The Delusionist (5 page)

“So what do you think, Paul? Pharmacy?”

Cyril braced himself for a two-on-one attack.

“I don't know if that's quite where Cyril's strengths lie,” Paul said, suddenly judicious.

“Is that right?” Darrel was disappointed at not finding an instant ally, but intrigued as well.

Cyril was interested—and fearful—of learning where, in Paul's opinion, his strengths lay. He could hear the laughter if he told them he was intending to go to art school. Both Darrel and Paul were looking at him. To his own surprise he stated: “Maybe I'll join the navy.”

“
The navy?
” Cyril's mother had been listening from the kitchen.

“Why not?” he asked, suddenly liking the sound of it. Maybe it would involve travel to tropical ports. Hadn't Gauguin gone to Tahiti? If Connie could run off why not him?

“Well, you get seasick for one thing,” his mother said.

Paul was laughing. “He threw up on the ferry to Victoria.”

Cyril was scalded. They'd boarded the boat in the downtown harbour and halfway across the strait he was vomiting.

Darrel liked what he was hearing. The troops were back in order. “Maybe the army, eh bub. Keep your feet on the ground.”

“Ginger's good for motion sickness,” offered Della.

They were on dessert when his mother asked if he'd heard from Connie, as if she was only off on a bit of a jaunt. He considered lying then just shook his head.

“No big movie contracts?” enquired Darrel.

His mother had blabbed. He felt invaded and betrayed, and for the rest of the meal stayed silent.

“She's waiting for the right role,” said Paul. “The Queen of Kowloon.”

“Sounds like a ship,” said Darrel.

“Yeah, a laundry boat.”

“Maybe her ship will come in,” said the ever optimistic Della. They all looked at her, not sure if she was witty or naive. Cyril wondered why she'd married Paul.

Later that evening, when Darrel was gone, Paul directed Cyril downstairs into the basement for a few words. They leaned against the old workbench, arms crossed, under the bare bulb.

“I've been doing a little research on Mr Darrel Stavrik,” said Paul. “Looked through the Edmonton directory then made a few calls.” His smile would have terrified Cyril in any other circumstances, but now he leaned forward eager to hear what he'd dug up. “Bugger has a wife and five kids.”

“
Five?
”

“Five.”

Being married was bad enough, having a kid was bad enough, but five of them? “The bastard.”

“I'd love to see him get audited,” said Paul, who looked almost dreamy at the thought of Darrel sweating before an Inquisition of Accountants. Cyril could see Paul seated at a high bench in black robes and a ruffled collar glowering ominously as he aimed an accusing finer. “Could be time to dial a few numbers.”

At that moment Cyril admired his older brother. Rare were the times they were on the same side but this was one and he was proud.

“Still, mom likes him,” admitted Paul, sobering.

“She's changing,” said Cyril. “It's like she's not even her anymore.”

“Maybe she's glad not to be her anymore,” said Della, coming down the steps. She had a long face and long teeth, a thin nose between big eyes, and straight brown hair through which her ears poked, though for all this she was not unattractive. She looked to Cyril like some sort of doll fashioned from sticks and straw.

“Do you like him?” he asked her.

She shrugged. “Your mother does and that's what counts.”

Cyril genuinely liked Della, yet her relentless reasonableness was too much. “He's pushy.”

Della leaned to look at Cyril's sketch of Connie. She was gazing forthrightly out from the paper as if committing Cyril to memory, as if Connie was doing the portrait, not Cyril. “Forget the Navy,” said Della. “Go to art school.” Before this became a general topic of discussion—and inevitably ridicule—she turned to Paul and reminded him she had the early shift tomorrow.

When Paul and Della were gone Cyril's mother asked him to sit down.

He knew what was coming.

“Darrel's only trying to help.”

“I don't want his help.”

“You'll be moving out some day and I'll be on my own. I'm thinking of the future.
My
future.”

His heart clenched and for the first time he saw her as she saw herself: a forty-four-year-old widow about to be abandoned. Widow. What a desolate word. Yet he could not accept Darrel living here in the house Cyril had lived all his life, where his memories resided. Darrel, King of the Manor. No. It was wrong.

The following Sunday, Cyril waited for Paul to drop the bomb and announce the news of Darrel's other family. They went through the roast beef and the apple pie then the coffee and he still hadn't raised the subject. Cyril caught Paul's eye and saw that he was playing innocent. Cyril suspected that Della had put a gag order on him. Cyril dove in, “So, Darrel, how's the family? In Edmonton.”

“They're doing just fine,” he said. “Thank you for asking.”

“Your wife?” repeated Cyril.

“Fine as far as I know.”

Their mother was smiling, perfectly at ease dating a married man with five children.

“You don't have to like him,” she said later.

“He's always calling me bub.”

“Is just his way.”

“I don't like his way.”

“He's willing to put you through university.”

“Who said I'm going to university?”

“Then trade school.”

“Why him?”

“I should sit home alone?”

“He's married.”

“She left him.”

“He's got kids.”

“So do I.”

Why could he never win an argument with her? It was as if he was forever five years old. The row of Virgin Marys on the mantel seemed to be smirking. He risked the question he feared the most: “Are you going to marry him?”

He saw lament and anger and exhaustion on her face; worst of all he saw that he was boring her.

All that week Cyril practised aiming Gilbert's pistol, one eye closed, right hand supported by his left, breath smooth and slow and even. “Firm the shoulder and exhale when you squeeze the trigger.” His dad had taught him these basics using Cyril's six-shooter cap gun. He and his dad had often played guns in the basement, ducking in and around the furnace and the stacked boxes. His dad never lasted long in the game, saying that the snap-snap-snap of the caps gave him a headache, and it was only years later that Cyril realized it was more than the mere noise that caused him to shut his eyes and rub his temples and withdraw to the bedroom and shut the door.

Darrel was surprised but genial the Saturday Cyril showed up at his apartment. He got him a stubby of Black Label, half of which Cyril drank in one chug, Darrel nodding as if impressed by such drinking bravado. The place smelled of coffee and cigarettes. On the wall above the couch hung a landscape of horses running away over hills.

“So what's up, bub?”

Cyril belched and said, “Leave my mother alone,” then belched again.

Darrel relaxed on the couch and lit up a smoke. “Sit down.”

Cyril shook his head.

Darrel puffed reflectively. “You really hate me, huh?”

The quiet wonder in Darrel's voice made Cyril reflect. Paul hated him, or often resented his youth and health with a hate-like intensity, and now he couldn't help feeling a little bad at hurting Darrel's feelings. “I just want you to leave her alone.”

“I don't think she wants me to leave her alone. Have you considered that?”

Cyril gulped the rest of the beer and reached down and carefully set the bottle on the coffee table. As a matter of fact he had considered that—he just refused to accept it.

“You want another one of those?”

“No.” He'd gulped too fast and some of the beer was rising back up his nose. He fought not to cough.

“Your mother wants to forget it all. The old country, the war, the past, the whole shootin' match.” Darrel gestured dismissively. “Time to move on. And definitely time to move out of that house with the front row seat of the graveyard.”

So that was it. Erase his past, erase his father and take his mother and sell the house. Cyril pulled out the gun.

Darrel began to chuckle. He stretched out his short legs and crossed his ankles and got comfortable. Darrel was always getting comfy. “We could get along, you know. Ever consider that?”

He and Darrel, pals? Maybe catch a Lions game? Darrel might have connections and Cyril could meet the players, shake hands with Joe Kapp and Willie Fleming. Yet this too he couldn't accept. Cyril aimed the pistol.

“You're starting to bug me, kid.” Darrel flicked his cigarette hitting Cyril in the chest. He flinched but kept the pistol pointed and could see the butt smouldering on the hardwood. Unable to restrain himself he crushed it out with his toe.

Darrel sighed. He stood and tugged up his trousers. He was big-bellied but broad-shouldered and had burly forearms, an old, short, bald athlete. “Now you can hit the road and we'll say no more about this or I can kick your can around the block.”

Cyril fought the impulse to obey, knowing that if he backed down now Darrel would be top dog forever. He kept the pistol steady.

“I'm getting bored, bub.”

“Don't call me bub.”

“You're bub until you start acting like an adult. Now swing your arse around and hop it on out the door before I tell mommy what you've been up to with your cap gun.”

Cyril exhaled and squeezed the trigger slowly. The bullet blasted the floor between Darrel's stocking feet. Darrel went straight up, squeaking like a shot rat. A small giggle escaped Cyril's mouth, then another burp.

“You dumb little fuck!” Darrel shrank back behind his Danish modern couch.

“Bang,” said Cyril, “you're dead.” And blew imaginary smoke from the barrel.