The Maltese Goddess
by Lyn Hamilton
PROLOGUE
I am at the beginning as I am at the end. I am the sacred circle, spinner of the web of space and time. I am the Cosmic “And”: life and death, order and chaos, eternal and finite. I am Earth and all things of it.
For periods of time you call millennia, we lived in harmony, you and I. I gave the bounty of the lands and seas to nourish you, and taught you to use them. I gave you artistic expression so that through your sculpture, painting, and weaving you might honor me, and through me, yourselves. And I taught you writing that you might remember me.
How is it that you wrenched apart that which is inseparable? Why did you make the Either/Or? Flesh or spirit, body or soul, thinking or feeling. Because when you did, when you replaced me with your despotic sky gods who rule from Without, you made me something to be mastered, something to be conquered, just as you then thought you had to conquer each other.
Neglected, devalued, insulted, and profaned I may be, but I remain. I wait in my sacred places. I live in your dreams. Nammu, Isis, Aphrodite. Inanna, Astarte, Anath. Call me whichever of my manifestations you will. I am the Great Goddess, and I will be avenged.
ADONIS
ONE
I like to think of myself as an honorable person, but once I’ve explained to someone slowly, in words of one syllable, why it would be cheaper for them to deal with someone else, then if they insist, I’m as happy as the next person to take their money.
At least that is what I thought when Martin Galea, the best of the best of the Toronto architectural scene, came into my shop, Greenhalgh and McClintoch by name, accompanied by his timid wife and his platinum credit card, and began to spend what seemed at the time to be almost breathtaking amounts of money. We—my business partner Sarah Greenhalgh and I— were suffering through the doldrums of an economic downturn, a seemingly chronic turn of events, and Galea’s purchase looked almost too good to be true. Which it was—and had I been gifted with the ability to foretell the future, no amount of money would have enticed me to agree to his terms.
It all started innocuously enough, though. It was a clear winter day in Toronto, and if there were tremors in the cosmic fabric that should have warned me of what was to come, I didn’t notice them. Diesel, aka The Deez, the official Shop Cat, was at his favorite post, curled up in the front window enjoying the sunshine, as usual ignoring the activity of the mere mortals around him.
Even Galea’s visit followed its normal course. He’d been in the store several times before, and the routine was always the same. A Jaguar pulled up in front of the shop, facing the wrong way, half on the narrow street and half on the even narrower sidewalk. Galea leapt out and bounded up the few steps to the store, leaving Mrs. Galea—if she had a first name, I was not privy to it—to negotiate her way out of the car on the street side, painfully aware, it seemed to me, of the hostile looks and rude gestures of the motorists and pedestrians inconvenienced by this display of automotive bad manners.
It never seemed possible for Galea to simply walk into a room. His entrance was always a dramatic event of some kind, although I would be hard-pressed to tell you exactly what he did to make it seem that way.
It helped, of course, that he was, let’s face it, extraordinarily good-looking. Not particularly tall, but well built, and obviously a man who worked at it, he had a very stylish look to him. On this particular occasion he wore some kind of collar-less shirt—it was silk, I think, although nobody has ever called me an expert on clothes—black, nicely cut pants, and a black coat, in what I’m sure was cashmere, which he rather cavalierly tossed onto the front desk on arrival. The clothes went well with the perennial tan and the dark hair, cut just long enough to be artsy but not long enough to offend his well-heeled clients. His features were almost perfect, except perhaps for a certain softness about the mouth, which men, jealous no doubt, liked to call effeminate, but which women found charmingly boyish.
In any event, we all—Sarah and I; my neighbor and our right-hand man Alex Stewart; and our only other customer, a young woman in the shortest black skirt I have ever seen, black tights and boots, and leather jacket, and who was not, my instincts told me, planning to buy anything at all—looked in his direction as he entered the shop, his driving gloves in one hand, his sunglasses twirling nonchalantly in the other. Sarah, who was a whiz on the business side but who found dealing with difficult clients troublesome, disappeared quickly into the little office in the back. Alex moved to assist our other customer.
“Ms. McClintoch.” Galea smiled in my general direction as he looked about him. “I’m very glad to see you are here. I’d appreciate your advice and assistance with my latest project.” Galea had a way of making you think your opinion was important to him, although my experience with him to date would indicate that the only opinion that mattered was his own.
“I’m building a house in Malta. I was born there, you know. A bit of a return to my roots. Nice little piece of property, sea view of course. I’ll be needing some furnishings for it, so let us see what you have,” he said, taking me by the elbow and guiding me toward the back of the store. He smelled very nice, I noticed, some exotic aftershave or men’s cologne I did not recognize. “A little more Mediterranean in feel than what I usually do. A little more relaxed. More like my place in the Caribbean, which you may recall.”
I nodded. Of course I recalled it. The last time we had supplied some furniture for Galea, it had been for the home he was referring to, a luxurious retreat on an exclusive island in the Caribbean. The house had been featured in one of the upscale architectural magazines, and indeed had won an award for its design, and Galea had been good enough to give Greenhalgh and McClintoch a credit. It had moved us into an entirely different league, so to speak, and had brought us some very exclusive customers. The point was, I didn’t need to be reminded. This was Galea’s way of telling me that I owed him, and while it was true, it irritated me because I had a feeling that payback time was near.
“Now, what have we here? Very nice—Indonesian, I believe,” he said, pausing in front of a very expensive antique teak armoire and chewing thoughtfully on the arm of his sunglasses in a way that I confess I found suggestive. “I think that will do quite nicely, don’t you?
“And what about this, Lara?” he said, sliding easily to a first-name basis while pointing to a large old teak dining table and eight slat chairs. “What do you think?” he asked, standing much too close for comfort.
“I, of course, think they’re perfect,” I replied, backing away slightly. “But I should point out to you that the price quoted covers the cost of their having been shipped from Jakarta to Toronto, and I’d have to charge you to ship it from here to Malta. Malta, if my knowledge of geography serves me correctly, is very close to Italy, a country whose design industry is among the best in the world, so it might be better for you to shop a little closer to your new home.” I tried to sound crisp and professional.
This apparently was not the answer he wanted. “What do you think?” he asked, turning to our only other customer. “Miss… ?”
“Perez,” she said, blushing from the attention. “Monica Perez. I think it’s…” Her voice trailed off as she thought about it. I could tell she was thinking by the way she chewed her lip and wrinkled her brow prettily. “It’s lovely,” she concluded.