The Further Investigations of Joanne Kilbourn (43 page)

Rapti handed me a glass of wine. “To good women and good men. May they find one another.”

I pulled a chair closer to the television. “I’ll drink to that,” I said.

As I looked at the screen, the first thing I noticed was that Tom was still wearing his jacket. Black leather was perfect for Tom’s “mad, bad, and dangerous to know” image, but before the show was five minutes old, it was apparent that Tom had given more thought to his outfit than to his homework. He made a lulu of a factual error about the powers possessed by the Senate, but when Sam Spiegel, who was a senator himself, nudged him gently towards the right answer, Tom was adamant. Glayne Axtell wasn’t gentle. When Tom misrepresented what the leader of her party had said, Glayne said crisply, “It would help your case if you got at least one of your facts straight.”

When the phone-in segment started, Tom’s performance went from bad to worse. The callers, sniffing incompetence, made straight for Tom’s jugular. As the show ended, and the screen went into its farewell configuration with the host in the centre and the panel members in their respective corners,
Sam Spiegel interrupted the host’s wrap-up to announce that he wanted to say goodbye to two colleagues who had been on the panel with him from the beginning, and whom he was certain the audience would miss as much as he did. When Sam was through, Glayne Axtell sent what certainly appeared to be genuine good wishes for the future to both Keith and me. Tom Kelsoe, isolated in his box on the lower left of the screen, gave an odd little salute to the camera but remained silent. By the time the credits finally rolled, I almost felt sorry for him.

Rapti jumped up and turned off the set. “That,” she said, “was the worst hour of television since ‘The Mod Squad’ got cancelled. Jill’s going to be livid.” She shuddered theatrically, “This is going to be one tense little party.”

It turned out Rapti was wrong, at least about the party. It was a very merry prenuptial event. No one made a hat with ribbons for Tina, and no one decided to break the ice with games. The wine was plentiful and the take-out from Alfredo’s was sensational. The only person happier than Tina was Rapti. As she pushed in the red wheelbarrow that was her gift, Rapti glowed with the effects of good Beaujolais and triumph.

Even I had fun. My improved spirits were, I had to admit, due in no small degree to Tom Kelsoe’s pitiful debut. My pleasure might have been mean-spirited, but I was revelling in it until, almost an hour after the party had begun, Jill Osiowy walked in the door. She was pale and tense, and as she picked up a bottle of wine from the refreshments table and poured herself a glass, I saw that her hands were trembling. She drained her glass, refilled it, and walked over to join the group who had clustered around Tina.

I had known Jill for over twenty years, and as I watched her trying to blend in with that carefree crowd, my heart ached for her. I was familiar enough with the structure of Nationtv to know that Jill had spent at least part of the past
hour on the telephone being castigated by someone who didn’t have half her talent but who picked up a paycheque twice as hefty as hers. I also knew that the most punishing criticism Jill would be subjected to that night would come from herself. She was in a miserable spot. She was passionate about two things: her work and Tom Kelsoe. Tonight the show that she had created, lobbied for, and nursed along had sustained a heavy blow because she had been foolish enough to offer it up to the man she loved.

I had long since stopped trying to fathom the choices other people made in their relationships. Perhaps, as an old friend of Ian’s once told me, it was all a matter of luck; if you were born under a benevolent star, your loins would twitch for the right one. In my opinion, Jill’s star had led her astray. If that was the case, maybe the time had come for me to stop sulking and let her know she was still very dear to me.

I walked over and put my arm around her shoulder. “How would you like to curl up with a large tumbler of single-malt Scotch?”

She smiled weakly. “That beats my last offer. The vice-president of News and Current Affairs suggested hemlock.” Suddenly her eyes filled with tears. In the years I’d known her, I’d seen Jill deal with deaths, betrayals, and disappointments, but until that moment, I’d never seen her cry. “Can I take a rain check?” she asked. “I think I just want to go home and go to bed.”

“Of course,” I said. “Any time.”

Her voice was low. “Jo, I’ve missed you.”

“Me too,” I said.

The clock was striking nine when I walked in the front door. The kids were down in the family room. Taylor and Benny were curled up on the rug listening to the soundtrack from
The Lion King
, and Leah and Angus were
huddled together on the couch, doing homework, or so Angus said.

“Fun’s over, T,” I said. “I’m back.”

She rolled over and grinned.

“How’s Nanabush?” I said.

“Better,” she said, “but I don’t want anybody to see it now until it’s done.”

“How was your party?” Angus asked.

“Good,” I said.

“How good could it be if you’re home by nine o’clock?” Then he grinned. “Alex called.”

“And …?”

“And he said he was heading out to Standing Buffalo for a couple of days. He said if we need him, we can get in touch through the band office.” My son looked at me expectantly. “Aren’t you going to call him?”

“Angus, I think he meant we could call if there was an emergency.”

Angus rolled his eyes, but for once he held his tongue. Leah came over and handed me a piece of paper. “You had another call,” she said. “I hope you can read my writing.”

“Let’s see,” I said. “Grace from the Faculty Club called. She found the picture. She wouldn’t have bothered me at home, except she thought I seemed worried about it the other night, and I can call her at the club until ten p.m.” I held the neatly written note out to Angus, who had long been known as the black hole of messages. “This is how it’s done, kiddo. Note the inclusion of all pertinent facts.”

“Hey,” he said. “I’ve got a life.”

I kissed him. “And you’re now free to lead it. Thanks for staying with Taylor, you guys. Angus, don’t be too late. Church tomorrow. It’s Palm Sunday.”

He groaned, grabbed Leah’s hand, and headed for the door.

I turned. “Okay, Miss, bath-time for you.” When he heard my voice, Benny arched his back and hissed. I looked him in the eye. “T,” I said, “why don’t you throw Benny into the tub, too. I think he’s starting to look a little scruffy.”

While Taylor ran her bath, I called Grace at the Faculty Club. Her news was unsettling. The cleaners had found the photo of Reed and Annalie when they’d emptied out the receptacle for used paper towels in the men’s washroom. Grace had been puzzled. “It was just an old newspaper clipping,” she said. “Why would anybody go to all that trouble?”

I told her I didn’t know, but as I hung up I thought it would be worth a couple of phone calls to try to find out. On her message to Reed Gallagher, Annalie Brinkmann had said her area code was 416 – that was Toronto. I dialled Information. There was only one “A. Brinkmann” listed and, as the phone rang, I felt my pulse quicken. But it wasn’t Annalie who answered; it was her husband.

Cal Woodrow was a pleasant and helpful man. When he told me that Annalie was in Germany attending a family funeral, he must have heard the disappointment in my voice.

“If it’s urgent, I can get her to call you,” he said. “She’ll be phoning here Wednesday night.”

“It’s not urgent,” I said. “But maybe you can tell me something. Did your wife know that Reed Gallagher died?”

“No,” he said. “She’d left for Dusseldorf by the time the obituary appeared in the
Globe and Mail
. I didn’t see any point in breaking the news to her when she called to tell me she’d arrived safely. Isn’t it strange that after all this time …?” He didn’t complete the sentence.

“After all this time what?” I asked.

“No,” he said decisively. “That’s Annalie’s story to tell or not to tell.”

“Could I leave my number?”

“Of course,” he said. “Annalie will be most interested in talking to anyone who knew Reed Gallagher.”

It was 9:45 when I tucked Taylor in. She’d brought the Marc Chagall book to bed with her, and she asked me whether her mother had given me the Marc Chagall book because Chagall was her favourite or because she thought he was mine. It was the first time Taylor had talked about her mother openly, and her healthy curiosity about Sally made me optimistic. Maybe Ed Mariani was right in believing that art was the answer.

When I turned out Taylor’s light, I went downstairs, made myself a pot of tea, and picked up my briefcase. I was tired, but I was too edgy for sleep. There were a couple of journal articles I had to plough through before class Monday, and this seemed as good a time as any to get started. When I pulled the articles out, I saw Kellee Savage’s unclaimed essay, and I felt a sting of irritation. Present or absent, Kellee was a problem that wouldn’t go away. On impulse, I picked up the phone and dialled her number. No answer. It was a south-end number, and it suddenly occurred to me that I could stop by her place on the way to church. There were only two weeks of classes left. If Kellee was lying low, watching Oprah and eating Sara Lee, it was time she shaped up and came back to school.

I went over to my desk, took out my box of index cards, and pulled out the section marked Political Science 371 – the Politics and the Media seminar. I flipped through, stopping to smile at Jumbo Hryniuk’s. The students filled out their own cards with name, address, and reason for taking the course. Jumbo had stated his reason succinctly: “Because in this day and age, nobody can afford to be just a jock.” Fair enough. When I pulled out Kellee Savage’s card and checked her address, I felt as if a piece had suddenly dropped into place in the puzzle. Two addresses were listed. One was
her Regina address, and the other was the one she called her home address: 72 Church Street, Indian Head, SK.

She had gone home. The obvious answer to her whereabouts had been there all along. I reached for the phone and dialled the Indian Head number. The phone was picked up on the first ring. It was a man’s voice. “Kellee?” he said.

“No,” I said. “But I’m looking for her. My name’s Joanne Kilbourn. I teach Political Science at the university. Kellee’s one of my students, but she hasn’t been in class for a week. I wanted to get in touch with her; I was afraid that there might be a problem.”

“My name is Neil McCallum,” the man said. “I’m Kellee’s friend, and that’s what I’m afraid of, too.” He spoke slowly, and there was a slight distortion in his pronunciations, as if he had a speech impediment. He paused, as if giving careful consideration to what he was about to say. Then he cleared his throat and made me an offer I couldn’t refuse. “Maybe,” he said, “we could help each other.”

CHAPTER

9

By 2:00 on the afternoon of Palm Sunday, I was on my way to meet Neil McCallum. After church, I had driven over to Gordon Road and stopped by Kellee’s apartment. The building she lived in was called the Sharon Arms. It was a new and charmless building, but it was handy to the university and secure. In the outside lobby, there was an intercom with the usual panel of buzzers opposite the appropriate apartment numbers and name slots. On the information card she had filled out for the Politics and the Media seminar, Kellee had written that she lived in apartment 425. The name slot opposite the buzzer for 425 was empty, but that didn’t surprise me. All of Kellee’s actions on St. Patrick’s Day suggested she was a woman who saw herself surrounded by outside threats; it made sense that she wouldn’t advertise her whereabouts. I had pressed Kellee’s buzzer long enough to let anyone inside know that I wasn’t a casual caller, but there was no response.

By the time I got home, I’d made up my mind. I was going to Indian Head. I called Sylvie O’Keefe and we arranged a double-header for her son, Jess, and Taylor: lunch with me
at McDonald’s, then bowling with Sylvie at the lanes at the Golden Mile.

As I drove east along the Trans-Canada towards Indian Head, I saw that the fields were already bare of snow. It wouldn’t be long before farmers were back on the land, and the cycle of risk and hope would begin again. It took self-discipline not to turn off onto the road that wound through the Qu’Appelle Hills towards the Standing Buffalo Reserve and Alex Kequahtooway. Alex had been a strong and passionate presence in my life for months, and I ached for him. I turned on the radio, hoping to shift my focus. Jussi Björling was singing
“M’appari tutt’amor”
from
Martha
. There had never been a time in my life when I hadn’t thrilled to Björling, but as Lionel, his despair as he recalled his former happiness and hopes cut too close to the bone. I leaned forward and turned him off in mid-aria.

For twenty minutes I drove in silence, yearning like a schoolgirl. A few kilometres outside Indian Head, I realized that, before I met Neil McCallum, I had to get a grip on myself. I pulled over on the shoulder, turned off the ignition, got out and looked at the prairie. The sky was clear, and the air was sweet. In the ditch at the side of the road, the first pussy willows were growing, and I broke off some branches to take back to Taylor. The catkins were silky and soft, and the woody, wet smell of the willows filled the car, a foretaste of April, with its mingling of memory and desire. An omen, or so I hoped.

I hadn’t hesitated about promising Neil McCallum that I’d drive seventy kilometres to talk to him. His recital of the reasons behind his growing concern about Kellee had been a Euclidean line of facts that pointed in only one direction: something was terribly wrong. Neil and Kellee were the same age; they had grown up next door to one another, and, according to him, they had always been close. The year
Kellee graduated from high school, her parents had been killed in a car accident, and she and Neil became even closer. When Kellee went off to university, he had helped pack her things; since then, he had been the one who had made sure her house was ready for her when she came home.