Grandpère (15 page)

It isn’t news I want to hear. So many divorces now. I hoped for all my children to be able to raise their children in a two-parent home with parents who love each other. I know so many people who grew up in a home where the parents made it a battleground, and those people are invariably scarred deep. I believe that if people can’t be nice to each other, they shouldn’t be around each other. I cross my fingers and my hands in an ancient warding sign passed down to this modern age, a symbol for hope.

I have a hard time going to sleep, and I dream about the little baby bear lost and crying for his mother. In the dream the little bear turns into Aaron, and then I am sitting in a chair rocking him, and then he turns back into the little bear, jumps off my lap and runs out the door of the house and disappears. Then I’m looking for him in the bush, but he’s a big bear now, catching salmon in the river, and I’m sad that he’s forgotten he was a little boy. I wake up, still half in the dream. It’s just as real for a while as the room I’m lying in, till my amazement that I am awake and dreaming at the same time snaps the dreamland out of focus.

The weather has been nice, but a snowstorm is forecast for Sunday, so the kids decide they should leave on Saturday. We decide to have Easter dinner on Friday and spend the day cooking. The boys take the saws and go cut up firewood. When they come back, they say we don’t have to stack it like that, they can just cut it out of the pile, and I wonder what they’re talking about. Then I remember Grandpère’s pyre, and I look at him.

“Oh, I just did that last fall while I was puttering around,” he says. I look down to hide my smile. He isn’t about to admit to these guys what he was doing.

On Saturday morning they time their departure so they can take the girls to the bus stop. Eleven people are stuffed in the jeep. Good thing they have three rows of seats. As it is, three of the boys are sitting behind the back seat on top of the luggage. I hope they don’t get stopped on the way into town, but they are all laughing with the fun of it when they leave.

Suddenly the house is too quiet, and Grandpère and I go outside. Blue comes running up and runs toward the greenhouse in little short runs, whining in the back of his throat. I know he wants me to follow him. I do, and when we get to the greenhouse, I see Duke lying in the little hollow he always sleeps in by the south wall. Blue runs over and pushes him with his nose, continuing to make little whimpering sounds. He runs back to me and sits down. “Come here, old boy,” I say to Duke, patting my knees. He tries to get up but can’t, and I see why Blue is upset. Duke can pull up his front end, but no matter how he heaves, his back end won’t co-operate. I know what it is. I have read in the animal health journal about old dogs’ hips suddenly becoming paralyzed. There is no cure. My dog needs to be put out of his misery. Should I take him to the vet? I wonder.

By this time Grandpère catches up. He stands beside me to watch the struggling dog. “Need to shoot him,” he says.

“I can’t do it. Maybe I should take him to the vet.”

“It would be cruel to move him to the car, make him ride to town and take him in to the vet,” Grandpère replies. “Just bring me the twenty-two. I can do it.”

I go to the house, put Blue inside and get the twenty-two and Duke’s dog blanket. I find a clip, put three bullets in it and bring it to Grandpère. “Are you sure?” I ask him, knowing he hasn’t shot a gun for a few years now.

“This little gun, she don’t even kick. You just go away and get the bike and trailer.”

I get the bike and am hooking on the trailer when I hear the shot. Just one. Thank you, Grandpère.

“We’ll take him to the landing, where the wood is,” he says. I drop the tailgate on the bike trailer and drag Duke onto his blanket. Then I lift him into the trailer. He is lighter than I expect, and I keep patting his side. I curl him up in the trailer, then Grandpère gets on the bike with me and we make our way to the sawmill landing.

When we get there, Grandpère, who seems to have turned into the funeral director, tells me to start piling wood. There is a huge pile the boys have cut up, and while I pile up wood, he sits on a stump and whittles shaving strips into feathery shapes. “Stop,” he tells me after I have made a pile about six feet across and three feet high. “Let’s make a nest for him.”

He points out two boards and tells me to lean them on the pile, then tells me to back the trailer up to them. We drag the poor dead dog wrapped in his blanket onto the boards, then, with Grandpère pushing and me pulling, we drag the dog and the boards to the top of the pile.

“Go get some bones,” he tells me.

I drive back to the house and get a package of frozen bones out of the freezer. When I get back, Grandpère has built a little teepee out of wood over the dog. He puts the bones inside and tells me to keep piling wood. I add strips till the pile is as high as I can reach, then make it round like a cone. Grandpère takes his kindling strips and puts them around the pile in a circle, singing a little chant while he does it. He tells me to light every one of them, and I do. The fire catches right away, and in no time the whole pile is blazing. “Say goodbye, and come away now, Anzel,” Grandpère says.

I think of the years I had with Duke and what a good dog he was. Happy trails, old buddy, I say to him in my thoughts, bowing my head for a while. Then Grandpère touches my arm and motions me toward the bike. I nod, and we climb back on the bike and go to the house. Blue must know something is over, because he doesn’t want to go outside. He just sits at the table with his head on my lap while we eat.

After lunch Grandpère goes for a nap. I sit on the step, my arm around Blue, and watch the smoke curling in the air in the distance. I have a little cry for myself, and Blue snuggles closer and licks my face. “Pretty good, that old dog,” I say to him, and he seems to agree with me.

The next morning Grandpère gets a little wooden box that he has made and tells me we have to go back to the landing. When we get there, the pile is completely burned up. Grandpère takes his walking stick and stirs in the ashes till he finds some bones. “Pick up the bones and put them in the box,” he tells me, and each time he stirs one up, I add it to the box. There aren’t very many, just some big joint bones and part of the skull with the teeth still in. When he doesn’t find any more, we take the box to the shop and nail a top on it.

“Where do you want to put him?” he asks.

“Up at the lookout, I guess. That’s where the rest of them are.” The thought that he and Lorne will be together again pleases me.

“Just walk around till you find the right place and leave the whole box there.”

I take the box on the back of the bike to the top of the hill. I walk around the ridge, wondering where to leave it. I stand at the edge and spot a little shelf about six feet down. I can get right to it and suddenly I’m sure that’s where I want to leave him. I get the box from the bike and climb down to the shelf. It recesses more than it looked like from the top, and I’m able to tuck the box right into the face of the rock. I go back to the top and hunt around till I find a flat stone about the same size as the box, then take it down and lean it up against the box. It looks like part of the natural landscape, and I am pleased with the location. “Rest in peace, my friend,” I say to him, and I suddenly feel a lot better.

When I get back to the house, Grandpère lifts his eyebrows at me, and I nod to him. We don’t talk about the dog funeral or the resting place. But the old man has a gleam in his eye that tells me he just showed me how to do things his way.

Chapter Ten

Next week the weather turns balmy, so I phone Rose to ask if they’re ready to plant some starts.

She says, “Come on Wednesday.”

I talk Grandpère into coming with me. “You don’t have to go inside, just help me get the beds right.”

“Don’t let any of those husky nurses throw me in a chair and start wheeling me around,” he jokes.

“Just yell for help, and I’ll hit them on the head with my shovel,” I tell him.

We load up the car with plants and seeds. I have been taking flats of lettuce, Swiss chard, bok choy, broccoli, cabbage and cauliflower in and out of the house every day to harden them off, and now they’re quite ready to be planted out. I bring along the garden spades and the two blankets.

I love this time of year when everything is waking up. As I drive to town, the poplars are just starting to turn green; no leaves are visible, but the tops of the trees have a greenish glow. The bright green of the new grass makes a striking contrast to the withered blades of last season that form great clumps along the roadway. The first arnicas are starting to bloom, their pretty yellow faces turning to the sun. The evergreen leaves of the Oregon grape are shining on the forest floor, soft in their mossy beds, and the sun is streaking through the pines. This is the decade when we learn to live with tall, dead pines. It may seem odd that dead things are beautiful, but the pines have gone through stages of red and purple and finally needle and bark drop. They remain beautiful.

On the way in we see three deer. They stand and look at us as I slow the car. They’re not a bit scared, and we pass within ten feet of them.

“Sacrifice deer,” Grandpère says. “They’re saying ‘Have me for lunch.’”

Lots of people are outside when we get to the home. It has a lovely yard, and there’s a concrete path to the garden area. Two workmen in coveralls, with shovels and wheelbarrows, are filling the beds. A big pile of compost has been dumped at the edge of the paved parking lot, and the men have the beds I want to plant all ready.

The top rail has been painted and plastic stapled to the inside of the wood. The soil is beautiful — fine and rich. When I squish it in my hand, it makes a clump, which breaks when I drop it to the soil surface. Perfect!

I borrow a wheelbarrow to bring the flats of seedlings from the car to the beds. One of the workers offers me his, then insists on wheeling it over for me and returning to get the rest. I thank him when he gets back. He’s a good-looking man of about my age. His hair is still mostly black, but I can see silver threads in it. He’s wearing it long and braided under a baseball cap turned backward. He has a sunshine smile and bright, dark eyes. He tells me, “At your service, little lady.”

I thank him, then realize I have already thanked him, get embarrassed and go off to start planting. Before I even realize I need it, he rolls out a hose with a fine nozzle. I thank him again, he just grins and inclines his head with the same gesture Grandpère uses for “you’re welcome.” I watch him as he walks away; he looks much younger just walking. Maybe I’ve misjudged his age. What a nice guy!

Some of the old folks have gathered round. Bertie is pushing Jack in a wheelchair.

“What happened to his legs?” Grandpère asks Bertie.

“He can still walk — he just can’t remember from one step to the next where he wants to go, so it’s easier to put him in the chair and take him outside. He likes it outside.”

She parks him by a tree, and he reaches out and touches the tree. Then he sits motionless, his hand on the tree, smiling contentedly.

Bertie comes over and takes an interest in the garden. She goes and gets sticky labels and marks what is in each row. It’s a good idea. We plant one bed with salad greens, one with broccoli and cauliflower and one with carrots and peas. The last bed I plant half with spinach and half with the hardened-off herbs. We put the garden blankets on the first and last beds, and I explain to Bertie that they need the blankets on if there’s a call for frost or if the sun shines as brightly as it does today. She says she personally will check the weather forecast every night and make sure they get covered. I tell her it’s okay to leave them covered up all the time, but she says they look too pretty to hide all the time.

The kitchen staff bring out tea and snacks, so we all sit down to enjoy them. The two workmen come over and sit with us. The one who helped us introduces himself as Jim.

“Have you lived here long?” I ask.

“Just moved to town last fall. I have a place above the learning centre.”

The learning centre used to be a corner store, and the people who ran it lived upstairs. I was up there once long ago and remember it as a rabbit warren of rooms filled with stuff from China, where the store people had emigrated from.

“Are there still lots of rooms up there?” I ask.

“Yes. I only live in three of them. The rest are just empty. They said I could knock out some of the walls and remodel the place. I might do that. A person could make it really nice.” Then he laughs. “They’d probably raise the rent if I did that.”

“Are you a carpenter?” Now I feel as though I’m interrogating him, but he doesn’t seem to mind.

“I’ve done a lot of carpentering over the years but I don’t have a ticket. I’m sort of a jack of all trades. That’s why I got this job. They need all kinds of different things done around here, and it’s a good place to work.”

Now it’s his turn. “Do you live in town?”

“No, Grandpère and I live about twenty minutes west of here,” I tell him. “We live on a farm, but it’s not really a farm anymore unless you count chickens as livestock.”

“If you have chickens, it’s still a farm,” he asserts. His eyes are black, and he has two dimples that show when he smiles. He is making me feel like a schoolgirl. I keep looking at him, and every time I do, he’s looking back. After a couple of times, I quit sliding my eyes away and look directly at him. He smiles, and I feel as though I’m blushing. My God. Sixty-three years old and feeling like this. I smile back, then tell Grandpère we’d better go. He and Bertie are having a plant discussion, chatting away like long-lost friends.

I wave to Jack. “Bye now. See you next week.”

He waves at us, then Bertie grabs his chair and wheels him back toward the door.

At the car Jim comes up and says it was nice to meet us. “Are you coming on Wednesday next week?” he asks.

“Yes, I’m going to try to come each Wednesday morning.”

“I’ll maybe see you then. Nice to meet you,” he says.

I’m glad I’m not the only one repeating myself. I grin at him, and he waves till I turn out of the parking lot.

Grandpère is sitting in the passenger seat, just full of it. “Goo-goo eyes. That’s what you have, Anzel, goo-goo eyes.”

“I do not. I was just being friendly. Besides, if anybody has those eyes, it’s you and sweet Bertie.” The best defence is a strong offence, I believe.

“She is pretty sweet. She doesn’t have to watch out for Jack; she does it because she’s nice.” He is unperturbed. “That was a mighty helpful man. I think he wants to steal my little angel.” Give Grandpère an inch, and he’s taking a mile. He’s grinning away as though he has ammunition to spare. “I think we’ll be seeing a lot more of that man.”

“Oh, get away with you,” I tell him. But I keep thinking about Jim all afternoon and that night I dream about him.

In my dream we’re in a canoe — he’s in the back — and we’re going down a river. I’m kind of scared, but he’s singing a song, and pretty soon I know the words and am singing along and am not scared anymore. We get to a bend in the river and beach the canoe. I have my wicker picnic basket and set out a picnic lunch, making a table out of a big rock. I cover it with an embroidered tablecloth and set plastic dishes and cutlery around as though I’m in a fancy dining room. He lights a campfire, and we’re cooking marshmallows over it when I wake up.

I shake my head. I think maybe I have a crush on the workman at the lodge. I haven’t looked at anyone else since I lost Lorne and feel disloyal for a minute or two. Then I laugh at myself. When I was younger, I thought passion died with age, but here we are, and this stranger has me thinking about things I haven’t thought of in years. Could I even deal with another relationship? Something to ponder when I’m pulling the weeds out of the garden.

I miss Duke, and Blue is living up to his name, though when we named him, it was for his colour and not his mood. He’s just moping around as though he’s lost his best friend. He has, I guess. I decide maybe we should get another dog as company for Blue.

“What kind of dog should we get?” I wonder aloud to Grandpère. “Do you think we should get a house dog, one of those little ones that sit in your lap?”

“God, no. Esther had a little Shih Tzu when we got married. That dog never liked me and never let me forget it. We had him eight years, and he never learned not to shit in the house. He liked to do it on anything that was mine. Once he even crapped in my shoe. Dogs are not meant to be in the house.” He thinks for a minute. “Let’s get a Bernese mountain dog. I knew one once. It was really big and really smart. It was a guard dog but it wasn’t mean. There were little kids there, but he was really gentle with them. I think that would be a good dog to have.”

I buy all the
Buy & Sell
papers for BC and one up from Alberta
too. We find only one listing for Bernese mountain dogs, and it’s in the city where
Parker and Kristen live. The ad says, “Puppies, eight weeks old with all their shots,
$1,000.”

“I think you picked a dog that we can’t afford,” I say.

“I got money. I’ll buy the dog,” he says, and despite my protests, he insists.

I phone Parker and ask him to go look at the puppies and pick us out the biggest male as Grandpère has specified. He agrees and phones us back two days later. “Those are the cutest pups I ever saw. The boys came with me and fell in love. We’ve got yours and we bought one that looks just about exactly like him for us. We’ll drive up on the weekend. When we said we’d take two, she let us have them for eight hundred dollars each.”

I’m eager to see our new dog, and Grandpère asks me about three times when they’re coming, so I know he’s eager too.

“Saved two hundred dollars on that dog already,” he tells me.

I go in on Wednesday to see the home gardens, as I’ve been calling them. Everything looks perfect. There are hoses clamped on the ends of the beds and little rows of sprinkler heads down the centre of each one. To water, we just turn a valve handle halfway, and a spray of water covers each bed perfectly. I think it’s a work of art, and when Rose comes by, I ask her who set it up.

“One of the maintenance men, Jim, did that.”

“Oh, I met him last week. He seems nice.”

“He seems to think you’re nice too. Asked me a couple questions about you.” She’s grinning like the Cheshire cat in Wonderland. “Only told him good stuff, don’t worry.”

I tell her my plans for the other garden beds. I want to wait two more weeks, then plant pumpkins and squashes in one bed, fill another with potatoes and fill a third with salad greens and carrots. The last bed would get planted later with fall crops. She doesn’t pay much attention to what I’m saying, just keeps telling me it’s my call and whatever I plant there is fine with everyone.

Bertie tells me that some of the seedlings are germinating in the salad green bed. Sure enough, radish seeds and some of the spinach seeds are starting to sprout. “Good management,” I say to her, and she beams with pride.

“Where’s Jack today?” I ask her.

“He didn’t want to come out. He doesn’t want to get out of his chair. He’s happy just sitting there, so I left him.” She sounds put out by his laziness and shakes her head disapprovingly. “It’s just sitting around that makes him like that. He spends too much time inside his own head and forgets to pay attention to the here and now. I’m not going to get like that. Your Grandpère, he’s a lot older, but he’s still a real person. I’m going to keep myself busy so I don’t get like them.”

“Good for you, Bertie.” I’ll bet it’s scary for Bertie in there, seeing people younger than her lose touch. I feel sorry for her; she could almost manage on her own. I wonder how she got here and where her family is. I wonder if I’ll get to know her well enough for her to give me answers to satisfy my curiosity.

I show her which are the radishes and spinach and point out the weeds. They’re just as quick to germinate as the seeds we planted. She helps, and another older man joins us. He compliments me on the fine job, and then he too helps pick the weeds. There aren’t many, and we’re done everything there is to do before lunch. Bertie tells me and Grandpère to stay for the meal.

I am hanging around, hoping I’ll see Jim so I can tell him how good the watering system is, but Bertie says the maintenance guys had to go into town to get a fountain, so I know he’s not around. I feel kind of disappointed. Oh well, I don’t have to listen to Grandpère on the way home. It’s going to be my turn to tease. I start on him before we even leave the parking lot.

“That Bertie is probably twenty years younger than you, but I think she has her eye on you. Says you’re still a real person.”