The Americans Are Coming (28 page)

“I know a lotta things,” said Dryfly.

*

Elva and Bob Nash sat in the parlour. Elva was knitting Shadrack a pair of mitts. Bob was rocking, thumping his heel on the floor each time the chair rocked forward.

They heard the kitchen door open, Shadrack’s uneven
footsteps. In a moment, Shad appeared in the parlour door. He was pale, his hair was messed up, he needed a bath and was obviously drunk.

“Mom? Dad? I’m . . . pretty drunk!” said Shadrack. Neither Elva or Bob commented. “I know you’ll wanna . . . wanna beat me up, but, but, before ya do, I got somethin’ to say.”

“I don’t want no sass from the likes of you!” said Bob.

“I n’ain’t . . . ain’t gonna ssshass ya. First thing Monday mornin’, I’m goin’ to ssschool.”

“Who in the hell you think you are, comin’ in this house smellin’ like dirty old liquor!” snapped Elva.

“Goddamned tramp!” said Bob.

“Monday mornin’, goin’ to school to make somethin’ o’ meself.”

“A little boy like you drinkin’ that dirty old liquor! What’s the world comin’ to?”

“A big boy like you goin’ back to school in . . . in grade seven! The other lads will be only half yer size!”

“I don’t care,” said Shad.

“You don’t care! Boys! You don’t care!” said Bob, then yelled, “It’s about time you started to care!”

“You make me sick!” yelled Elva.

“Get into that bathroom and clean yerself up!” yelled Bob.

“School all right! You’ll go to school or I’ll skin you alive!” said Elva.

“And you won’t be stayin’ home and playin’ hooky either!” said Bob.

“RIGHT NOW, I SAY!”

“DO AS YER TOLD!”

“NOW!”

Shad staggered to the bathroom, making no effort to hide his tears.

“All he needed was a good beatin’,” said Bob.

Nutbeam looked down at the fresh deer tracks at his feet. This was the fourth set of prints he’d seen in the last few hundred feet. “Four deer,” he thought, “all heading toward the brook. These tracks should all lead to a trail sooner or later . . . a trail that they all follow.”

Nutbeam followed the tracks for a hundred yards or so, and did, indeed, come to a path frequently travelled by deer. A lesser hunter would have followed the deer trail, but Nutbeam knew better. He sat to wait . . . Nutbeam knew you don’t follow a deer – “Sit and wait and they come to you. Might take an hour, might take as long as two days, but they’ll come,” thought Nutbeam. Nutbeam sat with his back against a tree. He stood the cocked rifle beside him.

While waiting for the deer to show up, Nutbeam’s mind was elsewhere. “The hunt’s as good as over,” he thought. “Deer are stupid.” Shirley Ramsey, on the other hand, was a more perplexing matter. “This whole thing might work. If it doesn’t, there’s no harm done, anyway. All it’ll do is make life a little easier.”

There were no leaves left on the trees, so that Nutbeam had a clear view of the trail. The November wind prophesied winter. “It’ll soon snow,” thought Nutbeam. “Meat’ll keep good from now on.”

Nutbeam sat there for four hours and the sun was nesting well down in the northwest before he heard it.

Snort, went the deer.

In one swift movement, Nutbeam grabbed his rifle and positioned himself.

“Calm down,” he thought. “There’s nothin’ to be excited about.”

He still couldn’t see the deer, but he could hear it snort,
and he could hear its hooves falling and crunching the dried leaves on the frozen ground. He waited.

Crunch . . . crunch . . . crunch . . . snort . . . crunch.

The deer approached slowly, cautiously, sensing danger, smelling Nutbeam.

“It could be a human,” said the deer, “but I’m not quite sure.”

Crunch . . . crunch . . . crunch.

The deer poked its head from behind a fir tree.

Sniff-sniff. “I probably should flash my tail. There’s definitely something at the foot of that tree up there. I’ll circle around and see if I can get a better look at it.”

The deer crunched its way to an easterly point where it could better see Nutbeam. “It’s a human, all right,” said the deer. “I guess I’d better flash and dash.”

When the deer leaped, Nutbeam swiftly shouldered his rifle and pulled the trigger.

A gigantic bell went BOING in the deer’s head; the legs buckled, the deer collapsed.

*

“Where ya goin’?” asked Elva Nash.

“To Bernie Hanley’s store.”

“Got some money?”

“Dad gave me five dollars.”

“Don’t spend it all foolish.”

“See ya later, Mom,” said Shad and stepped into the cool November evening. He was feeling good and stepping high; he had a sense of direction; it was Saturday night and he was bound for Blackville.

“I’m in with the in crowd! I go where the in crowd goes. I’m in with the in crowd, and I know what the in crowd knows!” sang Shad, loud, arrogantly.

Shad was not doing great in school; he had a lot of catching up to do. His higher-than-average intelligence and mild interest was helping him along, however, and things were improving.

He would not pass at Christmas, but would probably grade in the spring.

His relationship with Bob and Elva was improving, too. It had required a simple solution; stay out of their presence as often as possible.

As he was crossing the river on the footbridge, he noticed that the river was frozen almost completely in. There was but one hole in the ice, about twenty feet long and ten feet wide. It was six o’clock and nearly dark, and the hole appeared black, cold and forbidding in the blue-grey light.

“An air hole,” thought Shad. “Could stay there all winter. Dangerous thing, an air hole.” Shad was remembering a story about somebody who had walked into an air hole while crossing on the ice on a dark night. There was another story, too, about a child who had skated into one.

Shad made a mental note that the air hole was located just above Dr. MacDowell’s cabin, in front of John Kaston’s place. “I might be skating there later on in the winter,” he thought.

Shad stopped on the center abutment for a minute to take in the twilit scenery. The river frozen had a new beauty to it – a ribbon of ice dividing farms and forests.

“I’d like to build a cabin on the river down in front of home sometime,” he thought. “Of course, Dad’ll probably sell the shore to a rich American. He could do with a thousand or two.”

“See ya next spring, old river,” he said. “See ya when you’re thawed out again.”

*

Eleven men and boys stood around Bernie Hanley’s store, eating chocolate bars and drinking Orange Crush.

“Soon be gettin’ snow,” said Dan Brennen.

“Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Gonna snow for sure, Dan, yeah. Looks like snow tonight, I noticed, yeah, Dan old boy,” said Lindon Tucker.

“Kinda warm, though,” said Bernie Hanley. “Might come in rain.”

“Rain, yeah. That’s true, yeah. Might come in rain, I was thinkin’ too. That’s right, yeah, Bernie, could come in rain.”

“How was Fredericton, Lindon?” asked Bert Todder.

“Quite a place, quite a place. Lotsa women, lotsa women. Lived right there on Pine Street, yeah. Went to the hotel one night, yeah, so I did, one night, yeah. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Hotel, yeah. Quite a place!”

“Women ain’t much good, if ya can’t get yer hands on them,” chuckled Dan Brennen. “Did ya get your hands on them, Lindon?”

“Got me hands on them all right! No trouble there! Ha, ha, ha, ha! Got me hands on them all right, Dan old boy. There’s, there’s, there’s, there’s no trouble passin’ the hand on them ladies!”

All the men laughed. For the moment, Lindon was the center of attention. Everyone knew how Lindon would act when confronted with a female and didn’t believe a word he was saying. Lindon was always good for a laugh.

“Everyone should be livin’ in Fredericton,” said Lindon. “Lotsa women, lotsa women. I, I, I, I, I met up with some kinda fancy woman, I, I, I, so I did. Earrings on, smokin’ a big long tailor-made cigarette. Fancy lady, she was. Met ’er at the hotel, I did, yeah, so I did. Got a room. Got a room right there in the hotel, so we did.”

“Did ya put the lad to ’er?” asked Stan Tuney.

“Put the lad to’er, all right! Ho! No I didn’! No! No! No, I suppose I didn’t put it to ’er none! Ha, ha! Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Put it to ’er, I did! Right there in the hotel room. Drunk a whole bottle o’ this stuff she called vodker. There wasn’t a drop left in the mornin’! Woke up and I was all alone, yep. Jist as well, though. Jist as well.”

“Was she good?”

“Ha, ha, ha! Good! I guess she was good! Ho! No she wasn’t! Ho! The very best, so she was!”

“Did ya see Graig Allen while you was over there?” asked John Kaston, who was getting somewhat annoyed with all the dirty talk.

“Never saw Graig, no. No, I never saw Graig. Right there,
too, but I never saw him. Been over there for years, Graig has. Workin’ at the cotton mill, I think. Someone said Graig was at the cotton mill.”

“Never comes back, does he?” said Bob Nash. “Sold his land to Dr. MacDowell and never cried crack till he hit Fredericton. Never came back.”

“A man should go and see him, you know,” said Dan Brennen.

“Ya’ll never guess who I saw on the bridge the other mornin’,” said Lindon Tucker.

“Graig?”

“No, no, no, no, not Graig, no. Walkin’ cross the bridge I was. Saw that Nutbeam fella. Nutbeam. Nutbeam, know who I mean? Nutbeam. Met him on the bridge.”

“What’d he say? What’d he say?”

“Just said g’day. G’day, he said. Just said g’day.”

“What’d you say?”

“I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, ‘G’day, Nutbeam, old Nutbeam, old boy,’ I said. He never said nothin’, jist kept walkin’. He’s got the biggest ears, look o’ here, I ever saw in my life! Ya never saw the like o’ them! Big as that pound cake there! Homeliest man ya ever want to meet!”

“I heard, now,” lied Stan Tuney, “that he don’t cook one thing he eats! Use to being up north someplace. They don’t cook their meat in the Yukon, you know.”

“How do ya know he don’t cook his food?” asked Shadrack. “Well, if he don’t cook his meat he might be from the Yukon, who knows?”

“I heard everything that sticks out on ’im is a foot long,” said Bert Todder, “his ears, nose, everything.”

“His tool would just look like a young pig with no ears,” put in Dan Brennen.

“That’s what that Albert Johnson was suppose to look like,” said Stan Tuney. “Albert Johnson was from up north, ya know. Shot all them Mounties! I wouldn’ be surprised if that’s who he is!”

“They captured Albert Johnson, didn’ they?” asked Bert Todder.

“They never knew for sure,” said Stan Tuney. “They thought they got ’im, but they never knew for sure.”

“Homeliest man I ever saw,” said Lindon Tucker. “Just said g’day, was all he said.”

“You ever hear from yer boy, George, Bernie?” asked Bert Todder.

“Got a letter from ’im yesterday,” said Bernie Hanley.

“News from Palidin,” thought Dryfly, perking up to listen.

“Said he was workin’ in a bakery. Place called Richmond Hill.”

“Thought he went to Toronto,” said Bert.

“No, no, Richmond Hill. Young Palidin, now, is workin’ in Toronto, though. Got ’imself a job workin’ with a newspaper, deliverin’ papers or somethin’.”

“And George is workin’ in a bakery! Boys! Sounds like a pretty good job to me! I bet ya he’s makin’ good money, too!” said Bert.

“They’ll be back,” said Bernie. “Ya couldn’ keep that young Palidin away from the river! Best fisherman I ever saw, Palidin was.”

“He could ketch ’em when nobody else could,” said Bob Nash. “He use to borry that old rod o’ Shad’s and bring us up a salmon every other day.”

“I bought about ten from him,” said Bernie.

“How ya s’pose he did it?” asked Dan Brennen. “I fished all one day and never saw a thing. Young Palidin came over the hill, made two casts and bang, got a ten-pounder.”

“He seemed to just know how to do it,” said Bert Todder. “He’ll be back,” said Bernie Hanley. “You’d never get them young lads to stay away from the river for any length o’ time.”

*

Shadrack and Dryfly left the store and stepped into the dark, windy November evening. It was Saturday night and Shadrack was getting restless.

“There’s nothin’ to do around here,” said Shad. “I’m bored.”

“We could take a walk to Gordon,” suggested Dryfly. “Might be some girls around.”

“No girls in Gordon. Blackville’s the place to go. There’s about three hundred girls in Blackville school and they all hang around the canteen on Saturday nights. Why don’t we see if we can hitch a ride to Blackville, Dry?”

“No, I don’t think so. I don’t know anyone in Blackville, Shad.”

“I do, Dry. I know lotsa lads.”

“I don’t think so, Shad. We’d never get a ride, anyway.” Since Shadrack started to school in Blackville, Dryfly was seeing a great change in him. Shadrack was beginning to speak differently, to use words like algebra, math, classroom, corridor, cafeteria, and other words that Dryfly had no comprehension of. Shadrack was making new friends at school, too, and often spoke of Gary Perkins, Polly Saunders and David Carlyle. “That Mary Wilson’s a cool chick,” or “That Don Monroe’s a cool cat,” Shad would say, and Dryfly would be left feeling totally alienated.

Shadrack stayed over a couple of nights with a new friend called Peter Bower. Peter Bower’s parents possessed a television that Shad and Peter watched as much and as often as they could. This new apparatus was inspiring Shadrack to use terms and words like “River Boat, Darin McGavin, Rin-tin-tin, Time for Juniors, Jim Bowie and The Last of the Mohicans.”

With school, homework and visits to Peter Bower’s house to watch television occupying much of Shadrack’s time, Dryfly was finding himself alone more and more. It seemed that the duo were drifting apart.

“We could go to the canteen and get a wiener and chip,” said Shad.

“A what?”

“Wieners and french fries.”

“Cost a lotta money, wouldn’ it?”

“I got a few bucks. C’mon Dry, let’s go.”

“An awful long ways. What if we got way down there and can’t find a way home?”

“We’ll walk. Dad said he use to walk it all the time. It’s only ten or twelve miles.”