The Haweaters

by Vanessa Farnsworth

  Even so, her drunkard of a husband retains control, at least for the present. “Not about purpose. About knowing if the gun is still here and the only reason that could be is because the money that was owing has been paid. So say the truth before this goes any further.”

  “Money’s still owing. Gun is gone. I know the difference between the truth and a lie.”

  Charlie brings to mind a pot on the boil. His momma senses the need to bring forth some action to disperse the heat or all will surely be lost. So she turns, abruptly, intending to effect the necessary change when she discovers the blood-red eyes of her miscreant husband trained on her person with a look such as causes her soul to clench. Never does she want to be the object of that man’s attention when the whiskey flows freely in his veins.

  Eleanor gathers up the peas in her apron and sets a course for the wood stove, which, as the Lord so dictates, takes her away from Bill. It’s a start, but then Charlie goes and speaks, causing his momma to fear her spell of inaction has surely cost them the day. “Amer and Boyd and all the rest of them may think having no money makes me lower than them, but I’ll own the patent on this land one day. They’ll have no choice but to face me as their equal then. Not one of them will think of cheating me when that day comes.”

  Eleanor is dismayed that any son of hers could possibly think that which Charlie has just now voiced. It’s his nature, she supposes, to believe such things as that, but it’s the most dreadful of follies for this boy to entertain the notion that his destiny will be anything more than a labourer in someone else’s fields, assuming it’s so much as that. His temper has given all, save his eldest brother, an aversion to taking him on and even his own flesh and blood hesitates, saying maybe the year to come or the one after that, by which time this homestead will surely be in the hands of another and the four who remain will be a far sight worse than destitute.

  Eleanor again finds herself at the stove though she cannot now remember why. Her mind is agitated in the worst possible way. The truth is, she can’t stand so much as the thought of this wretched place. Never – not once in her life – have the pangs of isolation pursued her as mercilessly as they do on this island chock full of interminable forests and impassable roads and godless neighbours. In all her years, Eleanor has never known the like of it and she wishes she knew not the like of it now. At least in Erin her family was near and every fortnight brought about a church social at which she could gossip and sing and tell silly jokes. There was even a general store brimming with goods the likes of which she could ill afford to possess but sometimes, when her spirit was at its ebb, the proprietor would gift her a sweet on account of all the good she was doing for the community.

  What does she have to bring her joy here? Not a thing worth counting. No, what she has here is a dress made from flour sacks, one pot for all her cooking, forks carved from wood and cups fashioned from tin cans, a leaky roof, a dirt floor, a worthless drunkard for a husband, an ungrateful brute for a son, and a dear boy she’s trying desperately to save from the corruption of his poppa.

  Eleanor casts her eyes on Arthur, who is just now picking at the oat sack that appears as frazzled as his precious nerves. To see the sweet boy as clearly as need be, his momma must raise her hand against the sun that is just now streaming through the poorly chinked walls.

  This is all too much.

  Eleanor once again turns from the stove with purpose and once again she finds herself caught in Bill’s glare, only this time his feet are beneath him and his fingers are balled into fists. She braces for the blow that is surely to come. “Been hearing tales about Amer sneaking over here when I’m not around. What do you have to say about that?”

  That was surely not the blow she was expecting. Eleanor reclaims her wits. “I’m not rightly sure what foolishness is agitating your mind, husband, but it’s rare for you to be elsewhere, so far as I’m aware. If you were as frequently absent as your words just now suggest, the chores that daily render me exhausted would surely be lessened by far.”

  “Don’t be daft, woman. Plenty of times I’m not here. Spent just this afternoon over at Sloan’s. Spent most of last winter in the logging camps. Same was true the winter before. You recall things differently?”

  Always this. “I recall them same as you, but unlike you I recall separately that George Amer takes to Owen Sound for the winters, so any thought you have of his setting foot on this homestead while your person is elsewhere is most assuredly false. You know I’m speaking true, for any man who spends his winters not on this island is surely not to be found in our own home.”

  Bill’s face brightens, as is its nature when his mind fills with thoughts of the most grievous kind. Arthur stops fiddling with the oat sack and, in his quiet way, fits his body under the table where his staggering poppa can not easily get at him.

  “Who said anything about Amer being in our home? Didn’t say nothing like that. Only suggested he’d been on our land. It’s your own guilty mind that’s blurted out that nugget of truth. You might as well say the rest.”

  But Eleanor sees sense in not saying a blessed thing while a chance still exists for her to save Arthur from the drunkard before her now. “I’ve got nothing to say when you have evil on your mind and I’ve got no guilty conscience on account of my not having done anything that would be the cause of it. Let’s remind ourselves that I’m not the one breaking commandments like they have no value in God’s eyes.”

  Eleanor can no longer countenance her husband. She steps urgently towards the door with the hope of saving her bones from a thrashing by hiding amongst the trees until her brute of a husband either sobers up or passes out, she’ll not burden herself with a preference as to which.

  But Bill is not to be denied.

  He lunges forward, catching Eleanor by the arm. She makes the sincerest of efforts to pull away but, drunk though the heathen most assuredly is, her husband remains possessed of a cast-iron grip. “Don’t speak wise to me, woman. Whole neighbourhood knows what goes on around here when my back is turned. Think people don’t see Amer creeping over here? They see sure enough. And once they’ve had a good laugh, the truth finds its way to me.”

  Charlie now shows himself for the miscreant he is by blocking his momma from the door and, by extension, the bush that lies beyond. She can but wonder at the foolishness of a boy who fancies himself the hero of his own adventure story and yet moves against his momma to win the favour of his poppa. A boy who doesn’t protect his momma against harm in all its forms is a boy who’ll spend an eternity burning in hell. Eleanor taught Charlie as much. She taught all her sons as much and they’d all learned the lesson save for this one here.

  Charlie, however, is not her main problem. “Exactly who around here do you imagine can see who comes and goes from our door, husband? We live in the bush, in case you need reminding. The only ones with the kind of view you’re suggesting is Porter himself and when have you ever taken what he says on its face?”

  “Since he started speaking true.”

  Eleanor cannot but narrow her eyes. “Since he started saying what you wanted to hear, that is. You ignorant fool. You’re always looking for a way to justify your own brutish behaviour and now you’re trying to convince you and me both that you’ve just now finally got one. Well, have it your way. Let us together hope that throttling me will finally make a man out of you.”

  Bill grabs Eleanor by the neck. She tears at his fingers but there’s naught she can do. Blackness starts filling her eyes and her body tingles, then numbs. By the time Bill shouts over his shoulder to his youngest, his voice seems as distant as a foghorn on some far away shore. “What do you say, boy? You ever known Mr. Amer to be alone in this house with your momma?”

  Arthur freezes like a deer in the path of a hunting wolf and looks desperately to his momma before shaking his tiny head. Bill takes the sweet boy’s hesitation as proof he knows more than he’s saying which, admi
ttedly, he does. “Thought as much.”

  Bill shoves Eleanor backwards. She collides with Charlie, who deflects her into the wall. As Eleanor drops to her knees, Bill yanks her back up all the while barking orders to Charlie. “Move the oxen to the back pasture and hobble them. Don’t need them wandering over to Sloan’s place tonight. Gets hard to claim their waywardness is an accident when it happens near every evening.”

  Charlie neither speaks nor hesitates. He yanks open the door and rushes out into the late afternoon sun, looking back not once. Damn the fool. If he thinks chopping wood for his momma tomorrow will set right the treachery of this day, he’s got another thing coming. But not until tomorrow.

  Bill reaches for the strap, while Eleanor frantically flicks her eyes around the room in search of Arthur. The sweet boy is under the table yet, demonstrating the sense the Good Lord gave him by brandishing a crate as a shield against his festering poppa. Eleanor prays it will be enough. It’s the only thing she can reasonably do now that Bill has started to swing.

  6

  NO TRUER TRUTH

  George nods slowly. “Again.”

  Laban plunges the cleaning rod down the gun’s barrel, then measures out the black powder with shaking hands. He pours the powder into the barrel, taps the revolver against his palm, then tamps down the ball and affixes the cap. George is impressed. Proud even. The boy’s hands may have been shaking like an aspen in a windstorm, but he got the job done and George has to admit he couldn’t have loaded the gun any faster. Not that he tells Laban this. Praise leads to weakness and his son is already disturbingly prone in that direction. Unlike his daughter.

  George turns towards Annie, who’s staring down her sheet music. He doesn’t blame her. His daughter is far too spirited a girl to be lolling about at a melodeon. Hand her an axe or a hammer or even a sharp stick and she’ll be entertained for hours. But a melodeon? George doesn’t know what his wife is thinking. Does Annie really strike Anne as debutante material? Girl’s got gifts beyond sipping tea and plaiting her hair. That much is obvious to anyone not caught up in what the neighbours think.

  Alas, he’ll catch hellfire if he interferes with Anne’s attempts to mould their daughter into a marriageable young woman. So George snatches the gun from his son’s fumbling hands and places it in the upper drawer of the sideboard alongside his truncheon and handcuffs, all relics from his days as a constable in Owen Sound. He half-turns. “Fetch the butter up from down the creek. Make it quick. The evening meal isn’t long for the table.”

  “Yes, Father.” Laban looks relieved as he slinks towards the front door. It’s a short trip down to the creek where Ellen stores crocks of food to keep them from spoiling on these hot summer days. That’s where the butter is. Fresh. Cool. Bursting with flavour. George’s mouth waters just thinking about it. He needs a distraction.

  George turns to his wife. She’s perched at her writing desk, rereading last week’s correspondence. Stubbornly. Pointedly. As if the illness up at Boyer’s is somehow his fault. Classic. At least she’s found something in her letters to make her grin. “What’s amusing you so?”

  Anne looks up and sighs. “Emma Harrison is relating her adventures up at Indian Falls this May past. She says so much water was rushing over the cliff she was hard of hearing for two full days afterwards. Can you believe a thing like that?”

  Can anyone? “No.”

  Anne purses her lips. “Well, dear, if she says it’s so, it most likely is. There is no reason for her to waste ink on a lie when there’s plenty of other adventures she could be telling me about.”

  George can think of several, all of them dull. He strides over to the sofa and begins unlacing his boots. “Don’t you think it’s odd that we’ve been up at those falls plenty of times and there isn’t a single occasion when the water was so loud we couldn’t later hear the other?”

  George yanks off his left boot and inspects it. A bit of crease near the big toe and a scuff behind the heel. That’s to be expected. Overall these new boots are standing up well to the work-filled days. George won’t have to bust that shopkeeper upside the head after all. Or have someone do it for him. That’s good news. And confirmatory. Buy quality goods and they last you a lifetime. There’s a few around here who could stand to learn that lesson.

  Anne puts down her letter. “My word, you’re cynical. You asked what gave me a smile and I told you. There’s nothing for you to comment on. A woman’s words to another woman don’t require a man’s insights. I dare say you wouldn’t want me adding my two cents to the nonsense you men say to one another.”

  Got that right. George wrenches off his right boot, inspects it and, finding nothing to complain about, sets it down next to its companion. He steels his resolve. As annoying as Emma Harrison can be, George has to admit she does have her uses. “Mrs. Harrison have anything to say that might interest me?”

  Anne understands what he’s getting at. Owen Sound has never been short on gossip, and much of what continues to swirl through parlours pertains to kickbacks and counterfeiting and the abrupt arrival of the government men. As if what goes on in Owen Sound is any worse than what goes on in any other town. When you get right down to it, what had George done that was so wrong? Took a few dollars to look the other way when money was being minted against the government’s interests. Not like he was the one doing the minting. Not even like he knew for certain who was. Received good money not to know those things. Money he made damn sure came from the official mint in Ottawa.

  “Has Mrs. Harrison ever said anything that interests you, dear?”

  George leans back and shrugs. “Not so’s I recall, but there’s a first time for everything.”

  Ellen trudges in from the kitchen with a serving dish of fried potatoes in one hand and a basket of freshly sliced bread in the other. She places both in the centre of the table alongside the steamed spinach and caramelized onions that are already there. Anne waits until Ellen exits to continue.

  “Well, my love, maybe this will be of interest you.” His wife squints as if the passage she’s about to read is written in tinier script than the rest of the letter. “Mrs. Harrison says right here that Mr. Little has written something in the Advertiser about that land assessor – what was his name? – Mr. Black or was it Brown? Anyway, seems he’s been accused of showing around official papers that should’ve been kept confidential.”

  Several sheets of music cascade to the floor. Annie initially pretends they’ve fallen by accident, but quickly drops the facade when George stamps his foot. She hastily sweeps up the fallen sheets and returns to the melodeon.

  An irritated George turns back to his wife. “I’d have thought Mrs. Harrison would mention the assessor’s name in her letter. I’m a bit surprised she didn’t.”

  Assuming she noted anything even remotely relating to the assessor. George has his doubts. He could demand to see the missive so that he can verify what his wife is telling him, but that would spark a war and he’s not in the mood for doing battle with his wife this late in the day. Instead he notes this is the second time today his wife has challenged him on the same matter. “You’re in a funny mood today.”

  Anne drops the letter to her lap. “No funnier than most, my love.”

  “Something the matter I should know about?”

  “You mean aside from the local women not accepting me into their affections?”

  Walked straight into that one. “Just takes time.”

  Ellen is back and this time she’s carrying a plate of hot meat and the crock of butter he’d sent Laban to fetch. George looks to the kitchen door, but no, Laban isn’t following. Where in God’s name is that dawdling boy? Nothing complicated about walking to the creek and back. Even a simpleton could do it and Laban is slightly above that. Or maybe he isn’t. Did George really need to specify that Laban return to his father’s presence along with the crock? Had he sent Annie on the same errand, she
’d have bounced back here in minutes and she’s six years the younger of the two.

  Ellen’s signal cuts short George’s internal rant. He allows his wife to herd him into the dining room along with their daughter. Not that this lessens Anne’s griping. “How much time? It’s been nearly three years during which I’ve invited them for tea every chance I get. I’ve also hosted quilting bees and socials and for every one I supply more food than the entire island could possibly eat and none of it makes a stitch of difference.” Anne gives the table a sound rap. “I even brought a fresh-baked pie to Eleanor Bryan the other day and you know what that wretched woman said to me?”

  How could he possibly? George shakes his head as he pulls out his wife’s chair and beckons her to sit.

  “She said, ‘Best not pass your servant’s baking off as your own.’ She wouldn’t look at the pie let alone accept it. Instead she sent me on my way with some comment about Annie being more trouble than most mothers could bear. Can you believe that?”

  Yes. George has no difficulty whatsoever believing that his daughter could bring a mother to tears. Seen it many times himself. And, if she’s being truthful, his wife would have to admit she has no difficulty believing the same. George tucks his wife’s chair under her as she artfully arranges her skirt around her hips. “Best just let her be.”

  Laban stumbles into the room. George considers caning him right here and now over his tardiness and the insolence it implies. But he quickly decides that his wife’s mood is trouble enough for one meal. He’ll punish Laban later. When his wife is out of earshot. And eyeshot. And mouth-shot. Lord only knows when that will be.

  George motions Laban to his customary seat across from Annie and heads for his own place at the head of the table.

  Anne’s frustration continues to swell. “It’s excellent advice, my love, but you know I can’t do that. Have you seen what Mrs. Bryan wears? She only has the one dress and it’s fashioned from flour sacks, of all things, or at least it once was. Now it’s made mostly of patches and mends. I brought her some of my old clothes not three weeks past and she behaved as if it was beneath her to accept them. How does that make sense?”