The Long November Page 14

  It’s like staring at a burning light bulb, then suddenly turning it off and shutting your eyes. The blue of the filament burns clearly against the inside of your eyelids, and washes slowly downward in gradually fading forms. It’s all faded—except Steffie. And the clover scent. Faded, and now I have to think hard to remember the thin mouth of Emily Dawson, sitting across from me in BF’s office, calling me every lousy thing she could think of. And how she could think of them. Dick had said I’d have to take the “piece of her mind” and then she’d be all right—I’d have to grovel a little or lick her hand. But he figured she’d be satisfied if I’d take it. He’d spent nearly three weeks telling her what a “rat” I was but that nothing would be served by sending me to jail...he’d told her everything else he could think of, too, and some of it was out of this world. The only way I could take Emily’s tirade was to pretend it wasn’t me she was talking about, and just murmur fittingly penitent replies. It was interesting to watch the puddles of spit form in the comers of her ugly mouth while the burst of anger was coming out, and when she’d have to stop to breathe she’d suck them back in, but they’d form again on the next wave of hate.

  It went fine, too, until she made the crack about Steffie. I was so startled I nearly fell out of the chair. I looked past her to where Dick was standing eloquently shrugging his shoulders to tell me he’d given her everything in and out of the “book.”

  She had said, “I’m sure I don’t know what kind of a person this Miss Gibson can be, to urge you to take twenty thousand dollars of someone else’s money.”

  She stopped because she saw the look on my face, stopped because she knew she’d said one thing too many. I looked at her meatless face, and longed to slug it hard enough to drive her through the office wall. Instead I stood up.

  “I’ve heard enough of this, Miss Dawson. I’m no sorrier for having taken your money than you are for the way you got it. Go to the police or any other damned thing you want.”

  I walked out and went up to see Steffie.

  It was a day to clean house. I’d had three weeks of hell, expecting to be arrested any minute, and I wasn’t going to take it one minute longer. Emily Dawson’s face kept drifting across in front of me and I thought of a rat with bad adenoids. She’d had no intention ever of going to the police, but I didn’t know it then, and I wanted only to get straight with Steffie, then head for the Exhibition Barracks to join Phil’s outfit. The Army can’t keep a man out of jail, but Dick reasoned that they’d figure there was no point in sending an able-bodied soldier to the can when there’s a war to be won. I walked slowly up the street in Rosedale toward the frowning pile of brick and gingerbread with which old man Rutledge had saddled his heirs, and I thought of the year that had passed since I’d walked to meet Steffie. The leaves were drifting from the piles by the curb, rustling along the pavement to be snagged in the next pile. They made me think of human beings, only the leaves smell better. I had nothing to tell Steffie except that I’d stolen twenty thousand dollars from a vicious, man-starved old bitch and then insulted the old bitch so she’d be certain to do her damnedest. Or I could tell Steffie I’d hit every dream we had in the head because I couldn’t lose those claims—or I could tell her what she’d learn soon enough anyway, that her “strong” Joe was nothing but a substance that gives off a dark brown smell. But most of all I’d be telling her—putting her straight on what went on, and I’d be through with skulking, lying, and groveling.

  She kissed me and the loveliness of her made my breath catch again. God, how I hated to tell her...but she’d have to understand. Have to realize what those claims meant, and why I had to do it. She sat next to me on the sofa while I told the whole story, and I left out only the part about why I’d walked out on Emily Dawson.

  She turned and looked at me, her voice flat and even, “Joe, do you mean you’ve stolen twenty thousand dollars?”

  “Honey, that’s a hell of a word. I mean I’ve saved my claims.”

  She walked across the room then, and when she turned I could see she was crying. “But Joe...you might go to jail for this.”

  “I don’t think so, Steffie...I’m joining the Army in the morning.”

  She dropped into a chair and sat silently for a time. I poured drinks for us but she wouldn’t take one. When she looked up the tears were gone, but her voice was angry.

  “Joe, did you do this only to save the claims—are they so important?”

  I knew what she was thinking but I was afraid to tell the truth. “Not only the claims, honey. I thought of you and me, of everything we’ve planned. We couldn’t do much about anything without the claims, could we? If I lost them I’d have to go back to mining—it’s all I know—and that would mean living in one of those freezing holes.”

  Her temper flared. “Other people do it...”

  “Honey, you’ve only seen that country in the summer; wait’ll you put in a fifty-below winter in one of those piano-box houses.”

  “Fern Miller did it, didn’t she? Do you think I couldn’t? No, Joe, I don’t think you thought of me at all.”

  She was very angry now. “You thought only of the money you might make from it. If you’d thought of me you wouldn’t have done it.”

  It was a hell of a day. Taking all that crap from Emily and then having the girl you love tell you you’re a thief, too. I sipped my drink slowly, wondering where it was going to wind up, and wanting like the devil to take Steffie in my arms and tell her it wasn’t so—tell her I was only kidding.

  Her temper had gone and she was speaking again in the flat tone. “Joe, I thought you were stronger than that...My father did something of this sort and I can always remember how he ended.”

  “I’m sorry, Steffie, sorry as hell, but I couldn’t let my claims go...”

  “But, Joe, what could Millerville ever be with such a beginning, or didn’t you really mean it? Maybe you didn’t mean any of it...maybe you don’t even love me.”

  “Steffie, you’re taking this too big. I’ve done something I’m not very proud of but I did what I felt I had to do.”

  “And now you’ll join the Army—as though they arranged this war to provide you with a place to hide...” My temper was slipping. The pressure had been too much for the past few days and some little bastard of a bug kept telling me to “assert myself.” After all, she’s only a woman, and she was “my” woman, by God! “Steffie, for Christ’s sake! I’ve told you why I did it. And I’ll do a hell of a lot worse if I have to, saving those claims—and that’s that.”

  “You needn’t shout, Joe, but because you can justify your actions to yourself doesn’t mean I’m satisfied with them. I think the thing for you to do is give your share of the Sleeping Squaw Mine to Miss Dawson.”

  “WHAT? Are you nuts? Steffie, you don’t seem to understand...here, I’ll draw a map for you. Those are MY claims, and I’ll do the deciding on who does what with them if I rot in a jail for the rest of my life. Now, do you see?”

  “Yes, Joe, I see...I see a lot of things I didn’t see before. There’ll be other things like this, and I wonder if I can take it.”

  “Is that what you want to do, Steffie? Take a powder the first time things look tough? What do you think this world is? You fight for what you get, Steffie, or you get nothing. And in a fight, if you’re a smart guy, you use everything you can get your hands on.”

  “You really haven’t changed at all, have you, Joe? I can close my eyes and hear you say just that in Cataract City, years ago.”

  She looked tired, but she went on, as though it had to be settled, and she’d stay until it was. “You don’t know it, Joe, but I’ve loved you every day for as long as I can remember. I guess I always will—it’s like that. But I couldn’t face a lifetime of this sort of thing...this attitude. No, let me finish. I’d rather not have a cent and live—or freeze—in a piano-box. You’re wrong about this, Joe, and somewhere you know you are. Money isn’t that important—it can’t be. Will you go now? I’m tired.”
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  She stopped and slipped the ring off her finger. She handed it to me, and she was crying softly. “Joe, let’s not see each other again...”

  I looked at the ring and thought of a Christmas night. I tossed it across the room as I turned to walk out and I could hear it fall in the corner. Steffie didn’t call after me. I’d lost her, but I had a mine.

  They look like candles. They’re smooth and round and of hard rock, but traced through them you can see fine webs of gold lace. Curly’s beauty was rich, very rich. Yes, it’s there, they said, lots of it...this may be Canada’s largest mine before it’s through. No, we can’t reach bottom...seems to go all the way to hell. There’s a thousand feet of twenty-five dollar ore on the surface across four feet, and there’re two veins; funny thing, too, it’s shaped like a woman. You were right, Curly, and it took our drillers and the bright young engineers of the Northland Mining Company months to prove beyond any doubt what you knew in the beginning. She’s a big mine, Curly, a hell of a big mine. And she’s lying there just as you last saw her, with her golden limbs apart, taking everything they can give her. She’s changed a little, and she’ll change more, Curly. They crawl over her like ants, sinking shafts, building shaftheads, and some bastard huts are starting to huddle near her. Where do you fit, Joe? Yes, I fit, too. I helped, Curly, I helped them make a good paying whore out of your beauty...

  Well, I’d done it. I’d washed it all up and ironed it all out and there wasn’t much left to do except get drunk and join the Army. Or get drunk and join the Army the next day? Or reverse it...or just get drunk? I joined the Army. It doesn’t take long to swear your life away—mumble a few words about the King, touch the Bible, and stop thinking. Stop thinking, remembering, adding. Stop all processes of reason. Go through the motions, salute guys you used to call by their first names, wonder about it—wonder all you want to, but remember it. Slug it out for the hours in the day, then get stiff each night.

  Your name is Mack, eh? Joe Mack...Joseph Mack? Well, Mack, you’re PRIVATE Mack now. A-4443. Put that number on all your kit—all your issue. No, Mack, you don’t salute without a hat, you walk at attention...but you’re not properly dressed without a hat...where is it? No, Mack, you salute with your right hand. The longest way up and the shortest way down...don’t sir me, I’m a Sergeant...I don’t know who made these rules but they’re good enough for a hell of a lot of other guys and they’re good enough for you, Mack. When I want you to speak, I’ll tell you. You’ll get along a hell of a lot better if you stop thinking about it, Mack...stop thinking about it...stop thinking. But I couldn’t and I didn’t and God Almighty...I can’t. How can you stop thinking, remembering...

  You can use your head, Joe. Don’t you know life isn’t a fact, it’s a series of discomforts, and you have them or not in direct ratio to the number of pillows you put under yourself. Death’s the only fact...like the guy says, “Death and taxes ..only with you, Joe, it’s Death and smells. No, bub, I don’t think that’s it. Maybe Life isn’t a fact...but if Life isn’t, then Death can’t be...I think only dreams are facts and they become more factual if you keep them in your head.

  I dropped my kit on my bunk and looked around. Two feet either way was another bunk. It made me think of the Sally Ann, only it wasn’t clean and comfortable like the Sally, and the army bunks are double-deckers. A long, thin leg draped down in my face and I didn’t look up to see its owner. A hand came down and a lazy voice said, “Cigarette me, chum....” I put a cigarette in the hand and it disappeared for a moment, then the voice said, “Match me, chum...” I stood up and looked at him, and that’s when I first saw Bill Preston, a long, lanky guy with a swell smile. “Thanks, chum,” he said, “you’ll be handy....” I have been, too. He’s cost me a hell of a lot of money so far. He sat up and told me how to put my kit away and how to wear my battle-dress uniform. After we’d finished he swung lazily off the upper bunk and said, “Come, chum, beer me...” and we left for the canteen.

  The days slid by in a fog of beer which we spiked with whiskey. We’d drill all day and then have a pass until midnight; after that we could drop over the fence. Preston’s “lay-by-lay” description of his life and lots of Labatt’s Ale kept me from thinking too much about Steffie. Phil tried to square it but I told him he was wasting his time; there’d been no fight. There was nothing to square...I’d been dismissed, and he was attracting attention by talking to an enlisted man, to say nothing of keeping the enlisted man from the lovely green bottles. I couldn’t think of Steffie...I didn’t dare. I was A-4443, Private Mack, Jos., and if I worked hard and drank hard I might put the time in, and so those few days went. It might have been different if I’d known the Canadian First Division was shoving off for England on December 6, 1939. But Preston helped a lot, and listening to him chatter on while he scientifically worked beer after beer out of me was much easier than thinking of Steffie.

  The news broke one day of the remarkable values discovered on the Sleeping Squaw claims, and overnight I was a millionaire. Preston nearly bust a gut when he found the “Joseph Mack of Sleeping Squaw” and his “boy” were the same guy.

  “To think,” he said, “I’ve been working you for nickels and dimes when I coulda’ been putting it on you for heavy chunks. Come, chum, tonight we celebrate, you owe it to me.”

  He read me some startling statements from the paper, where “Jos. Mack, the President of Sleeping Squaw Gold Mines, Ltd., had stated his faith in the future of mining in Canada, and its invaluable contribution to the war effort.”

  “Did you say all that, chum?” Preston asked.

  “No, one of my partners stuck it in there.”

  I went to see Dick and “BF” to straighten out this business of who would be “President,” but “BF” would agree only to act in my absence. I had to arrange for a steady supply of money if I was to keep Preston in the style to which he was rapidly becoming accustomed. Emily Dawson had sworn out her warrant, but she withdrew it and accepted stock when she read the telegram from the property telling of the values discovered. It was flat, somehow, flat and dull. The thrill of having made a mine wasn’t anything like I’d thought it would be, and at that point I wanted only to clear up what had to be done and get the hell away from anything connected with Sleeping Squaw. But I felt good when I saw the change in Dick and “BF”; at least their dreams had become facts. “BF” is there, “acting” as president of Sleeping Squaw, watching his beloved wheels turn at the top of the shaft-head, as skip after skip of rich ore is raised to the surface, bringing wealth to a place where there never was wealth before. Doing his job honestly and asking others to do the same. He isn’t all buggered up trying to build model towns, or model mines, or trying to reward people who haven’t earned a reward—and for all I know, he’s right.

  It’s gone...it came on a breath of a scent of clover, and it’s gone. A moment ago the room was filled with it—but it’s not here now. There’re a few sticks of dank furniture, a sideboard with a broken mirror. Some boxes on the bed with a few pieces of junk in them, crazy junk that some Italian woman treasures if she’s still alive. But where is the scent of clover? Where did it come from and where has it gone? It’s gone, Joe, like all the rest of the nice things in your life. Gone because you weren’t meant to have them, or weren’t smart enough to hang on to them. Or weren’t clean enough.

  There are fields of it back home. Acre after acre. Maybe I’ll get back to it. Maybe I’ll survive this stinking mess. Oh God, if I do...if I get through this shambles, I’ll know how to live! It’s as if I never knew there could be a lift in simply breathing—in opening my eyes to a world where guys aren’t shooting at me. I thought only some of the time was worth the effort of living—that you sweated through the tough moments to get to those few, like the few with Steffie. When this lousy show is over, if I’m still able to pinch myself and feel it, I’ll count every second as if it were spun of platinum. Rebecca of Sunny-brook Farm will be a sour old hag compared to our Joe. Ill radiate strictly nothin
g but sunshine and joy. If they mark me in their book for a slob, it’ll be okay, for I’ll be laughing because I’ll still be able to laugh. The passing time will be like cool water running through my fingers. Every now and then I’ll stop and say, “You’re alive, Joe...you’re still alive.”

  I won’t waste a single instant. I’ll even resent the moments when I have to sleep because I’ll want to lie awake and look at Steffie. But I’ll lie there as long as my eyelids will permit. I’ll be a good guy, God, if I get back. Let me get back, let me live, let me have the chance again. I won’t muff it...I promise. Just let me breathe the air again, and in the air I breathe let there be a scent of clover, and, God, let it come from Steffie, and from fields I know. When I do shove off, let it be decent, and let it be clean, and let it be home.

  Where’s home? Home must be where the nice smells are. Home is where there’s a smell of burning leaves. A smell of November. Home is where I’ll find Steffie. And I’ll stand and breathe deeply, I’ll try to get every last ounce of air my lungs will hold, and it will smell like leaves, like pine, like clover and like clean things...it’ll smell like home. I’ll get a dog, just a mutt, and I’ll walk over fields of clover or along fences when the leaves have drifted up. Every little while I’ll drop down and pick up a handful of earth, or clover, or leaves, and I’ll squeeze it through my fingers. If anyone asks why, I’ll say:

  “Bub, I’m alive and I’m home...and I’d eat this stuff, yards of it, because it’s me and I’m it...and I’m alive and I’m home.”

  CHAPTER 10

  Its damp in here, and cold. The creeping darkness is doing whacky things to my nerves. Dark shadows rustle around like cold laughter and stand in the comers. It’s damp, and it smells funny...it’s moldy. Moldy, like opening a closet full of dirty clothes...a closet that hasn’t been opened for a long time. No, Joe...it isn’t a shadow you see...it’s the old bitch. She smells, too. She’s standing right over there in the corner, watching, waiting, and smiling to herself. That’s where the moldy smell comes from, Joe, from that old whore. What the hell does she want with me? I’m not ready yet, not by a damned sight. She’s wasting her time...this is only a scratch in my shoulder even if it does hurt like hell. Tell her to bugger off. Tell her there’re lots of good guys dying...tell her there’s plenty of work for her somewhere else. Tell her our Joe’s got a ticket home that he’s strictly going to use.