Verdict in Blood (11 page)

Right on cue, the front door opened, and the kids barrelled in, with Hilda behind them.

“How did it go?” Sylvie asked.

Jess went over to his mother. “You know those feathers owls have around their eyes?” Sylvie nodded.

“They help owls hear,” Jess said.

“How do they do that?” Sylvie asked.

Jess tweaked his own ear. “See this?” he said. “It catches the sounds and sends it inside our ears so we can hear. The owls’ ears are right behind those feathers.”

Taylor came over to me. “Could Jess stay over? It’s not for fun,” she said earnestly. “We need to work.”

“Sorry, T,” I said, “the owls will have to wait. We already have an overnight guest. Eli’s staying here tonight, and he could use a little peace right now.” I put my arm around her shoulder. “It gets pretty noisy around here when you and Jess are working on a project.”

Sylvie smiled. “I don’t mind a little excitement. If it’s all right with you, Joanne, the kids can work at our house tonight.”

Taylor’s eyes were pleading. “Can I?”

“Sure,” I said.

Taylor laid her head against my arm and lowered her voice. “After I go, make sure Eli goes to the studio to see the dragon-boat picture I made for him.”

“He’s right out back,” I said. “Why don’t you take him there now?”

She shook her head. “If I’m there, Eli won’t be able to really look.” She frowned. “Do you know what I mean?”

“Yes,” I said, “I know what you mean, and I think you’re right. I’ll make sure Eli sees the painting.”

After Sylvie left with the children, I fixed myself a gin and tonic and went up to my room to read. There was a new biography of the prime minister. The blurb on the jacket promised a Jungian exploration of the dark corners of his psyche. I had just about decided the
PM
was that rarest of beings, a man without a Shadow, when Hilda knocked on the door. She was wearing her dazzling poppy-red Chinese robe.

“I’m going to make an early night of it, Joanne,” she said. “It’s been a long day, and Justine’s funeral is at ten.” She leaned against the doorframe as if she were suddenly weary. “The last funeral I attended was for Frank,” she said softly.

“Hilda, would you like me to go with you tomorrow morning?”

“But your Saturday mornings are so busy.”

“There’s nothing that can’t be put off till later except for Taylor’s lesson, and Angus can drive her to that.”

“It would be good not to have to go alone,” she said. “And not just because tomorrow’s service will be painful. Joanne, you were right about the currents a murder sets loose. Sometimes this week, I’ve felt as if I were about to be swept away.”

“Then let me be your anchor,” I said. “You’ve been mine often enough.”

In all the time I’d known her, Hilda had never made a physical display of affection, but she came over, bent down, and kissed the top of my head. “I hope you know how much I cherish your friendship,” she said.

When I went downstairs to say goodnight to the boys, Eli was sitting at the kitchen doing a crossword puzzle. Angus was nowhere in sight.

I touched Eli’s shoulder. “Where’s your goofy friend?” I asked.

Eli gave me a small smile. “He went to Blockbuster to rent a movie.”

“You didn’t want to go with him?”

“No. I thought I’d just stay here.”

I pulled out the chair next to his and sat down. “Feeling a little shaky?”

He gazed at me. His eyes were extraordinary – of a brown so dark they were almost black. “More than a little shaky.”

“Taylor left a gift for you that might help,” I said. “It’s out in her studio.”

“What is it?” he asked.

“A surprise,” I said, “but in my opinion, a terrific one. Why don’t you go out and have a look while I call Mieka and Greg and see if that baby of theirs is any closer to joining the world.”

He started towards the door, then he stopped and turned. “Are you looking forward to being a
Kokom?”
he said.

“Yes,” I said. “I really am. I like kids. It’ll be fun to have a new one around.”

“I hope everything works out okay,” he said.

“Thanks, Eli, so do I.”

My older daughter answered the phone in a voice that was uncharacteristically gloomy.

“I guess I don’t need to ask you how it’s going,” I said.

“It’s not going at all,” she said. “I followed your advice about the Chinese food, and we’ve already scarfed our way through the whole menu at the Golden Dragon; I painted the kitchen ceiling; Greg’s lost seven pounds from all the long walks we’ve been taking; and here I sit, still pregnant, barefoot, bored, and in the kitchen.”

“Try to enjoy the moment,” I said. “When the baby comes, all that peace and quiet is going to look pretty good.”

As soon as I replaced the receiver, the day caught up with me. I decided to follow Hilda’s lead and turn in early. I had an extra-long shower, dusted myself with last year’s birthday bathpowder, put on a fresh nightie, and headed for bed. When I came out of the bathroom, Angus was sitting on my bed.

“Thanks for knocking.”

“I did knock. You were in the shower, remember?”

“Sorry. I was just talking to your sister, and I guess I’m a little on edge.”

“Still no baby?”

“No. It looks like your niece or nephew has decided to arrive on Mieka time.”

My son grinned. “Late. Late for everything.” He stood up. “Actually, what I came up for was to find out if you knew where Eli went.”

“Isn’t he downstairs?”

“Nope. I called and he didn’t answer.”

“He’s probably still out in the studio. Taylor wanted me to give him the dragon-boat picture. She noticed he wasn’t having a very easy time lately.”

Angus shook his head in amazement. “Most of the time she’s such a space-case, but every so often she tunes in.”

“When T comes home tomorrow morning, I’ll pass along your compliment.”

I’d just crawled between the sheets and was reaching to turn out the light when I heard my son racing up the stairs. He burst into the room.

“Mum, something’s the matter with Eli.”

I sat up. “What do you mean?”

“Just come and see him, please.” Angus’s voice was tense.

I grabbed my robe and followed my son downstairs.

“He’s out in Taylor’s studio,” Angus said.

When I opened the door, the breath caught in my throat. On the easel in front of me was the painting Taylor had
made as a gift for Eli. Once every centimetre of that canvas had danced with colour. Eli’s painting of the black horse had obscured the brilliance. The lines of the animal’s body were graceful, but the place where its head should have been was a jagged edge, clotted and sticky with paint bright as fresh blood. The animal’s head was in the right lower quadrant of the canvas. Tongue lolling, eyes bulging, it was obvious the animal had died in terror. Eli himself lay in the far corner of the room; he was curled into the foetal position and moaning.

My son’s voice was a whisper. “What’s happening, Mum?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “Go upstairs and get my purse. There’s a card inside with Eli’s doctor’s number on it. Call him and tell him we need to see him. Be sure he understands it’s an emergency.”

I took Eli in my arms and began to rock him like a baby. When Angus came back after making the call, I was still holding him.

“Dr. Kasperski’s coming right over,” Angus said. He bent closer to Eli and called his name.

When Eli didn’t respond, I saw the panic in my son’s eyes. “Why don’t you go upstairs so you can watch for the doctor,” I said. I tried to make my voice sound reassuring, but I was as scared as Angus was.

Less than ten minutes passed before I heard the doorbell, but it was a long ten minutes. Over the years, my own kids had had their share of broken bones, sprains, crises, and disappointments, and I had cradled them in my arms as I was cradling Eli. But after I had held them for a while, my kids had always responded. I had been able to feel them come back from the place of pain into which accident or misfortune had hurled them. Eli wasn’t coming back. He didn’t appear to be hurt physically, but his body was rigid. No matter what I did, I couldn’t reach him, and I was relieved
beyond measure that someone who might be able to was on his way over.

When Angus came through the door, my first thought was that the young man with him was far too young to be a medical doctor. Dan Kasperski’s body was as lithe as an adolescent’s, and he was wearing the teenaged boy’s uniform of choice that summer: cut-off jeans, a rock-and-roll shirt, and sandals. He was deeply tanned, and his hair was black, curly, and shiny. He seemed to radiate energy. Without preamble, he knelt beside me, and reached out and stroked Eli’s forehead.

“Eli, it’s Dan,” he said firmly. “I need you to help me find out what went wrong here.”

At the sound of Dan Kasperski’s voice, Eli’s body relaxed and he opened his eyes. Kasperski slid his arm under Eli’s body and raised him to a sitting position. “Let’s talk,” he said.

“Would you like to go upstairs?” I said. “Eli’s bed’s already made up for him. He might be more comfortable.”

Dan Kasperski leaned close to Eli’s face. “What do you say, my friend?”

When Eli nodded, Dan Kasperski helped him to his feet, and I led them upstairs to my older son Peter’s room. As I closed the door behind me, I could hear Dan Kasperski’s voice, soft and persuasive. “It must have been a terrible thing to have made you so angry. Can you tell me about it?”

I decided not to call Alex until I’d had a chance to hear what Dr. Kasperski had to say. When I went back downstairs, Angus was sitting in the dark in the living room.

As soon as he heard my step, he jumped up. “What happened to him?”

I slid my arm around my son’s waist. “That’s what Dr. Kasperski’s trying to find out.”

“Did Eli say anything?”

“Not while I was there.”

“Why would he wreck Taylor’s painting, Mum? It was a present for him.”

“I don’t know. I guess he was just angry and confused.”

“Is that what we’re going to tell Taylor?”

I let my hand fall away from him. “Angus, I don’t know what we’re going to tell Taylor. And you might as well stop asking me questions because I don’t have any answers.”

“Mum, I don’t mean to keep bugging you, but Eli isn’t the only one who’s confused.”

“Angus, I’m sorry. It’s just …” My voice broke. “Everything’s too much.”

For a moment, we stood together miserably. It was my son who broke the silence. “Do you want me to dig out the cards? We could play a game of crib while we’re waiting.” His voice sounded the way it had when he was little and wanted the reassurance of one more story before lights out.

“You’re on,” I said. “Loser has to walk Rose on the day of the first blizzard.”

We were just starting what looked like the final hand when Dan Kasperski came downstairs. He leaned over and glanced assessingly at Angus’s cards. “If your mother’s playing for money, she’d better start collecting pop bottles.” Then he looked at me. “I gave Eli something to help him sleep. He’s down for the count, but you should get in touch with his uncle.”

“I will,” I said. “There’s a flight back from Saskatoon in about half an hour. He can catch that.”

“Good. Ask him to have Eli in my office by eight tomorrow morning. We need to get him working on this as soon as possible.” For a moment he was silent, then he looked at my son and me. “Do either of you have any idea at all what went wrong here?”

Angus shook his head. “No, I thought everything was great.”

“So did I,” I said. “We had a pleasant dinner. Eli said he felt a little edgy, but he seemed fine. My daughter’s an artist. She’d painted a picture for Eli – as a kind of welcome-home gift for him. She thought it would be easier for him to see the painting for the first time without the rest of us around. Anyway, Angus had gone to rent a movie, so I suggested to Eli that he might want to go out to the studio to have a look at Taylor’s gift. When Angus got back, he found Eli the way he was when you saw him.”

“Nothing happened …”

“Nothing ever
does
happen,” I said, and I could hear the frustration in my voice. “At least not anything concrete. He just explodes. Dr. Kasperski, I know there’s no magic bullet here, but surely you can do something to get to the source of Eli’s problems.”

Daniel Kasperski cocked an eyebrow. “Eli and I
are
doing something. We’re talking, remembering, reconstructing. It takes time, Mrs. Kilbourn.”

“But don’t some doctors use sodium pentothol or hypnosis to help them home in on what went wrong in the first place?”

He shrugged. “Some do. I don’t. Mrs. Kilbourn, think about it for a moment. Does it make sense to force a person as fragile as Eli to confront memories that are so powerful he’s using every ounce of energy he has to suppress them? I know this way takes longer, but when Eli finally does face his demons, I want him to be strong enough to stare them down.” He glanced at his watch. “I should be moving along,” he said, “but before I go, could I have another look at that painting? When I was in your daughter’s studio before, I was pretty much focused on Eli.”

Angus shot me an anxious look. “Do I have to go out there again?”

“No,” I said. “Why don’t you try to grab some sleep?” I turned to Dan Kasperski. “Follow me, but there isn’t much left to see.”

Dan Kasperski’s face was grim as he gazed at the canvas. “What did it used to be?” he asked finally.

“We were at the dragon-boat races Saturday,” I said. “That was a picture of Eli and my kids watching the finish line.”

“Does Eli like your daughter?”

“I thought he did.”

Dan Kasperski continued to stare at the picture. Finally, he turned to me. “Can I take this with me? Signe Rayner might want to use it somehow in her therapy.”

I felt a tremendous sense of letdown. “But I thought that you were Eli’s doctor now,” I said, and I was embarrassed at how forlorn I sounded.

He turned to me. “No matter how much I want to help Eli, Mrs. Kilbourn, he is not my patient. Signe Rayner is treating him. I’m just her surrogate.”

I handed him the painting. “From the way Eli reacted to you tonight, I think he sees you as more than a surrogate.”