Punishment

by Linden MacIntyre

  “I think the kids need it. And Gilles.”

  “Gilles.” And then I realized. A name she rarely mentioned. “I think a change of scene …”

  “Please,” I said.

  Briefly, we talked about the stress of work. Troubled grown-ups with the needs of children in so many cases. It was then she told me that Strickland was being considered for a halfway house in Kingston. I said I’d heard something like that. She said he was a model inmate at Warkworth—had fabulous assessments from the team there, even a commendation from the warden, Moroz. She laughed and reddened slightly. “I believe you know the warden.”

  “Anna has started divorce proceedings,” I said, watching closely for reaction.

  “I heard. I’m sorry. I mean that.”

  “You heard?”

  “You know what the place is like. I really am sorry.”

  “You don’t have to be sorry.”

  “I know,” she said. “But it’s always sad. It’s a blessing in a way you don’t have kids.”

  “Yes. I’ve decided to be positive.”

  She smiled, eyebrows raised. She had her hair clamped high on the back of her head, emphasizing the clean strong lines of her face and brow, small perfectly shaped ears, unadorned by jewelry.

  I said, “It crossed my mind that being single will simplify my life. You must have some thoughts.”

  She shook her head. “It isn’t just about you, Tony.”

  “I think I’m going to have a drink,” I said.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be,” I said too sharply. “I’m fucking sick of sorry people.”

  “I have a meeting.” She checked her watch. I ignored the gesture. I waved at a lurking waiter. “My other news,” I said, “is that I’ll be going away soon, too.”

  She sat up straighter, tilted her head.

  “So you hadn’t heard that?”

  “No,” she said. “I hope …”

  I waved her to silence. “I’m only telling you because you should know your transfer won’t be necessary.”

  “You’re assuming a lot,” she said. “My transfer is about my kids. Okay?”

  The words were like a slap. “I didn’t mean … but I wanted you to know that I’m leaving the service for reasons that are unrelated to … us.”

  “I would hope that they’re unrelated …”

  I struggled with a sudden billow of despair. I suppose she saw it in my face. I looked away.

  “It was futile,” she said softly. “It was nice. But …” She compressed her lips and looked down at the tablecloth.

  The despair then turned to anger but the anger was locked in a deep safe place, next to the reservoir of tears. “I actually hoped for a while that it was more than nice.”

  “Me too,” she said. “But after Newfoundland …”

  The drink arrived and I realized that I no longer wanted it. I sipped, poked at ice cubes with my fingertip. A small airplane circled low over the lake under puffy woolly clouds that only seemed to make the sky more painfully blue. “That was awful last week, in the States,” she said.

  “Yes.”

  “You think there’ll be a war?”

  I gulped my drink, ignored her attempt to change the subject. “The timing is right for me,” I said. “And I’m sure you know this already, but you’re considered to be quite a valuable asset here. They will try to block your move to Ottawa. Now that I’m out of the picture.”

  She formed a modestly dubious expression. “I wouldn’t …”

  “They know about us.”

  “They brought that up?”

  “Yes.”

  “So the day Steele saw us …”

  “Yes. And he’s been broadcasting it around Warkworth.”

  “Jesus Christ.”

  “Speaking for myself,” I said, “I was glad. No more deception.”

  She stared at me for what I later realized was a long moment of disbelief.

  Then: “I’m glad for you, Tony. Now I have to go.”

  “I might stay here for a while.” I had a headache. I waved at the waiter, pointed at my glass. I couldn’t bring myself to stand. She came around and lingered at my side for a long moment, placed a gentle hand on my shoulder. “Goodbye, Tony,” she said softly. And like a ghost she disappeared.

  That evening, alone and mildly shit-faced in the silent house—Anna, I had learned, was staying with her lawyer-buddy, Rita—my future appeared to me as a landscape suddenly revealed by the cresting of a hill. It wasn’t grim but it was barren and it sprawled endlessly beyond the curve of the horizon. It was a scalding moment, delusions scoured from the surface of reality. Solitude and celibacy, I thought. And, I had to admit, under the alcoholic anesthetic, it didn’t feel all that bad.

  Even if I reframed the words—made them, say, abandonment and isolation—they still described a kind of freedom. I remember stumbling to bed that night in that paradoxical state of peace that comes with knowing you have nothing left to lose.

  13.

  After the first full day of Strickland’s hearing I watched the early evening news for any mention of the case. There was none. It was all Powell at the United Nations with his slide show, proof that the Iraqis really did have the potential to destroy the planet hidden in their desert wastes. Jesus Christ, I thought, will you give it a rest. I thought you were the honest exception in that cabal.

  That night I dreamed there was a woman in the bed beside me. I knew it was a woman by the rich thick hair that fell over an exposed shoulder. I desperately wanted to touch the shoulder, gently stroke the hair, but I was afraid of waking her because I was unsure of who she was, afraid, I suppose, of who she might be.

  I woke at dawn and sat up, looked around the barren room. The dog was curled up against my thigh, sound asleep. I asked him, “What do you do when you feel the urge for female company?” He looked up at me and yawned, then jumped off the bed and trotted down the stairs, claws urgent on the wooden floor. Barked once.

  I got up, went to let him out. “Good luck!” I shouted after him. He galloped off into the field, squatted. The eastern sky was scarlet. A mild spell that week had reduced the snow to crusty patches in the field, dirty snowbanks on the roadside. I squinted at the white-capped sea, concentrating on its majesty to dispel the hatred that I felt for Strickland.

  Pity him, I told myself. He spoke out of fear, made brazen by his poverty of options. Pity is worse than hatred. The injury to him from being pitied would be far greater than anything that I can achieve through hatred. I should have said it when I had the chance, when the time was right: I pity you. So I could feel the healing that would begin at watching his hateful arrogance diminishing. Instead I reacted as he would, or any other lousy con.

  Birch was back. “Let’s hit the trail,” I said.

  The frosty air was pleasant, refreshing. The trail had been well packed by snowmobiles and reminded me of the mountain road in the days when people still used horses and heavy sleds to get around in the wintertime. Where the trail crossed the road the dog galloped off along the pavement and disappeared.

  I shouted, “You get back here,” but I was in no doubt about his destination. Mary’s place. I smiled at the thought: We have this in common, Birch, that rare feeling of gratification that comes from little acts of human kindness. I jogged after him and eventually caught up to him halfway up her lane, urgently sniffing at footprints and a yellowed hole in the snow where a man had urinated powerfully. It was like a drill-hole and I could see the frozen earth at the bottom of it. The wind was rising, dark trees now sighing and I became intensely conscious of the day’s grim purpose.

  On the way to Caddy’s I stopped at the store for the papers. I was surprised to see Neil there.

  “I figured you’d be at the prelim,” I said.

  He told me he took the morning off to watch live coverage of Powell’s presentation to the UN Security Council.

  “You should have been watching,” he said to me indignantly, wh
en I told him I had better things to do than watch television in the morning. “You wanted proof? It was there in spades. The truth, right out of Powell’s mouth.”

  “Spades?” John Robert chortled. “Didn’t realize you were such a fan of spades, Neil.”

  “It’s no fuckin laughing matter,” Neil said, face flushed. “He showed the satellite pictures, he’s got the intelligence interceptions. I’m just waiting to hear the chicken-shit response from Ottawa.”

  “It’s all bullshit, Neil,” I said. “The Bush crowd cooking up an excuse …”

  “There it is,” he shouted, waving his hand at me. “The sun shines out of Powell’s arse for you liberals until he says something you don’t want to hear. I’m disappointed in you, Tony. I thought you had more brains than that. I thought there was more man in you.”

  Something about the hand, the menace in his tone triggered an old response, cold and cautious, almost angry. I said, “Back off … don’t wave your hand in my face.” He stepped back but I could tell it wasn’t a retreat, it was positioning. You could see it in his face, his eyes opaque.

  I turned away, but couldn’t control the shaking as I dropped the money for the newspapers on the counter. You’re a coward, I thought, sitting in the truck. You might as well face up to it. Something’s happened to you.

  Then Neil was at the truck window, rapping with a knuckle. I lowered the window, just looked at him.

  “Hey man,” he said, stooping to bring his face level with mine. “I’m sorry about in there. I get a little riled sometimes. Let’s just agree to disagree. Life’s too short.” He stuck his hand through the window and I grasped it, felt its meaty power. “We shouldn’t be letting all this shit get to us. Too much to be worried about closer to home.”

  I nodded.

  “Will I be seeing you at the courthouse?”

  “I’ll be there,” I said.

  “I was surprised you weren’t there yesterday.”

  “Did I miss anything?” I asked.

  “Ah well, it’s all interesting. The prosecution theory—him starting a little sex-and-drugs franchise down there. Plus a lot of technical stuff in the morning. Police investigation stuff and toxicology. Seems she had enough dope in her to kill a horse. There were a couple of teenagers who were supposed to have bought stuff from Strickland but they got all wishy-washy on the stand.”

  “I see.”

  “That sleazebag lawyer of Strickland’s pretty well took them apart. But everybody’s waiting for Caddy this afternoon. She’ll have a big impact. And I have a sneaky feeling the Crown has got some surprises up his sleeve. You wait.”

  “I’ll see you there, then,” I said.

  He stood, rapped the roof of the truck with his oversized knuckles and I drove away.

  Caddy was sitting at her kitchen table sipping at a cup of tea. She had her coat on. She’d heard the crunch of my footsteps on the deck and stared at me thoughtfully over the rim of her cup. I waved.

  When I came in, she said, “I’d offer tea but I don’t think there’s time.” She stood and kissed my cheek. Then placed the teacup on the table. “I guess there’s no putting it off.”

  “You’ll be fine,” I said. But she sighed and gave me a look that made me wish that I had simply shrugged agreement. “You’re doing it for Maymie,” I said. “Keep that in the forefront.”

  “No,” she said. “You remember that. No matter what.”

  In the truck she asked, “Do you think he ever feels anything? Like remorse? Does he ever think of her?”

  “I’m sure he has his moments,” I said.

  “Well you know him better than I do.”

  “I don’t know him all that well.”

  But there was a time when I cared about him because of the risk he took to prevent what turned into a bloody fiasco. There was a time when I stood up for him, disputed the cynical opinion that he became an informer only to hasten his release from prison. The answer I got from both sides, officer and con: a rat is a rat. Solidarity is key to survival.

  The name the court clerk called was unfamiliar, “Mrs. Catherine Stewart,” but then she looked at us. We were seated on a bench in the corridor outside the courtroom. “They mean you, Caddy.”

  She slipped her coat off, grasped my hand briefly, then stood. “You look after this,” she said. And I followed her into the courtroom, carrying the coat, feeling grateful for the intimacy of the gesture.

  I was surprised by the sparseness of the crowd. Neil was sitting in the last row watching intently as Caddy walked to the witness stand. I felt a strong surge of affection as she went. She was elegant in a simple black dress and mauve cardigan, sleeves shoved up almost to her elbows. The boots she bought in Detroit, and that, one lovely evening, I had helped her to remove, gave her added height and an air of confidence. But when she sat she seemed frail and her face showed the strain of worrying about what lay ahead.

  Neil slid along the row of empty chairs until he was beside me. “That’s one gorgeous woman up there,” he whispered. “I don’t know what’s holding you back.” He nudged my arm. But by then I was trying to get a sense of Strickland, though I could only see the back of his head, could only imagine what was going through his mind.

  The judge leaned forward, chin resting on his fist as Jones, the prosecutor, gently introduced the witness, Mrs. Stewart, grandmother of the victim, one of the last people to see her alive. His tone was almost parental as he led Caddy through Maymie’s short but obviously active life, the excellence in school, the musical talent, the angelic personality. Both Sullivan and Strickland were intently taking notes as Caddy spoke.

  “Now, Mrs. Stewart,” Jones said, “I’m going to ask a few questions that might seem a bit insensitive but they’re important and I want you to take your time.” Caddy sat up straighter, put her hands together, interlaced her fingers. Beside me Neil leaned forward, elbows resting on the chair in front of him.

  “Take us back to the last time you saw Maymie, before she left the house. How would you describe her mood?”

  “Normal, I would say.”

  “Normal. She was normally in good spirits I believe.”

  “Yes. Normally. Though she was a teenager and they can be moody. And she was still suffering occasional depression since the death of her father … I should say my husband.”

  “She was close to your husband.”

  “Yes she was.”

  “When you say she was depressed, was there any particular diagnosis or prescription?”

  “No. I was speaking generally.”

  “So the last time you saw her, there was nothing out of the ordinary.”

  “I’d say that.”

  The judge peered down at her, “Yes or no, Mrs. Stewart.”

  “No,” she said.

  Jones turned and walked a few steps away from her, rubbing his cheek, stopped and peered at some papers on his table, then straightened up and faced her again.

  “Now, Mrs. Stewart, there’s been evidence that Maymie had consumed a large quantity of a drug called oxycodone that night. You know the drug I’m referring to. Oxycodone.”

  “I’ve heard of it,” she said. “It’s been in the news a lot.”

  “Do you have any idea where Maymie could have got that drug?”

  “I’m assuming from …” and she looked straight at Strickland, but before she could finish the sentence, Sullivan was on his feet. “Hang on,” he said wearily.

  The judge removed his glasses and said to Caddy: “We mustn’t assume anything, Mrs. Stewart. If the answer is no, just say no.”

  “I’m sorry,” Caddy said.

  Jones said, “So I take your answer to be that you don’t know where she got the drugs?”

  “I’d only be guessing,” Caddy said.

  “So that’s a yes,” the judge said, smiling at her.

  “Yes,” said Caddy.

  Jones continued. “How would you describe Maymie’s mood on the evening of … last time you saw her.”

/>   “She seemed fine.”

  “Not … down.”

  She shrugged, looked directly at Strickland. “I wouldn’t say so. No.”

  “There was nothing out of the ordinary, last time you saw her.”

  “Nothing out of the ordinary.”

  “Did anything in your daughter—correction—your granddaughter’s behaviour ever give you cause to worry that she was using drugs of any kind.”

  “No. She cared too much about herself. And me.”

  “That’s all for now, Mrs. Stewart. Thank you. I know this isn’t easy for you.”

  For what seemed like a long time Sullivan just sat there, face propped by one cupped hand, staring at the yellow writing pad on the table in front of him, plucking at his mustache.

  “Watch this,” Neil whispered.

  Finally Sullivan shoved his chair back and stood, but remained where he was, leaning on the table. “Your granddaughter was quite the young lady, Mrs. Stewart. Lovely, bright, talented. The loss of such a bright light is nothing short of tragic. I offer my sincere condolences.” He walked slowly around to the front of the table.

  “But the question we have to answer here is why a young woman with everything to live for would risk it all just to improve the way she felt emotionally.”

  “I can’t help you there,” said Caddy. “But she wouldn’t be the first.”

  “Exactly the point,” said Sullivan. “Young people respond to the normal pressures of a complex world by getting high. And sometimes, for complex reasons, they put themselves at risk.”

  “Or people take advantage of them.”

  He didn’t object, just fell silent, nodding sadly.

  “You said that she was very close to your husband who, I understand, died suddenly.”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m assuming that she took it hard.”

  “Yes, she did.”

  “She was what? Fifteen at the time?”

  “Yes.” Caddy pulled a tissue from her sleeve, crumpled it in her fist.

  “I think we all know from personal experience that people that age have a particularly hard time with raw emotions like grief, loss.”

  “I suppose.”

  “I’m sure we can all remember some event in our own experience as children that left us quite at a loss as to how to respond. We just lacked the emotional conditioning, I suppose, that would provide some appropriate response. And so, sometimes, the responses are … inappropriate.”