William Deverell - Kill All the Judges

There is a proper genre for the carnal, and it isn’t crime , hectors Widgeon in a finger-wagging sermon about not making a disgusting exhibition of one’s swollen libido to the gentle, mystery-devouring sweethearts who prefer blood-spattered bodies to hot buttered cock. Brian contemplated his cellphone, finally switched it on, dialed, connected with Abigail Hitchins’s machine. “Pomeroy here, diligently returning your calls, and it’s, I don’t know, somewhere around three p.m…”

She came on. “It’s noon. Are you blasted already?”

“On Christmas Day you’re screening your calls?”

“From my mother. In case you forgot, we have a one-week trial starting in February.”

“I got it in my daybook.”

“Did you see my e-mail? A list of facts we’d like admitted. Non-contentious shit, street maps, house plans, dates, times, places.”

Brian vaguely remembered something like that.

“Without admissions this sucker’s going to last two weeks.” A pause. “What are you doing for Christmas dinner?”

“Hiding from the people watching me.” Why does she laugh?

“Yeah, and I’m hiding from my damn mother. Want to get together? We can go over my non-contentious wish list.”

“I’m too broke.”

“I’ll buy. Let’s say seven-thirty, Il Giardino. I’ll phone to confirm. Keep your fucking cell on. Capisce?”

“Capisce.” She was too eager, which was disconcerting. She had, unfortunately, become enraptured with Brian lo those many years ago, and with lamentable intensity. But that was the 1990s, another century. She’d had relationships since, a failed marriage, then five years sleeping with her therapist.

Brian looked out, the bongo busker was still working the street, another at the Keefer corner, doing mime. He was probably in on it with the doorman. The thin man was the leader, but he wasn’t around right now. There was Harry the Need, under Quick Loans, No References Required. He was the only one Brian could trust.

Abigail called right back. “We’re on. You still allowed to drive?”

“Had to sell the Honda to make ends meet.”

“I’ll pick you up, how’s that?”

“No, I’ll get there.”

“Where are you, Brian?”

They always want to know. “Ciao.”

He was scrambling down in inky darkness, going too fast, slipping on lemons. Suddenly, spread below him, were the lights of a throbbing city with a great cathedral…no, a colonnaded courthouse. He had taken the wrong trail, the one to the precipice. He was falling, falling…

Arthur awoke in fright, took his bearings. It was noon. It was Christmas Day. He was on a couch and the Aeneid was lying open on his stomach. He was in the woofers’ house, with its youthful clutter of art film posters, electronic gizmos, compact disks, Japanese paperbacks. Arthur had proposed to Margaret in this very living room. Clearly she now regretted having signed on to the deal.

This morning, when he tried to make amends for last night’s grand gaucherie by offering to be her kitchen slave, she snapped, “Just get out of here. Get out of the house.” She had spoken to him, however, despite yesterday’s vow never to do so again. That was after she checked his bruises and scratches, scolding all the while, after she drew him a hot bath.

His groping descent from the peak had been aided by the glow from a hotly burning pipe, but he’d lost the trail soon after his last match went out, and was hours working his way downhill. He’d been raked by thorns and low branches, and his clothes were in tatters. Finally, he’d come within shouting distance of the search party assigned to Mount Norbert. Other volunteers had been combing every nook and cranny of the island. Yes, all of Garibaldi had spent Christmas Eve looking for this lost soul. Arthur’s humiliation was spectacular, immeasurable.

The troop that won bragging rights was commanded by Constable Ernst Pound, who loudly announced his triumph by radio phone. “Listen up, folks. Sorry to disappoint anyone, but Mr. Beauchamp has been found by lucky Team Seven. It’s 21:51 hours, and we have him in our lights, he’s coming down the service road near the west entrance of Mount Norbert District Park.”

All this Arthur heard clearly in the cold, still night as he slogged toward those lights. “Someone better call his wife, she sounded real panicky…Yeah, he looks okay, he has a walking stick, he’s waving.”

Arthur accepted coffee from Pound’s Thermos but refused all other aid, refused bandages, though some scratches were beaded with congealed blood. A dead branch had decorated his left cheek with a painful, cup-shaped smile. Another branch had brought him a thick ear.

He followed Team Seven to the turnoff where they’d parked. “We tracked you as far as the general store,” Pound said. “I figured Mount Norbert, because it’s near there. You got to give advance notice where you’re hiking, Mr. Beauchamp. I have to file a report, a whole lot of people got inconvenienced, and I can’t ignore it.”

Arthur had sat slouched in Pound’s cruiser, not wanting to be seen, ducking as he passed the church, ducking the worshippers leaving after evensong. But neighbours had gathered at his house. “I’m fine, I’m fine,” he repeated as Pound escorted him past them, up the driveway of shame, toward Margaret in the doorway.

Thus was blind Oedipus delivered unto the Furies, to be punished for his unwitting crimes. Arthur had been stupid and thoughtless, and no apology, no explanation was acceptable. She’d been on the verge of cancelling the dinner she’d been four days preparing. “I see this as sabotage. You had better decide whether you’re with me or against me, because I am going to run in this election, and I intend to win. With you or without you.”

He tried to persuade Margaret that while watching eagles sail over the Gwendolyn cliffs, he’d been deeply moved by his love and admiration for her, a soul-cleansing epiphany that had resolved him to support her great democratic endeavour.

“Please don’t patronize me with your bullshit,” she said.

At night, feeling the whip of her silent fury, he’d again slept poorly, and he was glad for this short kip on the woofers’ couch. He was still hurting, especially his right ear, which resembled a chanterelle mushroom. He stood and stretched. He had best rise, prepare himself for the gala dinner-it was to start early, at four o’clock, so everyone could make the late ferry. No point in trying to hide the scratches on his face. He’ll make a joke of it, entertain these defenders of the wilderness with his tale of surviving it.

From the window, he saw that the mist was holding. Lavinia and the three Japanese woofers were warming themselves around a spit and its skewered lamb. No sign of Nick…Then he heard, softly, the tick-click of a computer keyboard from another room. Recall came suddenly of a duty not attended to. Nick. Good Christ, he’d forgotten to tell him his father had cancelled his Christmas visit.

Arthur saw the door to the den was ajar, a light within. He poked his head in and saw Nick studying the screen, speed-typing, studying the screen again.

“Ah, Nick, I’ve been meaning to talk to you.” Nick looked up startled. “Don’t mean to interrupt your, ah, research, but…”

“I was watching The Simpsons .” He turned the screen to him: cartoon personae cavorted on it. Arthur was skeptical-the phone line was plugged into the computer-but he wasn’t going to take issue. More important: how was he to say what must be said?

“This comes a little late from me, Nick, I’m sorry…Well, matters went awry-you heard about my, ah, goof-up last night.”