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gramps was not a person she wanted to discuss.”
    â€œI don’t want to discuss him, either—”
    â€œMust have been another woman in his life—”
    â€œBelle!”
    But Belle Graham, on a roll, wasn’t easily dissuaded. “Although, that’s strange in itself … Two generations removed, and the anger and hurt remain palpable … You would think … hmmm …”
    â€œWhat do you see out there?”
    Belle turned back to Rosco. “What do—?”
    â€œYou see through the window? I.e.: How’s the view?”
    â€œThe view?”
    Rosco sighed. The sound was indulgent. “The view for our romantic weekend.”
    â€œOh!” Belle spun around. “Very nice … Antique buildings with peaked slate roofs, icicles, smoke from chimneys … lots and lots of snow … the river completely frozen—at least the section we can see.”
    Rosco moved close to her and wrapped her in his arms. “A nice afternoon to stay indoors—”
    Belle leaned her head against her husband’s shoulder. “I can’t help but wonder who he was.”
    â€œWho?”
    â€œHelene’s grandfather. Mr. Verbose.”
    â€œDid anyone ever tell you you’ve got a one-track mind?”
    â€œIt takes one to know one—watch where you put those mitts of yours, buddy, they’re like ice.”
    â€œM AXIME Verbeux died when Helene and I were little. We never met him, however.” It was Helene’s first cousin, Pamela Gravers, who answered Belle’s question as the three sat sipping hot cocoa near the fireplace in Wordsworth House’s sitting room. Where Helene was short and precise, a devotee to detail, Pamela was lanky and tall, given to large and often incomplete gestures, and quirky, homemade garb. She was a conceptual artist based in Toronto; her visit to her cousin’s B and B coincided with the Festival Montréal en Lumiere , where she was displaying her newest work: Letters From Our Past —a celebration of the city’s bilingual heritage.
    As she spoke, Pamela munched distractedly on a super-chunk chocolate cookie, crumbs spilling down a handknit citron yellow pullover decorated with vivid geometrical designs in turquoise and flamingo pink. “Oops,” she said, spotting the crumbs. She brushed them to the floor, then immediately regretted the action. “I keep forgetting I’m not at home. Helene’s going to have my hide. She’s a ferocious neatnik.” A salt-stained, booted toe scuffed at the crumbs, brushing them under the chair’s skirt, then she glanced at Belle and Rosco in guilty appeal. “Don’t tell …”
    â€œHow does your installation work?” Rosco asked in a change of subject. “Letters From Our Past?”
    â€œOh! But you have to go see it!” Pamela’s hand made a wide arc in the air, nearly decapitating a table lamp. The shade rocked ominously; the base teetered. Rosco reached out steadying fingers while Pamela grimaced:
    â€œI’m going to break something, for sure. I just know it! My studio in Toronto is designed for work—not show.” She grabbed another cookie, and her sweater’s voluminous sleeve snagged against the plate. This time it was Belle who saved the day, retrieving sweets and china before they crashed to the floor.
    Pamela produced a self-deprecating sigh, leaned forward, and continued with an impassioned and excited: “There are some wonderful installations this year … a modified wind tunnel with voices whose speech is tantalizingly unintelligible and enigmatic … a mirror-like facade that projects your image—vastly distorted—across the snow as if you’d turned into a weird extraterrestrial shadow—”
    â€œAnd they’re all outside?” Belle began.
    â€œOf course! It’s a matter of space, of playing with and utilizing space, of light and darkness;