Dreams Come True in Dreamaway

© 2004 Jim McDougall
All rights reserved.

Rhadamanthus. What an odd name for a shop, Tina thought as she stepped from the sun-drenched lunch-time bustle of Yorkville into the gloomy silence of the antique bookstore.

A short, portly man in a conservative navy blue suit, or was it black—she couldn't tell for sure, her eyes still adjusting to the gloom—emerged from a narrow aisle between two neatly stacked shelves.

The man extended his hand in greeting and peered at her from over the edge of glasses that dangled from his nose. "Galliard is my name," the man said.

As Tina expected in a place like this, he had a classy English accent, rather like Anthony Hopkins.

Tina shook his hand. Her nostrils twitched. Incense—just like what she used at home.

"I'm Tina."

"Pleased to meet you."

"Likewise."

"May I help you with anything?"

"No thanks, just browsing."

Galliard raised a quizzical eyebrow.

She decided to let it all out. "To tell you the truth, I'm looking for something for my husband. His birthday's this week. He enjoys rare books and he's always talking about this place. I thought I might find something here for him."

Galliard nodded. "May I ask his name? Perhaps I have had the pleasure of his acquaintance."

"Howard Foster. Do you know him?" The perfectly ordinary name that once filled her with pride now filled her with ... indifference?

"I believe I have met him. Tall man, brown hair, brush cut?"

Tina's laughter sounded hollow to her own ears. "You've got it! Soon to be 48 and still a brown-eyed, handsome man!"

Galliard's smile was suave as he gestured to Tina to follow him. "I hope the coming year brings him every success. I would be happy to make a suggestion for him. A new shipment arrived just a few days ago. I doubt he knows about it yet, although he may have heard of it. I think it might make an excellent gift for him. This isn't exactly a traditional book, nor is it quite an antique, yet I'm almost certain he will enjoy it."

Tina accompanied the man through a maze of aisles, some so narrow she thought she would brush against a shelf and bring an avalanche of books down on both of them. Galliard looked over his shoulder at her. "Yes, this is quite a rabbit warren, but I can assure you that I do know my way around here."

Tina laughed although she thought it the driest of jokes. "Like I said, Howard loves your store. He's always talking about it and I figured he'd be really pleased if I got him something from here. He's away today visiting clients in Kitchener with his...." Her voice caught on the word "assistant." Yes, he was going somewhere with that damn Mary again. Business, he said, like he'd said so many times before.

"Yes?" Galliard looked at her quizzically.

Tina rubbed her eyes. "Sorry. I woke up a little early and I'm still a bit sleepy. I meant to say that Howard went to see some business associates in Kitchener today and he won't be back until late. So I thought I'd take the opportunity to sneak down here and see what you had."

"Well, I'm glad you did," Galliard said. Tina got the impression he didn't really care.

By now, they'd reached the end of an aisle where they stopped before a table, on top of which rested a heavy leather book, its blank brown cover framed by inter-twined vines of gold leaf.

"If I didn't know better, I'd say this was just a very fancy family photo album," Tina said.

Galliard smiled. "Yes, if it were possible for a family photo album to be over three hundred years old."

"Amazing!" Tina said.

"Look carefully at the cover." Galliard gently pointed to the vine and Tina's gaze followed. Her focus blurred and for a moment she thought it looked like entwined limbs. Strange. Not quite what she had in mind for Howard but....

Galliard spoke again, interrupting Tina's thoughts. "The vines are made of finely textured gold leaf; the cover is pure leather. The vines themselves are a masterpiece of craftsmanship. Let me tell you some of the stories about them...."

Tina nodded.

"This is an authenticated replica of a book in the library of the Earl of Seaforth's estate in northern England. The Earl of Seaforth lived in the sixteen hundreds and was quite a collector of rare books. He had a true passion for book bindings. Their appearances fascinated him, so much so that he commissioned binders to hand make them just for him. This was one of his favorites."

"I can see why," Tina said. "It's very beautiful. The vine, especially."

"Yes, its beauty has entranced scholars for centuries. Some say the design is based on Biblical symbolism, others say it is derived from medieval heraldry; still others suggest it comes from pagan fertility ritual. But I have an explanation that I also know to be the truth."

Galliard opened the book and flattened it out on the table. She blinked as a bright glow of reflected light burst from it.

Tina leaned over and gasped. "The pages are blank!"

"Yes! The Earl's library contained two thousand books just like this one."

"But, what possible use could he have had for them?"

"A few years ago I took a trip to the Earl's estate and asked the current Earl just that."

Tina noticed that Galliard's brow—what's that word the English use? —furrowed. A wistful tone came into his voice. Were those tears in his eyes?

"Times have changed so much and so quickly," he continued, "You know, the current Earl isn't even a descendant. He used to be in some rock band in the Seventies and he all but bought the Earl's title." He shook his head, as if to brush away cobwebs of disbelief .

"In any event, he showed me a diary where the Earl had written that these were the blank books of people's lives and that the gilt vines around the covers represented the passage of time and the changes people go through over time."

Tina nodded, gazing at the garland. "That's fascinating."

Galliard smiled. "It is, isn't it? Whenever the Earl received visitors, he would present them with a blank book as a gift and tell them to use it as a diary. He would open it, and as he inscribed the inside cover, he would think pleasant thoughts of the recipients. And they always had good luck."

"What a beautiful gesture!" She was astonished by the tale.

Galliard's voice grew pensive. "An uncommon act of benevolence from a man who often wrote in his diary that he wished the plague on many of the people he gave his books to. But he knew he had to keep his ill-will in check and feared that he had the power to destroy people with his thoughts. I guess it came from being a decidedly harsh judge of human character—both while pronouncing sentence from the bench and while with those closest to him—especially his wife."

"His wife?"

"Persephone was a lovely woman and he always suspected she was unfaithful. His spite toward her was so dreadful that the parts of his diaries where he spoke of her were almost unreadable. His anger and fear spread to women generally. He would always pass the harshest sentences on prostitutes and women criminals."

Tina shivered. Did she really want to hear more? But it was so fascinating. She picked up on one of the points Galliard had made. "He was a judge, then?"

"Yes, and a most feared one at that. Barristers and cutthroats alike conferred upon him the sobriquet of 'Rhadamanthus.'"

"Just like the name of this store."

Galliard's eyes lit up with a brilliance that made the hairs stand up on the back of Tina's neck.

"Rhadamanthus was the judge of the underworld in Greek mythology. He was almost always a hanging judge."

Tina shifted her weight from one foot to the other, the straps of her high heels digging into her skin; her ankles throbbing. Rather than ask why the store was named after such an unpleasant character, she struggled to bring the conversation back to something more cheerful.

"Don't you think this would make a great appointment book and diary? And what's more, all of my best wish vibes would be all over it."

Galliard grinned, his manner bright again. "That's exactly what I was thinking."

"How much do you want for it? Would you settle for a hundred?"

"This is a rare souvenir from an outstanding idiosyncratic figure in English history. Surely you can afford to pay more for such a treasure. Remember, it is a carefully hand-crafted replica, not an original certainly, but the leather and gold leaf are real."

Tina pursed her lips. Doubt gripped her for a moment, setting her jaw and making her stomach feel knotted up. Was Howard really worth this kind of money, even after twenty years of marriage? And not just because of his trip to Kitchener today with Mary.

What about his behavior at that company party he had dragged her to last summer? He only had eyes for Mary. And those long periods on the phone in the evenings at home, talking "business" with her, as he said?

At last, she made her decision. "I'd love to pay more, but my accountant would never forgive me."

"I have a modest proposal, then." He paused as if for dramatic effect. "Why don't you pay me five hundred?"

Tina couldn't believe it. Had the joke about her accountant gone over his head? He didn't smile. She said, "If you make that three hundred paid out in two installments of a hundred and fifty over the next two months, you have a deal."

Galliard winced. "I suppose I can accept that."

Galliard took the book in hand, and together, they walked to the front counter where he showed her a certificate authenticating its origin. While Tina paid for her purchase with her bankcard, Galliard sealed the replica of the old book, along with the certificate, in a custom-built wooden box. Galliard smiled as he held the door open for her to leave. She hurried up to the intersection of Yorkville Avenue and Yonge and the parking lot where she had left her Jaguar. Even out in the street, in air heavy with car-exhaust and diesel fumes, the sweet incense of Rhadamanthus clung to her nostrils like a reminder of a forgotten world.

With the air conditioning on and windows rolled up, Tina placed the box on her lap. Excitement overwhelmed her; she simply had to look at the book again. She undid the hasps sealing the lid. The spine of the book stared up at her and her eyes blurred; fatigue bore down on her. She really had been waking up too early these days.

Her tired eyes traced the outlines of the vine that snaked about the book's cover. Snake was the right word. She hated the damn slimy things, but somehow these ones were different, almost soothing. Her eyes froze on one snakehead. She blinked and it vanished. Why would she be seeing things? She hadn't slept that badly.

Tina opened the book's flyleaf. Now was as good a time as any to sign it. She fished out an old ballpoint pen from the glove compartment and laughed. Shouldn't she use something better? No, it didn't matter; Howard would never know. The thought was all that mattered.

What should she inscribe? Something saucy, or silly, or perhaps solemn? Just so long as she thought pleasant thoughts while she signed ... wasn't that what Galliard had said?

Her throat tightened. Why did she want to cry?

A truck roared past and she crinkled her nostrils at the imagined onslaught of diesel fumes. Of course, she'd closed the window, there was no way the stink of the truck would get in here. But the truck's sudden noise blasted away her final memories of the incense and the bookstore. Perhaps that was just as well. Last week, that day when she'd come back from her tennis game, hadn't she smelled an unfamiliar scent? A sweet perfume barely masked by the incense she used at home? Howard had been home alone that day. Since when did Howard like burning incense? He'd burned a lot of it too, so much that the air was almost stifling. Had he perhaps taken Mary home with him that day and he wanted to hide it?

She did her best to ignore the picture she'd formed of Howard and what he might have been up to with Mary that day; tried to forget what Galliard had said about Seaforth wishing plagues upon those he hated.

Instead, she struggled to concentrate on the inscription: "To Howard, my loving husband of twenty years: May the years bring even more happiness and love."

Clumsy, but the thought was what counted.

She started the car and left the parking lot, edging on to Yonge, then followed the slow traffic on Yonge all the way north to Richmond Hill where she traveled along side streets. On an August Friday afternoon, why go home right away?

After a leisurely twenty-minute drive, she reached the Dreamaway Subdivision, finding the home in Richmond Hill she and Howard had saved and striven for, for so many years, at the end of a block filled with houses almost identical to it. Tina pulled into the driveway and stopped, then got out of the car, carrying the specially sealed book under her arm.

As she sauntered up the front walk, she glimpsed in the living room picture window the reflection of the billboard across the street promoting the subdivision. DREAMS COME TRUE IN DREAMAWAY.

A man and a woman, glowing with youthfulness, well turned-out in bright summer clothes and perfect tans, stood reflected hand in hand, smiling at Tina. Tina smiled back. But her smile faded and she drew to a halt as she saw a face floating ghost-like in the darkness behind the glass.

The face seemed familiar, yet the mouth was twisted into a cruel scowl, with one cheek wrinkled and turned upward at a sharp angle, the eyes tiny pools of darkness; the whole mask of suffering framed by a golden cascade of straight, shoulder-length blonde hair.

Mary. Howard's assistant. What the hell was she doing here?

Tina's whole body tensed, as if ready to lunge. Sorrow and anger and fear burned in her gut in a way she had never before experienced as she raced to the door. It flew open just as Tina was about to turn the knob.

"Thank God you're here!" Mary cried. "Something's happened to Howard!" The horrible contortion of sorrow had vanished from her face, but Tina saw real suffering in her eyes.

"What the hell's this all about?" Tina hissed, almost gagging on the scent of sweet perfume that clung to Mary's well-pressed business suit: the same perfume she was certain she had smelled that day after coming home from tennis.

"Please...."

"Why are you in my house? Howard said he was going to Kitchener today! What's going on?"

Mary shrank from her, as if afraid of being struck. "We went to Kitchener and he was fine the whole time. But when we came back here, it was almost twenty minutes ... a half-hour ago ... I don't know ... Howard started getting sick. All sweaty and shivery, clutching at his stomach...."

"You expect me to believe that? Howard's not sick. Far from it. You two got your kicks today, didn't you? And right here in my own house! And it's not the first time, is it?"

Mary grabbed Tina's shoulders and pulled her inside.

"Get your hands off me!" Tina shouted.

"Please, you've gotta understand." Mary's voice broke. Fresh tears ran down her face, her mascara streaming. "I don't blame you for thinking I've had a fling with Howard, but it's just not true. Howard's a great guy, but I've never slept with him. You've gotta believe me! I know you hate me. But we've never made love. Believe me!"

"I don't!"

"Believe this, then!"

Before Tina could say anything more, Mary shoved her into the living room. In the glow from the big-screen TV, she could make out reassuring things: The shelves lined with Howard's antique books, the glass coffee table arrayed with her gardening magazines, the home entertainment unit that housed the TV. It was tuned to a cartoon channel and computer-animated ducks quacked "The Blue Danube Waltz."

Something wasn't quite right, though. What was that darkened shape on the couch? She walked trembling toward it, her gaze slowly taking in what was before her.

Then, she stopped, her vision blurring with tears. She gasped a silent sob.

The man she loved with all her heart lay sprawled on the couch.

Howard's shirt was off and rolled up under his head like a pillow, his hair smeared across his forehead, his face sweaty and blotchy. But most frightening were the dark blue swellings around his neck and armpits, his tongue swelling from his mouth, his wonderful brown eyes dull and lifeless.

Tina's chest tightened and she threw her hands over her mouth. The book she had been carrying crashed to the floor.

Mary put a comforting arm around her shoulder.

Tina shoved her away. "Don't touch me!"

"Please...."

"You poisoned him!"

"What?"

"You must have. Why else would his skin look like this?"

"No ... I didn't!"

"What happened, then?"

Mary swallowed, as though she were holding back sobs. "Like I said, we got here just about twenty minutes ago. He was delirious, raving about some hanging judge wishing a plague on him...."

Tina burst out with a cold, hacking laugh that made her own blood run cold. Mary hid her face and sank to her knees as Tina leaned over her and spoke slowly and clearly.

"You want me to think that crazy book man killed Howard, don't you? Howard has spoken to Galliard, I know that; he knows all about the Earl of Seaforth and the curses on his empty books!"

"What?"

"You killed him and now you want to make it look like some disease—some weird spell from that old book—killed him!"

As Tina bent down and picked up the box containing the book, Mary started yelling at her.

"Damn you, Tina! Dammit, if I'd killed Howard why the hell would I still be here? Snap out of it! I didn't kill him!"

Using all her strength, she broke from Mary's grasp, leaped back and hurled the book at Mary, hitting her on the side of the head; a dull cracking sound announced the breaking of bone. Mary gasped, staggered back, and fell on the white plush carpet.

As Tina knelt down beside her, she noticed thin streaks of blood trickling from Mary's ears, nose and mouth. A brain injury? Could there be anything in her skull to injure? Tina giggled until her stomach boiled like a cauldron. No time to even think about puking. She had to get back to Yorkville and exchange some choice words with that bastard Galliard!

She ran out the door to reach the car, and turned the ignition. Then froze. What was that on her arm? She looked at her hands, then at her face in the rear-view mirror.

She was breaking out in dark blue swellings, just like Howard: her whole body burning, her stomach a whirling pit of agony.

The full hatred of Rhadamanthus was turned against her now.

Tina slumped in the driver's seat and sobbed. There was no point in going anywhere now.

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