The Girl in the Wall (17 page)

“Yes,” said Frank. “It blows it clear out of the water.”

He walked her to her door and then backtracked to his own home a couple of blocks away.

When he got there the phone was ringing. It was Emma calling and she sounded happy. She was working on the geriatric ward of a big hospital in Honolulu and enjoying it. She loved the old folks, she said. And Frank loved her so very much for loving the old folks.

Saturday night lasted forever.

Frank went to bed early and the first time he woke up the sheets were damp with his sweat. He was freezing cold so he threw off the blankets and put on a pair of pajamas. It was a dream that had woken him — had scared him awake. He couldn't remember it now, but it had left him with a new dread, something huge. It was bigger than the fear that it was Mrs. Mortimer in the wall, bigger than missing the job, bigger even than living without Denise and Gus. It was as monumental as the fears for his kids, but different, more personal, if that was possible.

Much later that night, when Garth and Sadie were snug in their beds and sound asleep, Frank got up, changed into a pair of shorts and a
T
-shirt and went for a walk around the neighbourhood. Anything was better than lying in bed worrying that Garth would marry a hoarder and that his own unborn grandchildren would suffer at her hands, be smothered along with Garth under a houseful of junk.

Where the hell had that come from? Maybe it was the way Garth talked with admiration about his friend Ansel's collection of stuff. Ansel had every electronic gadget known to mankind and Garth knew what they all were and how to work them and he went on about them to Frank.

Frank felt as though he didn't know the names of things anymore. And for sure he didn't know what all the abbreviations meant. He heard the letters
NGO
on the
CBC
(Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) probably twenty times till finally, a kindly guest who may have been as bothered by abbreviations as Frank was, said: You mean by
NGO
a non-governmental organization? And the host said: yes, I'm sorry.

Thank Christ she was at least sorry, Frank had thought then and remembered now as he walked down the lane toward the bakery on Taché Avenue.

It was late enough or early enough that he knew the bakers would be there already, working away. He loved seeing the light coming through the windows of the tiny operation and hearing the voices of the wielders of the dough. Now and then when he strolled by, someone would be smoking at the open back door, often alone, sometimes with a co-worker, talking quietly. Their conversations were always punctuated by the occasional burst of laughter. Not uproarious, just medium and good. Average laughter.

Frank couldn't remember the last time he'd enjoyed an average laugh, let alone a hearty one.

Maybe I'm just growing old, he thought. But fifty-six wasn't supposed to be old these days. Wasn't it the new eighteen or something? He was sure he'd read something like that in a women's magazine in a waiting room. Frank liked women's magazines, but he felt he had to read them in secret. It was harder now that Denise was gone. She had been a big subscriber but now her
Chatelaine
and her
Homemaker
and her
Canadian Living
had run out. He supposed he could renew them but he didn't want to upset the kids by having mail come in her name and he didn't feel comfortable putting them in his own name. He already subscribed to a knitting magazine and imagined that he was the butt of letter carriers' jokes: that peculiar knitting-man who lives on Claremont.

Why do I care about such things? Frank wondered. How old do I have to be before I arrive at that place I've heard about where you do what you choose and don't worry about the opinions of others, where you say what's on your mind and feel comfortable with the words you speak?

Maybe I need to have sex, he thought, have someone fuck me till I go blind. There had been no one since Denise and no one other than her since they got married, unless you counted that long-ago misstep with Audrey. He wondered about her now. He knew she still lived in the neighbourhood but he hadn't seen her in years. Maybe he should knock on her door. They could have sex without thinking too much about it, wild demented sex, and then let each other go.

Frank realized there were tears running down his face. That was happening far too often lately. He knew he wouldn't knock on Audrey's door or anyone else's. He didn't have that sort of appetite right now; he was just plain miserable. It was a foolish idea, that's all.

He decided to sit on a bench in Coronation Park for a while and pull himself together before the walk home. The bench was facing in a westward direction near the path. He had sat there before, he realized, and a scene from the past played itself out before his eyes, as clear as a blue morning from 1962.

He was young, maybe not even a teenager yet and he had been sitting with a friend, Ricky Ormiston, deciding what to do with the cigarettes they had stolen from Ricky's mum.

The staring girl walked past, George's little sister. She walked stiffly, like her knees didn't bend as easily as the knees of other girls. They stopped their discussion to watch. Neither of them knew her well enough to speak to her.

Soon after she went by an older boy ran past them in the direction of the girl. When he drew alongside her he stuck out his right foot and caused her to tumble to the ground. He kept on running.

Frank stood up. Ricky too.

“She took quite a fall,” Frank said. “I think we should go and see if she's all right.”

“You go,” said Ricky. “I'll stay here and guard the smokes.”

Frank approached cautiously. He'd heard his share of stories about the girl and he wasn't sure what he was getting himself into. He knew her brother, George, though, and knew him to be a good sort. It was somehow important to Frank now to do his very best, whatever that might entail.

The girl was sitting up with a neutral look on her face. She wasn't crying and didn't seem to be upset.

“Are you okay?” Frank asked.

He knew her name was Morven but he didn't want to say it.

“We saw what happened,” he said.

“My glasses are broken.”

She handed them up to Frank.

“Thanks,” he said. He was grateful for her trust.

As he took them from her he noticed that both her hands were badly scraped on the palms. There would be little bits of gravel from the path lodged under her skin, he was sure of it, but he didn't want to risk touching her.

Her trust scared him a little, on her behalf.

“Is everything else okay?” he asked. “Do you think you can stand up?”

She stood and shook herself down.

“I can't see without my glasses,” she said.

Frank held the two separate pieces in his hands.

“Let me walk you home,” he said. “We'll tape them together to tide you over till you get new ones.”

Frank turned around to wave at Ricky and make a few explanatory gestures with his arms. He didn't want to shout and he didn't want to leave her.

They started walking, with Frank as the guardian of the glasses. She told him the number of the house on Monck where she lived. He hadn't known the number but he did know the house.

“Do you know who that boy was that knocked you down?” Frank asked.

“No.”

“Will George be at home, do you think?”

“I hope so. He'll help me get my glasses fixed.”

The next bit was hazy in Frank's memory, but he was sure George must have been home and put an end to his involvement. Surely he would remember if he'd been inside the house.

What he did remember now were the words exchanged between Ricky and him when he got back to the park to continue with their plans for the cigarettes.

“Who was that guy?” asked Frank. “Do you know him?'

“Jimmy Coulthard,” said Ricky. “He's a creepy kid.”

Frank hadn't heard of him then and didn't hear of him again till July of 2006.

The rain started up as Frank sat on the bench in the park. He didn't notice at first and it was coming down hard by the time he stood up and started a slow lope home. It didn't seem important to stay dry.

For what remained of the night he lay in bed worrying about his eaves. He had meant to clean them before it rained but he hadn't gotten around to it. They were packed with willow and Chinese elm seeds. The rain continued to come down hard. He wondered if he should go out and do it now in the early morning light in the rain. The light didn't amount to much with the heavy cloud cover but he didn't like the picture he had in his mind of the water running down his house into the cracks in the foundation.

Instead he turned on the reading lamp, opened up his Michael Connelly book, and managed to lose himself in the story. Connelly's main character, Harry Bosch, was a policeman. He retired and then returned to the job. Frank wondered if he could do that. If they would have him. As morning arrived, the rain began to let up, and Frank nodded off over his book.

There wasn't a cloud in the sky when Frank woke up, and the air was cool and fresh. The basement was dry and he berated himself for fretting. He took his coffee out to the porch, where the wind was high, getting a good start on drying things up. The wet leaves of the cotoneasters shone in the sunlight. Both kids were in their beds — he had checked — and Emma was fine as of yesterday evening.

Except for the Featherstone fiasco, making an idiot of himself in front of Jane continually, and his anxiety about Mrs. Mortimer, all seemed right with the world for the first twenty minutes or so of the new day. He was almost certain he could iron out the Featherstone mess with a little fake tact and diplomacy, less sure that Jane would ever see him again in the same light after the past couple of days. But somehow that was okay: if you couldn't lose your marbles in front of your closest friend, who could you lose them in front of? He was mildly surprised when he realized that he thought of Jane as his closest friend. She was gently moving in to fill the canyon left by Gus's absence. He wouldn't mention it to her ever, not even on his deathbed. He didn't want to scare her any more than he already had.

And if it was, indeed, Mrs. Mortimer inside the wall, there was nothing he could do to save her.

His pilfering of the photograph no longer even registered on his personal graph of things that mattered.

The phone rang and Frank went inside to answer it. It was Norm Featherstone, ending his working relationship with Frank and Jane.

“Fine, Norm,” said Frank.

He couldn't muster up anything more.

Norm hung up first.

Frank felt relief until he remembered that he'd have to tell Jane. He began to sweat and when he caught a glimpse of himself in the hall mirror he was alarmed by what he saw: a vaguely familiar man without a trace of colour in his face, who appeared to have aged a decade since the last time he had noticed him. Maybe he was coming down with something — the flu or a summer cold. He supposed this would be as good a time as any, seeing as he had no big jobs on the horizon. The Featherstone thing was going to be his summer. There was Mrs. Frobisher's hallway, but that was two days at most.

He decided to postpone calling Jane till later in the day when his breaths were coming more easily. Hell, he'd leave it till morning — let her get through her Sunday without knowing.

It was his plan to go and see Mrs. Beresford again, on his own this time, but he got to feeling worse. The beginning of the blanket feeling returned to his chest. It started out small, thin even, like a summer sheet, but as the day wore on it changed into something heavier, a cotton blanket, perhaps, and ended up as a woolly rug covering his heart and other vital organs. In the evening the woolly rug was damp and almost beyond carrying.

At nine o'clock Frank placed a large pail containing two inches or so of water beside his bed. He was certain that he was going to puke and he was beginning to feel dizzy. He couldn't bear the idea of throwing up onto something other than a receptacle prepared for that purpose.

When he crawled into bed and lay on his back the woolly blanket dissolved and he thought before he drifted off briefly that maybe all he needed was good night's sleep.

On Monday morning when Frank opened his eyes he looked directly into the face of a rosy-cheeked nurse, who greeted him cheerfully.

“Good morning, Mr. Foote,” she said. “You're in the hospital. You've had a heart attack, but you're doing fine.”

“What time is it?” he asked.

She looked at her watch.

“Seven fourteen.”

“I need to phone my kids.”

“Your kids are here, Mr. Foote. Would you like to see them now?”

“Yes, please.”

Tears were streaming down Sadie's face — it seemed like she was always crying, just like her dad, Frank thought — and Garth looked as though he were propping up a heavy slab of marble on his young baseball-playing shoulders.

“Oh, Dad,” said Sadie.

She hugged him carefully, avoiding the delicate tubes entering and exiting his body.

Frank couldn't speak and he struggled without success to stop his own tears from falling.

“You're not going to die,” said Garth. “The doctor told us that. You're going to be as good as new.”

“It's true,” said Sadie. “I asked him if it was mild, medium, big, or massive and he said mild.”

“Well, good then,” said Frank.

He gave Garth Jane's phone number and asked him to put her in the picture. He also asked him to mention to her that the job was off. In other words, he asked his boy to do his dirty work for him, but he had no choice.

Something stirred in Frank's brain: a vague recollection of himself stumbling down the stairs in the night to phone 911. He remembered opening the front door so that no one would break it down in an effort to get to him. He hadn't wanted to wake his kids, which he had realized was insane when he heard the distant sound of a siren coming for him as the world turned to black.

“Emma's coming,” said Garth.

“Oh, no. There was no need to tell Emma,” said Frank.

“Yes, there was,” said Sadie. “She'll be here later today or tomorrow.”

“No need,” said Frank again and closed his eyes.

“Need,” said Garth.

Frank drifted off to sleep.

Jane came to see him later in the day with the news that she had picked up their tools. She also brought peas from St. Leon Gardens.

“It's almost the last of them,” she said. “But they're still good.”

She knew how he felt about fresh peas.

“Everything seems to be intact, tool-wise,” she said. “I can't vouch for your stuff, but mine is all good.”

“Thanks, Jane. I hope they were nice to you down there.”

“Yeah, they were fine.”

She didn't seem able to look him in the eye.

“What's up?” he asked.

“I'm so sorry, Frank. About all this.”

She gestured to take in their surroundings and Frank realized that it was his heart attack that was causing her discomfort. Was she embarrassed by his feebleness, his oldness? Or maybe she was one of those people that couldn't abide hospitals. There were a lot of those.

“I'm sorry too, Jane, especially about the Featherstone thing.”

“Don't worry about that, Frank. Please don't worry about that. He's a dick and we're well rid of him. I can concentrate on Mrs. Frobisher's hallway until you're better and then we'll see what's what.”

Sadie walked in.

“Here's my beautiful girl,” said Frank.

“Hi, Sadie,” said Jane.

“Hey, Jane. Hey, Dad. Garth went to work this aft but he's going to come by on his way home.”

“Good. I'll need to speak to him about holding the fort.”

“Emma's going to be here by tomorrow afternoon. The fort will be well held by the three of us.”

Frank reached out for his daughter's hand.

“How are you doing?” she asked.

“I'm doing well. I'm scheduled for an angioplasty tomorrow morning and then I should be out of here in no time.”

The colour drained from Sadie's face.

“What's an angioplasty?”

“It's when they clear your arteries by placing tiny balloons inside them and then blowing them up into slightly bigger balloons.”

“An operation,” Sadie said.

“Yes, but just a minor one. The balloons are stuck in with a catheter.”

“What's a catheter?” Sadie's eyes welled up.

“I don't know, but it means that the operation doesn't amount to much,” Frank said. “It's not hugely invasive.”

Jane put her arm around Sadie and gave her a squeeze.

“My Aunt Leslie had an angioplasty last year,” she said. “It was a piece of cake.”

“Speaking of cake,” Sadie said, pulling herself together, “I brought some carrot cake. There's enough for you to have some too, Jane.”

“Mmm,” said Jane. “I love carrot cake.”

“Sadie's is the best in the world,” said Frank.

“I didn't think to bring accoutrements,” Sadie said. “I'm going to head down to the cafeteria for forks and napkins and stuff.”

Her brief appearance seemed to have increased Jane's comfort level somewhat.

“I ran into Chas Sampson at the Public Safety Building,” she said when Sadie had gone.

She spoke quietly, as there were many people milling about. Frank was still in the
ICU
awaiting a bed on a medical ward.

“The autopsy has been completed.”

“Man, that was fast. Did he tell you anything?”

“Yes, he certainly did. He couldn't wait. I think Chas is pretty excited about the whole thing.”

Frank smiled. “More likely he's excited about you.”

Jane blushed, as he knew she would.

“Anyway, the cause of death was inconclusive and an identification has yet to be made but there are some interesting facts that came out of it.”

“Go on.”

“The girl, and she is indeed a girl, was about fifteen years old and she had Down Syndrome, something they figured out from the shape of her skull. Also, because her pelvis was intact, they were able to deduce that she had given birth.

Frank gave a low whistle.

“A fifteen-year-old girl with Down Syndrome who'd had a baby. That's no good at all. This girl was in trouble long before she was boarded up in a wall.”

“Yeah.”

Frank knew that Mrs. Mortimer was a little off kilter, but he also knew what Down Syndrome looked like. The girl in the wall was someone else.

“They're going to do further tests to try to find out the cause of death,” said Jane.

“I wonder what became of the baby,” Frank said.

“Who knows?”

“I wonder if Jim Coulthard was the father of the baby.”

“Who knows?”

“Have they confirmed how long she had been there,” Frank asked, “how long she's been dead?”

“No. Again, they're going to run more tests. And concentrate some on the nightgown — its origin and so on.

“With nothing to compare her
DNA
to it'll be hard to figure out who she is,” Jane went on.

“Unless we find the baby.”

“That would be very hard to do, even if we knew when it was born.”

“I'm thinking 1970,” said Frank. “'69 or '70. It could have been even earlier, I guess. The girl had probably been of child-bearing age for at least a couple of years.”

“You're assuming the photograph is pointing the way.”

“Yes, I am. I don't know who those people are in the photo, if they're connected in any way to our girl, but it tells us who put her in the wall and when. It's possible that Jim Coulthard had a need to leave a clue. He disappeared to avoid trouble, but he was unable to leave it totally hanging. He wasn't the sharpest knife in the drawer, as my mum used to say, and he was probably in a hurry, but he left us a clue. He was a show-off. He wanted credit.”

“Hmm,” said Jane.

“Pea?” She held out the plastic bag.

Frank took one and ate it like someone who ate peas professionally. One swift movement of his thumb and the pod was empty, the peas inside his mouth and gone.

“You're right,” he said. “They are still good.”

He ate another and then another.

“The baby would be easier to find if it was dead,” said Jane.

Frank's forehead crinkled.

“I don't want it to be dead, Frank. I'm just saying. Death records for most likely a two-year or less period would be easier to peruse than the whole world in search of a thirty-six-year-old.”

“If it lived, chances are good it was given away.”

“Or worse, when you consider what happened to its mother,” said Jane.

“Whose mother?” It was Sadie back with supplies.

“No one's,” said Frank.

They all ate cake.

Sadie and Jane departed together with promises of returning soon. He asked to speak to each of them individually before they left. With Garth being at work, he wanted to make sure that Sadie would be okay on her own during the day till Emma arrived.

“Of course I will,” said Sadie. “Tomorrow is very soon, Dad.”

Tomorrow! Emma was coming tomorrow!

With Jane he had one request: please wait for me before you go to see Mrs. Beresford again.

“Of course, Frank! What do you think?”

“Thanks, Jane.”

“Sadie and I are going to the Red Top for a bite to eat.”

“That's fantastic,” Frank said and his eyes closed. He was very, very tired.