Punishment (11 page)

“The daughter in Windsor,” Lester said. “Rosalie. Maymie’s mother.”

“How much do I owe you?” I asked Mary, as she loaded newspapers on the counter. It had been about five days since the last visit. “Thanks for saving them.”

“Noooo problem,” said Mary.

“That’s nice, you looking after Caddy’s dog,” said Neil. He’d been standing at the back of the store, almost out of sight, elbow propped on the chip rack. “You and Caddy used to be a number years ago I think.”

I laughed. “Christ, Neil. You keep saying that. It was another life altogether.”

“The dog was always with little Maymie,” Lester said. The silence returned, this time heavier. Then he asked, “What do you think will happen to Strickland?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know much about the case.”

“I’m betting he’s gonna walk,” said Neil. “Crooked lawyers will always find a way. Remember where you heard it first, guys. People like that know the system, know how to play it. You saw him in court. An ordinary person would have been shitting in his pants. But not that one. Cool as a cucumber was that son-of-a-hoor.”

I knew I was being watched, commentary waited for. I studied the front page of the paper. Iraqi foreign minister saying something. Weapons inspections. Hans Blix skeptical. Considered
diverting the conversation to Iraq. Second thoughts. Christmas coming.

“Caddy went away for Christmas,” I said. “I agreed to take care of the dog. He’s pretty low maintenance.”

“I’m surprised you aren’t going away yourself,” said Neil, tension suddenly evaporated. “Must be pretty quiet over around Charlie’s. It isn’t easy being alone at Christmas.”

I studied him, trying not to show surprise at hearing something close to empathy.

“It’s just another day for me,” I said.

Nods around, floor being studied. Thoughts unsaid. Always the loner, Tony was. Adopted, what would you expect. Never had any kids himself, even though he was married a dozen times, wasn’t he? Thick as thieves with Caddy years ago, until someone knocked her up. Someone not Tony. Suppressed smiles.

Mary said: “Let me get you a little treat, Birch Bark …” The dog barked. “That’s the boy.”

Lester squatted, scratched the dog’s head. “They were together all the time, Maymie and this here little guy.”

“You must have got to know that Strickland pretty well,” said Neil. “Seeing him every day, in the joint.”

“I didn’t see him every day, Neil. He was mostly in a different institution. It’s a pretty large population, as you know.”

“Not fuckin large enough,” Neil said to laughter. I laughed too.

“It looks like things are finally sorting themselves out in Iraq,” I said, holding up the paper. “Should take the pressure off Neil Archie and George W. to invade. Let them focus on the real enemy.” People glanced at Neil, expectantly.

“And who might that be?” Neil asked.

“Oh, I don’t know. Al-Qaida. Bin Laden. The people who blew up the towers.”

“They’re all one and the same,” said Neil. “As long as that fuckin Saddam is there, it’s just a matter of time. You wait and see.”

“What do you think, Birch?” Mary said. “I suspect your opinion is worth as much as anybody’s.”

“Did you call him Bitch?” Neil asked, pretending innocence.

“You’re an asshole, Neil,” Mary said. And everybody laughed in what I took to be unanimous agreement.

It was pleasant returning to the house with someone in the car, even if that someone was a dog. I left the papers where I dropped them, on the kitchen table. Told myself: you’re wasting money, buying papers that end up mostly unread in the blue recycling sack at the end of the lane with all the cans and bottles. Buying papers was mostly a habit from Ontario—a public servant had to keep on top of things. What am I now, private servant, self-servant? The dog sat by the door and whimpered, looking at me, head atilt. Ah. Dog-servant.

“Let’s take a hike, Birch.” He stood and smiled at me, nodding. “You’ll soon be talking back to me,” I said.

The trail through the trees was once a railway track-bed. Birch dashed ahead of me, chasing creatures that I suspect were figments of a rich imagination, activating killing instincts from the wild. He always came back for reassurance, trotting by my side until another interesting diversion sent him
dashing once again. With a pang of sorrow that was tinged with guilt, I remembered another dog and how, for a long time he resented me, the small intruder who threatened to steal his place in the heart of the MacMillan household. I know this from my Ma, who’d laugh remembering how the dog, who was the same age as I was—five when I’d arrived—would slink out of a room if I was in it, looking back at me with frank hostility.

But he had a kind soul and an instinct for fairness and over time he seemed to realize that the heart of the MacMillan household was large enough to accommodate two needy pets. He lived long for a dog, into my adolescence. And when he vanished I hardly noted it, I was by then so mesmerized by the girl that everybody knew as Caddy.

It was Christmas Eve. Our excursions on the trail had become the highlight of our mornings. The ditches had a skim of ice and among the trees there were patches of dirty snow but the trail itself was bare. I heard the distant sound of a motor long before the ATV raced into view. I stepped to the side of the trail and shouted for Birch, but he’d already taken refuge in the woods. The machines were a common sight and sound on the trail, usually meandering. This one skidded to a stop beside me, and when the driver removed his helmet it was Neil, face flushed, smiling.

“How’s the hammer hangin’,” he shouted, high on what for him was physical activity. He turned the machine off and the trees resumed their whispering. Birch was back and sniffing
around a wheel, then he lifted his leg and pissed against it. Good dog, I thought.

“So,” said Neil. “I was thinking after the store the other day. You being by yourself over there for Christmas just doesn’t seem right to me. I was telling the wife and she agrees.”

“Neil …”

“No, the wife told me. ‘Call him,’ she said. You never met the wife. Girl I found in Boston. A good American who doesn’t take no for an answer. And she told me to make sure you come to our place for Christmas dinner tomorrow. Come early, say three in the afternoon. We’ll have a couple a cocktails.”

He started up the machine again and the dog dashed to the woods.

I shouted: “That’s awfully good of you, but I wouldn’t want to leave the dog …”

“Bring him with you,” Neil shouted back and spun away from me.

That night I stood at the kitchen window, drink in hand, sound of people singing on the television in the other room. Outside it was bright from a fattening moon but there was snow falling. I was tempted to walk over to the end of the long meadow and just stare at the sea. In Kingston, I’d often walk to the shore of the lake and stare out, pretending it was the ocean. In the early days Anna would come with me and we’d walk hand in hand, words now unnecessary. But one night she said simply, “It doesn’t work for me.”

“What doesn’t work?”

There was a long pause before she said, “You name it.”

“Okay,” I said. She took her hand away and folded her arms across her chest, a gesture I always associated with distress or anger. But she wasn’t angry, it seemed to me.

“That, for instance,” she said, nodding toward the lake. It was flat and still and there was a splash of blue from the moon and glitter from the streetlights, the sound of someone laughing somewhere in the darkness. “I don’t know how you can be satisfied with that, pretending it’s the ocean.”

Anna’s family was from Gdansk, which they’d fled in 1971 because of the disturbances after Gomulka. She remembered the Baltic. “A lake is just a lake,” she said. “It doesn’t matter how big it is.”

“Depends on how you look at it,” I said

“I suppose,” she said. “It depends on what you need, how bad you need it.” Then: “If you miss back there so much, why do you stay here?” In retrospect, that was how the end began. Or how I remember it.

I drained my glass. The drink wasn’t doing a thing for me. It would be nice, I thought, to walk out to where I could stare at the gulf, feel the gentle kiss of snowflakes melting on a cheek. Get the dog out. But the dog was unconscious on Jack’s old coat, on his side, legs stretched out, one twitching, dreaming of the chase, the kill. I couldn’t bring myself to disturb him.

Then I heard the newscast theme from the other room. I took the whisky bottle with me, sat down to watch. More about Iraq, quiet streets in Baghdad. Commentary about sanctions, poverty, shortages, people sick and dying. Whether or not this
was a country we should fear. Someone on a panel was certain there were weapons stockpiles hidden somewhere. Saddam was starving his own people, using petro money to buy weapons to attack his neighbours. I struggled to retain the information, sift the speculation out of it, the politics and posturing. The way I’d learned when I was working. Listen for the facts, draw your own conclusions, act accordingly.

The phone woke the dog. I could hear him scrambling to his feet. It was Caddy.

“Just checking in,” she said. “How are you guys doing anyway? Merry Christmas, by the way.”

“Doing good,” I said. “Everybody happy. How are things there?”

“Okay,” she said, “all things considered. I just wanted to wish you guys a Merry Christmas.”

“Same to you and yours,” I said. “No worries here. We’re great.” I held the phone out. “Aren’t we Birch Bark?”

“Yap,” he said and Caddy laughed.

“Oh,” I said. “I’ve been asked to go to dinner tomorrow. And I was wondering how my housemate would feel about being by himself.”

“That wouldn’t be a problem,” she said. “Leave a light on, and water and some munchies. And maybe the TV. You did break down and get a TV?”

“I did. I’m becoming addicted.”

“I’ll believe that when I see it. So where are you going to dinner?”

“Neil’s place,” I said. “He asked me earlier today.”

I wondered for a moment if she was still on the line. “I see,” she said.

“It wouldn’t be my first choice but he wouldn’t take no for an answer. The hard part will be avoiding arguments. Neil likes to stir things up.”

“He does that,” she said. “Anyway the dog will be just fine. I often left him by himself.”

“I hope everything is okay with you, Caddy.”

“It was the right thing to do, coming here,” she said. “But I’m missing my own place.”

“Yes,” I said. “It’ll only be a few more days.”

Then she said, “Well, I’d better get back to them. I just thought of you guys there. I’m glad you aren’t alone, Tony. Even if it’s just a little dog.”

“Hey,” I said. “It’s hard to beat a dog for company. Growing up my best friend was a dog.”

“Yes, I remember Bingo, and how upset you were when he disappeared.”

“Jesus. You remember? Even his name?”

“I remember lots of things, Tony. Lots and lots of things.”

“I don’t remember being that upset.”

“I remember it,” she said. “I remember you were upset.”

For a moment, after she was gone, I considered midnight Mass. How long has it been? I poured a drink. An old movie was beginning,
It’s a Wonderful Life
. Christmas Eves Anna and I would watch it, ironic and sarcastic. Now something about the familiarity brought a kind of peace. The dog hopped up and lay beside me on the couch, head resting on my thigh.

“Let’s watch this, shall we?”

He rolled an eye and it seemed to me he winked. I scratched his head.

“There’ll be more about justice in this story than you’ll ever hear in any church, eh Birch.”

He yawned.

“What’s your real name, Tony?”

“What’s
your
real name, Caddy?”

“You know my real name. Catherine Anne Gillis. Now tell me.” She had grasped my hand and was shaking it playfully.

We were in the red Ford truck, parked near the shore. We had opened the Christmas gifts shyly. Mine was shaving lotion. Old Spice. I dabbed some on my neck. She sighed over the small plastic camera I gave her. “It uses flash cubes,” I said. “There’s some in the package and a roll of film.”

“I’m going to try it out,” she said.

“Don’t you dare. And you know my name anyway. It’s MacMillan,” I said.

“I mean born with. Ma said your real name sounds French.”

“What’s the difference?” There was a low moon, three-quarters full, off to the left, the sea to the right, swishing in the loose shore gravel.

“Tell me!”

And I took the camera from her hands and placed it carefully on the dash, and drew her to me and kissed her deeply and she responded, lips moving gently, arms tight behind my neck. Then she pulled away. “Tell me.”

“What’ll you give me if I tell you?” I was trying to draw her back, my free hand now between her thighs. “How bad do you want to know?”

She broke free, slid away to the far door, arms folded. “You make a joke about everything.”

“Breau,” I said. “B-r-e-a-u. Like beau, with an ‘r.’ ”

She was looking in my direction again. “Tony Breau. Neat.”

“I wouldn’t go that far,” I said, fishing for the cigarette pack.

“It could be a singer’s name, or an actor.”

“What’s wrong with MacMillan?” speaking to the stinging smoke, blowing out the match.

“Everybody here is mac-something. Who ever heard of a famous mac-something?”

“There’s lots of them I bet. There’s a prime minister of England, isn’t there? Or was. A MacMillan, actually.”

There were little ragged flurries of snow settling around us. I rolled the window down, flicked the cigarette away into the darkness. I felt a chill, started up the truck to get us warm. Grabbed her hand and drew her back to me. She still seemed far away.

“Neil MacDonald is home from the States,” she said. “Neil Archie. I saw him this afternoon at Confession.”

“You went to Confession?” I said. “That explains it.”

“Stop,” she said. “Don’t be making jokes. You mean you didn’t go to Confession?”

“Nothing to confess,” I said. “You’ve made sure of that.”

She gave me the sideways look, mouth twisted in mock disapproval. “You’re hopeless.”