“Well then . . .” I trail off, distracted by the dance of tender reds and amber yellows that merge and mingle in figure eights around Peggy’s and Alec’s heads. I take a half-sip of my tea, which has grown lukewarm and too sweet since Peggy and Alec started telling their story.

Peggy sighs, shifting her weight from one arse cheek to the other as she looks at me, then at Gyaltso. She gets all still, stony, and mountainous for a moment.

“Your father was Old John Alec Spenser.”

“Oh, for Christ’s sake!” I thunk my head down on the table. “I don’t have time for a goddamn identity crisis.” Because at this stage in the game, it doesn’t matter who my father was. I’m Effie Fortune’s child, through and through.

The exact nature of Scruffy Effie Fortune’s relationship with John Alexander Spenser is a detail that was scattered out on the wind and waves of the Bras d’Or along with her ashes. Despite decades of trying to sniff out the truth, the only thing Peggy could ever smell was her sister’s ability to keep her mouth shut. It smelled like concrete and camphor. Smart Alec Spenser suspected that his father had taken advantage of Effie after they hired her as the housekeeper. But Effie never let on about anything until the day she came to Alec, after having told the old man to go to hell with his abortion money. Smart Alec didn’t have to think twice. He got his father to agree to let Effie and her baby live in the trailer on this piece of land, and in return, Alec would be the public face of paternity for Effie Fortune’s baby. To save everyone a pile of grief.

“Your mother was a wonderful woman,” Brother Gyaltso says solemnly.

“And John Alec Spenser was a poor excuse for a man,” Peggy grunts. “Which is why Effie never let on it was him who got her pregnant, and why she kept Alec alive in your heart and mind your whole life. He was the father she wanted you to have. The father you deserved.”

“The father who faked his own death, ran for the hills, and left my mother alone and pregnant.” I watch as the sharpness of the words, my tone, make a dent in Alec’s rusty red halo.

“We were young. And stupid. Doing what we thought was best under the circumstances. Your mother wouldn’t want your pity, or any sourness toward Alec. Effie always lived on her own terms.” Peg’s chin drops to her chest as the wall that was her auric defence collapses around her in a cloud of shimmering blue and yellow dust. “And maybe she died on her own terms, too.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I watch. Wait. Peggy squints hard, but that only forces out further the tears she’s suddenly struggling to contain.

“Maybe Effie was sick.” She straightens up, her eyes and her aura growing so wide and so open that for a moment I flinch, thinking they might have designs on swallowing me whole. “Sick with something real bad. Like cancer. All through her. Because her body held so many people’s pain, and couldn’t let it go. Maybe she didn’t bother going to the doctor because she knew it by feel. Maybe I could even smell it after a time. And maybe her accident . . . well maybe there are no accidents.”