We had come to the riverbank, where the Muskoka River ran swift and black in front of us. Peggy had walked to her left, upstream and under a series of high bridges that criss-crossed the river at the waterfall. The sinking sun caught Peggy’s silhouette as she traced the edge of the stream back to the falls, which could now be heard more and more clearly.
“She’s lovely, isn’t she?” Hamp Fisher said out loud.
I wasn’t sure whether it was meant for my ears or not. I took a chance: “Yes, I’ve always thought so.”
FIFTEEN
Sunday
For the rest of the weekend, I was content with my view of Lake Muskoka from the hammock at Norchris Lodge. I finished reading the Dermot Keogh biography, which left me with a clearer notion of the man. It reminded me that if I wanted to know more about him, I could catch his posthumous doings on the Internet. I made a mental note. In the hammock with my toes lined up against the view of pines and birches, that seemed like enough work for one day.
In front of the fireplace in the lodge on Sunday evening, I had been reading up on the history of Muskoka, the Muskoka Lakes, the summer cottages of the Lakes. There was a book about poisonous mushrooms that tempted me. I saw myself becoming the only private investigator in the Niagara Peninsula who could detect mushroom poisoning. Norma invited me to look into the photo albums for pictures of summers gone by. Judging by the smiling faces, I’d been misspending my summers for some decades. Norma told me that Chris, her husband, was on a fishing trip with his brother. When I’d finished with the albums, I returned to the mushrooms. By the time I was ready to go to sleep I could tell an Amanita phalloides from an Amanita verna. It’s a start.
Monday
I heard the city beckoning. I knew that should Vanessa return from Los Angeles early, she would expect to find me on hand to defend her against sudden death in whatever form it took. While thanking the McArthurs and paying for my short stay at Norchris Lodge, I got directions to the hospital in Bracebridge. I headed there after a bite of breakfast in town at a Chinese-Canadian restaurant, where I tried to memorize the creatures of the Chinese zodiac from a paper placemat.
The hospital was small, but busy. Orderlies, nurses and doctors were running through the halls as though they were on film that was being played at the wrong speed. The calm centre in all this was a woman in a crocheted sweater behind a glass marked “Information.”
“Why is everyone running around this morning?” I asked. “Has there been a big accident on the highway?”
“Welcome to the New Ontario,” she said with a mock grin. “We practise no-frills medicine these days. What may I help you with?” I told her and she looked up the room number. “Mr. Patel’s a pet,” she added. “Doesn’t get many visitors since Alma died.”
“His wife?” Then I remembered.
“Alma tried, but Ed could never see anyone after Lilly passed on. Alma ran his office and bought his neckties. Down the hall to your left and then turn right beside the stairs.”
I followed these instructions to the letter and came out in a small cafeteria. Reversing engines, I got back to the main corridor and asked an orderly for the room I wanted. This time I ended up in a new wing that had been attached to the main building as an afterthought. I walked past the nursing station and entered the small room, trying to decide which of the four men in the room was Ed Patel. I decided that the grey-faced skeletal figure by the window was the best candidate. The name, posted in masking tape to the wall behind him, confirmed my diagnosis. He was dozing over a copy of National Geographic balanced on his blue hospital gown. I saw that it was open to a picture of Lawrence of Arabia dressed in his flowing Arab costume. Ed Patel opened one eye and stared at me. Then his other eye opened, and they both examined me for a full thirty seconds. The magazine slipped from his chest to the edge of the bed and then to the floor.
“I haven’t seen you before,” he said. “Which agency sent you? Are you Community Care or Centra? I told them I can’t go home yet. My house’s been sold and the apartment’s still unfurnished.”
“I’m not from any agency, Mr. Patel. I’m just a visitor.”
“What church sent you? I don’t hold with churches nowadays. I’ve tried them all.”
“I’m a friend of Vanessa Moss, whom you probably know as-”
“I know, I know, I know. Is Stella at the cottage?”
“No, she’s in Los Angeles. She asked me to see how you’re getting on,” I lied.
“Well, that won’t take long. They keep telling me that my time here’s run out; they want to move me, but I can’t see how they can do that with all of these tubes running in and out of me.”
I couldn’t argue with that. He didn’t look as though he would ever travel again. His brown skin was as grey as death itself. I didn’t want him to read that in my face, so I stooped and retrieved the magazine. I put it down on the moveable table that straddled the bed.
He glanced at the magazine cover. “I once went to visit his house at Clouds Hill in Devon,” he said.
“Whose house?”
“Lawrence’s, of course. Tiny, nearly windowless place, hardly room to feed visitors. He sat the G.B. Shaws outside and fed them alfresco. Fed all his visitors that way. Okay for Shaw and Charlotte: they could munch on carrots. But what about Churchill? I can’t see him putting up with the muck Lawrence lived on. Lawrence couldn’t stand the smell of cooking. He sustained life on tinned fish, I think. But the Shaws knew better than to expect a banquet. I met the lad-one of the lads-he died trying to save, you know.”
I tried to show some interest. As he talked, he was rubbing his blanket between his thumb and forefinger. Perhaps there was a lurking memory of real blanket fuzz. He wouldn’t find any in these blankets. Ed Patel continued with his story: “There were two of them, on bikes, riding abreast even though they were told not to. Lawrence came on them as he reached the top of a hill and ran his Brough off the road to avoid hitting them. Saved their lives at the cost of his own. He lingered for nearly a week, never regained consciousness. That’s the way to go, eh?”
“I guess it is,” I said lamely.
“Not like this with all these pipes and tubes showing what’s not working inside.”
“Is there anything I can get you?”
“I don’t suppose you have a copy of The Seven Pillars with you? Or even Revolt in the Desert, I reckon. Oh, well. What about a Perry Mason mystery? There aren’t many of them I haven’t read. But now my memory’s so poor, I can read them all over again. What did you really come for? I won’t remember your name, most likely, but you might tell me just to humour me.”
I did that, and he nodded while trying to boot his memory to receive and store the information.
“Is Stella in trouble? What can I do?”
“She thinks that there might be somebody trying to kill her,” I said.
“And she’s made a heap of enemies at that city job of hers.”
“You don’t miss much.”
“I’ve got the mentality of a small-town lawyer because that’s what I am. In other words, I’m a snoop. But I’m getting behind. I used to enjoy being in the thick of things. I once had four federal cabinet ministers at my dining-room table. Bet you don’t believe that. It wasn’t planned, it just turned out that way. My cottage was always like that, especially when Lilly was alive. Everybody loved Lilly.” He seemed to drift into a reverie, thinking of the absent Lilly, and I let him.
“Stella’s dad and I were fishing buddies. Saved my life at least twice. Both times in fast water.”
“What do you know about Dermot Keogh?” I asked. He blinked at the change of subject.
“Fine gentleman. A bit wild, maybe, but solid, if you know what I mean. He could separate the serious from the frivolous when he had to.”