When I left him in the back room, I felt worse than when I’d arrived. For one thing, Woody was in for a major letdown when the world realized I had nothing to do with Benedict’s death.
Cyril Hemphill had heard all the same gossip plus more in the short time we’d been in the village. The best story featured a complex mix of international terrorism and home-grown passion.
“And those are only the English rumours—who knows what the French are saying.” Cyril shook his head.
“What about Benedict? Any good poop about him?”
“Benedict? No. He’s been minding his Ps and Qs this last couple of years.”
Right.
I’d written a cheque for my purchases at Woody’s plus fifty dollars to snag a bottle of Courvoisier at the Régie d’Alcool and an extra ten to hire Josey to pick up on any worthwhile rumours about Benedict.
Courvoisier is always appropriate for those occasions when you can’t even set foot outside your house without people pointing and suggesting you killed your lover because he refused to settle your gambling debts, or whatever.
* * *
All conversation stopped in the Nettoyeur Le Quikie when I dropped in my periwinkle silk blouse and matching suede skirt for cleaning.
The girl behind the counter stared. “What are those stains?”
At least ten eyes zeroed in on my dirty clothes.
“Chocolate mousse.”
She shrugged, Frenchly. “It will take about a week.”
“A week?” I squeaked. This is the problem with spilling dessert on your one good outfit, and then sleeping on the floor. You’re up the creek if you get an interesting offer. Not that I’d had an interesting offer for seven or eight years.
“Nothing I can do about it, madame. And we cannot guarantee suede. You must acknowledge that you understand this. Sign here.”
With everyone still watching, I signed, grabbed my receipt and hightailed it out the door and through the puddles, eyes front.
I got more looks in the Régie.
After that, I headed straight for Cyril’s cab, giving the Pâtisserie a miss, although I could have done with a half-dozen mille-feuilles. I decided this was not the perfect time to drop into the library and do a little research on the Flambeau. I couldn’t even face the Chez Charlie for a cheap lunch.
“Do you mind if I swing by the Marina way?” Cyril asked, innocence painted on his face like rouge.
Oh, sure. Cyril had probably found a way to make a buck driving me along a parade route, past the shops and restaurants near the Marina, where I might have been pointed out as the latest tourist attraction in St. Aubaine, with tourists tossing loonies into Cyril’s outstretched palms.
I didn’t give a flying fig about Cyril’s plans. Whatever else happened, I couldn’t risk coming face to face with Benedict’s girlfriend, Bridget Gallagher.
“Straight home and burn rubber, Cyril.”
Six
The early evening light gave a soft focus to the memorial gathering in Bridget’s renovated Victorian home on the hill above the Marina.
“Who is Miz Gallagher, again?” Josey Thring asked as we circulated.
“Bridget? Oh, she’s an, um, old friend of Benedict’s.”
“Just that her name never came up when I was inquiring around like you asked me to about Mr. Kelly. Of course, ten bucks doesn’t buy all that much information these days.”
I wasn’t surprised no one had mentioned Bridget. As Benedict’s longest surviving lover, she was well past the news flash stage. I didn’t point that out. Good thing I didn’t, because Bridget took that moment to hobble over for a chat.
“What happened to your foot, Bridget?” I blurted.
“Oh, that. I slipped on my friend Rachel’s stupid stairs on the way to our bridge game. Anyway, I broke my ankle.”
“That’s all you need right now. It must be painful.”
“They can give you stuff to kill that kind of pain. And this is as good a time as any to have a fried brain.”
No kidding. “Oh, Bridget, I’m so sorry.”
“Not your fault, dear.” She leaned her delicate body on her crutch and issued me a soft, forgiving smile. “I’m sure there’s a perfectly reasonable explanation for everything.”
I thought so too. Bridget and I have never been close, a holdover from my slight entanglement with Benedict. But since I hadn’t known about Bridget at the time, and since I broke it off when I found out and since she knew that, she’s always been cordial. Even after Benedict’s death, Bridget didn’t hold a grudge.
“If I can do anything to help, anything at all,” I said. It was awkward standing at my former not-quite lover’s not-quite wake with his not-quite widow, seeking the appropriate commiserative phrase.
We stood apart from the mourners gathered there to remember Benedict, to read from his poems and more voluminously from their own.
Josey, who had never been to a memorial gathering for a poet, circulated happily. Of course, Josey had never met Benedict. But she had been repairing the upholstery on my wingback chair when Bridget called to invite me. Being Josey, she’d taken the initiative of answering the phone and graciously accepting on my behalf. And seeing the poet’s memorial as fitting in nicely with her Grade Nine Creative Writing Class, she’d angled an invitation for herself, despite the close-friends-only nature of the event.
I suppose it was good. In a village this size, I couldn’t have avoided Bridget forever.
Josey approached respectability with the skirt she keeps for court appearances and her cowlicks dampened down. She looked better than I did. I was stuffed into my ancient, onesize-fits-none navy dress, desperately hoping the buttons didn’t fly across the room and blind some grieving poet. You never have a periwinkle silk blouse and matching suede skirt when you really need them.
Bridget took my arm, and we turned and limped into the dining room, away from the clusters of poets, fellow drinkers, plus Benedict’s former and more recent lovers. We stood by the huge oak table decked out with smoked salmon canapés, vegetables and pâté, shortbread cookies, Nanaimo bars, maple mousse, scones, four kinds of jam and an immense earthenware pot of tea. Too bad I’d lost my appetite. I couldn’t even look at food. I stared out the window instead. I watched a bevy of damp reporters, at least one forlorn street person and the now familiar burly form of Sarrazin taking shelter under a tree. I wouldn’t have been surprised to see the coroner out there batting her eyelashes at him. But then again, the rain would have ruined her hairdo.
Wait a minute. A street person? Since when did we have street people in St. Aubaine? Particularly on a hill with only houses? Puzzling about that was a welcome diversion from thinking
