The Last Stoic (3 page)

“Eventually,” the caupo said,
pausing for breath, “Commodus was murdered by his whores.  But they never did
find Sextus.  They say he’s still out there, playing hide and seek, and now
Caracallus is hunting him.  If he survived all these years he’d have to be
fifty or sixty by now, pretty old for scurrying across the empire like a greasy
rat.  If you ask me, he never made it out of Syria.”

The caupo tipped back his third
cup.  He peered at Marcus, as if to dare him to dispute his story.  The two men
stared at each other. 

“Well, that’s very interesting,”
Marcus said, finally, “But I’m still unsure of what it has to do with those
folks on the crosses out there.”

“Rustici stultum!  To them this
Sextus Condianus is some sort of saviour.  A rumour started that Sextus was
hiding out here, sheltered by the peasants and slaves.  There was nearly a
riot.  The soldiers couldn’t find him, so they nailed up fifty or so.”

The caupo’s eyelids wavered
heavily from their brows as he awaited an agreeable response.  Marcus had
mostly cleared his plate. 

“Well, thank you very much, it’s
fascinating.  I really should be tending to my horse.  She needs some good hay
and water, maybe some oats?”

“Oh.  Hay.  Yes, of course.”  He
pushed the copper coins back at Marcus.  “Don’t worry about it.  A good old boy
from Verulamium?  It’s on the house.”

The two exited the caupona and
around to the south side where a low-pitched roof, supported by stout, roughly
hewn timbers, extended from the walls of the building.  Patricius followed,
from a discreet distance. 

“The well is just over there,”
the caupo said, pointing behind the building. “You can fill the trough with the
bucket.  There’s more than enough hay.  Sorry, no oats.”

“Do you mind if I camp out here
in the stable with my horse?”

“Suit yourself, you wouldn’t be
the first.”

Marcus unfastened Phoenix from the fencepost and brought her back to the trough under the low-pitched roof. 
He unrolled his blanket on the mounds of hay, balled up some extra clothing,
and attempted to get comfortable. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Patricius decided he would wait
patiently in the shadows until the Briton fell asleep.  When the moon was at
its full height and the snoring was at its loudest, he would pad over, free the
purse from the traveler’s tunic, and lead away his nag.  With a horse and some
silver, he could begin his pursuit of Sextus Condianus.  And, most importantly,
he wouldn’t have to return home.

Mark had camped down at a rest-stop along a stretch of
the freeway where the Interstate became the New Jersey turnpike,
just past the many rows of
hulking 18-wheeler rigs, orange and red running lights like patio lanterns
strung along the perimeters of their cargo, idling diesel engines emitting an
endless hushed rattle, drivers catatonic in the fold-out bunks of their compact
cabs.  A quarter mile away the turnpike roared with a host of travelers finding
their way through the darkness.  The windscreen glowed softly with the
unremitting white lights of the distant sixteen pump service station.  Inside
the car, dashboard instruments cast a low, blue phosphorescence.  He sipped
from a can of frigid, metallic-tasting Budweiser.  For a moment, he felt
intrepid.  A stranger amongst strangers.  Unburdened.

Nearby, in the parking lot, the
activity showed no signs of slowing.  A black Lincoln Navigator and a silver
Lexus pulled up two spots over.  A woman emerged from the sedan and stepped
into the SUV, which commenced to lurch and quake moments later.  The shimmying
subsided after some time and the woman stepped from the SUV and disappeared
back into the sedan.  The Navigator backed out with a squeal and charged toward
the freeway.  It was soon replaced by a dark blue minivan.  Once again, the
woman hopped from her car to the van and the van began to rock.  An Expedition
and an Escalade parked three spots to the right of the Phoenix and played the
same game.  And so it went, every half hour or so, for the rest of the night.

The tawdry parade began to
depress him and his earlier élan subsided. He hadn’t been gone twenty four
hours and now he wondered: what am I
doing
here?

“Change is the only constant,”
that’s what Mark’s grandfather, so fond of aphorisms, always said.  It was the
consolation Vincent had offered when one of the chickens that followed
six-year-old Mark around the farmyard all summer, the one Mark had named
Gordon, was slaughtered and roasted for dinner.

He’s the reason I’m here.  To be
an engineer.  To be like him.

“I don’t really want to go.” 
Mark caught his breath at the stark truth and futility of it, spoken out loud
for the first time.  He wandered back into the truck stop to the pay phone next
to the restrooms.  Though it was late, he couldn’t resist. 

“Will you accept a long-distance
call from Mark?”

“Yes.”

“Ok, please go ahead.”

“Hello Mark?”

“Mom?”

“My beautiful heron.”

Mark had always recalled to her
the elegant creature.  His slow, deliberate movements were at the same time
ungainly and full of grace.  There was the abrupt tuft of hair that forever
lifted up from the crown of his narrow, protracted head, despite the endless
patting and combing.  Even at an early age he could stand perfectly still, to
inspect and study whatever had captured his interest, as he had that one early
morning at the beaver dam, when he was six, and Paulina had thrilled to see an
actual great blue heron stalking breakfast just a few yards away.

 “Where are you?”

“New Jersey I think.”

“How are you doing?  Is
everything ok?”

“Yes Mom, fine.  I’m fine.”

“I’m glad you called.  It’s good
to hear your voice.”

“Oh Mom, it hasn’t even been twenty
four hours.”

“I know, but we miss you
already.  Are you staying the night there?  Is it a nice place?”

Mark paused.  He looked around at
the mostly empty truck stop and the rows of semis beyond.

“It will do.”

“When is your meeting?  Are you
excited?”

“4:00 PM.  I’m a little nervous.”

“You’ll do fine, I’m sure you
will.”

They were both quiet.  Mark half
hoped that Paulina would implore him to come home and tell him that it wasn’t
all that important to Vincent after all that he intern at the old firm. 
Paulina half hoped that Mark would say he no longer wanted to go, that he
really wanted to come home. 

“Well, I’d better go.  Just
wanted to let you know everything was ok,” Mark said, finally.

“Ok, please call when you get
settled in the city.  Let us know how the meeting goes and where you are
staying.”

“I will.”

“And tell us as soon as you get
an address.  You left behind your grandfather’s gift.  The book.”

“Yes, I know.”

“I’ll send it down as soon as you
get settled.”

“Thanks. I love you.”

“I love you too.  Be careful
kiddo.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Patrick Jr. continued to loiter
in the deserted truck stop, with no-one to call.  No-one he wanted to call.  He
was satisfied to slouch over a soda in his booth.  It beat the alternative. 

Just about now, he predicted,
Patrick Sr. will have finished his sixth rye and ginger and would soon be
cooking up a rage.  It might be because the Steelers lost.  It might be because
the house is a mess.  It might be because the anxious terrier next door won’t
stop barking. 

But it won’t be because my music
is too loud or because I’ve been smoking his cigarettes or because I’m fighting
with Michelle again.  It won’t be any of those things because I’m long gone. 
Out of New Ravenna.  Finally.  He’ll have to find someone else he can smack
with his cane.  It will be the potted palm that he flattens, or he’ll give Jock
a kick in the ribs, or he’ll backhand Tammy.  I wonder if they even realize I’m
gone
.

Patrick didn’t linger on the
question long.  Solitude and fatigue inflamed his imagination.  He had his eye
on the curious, artless foreigner.  Who is he talking to on that pay phone
right now, so seriously?  What is he doing alone in that old, beat-up car out
there among the rigs?  Patrick crossed the diner to a window booth to watch
Mark hang up the pay phone and return to the car. 

He’s up to something and I’m
going to find out what it is.   

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Shortly after dawn, following a
cup of scalding, flavourless coffee, Mark wheeled the car back on to the busy New Jersey turnpike bound for New York.  In fifteen minutes it became all too clear that
the Phoenix had not recovered.  He pulled over.  A knocking came from her
engine block and curls of hot, white vapour poured from her grille.  Water
dribbled from spots of green on the radiator. 

The appointment in New York was that afternoon.  Mark gathered his belongings into his knapsack, triaging the items he least needed, slung it over his shoulder, and started walking.  Five hundred
yards later he was at the next exit.  The vapour that had initially gushed from
the grille had narrowed to a thin strand.  Mark sighed and left the freeway.  
It took about an hour and a half at the nearest crossroads to hitch a ride to
the Newark bus station.  Once at the station, he realized he had left the keys
in the ignition. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Patrick Jr. had watched and
waited in vain that night, and then had fallen asleep on his bench.  He was
awoken with a start when the old cook-woman rattled his booth with her mop.  He
rubbed his eyes roughly and stared out the window.  The old car in which Mark
had spent the night was gone. Patrick rose unsteadily to his feet and lunged at
the old woman like he was going to strike her.  When she cowered, he pulled
back and tumbled away to get himself an egg sandwich and cola for breakfast.

An hour later he was in the
passenger seat of a rusty Ford 150 picked up by a shift worker on his way
home.  Trundling down the freeway about twenty minutes outside of Newark they passed the empty Phoenix. 

“Stop!  Stop the truck!”

The driver, startled from his
after-work stupor, now regretted his generosity.

“This is the freeway.  I can’t
stop here.”

“Just pull over to the shoulder
and let me out.  It’s important.”

As quickly as he was able, the
driver eased the pickup to a halt on the shoulder, with the impatient, morning
rush hour traffic bustling by.  The truck had barely stopped before Patrick
jumped out of the passenger door and slammed the door behind him.  The truck
squawked back into traffic.

Patrick descended on the derelict
car.  He checked the gauges; there was still three quarters of a tank, but the
temperature was high.  He lifted the hood, examined the engine, and quickly
found the leak in the radiator.  The car had overheated.  Abandoned. 
He
must be in a hurry, the keys are still in the ignition
.  It occurred to
Patrick that if he could wait twenty minutes to let the engine cool on its own,
he could limp off the freeway, find a garage and pick up a bottle of Bar’s
Leaks to dump in the radiator.  Provided no cops came by first. 

He rummaged through the glove
compartment and found nothing but maps, some batteries, a roll of Lifesavers,
and a half empty tissue box.  On the back seat there was a bag of pita bread,
several empty beer cans, an unrolled sleeping bag, and some clothing.  In the
trunk he found a mouldy dome tent and a flashlight.  And the hunting knife Andy
had given to Mark as a departing gift. 

He’s roughing it.  Doesn’t want
to be seen? 

Under the driver’s seat he found
a pile of four notebooks containing drawings and schematics.  It was part of
Mark’s graduate thesis; designs for an experimental parallel computer. 
Patrick, who had dropped his drafting and electricity and computing courses in
high school, did not see an ingenious supercomputer in those plans; he saw a
nefarious blueprint.  A bomb.  Some sort of nuclear device.  “Mark” was printed
neatly inside the cover of each of the notebooks along with a phone number. 
Under the passenger seat he found the nine millimetre Glock Andy had stashed
there. 

Patrick didn’t have long to
consider all of the terrible and exciting ramifications of what he’d found.  He
became aware of a distant siren wailing from the north along the freeway.  His
discoveries were stuffed back into their hiding places.  The debris in the back
seat was arranged so that it didn’t suggest quite so much anarchy.  He didn’t
bother to close the hood.  Instead, he sat back in the driver’s seat and
fingered the keys lightly.  Within seconds, a motorcycle patrolman was at the
door.  Patrick swallowed and lowered the window.

“Morning son,” the cop said,
eyeing Patrick cautiously through his mirrored, aviator sunglasses. 

“Good morning officer.”

“What’s the trouble?”

“The radiator.  She overheated. 
I think I must have a leak.”

“Do you need a tow?”

“I was hoping not.  It’s a small
leak I think.  I was going to let her cool, try again, and then see if I can
make it to a shop.”

“Will she start?”

“I haven’t tried for a little
while.”

“Well, it can’t stay here. 
You’ll have to start her up and get off the freeway, or I’ll have to call in a
tow truck.”

“Right.  Can I try it?”

“Ok, best hurry up.”

Patrick gestured to the hood. 
The patrolman nodded and closed it.

He switched the key and the
engine sputtered to life.  Patrick turned and smiled.

“Thanks officer!  It looks like
she’s ready to go again.”

“Follow me to the next exit. 
There is a garage two miles west of here.  Have a good stay in New York.”

The patrolman returned to his
motorcycle and proceeded to give Patrick a short escort off of the freeway. 
The runaway from New Ravenna felt like his luck was changing.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Mark was roused from his uneven
slumber by the jabbing of a finger in his ribs.  He’d hoped to snatch a few
extra hours of sleep while in the Newark station waiting for the next bus into
Manhattan.  Instead, he now stared into a man’s pallid face.  Long shiny
strands of coal-coloured hair fell from the top of the man’s head and spilled
down past his shoulders.  A two-inch iron rod pierced the septum of his nose,
three heavy iron rings punctured his lower lip, and each of his two ears were
similarly perforated with silver hoops, loops and bars.  Thick kohl was daubed
around the man’s eyes and eyelids sweeping back toward his ears. 

“Hey dude, gotta smoke?” the man
asked.

The question was as unexpected as
the questioner.

“Sorry dude, did I wake you?”

Mark had been busy dreaming. 
He’d been dreaming of being on the run, of a vast tapioca pudding of a man
popping tiny dark-skinned people into his mouth like they were chocolates. 

He told the man that he didn’t
have any cigarettes.  Mark propped himself up on his elbow to watch him depart
and saw him join a group of men and women standing close by in a loose circle. 
They all looked the same, in their way; black hair, black clothes, and very
white skin.  Each one of them displayed a wide variety of metallic ornament,
punctured through all manner of their facial features:  lobes, lips, noses,
chins, brows, cheeks, and tongues.