THREE
‘Who did these?’ Saul asked CC, holding up the artist’s portfolio.
‘What?’
‘This here.’ He stood naked in their hotel room. ‘I found it in the garbage. Whose is it?’
‘Mine.’
‘You did these?’ He was staggered. For an instant he wondered whether he’d misjudged her. These were clearly the works of a gifted artist.
‘Of course not. Some pathetic little person from the village gave them to me to show around to my gallery friends. Trying to suck up, it was the funniest thing. “Oh please CC, I know how well connected you are.” “Oh CC would you mind very much showing my work to some of your contacts?” Very annoying. Imagine asking me for a favor? Even had the gall to ask me to show it to Denis Fortin specifically.’
‘What did you say?’ His heart sank. He knew the answer, of course.
‘Said I’d be delighted. You can put them back where you found them.’
Saul hesitated, then closed the portfolio and put it back in the garbage, hating himself for helping to destroy such a luminous portfolio, and hating himself even more for wanting to destroy it.
‘Don’t you have something on this afternoon?’ he asked.
She straightened the glass and the lamp on the bedside table, moving each a millimeter until they were where they should be.
‘Nothing important,’ she said, wiping some great carbuncle of dust off the table. Really, at the Ritz. She’d have to speak to the manager. She looked at Saul, standing by the window.
‘God, you’ve let yourself go.’
He’d obviously had a good body once, she thought. But now everything was flaccid. CC had been with fat men. She’d been with buff men. And in her opinion either extreme was all right. It was the transition that was disgusting.
Saul revolted her and she couldn’t quite remember why she’d thought this was a good idea. Then she looked down at the glossy, white cover of her book, and remembered.
The picture. Saul was a wonderful photographer. There, above the title, Be Calm, was her face. Her hair so blonde it was nearly white, her lips red and full, her eyes a startling, intelligent blue. And her face so white it almost disappeared into the background, leaving the impression of eyes and mouth and ears floating on the cover.
CC adored it.
After this Christmas she’d get rid of Saul. Once he’d finished the last assignment. She noticed he must have bumped into the chair at the desk when he was looking at the portfolio. The chair was now out of alignment. She could feel a tension blossom in her chest. Damn him for deliberately annoying her like that, and damn that portfolio. CC leaped out of bed and straightened the screaming chair, taking the opportunity to also move the telephone parallel to the edge of the desk.
Then she leaped back into bed, smoothing the sheets on her lap. Maybe she should take a taxi back to her office. But then she remembered she did have someplace to go. Someplace important.
There was a sale on at Ogilvy’s and a pair of boots she wanted to buy at the Inuit arts store along rue de la Montagne.
It wouldn’t be long before she had her own line of clothing and furniture in stores across Quebec. Around the world. Soon all the arrogant chichi designers who’d mocked her would be sorry. Soon everyone would know about Li Bien, her own philosophy of design and living. Feng shui was passé. People were crying for a change, and she’d provide it. Li Bien would be on every tongue and in every home.
‘Have you rented a chalet for the holidays yet?’ she asked.
‘No, I’m going down tomorrow. Why’d you buy a home in the middle of nowhere anyway?’
‘I had my reasons.’ She felt a flash of anger at him for questioning her judgment.
She’d waited five years to buy a place in Three Pines. CC de Poitiers could be patient if she had to, and if she had a good enough reason.
She’d visited the crummy little village many times, networking with local real estate agents and even talking to shop clerks in nearby St-Rémy and Williamsburg. It had taken years. Apparently homes didn’t often come up in Three Pines.
Then a little over a year ago she’d had a call from a real estate agent named Yolande Fontaine. There was a home. A great Victorian Grande Dame on the hill overlooking the village. The mill owner’s home. The boss’s home.
‘How much?’ CC had asked, knowing it was almost certainly beyond her. She’d have to borrow against the company, mortgage everything she owned, get her husband to cash in his insurance policy and his RRSP.
But the real estate agent’s answer had surprised her. It was well below market value.
‘There is one little thing,’ Yolande had explained in a cloying voice.
‘Go on.’
‘There was a murder there. And an attempted murder.’
‘Is that all?’
‘Well, I guess, technically, there was also a kidnapping. Anyway, that’s why the house is so cheap. Still, it’s a great buy. Terrific pipes, mostly copper. The roof is only twenty years old. The—’
‘I’ll take it.’
‘Don’t you want to see it?’ As soon as the question was out Yolande could have kicked herself. If this moron wanted to buy the old Hadley house sight unseen, without inspection or exorcism, then let her.
‘Just draw up the papers. I’ll be down this afternoon with a cheque.’
And so she had. She’d told her husband a week or so later, when she’d needed his signature to cash in the RRSP. He’d protested, but so feebly it would have been impossible for a casual observer to even recognize it as a protest.
The old Hadley house, the monstrosity on the hill, was hers. She couldn’t have been happier. It was perfect. Three Pines was perfect. Or at least it would be, by the time she was finished with it.
Saul snorted and turned away. He could see the writing on the wall. He’d be dumped by CC as soon as the next photo assignment of her in that dreadful hick village was complete. It was for her first catalogue and he’d been told to get pictures of her frolicking among the natives at Christmas. If possible he had to get shots of the locals looking at CC with wonder and affection. He’d need cash for that.
Everything CC did had a purpose. And that purpose came down to two things, he figured: it fed her wallet or her ego.
So why had she bought a house in a village no one had ever heard of? It wasn’t prestige. So it must be the other.
Money.
CC knew something no one else did about the village, and it meant money.
His interest in Three Pines perked up.