The Audacity of Goats

by J. F. Riordan

  Pali arrived home at dinner with his arms filled with packages from the mainland. He appeared jovial and smiling, as he kissed Nika and teased her about not looking in his closet. But she stopped him, her hands on his arms, and looked into his eyes.

  “What is it?”

  He shook his head briefly, brushing her worries aside. “It’s Christmas. It’s a time to be happy.”

  Nika looked into his eyes for an instant longer, then smiled, holding his glance. Whatever it was, it could wait until he was ready. “Well, hurry and change. Tonight’s Ben’s school concert.”

  Elisabeth was not, by nature, a worrier. She was blessed by nature with a serene disposition that accepted life’s vagaries with equanimity. Her calm demeanor had long been a primary factor in her friendship with Fiona, as a balance to Fiona’s passionate intensity. It wasn’t that Elisabeth didn’t feel things deeply. But she had a deep inner calm that guided her path through life like a compass: steady and sure.

  Roger’s yoga practice, however, had knocked her off her course. The very notion that Roger—Roger!—had taken up yoga was suspect on every level. But that his classes should be centered on this woman—this… Shay—well, that could only have one explanation. All Fiona’s reassurances to the contrary meant absolutely nothing. Elisabeth looked ahead to the holidays without her usual joy, her heart wreathed in anxiety.

  When Roger came home that evening, Elisabeth thought he seemed to have something on his mind. He seemed to be engaged in some deep inner struggle. Elisabeth braced herself. Was he about to confess? Was he about to say something she desperately didn’t want to know? Anxiously, she stood waiting, barely taking a breath, the chicken she had been sautéing ignored on the stove as it gradually darkened from golden brown to nearly black. Rocco, always nearby, and sensitive to every emotion, stood between them, looking from one face to another. He whined nervously and jumped to touch Elisabeth’s face. This comforted him.

  Roger paused, thinking hard. He looked at Elisabeth for a long time and with much concentration. At last he took a breath to speak. She felt as if her heart would stop.

  “You don’t look fat in that,” he said finally. Hanging his jacket on the hook by the door, he went into the living room to sit with Rocco, feeling a deep sense of accomplishment.

  Chapter Eighteen

  On Christmas morning, Ben was awake before anyone else in the house. He lay on the floor and pulled his present for his parents out from under the bed. Jim had suggested that he wrap the birdfeeder before bringing it home, and had even supplied him with paper and a red stick-on bow. Ben had to admit to himself that the whole project had turned out pretty well. The paint to simulate birch wood made it look a lot less like PVC pipe, and it was sturdy and solidly made. It didn’t hold all that much seed, but Ben knew enough to know that his mother, at least, wouldn’t care. She would hang it outside the kitchen window with her other feeders, and fill it when she filled the rest.

  Ben’s biggest problem now that the feeder was finished was how to explain where he was going every day. But he would think about that later. Today was Christmas. Ben ran down the hall to his parents’ room and jumped, with splendid accuracy, on his father’s stomach.

  Christmas week passed with its usual speed, and Fiona decided to celebrate New Year’s Eve at her house by inviting a few guests. It was, she admitted to herself, a ploy to keep from thinking incessantly about Pete. The flaws in the relationship were made evident by her needing to spend so many holidays alone, and her frustration that night—coupled with anxiety about his safety—led her to drink just a bit too much champagne.

  Among her guests were Nika and Pali. Although he was polite to others and attentive to Nika, Fiona could see that Pali was really not himself. He had often confided in her, but so far, in this, he had not.

  “So, how’s your writing going these days?” she asked him, when they met refilling their glasses. “It seems as if all anyone talks about lately is politics, and it’s starting to make me crazy.”

  As she spoke she saw his face close, and she knew that she had brought up a subject he did not want to discuss.

  “Too busy,” he said, just a bit too casually. “Not a priority, really.”

  Fiona, who knew perfectly well how much of a priority Pali’s poetry was to him, merely nodded and changed the subject. “Have you seen Stella’s new car? It’s one of those vintage designs that looks as if it’s sneering at you.”

  Pali smiled. “An appropriate choice, then?”

  Fiona smiled and was about to comment, when one of the other guests approached, and the conversation shifted in another direction.

  Too much champagne made Fiona’s sleep restless and shallow. She had hoped that somehow Pete would call to wish her a happy new year, but so far he had been silent.

  “Joyful evenings make sad mornings,” was one of Martin Luther’s maxims. In this, at least, they could agree. Her head was pounding, and so far in the new year, there hadn’t been that much joy to begin with. As she lay in bed, she pondered the absence of the chewing creature. Perhaps, he too was hungover. It was odd to lie there in silence, no sound of chewing in her ear. She hoped the creature—wherever it was—was all right.

  Fiona had just returned from an afternoon of doing doors when the phone rang. It was Pali. Fiona was glad to hear from him. He had still seemed a little flat lately, a little down. Tonight he sounded more like his usual self.

  “Dean Hillard is speaking tonight at St. Thor’s. Want to go?”

  Fiona, who had spent every night that week either doing doors or attending community events, gave a little cry of horror.

  “Good God, no. The idea of spending time listening to that…” she searched her mind for a word that was not obscene “… windbag is an affront to all that’s holy.”

  Pali laughed. “It’s kind of hard to argue with that.”

  “Besides,” she added. “I haven’t had a decent night’s sleep in a week. I’m going to take a long, hot, bath, read a book, and go to bed before it’s dark. There may be scotch involved.”

  Pali nodded understandingly. He was tired, too.

  “Okay. We’ll check it out for you.”

  “Report back.”

  “You got it,” he said.

  With mutual expressions of goodwill, they hung up.

  Wisconsin State Assemblyman Dean Hillard stood in the basement of St. Thorlakur Lutheran Church with his arm around Stella, beaming at the crowd.

  “I don’t think you have to worry about State support for the harbor this time,” he said. “Not with my aunt as your Chairman… errr… woman.” He chuckled at his little joke. “In Madison, we like to see good leadership when we invest in a local project, and with my Aunt Stella, we know you’ll be in good hands. I’ll see that the bill is introduced, and we will make sure Washington Island gets the support it needs!”

  The crowd applauded warily. The harbor dredging was essential, no doubt, but the prospect of Stella’s leadership was a high price, indeed.

  Pali and Jake, standing at the back of the group, exchanged glances.

  “I was afraid this was coming,” said Jake. “Soon as I heard she was bringing him in.”

  Pali nodded, grimly. Silently they stood watching the faces of the crowd, of Hillard kissing Stella, grinning, and shaking hands. The event was winding down, and Hillard was moving, with his aide, toward the exit. The crowd began to disperse.

  “Come on,” said Jake to Pali. “I’ll buy you a beer.”

  At Nelsen’s, the little group of Fiona’s friends were quieter than usual, as Eddie lingered sympathetically at their end of the bar. He kept their glasses filled, slipping away only briefly to attend to his other customers, and then returning to listen in on the conversation.

  “That guy’s a scum bag,” said Jake. “I don’t know what it is about him, but for some reason I don’t trust him.”

  “Well, one good reason is that he’s related to Stella,” pointed out Nika, reasonably.

&nbs
p; “Think there’s any chance we’d get the harbor funding without him?” Jim asked.

  Pali shook his head glumly. “Nope. We’ve already been turned down once. We can’t even get the State to acknowledge our school funding problems. How do you think we’d be able to get this kind of money for the harbor?”

  “Are you going to tell her?” asked Nika.

  “Of course we’re going to tell her,” said Pali with a brusqueness that was unusual for him.

  “She isn’t stupid,” said Jim. “She’ll figure it out herself anyway once she hears the news.”

  “What do you think she’ll do?” asked Charlotte.

  Nancy, who rarely came out for a drink, had been summoned for this conversation. “Well, she won’t run home crying, we know that for sure. She’s a lot tougher than you all think.”

  Pali looked at Nancy from down the bar. “It won’t matter, though. It won’t matter how tough she is, or how smart, or how hard she works on the campaign. The outcome will be the same.”

  They fell silent, contemplating the Island’s future. Unless Stella was elected, there would be no money for dredging, courtesy of Dean Hillard.

  Without the dredging, the harbor could not continue to function. Without the harbor, the Island economy would die.

  There was only one way to vote, and they all knew it.

  For once, the Island grapevine had included Fiona, so she had already heard the news by the time Pali, who had been deputized to tell her, knocked on Fiona’s door the next morning.

  “Come on in,” she said. “I just made coffee.”

  Pali followed her into the kitchen and accepted a mug. They sat at the kitchen table facing one another.

  “So, it’s hopeless, isn’t it?” asked Fiona.

  “Well,” said Pali. “I like to think there’s always hope. But I really don’t know what we can do.” He paused. “Unless you have a cousin in the legislature.”

  Fiona nodded silently and stared out the window. Stella’s house next door showed no signs of life, and the sky had the deep blue-gray that meant snow was coming. There were no birds or squirrels in the yard. Everything had the stillness that comes before a storm.

  Stella was going to win. She would find ways to make life on the Island impossible, and Fiona would have to sell up and leave. Maybe that would be a good thing. She could go somewhere to be closer to Pete. Or, at least, closer to him sometimes. But this, she knew, was against her instincts. She was not going to follow him around the globe. It was not her style.

  Fiona remembered, like a movie playing in her head, specific instances of Stella’s arrogance and malice, her sense of entitlement and selfishness. She felt her temper rising. Stella running the Island would be a nightmare, not just for Fiona, but for everyone. Why should they give in to this? Why should she assume that there was no other means of solving the Island’s problem? No. She had come this far. She had knocked on all those doors. She had attended all those events. She had painted ceilings, wrangled bats and goats, survived a blizzard, and weathered a barn fire. She had spent her little nest egg on repairing the house. She would not give in. She would not simply back off and let Stella win. There had to be a way.

  Fiona took a deep breath and looked back at Pali.

  “We are not giving up. We are not going to lie down and let her win. I don’t know how, yet, but we are going to find a way.”

  Pali looked at her with sympathy. “You’re the boss,” he said. He didn’t think she had a chance, and they both knew it.

  Shay could not help noticing that the attendance in her church basement yoga class was growing at a surprising rate. What had started with one California transplant—that incredibly beautiful man, Joshua—had grown to three men, then five, and was now an astonishing twelve. Every week some new man arrived, awkwardly attired, placing himself in the back of the room, among the others.

  What was more remarkable was that Roger, who had not at first struck her as having any particular talent, was making up for it by being highly motivated. His practice—and attendance at her Sturgeon Bay class on Saturdays—were showing astonishing results. He was increasingly flexible, and his strength made it possible for him to achieve poses that for most of her students were the stuff of dreams. It was clear to her that he would soon outstrip her capabilities as a teacher.

  But for now, what interested her most was how this man who spoke in monosyllables had managed to draw so many other men to her class.

  One afternoon after the closing “Namaste,” Shay approached Roger as he was rolling up his mat. He was surrounded by his acolytes, men in various stages of awkwardness and badly fitting sweatpants, who seemed intent on doing whatever Roger did.

  “I’ve been watching your progress, Roger,” she began.

  Roger stopped his preparations for departure and looked up, but he said nothing. The other men were busily pretending not to listen avidly.

  “You must be practicing a great deal.”

  Roger frowned.

  Shay, waiting for a response and finding none, forged bravely ahead.

  “Are you? Practicing? I mean, you must be, I know, but I’m interested in learning more.” Unconsciously she tossed back her wild blond locks as Terry, in his twenty-year-old sweats, ancient high school basketball t-shirt, and white socks, looked on, rapt.

  Roger seemed to be composing a thoughtful response for a long moment. “Yes.”

  Shay was nothing if not determined.

  “I’m interested, because I’d like to know how to advise beginning students. Most of them don’t progress as quickly as you have. Have often do you practice?”

  Roger’s silence gave Terry an opening. He was neither shy nor unwilling to interact with this slim, blonde, yoga goddess. He was a happily married man, but, he told himself, he wasn’t dead.

  “We meet every morning at Ground Zero. Five o’clock.” He paused for a moment, before adding hopefully, “You should come.”

  Shay looked for a moment at Roger, trying to understand his silence, then smiled dazzlingly, completely unaware of the effect on her students.

  “I’d love to. I’ll see you tomorrow, then.”

  She walked back to the front of the room.

  Roger’s icy look was lost on Terry, whose eyes were on Shay’s every move as she bent to gather her things.

  Fiona was not overjoyed to find herself in line behind Stella at the grocery store late one afternoon. Stella was in the midst of a conversation with the cashier when she noticed Fiona.

  “As soon as I’m finished here, I’m driving to Madison to see my nephew, Dean,” she said pointedly, and deliberately loud enough for Fiona to hear. “The Assemblyman,” she added, in case they had missed the point. “He has a parade this weekend, and he wants the convertible.” Her smile was an ugly grimace. “I figure he will be doing me some favors in the future, so I may as well do one for him.” This time she shot a look at directly at Fiona. “I like to think it’s for the good of the Island,” she said smugly.

  Fiona kept her face carefully neutral. She would not give Stella the pleasure of reacting, and she no longer made any effort whatever to attempt civilities with Stella. There was no point. She looked for something to divert her gaze and found herself drawn to a magazine displayed nearby. “205 Ways to Make Your Life Easier,” shouted the cover.

  “I could use at least 103,” she thought.

  She was pretty sure that number one would be not running into Stella.

  Elisabeth was sitting by the fire when Roger came home. There was a bottle of wine on the table nearby, and an extra glass, her own already poured. Rocco bounded up to Roger, entwining himself around his legs. Roger bent to stroke the big dog’s head, and spoke quietly to him. Elisabeth looked up at him as Roger poured his glass. If Roger noticed that her smile was absent, he did not make any indication. Subtleties were not among his talents.

  “Fiona’s coming tonight,” Elisabeth said, without preamble, and even as she said it she observed herself as if from
a distance. This was not how she wanted her marriage to be: business-like and impersonal, devoid of affection. It was not how it had begun only a few months ago, before Roger’s yoga obsession. She could not fathom how that had started, but she felt fairly certain that she knew why. Annoyed with herself, however, she determined to start the evening again. She got up and went over to Roger, putting her arms around him.

  Still holding his wine glass, he absently patted her on the shoulder. It occurred to Elisabeth that Rocco received more attention from Roger than she did.

  True to her word, Shay arrived at Ground Zero a few minutes before five the next morning. Her normal pre-class chatter was subdued. She was not a morning person. Her hair was a trifle wilder than usual, and she yawned sleepily but good naturedly as she set up her mat among the morning group of men. Some members of the Lutheran contingent were a little uncomfortable at her presence, but they dutifully searched their consciences and could find no necessity of leaving on her account, or, for that matter, their own.

  Roger, who had no grasp of the concepts of grace or hospitality, simply nodded in her direction and made a noise that might have been a greeting. It was left to Terry and The Angel Joshua to create an atmosphere of welcome. Shay had not come to any clear understanding of Roger’s personality, but it was her practice to accept people as they were, so she settled comfortably into the little group. Laying out her mat near the back of the room, the better to observe, she began a gentle warm-up.

  Fiona was gazing into Pete’s face on the computer.

  “Are you coming for the election?”

  “I don’t know that I can. But isn’t April a peculiar time to have an election?”

  “It’s to fill a vacancy, and there are legal requirements about the timing. But the general theory about off-cycle elections is that they’re scheduled to minimize the turnout.”