Adam's Peak (32 page)

The fact that Mary didn't seem to believe the accusation proved immaterial, for it soon became clear to Alec that his father did. The Tea Maker placed his cup and saucer back on the table and sat up in a manner that accentuated his considerable height. His sideways glance suggested that he thought Mary should leave but that he wouldn't bother insisting on it. He spoke softly and slowly.

“Tell me what you saw, Alec.”

Alec stared at the dark floorboards. Suddenly truth seemed a supple thing. What he'd witnessed behind the factory didn't
need
to be described the way he'd described it. Walking home from the fruit stand, he'd been solidly convinced of his interpretation—he believed it still, more or less—but now other versions, ignored or dismissed, clamoured for his attention, threatening to complicate matters. In his mind he tried to recall the details of the interaction between his brother and
the tea taster, but the scene had gone fuzzy, like an out-of-focus photograph. He wanted certainty and clearness, and he could see from his father's expression that he had the power to impose both. It was thrilling and dizzying.

“Alec. What did you see?”

Eyes still fixed on the grain of the floorboards, Alec moulded his truth.

“Ernie was—Amitha and Ernie were holding hands. Like boy and girl.”

At this, Mary rediscovered her voice.

“Alec! You're making up stories! I think they were only shaking hands.”

The Tea Maker ignored her, and Alec saw that in his father's mind the scene he had described was entirely plausible.

“What else, Alec? Was there anything else?”

Again he imagined the strange scene—Amitha's fingers touching Ernie's—only this time the picture was clear; it had a definite meaning, for he had given it one. There was more he could say, about the way Ernie and Amitha were standing, about Amitha's laugh, but he bit his lip and shook his head.

When Ernie came home that evening, Alec and Mary were sent to their rooms. Seated on the floor of the bedroom he shared with his brother, Alec listened at the door for the argument he'd been expecting for months. The crucial battle, in which, despite what he'd witnessed that afternoon, and despite his desire that Ernie be set right, he still felt a particular sympathy for his brother. But nothing, it seemed, was happening. The house was once again oppressively silent. Alec attacked his fingernails with his teeth. He wondered if Ernie had somehow managed to explain his actions, and if he, Alec, would be the one in trouble after all. Strangely, he began to hope that this would be the case, and that he'd be given a punishment of gruelling physical labour that would occupy him until the holidays ended.

It seemed to him he'd been waiting for days when he heard his mother scurry down the hallway, sniffing loudly. Alec hugged his legs and leaned his head against the door. Then he heard his father.

“And how are you planning to put food in your mouth?”

“I have friends. They'll help me.”

The Tea Maker and Ernie were in the hallway, just outside Alec's door.

“Your friends are willing to feed someone with an appetite like yours and no money?”

To this there was no answer.

“And what about Sunday afternoon?” The Tea Maker sounded exasperated but resigned.

“Sunday afternoon?”

“The McIntyres are coming for tea. You were to meet their daughter Sirima. That was the whole point of the invitation. What do you want me to tell them now?”

“Dada, this isn't a good time for me to be courting young ladies. Don't you agree?”

“It seems to me that spending time with young ladies is precisely what you need.”

“Dada, I'm not—” Ernie sighed. “Introduce Sirima to Alec. She's closer to his age, and she'll prefer him anyway.”There was a long pause before Ernie spoke again, his voice imploring. “Please don't make Amitha go. He doesn't have—”

The Tea Maker cleared his throat officiously. “Jayasuriya left two hours ago.”

Little by little, Alec began to see what he'd done. His body leaden with responsibility, he crawled to his bed and lay on his side, head pounding. When his brother came in, he pretended to be asleep. He watched through his eyelashes as Ernie changed his shirt and trousers, combed his hair at the mirror, then left, closing the door behind him.

C
LARE LEFT THE VANTWESTS
' house and walked in the direction of the Boulevard. The sun hung low and lazy; the maple buds were fat. It was a perfectly pleasant early spring evening, in which the fragrant air, the soft light, and the sturdy brick and aluminum houses seemed, like the photographs in the Vantwests' living room, to deny the existence of anything, anywhere, that might contradict such pleasantness.

At the corner of the Boulevard and Morgan Hill Road there was a pair of newspaper boxes. Clare rummaged change from her pockets and bought a copy of the
Gazette
. The news from Colombo was on the front page, along with a photo. “Blast in Sri Lanka Kills 60, Injures 1,400,” the headline read. She studied the photograph, in which four men—office workers, according to the caption—were running, arms bent, legs mid-stride, through a street filled with debris. They looked absurd, running in their white business shirts and ties through the obstacle course of rubbish. One of the men had an enormous belly and probably hadn't run in years. The young man in the foreground looked fit enough, but his shirt was splattered with blood and he was holding a cloth up to his forehead. Clare thought of Rudy and studied the injured man's face more closely. There was a resemblance,
but Mr. Vantwest had said Rudy was lucky. She skimmed the article below the photograph—things about Tamil Tiger rebels and a truck packed with explosives—then she folded the newspaper and turned back down her street.

There was no one out, with the exception of Mr. Carroll pulling into his driveway in his blue Reliant. Mrs. Carroll, Clare imagined, would be inside, making dinner—pork chops or chicken casserole, or something like that. The radio would be tuned to
The World at Six
, which would probably lead with the bombing in Colombo, though not necessarily. Clare watched Mr. Carroll get out of his car and head for his brown and white split-level house, briefcase in hand. Only moments earlier it had seemed inconceivable that the Vantwests' home-land could be falling apart while Morgan Hill Road basked in its pleasantness. Now it seemed to her that this pleasantness was dangerously volatile, and that the pattern of her life could not possibly hold.

As Mr. Carroll unlocked his front door, Clare held her breath and imagined his house blowing up in his face. She waited for the deafening noise and flying debris and clouds of smoke. Hoped for them even. She was at the edge of the Boswells' front lawn, and she imagined all the neighbours running out to join her at the sound of the blast—a bizarre re-enactment of the time they'd all gathered to build an ice castle during Carnaval. But Mr. Carroll disappeared quietly behind his door, leaving Clare alone in the street.

She carried on to her own house. In the narrow, shadowy space between the Skinners' property and the Frasers', she leaned against the brick chimney to think. She needed to do something. If the Sri Lanka plan was dead, she had to go somewhere else. Anywhere—it didn't really matter. Within reason. She recalled her awful, awkward family holiday in Scotland and realized that with the exception of trips to Vancouver she hadn't been away since. The Sri Lanka plan had been too much, too ambitious, but the impulse to escape made sense. She would do that much. Like a teenager fresh out of high school, she would leave the patterns of her Morgan Hill life.

Pull up your roots
, the chorus in her head chimed.

Do your own thing.

Find yourself.

The words were empty and crass. They trivialized the terrible urgency mounting inside her, so she shut them out and turned to the matter of where to go. Europe had been Emma's first destination—backpacking, taking the train from city to city, staying in
pensions
and hostels. It would do. In an instant her decision was made, and she realized with a calming confidence that she would go through with it. She walked around to the front of the house, hardly noticing the lights on in the living room across the street.

Inside, she heard her mother on the kitchen phone.

“I think that's her just coming in now,” Isobel said. “Clare! Telephone! It's Markus, from the shop.”

She frowned. Markus never called. Never once in the time they'd known each other had he called. As she ran upstairs to her studio, she imagined him finally, after long and arduous soul-searching, working up the nerve to reveal his feelings. Or, perhaps, experiencing an epiphany of some kind. She dropped her newspaper on the floor, flopped on the loveseat, and picked up the phone. She would let him down easy.

“Hello? Markus?”

“Oh, hi,” he said, and it was clear that no epiphany had occurred. “Is everything okay, Clare?”

“Everything's fine. What's up?”

“Didn't you want to talk to me after work?”

“About what?” she said. Then she remembered. Her telephone call to Markus seemed ages ago, when all she'd hoped to do was tell him she was moving to Vancouver. “Oh God, Markus. I'm sorry. I forgot. I was distracted all day. I was—” She glanced at the
Gazette
, its front page picture facing up on the floor. “I'm really sorry.”

“It's okay. Don't worry about it.”

Clare picked at the loveseat's tweedy armrest. Now that she'd shaken up her own life, Markus's impotence was more exasperating than ever.

“Are you still at the shop?” she said. “I hope you didn't wait around for me.”

“I'm just clearing some paperwork. I thought you might have gone out on an errand or something.”

“No ...”

He seemed to be waiting for more, but she punished him with a dull silence.

“So ... what did you want to talk about?” he finally said. “I mean, you don't have to tell me now, if you'd rather ...”

“No, it's fine.” Again Clare glanced at the newspaper photo. “I'm planning another trip.”

“Oh. Really?” Markus took shelter in his employer voice. “When are you thinking of going?”

“I'm not sure exactly. May, June. But listen, Markus, I know you can't give me any more holiday time. That's not why I'm telling you.” She clenched her left hand and rubbed her index finger with her thumb. “I'm actually planning to leave the shop.”

“To resign, you mean?”

“Yes.”

“So you can go on a trip?”

“Yes.”

“I don't know, Clare. I don't really think you need to leave. It's just that ...” The employer gave way to the repressed lover.

“It's not just the trip. I need to do something different with my life.”
There
. She'd said it.

“Well ... so ... where are you going?”

She sat up straighter. “Europe.” The word was sharp and convincing, completely different from the fuzzy foreignness of Sri Lanka.

“Really? How long—I mean, you could always come back.”

“I'm not sure how long I'll be gone. But really, Markus, I don't think I'll be back.”

In the silence she imagined him absorbing this.

“Um ... okay. So, uh ... what are you planning to do there?”

“Travel around.” She improvised. “I'll start with France and Spain. At least I can handle the languages there.”

“Do you think you'll go to Germany?”

What Markus really wanted to say and just couldn't get out, she knew, was that he
hoped
she'd visit Germany, for him. She was tempted to punish him again, to say she had no intention of visiting his homeland. Then an image came to her: Markus showing her around the small Bavarian town where he was born, speaking German with shopkeepers
and the old people on park benches, wearing hiking shorts and Birkenstocks. The same decent, dependable Markus, but
different
.

“I might. It would depend.”

“Oh?”

Her thoughts raced ahead. Surely if they got away from the shop, away from Montreal and the small but significant patterns they'd established with each other, they could each be different. Things could happen.

“If I knew someone there ... you know, someone who knew the language and stuff, I might.”

“Hmm. Yeah. That makes sense,” Markus said, his voice even, his feelings couched. But wanting her to continue. Yes ... definitely wanting her to ask.

Clare stared at the
Gazette
photo, the businessmen running, dazed. She could do this. After her encounter with Alec Vantwest, she could handle this. It was only Markus after all.

“So ... Markus,” she said, “would you be interested in going with me?”

She imagined him looking up at the calendar over his desk—sketches and biographies of famous composers; April was Beethoven—and assuring himself, with mounting excitement, that he could find his way to taking some time off.