— That family, in particular, had a lot of hard times. Anyhow, never mind. I never wanted to expose you or your mother to any of that.
Mary laughed.
— Oh God. You and Frank, you’ve got that in common.
— What’s that?
— This idea that the women in your life need to be protected all the time.
Stan wandered back into the living room, thinking maybe he’d have a nap. Emily was in the vestibule untying her shoes. Frank hovered around her, trying to make light of whoever it was in the car.
— You should have brought him in for supper, said Frank.
— It’s completely not an issue any more, Dad.
— I’m sorry to hear it. Hey, if you’ve got to insist on dating, how about you get yourself a guy with a better haircut?
— Actually, I’ve got an idea, said Emily. I’m sure I could get one of your rookies to take me out. That one that drove you home yesterday is really cute.
— Hey, said Frank. Listen …
Stan sat down in the recliner next to the cabinet stereo. He brought the footrest up and stretched his legs out. He didn’t want Emily or Frank to see the smile he was wearing. How close he was, suddenly, to laughing outright. He let his head settle back and he closed his eyes.
He snoozed for an hour and was gradual about waking up. By then, the whole house was filled with the deep smell of the roasting turkey. Emily was sitting at the Clarendon upright.
— I hope I didn’t wake you, Grandpa.
— I don’t think you did.
— You were snoring like mad.
— Gentlemen like me don’t snore.
Stan got up from the recliner. He wasn’t sure if she’d been practising or not while he napped, but she put her hands to the keys and began to play “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring.” In the kitchen, Mary and Louise were preparing the vegetables.
Frank picked at the turkey stuffing. When he saw Stan, he offered him a beer, and the two of them went and sat down in the screened-in porch at the back of the house. Cassius was loping around the yard, sniffing at the bird bath.
— Who was the boy in the car? said Stan.
— Bobby or Billy or something. He’s been around a little bit, but he’s nobody now. Just as well.
— She’s got a good head, Frank. If she’s going to university next year, you’ll have to trust her.
— She’d be young. Just eighteen. It’s still under discussion.
Stan stood up and watched his dog in the backyard. The dog dug under the cedar hedge at the back of the property until Stan called for him to cut it out.
— Stan, said Frank, I want to talk to you about Judy Lacroix. I want to know why you’ve got the interest in her.
— I’m the one who found her, Frank.
— She isn’t the first dead girl you ever found.
— No.
— Stan, I know you might have had a look at the toxicology. I’m not going to make a big deal about it, but I have an idea of who might have showed you. That same person might just have put it back in the wrong place when Len Gleber went to file it. You know you don’t have any official capacity.
— I don’t need to be reminded.
— I know that. I suppose I’m just putting it out there.
— You don’t think Judy was in any kind of situation that was over her head? There was a boyfriend, I heard.
— Yes, said Frank. Gleber interviewed him, the boyfriend. He’s a low-life, Stan. A nobody. And I don’t think he was quite the boyfriend she let on he was. I think he was taking advantage of a girl who didn’t know any better, whenever he felt the need … Matter of fact, though, it surprises me and exasperates me a little that you know about the boyfriend too. How much more do you know?
— That business about the boyfriend is about all of it.
The patio door slid open and Louise came out. She said: Hi Dad, hi Grandpa.
— Grandpa and I are having a discussion, said Frank.
— Supper will be ready in five minutes.
— That’s fine, said Frank. Be sure to knock first next time, you understand?
— Yes, Dad.
Louise went back into the house.
— Judy Lacroix killed herself, said Frank. She was a sad girl who should have been properly looked after, and she wasn’t, and when she couldn’t handle some of the ugliness this world has a way of dumping on people, she went and took her own life.
Stan nodded. He finished his beer. He looked to see what the dog was doing.
— It’s a damn shame that you had to be the one to find her, said Frank. But you did find her and then you made sure the right people were in the right place. Thinking about it that way, I wish anytime a body turns up to the public, it’s a retired cop who finds it. But now you don’t have to worry about it any further.
— I’m not worried, said Stan.
— I hope not. Now come on. You know Mary doesn’t like supper to be kept waiting. She’s just like her mother in that way.
— Yes, said Stan.
Frank got up and opened the patio door and went inside the house. Stan followed.
Stan tried to put the conversation with Frank out of his head, but a few days after Thanksgiving his telephone rang. A woman’s voice was on the other end.
— Is this Mr. Maitland?
— Yes, this is Stan Maitland here.
— Mr. Maitland, this is Ellie Lacroix calling. I wondered if you’d still want to speak with me.
He met with her at one o’clock that afternoon. They went to the Owl Cafe and sat in a booth halfway to the back. He had a roast beef sandwich and a cup of tea, and Eleanor Lacroix had a bowl of the day’s soup. She just moved her spoon around in it.
— I apologize, Mr. Maitland.
— Call me Stan, and I don’t know what you’re apologizing for.
— How I spoke to you when you came to see me.
He put his sandwich on the plate and sat back.
— I know this has been a real upset to you, Ellie, but I also know that that’s not why you weren’t so quick to chat with me.
— That’s true.
— I knew your family for a long time. It’s only been the last twenty years or so, which at your age would seem a lot longer to you than it does to me, that I haven’t had much of an eye on you.
— I don’t know how old we were, said Eleanor. Maybe six or seven. You and another cop arrested my dad one night. We, me and Judy, we didn’t even know what to think about that. We thought you were taking him to jail but when we got up the next morning he was there at the breakfast table. He looked like he hadn’t slept all night.
— Your dad didn’t sleep that night, you’re right about that. He had a long walk back from where we dropped him off.
— Why would you do something like that, Mr. Maitland?
— Your dad, Aurel, he liked to have a drink, didn’t he.
— He drank. But he never laid a finger on Judy or me.
— You can’t say the same about how he was with your mother, can you.
Eleanor had the soup spoon closed in her fist. She lifted it in a strange way, as though to emphasize something, and then she put it on the table.
— I … No, I can’t say that.
— That particular night he got very rough with your mother, said Stan. I don’t know how much of this you might of known about or not, mind, but the neighbours called us. It was me and Dick Shannon who went over to your place. Ellie, I was a cop for a long time. I did things, I don’t know now if I was right or wrong or what-all, but I did things in a certain way that I thought was right. I didn’t always care to see a man go to jail when I thought I could maybe help him come around to a better way of seeing things.
— So you hauled my dad out to some back road and kicked the hell out of him.
— No, Ellie. I never once had any kind of a battle with your dad. All I did was, I had a long talk with him and then gave him a good walk home to think it over. Do you remember him getting rough with your mother after that night?
— No, said Eleanor. I don’t. Look, Mr. Maitland-Stan. My dad had a lot of problems. He used to have nightmares, from the war, I guess, although that was something he never talked about. I know he got shelled pretty bad and there were some scars on his leg. Anyway, he drank too much. He had a lot of trouble keeping a job. I know. I know. But the first thing I remember in my whole life, me and Judy are sitting on my dad’s knee, and he’s telling us the story of Baptiste and the Devil, my favourite. He could tell it better than anybody else. He talked French so fast you could barely understand him. I loved my dad.