Lane heard his phone beep again. He pulled it out of the inside pocket of his sports jacket, pressing a button on the face. A text message read, “Don’t go to hospital. Indy, Christine, and Dan at home.”
SATURDAY, JANUARY 25
chapter 6
“You look like…” Nigel hesitated.
“Shit?” Lane watched the traffic in the outside lane.
“Tired. Baby come home?”
Lane nodded. He doesn’t need to know about the way I reacted when I found someone else in Indiana’s room, freezing instead of using my head.
Nigel checked left, easing around a green Ford with two women in the front seat talking with their hands. The car swerved into their lane. Nigel hit the horn and the brakes.
Lane got a glimpse of the wide-open mouth and eyes of the passenger. The driver continued to talk with her hands. The passenger grabbed the wheel. The vehicle straightened out.
“Hazards of sign language,” Nigel said.
Lane looked at the clock. “Okay if I take a look around inside while you get the pictures?”
Nigel nodded, gliding past another vehicle. “No worries.”
They parked in the LRT station lot, walking across the street to the funeral home. The wind was calm, the sun was out, and the forecast said the temperature was supposed to warm to minus ten. Lane looked at his watch. I wonder if there’s time for a coffee?
“Don’t worry, we’ll get a coffee after.” Nigel hefted the Nikon with the long lens, looking for an inconspicuous spot where he could snap the mourners walking in.
“You sure you want to stay outside and take pictures?” Lane adjusted his blue tie to ensure the knot was centred.
Nigel cradled the camera in his arms. “I’m sure.”
Lane looked at his partner. Nigel’s eyes darted left and right. His black toque was pulled down over his ears, riding his eyebrows. Lane saw the freckles on Nigel’s cheeks. A cloud of his breath hung in the air. Lane asked, “This case has got to you, hasn’t it?”
Nigel locked on his partner’s eyes. “Let’s just catch the fuckers.”
Lane nodded, crossed the street, walked to the entrance of the funeral home, and stepped inside. He knocked the snow off his shoes, unzipped his winter coat, and looked around. To his right was a wall of oak-framed windows and beyond that the chapel with its obligatory stained glass. To his left, the office and a broad staircase leading upstairs. A woman in a navy-blue jacket and calf-length skirt asked, “Can I help you?”
Lane smiled, reaching inside his suit jacket pocket and pulling out his ID. “I’m with the Calgary Police Service.”
The woman frowned, then turned her head slightly with disapproving half-closed eyes.
“Melissa and David Randall are aware I’m here. I’d like to sit to one side.” Lane eased his left arm out of the sleeve of his winter jacket.
The woman used her left hand to indicate direction, walking into the chapel and turning left. Lane followed her to the far left of the chapel. “Front or rear?” she asked.
“Front, please. I need to see faces.” She led him up front. He sat down against the wall. “Thank you.”
The woman nodded and left.
Lane folded his coat over the seat next to him and looked at the grey wall beside him. He looked at his grey sportcoat. I’ll blend right in. Just put on the face and disappear. “The face” was a survival technique Lane had learned as a child. It allowed him to fade into the background, a way of flying below the radar of recognition.
Mourners began to trickle in. David Randall walked in a side door followed by a girl of about fourteen. She wore a black jacket, black pants, and red pumps. Her black hair was cut short.
David said, “Come on, Beth, I just need to check and make sure everything is working.”
Beth looked at Lane; then her green eyes moved on to the back of the chapel where people were gathered. David touched a computer screen. It lit his face with blue light.
Lane thought, He looks like he’s lost maybe ten pounds.
“I already made sure everything is working. Besides, Aunty Peggy is here.” Beth’s voice was filled with a sarcastic blend of loathing and anxiety.
David looked over his shoulder, staring at his daughter, opening his mouth, closing it. “Can we just get through this without any drama?”
“Why is she here?” Beth turned to her father, looking for something to attack.
When you’re fourteen and angry, you have to take it out on someone.
David turned to the projector. A picture of his mother and father appeared on the screen. They were on a beach, smiling, leaning into each other, with Beth tucked under her grandfather’s arm. A smaller boy stood next to Elizabeth.
“How come you never stand up to Aunt Peggy?” Beth looked up at the image. “She was mad because we went to Mexico with Poppa and Nanny, remember?”
David shut off the projector. “What good would it do?”
“You’re such a wimp!” Beth turned around, her posture stiff with anger, and stomped out the side door.
David’s shoulders sagged. He turned to follow.
A seismic wave of braying laughter rolled through the chapel. Lane and David looked toward the main doorway at the back of the chapel. A woman with dyed-red hair, painted-on eyebrows, a six-foot frame, an oversized head, and a white dress threw her head back and performed again. She leaned on a Malacca cane. The posse of women surrounding her added lemming laughter.
Lane watched David’s face redden. The man stepped forward, then retreated out the side door.
The voices outside the main doorway grew louder. People trickled in, sitting on benches. Lane looked at his watch and saw there were only five minutes before the service was to start. The woman with the eyebrows stood in the doorway with two other women. They were deep in conversation, a car wreck in the centre of a downtown intersection. Behind them, people gathered, waiting to get inside.
The funeral director opened the side door, walking in front of Lane, then over to the blocked doorway. He smiled and took Aunt Peggy by the arm, guiding her like a bouncing front-end loader down a roadway to the front bench on the family side. Behind her, the other rows of pews filled with people until every seat was taken. Only a handful of seats next to Peggy remained.
Lane saw the suits and glittering jewellery. The carefully trimmed hair of the men and the elaborately coloured, stylishly coiffed cuts of the women. It’s been a while since I’ve been to one of these. The last time it was Dad’s funeral and I had to leave early. I remember the light coming in through the stained glass. He looked at the paired stained-glass windows behind the podium. They faced north, illuminated by reflected light. He saw David and Melissa set paper atop the lectern in front of the windows. Melissa wore a fitted red jacket, black blouse, and black pants. To their left a pair of brass urns held the cremated remains of their parents.
David lifted his head, beginning to speak even though many people in the chapel were still talking. “Thank you for coming to celebrate the lives of our parents.” His throat constricted with emotion, and he stopped. Some people in the pews continued to talk.
Lane looked right to see Aunt Peggy talking with the man and woman behind her. Lane turned back to the front.
Melissa put her left hand on the shoulder of her brother’s navy-blue sports jacket. She said, “Our parents did well with their business and thought it was important to give back to the community. They believed in deeds more than words. So we wanted to tell their story in pictures.”
A photograph of their much-younger parents was projected on the screen. They were tucked in close to each other, the Chateau Lake Louise in the background. It was summer. The lake was glacial blue.
A series of slides followed. Lane turned to watch the faces of the people in the chapel, systematically moving from row to row, face to face. He heard Melissa say, “Mom’s maiden name was McKenzie. We used to spend time in the summer in the Shuswap with our cousins from her side of the family.”