Punishment

by Linden MacIntyre

“Almost good as new,” I said.

  The air inside was warm and heavy with the fragrances of cooking. We went straight to the kitchen where Hannah looked stressed, juggling two recipe books. “You guys stay out of the way,” she said. Neil quickly fetched a whiskey bottle from a cupboard and led me toward the living room.

  “Just let me get this out of the way and I promise there’ll be no more talk about politics tonight,” he said. “What do you think Canada will do when the Americans go in?”

  “Well, the government said today we’re staying out of it …”

  “Bullshit political pandering,” he said. “When the rubber hits the road I can’t believe Canada will stay on the sidelines with the pussies.”

  “Maybe it’s all bullshit,” I said.

  “Oh, the Americans are going in, man. And surely to hell this country is gonna do the right thing. Think of the embarrassment if Ottawa just sits on its hands. Even fuckin Poland is in the coalition.”

  I shrugged, smiled. “We’ll see.” And to change the subject: “I had a chat with Strickland the other evening.”

  “You did?”

  I explained how I had gone there on an impulse, drawn by curiosity about the drug raid—who really owned the drugs, how the police found out so quickly and were so confident of their intelligence they’d mobilized a full-dress takedown. That it seemed strange to me that Strickland would be so careless.

  “You know the mentality as well as I do,” Neil said. “Cocky. After that court fiasco I’m sure he feels like God almighty. Look at the way he barged into the store, making accusations.”

  “Come on,” I said. “That wasn’t strength—that was fear.”

  “Well he’s got goddamned good reason to be afraid,” Neil said. “What you did was what anyone of us would have done with the kind of reason you had.”

  “What are you talking about, Neil …”

  “Come on Tony, we’re old friends. I heard him mention your wife’s name. That would have been enough …”

  “How do you know it was my wife’s name?” I was struggling to keep the tone light.

  He stood, drained his glass. “I’m sure you mentioned her. Let’s go see what’s happening in the kitchen.”

  Generous pouring of wine failed to diminish the tension. I even ventured into the forbidden field of global politics. “Looks like George Bush will get his way after all.” Neil ignored me and Hannah remarked that she had no interest in the subject. She was from a family of Democrats and to her Bush was like the aftermath of a bad curry. Something nasty passing through the American digestive tract, a pain the world would have to suffer for another year. No way he’ll win a second term.

  “I wouldn’t be so sure of that,” said Neil.

  She stood. “I hope you won’t mind if I excuse myself,” she said to me. “I’ve been feeling miserable all day.”

  Neil watched her go, then returned to his dinner. “She’s been low for a while,” he said. “The long winter got to her. And she hasn’t made any friends here. I was thinking her and Caddy, maybe you and Caddy coming here for an evening sometime. Two couples. What do you think?”

  “Maybe,” I said.

  “It’s a hard place for an outsider,” he said. “Especially in the winter. I’ll tell her that. You and Caddy making it an evening here—that might cheer her up.”

  “Neil,” I said. “I have to ask. Who told you about Anna and me? And Strickland.”

  “Told me what?” he said, eyes narrowed, brow furrowed. “What about Strickland?”

  And after some long seconds he looked away and seemed to nod, then we returned to the business of eating.

  After dinner and another drink he insisted on listening to a new CD he’d found in town. Local music. But halfway through a tune he stood, walked to a window and peered out, as if expecting someone. He was restless. “That’s some rig you got out there. New is it?”

  “Last fall,” I said. “Hardly driven.”

  “I was half-thinkin’ I need one of those,” he said. “I’m constantly hauling stuff for this place. Ruining the car or paying a fortune for delivery. What do you think?”

  I shrugged. He sat down across from me, both hands wrapped around his glass.

  “I seem to remember you driving a little red half-ton way back, when we were youngsters.”

  “You have a good memory,” I said.

  “Your dad, Duncan, what year was it he went?”

  “1969,” I said.

  He leaned back, stared off somewhere over my head. “Strange times, 1969,” he said. Laughed at some private memory, then stood and returned to the window, deep in thought.

  “Hey,” he said suddenly. “I’d like to take that thing for a spin. What do you think?”

  “Whatever,” I said. “But isn’t it a little …”

  “Grab your coat,” he said. “I want to see what it feels like.”

  “It’s a standard shift,” I said.

  “Perfect.”

  We drove in the general direction of my place and then he turned down the Shore Road. The night was clear and dry and cold. He fiddled with the radio, found old rock music from the seventies. “Those were the days,” he said.

  Near the end of Strickland’s lane he stopped, turned off the engine and the lights, plucked a package of cigarettes from a shirt pocket. “You don’t mind me smokin’ in here?” Rolled the window down a crack. “Beautiful,” he said.

  “Why are we stopped here, Neil?” I asked.

  “Well, it’s like this,” he said, exhaling. “A few of us kind of keep an eye on this place, just to be on top of what goes on up there. Some of the ones with kids have some concerns. If the young ones are hanging around up there, the parents like to know. You never know what other visitors he gets. He’s got some pretty rough friends. It’s a kind of Neighbourhood Watch. A coalition of the village if you like.” He was smiling, watching me, waiting I suppose, for some response. A song by Crosby, Stills and Nash with Neil Young was playing softly on the radio. “Like the song says,” Neil said, nodding toward the sound. “Teach your children well.”

  “There’s also something about ‘teach your parents,’ ” I said.

  He laughed. “That’s good.” Then he opened the truck door. “You wait here, I’ll just be a minute.”

  “Neil,” I said. “This is a bad idea.”

  “I hear you, Tony,” he said. “I admire how you feel after everything.”

  “After what, Neil?”

  He closed the door, sat staring straight ahead for a while. “Okay. Fair enough you’re wondering what I know about you and your ex. It’s like this. Anything I know originates up this lane.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “He’s been spreading it around. How there was a thing with your wife.” He raised a hand. “I’m just repeating what he’s been saying.”

  I stared into the night, suddenly desperate to be home, craving a cigarette for the first time in years.

  “Apparently he’s been telling the young ones that you’re the one stirring the place up against him and the only reason is because, well … anyway, that’s what they passed on to their parents when they got some grief for hanging around his place. I’m just repeatin’, Tony. I’m not saying I believe any of it.” He stared at me for a while, waiting for a response, then he opened the door again and slipped out of the truck and vanished into the darkness.

  I stood on the roadside near the truck studying the stars. Duncan knew the planets and the constellations. Told me once, very briefly, how in late adolescence he had spent a year or so at sea and had become enchanted by the sky during long hours on the night watch. Typically he never spoke of it again. He was like that, delivering brief biographical disclosures that became, after he was gone, a disjointed and confusing memory. I can imagine, now that I have lived longer than he did, that it was how he avoided scrutiny; in his time it was important to avoid discovery of hidden weakness. We all have them, always did. But once upon a time weakn
ess was a challenge to be overcome or hidden. Now we deceive ourselves, thinking that our private weaknesses don’t matter. We reveal them freely, sometimes unsolicited, hoping that our disclosure of vulnerability will be interpreted as a sign of trust and will warrant kindness, or tolerance at least, in return. So naive we are, our sad belief in sympathy.

  There was a car sound in the distance, a quiet murmur in the stillness of the night. I looked in the direction of the sound, saw a glow.

  You should have been more like me, Tony, learned to read the skies. Read people better. But it’s too late now.

  The car was closer now. Instinctively I moved away from the truck, nearer to the roadside trees.

  How did you ever survive all those years in the corrections jungle, Tony?

  Truth of the matter? I didn’t. Did I, Duncan?

  The car was slowing down. Should I step out, wave, acknowledge it. No, nothing wrong, just answering the call of nature. Lovely night though. But the car continued past me, then turned up Strickland’s lane.

  I got behind the wheel and started the engine, peering into the night to where Neil had dissolved into the silent shadows. Then the truck door opened roughly, and Neil was inside, panting. “Go, Go!” he shouted.

  “What happened,” I shouted back. Wheels spinning, then the truck jerked forward as rubber caught the pavement, fishtailing slightly.

  “Just go.”

  “What happened?”

  “Nothing. He saw me. Drive.”

  Darkness parting, pale roadside furrowing away before us as we raced through the narrow corridor of light. Neil was staring backward. “Fuck, there’s a car behind us.”

  “What did you do, for God’s sake?”

  “I did nothing. Just drive.”

  I’d barely come to a stop when Strickland was at the passenger’s window, the car he’d been driving tight behind me, high beams glaring. He was pounding on the glass. Neil rolled his window down. Said nothing.

  Strickland shouted: “What the fuck …” Then Neil was shoving the truck door open. When he was halfway out, Strickland slammed it back on him, trapping him half in and half out of the cab.

  Neil roared in unintelligible rage and heaved outward, sending Strickland stumbling backward.

  Then I was outside and I saw another backlit figure in the glare of the car headlights, just a shadow. I backed away, realizing that I was totally exposed. Then Strickland was advancing toward us. Neil turned toward the house. “I’ll be right back,” he shouted to me. “I know how to deal with this shit.” He left the door open when he went inside.

  ’ ”You’d better leave now, Dwayne,” I said.

  “Oh, I’m leaving. But it’s all clear to me now, Tony. No doubt left now …”

  “Just go.”

  “You’re a pig, Tony. Like Anna said …”

  “Go now,” I hissed, looking toward the house where a light suddenly flooded an upstairs room and a shadow moved, bent, searching urgently. “Go, for God’s sake, before he gets back.”

  “She said that down deep you were no better than the rest of them, including her old man …”

  Then Neil was back, breathing heavily. “Leave this to me,” he said. His arm was hanging loosely at his side, whatever he was holding concealed behind his hip. “Move out of the way,” he said, elbowing me.

  “Pigs,” Dwayne said.

  I moved directly in front of Neil, blocking him. He shouted, “Get out of my way, goddammit.”

  “Strickland,” I gritted. “Get out of here before my friend puts a bullet in your ass.”

  ——

  I remember small details from later that evening—the look on the dog’s face when I came in the door, which might have been comical in different circumstances.

  “So I’m in the doghouse, am I, Birch?” I said. “Great. Move over.” And I went to bed but couldn’t sleep. Tossed and twisted in the darkness, battering the pillows into human shapes. Holding tight, fighting a sudden disorienting confusion.

  Strickland had seemed genuinely pissed, but mostly disappointed.

  The next morning I didn’t even notice when the dog, after his morning ritual of sniffing at and pissing on the left rear truck wheel, trotted off up the lane and didn’t come back. I forgot about him, only noticing his absence when I heard a car outside and didn’t hear him bark his customary warning. I felt a sudden sense of panic. Where did he go?

  I didn’t wait long for an answer. Mary clambered out of her car and the dog hopped out behind her.

  “So look who came to visit this morning,” she said happily. “There he was, yipping on the doorstep.”

  “He was mad at me,” I said, squatting in front of him. He licked my face, full of forgiveness.

  “I was thinking,” she said. “Here you’ve been batching for over a year and I’ve never once had you up for supper. What about tomorrow night?”

  I couldn’t think of any reason to say no. “I’m getting to be like Charlie,” I said. “Living off the local hospitality.”

  “No fear of that,” she replied. “Anyway, there was no harm in poor Charlie.”

  ——

  Neil was at the store early Wednesday morning, poring over the newspaper, jabbing the paper with a stubby forefinger. “Thirty countries in the coalition and guess who isn’t. Makes me ashamed to be a Canadian.”

  “I thought you were an American,” someone said. He ignored the comment, kept reading.

  Collie winked at me. “Looks like this is gonna be Neil’s big day,” he said. “Finally, he’s got himself a war to fight.”

  I waited for Neil to allude to the night before, the confrontation in his yard, but he kept his eyes down, scanning headlines. Then he looked up and past me as if I wasn’t there.

  “See, this is typical,” said Neil, gesturing toward Collie. “You think it’s all a joke.” He tossed the newspaper back on the rack and walked out.

  Mary phoned mid-afternoon to confirm that I was coming. “And come early,” she said. “I like to eat early.”

  Her place was an old farmhouse with a huge kitchen that reminded me of my childhood home on the Mountain Road. The walls were unadorned, except for a calendar, a crucifix and clock. The doors to the rooms beyond were all closed. The kitchen was uncomfortably warm.

  “I’d show you around,” she said. “But the rest of the house is freezing. I suppose you remember the layout anyway, from growing up. I keep threatening to get a furnace but they’d have to tear the place apart.”

  In the cold deep winter months, all life happened in the kitchen. One of the doors would lead to a steep, narrow stairway and a bedroom directly above.

  “I sleep up there,” she said, pointing to the ceiling. “Not that it would matter to you.”

  I laughed.

  “Sit,” she said. “Let me get you something.”

  I calculated that she was in her late thirties. Her face was pretty, hazel eyes that seemed to go from green to grey depending on the light; dark hair with a dramatic streak of white above her left ear.

  Over dinner she informed me she’d been working at the store for more than twenty years. She started in her teens, a summer job to earn the money she needed to go away. Then her mother became ill and lingered long enough that Mary lost whatever dreams she had. “You stop noticing time after a while,” she said. “It’s just one day after another, each more or less the same. Then one day you look back and it’s too late for anything else.”

  We ate in silence for a while. Then she said: “But don’t get me wrong. I have no complaints.”

  “Going away is just ending up somewhere else,” I said.

  “That’s the thing,” she said.

  Then after another long pause, I said: “So you’d be older than … your neighbour.”

  “A few years,” she said. “I was ahead of him in school. But I remember him—he was always getting the blame. Most of the time he deserved it. A little instigator he was, for sure. Teachers used to say it was a shame he couldn’t
put the brains God gave him to better use.” Another long pause. “But I always found him nice enough.”

  She put her fork down. “Looking back, you start to remember some of the good things. Like, he could be hilarious. He’d come to the store and if it was just me there he’d be mimicking people, the locals who hang around for the free coffee. He’d even be trying to sing popular songs with a local accent—‘Hey, hey, get affa my clewd.’ You couldn’t help but laugh.”

  And she started to laugh but stopped suddenly. “Sad when you think about it. Collie never wanted him around.”

  “The incident at the store,” I said. “The little fracas.”

  “Yes,” she said. “That was a shocker.”

  “I meant to apologize. It was just that when he mentioned Anna …”

  “No apology necessary,” she said. “But I was wondering. Who’s this Anna anyway?”

  I laughed. “I thought everybody knew who Anna was, thanks to the gossip …”

  “What gossip?” she said, standing. She walked toward the counter with her empty plate. “Help yourself to more.”

  “Anna was my wife,” I said.

  “Obviously not from around here,” she said above the sound of running water as she rinsed her plate. Then she turned, looking puzzled. “How would Dwayne have known her?”

  I studied her open face for evidence of guile, saw only honest curiosity. “Don’t answer if you don’t want to,” she said, turning back to the sink.

  “I heard Dwayne was blaming me for all his troubles in the village,” I said.

  “Well, I suppose,” she said. “He was over here afterwards saying he suspected you for planting the dope. I told him he was crazy, that if there was one person in the village he could probably count on it was you. Then he said something like, ‘You don’t know the whole story.’ ”

  “That was all he said?”

  “That was it.”

  She squatted by the dog who was sprawled, asleep. “What can we give you, little guy? How about one of Mary’s special treats.”

  Birch raised his head then scrambled to his feet, wide awake.

  I said, “I’m surprised you’re into cats, Mary. You should have a dog.”

  She put her face close to his and he licked her mouth. She grimaced. “Cats are great,” she said. “A cat’ll never let you love him. I never know one day to the next where my old tomcat goes. Just shows up at the door when he needs something.”