Aloha, Candy Hearts (30 page)

“No, they certainly can’t.” These two men had committed themselves to one another for over four decades in a time when it wasn’t easy to be a gay couple, never mind a devoted gay couple.

So what the hell was my problem? But now wasn’t the time to think about that. I said, “I’m sure you must really miss Walter.”

“Horribly, son,” he admitted. “Just horribly. And so do the kids. Especially Brigitta and Gretl. They’re the youngest. All they’ve done these last few days is sit and wait by the door.

They’ve been expecting him to come home and laugh that honking laugh of his, which he used to do every day. They’d run and jump all over him, and lick him so much their tongues sometimes ended up his nose. It tickled him. And oh, he laughed, he loved that. They loved doing it too. They don’t understand why he’s not coming home.”

“It sounds like you had a wonderful life together.”

“He was not supposed to go first. I always thought of it as my one reward for being so much older, you know. I’d never have to see him go. This…this wasn’t how it was meant to be.”

I swallowed hard.

“It’s so quiet now. Even with the girls and boys. So quiet.”

“Mr. Henckell…”

“Call me Sven, if you can. It makes me feel young.”

I smiled, but I wasn’t sure he could see it. “Sven, I first met Walter a week ago. We were on the same flight, coming home from Vancouver.”

“Actually he was in Victoria. That’s where Helen was. He must have made a connection through Vancouver, I suppose. I didn’t really pay much attention to his itinerary. Other than the date he was supposed to come home. I was sitting up waiting for him that night. For hours. I didn’t know what had happened. I thought maybe I’d gotten the wrong day. I don’t know how many times I checked the calendar to make sure I had the right one. Then they DD6AA2AB8

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called…” He took such a deep breath, I could see his thin chest struggle with it. I debated leaving. Maybe it was too soon to have this talk with him. But then he said, “Oh, but you don’t want to hear about all that, now do you? Anyhow, as I said, he was in Victoria, where Helen was.”

Helen again. I’d bet my last bottle of Kanonkop Pinotage it was the same Helen who used to be the head archivist at the U of S. I suspected it was she who created the treasure map. Had she given it to Walter? Or had he taken it?

“Was it Helen Crawford he was visiting?” I asked in a way that might have suggested I’d know Helen all my life.

I saw his near naked noggin move up and down just a nudge.

“That’s the Helen of course, but it wasn’t any kind of visit he went for.”

“Oh? Why do you say that?”

“She died. That’s why.”

I could hear a few pieces clicking into place. “So Walter went to Victoria to attend Helen’s funeral?”

“Oh no. They weren’t really close enough for that. They worked together for many years, but they weren’t ever best friends. And after Helen retired a few years ago, they’d pretty much lost touch. Up until the call from the lawyer.”

“An estate lawyer?”

“I suppose, I’m not sure what kind of lawyer he called himself.

But he told Wally that Helen had left something important for him and did he want it mailed or couriered.”

The treasure map. “But instead he flew all the way to Victoria to get it? Why would he do that?”

The old man made a noise that sounded like, “hehmphf”, and I took it to mean my question stumped him. “I can’t really remember why he said it was so important to go all that way. But Wally tells me my memory is failing…or he used to. I guess maybe it’s true.”

This was not a private investigator ’s favourite admission.

“Anyhow, I suppose he thought whatever it was she’d left him was too important to trust to Canada Post. Maybe it was something fragile? Like a vase or something? Maybe fruit. They have DD6AA2AB8

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nice fruit out there, you know.”

“M…Sven, did your husband ever talk to you about a treasure or a treasure map or anything like that?”

He shook his fragile head. “Can’t say he did.”

I hated mentioning this to the old fellow, but I had to give it a try. “What about blackmail?”

This seemed to get his attention. The eyes behind his thick glasses noticeably widened as he leaned forward to get a better look at me. “Blackmail? Did you say blackmail? Was someone blackmailing Wally?”

“Uh, no. I was thinking the other way around.”

“What’s that?” he turned up the volume on one of his hearing aids.

“Sven, I know what I’m asking may be difficult for you to consider, but, well, do you think Walter might have been capable of committing blackmail?”

The bald head swung back and forth. It was the swiftest movement I’d seen from the man since I’d arrived. “Oh no. Oh no. I may be old and hard of hearing and can’t see much and maybe losing my memory, but I know my Wally,” he insisted. “He was a good man. He would never blackmail anybody. He wouldn’t be able to live with himself. I’m telling you the God’s honest truth, Mr….mister man. And I don’t want to hear that you’re passing around those kinds of horrible rumours about my poor Wally, either. That clear?”

“I’m sorry, Sven.” I really was. “I don’t mean to upset you with these questions. I don’t know if what I suspect is true. But someone killed your husband. I’m just trying to find out who, and why.”

He nodded a bit. “Well, okay then. But just forget about this blackmail nonsense. It’s just not true.”

I sighed. “Sven, is there anything you can think of that might help me find Walter ’s murderer?” I was going to suggest enemies, money problems, that sort of thing. But I didn’t think it would do me, or Sven, any good.

“I’d have to say a big no to that, young man.” He petted the nest of dog fur in his lap. “And so would Friedrich. Or is this DD6AA2AB8

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Kurt?” He stared at the animal. “Is that brown hair or red? So hard to tell in this light.” He fiddled with one of his ear pieces, then said,

“Mr. Quant, could I ask a favour of you?”

“Of course,” I agreed, surprised he remembered my name when he’d clearly forgotten it earlier.

“Would you mind going into the kitchen cupboard and checking on how much dog food we have left? I can’t see very well, you know, and I can only reach so high. I’m afraid to use the step ladder because I’m not too steady on my feet. I’m scared I might fall off. Wally did the shopping before he left for Victoria, but it’s been a week. I don’t know how much we’ve got left. Could you do that for me? I don’t care about myself, but I don’t want the kids running out of food.”

While I scouted the kitchen cupboards for dog food, I took the liberty of assessing the people food supplies as well. By the looks of things, Sven was getting down to a diet of dry cereal and condi-ments.

About twenty minutes later, as I finished unpacking a few things I’d picked up from the corner store to restock Sven’s and the Poms’ basics, two Molly Maids from Ash House arrived. I made introductions, paid the cleaners including a hefty tip, and filed a mental note to have a talk with Ethan about Sven’s future.

Churlish clouds filled the sky by the time I reached PWC. The temperature was dropping, the wind getting stronger, and I was almost out of time. Anthony and Jared’s wedding was only hours away, and my meeting with Reginald Cenyk a couple hours after that. Maybe it was the weather, but a bad feeling was growing in my stomach. Was my archivist informant in danger? Was I?

Instead of one murder, were we dealing with a string of murders?

Was someone else about to get killed?

The news about Helen Crawford’s death was interesting indeed. I now had a new twist to take into account. Had she truly died of natural causes, or was Walter Angel’s death not the first murder tied to the Durhuaghe papers? Had someone killed Helen, then Walter? Were both archivists killed by the same hand? Was it DD6AA2AB8

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Durhuaghe? Maybe he’d lied to me. Maybe he’d been blackmailed by Helen all along. He’d have thought with her death the blackmail would stop. But to find it would continue—in perpetuity—

because of the existence of the treasure map, might have been too much for him to swallow. He’d have realized that he would be forever under the thumb of whoever had the map. That couldn’t be an easy way to live.

Tuxedo in hand, I quickly scaled the fire stairs to the second floor of PWC and made it inside just as the first of a series of roving showers dropped on the city. I hung the garment bag on the back of my office door and plunked myself down in front of my computer. As I typed away, I kept one eye on the time indicator on the bottom right hand corner of the screen.

It took longer than I’d hoped to find what I needed. I dialled the phone number as I stripped. An answering machine took my call. I left a brief message and my cell number and hung up.

All I had left to put on, other than my jacket, was the cummer-bund. I remembered the handy rule of thumb—or should I say rule of crumb—taught to me by Anthony. If you consider the cummer-bund as your crumb catcher, you’ll always know to put the thing on with pleats open to the top, making it easier to catch crumbs in.

I guess people at fancy events must be notoriously messy eaters.

I ran downstairs to check myself out in the full-length mirror.

Not too shabby. Anthony and Jared had selected cream-coloured tuxes with fawn accents for their attendants. It looked good with my not-yet faded Hawaiian tan and sun-bleached hair.

I pulled up the jacket and turned around to assess the assets. Not exactly up to wonderpants standard, but the caboose was looking A-okay.

The Mazda was purring out of the parking lot a few minutes later when I slammed on the brakes. I raced back into PWC, opened the safe in my office, retrieved the wedding rings I’d been storing there for months, and galloped back to the car.

As an overcast sky continued to threaten rain, delivering every half hour or so, an anomalous mist swirled about the tents behind DD6AA2AB8

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Ash House in which one-hundred-and-fifty guests were gathered, awaiting the nuptials. The whole setting was beginning to look a little like a Sherlock Holmes movie starring Basil Rathbone. The only disparities in my foggy little dreamscape were Sereena’s candy hearts, now set up on the lawn, bleating their sad-looking orange, yellow, and pinkness through the blur of grey. In its own way, it was a rather oddly beautiful scene. Not exactly the warm, dry, sunny day hoped for, but as Sereena always says, a sign of a person’s intelligence is their ability to adapt.

I found Jared in a second floor bedroom, fussing with his bow tie.

“I told Anthony to go with the pre-tied bow ties,” I said as I entered the room and took over the tying.

“You’d think as a former model I could handle this. But my fingers are all thumbs today.” He laughed nervously. “Gawd, listen to me. I’ve been spouting clichés all day. Next thing you know I’ll be hunting for something old, something new, something borrowed, and something blue. Do you think my hair looks okay I shouldn’t have had it cut yesterday it always looks best several days after a cut it’s too new I need some product and these shoes are killing me but you look great Russell I love your hair that way and can you believe the weather thank god for the tents I suppose we’ll miss seeing the sunset now like we planned I mean what’s the point of a sunset wedding if you’re in a tent but we knew…”

“Jared. Jared. Jared!” I took hold of his shoulders and gave them a bit of a shake, setting his copper tinted curls to bouncing.

I’d never seen the man so jumpy before. Ever. Jared was always the cool, collected one.

“I know, I know,” he responded with a lopsided smile. “I’ve walked runway in front of thousands of people, and it never fazed me. But this…this getting married stuff is…well, it’s just crazy. My heart feels like it’s going to burst out of my chest. Imagine the mess!”

We laughed. Not because the visual was funny, but because we really needed to.

“Do you remember, Russell?” Jared asked, suddenly serious again. “A couple of years ago? After this.” He indicated the scar DD6AA2AB8

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tissue on his face.

I hardly noticed the disfigurement anymore. Jared’s spirit, not to mention his killer smile and flashing green eyes, easily shone through anything any deranged attacker could have done to him or his appearance. When I looked at him now, I saw the same lovely face I saw, only inches from mine, on the day we woke up together in that country barn and realized we’d survived being abandoned and left for dead in a raging winter storm. I saw my friend. I saw a man I loved, who was beautiful inside and out.

“Remember,” he urged again. “I came to you, and asked you to help me leave Anthony?”

I nodded. It had been a horrible, ugly time in my relationship with Jared. He’d decided that the mutilation had made him into a different person. That he was no longer the same man Anthony fell in love with. Anthony and Jared had long been admired for being one of the most strikingly beautiful pairs in all of coupledom. How they looked, how they dressed, how they lived larger than life, was hard to separate from their love affair.

Jared stared at his face in the mirror, unconsciously busying his hands by trying to straighten his curls. “After her original cancer diagnosis and mastectomy, I watched Kelly run away from Errall, from her life in Saskatoon. She escaped. She ran away and found another life. I envied her. It’s what I wanted. I wanted it for Anthony too. I thought he deserved another chance with someone else.”