The Hidden Keys

by André Alexis

  Plan B seemed solid. But, not unexpectedly, Freud objected.

  – I didn’t come to kick pensioners around, he said.

  Those very words, however, settled the matter. Freud did not want to hurt the Mallays, but he could still serve as intimidation.

  – Let’s do this, Colby said. Let me handle it. You won’t have to do a thing. I mean, unless you want to stay in this car …

  No, Freud did not. They waited a few more minutes, as if to tacitly acknowledge the absence of Mallay fils. Then they got out of the car and resolutely crossed the street to the Mallays’ porch. Colby pushed the doorbell and, when Mrs. Mallay opened the door, he put his foot in and forced the door open, gently pushing the woman back as he did.

  – Mais qu’est-ce qu’il veut, Monsieur l’albinos? she asked.

  But by then Colby and Freud were already in.

  Inside, the house was dim, warm, almost humid. It smelled of Christmas ham and old men. To the right of the door, wooden steps led up to the next floor. Attached to the banister was a chairlift. In the lift an old man sat, as if he’d just come down or were just heading up.

  – We should help Mr. Mallay down, Colby said.

  – But I don’t need help, said Mr. Mallay.

  Freud, annoyed at having to intimidate the Mallays, lifted the bar on the chair and, as if taking a recalcitrant child from the seat of a Ferris wheel, pulled him from the contraption, hurting him as he did.

  In distress, Mr. Mallay said

  – Help is not necessary.

  His accent was as thick as if he’d immigrated from France the day before.

  – Shut up, said Freud.

  To the right of the door there was a living room – fireplace, sofa, armchairs and floor lamps whose shades had pink tassels. Freud pulled the old man into the living room and, unceremoniously, pushed him into an armchair. Colby encouraged Mrs. Mallay to join her husband, pointing to the armchair beside him.

  – Why don’t you sit there, he said. We’ve got a message for Olivier.

  Mrs. Mallay sat in the chair, but it was as if neither she nor her husband could believe the men before them were not actors. It felt as if their living room had turned into a theatre, the play they were watching an absurdist thing with a broken fourth wall. The couple spoke to each other in a kind of running and loudly whispered commentary.

  – Mais qu’est-ce qu’ils veulent, ces messieurs?

  – Comment veux-tu que je sache? J’les connais pas, moi.

  – Ils n’ont pas l’air gentils. Ça c’est évident.

  – Oui, ce ne sont surement pas des gentlemen.

  This whispered talk – rather loud because Mr. Mallay, years older than his wife, was hard of hearing – was too much for Freud. It wasn’t just that he’d been talked into abusing geriatrics. It wasn’t just that the geriatrics in question were foreigners who very likely wouldn’t understand a thing Nigger said. No, on top of it all, Mallay’s parents would not even listen to them. It was all, after hours in a ridiculous car, an indignity. He was Nigger’s friend and loved him like a brother. Nigger had helped him in the past. So, he did not mind wasting time if Nigger wanted it. But a man has to keep his dignity, whatever the circumstances. And, feeling as if he were in danger of losing his, Freud jumped at Mrs. Mallay, grabbing her by the throat and shaking her.

  – Shut your mouth! he said.

  This had an immediate effect, though not the one Freud was looking for. The others in the room shut their mouths. They stared at Freud, taken aback. All, that is, save Mrs. Mallay. Mrs. Mallay’s mouth opened and her body contorted. Her hand moved up, clutching at something – Freud’s hand, perhaps. Whatever it was she was going for, she would never reach it. She had a massive heart attack and died at once, with Freud’s fingers still at her throat.

  It was a moment before the three men realized that Mrs. Mallay was not doing at all well. Freud, feeling both resentment and disgust, took his hand away from the woman’s throat as if it had scalded him. But it was Mr. Mallay who spoke first.

  – Mais vous avez tué ma femme, he said.

  And then, because he did not really believe his wife was dead:

  – Mathilde? Qu’est-ce qu’il y a, ma chérie?

  As if he had been a doctor, Colby put a hand on the woman’s forehead. This told him nothing, of course. Her body was still warm. But then Mrs. Mallay’s head lolled to one side and, doctor or no, that was enough for Errol Colby.

  – Let’s go, he said.

  And he and Freud cleared out.

  Colby’s good luck was stubborn. Mrs. Mallay’s heart attack accomplished what he’d hoped intimidation would: Tancred began to co-operate with him. But Tancred’s change of mind was not a change of heart. Colby was mistaken about the reason for the change.

  To begin with, Puli Paulsen had seen Colby and Freud go into the Mallays’ home. He did not know Olivier, so the house meant nothing to him. From his own car, half a block away from the Volkswagen, he’d taken photos of Colby and Freud as they stood on the porch, as they entered the house and as they unexpectedly left it not ten minutes later. (Why would anyone wait four hours before conducting ten minutes’ business?) He’d then followed the men to Parkdale where they’d spent time in the Skyline before going their separate ways. An unexceptional day, save for a minor episode on Runnymede that faded from Puli’s memory. When, a week later, he reported to Daniel, he put no particular emphasis on the photos of the Mallays’ home. But Daniel recognized the home of his friend at once. He had been there, days before, at Mrs. Mallay’s wake.

  – When did you take these? he asked.

  Puli turned one of the photos over.

  – November 23rd, he said. Between nine in the morning and one in the afternoon.

  – A week ago? said Daniel.

  – Yes, said Puli. Why?

  But Daniel could not say why. He’d been to Mrs. Mallay’s funeral and her wake. On neither occasion had Ollie mentioned Colby or Freud. In fact, judging from Ollie’s behaviour, one would not have said there’d been anything unusual about his mother’s death. A heart attack, plain and simple. The only thing he remembered Ollie saying was: Death being unavoidable, there was no reason to take this one harder than any other. And, as the death of those he didn’t know never bothered him, this one would not either.

  That was exactly the kind of thing Ollie would say, and it must have seemed to anyone who did not know him well that his friends had taken the death of his mother harder than Ollie himself. His grief, which he denied feeling, was expressed (paradoxically) by his good spirits. Daniel could not recall, in all the years they’d known each other, ever seeing Ollie so accommodating, so insistent that people eat or drink. It was as if Mrs. Mallay were still alive, saying, as she had countless times over the years

  – Voyons, Olivier, tu ne vois pas que tes amis ont soif?

  Ollie’s father had been a different matter, of course. A man who could not, at the best of times, hide his emotions, Mr. Mallay had been a heartbreaking sight: a seventy-two-year-old man sitting in an armchair, tears running down his cheeks, unable to speak. To think that loving a woman could lead to such suffering. Daniel had turned to Fiona. They’d been married five years – very little time, really, but it was painful to think about a world in which she did not figure.

  In the midst of all that grief and remembrance, Daniel had not for a moment doubted that Mrs. Mallay’s death had been natural, that her time had come, that there was no more to it than that. So, it was a shock, looking over Puli’s photos, to recognize the shadowy figures of Colby and Freud on the Mallays’ front porch. He could not believe that a couple as gentle and generous as the Mallays would have anything to do with the likes of Freud or Colby. That could only mean, as far as Daniel was concerned, that they’d been there to see Ollie. But that too was hard to believe. Though by his own admission, he sometimes helped Tancred out, Ollie was not a proper criminal. For one thing, he lacked ambition. No, that was putting it mildly. Ollie was philosophicall
y opposed to ambition.

  Beneath these thoughts, a more unsettling idea ran: what if Freud and Colby had something to do with Mrs. Mallay’s death? Ollie would have said so, wouldn’t he? Hard to say. If Ollie was mixed up with Colby and Freud, he might keep quiet. Or, as this was Ollie, and Ollie was indifferent to mortality, the cause of his mother’s death might not have troubled him enough to inspire mention. In any event, he could not stand the thought of questioning Ollie when, as far as he knew, there was no crime and, so, no reason to disturb Ollie’s thoughts. Nor, obviously, could he call Colby in. His suspicions or fears could not justify letting Nigger know he was being followed. Yet, given the photos of the two on the porch, it was disturbing to do nothing. So, he chose to speak to Tancred, to find out if Tancred knew anything that connected Colby and the Mallays.

  They did not meet in Parkdale. At Tancred’s suggestion, they met far from it: way the hell and gone, past Dufferin and St. Clair. And though Daniel loved Toronto – the city of his birth – it was hard for him not to feel that St. Clair, from Bathurst west to Earlscourt, was a test of human patience. Traffic lights every yard or so is what it felt like, with lanes reserved for streetcars and countless offshooting streets you couldn’t turn onto. To drive a klick, you needed half an hour, half an hour if you didn’t hit one of the taxis careening and caroming along as if St. Clair were meant for bumper cars. Making things worse, as far as Daniel was concerned, was how lovely the street was in his mind: from Wychwood and old churches to Italian restaurants and Pain Perdu, past north-rising streets with their old houses or south-subsiding ones that led to mazes of smaller streets and more elegant homes. It was diabolical that a road should be so lovely in the mind and yet so dire to drive on. But drive he did, Earlscourt being too far to walk.

  He and Tancred met not far from Prospect Cemetery at a bakery whose name, Café Pastéis de Belém, suggested something more wonderful than the unremarkable shop above a lawyer’s office. As usually happened when they met, it was some time before they’d caught up, caught up not only with the present but also with old matters – this thought bringing forth that one from long ago, that one calling up things they’d spoken about months previously.

  It was Tancred who brought up Olivier.

  – I swear, he said, Ollie’s even stranger now than he was in high school. It’s like he’s not any more upset about his mom’s death than he was about Bazarov’s.

  – His cat? said Daniel. If Bazarov died, Ollie’d be in mourning for at least an hour.

  – Baz the fifth, said Tancred. I remember because when the fourth one died, Ollie wanted to drink in the cat’s memory. I said, ‘Why should we have a drink in Bazarov’s memory if death is no big thing?’ I was only kidding, but you know how Ollie takes these things. He said, ‘You don’t have to get sentimental. I just bought a bottle of Stoli Elit. And Baz’s death is a good excuse to try it.’ So, when Baz the fourth died, we drank three-thousand-dollar vodka.

  – Three-thousand-dollar vodka?

  – That’s not all, said Tancred. It was good vodka, but Ollie didn’t like it because Ollie doesn’t like vodka. So, he gave the bottle to his neighbour. You know, the Filipino woman he’s got a thing for. Only problem is, she doesn’t drink. So, she threw the vodka out and kept the bottle. I said, ‘Didn’t you tell her the vodka was worth three thousand dollars?’ He said, ‘What’s the difference?’ I said, ‘It’s a waste of money. And it’s not like you can afford it.’ And he said, ‘I saved up for it and Jovelyn likes the bottle. What’s the problem?’

  – He’s right, said Daniel.

  – I know he’s right, said Tancred, but if you’re going to pay three thousand dollars for a bottle, you could have got a nicer bottle. It was plain as dirt. Anyway, it’s useless to argue with Ollie about anything.

  – Listen, that reminds me, said Daniel. Do you know if there’s some kind of business between Ollie and Nigger Colby?

  Tancred tilted his head, as if he’d missed something.

  – What?

  – You know I don’t like to talk business, said Daniel, but one of our officers saw Nigger and Sigismund at Ollie’s house a week ago, just around the time Ollie’s mom died. I thought it was a strange coincidence. I’ve never known Ollie to hang with those two, have you?

  – What were the police doing at Ollie’s house? said Tancred.

  – They were on Runnymede and recognized Sigismund, so one of the officers took some pictures. On a whim, I guess, but Luxemberg’s a violent man, so they were interested. They didn’t know it was Ollie’s house. I’m the one who recognized it.

  Daniel pushed one of Puli’s photos across the table and watched as Tancred examined it.

  – Next time you see him, Daniel said, you should tell him these aren’t the kind of people to hang out with. As it is, I can’t help wondering if there’s any connection between them and Mrs. Mallay’s heart attack.

  – Can I keep the photo? asked Tancred.

  – Sure, said Daniel. If Ollie doesn’t know about this, he should.

  The following day, it was Tancred who pushed the photo across a tabletop.

  – What’s this? asked Olivier. Is that Colby and Freud? Then my father wasn’t dreaming. You know, Tan, since my mother’s death, my father hasn’t always been coherent. He was going on about a white man, but he never said albino. And there wasn’t any word from the doctor that anything was wrong. She died, that’s all there was to it, so I thought he was talking about death, not an albino. I still don’t think Colby and Freud had anything to do with it.

  The day after that, Tancred pushed the photo across a final tabletop toward Colby, whom he found eating (with Freud, of course) in a booth at Harry’s.

  – Where’d you get this? asked Colby

  as if politely impressed by a trick.

  – From a friend, said Tancred.

  – You have nosy friends, said Freud.

  – This was the day Mrs. Mallay died, wasn’t it? asked Tancred.

  – We don’t know anything about anybody dying, said Freud.

  – What are you, added Colby, a district attorney? Like a tv show? You think this is a tv show? Well, listen, Counsellor, how should we know when some biddy decides to kick the bucket? As far as I remember, we were asking for directions, weren’t we, Freud?

  – We were asking for directions, said Freud.

  – Anyway, what’s the big deal? said Colby. Bad things happen to good people all the time.

  – If she was good people, said Freud.

  – Exactly, said Colby.

  In that instant Tancred accepted that everything Mr. Mallay had told Ollie was true. Freud and Colby were responsible for Mrs. Mallay’s death. And it had been his – that is, Tancred’s – fault. Ollie had nothing to do with these men.

  He was shaken. He’d miscalculated the extent of Colby’s drive and competence, and his miscalculation had cost Ollie’s mother her life. There was no recourse, nowhere to go for justice. But what he felt more than the longing for justice was the desire that nothing like this should happen again, that none of his friends should ever suffer through his fault.

  The other thing he felt was anger, an emotion that was useless to him, interfering as it did with his ability to think straight. Looking at Freud, for instance, he had to shake the terribly strange thought of stabbing the man’s face with a coffee spoon.

  – I haven’t been fair to you, Errol, he said. From now on, we should work together.

  – Now he wants to work with us, said Freud.

  Colby put up a hand to silence Freud and, to Tancred, said

  – How haven’t you been fair?

  – I admire your nerve, said Tancred. I think we’d work well together.

  Magnanimous in what he took to be victory, Colby said

  – We’re good people. We only want what’s good.

  – Should we bring Mr. Armberg in on this? asked Tancred.

  – If we’re in on it, he’s in on it, said Colby. Mr. Armberg’s the man.


  – Okay, said Tancred. This is what I know about Willow’s inheritance.

  Dispassionately, he told Colby and Freud much of what he knew.

  2 Castle Rose

  On seeing von Würfel’s replicas, Tancred had begun to question the need to complete Willow’s task. But he’d decided to go on stealing the Azarian mementos because a task’s demands are distinct from its reasons. He’d given his word and that was it, at least until (or if) he figured the puzzle out. But for the first time in his life, a vow he’d made clashed with his ideals. His vow had brought pain to those close to him. The moral dissonance was almost unbearable.

  He had no choice but to keep Colby close, because it was only by keeping him close that he could be certain Colby did not interfere with Ollie or Daniel. Then again, keeping Colby close was a temporary solution. If Robert Azarian had actually hidden something of value, it was Tancred’s duty to give most of what he found to Willow’s siblings. He’d already promised some of what was due him to von Würfel. He’d have to split what remained with Colby or even give Colby all that he had promised Willow he’d keep. He could not be sure, however, that Colby would accept less than what he’d demanded: 50 percent of anything they found.

  That was out of the question. Willow had not told him what to do with her share. Giving it to Colby was, therefore, not breaking his word. Giving away the part meant for her siblings, however, most definitely was. So, he, a child of Alexandra Park, had become a defender of people who had all the advantages (the Azarians) against the depredations of men (Freud and Colby) who’d had none.