseum —”

“Everything we know is recorded in my files.” “Good. I went to see Tulk in his bookshop again. Turns out the Colosseum has been part of his mission. He's been working on it for years, gathering evidence from young people who were involved. Apparently, it was one long party extending over several nights in 1985. The so-called Romans have been doing damage control ever since. One of the participants went on to become Minister of Justice.”

“Tolliver.”

“Tolliver made sure the information Tulk brought to the prosecutors, when he was a cop, was discredited. Tulk was made to look like a religious kook. This Tolliver apparently extracted money and even good works out of Kenneth Fanshaw for the city, in the district he represented! Homeless shelters and that sort of thing. I don't know how they kept it as quiet as they did.”

“Well, the Romans — the lawyers and other upstanding citizens — would be terrified of admitting they knew about it. And the street people must have been kept in line with booze, drugs, and threats.”

“Tulk is determined to see that justice is done.”

“Good. I'll go talk to him.”

“Yes. He sent you the postcard but he didn't want to show his hand otherwise, because he didn't know if you might end up representing Dice Campbell's estate in some way. He wasn't sure what you were looking into.”

“That makes two of us!”

“Anyway, I imagine Mr. Fanshaw is in for a surprise.”

And I would have to gamble that, by the time the police arrived at the drawbridge of Fanshaw's château, Fanshaw would realize it was too late to gain anything by spreading the story of my misadventures in New Orleans. To Burke, I said: “I'll ask Tulk how close he is to handing his information over to the police, then I'll have a word with Phil Riley, my pal on the force.” But I would not be giving them the name Vegas Negus. I couldn't do that to Ed Johnson. With any luck, the police would see no reason to talk to Burke. Vernon might or might not recall the name Negus, might or might not repeat it if he did. Either way, I didn't think anybody would be able to prove Ed had been there. The Romans would be busy denying that they had been there themselves.

I realized Burke was winding up his call. “Don't let me hold you up. See you at eleven.” Click.

Why not? A little spiritual refreshment would not go amiss. I showered, shaved, and dressed in a shirt and sports jacket. On my way downtown I came up with the idea of stopping in and seeing if the kids might like to join me. But when I drove down Dresden Row I saw a sight that stopped me cold. There, turning left at the corner of Dresden and Morris Street, was my family: Maura pushing the baby carriage, Normie holding on at the side, and Tommy walking behind. I knew that picture would stay with me as clearly as if I had it framed and hung on the wall across from my bed. They were dressed up enough that I knew where they were headed: St. Bernadette's Church. That put paid to my appearance at Mass there. I turned the car around, went up the street to Clyde and turned left.

†

When I got to the address I wanted on Tower Road, I rang the bell and waited. The place was not what I would have expected; it was
one of the beautiful Victorian houses with an Italianate storm porch on the front. I was just about to give up when a pale but bravely painted Mavis Campbell came to the door.

“You again.”

“Me again. Nice place. I expected something a little more flashy.”

“I'm just an old-fashioned girl at heart. But you wouldn't know that. Are you ever going to go away and leave me alone? Now that you know I didn't kill my husband?”

“You'll never see me again.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

“Oh.” She stood staring at me. “Would you like to come in? Have a drink?”

“I thought maybe I could take you out for breakfast. Or lunch.”

“As long as it's licensed.”

“How about walking over to Barrington Street. The Athens.”

“All right. I keep hearing rumours they're going to move.”

“No! Where to?”

“I heard Quinpool Road.”

“Hmm.”

We walked up Tower Road, cut through the Victoria General Hospital parking lot, and headed east on Spring Garden. A cold fog had settled over the city; the occasional foghorn broke the silence of the morning. Nobody was out, except for the odd pan-handler. My mind kept replaying the image of my children with their mother and their new baby brother. But I turned to the subject at hand.

“Mavis, you now know Dice was murdered. By Ross Trevelyan.”

“I know. But none of it makes any sense to me!”

“Trevelyan wasn't working with us then. In fact, he joined our firm for one reason: to control the lawsuit against the Baird Centre, so he could cover up the fact that he killed Dice and then killed Leaman to keep the Dice killing under wraps. Graham Scott was shot because he arrived on the scene before Trevelyan could get away.”

“Why?” She stopped walking; her face had gone a deathly white. “Why did he kill Dice? Was he involved in the . . . Tell me.”

I recounted the story of her husband's death.

Tears streamed down her face; she made no effort to wipe them away.

“Mavis, I'm sorry. About Dice. About everything. Truly.”

“Well, at least I know,” she said, struggling to get her voice under control. “After all these years. And, as much as it sticks in my craw, I have you to thank for taking the trouble to find out what happened. I know it would have been tempting for you to have stuck to the Leaman suicide theory and gone for the payoff.”

“Mavis, you know I'm going to have to tell the police about that party. The Colosseum. I understand that you weren't part of it.”

“Good. Nail them. I wanted to call the police myself. But . . . I couldn't do it. Kept telling myself the things I heard could not be true. Even Dice felt guilty. He didn't let on — he never mentioned that Colosseum business to me — but I knew. It had an effect on him. He'd hold forth about the Hobbesian view of man, that life was nasty, brutish, and short. I just stayed blind drunk all the time so I could be oblivious.”

“It won't be good for Dice's reputation.”

“It can't hurt him now. He's dead.”

We walked in silence, lost in our thoughts. Then I said: “Well, as promised, as soon as we finish lunch I'm out of your life.”

“Now that I'm finally going to be rid of you, I'm not sure I like the idea. Is there a woman in your life these days?”

I ended up spilling the whole sorry tale to her as we walked through the fog.

“Is she in love with this other man?”

“If it's who I think it is, this Giacomo, then no, I don't think she is.”

“Well, then.”

“Well, then, what?”

“The love of your life is still breathing. Mine isn't. Try to imagine yourself grieving for someone and then, in the middle of that grief, you're brought up short by the fact that the person didn't love you. Was seeing someone else right up until he died. Try to imagine what that's like, Monty. Plus those other things . . . I have a friend who's an arch-Catholic; she'd probably tell me there's a prayer for uncomplicated grief! Too late for me, if there is. And you think
you
have
problems. My advice to you, Monty, is get over it and get on with it.”

“I'm not sure I can.”

“It's up to you. You have to decide whether you want to spend the rest of your allotted time on earth with her. Or without her.”

I couldn't answer.

After a moment she looked at me and said: “I guess you don't want to take up with an alcoholic!”

“I don't want to become one, Mavis; it scares the hell out of me.”

“It hasn't hurt me.”

“No, of course it hasn't, sweetheart.”

We passed the Basilica and were nearly knocked over by a blast of wind from the Maritime Centre as we turned the corner onto Barrington Street. I took my friend's arm and slipped it through mine. We huddled together against the wind as we headed north.

ANNE EMERY is a graduate of St. F.X. University and Dalhousie Law School. She has worked as a lawyer, legal affairs reporter, and researcher. She lives in Halifax with her husband and daughter. Her earlier novels were
Sign of the Cross
, winner of the 2006 Arthur Ellis Award for Best First Novel, and
Obit
(2007).