Brethren of Acadia

Brethren of Acadia

a Second Face in FebruaryBy David B. Green

AuthorHouse

Copyright © 2011 David B. Green
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4567-1733-9

Contents

Prologue..........................................................xxviPart 1: Anatomy of the Talented...................................1Chapters One thru Twenty..........................................2Interlude at the Iolani Palace, Honolulu..........................71Part 2: Anatomy of the Underground................................78Chapters One thru Fifteen.........................................79Interlude at Caxton Street, St. James, London.....................138Part 3: Anatomy of the Game.......................................142Chapters One thru Twenty Five.....................................143Epilogue..........................................................228

Chapter One

There had been an abdication of responsibility. It had been subtle, though distinct.

Much pressure had been brought to bear as a result. It had not escaped Oscar and his associates.

Down, deep in the ever darkening distance, Oscar could hear the sound of shutters being rolled down to cover the rows of terraced plate glass showcase shop-front windows and make them secure from both vandals and the elements, both of which at night appeared that much fiercer. It was almost the last thing he had grown accustomed to hearing each day at this time. He listened instinctively for the comfort it would bring him. The reassurance. The surety. The security held in boredom. In sterility.

The slow rattle of the engine from the truck that moved off with apparent reluctance from the curbside next to the now closed Maddy's Chippy fish & chip shop. Driver having tooled up with the fruits of the briny, consoled no doubt by the hot food housed within the heavily vinegared golden brown package held, was a constant, as was the belching cloud of black diesel released from the exhaust pipe as it left St. James Place in its wake.

He saw her white coat flap open in the distance as she turned the corner and approached the telephone box across the road from the low stone walled church yard. Oscar wondered if she had been engaged in an embrace, delivering a long and hard, deep, flickering-tongue probing, bottom fondling farewell to her boyfriend. He wondered if the boyfriend had deserved it?

Everyone deserved a modicum of pleasure.

Then the taxi with a rear break light out, drove off with a lurch in the direction of the small harbour nestled over to Oscar's left. Footsteps pervaded now from heavy hob-nailed boots. It was time to move on.

Meanwhile, in a very Northern European heraldic city, Helene Kvakheim was waiting along with her girl friends for supper to be served; Ariana Danielli, Dalia Lundberg, Veronica DeMarco, Babet Dubuclet and Mrs. Hillary Robinson in attendance, were ravenous.

They were seated and were becoming quite loud, raucous and animated, at a long corner table at the Potetkjelleren Restaurant in Bergen, Norway, located just off the main Vågen harbour up on Kong Oscars Gate.

The Potetkjelleren had a warm and cozy cellar atmosphere as befitting a restaurant found below ground - in an actual cellar. A potato cellar.

The ladies had perused the menu and in the main went for selections favoured by the Vikings. There was nothing about the concept of the VIKING that Hillary Robinson didn't like.

Her fire had been ignited.

Meals containing oysters, mussels and sometimes with mutton, cheese, cabbage, apples, onions, berries and nuts were evidenced. While Helene had ordered moules avec frites, her friends had opted for either reindeer or whale, which were house specialties. Hillary, not surprisingly, had gone for the whale.

When it surfaced, which was often, Helene had an unfortunate laugh; capable of bringing down a fleet of small light aircraft at some distance ... the dinner would be a good one.

The all night lesbifest planned to take place in Hillary's suite at the Clarion Collection hotel would be even better and in all probability take significantly longer to conclude.

The peel of the bells were soon to ring out from the close-by Korskirken, 17th century church ...

Ariana Danielli knew of course that they would also be soon to relent. It was not a happy thought.

Oscar had taken to carrying in the left side pocket of his charcoal chinos, a red handkerchief of cotton, complete with a small embroidered cross of St. George in one corner. He carried it habitually, for the 'Luck' that it would bring him.

He had long since recognized the inevitability of it all. That in his life and relationships, there would always be a time when those closest to him would see their feelings toward him turn to stark hatred. He would be ostracized and castigated by the people he loved and held dearest. A precedent had been set. Poor Eric.

In his rapidly approaching dotage, it was something that had become somewhat troubling. Try as he may, he could never quite find just cause. It made Oscar sad. Morose even.

Oscar had recently, while back in Niagara, ventured through the cemetery at St Marks, the bastion of the Rev. Jephcott Proudfoot-Wason and found immediately to the right of the Carnathan-Baur crypt, a young lady dressed all in gray. She was laid prostrate and was completely ignorant to his presence. She had a small paperback book laid open at her fingertips nestled on the ground and her eyes were closed as she listened intently to her headphones ... Oscar had moved a little closer. The book was a guide to North Devonshire mysteries ...

To England; where the vernacular of the populous had crassly degenerated to that of the east end barrow boy. Oscar had found it appalling! Depressing. What had happened? People had learned to be happy with and accept so little from life. They appeared to esteem their lives so cheaply. Contentment in mediocrity.

As Oscar moved steadily down the unforgivingly steep serpentining pathway to the main road next to the Landmark theatre, the cut of the wind began to diminish.

It was replaced however by something much more menacing. Something that would prove to be altogether something else. Altogether something very sinister and something very terminal. Oscar found himself lapsing into invisibility and of no consequence as he moved through the narrow streets back towards the harbour. Things had gone wrong, more often than he could accept. Life had become for Oscar, one long and lovely suicide and he was not sorry that it had. There had been so many contingencies. So much angst. So much grace.

He had contemplated that there was no time quite so remote, as the recent past.

As with the Brethren of Acadia and the guest's of the Queen's Royal hotel in Niagara ... the guest who never arrives, seemingly, is always welcomed back. Oscar's thoughts drifted back to the poignance of his first love.

He was ready for whatever lay ahead.

Chapter Two

Reuters Newswire: February 20th 200X; Oscar Phelps former friend and business associate of the Rt. Hon Eric Armstrong-Jones KBE, reported 'found dead' in the early dispatches of the Boston Herald.

Era es verdad.

His body had been discovered in the cold dark early morning by an ICS bicycle courier who was taking a short cut through the Public Garden in Boston. He had been found fully clothed and rigid in elegant and expensive gentleman's winter attire by Barbour. He had on a full length Drovers-cut long length wax cotton Stockman coat in golden brown, He was seated upright on a bench (ironically) and carried as identification a drivers permit issued curiously in Louisiana which had been folded in to an old receipt from the Le Pavillon hotel of Poydras street in New Orleans, and which had been further secreted within the pages of an old paperback book which was heavily soiled with a solution of tar and was lay flat at his side. His shirt was made by Turnbull & Asser, his heavy silk tie was broad and dark blue with logo by R. M. Williams, Australia (the Bush Outfitter), his black cotton socks by Rodd & Gunn, black trousers by Eddie Bauer and he sported Edward Green shoes. Excepting the tie, they were all mainly products of the Old England department store in Paris. A store Oscar was known to patronize.

The novel was called 'Red Lights' by Georges Simenon and a stamp on the inside front cover indicated that it had been the property of the Nerja Bookshop in Spain and the Illfracombe public library.

It was past due ...

Chapter Three

After having given the matter some real and extended consideration and very serious thought, his conclusion though drastic was inevitably the only viable recourse. At the very least, it would buy him some time and allow Hillary and Trent to complete their various missions under marginally less scrutiny.

Staging his own death was the correct decision.

While it would make the required journey down-under a little more difficult to manage, it was doable and while he found it a bore, the rewards from the risk involved where clear in his mind. It had to be this way.

Relatively speaking ... He was in the pink!

Trent Alexis was seated at the bulkhead in an aisle seat in row 1 (front); seat D of the 7.01am WESTJET flight en route from Toronto to Vancouver. The flight was 45 minutes into its journey. They were approaching 37,579 feet and had a cruising velocity of MPH541.

The route was taking them across the US, high above Traverse City in Michigan, before swinging back north into Canada at the far western North Dakota/Montana border.

Trent was bloody annoyed. He had things to do. They wouldn't be pleasant.

The WESTJET flight attendant seated opposite, slightly forward and to the left of Trent, who had been strapped in for take-off in the cabin seat adjacent the main entry door to the aircraft had caught his attention. She wore a short jacket of turquoise with logo positioned just above her left breast, a white blouse with an ornate frill at the neck, a partially zipped up black cardigan and long dark pants which looked good and pulled tight when she crossed her legs. Her auburn hair was pulled back into a short ponytail and she had a high tapering forehead and large eyes of green. Her face was almost Egyptian looking, but not quite and her complexion was olive and unblemished. Her eyebrows were sleek and somewhat sculptured. She had taken care and had made a nice job. She perhaps had applied a little too much mascara to her lashes, which were long. She looked as though she had recently applied a good moisturizer. She wore wide black oblong-rimmed eyeglasses, which gave her a certain distinction. She had dainty pink earlobes protruding just below here hair, which held small diamond stud earrings. They looked inexpensive. She had large, though even white teeth and her smile, when occasioned, served to brighten the day. She was prim. She carried a certain sex appeal. She was eating a green apple. Trent sat back into the four and a half hour flight, closed his eyes and started to mentally undress her.

Chapter Four

It was bloody cold and the Court House in Niagara on the Lake was open at its side door entrance and waiting for the ambulance which was expected imminently. The punters at the Olde Angel Inn, circa 1816, had gathered outside the front door to see what had caused the commotion across the street. The skies were dark yet somewhat obscured and showed few signs of the appearance of a star. The air was chill and as Oscar stood in the shadows of the car park, stogie in hand, he could see his breath first extend, then hold and finally dissipate in front of him as he waited along with the now massing crowd to see if the fall to the bottom of the stairwell had been enough? Her neck had looked twisted and broken and certainly she had not been moving as her body lay skewed and prone, sprawled upside down along the final decline of the last few steps. Her facial expression had not held any promise. It had hardly been a very Dostoyevsky-like executed solution, was Oscar's thought. He hadn't broken into even a tremble, let alone a cold sweat. The whole episode, short as it was, was completely devoid of panic, anxiety or confusion.

She had annoyingly given him a quite dreadful laugh, almost a guffaw, which disclosed villainous yellowing teeth as she had been speaking and she displayed an altogether childish lilt which was unseemly. Her mouth had been slack right before the event, then as Oscar had gone about his business, her eyes had screwed up and her brow had become furrowed, betraying a violent and nauseating pain.

Still, Oscar justified in his own mind ... if it meant one less car in the street, one less voyeur in a gallery and just that little less noise for all to suffer, then all was well.

The music from the wedding party one flight above the scene was still banging out relentlessly with vigour and showed no sign that it would be abated.

Oscar was thinking back to the Oscar Wilde line with amusement as the ambulance, lights flashing and siren sounding turned the corner from Queen Street and swung a hard left bypassing the Olde Angel.

"Sausages and women ... if one is to enjoy them both, one ought never to see either in preparation".

The ambulance pulled in hard, crackling on to the apron next to the car park designation and the doors swung open in silence and the two paramedics, a man and a woman came to the rear of the vehicle with haste. The entrance to the Court House theatre stood grand a few metres away. The two white wooden entrance doors were pulled outwards to fully open by inquisitive bystanders looking to help and the impressive stone portico that lead to the entrance of the building, the staircase and the elevator, extended as a small colonnade with a flat roof supported by two rounded columns, which was structured over the short walkway and was ready to bid them entry.

Oscar stood slightly round shouldered and head bowed. His cigar, a MonteCristo 'Edmundo', hecho en Habana, Cuba, fell to the hard ground and bounced somewhat, scattering a few embers before dying.

We are all racing towards death was Oscar's conclusion and no matter how many great, intellectual conclusions and discoveries we draw during our lives, we know that they're all just man-made, like God.

Oscar began to wonder where it all might lead? But concluded that you can do very little except do what you can do, as best you know how. In this he drew some comfort. Profound.

He found his thoughts drifting to "32-Red", to his precipice, to his friends and to things Mediterranean. It was a form of catharsis.

He was distracted by events unfolding in New Orleans and further south in Buenos Aires, which were not as they should be. He then began to visualize a waterfront hotel on Victoria Road in Devonport, a short 10 minute ferry ride courtesy of Fullers, from Auckland harbour on it way to Rangitoto Island in the Hauraki Gulf of New Zealand. The old world charm and Edwardian architectural and the alluring ambience of The Esplanade Hotel, was beginning to pull at Oscar from afar. Perhaps he would venture south, but first he must attend to matters in Memphis, Tennessee, where a young paralegal had discovered, nay stumbled over, items of a nature that could only serve to annoy and frustrate.

It was time to reacquaint himself with the hotel which had spawned years earlier, an altogether entertaining encounter with the now long deceased nemesis; "Buffalo" Bertram Keelan. He of the Peabody Duck tie. The Peabody Ducks being five North American mallards - one drake with white collar and green head, and four hens with less colorful plumage. They had become a tradition. Somehow, that seemed very apt.

This was going to be a difficult one.

Oscar had never seen life as simply an exercise in survival. That was something for other people. His idea of survival revolved around getting by each November 11th armistice day ceremony in the Olde Town, unscathed by the attempts at local tradition and occasionally upon his life. He so loved and looked forward to his Remembrance Day anniversaries. They served as the launch pad in to another year of promise, discovery and adventure. Oscar had long since considered that there was more to being a great man ... than simply the willingness to commit and get away with a crime.

Oscar began the next morning with a determined optimism. He awoke early and dressed in old but still stylish comfortable clothes – after taking in his suite, a pot of delicious 'Seattle's Best' coffee and sweet morning rolls. He had taken his first cup black to wake himself up – he then made his way through the narrow corridors passing by the Vintages Wine Bar and Lounge and in to the main reception area of the Pillar and Post Inn. It was just after 7.35am and the broadsheet newspapers, the Globe and Mail, the Financial Post, were already on the rack and the fireplace was generating heat.

To his left taking pride of place on the wall next to the men's room was a photograph of the Queen, strolling through the very same corridors some years earlier. This somehow seemed inappropriate.

Time for a sojourn.

Oscar had chosen eight o'clock in the morning as the time for his promenade down King Street before turning left through and on to a wintery Queen Street, simply because it was his favorite time of day in Niagara. He loved the quality of the crisp morning cold, the sprinkling of layered snow and ice and the invasive sunshine that made him squint. He had grown to love the sounds that began and made the day's activity.

Early traffic in the street, doors opening and closing, sidewalks being scraped and hosed down with hot water by industrious town workers with their red liveried trucks parked nearby and displaying in near silence a keen sense of sobriety. The increasing footfalls on the sidewalk, which steadily increased in volume as the day commenced, the filling up of the parking bays with good and close access to shops, which would lead in quick time to the inevitable encounters with the 'Parking Nazis' who patrolled the town with vigilance post Ice Wine Festival and Winterfest seasons.

(Continues...)

Excerpted from Brethren of Acadiaby David B. Green Copyright © 2011 by David B. Green. Excerpted by permission of AuthorHouse. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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