by Liz Graham
The kettle whistled as he finished placing the last newly washed plate on the dish rack and he let the tea brew as he wiped each surface clean.
‘Come on then, lass,’ he finally said, placing the mug of tea before her. ‘Out with it.’
She didn't look up at him.
‘It’s nothing,’ she said, automatically reaching out to cup her hands around the warmth of the mug. She blew on it gently, watching the steam evaporate.
He broke in to her reverie. ‘It‘s not nothing that makes my daughter sit around so mournfully,’ he began. ‘Now, it's not the business getting you down, that’s busier than ever. And I know for a fact it’s not me, for you haven’t nagged me once in the past few days.
‘Tell me what’s on your mind,’ he continued in a gentler voice. He waited, but still she made no reply. ‘If I didn't know you better, I’d say it was a man,’ Seamus said, watching her carefully.
She quickly looked up with a scowl almost hidden by her brown hair.
‘Ah!’ he said, pouncing. ‘I've hit a sore spot there, I see.
‘Sure it's about time,’ he continued, gazing at her with concern. ‘You haven’t so much as looked at a fellow since you’ve been back these five years, and that's not natural for a gorgeous young woman like yourself.’
He sat back in his chair as he ruminated aloud.
‘Let's see,’ he said. ‘Most of the men your age here are married, or you’ve known them all your life and wouldn’t touch the likes of them. The only new one is that handsome doctor at the hospital...’
She crossed her arms and slumped further into her chair.
‘That’s the one, then,’ he said with satisfaction. ‘A good choice, I’d say so myself. Perhaps I'll have a word with him. I saw him come into the shop today, you know.’
Conor knew. Fortunately for her, she’d just hired Susan, a local teenager recently finished school, and was training her to help with the shop in the mornings. She’d made the girl go out and serve Devon.
She started and looked up as the meaning of her Dad's words sank in.
‘Don't you dare,’ she warned before she could stop herself. ‘Just stay away from him, and don’t interfere, especially when you’re...’
She broke off and bit her lip, but he understood where her words had been headed.
Seamus wasn't resentful at this expression of her feelings, nor did he get angry. He sighed with the depth of an old sorrow.
‘Not to worry, lass,’ he said softly. ‘I’ll stay away from him. Especially when I'm on the booze.’
‘No, Dad,’ she said softly so he had to strain to hear her. ‘I’m sorry. You be yourself.’
He paused, folding and re-folding the dish cloth in his hands.
‘Why don’t you come out with me tonight?’
‘What, down to Joe’s shed for a booze-up? No, thank you. Not my style.’
‘You don’t get out enough, you know,’ he said. ‘It’s not natural, a young woman like yourself.’
‘I have stuff to do here.’
‘That’s a whopper, you don’t have anything that can’t wait,’ he said. ‘Come on, the lads are getting the band together at the pub. You could do with a dance or two to liven you up.’
‘A dance or two.’
‘Oh, alright then, a drink or two,’ he said. ‘You’ve been working so hard lately, I never see you out having fun. It’s all business, business, and then you have to go and take on more work on top of it all. Let loose for once in your life.’
They walked the distance to the pub in town, with Seamus keeping up a patter most of the way to cover up Conor’s quietness. The fresh air was good for her, and the night sky was dark, free from light pollution in this isolated land. She paused and looked up at the stars.
‘So many of them, just look at the Milky Way,’ she said. ‘It’s in places like this that you see where it got its name. It’s like a highway of light in the sky.’
He paused alongside her. ‘People in the cities wonder why the stars meant so much to the ancient folk,’ he said. ‘But for fully half their lives, all they had was stars and moon to light their way.’
Seamus placed his arm around her and she nestled into her father’s warmth.
‘I’m glad I came back, Dad.’
He squeezed her. ‘You’ll never know how happy it makes me to hear that, love.’
The music had started already, they could hear as they approached The Anchor Pub, and the doors were wide open with the crowd spilling out into the fresh air.
‘An ale for you, lass?’ he asked. She nodded.
She made her way through the press of people to some folks she’d grown up with. All high-school grudges had been forgotten with the passing of time and as they all matured, and it was good to reconnect in the spirit of laughter. The band was a group of ex-rockers who held on dearly to the popular music of the seventies and eighties like Creedence Clearwater Revival, those solid tunes which always got the crowd onto their feet, and Conor found herself laughing and dancing up a storm, so much that she totally forgot about Devon for that evening.
Only one thing marred her night, and that was the sight of Melissa skulking around the edges of the bar, accompanied by some cohorts of government workers, but she threw back her head and fell into the music and good times. Devon was nowhere in sight.
After an hour or so, she came back from the dance floor to look for Seamus, and soon spotted him at his usual post of holding up the bar, surrounded by a bunch of people as always. As she approached though, she saw that he hadn’t stuck to the beer, and his glass held an amber liquid. He’d started on the whiskey and she could tell by the way he held himself that he was three sheets to the wind already. Her heart sank, and she pushed her way through towards him.
The band paused between songs, and in the space between the notes she heard a twinkling, mocking laughter rise from the crowd around her father and there she saw Melissa standing next to him, buying him liquor, urging him on. He needed little encouragement when the booze was flowing so freely and he played up to her, taking her laughter as fellowship instead of the spiteful trick it was.
She took a stand just behind Melissa and fixed her eye on Seamus, her face like a stone. After a few minutes he saw her and, about to call her over, noticed her expression. He looked at the glass in his hand as if surprised to see it, and lowered it to the bar. Giving scant excuses to the people surrounding him, he pushed his way through the crowd and followed Conor to the door, stumbling a little as he went.
She paused around the corner of the building, waiting for him to catch up, and she said not a word.
‘Let’s get you home, Dad,’ she said, her voice much gentler than her expression had been in the bar. He stood and smiled at her, swaying a little as the fresh air worked to clear his mind.
‘I’m still glad you came back,’ he said. He held out a hand to steady himself against the wooden wall of the pub, then looked up at the sky and breathed in deeply. ‘Look.’
The northern lights like a shimmering curtain were dancing across the night sky, all shades of purple and green. Conor had grown up with the reality of them, but they never failed to make her catch her breath when they graced the land and reflected in the water of the harbor. The two stood in awe as they watched, father and daughter.
‘Aurora Borealis,’ he said. ‘The souls of the dead are watching over us. They bring good tidings, something wonderful is about to happen.’
So caught up were they in this wondrous sight they didn’t notice Melissa leaving the pub to head to her car. Her head down, trying to pick her way in the dark on the potholed and gravelled road in her high heels, she didn’t look up to see the wonders offered by the sky in this strange and awe-inspiring land she found herself in.
Chapter 5
J une Peckford called the bakery early that morning to request an unexpected delivery of Belgian bread and croissants. ‘Sorry to make you come out all this way,’ she apologized over the phone. ‘But I’m all on
my own here, and I had unexpected arrivals late last night. I haven‘t got anyone helping yet this early in the season.’
With Susan in the storefront, Conor was free to make the short drive to where June’s B & B sat nestled in trees.
‘Business is already starting,’ June shook her head in wonder as she met Conor on the doorstep. The sun was shining brightly, the air still cool and crisp from the night's frost. Roses might already be blooming in other more southerly parts of Canada, but here on the tip of the Northern Peninsula, the warmer seasons came late. Yes, there was a hint of spring in the air, but the ice packs still visible off the coast warned that temperatures would not truly warm up until they had passed.
‘There's not a lot for them to do around here at this time of year,’ June continued. ‘L‘anse aux Meadows doesn’t open till June, likewise the Grenfell Museum Sure, the only thing around here they can do is go look at the bear in the Municipal Building.’
June was referring to the polar bear which had terrorized the town back in 1984, until it was later found collapsed on the ice. Stuffed and mounted, the huge bear was awesome to behold, but hardly enough to attract tourists the hundreds of miles to come all this way north.
‘It’s not like in the fall when you get the hunters staying here,’ Conor agreed. The hundreds of miles of wilderness surrounding them was a great draw for people with guns from all over the world. The native caribou were off limits, but the moose population had been introduced in the previous century and had thrived with no natural predators. Salmon fishing was also pretty popular further down the coast in season, another attraction which helped June’s business stay afloat.
She took her leave of June and turned to go back to the van. As she pulled out of the driveway she had to stamp on the brakes as a golden hued car whizzed past, coming out far too last from the potholed old woods road.
What was Melissa doing out on this old road, and at this early hour of the morning?
Conor followed the sedan at a slower pace back into town.
The sun shone directly onto Melissa’s passenger, and Conor could see the glint of blonde hair. Yet it didn’t look like Devon, she thought squinting at the car ahead. The hair looked too short, too well groomed.
She shrugged. Maybe Melissa had forced him to visit the town barber, she thought spitefully. He seemed ready enough to do her bidding, as she had seen at the old base the other evening. Anyway, did Conor really care?
Having Susan in the shop each morning was a convenience for everyone. Conor could make deliveries to businesses, which meant that business owners didn’t have to make a special trip past the town to pick up their orders themselves. And she appreciated the chance to get out and see the town in the morning, something she hadn’t been able to do for a long time.
The last stop for the morning had been Joe’s Convenience store. She opened the van and tossed the plastic trays into the back with a sigh.
‘Conor,’ the quiet deep voice at her elbow made her jump.
She neatened the trays before she allowed herself to turn and face him.
It couldn’t have been Devon in Melissa’s car that morning, she realized. He looked as though he hadn‘t slept for three days, let alone visited a barber. His eyes were ringed with fatigue.
His hands were shoved into the pockets of his worn green coat. Melissa hadn’t been able to get him to shed that, she noted with satisfaction.
‘Hi,’ he said. His eyes were even bluer in the noon sunshine, or perhaps it was the red around them which made them seem so. ‘Just wondered how the artists’ retreat is going.’
‘Good,’ she said, happy to keep their conversation off the personal level. ‘I’ve got the application for the Crown Land folks almost ready to go. In fact, I’ll finish it off this evening and put it in the mail tonight.
‘There shouldn‘t be a problem with that,’ she continued. ‘The next biggie is finding the funding to carry it all out.’
‘You'll do it,’ he assured her, a small smile on his lips. ‘I know you can be pretty determined.’
Conor ignored this last remark. It only served to remind her that she had to keep contact with this man to a minimum, that whatever they had had those years ago was gone. She turned her back and swallowed hard, pretending that her heart had not suddenly started beating faster.
He too, had turned to go, when she abruptly swiveled and placed her hand on his arm to stop him. He swung around quickly to face her. She had to ask him about what she'd seen that morning, she was too curious not to.
‘Did I see you and Melissa coming back from the base early this morning?’ she queried, carefully watching his face.
His eyes widened a little in surprise. ‘Not me, that's for sure,’ he said, rasping his hand over two days’ growth of beard. ‘I’ve been delivering two babies since four this morning.’
‘Strange,’ Conor said, turning away. ‘I could have sworn it was her car.’
He paused for a moment, then spoke.
‘Her brother’s in town,’ he said. ‘Perhaps she was showing him the base.’
‘Why would she do that?’ Conor wondered aloud. ‘I can't imagine her brother is any more of an outdoor enthusiast than she is.’
‘No.’ Devon laughed. ‘Bradley is like her, only goes skiing for the drinks in the chalet afterwards.
‘But maybe,’ a thoughtful look came to his eyes. ‘Maybe she got him out here to get him to donate money for the retreat.’
Conor wasn’t so sure.
‘It’s a long trip to do that,’ she said, puzzled. ‘Even if he flew in. He could just sign a cheque and mail it. And besides, how much could one person give?’
‘It wouldn’t be his own money,’ Devon said wryly. ‘It would be a tax write-off for Avalon Corp. Good publicity for them too.’
Only a deaf and blind person wouldn't have heard of Avalon Corp. It was a local company which had seemed to appear out of nowhere but all of a sudden it was everywhere. The newspapers had reported it as buying up first one company, then another, and a lot of real estate in between. As far as Conor could make out, it was a consortium of old St. John’s wealth, including an ex-Premier of the province, and they seemed to have an endless pot of money behind them.
His face cleared, and his eyes smiled.
‘See? I told you she’d be useful,’ he said. ‘I know you two don’t get along great, but she’s really not so bad. With her work and family contacts, your retreat might become a reality sooner than you think.’
AFTER HE'D GONE, Conor sat in the van for a while trying to figure out her own head. Like, why the thought of accepting money from Avalon Corp bothered her so much. Was it the connection to Melissa? She had to get her mind straight for although the artists’ retreat had originally been her idea, it had taken hold of the public imagination, blossoming to become community property. She couldn’t allow a personal bias to get in the way of what had become a dream for so many in the town.
Any assistance, especially financial, would be more than welcome and a great boost to the project. Avalon Corp had pots of money to spare and would be doing the whole community a huge service with any potential donations. Was she bothered that any funds given by Avalon Corp would only be to serve the company with a tax write-off?
No, that wasn’t it. She knew from her conversations with other arts groups in the province how the tax laws had benefited them, allowing them a presence in their communities which would never have been possible without the donations.
It was just - this retreat was a community project. She had envisioned the whole community working towards the establishment of the retreat and feeling a sense of ownership in its success. And with easy outside funds available that sense of ownership might not develop. At least, not to the same extent.
‘That’s just silly,’ Conor scolded herself. ‘Why not just accept any money that’s offered?’
Others in the group would be delighted, she knew. Although she had a dedicated crew on board, how much serious money
could they raise from the bake sales, sleigh rides and other ideas which had been bandied about at the meeting?
They would do just as well to go on a parade through town, shaking their donation cans and exhorting people to pay up or repent, like the Lambs raising funds for their temple.
Maybe it was the Melissa connection that turned her off, she realized, but she didn't want the retreat to be dependent on a large corporation for its existence. That kind of thing could lead to corruption, at its worst, yet it was all part of the game. The money game.
Conor sighed as she put the van in gear and checked the road for traffic before she pulled out. Her eye was caught by a strange figure coming out of Cheng’s, the Chinese restaurant.
Strange as in unknown, that is. Conor knew most of the folks within a twenty kilometer vicinity, but this blond man wasn‘t one of them. Perhaps he was one of June’s guests at the B & B? She stopped and unabashedly examined him more closely, as people do in small places.
‘No,’ she said to herself. ‘That must be Melissa’s brother Bradley.’
She recognized now the short blond hair she had seen through Melissa’s back window. Yet that was Enoch Sheppard coming out of the restaurant behind him.
The two men looked to be clueing up a meeting, she saw as they shook hands and nodded. Enoch glanced surreptitiously up and down the road before departing.
What a strange sight that was, to see Enoch coming out of the restaurant.
Enoch didn’t permit his flock to enter any establishment that sold alcohol, a ban which had even lately stretched to Joe’s convenience store with its refrigerator of beer. Cheng’s definitely sold alcoholic beverages, and was rumored to have the odd game of poker on Saturday nights in the back room.
Not the place for Enoch at all.
That was a mysterious thing but none of her business, Conor decided as she pulled on to the main road.
‘Maybe Enoch wants Avalon Corp to contribute to his temple fund.’ she thought to herself with a chuckle.