A Town Called Solace

In the hospital, Elizabeth Orchard listens to her ward mate, Martha, rant incoherently. Mrs. Orchard reflects on how no one comes to visit her or Martha; none of Mrs. Orchard’s friends are able to drive anymore, and she asked Diane not to bother with bringing Clara to visit, as the hospital is too far.

Mrs. Orchard reflects on how she misses the routine of home and her conversations with Clara, even though Clara cannot quite replace Liam. Mrs. Orchard knows Clara visits their house more for Moses’s company than hers. Talking to her late husband, Charles, in her head, Mrs. Orchard first claims Clara is the one visitor she would like to have before changing her mind and deciding that it is Liam.

Martha begins raving again, and Mrs. Orchard asks her who she is angry with. Martha reveals that it is her sister, Janet, who apparently ran off with a man, and it didn’t end happily. Mrs. Orchard wonders if Janet had a child out of wedlock, reflecting on how, to her, the idea of an “unwanted child” is “blasphemy.”

At night, Mrs. Orchard relives memories from the brief time that Liam was a part of her and Mr. Orchard’s lives. She remembers a simple moment when Liam was asleep on the camp cot in their bedroom, while she prepared a late-night snack and Mr. Orchard read, which for Mrs. Orchard felt like a “miraculous thing” (28).

After bringing his boxes and suitcase into what used to be Mrs. Orchard’s house—which is now his—Liam Kane sets out to explore the town of Solace in Northern Ontario. In September 1972, the town does not have much besides a few stores and a couple of cafés, all of which are already closed at 7:00 p.m.

Liam heads back to the house, deciding he will stay for a couple of weeks, taking a holiday for himself, before selling the house. The sale of the house, and the money Mrs. Orchard left him, will add up to a substantial amount. As he walks in, he pauses, thinking he has heard something, but is unable to locate anything unusual. After a snack, Liam heads to bed, where he replays the bitter disintegration of his eight-year-long marriage to Fiona, which recently ended in divorce.

Unable to sleep, Liam finds and rereads the letter he received from Mrs. Orchard eight years ago, informing him of her husband’s death. She is not sure whether Liam will remember them, and describes how she and Mr. Orchard were Liam’s neighbors in Guelph when he was young. He was only three when they became neighbors, and four when the couple last saw him, but he was an important part of their lives in that short time. Liam dimly remembers the couple, and spending considerable time at their house; he also remembers feeling distressed when his family moved to Calgary and he had to say goodbye to the Orchards.

Now, Liam remembers an ominous fight with Fiona around the same time he received Mrs. Orchard’s letter. The couple had recently moved to Toronto with well-paying jobs, and were planning their wedding. Fiona had objected to the immediacy with which Liam sat down to respond to Mrs. Orchard’s letter when he was to be writing out wedding invitations, and the situation devolved into an argument. It was the first time Liam wondered whether he truly wanted to spend the rest of his life with Fiona.

The next morning, Liam notices the floor around the bathroom sink is wet, and resolves to get it looked at. He heads into town to buy some groceries; when he returns, he again believes he has heard something, but cannot find anything out of place. Just as he finishes unloading the groceries, a police car pulls up in the driveway.

Clara is annoyed to find that Liam’s car is still there the morning after he arrives. She panics about how she will continue to take care of Moses; she knows Liam has not seen the cat yet, and worries that Liam will harm Moses if he doesn’t like him. Clara is unable to concentrate in school, weighed down by worry about Rose, Mrs. Orchard, and now Moses.

Once she is back home, Clara watches the house and heads over as soon as she spots Liam step out. She moves Moses’s things into her parents’ garage, but is forced to head back into Mrs. Orchard’s kitchen to use the electric can opener; she tries and fails at using the manual tin opener in her own house, and “her body got so anxious it forgot how to breathe” (50).

Days pass in an anxious haze with Clara unable to concentrate at school and things getting worse at home, until one day she is intercepted by Dan Karakas, one of Rose’s classmates, on her way back home from school. Dan asks if Clara has had a message from Rose yet, revealing she promised him one, too. Clara is astonished at Dan’s assertion that Rose had even asked him to go with her. He couldn’t because it was harvest time, and his father wouldn’t be able to manage on his own. Dan asks Clara to send him a message through his classmate Rick Steel’s sister, Molly, who is at Clara’s school, if she hears anything from Rose.

Every evening, Liam leaves the house for an hour at six, so Clara heads over to play with Moses in Mrs. Orchard’s living room after feeding him in her garage. The day Clara meets Dan, she feels extra anxious, but is calmed down by Moses unexpectedly curling up in her lap. She tried to get Moses to move out of the house altogether, but besides eating in the garage, he insists on staying inside the house. He also stays permanently underneath the sofa except when Clara is over, and Clara recognizes that he is as afraid as she feels these days: He is waiting for Mrs. Orchard just as Clara is waiting for Rose.

Nine days after Liam moves in, Clara spots him packing up some of Mrs. Orchard’s things in the living room. Angry, she rushes to alert her mother that the man is stealing their neighbor’s things, but lost in thoughts of Rose, Diane barely reacts. When her father, John, gets back home, Clara rushes to tell him instead, and is astonished and furious at her father’s vague assertion that Mrs. Orchard won’t mind, as Liam is looking after the house for her. Angry and confused about everyone lying to her, including Mrs. Orchard, who promised to be back home soon, Clara sobs and yells at her parents, calling them liars.

Mrs. Orchard is finding it harder and harder to breathe, and though the doctor suggests another pillow might help, he doesn’t explain what is wrong. Martha asks Mrs. Orchard her name, and Mrs. Orchard worries for a minute that Martha will recognize it, but it has been 30 years since the incident Mrs. Orchard worries about, and she’s not sure Martha would have even read the newspapers back then.

Mrs. Dubois in the opposite ward is visited by her husband and two sons. Mrs. Orchard wonders whether Mrs. Dubois worries about her sons no longer missing her. Once the children leave, Mrs. Orchard remembers her first miscarriage, 35 years ago. They had gotten pregnant after three years of trying and she had just quit her job as a kindergarten teacher when she lost the child.

Mrs. Orchard forces her thoughts to a different memory, six years after that one: The Kanes arrive next door. Mr. Orchard insists they invite them over, as Ralph, Liam’s father, will be Mr. Orchard’s colleague. Mrs. Orchard is still intensely grieving a fifth miscarriage that occurred some weeks before and worries that she may burst into tears in front of the neighbors.

The Kanes arrive with their three children—Liam and his older twin sisters—but Liam refuses to enter the house, tugging at his mother Annette’s skirt. Annette wearily apologizes, explaining that Liam is not good with strangers. However, Mrs. Orchard offers Liam the option of eating a slice of chocolate cake and a cookie alone out on the porch, and he immediately accepts.