All Saints (22 page)

 

AP—Notorious child-killer Alice Vipond is dead at the age of 89. She died peacefully in her bed Sunday night at the Philomena Blanding Institute for the Criminally Insane, where she had spent most of her life.

 

Alice Vipond was born in Toronto in 1922, the only child of Doris and Frederick Vipond. She attended Normal School and taught grade two for fifteen years at Claredale Public School, now the site of Claredale Condominiums.

 

On October 19, 1957, Alice Vipond murdered her entire grade two class by serving them lemonade laced with foxglove, the source of digitalis. There was one survivor, Peter Aspinall, who was absent from school that day. Mr. Aspinall, an instructor at Breadalbane College, was not available for comment.

 

Alice Vipond was found not guilty by reason of insanity. She was incarcerated in the Philomena Blanding Institute, where for her own protection she was kept under heavy surveillance.

 

Out of respect for any surviving members of the families of the murdered children, Corrections Canada has mandated that there will be no memorial service for Alice Vipond, and that her gravesite will be unmarked.

 

Too soon, Simon stops walking and says, “Here we are.”

The church has just appeared out of nowhere. They were going past the grounds of a big new condo building, presentation centre modelled after the Parthenon, when all at once there was this little brown—thing.

“I know,” Simon smiles at Pete's expression. “Not the greatest example of Anglican church architecture. First time I saw it, I thought somebody had slapped a bell tower on top of a garage.”

Pete stands looking at the recessed entrance, fists balled in his pockets. He still doesn't know what he was doing, stopping and waiting for Simon to notice he was gone. The priest had turned, seen him and just stood, his expression neutral. After what was probably less than a minute but felt like ten, Pete had shrugged and closed the distance between them.

Simon had made no reference to the incident, had kept the talk light as they walked along. So Pete was retired from teaching high school?
Yes.
How long?
Five years.
But he still keeps his hand in, teaching courses? Like the one Ruth took? At the college?
That's right.

Listening to himself, his terse replies, Pete had wanted to slap his own face.

“You know,” Simon begins, “a lot of people have associations with churches that aren't great. I've had folks phone me and ask if they can talk to me in a library or on a park bench. Anyplace but
in there.
” When Pete says nothing, he adds, “And this collar does come off.” He pulls his dickey away from his neck and tucks it inside his jacket. “I only wore it so you would recognize me in the coffee—”

“It's not about the church. Or your collar. It's—I'm sorry. I don't know what it is. So can we just—” He gestures toward the door.

“Sure. Did you bring your report card?”

Pete pats his lapel. “I've got it here.”

“And I've got the letters. So. Here we go.” Simon leads Pete down a laneway to a smaller entrance. “I'm going to take you up to my office. I'd rather do this in the sanctuary, but we have to be careful.”

 

At some point during the six weeks between reading Simon's letter and talking to him on the phone, Pete decided he was having a breakdown.

It didn't feel like something he was allowed to have. Nervous breakdowns were for grown-ups, and Pete had given up on ever thinking of himself as one of those. He knew how to pass for one. He went about his day like a mature person, a citizen, a taxpayer. But he felt like a fraud. Not qualified to do something as grown-up as breaking down.

It was easy to deny it at first. He always went a bit strange in October. Touch of depression. Stomach upset. Trouble sleeping. And the Brian dream, of course. Stir in the news of Alice Vipond's death and things were bound to be a little turbulent for a while. But Alice had been in her grave, wherever that was, for weeks. And the anniversary of the crime had come and gone. Things should have settled down by now.

So he reminded himself that he had had a lot of stress, what with moving into his present living space just a few months ago and Jean divorcing him last year. He still thought of both things in those terms. His present living space
.
And the divorce as something Jean had done all by herself.

She had engaged one of her colleagues as their lawyer—a man who kept complimenting the two of them on the most easy and amicable divorce of his career. And she had moved Pete's stuff into their guest room so he could stay in the house while he was looking for an apartment. Then, when he found one, she had all but organized his move for him.

Pete was used to things being taken out of his hands. He must have proposed to Jean, but couldn't remember doing it. What he did remember was her arranging the marriage. Lining it up. Facilitating it, the way she would a corporate merger—all very much to his advantage, as he surely could not fail to see. The teaching thing—that's how she had referred to his career—wouldn't have to be forever. He could even quit right away if he wanted. Start seeing agents. Become the actor they both knew he wanted to be.

She never said so, but Pete knew Jean was embarrassed to be married to a man who taught high school. She wanted him to have a name and a face that her colleagues might recognize. At the very least, she wanted him to be a little strange and interesting—someone she could show off at company gatherings like an exotic pet.

That was hindsight talking. At the time, Pete had believed he wanted to be an actor instead of a high-school theatre arts teacher the way he had believed he wanted to marry Jean. And when the schools started to downsize, he looked forward to being offered a retirement package. He was two years away from the requisite length of service. All he had to do was hang in. Pray they wouldn't pick him off early. For the first time in his career, he wished he was teaching something like math or science—something people thought of as hard and necessary.

But in the end, it was all taken out of his hands.

 

Mr. Aspinall? Do you think there's any point—Like—I mean, it's probably a stupid idea.
Long pause. Then, in a rush—
Yale Drama School?

Brendan. Not a child. Seventeen. But not quite an adult, either. Brilliant young actor. Not beautiful. Bumpy nose, bit of an underbite. But a voice. And a body.

They filled out the Yale application together, Simon correcting Brendan's spelling and writing a letter of recommendation. Then the audition—the boy flew down with his mother. Then the wait. Then that day.

Running steps behind him.
Mr. Aspinall! Mr. Aspinall!
Pete turned. Saw the boy's tears. Prepared to be strong. Calm. The teacher, who would help his student find something to learn from this disappointment.

They want me! I'm in!

He didn't have time. The boy-man was on him. Arms wrapping his shoulders. Spiky hair tickling his throat. Chest, damp through the T-shirt, heaving against his. Then the kiss. Not on the mouth, of course. More like the way he would have kissed his father. But.

There had been nothing before that. No dreams. No crushes on other men, not even when he was a student. And he was married. To a woman. And they had sex. Not a lot, and not fabulous, but often enough and good enough.

“That's wonderful news, Brendan.” Gently disengaging himself. Pitching his voice, arranging his mask into teacher mode—kind but not too friendly. Praying the kid would not glance down at the erection he had miraculously missed feeling. “Let's take a look at that acceptance letter.”

 

He told Jean he couldn't do another two years. He was burned out. And the package wouldn't be that much smaller anyway. Then he burst into ridiculous tears at the exit interview, was handed a box of Kleenex and assured that lots of people cried. Retirement was a big step, after all. Even when it was exactly what you wanted.

Obedient to Jean, he made the rounds of agents. Found Sally, who had been in first year university when he was in fourth, and had seen him play Laertes.
You should have been Hamlet, Pete. I remember thinking that.
He refrained from saying, No, I should have been a teacher. I should still be a teacher.

Sally sent him out on auditions for TV, film, stage, voice work.
You're perfect, Pete. You look great, and you're at the age when men start being very rare in this business, and very valuable.
He started to get jobs. A few TV commercials. A one-line film role. A couple of parts in plays in small theatres.
It'll take a couple of years to sell you, Pete. But once you're in, you'll be in like Flynn.

For the first time, he felt that Jean respected him. He had always assumed that she loved him, but in a rueful,
oh well, what can you do
kind of way. As if he were some sort of lovable nincompoop. Now she was shy around him. Even a little frightened. Not long after being taken on by the agency, he had requested separate beds. Used his bad back as an excuse.

Sometimes he thought about Brendan. What had that been about? Why had he panicked and run? He hadn't done anything wrong. And it wasn't as if he couldn't trust himself to keep his hands off the boy. Off the boys who would have come after him. Sometimes Brendan did show up in his dreams. But when he did he was more like Brian. Brendan/Brian and Peter. Two little guys playing together.

It was just a matter of time before he started scribbling lists of figures on foolscap. Estimates of monthly expenses. Food. Rent. Separate insurance. And it was just a matter of time before he started leaving those sheets of foolscap lying around where Jean was bound to see them.

Once he had scraped together enough credits to get his Equity and Actra cards, he quit the agency. (
But you were just hitting your stride, Pete!
Sally, wailing.
You were starting to get known! Saleable!
) He applied for and got a part-time teaching position at Breadalbane Community College. Two regular classes, plus some continuing ed work in the evenings. With his high-school teacher's pension, it would be enough to keep him.

 

“This is the story of Pete.”

It was an exercise he used to give his high-school students. Tell the story of your life as if you were talking about somebody else. Act bits of it out. Story theatre.

He missed theatre games. His students at the college were more focussed than the high-school kids had been. They were either there to craft a career, full of questions about technique and the business end of things, or they were retirees, taking an acting course to make friends, perk up their marriages, whatever. He missed the younger kids, missed playing with them. Yes, he had been their teacher—but a teacher who sat on the floor and mimed peeling an orange.

Now he sat on the couch, resting his scotch on the arm. Addressing a non-existent audience.

“When Pete was in Grade Two, Grade Two disappeared. No more teacher. No more classmates. Yellow sticky tape criss-crossing the door of his classroom. So where could Pete go to school?”

He got up from the couch, grabbing his scotch as it sloshed. Was that his second? Already?

“At first, they gave Pete a desk at the back of the Grade One classroom.”

He went and sat on a dining-room chair, heels tucked up on a rung, looking down at the floor as a giant would look down on a tiny village.

“But the desk was too small for him and it made him feel big and stupid, as if he had to do Grade One all over again, even though the teacher visited him back there now and then to give him Grade Two work to do.”

He unfolded himself from the dining-room chair and went and flopped down in his big armchair, clutching his scotch.

“So then, for a while, they put Pete in a desk at the front of the Grade Three classroom.”

He looked fearfully up and all around, like a mouse on the floor.

“But the desk was too big, and all the kids sitting behind him were big kids and he couldn't understand the work they were doing and he cried, even though the teacher told him he didn't have to do it, and that when she had a moment she would help him with his Grade Two work.”

He slumped back in the armchair. Jesus Christ. It was his third scotch, matter of fact. Is this the story of Pete? Divorced. Retired high-school teacher. College instructor by way of aborted acting career. Getting drunk every night. Playing theatre games by himself. In his present living
space.

 

By the time Simon's letter arrived, there were still no pictures on the walls. He hadn't unpacked the pictures. Or much of anything else. Months after the move, he was still edging his way around stacks of sealed brown cartons. They had a curiously Soviet look—identical save for the stickers with Jean's impatient dashings in black Magic Marker: BOOKS, AUTHORS R—T, DIPLOMAS, TOOLBOX .

When he first moved in, he had managed to excavate the sheets, towels, coffee maker, a couple of plates, some cutlery, a frying pan and a pot. Just the stuff he needed to get through the day. He had been getting through the days with that same stuff ever since.

He went to work. Taught his classes in voice and TV acting for the young pros, beginner stagecraft for the retired boomers. Drank scotch. Cooked balanced, if bland, meals for himself. (SPICE RACK was still packed with SALAD SPINNER and MUG TREE.)

Every now and then, he would approach one of the cartons with a pair of scissors gripped in his hand. Sometimes he would get as far as sliding a blade under a strip of packing tape. But then he would pull the blade free and scurry away from the box. Run to the bedroom. Shut the door. Curl up on the bed, still clutching his scissors.