Children in the Morning Page 2

  “Selfless Mother” Dies at Home

  Margaret Jean (“Peggy”) Delaney, 48, prominent children’s rights advocate and mother of ten, died in her south-end Halifax home two nights ago. She was the wife of well-known criminal defence lawyer Beau Delaney, and the daughter of Gordon and Margaret Laing. Mr. Delaney said he returned home late on Wednesday night and found his wife at the bottom of the basement stairs. Foul play is not suspected but Mr. Delaney expects that there will be an autopsy because this is an unexplained death. Mr. Delaney said: “Peggy was the love of my life, and the most giving, the most selfless woman and mother I have ever met.” The couple had a family of ten: two biological, two adopted, and six foster children. “They are all our children,” Mr. Delaney said. “They are devastated. I don’t know how to get them through this. We’re going on a wing and a prayer at this point.” A funeral will be held at St. Mary’s Basilica once Mrs. Delaney’s remains have been released.

  I didn’t like our bare-bones defence that Delaney wasn’t there. But we had one thing going for us, and it was no small thing: Delaney’s character. Loving father of ten children, BCL (big Catholic layman), top-notch lawyer working above and beyond the call of duty for his clients. Part of the Delaney legend was that he had been known to work above and beyond the call even for people who were not his clients, people who had in fact refused his offer of pro bono — free — legal services. This was the Gary’s General Store case, which had propelled Beau Delaney to national fame.

  Fourteen years ago, in 1978, two men robbed Gary’s General Store, a family-owned store in the tiny community of Blockhouse, an hour west of Halifax, shooting the two young employees who were on the night shift. Scott Hubley, the owner’s seventeen-year-old son, died on the floor behind the counter. Cathy Tompkins, the other clerk, sixteen years old, was shot in the head and left with permanent mental and physical disabilities. Police arrested two suspects the following day. They went to trial and each pointed the finger at the other, saying the other guy had pulled the trigger. The evidence showed that both men had handled the gun at some point, so it was not clear who had done the shooting. What was clear was that both planned and perpetrated the robbery. Beau Delaney represented one of them; another Halifax lawyer represented the co-accused. Beau gave his client, Adam Gower, a brilliant defence and, to use layman’s language, “got him off on a technicality.” The co-accused was convicted of the second-degree murder of Scott Hubley and other charges relating to Cathy Tompkins.

  Understandably, feelings ran high in the small rural community. So high that Beau and the other lawyer received threats against their lives and were warned never to set foot in Blockhouse again.

  It didn’t end there. Delaney’s client, Gower, left the province but decided to move back a year or so after the trial. Within days of his return to Nova Scotia, he was found in the woods off Highway 103 in Lunenburg County, beaten to death. Only his dental work identified him as Gower; his injuries were so severe that he was otherwise unrecognizable. Cathy Tompkins’s brother, Robby, who had a minor criminal history himself, and who had been heard uttering threats against Gower, was picked up and charged with the murder. Beau Delaney entered the picture again. He contacted Robby Tompkins after his arrest and offered to defend him free of charge. But the Tompkins family, still outraged over Beau’s successful defence of Adam Gower, refused his help. Robby Tompkins vehemently denied involvement. He went to trial with another lawyer. The jury took four days but eventually — one can presume reluctantly — found Robby guilty of second-degree murder. He was sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for ten years.

  Beau worked the case like a cop for two years, trying to find something that would exonerate the young man. His efforts were noticed, and they paid off when he received an anonymous phone call that pointed to a shady character named Edgar Lampman as the real killer of Adam Gower. Lampman was a middle-aged man who had a record of violent offences, and who had been a frequent customer in the convenience store when Cathy was working. She had apparently been uncomfortable in his presence; the suggestion was that he was attracted to her. Since the killing, Lampman had died of natural causes. Beau passed the tip on to the police, who checked it out and found that it was legitimate. The upshot was that Edgar Lampman was posthumously fingered as the killer, and Robby Tompkins was exonerated and set free.

  Delaney was lionized after his triumph. There was even a movie about the case, titled Righteous Defender, with Jack Hartt starring in the role of Delaney. Known in the tabloids as the Jack of Hearts, the tall, handsome actor was a Canadian raised in a suburb of Toronto. He had gone on to fame and fortune in the United States.

  So. I had a hero for a client, and I would make the most of that fact in defending him against the murder charge in 1992. I wished I could play the feature film for the jury. No such luck.

  Not surprisingly, Delaney’s arrest was front-page news in both of the daily papers, and even earned a spot in the national media. The Chronicle Herald showed Delaney in his barrister’s gown and tabs, holding forth in the plaza of the Nova Scotia Supreme Court building. Gown and mane of hair lofted by the wind, arm raised to make a point, the lawyer proclaimed a client’s innocence to the throng of reporters and cameras. The focus of the piece was a history of Delaney’s courtroom triumphs. The Daily News showed him waving from the driver’s seat of his customized Mercedes twelve-passenger van. Several of his children gave toothy grins from behind the car windows. The story centred on the Delaney family’s well-known practice of holding weekend events, such as picnics and sports tournaments, in public spots like the Halifax Commons, Point Pleasant Park, and Dingle Park. Any children who happened by were welcome to join in, pick up a ball glove, have a hot dog or an ice cream cone, take part in a sing-along.

  The Delaney kids were now split up, staying with various relatives of Peggy and Beau; they were in a holding pattern until the completion of the trial. None of the relatives was in a position to keep the children indefinitely, and certainly not all ten of them. One of Peggy’s sisters broke down and wept — and terminated the interview — when asked if only the Delaneys’ “own” children would find a permanent home with relatives. It was clear that if Delaney was convicted, at least some of the kids would go back to government care or foster homes. The family would be ripped apart.

  Chapter 2

  (Monty)

  The news media were out in force on the Wednesday morning Delaney appeared in the Supreme Court of Nova Scotia for his bail hearing. And they weren’t disappointed. Or perhaps they were; it was good news, at least for us. Delaney was released, with a number of strict conditions, including a curfew, no unsupervised contact with his children, no alcohol or drugs or firearms. I had never pictured Beau as a gun-totin’ boozer or a crackhead, so I didn’t think he’d have any trouble on that score. His law firm put up the $100,000 bail money. We had a bit of a public relations coup in that Beau’s brother-in-law invited him to stay at his place for the duration. This was not quite as good as it might have been; this was not Peggy’s own brother, but the husband of her sister, and the couple had separated. Still, we had a relative on Peggy’s side of the family who obviously believed in Beau’s innocence and was not afraid to have him in the house.

  The release gave Beau the opportunity to grandstand in the plaza in front of the courthouse. He declared his innocence, expressed his faith in our criminal justice system, which he had observed close-up for twenty-five years, and said he was confident that he would be acquitted of the charge of murdering his beloved wife, Peggy.

  I drove my client to his new residence in central Halifax. On Brunswick Street there is a row of brick townhouses known locally as the Twelve Apostles. They were built as barracks for British soldiers in the year 1900. Each house has a little gabled roof and front porch with a side-facing door. Delaney’s brother-in-law, Angus MacPherson, met us out front. Angus was a piper who played in a local pipe band and also performed at on
e of the hotels downtown, greeting guests and piping them in. He was in full Scottish regalia, white-and-black Dress-MacPherson tartan kilt, with his sporran or purse on the front and the knife called a sgian dhu stuck in his right sock. The bagpipes were slung over his shoulder. None of this turned any heads among the locals here in Halifax. Men in kilts were a regular feature in New Scotland.

  “If I’d known you were coming right now, I’d have piped you in. Next time!”

  “Thanks anyway, Angus, but I’m keeping a low profile. I’ll expect a massed pipe band in front of my own house the day I get acquitted.”

  “You’ll have it. I’m off. Make yourself at home. Here’s your key. See you later.”

  “Thanks, Angus.”

  “Ciad mile failte!”

  (Normie)

  I wasn’t scared when I knew Mr. Delaney was coming to the school to see Jenny and Laurence. They really did join Four-Four Time, our after-school music program, when I invited them, and they asked their aunt, who was taking care of them, if they could come. She said okay. The program is for all kids, from any school, and it’s free. I planned right from the beginning to go to it myself most days after school and help out. Jenny and Laurence were shy at first, but they were nice. The reason I wasn’t scared of Mr. Delaney was that I knew he didn’t really kill their mum. He was an innocent man arrested by mistake. Even though that was true, Daddy said there were some rules Mr. Delaney had to follow. One of them was that he was not allowed to see his own kids unless another grown-up was there. They made a plan that, since the kids were coming to Four-Four Time and Father Burke nearly always came in to hear the music, that was the place where Jenny and Laurence could see their dad. I guess their sisters and brothers saw him someplace else. Anyway, when he walked in, the other kids in the music program were whispering and pointing. “Is that him?” they all asked.

  “That’s him,” I told them, because I recognized him from the newspaper and, besides, I had seen him before somewhere. He is really, really big and has a lot of brown and white wavy hair. He has old-fashioned glasses with thick black frames. My own glasses you can hardly see because the frames are thin and metal. Some people don’t even notice them. But you noticed his.

  Jenny and Laurence ran up to him as soon as he walked in. “Daddy!” they both yelled, and they buried their faces in his jacket. He put one arm around Jenny and one around Laurence, and kissed the tops of their heads.

  “I’ve missed you guys! Don’t worry. I’ll get this whole mess straightened out, and we’ll all be home again. And you guys will be able to play me a song on, what?” He looked around the room and saw the instruments the other kids were playing. “Jenny plays the tuba, and Laurence plays the triangle. Right?”

  They laughed and said no, that Jenny was learning to play the piano and Laurence the guitar.

  Mr. Delaney noticed there was a priest watching him, and nodded his head at Father Burke. Father came over and said: “Mr. Delaney.” It would have been rude if Father did not shake his hand, so he put his hand out and they shook. “I’m Father Burke. Your children have a great deal of musical ability; we’re very pleased to have them here.”

  “Thank you, Father. I appreciate their being here. And I appreciate being here myself.”

  “You’re welcome. Make yourself at home. Is there anything we can get you? Tea? A soft drink? A sweet?”

  “No, no, I’m fine.”

  “Ah, sure you’ll have something.”

  “Well, a cup of tea then.”

  “Ian!” Father Burke turned to the kid closest to the table, Ian McAllister. “Pour Mr. Delaney a cup of tea, and bring him over that plate of sweets, after you wash . . .” Ian made a grab for a teacup and put his finger right inside it when he picked it up. “. . . after you wash your hands, I was about to say. Then get a fresh cup. Keep your fingers out of it.”

  “Yes, Father.”

  Jenny saw me looking at her dad, so she said: “Daddy! This is Normie. She’s the one that told us about Four-Four Time.”

  He looked down at me and smiled, but his eyes behind the big glasses looked sad. “That means you’re Miss Collins,” he said.

  “That’s right.”

  “Your father is a wonderful man and a great lawyer. You know he is helping me.”

  “I know.”

  “Well, I think the world of him. And he must have a very fine daughter.”

  “Thank you.”

  Then I went over to a little kid I was supposed to be helping with sight-reading. He had dropped his book on the floor and was standing on it and making faces at another boy instead of reading. You have to have a lot of patience with little kids.

  I looked back at Jenny and saw that she was clinging to her dad and trying not to cry.

  You wouldn’t believe what happened at our house the night after that. Daddy was out at his place getting a guy to fix his furnace, and Tommy was playing with his band. So Mummy and I decided to order a pizza, just for ourselves. Without pepperoni. Dominic is only a baby and he’s too young to eat pizza. Obviously. When the Tomaso’s guy came to the door, there were two pizzas; it was a special deal, which Mummy had forgotten about or not paid attention to. So we decided to call Father Burke to share them with us, since he lives only a few blocks away. He said yes and went to the Clyde Street Liquor Store to get a bottle of wine. He didn’t look like a priest when he arrived; he was wearing a regular shirt with a sweater over it. The baby was fussing and crying but when Father Burke arrived, a big grin came on Dominic’s face, and he kicked his little fat legs in the air and moved his arms up and down to get Father to pick him up. Dominic was always doing that whenever Father Burke came over. It was really cute, especially because he looks like Father, with black hair and really dark eyes. We put him in his high chair to eat, but he fell asleep.

  “Sit your blessed arse down, Father,” Mum said. “How may I serve you?”

  “Sure I have an awful thirst on me, Mrs. MacNeil, and I’m a bit peckish as well.”

  So we all sat down. Dinner was really fun. They let me have a tiny bit of wine in a little wee glass. It was a dark red and tasted kind of sharp at first; then, I really liked it.

  “This is damn good wine, Father,” Mum said. “I hope it didn’t cost you a month’s pay.”

  “Well, they took up a special collection for me at the church, Mrs. MacNeil, knowing as they do that I live in the spirit of poverty. Just following in the footsteps of our Lord and His disciples.”

  “Oh, you’re a saint, Father.”

  “Ah, now, all this talk from yourself and so many others about me being a saint, it embarrasses me. If Holy Mother Church deems it appropriate to canonize me after my passing, so be it. In the meanwhile, I’m here to serve as best I can.”

  “And serve you do, so generously. Taking your last coin and spending it on a little treat for us.”

  “And a drop for meself, too, now. I’m not as selfless as I’m portrayed in the local . . .” He said a word like “geography” but with something like “hag” instead of “geo.” So I asked what that was.

  He said: “Hagiography. A book about the life of a saint.”

  “Okay.”

  He looked at me and my wineglass then. “Whoa! Take it easy, little one. Don’t be getting too fond of the drink there, Normie!”

  “I won’t!” If you get too fond of drinking, you become an alcoholic. Which is bad. But I don’t have that problem. I can drink or not drink; either way is fine with me. I didn’t ask for seconds when I was done.

  “Future sainthood aside, Father, do they ever take you to task over at the rectory for all the high living you do? The worldly pleasures you enjoy? Wine, whiskey, cigars, rich food . . .”

  “They do, darlin’. I’m on my knees every night, in contrition. But the bishop usually lets me off the hook when he knows I’ve eaten here. ‘No sumptuous dining tonight, e
h, Brennan? Gnawed on a few tough scraps at the MacNeil house again? Offer it up to God, my son.’ But you’ve outdone yourself tonight. By far the best meal I’ve ever enjoyed here.”

  “Father?”

  “Mmm?”

  “Pòg mo thòn.”

  I didn’t get what they were talking about, but I wrote it all down in my personal diary anyway, and looked up the spelling of some words. I think it was just a joke about Mum’s cooking. She’s not a great cook, even though she’s a great mother. But I do know what she said to him at the end: it’s Scottish Gaelic for — and it’s not me saying this, it’s Mum — kiss my arse!

  So it was funny to listen to them talking, even if some of it didn’t make sense to me. A couple of times I saw Father Burke staring at the baby, then he looked away, as if it’s rude to stare at someone’s baby. But it isn’t. Everyone likes people to look at their baby because everybody thinks their own baby is cute. Even if it isn’t. But ours is.

  Then there was a loud knock on the door.

  “Who could that be?” Mum said. It always drives Dad crazy when the phone or the doorbell rings and Mummy asks who it might be. The whole family is like that, Mum’s side anyway. Daddy just says: “Answer it. Mystery solved.”

  Anyway she got up and went to the door.

  “Oh!” I heard her say. “What are you doing here?”

  “I came to see my son!”

  “I don’t believe there is a piece of paper filed anywhere in this province that names you as the father of my child!”

  “Don’t make jokes. I want to see him!”

  Anybody would know who that was, because of his Italian accent. He had long curly brown hair and dark eyes, and looked like somebody in a movie. It was Mum’s old boyfriend, Giacomo. We had not seen him for ages. Me and Tommy thought they broke up. Now he was at the door. And then he was in the dining room. Gawking at Dominic in his high chair.