wall displayed Lord of the Rings posters and a picture of Bob Marley, Rastafarian dreadlocks flying. A state-of-the-art PC with twenty-inch flat screen sat on an L-shaped desk. On a shelf above was a Harry Potter collection in addition to the book Son of Web Pages That Suck. Mine sure does, Belle said to herself, having constructed it amateur-style using FrontPage Express.
“Don’t they like their privacy? And my son hasn’t even entered his teens.”
“What an unusual flag. I don’t recognize it.”
“Jamaica’s. My late husband Michael wanted Micro to appreciate his heritage.” She picked up a hardcover book, Heroes of Jamaica. “His distant relative was Alexander Bustamante, the island’s first Prime Minister in 1962.”
“I have to confess that I know nothing about that lovely country, except that its climate is heaven next to ours.”
Bea smiled softly. “You’re not alone. Many people think only of gang wars or deportations. Jamaica had a proud history of fighting oppression, British, of course. Many of its people had been brought over as slaves.”
“But there is the reggae music,” Belle added.
“Michael loved the old folk songs. He used to sing Micro to sleep with ‘Clap Hands Til Papa Comes Home’.” She hummed a few bars and swayed with a gentle rhythm.
Belle noted the Snickers wrappers in the wastebasket and the pile of textbooks. “I used to teach high school. Bailed out after a few months. English was not foremost on their minds.”
“Sounds like a sudden decision.”
“Certainly was.” The incident was as fresh in her mind as this morning. “Why you always say I’m acting like a fool?” one tenth-grader had demanded, and she hadn’t been able to resist. “Brian, you don’t have to act like a fool.” “Kiss my ass.” Off to the principal. Parents’ conference. Everyone crying except her. And a Greyhound bus ticket that weekend.
“They don’t miss much.” Bea’s chuckle spread over her face, an invitation to mirth. “Every year is a whole new world with kids. Thirteen’s coming up, and my friends tell me to fasten my seatbelt.”
The master suite was immense, with walk-in closets and a Jacuzzi in the custom-tiled bathroom. The Mexicana furnishings, warm, weathered pine with copper fittings, were a surprise, a king-sized bed, drawer chests and nightstands, a splendid armoire, and in the corner, a box table. As always, in the more intimate parts of a house, she felt strangely voyeuristic. In the corner was a cherrywood antique prie-dieu.
Bea ran loving fingers over the fine petit point on the kneeler. “Great-Great-Aunt Mafalda’s. For show rather than usage now. It’s a bit creaky with age.”
“I know the feeling.”
While Bea fixed tea downstairs, Belle relaxed in a sunny breakfast nook, enjoying the antics of chickadees around the feeders. She looked past the deck to the choppy diamond waves of Lake Ramsey, where Bea’s husband and daughter had died. From her Canlit class, she recalled a sinister poem by Margaret Atwood: “This is a Photograph of Me.” The speaker addressed the reader like a friend deciphering a blurred black and white picture, so casual, lulling him into a reverie with “a gentle slope,” “a small house,” “some low hills,” then adding, “The photograph was taken/ the day after I drowned./ I am in the lake. . . . if you look long enough,/ eventually/ you will be able to see me.” What a mistress of understatement Canada’s icon was.
Bea’s pastries proved that her talents ran in the genes. Rum-butter squares. Apricot clusters with pecans. “My grandfather bought Cayuga House in a distress sale during the Depression. The owner had invested heavily in Cobalt silver mines and lost everything. When you’re an only child, it’s hard to sell your family home, but it’s simply too big.” She gave a small sigh. “Has been for years.”
Belle nibbled at a coconut square, piquant with lemon rind, its sweetness opposed to the bitter personal loss left unspoken. “As a realtor, I wear two hats, Bea, one for the buyer and one for the owner. I had imagined that Cayuga House might be demolished. People want modern homes.” She tried to couch the observations in language that wouldn’t insult the woman.
“I suppose so.” Bea’s large mouth sagged at the corners.
As the winey taste of Earl Grey cleared her palate, Belle added, “Now that I’ve seen everything, I’m not at all sure that will happen.”
“The heating bills are plain murder, even though I love the old hot-water system.” She put down her cup and patted a radiator near her shoulder. “A convenient place to dry mittens and toques.”
“It’s a stellar property. I’ll get a lockbox set up for the front door tomorrow and take out a large ad in the paper for the weekend. MLS will reach outside the city. We’ll keep our fingers crossed.” She gave Bea a reassuring smile and opened the attaché case for the paperwork. “Hélène said that you liked the Kingsmount area. ‘Historical’ is the latest catchword for that part of town. I have a classic little place on Roxborough Drive. Mullioned windows. Fretwork. Steep gables. Private gardens out back.” She paused for effect. “And a spanking new gas furnace.”
On a tour of the property, Belle noticed a cozy doghouse in the backyard. A large grey and white sheepdog ambled out and shook itself. “Buffalo. Dave said a kid should always have a dog.”
“I agree,” Belle said, kneeling to embrace the massive shaggy head. “Mine’s a German shepherd. Not as laid-back as this guy.” She noticed that the left incisor was broken. Probably a stone chaser like Freya.
Bea pointed to a caragana hedge at the rear, beyond it a tiny cottage barely visible through the maples. “He can be a noisy one. Kids running through on their way home from school get him barking. Jean McBride over there calls me every now and then when he bites his rope and gets into her yard. Buffy’s only outside a few hours a day in good weather. He sleeps on Micro’s bed.”
They strolled for a few minutes, remnants of the old estate adding charming touches. Bea’s “secret garden” had a verdigrised sundial, a gazebo, and rock terraces to hold the soil against erosion on the steep slope. In the distance, a cigarette boat streaked across Lake Ramsey, two minutes across, then a turnabout, throwing up spray as its engines roared like 747s. A kayak struggled to position itself against swamping waves.
“You don’t want to know my opinion of jet skis. And the snowmobiles are even worse,” said Bea. “Here we are in the middle of town and have to put up with this.”
“Perils of lakefront, I guess. But it adds one heck of a punch to the property values.”
As Belle prepared to leave, Bea stood under a huge sugar maple by the front steps. One hand touched the rugged grey bark. Leading upward was a trail of nailed boards. In a spreading crotch twenty feet up, Belle glimpsed a structure. Bea’s grin lit up her face. “My treehouse. Mother nearly had a heart attack passing up the heavy boards. Micro loves to camp out up there. And don’t I provide the catering.”
THREE
After breakfast, Belle ripped a page from her Tough Dames calendar, with its daily quote. “You gotta get up early in the morning to catch a fox and stay up late at night to get a mink.” Mae West wore the minks, but Belle was determined to save their relatives.
Rousing a snoring Freya from
