Speak to the Earth (13 page)

Bryan glanced at Walter. “What happened this time?” he asked his uncle.

“For some reason she decided to park her carcass on the bridge and block the trucks again. So she’s broken the terms of her release. They already took her to Nanaimo. She could get six months this time. This is real serious.”

Six months? Bryan took off his sweater and hurled it against the wall. Six months for sitting on a bridge? He didn’t know who made him more furious, more tied in knots, his mother or the law.

B
ryan didn’t bother with lunch, even though he was ravenous from the morning’s slugging on the boat. It was raining lightly — what some residents of Nootka Harbour would call a heavy fog — when he set out for Elias’s place on his bike.

The Wilsons’ house was a big two-storey with a verandah stretched across the front. When Bryan arrived, breathless, he found Elias and Zeke rebuilding the steps. He knew Elias’s dad liked to keep the place looking slick because of the art gallery he had made by knocking out a wall on the first floor and converting what had been a parlour and dining room. He displayed some of his paintings there.

Bryan was pleased to see Zeke at home — he still lived with Elias and his parents — because he wanted to talk to both of them. Working away despite the rain — in Nootka Harbour, if you postponed work — or anything else — because of rain, nothing would ever get done — they greeted him as he propped his bike against
the verandah railing. The stair risers were in place and the brothers were measuring planks to cut the steps.

Zeke looked a little sheepish as he handled the tape measure, still embarrassed, Bryan thought, at having to arrest his mother.

“Hey, Zeke,” he said, getting to the point right away, “do you mind if I ask you something about police work?”

“Feel free,” the big man said. He was dark, like Elias, heavy across the shoulders, with a boyish face.

Elias picked up a handsaw. “Thinking of joining the boys in blue, Bry? I don’t think you’d make the height restrictions.”

Bryan gave Elias the finger and said to Zeke, “Well, suppose a person thought a couple of other persons were committing crimes and he was afraid to go to the cops because a different person might get into trouble if the two persons were breaking the law.”

Zeke stood and brushed sawdust from his jeans. “Ah …”

Elias laughed. “You’re starting to sound like Walter, Bry.” He began to saw the plank, balancing it across the risers.

“Yeah, Bryan, that wasn’t what you’d call clear and to the point,” Zeke said.

“Okay.” Bryan tried again, wondering if he should have even started. “Let’s suppose —”

“Hang on a second,” Elias said, interrupting his sawing, his tone serious. “I think what Bryan wants to do,” he said, talking to his brother but looking at his friend, “is describe a totally imaginary situation to you. Just sort
of for the fun of it. Right, Bry?”

“Right. Totally imaginary. Just for the fun of it. Because I’m interested in how a cop might see it.”

“A cop who was on duty,” Elias added. “Which you aren’t, Zeke.”

A wide grin formed on Zeke’s face as he removed his baseball cap and scratched his head. “Nope, I’m off duty today. That’s right. Off cop duty and on step-building duty.” His grin faded. “But — and this is a big ‘but’ — if somebody was to know for certain that a serious crime had been committed, and if that somebody was to tell a real live cop, on duty or off, that cop would have to do something about it, because he’s sworn to do so. Do you get my drift, Bryan?”

Not at all certain that he wanted to keep going on this, Bryan kept his mouth shut. Elias took up his sawing again, and Zeke sat down on the plank to keep it steady. Bryan kicked at the damp spruce needles beside the walk. Then the picture of his mom sitting in jail for half a year formed in his mind, and his confusion slowly turned into anger, anger at jerks like Kevin and Otto, sneaking into his town and into his life, causing havoc and taking off again, probably for some condo in Vancouver.

“Here’s the imaginary situation,” Bryan began once more. “There’s this person who owns a B&B. This person is an activist who’s been arrested for the second time —”

“Did you say
second
?” Elias interrupted.

“Not first?” Zeke asked.

“Second.”

Abandoning his saw, Elias stood and listened.

“Now this person, let’s say, has rented rooms to a couple of guys who claim they’re from Toronto. They’ve got a van with Ontario plates. But one of them has a B.C. driver’s licence and —”

“How do you know that?”

“He doesn’t know anything, Zeke,” Elias said. “This is just a theory, remember?”

“Okay, okay. Keep going, Bryan.”

“So anyway, someone who knows this B&B person thinks that these two guys are responsible for some pretty serious vandalism that’s been going on around a certain logging site. But he’s afraid to go to the cops because they might come down on his mother — who he knows,” Bryan said, no longer caring that he had stepped out of the imaginary situation and into real life, “had nothing to do with the vandalism. And he’s afraid not to go to the cops, because things might get a lot worse and who can guess what would happen then?”

The three of them stood there in the drizzle.

“Let’s go in the house and get something to drink,” Zeke suggested.

In the family room, each of them holding a can of pop, Zeke continued.

“Okay, Bryan,” he said quietly, “let’s do it this way. I’m hearing some stuff, but I don’t know where I heard it. Right?”

Bryan nodded, relieved. Until Zeke went on.

“But, like I said outside, if I find that someone has done something against the law, no matter who that person is and no matter how much I like and admire that person, I can’t let it go. Now if you can handle that, keep talking, and drop this charade. If you can’t, you can help Elias and me with them damn steps, and anything else — besides how to get the steps built — that we have talked about gets forgotten. And no harm done.”

“I don’t know what to do,” Bryan said.

“Talk, Bryan,” Elias told him. “Your mother just isn’t the kind of person to get mixed up in sabotage, and everybody knows it. Right, big brother?”

Zeke waited. Bryan read the words on his pop can a few times, took a deep breath and told Zeke everything — the licence, the sock with kerosene, Kevin and Otto taking pictures at the Big Bear River the day Walter and Bryan were looking for Iris.

“You understand,” Zeke said, “that you’re not to pass on anything I say? Elias already knows this. I can’t feel free to talk about my job if people go blabbing and gossiping around town, saying, ‘Zeke Wilson said this and that.’ Or I’d lose my job.”

“I understand, Zeke.”

“First, nobody on the job — at least, the locals — really thinks your mother is a saboteur. We had to investigate her and her group because it’s routine — and because certain powerful interests around here put pressure on the force to do that. I happen to admire Iris, like I said outside. I agree with her goals, too. Elias and me
are half-native, remember. But us cops gotta do our jobs without taking sides. Anyway, it sounds to me like the cops ought to take a hard look at those two guys staying at your house. I want you, when you get home, to call me when they’re in so I can drive by and get their plate number. I’ll put it through the computer. I’ll put their names through, too. If I meet them on the road I’ll pull them over and check their paperwork. I’ll tell them we’re looking for a stolen van. I don’t want them to know I’m looking at them, see? Meantime, here’s what I want you to do.”

“What?” Bryan blurted, pleased at the prospect of finally being able to
do
something.

Zeke took a long pull from his can of cola. “Nothing.”

“Huh?”

“Nothing. Leave it to me. You give those guys a wide berth. And in a day or so, if I find out something — or find out nothing, since these guys may be, probably are innocent — I’ll tell you and Jimmy, and Jimmy can give them their walking papers.”

“He’d love to do that anyway,” Bryan said. “He doesn’t like tree-huggers.”

Elias spoke up. “But your Mom needs the money they bring in.”

“Yeah, that’s true.”

“Well, if they’re clean, you may want to let them stay,” Zeke said. “That’s up to you. So.” He stood and held out his hand. “We got a deal?”

Bryan rose and shook with him. “Deal,” he said,
relieved. “Thanks, Zeke.”

“No problem. Now, I gotta get back to work. Don’t we, little bro?”

“Yeah, yeah. What a slave-driver.”

As Zeke walked down the hall to the front door, Elias held Bryan back.

“Are those two guys at home nights?”

“Usually. Why?”

“Days?”

“They’re always out at the peace camp. They head out right after breakfast.”

“Okay, call me tomorrow soon as they’re gone.”

“Eliaaaas!” came Zeke’s wail from outside.

“Why? What’s up?”

“Maybe we can do some investigating on our own.”

E
arly the next morning, Bryan’s mother phoned from jail in Nanaimo. She told him that the day started early there; as soon as the sun came up the women were herded down to breakfast, decked out in “these lovely blue dresses they make us wear.”

“Are you okay, Mom?”

“Oh, sure,” Iris answered with obviously false cheerfulness.

“So, what happened this time?”

“It’s, well, hard to explain —”

“I mean,” Bryan cut in, hoping he did not sound as angry as he felt, “you told the court you wouldn’t demonstrate against the injunction, right?”

“Yes, but I felt I had to. I guess that’s the simplest way to put it.”

Bryan was on the verge of telling his mother that he had seen her carted away on her first arrest and that because she was a tree-hugger, she now had two crooks living in the house. But she wasn’t there to deal with
them. And because she was a tree-hugger, Jimmy had had to leave home, so he couldn’t help either. And if it hadn’t been for her, Ellen would still be in Nootka Harbour.

He wanted to tell her all these things. But he said nothing.

“I just couldn’t stand there on the sidelines and watch the cops taking kids and seniors and university students and people from my own community without standing with them,” Iris said.

“I understand what you want, Mom. At least I think I do. I just don’t see why you have to go to jail for it.” And screw up my life from top to bottom, he thought.

“Well, I may be home in a day or two. I can probably get out on bail. But the word is that they’re going to put us to trial fast. Anyway, son, there’s a line-up behind me for the payphone. I’ll try and call you each morning around this time.”

Bryan stared out across the cove, his mind a prickly batch of emotions. His anger at his mother honed a sharp edge of guilt when he thought of her alone in a jail, living with hard women who probably belonged there, cut off from her son and brother, her community and friends. He wanted to feel sympathy, to show her he was with her. But how, when he wasn’t with her?

Bryan began to make breakfast for Kevin and Otto. They came upstairs when they smelled the coffee. Hoping that his suspicions did not show, he served them bacon and eggs with a platter of buttered toast, planning
to make a quick exit from the kitchen.

But Kevin was in a talkative mood. He rambled on and on about the activities at the Big Bear River bridge and delivered a sermon on what a great woman Iris was. Finally, he wound himself down and asked, “So how’s that girlfriend of yours? What’s her name? Eleanor?”

“Ellen.”

Otto smiled and forked a large gob of scrambled egg into his mouth. “She’s more than okay. She’s a nice little piece, that one.”

Kevin shot his companion a hard look. “You sure are a fine cook, Bry,” he said.

“That’s Bryan to you. I’ve got some work to do.” He thumped down the hall and slammed his bedroom door. No wonder Otto doesn’t talk much, he thought. The guy’s a pig.

Soon afterwards, the scrape of chairs and the bang of the kitchen door told Bryan the two men had gone. When he heard the van roar to life, he sneaked a look out his window, making sure that both men were leaving. Then he got on the phone to Elias.

Fifteen minutes later, Bryan’s friend burst into the house, breathless from a bike ride at break-neck speed, wearing his green Pacific Sands Provincial Park shorts and shirt.

“We have to do this fast,” Elias announced excitedly. “I have to be at work at ten-thirty.”

“Do what? What’s the plan?”

“We’re going to toss their rooms.”

“No, we’re not. They lock their doors — I’ve checked before — and there are two keys to each room. They have one each and Mom has one of each on her key-chain, which is probably in a brown envelope with her name on it in a file cabinet in Nanaimo Minimum-Security Facility for Women.”

“So we break in.”

“No, we do not break in. Mom would kill me if we damaged the doors, and those two scumbags might be a little suspicious when they come home from a hard day on the protest line and find their bedroom doors splintered.”

“Hey, Bry,” Elias laughed, “I thought I was the sarcastic one. There’s hope for you yet. Go get your student I.D.”

“ ‘Break-in’ is just an expression,” Elias gloated a minute later as he ran the thin plastic card between the door jamb and the lock of Kevin’s room. The door swung open. Otto’s door proved no more of a challenge.

“Well, Mr Expert,” Bryan sneered, “do you think we might need a look-out? Or were you planning to say something really clever if the two guys come home early?”

His face flushed, Elias answered, “You’re right. Go stand by the outside door and whistle if —”

“No chance. You stand guard.”

Arguing was something Elias was good at, and he pulled out every trick he knew, but Bryan would not budge. Finally, Elias opened the basement door partway to get a good view of the driveway, then gave Bryan a
dramatic nod and thumbs-up.

Bryan entered Kevin’s bedroom first. The single bed was a disaster area — blankets strewn half on, half off the bed, a pair of jeans tangled up in the mess. On the floor, socks and underwear. Two hardcore girlie mags on the bedside table. “Jeez,” Bryan said to himself as he replaced one of them on the table. On the pine dresser, a comb clutching a few long hairs, a half-empty bottle of whiskey, and two glasses that hadn’t been washed lately resting in a cluster of ring marks on the wood.