in his studies, and helped his father in the store. Early on Sunday evenings, Philippe would disappear to his small room on Amherst. When he was gone, Max paced the floor, not knowing what to do. He had trouble fighting the sadness brought on by big brother’s absence. Fortunately, there was Kavanagh, a constant guest at their table after Solange walked out. Likeable, open, and “modern” in his own way, he gradually replaced Philippe, who showed up less and less.
A love lost turned into new prosperity for Gilbert. He had been right, and Kavanagh the banker was delighted. Business at the hardware store doubled every trimester, and it was time to expand right away. The housing boom surpassed all expectations, and the king of Roxboro reigned supreme. Gilbert invested more and more, and Kavanagh backed him up. The bank made bigger loans on the strength of even greater projected income. Gilbert spent more than ever and didn’t mind sinking everything he had into the project. Success became almost a monotonous routine: no bumps or sharp turns in a road as wide as tarmac leading straight up into the clouds.
The fateful day was one Max could never forget. The radio said it was the coldest day of the year. They came to get him while he was in math class late one afternoon. Way to go, he said to himself. He hated differential and integral calculus. Philippe was in the principal’s office, fresh from Vancouver, where he’d been studying political science since September. Then Philippe took him out to a waiting taxi. The driver already knew where to go. He headed straight for downtown, but road construction led him back to Gouin and the hardware store.
By the time Philippe realized what was happening, it was already too late. The store was closed … on a Friday. Max looked for his father, but the place was deserted.
“We’re going to a hotel for a few days,” Philippe said when Max turned to him. “The house has been seized, too. It’s the bank’s now.”
“What about Papa?”
“He’ll be here soon.”
Kavanagh had six stitches in his face where Gilbert had hit him with a nail-puller. From the police station, he’d called Philippe in Vancouver instead of a lawyer, and Kavanagh declined to file charges, so Gilbert was able to join his sons at the hotel by evening — motel, actually. A pretty grubby one, too, in a slummy neighbourhood. The windows hadn’t been opened in weeks, due to the cold, and the room hadn’t been cleaned ever, except maybe a superficial once-over. All three slept in the same big bed, three world-weary musketeers chewed up and spat out by fate. Gilbert turned on the light in the middle of the night. He had to talk, confess, get it off his chest. He was washed up. Kavanagh hadn’t kept his word and had let his superiors take a piece out of the king of Roxboro. The vultures had swooped down on his business and torn it to pieces. It was the saddest night in Max’s short life: a filthy little bulb overhead, worn-out furniture, and the hum of traffic in the distance.
“Why us? Why?” Gilbert couldn’t get over it. He never did. After the nervous breakdown, he wound up in the woodworking section at Castor Bricoleur, where he coasted along. He’d come home with his hands full of splinters and never even bother to pull them out. All desire to make an honest living or even “make an effort” deserted Max, too, which resulted in petty crimes to round out the month’s expenses, a borrowed car to impress a girl his age in the neighbourhood, some vandalism, a few misdemeanours here and there: nothing original, just run-of-the-mill impulses. Then one day, he took off after Kavanagh to give him a taste of their calamity. Another dose of the old nail-puller. But the banker had pulled up stakes. Aw, the hell with him. Max had to get on with his life, and he wasn’t about to let anyone get in his way, not like his dad. Little crimes led to bigger ones, bolder, riskier. Max was bound to end up in jail sooner or later.
Then along came Mimi.
Before her, Montreal had always spelled misery and hard times for Max.
The first time he got out of the Bordeaux prison in 1972 — it seemed like only yesterday — there was no one but the bus driver. Gilbert hadn’t passed the news along, so Philippe didn’t know Max was out. No sign of his father in the little apartment on Bagg Street, either. That’s what Max thought at first, because of the drawn curtains and locked door. A neighbour came and let him in. There was Gilbert, sitting in the shadows with a cat on his lap. He’d never liked animals before.
“I don’t want you here, Max. I put all your stuff in that box. Take it and go.”
It was only a shoebox of souvenirs he didn’t want anyway, and he tossed it in the first garbage bin he came across on his way to Mimi’s place — an ex-cellmate had given him the address.
Mimi was the eldest of the three and stood in as mother for the other two: Antoine, who was Max’s age, with his nose buried in Popular Mechanics, was the intellectual in the family; Pascale was secretive and melancholic, looking at him that day through wide teenage eyes, more curious than frightened. The tenants were the collateral damage of the justice system, and Mimi had seen plenty already, so what was one more or one less? And what did these bewildered black sheep live on? Max had an idea, but he wasn’t about to ask. To each his own. They barely said “hi,” then one day they disappeared. A halfway house to crime is what it was. That’s the way Max was headed, too, inevitably. Mimi, though, liked nothing better than to exercise her maternal instinct.
She was taken with Max, and she stood behind him unobtrusively. A slight glance or a word or two once in a while, nothing more. She was cautious as if she were afraid he’d panic.
One morning, she found out what he was up to — a gas-station holdup, just one more dumb move — and she took him out to a restaurant to explain a few hard realities, as she called them. Not just any restaurant … the Château Champlain, swarming with waiters decked out in formalwear. Max had never eaten in a place like this before. He had trouble believing Mimi could manage such luxury. Okay, she had money, but not that much.
“What’s the matter, Max? I’ve never been here before either.”
She’d chosen a table at the far end near two businessmen in suits and ties whose discussion involved airy sweeps of their pens. Mimi at once struck up a conversation with them. They were only too glad of a pretext for getting off business matters, and she was especially charming: a smile here, a burst of laughter there, and her timing was perfect. Max twiddled his thumbs until they ordered … the same thing as the two business types, who were now back in the thick of their number-columns. After dessert, and feeling stuffed, Max was still wondering what this life lesson was that she wanted to teach him. Till now, they’d just talked about trivial stuff, as though intimidated by their surroundings, nothing heart-to-heart. Max was confused. Mimi had brought him here to talk him out of a burglary, but they were surrounded by things only money could buy — lots of money. Max figured after the burglary he’d invite her out for a life lesson, too.
When they’d finished eating, Mimi caught the attention of the businessmen once more. On the ground was a leather wallet one of them had probably dropped.
“Is that yours?”
Intrigued, one of the men scooped it toward him with his foot, but it wasn’t his or his colleague’s. Mimi took it from him and said, “I’ll give it to the waiter. He’ll want to know which table it was under. If he looks this way, signal him, would you?”
Baffled, Max followed her to the counter where the overworked waiter was trying to juggle three different orders.
“Our boss is getting the bill, so just give it to him.”
“Your boss, where?”
Mimi pointed to the two businessmen, and one of them, as expected, waved to them. The waiter nodded and went on about his task.
