For Sure (70 page)

“Geez, I didn't know dat neidder.”

Work. Work hard. Put your nose to the grindstone. Do the heavy lifting, use a little elbow grease. Earn your keep, earn every penny, earn your stripes. You don't have money to burn. Spend wisely. You're not made of money. Save. Don't play the stock market. Don't throw good money after bad. Don't pour money down the drain nor spend it like it's going out of style. The noun
argent
is masculine. It doesn't grow on trees, nor will it fall from the sky.

They walked a while longer, Catherine leading the way, Chico following behind. The sun drew pretty patterns on the ground.

“Is she still a long way, yer cabin?”

Catherine was surprised.

“My cabin? It's just a place I went to be alone; there's no cabin.”

The absence of a cabin excited Chico just a little.

“Wot is it, den? A cave?”

Chico imagined discovering a cave. He'd seen them on television, but never in reality.

“No, it's not a cave.”

The moment of writing is one. It is the moment. All writing comes back to this moment, compression of the same into one.

“When will you be going?”

“Are some weeks cheaper dan udders?”

The agent hit a few keys on her keyboard and chatted with Carmen while she waited for the page to upload.

“System looks overloaded . . .”

Carmen was in no hurry, with nothing better to do. The telephone began to ring on the desk next to them.

“Telephone's been ringing off the hook since morning. You'd think everyone'd decided to go at the same time.”

The agent opened a drawer, searching in it for a several moments:

“I broke me nail before comin' in to work this mornin' an' I haven't had time to file it. Rubs me nerves raw.”

And then suddenly it was too much: the blank screen, the telephone ringing non-stop and the lost nail file all came together to erode what little patience the agent had left.

“Lard tunderin'! Where's dat friggen file got to!”

In the living room, immobile, her head resting on Élizabeth's shoulder but her eyes wide open, Marianne allows herself to be rocked in the old armchair that sings cooey-pik one way and cooey-pak the other. In the kitchen, Jean-Jacques is listening to the radio while he washes the dishes.

Catherine saw the river, and wondered if Chico had spotted it, too.

“We're almost there.”

But Chico was no longer thinking about how far they had to go. He was listening to their feet crackling twigs, snapping dead branches, muffling the ground where the thick roots of pine trees buckled up out of the earth like the veins on his grandfather's hands, long ago now.

The property register was overflowing with title deeds, but not one was suitable.

The weather was perfect, the surface of the river barely shimmering. Neither Chico nor Catherine felt the need to talk. From time to time, a bird's call or a squirrel's breakaway fissured the silence.

“Would you like to swim?”

Chico was more interested in exploring the edge of the shore. It was the first time he'd been on an untamed river. It was nothing like the beach. The muddy bottom was strewn with tree trunks and branches; walking through it was a real challenge.

“It isn't deep. You can even walk across.”

Chico looked at the other shore. Indeed, it wasn't very far. He might very well end up going over.

Leaf through a book looking for an expression, a phrase, a passage that struck you. This time, you underlined it, or earmarked the page. But once you find it, the passage is disappointing, seems weaker than you remembered it. Something's missing. Maybe it was the cumulative effect of the preceeding pages, the momentary flash of light, the surprise, the enthusiasm of a first reading. Confusion, sense of loss. Perhaps every pilgrimage carries with it a sense of loss.

“. . . companies dat folks wouldn't tink of.”

“Dat's just it! Der are a whole lot o' dose! Only, how do you decide which?”

“Well, der's a couple or tree principles: 'ow much risk yer willin' to take; companies dat're young or de more mature companies, wid or widout dividends; an' den der's de different sectors, like banks, energy, healt', consumer goods . . .”

Zed understood.

“Some folks say you've only gotta be buyin' in six or eight companies in tree different sectors. You buys a wee bit at a time, when de price is down. Dat means when der in a bit of a dip, like you sees right 'ere.”

Terry pointed to a graph on the screen depicting a modest downturn.

“You can see 'ow, every once in a little while, she goes down a wee bit. Dat's normal. Dey says a dip o' ten percent is good. Ya see, de percentage's written 'ere.”

Zed looked at the figures in the small box on the screen, found a percentage.

. . .

. . .

“Anyhow . . . dat's one way. Only dat's not really de way I goes about it.”

Marianne also likes to ride piggyback on Chico, especially when he rears up, whinnying, and she has to hang on, yelling and laughing at the same time. It's a little like when you have to go peepee.

Étienne had been following every one of his grandfather Thibodeau's gestures, as he worked that day to replace the veranda's supporting posts.

“How come de wood's green?”

“Dey puts sometin' on it so it don't rot.”

And:

“How come you takes dem old nails, Granddad?”

“Der still good, even doh dey're a wee bit bent an' rusty. We only need to straighten dem up a bit.”

And with that, the master shaper tossed another handful of old nails on the cement block and began gently hammering the shanks as he rolled the ends with his index finger.

“Luh?”

Yes, Étienne had seen.

pattern

slide the needle

take hold, oh gladsome girl

these nights forever now stitched

with stars

After a while, Catherine, ankle deep in water, stood up from the tree trunk on which she'd been sitting — a trunk jutting obliquely from the embankment where it was still anchored — and began like Chico to explore the river bottom. In the perfectly transparent water before her, she saw once more those groups of tiny fish rushing to get here and there, then suddenly turning back without any apparent reason.

“A bottle!”

Chico bent, freeing the bottle from the silt where it was buried, an old brown beer bottle, all scratched up and without a label, short and stout, a bottle from a bygone era. But unbroken.

Having considered the question from all angles, Carmen was absolutely convinced that Terry was planning a surprise party for her 36th birthday. After all, 36 was the product of 3 times 12, and Terry was sensitive to such things. If she was right, well then her own secret project seemed to be all the more fitting.

“Would you like to walk a little further that way?”

“OK.”

In the process of writing, a number of accidents occurred that confirmed the underlying theory. That was very satisfying.

A fellow's gotta expect to be makin' a few mistakes along de way. An' you can expect de udders to screw it up as well.”

“Me, I looks fer de companies dat everybody agrees on. Like, if everybody's sayin' dat de Billy Bully company's about to go up to seven dollars, 'cept fer dis one fellow who tinks she's only goin' up to four, well, den I gets real careful. On account of even de analysts're gonna fall into de trap o' wishful tinkin'. Dey doesn't do it on purpose. Dat's just de way of tings. Nobody sees one hundred percent wot's goin' on inside der own head.”

. . .

“So on account of de wishful tinkin', dey comes up wid different predictions. Well, fer me, dey all has to be in de same ballpark, udderwise it's no go.”

Zed was following, and agreed.

“Same time, you has to be mindful. You has to listen to de contrarians.”

“De who?”

“De contrarians. Der de analysts wot's always tinkin' de exact opposite of all de udders. Dey looks fer de wee crack in de wall. On account of, wedder you likes it or not, der's bound to be one.”

Zed appeared to be discouraged.

“Don't go gettin' all boddered. It sounds a whole lot more complicated dan it is.”

But as valuable as a theory may be, it is futile to adhere to it every day. A kind of intermittence then. A necessary intermittence, vital even. Must we absolutely grab that bull by the horns? Perhaps, but not today. No, today the bull is too much bull. Today something else calls to us. So be it. Like the movement of a pendulum. The pendulum never stops, never attains its limit. There's no relation of cause and effect here: the pendulum never stops; the pendulum repeatedly attains its limit. Who would dare argue that the pendulum retreats before the impossible? You may object that the pendulum cannot think in such terms because it isn't human. But who can say with certainty that we ourselves are not pendulums? Embrace the matter rather than forcing it. Become one with that which desires. Act on the manifest potential of things. And then one day, hop! The bull, both hands tightly gripping his horns. Intermittence. A technique. A tactic. A fervour. A fantasy.

They waded up to the first bend in the river, where Chico was surprised to see another splendid bend further ahead.

“She goes a long way, eh?”

“Almost all the way to Moncton.”

Impressed, Chico looked once more at the river before him.

“There's a covered bridge about halfway there.”

“A wot?”

“A covered bridge.”

Chico still didn't understand.

“A bridge covered in wood, with a roof and windows. You've never seen a bridge like that?”

Chico shrugged, uncertain.

“We'll go by on our way, so you can see it.”

They stood there in silence in the water for a while, contemplating the river's turning in the distance, before quietly turning back themselves the way they'd come.

“Did yous have a fishing rod?”

“No, only a kind of cage to catch the minnows you can see. I could catch a whole bunch in a day. I'd bring them home in a pail and put them in a big tub of water. We called it a gully in those days.”

“Granny's got a gully . . .”

“See? It's a fine word. Only in school they taught us to say tub, and that made us forget gully.”

Chico understood.

Because I sometimes open parentheses without closing them, because I launch beginnings that lead nowhere. Because I evoke trails that evaporate. Because all this is deceptive. Readers think they've guessed a meaning, imagine a direction, a probable action, a possible resolution. Wild goose chases. Yes, open parentheses, initiatives that lead nowhere, trails that evaporate. As in life. Possibilities, ambiguities, incompletetions. In light of all of which, it becomes occasionally necessary to rethink, reinterpret, reread. Not really a theory. More like a precaution: to rule nothing out, because everything can end up being useful. Not to presume.

“Don't be takin' dis de wrong way or nuttin', only it stuns me just a wee bit to 'ear you talkin' like dis 'bout de stock market'n all.”

. . .

“I doesn't know you dat way. Wot I mean to say, I never tawt you 'ad it in you!”

. . .

“I suppose it oughtn't to be surprisin' me, on account of de way you tawt of how to finance de lofts, an' den you does run yer own business . . .”

. . .

“An' Carmen wid de bar, well dat's a business as well.”

. . .

“An you 'aven't said a word to Carmen, you little noggyhead . . .”

Terry was laughing.

“I can't get it in me 'ead you hid dis from 'er.”

Terry, still laughing, protested:

“'Tisn't dat I wanted to be hidin' it from 'er. I only started out dat way, wid little bits. I didn't want to be tellin' her an' puttin' her on de edge of 'er nerves fer nuttin'. She 'ad enough to tink about wid de bar startin' up an' all. Plus, she was pregnant.”

Zed understood but, at the same time, it bothered him because it was as though he too was now participating in the cover-up. He'd been caught before by Carmen in this sort of misdeed, and he didn't want it to happen again.

“Well, seems to me now's de time to tell 'er.”

“Matter o' fact, I almost told 'er dis mornin'. Came dat close.”

“And wot?”

“Don't know. I was afraid 'twould break me luck.”

“You told me luck had no part in it!”

“I know! Dat's not wot I mean.”

The two guys were enjoying this arguing back and forth. Zed insisted:

“De way dese tings go, she'll most likely be tinkin' I's de one got you started.”