“Perfect,” he said, holding up a thumb.
“Right,” she said through unusually white teeth, “I’ll just ask you two some questions and you just answer them. Don’t worry if you stumble, we’ll edit it all together when we get back to the studio. Just go with whatever thought you have. And we’ll start with the professor, if you don’t mind, Mr Mayor?”
Bull shook his head: “No, not at all.”
Then a bright light affixed to the top of the camera came on and Bull shielded his eyes. The reporter gently pulled his hands away from his face.
“Sorry about that,” she said apologetically. “It is a little intense but you’ll get used to it.”
“Now,” she continued, holding her microphone at arm’s length, “Professor Morrow, can you tell us what this is all about?”
“I can indeed,” Morrow said, bouncing up and down on the balls of his feet. “Oh, yes. I can indeed. What’s happened here in Marbleton is, I can safely say, a magnificent scientific marvel. A discovery, or rather a rediscovery, of stunning importance. I would put it on a par with the finding, in 1938, of the long-thought-extinct coelacanth …”
Just as Morrow started in on the story of Sir Holyfield Lewis, Bull caught sight of Darlene. He didn’t recognize her at first; her usually straight, long blond hair was pulled up into untidy bunches on top of her head. She was standing at the bottom of the steps, partly hidden behind a tall lanky boy in a tie-dyed shirt with a banjo slung across his shoulders. Having been spied by her father, she tried to shield herself from view. Then, with an expression of boldness Bull had never seen before, she forced herself into the open and very obviously took the arm of the scraggly troubadour. Bull could feel himself cringe when Darlene, looking straight at him, stretched onto her tiptoes and sucked on the boy’s earlobe. It was as if through a long cardboard tube that he heard the reporter’s next question to Dr Morrow.
“And just what exactly is it that you plan to do here, Professor?”
Bull could feel Morrow’s spindly arm brush against his own as it shot into the air.
“We’re going to fight!” the fishy-scented aquatic biologist squealed.
“What?” Bull said in disbelief.
“Fight how?” the reporter eagerly asked.
“We’re going to take a stand in the forest,” Morrow said, his tone verging on rabid. “We’ll defend the Jericho trout from the manic industrialization that’s intent on wiping it from the face of the earth. To the last person we’ll defend it.”
A loud shout rose from the steps, and looking out Bull could see the Marbletonians standing on the fringe of the crowd begin to slink away, frightened by the scene. Then he heard the reporter.
“Mr Mayor? Mayor Maxim?”
“Yes?” Bull said, still stunned by Morrow’s outburst.
“As the authority in the town, what do you plan to do about this incendiary demonstration?”
“Incendiary?”
“Yes, Mr Mayor,” the reporter smiled, looking hungrily at Bull. “By the sound of things, this is a protest that could easily become violent.”
“Violent?” Bull said, shaken. “I don’t know. I don’t know what Dr Morrow is talking about. We don’t have any industry here. We don’t even have any police.”
Another shout went up from the crowd.
The reporter turned to the cameraman and drew a finger across her throat.
“Perfect,” she said to him, then turned back toward Bull and Morrow. “Thank you very much, gentlemen. That’ll play great. We’re just going to get a few shots of the crowd now, if you don’t mind.”
Bull felt a spidery hand crawl across his shoulder.
“Oh, boy,” Morrow said, his grin wildly boyish. “I think that went great, just great. Didn’t you, Mr Mayor?”
Bull pushed his hand roughly away.
“No, sir,” he said, feeling his guts start to bubble. “No, sir, I didn’t think it went just great at all.”
“You’re not upset about all that making-a-stand stuff, are you, Mr Mayor?” Morrow said, the picture of innocence. “That was just for the camera. We’re in this together, you and I. We’re going to put this place on the map.”
“I’ll have you know,” Bull said, turning back into the building, “that Marbleton is already on the map.”
Then he stopped and looked back toward the crowd in search of Darlene, but she was nowhere to be seen.
Bull cannot believe what he is seeing. The lid is off the crate. Inside there is straw, old and dry. The first thing that comes to his mind when he looks at it is Marlene’s hair after she’s had it permed and dyed. So brittle that just touching it might cause the strands to snap. Then Bull sees the pale pink sticks. He counts six of them, nestled in among the straw, but there might be more buried beneath.
“Jesus Christ, Billy. How long have you had this stuff?”
Finnegan smiles proudly: “Oh, it’s gotta be going on six years now. But I’m sure it’s been kicking around a whole lot longer than that.”
Bull has to suppress the urge to flee, to run home blindly out of the trailer in search of safe cover.
“Do you know how dangerous this is?” Bull asks in lieu of flight.
Finnegan, still holding the lid of the crate, turns it over in his hands and holds it up so Bull can read it.
“Says to keep it in a cool, dry place. I figure under the bed’s the closest I got.” Then he laughs. “Hell, I figure if it ain’t gone off yet, it’s not going to.”
“And this was just sitting over there at the quarry?”
“Yep. Found it in one of the old depot sheds out back of the wash house.”
“Don’t sweat it, Pop,” Darryl says, putting a hand on Bull’s shoulder and giving it a squeeze. “We’ll be rid of it soon enough.”
Darryl’s touch is comforting, and Bull can feel his fright slipping away. It’s as if their roles have been reversed and his son has become the paternal rock. And Bull wonders if Darryl begrudges him for never having been that rock for him.
“You all right there, Pop?” Darryl asks, leaning in toward him with an expression of genuine concern.
“Sure, son,” Bull says. “It’s just my stomach. It’s goddamn killing me.”
The weight of the mayoral chain felt like a lodestone around his neck. Looking out at the gallery from his seat in the middle of the horseshoe-shaped council table was like looking out at the assembled guests of an unpopular marriage. On one side were his stern-faced constituents; on the other, Morrow and his quite obviously light-headed supporters. And the aisle running down the middle might as well have been a sweeping gorge for all the chance there was of one side reaching out toward the other. If they had rocks, Bull thought, they would probably be throwing them at one another.
The question had just been put to him, from the constituency camp, why the authorities hadn’t been called and these rabble-rousers run clear out of town. Before Bull could answer, a chorus of hisses and barely stifled profanities rose from Morrow’s crew. Bull had to bang his gavel to quiet them.
“As I told you before,” Bull said, leaning in close to the microphone which he normally didn’t have to use, since very rarely did anyone bother showing up for the council meetings, “the land that Professor Morrow and his supporters are …” He hesitated. “The land that Professor Morrow and his supporters are … occupying … is still owned by NystroCorp. And the police told me that if NystroCorp didn’t launch a complaint, then there was nothing that could be done. Now I spoke to Robert Nystrom himself this afternoon and he told me …”
Bull searched the table for the note he’d made that afternoon. Having found it, he took a good few moments to decipher his own handwriting.
“He told me,” Bull continued, feeling a little flustered, “to quote his exact words: ‘I don’t give a damn who’s in that forest. It could be the Queen of Sheba for all I care. Just don’t be calling me about any freaking lawsuits. We got signs up all over the place, and if those bastards can’t read, then that’s just
too damn bad.’”
Bull folded the paper into quarters and set it down on the table beside the pitcher of water that he so desperately wanted a drink from.
“So you see,” he went on, feeling more parched with every word, “if Bob Nystrom and his brother don’t want them moved, I’m afraid there’s nothing we can do.”
Another shout went up, this time from both sides, and Bull had to hammer his gavel again. As he did, he saw Morrow, who was sitting right up front, slowly get to his feet and raise his hand, as if he were a schoolboy waiting to be called upon. Bull made to look away, but the professor had already caught his eye.
“Yes, Dr Morrow?” Bull said, defeated.
“I was wondering if I might say a few words?”
A low grumble started on the Marbletonian side of the gallery, and a councillor to Bull’s left began to object, but Bull held out a hand to silence him.
“I figure,” Bull said diplomatically, “that since Dr Morrow is the reason we’re all here, we might as well do him the courtesy of hearing what he has to say.”
“How very kind of you, Mr Mayor,” Morrow said and performed an awkward bow in Bull’s direction. Then he turned slightly and faced the constituents.
“I fear,” he began in a vain attempt to lower the pitch of his voice, “that we have gotten off on the wrong foot. It was never my intention, never our intention, to cause you any distress. I realize we may”—he made a wide, arcing gesture, which took in those sitting around him—“appear slightly odd to you. We’re not, how should I say, a very tidy bunch. But I implore, don’t let our aspect prejudice you against us. We’ve come here only to do good. You have, in the vicinity of this fine town—and I don’t mean to be patronizing, for I think this is indeed a very fine town. You have in the vicinity a true marvel, nay a wonder. It should be cherished. But to be cherished it must be protected. And that is all we aim to do. Protect. We are not against you. We are for you. So, please, I beg you: accept us. Think of us not as interlopers, but rather guardians. Your guardians. Guardians of your precious wonder.”
Finished, Morrow executed another clumsy bow.
Then someone at the rear of the gallery shouted, “Why don’t you just fuck off out of here, you hippie bastard.”
There was a moment of complete and stunned silence as the profanity sank in, then the room exploded, both sides screaming obscenities and jabbing fingers in the air. Bull pounded his gavel, hit it so hard against the table that the head came off and clattered across the floor. Still there was disorder. And it began to appear as if something truly ugly was about to occur. Then, through the chaos, Bull could hear a lone voice begin to chant. At first he couldn’t make out what was being said, just the simple rhythm of the cadence, but he recognized the voice. He stretched himself on tiptoes to get a better look. People in the gallery were out of their chairs now and the two sides were pushing dangerously close. Then the chant started to catch on with Morrow’s people, and as it did, the constituents grew quieter. That’s when Bull saw her. Darlene, right in the middle of the throng, leading the mantra, her fist pumping in the air.
“Hell no, we won’t go.”
She was looking straight at him, her grubby balladeer at her side, banging time on the skin of his banjo.
“Hell no, we won’t go.”
The chant grew louder still, and Darlene began to push her way into the aisle, pulling the banjo player behind her. Fist still stabbing the air, she formed the head of the parade, leading the filthy chorus down the middle of the gallery to doors at the far end, and from there, out into the streets.
This time he hadn’t fallen behind, hadn’t felt old and out of breath. This time Bull kept pace. A young man again, rushing the line, stiff-arming the low-slung branches. He’d even, in a moment of bravado, offered to carry the crate, but Darryl kindly waved him off, saying that he and Finnegan would share the load.
“I have to give him something to hold on to,” Darryl had said, “or else he gets lost.”
For all their weight, his and Darryl’s, and Finnegan’s notorious clumsiness, they’d made very little noise as they wound their way through the woods. Whatever sound they did make was easily drowned out by the noises of the night creatures hiding in the darkness. Twice Darryl had halted their progress, putting a protective arm across Bull’s chest. It was as if he knew instinctively where the flues were. And as they drew near to their destination, Darryl guided Bull and Finnegan with such care and paternal concern that once again Bull felt as if he were the son, and it made him feel so happy that he thought he might actually cry.
Bull hadn’t asked Darryl exactly what they were going to do, and Darryl hadn’t offered. But once he had taken a good look at the ancient sticks of dynamite that Finnegan had salvaged from the old quarry, it was plainly obvious, and he decided simply to trust his son.
Now, though, standing in the brief clearing at the edge of the quarry, Bull is beginning to have doubts, which are accompanied by a painful flare of indigestion.
“You know, Darryl,” he says. “I’m not so sure about this.”
Even in the dark he can tell his son is disappointed.
“Well, Pop,” Darryl says quietly. “It’s up to you, really. If you don’t want to do it, we won’t do it.”
It’s like a hot poker pushing at him from the inside. He wants so badly to please his son but he’s … he’s what? What is it that’s keeping him from doing what his darling boy wants? Why is it that he can’t give Darryl just this one thing? And finally, in a flash, as if he’s known all along, Bull realizes what it is that’s stopping him. What it is that always stops him. He’s afraid. He’s afraid of what people will say, afraid of what Marlene will say. He’s afraid of Morrow and his unwashed horde. He’s afraid of his constituents. He’s afraid of getting caught. He’s afraid Darlene won’t love him any more.
“Darryl,” he whispers. “What about Darlene?”
“What about her?”
“This will break her heart.”
He hears Darryl laugh.
“Is that it, Pop? Is that what you’re worried about?”
He can’t remember the last time he’s heard Darryl laugh.
“What?” Bull says and hears his own voice crack. “What is it that’s funny?”
“You think Darlene cares about some stupid fish?”
“But …”
“It’s not the fish, Pop.”
“But she’s out there,” Bull says, his tone now panicky. “She’s out there in the woods with those … with those … people.”
“Sure she is, Pop. But that doesn’t have anything to do with the fish.”
“It doesn’t?”
“No.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
Bull feels as if he doesn’t know anything any more. Nothing makes sense to him.
“So,” says Darryl, coming closer. “Do you want to do this or not?”
Out of the darkness Bull hears a noise. Strange. Out of place here in the woods. At first he cannot make it out. Not crickets. Not critters in the underbrush. Not the wind. It’s something more melodious, like singing.
And it is singing. Faint and hymn-like. And there’s something else, something straining just beneath the song: a banjo.
He turns to Darryl.
“Yes,” he says. “Yes, I want to do this.”
“Well, hot dog,” chirps Finnegan. Bull had forgotten he was with them.
He feels Darryl press the dry stick into his hand and then the flame of the lighter lights up his son’s face.
“The wick, it’ll be pretty dry, Pop. So you better throw it as soon as it catches.”
He watches as the small yellow flame licks the fuse and waits for it to ignite.
“What if it doesn’t work?”
“Relax, Pop,” Darryl says confidently. “It’ll work.”
And with that the fuse sparks to life, and Bull is reminded of the sparklers he used to buy for Darryl and Darlene when they were still
children and how they used to run through the backyard writing their names in the air.
“Come on, Bull,” Finnegan yells out of the darkness. “Get rid of the thing.”
And Bull draws his arm back, feeling the stretch in his pectorals and the wound-up elastic tension of the tendons in his elbow. He plants one foot firmly on the ground in front of him and pushes off hard with the other. His arm begins an exquisite arc, starting from behind his head and extending upward. At the zenith his fingers open and he feels the stick of dynamite leave his hand and watches as it soars out into the air before him, out and out, a perfect toss, the sparkling fuse spitting needles of brightness into the black night. For a moment it seems to pause, suspended in the void, as if hanging from a string, before it begins its descent, falling, falling into the chasm, its glittering ember growing dimmer and dimmer until it disappears. There is utter silence. Even the far-off singing has stopped.
Then the night roars with great force and Bull falls backward, landing with such a thump that he bites a chunk out of the tip of his tongue. But he is laughing. Even as the blood starts to stain his lip, he is laughing, thinking of the fish, the Jericho trout, its muscles as stiff as a board as it sinks to the bottom of the quarry.
He can hear Darryl’s voice close to his ear, and though he’s yelling, he sounds far away.
“Pop? Pop? You okay?”
“Great,” Bull hears himself slur, swollen tongued. “Oh, boy. I’m just great. It was just like an open-field tackle.”
With Darryl’s help, he pulls himself to his feet.
“You’re bleeding,” Darryl says, sounding much closer now.
“Yes, I am, son. Yes, I am.” Then he takes his son’s face in his hands. It’s been so long, so long since he’s reached out and touched him the way he’s so wanted to. “Do you know what kind of fish drowns, Darryl?” he says, feeling so happy, so much happier than he has in more years than he can remember. “Do you, son?”
He can feel Darryl shaking his head.
“One that’s too afraid to swim,” Bull shouts out and looks up to the night sky, laughing. “That’s what kind. One that is too goddamned afraid to swim.”
COMING AUGUST 2009!
Foreigners Page 23