Cadillac cathedral, p.19
Cadillac Cathedral, page 19
The Honda’s rear was down to its axle in sand, loose gravel, and a patch of yarrow, but at least it wasn’t below the high-tide line. They could wait until later to haul some planks or boards out from behind Martin’s house and set them down where her tires could grab hold.
He could see that a few lawyers and realtors and retired store clerks had abandoned their Saturday afternoon on the grass of Penti Pekkanen’s golf course and were already heading, with cases of beer in hand, out to the driftwood logs for the pleasure of tipping back a drink while watching the tide come in, and possibly exchanging anecdotes about Martin Glass that might or might not be accurate.
Margaret Baxter came out onto Martin’s deck to flap a tea towel free of crumbs. She had dressed in her mother’s old clothing, as she did for all funerals — black dress, black gloves, a black hat with a veil over her face. It was known that the Baxters never threw anything away. Margaret might be in the process of setting herself up as a sort of hostess here, probably so that by the end of this event there would be more than a few people suspecting she’d had a long secret affair with Martin Glass right under their noses.
Of course it was possible she had. But unlikely. Martin had never said anything to make you think this was possible.
Frank and Evie Walker had driven down earlier to tidy up the house interior and help Leena Pekkinen and Margaret Baxter with the food. The Walkers’ Corolla was parked on the grass to one side, at the foot of the sidelong slope of driveway, but an unfamiliar silver Mercedes convertible sat up closer to the small cedar-shake house. When Arvo had eased the hearse most of the way down the slope, Frank stepped out from the bushes with his arms out wide to stop him. “The son,” he leaned down to tell Arvo. “Already here with a couple of friends. Well, he said they were friends but they look more like business partners to me. White shirts, sleeves rolled up? One of them was out there pacing off the waterfront. How many lots you think they can get outa this?”
“You told the son what we’re up to?”
“I told him about scattering the ashes but I didn’t tell him we’d planned to be here for the day and probably half the night. I don’t suppose he imagined there’d be all that traffic lined up behind you.”
Some of those behind him now honked their horns — part impatience, part high-spirits on a pleasant summer day with hardly a cloud in the sky and the sun shining down on the sea. They would have no idea yet that it was Martin’s son who’d parked that Mercedes convertible possessively next to the house, throwing a damper over their plans unless they were determined to ignore him and make the best of the situation.
The rest of them would have to park up top on the hayfield. Arvo eased the hearse farther down and onto level ground directly behind the Mercedes.
Herbie walked down past the hearse and headed out across the driftwood sand and salt-grass to repair the storm-damage done to his “Booze Corral” — a ring of bleached driftwood logs set upright in sand, a primitive sort of jagged fortress he’d built in June for a party where he took responsibility for watching over everyone’s drinks. At all community beach events Herbie stood guard over the ice chests, opening bottles or cans whenever their owners stopped by. Because he did not drink liquor he was considered the perfect bartender and often went home from these events with his pockets bulging with tips. “Your booze is always safe with Herbie,” people said. “He won’t touch the stuff himself, and he makes sure that no one else touches yours unless you told him otherwise.”
There was no doubt that the middle-aged man who came around the end of the house with authoritative strides was the owner of the Mercedes. “You and these others will have to turn around and leave,” he said to Arvo. “This is private property.”
His hair had been dyed a sort of pale orange colour.
“We know it’s private property,” Arvo said. “We also know whose private property it is. We have him with us.”
Martin’s son did not look much like Martin though he did have Martin’s way of scowling at news he didn’t like — had had this habit even as a boy. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means we’ve brought Martin home, just as he would’ve wanted. There’s about a hundred of his friends lined up behind me, determined to give him a proper send-off.”
He doubted the others would allow themselves to be stopped by a stranger with a German car and hair the colour of a turnip. “Tomorrow it will be between you and the lawyers,” he offered. “Today it’s between you and us. Maybe you weren’t listening when this was all explained.”
Martin’s son looked out across the water for a while. Then he said, “All I heard was he was in hospital.”
“But you came here instead of going to pay him a visit?”
The man’s face coloured up. “I came here first because this is his home! I intended to take him a change of clothes when I drove down to see him.”
“But you couldn’t find his suit because we’d already put it on him rather than let him go into the furnace dressed in his paint-splashed old work pants he had on for his emergency trip to the hospital. Were your friends in dress shirts also planning to visit Martin?”
Two of those friends — both with sleeves rolled up over hairy forearms — had stepped into view at the front corner of the house. Jackets must have been tossed over a log or hung on a nail, or possibly laid out across the back seat of the Mercedes.
Again the blue sea was consulted, this time at considerable length. You could see that Martin Glass’s son was fighting to control his annoyance. He ran his fingers through his peculiar hair.
“The people behind me,” Arvo said, “expect to make use of the public ocean, the public shoreline, and all those public driftwood logs below the high-tide line. Maybe Martin’s covered deck too, if it rains. You and your friends will hear a good deal of noise but it will all be good-natured noise. We won’t go inside your father’s house without your permission.”
“We’ll need to use the fridge,” Cynthia said, putting a hand on Arvo’s arm.
“We’ll need to use the fridge,” Arvo said.
In his mirror he could see Peterson hurrying down the slope on foot, no doubt to find out what was going on.
“Oh, to hell with it!” said Martin Glass’s son. “Go ahead and use the goddamn house. A month from now it’ll be gone — towed away on a raft. There’ll be No Trespassing signs at the top of the road, maybe coils of barbed wire if it’s needed. Have your stupid picnic while you can.”
“This stupid picnic is Martin’s picnic.” This was Peterson, who’d come down behind the hearse. “You can join us or you can haul your asses out of here until tomorrow.”
“Take it easy,” Arvo lowered his voice to say. He got out of the hearse and shut the door. “The man has already said we could use the place.”
Those who had parked their vehicles at the top of the hill were now hurrying down the steep slope on foot, carrying freezer chests and shopping bags filled with bottles and beer cartons. Cynthia got out of the hearse and stood with a hand blocking the sun from her eyes while she watched the others descend.
Matthew Foreman was having some trouble navigating a safe descent, the box in his arms so big he could barely see over it, so he was likely to trip on one of the rocks that had worked their way to the surface of Martin’s road. Not surprisingly, the newspaper writer was walking beside him, carrying a leather case that no doubt contained her camera and tape recorder. Even at this distance you could see she was excited to think she was about to get her story after all and wouldn’t even need the co-operation of the lanky tight-mouthed old man who’d refused to have his photo taken in his ancient hearse.
Jenny Banks was in the crowd. And Mauno Pekkanen, neglecting the family golf course — his hefty sister Leena clinging to his arm in order not to break her neck on this steep slope. Arvo hoped that the wide flat box Mauno was carrying contained loaves of Leena’s famous pulla. She would expect to be asked for the recipe fifty times before this day was through but would refuse to divulge her secrets. Of course her recipe was in Arvo’s mother’s recipe box and probably in any number of other recipe boxes throughout the district.
It was beginning to look as though the entire community had planned to show up. Maybe Martin had more admirers than Arvo had realized. After years of neglect he was suddenly a local hero. Or maybe curiosity had merely trumped the prospect of an afternoon mowing lawns. The gap between nosy and caring was fairly slim.
“Look,” Cynthia said. “Up at the top. The white dress — and white high heels, for heaven’s sake! — walking like she’s terrified of falling. Isn’t that her — your, you know, the woman we stopped in on?”
For a moment Arvo wasn’t sure — though the white dress and white umbrella did stand out amongst the others in their beach clothes.
“Why would she want an umbrella on a sunny day?”
Cynthia had taken his hand in hers. Was this to offer him reassurance of some kind, or to seek it for herself? “That’s a parasol,” she said. “It isn’t rain she’s afraid of, it’s the sun. She’s a delicate city girl braced to mix with us primitives in all this rugged Nature!”
CHAPTER 15
THIS WAS RIDICULOUS. No, he was ridiculous. As soon as he’d seen that it was Myrtle Birdsong working her way down the gravel slope of Martin’s driveway, holding a parasol overhead and taking care where she put her white high-heeled shoes, he experienced a surge of anger. Or maybe it was irritation. He’d half-expected her, some part of him had even hoped to see her here — but now that she’d appeared he felt something like resentment, that she would show up unannounced so soon after turning down his offer to return her father’s hearse.
Well, if she’d come to check up on it, here it was — parked to one side while neighbours hurried past. Its mission for today was over. Martin would be completing his journey by boat.
She was far too intent on watching where to put her feet to notice him. And he’d rather behave as though he’d hadn’t noticed her, at least for now. Since Cynthia had gone into Martin’s house to help Leena carry the food out onto the deck, Arvo set off to see if Johnny Johnson had remembered to bring his horseshoes and, if he had, to help him prepare a horseshoe pitch on the weedy grass between Martin’s tool shed and his overturned skiff.
Peterson had taken the Community Association’s badminton equipment out to look for a spot where wind off the sea wouldn’t blow shuttlecocks into the wild-rose bushes along the base of the cliff. This reminded Arvo that later in the afternoon, either he or Peterson must relieve Herbie in the Booze Corral so that Herbie could run in for the brief swim he’d planned to honour the man who’d taught him how — though not, he’d said, if the weather turned cold. It remained to be seen if anyone would join him.
Children were already flying their colourful kites out along the water’s edge. The sounds of their laughter carried, like all sounds down here, with a sort of crystal clarity. The light breeze that carried their voices also carried the fresh salt smell of the sea.
As he passed by the lower side of the house, he could smell the food Leena must have brought with her. She had probably prepared a complete seisova poyta, which everyone but the Finns would assume was a Swedish smorgasbord. Smoked salmon, salted herring. A huge bowl of cauliflower soup. Beetroot salad. Some sort of berry soup for dessert. Her donations to public events never varied.
Of course others would have brought the more common sort of summer fare that Martin had preferred — potato salad, green salads, cold ham, fried chicken.
While Margaret Baxter and Leena Pekkinen carried bowls and platters of food out onto the deck tables and covered them with tea towels against flies, a tall young woman in a long skirt sat against the wall to play her cello — a town relative of the Baxters, Arvo believed. Her music was soft, melancholy — chosen, he supposed, to suit the occasion.
“A gentleman at the General Store gave me directions,” Myrtle Birdsong said, suddenly beside him. “I suppose I forgot about this gathering, or had the date wrong. I’d driven up just hoping for a chance to speak — to apologize, actually, for turning away your offer so casually. In the circumstances, I hardly knew what I was saying.” She turned to look off to the sparkling water of the Strait, but tilted the parasol to keep herself in its shade.
“Well,” Arvo said, “I didn’t warn you I was coming. We dropped in when you were probably still in shock.”
“And I did not properly express my gratitude. Or my admiration for your skill in restoring my father’s dear old hearse!” She put a white-gloved hand on his arm. “If you are still willing to return it — after today, of course — I’ve come to thank you for it as graciously as I should have done when you showed up at my door bearing flowers.”
Arvo tilted his head to view her aslant. “You’re sure of this?”
She nodded, briefly closing her eyes. “Of course I don’t intend to keep it to myself.”
It would be absurd for her to keep the hearse, she acknowledged, since she was not a funeral director and had no intention of becoming one now. “I’ve spoken to Ben Robinson, who may want to use it occasionally — whenever he is given responsibility for the funeral of, say, an important politician, or a local historian or a personal friend of mine. I’m sure my father would have approved.”
Ben had agreed, she said, to put the old hearse on display in some manner, so that people could admire it without doing it harm. “Behind glass, I expect.”
Arvo supposed that being on display in a picture window was preferable to hauling logs in the mountains, but neither was what the hearse had been originally built for. Of course she’d said it could be used for special occasions, which he supposed might include the funeral of famous, or at least wealthy, sons and daughters of the city.
“And maybe the city’s First of July parades?” he said. “Possibly even with you behind the wheel again.”
She laughed and brushed the notion aside with one hand. “Never! Never! I cringe to think …”
Her attention had been drawn to the few people still working their careful way down the slope. “I imagine your friend would be pleased with all this if he’d known — a large picnic in his honour. My goodness!”
Neighbours and friends, he explained. As well as some merchants from town, and those few city hall officials who still admired the efforts Martin had made in Ottawa on the district’s behalf. He did not say that he wondered how many of these people had bothered visiting Martin here while he was alive.
She drifted off in the direction of Martin’s house, maybe to see if there was anything she could do to help, or possibly just to be where so many of the women were chatting cheerfully as they continued to set food out on the tables.
Like four little birds on a wire, the young daughters of Ellen and Matt Foreman sat patiently in a row along a thick arbutus trunk that had chosen not to grow upright but to keep its head down and grow horizontally, a metre or so above the ground. Three of the girls swung their feet back and forth, humming some sort of tune, though the one nearest to Arvo scowled and hunched over her folded arms — disgusted, impatient, wondering why she was here.
He had no time to wonder such a thing for himself. Cynthia was suddenly beside him again, a hand on his arm. “She’s changed her mind, hasn’t she?” She must have been watching, and couldn’t stand not knowing what had been said between him and Myrtle Birdsong. “It just took her a little time to get used to it. Did she say she wanted you as well?”
For a moment he wasn’t sure he’d heard correctly.
Cynthia studied his face, maybe to make sure he wasn’t keeping something from her. Then she smiled. “When you drive it down to the city this time, I’ll follow to drive you home. You won’t want Bert to do it. Lucy might decide she needs another shopping spree and then you’d be at her mercy.”
“Instead of being at your mercy, you mean?”
“Something like that.”
“Do you have any more plans I don’t know about?”
“Well. You already know about getting my drive-in theatre up and running again. You think it’s a nutty idea, I know, but I still may be asking you for all the help you’re willing to give, to keep me from making a total fool of myself. Whenever you’re not hiding in your workshop fixing up wrecks. Now watch out, here comes Martin’s boy. Probably wants to talk business. I’m out of here! I can’t trust myself not to tell him what I think. I remember all too well what sort of boy he was in the classroom. Poor Martin!”
Despite his opinion of this man — and now that he’d resurfaced it was possible to remember the boy he had been, before turning his back on his father — it was only right that he at least offer the son a chance to scatter Martin’s ashes in his stead. The women had told him this was to be done before they ate. A few people would make brief speeches from the deck, then Ed would start up his outboard motor and take Arvo and the cylinder of ashes out onto the bay. This was something a son might want to be seen doing by those who knew how little he’d done for his father while the man was alive.
But Andrew Glass closed his eyes to the offer, and shook his head. “Uh-uh! No thanks. Just tell me how long this business will take and I’ll get out of your way till you’re done.”
“You don’t want to be part of this?”
Arvo could imagine taking hold of this man by the front of his shirt and pulling him up close for a talking-to. “Your father left you his place even though you stayed clear of him for years. You don’t think you owe him something?”
Martin’s son shrugged. “He wrote me long ago to say the place would be mine. Signed, sealed, and delivered. Guilt, I suppose. Since he knew I wouldn’t want to live here I assume he meant I could do whatever I want with it.”
“And these fellows with you — this means you’ve decided what you’ll do?”
Martin’s son looked at Arvo as he might at any proven fool. “I had the plans drawn up three years ago. As soon as all the paperwork’s done we’ll start.”
“Renovating,” Arvo guessed.
