The 53rd Parallel

by Carl Nordgren

  “He'll understand what needs to be understood, and you'll understand him as he guides you on your fishin' adventures. Just follow his lead an' I promise you'll come back here this evenin' from the best fishin' you've ever had, an' if you're not toastin' the accuracy of that prediction with me at the pub tonight, well sir, the drinks will be on the house tomorrow night as well—bein' it was already determined our very first guests would drink free tonight.”

  Two of the Irish lads who overheard Eamon's conversation in the pub took the bus into Dublin the next day. The eighteen-year-old, Tony, went with Kevin's recruit, the hurling lad, who carried his hurling stick with him everywhere he went. His da only had to mention once that the great Timmy McShay, the best hurler of his time, had carried his stick with him everywhere he went, and his son took up the practice immediately. The hurling lad loved the feel of his stick in his hands, the weight of it at his side.

  A trip to Dublin was itself an adventure for these country boys—they'd each been there but once before—and as they walked the busy city street they felt like they were prancing.

  The hurling lad led them onto a side commercial street lined with shops, and leaving Tony outside, he stepped into a music shop. From the window, Tony watched the hurling lad ask a clerk a question that elicited a serious reply with hands waving directions. The hurling lad dashed back outside and waved for Tony to follow him as he walked quickly, calling back over his shoulder.

  “He says Kevin's home today with a bit of an ailment. Others were askin' after him as well, he says, just a bit earlier. There were three of 'em, an' he says they had the look a' toughs”

  “The look a' toughs?”

  “That's what he called 'em.”

  “An' he told you Kevin's street number?”

  “He's just round this corner here.”

  The boys turned off the business street for one lined with modest townhouses. They dashed up the steps to Kevin's door, but before they could knock, they heard a crash from inside. They crouched low, listening at the door, and when all was quiet the hurling lad rose to peer through the door's window.

  “I see half an empty room. There's a hall, but I can't see but a short length of it… no lights… no movement.”

  “What should we do?”

  The hurling lad tried the door.

  “It's not locked.”

  He pushed the door open a bit, holding it with his hurling stick. He peeked around the door and whispered back to Tony.

  “Take it slow 'n take it easy.”

  “You sure we want to go in at all?”

  “You don't start trouble in your own place, so I'm thinkin' these three must 'a brought it with them. We gotta see if Kevin is all right.”

  They opened the door and heard a cry of pain and another crash from down the short hall. The stick felt like a club in the hurling lad's hands now as the two walked quietly but quickly down the hall to an open door where they heard a voice roaring inside.

  “Gettin' it yet, Kevin? It's us is real IRA. So it's us with the only claim on Clann na Gael.”

  The lads saw the broad backs of two men just inside the small room, and in front of them a third man stood over Kevin who was slumped on the floor, leaning against a narrow cot along the far wall of the otherwise empty room. His face was bruised, and his nose and his lip were bleeding.

  “Not sure he gets it yet, J.P. Give him one more good measure of truth.”

  The third man grabbed Kevin by the front of his shirt and loaded another punch but sensed something and turned too late as the two lads dove into the backs of the closest two men. One man was knocked into the puncher, who turned swinging wildly, nearly hitting his own. The second man stumbled as the hurling lad raised his stick and followed up with a big blow. It was intended for his shoulder but the man moved and instead the stick hit him in the head, producing such a loud crack as it knocked the man to his knees that the hurling lad wondered if the stick was broken. There was such violence in the act that everyone felt it.

  The two who were knocked into Kevin grabbed him and stood either side of him, fists cocked for Kevin's face.

  The hurling lad had a full hold on the collar of his hostage and realized if he let go the fellow would fall flat on his face. Blood began flowing from his scalp, trickling down his neck.

  Tony was looking for a move, saw none, and held his place next to the door. No more than four or five feet separated any one from another.

  The lads were country strong. But the others were men.

  Kevin spoke up, “Only smart move right now is to see how badly your man is in need of care. My lad's been smashing the ball across Connaught near all his life, and neither of you want a bit of what his club delivers. Take a look if that isn't clear already.”

  The hurling lad released his hold of the clubbed man's collar and they all watched the injured man's slow-motion roll from his knees to full spread out on the floor, nearly touching everyone in the room.

  He lay motionless.

  “Step back and we'll take him wit' us.”

  The club retreated and the two men released Kevin to cover each other's backs. They slowly worked their way to the door, supporting their fallen man between them.

  Kevin rose to his feet and tried to sound strong.

  “So we all know you heard me clear, tell Michael he should come talk with me himself, there's still time for you all to return.”

  The men stumbled as they dragged the injured man down the hall, and Kevin collapsed on the cot with a moan as soon as he heard the front door close. The hurling lad followed Kevin's attackers and locked the door.

  When he returned to the room, he was staring at his club and frowning.

  Tony handed Kevin a cloth for his cut lip, waiting for him to explain what just happened. When he didn't, and with the hurling lad standing stone faced and still, Tony told Kevin of their news about Maureen. By the time he finished, Kevin was sitting up.

  “That's very promising, yes, quite a useful lead. Well done.”

  Tony checked back with his friend, who stood in the spot where he delivered the blow. He began to silently and slowly repeat the swing that had delivered that blow, shaking his head.

  Kevin dabbed the cloth at his face one more time, then laid it aside. He was watching the hurling lad the whole time.

  “There are some who want a statue of Sean Russell in Boston. And some who don't.”

  “What?”

  “I was attacked because we have yet another splinter group.” He thought about that for a moment. “Aptly named. Splinters. Some things just can't be separated without the sharp pain caused by splinters. We grew up as one IRA. Each of us has a claim on that.”

  The hurling lad wasn't listening. He was playing what happened over and over in his head, repeating how he moved to understand what he did. Tony and Kevin broke away from studying him and Kevin went on. “As we've been reviving ourselves here, so has Clan na Gael in America, and there are plenty of rich American cousins eager to raise funds in Boston and New York and Chicago to support the new operations we're planning.”

  Now the hurling lad raised his club to study closely the point of impact. There was nothing to mark it, but he knew exactly where it was. He rubbed it once, then lowered the club.

  “There's IRA who want some of that money to go to building a statue in Boston for Sean Russell. And some IRA don't.”

  Tony found he could listen only if he turned away from his fascination with his friend's state.

  “Which are we?”

  “We're in favor of the statue. Russell was a great man. But you have to understand it's no longer the issue, maybe it never really was. As I said, splinters hurt and so the fight turned to who gets the American assets in the first place; it's where most of our money has always come from. It's always about money, and so you've done us a good turn with the news you brought, for she just might be a link to plenty.”

  The hurling lad held his club in front of him and shook it repeatedly. He coul
d feel the hit, and he could hear the crack, and he cried inside each time he did.

  “If Russell died without speakin' to no one, how do they know there was money for her to take?”

  “It was never more than a rumor. I'm not sure anyone considered it seriously. But if she and some broken-down ghillie have bought land in the New World and built a grand country lodge, you have to wonder if Russell hadn't handed her a small fortune. Where else does the money came from?”

  “What do we do now?”

  “I want to find her and get her back into our operations if I can. We can use her. And yes, we need to find out where her business capital came from, and if it was our money, of course we want it back. But some of the new boys, they talk like they want to punish her, to teach her some sort of lesson… So I need to find her first.”

  Tony had more news.

  “I've been asked to be what's called an extra, in The Quiet Man filim. I'll be part of the scene an' hangin' 'round without suspicion. I can stay real close to Eamon Burke. They say I'll be in three or four scenes.”

  “Good. Keep a close listen.”

  Kevin had a pretty good idea what the hurling lad needed to hear.

  “I'm thinking you knocked him out. He'll have a massive headache for a week. But he'll be fine. In any case, and I mean this, considering the circumstances that were facing me and what you walked in to, you did a brave thing, stepping in. And the right thing once you did. I'll make sure everyone knows you did this as a good deed to save me. That is how it was and how it will be seen.”

  The hurling lad found he could talk, but it came from somewhere outside of him. “I was swingin' for the back of his shoulder. I was goin' to hit him a good crack to knock him down… but he moved… I was swingin' for his shoulder… but I smashed his skull right above his ear … I might have heard two cracks… Why did he have to move?”

  “When's your next match?”

  “My next match?”

  “We play Saturday, against Sligo.”

  “Put your mind to that. He'll recover.”

  “I was just goin' to hit him on the shoulder, but he moved.”

  New rituals took shape at this sacred place. The late afternoon Return of the Boats quickly became the most important. Brian saw it first; fishermen returning to a crowded dock filled with the excitement of other fishermen resulted in a greater celebration of the day for all. Maureen helped the guides orchestrate this happening by simply suggesting that when guides see a fishing boat heading back to camp at the end of the day, that unless the guides are finding fishing was spectacular in that moment, they should join them.

  One late afternoon, a couple of weeks after the camp opened to its first guests, the dock was filled with the joy of a great day on the River. Two fishing boats had already returned, and Joe Loon's boat just rounded the point and entered Innish Cove.

  The four American guests on the dock stretched and patted each other's backs and shoulders as they told Brian and Maureen all about their adventures. Albert and Old George walked past hauling shore lunch boxes to the big heavy-duty storage tent next to the log shed near the foot of the dock.

  Behind the tent and the shed, farther up the beach, just at the edge of the forest, were the tents and birch bark wigwams of Joe Loon's clan. A woman stood in front of them behind two children, watching the action on the dock.

  One of the guests had slapped down his big northern pike on the dock in front of Brian.

  “So, Brian, what's your verdict?”

  “It's a lovely fish. Just might be the biggest pike we've seen this summer.”

  “How big?”

  “Seein' it makes me think about back home in the West of Ireland, before the war. The Brits came over to fish our River for trout an' some Germans did, too, but mostly the Germans were comin' to fish for pike in Lough Corrib. An' years went by before one as fine as this was caught.”

  “I was thinking it was 25 pounds.”

  “Maybe more, yeah.”

  Joe Loon's boat slowed as it approached within hailing distance, and the guest in the bow stood to call out greetings to all on the dock as they pulled up. The guest who had caught the big northern pike picked it up to feel its heft and show it to the new arrivals as he tried to keep Brian's attention on his story.

  “But here's the most amazing thing. As I'm fighting this trophy, I can call it a trophy, right Brian?”

  “I'd be proud to pay to send it into Kenora an' have it mounted with your name on a bit of brass, then hang it in the pub, if you would permit me.”

  Joe Loon was tying his boat to the dock.

  “That's exactly what I'll do. Golly, yes. Hey, James, how'd you make out this afternoon?”

  “We went after smallmouth bass off some islands west of here. We must have caught twenty before it slowed down.”

  “Take a look at this fellow here. I was just telling Brian that I hooked this baby…” he found his boat mate and waved him over, “… and the other boat is right close by, and we're all excited. They're calling out advice left and right and I'm fighting him and fighting him, but then I realize that no one is making a sound, and it takes me a second to check and see because I am kinda busy at the moment trying to catch this fish, but when I do look up I see no one is watching me anymore—”

  His friend took over.

  “Because Albert has noticed this osprey circling above us, a little off, but pretty much above us, and just as he taps me on my shoulder and points it out to me and I tell the guys to take a look, just then the osprey starts his dive. He folds his wings back and he just shoots, like an arrow, straight down. I mean, he must have been going a hundred miles an hour from about, gee what did we guess? Maybe 400 feet in the air? And he's diving closer and closer, and then he brakes and throws out his talons and smack! bam! He hits the water. There's a big splash, but just at the surface because he takes off right away and has this corkscrewing little pike in his grasp, a little one, about this big.” He held his fingers ten inches apart.

  “And then the osprey is flying away with his catch, he gets about a hundred feet above the water when we hear Albert saying something in Indian and out of the blue, and I mean it literally, just out of the blue, here comes this big old bald eagle. And the son of a bitch, he smashes into the osprey so hard you can see feathers flying off and the osprey makes sort of a shriek. But he drops his fish and flies away and the pike is flip flapping nose to tail as it's falling and the eagle now is streaking right behind it and just as the fish hits the water—”

  A guest from the other boat had been listening and swooped in with his arm as he finished the story.

  “The eagle scoops it up and flies away with it—”

  “And then I finish reeling in this trophy and we get him in the boat… But I notice now we're all just quiet and I don't know, I just looked down at this fish… it even crossed my mind that maybe I ought to release him back in the water. ”

  “At that moment, I got to say it, at that moment, I was in awe. Of the world. And I'm proud to be saying it.”

  “I was just totally exhausted and couldn't say a thing.”

  “He's just sitting there smiling, for the next 30 minutes he's just smiling, staring out at the sky, looking at the fish, sipping his beer, staring out at the sky.”

  “I was thinking this was heaven… I kinda wish now I had thrown him back.”

  Maureen stepped up with her camera and took a snapshot unposed, and after another candid shot, the Americans all gathered with their guides to compose a pictorial signature of the day's adventure.

  After the photo, as the guests gathered to go, the Ojibway guides and sons stood together on shore. This Man stood with them. As the guests passed, Joe Loon spoke the forest language of this place, and they all laughed softly.

  The guests liked the sound of it, the peace of this native language, and their smiles grew deeper, for the ritual was complete.

  The Ojibway children's uniform numbers were tallied as they were led into the s
chool's auditorium set up to show a movie. As a Jesuit brother shouted instructions the lights were dimmed, and the projected beam's flickering images came into sync on the title card.

  It was a John Wayne film, and he and his men were about to kill a great number of Indians.

  Mathew sat in the dark auditorium among sixty or seventy children with his eyes closed. The boys and girls closest to him closed their eyes as well. Still, the gunshots and the yelps of pain told them that John Wayne and his men were shooting more of the Ondaga Sioux and Cherokee.

  The Jesuits showed these boys and girls movies of the white man killing Comanche and Dakota, Cheyenne and Shawnee, a couple of times a month during the school year. Sometimes it was cowboys doing the killing, sometimes it was blue-jacketed soldiers. The message the Jesuits were delivering was that aboriginal life was dead and that these children should accept the white man's ways.

  The first time they showed a movie after Mathew arrived, when the children were back in the sleeping rooms, he waited until the dead of night, slipped past the rows of sleep-filled cots, checked the hall, came back to each cot to wake the children and bid others to do the same.

  They had to gather close to him and listen carefully as he spoke softly.

  “My grandfather is an elder of the Loon clan, honored by all of the People as a man of wisdom. He told me the true story of Geronimo, and I will tell it to you. Geronimo was a great Chiricahuas warrior. Geronimo fought many battles so his people could be free. Free to be People of the Great Spirit. Geronimo did all he could to save the People. This movie is a lie. Geronimo did not always lose.”

  This showing was the last night they would play this same movie, as school ended in three days and the children would be sent home for a short summer recess. Mathew had chosen this night for his moment of protest so the punishment inflicted would be visible to his clan when he returned.

  The idea came to him the last time he was strapped by one of the men wearing the Cross of Jesus the Christ. The pain was so great he left his body. Before he returned, he had the vision of him fighting with Geronimo.