The Fortunate Brother (15 page)

“I woke up drooling. I drooled blood from a cut jaw.”

“Who opened your front door to let you into your house the night Clar Gillard struck you?”

“I opened the door.”

“Where was your father?”

“Behind me.”

“Did you see the blood on your hand before you opened the door?”

“Yes. When I woke up I seen the blood on my hand.”

“Did you wipe it off?”

“No, seen the old man standing there and never thought no more about it. What's the fucking big deal?” He twisted sideways, unnerved by MacDuff standing so close behind him that he could hear his breathing scratching past his nose hairs.

“Think back, think back to that night. You were sleeping. You woke up and your father was standing there. What did he do?”

“He done nothing.”

“If he done nothing, he'd still be standing there. What did he do?”

“Christ.” Kyle dragged his hands down his face, trying to think.

“You stood up. What next?”

“What next?”

“Think back.”

Think back—think back—he was lying under the tarp, he pulled himself up and got the spins. Near fell off the wharf. His father caught hold of his arm, led him to the door. And opened it. His father. His father opened the door.

“What do you remember, Kyle?”

“The dog. The dog was there, whining. Drives me nuts, that fucking dog. I got up, pushed past the old man and opened the door and went inside. Now can you tell me what the fuck got you hooked on
who
opened the door?”

“It was Clar Gillard's blood that was on your doorknob.”

The words reverberated like eddies from a dropped rock. Two thoughts surfaced, one following the other and each grappling for his mind. He hadn't felt fear before because he hadn't done it and there was safety in that. And Bonnie Gillard. She hadn't shown fear either; when the cops had accosted them back at the hospital she hadn't been afraid. She didn't do it. Bonnie Gillard didn't kill Clar. That thought suckered like a leech onto his brain whilst another slipped from some distant mooring and sank cold in his heart.
He was in the water, he knew Clar was dead, he opened the door that night, and Clar Gillard's blood was on the knob. It was his father. It was his father who killed Clar Gillard and his mother was covering for him and Bonnie Gillard was covering for them both.

“What's going on, Kyle?” MacDuff's voice was like an ice pick chipping at his neck. Sweat started down his forehead, and as it trickled onto his lashes he raised his eyes and saw the black
nose of a camera tucked behind the door facings. They were watching him. They were watching him up close and he smelled his own fear like a bloodhound smells supper.

He got up and faced MacDuff. “Nothing's going on. I didn't kill the bastard and it don't matter who did, they done humanity a favour. Ask his ex-wife what he done to her. Tied her to a chair and sprayed her with oven cleaner. How's that for a sick bastard?”

“You think she killed him?”

“Da fuck you care what I think? What do
you
think?”

“I think there's a lot of secrets going around, Kyle. And we think you know some of them. Like, how did Clar Gillard's blood get on your doorknob?”

“He was up to no good, is why. He was on our wharf. Likely he tried the door.”

“Was it locked?”

“No. It's never locked.”

“Then why didn't he go in?”

“Maybe he seen through the window I wasn't there. What the hell do I know?”

“Clar Gillard already punched you in the jaw. Why would he be waiting at your door for you to return?”

“You're asking
me
why Clar Gillard would do something? He was nuts. Maybe he wanted to clock me agin. Maybe he thought I was dicking his girlfriend.”

“Maybe he thought your father was?”

“Even Clar Gillard knows the difference. Tell you what. If any of them secrets come to mind, I'll give you a call. Right now I got nothing you don't already know. Mind if I leave now? There's cement waiting to be poured and I'll not say no more till I got a lawyer. Unless you're going to charge me with murder, I'll be on my way.”

It was instinct, not balls, that made him say that. If they thought it was him, they wouldn't be wasting their time questioning him about others. He went for the door. He waited for MacDuff to order him back, half wishing he would. He twisted the knob, went out, and started down the hall. No footsteps came after him, no one hollered for him to come back. He took the wrong hallway, walked past a receptionist behind a glass partition and two scrawny teens sitting outside, sneer-like smiles as they waited for roll call. Another short hall and he was in the foyer and then outside, legs trembling, hands dug into his pockets, shoulders hunched against a chilled wind.

H
e crossed the highway and stuck out his thumb, heading west towards Corner Brook. Sylvanus would still be there, sitting with his mother, and he needed his father, he needed bad to see him.

A green Chevy drove past, heading east towards Hampden. It honked, pulled over, and the window lowered. Ambrose Rice, Ben's father. Kyle hopped back across the highway and ran towards the car. A dark grizzled head poked through the passenger side window. Suze, Ben's mother.

“Recognize that muck of hair anywhere,” she called out. “Just like your father.”

“How's she going, Suze? What're you up to, buddy?” he asked Ambrose, lowering his head to better see him.

“Get in,” said Suze, “we gives you a ride. Your mother would have a copper kitten if she knows you're hitchhiking.”

“Thanks, but I'm on my way to Corner Brook.”

“Then we'll drive back to Corner Brook. We were just visiting with your mother. Imagine that now, she keeping all this to herself and your poor old father going along with it.”

“Yeah, I gotta go see him, you guys go on, now.”

“Your father's on his way out,” said Ambrose. “Said he had to check on you and the boys with the cement.”

“He's on his way out? You're sure?” Kyle straightened, looking back down the highway.

“That's what he said then—might already be ahead of us. Had to pick up some things for Addie in the drugstore.”

“I'll take a ride home, then.” Kyle squeezed into the back seat amidst a pile of stuffed grocery bags and tried to focus on Suze's yakking as Ambrose hauled them back onto the highway behind an eighteen-wheeler screaming past.

“…he got some lot on his mind now, your father do. Hardly spoke all while we were there and that's not like Syllie, hey Am? And to think, not one of you calling me about your mother. But that's Addie—always to herself. Never knew a thing till Roger Nichols showed up from Corner Brook yesterday, looking for a box of crab legs. And I blames you, too,” she said, twisting sideways, grey eyes snapping back at Kyle.

He mumbled something apologetically and Ambrose winked at him in the rearview mirror and he kept seeing his father opening the house door that night,
Clar Gillard's blood on the doorknob.

“…and what's Bonnie Gillard doing there? Motioning me outside your mother's room and telling me to say nothing about your house being taped off and all that. Like I was going to barge into Addie's room and bring it up. Near bit me tongue off. It's Bonnie Gillard herself what's worrying me. All that stuff going on and she acting like she don't have a care in the world. They says she done it. That's the word down home. I hope she's not bringing her troubles onto your mother because that crowd can suck blood from a turnip, they can. Drains the energy right outta me just looking at the mess around her father's doorplace. Jack Verge.
Not fit. And he the first one up every morning, then, with the smoke coming from his chimney so's everyone thinks how hard-working he is. Stun thing. Most likely he's not gone to bed yet. Still sitting and drinking at the breakfast table. And your poor father! Sitting by your mother's bedside and holding her hand like she was his young sweetheart…”

…
next morning his father wouldn't drink, had thrown that bottle of booze out through the truck window…

“And that Kate what's her name—you know her, Kylie? Sidling off down the hospital hall with Bonnie Gillard—”

“Kate was there?”

“Like thieves they were. You wonders what's so important they stole off like that, having their chat and your poor mother watching after them, right concerned.”

“What were they talking about?”

“I never heard—they kept far enough to themselves, whispering like two crooks. Where we taking you, my love? You can't go home. How long they going to keep your house sealed off? And where's your mother going to go when she gets out of the hospital—and Sylvie?”

“Don't know. We'll figure it out.” He shut out Suze's prattling and stared out the window at the passing belt of green. The clouds parted, a shaft of sun striking gold through the trees. Winter finally ending and yet here he sat, paining like an arthritic limb before the mother of all storms about to descend. And for the first he could remember he felt like something adrift, no pier to tether himself to.

“Look. Look there,” Suze cried out. Sitting on the guardrail beside the junction turnoff to Hampden and Jackson's Arm, arms wrapped around himself for warmth, was Trapp. Skinny as old fuck and with ruffs of tawny hair clinging to a gaunt, pointy face. He rose as Ambrose braked, turning off the highway onto the
Hampden Road, and came towards the car. Glassy green eyes staring into Kyle's with such intensity that Kyle drew back.

“Don't you stop, don't you stop!” Suze was shrieking at Ambrose. “We're not giving him a ride, he can rot on that stump before I ever gives him another handout. Don't you stop, Am.”

“You gone silly?” yelled Ambrose as Suze grabbed at the wheel. He sped up, pushing her aside, and Kyle looked back, watching Trapp staring after them. The same slump to his shoulders that he'd worn the second last time he'd seen him, sitting on the bank outside the bar and talking with Ben. Or, listening. Trapp hadn't been talking. Just slumped there, head hanging as though it were too heavy to hold up, and Ben, his arm wrapped around Trapp's shoulders, hugging him, hugging and talking hard and Trapp kept slumping further inside himself.

Suze's voice was rising unbearably. “He's heard Ben's coming home, that's why he's poking around now. He got poor Benji drove crazy, he have. Too bad it wasn't he that got shot and not his dog—”

“Sufferin' Jesus.”

“I means it, yes, I do mean it, Am.” She looked back at Kyle. “That's how it started, back when Trapp's dog bit Benji. And Benji always felt bad when that sick father of Trapp's shot the dog. He's still making up for it. And I don't care if Benji was teasing the dog—you can tease a dog and not have your leg bit off. And he was strange, Trapp was. And he's who caused your poor brother's death, too. Poor Chris. Don't shush me, Am. Benji told us enough. Trapp wasn't doing his job properly on the rig, too busy fighting with everybody, and then when he seen the rig about to blow—”

“Shut up!” yelled Ambrose. “Bloody well shut up. She don't know no such thing, Kyle.”

“Benji told me straight.”

“Ben was drinking and shouldn't been talking.”

“And that's when the truth comes out, when liquor got your tongue.”

“By Jesus, the devil must have yours, then. Blaming a man for something like that just because you don't like him.”

“And what's the reason I don't like him? Because he's so nice? You must be foolish, my son, because the reason I don't like him is because he's an arse. Just like Benji said.”

“Ben treats him like a brother.”

“Brothers hate each other. Ask Cain.” She twisted around back to Kyle again. “And your poor sister, wonder she never got killed, too. She was there, seen it all, she did. First one to his side, she was.”

Kyle was opening his car door now. “Pull over, Am. Pull over.” They'd just driven past Bayside and were coming upon Bottom Hill.

“I never meant to say anything. Oh, my, Kyle. He never suffered, it was too fast and he never suffered. Oh my, what have I got done now?”

Kyle was out of the car before Ambrose rolled to a stop. “Go on now, thanks for the lift. Don't worry,” he said to Suze. “Go on now and we'll see you when Ben gets back.” He started walking. Walking fast down Wharf Road. Walking fast from Suze—
your poor sister, seen it all, first one to his side…

He hopped the yellow ribbon cordoning off his house and then went up to the door and stopped, staring in through the window. He saw them there, his mother, father, Chris, Sylvie—all of them. Their faces hung like ghosts around the empty kitchen. The yellow plastic ribbon
tic-ticced
in the gusting. He clasped his hands behind his head and walked in circles like a mangy dog. His father, he needed to see his father.

The tide was just starting in. He hopped off the wharf onto the scrap of beach and started climbing around the outcropping, grasping onto the cold granite rock, short-cutting it to Hampden.
He came to the ragged inlet that had cradled Clar. He wondered at the innocence of wavelets splashing and playing where Clar's sightless eyes had stared up at him. Then he sat, cupping his knees in his hands and seeing Chris's warm brown eyes full of light. He watched the seaweed floating on the water, watched again as it settled onto the vacant eyes of Clar Gillard, and wondered if light had ever entered those dark orbs or if he'd been a darkness even unto himself. Doing as he, Kyle, was doing. Fleeing down side roads and detours and never stopping to think that yesterday can never be fled, that its ills and thrills work hand in hand in shaping the morning's path.

The water started swelling into the inlet, the wavelets lapping a little too hard at his boots. He pushed himslef up from the rocks to leave and paused. Peered more closely towards the rugged back wall of the inlet. About six feet up, just above eye level. A little star within the crevice of a rock. Sunlight bouncing off steel. He found footing on a ledge and hoisted himself closer. He saw the handle of a knife, its blade buried. A knife used to fillet cod in the fish plants. His heart kicked with knowing—the knife that had ended Clar's life. Sure as hell, it was the knife. He leaned closer and his heart kicked harder and kept kicking, near rupturing his rib cage. It was
his
knife. Kyle's. The knife that his father always used. Nicked in the handle from where he, Kyle, had pinged his axe off it once.

Blood pounded in his ears. The water lapped harder at his boots. He looked madly around the inlet for somewhere to hide the knife. Why hadn't the cops found it? It was right there, easily seen. How hadn't they seen it?

Because it couldn't have been there. Couldn't. They would have seen it. Someone put it there. After the cops had finished searching, someone had returned and stuck in the knife. There hadn't been a storm. No wave could have flung the thing ashore
and wedged it this high onto the rock. He looked up. It was a thirty-foot drop from the top of the cliff.

He pressed his hand against his still kicking heart. He extracted the knife and slid it down the inside of his coat sleeve, crooking his elbow to keep it in place. He climbed around the outcropping and onto the grey pebbly beach girdling Hampden, looking up at the houses against the wind-blown sky. A revved chainsaw ripped through the air, smell of cut birch. A missus hanging a mat over her clothesline. Another coming out of her basement with a load of splits. They both stopped, looking down at him, watched.

He bent his head, took a scuffed path through the weeds and up onto the road, coming face to face with the old fellow with the hitched-up pants and glasses. Dobey Randall. His eyes cut stark clear through his lenses at Kyle. They were poignant with knowing, as if he'd seen everything that had just happened. Kyle walked away from him, his step quickening with panic. He kept himself from breaking into a trot past a gathering of men and young boys on the wharf near Clar's ribboned-off truck. Their voices lowered as he passed. Felt like he was in a movie scene and all eyes were on him; the director would yell
Cut
any second now, everyone would break into chatter, all would be normal again. A rough voice called out.

“Your father working today, then?”

“He's in Corner Brook. How's she going, Pete, b'y?”

“Not bad. Your mother's good, then?”

“Yeah, she's good. You sees Father, tell him I'm down Beaches.”

“Needing a hand down there?” asked Stan Hurley.

“Naw. Got the boys with me, Lyman and Wade.”

“Give you a ride, I suppose.”