The Glass Coffin (23 page)

Authors: Gail Bowen

BOOK: The Glass Coffin

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“But she sent you back,” I said.

“She said that by coming to Toronto I’d linked her to Evan’s murder. And of course, she was right. She told me that I had to go to Regina, see the murder investigation through, then we could be together forever.”

“And you believed her?”

“Why wouldn’t I?”

I was exasperated. “Felix, can’t you understand what happened? Caroline manipulated you, the way she’s manipulated everyone else all these years. But this doesn’t have to be the end of it. Your life doesn’t have to end in a stranger’s living room this morning. We can get people to attest to your character. We can get experts to testify about what she’s done to you.”

The hand holding the gun relaxed, lowering it so the muzzle pointed at the floor. Relief washed over me.

“And you really would help?” Felix said.

“I would. Jill would. So would everyone. Please. Just put down the gun, and let me get Dan Kasperski in here, so you can talk to a professional.”

Our eyes locked, and for a moment I thought I had him. Then, as if to prove that evil is always a force to be reckoned with, the phone rang.

“Don’t answer it,” I said. “We can work this out. You can have a life.”

“What kind of life would I have without her?” he said.

The phone rang again. Felix touched my shoulder. “You will tell people the truth about us, won’t you?”

“I’ll tell them the truth,” I said.

Felix picked up the phone. “I’m ready,” he said. “Thank you, Caroline. Thank you for giving even my death beauty and purpose.”

When he rested the muzzle against his temple, I closed my eyes. For a moment after he pulled the trigger, I felt as if I’d been shot too. The sound of the gunshot ricocheted around the small room causing something in my brain to vibrate in sympathy. The stench of sudden death filled my nostrils, leaving me breathless and gagging. The force of the shot had driven Felix’s head backwards and I noticed, as if from a great distance, that my clothes were covered with blood and something worse than blood. I felt cold – cold as the dead. I don’t know how long I sat beside the body before I bent to pick up the cell from the place on the floor where it had fallen. After I called Alex, I chose the softest of Dan’s quilts and placed it over Felix. On the television screen, Caroline MacLeish’s image remained frozen – a wasp in amber – beyond regret, beyond pain, beyond humanity.

Suddenly I was angrier than I can ever remember being. I grabbed the remote control and hurled it at the screen. “You murdering bitch,” I said. “You venomous, murdering bitch.”

Only when the remote control bounced impotently to the floor did I begin to weep.

When Alex Kequahtooway arrived on the scene, I wasn’t alone. At some point after the shot rang out, I’d run out to the garage and pounded on the door to Dan’s office. Dan had reassured his young patient and steered me into his drum room. There among the dazzling display of Zildjian hi-hats, crashes, and earthplates, I told my story.

After I was finished, Dan took my hands in his. “You did everything you could, Joanne,” he said. “And it was good that you were with Felix at the end. No man should go to his death alone.”

“He didn’t think he was going alone,” I said. “Caroline promised that she’d die with him – a double exit.”

“Do you think she kept her word?” Dan asked.

I remembered Caroline’s image frozen on the
TV
screen. “Not a chance,” I said. “Not a chance.”

Alex’s interview with me was consummately professional. My answers to his questions were factual but not expansive, and when he realized there was nothing more to be gleaned from questioning me, he told me I could go. He didn’t chastise me for throwing the quilt over Felix’s body and contaminating the suicide scene. Alex was a good cop, and he seemed to understand instinctively that the answers to Felix’s suicide would not be found in forensic evidence.

The day after Felix’s death, Alex called and invited me for coffee. We met – not in Marv Brenner’s window – but in a small and pretty café where we’d often come to drink coffee, eat cinnamon buns, and count the moments until we could be alone. The meeting was not a success. After a few perfunctory questions about how I was handling the trauma of witnessing a man’s suicide, Alex lapsed into silence. I asked a few questions about Alex’s future plans and about how his nephew, Eli, was doing in university, but the responses I got were monosyllabic. The air between us was heavy with the weight of things unsaid, and we left after ten minutes, each carrying an uneaten cinnamon bun in a red-and-white-checked paper bag. On the sidewalk outside the café, Alex kissed my cheek. “I wish this had gone better, Jo,” he said.

“Me too,” I said. I was the first to turn and walk away.

Jill and Bryn stayed with us till the last day of the old year. Claudia and Tracy had left for Toronto the night before. They were not going back to the house on Walmer Road – not that day, not ever. Their plan was to spend some time with a friend of Claudia’s who lived in Garden Hill, a small town east of the city. Claudia was going to look for an acreage where she could raise and board dogs, and Tracy was going to take in the country air until her next big theatrical break. Jill was financing the move, and she was sanguine about the fact that the investment she was making would be long-term.

Relations between Jill, Bryn, Claudia, and Tracy had been steadily improving since the four of them sat down together and watched
The Glass Coffin
. Jill described the experience as highly affecting, a breaking of the emotional logjam that had trapped the members of Caroline MacLeish’s household for years. Jill said the film was the most important and enduring legacy Evan could have left his family.

The members of Evan’s family weren’t the only ones who gained entry to the private world of Caroline MacLeish that winter. The morning I was to drive Jill and her stepdaughter to the airport, she called me into her bedroom and pointed at the
TV
. The network ad campaign for
The Glass Coffin
had started. Someone at
NBC
had unearthed a treasure from Evan’s archives of discarded footage: a poignant scene of Caroline alone in her bedroom. She was wearing a silk robe in the forget-me-not blue of her eyes and she approached the camera with a lover’s intensity. “My world is smaller than most,” she said. “But what my life shows it that even the smallest world can be made to yield everything. I have known loyalty and betrayal, joy and despair, and I have known love.” Her fingers caressed the frame of a photograph on the elaborately carved table beside her. The camera moved in for a closeup of the picture in the frame. It was of Felix Schiff. “I have known unimaginable love,” Caroline said triumphantly.

The television announcer’s voice was breathless. “And Felix Schiff killed for that love – not once, but twice. In time for Valentine’s,
NBC
is proud to present the passion that made headlines: a very special portrait of a very special love.”

Beside me, Jill shuddered. “Poor Felix,” she said. “Speaking of – I had a call from the funeral home yesterday. They have two boxes for me: Evan’s ashes and Felix’s. How’s that for a going-away present?”

“Unique,” I said. “What are you going to do with them?”

“I’ve already been in touch with Linn Brokenshire’s brother about having Evan’s ashes buried with her.”

“That’s a surprise,” I said.

“It shouldn’t be,” Jill replied. “You were the one who told me that Evan really loved Linn, and I didn’t have any other ideas. There’s only one catch. The brother’s a born-again, so there will have to be what he calls ‘a truly Jesus-centred service.’ ” Jill shook her head. “After all these years, Linn is going to get to save Evan’s soul.”

“We get our rewards on this side of the grave or the next,” I said.

“If only …,” Jill’s eyes filled with tears. She took out a tissue and blew her nose noisily. “Anyway. That leaves Felix. What should I do about his ashes?”

“FedEx them to Caroline,” I said. “To the victor go the spoils.”

“What a monster she is,” Jill said. “Poor Felix. Poor all of us. Do you think we’ll ever be happy again?”

“Sure,” I said. “It’s New Year’s Eve – the most hopeful night of the year – 365 days of possibilities ahead.”

“And what are you doing New Year’s?” Jill asked.

“We’re going to Mieka’s tomorrow, so I’m taking down our Christmas trees tonight,” I said. “Kevin is coming over to give me a hand.”

“Speaking of possibilities,” Jill said. Suddenly she looked impish. “Hey, here’s a plan. Let’s crack open a couple of cool ones and listen to Taylor’s tree one last time.”

“I don’t think I can take it,” I said.

“Sure you can,” Jill said. “It’s for auld lang syne.”

So my old friend and I went downstairs, opened two bottles of Great Western, and turned on Taylor’s tree. We drank a toast to absent loved ones, then we sat on the floor and listened to the world’s most painfully tuneless version of “The Way We Were.” Above us, Jerry Garcia, once the bard of Songs of Innocence and Experience, now an icon in a Day-Glo sunburst, beamed down warmth and hope on our cold and needy world.

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