William Deverell - Kill All the Judges

“My landlord bottles his own Merlot, very pleasant, but potent.”

That’s how he’ll blow it, he’ll get drunk, throw up on her rug.

He followed her into a funky small salon, jade plants, a blackboard with chalked Chinese offerings. He listened politely to the sing-song Cantonese of mom and pop and April, but felt out of place, disoriented, as if catapulted into some bizarre fantasy, with possibilities dangerous and erotic, a place beyond imagining, beyond where daydreams dare to go.

He wasn’t sure what he was ordering, number two, something called ginger noodles. He was tongue-tied, grateful she carried the conversation, listened in a haze as she spoke of her long-held dream of fleeing the crowded East for Canada, where there was air to breathe. How she’d nearly botched this dream. How she was terrified she’d be deported after she spilled the truth to Arthur. How grateful she’d been when forgiven. Grateful to Wentworth, for taking her side.

That was true, he’d worked at it, entreated Brovak, pitched Arthur hard. Was that was this was about, was she paying off a debt? He worked clumsily with chopsticks, twirling his noodles. Finally, after a long, searching look at her, he asked, “What’s the catch?”

“What do you mean, Wentworth?”

“I mean why me? You seem interested in me. I don’t get it.”

“That’s what I like about you. You don’t get it. You’re not aware of what an attractive man you are. I’ve known many lawyers. I’ve not worked with many I liked. Most are full of themselves. You’re quite the opposite. So I want to celebrate with you. The year of the rat. It’s my birth sign.”

“The rat. That doesn’t sound awfully auspicious.”

She explained that the rat was much admired in the Asian zodiac. Those born under it were seekers of new adventures. She seemed delighted to learn Wentworth was born in the year of the dragon-they were profoundly compatible. “The dragon has a powerful spirit and bravely faces challenge.”

He began talking then, slowly at first, not sure why he was opening up, maybe to dispel her notion he wasn’t full of himself, telling of growing up in a small town, his Pentecostal mom and self-flagellating father, rueful anecdotes of his social awkwardness and failed romances that, to his surprise, brought smiles and gentle laughter. He was entertaining her! He was amusing! He pressed on, confessed to his silly daydreams, his wonky obsession with the law, his fears he’d never rise to the upper tiers of counsel.

“You will rise. You are a dragon.”

She held the door for him. “It is small but cozy.”

If there existed such a condition as erotic panic, Wentworth was its victim, trembling in her doorway, under a wind chime, taking in the feng shui. Clean and uncluttered, framed epigrams in Chinese characters, a squat stone Buddha in the corner. A glimpsed corner of a bed behind a door.

April caught him staring at it. “We believe the bedroom door must not face the soles of the feet. Please relax, Wentworth, you are making me nervous.”

For a few minutes, an eternal few, he stood about helplessly as jacket and coat were hung, lights lowered, stereo turned on, something electronic, Philip Glass. Somehow he found himself transported to her kitchenette, where she poured the Merlot. “To the year of the rat,” she said.

They raised their glasses, and as he sipped from his, she rose on her toes and kissed him lightly on the cheek. A spasm of wine-spill terror, her skirt turning orange, the evening brutally ended. He set his glass down shakily, his cheek tingling with the soft touch of her lips. He felt faint, he was going to blow this, he was going to blow this. No! He was a dragon…

He took her in his arms, feeling fire if not breathing it, giddy with scent of her, the feel of her slender, supple body, her mouth opening to his, the electrifying sensation of her hot, searching tongue…

Her phone rang. “I’m not home,” she said huskily, but they waited until it stopped, still clenched, breathless, the moment altered.

Then silently she led him to the bedroom, and he found himself standing by the foot of the bed that must not face the door. April set down the wine bottle, and they came together again, she on her toes, pulling him to her mouth, pressing against him. Through fogged glasses he made out a white, loose breast, her top askew.

A different ring, chimes, his cellphone. From his jacket, the other room. He tensed, but she still clasped him hard. The phone sounded twice, thrice, four times. April looked shocked as he pulled away.

“Oh, God, I have to answer !” Because it would be Arthur getting back to him. At a royally horribly inopportune time. He raced for his phone.

Not Arthur. Dr. Oswald Schlegg from Hollyburn Hall. “Sorry to be a bother, Mr. Chance, but Ms. Wu wasn’t by her phone.”

“What’s the damn problem ?” His voice cracking with frustration.

“We have a little spot of worry here. It seems Mr. Pomeroy tried to hang himself with a bathrobe cord.”

The cab curled along the causeway that slices like a scimitar through Stanley Park, its lone passenger slumped in the back in torment-not because of Pomeroy, who had apparently botched the job, not because of acute pre-coitus interruptus, though that was bad enough, but because of fate’s cruelty, his own bad chi.

Wentworth had not only entertained the woman of his dreams with anecdotes of his romantic fuck-ups, he’d brought the show live to her bedroom. After assuring Schlegg he was on his way, he’d thought of ignoring Pomeroy’s plight for, say, the next half hour. But how could he and expect to live with himself?

He’d found himself stammering. But she’d smiled, even laughed at the absurdity of their fate, and kissed him again as she straightened her garments. “It’s okay, Wentworth. As my grandmother used to say, find happiness once, and the next time is always better.” She’d offered to come with him, but he dissuaded her, he might have to stay the night there.

As for Pomeroy, his neck got stretched a bit, Schlegg said, that was all. He’d got his foot tangled in the chair he was standing on, and a steward heard the racket. Wentworth guessed the poorly executed effort had been triggered by Caroline’s visit. He was wired to her, despite his history of marital negligence.

The skies had begun to open as they pulled off the highway, into the rain shadow of Hollyburn Mountain. Schlegg hurried out to greet him with one of the custodians. “Bertram here was right on the job, fortunately. We’re always checking-the doors have no locks, we try to anticipate this sort of thing. I hadn’t realized he was that depressed.” He led the way into a foyer, speaking softly: “We don’t like to bruit these things about, Mr. Chance. It gets some of our guests upset. Some are hardly coping as it is.”

Wentworth couldn’t believe that was proper practice, suicide attempts must be reported. The Facilitator. Wentworth could see why he repulsed Brian.

“Brian’s okay?”

“Little the worse. He was gagging, some neck bruising, strain to the muscles. A bathrobe cord wouldn’t have been my choice for this kind of folly, too loose. One doubts whether he expected to succeed at it.”

“You shot him up?”

“He’s about ready for another.” Checking his watch. “Lately, he had been unusually quiet in relating to me-a quite fractious fellow normally. We observed nothing untoward about his wife’s visit, no outbursts or screaming fits, but I overheard her talking about a year’s sabbatical in Ireland. He seemed rather flattened afterwards.”

“You should have anticipated this,” Wentworth said, peeved.

Schlegg sourly led them past tables of drug-deadened patients playing cards or backgammon, past a fireplace and conversation pit, up the stairs.