Authors: Anthony Bidulka
the more than obvious.
“Yes,” he agreed. “I did like Jo. Very much.”
“Yet you think he’s the one who’s doing this to
you, you think he’s the blackmailer?”
Daniel seemed to shake himself clear of the
images of young Jo and resumed the serious busi-
ness at hand. “Yes.”
“Why exactly?”
“Because he was in my house.”
“Did he do something that night to make you
suspect him now? Did he say something? Steal
something? Try to contact you again?”
“No,” he admitted. “None of those things. We
met only the one time. But just the fact that he
knows where I live, knows my name, knows
about…the sex, makes him the likely candidate.
The only candidate. And in addition to the obvi-
ous fact that we’d had sex together, it would have
been so easy that night for Jo to figure out I was
married and financially well off.”
42 — F l i g h t o f A q u av i t
He had a point. “I suppose that’s true.”
“It’s him, Russell, I know it.”
“What else can you tell me about him? What
did he look like?”
“Well, he was twenty-two. He had long, blond
hair and he wore it messy-like and parted in the
middle. Blue eyes. Lean but well toned if you
know what I mean? Really white teeth. He smiled
a lot, like it came easy to him and there was a bit
of a gap between his two front teeth. Cute. He was
articulate for a young guy. I guess the acting classes
did that, I don’t know. He seemed natural, real
sure of himself, confident. He laughed a lot.” He
stopped there, his cheeks a peachy-pink, then
added, “Do you need to know…y’know, more
physical details about him?”
I may have blushed too but I doubt it. “No, I
don’t think I’ll be needing those characteristics to
identify him. But if I do, I’ll get back to you.”
He smiled shyly. Really, he did.
“Anything else?” I asked. “Anything I might
be able to use to track him down?”
“It took him less than twenty minutes on his
bike to get to my place, so he must live within that
radius of my house.”
I didn’t think that would be too helpful. It
would be a better clue in a metropolis the size of
Toronto or Montreal or Los Angeles, but, if you hit
the traffic right, you can get a quarter of the way
across town by bicycle in that amount of time in a
city the size of Saskatoon. “You said he was a
drama student?”
“More than that, actually. He said he’d gotten a
Anthony Bidulka — 43
bit part in some local play and that I should ‘check
it out.’”
Now this was interesting. “Did you? What the-
atre?”
Daniel scoffed at the question. “Of course not.”
Then just as quickly realized the loss of a potential-
ly valuable clue. “I guess I should have asked him
more questions about it but I really didn’t…”
He really didn’t care is what I guessed he was
about to say, but he let the sentence dissipate.
“This was October?” I asked, mentally figuring
out how I could extract as much as possible from
this bit of information. “Early or late in the
month?”
“Early.”
“Daniel, you’re convinced Jo the drama student
is our top suspect?”
Daniel cleared his throat to firm up a voice that
had grown rumbly and perhaps a bit weary. “Yes,
Russell. There is no doubt in my mind that Jo is
Loverboy. Jo is the man who is out to ruin my life.”
“The Travelodge Hotel and Banquet Facility. This is
Marianne speaking, how may I direct your call?”
said the cheery female voice.
“I’d like to speak to your banquet manager,” I
told Marianne. I was now back in my office with a
contract signed by Daniel Guest promising to pay
me ninety-five dollars an hour plus out-of-pocket
expenses and applicable taxes as well as a retainer
cheque for $1500. I like clients who show up with
cheque books and aren’t afraid to use them.
44 — F l i g h t o f A q u av i t
“That would be Natalie. Hold on and I’ll con-
nect you.”
As I waited through an interminable chorus of
clicks and buzzes there were enough clicks and
buzzes in my own head to run an entire phone
company. I had a million questions following my
meeting with Daniel. We had certainly made some
headway, but I sensed he still doubted the PI
approach to solving his problem and in the end I
decided it was best to let him scamper off to the
safety of his accountant world while I did a bit of
initial snooping around.
Finally I heard Natalie’s phone ringing.
“Banquets. Marge speaking.” A less cheerful voice.
“Yes, I’m looking for Natalie.”
“She won’t be in ’til after one.”
I looked at my watch, did some fast calculations
of traffic and travel time and said, “Okay, could
you book me in to see her at that time?”
Marge hesitated, as though I’d called KFC and
tried to order pizza. “You want an appointment,
like?”
“Sure. I’ll only need a few minutes of her
time.”
“Well, like I says, she’ll be back around one.”
So did that mean I had an appointment or
would it be a matter of luck to catch her at her
desk? I didn’t think Marge gave a hoot one way or
the other. I said my thanks and hung up. I put my
computer to sleep, grabbed my coat, a favourite
brown suede with a faux fur lining, and headed
downstairs. I found one of the homemade muffins
Beverly regularly stocks in the kitchen. That
Anthony Bidulka — 45
would have to do for lunch today. As I waved to
Lilly and told her I’d likely be out the rest of the
day, I noticed Errall’s waiting room was still
crammed with clients. Busy girl.
Outside I unplugged my Mazda RX7, threw
the cord into the trunk and, nearly frozen solid by
the time I sat inside, was ever thankful for the car-
warmer I’d installed last year. I let the car run for
a minute. One of the benefits of having a small
vehicle in a cold climate is that it doesn’t take
much time for the heater to do its job. I directed
the car towards 22nd Street hoping to get out of
downtown before the lunchtime crowd got mov-
ing. Noon hour traffic is especially fierce close to
Christmas. For some reason, even though stores
are open seemingly all hours of every day, every-
one gets the same bright idea that they’ll find that
perfect gift if they can just slip out for a few min-
utes over their lunch break. As if there really was
any chance it would only take a few minutes—or
such a thing as the perfect gift.
Persephone Theatre is one of the best of several
options for live theatre in Saskatoon. Even though
it is illogically located in the middle of a residential
no man’s land near the west end of town, it’s been
around for over thirty years so they’re obviously
doing something right. And I hoped I was too.
I pulled up to the converted one-time church,
grateful for the empty parking lot adjacent to the
front doors. In Saskatchewan, wise wintertime
parking decisions always involve keeping vehicle-
46 — F l i g h t o f A q u av i t
to-shelter distance at a minimum. But as luck
would have it, the front doors were locked. I
pulled up my collar, stuffed my un-mittened
hands in my jacket pockets and ran around the
side of the building to where I hoped I’d find an
office entrance. And indeed, up a barely shovelled
walk and through a door with a cracked glass, I
found what looked to be a small reception area.
Behind a scarred desk that I imagined once
belonged to a curmudgeonly old school teacher (I
think the theatre atmosphere was inspiring my
sense of the dramatic) sat a very pale girl with
very black hair eating a very insubstantial looking
sandwich. Butter and lettuce maybe, on paper-
thin white bread.
“Hello, my name is Rick Astley and I’m the
Artistic Director for Theatre Quant in Mission.” I
was betting she wasn’t old enough to be up on her
late 1980s teen idol trivia or informed enough
about British Columbia community theatres to
catch on to my clever ruse. And actually she
looked pretty unimpressed with life in general,
regardless of the decade. I continued on, hoping
my enthusiasm, if not my really bad English
accent, would be contagious. “I’ve been visiting
Saskatoon and of course have made a point of
seeing each of the current season’s Persephone
productions. Well, one of your actors has caught
my eye. And now that I’m preparing for a
remake of the classic
Who’s Afraid of Valerie
Bertinelli
, I just have to have him for one of the
lead roles.” I stopped there to give her an oppor-
tunity to express her amazement.
Anthony Bidulka — 47
She blinked.
“So I was hoping you might help me get in
touch with him. I know you will want to. Acting is
such a risky career these days. Always has been
actually. I used to do some acting myself, you
know—Shakespeare—the exquisite bard—now
that is real acting. You’ve no doubt heard of me?”
Nibble, nibble.
“Of course I’m better known for my roles in
more contemporary classics like, ‘She Wants to
Dance With Me’ and ‘Take Me to Your Heart,’
which I’m sure you’re familiar with, being a part
of the theatre world as you are.”
Blink, blink.
“But great roles were hard to come by and I
finally found myself ‘Giving Up on Love,’ my love
of acting that is and turning to directing. And of
course my reputation in that arena is…well, let
me just say, ‘I’ll Never Let You Down.’ So, do you
think you can help me, Miss…?”
“Rebecca.” She had finally put down the sand-
wich and managed a look of idle curiosity. “You’re
who again?”
Brave young thing. “Rick Astley. You see I have
a description of the actor I am looking for, but no
name or contact information.”
“You saw him when?”
She must not have been able to chew and listen
at the same time. Probably for the better, she
might have actually recognized one of Astley’s
bigger hits and revealed me as a fraud.
“This past fall. You have what, three shows in
the fall season?”
48 — F l i g h t o f A q u av i t
“Uh-huh. But, I only just started working here
this month.”
I was not shocked by this news.
“There’s really no one else here who could
help.” She screwed up her face. I’m sure she was
wondering if that meant she’d actually have to do
something herself. “Our last show just closed and
most of the management people are gone on
Christmas break. They’ll be back after the holi-
days though,” she added sluggishly.
“Oh dear, well, I’ll have to cast the show long
before then. I’d hate for this actor to lose this
opportunity to make some good money doing
wonderful theatre.”
She nodded sympathetically. “Yeah, yeah,
that’s for sure. But I don’t know how we could
help you without a name or anything.”
Perfect, just the opening I was looking for. “Do
you have a copy of the programs for the shows
you’ve done this past season?”
“Well, yeah, sure.”
“Could I take a boo?”
“Huh?”
“Take a look, dear, could I please take a look at
those programs?”
“What show did you say it was?” Her voice
was whiny, as if she was beginning to strongly
suspect this might involve some effort on her
behalf.
“Unfortunately I don’t recall. Could I see all
three?”
She lethargically pulled open a drawer that
must have weighed several tonnes given the effort
Anthony Bidulka — 49
she expended to do so and pulled out just the doc-
uments I was looking for. I quickly scanned the
first one and was gratified to see that indeed the
photographs of each of the actors for each produc-
tion, as well as those of the staff of the theatre,
were semi-glossily reproduced in miniature. I went
over all the pictures in the three programs and
identified five men who could conceivably fit the
description of Jo given to me by Daniel Guest. So
far so good. Next hurdle.
I looked up at Rebecca and judged her recov-
ered enough from the drawer opening adventure
to move ahead with a new task. “Now, I ask all