“Spying on someone, were ya?”
Noble recognizes the singsong swagger of East london in the voice, its undertone of menace. He tries to sit up, but someone has fastened lead weights to his head, run glass through his eyes. Lips cracked, spittle dried at the corners of his mouth, tongue furred and foul tasting. Squinting against the painful sun — where is he and what the devil time is it? — he stares up at the skinny figure before him. Spoon. He kicks at Noble’s feet.
“Time you were moving on, mate.”
Noble holds up a hand, needing a minute. Though hard as hell the ground is still unsteady, and his stomach isn’t happy with the sudden shift in his axis. What in God’s name is he doing this far from his bed? It rained in the night, his clothes are damp. And he’s as stiff and sore as a kicked dog. A thud by his side, a spray of sand. A water canteen. He takes it and empties the cool liquid down his throat. He licks his lips, then runs a hand through his hair. Pine needles and grit, bits of leaves.
“You’re gonna be late for church, mate.” Leaning his wiry body forward, Spoon scoops up the canteen from Noble’s lap and walks away, whistling.
Noble turns his head and hurls up the contents of his stomach. He rolls onto his knees. On and on his stomach heaves. Cold sweat on his forehead and he’s shivering, shuddering. Glances down the bay in the direction of Begging Dog weir. Tide’ll be out soon. Butler will be all over him for not showing up last night. But he can’t face work right now. Might as well be hung for a sheep.
Church bells begin pealing and Noble’s guts lurch again. He can picture his mother’s stiffened back, jaw tight as glass. Which is worse, being late or skipping the service altogether? The church door has a squeak that could set a schoolmarm’s teeth on edge.
Had he walked down here last night? Staggered? He remembers lights in the cabin on the Esmeralda. What time would that have been? And the Douglases taking their leave of the luscious Esmeralda. Hetty Douglas was three sheets to the wind herself if all that giggling and tripping over her own feet was any indication. Sipping at the captain’s private stash, which must be considerable. But how to explain his own presence at the wharf? What the devil had he been up to —
Mary.
And the doctor. Blundering about on their back lawn. Christ. What had possessed him to go over there last night? Booze, you stupid buggar. The better part of a bottle of Irish whiskey, the thought of which curdles his insides again.
Bad form, Noble old chap, shouting and carrying on like some spurned lover. It’s coming back to him now, Mary’s face, Baker’s hand on his arm. He’d been making an utter fool of himself, no doubt, but what had he said? A cold dread sneaks up alongside his hangover. Something to do with Jem. His son. My son. There’s an unreal quality to the words still, trapped in his head as they are.
“My son,” he says aloud, then freezes, waiting for a voice of dissent in his ear, a hand on his shoulder. The damp air needles at his skin. “My son,” he says again, thrilled by the bold new sound of the words. He prays that the boy was fast asleep the whole time. Prays the Bakers keep their mouths shut. Prays the village grapevine missed last night’s events. Noble pulls himself to his feet and nods in the direction of the church steeple, apologizes to God for playing hooky this morning and stumbles into the village on wobbly legs.
Standing at the water basin in the kitchen, he washes his face and hands, the back of his neck. He’d like a bath but there’s scarcely time enough to draw and heat the water, never mind have a soak and clean up the mess afterwards, before church spills out and his mother will be home, frowning at the waste. A Saturday night bath is fine if you plan on attending church the next morning. God, apparently, is the only event worth getting clean for.
Sleep presses at his temples, a band of pain across his forehead. Noble crawls upstairs; his bed beckons. He won’t get in, just lie on top of the covers. A short nap is all he needs.
But the next thing he knows his mother is staring down at him, eyes doleful, lips narrow and straight, underlining the disappointment that is the rest of her face. Noble blinks and stares back but can think of nothing worth saying. His headache has settled behind his eyes like some cantankerous lodger and his lips feel as though the skin on them has grown together. He couldn’t part them to whisper sorry if he tried.
“You should open the window,” she says, turning away and going back downstairs. He listens awhile. No banging of cupboards or slamming of doors. Mother and son have both learned to tie down their feelings.
Noble climbs from his bed, straightens his clothes and walks quietly downstairs. Sarah is in the kitchen.
“Tea?”
He pulls out a kitchen chair, cringing as the legs grate across the floor. Tea he can stomach.
“Could you manage anything to eat?”
He shakes his head.
No lecture, no prophecies of doom. She doesn’t even berate him for his crimes, the possibility and consequences of his being caught and fined, even jailed. Though someone would first have to find the bottle — where did he leave it, anyway? — and prove he was drinking from it. You couldn’t be charged for having a hangover. Or could you?
His mother sits opposite him at the table, her hands around her own mug of tea, staring into its milky brownness. Noble watches how she still sits to one side, leaving room for Lawson. After his father died, Lawson, himself and their mother had all shifted sideways, filling up his empty space. It wasn’t as if the man had expired suddenly, leaving them with a keen sense of loss; he had simply faded away. Noble doesn’t have to wonder for long what is on his mother’s mind.
“The memorial committee was all assembled there on the church steps after service this morning. They said they would wait on you.”
Noble rubs a hand across his brow. “I completely forgot.”
His mother picks up her tea mug, sets it down again. “Your brother’s soul, God rest him, up there looking down on you, Noble Matheson. Makes a person wonder what he’s thinking, you not there to do your duty.”
Resentment rears in Noble, his fingers tighten around the mug in his hand. How can she always make him feel so guilty?
“I meant no disrespect to Lawson’s memory, Mumma. You know that.” It crosses his mind’s eye sometimes: him grabbing her shoulders and shaking her, yelling, his mouth inches from her face, his spittle flying. I miss him too. You don’t have a monopoly on pain, Mother. I’m hurting too. He takes a sip of scalding tea, hoping to burn the rage from his throat.
“Aye, but does the rest of the village know that, Noble? What about how it looks in their eyes? What you need to do is pull yourself together and get yourself over there.” He rises from his chair. “not now, not stinking the way you do.”
“There’s water on for you to bath in. And you mind you scrub long and hard, Noble Matheson.” Here her voice, so far under control, spills over. She stands and walks to the kitchen sink, rinses out her mug. “I don’t want to know where you got it from, though I have a good idea. But just you make sure you scrub all traces of sin from your flesh.”
The memorial committee meetings are held in the basement of the Methodist church, as if the Protestants have some kind of monopoly on lost and wounded menfolk. Or so Noble had once overheard Rose O’Flannagan complaining to Jed Harper down at the store. When Noble, his skin red and tingling, his hair still wet, makes his way down the stairs, however, he hears, not the voice of Reverend Walker, piping on about the memorial day preparations, but rather the censorious tones of the village doctor.
It’s too late to turn and flee. An embarrassed silence greets him. Noble, rooted at the foot of the stairs by the scene before him, has to stifle the urge to laugh. It would appear that the regular tables and chairs have already been commandeered for next Saturday’s ceremony, and so the committee is making do with the sunday school furniture. The effect is of a group of large and sombre schoolchildren, bottoms hanging over the seats of their pint-sized wooden chairs, legs splayed beneath the kindergarten tables, dominated by the ornery Dr. Baker. Resplendent in his dark Sunday morning suit, hands linked behind his back and under his anachronistic coattails, Baker paces back and forth like a glowering raven.
Has he been regaling them with last night’s sordid details? Why else would the man be here? And Pete Douglas, whom he now spots leaning against the far wall, arms folded across his chest. As a decorated officer and a four-year veteran of the war — few men could boast four years over there — Douglas is slated to give a speech Saturday. Though to Noble’s knowledge he’s never bothered showing up at any previous meetings. Noble hulloes the rest of the committee and does a quick head count. Bob Winters and Matthias Tweed, both carpenters, both of whom have been working on the Esmeralda, are missing. He wonders how many absentees there were from church, how many villagers have hangovers this morning. This afternoon, he corrects himself, remembering he’s already slept away half the day. Is Baker avoiding his eye or is that just Noble’s imagination? Exactly what had he been shouting last night?
“Glad you could make it, Noble.” Marjorie McFadden, the blacksmith’s mother. A large woman, almost as broad as her son, a woman who never seems to age or change in any way, a woman many villagers feel disinclined to cross. “We missed you in church this morning.”
Noble bows his head in her direction. “Under the weather,” he mutters. Absent-mindedly he rubs at his arm, feeling the press and outline of the doctor’s bony fingers.
“But feeling better now, are we?” Her eyes are penetrating, like her son’s.
“Much,” he lies, with a weak smile. Oddly enough there’s nothing at all funny about being interrogated by a big woman in a small chair. Noble steps towards the table, which barely clears his knees, pulls out his seat and sits down. He’d like to see Butler negotiate his long legs around this child-sized furniture with grace.
The doctor claps his hands impatiently. “I trust then, ladies and gentlemen, that I have painted an adequate picture of what may befall the village if the present circumstances are allowed to continue. Kenomee is a dry village, an edict voted for by the good people assembled here and other like-minded villagers. It is our duty to uphold the law.” Nods and murmurs of assent around the room.
“I understand that as a coastal village we likewise have a duty to assist mariners in distress. But I’m informed that damage to the aforementioned schooner has now been repaired. So the continued presence of the Esmeralda is, as I see it, a threat to the integrity of the Prohibition Bill as set out by our government.” Noble stares at coloured pencil drawings of Joseph in his coat of many colours and pictures Lillian’s soft pale hands pinning them on the wall, praising each child’s effort, no matter how uninspired. He sniffs. The smell of Bushmills is seeping through his pores and into the humid atmosphere of the room. Rocks roll and slide inside his head as he concentrates on breathing through his nose. He hopes that now he’s sitting no one will ask him a question.
“Then we all understand each other and agree that action must be taken?” More nods and murmurs. “I’d like a show of hands, please.” Noble’s eyes dart about. What is Baker planning? McFadden’s mother and Jed Harper’s spinster sister, Iris, raise their hands immediately, as does the minister and Marsh Bates, leader of the Truro Pipe Band, not that it’s his village to be voting in. Noble would like a clearer picture of exactly what it is everyone’s voting for. Marching down to the wharf and unmooring the Esmeralda? Armed insurrection? Asking means he’ll have to breathe on someone and risk provoking the doctor’s ire. One by one the other men raise their hands. Finally Noble raises his along with them. Who is he to stand against the majority? And considering the way he’s feeling today, keeping alcohol out of the village is probably a fine idea. As long as it doesn’t turn into a bloody witch-hunt, Baker, he thinks, lowering his arm now that the doctor is nodding his satisfaction.
Still, perhaps it won’t come to that. The Esmeralda, bowsprit and rigging brand new and shining, as he’s seen for himself, could be gone on today’s tide. And maybe that is in part why it’s easy for everyone to agree with the doctor this afternoon, the promise of Sunday dinner a few hours away, a seat on the verandah to watch the sun go down. They’ve already got what they wanted from the schooner: money for loaves of home-baked bread and jars of preserves or a few days paid work or a bottle or two of booze to chase away low spirits.
Excusing himself to go look after his wife, whose nerves are a little frayed this morning — the doctor sweeps his hawk’s eyes over Noble — Baker stands to leave. Reverend Walker stands too to shake his hand and thank him for coming and “for giving us all this little pep talk.” Noble couldn’t be more surprised when Pete Douglas takes his leave at the same time, the two men muttering together. The door has no sooner banged to behind them than everyone begins speaking at once.
“All the Swinton menfolk were missing from church this morning.”
“The women too.”
“Aye, but Allison and young Marie would’ve been too ashamed to show their faces alone. Too many questions.”
“It was like party night in a brothel down at the wharf last night, so much noise. Surprised the whole village wasn’t wakened by it.”
“And what would you know of a party night at a brothel?”
“Nothing. I was just using it as an example, is all. I only know what I been told. A lot of carry-on like that in France.”
“So you’ve been told.”
“Aye.”
Noble nods in the direction of the various comments, in half a mind to run after the doctor. And say what, though?
“Wasn’t Pete Douglas down there? With his wife.”
“My sister told me the whole shindig was some celebration in her honour.”
“What honour? She hasn’t got any, stuck-up young madam.”
“She’s not so bad. Has anyone given her a chance? Anyone here?”
Noble realizes he’s spoken aloud. Faces round on him.
“Has she given us one?”
“Serves her right, putting on so many fancy airs.”
“We were planning to go over the route of the procession and the music for the marching band.” Reverend Walker, back from his goodbyes at the door, is once again seated and smiling, eyes closed and crinkled at the corners. Marjorie McFadden nods at the Sunday school chalkboard. Noble turns around and reads: ROUTE PROCESSION. MUSIC PIECES (MARCHING BAND). He pushes his hand through his hair. It’s ground they’ve covered time and again. The band has been rehearsing for weeks, the route mapped out in every villager’s mind. Baker’s lecture is the real reason this meeting was convened.
“Is the rigging ready for the unveiling, Noble? The ropes and curtains?”
“All ready for set-up, Reverend.” He can’t meet the man’s eyes. What a farce. The village has been prepared since well before Victoria Day, when the ceremony — the unveiling of the bronze statue of a soldier who stood to commemorate the village’s dead, an uncommonly high number of bright young men — was to have taken place. But then Frederick Murray had succumbed to his war wounds. Adding the young man’s name to the plaque became a point of honour for the villagers though they lacked the extra funds to stand behind their pride. Until Pete Douglas offered to pay for the recasting himself. When the new plaque failed to arrive in time it was decided by a majority to postpone the unveiling until the following week. Though not unanimously. Some held that the memorial celebration should proceed as originally planned on the day commemorating Queen Victoria. The first plaque could be temporarily mounted to the statue’s granite plinth and the new plaque substituted when it arrived. The Murray family had bristled at the suggestion; friends and sympathizers had threatened to boycott the event.
“And you’re confident the curtains will glide open without a hitch? We wouldn’t want them to rip, or the entire installation to topple over onto someone, would we?” Noble forces a laugh, though the minister has used these lines several times now, and the rest of the group chuckles in response. It’s as if the wretched schooner is in the room with them, seawater dripping from the rigging, and everyone is trying to ignore it.
“It is,” Reverend Walker says, pushing back his chair a little and raising his chin, “important that the occasion befit the seriousness of the moment. This is the village’s opportunity to formally honour its many dead.” Here heads bow. “Far too many of our young men lost their lives fighting evil. We owe it to them to make next Saturday a serious and formal occasion.”
Mary is sitting across the road on one of the village green benches when the memorial committee files out from the side door of the church. She has her back to the door, but it’s obvious she’s been waiting for the committee to finish up when she rises and begins walking towards them. And while she isn’t looking at Noble, she is heading in his direction. He glances around for her husband, and just as he’s about to dart sideways to avoid a collision her hand reaches out and takes his. Without breaking her stride she presses something into his fingers and is gone, greeting Iris Harper in a too-loud voice.
It’s a note. Some sort of warning about last night no doubt. Stay away. Leave my son alone. But he’s my son too, Mary. Blood thumps through Noble’s ears. Feet moving in the direction of home, he waits until there’s no one around.
I NeeD To TAlk To you. MEET ME DOWn aT tHe wooDs AS SOON AS yOu ReAd tHis. M.
So the doctor hasn’t cured her rotten penmanship. He probably writes all her correspondence. Her shopping lists. She must be a source of embarrassment to him. Nice to get yourself a young wife who looks good on your arm and feels good in your bed, but you have to take the sand with the marsh greens.
If she just wants to tell him off about last night then he’s disinclined to go; he even starts off back home. But on reflection Noble figures he probably owes her for last night. Staggering over there and chucking his drunken weight around, disturbing the peace, interrupting their sing-song or bible-reading or whatever it is they get up to evenings. More than likely she wants to talk about Jem. She’s going to say leave the boy alone, stay out of his life.
But now that Noble has ventured down the Jem-is-my-son road, it’s impossible to turn back. In his mind he has already begun shifting over and making room for this young soul, has already guided those young hands (clammy, for children’s hands invariably are) in his own. He has shown him how to whittle an arrow and string a bow, how to climb an apple tree, how to select the best conkers, how to scoop a fish by its gills, how to saddle and bridle a horse. How to drive a car. He’s walked with him through the streets of Kenomee, his hand on Jem’s shoulder or tousling his hair, the boy looking up at him from time to time, face animated in a smile partway to a laugh, a non-stop barrage of question spilling from his mouth, feet skip-stepping to keep in time with his father’s strides.
Noble pulls out his tobacco pouch and rolling papers and doubles back. He can always walk away if she gets hysterical.
From the stiff and self-conscious way she holds herself, walking towards him, Noble can tell that Mary feels as awkward and uncomfortable as he does. He grinds the butt of his cigarette under his heel and begins rolling another. Closer, he can make out the band of red that plays across her eyes like a mask
“You know,” she begins, fussing with the collar on her dress. It cost a pretty penny, did that dress. As did her fancy shoes. Noble takes a bitter pleasure in the streaks of red clay across the toes. She must have stumbled making her way down here. “I could get the magistrate on you after that stunt you pulled last night.” Briefly she looks him in eye. “And the doctor had a mind to do exactly that. It took me half the night to talk him out of it.”
Was he supposed to be grateful to her?
“The doctor doesn’t like alcohol, and you fairly stank of it last night.”
“This is why you dragged me out here? To tell me your husband doesn’t like alcohol?”
“No.” She looks away, and he can hear in her choked off voice, see in the wringing of her fingers — that’s some fine jewellery she’s got there — that she’s trying to collect herself. “Jeremiah isn’t yours. I don’t know who put that idea in your head, but he’s most definitely not yours.”
“I can count, Mary.”
“So can the doctor.”
“Had us both at the same time, did you?” Noble is shocked at the sudden hatred he feels, expanding like heartburn. So she was being wooed by Baker before their Halifax tryst. While he was away getting shot at in the trenches — at least for all she knew he was getting shot at in the trenches — Mary was entertaining a man old enough to be her father. He has a fleeting urge to grab her fine dress by its oversized collar and rip it from her back. “You’re a weak and stupid woman, Mary. Only I was too young and stupid myself to see it at the time.”
“I’ve been a good mother to him.”
“You’ve lied to him. You’re still lying to him. You think that makes you a good mother?”
Her eyes glisten. She looks away in the direction of the woods. “He has a good home. He’s happy. Why do you want to go stirring up a bunch of trouble?”
“I want to get to know him, do things with him.” He does, but he hasn’t thought this through. Sarah. What in God’s name is she going to say? And the rest of the damn village.
“No. That’s impossible.”
“I could take him fishing, show him how to skin a rabbit.”
“He’s six years old. You want him slicing his fingers off?”
“We can go skating on Miller’s pond in the winter.”
“He goes there with his father.”
“Hunting, then. All boys want to know how to hunt.”
“A knife isn’t dangerous enough? Now you want him carrying guns?”
“I’m his father, he should be with me.” Noble’s mouth is so dry and sour it feels as if he’s taken a spoonful of baking soda.
“And what does the word father mean to you, Noble Matheson?” Hands on her hips. “Exactly what do you think it means? Because let me tell you this, it is much more than being the Sower of the seed. Anyone can do that.”
Sower of the seed. She was never this eloquent before. Obviously living with the doctor has rubbed off on her, or the man has spent hours correcting her speech and manners. Noble thinks he almost misses the cruder, brasher Mary. But there’s another realization rattling around his head. She’s almost as much admitted he is Jem’s father. That his seed produced the child. Hasn’t she?
“Nothing to say for yourself now, mister? I didn’t think so.”
She hasn’t given him a chance. He’s still collecting his thoughts.
“Well, mark my words. As long as I’m still in this village, Noble Matheson, he won’t be with you. I’ll make sure of that.” And she’s marching back towards the main road.
“You’ll make sure how, Mary?” Fool. Bloody fool. Keep your mouth shut, can’t you? But some part of him, unleashed in last night’s whiskey-fuelled venture, has taken control of his mouth.
She stops, turns, and takes measured steps towards him. There’s a trace of a smile about her lips. “Do you care about him?”
“Jem? Of course. He’s my —
“Then you’ll think on what vicious gossip and rumours will do to him and you’ll leave well enough alone.”
Up close, her eyes sparking with passion, her features set with purpose, Noble is reminded of how attracted he once was. Without thinking he raises a hand to straighten the furrows on her forehead but she bats it away with her own gloved one. Finger pointed at him. “If you care you’ll keep your distance. You know how cruel kids can be.”
Not half as cruel as adults, Noble thinks, watching her walk away.