Mission

by Paul Forrester-O'Neill

  People were pliable, he thought. They were unpolished and callow. They were credulous beasts; you could tell them anything. They were so ripe you could pick them, pluck them, and pickle them without them even knowing. You could move their arms and legs. You could lead them, pull them along, drag them this way and that and still they wouldn’t know. Look at what you could get people to believe. Look at every con-trick they’d played. You couldn’t do that, on that scale, for so long and so often, unless people were there for the taking. His father taught him that much. “You know what you need to succeed with people,” he’d said, “to get them right where you want them, where they’ll do whatever you what them to do? The right carrot, and the right stick.”

  John got him from fifty paces at least. He got the age, the bulk, the round-shouldered amble. He got his feet clomping over the hard, winter earth with the grace of a dizzy bear. He got the part-roasted face, the hair a matted tobacco across his skull and the fat-fingered hands. More than anything, though, he got the ears.

  He had to calm himself, to ride that clamp that fixed across his chest and around his skull. He had to stop himself from walking over to the kitchen table and picking up the knife, to avert himself from any tin he could hold and wield in one hand, any bottle, any chair leg. He had to keep away from the rat poison down in the cellar, from the bleach and the toxic industrial cleaners. There was the spade and the rake near the porch-way, the saws and the scythes against the wall and, over in the bedroom, alongside the drawers under which the encyclopaedias piled still, there was his father’s shotgun.

  Lester got closer to the homestead with the slow rise of steak juice, beer and stashed tequila coming off him like steam as he went. His lungs burned, his joints pounded and, as he got up to the porchway steps with a jerry-can as hollow as a pauper’s gut, he tried, in the only way he knew how, to gather himself and play it cool; with those inward dog-like snarls to keep the fuck calm.

  He sank down into the old, ripped armchair. He closed his eyes, absently rolled a wrapped cigar between fingers and thumb and slowed his breathing to a level he could speak from. A few zest-white clouds scooted over the peaks of Rupture Hill, like training poodles. He stood, knocked and waited. He heard sounds from inside, a few scratches and scrapes, the slide and fall of something heavy, then footsteps. The door opened. The two men looked at each other.

  John stayed fixed on the tufts of hair in the ears of the shyster’s bitch. His hands rooted down into the depths of his pockets, clenched almost to crushing point. He waited for Lester to speak, his frontal lobe twitching like a sandworm.

  “Could I have some water, please?”

  The voice, the same voice his father heard in the corner bar. Gruffer than he imagined.

  “What’s your business?”

  “I’m just walking.”

  “You’re not from these parts?”

  “No, sir. I’m looking at the land. I understand it might be for sale.”

  John looked at the rashes of red on the man’s neck, the dry, bird-meat lips, and the claret map-lines over the nose.

  “Do you have a container, something?”

  He watched him fish out the empty jerry-can from the rucksack, mock-shake it, and hand it over.

  “Wait there.”

  He turned and went back into the house, ran the faucet, the pitch changing the fuller the can got.

  “This is my land,” he said, handing him the container and watching as Lester guzzled down a good half of the water, his eyes closed, the back of his hands as though downed in ageing fox fur.

  “I appreciate that,” he said, gasping.

  “I’m not sure you do.”

  “I meant no harm. I could hardly breathe.”

  “Trespassing, coming to my home, uninvited.”

  “It was just the water, fella. I was in a bad way.”

  John watched him put the jerry-can back into the rucksack. water had spilled onto his chequered shirt.

  “I’m heading back into town,” Lester said, “which way’s best?”

  John studied the grooves beneath his eyes. He took a breath in. Take it, he heard. Take it and get me some more.

  “The long way is by road. That’s an hour at least. Or, you can go past the Anderson place there, head up to Coronation Point, follow the track to the rickety bridge, and you’re almost there.”

  Lester tried again to look into the house. Hearts and minds, he mumbled to himself. We don’t upset anyone. We don’t move until we have to. We don’t say boo.

  “I’ll take the track,” he said, “and thanks for the water. I owe you one.”

  He turned, and before he got to the bottom of the steps, the door was closed behind him. And before he got to the Anderson place, to the line of starched bonnets, the kitchen window of the homestead was open and the twin barrels of Jack Cassidy’s shotgun were pointing at the base of his skull, at an equidistant sweet spot between his two unglazed, hairy ears.

  “Who’s this guy, again?” Ted said.

  “Vincent Clay.”

  “That doesn’t tell me a damned thing, Doug. Who is he?”

  “He’s a businessman, and he’s interested in the Cassidy land.”

  “Except it’s not the Cassidy land, is it? It’s the land that belongs to the LMA. Are you not sleeping?”

  “It’s Viola, sir. She has migraines, night-sweats. We’re going away for the weekend, without the boys.”

  Ted looked at his watch. It was 10.15. “Go get yourself a coffee, Doug, find your shape. What time’s he due?”

  “Eleven.”

  “OK, let’s get ready.”

  The Land Management Agency, but specifically Ted as its absolute figurehead, had a reputation for not making the purchase of land as easy or as smooth as the purchasers would like it to be. Any potential buyer needed to know that it was Ted in control, and that their wishes, their clauses and sub-clauses were nothing without him as the final arbiter. And so, on that morning, he was prepared for Vincent Clay and any offers and proposals he might make.

  So, imagine then, when at 10.59, Vincent breezes into the office, nods to Doug and the ledger-men, introduces himself to Ted with a beaming smile and tells him that the rough terrain, the thousand square yards of land he’s interested in, is only one of a large number of potential sites for investment and that his financial backers have encouraged him to ‘think expansively’.

  His compliments, too, were seamless; the ergonomics of the office, the walnut angels, the Italianate cornicing and the sweep of brush-strokes that captured the majesty of Edward Mallender astride his chestnut stallion. Not to mention the effusion of civic pride he sensed everywhere he went, the generosity of spirit, the hospitality, and, of course, the quality of Sizzlin’ Steve’s quarter-pounders. In those moments it took for Vincent to create his impression and Ted to absorb his compliments like a sponge, the latter had gone from fierce protector of his land to a man not only willing, but eager, to sell on account of being a man of entrepreneurial spirit himself; he was keen to be a sizeable part of whatever expansive thinking Vincent and his quixotic aftershave was attached to.

  Over the next hour, Ted gave him a brief history of the land. He showed him the plans, the deeds, and the Cassidy signature. He got Doug, bolstered by caffeine, to manoeuvre the pins around on the board and he mentioned a price he figured reasonable enough to work around. He told him how the town of Mission had attracted pioneers and visionaries before and it could do so again. It was a town on the rise. It was going places. He told him about the lush prairie lands and the soft, coastal wind that yearned to come this far inland. He talked about the advantages of the railroad and, when Vincent pointed to the photographs on the desk, he told him about Lily in Oklahoma, Lily in a red organza dress, Lily in a ball gown the colour of moonlit mulberries.

  He tried to tease out the more precise nature of Vincent’s plans but they were skirted and sidestepped in such a way that pinched at Ted’s curiosity even more and made him offer him lunch, more cof
fee, a beer down at Harry’s, dinner at the Mallender estate sometime. He offered him one of the spare rooms in his house for as long as he liked but Vincent, politely, declined them all. There was his business partner, for one thing, his long-time, loyal associate. And there were other meetings, other discussions to be had, and other places to see.

  At 12.30 Vincent looked at his watch and offered Ted his firm handshake.

  “I’ll be in touch,” he said. And then, in the guise of an after-thought, he added, “Can I get a game of golf around here?”

  “Doug here’s your man,” Ted said, “he plays off six. And he’s a leftie, aren’t you, Doug?”

  Doug stood and dutifully practised a mock-swing, a mid-iron from fairway to green.

  “How about tomorrow?” Ted said. “I can let Doug go for a few hours.”

  “Tomorrow’s no good for me,” said Vincent. “There’s some decent land available up near the border. What about Friday afternoon? I’m seeing someone at mid-day. He’s got farmland he wants to sell but I might be able to do the afternoon.”

  Doug paused, took a breath in, and stood there. And the reason he stood there as if spellbound, as if suddenly mesmerised, with Ted looking towards him and the two ledger-men raising up their heads, was that he had the weekend trip with Viola all planned out. Everything. Including reservations for dinner at six. He pretended to think. He picked up a diary that he opened and read like a caddie checking yardage. The diary page was a Sunday in May, as white as driven snow, and while he trailed his finger down the page and Ted’s look grew expectant, he began to frown. He had visions of carnage, of surface-to-air volleys of assorted objects hurling through his domestic space.

  “How about Monday?” Vincent said. “Actually, Monday’s probably best.”

  “Monday it is then,” said Ted, “and listen, the Agency’s paying. Anything you need, anything you want, you send the bill to Ted Mallender.”

  And with that Vincent was gone, down the stairs.

  For a good half-minute Ted and Doug and the two ledger-men stayed rooted, until it was clear that the potential buyer of the rough terrain, the thinker of expansive thoughts and the most kindred spirit Ted had met in a long time, had left the building.

  “What the fuck was that?” Ted said, “You almost lost us the guy.”

  “It was just…”

  “Just what, Doug?”

  “Viola,” he said, and looked down at the floor.

  In that meantime, as the temperate air for early February and the extra sunlight that came with it melted some of the low-lying snow and pixels of buds and sprigs and freakish shoots popped in the woodland, the diametrics and tangents of the situation were these; that Lester told Vincent about obdurate John and Vincent told Lester about Ted. Out in the Cassidy homestead, after John had put his father’s shotgun away, Delilah told him about Lily and Jorge and, later that evening, John fed that information to a tousled and distracted Doug, as ammunition, should he need it. Doug, meantime, told John about Vincent, not knowing for a moment that the out-of-town businessman with whom he was due to shoot eighteen holes of golf was in John’s diabolic sights. Over at the Mallender estate, in the kitchen bereft of grass blades, gastric Ted told Lily all about Vincent, about the expansive plans and the rough terrain and how young Douglas had nearly lost him because of his indecision. And Lily, not yet coiffured and allowing the contents of a five-fruit smoothie to slide down her throat, told Ted that maybe Doug and Viola needed that time together, to touch whatever shaky base they had.

  Elsewhere, the two Snipe boys were in trouble again. Old Mr Parker made a healthy and unsurprising January profit. Rita Mahoonie’s less salacious cousin changed her mind about the widower and the spare key when she found a receipt from the Central hotel in his pocket.

  And, one more thing, some twenty or so miles out of Mission, on the road south, the two-tone Chevy of Lee Shaw’s was found nose-down in a ditch. Mr Shaw, aged thirty-four and a mechanic by trade, was taken to hospital with a dislocated shoulder and minor cuts and bruises. Upon inspection, the steering mechanism of the car was found to be seriously faulty.

  Doug Sketchings stood on the first tee of Sermon Park on that Monday and tried, as he lined up his long-iron drive, to forget the eggshell of a weekend with Viola. Not Viola herself, but the over-bolstered bed, the under-done steak, the flecked mirror in the small bathroom, the mumbling bell-boy, the receptionist with the runny mascara, and the long-haulage trucks that boomed past and shook the bedroom window at three, four and five o’clock both nights.

  It wasn’t too difficult. As sleep-deprived as he was, he still loved the aesthetics of a golf course. He loved the eighteen sections of land, the subdivisions of tee, fairway and green, each with their own individual frisson of excitement. He loved the arc of the hit ball, the lushness of the grass, even the amoebic shapes of the bunkers he tried to avoid. And maybe that was why, along with being able to walk without tip-toeing and talk without every word being one of appeasement, he played better on that day than he’d ever played in his life, outscoring a more erratic and cavalier Vincent Clay by twelve clear shots.

  Vincent, naturally, was never anything other than gracious as bogey piled on bogey and short putts sidled by the holes without waving. He was complementary, courteous and conversational whenever their paths chanced to cross. He mentioned the land from time to time, particularly after slicing his drive into the rough terrain of the dogleg seventh. He asked, too, about the land around the homestead, about its size, the condition it was in, what its history was and, across the tees and greens, if not the fairways of the ninth, tenth and eleventh, he got an abridged version of the Cassidy story; the great-grandfather, Patrick, the card game, the forty-year neglect, the building of the homestead, the further neglect, the sick father and that sense of genetic resentment the townsfolk seemed to have towards the Cassidy name. Vincent listened carefully. Vincent missed his three-footer on the twelfth. Resentment he could always use. Resentment was curdled fuel.

  Doug basked in the rhythm and grace of his game. He was basking on his drive home. He was basking as he lay in bed next to a sleepless Viola, and he was still basking the next morning when Ted Mallender stood with his hands behind his back and glared across at him.

  “Twelve shots? What the fuck were you thinking?”

  “I played well, sir. It just happened.”

  “Nothing just happens. Listen, boy, when you’re playing a prospective client you let them win. Golden rule. You make them feel good about themselves. How is this going to happen if you beat the guy by twelve shots? Did he mention the land?”

  “Sometimes.”

  “Did you try to persuade him? Did you put in a good word?”

  Doug lowered his head, picked up a couple of spare red pins on his desk and ran them between his fingers.

  “You’re a fucking miracle worker, Douglas. That’s what you are.”

  Mid-morning Doug got a call from Viola. One of the boys was sick, she couldn’t tell which. He’d hurled over himself and the kitchen floor and she couldn’t deal with cleaning it up. Her head felt like it was in a vice, she said, could he come home, could he take a couple of hours out to clean everything up? He looked across the room. The ledger-men were busy and Ted was in the small office looking at the deeds of the land. He walked over, and knocked.

  “Excuse me, Ted,” he said, “I wondered if I could get a couple of hours out? It’s Viola. It’s one of the kids.”

  “Which one is it?”

  “Both. I got a call. One of the boys, he’s sick.”

  “How sick?”

  “He’s hurled over the kitchen floor. And himself.”

  “That’s it?”

  “He’s three, Ted.”

  “And how old is Viola?”

  Ted waved him away from the door. The conversation was over. Five minutes later Doug was back.

  “What are you saying?”

  “I’m saying after your fuck up on the golf course, you leave at your peri
l.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Figure it out.”

  Ted sighed loudly, stood up and put the deeds in the drawer.

  “Ask me in an hour.”

  “An hour?”

  “Yes, the time it would’ve taken Vincent Clay to drive from his humiliation at Sermon Park back to his hotel.”

  Viola called Doug again. Lloyd had hurled since, this time over his brother who, with a natural reflex, had hurled back. They were covered in the stuff, both sitting, both crying.

  “I need you,” she said, quietly, the TV voices louder than her own “Tell me you love me.”

  Doug took the call by the vending machine in the hallway. He could picture her, his prom date. He knew where she’d be sitting, what she’d be wearing; the dress with the faded roses, shoeless, no make-up, the small bottle of nail polish in her hand, the once-lustrous hair tied up, loosely. Fifty minutes had passed.

  “I love you, honey,” he said.

  “You know it wasn’t that she let the mascara run.”

  “Who?”

  “The receptionist. It was the way she looked at me.”

  “I know,” he said.

  He went back to the office. Ted was standing as if to attention in front of a map replete with red pins.

  “It’s almost an hour, sir.”

  “Is it an hour?”

  “Almost.”

  “Is that the same thing?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “Then bide your time, young man. You’re playing with fire.”

  “She needs me.”

  “Oh, needs, is it now?” he said and swivelled to face Doug, glowering in his direction with the full expectation that he would, as usual, wither like a plant. But he didn’t. His face didn’t tremble or rouge, and his voice showed no sign of cracking.

  “Yes, it is needs.”

  “Then we’ll decide on the hour.”

  In the weeks and months to come as he sat at home with Viola and the boys, he would remember how, instead of going back to his desk like a slapped dog, he moved a pace closer to Ted and fixed him straight in the eye.