Mark Lee - The Canal House

Back in London, a cold autumn rain was falling and wet leaves filled the gutters. Alex, the night clerk at the Ruskin Hotel, said a Mr. Seaton had left several messages asking me to contact him as soon as I arrived. He wanted to know if the caller was the famous “I Bought My Home with Richard” Seaton, and when I nodded he hummed the tune that went with the TV commercial.

I slept for about ten hours, then woke up and ordered some toast and a pot of tea. When the breakfast-room waitress showed up with the food, I searched through my pockets for a tip, then rummaged through my camera bag. Tucked in a side pocket was a single roll of black-and-white 35mm film. I had attached some medical tape to it and written the words Canal House . This was ancient history, shots I had taken of Daniel and Julia the first time they invited me there.

I didn’t want a stranger touching the negatives so I went out that afternoon and bought developing chemicals, photographic paper, and three plastic trays. I sealed off the cracks around the bathroom door with duct tape, processed the film in the darkness, and hung the negatives from the shower rod. After the film dried, I covered the light over the sink with a sheet of red cellophane. I taped the negatives to a sheet of photographic paper, then gave the paper a burst of light with a desk lamp held in my hand.

Kneeling on the bathroom floor, I pushed the paper into the developer and the photographs appeared. The pictures were small, the size of the film itself and I took one of my lenses and turned it over to magnify the images. I saw Daniel and Julia standing at the front door of the Canal House, Daniel working in the kitchen, the two of them together, sitting on the couch, his arm on her shoulder as they looked at my camera. I stared at Daniel’s face, looking for an answer. Had he known that he was going to die in East Timor? Was there a hint of sadness, a deeper knowledge, in his smile?

I HID IN MY ROOM for two days, then finally called the Riverside Bank. Some people think that power is revealed by the number of layers protecting you from the outside world. By that standard, Richard Seaton was a very powerful man. I had to talk to a series of receptionists, secretaries, and special assistants until Richard’s voice finally came on the line.

“Nicky! Glad you called. We lost track of you after you left Dili.”

“Where’s Julia?”

“In Bracciano.” Richard said. “Staying there just brings back a lot of bad memories. I’m flying to Italy this weekend in the jet. Maybe you could come along with me. We need to talk her into returning to England and resting. For a long time.”

“Maybe she doesn’t want to leave.”

“Yes. That’s why I need your help, Nicky. Where are you?”

“In London, at the Ruskin. Maybe we could meet later on this morning.”

“Of course. Right away. Let me send a car over.”

“It’s not necessary. I’d rather walk.”

“Whatever you want. Pick a time and I’ll be here.”

He gave me the address of his office and I said I’d drop by in two hours. Sitting on the edge of my unmade bed, I ate a candy bar and wondered what I was going to say. The only real decision I’d made was not to bring along my camera.

The Riverside Bank, Ltd., was in a large office building near the Strand. A security guard wearing a blue blazer was sitting in the central foyer. When I gave him my name, he picked up his phone and dialed a number. Another guard appeared and escorted me to the twenty-third floor where an older woman with a clipboard was waiting. Modern art decorated the office, geometric shapes on white canvas that were easy on the eyes. My guide escorted me past several determined-looking people staring at computer screens, pushed open a burnished steel door, and told me that Mr. Seaton was waiting.

The office was immense, four times bigger than the breakfast room at the Ruskin. It had glass walls on three sides and a spectacular view of the River Thames. Richard was sitting at a massive desk that looked like it had been molded out of concrete. He was looking at two different computer screens and typing on a keyboard. There was a phone on his desk with lots of buttons and a framed photograph of Julia standing on the tennis court at Westgate Castle.

“Nicky!” He jumped out of his chair and gave me a hug. I felt his hand pat me on the back a few times as if I was on his team and we had just lost a game.

“It’s wonderful to see you again. I still can’t believe all this happened. Daniel’s death is such a loss.”

“A big loss.” I said. My voice was all wrong, cracking a little, not confident.

“Please. Sit down,” he said and led me over to a conversation area. Framed photographs were on the wall: Richard talking to two American presidents, the prime minister of Britain, and the Dalai Lama.

“Can I get you anything? Coffee? Tea? Or maybe something a bit stronger? Anything you want.”

“That’s okay.” I sat down on a black leather couch. He took a heavily upholstered chair. Magazines were on the coffee table—some going back several years—but all of them had Richard’s face on the cover.

“What happened after Billy left East Timor?”

“We buried Daniel in a cemetery. A lot of people came to the funeral.”

“Is there a gravestone?”

“Just a wooden cross.”

A pad of paper lay on the coffee table. Richard picked up a silver fountain pen and scribbled a note. “I’ll get a memorial stone carved here in London and have it shipped to the cemetery. We can just put his name on it—or anything else you want.”

“That’s a wonderful thing to do for the man you killed.”

The words just came out of my mouth. I didn’t even think about them. I felt like a little kid who had just leaped into the deep end of the pool. Now I had to start kicking or I was going to drown.

“I beg your pardon?”

“I talked to Pak, that old man on the Seria . He said you paid him to fake an engine breakdown.”

Richard looked like a cyclist who had been rolling down a smooth boulevard when suddenly the pavement disappeared. “That’s insane,” he sputtered. “Completely untrue.”

“I know what happened.”

“Calm down, Nicky. Just calm down. Daniel was your closest friend. His death must have been an enormous shock.”

“I don’t know how you can justify killing another person, but I’m sure you have an explanation. Maybe you tell yourself that everything was crazy in Timor and now you’re back in London and everything’s normal again. People do that a lot, Richard. Blame it on the Third World. Blame it on the weather. There’s a million excuses and none of them are true. I think it was all about power. When Daniel ran off with Julia, he took something from you. And nobody does that to Richard Seaton.”

Richard pushed one of the buttons on the table phone. He stared at me, not saying a word, then the steel door popped open and Billy charged into the room. This was the London Billy, wearing an Armani suit and gray cashmere shirt.

“What’s the problem?” he asked, then recognized me and grinned. “Hey, Nicky! When did you get back in London?”

“This isn’t a social visit. Nicky is acting a bit strange.”

Billy shrugged and tried to make a joke. “Well, he’s never been completely normal . Isn’t that right, Nicky?”

“He says we paid Pak to sabotage the ship’s engine.”

Richard and Billy glanced at each other. They didn’t play leader and follower at that moment; it was something much more complex. At that moment I wasn’t sure if killing Daniel was Billy’s idea or if Richard had actually given the order. Perhaps Richard only provided the desire, the need, and Billy made it real.