The Cast Stone

by Harold Johnson

  “Come down from there, my girl. Come on over here and see. Look out the window, see that? That’s snow. That white stuff. That’s snow, my girl.” They stood together and watched it fall. There were more flakes now, and not lazy. The wind picked up and slanted them, gave them purpose and destination. The sight chilled Elsie. She added another block of wood to the steel fireplace. Not that it needed it. Forced it in and shut the glass-screened door. “You stay away from this stove Rachel. It’s hot. Don’t touch. Hot.”

  She wished she could build something around the stove. Something to keep Rachel away. But this wasn’t her house. It was Ben’s. And someday Ben was going to come home. What would he say when he found her here, living with Benji. Shacked up, like they used to say. What would she say? “We were looking after your place for you. Taking care of things.” If he ever came home.

  She wished she and Benji had their own place, a small warm cabin, built of logs, like the one up the lake where Ben was raised. That would be nice. She could live without electricity, without all the distractions that came with it. But, could Benji? Or was he still too dependent, too modern to ever give up the comforts and ease. Not that there was anything wrong with comfort. She felt the heat of the crackling stove. But some comforts are better than others. Some don’t cost your soul so much.

  “You have mail.”

  “Mail?” Ben didn’t get it.

  “Well, not for you, but about you.”

  The daily interview, at 2:00 pm. The guards came to the cellblock, beckoned Ben to come with them down the concrete hallway to administration, into the office complex where the floor was tiled and the offices had glass in the windows, where coffee and doughnuts scented the air. Someone here liked Tim Hortons. Brought in a half-dozen sugared old-fashioned every afternoon and spread the smell of cinnamon into the otherwise still, dead air.

  The interview would last an hour, the same questions, the same answers. “Why an M-37?”

  “Because my eyesight is fading.”

  “That’s not the average hunting rifle you have there.”

  “It works for me.”

  Ben sat in the chair, kept his feet flat on the floor, never stretched out his legs, never relaxed. The voice had a name now, John Penner, and a face. The hood was negotiated away. “I’ll trust you, if you trust me. It’s about answers.” Ben knew it wasn’t about answers. It was about questions. The questions John Penner wanted answered weren’t about guns or meetings or the hitchhiker. The daily interview always started with those questions, repetitions, rote to the point of becoming custom. The answers were slight variations of more of the same.

  Ben watched the time, the big office clock on the wall in the next office, there where the window let in the light from outside. John Penner came to believe that Ben was looking in that direction because of the light, outside, freedom, believed that it tormented Ben. He liked it that he sat between Ben and that freedom and that Ben had to go through him to get to where he knew Ben wanted to be. He sat in the seat of power, his legs stretched out under the desk.

  Always take your time, my boy. Don’t rush things. Those old people, when they negotiated the Treaty, they took their time. It was the government people that were in a hurry. Us Indians, we sat and talked about things, all kind of things before they got here. We were ready. We knew what we were going to say. We sat on the ground, on our Mother, got our strength from there. They sat on chairs. It was always the treaty commissioner who tried to hurry things up. Remember that my boy. When it’s important. Don’t rush. Time is your friend.

  Ben had one hour with John Penner. He had the rest of the day to listen to the words of his father. One hour in an office, and then he would sit by the fire in a log cabin, hot tea in his hands, a willing receptor of the wisdom of generations and their stories. Even here, even in this concrete and glass, in this office, he heard his father, heard the slow speech, the short sentences, each filled with importance, never an empty phrase, a wasted word.

  “It seems like you have some friends, Mr. Robe.”

  “I’m sure I have one or two.”

  “Oh, there’s more than two. We’re starting to get a little pile of letters, people are writing, saying you’re a political prisoner. Are you a political prisoner, Ben?”

  “I am a prisoner.”

  “That’s not what I asked. Are you political?”

  “Wasn’t it George Orwell who once wrote that everything is political?”

  “So you admit that you are part of a political movement?”

  “I’ve told you over and over again, John, I am not part of any organized resistance. I speak only for myself.”

  “Maybe not organized, as you say, but you are resistant.”

  “I accept that you are here and that you are not going away, that we have to learn how we will live together.”

  “Good answer, Ben. But between you and me, we know you would prefer that I went home to Richmond. I’d like to go home to Richmond too. Especially now with winter coming on. But, we have things to take care of here first. Satan walks these lands, spreading lies, spreading his hatred of the holy.” Ben watched as Penner’s hands began to wave the air. The beginning of the rant, the calling down of the wrath of God, the demand for repentance that began with admission of sin. Soon he would be begging Ben to save himself, save his soul from eternal damnation, admit his wrongs so that he could experience the salvation of the lord.

  Ben tuned him out. Would not follow him into the circular depths of his rant. Instead he wondered why Penner had told him about the letters. People on the outside were putting on a little pressure. He imagined the content; held without charge, principles of fundamental justice, the rights of humans.

  But why tell him?

  To give him hope?

  Maybe. Probably. Give him hope so that there was something to take away. The problem was that Ben had no hope, had taught himself to not hope. Hope exists for people who never learned to live entirely in the moment. Ben stayed in the here and now.

  “Repentance is the path to salvation.”

  Ben didn’t need salvation, or the promise of salvation. His Mother, the Earth, was still somewhere beneath the concrete. His Grandfathers were in the air around him. He didn’t need promises of somewhere better. He was home.

  “‘I am the way, the truth and the light. No man comes unto the Father but by me’.” John Penner stared straight into Ben’s eyes. “Jesus said that. Know what he meant?”

  Ben kept silent.

  “He was telling us that the Muslims and Buddhists and Indian spiritualists and Atheists, and all of them are deceived by Satan. There is only one way, Ben. You have to follow the truth and the life.”

  Ben refused to respond, kept his face calm. He realized in that minute, even though he had thought about it before, the power of a few words. He counted them in his head: I am the way, the truth and the light. No man comes unto the father but by me . . . Eighteen words. How many millions have died for so few words? The phrase was the epitome of intolerance. There it was, clean, simple, deadly, perfect. It didn’t say go and kill everyone who prays differently than you. Ben couldn’t resist. He asked, “What did he mean, he was the truth, the light and the way?”

  “That’s not important, Ben. The important part is that no man comes unto the father but by Jesus. If you understand that part, then you are on the path of righteousness.”

  But Ben couldn’t stop thinking that he knew a little about the truth, that the light was synonymous with understanding and that he definitely had a way to pray that was humble and honest.

  “Do you think Benji could set a net?” Rosie was talking to Elsie, but her eyes were on Rachel. The little girl toddled, holding on to the edge of the cot, her feet unsteady. Going, always going. The little girl had two speeds, flat out and stop: she was either asleep or moving, a handful.

  “He could.” Elsie forced confidence into her voice. She had never seen Benji set a net, didn’t know for certain that he could. “Are you
hungry for fish again?”

  “Oh, not for me. I could use a big feed of pike, maybe make a fish pie. No, I was thinking about Duchess and her puppies. Whitefish run this time of year, we might want to put up a bunch of fish to feed them over freeze up. Might be a long time until we can set nets through the ice.”

  “I don’t know if Benji can set a net through the ice. His dad showed him how to set a net in open water. But, I don’t think he ever saw fishing through the ice.”

  “That’s okay, we can show him.” Rosie moved to stand behind Rachel, let the little girl fall against her legs.

  “Now, how in the world did you know she was going to fall right then?” Elsie stayed seated at the table, her tea cooling in the cup, no need to move, her mother had things under control.

  “Four kids, no help from anyone.” Rosie offered an answer that didn’t satisfy Elsie, didn’t at all explain how. Elsie let it go, one of those things about her mother that she might never understand.

  Benji pulled the boat up on the beach. Setting the net had not been too difficult, he tangled it a couple of times, it hadn’t been a smooth set. But now it was in the water and tomorrow there should be fish in it. He stood for a moment before unloading the gear, a moment to take in his surroundings. It was one of those perfect fall days, crisp; a light wind out of the west that rippled the lake for no apparent reason other than to give the sun something to reflect off of. A large flock of snow geese swirled off the northern horizon, formed patterns, waves that broke and reformed chaotically. Nearby a gull screamed its demand for food, or just yelled for the joy of its own voice in the wind and sun.

  Benji noticed a bit of ice on the deck of the boat, it didn’t mean much to him, other than the day was colder than it looked. He packed the gear into the back of the truck. No need to put the boat onto the trailer. He would be back out onto the lake tomorrow. He was thinking about a hot cup of coffee with Elsie and Rachel when he put the truck into gear. The rear wheels spun in the sand, the truck bounced up and down. He pushed a button on the consul and the bouncing stopped. Four-wheel drive was such a nice option.

  A large black and grey pup jumped at the hanging fish, out of reach. It stood and bent its neck back, blue grey eyes begging. “That fish is for you, but you can’t eat it all today.” Rosie’s soft voice shooed the puppy as she hung another string of fish, a slender, peeled pole pushed through holes cut in their tails, shoulder-high on the drying rack. “These are for winter, little guy — you go eat with your brothers. Benji brought you lots of tasty fish.”

  She knelt and petted the pup, felt it along its broad chest already muscled, ruffled the fur along its back and its narrower hips. “You’re going to be a good size dog in a few months. Before winter is over you’ll be big enough to pull.” The pup wriggled with the petting, turned and licked her hand. “I’ll make you a harness the way my mother used to. A nice one with lots of padding so it doesn’t rub. Yes sir, little guy, you are going to become a good-size dog.”

  “Having trouble, my girl?” Rosie returned to the gutting table under the pines where Elsie struggled with a knife.

  “Just this part gives me a hard time. How do you get the little bones out.”

  “Here, I’ll show you again, just run your knife along here.” Rosie started a cut down the inside of the pike fillet. “Well, here is your problem, your knife is dull.” She ran the edge of the knife against a honing steel hung with a string from a branch. A half dozen quick strokes and she handed the knife back to Elsie. “Try it now.”

  “Benji did good. I didn’t think we’d get this much out of one net.” Elsie’s knife found the line, made the shallow cut the way her mother showed her, felt the click of it against the line of tiny bones, another cut above the first line and a sliver of flesh fell away. Elsie held up a perfectly boneless fillet.

  “Pretty good,” Rosie agreed as she prepared the next string of fish. She watched Elsie without being intrusive, let the girl learn, even though Elsie was leaving way too much fish on the bones. She had to do it to learn it. Rosie prepared the fish that would go to the dogs and let her daughter prepare the fish for the frying pan.

  The wind died overnight. The water calmed, Benji slept content in the silence.

  “Rosie said we had enough yesterday. I should have listened. But man we were catching good, I just wanted one more lift, just one more.” Benji tugged against the boat frozen into the lake.

  “That’s the way it goes.” Red agreed. He was happy to answer cousin Elsie’s phone call, I need a favour, cuz. He looked out across the frozen bay. “Where’s your net set?”

  “Off Willow Point.”

  “That part still looks open, lucky thing. It’s hell chopping out a frozen net.”

  “If the boat isn’t buggered up.”

  “It’s not the boat you have to worry about. A little chopping and we’ll have that out. You left the motor down. If there was any water in that gear housing, it’ll bust sure as shit.”

  Elsie helped Benji to hang the net. “You’ve had quite the day.”

  “You can say that again. If it wasn’t for Red we’d be in real trouble. He not only helped to get our boat up onto shore. He chopped ice for about fifty metres so that he could get his boat out to open water to go rescue this net.”

  “Red’s a good guy.”

  “I like his attitude. Know what he said about the motor? ‘Well good thing it happened today, now you have until spring to get the parts.’”

  “So, how bad is the motor?”

  “Broke the housing around the gears and the water pump is shot. I should have known better. It’s not like Dad doesn’t have enough going on right now without me wrecking his stuff.”

  “Don’t worry about it, it’s just stuff.” Elsie hung the last of her side of the net on the peg, turned, and wrapped her arms around Benji from behind.

  He turned back for the kiss on the cheek he knew was coming. “Dad might not think of it as just stuff.”

  “Like Red said, you have till spring to fix it.” Elsie hugged him tighter.

  “‘I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, saith the Lord, which is, and which was, and which is to come, the Almighty’.” John Penner nearly screamed.

  Ben thought about this simple linear construct of time. It wasn’t at all relevant to his experience; he let the thought go, let it drift out into the cyclical universe that Ben chose to exist in.

  Penner was in the middle of his daily rant, and Ben knew from experience not to push his buttons. Penner’s vomit of words excluded rationality, excluded Ben, excluded even Penner himself. The words poured, spewed, angry and raw. This wasn’t a preacher bent on conversion. This wasn’t a teacher explaining. This was hate wrapped in gospel, hate warped by gospel. Hate that surfaced and subsided quickly. Penner stopped. Briefly the interview room fell silent. He looked directly at Ben and asked. “Do you believe in Democracy?”

  Ben hesitated, looked for the trick in the question and decided it would be safe to answer “Yes.”

  “That is absolute foolishness. Democracy is the work of Satan. Satan puts ideas into men’s heads to lead them away from the Kingdom of Jesus. There is only one rightful government. That is the government of God. Jesus came here to create his kingdom on Earth. It is his kingdom that we should be working to create. Not our, or your kingdom, Ben.” Penner’s voice changed. It became a pleading. “Do you honestly believe we could create a kingdom on Earth that would be superior to Jesus’ kingdom? Do you believe that man is better than God?” He didn’t give Ben an opportunity to answer. “Of course not. Now you are asking, what would this look like, this kingdom of Jesus on Earth? Well, let me tell you. It would be Christian Totalitarianism. Mao had it right, even Hitler knew what he was doing. God chose those men. He chose them to get the world ready for the day when he puts his kingdom back on Earth.”

  For the remainder of the interview Ben sat and listened to the words of hate, the words that were part prayer, part calls for help, part confes
sion (though this had to be read in) and part demand for the damnation of everything not Godly.

  The chainsaw screamed in Benji’s hand; he concentrated on Red’s instructions. “Cut out a wedge on the side you want the tree to fall toward. Then when you make the back cut, don’t cut all the way through, leave a little wood, that’s what you use to steer with.” The standing dead pine was a nice size. A good tree to learn with. Red stood back and watched Benji fall his very first tree. Eighty feet, at least eighty feet. Red looked toward the heavy crown where dwarf mistletoe cancered the ancient tree, rapid growth, branches twisted into thick brooms. The disease clustered in stands of pine, leaving dead wood for insects, and the birds that feed off them and easy fire wood for people like Red who still enjoyed simpler though harder ways of living.

  Red didn’t notice the change in colour of the sawdust, from white to orange brown sprayed out onto the thin covering of snow. He was looking toward the crown, feeling pride in Benji, a good sized tree for his first. Fall a tree like that and a person couldn’t help but to feel proud of himself. Neither of them knew about the ants. Big carpenter ants that ate away the tree’s core, left a honeycomb labyrinth at the centre. The little wood that Benji was to use to steer the tree with had no strength. The big pine leaned, twisted on the cut at its base and slowly began to fall. Red saw it first. The tree was coming toward them. He grabbed Benji’s shoulder, pulled and stepped aside. They stood still and watched the tree pick up speed. Benji screamed a silent “No!” when he realized where the tree was going. “No!” his heart sank “Please No!” The top of the tree hit the cab of Ben’s truck where the passenger door met the roof, smashed glass and warped metal, the weight of two hundred years growth and the inertia of coming to earth drove the tree until the roof of the truck touched the seat. The steel frame under the cab bent, then held, snow caught in the branches and released in the fall flittered down for a few more seconds, then everything was still and quiet.