A Three Day Event (9 page)

The familiar roar of Benoit’s Harley Davidson invaded the barn. Roch’s face darkened as he caught the sound of Guy cursing. The horse must have jerked his head at the sudden noise. Roch had asked Benoit a hundred times either to park the machine further away or cut the engine sooner.

A moment later Benoit swaggered in. He approached the little group and, glancing contemptuously at Gilles’ pallid face and terrified eyes, asked with routine insolence, “
Qu’est–ce qui se passe, boss?
What’s wrong,
hein
? Hey Gilles, you seen a ghost or something?” His tone was clearly intended to be light, but there was no mistaking the underlying menace.

Benoit hissed in angry surprise as Gilles fell back against a stall with jellying knees and slid slowly to the ground. His face was dead white. Roch bent to him and gripped his shoulder.

“
Qu’as–tu?
What is it?”

“No, no, I’ll be okay. It’s just what you did, what you said–the tongue–the wire–blood–I can’t stand–”

“
Maudit
, Gilles, pull yourself together. I got a million things to do. Look, you better go lie down for an hour. Come back when you’re feeling better.” He added, with rough compassion, “It’s normal, son. I got pretty sick when I saw it myself. But he’ll be okay, I think.”

Gilles nodded mutely, struggled to his feet, glanced with dumb fear at Benoit, and slunk out the stable door. Roch frowned. He had noted the boy’s reaction to Benoit’s presence.
What the hell was going on?

“
É
coute,
Benoit. There’s trouble here. Someone got to the stallion”–he jerked his head toward the end where Guy was working –“and did a job on him. It’s bad, what happened. Cut his tongue off. You know something?” He watched Benoit with laser intensity for his reaction.

Either the youth was a world–class actor or he was genuinely shocked and puzzled at the news. He took a step backwards, shook his head, and lifted both shoulders and hands in disavowal. “Me, I don’t know nothing about that. That’s really bad news, boss.”

Roch’s eyes bored into the boy’s for a full half–minute, but Benoit held his gaze and didn’t flinch. “Okay, Benoit. I believe you. Now maybe you can tell me what you know about my office.” He took a step forward as he spoke. His face was very close to Benoit’s, and suddenly the boy was no longer meeting his gaze.

“Your office?” Now it was clear the boy was working up a tone of surprise. It was a weak effort.

“Yeah, my office. It’s a mess. Looks like some fucking cowardly
séparatisses
got in there and had a party. But like I said, they’re fucking cowards and they didn’t leave their names. What do you think of that,
hein?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Benoit muttered, squaring his shoulders and affecting a manly spread–legged pose of confidence. But his hooded eyes were darting randomly round the barn and a greasy film of sweat was forming on his forehead.

Jocelyne blurted out, “What do you know about Liam? He’s gone. You must know something. You were mixed up in his dirty work, don’t deny it–”

“Hey you, you watch what you say there, you bitch,” Benoit snarled. His fists balled up and Roch instinctively laid a restraining hand on his arm.

“Where is he?” Roch snapped. Benoit turned sullenly back to meet his fierce gaze, licked his plump lips as if about to speak, then immediately dropped his eyes again. Shrugging, he said, “How should I know? Weren’t you the one who told him to clear off or there’d be trouble for him?”

“
What are you talking about?”

Benoit seemed to sense that he was on firmer ground and, clearly relieved to see the object of Roch’s attention shifting from the office to Liam, he assumed his customary impertinence. “Look, all I know is yesterday afternoon he said he had to leave. Said he’d got the push and he had to clear out or there’d be trouble. He didn’t say who told him to go, but I just figured it was you. I mean, who else would–?” He seemed bewildered for a moment as Roch and Jocelyne exchanged a spontaneous look of apprehension and uneasiness. Then he licked his lips, assessing the ambiguity of mood to be in favour of a personal initiative.

“Uh, hey listen, boss,” Benoit shuffled self–consciously and crossed his arms, “maybe this isn’t such a good time to mention it, but you know, I could maybe fill in for a while as head boy, eh? I mean, I’m good with the horses, and I know all the people here, and at least I belong, I can speak English
and
French, you know it was a pain in the ass with Liam only speaking–”

“Are you out of your mind?” Roch had been staring at him throughout this little speech in pure astonishment, as if the boy were speaking some foreign language, but Benoit had been avoiding Roch’s eye. His head snapped back in shock at these words. Sensitive to the heat of Jocelyne’s scornful gaze upon him, his fleshy cheeks mottled and he drew breath to answer. What he had to say seemed to give him the spurt of extra confidence he needed.

“I don’t think you should talk to me like that, boss,” he declared loudly, settling his feet wider apart and unconsciously expanding his chest in a gorilla–like gesture of challenge.

“And just why is that,
hein
?” Roch’s eyes narrowed and his body shifted to face the boy head–on. Jocelyne backed away, thrilled in some atavistic recess to find herself, however marginally, the catalyst for this masculine face–off.

“Because a lot of people here think I should have my chance.” He jerked his thumb at his chest. “My family belongs here. A lot of people say you’re forgetting about that. They think you’re forgetting about your old friends, who fits in here and who doesn’t. They say maybe you think you own this place, and–” his words were choked off by his shirt suddenly tightening against his throat in the grip of Roch’s iron fist. Roch’s move had been so swift that Benoit was caught off balance. He was slammed against a stall door and found himself staring into the face of a madman.

“
Asshole!”
Jocelyne whispered loudly. She wore an expression of undisguised pleasure at seeing Benoit humiliated. The boy gurgled inarticulately and lunged futilely in her direction. Roch slammed him up against the door again, harder this time, and the boy groaned, pulling desperately at Roch’s arms.

“Get out,
pissou’
!” Roch snapped. “And tell the “people” who think you should tell me who works here and who doesn’t that as long as I’m in charge of this barn, I decide everything in here.
Everything
! You got that? And tell them I’ll be in charge as long as it suits me. You got that too, Benoit?”

Benoit rubbed his throat and muttered something that may have been acquiescence. He made for the barn door and at the threshold, sure of escape, he turned and spit. “It’s not over, boss. You should be more careful.” He twitched his head toward Guy working on the stallion down the aisle and added softly, teasingly, “Looks like you’re not so in charge of everything around here, that’s what it looks like to me.” And then he was out the door, and seconds later the Harley bucked and roared to noisy life, spraying a hailstorm of gravel against the barn. Guy cursed audibly and made soothing sounds to his patient.

Roch swore quietly, ran a hand over his face, rubbing at his eyes and trying to work out a plan of action.

“Okay, listen,” he said wearily to Jocelyne, “go get some of your stuff at lunchtime and move into Liam’s room. I want the barn covered at night. We’re going to be locking it from now on. I hope you’re a light sleeper,” he finished grimly.

Jocelyne nodded, eager to please him for a change. And even if he hadn’t asked, she had decided to install herself near Michel’s horses until things got sorted out. There was no question of leaving them alone after this.

Roch looked around and planned the next moves of the day.
Get one of the working students to cover for Benoit. If I’m lucky, he won’t come back. Police, oh fuck, that journalist, insurance…better call Polo and Hy, maybe better not Hy just yet, change the pass door and office and front door locks…a new lock for the stable entrance….

“Jocelyne, stay with Guy and help him. Get me for anything. When the boarders start coming, when
anyone
comes, just say he cut himself by accident and he’s getting stitches.
Compris?”

“Michel will be here in twenty minutes. I’m supposed to have his first horse ready.”

“Send him to me.”

* * *

“Hey, what does a guy have to do to get a kiss around here?”

Ruthie’s eyes flew open, she laughed into the smiling face leaning over the deck chair, and flung both arms up to him in a spontaneous hug of welcome. “Polo!” He slid onto the edge of a flower–filled barrel beside her. She sat up and hugged her knees.

“It killed me to wake you, but Roch just called here with a message for me, and I can’t stay. I thought I’d have time for a quick coffee with you, but–”

“Yeah, I know, it’s the story of our lives–love to chat, but there’s a horse I gotta see–oh, c’mon, just two minutes to catch up…”

“No, really, Roch sounded pretty worried. And don’t say anything to Hy yet. Anyway, I’m coming for dinner. It’ll be like old times, just family…”

“Gee, Polo, you look terrific. Is there a picture of you in an attic somewhere getting all old and wrinkled?”

“That’s from a book, right?”

“Yeah, how’d you know?”

“You have your book voice on.”

“Book voice?”

“Yeah, sort of half a tone higher than normal. Like when you speak French…”

“I speak French in a different
voice
?” Ruthie considered this information with astonishment and the thin edge of pique.

“I didn’t say it was a bad thing–just different. Hey, don’t shoot the messenger.”

“
Touché!
Anyway, to return to my original point, it doesn’t mean you don’t look fabulous. Weatherbeaten becomes you.”

“Well, you don’t look fabulous, Ruthie. You look awful. You’re too thin and you’ve got raccoon eyes, so that means you’re not sleeping right, or eating–”

“Gee, don’t be shy, Polo, tell me what you really think–”

“Hey, don’t blame me. I never used to think insulting people was chic before I met the Jacobsons”–

Ruthie pulled at an imaginary knife in her ribs and grimaced. “A palpable hit. We created a monster.”

“I gotta go, but–” he laid a finger across her wrist and his voice dropped to an embarrassed murmur–”Are you okay,
ziess–
?”

She wiggled her open hand in the air.”
Comme ci, comme ça
…but I seem to be coping. Come early tonight. And set your mood meter to ‘nostalgia’. Hy and I had dinner in town with ‘The Duchess’ yesterday. It was her birthday. She’s been clearing out the rec room for when she moves. Wait’ll you see…”

* * *

Sue Parker mopped up the last of the egg yolk with her toast, speared the remaining morsel of bacon, and regretfully acknowledged her excellent breakfast to be finished. Sipping slowly at her mug of coffee–really, the grub was just super, who’d have thought in a stable, of all places–she pondered whether to order another go–round, but decided that this might seem insensitive considering the atmosphere of worry and confusion swirling around her.

For the moment she was the only customer, although a carefully organized, seemingly casual chat with the owner had already informed her of the comings and goings in the restaurant in the course of a busy day, as Fridays in spring generally were. It was not only the riders who used the restaurant, it seemed. Mountain bikers, joggers, local residents all dropped in for a meal or a beer. And now that the weather was fine, you could sit out under the large awning and enjoy the view of the Jacobson’s grounds and the entire vista of the parklands below.

Caroline Laurin, Roch’s oldest brother’s wife, had been naturally agitated at the news and the sight of the vandalism. Guiltily she had rejoiced that her place had been spared any damage. She had worked very hard to decorate the room so cozily and build up her growing clientele after the indifferent and unimaginative policies of the previous tenancy. In the old days only the Hunt Club members used the place, and then mostly to drink. It was furnished any old way out of people’s basements. It had looked
kétaine,
tacky, and the ‘menu’ was positively
folklorique
:
tourtière
, pea soup and sugar pie were the staples.

From behind the counter Caroline eyed the sole diner with a curious and bemused eye. She was an odd one, all right. But intelligent. Caroline was aware that she had been ‘pumped’ about the stable’s routines, but everyone in small towns was curious, and in stable life the restaurant was the hub for the latest gossip, after all. The girl had been particularly curious about Roch. Everyone was. It certainly hadn’t taken long for Roch to make a big impression on this one, though. Five minutes was a record, even for him.

Noticing the wall telephone beside the coatrack, Sue made her way over to it. She’d promised to call her parents in Toronto the minute she arrived. They hated her driving alone on the highways, and were annoyed that she had decided to travel to Saint Armand overnight. She extracted her Bell card from her wallet as she walked.

“I hope that’s a local call you’re making,” Caroline said politely as Sue picked up the receiver. For answer Sue waved the card at her.

“No, I mean you can’t call long–distance even with a card on that line. It’s fixed so you can only use it for local. But there’s a pay phone in the hall and there’s a phone in the stable office. Or Roch might let you use his direct Montreal line if that’s what you need.”

With a sigh Sue pushed open the door to look for the pay phone, and almost collided with a slim blond man, who skirted her in a quick, neat reflex, threw her a sharp, curious glance, and slipped into the office, closing the door firmly behind him.

* * *

Nothing had been touched in the office. Roch was on the telephone inside at his desk, passing a hand over his sparse hair in a repeated nervous gesture. Marie–France kept looking from wall to wall, as if she could erase the words by the intensity of her gaze. She held a fist clamped round a balled–up tissue to her pursed mouth. Her pale eyes were red–rimmed and frightened, and her entire plump little body seemed to vibrate with indignation.