by S. P. Hozy
Grace took their life savings out of the bank (because she could not collect Robert’s insurance after his death was declared a suicide) and went to Nice. She found Celeste and gave her the money. “It was all I could do,” she told me. “I’ve never been back to Nice since, and I never shall go again. I hate the place.”
Chapter Forty-One
“I never wanted to come between you and your friends,” Axel had said as she left his hotel room. She would give him the benefit of the doubt on that one, she decided. How could he have known things would work out this way? But to get so close to her and not to give her the slightest inkling of what he was up to? He had come into the gallery looking for smugglers. That’s essentially what he’d said. They were on a list and he was checking everybody on the list. His interest in collecting had been a ruse so he had a reason to come back. He was good, she conceded. They hadn’t had a clue.
But what about those mysterious phone calls he was always getting that he took in private? He said they were business. Now she knew they were probably police business. Interpol business. That annoyed her when she thought about it because it meant he was conspiring against her — against the gallery, at least — in front of her. Damn! The more she thought about it, the angrier she got. His behaviour was totally duplicitous. Had he been honest about anything? He had been conducting an investigation, not forging a relationship. They had been at cross purposes the whole time.
He had said he loved her. Should she demand he prove it? Should she call his bluff? Find out for once and for all? Either he loved her and wanted to be with her, or he had been using her and would find a way out. One way or the other, she needed to know.
But first she had to see what she could do about Dinah and Angela. They were being held, but had not yet been charged. Henry Fong, the lawyer who Maris had called, told her they were in a detention centre near the Polo Club. He could arrange bail, he said, but they could be held for forty-eight hours without charges being laid, so there wasn’t much he could do until then. If charges were not laid after forty-eight hours, they would be let go. Best to wait, he said. In the meantime, he had arranged a visitor’s pass for Maris so she could talk to them, but not both of them at the same time. Maris said she wanted to see Dinah first, then Angela.
Dinah was a mess. She knew enough about the Singapore prison system to be afraid. She told Maris not to be surprised if they locked her up and threw away the key. “And I haven’t even done anything,” she said.
“I know,” said Maris, “and Henry’s doing everything he can to get you out of here. Just try not to go crazy. We’ll get you out.”
“How could Axel have done this to us?” she said. “I thought he was our friend. I thought you and he were … you know … close.”
“So did I,” said Maris. “I don’t know what to think now. I keep going over everything in my mind until I’m more confused than ever. The bottom line is that he’s a cop, Dinah, and duty comes first. He told me he’d been working on this case for a couple of years. He didn’t know anything about the gallery, just that it was on a list of possibilities that he was checking.” She was shaking her head. “I just can’t believe that this is happening.”
“Believe it,” said Dinah. “And be glad you’re on that side of the Plexiglas.”
Maris smiled. “I’d trade places with you if I could,” she said. “You shouldn’t be here.”
“Have you talked to Angela yet?”
“No. I’m seeing her next,” said Maris. “Do you think she knows anything about this?”
“I have no idea,” said Dinah. “For all I know, she’s the mastermind behind the whole thing. You know Angela, which means, I suppose, that neither of us knows anything about Angela. She comes and she goes. The shipments come in and the shipments go out. Your guess is as good as mine.”
“Don’t worry, Dinah. You’ll be released. They won’t find anything and they won’t be able to hold you.”
Dinah nodded but she looked defeated. “I hope I can stand another twenty-four hours of this. They keep asking me the same questions, over and over. And I keep giving them the same answers: I don’t know anything. I don’t know what they’re talking about. I didn’t see anything.”
“Hang in,” said Maris. She couldn’t think of anything else to say.
Angela was cool and calm when Maris saw her. Even her hair was neatly combed, whereas Dinah looked like she hadn’t slept or eaten. Angela looked the same as she had when Axel had taken her in for questioning. Her clothes weren’t even wrinkled. She didn’t say anything to Maris at first; she just watched and listened.
“Henry’s doing everything he can to get you and Dinah out of here,” she said. “They only have forty-eight hours to charge you, then they have to let you go.”
Angela nodded. “Dinah didn’t know anything about it,” she said. “They have to let her go.”
Maris stared at her. “What are you saying?”
Angela looked straight at her. “If they charge me,” she said, “I will say nothing. It will be up to them to prove their case. And that will be difficult.”
“Are you saying you knew about this?” said Maris.
“I’m not saying one way or the other. But Dinah definitely knew nothing about this. Don’t let them railroad her, Maris. Talk to your friend” — she emphasized the word friend — “and tell him they have to let her go.”
“I don’t understand,” said Maris. “You knew about the smuggling?”
“I’m not saying I did and I’m not saying I didn’t. All I will say is that there are some very powerful people behind it and it’s unlikely they’ll be caught. It’s unfortunate that Peter discovered what he did.”
“So Peter didn’t know anything about it,” said Maris.
“Peter didn’t know anything about it.”
“Thank you, Angela. I needed to know that. But it got him killed, didn’t it?”
Angela nodded.
“Why are you telling me this?” Maris said.
Angela shrugged. “A moment of weakness,” she said. “It won’t happen again.”
Maris closed her eyes. She felt dizzy and knew if she stood up, she would probably pass out. She took a deep breath and opened her eyes. Angela was still looking at her with the same unreadable expression. In that moment, she realized that Axel had been right. And the letter from Peter that she had given to Simon Lam had merely confirmed his suspicions and sped up the investigation. Had she made a terrible mistake or would things have turned out the same way without the letter? She would probably never know.
Maris took a taxi back to Dinah’s apartment. There was nothing to do but wait.
Why? Why had Angela done it? Why had she risked everything, including Peter’s life, as it turned out? The money? Had it been worth it? She thought of a hundred questions she wanted to ask Angela, but it was too late. She wouldn’t be able to ask them now. Angela had probably said all she was going to say. And why had she said it to Maris? That was one of the hundred questions. Why me?
Maris managed to sleep a few hours that night but she was awake at dawn pacing the apartment and drinking coffee. Her insides were in a knot and she threw up the coffee, which made her feel even worse. She found some cooked rice in Dinah’s fridge and heated it in the microwave. She poured some milk over it and ate a couple of spoonfuls. Coffee on an empty stomach; she should have known better.
At ten o’clock, Henry Fong called. “They’ve released Dinah,” he said, “but Angela’s been charged with smuggling illegal contraband into and out of the country, and as a possible accessory in Peter’s murder. They know she’s not the big fish, but she’s not talking. It’s probably not worth her life,” he said.
A few hours later, Axel brought Dinah home. She hugged Maris and burst into tears. “Come on,” said Maris. “Get out of those filthy clothes and I’ll run you a nice, hot bath.” While the bath was running, Maris put the kettle on and made a chicken sandwich for Dinah. She asked Axel if he wanted a sandwich and
he said, no, but he wouldn’t mind a cup of tea.
While Dinah soaked in the tub, Axel and Maris sat in the living room not saying much. Then Axel’s phone rang and he left the apartment to take the call.
Maris crept over and opened the door a crack to listen to the conversation. “I can’t come home yet,” she heard him say. “We’ve made an arrest in the case and I have to stay to tie up all the loose ends.” Then he said, “I miss you, too.” Maris quietly closed the door.
When he came back into the living room, she said, “You’re married, aren’t you?”
Axel hesitated, not knowing how to respond. Then he nodded. “Yes,” he said.
“You were speaking English.”
“Yes,” he said. “My wife is from England. We met while I was attending a series of lectures at Oxford. Five years ago.”
“So all those calls you took, those business calls at night … they were from her?”
Axel nodded. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m really sorry.”
“Not as sorry as I am,” she said.
He started to speak and she put up her hand. “Don’t,” she said. “Don’t bother.”
Chapter Forty-Two
The gallery remained closed for two weeks while Dinah and Maris decided what to do. Dinah had been shaken to the core by her experience with the police and with Angela’s arrest. Maris had persuaded her to see a doctor and he had prescribed an anti-anxiety drug for six weeks to help her filter out the extreme feelings of stress and to help her sleep at night. Since she had no previous experience of stress brought on by trauma, or even mood swings, he decided against prescribing an antidepressant, and Maris was relieved. Dinah just needed a little time, some rest, and to have her confidence in the future restored.
She and Maris had many talks about the past and the future, but not much discussion of the present. The shock of what had happened to Peter hit them all over again now that they realized Angela had been involved.
“Do you think Angela might have poisoned him herself?” said Dinah. “She’s capable of it.”
“She might have,” said Maris, “but she may have been acting on orders from some gangster and afraid for her life.”
Dinah shook her head. “But to kill Peter? I just can’t get my head around it.”
“I know,” said Maris. “I guess she was in too deep to get out. But we don’t really know she did it.”
“I don’t care,” said Dinah. “At this point, all I know is that what she did got him killed. It’s the same thing.”
“Well, maybe something will come out at the trial, but I doubt it.” Maris hadn’t told Dinah much about her conversation with Angela, except to say that Angela knew Dinah hadn’t been involved. “She definitely did not want you to be charged.”
“That makes me feel so much better,” said Dinah. “I won’t be blamed for killing my own brother. Thanks, Angela.”
There are some wounds that don’t heal, Maris thought. And this was one of them. They both believed that Angela should pay for what she did. But in Singapore, that probably meant the death penalty. At the very least, it meant a long stay in prison. Angela’s life was effectively over. She believed they wouldn’t be able to prove the charges, but Maris was pretty sure they could. There would be a trail somewhere. And Axel and Interpol were after the big fish. They wouldn’t stop until they caught them.
Maris had thought long and hard about whether she should tell Axel about her conversation with Angela, but now that Dinah was free, she saw no reason to. Nothing would bring Peter back. They knew the truth now, even if they didn’t know all the names. Peter had been killed because he’d accidentally stumbled on the evidence of wrongdoing. If he had just written the letter to Maris and not said anything to Angela, maybe he’d still be alive. But his mistake had been to assume that Angela knew nothing about it. His mistake had been to trust her.
Axel had called twice since Dinah’s release. Once he had spoken to Dinah to make sure she was all right. And the second time he had talked to Maris, to apologize again and to try to explain.
“Just go back to your wife, Axel,” she said. “Whatever we had is over. I could never trust you again. Let’s just move on.”
Move on. That was a laugh, she thought. What did moving on mean, anyway? You just forget it happened? You pretend it didn’t happen? You draw a line, step over it, and never look back? It was easy to say, but not so easy to do. She thought about Axel most of the time, especially last thing at night and first thing in the morning. He was just there, in her thoughts, all the time. She truly had fallen in love with him. It wasn’t so easy to let that go. And then, of course, there was the baby. She was sure now, but she hadn’t said anything to anyone. Pretty hard to move on when you were going to have a baby.
She wanted the baby; it hadn’t taken long for her to decide to keep it. What took longer was deciding whether to tell Axel about it. But finally she decided not to. Maybe someday, for the child’s sake, she’d say something. But that was a long way off. Right now, the important thing was to have a healthy baby and to raise her child.
So for now, she concentrated on getting the gallery going again. She told Dinah she wanted them to run it together. Technically, the gallery belonged to Dinah. Angela had agreed to sign the necessary papers so that Dinah had sole ownership. Nobody could take it away from her. That was ultimately what pulled Dinah out of her funk. The gallery was hers and she could keep Peter’s memory alive in it.
“Maris, are you sure you want to stay and help me?” she said. “I’d understand if you didn’t.”
Maris told her she was sure. She would tell Dinah about the child soon. But first they would make plans for the gallery.
“I’m going to get my brother Ray to come here,” she told Dinah. “I want us to give his photography a show. I promise you he’s good enough.”
Dinah smiled. “I’m sure he is,” she said. “If he’s half as talented as you, he’ll be very good.”
“And next year, we’ll have a show for me. I promise.”
“I’ll hold you to it.”
“I’m serious. I want to paint again, and I will. I’ve already started.”
“I know,” said Dinah. “I love what you’ve been doing.”
“You peeked?” said Maris.
“I peeked.” Dinah hesitated. They hadn’t talked about Axel, but it was Axel who had told her that Maris was working again. She had begun soon after their visit to the bird park. She had been inspired to paint by the brilliantly coloured parrots, lorikeets, peacocks, and, especially, the scarlet macaw. The macaw’s magnificent plumage, starting with the vibrant red head and shoulders, moving into a ring of molten yellow around the middle, and extending into a stunning cerulean blue on the lower body and tail, had grabbed Maris’s heart and hadn’t let go. The bird was an explosion of colour that reminded, re-minded her, of why she painted.
It was then that she had known that life was full of colour and possibilities.
Historical Note
There is no graveyard attached to St. Andrew’s Cathedral in Singapore. For story purposes I had to invent one because most of the old cemeteries in Singapore (including the Fort Canning Cemetery, which is also referred to) were dug up to make room for urban development. Records from 1952 show that there were 229 registered burial grounds in the rapidly growing metropolis. As these cemeteries were closed, the bones were exhumed and cremated. Whenever possible, the cremated remains were moved to the Choa Chu Kang Columbarium, part of the only cemetery in Singapore still open for burials. The terms and conditions of the Choa Chu Kang Cemetery state that after fifteen years, a body shall be exhumed for reburial or cremation.
Copyright © S.P. Hozy, 2013
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise (except for brief passages for purposes of review) without the prior permission of Dundurn Press. Perm
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Editor: Gillian Buckley
Design: Courtney Horner
Epub Design: Carmen Giraudy
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Hozy, Penny, 1947-
The scarlet macaw [electronic resource] / by S.P. Hozy.
Electronic monograph.
Issued also in print format.
ISBN 978-1-4597-0600-2
I. Title.
PS8615.O99S22 2013 C813'.6 C2012-904647-7
We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council for our publishing program. We also acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund and Livres Canada Books, and the Government of Ontario through the Ontario Book Publishing Tax Credit and the Ontario Media Development Corporation.
Care has been taken to trace the ownership of copyright material used in this book. The author and the publisher welcome any information enabling them to rectify any references or credits in subsequent editions.
J. Kirk Howard, President
Printed and bound in Canada.
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