The Years of Fire

by Yves Beauchemin

  Truth to tell, poor Fernand no longer knew what to think about anything. Despite his best efforts, business continued to fall off. He who had always been able to make a good living could see the day coming when he would barely be able to scrape by.

  “We’ll just have to wait out the storm,” he sighed each night when he climbed into bed with his wife. “All we can do is try to keep our heads above water.”

  He was powerfully affected by the defeat of the YES side in the referendum. A smirch on the honour of all Quebeckers, he said, and he declared to anyone who would listen that a people so in love with their own mediocrity that they refused to even ask for the freedoms owed to them deserved every kick in the backside, constitutional or otherwise, that anyone cared to give them. However, he added in the same breath, one mustn’t be too hard on one’s compatriots. Trudeau and his team of federal tricksters had trampled all over the law governing referendums in conducting a campaign parallel with that of the NO camp; the law allowed each camp to spend no more than two million, two hundred thousand dollars on its campaign, but Ottawa had spent an additional seventeen million urging Quebeckers to vote NO! Why had the party simply denounced the fact without doing anything about it? Why hadn’t they laid the thing out before a commission of inquiry? Appealed to international authorities? Held a new referendum, this time one with a real chance of winning? But no! Instead, everyone simply sank into a stupid and humiliating depression, wanting nothing more than to be left alone to forget about it, at any price, and to give themselves over to all kinds of stupidities. What a bunch of potato-heads!

  Despite his criticisms of the Quebec government’s strategies, Fernand had worked his tail off during the campaign, partly out of loyalty to the cause, but also as a way of taking his mind off his own financial difficulties, which nonetheless made him bitter and kept him awake at night. He went door to door, organized kitchen meetings, spent entire nights on the telephone conducting polls or trying to convince voters to vote YES; a huge YES sign hung across the front of his house, and his wife practically had to throw a fit to stop him from putting a similar one in the window of the hardware store. Though no less fervent a sovereigntist than her husband, Lucie was more prudent; she warned him against making his political convictions so well known; it could only cost them more customers, and the Lord knew that was the last thing they needed!

  “I don’t need that kind of customer,” Fernand replied with superb disdain.

  But then the businessman in him resurfaced.

  “Besides, you’re worrying about nothing, my love. When the dust has settled – and we finally have a country like any other normal people have, for crying out loud! – they’ll all come back to me, you’ll see. The law of the best quality and lowest price always wins out in the end. In fact it’s working now, as we speak. There may be a few hotheads in the neighbourhood crazy enough to spend an extra five bucks for a screwdriver at my competitor’s simply because they don’t like my ideas. But they’re not going to make me rich or poor, and it gives me great pleasure to be sending them off to suck on Pierre Trudeau’s toes!”

  In early April, René Lévesque was touring the riding when he was informed of the courageous support Fernand was giving to the cause. Late in the afternoon he paid a visit to the hardware store, along with a bevy of local bigwigs.

  All of Fernand’s objections vanished in a puff of smoke. He felt that that day was the most beautiful day of his life.

  “Monsieur Lévesque! What a great honour!” he babbled, blushing with pleasure, when he saw the premier coming through the door of his shop.

  He hurried towards the great man, hand outstretched, accidentally stepping on the foot of a customer who had come rushing down an aisle.

  “Careful, Monsieur Fafard,” laughed the politician, “you might have just cost me a vote.”

  “It’s nothing, nothing at all, Monsieur Lévesque,” managed the customer, wincing with pain.

  Just then Charles walked in, looking for a bolt for his bicycle. He was rooted to the spot, as though he had seen a vision of the Messiah. Fernand introduced him to the premier.

  “Charles, my son. One of my two sons, in fact. I also have a daughter.”

  Lévesque shook the boy’s hand and smiled broadly, looking him straight in the eye, and for a second Charles sensed that he was receiving the man’s entire attention, burdened though he must have been with so many heavy responsibilities.

  Fernand escorted the premier to every nook and cranny of the store and was amazed by the pertinence of the man’s questions about the business. (“Really intelligent questions,” he would later say, “the kind of questions only a brain would know how to ask.”) Charles followed them closely, a few steps behind, drinking in the statesman’s every word. Every so often he would raise his right hand and stare at it in amazement. Just think, it has just shaken the hand of René Lévesque! The hand had become almost sacred, a kind of holy relic. Too bad no one had thought to take a photo! His friends would go crazy with envy when he told them about it tomorrow.

  For once there were a few people in the store. They gathered admiringly around the politician, who chatted with them amiably, relaxed, knowing that he was in friendly territory. From a slight distance, an elderly man observed the scene with lips pressed together in disapproval; when Lévesque approached him he turned his back and swept out of the store, wearing his hostility like a flag.

  For a second a shadow passed through the store, but then someone said something funny, everyone laughed, and Lévesque made his little amused grimace, which was such an expressive part of his arsenal of charms.

  “Well, there’s one we won’t have to convince,” he said, shrugging his shoulders.

  “Do you think we’ll win, Monsieur Lévesque?” Fernand asked worriedly as the politician was about to leave.

  “We all have to work hard, day and night, just as you’ve been doing,” was all that the premier replied, giving the lively, penetrating look that didn’t always reveal what was going on behind it. “If we do that, we’ll win, I promise you.”

  On May 20th, sitting in the living room in front of the television with the rest of the family and a few neighbours, Charles followed the election results, first with passion, then with an anguish that was soon transformed into a sticky, sickening sadness. Everyone was silent. A tall young man who was sitting on the floor with a beer between his legs began to cry and mutter vague imprecations. Fernand, sitting straight up in his chair, stared at the screen, not bothering to wipe away the tears that streaked his face. Lucie had put her hand on his knee and patted it from time to time. Near the end of the coverage, Lévesque appeared on the stage at the Paul-Sauvé Arena, accompanied by his wife and the minister of state, Lise Payette, all of them dressed in black. Lévesque went to the microphone, a frail, little man, his face drained of colour, incapable, it seemed, of seeing beyond the defeat to the long road they had come down in spite of all the odds. He stood without speaking for several minutes while the crowd cheered wildly. Gradually, reluctantly, the people fell silent.

  “If I understand you correctly,” he said in a voice hoarse with exhaustion, “what you’re telling me is: Until next time!”

  Lucie gave a sob and bent over, reaching out to the television, exposing some of her ample chest.

  “He looks so sad,” she said. “I just want to hold him in my arms.”

  “Now would be a good time,” groaned her husband.

  3

  Early that summer, Chez Robert changed its name to the Blue Bird. After lengthy and bitter negotiations that went on for three long weeks, the restaurant was acquired by Constantin Valiquette for “a reasonable price.”

  Valiquette was a thin, nervous man in his forties, of medium height, florid of face, with an oversized head; he walked with short, jerking steps, as though his ankles were tied together by a rope. He had thick, wet lips that looked as though they belonged to a fat woman, dark, cavernous nostrils large enough to accommodate a thumb, and small, pry
ing eyes that were both inquisitive and distrustful; hardly a face to show sympathy or inspire friendliness. Which made sense, because Constantin Valiquette was neither a sympathetic nor a friendly man.

  For most of his life, in fact, he had divided the world into two categories: prey and predators. He attributed his own suspicious nature to two major events in his life. The first had occurred in 1947 and resulted in the death of his father, also a restaurant owner, who had been getting on in years and was deaf. One day he’d hurried out of his restaurant, headed across the street without checking for traffic, and been run over by a truck. From this, Valiquette learned a valuable lesson: “You have to look where you’re going.” The second event, which had involved him directly, had taken place in 1953, in the restroom of the old Loew’s Theatre on Sainte-Catherine, while he was still a student. Standing at the urinal with his leather briefcase on the floor between his legs, he’d been in the process of relieving an overfilled bladder when he felt something rubbing against his ankle.

  “Hey!” he shouted. “Thief!”

  But by the time he’d got himself tucked back into his pants and done up his zipper, the man had run out into the vast theatre lobby and disappeared into the darkness. From this misadventure he learned a second lesson: “Always watch your back.” Since then the two lessons had stood by him like shining beacons, lighting up the sometimes obscure paths of his life.

  On the 26th of June, 1980, a ladder truck pulled up in front of Chez Robert and the men went to work. They took down the sign that Charles had been so proud of and replaced it with a longer, larger sign that showed, on the left, a bluebird with its wings spread out, and, to the right, the words:

  THE BLUE BIRD

  painted in blue letters. Below that, in smaller, red letters, the sign said:

  CANADIAN, ITALIAN AND CHINESE MEALS

  Charles and Blonblon watched the operation from across the street. They thought the new sign was ridiculous and vowed never to set foot in the place again. Charles loudly declared that it would feel dishonourable to go in and offer the new owner his services.

  For the next few weeks, however, he couldn’t stop thinking about the five thousand dollars Fernand had had to give his father to make him forfeit his paternal rights. The whole thing made him feel more and more unhappy.

  Conversations in the Fafard household were never directly about their financial difficulties, but they were always slightly coloured by it. The burbling joy that had once rung out through the house was now tinged with moments of sadness. It took very little to send Fernand into a raging temper; Lucie, now juggling her household duties with her work at the hardware store, went to bed exhausted each night at nine o’clock. Charles told himself that the five thousand dollars would come in very handy, and wondered if Fernand regretted having let the money go, since no one had been forcing him to give it up. How sweet it would be to one day stand before Fernand with five crisp, thousand-dollar bills in his hand, and to give them to Fernand, saying: “Fernand, you have been extremely generous to me. This is my way of saying thank-you!”

  But there was no chance that that dream would come true in the foreseeable future. Charles had no source of income, and his bank account, once impressive for a boy of his age, had shrunk to less than a hundred dollars. The day was not far off when he would have to ask his adoptive parents for pocket money, which they had already been giving him from time to time.

  So it was that early in the morning of July 8th, Charles went back on his fiery declaration and presented himself at the Blue Bird to offer his services to its owner as a delivery boy.

  The restaurant’s interior had been repainted (blue, of course) and the seats of the stools lining the counter had been replaced (the old ones had admittedly been ripped in several places). Marie-Josée walked past him carrying a large tray of dishes and gave him a big smile, which encouraged him to continue. Then he stopped again, intimidated by the sight of Constantin Valiquette, standing behind the cash, absent-mindedly fingering his lips. With a movement of his enormous head he gestured Charles to step forward.

  “Hello, sir,” said the adolescent. “Are you the owner?”

  The head moved again. Charles introduced himself nervously, adding that he lived just down the street from the restaurant, on rue Dufresne.

  “Oh yes? Glad to meet you, my lad,” replied the owner, apparently without thinking it necessary to introduce himself. “What can I do for you?”

  Charles was already regretting his boldness, but he went on. He said he’d worked as a delivery boy for the previous owners for nearly four years, knew the job very well, and could be quite useful.

  “Well, well, well. A delivery boy, a delivery boy, eh?” muttered Valiquette, still tapping his lips. He began questioning Charles closely on the workings of the restaurant, how it had prospered, what the customers were like, what kind of food they preferred, whether the previous owners had had to change the menu over the years, what improvements they had had to make to the building, why Roberto had decided to sell the business, how he got along with the police and the health inspectors, and so on. Every now and then he excused himself to serve a customer. The interview went on for half an hour. Charles, torn between fear and hope, had no idea where the conversation was going but answered as best he could, casting an occasional glance through the window out onto the street.

  Valiquette was busy for several minutes with a customer who thought he’d detected an error in his bill. Then he turned back to Charles.

  “Sorry, my lad, but I don’t need a delivery boy just now. But thanks for the information. Maybe another time, eh?”

  And he shook Charles’s hand with a huge smile.

  “Happy birthday, Charles,” said the notary, coming forward with a beribboned box in his hands. “Careful not to drop it. It’s a bit heavy.”

  “Fourteen already!” murmured Amélie Michaud, with an expression that could have registered either joy or sorrow.

  “Yes, fourteen!” cried Fernand. “Almost a man!”

  Charles looked embarrassed.

  “Fernand,” he said, “stop talking as if I were a baby.”

  Turning red with emotion, he began unwrapping the gift. The party was taking place in the notary’s living room, with members of the Fafard family as well as Blonblon, Steve Lachapelle, and – wonder of wonders! – Roberto and Rosalie, who had come down from the Laurentians especially for the occasion. Parfait Michaud had asked if he could throw the party because, as he said, “although I know you’re not my son, you’re the closest thing to it I have.” Amélie had slaved most of the day to make a “really healthy menu,” but had given it up in the end and called a caterer.

  “Oh, isn’t that cute!” cried Rosalie, with slightly forced enthusiasm, when she saw what was in the box: a bronze statue of a sitting dog, about thirty centimetres high, looking alert, ears erect, chest puffed out, with huge hind feet and its tail curled up on its back. It was, in fact, nothing special.

  “Well, at least it’s an original,” said Roberto, tugging at his tie. He took a long drink from his glass of beer.

  Steve, completely baffled by the notary and his strange wife, stretched out his thin hand and felt the statue. Boff, too, gave it a good, long sniff.

  “It is, I’ll have you all know,” declared the notary, who could sometimes sound a trifle pompous, “a replica in miniature of Hachiko, a statue erected in the Shibuya Train Station in Tokyo in 1934. It was put there to invoke a very moving story of a dog and his master. Would you like to hear it? I’m going to tell it to you anyway, whether I have your permission or not. Hachiko belonged to a professor at Tokyo University. Every day the professor took the train to work from Shibuya. It was the dog’s custom to accompany his master to the station in the morning, and then to come back in the evening to meet the professor on his return. Well, it so happened that one day, in May of 1925, the poor man died of a heart attack in his office. However, that day – and every day for the next nine years, that is, until his own d
eath – the dog went to the station at the usual time in the evening, in the hope that his master would return. His loyalty so struck the station personnel and the other commuters that they got together and built a monument to him, which became famous throughout Japan; many people in Tokyo (who are called Tokyoites) still use the statue as a rendezvous point. And Hachiko has become the very symbol of fidelity. Lovers stand beside it pledging eternal faithfulness – imprudently, in my opinion, but we insist on believing that human nature is composed of such sentiments.”

  “Not yours, it seems,” sniffed Amélie, looking daggers at her husband.

  “I thought,” continued the notary, ignoring her remark, “that this little statue would please you, since you’ve always been so fond of dogs.”

  “Oh yes, Monsieur Michaud, I think it’s very beautiful. Thank you so much!”

  He shook the notary’s hand vigorously and then, finding the gesture somewhat inadequate to the occasion, threw himself into Michaud’s arms.