Murder and Mayhem (36 page)

“Em told me she was going to University and working
part time at a department store in the city to help pay the bills. Sunday
afternoon, she explained, was her day off. She said she shared a house near the
university with a couple of girls and at weekends it was noisy and filled with
people, so she came into the restaurant to study in peace, and to keep warm
during the winter.

“As time went on, we got to know each other pretty
well and Emma would often wait for me to finish my shift then we’d walk to the
park or take a bus into the city. Sometimes we’d go down to the quay and sit on
the wharf and watch the boats in the harbor while we listened to the buskers on
the boardwalk. It was cheap entertainment.

“Emma was quiet, and gentle… and she was sweet. My
little bird, I used to call her. She was my first I love.” Danny didn’t say
anything for a while as he recalled painful memories from long ago.

“At the time I was renting a room from an elderly
couple, which really wasn’t very convenient, so one day Emma and I found a
small apartment in an old terrace house in Newtown, with a bed and what passed
for a kitchen in the corner with a two-burner hotplate. The bathroom was little
more than a cupboard with a toilet and shower–but no hand basin. We had to
brush our teeth over the kitchen sink. It wasn’t much, but we were together and
that’s all that mattered.

“I wanted to get married but Em said we should wait
until we both graduated. I reluctantly agreed. Em was smart. She was doing
medicine, so it meant she would still be studying while I was out in the real
world, working. But I didn’t mind. I adored Emma. I’d never met anyone like her
before. And, for the first time in my life I was in love and I had someone who
loved me. As far as I was concerned, life didn’t get any better than that.”

Nicola gave him an understanding smile, and nodded.

“Eventually, the day came and armed with my degree, I
got myself a real job, earning real money, but I still worked a couple of
nights a week at the restaurant, to bring in extra money to put aside for our
future. I finally convinced Em to give up her job at the department store and
concentrate on her studies.”

A foghorn boomed out a warning from somewhere as a
small motorboat putt-putted up the river. They could hear people laughing
across the river where beer bottles clanked and a fire flared under a piece of
meat in a barbecue pit, sending sparks rising into the air.

Danny wiped the back of his hand across his eyes.

“Don’t talk about it if you don’t want to, Danny. I
understand,” Nicola said.

“No. I’ll be all right, just give me a minute.” He
looked up at the black velvet sky where the stars were so low you could almost
reach out and touch them.

His eyes were like marbles in a pan of water when he
started to speak. “One day I came home and found Emma in bed, she told me she
was tired. I didn’t think anything of it at the time. I just thought she had
probably been overdoing it.  She had exams coming up so I knew she was under a
lot of pressure. But this went on for over a week and she got big, dark blue
circles around her eyes and her skin was pale, and she hardly ate anything. She
said food made her feel nauseous. I joked and said she was probably pregnant,
thrilled at the prospect, but she assured me she wasn’t. I begged her to marry
me, but she insisted we still wait.” Danny’s throat constricted as he heard
Emma’s voice speaking to him from the grave.

“Finally I talked her into going and see a doctor. I
was still convinced she was pregnant so I took time off work to go with her. I
wanted to be there to hear the good news. After weeks of tests we were becoming
concerned. Until, finally, we were given the diagnosis. Emma had leukemia.”

Nicola was shocked. She hadn’t expected that. “Oh,
Danny, I’m so sorry.”

Danny nodded, and forced himself to continue, “As you
could imagine we were both devastated. But the doctors were optimistic so we
took comfort in that.” Danny stopped, and gazed up at the sky as though
searching for his lost love.

“Emma had chemotherapy,” he said, “a bone marrow
transplant, countless blood transfusions, and all kinds of treatment, but in
less than a year, she was gone. I was completely destroyed.”

Danny wiped the tears from his cheek with the back of
his hand, kissed the top of Nicola’s head and brushed the palm of his hand
across her cheek, wanting to feel the warmth of her skin.

“Like me, Em, had no family to speak of, only an
elderly grandmother in a small country town who had raised her after her
parents had died when she was only four years old. So I took Em back to her
brokenhearted grandmother, and we buried her in the small town cemetery beside
her mother and father.

“In less than a month, Emma’s grandmother died and I
laid her to rest in the old churchyard cemetery, next to our darling girl.”

Nicola was about to say something but Danny stopped
her with a shake of his head.

“For more than a year I went through the motions of
living, not knowing, not caring what happened to the rest of the world. Every
day I had to struggle just to exist. It took me years to recover, but I’ll
never really get over losing my little bird. Em was such a dear, sweet,
wonderful person and I’ll miss her every day of my life.” A tear slid down his
cheek. He reached up and brushed it away with the back of his hand.

“I’m sorry, Nic. I didn’t realize how much it still
hurts.”

“Oh, Danny, don’t be sorry, I understand. I’m just
sorry I made you relive those painful memories.”

“Don’t blame yourself, Nic. I’ve wanted to tell you
but couldn’t seem to find the right moment, until now.”

They sat for a long time in the stillness of the
night, as a gentle breeze sent ripples through the grass. And dry leaves
swirled and scratched across the asphalt. Overhead the sky was dusted with
stars, and the chatter of the night birds could be heard as they settled in the
trees. The sound of voices carried through the darkness from distant lights as
a haunting tune drifted up to them on the warm, gentle breeze.

Memories are like shadows of the heart…they never
leave.

*****

I noticed tears running down Rosie’s cheeks and
suddenly became anxious.

“What’s the matter, Hon? Are you in pain? Do you want
me to get you something?”

“Oh, Bee, that is so sad.”

“It’s just a story.”

“I know. But it’s so sad,” She wiped her sleeve across
her face.

I shook my head in disbelief. “Hon I made it all up.
It’s not real!”

“Poor, Danny!”

“Poor Danny! It’s a story for crying out loud. It’s
not real. I made it up!” I handed her the box of Kleenex. “Here, blow your nose
and stop sniveling.”

Rosie wiped her eyes, blew her nose. Then she looked
over at me… and laughed.

“It’s a testament to your ability as a storyteller
that you had me believing every word you had written.”

“You are such a sook. I’ll never forget how you cried
when Bambi’s mother was killed by the hunter.”

“I know. Whenever I see that movie, I cry.”

“You need to remember none of this is real. It’s only
a story. Okay?”

“I know. But you tell it so well.”

“Good grief, woman, give me a break!” There was a
sudden shuffling of papers and I noticed Ross’s hand dart out from behind the
newspaper and grab a handful of tissues.. There was a very loud sniffle
followed by noisy nose blowing. Then Ross cleared his throat a couple more
times, and sniffled.

“Oh, for heaven’s sake, Ross, not you too?”

“I think I’ll just go and make us some tea,” my big
burley biker husband with a heart made of putty, said as he dropped his
newspaper on the lawn and hurried down the path wiping his eyes and blowing his
nose loudly.

“He cried in Bambi too.”

*****

As the season started to change, the nights became
crisp even though the days were still warm. The trees were heavy with gold and
red leaves where the gentle autumn sun dripped through the branches.

The morning breeze was laced with the smell of distant
rain as Danny drove down the narrow country road past an old cemetery where a
tumble of late-summer roses cascaded over stone walls all pale and creamy with
just a hint of a blush; and moss-covered flagstone paths wound between
crumbling lichen-covered headstones where inscriptions had faded long ago. At
the back of the cemetery a line of tall pines thrust, like spears towards the
sky.

As they drove through the small hamlet not far from
the river, they passed a tractor equipment yard where a bank of shiny new snow ploughs
were lined up out front in anticipation of the coming winter. Everywhere they
looked, autumnal foliage painted the landscape in colors of plum, copper and
gold.

When Danny looked at Nicola he could see the steady
rise and fall of her chest. The hollow at the base of her throat was in shadows
while she gazed out the window and hummed some indistinct tune. Suddenly she
was aware of him watching her.

“What?”

“You are so beautiful, Nicola Madison. You take my
breath away.”

Nicola felt the heat rise up her throat, bloom across
her cheeks, and burn the tips of her ears.

It was easy to see that compliments did not sit
comfortably on her.

“No, I’m not, Danny. I might have some nice features,
but I’m not beautiful. My mother was beautiful. When she walked into a room,
every head turned. But she only had eyes for my father.  She adored him, and
Daddy felt the same about her. Daddy was a tall, handsome man with a smile that
could melt icebergs.”

“Not unlike my own,” Danny teased, pointing to his
mouth fixed in the wide grin of a carnival clown.

“Ha!” Nicola said as she took a playful swipe at him.
“Daddy was nothing like you, you preening peacock. Women used to throw
themselves at him all the time, but he never noticed them. Some were even
openly flirtatious making sure he understood their intentions.”

“As I said … Whoops,” Danny ducked to avoid another
playful swipe aimed at his head, and laughed.

Nicola’s eyes flashed, daring him to open his mouth,
again. “As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted, we often would
laugh when Daddy would recount an incident where one of his patients tried to
seduce him, on the examination table, even though there was a nurse in the
room.

“My parents loved each other so much nobody else
existed, except me.” Nicola fell silent for a while and then added, “So, you
see, it’s all in the genes. But no, I’m not beautiful.”

When they stopped for lunch at a restaurant on the
outskirts of Hartford a small white Toyota pulled into the parking lot of a
Subway across the road. The driver grabbed his cap off the seat and went
inside.

* * *

Founded in1638, New Haven, Connecticut, gained
notoriety in the late sixties, as the place where James Morrison, the lead
singer of The Doors, was arrested…

*****

“Did you know New Haven was where the first Doctorate
of Medicine was awarded–to a man who never practiced medicine?” Rosie said.

“No. I didn’t know that. Never
practiced medicine, you said?”

“No. Never.”

“When was that?”

“Some time in the early seventeen hundreds, I think.”

“Well, can’t say I find that
particularly interesting, but you would wonder why he’d bother to get his
Doctorate if he wasn’t going to use it.”

Ross wandered into the room and placed a tray of
sandwiches and fresh cut slices of fruit on the table next to the bed.

I looked up and smiled. “Thank you, Ross.”

“Do you girls want to have your tea now?”

“Hon?”

“Can I just have some juice, please Ross?”

“Sure, Hon. What would you like?
I got some fresh apples and melons from Whole Foods this morning I can juice.”

“That sounds really yummy.”

“What about you, love?”

“I’ll have some too, thanks, Ross.”

“I bought a couple of punnets of fresh strawberries
this morning–big, plump, juicy ones. I plan to make strawberry shortcake for
dessert but I’ve got more than enough so I’ll add a couple to the juice.” As he
headed for the kitchen I heard him whistling.

“What a man,” Rosie said when he
was out of earshot. “Maybe he just wanted to show off,” she added as she
checked the filling in the sandwich and took a bite. “Yum, this is good.”