Charlie and Ariel had made two concessions to the realities of their neighbourhood. The front lawn was protected by a chain-link fence and, as I stepped onto the porch, the dog that began barking in the backyard sounded like it meant business. After five minutes, the dog was still barking, no one had come to the door, and my idea about ambushing Charlie into supplying some answers seemed hare-brained rather than inspired. As I headed back to my car, I tried to step carefully around the water pooling on the walk, but despite my efforts, my feet got wet. By the time I reached the car, my temper was frayed. It was a toss-up whom I was angrier at: myself for thinking I could play Nancy Drew, or Charlie for leaving his dog out in a downpour.
The penny dropped. It had been raining constantly since 5:30 that morning. I hadn’t been close to Charlie for years, but if the Jesuits are right about the boy being the father of the man, I couldn’t imagine the Charlie I knew growing into a man who would leave his dog out in the rain. I retraced my steps and walked by the side of the house and peered over the gate into the backyard. A man in a khaki slicker, whose hood hid his face from view, was trying to feed paper into a smouldering hibachi. The dog, a Rottweiler, was beside him.
“Why don’t you wait for the rain to stop, Charlie?” I said.
But when he turned, the man facing me wasn’t Charlie. With his strong features, wire-rimmed glasses, and slick, swept-back hair, he had the look of a man who was accustomed to dominating the situation: a lawyer or an actor. He didn’t greet me, and his silence seemed like a professional tool.
“I’m looking for Charlie Dowhanuik,” I said.
The man remained silent. His expression wasn’t hostile, but it wasn’t welcoming.
“I’m a friend of the family.”
He shrugged. “What’s Charlie’s mother’s name?”
“Marnie,” I said. “Marnie Sullivan Dowhanuik.”
“Where does she live?”
“Good Shepherd Villa, in Toronto.”
He walked towards me, and unlocked the gate. The Rottweiler stayed at his side. As I came through the gate, I held my hand out, palm up, to the dog. He sniffed it eagerly; then he let me scratch his head. The man watched with interest. “You passed the name test and you passed the Fritz test,” he said. “That’s good enough for me. My name is Liam Hill, and I’m sorry for being suspicious, but it’s been that kind of day.”
“Joanne Kilbourn,” I said. “Have you had to deal with a ghoul patrol?”
“The stream has been steady,” he agreed. “I guess it’s human nature, but when you know the people involved, it’s hard to see tragedy as a spectator sport.”
“So you’re a friend of Charlie’s.”
“And of Ariel’s,” he said. “Look, we’re getting soaked. Do you want to continue this inside the house?”
“Sure.” I gestured towards a sheet of yellow legal paper smoking wetly in the hibachi. There was handwriting on it. “That’s not going to work, you know.”
He stiffened. I saw immediately that he had given my words a significance I hadn’t intended. I didn’t want to alienate him. At the moment he was the only link I had. “It’s too wet now,” I said. “Why don’t you try later?”
I could see him relax. “Let’s go inside.”
Fritz loped happily ahead, and I followed. We walked across the deck into the kitchen, an attractive room with hardwood flooring, old fashioned glass-faced cupboards, an ancient slope-shouldered Admiral refrigerator, a huge gas stove, and a picture window that looked onto the garden. Flush against the window was a butcher-block table. On the table, Ariel’s tomato plants languished, dry and yellowing. Unexpectedly, my eyes filled.
Liam Hill didn’t notice. He had his back to me, hanging his slicker over the back of a chair. When he turned, I saw that he was wearing a navy sweatshirt with white lettering.
“St. Michael’s College,” I said. “I went to Vic, but my first serious boyfriend was at St. Mike’s. His name was Bob Birgeneau, and he told me that he knew I was a nice girl, but that other boys wouldn’t know I was a nice girl if I kept wearing slacks to class.” I smiled. “Sorry,” I said. “Too much information.”
“Not too much information,” Liam Hill said. “Just an interesting sociological nugget. Shall we sit down?” He pointed towards a built-in breakfast nook just off the kitchen. Like the refrigerator, it was a period piece, a restaurant-style booth with wine leatherette banquettes facing one another across a Formica-topped, chrome-edged table. “Incidentally, we’re a little more enlightened about dress codes at St. Mike’s now.”
I slid into my place, and Liam Hill slid into his across from me.
“I feel like I should be ordering a cherry Coke and fries.” I said.
He smiled. “Whatever happened to cherry Cokes?” Then he leaned towards me. “I probably should have said this off the top. I’m not going to talk about Charlie.”
“Fair enough,” I said. “Actually, I was hoping to talk to Charlie myself. I thought he might need a friend.”
“How well do you know him?” Liam Hill asked.
“Not well at all any more. He and my kids knew each other when they were growing up. My connection is really with his parents, which, of course, now pretty well means Howard.”
“You and Howard Dowhanuik are close.”
“He’s my oldest friend.”
“For Charlie’s friends, that’s not necessarily a recommendation.”
I could feel my temper rise. “There are two sides to every story, Mr. Hill.”
Actually, it’s Father Hill,” he said, “and you’re right. I do only know Charlie’s side of the story.”
“Charlie was never very charitable about his father,” I said.
“Perhaps his father hadn’t earned charity.”
“That’s an odd comment coming from you,” I said. “Has your order started charging for caritas, Father Hill?
He winced. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Kilbourn. This hasn’t been anyone’s finest hour.”
“Then don’t prolong it,” I said. “Tell me when Charlie will be back, and I’ll be on my way.”
Father Hill’s face gave away nothing, but the pulse in his neck fluttered as he weighed his decision. Finally, the scales tipped in my favour. “Charlie won’t be back for a while. He went to Toronto to see Marnie.”
I was incredulous. “To see Marnie? Is she better?”
“There’s been no change in her condition. Charlie just wanted to be with his mother. Your friend, Howard, went with him.”
Liam Hill’s words were innocent, but something in his tone got under my skin.
“Howard doesn’t need me to defend him,” I said, “but, for the record, you’re wrong about him. He’s a good man, and he made a real difference in the lives of a lot of people here.”
“And his wife and son paid the price,” Liam Hill said quietly.
“You knew Marnie before the accident?”
He shook his head. “No, she was already at Good Shepherd when I met her. But Charlie told me she was brilliant. He said there was nothing she couldn’t have been, if she hadn’t had to sacrifice everything -”
I cut him off. “Marnie Dowhanuik didn’t sacrifice everything.”
Father Hill shifted his gaze. “We all have our own perception of reality,” he said mildly.
“Don’t humour me,” I said. My voice was loud and angry. When I spoke again I tried to take the volume down a notch. “This isn’t a perception. This is the truth. For many years, Marnie and I were as close as sisters. Father Hill, she wasn’t a victim. She was smart and funny and… she was Marnie – driving stubborn voters to the polls, handing out placards at rallies, cooking turkeys for all those potluck suppers. And her cabbage rolls…” I smiled at the memory. “She could make a pan full of sensational cabbage rolls in the time it took me to find the recipe. I remember once we’d been at a constituency dinner in the basement of Little Flower Church. At the end of the evening, when she and I came out to the parking lot, she was carrying this big roasting pan filled with leftovers. Howard was surrounded by men hanging on his every word. Marnie waded through all those fawning guys and handed him the roaster. ‘Howie,’ she said, ‘I made these cabbage rolls, I delivered them to the church hall, I reheated them, I served them, I washed the plates they were eaten off, I paid the party ten bucks for the ones that were left; the least you can do is carry them back to the damn car.’ ”