Hang Down Your Head

by Janice Macdonald

  “I’ll be on call, just in case. I doubt anything will happen though; it’s usually such a calm bunch there, and besides, to boost my karma, I’ll be supervising at the Works and the Street Performers’ Festivals, and doing some crowd control at Heritage Days. Mmm, this is good.”

  I pushed the salad bowl at him, which he dug into without demur. That’s what I like about feeding Steve. He just loves to eat, and accepts almost everything with good grace. His metabolism must run as high as his temperature, because he stays trim with only a couple of weight training sessions a week, and a run whenever he can fit it into his weekend. I, on the other hand, tend to be pretty lax about my attitude to both exercise and food. While I fluctuate between kicking my weight scale under my bed and obsessively weighing myself every morning, I hadn’t been paying attention while ten pounds crept onto my already generous frame. So, I was in a bout of body-consciousness at the moment, which mostly exhibited itself as fretting over eating bread.

  “Are you going to eat that or write an ode to it?” Steve pushed some more salad on to his fork with the remains of his bread. I scraped as little margarine as I could out to the edges of the crusts and fell on the sourdough with the sort of soft moans other people might reserve for sex. What the hell. I’d have to find some form of exercise. I wasn’t going to do without bread.

  We got back to the discussion once the salad was gone and we’d each had another two slices of bread. There were two or three festivals I’d never actually been to, and I was trying to figure out why. It seemed that the Cariwest Festival occurred on the same weekend as the Edmonton Folk Music Festival, so that explained that one, even though I adore steel drum music and the fabulous costumes that the krewes come up with in their parades. I had no excuse for not having attended the Dreamcatcher Aboriginal Festival, though, except that it happened right near the beginning of the school year, when I was always running behind, getting a syllabus organized for printing. I decided to make a point of attending this year, though, and popped up to my calendar to make a note of it.

  “It’s a nice festival, in Sir Winston Churchill Square, and now that the renovations down there are done you’re not always tripping over power cords. The Street Performers Festival, too.”

  “Not that the Street Performers used a lot of power cords, though. I still hate thinking about how much that renovation cost; I couldn’t care less if it was successful or not. Imagine using up all that money when the transit system needs it, or school buildings, or inner-city shelters or low-cost housing. Instead we have fancy electric plugs and a coffee shop on a sterile promontory. It delights not me,” I added, really getting into the whole Shakespeare thing, and thinking to myself that the Freewill Shakespeare Festival in the Park had just started, too. Now there was a festival I could really get behind.

  I didn’t really want the Churchill Square refit to fail. While I thought the city councillors myopic in their vision of city planning ventures, I actually hoped that things would work out for the best. You can’t help it; if you live in Edmonton for a while, you develop a real sense of love for the city. There’s something so “little engine that could” about it. Now, if only they could really make the LRT and transit system effective so that parking wasn’t such a horrendous issue downtown, they’d have it all worked out. At least the present mayor didn’t splash around town in a gas-guzzling SUV like a previous mayor, and I had spotted a couple of councillors riding the LRT.

  After supper, Steve and I decided to go out for a stroll. Even though I always tried my best to angle the blinds to avoid the hottest part of the day, my apartment wasn’t the coolest place to be on one of the hottest days so far, and Steve had a slight sheen of sweat on his forehead through dinner. Thank goodness I’d gone with salad. If I closed the southward kitchen window and left the east-facing living room window circles open, by the time I got ready for bed, it might be possible to sleep—on top of the coverlet. I never invested in an electric fan since I did have some cross-ventilation, and after all, it usually cooled down nicely every evening but about twelve a year.

  This happened to be one of the twelve. While I was immune from it in the tree-laden river valley, the library and then the ­climate-controlled Centre all day, the temperature soared to nearly thirty degrees Centigrade. There was no way, barring a thunderstorm, that my apartment was going to be livable this evening for Steve. So much for vigorous exercise. I knew I shouldn’t have had that last piece of bread.

  Outside, we stood looking at the old red-brick Garneau School, faced with the decision of which direction to venture. Steve proposed a jaunt down Walterdale Hill, toward the Kinsmen Fieldhouse, but since I’d already been that way at midday, I opted for a walk southwestward toward the University Farm. A lot of it was getting covered in buildings, but there were still a couple of fields. Steve acquiesced, mostly because the residential communities we would walk through had lovely tree-lined streets, and life would be cooler in the shade. Sweating may be many healthy things, but it’s never going to be romantic.

  Steve and I were well matched as walking companions. Neither of us had to slow up stride to keep a good talk and stroll pace. Of course, when I sat down, I was much shorter-looking, but the inseam on our jeans was the same length. In fact, the waist measurement was, too. Theoretically, this is all to the good, in that I would have twice as many jeans to choose from should the need arise and our closets completely mesh. It didn’t do much for my sense of well-being, though. I wanted to be sylph-like, and one cannot possibly consider one’s self to be in the ballpark of naiad when one is able to share trousers with a cop. A really well-built cop with great legs and a gorgeous butt, but a cop nevertheless. I am betting Karen Kain never shared tights with Frank Augustyn, and when push came to shove, I wanted to be at least a size smaller than Steve in the denim department. It helped that his sweatshirts drowned me, but it wasn’t quite enough.

  I tightened my buttocks as we walked through McKernan, hoping this would somehow add to the burn. I doubted it would. It was too hot to try for a burn of anything, but perhaps the heat could create some sort of melt.

  “There’s what I managed to duck out of earlier.” Steve pointed to some squad cars parked in a cluster in the Neil Crawford Building parking lot, kitty-corner from where we stood on the corner of Belgravia Road. “The body being found. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was a kid asphyxiated in a car on a day like today.”

  “Would that be a criminal charge?” I asked.

  “It would if it was a dog,” Steve said with a tired shrug. “In fact, if it was a dog locked in a car, there would automatically be an enormous fine, possible jail time. People are more problematic. Remember the case where the guy forgot he was supposed to drop the baby at the daycare and left him in the car seat? Well, that was considered a tragedy and not criminal. No charges laid.”

  Steve and I crossed the intersection and were almost even with the parking lot by this time. From the looks of things, there was no suffocated infant in a minivan. Instead, the focus of activity seemed aimed at the entrance to the LRT tunnel. There was crime scene tape hung across, and a police officer standing in front of the entrance. A CBC minivan and the City-TV Hummer were parked nearby, and the Global van was arriving at the lot entrance in front of us as we meandered along the sidewalk north of all the action.

  “You may be curious, but the minute we go even three steps nearer, you’re going to get sucked into all this,” I warned. Steve nodded, but just then his pager went off on his belt. He checked the top of it and hauled his cellphone out of his pants pocket.

  “I think we might have to postpone our walk, Randy,” he shrugged apologetically. “I have to call in, and what do you bet I’m going to be assigned over here?”

  “Well, you could pop back in to the apartment when you come to pick up your car,” I suggested. Steve nodded, but promised to check for lights on in the apartment before disturbing me. I waited with him while he dialled in. The body language said it all. As he listened to the v
oice on the other end, his whole torso swivelled to align itself with the entrance to the LRT hole in the ground. Even though the temperature was still just south of a blast furnace, I shivered. Something ugly was unfolding for the man I loved. I was just glad that this time it had nothing to do with me.

  6

  ~

  Steve didn’t come back to my place, and I went to bed alone, which was just fine considering the relative humidity and heat in the apartment. Even I didn’t sleep very well and called it quits on trying around five-thirty. I checked with the thermometer outside my dining room window; it already read twenty-five degrees. This heat wave wouldn’t last; in fact, it would likely rain most of July. However, that didn’t make it any less enervating. The worst thing about hot weather in Edmonton is that you feel incredibly ungrateful if you complain about it. So much of the year is spent bundled so that you have no exposed flesh to freeze within ten seconds, that when some hot weather comes—which you really aren’t equipped to deal with—you feel as if you can’t voice an opinion about it.

  I had a shower, sluicing off the layers of sweat accrued during the night. Then I dressed in a pale yellow cotton blouse and white denim capris. My hair was already kinking up as I braided it back. To keep even the small amount of heat generated by the braid off my neck, I twisted it twice and anchored it onto the back of my head with a monster-sized clip. Moisturizer, eyeliner and mascara were all I ever managed in terms of makeup, and today it was an effort even to do that much. However, since it seemed possible that we’d be getting more visitors to the Centre than I’d at first accounted for, I had to make some concessions toward public appearances. There’d been a piece in the paper recently on dressing professionally, and although I didn’t think it necessary to power-suit for this sort of research work, it didn’t hurt to be as polished as possible.

  I packed up a lunch and headed down the two blocks to the campus. The goal of climate-controlled surroundings was fabulously inviting as I could already feel the heat beginning to ramp up another scorcher of a day.

  Since most of the houses between me and the campus were university owned or fraternity buildings, there wasn’t all that much in the way of gardening on view, but I knew that a block or two over there would be older residents parcelling out precious drinks to plants before the main heat of the day evaporated it all. The birds were singing in the tallest branches of the trees. It was a great day to be alive, even if it was so bright I could hardly see.

  It seemed a shame to waste the brilliance of the day hiding out from the heat entirely, so I decided not to cut through the Law Building but moseyed along beside it, toward the front entrance to the Fine Arts building. Everywhere, the core people of the campus were arriving. Up out of the LRT entrance, off buses in the transit zone, out of cars in the parking lot east of HUB, came the secretaries, lab techs, researchers, librarians, custodians, grad students, professors, and service workers. The university was a small city unto itself in many ways, completely self-sustaining.

  I decided to pop into HUB first to buy a Java Jive, since I figured Paul’s coffee pot wouldn’t be perking for another twenty minutes at least. The curly-haired fellow who had been serving me coffee since I was a student smiled and poured fragrant life-support into my travel mug. At the small tables nearby were familiar faces, people I didn’t know by name but nodded to out of long-time familiarity. I walked back toward the Centre through the overpass. Somewhere in the building, someone was already practising a violin piece. I let myself into the Centre with my key, since Paul hadn’t yet opened up. He was in already, though, and looked up as I entered.

  “Oh, Randy! I thought you were Dr. F. She called me at home and told me to be in early today. You too?”

  “Nope, I just figured it would be cooler here than in my apartment. Did she say why she wanted you in early? I wonder if she tried to get hold of me?”

  My answering machine is sometimes temperamental, and I hadn’t checked my call display to see if anyone had tried to call. Oh well, if she wanted me, I was here, and if not, I was here anyway. I moved toward my carrel with the heavy-footed pace of duty. By ten, I knew I’d be captivated once more in my research, but at seven-thirty in the morning, it seemed like any other form of yoke. That’s where the crossword came in handy. I picked up a pen, and went through the clues as I popped the lid off my coffee mug. Within ten minutes, I had seven clues filled in. Dr. Fuller came in just as I was giving up on it, nine-tenths of it complete. I wasn’t going to come up with a seven-letter word for “take whatever is left” any time soon. I popped a CD of Pete Seeger singing Woody Guthrie songs, and soon I was humming along to the “what were their names” chorus of “The Sinking of the Reuben James.” It seemed Dr. Fuller had no need to speak with me, and although she’d asked Paul to come in early, she still hadn’t come back out of her office to speak with him. I looked over at Paul, who was checking out Dr. F’s door, looking edgy. He’d been working with her long enough to get a sense of his boss’s moods and you could almost see his antennae waving slowly, trying to get a bead on what was up.

  He didn’t have too long to wait. About twenty minutes later, Dr. F came out of her office, and checked her watch. She waved me to join Paul and her behind the counter, so I turned off the CD player and set my headphones down on the carrel desk. From the looks of it, this wasn’t going to be good news.

  “I’m glad you’re here, Randy. I’ve got something to share with you both that I’ve just learned this morning. I think it will likely affect us and our daily work here for a few days, so you might adjust your schedules for that.” She took a deep breath. “The police have been on the phone to me at home, and again just now. It seems that they came across a body yesterday on campus …”

  “In the LRT tunnel?” I broke in.

  “That’s right,” Dr. Fuller said, her eyes widening a bit, questioningly.

  “I was walking past there last night,” I stumbled, feeling awkward for reasons I wasn’t quite sure of.

  “Well, the police have identified the victim as David Finster, the contractor for the project.”

  “Finster?” both Paul and I croaked. It was the last name I’d expected her to say. It felt so bizarre to think that someone I’d spoken to just the day before could be dead. Come to think of it, he’d been found dead the same day I’d been speaking to him. I shuddered, much as I had the night before when Steve was called away to the investigation.

  “It was murder, wasn’t it?” I asked. No one would have called Steve back on duty for a construction accident. “Steve was called in last night,” I tried to explain, seeing that Paul and Dr. F were looking at me the way people check out two-headed calves. “He’s a detective.”

  Dr. Fuller nodded. “It was murder. He was found in an alcove of the tunnel under Belgravia Road. He’d been stabbed and then hanged.”

  “What?” I was about to say that seemed like overkill to me, when the word “overkill” bounced out at me. That sort of thing has always happened to me. I find myself tossing phrases like “couldn’t you just die?” and “I could murder a piece of pie” to folks who’d just had a death in the family. With the way Paul’s lips were losing colour the more we discussed this, I didn’t think I should push it. He obviously wasn’t one of those folks who have been inured to death by reading murder mysteries or constant exposure to various permutations of CSI on television.

  Dr. Fuller noticed Paul’s colouring, or lack thereof, at the same time and offered him a mint from her pocket, putting a hand on his shoulder. I sat, too. I wasn’t quite sure what to do. It’s not as if there’s much etiquette written on how to deal with speaking about people who’ve just died and with whom you were irritated just the previous day. About the only thing I could come up with was the adage of not to speak ill of the dead, but how was one supposed to think of the dead, especially the ones we’d been thinking plenty ill of so recently?

  Well, at least Finster wouldn’t be around to cause me trouble with my job. With any luck, hi
s sister would be less inclined to fight the bequest now that she didn’t have a partner in her quixotic quest. Dr. F was pouring us all coffee, and Paul’s colour was returning to normal. My own heartbeat was calming, too.

  “The police called me because my name and number was in his datebook for yesterday. I expected a visit from Mr. Finster yesterday afternoon, but he didn’t show up,” Dr. F was musing. “I wonder now what it was he wanted.”

  “He showed up yesterday morning, but I was the only one around. I told him to check back later.” I looked at the others. “I’m sorry, I forgot to mention it, Dr. Fuller. Paul caught the tail end of him leaving in a huff.”

  “What did he want?”

  “Mostly he was going out of his way to be nasty. He said some ugly things about his mother giving his room to musicians and then became threatening in an ambiguous sort of way. I got the feeling he wasn’t all that enamoured of the Centre or the Folkways Collection, but I guess that was no secret, eh?”

  Dr. Fuller sighed. “No, I guess it wasn’t. Well, we must have got our wires crossed, because I was sure we were to meet here at one, but he didn’t show up. To tell you the truth, I was relieved that he broke the appointment, since I hadn’t been looking forward to another session of bombast. I just assumed he’d call and reschedule.” She turned to Paul. “He didn’t call yesterday, did he?”

  “I haven’t checked the voice mail yet this morning,” Paul replied. “I was in the mixing booth most of the afternoon, so I just left from there. Randy?”

  “Well, I got back from the library around two, and there was no one here. I think I went home around four forty-five. Of course, I had headphones on most of the time, so I’m not sure I’d have heard anything anyhow.”