For Those Who Hunt the Wounded Down (10 page)

“I have to go back down to Lucy’s and get William,” he said. “He’s all upset – just like his mom now. That’s no good at all.”

When Ralphie came home he sat down on the small chair in the living room.

“Do you know why I don’t like him?” Adele said. She came into the room and looked down at him. He was lost in thought. His hair was turning white, and his whole life was filled with expectations that to him had not materialized.

“I don’t know why you don’t like him,” he said, matter-of-factly. “Not at all.”

“When I knew him he wasn’t famous – not like he is now. His dad used to hold parties up at his house and Joe was still tilted then and used to go up. Jerry used to beat up the kids and take their money – he was a little snitch, and his father Digger used to hit on the old man – but Joe wouldn’t hit him back because he was his sister’s husband maybe or he had a plate in his head. Digger would wait until Joe got drunk and then throw a
punch and knock him off the chair. He was built just like Joe – strong as a mule.”

“So that was years ago – look how Jerry had to grow up,” Ralphie said. “His father wasn’t responsible for his actions. He had pain in his head all the time.”

Adele sat down on the seat opposite him. In the pale light of afternoon she looked her age, like Rita had looked some fifteen years before.

But this is not what Adele had wanted to say.

She wanted to tell him about the tractor-trailer that was stolen, and Joe losing everything because of it.

“Oh, I don’t think that was Jerry,” Ralphie said.

He said this in the way every man or woman does when they choose not to want to know.

“Who put the finger on that tractor-trailer, Ralphie-face?”

Ralphie didn’t answer.

“What lad in town would be brash enough to do that?”

Ralphie didn’t say anything. He only looked up and then looked away.

“Who do you love more – me or Jerry Bines?”

“You,” Ralphie said.

“Who put the finger on that tractor-trailer, Ralphie?”

Ralphie didn’t answer.

The day was growing darker, panning out into one shadow with the moon over the trees lying down flat on its back.

“Who do you think you hurt when you talk of Jerry Bines as a hero?”

Ralphie didn’t answer.

“Who wanted to see my sister graduate from university?”

“Joe.”

“And that’s the guy they suspected when they couldn’t find their cigarettes.”

Ralphie sat with his head down, a strange smile on his face.

“Who put the finger on those cigarettes, Ralphie? Who put the fuckin finger on that tractor-trailer?”

“He’s all changed now – he’s trying to change,” Ralphie whispered. “Joe – Joe wouldn’t mind him now, he’d help him.”

“There is a dream about the most beautiful boy in the world being cold on the street – and you are in it – it was in the dream I had one night when you went up to see him at the hospital and I say to you in the dream, ‘Don’t look at him, don’t pick him up, because as soon as you pick him up he changes and becomes something else.’ That was a dream I had, Ralphie-face.”

Ralphie didn’t answer.

“It’s his power that you like, Ralphie-face.”

Ralphie didn’t answer.

“There is trouble coming – I can tell.” And she tilted her body over and reached into a stack of papers that were ready for the fire. She showed Ralphie a picture of Bines’ camp. “Why did he blow this up?”

“Oh, he didn’t blow it up,” Ralphie said, in the tone of voice that suggested that someone had gone too far in their argument.

“Someone is on his way and Jerry doesn’t want him using it – so he blows up his camp.”

“That’s the most ridiculous theory I’ve ever heard,” Ralphie said, as a less perceptive person will always tout their rationality.

“Someone is coming and he doesn’t want him using it. That’s why he blew up his camp.”

Ralphie didn’t answer. He seemed to be cold and his beautiful hands trembled slightly, as if they were trying to find some bolt or screw or attachment to fix.

“What did you teach me, Ralphie?”

“I don’t know.”

“You taught me in calculus that everything is for a purpose, everything happens – a rock falls twenty storeys at an angle that laws of ten billion or hundred years says it must. That’s what I put faith in when you lost your feasibility study – and the eighty thousand that went along with it. That’s what I put faith in when our life went wrong – when Mommie and Joe died – why did Bines blow up his camp?”

“I don’t know.”

“That’s what I put faith in – who fingered the tractor-trailer?

“I don’t know.”

“Who was Daddy trying to sober up?”

Ralphie didn’t answer.

“Jerry – who everyone told him not to trust – who knew Dad had to pick up 120 thousand dollars’ worth of cigarettes – who knew he was going to go to Saint John.”

Ralphie lit a cigarette and looked out the window as if he were very interested in something outside.

It was not as if this was an unusual way for Adele to argue. She had argued like this for years – over matters far less consequential. And Ralphie pretended that all of these arguments were the same and not one new idea was ever explored. And to do this he looked out the window, and puffed on his cigarette.

“Who sent him a postcard – when he was in prison?” he said. “Who told me that they took care of him the year his mom died?”

Adele faltered, and looked about the room.

“And who loves this most beautiful child in the world – you don’t want me to pick up? Whose family is the only family on the river ever to love him?”

Adele didn’t answer.

There was a long silence.

“Loves that most beautiful child in the world –”

There was another silence.

“Because he is their own. And he’s come home now–asking forgiveness –”

There was another silence.

“Looking for shelter.”

There was another silence. Then Ralphie whispered: “Tired of being hunted down.”

Nevin took the bus to Fredericton. It was a long dreary ride, and the bus stopped many times, to let off passengers or to pick up parcels. He was on his way to see his first wife.

After they reached McGivney Station he slumped into a depression.

It was fine to say to yourself you were going to meet someone and ask forgiveness for a cruelty you had done. It was another thing to actually do it.

He went along the old street where they had once lived, near the farmer’s market, and felt himself shivering. All the memories of those youths who had grown
up on popular songs of revolution and change, and used it to hurt and bully others until they themselves floundered into middle age and obscure dreams on windswept streets while the lights flickered on at dusk.

For nearly an hour he stood in the parking lot behind the apartment he and his wife had shared. Memories flooded him of her hanging out the clothes, or smiling at him when he came home.

Finally he went to the door and knocked. An old lady answered it, and he stared into the same kitchen he and his wife shared almost twenty years before. Except it looked much homier now with a great degree of quietude.

“I was looking for Gail White,” Nevin said.

“No, I’m sorry, this is the wrong apartment. You could try upstairs.”

Nevin nodded. “Okay, I’ll do that,” he said.

And he turned and walked along the street towards University Avenue.

With Nevin the compulsion to have a drink was almost always unbeatable. Sooner or later he would have to submit to it. And the idea of course was that he had already submitted to it, and the matter was settled. He took out his change purse – for he had always carried one – and looked through it. Besides the little miniature picture of Hadley, and an older picture of Vera, he had four dollars in change, which would give him a few draft at any rate.

He smiled at this, and he looked through every
pocket of his coat, not only for more money, but to make sure he had his return ticket.

The old tavern was gone with a new one in its place, and he sat down. Over in the corner a heavy-set man with a huge black beard and a worker’s vest was looking at him.

It was Gail’s brother. Nevin knew this instantly but the man didn’t seem to know why he recognized Nevin.

“What’ll it be?” the waiter said.

“Yes – just a minute,” Nevin answered.

He went over to Donnie and sat down.

“Oh ya – Nevin – well, how are you?” Donnie said.

He put out his huge hand and held Nevin’s gently and shook it up and down the way a man does who is hardly ever this formal.

Nevin was frightened that there would be abuse heaped upon him or scorn or ridicule for how he had treated Gail. But Donnie only said, “Boys it’s been a long time since I seen you – where you been?”

“Oh, haven’t been any place in particular,” Nevin said. “Do you want a beer – I’ll buy you a beer.”

“Ya, sure – I’ll have a beer,” Donnie said, “and then I’ll buy you one.”

“No, just get me a pop,” Nevin said. “What are you doing?”

“Oh, I work on tractor-trailers – work on them – probably be run over by the sons of whores some day.” And he smiled. He took his beer and drank a sip and looked about as if he didn’t know what to say.

“You a professor now I suppose or somethin like that.”

“No, no, I’m nothin like that,” Nevin said. He wanted to be derisive about professors and say that is why he couldn’t be one, but Donnie only smiled at him kindly, and he found he could not.

“Oh, I was thinking of you just the other day –”

“When was that?”

“Oh, I don’t rightly know,” Donnie said, in the old-fashioned way, and smiled. “Oh, yes, it was the day I had to drive the grader down to Hampton – what day was that?”

Nevin shrugged, and lay his huge mittens on the table before him.

Donnie looked about again and then yawned and looked at his boots. They were frayed and torn and untied.

“Well boys I don’t know she’s some bad now this economy,” he said, looking up.

“Yes, it is,” Nevin said.

“The country is more or less a ghost now,” Donnie said.

“That’s true,” Nevin said.

There was a pause.

“More or less useless as a country now,” Donnie said holding his glass and drinking, while he looked around the room.

“So, are you married?” Nevin asked.

“Oh ya – married now, a boy and two girls.”

He cupped the glass in his huge hands so it was almost hidden.

“Where’s Gail?” Nevin said. He said it in a way that startled him. He held his breath after he said it.

Donnie took his big thumb and pointed it sideways.

“Oh, she’s just here –”

“She married too?” Nevin said, after a pause.

“Oh ya – married – married a boy from home – Furlong – George Furlong – no, you wouldn’t know him,” Donnie said, shaking his head at himself.

“I’m glad,” Nevin said, although secretly he was disappointed.

“Oh ya – well, she’s doing all right you know – you too married now?”

Nevin shook his head. “No, no – I’m not married.”

It was growing dark. The snow was hard on the street, the lane lying brown and salted in small neat heaps, and the lights were on above the wires, shining golden on the snow.

Nevin followed him outside and stood beside him a moment.

“Do you know where I can find her?” he said.

“Who? Oh, Gail – well, she’ll be home now,” he said. And he told Nevin where she lived.

“You need a drive?” he said.

“No,” Nevin said, “I can walk.”

And he started out briskly, with the wind and the cold in his face.

The house was across the river. The driveway was
ploughed to the stones, and an old hockey net sat inside the open door of the garage.

The closer he got to the door the more nervous he became, until his whole body shook.

“She will laugh in my face,” he thought. “She will laugh and then spit in my face.”

But he was propelled not by his courage but by some other aspect of his nature. He took off his hat and held it in his hand, and knocked.

The door was opened by a little girl.

Nevin looked at her. A little over three feet highp with big brown eyes and her whole head a mat of tiny curls.

“Mommie, it isn’t Patty – it isn’t Patty–”

“Well, who is it?” he heard.

“It’s me,” Nevin heard himself saying.

Gail came to the top of the stairs and looked down at him, bending her head down to make out his face.

“It’s me,” Nevin said, smiling slightly, “Nevin.”

“Nevy–” she said.

He had not been called Nevy in twenty years.

“Yes,” he said, “it’s me.”

He stood at the door and she came down the stairs.

It was, to Nevin, as if they had said goodbye earlier that morning.

“Thea,” she said gently to the little one, “don’t block the door.” And she smiled.

She was now forty years old, but to him she was exactly as she had been.

She had three children and it was right at supper time.

The baby was in the highchair, with a big plastic bib on, which made his face look very chubby, and covered with red spaghetti sauce. The older boy sat at his own table in the hallway, drawing. There was something reserved about him that Nevin did not like – he did not know why. Perhaps it was only because he was no longer a child but a little boy, something he took very seriously.

Perhaps it was just because Nevin was nervous. He put his mittens in his pockets.

Have you had your supper?” she said.

“Oh, I’ve just got a minute,” Nevin said. “I was in town and saw Donnie – so I just thought I’d drop over.”

“Oh, yes – well – you were where? Up at the university?” she said, somewhat cautiously, as if she didn’t want to intrude on his intellectual doings.

“Yes,” Nevin said, sitting down in a chair, “on business – so I just thought I’d come over and see you – I mean see about how you were.”

She smiled and sat down.

“You just missed my husband,” she said. “He’s gone to work – just went out the door –”

There were shouts of children playing road hockey on a side street and far away a train shunted with a thud that was muffled by the snow.

“It’s good to see you,” she said. “I often wondered where you were now – and what you were doing. I mean, almost every week I think about you.”

Instantly Nevin thought of making up a story to impress her. But he only said, “I wanted to see you for a long, long time.”

After a moment she said, brightly, her eyes shining, “You didn’t know that I ran after you – after you went around the corner – did you?”

“Oh no, I didn’t know that,” he said, and he tried to make it sound light-hearted but it didn’t sound that way. Then he cleared his throat. “If I had known that – maybe I would have turned back,” but he thought he had said this too flippantly.

She smiled gently and smoothed her hands on her apron and looked about the room, but averted her eyes somewhat.

“I wanted to find you for a long time,” Nevin said. “I did not know where you went – where–”

“Oh well,” she said simply. “We were both young.” She looked at him. “I mean, we can’t blame ourselves – it was so long ago now.”

“Oh no – no,” Nevin said, “I don’t blame myself about anything.”

She smiled. There was some powder on her chin, and she wiped it away. Then when she turned to the baby, when he saw her slight back and the angle of her head so he could see her small neck and the medallion’s chain clasped to it, he said, almost humbly: “That’s not true – I’ve always blamed myself – I always thought – not always, but in the last five or six years, that I should
never have gone away – that I always loved you – that I always loved you and –”

She turned to him and her eyes seemed startled with hurt, and then suddenly she reached over and put her fingers to his lips.

“Shhh,” she said, and her eyes filled with tears.

It was as if he had gone around the corner but had decided to come back, and all those years – all those years had never passed or mattered in any way.

“I’ve always loved you,” he said, through her fingers. “Why did I belittle you – why did I belittle –”

“Shhh,” she said, and smiled. “Shhh.”

He left an hour later to catch his bus.

He was out on the street and he looked up at the stars, and felt a kindness in the cold air, a warmth in the battered naked trees, and he didn’t bother to put on his hat.

The boy came out with his jacket unzipped and his boots on.

“Here,” he said, and running to the edge of the driveway he handed Nevin two peanut-butter cookies, which were still warm from the pan. “Mom says to give these to you for your trip on the bus.”

And then he nodded and ran back to the house, turning suddenly at the door to wave goodbye.