Whipped: An Arthur Beauchamp Novel(6)
“Some folks think he’s the second coming of Christ,” Arthur said. Margaret gave him a disapproving look. “Quite the politician,” he added. Even that sounded snide.
Margaret continued to stare at Silverson, sizing him up. “Can you introduce me?”
She wouldn’t have to wait for that; Silverson was working his way toward them, a shoulder squeeze here, a few words there, a wink and a smile. He aimed his camera at Arthur and Margaret before approaching with one hand extended. “What a pleasure. I was hoping I’d see you, Mr. Beauchamp.” Bee-chem, pronounced correctly, the Anglicized version, not the French. “Wanted to tell you I’ve been enjoying your biography.”
A Thirst for Justice: The Trials of Arthur Beauchamp. An embarrassing 450-page strip search authored by lawyer–writer Wentworth Chance. Arthur’s notable courtroom triumphs were chronicled, but also his lapses, his debauches in the El Beau Room or Chez Forget, court hearings adjourned because he was too potted to carry on, his arrest outside a Gastown bar for being drunk and disorderly. His failed first marriage. His years of cuckoldom. His battle against alcoholism, finally won many hard years ago.
“Compelling story, Mr. Beauchamp. Your discovery of an authentic life path seems almost spiritual.” With that oblique compliment, Arthur was quickly disposed of, and Silverson shone his bright blues on Margaret. “Ms. Blake, I’m at your feet.”
She seemed taken aback by his intensity — he held her hand for twenty seconds, talking all the while in a mellifluous purr. He insisted she call him Jason. He was her truest follower, a passionate supporter of all things green. She must visit Starkers Cove — “your husband too” — to observe “our little experiment in healthy, cooperative living.”
It was a showcase for a sustainable lifestyle. Their goal was to live off the land, be dependent solely on their own resources. “No mechanized shortcuts, no exhaust-spewing engines, just the authentic peace that reigned before man’s destructive conquest of nature.”
Arthur read this as authentic cow flop, propaganda well rehearsed. Reverend Al called him Silver Tongue.
Margaret punctuated his eco-friendly discourse with supportive adverbs: “Exactly.” “Absolutely.” Maybe she’d succumbed to his flattery. If she was angling for the votes of his thirty followers, that would be a waste of time — almost all of them were Americans.
Maybe Arthur was just enduring another spasm of jealousy. He was prone to this, but repressing it only downloaded it into his fretful dreams. He’d been forced to accept that his feelings for Margaret weren’t fully requited. Her Ottawa affair had been discussed once, apologized for, never spoken of again. Relegated to the trash bin of history, he kept telling himself. Though that was far from true.
Dr. Lloyd Chalmers, professor, social psychologist, author, eco-activist: he was handsome, rugged, long-haired, as observed on the small screen — a TED lecture Margaret had played for him, about something called climate-change-denial neurosis.
Arthur’s morose musings were interrupted by the arrival of a young man, Silverson’s driver and aide-de-camp, introduced as Morgan Baumgarten. Heavily built, dark, a trim beard that failed to hide a scar running laterally under his chin — inflicted in lethal combat or by his own hand? His smile was nearly as bold as Silverson’s, but there was no life in his eyes. They seemed unfocussed. In contrast, the message on his T-shirt was eerily upbeat: “Just Do It!”
As Arthur shook his hand, Baumgarten stared past his right ear into the unfathomable distance. He didn’t have much to say, except, “They call me Morg.”
Arthur too was reduced to the role of silent sidekick while his life companion engaged Silverson in a spirited to-and-fro about the proposed Coast Mountains Pipeline that Margaret had been fighting tooth and nail, convinced it would irreparably pollute the waters and tar the shores of Super Natural British Columbia. Arthur found himself annoyed that Silverson was so alive to the issue, so . . . simpatico with Margaret.
Clearly this fellow was a con man — Arthur knew many, had defended some of the best — but he was unsure what his profit motive might be. It was known that he’d come here with about two dozen disciples and had added several dreamy-eyed locals. Freddy Biggs, for instance, who was working his way through a midlife crisis, and Herman Schloss, whose actress wife, Mookie, had left him for Hollywood to do a couple of low-budget films.
Having failed to engage Morg in any meaningful dialogue, Arthur went to help Reverend Al Noggins and his wife Zo?, who were at the refreshment table packing up dishes and coffee mugs to be washed and returned to the recycle station.
“Saw you talking to Silver Tongue,” Al said. “I hope you didn’t buy his guff, old boy.”
“He zeroed in on us. Margaret, mostly.”
“That guy Morgan Baumgarten, Silverson’s dogsbody, did you see his eyes? Thousand-mile stare. Empty sockets, reflecting the emptiness inside. Blind and speechless as baby rats, all of them. Jelly-brained followers of Swami Charisma over there.” Al wasn’t normally so cantankerous; that was Arthur’s traditional preserve.
Silverson finally parted from Margaret and looked about for others to schmooze, choosing, like the good publicist he was, Nelson Forbish, the 150-kilogram editor of the weekly Bleat. Several women hovered not far away, nudging each other, ogling, whispering.
“He gave me a brochure.” Al pulled it from a pocket. “‘Join us at our Personal Transformation Mission Centre. Enjoy creative growth. Awaken to love. Soul attunement.’ Attunement! Have they no shame?” The good priest had a liberal view of most beliefs, but not the airy-fairy.