Yes Cecil, A Long Story Short, Part Fifty-Seven

As Edward Seymour pulled on his double breasted camel hair overcoat, and then arranged his scarf in the mirror, Isabelle Cloutier, the daughter of his younger, and now deceased, former associate at McGill University's Psychology Department, Marcel Cloutier, was waiting for the approaching train at the Atwater Metro station. She stood close to the tiled wall and noticed the risk takers who braved the orange line a mere foot away from the platform edge. They leaned towards the tracks like sprinters at a field race as if their motions would hasten the appearance of the white head lights in the shadowy tunnel. Such a diversity of faces. Every walk of life. She liked the phrase, every walk of life. The early afternoon crowd was a mixture of back-packed and ear-podded students, fashionable office workers, bleary eyed shift workers, shoppers, commuters, older people with groceries, Mothers with strollers. How many languages she wondered? How many Mother tongues were humming away above the collective consciousness of this group alone? And was there a loose thread amongst them, one with suicidal tendencies testing their will to life? It could happen at any station she thought.

With a sound like a raging river and exhalations of warm electric and rubber ions in the displaced air, the Metro train entered the station to the anticipatory manoeuvres of the travellers, their loose hair dishevelled as they sought out the closest proximity to the doors. She followed a small group on to the train and managed to settle herself on a single seat as the rising triadic tones of the train's departure issued from some mysterious location at the front of the train. The notes mimicked the opening of Strauss' Also Sprach Zarathustra. She tapped her feet to the unheard tympani thinking of Kubrick's 2001, A Space Odyssey.

“Prochain station, Guy-Concordia,” a recorded voice of a woman announced.

No one had followed her. She'd been watching. After leaving her office at Greene Avenue and Dorchester, she'd walked through the lower promenade of Mies van der Rohe's Westmount Square, pausing to browse the expensive boutiques in order to watch for mirrored signs of a follower. She'd then taken the underground tunnel to the Atwater Station with only her echoing footsteps to accompany her. A little cloak and dagger at the beginning of the week felt good. She could appreciate its addictive properties. The shot of adrenaline, the sharp excitement, the self-centered concentration.

She generally only heard from Edward Seymour once a year with a Christmas card, so it had been a rare delight to discover a pale blue envelope in her mail box upon arriving home on Friday evening, an envelope that looked like a birthday card with Edward's still distinctive flourish of her first name. Hand delivered. Old school tradecraft. Untraceable.

Dear Isabelle,

I do hope this finds you well.

I have a request that may very well test your ethical principles. I shall leave it up to your judgement whether you can help me or not. I'm not familiar with your clearance for documents and files (or is everything now on some electronic device?) so I will merely proceed with my question. Either way, please destroy this letter once you've absorbed the information.

A very good friend of mine is/was the legal representative for a man named David Ashemore, a former employee of a branch of the Intelligence Services, research I believe. This young man (fifty-three does seem young to me) left instructions with his lawyer to pursue an investigation if he died young under unusual circumstances. He died in the fall of 2011 and the circumstances did warrant a look. His beliefs seemed at the edge of paranoia, but considering his position, there was good reason to accept the possibility he was being targeted in a manner that may have led to his early demise. So my good friend employed an acquaintance, a freelance journalist, to investigate, tentatively, in order to fulfil his legal requirements. This journalist, Thérèse Laflamme (who also uses the name Tess Sinclair) attended the funeral of the young man in early November of last year but wasn't able to glean much from the few who attended. Her attempts at following up the story by interviewing Ashemore's dentist, doctor, neighbours, or anyone possibly connected to him, met with much resistance. She suffered from various pressures working against her. All her regular connections in the journalist business apparently began giving her the cold shoulder. She felt she was being followed, her apartment searched etc. After a while she decided to leave Montreal and settle in Edinburgh having friends there. It began all over again. She then relocated to Bergen, Norway, and it was there she was met with what seems to have been a decisive action. She had in her possession compromising files of some kind that David Ashemore had left behind under the stewardship of his lawyer. She had kept copies on a small computer storage device and this had been stolen from her in Bergen, and then she had been subjected to a mysterious spray which had left her memory impaired. The complete Ashemore files and his journals that were in the hands of the lawyer were also stolen around the same time in a most professional manner.

His lawyer, my good friend, provided me with this background information. He has arranged for her to be brought home to Montreal on Sunday, and I will be seeing her this coming Monday morning for a psychological evaluation. I may be a bit rusty, but I do plan to try hypnosis to see if she can reveal anything that would point towards a reason for her attack.

If she does reveal anything, I do not plan to share this with her. It would be better if she is now seen to be free from such memories. We shall see. I really don't know what to expect.

My request: Any information concerning David Ashemore's life and his professional areas of investigation. It might very well be important to your service if something was amiss. I am really too old for such shenanigans, but the arrow of fate has pointed at me for assistance, so I must do my part.

I will be taking George III for a walk on Monday afternoon down the street to the access path to the mountain. You will find me strolling or sitting on a bench near Redpath Crescent between 2 and 2:30 p.m. Please don't take you car. Public transit or taxi please. Best for all. I can have Mary drive you back. She was kind enough to have dropped off this letter in your box today. If I don't see you, I will assume you have declined (or are away). Quite understandable. I would, however, certainly enjoy seeing you with or without the information.

All my dearest wishes,

Edward.

She looked around the train car as her memory of reading and then burning the letter faded. The other passengers were in classic Metro mode, reading papers or books, fiddling with smart phones, listening to music, staring at the floor or dejectedly at their ghostly reflections in the smudged windows, the grey and black tunnel with its flashes of light slipping past like the end of an old filmstrip. She wondered if she would tell Edward about David Ashemore's family background. Was it necessary? Did a man nearing his end require but another example of the tragic sense of life? Did he need to know that David's parents were Holocaust survivors? Did he need to know that they changed their name from Auerbach to Ashemore? Who could possibly fathom the depths of their suffering and the reasons behind their choices. What memories they must have shut away like an old oak trunk in a dusty attic.

She joined the pressing crowd to ride the escalator to the light of day like weary miners after a long shift. Outside, breathing in the cool humid air, she hailed a long dark taxi and was whisked away from the the bustle of pedestrians, bicyclists and noisy buses up Rue Guy to the mountain. Easing her head back, she breathed in the scent of artificial pine freshener which seemed embedded in the burgundy plush upholstery, and absorbed the sounds of soothing orchestral strings pouring from the hidden speakers like overflowing jars of honey. From behind the quiet, dark-haired older driver, she noticed the CD case on the built in organiser between the seats, Mahler, Symphony No. 3. Simon Rattle, EMI Classics. She closed her eyes remembering a childhood friend whose Father drove a taxi even though he played French Horn with the Montreal Symphony. She imagined they didn't pay well in the 1960s. Upon turning abruptly to the right onto Dr. Penfield Avenue, she opened her eyes and began to remember her strolls along the street when she was a student at McGill University in the 1970s, a time when the street was still known as McGregor Avenue after the man who owned the land in the nineteenth century. How she would walk past the old mansions then occupied by embassies and dream of living in such grand houses surrounded by books and plants, daydreams that would help relieve the pressures of her student workload. Her Father had been pleased when they renamed the street after his friend, Wilder Penfield. And she remembered during the late 1960s when her parents had rented Penfield's summer home on Lake Memphremagog, not far from the Abbaye de Saint-Benoît-du-Lac. It had been two weeks of endless book reading, fine sunrises, swimming, and sailing. She and her sisters would descend the wooden stairs to the boathouse, lie on the wharf to suntan and try to capture minnows with a butterfly net, explore the wooded lot around the house, watch the clouds pass, and gossip about the handsome teenage boys four houses over. Isabelle breathed in deeply savouring the memories. The black and white photograph of Wilder with her Father signed by the famous doctor was on her RCMP office wall to this day.

*

Edward Seymour's stature and the erect figure of George III were easily identifiable and she raised an arm in greeting as she emerged from the taxi. Edward approached and kissed her on the cheeks, while George sniffed at her pant legs.

“You're looking lovely Isabelle, so glad you could make it.”

“Me? My God, you're the one who's looking fabulous. Whatever Mary is serving you, I want the recipe.” She took his arm and they slowly began strolling across the street to the sidewalk.

“Shall we walk back to the house for a cup of tea?” he said.

“Yes, that would be lovely. I'm sorry I couldn't get here earlier,” she said, checking her watch to see it was 2:20 p.m.

“Not at all. Perfect timing,” he said squeezing her arm in his. “George has had his outing and we're all content. So then, I imagine the powers that be must be keeping you busy, nose to the grindstone, reports to be written, seemingly endless meetings to attend.”

“Yes, all of the above, and more.” They walked along in silence, George leading the way. “It's a sad story about Thérèse Laflamme. I hope she can . . . recover completely.”

“I do hope so,” he said, as they stopped briefly while George relieved himself rather stereotypically at the red and yellow fire hydrant to let his fellow canines on the street know he'd been out and about. “I imagine she'll be much like a precious fallen vase that's been glued back together. From a distance it will appear fine, but on close inspection, the fractures will be apparent.”

She nodded her head as they made their way up the long sloping sidewalk. “It was fortunate I was home on Friday and received your letter. I was going in to work on Sunday anyway, so I spent the day looking into the Mr. Ashemore for you.”

“I hope you'll forgive me for spoiling your Sunday.”

She laughed. “I enjoyed it. Something different. And now that I'm on my own, I feel I have more time.”

“I was sad to hear of your divorce but as long as you are better off and happy, that's all that's important. And if you need someone to talk to, I have some very nice sherry awaiting. Anytime Isabelle, anytime.”

She gave his arm a squeeze. “Well, I guess I should begin by telling you about David Ashemore's family background. His Father was an accountant and his Mother a bookkeeper. They raised David in a secular household in a modest home in Notre Dame-de-Grace, and he attended Protestant elementary school before being accepted at Lower Canada College. From there he won a scholarship to Yale for an undergraduate degree in Political Science and he continued on for his Masters degree. His interests were international security, multilateral diplomacy, asymmetric conflicts, and he seemed to have had a continuing interest in post-hegemonic global governance. He had various relationships but never married. Near the end of his life he was seeing a married woman five years older than him.”

“Hmm,” Edward managed. “Could that be a possible motive for his early death?”

“As far as I could tell, the affair was not seen as . . . contentious. Very wealthy husband, travelling most of the year, international business, probably had affairs himself. A tolerated secret, or one well kept.” She wondered if she might have to interview the woman. “It seems as part of his job, David was monitoring the latest research and development in science and technology, and how it was being used or misused by international intelligence agencies and filtered down to various special interest groups. Essentially the dissemination of cutting edge knowledge and the techniques of misuse.”

“I am impressed Isabelle. I had no idea you could find out so much about his work.”

“Oh, I have my sources. He wrote many reports and papers. David had been monitoring the research and developments of the manipulation of the brain chemical oxytocin and its relationship with the amygdala to induce a form of amnesia. The ability to induce amnesia in an enemy instead of killing them. A weapon to render them harmless. You can imagine the applications.”

They paused awhile, Edward breathing deeply. “When I interviewed Thérèse under hypnosis she revealed a name,Yumashev. Dimitri Yumashev. Does that ring any bells?”

Isabelle retained her composure. “It could be a lead.”

“She also mentioned the word Eclipses which seemed significant.”

That name did seem familiar to her. E-clipsis Four Ltd . David had mentioned the company in a number of his reports. “Well, those are excellent leads I can follow up. Don't worry, I'll be discreet.”

“Please, yes, I wouldn't want to be stirring up a hornet's nest that will endanger you. It's now in your hands, and I shall try to forget all about Yumashev and Eclipses.”

Thinking it was a good time to change the subject, she ventured into the personal. “So, how is your favourite niece, the translator, Emily is it?”

“Oh, Amelia. She's fine, fine. Thank you for asking.” Edward didn't want to reveal that Amelia was to entertain Thérèse that very night. “She's very helpful and looks after me like Mary.” He was just about to tell her that she had visited him this morning but caught himself. “The life of a freelance translator can be a challenge, but Amelia and Duncan are managing. He's the bookseller if you remember. I hear that world is changing drastically, what with these electronic books and such.” He stopped and gazed upon the autumn wreath and flower arrangements in ornamental urns in front of a slate roofed mansion. “The world is moving awfully fast these days. I don't know how young people keep up.”

Isabelle looked down at George who returned the gaze wondering why they had stopped. “I guess we should envy George here. Your world hasn't changed that much has it George?” she said and stooped to give him a pat on the head.

"Yes, George and I are like snails under the shrubbery. Living up here on the mountain with the rabbits and the crows, above the fray, the struggle. We know it's a battle down there, one that's full of daily efforts of hard-working people trying to make a good life for themselves and their children. And then there's the poverty, the violence, the crime. We hear the sirens. Ah yes, and we're glad they're not singing for us. But, we've had our day, our own struggles." They continued walking up the gentle slope.  "Sometimes Isabelle, I feel morbidly guilty for living so long. Most of my contemporaries have already gone."

Retrieving a birthday card from her inside jacket pocket, she held it before him. "Well, I hope you won't be feeling morbid as you celebrate your your upcoming 92nd birthday! And may there be many more to come." She gave him a kiss on the cheek.

"Thank you my dear, very kind of you to remember." And as Edward walked on, he felt as if they were part of a caravan, the mauve envelope in his hand like a vital message for a Queen awaiting in some distant oasis.

© ralph patrick mackay

Yes Cecil, A Long Story Short, Part Fifty-Six

Pulling the thread tightly, Mrs. Shimoda poised the needle above the opalescent button on her favourite teal coloured blouse like a Northern Gannet ready to plunge into the sea, when the doorbell rang. Not wanting to rush the final steps, she set her blouse upon the dining room table and quietly walked through to the living room's front window wondering who it could be. Canada Post? A nervous salesman with a clip board? Resolute religious pamphleteers from the far edge of reason? It was Amelia from upstairs. A welcome sight.

“I'm sorry to bother you Mrs. Shimoda.”

“No bother, please, come in.” She closed he door behind her and invited Amelia into the living room. “Would you like some tea?”

Wondering if she should accept or refuse, she read the signs as quickly as she could, and noticing the shimmering light upon a seemingly completed jigsaw puzzle on the dining room table in the next room, and the open sewing box and a blouse beside it, she decided Mrs. Shimoda was offering tea as a necessary preamble, a courtesy. “No, thank you, very kind of you to offer. Perhaps another time.”

“Please, sit down. Is everything all right upstairs?”

“Thank you.” Amelia sat down on a mossy yellow shot silk armchair. “Yes, yes, we're fine. It's about your previous tenant, though, Thérèse Laflamme.”

Mrs. Shimoda lifted her chin slightly half expecting bad news.

“She's all right,” Amelia added quickly to dispel any possible inference of a violent end in a far away country. “It's just that she's suffered a slight case of amnesia, and her friends thought that by revisiting the apartment and meeting you again, it might help her revive memories and reanimate the past.”

Mrs. Shimoda nodded her head not at all surprised by this revelation. To help her arouse memories, she could lay the original lease forms upon the dining room table, place her black fountain pen with its small images of koi beneath the layers of lacquer—certainly a memorable device—and then replicate the signing ceremony. “Yes, of course. How unfortunate for Thérèse. When do they want to do this?”

“Well, today if possible. Only if it's convenient for you. They're coming over at six o'clock for dinner. ”

She breathed in deeply. “It would be best if Thérèse came here first. I'll prepare for her visit. I'm sure it will help.” She showed Amelia out with a smile waving away her effusive thanks.

Returning to her sewing she looked out of the dining room windows and thought that they could stand there together, looking out at the garden lit by the porch light, and that too might evoke memories. It's difficult enough, she thought, living on the edge of tomorrow, without the past for consolation.

*

While the clouds dissembled and city hummed, Duncan Strand, or his consciousness, tried to fend off the fatigue of his body by creating little nervous spasms and fits to keep it awake, but his body was weary and dragged his consciousness into the depths of sleep. . . .

. . . he was walking a narrow wooden hallway and coming to a door with a brass plate reading H. M. S. Absolute, he entered and with hands clasped behind him like a visitor at an art gallery, he carefully made his way between low stacks of hardcover books distributed like a miniature maze upon the polished floorboards of the what felt to be the great cabin of an old ship. He stood for a moment looking out of one of the slanted rear windows until, hearing a tingling bell he turned round to see the approach of Søren Kierkegaard and Ludwig Wittgenstein.

“It's odd how these windows are on an angle,” he said.

Søren sighed deeply. “The windows," he said, "being at the back of the ship, must allow for an angle of understanding for we're looking backwards, and looking backwards is always slightly askew.”

Ludwig, his arms crossed in his grey tweed sports coat, with a look of perplexing simplicity stated, “The light reveals that even the dust has its place."

At that moment, Yves, Tom, Jerome, Mélisande, Pavor, Amelia, and Thérèse entered the room, and then his long lost twin, Gavin.

They each took a shot glass of shimmering clear liquid, and raised them as if to propose a toast. 

The next thing he knew, it was night time, and they were on a flank of waste land with piles of rubble and gravel rising behind them, while before them, dark waters lapped a shoreline, and lights in the distance spread upon the water like leaking photons. They gathered round an oil barrel burning with rubbish and old palette wood. Ludwig looked deeply into the flames, and quietly mumbled a few sentences no one could hear or understand. And with that utterance, he turned around and climbed the gravel pile and disappeared from view between the crags in the dark. They all looked at each other with profound confusion. Then they heard laughter as a gust of wind roared down upon them. Gavin then picked out a flaming piece of wood to act as a torch, and made his way up the rubble and gravel pile, and standing atop, he yelled something, which was drowned out by the winds, and launched himself into the darkness. By the time he himself climbed to the top of the gravel pile using his hands to steady him, he could see no trace of Ludwig or Gavin. They had quite vanished away. He then felt his feet slip in the loose gravel and sensed he was falling . . .

Duncan awoke, The Hunting of the Snark falling to the floor with a soft bump. His neck had been lolling to one side, and dribble had rolled down his chin and into his shirt pocket. Breathing slowly, he wiped his lips and face and as he raised his head, the details of the dream began to recede from him like a wave rushing back to the sea, only fragments lingered in the wet sand like polished stones. Kierkegaard and Wittgenstein had been actors in his two-act drama. And Amelia, his friends and others, plus his brother Gavin, aboard a ship . . . then on a shore at night . . .but the details were fading rapidly, ineluctably, frustratingly. He wondered which character in the Snark they each represented: the Beaver, Butcher, Bellman, Baker, Bonnet-maker, Banker, Barrister, Broker, Billiard-marker, and Boots. His profession also began with a B: Bookseller.

He looked down and noticed a lose piece of paper had slipped out of the fallen Snark, and picking it up, discovered two stanzas written with the same fine penmanship as the inscription on the flyleaf:

They sought it with theories and a fine research chair,

They pursued it with tenure and scope.

They postulated facts with utmost care,

But failed with values and hope.

That's why I am here, not lounging back there

Seeking it with letters and chalk.

And now if you'll excuse my silent despair,

I think I will go for a walk.

Letters and chalk. Silent despair. Placing it back in the book to accompany the inscription “To David, From one Snarkophile to another, warmest wishes, ............” and the signature he couldn't make out, the thought occurred to him that if he could trace the writer of the inscription and the stanzas, he might discover an interesting provenance. The inscription lacked a date, but the faded ink, and the fine penmanship suggested it could be upwards of a hundred years old. He returned to his desk and settled it on a pile of books for his personal collection. If he'd known about the sale of the building before the weekend, he wouldn't have been out buying books, wouldn't have found the Snark, wouldn't have had the dream.

He looked over at the painting. It already exuded an aura of bleak suggestiveness.

He clasped his hands behind his head and leaned back in his chair, and imagined himself a few years into the future, sitting on bench facing this very spot, now a towering mass of glass and concrete blocking out the sun, and just as he had come across Stuart Grange that day on McGill College Avenue sitting on a bench facing the location of his old bookshop, and they had sat there recreating images from the past, perhaps he too would be joined by a friend and proceed to shuffle the deck of nostalgia and deal each other cards of numbered reminiscences.

Opening his desk drawer to look for a thin booklet with samples of famous author's handwriting, he rummaged through the assemblage of bookmarks, pencils, paperclips, happy-face tacks, screwdrivers, sticky notes, labels, Canada Post custom forms, petrified glue sticks, an empty match box from Davidoff's on Sherbrooke Street, his plastic pin depicting a rabbit on cross-country skies over the number 110 for the Canadian Ski Marathon his younger brother had dragged him into so far back he couldn't remember the year, an old red and gold stiff cigarette pack with Egyptian illustrations: Ramses II filter tip, casino dice with his name on them, a limited edition ten dollar gaming token from the Riviera in Las Vegas from 1996, three Rapier English darts in a black leather case, broken cassette tape holders, and an assortment of CDs. Eyeing David Sylvian's Secrets of the Beehive, he felt it was just what he needed. Forgetting all about his search for the booklet, he popped the DVD drive open on his computer and selected the song Orpheus, then walked over to his mini fridge with the kettle on top and decided to make tea. One could never go wrong with a pot of tea, he thought. Enjoyable when shared, but just as restorative when alone. Better still, a long walk with the one you love, and then a pot of tea. Life always came down to the simple things in he end.

*

Influenced by Thérèse's condition, and having the afternoon to himself, Pavor had fallen into the nostalgic mood of a flâneur, walking up and down the streets between McGill College and Mackay, observing, absorbing, and seeking the hidden and the obscure, such as the beautiful projecting bay window on the side of a Victorian era home now looking down upon an alley and across at a brick wall of a twenty floor apartment block like a vulnerable eye in the land of the blind, or the particular symmetry of twelve window air conditioners—window shakers he'd heard them called—across a span of three period buildings like punctuation marks, or the unfortunate renovations stripping a building of all sense of uniqueness, but also, on occasion, buoyed by the preservation of a quality architectural specimen, inspired enough to set his imagination off to visualize the street as it used to be over a hundred years ago, a narrow residential avenue of fine townhouses with cut stone facings—city residences of managers, doctors, and widows—with cast iron fences around small front gardens with bird baths, large shade trees, birdsong, horse drawn carriages, busy squirrels, families walking dogs, aspidistras or cats in windows, and tradesmen delivering staples, and then to contemplate the passage of time, as the enlarging city began its commercial encroachment, leading to the transformation of many of the homes into rooming houses, the gradual loss of their Victorian gingerbread details, the demolition of many due to neglect and developers seeking to build apartment blocks or office towers, the survivors succumbing to commercial establishments such as dental offices, jewelry stores, fashion boutiques, restaurants, bars, and nightclubs. In another hundred years, he couldn't possibly imagine what would be found.

There almost seemed to be a generational change taking place. The closing of the Mount Stephen Club seemed to mark the passing of the old Anglo elite who had held on to the past as long as they could, now to be revitalized by new money and architectural vision into a boutique hotel for the nouveau riche. Transformation. Change. It was inevitable.

He rested for a moment, his shoulder against the black cast iron lamp post on Crescent Street, the sign for Ruelle Nik-Auf Der Maur above him pointing towards the Sir Winston Churchill Pub and not the damp shadowed alleyway along the side of the building. He conjured up an image of Auf der Maur's hard-drinking cronies with a ladder, screw drivers and a hammer, providing that honorary shift to the sign, and then repairing to the pub for a toast to their fallen journalist comrade, Boulevardier, and raconteur. Then again, it may have been pointing at the pub from the very start. He'd never met the man but had heard stories of his smoking and drinking stamina, and his friendship with the author Mordecai Richler, another man of the world, one likely to be found with a decorative pack of Schimmelpennincks nearby.

One street over, on Mackay, between St. Catherine Street and de Maisonneuve, he stood before the two surviving houses on the block, attached twins in disrepair under the shadows of the modern. It wasn't so much the deterioration and neglect of the architecture that stirred deep emotions within him, as the loss of the rich experience that had existed there in the quiet old world charm of  Café Toman, the Czech café on the second floor of the turn of the century home. He remembered the entrance with the large mirror to check your hair and scarf before scaling the old creaking wood staircase to the landing with its round oak table spread with magazines and newspapers, the hall tree to hang your coat, the gentle classical music coming from the modest speakers, the old prints of Prague on the walls, the tall narrow windows and their muted light, the laughter and greetings of the charming Robert who managed to make everyone feel special and remembered, the descent of his Father George from his nap on the third floor and the overheard conversations in the kitchen in the old language, the delicious borscht or goulash with a little plate of subtle cheese bread fingers baked in special old world forms, the delicate sandwiches, the coffees and cappuccinos, the cookies like the vanilkove rohlicky—a favourite of his Mother's—little vanilla crescent moons dusted with the fresh snow of confectioners sugar, or the irresistible apple strudel with a dollop of fresh whipped cream which would leave one feeling dinner wouldn't be required that night. And of course the hand-made truffles to take home to someone special. For many years it had been his escape, a writer's refuge from the bustle, a place where he had felt completely at ease, he could relax with a coffee and a pastry, think, read, and scribble notes. A place to observe university professors, students, and occasional groups of noisy first timers thrilled with the unusual. But once Robert's Father passed away, he took the end as an opportunity for a new beginning, and closed the café.  Freedom. More time. A new life.

Turning around, he saw the fairly new tea shop in the lower level of the still new Concordia University building, and made his way over. He was impressed with Thé Kiosque's offerings and ordered a small pot of Margaret's Hope and a Chai tea scone, and then sat at the window counter seat, and stared at the sad building directly across. There must be many like him who missed the old café. The deterioration didn't bode well. It looked as vulnerable as a wounded rabbit under a circling hawk. It wouldn't surprise him to hear it had become a parking lot one day.

“Your tea, and your scone,” the young woman said.

“That smells wonderful, thank you.”

“Do you know the story of Margaret's Hope tea?” she asked, seemingly eager to talk on this quiet early afternoon.

“No, but my . . friend introduced me to the tea and I recognized it on your list, so I ordered it.”

The slim dark haired young woman with numerous rings in her right ear, rested her hands on the top of a nearby chair and began to tell him all about the tea. “It was a small tea plantation owned by a man who lived in London who had a younger daughter named Margaret. On one occasion she visited the garden plantation and was charmed, but on her return to England, she became ill and died. The Father named the tea garden Margaret's Hope in her honour.”

“That's very sad,” Pavor said, “but a lovely story.”

“Supposedly, visitors to the old tea estate have felt or seen her ghostly presence in the old home, on the verrandah, or watching over them while they try to sleep.”

“A delicious tea, and a ghost story. Thank you for telling me. A very interesting background.”

She smiled and began to wipe the table running the length of the window and told him to just ask if he needed anything else.

He thanked her as he gently poured a sampling of Margaret's Hope, and looking across at the derelict structure, he tried to suppress the thought that his life was surrounded by ghosts.

© ralph patrick mackay

Yes Cecil, A Long Story Short, Part Fifty-five

Out To Lunch, Please Call Back Again. Thank you. Duncan was late. His part-time secretary, Julie, had already dashed off to her real job as a hair stylist and placed the sign on the door, a sign she jokingly referred to as his mullet sign, business in the front, and party in the back, the French words in large bold letters above the English equivalent in smaller letters below—although it seemed counter-intuitive to him what with the English being famous for their Protestant work ethic, and the French for their artistic laid-back savoir-faire. Cultural clichés tended to keep them cozy in this ever changing city. He eyed the lock as he groped for his green leather key case, noticing perhaps for the first time, the inner circle—with its dark hieroglyph awaiting the key—surrounded by the outer circles of the round lock as if it were a large moon in relief upon a planet's surface. Once inside, he locked the door again, and turned the sign over to provide an instructional for potential—or metaphysical—customers to ring for entry. Having checked his messages left to him by Julie concerning the nothingness of the Monday morning enquiries, he made his way up the stairs to Lafcadio & Co., feeling the emotional attachments to the past bear down on him with the increasing gravity of every step. What would he keep from all of this? What about the cordage business archives? Donate the old ones to the McCord Museum? Missing a year here Mr. Strand. Yeah, I know, tell me about it. Storage? Stuff It and Store It would be a good name for a self storage facility. Stuff it in and store it away, out of sight, out of mind. Outdated garden furniture, boxes of family photographs and slides, camping equipment used once, sets of dishes inherited but kept for family reasons, old lamps, VCRs, boxes of cassette tapes and video cassettes their labels fading along with their contents, musty books, years of weighty Martha Stewart magazines, pots and pans, exercise equipment, memorabilia from vacations better off forgotten, plastic bins with mysterious contents, chipped pressed board bookcases, battered luggage, microwave stands, pneumatically challenged bicycle wheels, window and floor treatments rolled and standing up like fabric soldiers in the corner. Landfill layabouts all. He could see the sign already, Clearance, Everything Must Go, Going Out Of Business Sale....

He switched on the lights and approached his desk surrounded with crisp boxes of fresh stock purchased from estate sales on the weekend. One rich yuppie was changing his decor. Duncan was his first call. Book sets the man had said. Bindings. So he arrived to discover 20 volumes of a 25 volume set of Waverley novels, centenary edition in a fine three-quarter green leather with red labels and gilt titles with decorative gilt thistles, marbled endpapers and edges. Fine condition. Worth something if complete. In addition, ten spine-sunned volumes of a thirty volume set of Ruskin's works, uncut, three-quarter green levant morrocco, gilt titles and decorative devices, top edges gilt, marbled endpapers. Worth a great deal if complete. The loft yuppie was changing to a pastel decor and these green, golds and reds would have to go. He was going ultra modern, shifting with the times. No more pretentious bindings by the yard.

There had also been a strange painting resting on the floor nearby and Duncan had asked if it was going too. Most definitely Mr. Yup had said as if it were an embarrassing movie poster like Risky Business, Pretty in Pink, or Better Off Dead. He had offered him 50 bucks for the books and the painting. The guy had held out his hand without a word, happy to have the offending objects removed—along with their dust—from his space.

The painting was intriguing. Duncan sat at his desk facing the frameless canvas propped against the bookcase facing him. A thin-surfaced slightly distorted painting with tones of white through grey to black, depicting Keanu Reeves as Johnny Mnemonic. Keanu/Johnny, dressed in the character's white shirt, dark thin tie and dark grey suit jacket with damaged shoulder seams, was staring out from the canvas holding onto his suit lapels creating a classic triangulation of form which directed the eyes towards the centre. Probably painted from a photograph. In the upper left hand corner, dark black lettering, imitating Renaissance inscriptions:

Anno dni aetatis svae 30

1995

Ego volo cubiculum servicium

Qvod me nvtrit

me destrvit

He liked it, but he knew that Amelia would find it an undesirable if not unwelcome acquisition. The books he could always sell to another upstart yup looking for bindings by the yard, but he planned to keep this painting for himself. Back of the door to the study perhaps, where no one would see it. He remembered when they filmed scenes from the movie below Jacques Cartier Bridge back in, what was it, '93 or '94? the city rippling with excitement over the hip new star in their midst. The scenes were probably shot over on Ile Ste. Helene, for he remembered having noticed a fleeting, out of focus image in the background of the shot, of Molson's Brewery sign glimmering in the deep distance.

The inscriptions were interesting. Even with his weak knowledge of Latin he could see the first inscription was a translation of I Want Room Service! Johnny Mnemonic's breaking point desperate cry for the upscale normality of delivered food, laundered shirts and expensive female companionship voiced atop a gravel pile as if he were Henry V calling out for a horse. Possibly the rallying cry for that whole generation. What was the rallying cry for his generation twenty years earlier? He scanned his memory for his favourite movies from the 1970s: Three Days of the Condor, Being There, A Fistful of Dollars, Brewster McCloud, Harold and Maud, Day of the Jackal, Manhattan, Network. “I'm as mad as hell, and I'm not going to take this anymore,” from the movie Network. Yes, perhaps that was the rallying cry for his generation. It was the end of 1976, his first semester of CEGEP, he had gone to see the film with his brother and their girlfriends and Gavin had come out of the cinema manically screaming the line to the cold December air. Perhaps that's what set him off into punk music, and aroused the divergence in their tastes, Gavin the extroverted young man of action, and he, the quiet introvert more interested in melody and harmony. Gavin had written a song called Mad as Hell which had a local following. What had he used to rhyme with more? Rotten to the core, yes, rotten to the core. Was there a rallying cry for the present generation? His mind failed him. Too many movies, video games, and television shows, the great majority he knew nothing about. He felt out of sync with the times. Too much information. Duncan returned his attention to the painting. There was a signature in the bottom right corner, but it was black on black, difficult to read. Lac Pin? Lac something.

Facing his desk, descriptive cataloguing desires overcoming him, he reached down to a box of books he'd purchased from a retired academic—scholarly volumes likely to be slow movers—and came up with a decent copy of Alfred Russel Wallace's Natural Selection and Tropical Nature: Essays on Descriptive and Theoretical Biology, London, Macmillan, 1895. He dipped his hand down again and brought forth Mind and Nature, A Necessary Unity by Gregory Bateson. A third dip and . . . The Hunting of the Snark by Lewis Carroll, illustrated by Henry Holiday, Macmillan, 1898. Inscription on flyleaf, “From one Snarkophile to another, warmest wishes. . .” Duncan turned the pages skipping past the short preface and began reading the first stanzas:

“Just the place for a Snark!” the Bellman cried,

As he landed his crew with care;

Supporting each man on the top of the tide

By a finger entwined in his hair.

“Just the place for a Snark! I have said it twice:

That alone should encourage the crew.

Just the place for a Snark! I have said it thrice:

What I tell you three times is true.”

The telephone rang. It was an old rotary dial desk model from Strand Cordage days of yore, still managing to play a role as the bookstore's designated silence interrupter in the twentieth first century.

“Hello?” Nothing. Was it the phone or the caller? “Hello, anyone there?” Prolonged silence. “Lafcadio & Co. Bookshop here, can I help you? Puis-je vous aider?” Nothing. “Are you all right? Are you calling for help of any kind?” He held on a few moments longer and hung up.

He stared at the phone with his descriptive mind as if it was a divining instrument: the clear plastic finger wheel with ten finger holes; the ten white dots on the black phone like the motions of some stellar object; the metal finger stop like a kick starter for a motorcycle; the full moon in the middle of the dial, its white paper faded and soiled like a cratered surface; the numbers and letters surrounding the dial like a zodiac, the numbers One and Zero—which had become King and Queen, or vice versa, with the digital evolution—were alphabetically unchaperoned, while the Two through Nine boasted triadic alphabetic bodyguards. And what about the space for two other finger holes in the plastic finger wheel between the 1 and 0. Pulseless phantom numbers. Heaven and Hell. Direct.

The phone rang again.

“Hello?”

“Wow, that's a quick pickup,” Amelia said. “Were you about to phone me?”

“Sorry. The phone had just rung before you and no one was on the other line. Was that you?”

“No, I just got in. Listen . . .” and she informed him about having met Thérèse and Jerome and about inviting them to dinner that night. “But that's not all. Mélisande's Pavor is back in town and they are close friends with the other two and want to come along.”

“That's crazy. I just met Pavor when I popped in to see if the bag had been returned.”

Amelia was standing in the kitchen looking at her Reading Woman calendar—October being a Danish painting by Michael Ancher of a young woman reading. “Well the calendar says it's a full moon tonight. And Hallowen's two doors down.”

“Ah, yes, full moon. Halloween. Of course.”

“Uh huh. Should be quite an evening.”

“What about food? Do I have to pick anything up?”

“No. Supposedly Thérèse is a big pizza lover and so they're bringing over her favourites along with wine. Casual. Easy peasy. They even offered to bring paper plates but I had to draw the line somewhere. I'll pick you up just after five. Bye my love.”

Pizza. Wine. Full moon. He could almost hear Dean Martin singing That's Amore.

He picked up The Hunting of the Snark and walked over to the chairs near the front window. Not much activity out there. Concrete blocks along the front of an empty lot like fallen stones from a classical ruin, a homeless guy scrounging for bottles and beer cans, last month's newspaper swirling in the breeze like playful textual butterflies. He sat down and looked towards the slightly overcast sky. Would they even see the moon tonight?

Full moon. He put his feet up on the small table and watched the clouds dissemble as he remembered an incident from his childhood. The summer of 1969, the beach at Cavendish Camp Ground, Prince Edward Island. He'd wandered off to the west, as he usually did to be on his own, in search of interesting shells, stones and possible glimpses of life beneath the water, away from his family, the sun tanners, castle makers, ball throwers and the cries of the swimmers echoing from the waves. After a while, his cotton hat holding a small bounty of remnant shell life, bones of the sea, he had stubbed his toe in the shallow water against a stone, and looking down, he discovered an unusual piece of red sandstone shaped like a foetus—though at the time he hadn't recognised it as such, being only ten years old and quite ignorant of such things—a red stone with an absolutely perfect hole in the middle, drilled by countless waves and perhaps a pebble for the grinding. He'd reached down and pulled it away, separating it from it's sandy bed, leaving behind the outline with a little tower of sand where the hole had been. The gentle salt water wavelets had washed his bare feet as he naturally brought the stone up to his eye to scan the horizon. A charm of elementary particles. A sand-stone sextant. A new-found amulet that fit under his eye brow like an Egyptian eye of Horus. A future signifier of the yoni. A talisman against the disillusions held in store. It had been a moment of still magic, as if he'd been led away by some ancient spirit of the island to discover this very stone.

And that night, they had joined their neighbours and new acquaintances, a family from Atlanta, with their ultra modern motorhome with all the comforts—so different from their own privations in the tent trailer and separate kitchen tent with picnic table—to watch on their small portable television a broadcast of the moon landing, and how he had pulled out of his bunny hug the magic stone to scope the sliver of moon above him, dizzy with the thought of men walking on that distant light in the sky.

And yet, the next year, his Mother had died. His attachment to the stone had dwindled. It's magic doubted. It ended up resting on a bookshelf in the finished basement with shells, stones, a pennant from Plymouth Rock, a small lobster trap in balsa wood, a peace pipe from a wilderness village. He had left it behind when he had moved out, and years later, when he was helping his Father pack after having sold the family home for financial reasons, he had taken up the stone and had placed it among items he was going to take home with him, and his Father had told him it was his. He'd discovered it he had said. Duncan had stood there speechless. It was as if a vital organ had been torn from him. He'd let it go. Mystified, feeling sorry for his Dad. But when he cleared his Father's small apartment out after his death, it wasn't there. Gone.

Duncan breathed in deeply and exhaled with a great sigh. Had it been a blessing to find or lose he'd never know. A curse to have lost or found, his myth.

He shook his head to dispel the past and opened Carroll's Snark, and remembering the disappearance of the Baker at the end, he flipped to the last stanzas, spread the pages out on his lap and read:

The silence. Some fancied they heard in the air

A weary and wandering sigh

That sounded like “—jum!” but the others declare

It was only a breeze that went by.

They hunted till darkness came on, but they found

Not a button, or feather, or mark,

By which they could tell that they stood on the ground

Where the Baker had met with the Snark.

In the midst of the word he was trying to say,

In the midst of his laughter and glee,

He had softly and suddenly vanished away—

For the Snark was a Boojum, you see.

Duncan closed the book feeling a sense of exhaustion overcome him. He lay his head upon the soft chair back and fell into a light sleep.

© ralph patrick mackay

Yes Cecil, A Long Story Short, Part Fifty-Four

As Pavor approached the Religious Studies building where Mélisande worked, the Parisian accordion theme music from the movie Amélie played from his smart phone.

Pavor answered, voicing a three syllable pronunciation arc to the word hello.

“How's the weather in Trieste?” It was his literary agent Luke (“Fig”) Newton. “Yeah, you don't know do you, because you're not there!”

Pavor audibly sighed. Why did he answer, he asked himself. “I had to come to Montreal on family business. Sorry Fig, I should've let you know.”

“Family business? Your Mother lives in Prague, you're a single child, and your Father has been deceased for many years, sorry, no offence, I know what it's like to lose a Father . . . but, then again, I generally find Pops wandering the local mall so maybe it's not quite the same, but anyway, how's the book coming?”

Pavor looked up and noticed a dark-spectacled man seemingly lost in thought, or just lost, looking up at the computer science building down the street. “Great, new characters popping up, scenes in Prague, some will be in Trieste too. It looks good. Plot's firming up. So how's the agency biz?”

“Jesus Murphy, it's frosting my tomatoes if you know what I mean. Everyone wants an author who's twenty, female, gorgeous, been through hell, and writes like a fucking genius. The market's been through what, magic, vampires, zombies, S&M, what the hell's next? Septuagenarian surfer assassins?”

“I'll get right on it.”

“You know what I think P. K.? The next big thing will be pay-on-demand narrative, something like an intravenous drip right into the reader's head on a bi-weekly basis, fiction that's plugged right into the moment, informing the text, referencing the latest diversions and news, or better, some kind of prescient narrative foretelling the near future of next week. Forget about hyped-up history-smishstery fiction, oversized rehashes of the past. No, my good sir, what we need are narratives riding on the veritable edge of the wave, hanging ten, coming out of the tube carrying a new idea they didn't see going in. A writer who can glean the world and then sit at the keyboard and get into medium-mode and generate text streams for the world.”

“Right. Well, my clairvoyance quotient is kind of low, Fig, but you might have something there.”

“Damn right I have. Just think, the monstrous regiment of baby boomers are going to be hit with a massive wave of Alzheimer's like a bloom of algae in the future, this could be the answer. Keep their brains from shorting out, creating new sympathetic passages and connections. So, can we do lunch this week, or what?”

Pavor felt his head swim with the panic of such thoughts. 'Sympathetic passages?' “Sure, I think I can squeeze in lunch. How about your old favourite, Schwartz's, on let's say, Thursday.”

Fig Newton checked his coffee-ringed monthly blotter in silence. “Ah, Schwartz's . . . . Thursday's no good. Wednesday will work though. Two o'clock. See you there my friend. Bring a pen.”

Pavor turned his phone off, breathed deeply and scaled the stairs with a cold rhythmic scrape that echoed in the Gothic portico to the strained harmony of his heartbeat.

He might have to change agents.

*

Whether due to dust, germs, or allergies, the silence in the library was punctuated with a double sneeze from Mélisande's co-worker Manon, to which she offered the requisite phrases of à tes souhaits, and à tes amours, but when Manon let go an explosive third, it was her co-worker's turn to speak, as was customary, with et que les tiens durent toujours. Exchanging looks of anticipation for a follow-up, Mélisande was ready to resort to a common bless you, when they heard the hinges creak on the entrance door and turned to see the unexpected head of Pavor Loveridge appear like the leading actor in a door-slamming English farce.

Mélisande had dreamt about him last night. She had been in a large silent house, darkly lit, rooms full of people as if it were a party or a wake, and she was looking for him, manoeuvring around little cliques and coteries like a hostess with a tray of crudités. On waking, she felt she'd been wandering his house of fiction, his characters huddled in groups or lounging in the shadows, voiceless and menacing, preventing her from getting near him or finding a seat to rest upon.

In shock with the surprise of his visit, she quickly went to the door leaving all her conflicting emotions behind, and with a glance at Manon—who merely nodded her head knowingly—she was out the door followed by the reverse squeak of the fusty hinges. They found themselves surrounded by a haphazard assortment of student's running shoes, loafers and cheap lace-ups like an avant-garde art installation on the subject of souls, and wordlessly they embraced.

“What are you doing in Montreal?”

The coolness of the question hit Pavor like a waft of cold air from the open back door of a city bus. “I wanted to see you. . . so I quickly booked a flight.” He squeezed her hand softly. “Can we talk?”

She pulled him over towards the chapel doors and finding it empty, they settled themselves on the right-hand penultimate pew. With his sun tan and the dark crescents beneath his tired eyes, he looked like a jet setter seeking atonement after a long night of excess.

“When did you arrive?” she asked, looking at him closely for signs of dissimulation, as if his having missed a small section under his chin while shaving was revealingly duplicitous.

“I came in last night. I wanted to surprise you. I'd planned to see if Pascal was still using my apartment and if so, I'd have taken a cheap hotel room. But you'll never guess who I bumped into at the airport.”

She shrugged her shoulders, “Your publisher?”

“Jerome and Thérèse! She was supposedly staying in Bergen with a friend and somehow suffered a form of amnesia. She seems a bit fragile. Jerome flew there to escort her home and was met at the airport by a Mr. Roquebrune, a lawyer and friend of Thérèse, and also, Jerome's landlord.”

“My God, I hope she's all right. Jerome visited me last week and we talked about Thérèse. We were worried about her secretive investigations, but you know Thérèse, the free spirit, independent and strong, always willing to take on the big issues.” She relaxed her back against the hard wood pew feeling her shoulder blades touch the wood like inceptive wings. “We always felt she'd find the balance of truth on her side. Someone looking out for her and all that. Was she attacked?”

“No, but I've yet to hear all the details,” he said, feeling selfish in his lack of answers. “I'll see if we can all have dinner together. Maybe it's what she needs to help lift the veil of memory.”

“Dinner would be great. I'd like to see her. So you stayed with Jerome?”

“Yes, I slept on his sofa bed and Thérèse stayed with Mr. and Mrs. Roquebrune. When I awoke this morning he'd already gone over to see her.”

"I'm sorry I didn't respond to your lovely email last week. I printed it off. You made Trieste, Slovenia and the countryside very appealing.”

“You must come over with me . . . .” He hesitated, faltering, words swirling around his mind like dry leaves in a vortex, and, as if by centrifugal force, the words that spun out were like mirrored images: “I must tell you something before I can ask you something.” Light-headed, with a sense of lurking variables waiting to upset his progress, fictional hands sliding invisible hurdles onto his path, he felt naked and blind as he walked towards his self-revelation. “When I was young, foolishly young, I . . . my girlfriend became pregnant, and we married. We had a daughter. . . .”

Mélisande was struggling with how to respond. Should she tell him she knew all about what had happened? Or let him bring it forth as a revelation? She followed her feelings and reached out and put her hand on his arm feeling the pressure of warm tears in her eyes and the tightness in her chest.

“They died in a car crash. I . . . I've been keeping it inside all these years as a way of getting on with life, but . . . it's as if the seeds of that suppression or guilt sprouted and grew into an enormous pine tree, and I've discovered I've been living beneath it, on the pine needles, in the shade, listening to the haunting winds speak through the branches. When I was in Trieste I decided I didn't want to live like that anymore. Being away from you and surrounded by the ancient landscape, the summer light, the warmth of the sun, the sea, the winds, I . . .” He knelt in the narrow space and withdrew a small black box from his jacket pocket, it sported the mark of a Triestine jeweller, and opening it, he asked, “Will you be my wife?”

*

“So you think there might be a correlation between the loss of the cash book, the alpha-numerical manuscript, and the sale of the land to Westlake-Declan Enterprises?” Tom Culacino said as he paid for their coffees.

Duncan blew on the froth of his cappuccino like a gambler blowing on dice for good luck. “No, nothing so fantastic. Just that it's one of those patterns of three.”

“It might be an opportunity you know. Sell off your books, the rope business, and embark on a new phase of your life. You're turning 54 soon, give it a title, Fifty-four Reset. Has a nice ring to it.” He placed his coffee on the small table creating a hoop of hot wet moisture. “Look at it like a new chapter in your life. A new model. A monetization of the old Duncan into a new Duncan, Duncan 3.0 with the next thirty years of your life before you. A new adventure.”

Duncan thought it was easy to say, harder to experience. He envied Tom's choices having constructed a successful path through this brave new world of computing with its litter of punched cards, floppy disks, hard drives, monitors, CPUs, microchips RAM, bitstreams, configurations, assemblers, compilers, vertex shaders, and God knows what else behind him to arrive at his comfy position with a padded pension to look forward to. But he admired Tom's achievements. Tom's skills and interests had coincided with the developments of new technology, while his own interests had converged with the past, books and rope. He felt like an anachronism. “Yes, a new adventure. So, what have you been up to? Any research that would help me with my 'new adventure,' something to invest in perhaps?”

Tom shot him a glance as if he'd just seen a Luddite trying to jump his gravity gravy train. Drinking deeply from his coffee he concluded poor old Dunc was the most unlikely tech spy, so far removed from the edge as he was. “Well, there's always the gaming applications I have on the back burner, but, for your ears only, I've been researching something I call S. A. Y.”  He lowered his voice and leaned towards Dunc with a conspiratorial eyebrow, “It stands for Storative Ambiotic Yielder. A program to funnel the fluid information from Google News via various Geo positions and run it through my program which would synthesize it into one narrative story line, which would in turn fuel the virtual worlds of Second Life, MMORPGs and such with real world forces and pressures to inform the virtual experience.”

“MMORPG?”

Tom almost felt sorry for him. Like some guy dabbling in alchemy. “Massive Multiplayer Online Roleplaying Games. Milly is a Games Master of a little thing I developed which is taking off called The Rings of Voltan. She's making a nice little salary without leaving home. Yup, a crazy new world to discover.”

Duncan was secretly appalled people could be making money off of virtually nothing, thin air and computer code. He had a ship load of books and . . . it didn't bear thinking about. Stay positive Dunc he told himself. Fifty-four Reset. A new adventure. “Yeah, crazy new world.”

“How's Amelia doing?”

Remembering the discussion concerning Mary's position and moving into the coach house up on the mountain, their future was indeed taking on a shape he couldn't have envisaged last week. Chance to save money, time for travel. A chance to visit Henry James's old house in Rye, look up Oxtoby & Snoad. Pop over to Bruges, Paris, Prague. “She's well. Busy with translations of one type or another. We should have you and Milly over for dinner soon.”

“We'd love that. It's been awhile.” Tom stretched and yawned. “Sorry, I was out late last night. Not used to it. That band Yves emailed us about were playing a club so I rolled by to catch a set. Yves even showed up.”

“Ah right, I'm sorry I couldn't make it. Past my bedtime. I tell you, when Sunday at 10:00 p. m. arrives, I'm brushing my teeth, getting ready to turn in with a good book.”

“A bit of Masterpiece Theatre and then to bed eh?"

"We don't have tv."

"Oh, right. I don't know how you guys live without it."

Duncan wondered how they lived without books. "So how was the band last night?"

"They were interesting. I downloaded their music already,” he said fingering the ever present earbuds dangling from his shirt pocket. “You'd like their music. Literary references. I think the singer has a PhD in literature or something, though she looks kind of young.”

“Everyone looks kind of young these days.” He sipped his cappuccino. “Our antidote is to watch the lawn bowlers in Westmount to feel young again.”

“Hmm, yeah, but then again, they're probably in better shape than us mouse-jockeys.”

They both chuckled, then sat in silence drinking their coffees, picturing themselves in Tilley hats, white shirts and trousers, maybe an Oxford tie for a belt and those soft white runners plying the soft green sward under an azure sky.

*

After finishing his coffee, Duncan decided to drop by the library and ask Mélisande if an attractive young woman with expensive tastes had made an appearance looking for her copies of Kierkegaard. Standing in front of the wood doors, he slipped off his shoes and quietly entered looking to his left where she was usually to be found. A young woman came from the depths of the area to ask him if he needed help.

“Actually, I've just dropped by to speak with Mélisande.”

Manon, thinking of the old proverb, un malheur ne vient jamais seul, informed Duncan that Mélisande had just stepped out for awhile and that he could wait if he desired.

He thanked her, and checking his watch he realised his time was limited. He slipped back out and as he began putting his shoes on, he heard the chapel doors open and looked up to see Mélisande followed by a tall man who he recognized as the writer, P. K. Loveridge.

“Duncan? I'm so sorry, no one's come by looking for their bag yet. I can email you if they turn up.”

“Thank you, that would be great. I discovered it might be a young woman of expensive tastes.”

“Good, I'll keep my eyes out,” she said wondering how he could possibly have discovered this. “I don't think you've met my friend Pavor. Pavor this is Duncan Strand who runs Lafcadio & Co. bookshop. Duncan's wife Amelia is an old friend of mine.”

Duncan shook hands with him sensing a firm yet yielding grip. “I enjoyed your Olivaster Moon. A great read. Any chance you'll bring back Ormond Develle in another book?”

Pavor exchanged a quick look with Mélisande. “That's very kind of you. Perhaps he'll rise up and demand a new role. Never know.”

Sensing an awkward pause, Duncan made his escape. “Well, I have to get back to the shop. It was very nice to meet you Pavor. Thanks again Mélisande.”

“Say hi to Amelia for me.”

Duncan waved at the top of the stairs saying he would. He made his way out with a sense of having achieved something this morning. A few gleanings of interest: the description of his Kierkegaardian, a new perspective on his changing future, and Mélisande was sporting a large diamond on her ring finger. The engagement ring would be a choice dinner conversation piece.

© Ralph Patrick Mackay

Yes Cecil, A Long Story Short, Part Fifty-Three

Duncan was thankful for the seat on the mid-morning bus going uptown. He needed it. He'd just learned that Mr. Therriault, the owner of the William Street property where he operated his rope and book shop, had accepted a generous offer to sell up. A vast area was being gentrified and his fairly well-kept building was, unfortunately, or fortunately depending on the point of view, in the way. Duncan had anticipated the possibility of change, yet he hadn't quite estimated the probability, and now with the hidden variables having risen to the surface, he felt swept away like so many loosing chips on a craps table. First the exchange of shoulder bags at the library, then the missing alpha-numerical text from the shop, and now this. The pattern of three strikes again. How many years had his family been on that street in various addresses over the years? How many years? Well, the whole area was being developed and soon all the crumbling red brick buildings with their boarded windows and graffiti scrawls surrounded by empty lots filled with debris, derelict trees and rank standing water—random rippling mirrors of the ever changing sky—would be bulldozed away and efficient, modern structures would rise—along with the tax base—and bring a new life of urban professionals, landscaped frontages, speciality shops, expensive cars, bicycle paths and the smell of rebirth in it's sharp angles, level planes and clean reflections. The old area would pass into the local history books for what it had been, a mixture of residential and factory life where manual labour met machine, a destiny of forgotten names and addresses listed in old street directories, of interest only to those looking back. The area had fallen so low that this development was a good thing. It had to be. There was a time, the decade of the 1970s and early 1980s, he thought, when a building crane had been unknown. The lean years. Duncan then remembered the Olympics in 1976, and rolled his eyes. Taxpayers were probably still paying for that stadium.

A young woman wearing an attractive mauve hijab entered the bus and made her way down the aisle and sat beside Duncan. He smiled with his eyes and pulled himself out of his slouch. Life goes on he told himself. Life goes on. The woman's attire reminded him of an incident, in a life of seemingly endless incidents. It was the end of May 1979, he was driving his yellow Volkswagen Rabbit on his way to the new apartment he shared with his girlfriend, and he came up beside a dark model two-door jeep which was quite full of what looked like household objects. The jeep had been signalling a left turn and he was going straight, but the jeep didn't turn and ended scraping the side of his car. The young woman in the passenger side who was wearing a hijab had looked frightened, and her partner, a large young man with dark hair, moustache and six o'clock shadow had come out to inspect the damage. The jeep had not suffered anything but his Rabbit had sustained large scuff scratches along the doors.

“I have a friend on the south shore who can fix this,” the man had said, pointing to the scratches.

“Ah, maybe we should exchange information first,” he had countered.

The young man had brought out a folded sheet which apparently was a temporary international driver's license. He was from Iran. A student at Concordia University. It was his address, however, that jolted Duncan as much as the jeep itself, for it was the same address as the large apartment building where his girlfriend used to live with her parents, and where he was forever parking his yellow Rabbit on the side of the ramp that led to the underground parking—a space the tired-eyed janitor was forever telling him half-heartedly not to use. Had this young man recognized his yellow car and considered he'd been following them? Perhaps had been following them for some time? Had he hit his car to find out? They must have been under pressure, stress, easy enough to brake out with a symptom of paranoia. The revolution in Iran had been going on since January. He assumed they were likely children of wealthy parents in Iran, perhaps professionals themselves, possibly on the wrong side of the new regime, and he knew that Concordia had a substantial number of Iranian international students and that many lives were being disrupted. They had exchanged information but when he tried to follow up, the young man had seemingly left the country. He often wondered what happened to them. He had followed the news, read about the purges of the universities, and he had heard that thousands of politically motivated executions had taken place. A few scratches to his car seemed so ridiculously unimportant. It was one of those incidents, however, that had made him feel like a pawn in some strange game of the Gods; human lives manipulated to collide at a crossroads on a dark night, one side seeing possible significance in the yellow car, the other, bewilderment over the coincidence of an address. Life was forever sliding these incidents his way it seemed. Why had he taken that road that night? The timing was so precise. He shook his head, defeated by a lack of answers. The world must be overflowing with such incidents, he thought, the nature of fates crossing in space and time, those moments when life is lifted above the mundane and a choice is offered, a chance to be taken. Could he have been instrumental in that couple's life? Had he failed them? Had they failed him? He would never know.

Seeing his stop ahead, he excused himself and slipped past the young woman and was soon walking towards the bookshop where he hoped to find a clue to his missing bag. The thought of what he was going to do with the family business and his bookshop, due either to shock or disbelief, had not penetrated his deepest concerns, and he had put it on a shelf like a book requiring further research. He wasn't prepared for that opening chapter quite yet. That narrative seemed to be in another language, one he would have to learn.

As he reached the bookshop, he couldn't help but stop and check the cheap books on the window sill, an irresistible pull like a bee to lavender, and as he browsed, he breathed in the unique fragrance emanating from the open door, as enticing a the smell of fresh baked bread to a hungry man. A slim blue volume of Rousseau's Les Rêveries du promeneur solitaire caught his eye and he deftly slipped it out from its forlorn sill-mates thinking it would be an ideal companion for his pocket. Opening it, his left hand thumb fanned the pages coming to rest on the third promenade, and he read the first lines:

Je deviens vieux en apprenant toujours.

Solon répétait souvent ce vers dan sa vieillesse. Il y a un sens dan lequel je pourrais le dire aussi dan la mienne; mais c'est une bien triste science que celle que depuis vingt ans l'expérience m'a fait acquérir: l'ignorance est encore préférable. L'adversité sans doute est un grand maître; mais ce maître fait payer cher ses leçons, et souvent le profit qu'on en retire ne vaut pas le prix qu'elles on coûté. D'ailleurs avant qu'on ait obtenu tout cet acquis par des leçons si tardives, l'à-propos d'en user se passe.

Yes, he thought, just what he needed. He possessed a few copies of the work in both English and in French, but they were hardcover volumes with aged dustwrappers and fine portraits, not suitable for peripatetic perusals. He made his way in, searching his pocket for a dollar. The young man working was unknown to him, but he knew that any employee of the shop was bound to possess an exceptional quality in some fashion or other—whether they were a polyglot, a tuba virtuoso or competitive kite flyer—and this kept his hope from faltering. He laid the volume on the small wood counter followed by the loonie.

“I know this will be an odd question, and a long shot, but do you happen to remember a customer who purchased a two volume softcover edition of Kierkegaard's Either/Or recently? It had a three letter stamp on the flyleaf, PMR.”

The young man dropped the loonie in the till producing a hollow clink as it joined its till-mates. He looked at Duncan steadily, recognizing him from book sales over the years as another bookseller and friend of his boss. “A two-volume set of Kierkegaard? . . . I do as a matter of fact.” Placing a bookmark in the Rousseau, he paused to evaluate the effect the information had upon his questioner and seemed pleased. “It was memorable due to the method of purchase. An attractive woman entered the shop, went straight to the display table, reached down and plucked the volumes up and paid for them. Not a glance at anything else in the shop. She paid and she left. Not a word. Fastest sale I've ever known.” He turned his attention back to a small tower of books he was pricing. “She was quite attractive. Didn't seem like your average philosophy student. Expensive clothes, expensive purse, expensive perfume.”

“Really? Was that recently?”

“Last week . . . Wednesday.”

“Wednesday . . . .” Duncan was lost in thought as he made his way to the door almost tripping on the step. He turned and thanked the young man for his exceptional memory and made his way slowly towards the university, his eyes cast downwards as if reading the fractured sidewalk for signs of symmetry.

*

Jerome heard the rattle of the tea tray as he stood before the window looking out at the remnant fall colours and the city towers in the far distance below, huddled together as if for warmth. Turning, he was surprised to see a young woman with the tray followed by an inquisitive, if formal, Airedale whose light ochre, charcoal and black coat made him briefly remember Declan's dog Beaumont. The dog's face looked very familiar. He'd seen one very similar recently, and he began to search his memory.

“Mary asked me to bring the tea out for you, there are biscuits if you like.”

“Thank you. Very kind.” He was perplexed over who she was; her clothing and overall appearance suggested more of a private secretary than a servant. Perhaps Mr. Seymour's. She also looked vaguely familiar. Had he watched her pass by one day he wondered.

Amelia sat upon the sofa, poured him a cup and handed it to him. He sat across from her on one of the high back embroidered chairs, and George sniffed his trouser leg.

“What a handsome dog. What's his name,” his fingers running through the dog's rough upper coat.

“George the third. The third because he's my Uncle Edward's third Airedale. Yes, I'm sorry, my name is Amelia, I'm Edward Seymour's niece.”

“Ah, nice to meet you. My name's Jerome. Your uncle has a very lovely home, and such fine paintings.” He reached for a biscuit and George sat on his haunches beside him looking hopeful. “I'm a painter myself.”

She felt guilty for having had any misgivings about him, unshaven though he was. “There's a very interesting portrait of a distant relative of my uncle's on the landing, the eyes never let you go, painted in Holland by Jan van Ravestyn my uncle believes, but he did say it requires a cleaning. Do you know who could do such a job?”

“Ravestyn. That would be a fine old painting. I know of several people who do such work, but their waiting lists are very long. I'm capable, but it's a laborious job to be a restorer . . . it requires a great deal of patience.” He bit off half of his biscuit producing a subtle nervous tick in George, who then moved his head and licked his upper lip. "Not really my area."

“You can give him some of your biscuit if you like. It won't harm him.”

Jerome did so and she handed him a small napkin. “Don't worry about the crumbs, I'm sure George will ferret them out of the carpet. Would I know your work?”

He looked at her wondering if she frequented his type of cafés and bars and concluded it was unlikely. She seemed a few years older than him, studious, and stylishly conservative in her dark pants, burgundy turtleneck sweater and colourful scarf. A different orbit of friends altogether. “Some of my paintings are around the city in cafés, businesses, and in private collections; I also do portraits. Helps pay the rent.”

“Oh, hmm,” Amelia mumbled as she munched on a digestive. She began to view him as someone who wouldn't be offended by a candid, point-blank question, no circling round the subject and wasting time, and she couldn't see how to advance the subject in any other way. “May I be quite frank with you Jerome?”

He nodded, wondering if he'd made a faux pas.

“I happened to drop by to speak to Mary and I mentioned seeing Mr. Roquebrune drive past me looking very serious. I've known him for many years and it made me think something was wrong. Well, Mary mentioned he had brought a young woman to see Uncle Edward, a journalist named Thérèse. I asked Mary if young woman's last name might be Laflamme, and she said it was.” She noticed Jerome had taken the revelation like rain rolling off a statue's face, as if he'd turned to stone. “My husband and I, you see, recently discovered that your friend, Thérèse Laflamme used to rent the flat we're living in now, in the house owned by Mrs. Shimoda, so when I heard her name mentioned, I felt I must meet you both. I understand it's not an optimal time . . . .”  The thought occurred to her that a visit to her old apartment and seeing Mrs. Shimoda might be helpful for someone reconnecting the dots. “But, I wondered if a visit to our flat and meeting Mrs Shimoda might help her revive memories. Of course it would depend on whether Uncle Edward considers it acceptable.”

“You're living above Mrs. Shimoda now?”

She smiled widely. “Yes, isn't that amazing? A friend gave us Mrs. Shimoda's phone number when she heard we were looking for a new place.

When we met our neighbour, Natasha Roy, she mentioned Thérèse's name as the previous tenant.” She had no desire to connect Thérèse with the strange manuscript Duncan had found in the dark. She was actually pleased it had disappeared and hoped Duncan would never mention it again.

If it had not been for the initial stage of jet-lag on top of his mild hang-over, Jerome might have reacted with a greater expression of astonishment, but he was seeking simplicity and calm, and this brilliant streak of crimson dashed upon the dour canvas he had been contemplating was discouraging. He was saved from any further response by the approach of Thérèse and Uncle Edward.

“Amelia, what a pleasant surprise. I see you've been keeping Jerome company.” Her uncle had the gift of graciousness; he could have found them rolling on the carpet in a torrid embrace and he would still have retained his composure. “I'd like you to meet Thérèse Laflamme.”

© ralph patrick mackay