02 _ Maltese Goddess, The (7 page)

The next day, though, there was an even nastier surprise in       store for me.

Anthony had obviously told Marissa and Joseph about our problem with the car, because as soon as they and two workmen arrived on Monday morning, the men began to inspect the vehicle. Despite my protestations—the car could sit in the driveway forever, as far as I was concerned—it was decided that before work on the house could begin, the car would have to be repaired. After much gesticulating, sounds of annoyance, and shrugging of shoulders, one of the men, Eddie by name, headed off somewhere in Joseph’s car.

“Have you found what’s wrong?” I asked, hoping for an affirmative and a diagnosis that would not take long to fix.

“Part missing probably,” Joseph replied. “If Eddie moves fast enough, he may get it back. For a price, of course.”

I looked from Joseph to Marissa. “I’m not following this conversation,” I said.

Marissa smiled at me. “We have a lot of old cars here. People grow very attached to them. Parts are scarce; sometimes they aren’t even manufactured anymore. So they get stolen fairly regularly if you’re not careful. We thought the place was far enough off the beaten track that it wouldn’t be a problem. But I guess we were wrong.

“There are body shops around that miraculously always seem to have parts. Everyone knows who they are. So Eddie will visit a couple of them and get the part. It could even be the one we lost.” She smiled wryly.

“Isn’t that theft, or extortion, or something?”

“Probably. Here we call it the way things go. Joseph will clear some of the construction materials out of the garage so you can lock the car in at night.”

“You know, the first night I was here I thought I saw someone out by the edge of the cliff. Someone wearing a hood. Perhaps he’s our thief!”

“Did you now?” Joseph said. “Strange things go on here from time to time,” he added. Marissa’s usual sunny smile faded somewhat, but neither said anything more.

Eddie returned about a half hour later with a mechanic, and the two of them got to work. At first Eddie was very talkative: he told me that while he was at the body shop he’d also checked for a part that would fix the transmission, which is to say, give it a second gear. He’d had no luck. Someone had beaten him to one by
minutes,
he told me.

But suddenly there seemed to be a chill in the air, metaphorically speaking, and both Eddie and the mechanic grew silent. Soon there was a whispered consultation with Joseph, who in turn whispered to Marissa, who looked really upset. Joseph started clearing his tools and construction materials out of the garage, and Eddie headed out again, returning this time with a huge padlock which he went about installing on the garage door.

All of this was making me nervous, and by extension, annoyed. “We need to talk, Marissa,” I said to her. “I want to know what is going on around here!”

“Let me talk to Joseph,” was the reply. The two of them held another whispered conversation, Joseph finally nodded, and Marissa came back to me.

“The problem with the car was a bit more serious than we thought,” she began.

“More serious than a stolen part?”

“A bit worse than that,” she replied carefully. I waited.

“It’s not so much a part missing. The mechanic said nothing was missing, actually. Some minor problem with the carburetor,” she said. “It’s just there was also a broken line, or something.”

I watched her face carefully. She was frightened, I could tell.

“To the brakes,” she said finally. “You… we were all lucky the car wouldn’t start,” she said. “I’m sure it’s just because the car is so old,” she went on. “But the mechanic says there is a possibility that the line didn’t break, that it was cut.”

I just looked at her. “It’s fixed now, of course,” she said, then burst into tears.

Anyone with any sense would have moved out of the house after this, I know, and I’ve often asked myself since why I stayed. It was partly my capacity for self-delusion, which is as strong as anyone’s. I, like Marissa, preferred to believe the brakes were just old, not tampered with. In addition, I just decided, I think, that these horrible events were not directed at me. Furthermore, I had a job to do, and I didn’t like the idea of telling Martin Galea his house wasn’t ready for his important entertaining. Somehow I didn’t think he’d find a dead cat and what was probably just an accident with the brakes a good excuse for not getting the house finished.

In any event, the job of getting the house ready took up more and more of my time and energy. I’d assumed, more than a little optimistically as it turned out, that by the time Sophia’s lecture rolled around, the house would be shipshape and the furniture winging its way to me.

Instead, after the incident with the car, I put in a rather exasperating and anxiety-ridden couple of days as our work on the house not only did not progress as quickly as it should, but we actually seemed to be losing ground. Galea had said he’d arrive Friday or Saturday to inspect the place, and we were far from ready. I was getting worried.

The electrician, for example, was supposed to arrive Monday morning. However, he and most of the other tradespeople I encountered ascribed to a casual philosophy I’d call a Mediterranean version of manana, and it was late Monday afternoon before he got there. Then what had seemed like a simple matter of installing a few ceiling fixtures had turned into a major wiring problem requiring several holes in the ceiling and walls to put right.

Next we ran out of the glaze for the stucco and had to match it. A good designer, for example my ex-husband on one of the rare days when he was actually prepared to work, would have matched it in a minute or two. Joseph, Marissa, and I took considerably longer, and in the end we agreed we’d have to redo one whole wall to get it right.

Even this would have been manageable. The really big problem was the shipment from home, and my early optimism that meeting Galea’s deadline would be reasonably easy was fast beginning to fade.

A massive winter storm had blanketed much of the Great Lakes region and was now moving on to the eastern seaboard of the U.S. and Canada. Nearly twenty inches of snow had dumped on the Toronto area; temperatures had plummeted to way, way below zero; schools and offices were closed, as was the airport.

“We’re completely socked in,” Alex told me. I was in almost constant touch with him and with Dave Thomson as my anxiety levels headed for the stratosphere.

“Dave sent a truck out from his warehouse at the airport to pick up the furniture here and at Galea’s place on Saturday afternoon. He’d found an Air Canada cargo flight headed for Heathrow that night that had room for the shipment. But it was so cold the truck blew a tire on the highway.

“Dave tried to find another truck but couldn’t, then… Well, anyway, they never got here or to Galea’s house and we missed that flight. Then the storm moved in. The airport authorities estimate they’ll be back in business by tonight, so we’ll try and find a flight then. Dave says don’t panic yet!”

“Yet!” I grumped. But there was nothing I could do.

By late Monday night, Malta time, the situation didn’t look any better. The airport might be reopening, but the flights were backed up and Dave was having trouble finding space for such a large shipment at such short notice. Furthermore, a pipe had burst in his warehouse out near the airport, and he hadn’t been able to bring the two shipments there to pack them.

“I could probably get the stuff to Paris tonight,” he said. “But I’m told there’s going to be a countrywide transportation strike in France as early as tomorrow, and they’re saying it may last several days. I don’t want to risk getting the stuff there and then not being able to get it out again.”

I knew he was telling the truth. I’d read the Paris papers on the way over and they’d said as much.

“So I’m working on something to Italy. Both Air Malta and Alitalia fly to Malta from Rome. Hang in, Lara,”‘ he told me. “I’ll get it there somehow. As soon as I know which flight we’ve got, I’ll get all the stuff picked up and packed in a container, and deliver it direct to the plane. I’ve already contacted a customs broker at the airport in Malta, and he’s standing by to clear it through in a hurry and transport it to the house. You be ready to move fast. Mrs. Galea is being very nice about this, by the way.” Then he added, “But I haven’t talked to the Great One himself yet. Can’t say I’m looking forward to that conversation!”

By late Tuesday afternoon I was truly despairing of ever meeting my commitment to Galea. There was nothing more I could do that day, however, except worry, and I didn’t want to disappoint Sophia, so I decided to go to the lecture and to try to forget all the aggravations of the past couple of days, for an hour or so, at least.

But there was the small matter of making my way to the University on time.

Marissa had given me rather complicated directions for taking the bus into the terminal and then another one out again. The bus route network in Malta seemed to operate on a hub and spoke model, with all routes radiating out from the Valletta terminal. This meant it was not possible to take one bus from the house to the University. On top of that the lecture was in the evening, and Marissa had told me the last bus service was about ten. I decided to drive. The car had been locked in the garage ever since it had been repaired, and I checked the padlock carefully to reassure myself it would be safe to use the car.

I knew from Marissa’s instructions that the University was at the intersection of the regional road to Mellieha and the road to Balzan. When I consulted the map she had given me, it seemed to be almost due north of the house. The island was only eight or nine miles wide, and I prided myself on my sense of direction. I also prided myself on my ability to drive almost anywhere. My buying trips had taken me all over the world, and I’d found myself in pretty obscure places. I’d driven on the left and the right. Why, I’d even driven in Rome. And I was used to almost any kind of vehicle. I once rode a donkey up a steep slope to get to a village that had particularly lovely weavings. How difficult could this be?

As the saying goes, pride goeth before a fall.

I mapped out a route that took me to a place called Siggiewi, then Zebbug, to Attard, then Balzan, then on to the University. But I ended up on the road to someplace called Rabat. Cars roared past me on both the passing lane and on the inside shoulder; I dodged donkey carts and potholes the size of craters on the moon; I passed through towns that reminded me of illustrations in my childhood book of Bible stories; I whizzed around roundabouts; and I got totally, utterly, irretrievably lost.

I also learned that second gear is a really important feature in a car. Without it I either had to go very slowly, or speed along in third. Stalling was only a hairsbreadth away at any given time. I listened enviously to the sound of more fortunate drivers gearing smoothly up or down. I became obsessed with not slowing down.

Finally I got on a relatively well-kept road that unfortunately headed in the wrong direction, toward the aforementioned Rabat and something called Verdala Palace, which if I remembered Anthony’s lecture was built by his idol, Gerolamo Cassar. That meant, at least I thought it did, that I was headed west, not north, but my innate sense of direction had totally deserted me so I couldn’t be sure. I could only hope it would lead to something headed north, or at least a place name I recognized.

As I moved along this road, I overtook a car moving relatively slowly. There was an approaching truck, but it was still quite far away, and rather than slow down, I decided to go for it and pass the other vehicle. I floored it, roared past, then pulled quickly in front of the other car, in a way that, if I’m being honest, I would have to consider rather rude, if not a bit reckless.

I glanced guiltily at the driver as I passed the car. He was looking at me too. We were both surprised to see each other. It was the Great White Hunter yet again, and he was not pleased to see me.

Normally I think I would have found this a funny coincidence, but now, with the business with the brakes, there was an edge of menace to it, not the least because of what happened next. When the oncoming truck passed us, he geared down, then passed me much too closely, pulling in so tightly that I had to slam on the brakes, which mercifully worked in a manner of speaking. The car started to skid, and for a few seconds I thought I’d lost control of it, but I was able to pull over to the side of the road, where I sat for a few minutes listening intently to my heart pound. The Great White Hunter I couldn’t see for dust.

It took me a few minutes to stop shaking. I kept telling myself I sort of deserved it, what with my rush past him. But to be forced off the road? I could hardly believe what had happened.

While I sat there, a man on an aged bicycle pedaled by, and I flagged him down. He was a pleasant person who gave me new directions, briefly explaining the intricacies of navigating around Malta: which is to say, road signs, where they exist, are only relative. One gets a general sense of the direction one is going, then sticks to it, ignoring signs for towns and sites along the way.

It was good advice and I managed to find the University, then most fortuitously a place to park. I got out, pulled up the window on the passenger side which had done its trick of falling down into the door at the first roundabout I encountered, then eyed the car. I sincerely hoped I would not return to find it minus several critical body parts. A young boy offered to watch the car for me—such a nice car, he said—for a small fee of course. I paid him on the spot, walked into the hall, flinging myself—there is no other word to describe my hasty and inelegant entrance—into the seat that Sophia and Anthony had saved for me just as the speaker mounted the platform and moved to the podium.

“Who will speak for the Goddess?”
she began, a tall, big-boned woman with wispy, greying hair, owlish glasses, a less than stylish print dress, and what my mother would call sensible shoes. Not that my mother would be caught dead wearing sensible shoes herself, mind you.

The lights in the hall dimmed, then were extinguished, a single reading lamp on the podium the only light in the room, casting eerie shadows on the wall behind the speaker as she spoke.