“For variety of diet, sir. Here, at Colquitz, if you like; but also perhaps with a contract with the military? They must be weary of those endless tins of Spam.” This was my attempt at a joke. Everyone knew that one of Dr. Frank’s favourite dishes was Spam in orange sauce. It used to be made for him, as a treat, by the asylum chef when he could come by the oranges and sugar. Sugar was now out of the question for our acting director.
“Roast quail and stuffed pheasant, sir; we could even have a sideline in feathers for ladies’ hats.”
“And fuck you a duck,” said Pete Cooper, who, for sure, was drunk.
“Ducks?” I said. “Not a bad idea, Attendant Cooper. We’ve the pond already. I’ll see what I can discover about raising ducklings.”
“There’d be duck eggs, too!” Ron said, with sudden enthusiasm.
“Possibly fish, as well. I’ll have to look into that. I’m not sure what the pond will sustain.”
“Why not fucking squab?” Pete Cooper said. “Why not fucking mink!” He placed a thick hand on his crotch, and leered generally. Mink, of course, have a reputation for sexual excess: I took another look at Pete Cooper’s blurred face and could see in it the small glittering eyes, sharp teeth, even stray long whiskers of his mink friends.
“That’s not a bad idea! We’d kill two birds with one stone!” I said.
Dr. Frank had begun to look grim. He lifted the earpiece of his telephone, joggled the receiver, reached the kitchen and ordered black coffee to be brought to his office. “I’m serious, sir,” I said to him. “Squab. Pigeons. The pigeons we could raise for food and communications. Think of the possibilities!”
“Well, Sandy, I dunno…” Ron Signet said, and glanced at Dr. Frank for a cue. “We’ve a lot on our plate as it is. You don’t think this might be, well, excessive!”
“Fucking excessive,” Pete Cooper slurred.
“But that’s it exactly! We’re about the only outfit left that has time and resources to attempt it! We’re not going anywhere: we have labour, and natural advantages, and…”
“Now, Sandy,” Dr. Frank said, “Attendant Signet is correct: We have to continue to do what we’re already doing well: there’s the vegetable growing, the cattle production, the…”
“It was your decision to take on the Speller farm. Sir.”
“And,” Dr. Frank said, “we have our basic defence responsibilities and in case you’ve forgotten I have an institution of sick men to take care of. Not excluding you.”
Pete swivelled his head my way: His eyes glinted. They telegraphed happily that I’d gone too far.
“The Speller farm was a good decision, a brave one,” I plunged on. “You could see the possibilities, sir: It’s a courageous man who during times of danger when all others are scrambling for cover, can take the long view, find the advantages…”
“Don’t bull-feather me, Sandy,” Dr. Frank said. But he was interested. He hadn’t shut the door.
The office door opened and the once-sunburned nurse who worked with Dr. Frank in the narcosynthesis room, the one who’d helped me when I was in the East Wing by passing on my message to Dr. Frank, came in carrying the coffee tray. His face softened. He smiled at her, then looked at me. “I suppose it could be part of your therapy, eh, Sandy?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Write me up something. I’ll see what I can do.”
—
Ron and the new men all sleep in the farmhouse with me, with Ron downstairs and the others in the remaining upstairs bedrooms. We farmhouse inmates live in a kind of no-man’s land: linked to the institution for our room and board, under armed guard, assigned to specific jobs, but free in most other respects to do and say what we want.
I’ve tried to begin conversations with the new men along the lines of the parallels of our situations with Nazi-occupied countries—you could call us forced labourers or collaborators or some of us (perhaps) resistance fighters, even prisoners of war, in which case we’d have a duty to escape. I suggest these topics but they won’t bite. They keep their heads down and mouths shut except for some heavy chewing at mealtimes. Even Ron Signet smiles when I refer to them collectively as “the bullocks.” I have qualms about the term: They could well have been castrated under the sterilization program and I wouldn’t know; I should show more tolerance. But I have nothing in common with them: They’re older than me, more worn around the eyes; they have massively developed upper arms and shoulders and low-slung sloping bellies; they know each other, and communicate in grunts. They do exactly what they’re told. Thank God I have Ron to talk to! And Georgina, when she comes by. Which she’s started to do again, now that the admiral has been recalled to duty. I suppose I’m her second choice as a confidant, but if so, I don’t mind. Georgina’s happiness comes first.
I mention the squab/homing pigeon plan to her—as I think, upon reflection, that it has the most potential. “If all goes well, George, and we train them up, we can send messages back and forth, we can write what we want!”
“Short messages, Sandy. Don’t they carry them in little tubes on their legs?”
“Yes, but I could get hold of you and you of me in an emergency.”
She frowns. “What kind of emergency?”
“I don’t know, George. We’re at war, aren’t we?”
“I’d have to have my own set, wouldn’t I?”
“Can you do it, George? I don’t suppose your father could help build a dovecote?”
“The old man? Are you kidding? He’d nail himself through his palms. God, though, Sandy, I like the idea of slipping past the censors. Half the time I think my phone’s tapped and somebody certainly reads my mail. I wouldn’t put it past my sister to have hired a private investigator. She’s convinced I’ll get my father to change his will. She’d like to have me put away—for good!”
“Are you going to?”
“What?”
“Have him rewrite his will?”
Georgina looks shocked. “Sandy, no! That would make me just like her! There’s nothing wrong with his will: It’s split fifty-fifty between us. Besides, the admiral would be cross. He doesn’t like that sort of thing. He’s a truly moral man, Sandy.”
I don’t want to get off on the subject of the admiral, her admiration for him, her worry about his new sea duties chasing Japanese submarines. The plans they are discussing for the future. He’s too old for her: It isn’t right. I remind myself that Georgina deserves to be loved and that I’m not available, at the moment, to be more than a friend, but it doesn’t help.
“So, will you do it? Get your own pigeons, build a dovecot.”
“You bet,” she says. She winks.
“You have to keep it secret.”
“Of course I will, Sandy,” she says. She pats my hand.
I worry about Georgina. Although things are going better for her, it is clear to me that her grief over the death of her son, Brentwood, continues to be corrosive; it has undermined her skin so that you can see right through it to the veins below; it has thinned her bone structure—she looks like she’d fall over in a puff of wind—and it has, I fear, damaged her spirit. Her eyes, when she lets me meet them, still show shock. She no longer bothers much with her dress. She wears trousers instead of fashionable suits, although she can still look smart when she wants to. It hurts me when I think about Georgina and all the trouble in her life. With the admiral absent—much as I dislike the way he’s taken over, he does look after her—I’m afraid she’ll start drinking again. And then what? Would the sister and the medical men move in? I don’t want anything bad to happen to her.
“Someone will have to know what you’re doing. You can’t build the lofts by yourself.”
“I have a carpenter in mind,” she says. Her dark blue-gardenia eyes sparkle. I think of the very first time I saw her, onboard the ferry. How beautiful she looked then. For the very first time I realize that the name of the ferry is the same as her son’s! Both Brentwood! This only adds another layer of meaning to our meeting. “It’s ri
ght up his alley,” she continues. “Just don’t ask me who it is.”
Can it be who I think it is? Kosho in hiding? I know better than to ask.
From what I can tell from my reading, with the right breed and the right feed, pigeons are easy to train. Once they’re six weeks old or so, they leave the nest to practise flight. You just show them how to use a trapdoor entrance and start releasing them short distances from the loft. They quickly get the idea and can be taken farther and farther afield until you can exchange them with those to whom you want to send messages.
In the paper I draw up for Dr. Frank, I give particulars of all the projects we’ve considered but suggest that we start with the squab and homing pigeons first. For practical reasons, of course. The pigeons can fly up to forty miles. If the Japs arrive and shut down the phones and telegraph offices, this resource will be invaluable. The military will only thank us.
After his first quick perusal of my paper, Dr. Frank says, “Don’t you think our generals have already thought of this, Sandy? Have you checked to see what they’re already doing with carrier pigeons?”
His comments remind me of his initial objections to my project concerning Alan Macaulay. In that case, with persistence, he came to see reason.
“If they have, sir, they’ll be thinking of communications between bases; they won’t have a civilian backup. With the kind of operation you run here, sir, we could be completely undetected by the Japanese.”
“Hmmm,” he says. He has his back to me. He fiddles with the objects on the insulin tray.
“We’ll start with squab. We can begin selling these within a few months. Once we have our markets we can think about pigeon training. Depending on how that goes, we can then add in the pheasant and ducks.” That’s me, Sandy Grey, giving Dr. Frank his instructions.
—
Stage one: Build a suitable loft. We won’t need much space, but there must be an indoor and outdoor area. The outdoor area must be caged in with wire. Set up roosts inside, with nest boxes, provide nesting materials of hay and straw. Order grains and pellets. Set up records and banding procedures. Order breeding stock. Initiate inquiries as to interest from restaurants and the officers’ messes, army, navy and air force. Contact local butchers and game suppliers.
At the same time I lay the groundwork for ducklings and pheasant. There are similarities in the requirements of each—secure sheltered space, adequate light and food and clean water—but it’s clear to me that eventually I’ll need an assistant. All things are possible, but all things are not possible by oneself. The trouble is, who should I ask for?
I want to request Karl or Winchell but I don’t dare. Dr. Frank’s jurisdiction over the East Wing is limited, and I’ve lost touch with Dr. Love. Where can he be? It won’t matter to Dr. Frank—not the way it does to me—that securing their release might save their lives. Dr. Frank believes they belong there. Karl, even in the state he’s in, might be capable of directed labour. He couldn’t be worse than the “bullocks” who do nothing unless they’re told. There’s nothing wrong with Winchell other than tuberculosis—at least there wasn’t when last I saw him, and not now if he’s indeed the one sending messages through Deceased Property. But I know better than to open up a subject when I’m not sure of the outcome. Bob, if he were still here, would have been perfect. Bob’s another subject not to mention.
“One thing at a time, Sandy,” Dr. Frank says when he comes to check on the loft building progress and I tell him I’m going to need help. “Don’t try to go too fast. Take it easy. Prove this will work. Show what you can do with the squab, and if that’s successful, we’ll move on. We’ve plenty of time. The main thing is the new dairy farm.” He looks over his shoulder to where Ron Signet and his boys are waiting to take him through their operation.
“Righty-oh, sir.” For a second I feel downcast—where’s the enthusiasm my work deserves? It’s abundantly clear it’s not high priority for Dr. Frank. How I miss Kosho! He would understand the potential and pitch right in. We’d have quick results. Still, it’s those who work behind the scenes who often achieve the most. The important thing is that Dr. Frank, acting director, has signed the necessary documents. Squab and homing pigeons and then ducklings and pheasant.
“You’re a devious man, Sandy,” Georgina says to me when I outline the whole of my plans to her later. She sits in our warm kitchen, her shoes off, her feet up on a chair. There’s a hole in the toe of one of her socks—men’s socks. Her father’s? The admiral’s? Or old ones of Brentwood or even her husband? I get up and take a fresh batch of cookies from the oven. Georgina has given me her ration of sugar.
“Don’t forget we’re at war, George,” I say. “We have to be cunning to survive.”
As an enterprise, the management of living creatures requires wholehearted commitment. Once the breeding pairs arrive I’ve little time for anything else. The boxes in Deceased Property pile up. I worry about it until Ron claps me on the shoulder and says, “No hurry there, Sandy! Nobody’s punching that particular time clock! Ha ha.” He loves being in charge of the dairy. He’s king of the cows. I don’t begrudge it to him. He would have made a fine farmer.
I have five pairs of mated breeders. These pairs, so I’m told, generally bond for life. I’ve banded them with the same colour leg bands and given them the same number. When the hatchlings come, they’ll be banded and colour-coded too so we can keep track of our results. Each pair has selected a nest and three of the females have already laid their eggs—two white eggs each, about one and a half inches in length. The males and females take turns in sitting. I have two weeks before the first set hatch.
Tonight I’m finished early: all’s well in the loft. The door is shut and the wire netting of the enclosure is pegged down and secure. The others are quiet in their rooms in the farmhouse, doing whatever they do after dark. Ron sits in the kitchen downstairs and listens to war news on the radio. I adjust the objects on my desk, set out some fresh paper, check the nibs of my pens, smile at Bob’s postcard—and settle my feet on the box containing Winchell’s tools and guns.
With the window open I can smell the sweet smells of early summer. The warm, damp weather brings out the richness of the earth, the fertile loam threaded with worms, the hay and vetch crops showing well: On the old part of the farm, they’re already harvesting vegetables. In the asylum garden, roses wind through hedges and over trellises: The heady scent of jasmine heats the air. If I didn’t know better, I’d say Bob was back on the job! As if summoned, the throb of a Harley engine sounds from the road beyond the wall.
God’s in His heaven. All’s right with the world.
I turn to my writing and go over the progress I’ve made so far with Karl’s The Romance of Stanley Park. Precious little, it seems. What with being so busy, I’m no closer to understanding how to approach the subject, and am certainly far from the source of inspiration that served me so well with Alan Macaulay. With Alan, I suppose, somehow, I was writing what I knew. An injustice had been done: It was up to me to rectify it. The case for Alan Macaulay’s pardon is, indeed, Dr. Frank informs me, making its way through the bureaucracy: There’s cause for hope. Where Karl is concerned, on the other hand, I have no real expectation of a result: only a sense of duty, a desire to reclaim a remnant from the wreckage of Karl’s life to present to his parents after the war. Karl’s subject matter was a story of a tragic marriage—a state of which I’ve no experience. The wife in the story could not have children and the husband rejected her. The husband refused to adopt a child. Since he behaved in a cruel and unfeeling manner towards his wife and would have done so, doubtless, to any children in his care, it seems to me this was fortunate. Their failure to have children was a blessing. But this kind of attitude is anathema to romance. Perhaps I’m just not the right person for it?
The trouble also is that I don’t know what Karl planned. Were the parents to stay together? What role, if any, did Stanley Park occupy in the story, or was the title merely a device to indicate
setting? What elements of Karl’s own life were to play a part? Was the story he told me about freeing the birds to be an element? I only have questions now and no means to ask them. Karl’s been taken from us, he’s deep inside what remains of his thoughts and feelings, whatever elements of his brain he’s been able to protect from the barbs and jolts of electricity.
I put my head in my hands. There must be an answer!
What else? I try to relax and think.
I lift my head. I reach for The Storehouse of Thought and Expression and flip through. “Story writers should keep in mind that the opening situation should show that trouble may follow. The incident that starts the trouble should be unmistakeably the whistle of the referee, Fate.”
This strikes a chord.
Once more I open the pages at random. A sentence jumps out: “When all else fails, change your point of view.”
I sit back and close my eyes. I let the advice resound through the caverns of my being. Some door opens on a beginning. Writing on a wall. Chinese characters. A face that belongs to someone. Not myself. I’m away.
A Tale: Not The Romance of Stanley Park
There’s no telling what can set things off. You step out, for instance, from your uncle’s shop on a Vancouver street. The weather is brilliant, the sun showers its coins over your hands and arms; when you see a woman, she, too, is sprinkled with gold: Of course you follow her. You could have chosen not to: You could have turned your back on the summer’s day and remained indoors. You are only eighteen.
The woman is young, like yourself, but she is no one in particular. It’s just the hat she wears, its glitter of feathers—a hand’s width of blue iridescence sewn onto black velvet. You feel it in your throat like a drink.
You’re new at this: You’ve only just come from China. You could have stayed at home and lived with your mother. She wanted you to: She took you out, the day before you left, for one last walk along the estuary and pointed out the birds—as if you didn’t know them, as if this could have any effect on your desire to go. The green valleys and great rivers of your province were not going to be left behind: They had entered into you.
What It Takes to Be Human Page 24