They were back on the river before the mists had completely cleared, anxious to see what was ahead.
“Whoa!” Cyril said it. Malcolm silently echoed it.
They had just come into view of the bend that Malcolm had talked about. They were both looking at a raw and scarred landscape that looked like a big treeless river gorge. The few trees that were visible on the slopes of it looked like they had been tossed or trampled into those locations. Many had their roots exposed.
“We’ll have to look this over,” Malcolm said, and shouted, “Pull! Pull hard!” as he veered them across the river to the far bank, to the lowest and safest side of what had obviously been a landslide, and the cause of the river’s obstruction.
There was a gravel bar to land on, and a place to which they could carry their canoe, so that it would be well above the fluctuating water. Beyond that, there was a lot of loose gravel that looked like it had recently been dumped there by a giant shovel.
“Whoa! It looks like a big beaver dam made of gravel,” Cyril commented, once they had climbed to the top of the obstruction.
“One with a big hole through it,” Malcolm added, pointing to the low spot, where the water had finally breached its barrier and gouged out a new channel.
Cyril continued to look around. Finally he said, “Jack would sure have liked to see this. From the looks of things, the whole valley up there must have been flooded. Is that where Hinton is?”
Malcolm nodded and looked over to the hillside beyond the river. It hadn’t looked all that high or formidable as he remembered it, but he could imagine the landslide when the hill finally gave way, sliding down and across the Athabasca. He remembered the hat they now carried with them, and wondered if Harley had been a victim in this battle with nature.
“Dad? We can’t go up through there, can we?” Cyril was looking at the wild new channel.
Malcolm shook his head. “Maybe in some future year. But now, we portage.”
“Maybe on the way back?”
“Not with a full canoe,” was the simple and logical answer. “Not even if the channel was clear and straight. We can’t see everything from up here.”
It took them until almost noon to portage themselves across the landslide to a safe place to put in, above the gorge that the gravel had created. Malcolm handled the canoe, while Cyril picked the easiest way with their gear. From up above, Malcolm had decided on the point of entry from which they would be able to launch and paddle safely. He marked the spot with a poplar sapling he’d cut down with his ax.
“I can hear the river getting sucked through that gorge,” Cyril said as they loaded up. “It doesn’t sound like it would be very safe.”
“No. It’s created a big drop,” Malcolm admitted. “It will be interesting to see what it does next spring during break-up.”
They finished off the remainder of their cold beans, and then pushed hard for the rest of the day. When they finally stopped, Cyril understood why. Malcolm knew where they were, or rather, where Hinton was. It wasn’t long after they had set up their campsite on the western shore of the river that a noise in the distance triggered a memory from Cyril’s long-ago childhood.
“That’s a train, isn’t it?” he asked. The evening stillness and a westerly wind had carried the sound of a wheezing and clattering train down to them.
Malcolm nodded. “Hinton tomorrow. And then back here tomorrow night.”
Cyril was up first in the morning. In fact, he’d been up a couple of times during the night. The distant noises from somewhere upriver had challenged his imagination and probably colored his dreams. He tried to remember the pictures that might have gone with those sounds. Going into Hinton was like going back into his memory, while at the same time generating ideas for the future.
“Don’t get your hopes up,” Malcolm warned. They sipped their tea and ate some beans, while waiting for the daylight that seemed not to be in a hurry that morning.
Finally, the town appeared, as Cyril pulled the canoe forward faster than on any previous day. Hinton appeared as a big scabby wound in the landscape of bush all around it. The Athabasca River passed below it. The manmade arteries of the railway, and what must have been a road to somewhere, passed through it. The latter became visible when billows of dust seemed to push a large truck along it.
It took Malcolm a little while after they landed to get his bearings and point out the school and a church.
“And that’s the general store,” he said, jabbing a finger toward a big building made with real boards and with big windows. “That’s where I can sell my furs in the spring and pick up new supplies.”
They’d walked up into the center of things, all very new and intriguing. But Cyril wasn’t paying much attention. What he was really interested in was the railway, and maybe seeing a train up close.
Malcolm saw him looking and knew what was on his mind. He pointed a little farther up the hill and said, “I’ll be in the general store doing some business. You come looking for me there once a train’s passed through.”
“Which way will it be going?” Cyril asked.
“It could be either way. They pass about every two hours in either direction on regular days.”
“We haven’t heard one for a while, have we?” Cyril looked excited.
“No. There should be one soon. The man at the station will know. It’s the red building beside the tracks.” Malcolm smiled. He’d hardly gotten the last word out before Cyril started running. “Don’t forget! The general store!” Malcolm yelled after him.
Cyril found the train station and didn’t have long to wait. He jumped back from the platform, as a long freight train passed by on its way to Jasper and the mountain pass beyond. He wondered if he should cover his ears, as the train’s wheels screeched their way along the steel rails. He noticed some other boys there, too. They were looking at him. Cyril decided just to let the noise wash over him, as the train passed and then faded into the distance. He wondered about talking to those boys but decided against it. He wasn’t sure just how to go about that sort of thing, anyway.
It would be easy to get distracted in a loud and busy place like Hinton, with its important railway. But his dad had given him orders, and he would know when the train had passed through.
The man in the store recognized Malcolm. He was a regular, if not frequent, customer. He was also not too hard to please.
Unlike in the spring, when he brought in his furs for the agent, there was no haggling this time. Neither was there a long list in Rose’s meticulous script. This time the list was in Malcolm’s head. He had fifty dollars to spend on it. A ten-gauge rip saw was first on that list, followed by a small keg of nails and coils of oakum. And, if there was still money left, he had a few other things in mind.
By then, Malcolm noticed Cyril looking in through the windows, and nodded for him to come in. As he did so, Malcolm realized just how long and far away Cyril had been from any of this. He watched his son’s eyes roam over the shelves and boxes on either side of the store’s center aisle, and then look up at all the things that hung on the walls above. Finally, his eyes settled on the glass in front of the counter, behind which were the real treasures of the place.
“We’ll set our things by the door and come back after lunch to pick them up,” Malcolm told Cyril. He’d arranged things with the storekeeper.
Cyril was still wide-eyed and slack-jawed, as he followed his dad out into the street. His eyes squinted at the brightness of the summer sun. They widened again as they went into a place under a swinging sign that said, “eat,” and continued that way, as they worked their way through a meal of stew, served by a lady in a uniform dress, who wondered what kind of pie they would like to go with their meal.
Cyril could happily have waited for another train, or tried to memorize all the things that seemed to be available in the wealth of the general store, but he kn
ew better than to ask. On that day, with what he had already seen, he knew he would have weeks of stories to share back home. And probably more than a few questions to ask his dad, once they got back to the quiet of where they’d camped the night before. He certainly did not complain about carrying the keg of nails and other things back down to the canoe. It was a small price to pay for such a good day.
“Why did we move out to where we live?” Cyril asked later that evening. They’d had a couple of goldeye they’d caught for their supper; beans were cooking for the next day; and tea was helping to make the evening go by, as they sat in the glow of their fire. Cyril had heard answers to those questions over the years. Things about mines closing and a Depression. But obviously Hinton and the people living there seemed to be doing all right and, according to Cyril’s appraisal, living in luxury. There was everything and more in the general store alone.
“It seemed like a logical thing at the time,” Malcolm said. “And you know the reasons behind it.”
“I know what you told us,” Cyril said, “but things change, don’t they?”
Malcolm waited for a long time. Maybe because it had been an odd summer. First one boy, and now another, had challenged him. Finally he said, “Yes, things change. But usually not too much. Often the things that really need to change are people.” Then he abruptly asked, “How old are you?”
Cyril wondered about what his dad was saying. Or what he was really asking. “I think I’m almost fourteen,” he stammered.
“And have you changed very much since we moved out here?”
“I’ve gotten bigger,” Cyril stated, wondering. “Jack’s changed, I think. We’re not friends like we used to be. He treats me differently.” He looked over at his father, the man with the beard that was now grayer than it had ever been. “You’re not talking about me, are you,” he stated. He also knew he shouldn’t ask any more questions. Not about people.
They sat in silence for a while. The moon was rising, its light shimmering on the water of the Athabasca gliding by.
“Did you find out anything about the flood?” Cyril asked at last.
“They say it stopped the train. The water came up so high in Brûlé Lake that it almost reached to the tracks on the train bridge.”
They both turned in without any other formality, aside from tending to the fire. Cyril wondered what his dad had really been asking. Or what he was thinking. He’d never talked too much about anything before. Life seemed to get more confusing as you got older.
10
Rose was also thinking. Thinking about the expression, “man of the house.” She thought about it because of Jack. What did he know about being a man?
“Do you remember why we moved out here, Mom?” he’d asked. It was a question that everything from this summer brought to mind again. “Do you remember?” Jack asked again, when there was no immediate response.
They were out in the garden, weeding beans. Amelia was at the far end of the garden among the potato plants, looking for those pesky Colorado potato bugs again.
“Do you think the answer might have changed from before?” Rose asked by way of a reply.
“No. But I think that there might be more to it. Reasons that you might not have wanted to talk to us about when we were smaller.”
“Why do you say that?” Rose asked. Then, almost teasing, “Do you think you’ve changed all that much?” Then she wondered if she should have asked that.
“I’m not a boy anymore,” Jack said defensively. “I’m more like Dad than I am like Cyril, I think.”
“What makes you say that?” Rose asked, after thinking a bit. Thinking about whether she and her big son might be heading into things she was afraid of, and wasn’t quite prepared for.
“Dad and I talked on the river. Maybe because of my broken arm. Maybe because we just had to sit and wait until things settled down after the flood.”
Jack hesitated. “I think Dad knew that I was older, more like a man. He sort of talked to me like a man. At least, he talked more and ordered me less.” Then, as if he was still sorting things out, “Does that make sense?”
“Yes, I think so. I’m glad you were able to talk. I was wondering what might happen when he found you.” Finding the boys before in some of their misadventures had seldom involved talking. Malcolm had just set things straight with his belt. It was quick and sometimes necessary. And yet, it solved or answered very little.
“Do you and Dad talk very much?”
Rose wanted to say, or almost scream, “No! That’s why we’re out here in this wilderness!”
The question had caught her off guard. And maybe it actually proved that Jack was becoming more of a man. That he was seeing things more like an adult. But instead of answering, Rose brushed the hair back from her forehead and called for Amelia to fetch some water.
“We’re done this row,” Rose told Jack. “Let’s just straighten up for a bit and take a break.” She made an exaggerated show of relieving the strain on her back.
“There’s lots of bugs,” Amelia informed them as she brought the water. “Maybe Jack should help me instead of you.”
“No, let’s see who’s finished first,” Rose countered. “Then maybe we’ll all help each other.”
The two scarecrows flapped away in the afternoon breeze, and watched the three of them get back to their tasks.
“I remember hearing you and Dad talk a long time ago, when we first got here,” Jack said, as he started on another row of beans. “I think you always waited until we were asleep. But sometimes I woke up.”
Rose said, “Oh?” in a questioning kind of tone, wondering if Jack might say more.
“I guess I woke up sometimes because it was loud. It sounded like Cyril and me arguing, sometimes,” Jack added. “I think I heard you crying sometimes, too.”
Rose tried to smile. “Just because you become an adult, or get married, doesn’t mean you stop . . . ” Rose wondered what to say next. Finally she said, “Well, older people sometimes need to argue and fight, too. Sometimes we get frustrated.”
“Is that why there’s war?”
“Maybe. But in a bigger and louder kind of way. And between countries. Like in history. And sometimes for years at a time.”
“That’s what Dad said. They all thought they were going for a few weeks. But it took years before they got back.” Jack looked over at his mom. “Did you and Dad know each other before the war?”
Rose laughed. “I knew about him. But he seemed to be a lot older. I was still a girl, I think.” She was happy for the heat of the afternoon sun to camouflage the redness in her cheeks, as she remembered those days.
Finally, at the end of another row, she said, “We got married, thinking it would change things and bring back the way we were before the war.”
“But the war had changed you, too, hadn’t it?” Jack said.
The afternoon ended without all of the potato bugs being picked off the potato plants and squished into the ground by Amelia’s angry foot. Neither had all the rows of beans been weeded. It would all be waiting again the next day, like always. Only the bugs got diminished some more, as Jack and Amelia both waged war on them, while Rose went in to cook supper for the three of them. Rose imagined that her conversation with Jack wasn’t finished. He was becoming a man in more ways than one. It was only with Amelia and the potato bugs that he could still be a boy, for a while.
Amelia was asleep in bed, while Jack and his mom sipped on some tea in the glow of the coal oil lamp. The occasional flash of lightning and the rumble of thunder, as a storm curled up into the distant mountains, reminded Jack of his experience with his father during the flood.
“Did Dad tell you how I broke my arm?” he asked.
“Not any more than what you did. Something about the canoe tipping in some rapids. Why?” Rose sensed that Jack was talking about more than just his a
rm.
“I think his finding me that day reminded him of something in the war. Dad mentioned someone called Billy.”
Rose nodded. It was a name she had heard before, during the nightmares, when the demons of war bubbled to the surface. Sometimes all too often. They were dreams that haunted, and soon began to interrupt more than their sleep.
“I think there was a Billy who died in the war,” Rose said at last. “I heard the name. But when I asked him about it, your dad said I wouldn’t understand.”
“I think I reminded him of that Billy,” Jack said quietly. “I heard him dreaming one night after he found me.”
“And he told you about it?” Rose asked.
“He just said he was glad I didn’t die like Billy. I don’t think you can die of a broken arm, though, can you?” He laughed nervously and, just for good measure, waved his arm to prove that he really was all right.
“So, what really happened on the river?” Rose asked. “You know, with the flood and all?”
“Well, we both got wet, and the big canoe got washed away.” Jack looked pensive, as if he was trying to remember. Then he said, “It’s hard to explain. I guess you had to be there.”
Rose screamed inwardly. Jack had become like his father! Her boy had told her she wouldn’t understand.
After a while, a distant flash and rumble brought Rose back to the reality of where they were. She put down her cup, still half-full of tea, looked over at Jack, and said, “I guess you grew a lot older out on that river, didn’t you?”
“Dad said the boys who went to war came home as men.”
“If they came home at all,” Rose added quietly. She didn’t say that those who went away to war usually came home broken and bruised, if they came home at all. “And for some, the wounds never healed,” she said, almost in a whisper.
11
Cyril was the first one up the hill and over to the house when he and his dad arrived back from Hinton.
“It’s Harley!” he proclaimed. “It’s a cat!”
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