Read Online The Master of Happy Endings by Jack Hodgins - Free Book Online

catch my breath.” He lowered himself with a grunt to the step beside Thorstad and held his staff in both hands between his spread knees. It was an almost perfectly straight pole, ocean washed nearly white, with the suggestion of a sea serpent carved into the top. Like most men here, the maestro wore a ponytail at his neck though he was completely bald on top. “I decided to circle the island in the opposite direction for a change and it’s taken me nearly an hour longer then usual. I suppose there is some explanation for that, but I don’t know what it is. I just thank Gott-in-himmel you’re not torturing that poor cello at this moment. The world needs fewer musicians and many more good listeners.”
    And fewer bullies as well, Thorstad did not say, but saw no harm in explaining the letter in his hands. “This man has written to suggest I put some adventure into my life.”
    The maestro stabbed the ground with his pole. “You were a teacher, for heaven’s sake! He doesn’t think teaching is an adventure? What a fool! It would be easier to climb the Matterhorn! Safer too!”
    â€œHe also suggests travel, but he fell short of inviting me to join him in Iceland.”
    Von Schiller-Holst spoke to the ground between his feet. “Once in a while—maybe twice a year—some small orchestra invites me to be a guest conductor for a concert or two. That’s enough adventure for me. Enough travel as well. I have my CDs. Music provides me with everything I need.” He stood up, again with a grunt. “Off I go before the light begins to fail. To fall and break my neck is not the sort of adventure that appeals to me. Nor is a helicopter trip to the hospital my favourite form of travel.”
    Once the maestro had set off to continue his reversed circumnavigation of the island, Thorstad went inside to spoon coffee into the pot: Kicking Horse brand, Kick Ass quality, certified organic. Just the scent of it could lift his spirits, though Lisa warned him against the habit every time he brought a new package to her counter.
    Doyle had suggested travel and adventure. Well, there’d been more than enough adventure travelling with Elena, who had a tendency to make scenes that Thorstad had to smooth over. On their final day in Barcelona a beggar woman had tossed her bundled-up baby at Elena, who instinctively dropped her purse in order to catch the child. Naturally the woman had snatched up the purse and run, which meant they’d had little choice but to carry the woman’s doll to the police station to report the theft. Elena berated herself for her stupidity—she who ought to have known the habits of Barcelona beggars! The police were so incensed by her elaborate criticism of their failure to rid the streets of crime that they’d put her behind bars, though only until she’d calmed down and even, to Thorstad’s astonishment, apologized. At least she claimed it had been an apology. He did not know enough Spanish—either Catalan or Castilian—to be sure.
    He could not imagine travelling now without her, just as he could not imagine actually writing, without her encouragement, his planned biography of Jack Jones, the “Pocatella Kid,” whose career as a stunt double ended when he was thrown from his wagon during the filming of The Dawn Ride . To write the biography now would feel like an unhealthy disappearance into daydream, a retreat to a world more dangerously narrow even than his current life.
    The return address on today’s second envelope included some sort of embossed logo created from an entanglement of initials, followed by the name of a street in the provincial capital. Inside, the handwriting was steady, and slanted uniformly to the right.
    Dear Sir,
      I did not see your advertisement myself, but my mother-in-law in Prince Rupert sent it to me as a clipping, along with some sentences praising the kindness she