He watched the eastern sky begin to redden, enjoyed the bitter, nutty, flavour of his coffee. There was no wind. Dougie remembered his father once saying, “Twelve days a year the wind doesn’t blow on the prairie, maybe today will be one of them.” Dougie concurred. Maybe today would be one of them. Maybe today the dust would not blow black across the earth. It was still properly winter, there should be snow. Maybe there was. Maybe come spring one of those black mounds would melt, turn to mud instead of slush, maybe they would call it mush. Maybe there would be no spring, can there be spring if there was no real winter? Maybe the earth would stay black, never bloom again.
He thought of home, of his mother up at Moccasin Lake. There was snow up there, lots of it. When spring came, that country would green up. Grouse should be in the poplars about now, eating the forming leaf buds. Dougie remembered hunting this time of year, him and Darren sharing a .22. He’d been thinking a lot about family recently, just homesick, part of the job, part of what he did. The job was going well. His men were still asleep, each with their own motel room. They would eat breakfast together in the restaurant then head out to the pipeline.
He felt someone beside him. He did not have to turn to see that no one was there. It was Darren. He knew. It didn’t feel scary, or awful. It felt okay. It felt right to have his brother beside him. “In May,” Dougie spoke to the presence. “In May, I will come visit you again, when it’s time to plant.”
“Where did you get the coffee?”
Dougie turned to meet the voice. It was a slow voice that spaced words, forced each word to follow the last.
“In my room, would you like a cup?” Dougie indicated the door behind him.
“You’re a Canadian.” The slow voice said.
“Yeah, eh.” Dougie smiled at his own joke.
The man turned, walked back the way he came, four doors down the line of motel doors and went into his room.
“His problem.” Dougie spoke to his cup. It was nearly empty and getting cold. Didn’t matter, there was a carafe in his room. If the American didn’t want his coffee because he was Canadian, then he would drink it by himself.
The presence that had been Darren was gone. Dougie felt very alone under a large prairie sky.
The light woke Ben. He dressed quietly, let Benji, Elsie, and Rachel sleep. Outside the world was quiet. He could hear his own breathing, drawing in cold air, warming it, releasing it in a soft white mist back again. He looked toward the stars, dim now that the eastern sky was beginning to brighten. “Thank you for today.” He spoke toward the specks of overhead light, somewhere up there his ancestors were watching. His boots crunched in the snow, loud in the absolute quiet of early morning as he started out on a walk, a pilgrimage, a blend of exercise, prayer, and meditation.
A mile down the empty, ice-packed road, Ben stopped, looked at the house, the house with the lights that reflected off the snow. Someone else was awake. He forced his mind to remember, clicked through names of neighbours, until he came to Leroy. That was Leroy’s house. Ben had not talked to Leroy since the funeral, stood beside him at the gravesite as Elroy’s casket was lowered, and covered.
“I was hoping someone would come visit me today.” Leroy was moving much slower than when Ben had last seen him.
Leroy’s coffee was weaker than what Ben preferred. Ben let the first liquid of the day fill his mouth, hot, watery, smooth with a hint of sweet.
“So, I heard they drilled a hole in your head to let in some light.”
Ben did not respond, just smiled, relaxed into the armchair, tasted the coffee again. He remembered how to take teasing. The old man was doing him a favour, doing something good for Ben, helping him to laugh at his misfortune. It needed to be laughed at.
“I heard they used a number 12 Robinson.”
“No, it was only an eight, maybe even a six.”
“That’s how it goes, people add on. Just wait, pretty soon it’s going to be a lag bolt.” Leroy’s smile held a hint of mischief.
“I’m sure if you have anything to do with it, it will have gone in one side and come out the other.”
Leroy laughed, a little chuckle laugh. “Now that would be a story worth telling.” He was comfortable now that laughter had chased away the tension. “So why were they pissed off at you about in the first place?”
“Oh, I had a gun I wasn’t supposed to have.”
“What kind of gun?” Leroy exercised the privilege of bluntness that comes with age.
“M-37 assault rifle.”
“What the hell did you want with one of those? Were you going to war, or what?”
“No, I just got scared. I was getting tangled up with the resistance and, well, things were getting scary.”
“So, you went looking for trouble and you found it.”
“Something like that.”
“You know better.” Leroy exercised the other privilege of age, the right to scold. “Didn’t your dad teach you anything? I used to work with him, out in the pulp camps, long time ago when there was still trees worth cutting. There was a man, would never go looking for it. Us Indians Ben, we got enough trouble every day. Don’t have to go find it.” It was said, done, Leroy did not have to say anymore.
Ben felt a little smaller, as though the armchair had grown. Like the teasing, this scolding was meant to help him, help him feel humility, help him to be human. He remembered to be appreciative. “Thank you, Uncle.” He kept his head down, focused on the darkness inside his cup.
“Okay then, enough of that. How’s your boy?”
“Benji? Benji’s doing good.” Ben looked up.
“You are a lucky man, Ben Robe. I was worried about you for a while, not having any children. Then out of the blue you have a son. What a blessing, someone for you to pass along all those things your dad taught you.”
“Yeah, it’s good.” Ben agreed fully.
“You know, maybe it’s just age or something, but I don’t think so, it’s something more. I’ve been thinking about all the people that have gone ahead of us. Your dad, my dad, my mom, my sisters.” Leroy paused, then said what he wanted to say, said it as simple matter of fact. “Elroy was here this morning.”
“Yeah.” Ben agreed with him, acknowledged what he said, not patronizing. If Elroy was here, Ben knew it was for a reason.
“I guess I won’t be here long.” Leroy stated the reason. “I don’t know how many times I’ve been told that when it’s time to go, one of your relatives will come and get you.”
“Yeah.” Ben agreed. “What did Elroy have to say?”
“He never said anything, just walked in, smiled at me, and sat in that chair you’re in, sort of waiting for me.”
Ben was suddenly acutely aware of the chair, its shape, how it wrapped itself around him. He forced down an impulse to stand up.
Leroy smiled at Ben’s discomfort. “You don’t have to be afraid of Elroy. He always liked you.”
“I liked him too.” Ben made peace with his situation.
“You know, I’m half a mind to go for a walk. Just go out and find a big old spruce tree and sit down and wait like they used to do. You know they tell stories about long ago, old people went out to die. They said it was because those old people didn’t want to be a burden, as if everything was really bad for us, like we were always starving. I don’t think so. I think those old people just wanted to go some place quiet, sit down, relax, let what happen what was going to happen. That’s what I think.”
“I think you might be right.”
“Don’t think about it too much my young friend. Not like me, I think this is my last winter; North Wind is going to come get me, take me home. You . . . ” Leroy nodded toward Ben . . . “You got lots of time. Your job is to remember all the good things. Like the old people did for us when we were young. When times were tough, your grandma or grandpa would start talking about when they were growing up. How it was. They never told us stories about starvation or freezing. They told us about how good it used to
be. That’s your job now. Remember how it was, so that the young people have some hope. Remember how the world was, how the trees grew, how there used to be big fish in the lake, how people were decent to each other. Now you got a hole in your head to let in some light so that you can see your way around in there. You’ll be all right.” Leroy sat back, relaxed. “Yeah, you’ll be all right, Ben.”
At first Ben thought the old man was just talking the way he talked all his life, loud, in your face, always the one to step forward, take a position and defend it, but the more he listened the more he realized Leroy was talking in a rush. He was speaking as though he might never speak again.
He watched the old man on the couch, flannel pyjamas that might have fit better even a few months ago, now hung on his thin frame. He seemed to be shrinking, fading as he spoke. Ben tried to focus, wondered whether what he was seeing was real or a product of his damaged brain.
“You got money, Ben.” It wasn’t a question. It was a statement.
“Some.”
“A little more than some I think.”
“I’ve got enough.”
“That’s going to be the hard part. Like I told you, you’re going to be all right. But that money you got. That’s going to be your challenge. You got to figure out how you’re going to do some good with that. Money has always been hard for Indian people.”
The old voice dimmed. Ben leaned forward to hear. He missed a few sentences, something about residential school money.
“You, figure it out. I still believe it can be done.”
“I thought about giving it to the resistance.”
“Resistance!” The old man came back to life. If he had a table he would have pounded it. “Resistance. You ever go moose hunting with a stick? You’re just trying to throw it away, give it to someone else to worry about. No. It’s yours. You figure out how to use it. Resistance is just going to cause a whole bunch more misery. Who said ‘an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind’?”
“Gandhi.”
“Yeah, him. We need another one like him. Think you’re man enough?” Leroy raised his chin higher, pointed with it toward Ben.
“He walked to the ocean to make salt and kicked the English out of India.” Ben thought about the old movie, remembered images of dusty feet, and men beaten with bamboo rods.
“Think about it. You can’t ever buy enough guns and bombs. I know you have money, but can you buy even one fighter jet, can you put a satellite into outer space, drop bombs from up there on Washington?”
Ben remained silent, accepted the truth of the old man’s words. His head began to throb, little bubbles of pain, a pulsating ache. He consciously relaxed, let his shoulders sag, and breathed, slow, deliberate deep inhalations, and controlled release.
“Did it change you?”
“Did what change me?”
“That screw in your head.”
“No.” Ben answered quickly. He thought about it. It hadn’t changed him, he was the same Ben, the same convictions. Then he became acutely aware of the numbness that ran down his left side. “Yeah, a bit.” He changed his answer. He was a changed man. He was slowed down physically. Mentally he was as sharp as ever. He thought about that too. His mind was sharp but it wasn’t as ever. The fog was gone. That haze that accumulated with age had dissipated. The mist in his thinking that he became so accustomed to, or perhaps because he had no reference to anything other, that he perceived it as normal wasn’t there anymore. His thinking was crystallized.
“Yeah, Uncle. It has changed me.”
“Tell me about it.”
Ben was about to tell Leroy about the numbness and the mental acuity, but when he opened his mouth, his answer surprised him. “I used to be afraid.”
“Of what?” the old man still had strength in his voice. A bit of power.
“I wasn’t afraid of death, well not much, it wasn’t the dying part that scared me. When I first found out I was in trouble with HS, I was really scared they were going to torture me.”
“And they did.”
“That’s right. And I’m not afraid of it anymore.”
“You survived it.”
“I survived it.” Ben and Leroy were on the same page, nodding toward each other as they spoke, echoing.
Leroy carried it forward. “It was bad.”
Ben nodded.
“Hurt like hell.”
“Oh, Yeah.” Ben remembered.
“But now you’re okay with it. Not with the torture. I mean you’re okay with the fear of it. You’re not going to go and buy another rifle and try to take on the whole American army by yourself again.”
“No, you’re right, Uncle. I’m way past that.”
“Good. But you’re still afraid of death.”
Ben had no response to Leroy’s direct statement. He couldn’t deny it. But, he couldn’t quite accept it either. Fear of death — wasn’t everyone afraid of death?
“You stay with me today.” Leroy broke the growing silence.
“You want me to?”
“Yeah,” the old man nodded. “Stay with me. I don’t want to be alone, but I don’t want a whole bunch of people around. My granddaughter is going to come in a few hours and make lunch. We’ll eat together. Then she’ll go back to her family. It’ll be all right.”
“I’ll stay.”
“All day?”
“If that’s what you want.”
“It’s what I want. You know what, I think it’s time for a nap. Think I’m gonna lay down on this couch for awhile, close my eyes for a little bit. You’re gonna stay?”
“I’m gonna stay.”
The old man stretched out his long, thin body, pulled down a Pendleton blanket from the back of the couch and wrapped himself in it. He struggled to get it right, let out a little groan as he tried to get it around broad shoulders. Ben noted the feebleness, reached over from where he sat and tucked it around the callused, bony feet; wondered how many miles they had walked. Leroy twisted around, straightened the pillow so that it fit better under his head, closed his eyes, and sagged into a comfortable sleep.
The sharp, rugged Argentinean Andes Mountains faced a dull blue sky. Clear, cold wind, the always wind of this place tugged at the flimsy satellite dish in Stan Jolly’s hand. He set it down, found a flat rock nearby and leaned it against the base. He needed it to point north, toward the equator, toward satellite WV3114.
There was enough power in the platform, the battery checked at 68, but with the sun out, it would be a good time to use the solar panel. Using more rocks to stabilize it, Stan aimed the concave black dish generally toward the west. Precision was not necessary. This solar dish was designed based on the sunflower. It knew to follow the sun in its arc across the sky, always in direct sunlight, a technical solution borrowed from the botany of a plant that learned millennia ago to harness solar power.
Ready, he keyed the computer, waited for connection, entered the password that was written only in his memory. His program. It was his program now, he was the only person remaining who knew of it, the rejected program, perfectly adequate, simple, rejected by HS for a more complicated security program, because for some decision maker, complex equated with better. The program Stan used, this rejected program, once existed on a single disc, a disc left on his desk when he still worked as the Canadian Liaison on Security and Trade. He could not say for certain that the program was given to him, or that it was deliberately left for him to pick up and use, all he could honestly say was that he suspected it was left by the program writer out of frustration at having his program rejected, feeling rejected. The program now only existed in the memory of Stan’s platform, labelled Space Invaders and filed fourth on a list of a half-dozen games.
Stan always worried at this point, when he connected to the satellite, entered his password. Would the system suspect him,randomly select him for detailed protocol assessment, search for his uplink position? It didn’t. Stan, as ever, was allowed in. He scanned through files of communica
tions, searched for friend’s names, scrolled down a list of the last 24 hours, found Monica Bird, stopped and read:
“The bunker contains seven-hundred-and-fifty kilograms of U238 unprocessed Yellowcake uranium. Operative Monica Bird attends regular to bunker.”
Stan clicked up the communication trail to the next message.
“Sensors indicate slight elevation in radiation at and near house at civil address 3112 Avenue H North, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Second Division.”
He clicked up one more, the latest communication, minutes old, held his breath as he read:
“Thunder Bolt Satellite directed to position. Wait for confirmation operative is in bunker before dropping. Ground surveillance directed to positive identification of operative. Gentlemen, we want to be absolutely certain she is in there before we drop.”
Why? The question crawled into Stan’s mind. Why a Bolt from Heaven? Why not just shoot her? There were no logical rational answers. This wasn’t calculated. Someone decided this way rather than another way. The decision was probably based on nothing more than someone wanted to play with the big toys of war.
The important question was, who turned? Someone turned. Stan frantically searched through the trail of communications, senders, receivers, names — he needed the name, the name of the informer, the enemy within. He raced against his own addition to the program. It was going to automatically disconnect him at one-minute fifty-nine point nine seconds, just before the two-minute mark when the system would perform another security check. He thought of downloading the entire file and reading it later, but a large download would trigger the security program. Too risky. Or was it too risky to save a friend? Seconds clicked, Stan experienced an internal battle between rationality and emotion, expose the informer or risk exposing himself. He heard words coming from his mouth, a prayer, “please, please, please.” His fingers clicked through the list, images appeared on the screen and disappeared in a blur as he searched for a name.
Then, there it was, not in the sender’s box; halfway through a message he caught the words, not capitalized, “b.chance”. Betsy Chance. Betsy Chance. The name echoed in Stan’s mind. Betsy betrayed Monica.
The Cast Stone Page 24