The Further Investigations of Joanne Kilbourn (6 page)

I got out of the car and walked over to him. The former premier of Saskatchewan was peering so intently into the front seat of the Buick that he didn’t hear me.

“Angus tells me these vintage cars are a snap to hotwire,” I said. “Want to go for a joy-ride before the big event?”

He didn’t look up. “Sure,” he said. “It’d bring back a lot of memories. The first time I ever got laid was in a car like this.”

“When was that?” I said.

“In 1953,” Hilda said. “This is a Buick Skylark, Joanne.”

Howard straightened and faced us.

“And you’re sixty now,” I said. “That would make you twenty-one. Good for you for waiting, Howard. I’ll bet not many boys in law school did.”

He laughed and threw an arm around my shoulder. “Same old Jo,” he said. “Still a pain in the ass.” He held out his other arm to Hilda. “Come on, Hilda. Let’s get in there. I’ll buy you a Glenfiddich before the agony begins. Did you come down from Saskatoon just to watch me squirm?”

“I’d come farther than that for a tribute to you,” Hilda said simply.

Howard’s old fighter’s face softened. “Allow me to make that Glenfiddich a double,” he said.

When we saw what was waiting for us outside the hotel, we were ready for a double. The Saskatchewan is a graceful dowager of a hotel, but that night the dowager was confronting the politics of the nineties. Demonstrators spilled from the entrance and onto the sidewalk. There seemed to be about forty of them, but they were silent and well-behaved. Around the neck of each protestor, a photograph of a foetus was suspended, locket-like, from a piece of cord. Two boys who didn’t look as old as Angus were holding a scroll with the words
BEATING HEART
written in foot-high letters.

Beating Heart was Tess Malone’s organization. The media potential of Howard’s dinner must have been too tempting for her to resist. The new premier and half his cabinet were coming, and they all supported the Women’s Health Centre. When the demonstrators saw Howard, there was a stir. Howard might have been only an ex-premier, but he was still the enemy. Oblivious, he took my arm and Hilda’s and started up the stairs. The Beating Heart people moved closer together. Beneath the heavy material of his overcoat, I could feel Howard’s body tense.

“Hang on,” he said. I shuddered, remembering other demonstrations I’d had to wade through since the Women’s Health Centre had opened in late summer. They were never any fun. I braced myself and moved forward. Then Hilda was in front of me, so close to the demonstrators that her trim body seemed pressed against the body of the man in front of her.

In the silence, I heard Hilda’s voice, as civil and unworried as it would have sounded in the classroom. “Gerald Parker, that is you, isn’t it?”

The man in front of her smiled.

“Yes, Miss McCourt,” he said.

“I hear you’ve done well for yourself,” Hilda said. “Real estate, isn’t it?”

“Last year I made the Million Dollar Club for the third straight year.” he said.

“Splendid,” said Hilda. “You always were a hard worker. Now, Gerald, I wonder if you could let us pass. You’ve made your point. Nothing’s to be gained by keeping us out here in the snow.”

Without a word, Gerald broke his connection with the woman next to him, and Hilda walked between them. It wasn’t Moses parting the Red Sea, but it was close. Before Gerald changed his mind, I followed. Then Howard. We had just reached the top of the stairs when I heard a man’s voice: “She’s here.”

I turned. Jane O’Keefe was getting out of a taxi at the front of the hotel. Her sister, Sylvie, was with her. They glanced at the crowd, and then they turned towards one another. Their profiles were almost identical; cleanly marked jawlines, generous mouths, short strong noses, carefully arched brows. The two women had the scrubbed blond good looks you could see on the golf course of the best club in any city in North America. In fact, the O’Keefe sisters had grown up in the pleasant world of private schools and summers at the lake. As the crowd began to surge towards them, that idyllic existence must have seemed a lifetime away. The lights in front of the hotel leached the sisters’ faces of colour, but Jane and Sylvie didn’t hesitate. They started towards the stairs. Sylvie was carrying a camera and she hunched her body around it, protecting it the way a mother would protect a child.

The crowd surrounded the two women, cutting them off. No one moved. The only noise was the muted sound of traffic on the snowy streets. Then Howard came down the stairs towards them. This time there was force. He used his
powerful shoulders as a wedge to break through the line. When he got to Jane and Sylvie, he linked hands with them and started back up the steps.

“Proverbs 11:21.” A woman’s voice, husky and self-important, cut through the silent night. “Though hand join in hand the wicked shall not be unpunished but the seed of the righteous shall be delivered.”

I turned towards the voice. So did a lot of other people. When she saw that she was centre-stage, a smile lit Maureen Gault’s thin face, and she gave me a mocking wave.

The demonstrators on the front steps had broken ranks during Little Mo’s outburst, and Howard took advantage of the situation to get Sylvie and Jane into the hotel. Seconds later, the five of us were safe in the lobby, our shaken selves reflected a dozen times in the mirrors that lined the walls.

Hilda took command of the situation. She turned to Sylvie and Jane. “We were planning to have a drink before the festivities started. Will you join us?”

Jane O’Keefe smiled wearily. “As my grandfather used to say, ‘Does a bear shit in the woods?’ Let’s go.”

The Saskatchewan Lounge is a bar for genteel drinkers: the floral wallpaper is expensive; the restored woodwork gleams; the chairs, upholstered in peony-pink silk, are deep and comfortable; and the waiters don’t smirk when they ask if you’ll have your usual. We found a large table in the corner as far away as possible from the singing piano player. When the waiter came, I asked for a glass of vermouth, then, remembering the menace in Maureen Gault’s smile, I changed my order to bourbon.

Howard raised his eyebrows. “Trying to keep pace with the guest of honour, Jo?” he asked.

“No,” I said, “but Howard, didn’t you see …”

He’d been smiling, but, as he leaned towards me, the smile vanished, and I changed my mind about telling him Maureen
Gault had been in the crowd. Howard had always been there when I needed him, and this was his night.

“Nothing,” I said. “Just a case of mistaken identity.”

“Sure you’re okay?” he asked.

“Yeah,” I said, “I’m sure.”

“Fair enough,” he said. Then he turned to Jane O’Keefe. “So, are you having second thoughts about the Women’s Centre?”

“Not a one,” she said. “And I’ve waded through crowds a lot loonier than that bunch out there.”

Sylvie started to speak, but Jane cut her off. “My sister doesn’t agree with me on this issue. But my sister hasn’t had to try to salvage women who’ve been worked over by butchers. If you’d seen what I’d seen, Sylvie, you’d know I didn’t have a choice.”

“No,” Hilda said, “you didn’t. For sixty-five years, I’ve known that an enlightened society can’t drive women into back alleys.”

I was surprised. There were some subjects I never discussed with Hilda. The drinks came and, with them, another surprise. Hilda had never been forthcoming about her private life. She sipped her Glenfiddich and turned to Jane O’Keefe. “My sister died from a botched abortion,” she said. “By the time I’d convinced her to let me take her to the hospital, she was, to use your word, Jane, unsalvageable. It’s vital that women are never driven to that again.” Hilda’s eyes were bright with anger.

On the other side of the bar, the piano player had started to sing “Miss Otis Regrets.” Jane reached over and touched Hilda’s hand. “Thanks,” she said. “There are times when I need a little affirmation.”

Howard snorted. “Janey, you never needed affirmation. You always had bigger balls than any of us.”

Jane looked at him, deadpan. “What a graceful compliment,” she said, and everybody laughed.

Everybody, that is, except her sister. For as long as I’d known her Sylvie O’Keefe had been an outsider. As I watched her blue eyes sweep the table, I wondered, not for the first time, what that level gaze took in.

She had always been unknowable and, for much of her life, enviable. She was rich, she was talented, and she was beautiful. She and Gary had been a golden couple. Physically, they were both so perfect, it had been a pleasure simply to watch them as they came into a room. In the days when we were all having babies, we joked about the glorious gene pool Sylvie and Gary’s child would draw from. But there was no baby, and as the months, then years, went by, Gary and Sylvie stopped being a golden couple. By the time Jess came, Gary and Sylvie had stopped being any sort of couple at all.

Jess was a miracle, but he didn’t bring his parents together. Gary continued his headlong rush towards wherever he was going, and Sylvie became even more absorbed in her career. She was a gifted photographer, and her son soon became her favourite subject. Her luminous black and white photographs of him, by turns sensual and savage, were collected in a book,
The Boy in the Lens’s Eye
. The collection established Sylvie’s reputation in the places that counted. She was a success.

As I watched her assessing the people drifting into the hotel bar, I wondered if the time would ever come when Sylvie O’Keefe and I would be friends. Somehow, it seemed unlikely, but one thing was certain: after twenty years, fate – or the vagaries of small-city living – had brought our lives to a point of convergence again.

“Kismet,” I said.

Sylvie turned reluctantly from the partygoers to me. “I don’t understand.”

“Sorry,” I said, “just thinking out loud about how the kids’ discovering each other has brought our lives together.”

“Actually, I’m glad we were brought together tonight,” she said. “I was going to call you about taking some pictures of Taylor. Have you ever watched her when she draws? She’s so focussed and so … I don’t know … tender. She has a great face.”

“She looks like her mother,” I said.

Sylvie looked at me quizzically.

“You know Taylor is adopted,” I said. “Her mother was Sally Love.”

Sylvie’s eyes widened. “Of course. I’d forgotten. Sally’s work was brilliant,” she said.

“It was,” I agreed. “That’s one reason I’m happy Taylor’s spending some time around you. I think being with another artist can give Taylor a link with her real mother.”

Sylvie leaned towards me. “And that doesn’t bother you?”

Before I had a chance to answer, there was an explosion of laughter at the other end of the table. Howard was in the middle of a story about a rancher he’d acted for in a lawsuit against a manufacturer of pressurized cylinders. The rancher’s semen tank had sprung a leak. Like Onan, his seed had been wasted on the ground, but the rancher wasn’t waiting for God’s judgement. He hired Howard and took the case to court.

As I turned to listen, Howard was recounting his summation for the jury. It was funny, but it was crude, and at the next table a smartly dressed man with silver hair and a disapproving mouth turned to glare at him. Howard smiled at the man, then, still smiling, leaned towards me. “I make it a policy never to get into a fight with a guy whose mouth is smaller than a chicken’s asshole.”

The pianist segued into “Thanks for the Memories,” and I stood up. Howard looked at me questioningly. “It’s time to get out of here,” I said. “Some cracks are starting to appear in your guest of honour persona.”

We finished our drinks, and headed for the lobby. Gary Stephens was just coming up the steps from the side door, and he joined us.

“Sorry I’m late, babe,” he said to Sylvie. She looked at him without interest, and I wondered how often she’d heard that entrance line. But Jane O’Keefe was interested. Her grey eyes burned the space between herself and her brother-in-law. “You’re a real bastard, Gary,” she said. Then she turned her back to him and started towards the cloakroom. We followed her and dropped off our coats, then we took the elevator upstairs to the ballroom.

The crowd in the upstairs hall was surprisingly young. Many of the men and women who were now deputy ministers or People on Significant Career Paths had been having their retainers adjusted and watching “The Brady Bunch” when Howard Dowhanuik became premier, but tonight that didn’t seem to matter. Our party’s first year back in government was going well, and there seemed to be a consensus that we had something to celebrate. In the ballroom, a string quartet played Beatles tunes, the crystal chandelier blazed with light, and silvery helium-filled balloons drifted above every table set for eight. It was party time.

Hilda looked around the room happily. “It’s everything Howard deserves,” she said. “Now I’d better find my place.” She lowered her voice. “Joanne, I’m sitting with a man I met at the art gallery last Sunday. If we continue to enjoy one another’s company, I might not go home with you. My new friend tells me he has an original Harold Town in his apartment.”

“But you hate Harold Town.”

Hilda raised an eyebrow. “Well, there was no need to tell my friend that.”

I laughed. “Let me know if you need a ride.”

“I will,” she said. “Now, you’d better get over to the head table. Howard likes people to be punctual.”

Manda and Craig Evanson were already in their places. Manda was wearing a blue Mexican wedding dress, scoop-necked and loose fitting to accommodate the swell of her pregnancy. Her dark hair, parted in the middle, fell loose to her shoulders. She was very beautiful.

Sylvie stopped in front of Manda, took out her camera, and began checking the light with a gauge. As always, Sylvie seemed to have dressed with no thought for what other women might be wearing, and as always she seemed to have chosen just the right thing. Tonight, it was a pinstriped suit the colour of café au lait, and a creamy silk shirt. As she moved around the table, adjusting her camera, I noticed more than one woman in iridescent sequins taking note.

“I don’t usually walk around like the inquiring photographer,” Sylvie said, “but I thought Howard might like some pictures of his party.”