7 “Hi, Pete,” Tom Radnovich began when Orsini answered his phone. “I got your message. I didn’t think it was urgent because it didn’t seem like it would make a difference.” “It does. Our captain got mad when he got the results of the arraignment and demanded a new ADA, and got one. This one’s a toughie. She’s part Albanian, too.” “It figures. What’s her name?” “Tracy Schiller.” Tom had seen the name before, though he hadn’t met her. She must be Albanian on her mother’s side, he thought. “I understand she’s already working on getting the bail revoked, and we’ll probably have another arraignment first thing Monday morning, at nine.” “I’ll be there.” Even if Megan were to spend the night with him, she would need to be back at the hotel early enough for her kid. “I’ll be briefing her this afternoon, so if you’ve got anything to add to the record, e-mail me. She’s going to serve a seven-ten-thirty-one-A notice based on what Safet told us.” “Okay, if I can think of anything.” Tom had no intention of going home again in order to log into his computer. Lindsey and Brian were waiting for him. “You’re going to bring up the Wilner tie-in?” “Yes, what you’ve given me so far.” “That should be good enough. Have a good weekend!” “You too!” You bet I will, Tom said to himself after he clicked his phone off. And then he thought of something. He had read in the previous day’s Times that just two years earlier the first transmission of a photograph by wireless phone had taken place, and that within another two years cell phones would have built-in cameras as a standard feature. How convenient will that be! he remembered thinking. Now he remembered that when Daniel Wilner’s apartment was searched for clues, a digital camera was found there, and taken into police custody. But during the original investigation no one had bothered checking it, since he had not had it with him at Old Nick’s and it was unlikely to yield any clues for the case at the time. But he may well have had it with him in Kosovo, and its memory card, if it was still in the camera, might possibly hold some pictures of KLA members. He would check it out Monday after the arraignment; all he would need to do would be to walk down the stairs of the Bronx County Criminal Court Building into the subbasement, where the property office is housed. But the camera might also have some pictures of a more private nature. When Dr. Bouchard, Wilner’s mother, had come to New York to identify the body, she had arranged to have all of Daniel’s things that were not in police custody shipped to Montreal, along with the body. Tom now wondered if she had made any arrangements for the articles that were left – computer, camera, papers. Or would that be up to Megan Kenner, the executor of Wilner’s will? He wished there were a way of clicking off the part of his mind that was on his cases, the same way that he clicked off a cell phone. He forced himself to think about what he would do with the kids. He was only a block from Karen’s place. Betty could see Marcia Berman’s eyes light up behind her glasses when, stepping out of the taxi, she saw her daughter-in-law waiting for her at the entrance to the teashop. “It’s so good to see you,” Marcia said as she put her arms around Betty. “For the first time we’ll get a chance to talk like two grown women, with no men around. No Greg, no Paul.” Marcia laughed, and Betty joined her as she was led inside. Marcia sat down at the first free table, and Betty followed suit. “You know,” Marcia went on, “it seems like you’ve always been part of our family, but first it was as Mireille’s baby, then as Daniel’s little sister and then as Paul’s girlfriend. And now here you are, almost a PhD...” “I know exactly when I became Paul’s girlfriend,” Betty said with another laugh, “to the day. But when did I change from Mireille’s baby to Daniel’s little sister?” A large pot of tea with two cups, and a bowl of cookies with two small plates were brought to their table without being ordered. It seemed to be the standard operating procedure of the place, or maybe they just knew Marcia Berman. “When you were two,” Marcia said as she poured the tea, first into Betty’s cup and then hers. “It was when Daniel and Harvey started kindergarten together. Mi... your mother would bring Daniel over and I would take them to school, and she always had you with her. That’s when Paul noticed you. He was three, and he wanted to play with you. He said, ‘I like Betty. I hate Daniel, but I like Betty.’ He was always sad when your mother took you back with her.” “Did he really say that he hated Daniel?” Betty tried a sip of her tea, but it was too hot. Marcia, she noticed, put milk and sugar into her cup and took a drink before replying. “You know Paul, how he always expresses himself so emphatically. Well, he always did, even as a little boy. Of course he didn’t really hate Daniel. But he resented him for having become Harvey’s best friend, instead of him.” “Daniel thought that Paul hated him, it seems.” “Did he tell you that?” “No, he told Megan.” “Ah, Megan... Now there’s someone that Paul actually hated.” “He did? Why?” “Well, according to what Harvey told us, she had a reputation for being easy, and he wanted to get into her pants – that was before he and you got together, of course – and she turned him down. Harvey said that she just didn’t like boys younger than her, but Paul took it personally, and he would bristle whenever her name was mentioned, which Harvey used to do on purpose, just to goad Paul.” “Paul has never bristled when I’ve mentioned her,” Betty said while reflecting on the fact, new to her, that sex seemed to have been freely discussed among the Bermans. She tried a sip of tea again, and this time it was drinkable. She took a shortbread cookie, dipped it in the tea, and munched on it between sips. “Of course he wouldn’t.” Marcia laughed. “Nothing you would say or do would ever bother Paul. He worships you. You’re lucky to have a guy like that, but he’s even luckier to have found a girl like you, so beautiful and smart and sweet. It’s funny, he was clumsy with girls, as good-looking as he is. Just the opposite of Harvey,” Marcia said with another laugh. Not quite the opposite, Betty thought; Harvey wasn’t bad-looking at all. “But about Megan,” Marcia went on, “we always thought she was a strange girl.” Betty didn’t know who was meant by we, but didn’t feel like asking. “Especially after we found out from Harvey about her career. But your mother has told us that she’s very nice, a good mother, and all that.” “She’s all that and more,” Betty said. “So you’ve known about Sam?” “Yes, your mother told us.” “But Paul didn’t know till just a few days ago, when I told him!” “Well, we just never talk about Megan when Paul’s around. Besides, Greg and Harvey thought that it would be better if Paul didn’t know.” “Megan thought so too, until just recently. It felt weird, keeping a secret from my husband.” Marcia laughed again. “I know what you mean. Greg and I try not to keep secrets from each other, even if they involve indiscretions. That way they don’t feel like cheating.” Another laugh. “You mean, you and Greg...” Betty began but didn’t quite know how to continue. “Sweetheart, life happens,” Marcia said. Betty wondered if Harvey and Paul knew about their parents’ indiscretions, but asking about it would be awkward. Asking if Marcia knew about Greg’s fling with Mireille would be even more so. “How did you and Greg meet,” she asked instead, “you being from Toronto?” “We met in Israel. I went there in nineteen-sixty-six when I finished university, and got a job at the Canadian embassy. Leon, your dad’s uncle, went there because he thought that there was a miracle doctor there who would cure his cancer. Of course he didn’t. Your father and Fela were there with him for the whole time, but when he died a bunch of his friends went there for his funeral. Greg’s firm were Leon’s lawyers, and they sent him to represent them. He needed to get Leon’s death certificate registered at the embassy, and that’s how we met.” Marcia ordered another pot of tea from the passing waitress, and the conversation went on for another twenty minutes or so, reaffirming Betty’s long-held feeling that her mother-in-law was more of a talker than a listener. Unlike my mother, Betty said to herself. Au contraire de maman, she confirmed to herself in her mother tongue. After a warm hug and a mutual promise that they would see more of each other back in Montreal, Betty walked back to the Spadina subway station. Along the way she suddenly found herself walking amid some eight or ten young men, about her age or a little older, coming out of a bar. She was used to male attention, sometimes of a boisterous nature, but these men gave her no more than bashful glances, and their mood was subdued. She gathered, from the Blue Jays caps some of them wore and the talk she overheard, that they had just seen their team lose to the Phillies. Betty liked to ski and play tennis – in the respective seasons – but spectator sports had never interested her much, and she was glad that Paul – unlike Harvey and Daniel, who were passionate soccer fans – shared her lack of interest. But this time she felt empathy with the dejection that these guys showed, quietly, not noisily as their Montreal counterparts might do. And she found herself looking at the men. She had always – at least since she was twelve – enjoyed looking at cute guys, in the same way that she might look at beautiful flowers or stately trees or handsome dogs (the quadruped kind). But this time it seemed different: she became aware of judging them by attractiveness. Not only that, but by whether they were attractive to her. It so happened that none of them were anything but borderline at best. She felt a sort of relief, but the experience made her wonder. At the station the group split up, and only two of the men went to the Bloor line platform with Betty. By then she had lost interest in them. She got off at Kipling to take the 45 bus back to Richview. Just after her a man and a woman, both in their thirties and fairly good-looking in an Anglo way – tall, blond, blue-eyed – boarded the bus and sat down across from her. They were chatting in a friendly way, but it wasn’t obvious to Betty if they were a couple; they might even have been brother and sister. She didn’t quite know why she was curious about them until she realized that she found the man attractive. More than that: she felt attracted to him. She even became aware of a stupid, juvenile thought darting through her brain: I could get him away from her, I’m prettier. Was she ready to commit what Marcia had called an indiscretion? And if she did, would she really not be cheating on Paul if she told him? She didn’t quite know when they had started, but Megan became aware of nagging doubts about her date with Tom Radnovich when two lines of thought coalesced in her mind. She wondered if it was appropriate to get casually involved with the detective who was investigating the death of someone that she had been intensely involved with. She also wondered about the efficacy of leaving Sam with Betty. There was no doubt that the boy had taken to his aunt with all his being, but he had never before been left with a babysitter, and it didn’t seem right that the first attempt at doing so, with no previous trial runs, would be for a whole evening, perhaps an extended one. Still, the prospect was a tempting one. Megan Kenner had never been one to fight temptation, and she decided that canceling the date at this point would be premature. The Fernández tax return was ready, in its sealed and stamped envelope, awaiting mailing from the airport the next day. The house was quiet. Sam was asleep and Betty was out. Megan began to pour herself a glass of sherry when the phone rang. It was Betty. “Hi, Megan. I’m on my way home...” “You mean you’re going back to Montreal and leaving all your stuff here?” Betty giggled. “No, silly, I’m just about to get off the bus and walk to your house. It’s my home for now. Is Sam awake?” “No, not yet,” Megan said while glancing at her watch. It was almost five, unusually late for him to be still asleep. The last time he had napped for so long had been in March, when he had had a cold. Could he be getting something now? A day before getting on an airplane? She went into Sam’s room. He was breathing quietly. She touched his forehead with the back of her fingers. It felt a little warm, but normal for the 27-Celsius weather that Toronto was enjoying these days. And he must have been about to wake up, because the gentle touch of his mother’s hand was enough to get his little body stirring. He opened his eyes and began to make a face as though he were about to cry, but when he saw Megan’s smiling face above him he smiled back. She felt her chest swelling with maternal love, and bent down to kiss him on both cheeks before picking him up in her arms. “Where’s ‘tie Betty?” he asked in what may have been his first grammatical sentence. “She’ll be coming soon, sweetie,” she said. “Coming soon, sweetie!” he repeated and laughed. But his mood suddenly changed again and his face took on the about-to-cry look. Could something be hurting him? “Is something hurting you?” Megan asked. “Hurting,” Sam said. “Where?” She doubted that Sam would answer her question, especially if whatever was bothering him was internal. But before he even had the opportunity to respond, the doorbell rang. “‘Tie Betty!” he exclaimed, happy once more. Betty must have forgotten, Megan thought, that in Richview – as she had told her – doors were usually left unlocked. “Come in!” she shouted. “Come in!” Sam echoed her and laughed again. Betty entered in a gushing mood. “Hi Megan! Hi Sam!” she said, and kissed them both. “Can I hold him?” she asked Megan. “He may need a diaper change,” Megan said. “After sleeping is just about the only time he does.” “Can I do it?” Betty aside. “I need to practice.” “You mean, you and Paul...” Megan began as she handed Sam to Betty. “No,” Betty said, laughing. “I mean for tomorrow, when you go out on your New York date.” “Yeah, Sex and the City,” Megan said. “What’s that?” “It’s an American TV series about women and men in New York. It just started running in Canada, on Bravo.” “You mean Bravo!” Betty said, with a rising inflection. “The exclamation mark is part of the name. Isn’t that stupid?” “Yeah,” Megan said with a chuckle. “But anyway, we can watch the second episode tonight.” “Did you see the first?” “Yeah, last Saturday. I’ll tell you about it. After you change Sam’s diaper.” “Ooh! I get a reward! Okay, tell me what to do!” In fact Megan didn’t wait for the diapering to be completed before giving Betty a synopsis of the show, but did so while interspersing instructions. Sam was uncharacteristically quiet, but took his aunt’s sometimes awkward manipulations in stride. “I don’t think it’s the kind of show that Paul would watch,” Betty said. “Fuck Paul,” she added after a pause. “Bravo!” Megan said. They laughed together. It turned out to be a good kite-flying day: mild weather – about seventy Fahrenheit – and a good wind of ten or eleven knots. Lindsey and Brian had had fun – though Brian had been sniffling to an unusual degree – and they were ready for their customary pizza at Leonardo’s. While waiting for the pizza, Tom Radnovich switched his cell phone on to check for messages. There were two, one from Karen and the other from Orsini. “I forgot to tell you,” Karen’s voice said. “Brian’s having an allergy attack and needs to take some mild antihistamine; any generic will do. Could you please get him some? Thanks.” There was a Rite Aid half a block away, and Tom went out to get the medication while the kids stayed in their booth, playing some sort of word game that he didn’t understand. Once he was on the sidewalk he played Orsini’s message. “Hi Tom, it’s Pete. Call me as soon as you get this message. There’s a major development.” There was a pause. “Lejla’s mother wants to talk.” The addendum was probably an afterthought on Orsini’s part, due to his understanding that his fellow detective would want to know what the fuck is going on. Selima Begović didn’t speak much English, so obviously Radnovich, the designated Slavic hitter of the Bronx, was needed. He had been getting bored with the Begović case, especially since the reopening of the Wilner case. He had been put on it only because he knew Serbocroat, and since no one was talking he felt useless. But now things were different: Lejla was dead, and Selima was willing to talk. He would get back to Orsini right away. In the drugstore he wondered whether to get the adult or the child dose of chlorpheniramine for Brian. He was a big kid, probably over 100 pounds by now, and if a 100-pound woman took an adult dose, why wouldn’t a 100-pound boy? On the way back to the restaurant he called Orsini, who answered the call immediately, as though standing by for it. “Listen, Tom,” he said, “Missis Begović went to the hospital to see Lejla. She was the one who called the nurse when she saw that the girl wasn’t breathing. As I understand it, the father wants nothing to do with her and doesn’t want to give her a Muslim burial. Anyway, she wants to talk to us, as soon as possible, so we figured that tomorrow afternoon would be best. It’s got to be before the Murova arraignment.” “ Who’s we?” “Me and Tracy Schiller, basically. We talked to your precinct and we know that you’ve got your kids and want to keep them as long as possible. We figured on four o’clock. How’s that?” “It should be okay. I’ll check with my ex and get back to you.” Before entering the restaurant he called Karen, briefly explained the situation to her – “some work has come up,” he said, remembering that this was precisely what had driven them apart – and got her agreement, which he immediately reported to Orsini. Lindsey and Brian didn’t seem to mind that they would be home a few hours early the next day. Both were enrolled in a summer program, and Lindsey welcomed the extra time for working on a project. After dinner he took them to his apartment for the usual Saturday-evening treat: a Western movie. He had just recently bought a DVD player – he had determined to do so once he found one under $250 – and he would inaugurate it that evening by showing a DVD of Tombstone, which he had rented for the occasion from the Blockbuster store on Third Avenue. He had acquired a taste for the Western genre when he was around ten, by watching old oaters on television. Sometimes these films would run in the middle of the night, and he and Gabe would sneak into the living room to watch them, very close to the set, with the sound turned down to barely audible. But Gabe never became the fan that Tom did. And then, at fourteen, standing in the ticket line for The Missouri Breaks, he met the almost-seventeen-year-old Ellen Daugherty from Montana, who was visiting New York for the summer. She persuaded him to see with her, in the course of the next few weeks, Buffalo Bill and the Indians and The Outlaw Josey Wales. And so she became his first girlfriend, and he became a fan of modern Westerns. He also enjoyed wearing cowboy attire – Western shirts, jeans, boots, but no hat (that would look too silly in New York) – and he would put on such an outfit for a not-too-formal date (another result of Ellen’s influence). He found that women often got turned on by his quick unsnapping of the shirt, followed by a sight of his muscular chest. Of course he would dress this way for Megan Kenner. Once the kids were in bed he would look in his closet for the appropriate shirt. Megan could see that Betty hadn’t particularly enjoyed the show, but it had made her restless. She was not surprised when, instead of talking about it, Betty got personal. “You said that you were thirteen when you first had sex,” she began. “Well, almost fourteen. It was at a Christmas party, and my birthday’s in February.” “Who was it with?” “My second cousin Joel. You know, Amy’s brother. In those days the Kenner-MacDougal clan used to have big parties, before some feuds set in. Mostly around sex,” Megan said with a laugh. “How old was he?” “Nineteen or twenty.” “That’s right,” Betty said. “I remember that Amy’s sister and brother were quite a bit older than her.” “Yeah. If you want to know more, my first four were all cousins of one degree or another, while I was still in grade eight. Once I was in grade nine, on the main campus, I started on the boys at North Am. I saved Daniel for last.” Megan laughed again, and this time Betty laughed along with her. “Did you ever do it with Harvey?” Betty asked with some hesitation. “Once, when I was in grade ten and he was in eleven. It didn’t work out too well. But then Paul tried to hit on me.” “I know. His mother just told me this afternoon. She said that you turned him down, and that’s why he hates you.” “I didn’t exactly turn him down. I just ignored him. I suppose that’s even worse.” Betty suddenly laughed. “Look at us! We’re talking about my husband and my new best friend!” “Dear Abby,” Megan said mock-seriously, “my husband hates my best friend. Do I have to choose?” Both women laughed. “Now,” Betty said after a pause, “would you like to know how I felt about the show?” “Yeah. I was wondering.” “Well, I don’t just think that Paul wouldn’t like it, I know he wouldn’t.” “What about you?” “Well, first of all I thought it was kind of silly, the idea that models are the embodiment of female beauty. I never thought of them as anything but living mannequins, maybe because in French it’s the same word. Do you think that there really are men who think of models as the most desirable women?” “Of course there are, lots of them. Look at all the movie stars and rock stars who married models: Richard Gere, Billy Joel...” “I don’t think of movie stars and rock stars as real people; they’re in a world of their own. But the world of Sex and the City also seems to be a strange world, where women talk about nothing but clothes and sex. I mean, when you and me and Kathy and Donna were chatting this morning, we talked about books and language and politics...” “And sex.” “Well, yes, about birth control, and monogamy. But on the show they don’t move from subject to subject, like real people do.” “Maybe you’re right,” Megan conceded. “But compared to the movies I used to be in, Sex and the City is the acme of realism.” They laughed. “Speaking of which,” Betty said after a lull, “now that you’re retired, have you thought of moving back to Montreal?” The question struck Megan as preposterous, and she was stunned for a moment. “Why would I do that?” “Well,” Betty said hesitantly, “it’s your hometown, and you’ve got family...” “I haven’t been close to my family in years. Toronto is my home: it’s where I have my house, my friends, my practice, my doctors... Besides, and I hope you don’t take this the wrong way, I’m an Anglo, and I want Sam to grow up as an Anglo without an inferiority complex. You see, you’re bilingual, and so was Daniel, but you guys are a special case. You got to go to an English school only because Daniel went to an English kindergarten just before Bill One-Oh-One went into effect.” “We could have gone to a bilingual school. There is one in Saint-Laurent – the only one in Quebec – but it’s Catholic.” “See what I mean? Here in Toronto there are bilingual public schools, not just English-French but also Spanish, Italian, Chinese, and I can send Sam to any one of them if I want to, regardless of ancestry. The only thing I miss about Montreal is poutine.” It was Betty’s turn to be stunned. “You’re kidding!” she said at last. “No, I love poutine. But I understand that it’s coming to Toronto. It’s going to become the national food of Canada!” “But it seems so vile! French fries with gooey crap on them!” “Have you had it?” “No, and neither has anyone that I know, except Harvey, and he’ll try anything.” “Don’t knock it till you’ve tried it.” “I guess you’re right,” Betty said sheepishly. “And it’s not the only thing I have yet to try.” They laughed again.