Savage Gerry

by John Jantunen

  A hand clasping at his ankle had him staring down at the cop. The left side of his face looked to have melted but that was only from the blood where his ear had been shot off. His one sleeve was on fire but he didn’t seem to have noticed, clutching at Gerald’s ankle and squeezing him hard as if he meant to do him harm. There was grief in the man’s eyes and a tear sprouting at the corner of one. The cop was gasping for breath and spittle was foaming into bubbles at his lips.

  Keep ’em safe! he was yelling in a desperate plea with what amounted to his dying breath. You keep ’em all safe!

  His grip relented and his head sagged to the floor and Gerald turned towards Devon.

  He was somehow still on his feet. He was rubbing frantically at the top of his head with one hand and patting out a fire on his shoulder with the other, stamping out those on the floor with both his feet. The treetops around him were a seething furnace of yellow and orange billowing in gusts, Gerald watching as the fire chased along the treeline ahead of the truck and feeling at any moment it would consume them too.

  38

  The night broke into a simmering dawn.

  The tracks had turned due north and Gerald was facing due south, sitting propped against the back of the truck’s cab and watching the stars wink out one by one against the sky’s lightening blue until only one remained, though he knew it wasn’t really a star at all, it was the planet Venus. It hung just above the horizon and seemed to grow brighter as the others faded in a futile attempt to challenge the sun’s dominion over the day, the first rays appearing as a hazy diffusion of deep reds shading to pink seeping through the cloud of smoke blurring all sense of the world’s southerly expanse. When the sun finally did manage to shine through it was well above the treetops, emerging as a perfect disc of shimmering orange about the size of a full moon, its bright dimmed enough that Gerald could stare straight into it without feeling the urge to even blink, a welcome balm against the sight of the dead cop lying at his feet.

  Devon had covered Émile’s face with a green John Deere ball cap but his missing ear was clearly visible and it was impossible for Gerald not to see in him a shade of his grandfather. When Gerald had finally found him three days after he’d gone to check his traps that one last time, crows had pecked his face clean to the bone, Gerald wishing ever after that he’d never had to see him like that.

  He must have fallen asleep staring at the sun, for the next thing he knew Devon was jostling him awake.

  Pit stop, he said when Gerald opened his eyes, squinting against the morning bright and at Devon’s face, mere inches from his, smiling not unlike Clayton had the first time he’d met him.

  I left you some clean clothes. He motioned to the truck’s sidewall. Figured you could use some.

  He’d stood up and was peering down expectantly at Gerald, waiting for him to say something. Gerald’s head was still ringing from last night and his mouth was dry as sandpaper and all he could muster was a curt nod.

  It seemed to satisfy Devon just fine and he offered a slightly more boisterous nod in return.

  You going to help me or not?

  This from Brett, who was standing in front of the open tailgate. His hands were resting on the dead cop’s feet and there was a shovel propped beside him.

  I’ma comin’, Devon answered, turning and bending to the cop and taking up his arms.

  The ball cap dropped from the dead man’s face as he lifted him up and Devon motioned to set him back down.

  What the hell are you doing? Brett asked.

  Fetching the hat.

  What the hell’s he going to do with a hat, buried in the ground?

  Devon must have seen the logic in that and walked straddle-legged to the edge of the truck bed with the cop suspended below him.

  Gerald could feel a burning spot about halfway up his arm and when he looked down at it, there was a blotch the size of a quarter — red, raw and blistering — singed into the skin where he’d been hit with the burning oil.

  A little staunchweed’ll clear that right up, he told himself and that was enough to finally get him onto his feet.

  The crunch of footsteps on gravel as Devon and Brett carried the body down the tracks gave way to Brett cursing, Goddamnit, I thought you said you had him! And Gerald could hear other noises too — the buzz of deerflies circling his head and further off a baby’s cry and a metallic banging, like someone throwing stones against one of the container cars.

  Devon had left him a pair of brown cargo shorts and a green T-shirt. It was pretty much the same outfit he’d worn every summer’s day from the time he’d come to live with his grandfather. It was also what he’d been wearing the night he’d fled the farm with Evers, a mild enough sort of coincidence that he didn’t give it much thought until he was picking up the shorts. Devon had threaded a brown leather belt through its loops and when Gerald unfolded them he saw that he’d threaded that through the loop of a leather sheath holding a hunting knife, the hilt of which struck him at once as familiar. Its metal was bronze in hue and wound with strips of leather, alternating between black and red. When he pulled the knife up an inch, there was imprinted on the steel just below the tang, Made In Sheffield, England and so he wasn’t at all surprised that when he flipped it over William Rogers was imprinted on the other side.

  Damned if that ain’t the exact same knife your grandfather gave you on your sixteenth birthday. The same knife you’d carried with you every single day of your life afterwards. Until … Until you left it jammed in that bear’s eye and Charlie Wilkes found it three days later.

  The last time he’d seen it was in the courtroom in a plastic Ziploc bag labelled Exhibit Q. A strange enough coincidence that it had him craning over the side of the truck, peering after Devon, wondering where he might have got it. Him and Brett had set the cop’s body on the ground, a hundred paces hence, and appeared to be embroiled in some heated argument, maybe about what they were supposed to do with it next.

  The train had stopped amidst a field of granite humps, smaller ones like foothills on either side piled into miniature mountains, the largest fifty or so feet tall. A sparse few spruce had taken root in the crevices lining the black rock but nothing else grew there except patches of moss, dried to a flaky crisp. The landscape told him that he was almost home and also that Devon and Brett were a long way from burying the body just yet.

  He left them to their debate and stripped off his blood-crusted shirt. He dressed in the shorts and T-shirt, then stepped over the truck’s other side dropping to the ground and scanning along the tracks, looking for any sign to tell him how far he might still have to go. All he could see were more granite humps and a smattering of people lingering in the train’s shade or crouched over, picking at the blueberry shrubs growing in groves along the edge of the rail bed.

  Darlene was sitting and smoking with restless deliberation on the platform of the car four down and Trent was bent over stiff-legged in front of her. He was picking berries one by one and holding each of them up to her, showing them off, before popping them into his mouth, as jovial as ever. Devon’s two kids were picking alongside him, the boy dropping his harvest into the peanut butter jar at his feet and his younger sister reaching into that to claim her share, their own nonchalance at complete odds with the desperation wrought on their mother’s face. She was standing a few feet behind them, cradling her pregnancy bump in both hands and gazing in abject longing at some indeterminate point on the horizon, her lips moving in silent prayer as if pleading with her God to show her some sign of his mercy.

  In front of the container opposite there was a charcoal barbecue, the same one Larry had been grilling steaks on the day before. It was a younger man tending the grill now. He was as wiry as Larry so it could very well have been his son. He couldn’t seem to keep still, endlessly fidgeting at the scruff of his beard and prodding at the steaks with a fork, his eyes all the while fixed as if on a tether to
the two women walking down the tracks. They were holding the hands of a toddler between them, swinging him upwards, and the boy was laughing and shrieking his delight. One of them was Chris, maybe the man’s mom. That would make the other woman his wife and the toddler his son and after what had happened last night it wasn’t much of a mystery to Gerald why he’d be looking so nervous watching them walk away, even though they only ventured to the end of the next car before turning back around.

  Otherwise, Gerald didn’t recognize anyone else of the dozen or so others milling about. All of them were grouped in twos and threes, huddled together or hugging each other, some laughing through tears and others outright sobbing, some just talking, could have been about the weather or any other damn thing as long as it wasn’t about what they’d just been through, every last one of them seemingly trying to figure out a way to cope with their own personal grief.

  Gerald played along by reaching down and scooping a handful of blueberries from a bush laden with the fruit, as big and juicy as grapes. As he munched on those he mounted the nearest of the granite humps, hopping from that one to the next, a little higher, and then onto the next after that, higher still. He was twenty feet up when he stopped and turned around, scanning again down the tracks and seeing no more than he had before except for one important thing: Clayton’s familiar lank bent over a puddle of rainwater just beyond the last of the pickers. He was bare-backed and washing handfuls up over his face and through the soapsuds foaming in his hair. After he’d done that a few times he reached into the puddle and pulled out his shirt. Wringing it, he started down the tracks in his limpity-hobble, his head craning ever so slightly around the cars, searching out, it seemed to Gerald, the white truck just around the bend.

  Plucking a marble-sized pebble from the ground, he waited until Clayton had come to its bumper and then launched the stone. He hit the cab’s door between the C and the N and startled Clayton such that he ducked for cover with a mad flail of his arms as if someone was shooting at him all over again, no matter that the shot would have had to come from above and behind. He was quick to recover though and even quicker to smile when he spotted Gerald standing above him. He stepped up onto the same hump Gerald had but the jump to the next seemed to be beyond him.

  He took the long way around and when he’d finally made it to the top of the rise, Gerald was peeing off the highest peak and into the valley below. A four-lane highway had been cut through the lowlands but all that was visible to Gerald was a span of asphalt twenty or so yards long. On the far side of it there was a fringe of trees bordering a small lake. Beyond that the only thing he could see to the horizon was a gaggle of geese flying north in V-formation against a cloudless sky, honking in their insistent manner as if they were fleeing some urgent threat right on their tail feathers.

  Helluva view from up here, Clayton said coming up behind him, staying at careful remove. He’d found a two-pronged stick and was using it to scratch at either side of the dressing on his leg while Gerald finished his business.

  Gerald gave a double shake and tucked himself back into his shorts, turning around, brushing his hands on his shirt out of habit and blinking, as much against the sun’s glimmer as against the way Clayton was looking at him, sneaking quick peeks out of the sides of his lowered eyes, struck suddenly shy.

  They say how long it’s going to be? Gerald asked, more to break the awkward quiet than because he cared one way or the other.

  Oh, it’ll be awhile yet, Clayton answered. Larry said there was a bunch of railcars blocking the tracks just outside of Sudbury. They’s gone to see about moving them. Then they got to switch the tracks. Looking up and peering at Gerald with those eager eyes: They’s taking us over to North Bay.

  That right?

  I ain’t never been to North Bay. I guess it’s as good as anywhere. Jenny seems pretty keen on going there anyway.

  At least it ain’t Marmora.

  Clayton grinned wide.

  You said a mouthful there.

  A voice called out, Clayton! and he turned around, finding Jenny standing in front of the CN truck.

  What I tell you about scratching your leg? she yelled.

  What? Clayton called back. I weren’t scratchin’.

  She frowned at that, both hands now firmly on her hips.

  You find any yarrow yet?

  I’m getting to it.

  Well hurry up. I told you, there’s people waiting!

  With that she set off back down the tracks with a brisk stride, shaking her head and Clayton shaking his head too, but for an entirely different reason.

  I think she must have a little of my mother in her, he said, and from the sparkle in his eyes it seemed he wouldn’t have had it any other way.

  He made to turn around then stopped.

  That’s three I owe you, he said.

  What? Gerald asked.

  I’d have been dead three times now, it weren’t for you.

  Clayton was looking again at him shy-struck and it occurred to Gerald that what he was really trying to tell him was that he wanted him to stay. Gerald couldn’t promise him that and searched past him, looking down at the tracks, trying to think of something he could say on this the last time, he was certain, he’d ever see the scarecrow again.

  He spotted Trent helping Linda down the ladder from one of the freight cars. Beside them, Darlene was looking up at him like she had been doing so for a while, waiting for him to notice her. Now that he had, she waved and he offered her an awkward wave of his own. If it hadn’t been for Clayton he’d have never come back to the camp and all three of them would be dead right now.

  We’ll call it even, he said to Clayton.

  Ah hell, I ain’t going to let you off that easy.

  Clayton was already turning around and hobbling away, Gerald watching after him and seeing that Darlene was still looking up at him. He couldn’t read her expression but it wasn’t much of a leap for Gerald to imagine that she was imploring him to stay too.

  You ain’t likely to find another woman like her anytime soon, he thought, though really he was thinking of Millie and the life she’d given him.

  You could make yourself a new life all over again.

  Teasing himself with the thought even as his hand wheedled under his shirt, seeking out the photograph of his son.

  A piercing shriek then, Linda screaming, Trent, let me go! I told you to let me go!

  She was slapping viciously at Trent’s arm and he responded by jamming his fist in his mouth, biting down hard. Darlene pitched her smoke and hastened to intervene, yelling, Linda, stop it! Stop it!

  Her eyes were off Gerald for only a moment and that was all it took for him to slip over the edge of the ridge, letting gravity take hold, his sneakers flat against the steeply sloping rock face and his hands levered at his sides with their fingertips brushing against the rough-hewn stone, keeping him on an even keel as he glided down towards the road.

  39

  The highway led him west.

  The granite field was shortly overcome by a lightly cultivated forest of mostly evergreens that broke, at the city’s limits, against a ten-foot-high wall made of some synthetic compound moulded to look like stone and mortar. It stretched a kilometre along the road and was overseen at intervals by a dozen or so security cameras and had three entrances all guarded by wrought-iron gates, the so-called “safe zone” Millie had never grown tired of railing against.

  It had once housed an idyllic suburban paradise reserved for government employees and whatever executives the mining companies had seen fit to leave behind. The task of buffering them against the swelling tides pounding Sudbury in wave after wave of human detritus was placed squarely on the shoulders of its own private security force. The remnants of that Gerald could see in the crow-and coyote-ravaged bodies clad in black riot gear sprawled on the ground inside the smashed in first gate, evidence of a l
ast ditch attempt to muster some sort of defence after the dam had finally, and terminally, burst.

  That it was The Sons who’d rode the crest of that particular wave, there could be no doubt. Their shady-tree-at-dusk emblem was emblazoned on the wall, underscored by a spray paint scrawl reading And God said that the end of all flesh has come before me for the earth is filled with violence through US.

  How that violence had played out was clearly delineated in the burnt-out husks of a half dozen cars and trucks cluttering the road ahead. All of them had been customized with steel plating over their windows and ornamented with spans of razor wire. A few of the larger vehicles had been equipped with snowplough blades–cum–battering rams as had the semi that had finally smashed through the gauntlet. After it had breached the gate it had crashed into what must have once been a sprawling mansion and was now a toppled pile of blackened wood and household appliances. The truck had plummeted through the house’s floor and leaned at a drastic angle into its basement. The rear doors of its trailer were open and it was hard not to image a Trojan horse’s worth of heavily armed maniacs storming out, wreaking unholy havoc on the occupants of the “safe zone.” Multitudes of those littered the streets and driveways, food now for the hosts of crows and vultures cloistered in delirious squabble over the bodies, overseen by a spiralling mass of their brethren darkening the sky into a great and swirling whirlpool of feathered black.

  Such devastation that it surely wouldn’t have been out of place in The Road Warrior. Yet as Gerald stood at the gate, surveying the wreckage, his gaze at last settled on the decomposing body of a French poodle chained up in the nearest yard, so that it was a line from another movie that immediately sprung to mind.