“Did you see her last night, at the party?” Beauvoir handed Ruth the photograph of the dead woman. She studied it then handed it back.
“Nope.”
“What was the party like?”
“The barbeque? Too many people. Too much noise.”
“But free booze,” said Beauvoir.
“It was free? Merde. I didn’t have to sneak it after all. Still, more fun to steal it.”
“Nothing strange happened? No arguments, no raised voices? All that drinking and no one got belligerent?”
“Drinking? Lead to belligerence? Where’d you get that idea, numb nuts?”
“Absolutely nothing unusual happened last night?”
“Not that I saw.” Ruth tore off another piece of bread and tossed it at a fat robin. “I’m sorry about your separation. Do you love her?”
“My wife?” Beauvoir wondered what prompted Ruth to ask. Was it caring or simply no sense of personal boundaries? “I think—”
“No, not your wife. The other one. The plain one.”
Beauvoir felt his heart spasm and the blood pour from his face.
“You’re drunk,” he said, getting to his feet.
“And belligerent,” she said. “But I’m also right. I saw how you looked at her. And I think I know who she is. You’re in trouble, young Mr. Beauvoir.”
“You know nothing.”
He walked away. Trying not to break into a run. Willing himself to stay slow, steady. Left, right. Left, right.
Ahead he could see the bridge, and the Incident Room beyond. Where he’d be safe.
But young Mr. Beauvoir was beginning to appreciate something.
There was no such place as “safe.” Not anymore.
* * *
“Did you read this?” Clara asked, putting her empty beer glass on the table and handing the Ottawa Star over to Myrna. “The Star hated the show.”
“You’re kidding.” Myrna took the paper and scanned it. It was, she had to admit, not a glowing review.
“What was it they called me?” demanded Clara, sitting on the arm of Myrna’s easy chair. “Here it is.” Clara jabbed a finger and poked the newspaper. “Clara Morrow is an old and tired parrot mimicking actual artists.”
Myrna laughed.
“You find that funny?” Clara asked.
“You’re not actually taking that comment seriously?”
“Why not? If I take the good ones seriously don’t I have to take the bad too?”
“But look at them,” said Myrna, waving to the papers on the coffee table. “The London Times, the New York Times, Le Devoir, all agree your art is new and exciting. Brilliant.”
“I hear the critic from Le Monde was there but he didn’t even bother to write a review.”
Myrna stared at her friend. “I’m sure he will, and he’ll agree with everyone else. The show’s a massive success.”
“Her art, while nice, was neither visionary nor bold,” Clara read over Myrna’s shoulder. “They don’t think it’s a massive success.”
“It’s the Ottawa Star, for God’s sake,” said Myrna. “Someone was bound to dislike it, thank heaven it was them.”
Clara looked at the review then smiled. “You’re right.”
She walked back to her chair in the bookshop. “Did anyone ever tell you that artists are nuts?”
“First I’ve heard of it.”
Out the window Myrna watched as Ruth pelted birds with hunks of bread. At the crest of the hill she saw Dominique Gilbert heading back to her barn, riding what looked like a moose. Outside the bistro, on the terrasse, Gabri was sitting at a customer’s table, eating her dessert.
Not for the first time Three Pines struck Myrna as the equivalent of the Humane Society. Taking in the wounded, the unwanted. The mad, the sore.
This was a shelter. Though, clearly, not a no-kill shelter.
* * *
Dominique Gilbert curried Buttercup’s rump. Around and around her hand went. It always reminded her of the scene in The Karate Kid. Wax goes on. Wax goes off. But instead of a shammy, this was a brush, and instead of a car, this was a horse. Sort of.
Buttercup was in the alley of the barn, outside his stall. Chester was watching this, doing his little dance as though he had a mariachi band in his head. Macaroni was in the field, having already been groomed, and was now rolling in the mud.
As she rubbed the caked and dried dirt off the huge horse, Dominique noticed the scabs, the scars, the patches of skin that would never grow horse hair, so deep were the wounds.