by Paul Watkins
The Range Rover pulled up and Mackenzie saw the crowd ooze toward him through the dust. The soundman held his microphone in the air above the bobbing heads. Linda Church advanced toward the car as if she meant to pick it up in one hand and shake Mackenzie out of it like a cookie from a jar. To Mackenzie, she looked so completely out of place here, with her just-so-tousled hair and white turtleneck sweater and green skirt and trenchcoat. She was wearing too much clothing for this summer day. Probably, he thought, because she’s one of those people who think that any place north of Boston is a permanent region of ice.
The car nudged a path through the people. Loggers peered in at Mackenzie as if they had never seen him before. He stared straight ahead and gunned the engine. Mackenzie could not hear what the people were saying, but he could hear their talking. It was a constant, beehive hum.
Linda Church came into view. Mackenzie expected her to lunge at the glass and he braced himself for the shock. But she just stood there and watched him go by. Mackenzie had the feeling he was being scanned by some machine, drinking in each thought he could no longer hold inside the bone box of his skull.
Mackenzie didn’t bother to park the Range Rover. Instead he just cut the engine once he was inside the lumberyard. He opened the door and stepped outside. The ground crunched under his feet. Then he closed the gate to keep out the crowd. It made him angry at the ones who’d walked away, leaving him to do a job he wasn’t strong enough to carry out, especially with his leg. He blamed them for making him tug at the dull gray latch, inching the rusty wheels along their dirt-filled runners.
The crowd had cleared a space for Linda Church. She stood at the gate, flanked by her TV crew. The air seemed about to explode. “Mr. Mackenzie.” Her voice had a ring like struck bronze. “You really should talk to us.”
“And I will, ma’am.”
Linda Church muttered to her camera operator. A red light winked on the camera.
Mackenzie watched the cyclops eye of the lens twist as it focused on him. “You can all talk to me and I’ll hear your questions and you can hear what I have to say. Tomorrow night at the Woodcutter’s Lodge.” He grinned at them with his best worry-less smile until he thought his jaw would crack from the strain. Mackenzie had no idea what he would say to them. He had a sense of digging in, like a soldier gouging a foxhole in the soil before an artillery barrage. It was an old and familiar feeling—of not giving in or giving any ground. Mackenzie told himself he would stonewall them until he was dead. He did not know where he would find the strength to do it, but this was the only way he knew.
Some loggers turned to leave, as if they had been waiting for any excuse to go home but needed one before they could depart. Others looked at Mackenzie as if this whole thing had gone far beyond what words could set straight.
Linda Church hauled in a length of her black microphone line like someone coiling a bullwhip. “Mr. Mackenzie!” she called out in a louder voice, above the murmur of the crowd.
“I said tomorrow tonight, ma’am.” Mackenzie gave one last tug at the muscles of his jaw and then let the smile collapse.
When he reached home, he walked straight up to his study. The great silence of the place rushed in to meet him. He had lost count of the nights he spent here in his office. His father had died in this room after giving up the company. It was as if the act had somehow torn some vital organ from his father’s body, like a bee that had spent its stinger. He wished his father were here now to give him advice. Just as he reached his study, Mackenzie heard a half-choked sound coming from the other side. When he opened the door, he found Alicia sitting at his desk. Her face was blotchy with tears.
“Why are you crying?” Mackenzie asked.
She shrugged and shook her head. “I’ve just been thinking all this over. Everything you’ve done, Jonah. You used to say you would never do anything to hurt this town and that everything you did was for the good of this town. But I don’t know if that’s true anymore. You always talk about the clean sweep you like to make of things. Your tabula whatever it is.”
Mackenzie stared at her. “Rasa,” he said in a soft, choked voice. “Tabula rasa.” It hurt him to see her cry and know he was the cause of it.
“Whatever it is,” she continued. “You only ever think about knocking things down and then you build what you want in the space that’s left behind. Only first, you’ve got to destroy everything. I don’t want to be in your new world. I’d rather be swept aside with the old one. I feel as if I’ve waited half my life to tell you that, but before I didn’t know how to say it. So go ahead. You and people like you can knock the whole planet down and build it back up the way you want it to be. But it won’t be worth living in, because you and all the Sal Ungaros of this world aren’t smart enough to see what you’re destroying.”
Mackenzie continued to stare. He saw in Alicia’s words a thing he never dreamed he would see. She was pulling away from him. She no longer trusted him, and he realized suddenly that she had not trusted him for a long time.
All that night, Mackenzie sat alone in his study with the lights turned off. When Alicia asked him if he was going to bed, he was so lost in thought he couldn’t even answer her or move his dried-out, staring eyes from the blotter on his desk. He had no sense of time passing, except the pale sweep of moonlight across his bookshelf and the books he never read. Alicia had said the one truth that made a mockery of all the truths he had invented for himself. He realized it with perfect clarity, and he despised himself. He remembered lying in the woods a few days earlier, struck dumb by the certainty of his own fast-approaching death. He remembered the words he had chanted. The verdict on each person dead. Now he knew what that verdict would be, because the person he loved most had called it out. There would be only one way out of the chaos he had created. There was no time for pride or stubbornness or careful thought to covering his fast-retreating tracks. No time for strategy worked out in the smoky war room of his brain with the blind-obedient generals he had invented over the years.
He had not known until that moment what it was he would say to the town when he stood before them. But now the words unraveled in his mind more quickly than he could have spoken them. He would halt all cutting in the Algonquin. He would return to an industry of sustainable yield. He would call back Coltrane. He would start everything over again. Mackenzie found himself filled with the same sweeping energy that had accompanied all the great adventures of his life. He was filled with optimism. This would be his triumph after all. Mackenzie turned on the lamp that perched crooked-necked like a vulture on his desk. He pulled out a sheet of paper and began to write, his dry lips forming the words.
CHAPTER 15
Shelby sat down on the bed in Gabriel’s house. He had broken in through a back window after he saw Gabriel leave for work. Now Shelby took out his gun from its shoulder holster. He had not owned it long and found that it had a tendency to jam. He was not used to the Glock’s squared-off barrel, but had practiced with it at a firing range until he knew he could use it. He had practiced so much that he had worn the skin off his trigger finger and had to use a synthetic substance over the blister. It was a rubber compound made for burn victims, and he dabbed it on each day so he could keep shooting. Shelby checked the magazine and then cocked the slide to put a bullet in the chamber. Then from his other pocket he took a silencer and screwed it onto the end of the Glock’s barrel. The added weight of the silencer made the balance of the gun feel strange in his hand.
He made a point of not looking through Gabriel’s drawers, or familiarizing himself with the tiny details of Gabriel’s life—the way he hung his clothes, the food in his cupboard and the titles of a stack of books piled neatly on a shelf beside his bed. The way the black-on-faded-red lines of the Hudson Bay blanket wrapped like bands around the mattress. His little alarm clock still perched on his bedside table. His spare boots still standing by the closet, heels against the wall. Shelby kept his distance from these things. It made his job easier and afterward m
ore simple to forget.
All day, he sat in the room. He watched the shadows stretch across the wall. By six o’clock that evening, Shelby realized that Gabriel wasn’t coming home. Now things would be more messy and more complicated. Shelby slipped out the back, the same way he’d come in. As he made the dash to the forest, he noticed that the streets were filled with people. They moved in a shuffling stream toward the Woodcutter’s Lodge with its clock tower and illuminated clock face, like a full moon lodged against the meeting hall. Then he knew where Gabriel had gone. He wondered what was happening.
Shelby wiped sweat off his forehead on the sleeve of his jean jacket. Then he jogged out to the road, hands in pockets. His eyes had blackened from the fight with Gabriel, so he had dabbed base makeup on the areas to hide the purple stain on his skin. He hoped that would be enough. It was too late now to care. He spread a smile like grease-paint camouflage across his face and slipped into the walking crowd, heading for the hall. He grinned at children who laughed with excitement and slalomed around the adults. With an easy motion, he brushed a hand across the fabric of his jean jacket, feeling the pistol snug against his rib cage.
Dodge stood in the road, wearing an ankle-length, signal-orange duster jacket. He directed traffic into the gravel parking lot of the Woodcutter’s Lodge. When the headlights fanned across him, the orange jacket made him look as if he had burst into flames. The hall itself was blinding bright from lights that had been set up by the television crew.
Mary the Clock walked past Dodge into the hall. She sat down next to Paul, the caretaker of the Woodcutter’s Lodge, who sat patiently and alone on a chair in the corner. Then Madeleine came up to Dodge and kissed him and smiled. “I’ll see you afterward,” she said. A few minutes later, Gabriel entered the hall, still wearing his work clothes and carrying his lunch box under his arm. He nodded hello to Dodge, who nodded back and smiled.
A man Dodge did not recognize slipped past him. He did not see the man’s face. All Dodge saw was the short-cropped blond hair and broad shoulders beneath a blue jean jacket and a heavy knuckle-duster college ring on the ring finger of his right hand. The man stayed at the back of the hall, hands in pockets, head turned away from the fish-eyed camera lenses.
The TV crew were checking their sound system. A man with black jeans and a black T-shirt climbed onto the stage. The logo on his T-shirt said STEPHANIE’S BONES—SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO. He leaned toward the microphone attached to the podium and said “Pop, pop, pop.” The steel chairs creaked as people sat in them. Eels of black cable slithered across the floor. Talk was constant in the room, spiked with laughter that rose and fell back into the mumble of the crowd.
Shelby sat down next to Mary the Clock. “What’s going on here?” he asked her. As he spoke, he kept his eye on Gabriel.
“Mr. Mackenzie is going to give a speech,” she said. Then she wound up her clock.
“What about?” Shelby felt suddenly panicked. The old man’s buckled on me, he thought. He’s going to turn this into a confession. He got up and moved toward the side door, where he knew Mackenzie would be waiting. Just as he approached the door, Mackenzie himself walked out. “What are you doing?” asked Shelby. “What the hell are you doing?”
“I’m just going to check the speaker system,” replied Mackenzie. “Is everything all right?”
“No, it is not.” Shelby’s voice was low and angry. “What exactly are you going to tell these people?”
“I’m going to tell them I made a mistake.” Mackenzie’s heart was beating fast as he thought of addressing the crowd. The formality of it made him nervous. “I’m going to stop the logging.”
“You’re going to blow everything!” Shelby couldn’t help raising his voice.
“I’m going to undo what I’ve done,” said Mackenzie. “It’s all right,” he said. “You get to keep your money.”
“It’s not about money anymore,” snapped Shelby, still trying to keep his voice low. “It’s about timing, and what I’m telling you is that you left this too late.” The doors of the hall closed with a thump. Shelby turned to see Dodge taking his place in front of them.
“Will you take your seat, please?” Dodge called to him.
Shelby looked around wide-eyed for an escape route. He knew he was about to be compromised. His worst fear was coming to life. He could not allow it.
“Sit down!” Dodge called to him.
“Yes, do sit down,” Mackenzie said.
Slowly Shelby took his place. His face was blank with shock.
Alicia opened the side door and motioned to Mackenzie.
Mackenzie walked over and kissed her.
“Good luck,” she told him. “I’ll wait for you in the back room. I wish you’d let me see that speech. You know how you hate formal speaking.”
Mackenzie held it away from her and smiled. He wanted her to be as surprised as everyone else. He turned away and walked over to the podium. He cleared his throat into the microphone and the rumble of the crowd immediately fell to a murmur. The lights were in his face and he couldn’t see anyone, but he could hear the size of the crowd. Hear their breathing. Hear the soft rustle of clothing as people settled down into their chairs.
Alicia closed the door behind her. Just before it clunked shut, she looked out at Mackenzie. He seemed very alone out there by himself on the stage, squinting into the lights, which showed up the creases around his mouth and eyes. They looked like a spiderweb spun across his face. Alicia dragged a chair to the keyhole and spied through it. She thought of the dances she had seen out in that hall when the Woodcutter’s Lodge was not just Jonah’s private club—swing bands staffed by old men in glitter-encrusted jackets who played as if their lives depended on it while the windows sweated condensation. She remembered weddings and raffles and jumble sales and memorial services. These pictures charged so fast and clearly through her mind that Alicia wondered if this was how it might be to drown, her life flashing before her eyes.
Mackenzie felt the heat of the floodlights. They sealed him off from the crowd. The stage seemed so vast. Everyone had stopped talking. Now there was only the rustling of clothes and the occasional cough. There had been no opening applause. No introduction. He set his walking stick against the podium, checked that all the pages of his speech were there and in order, and then raised his head to meet the stares of the audience. He tapped at the silver-webbed ball of the microphone. “Can everyone hear me in the back?” No one answered him. “Good!” he said and laughed nervously. He stared for a second at his speech. For a moment, the words all clumped together and his mind could not pull them apart. Slowly they drifted into meaning. “Thank you for coming!” His words sealed the silence of the hall. “I know we have been living in a time of trouble lately.”
In the front row, Shelby stood up. Mary the Clock, in the next seat over, reached out to touch his arm, but Shelby pushed her hand away. Then Shelby pointed at Mackenzie, as if to single him out from a dozen others on the stage.
“Please,” Mackenzie said, and held up his hand. “If you’ll please just listen to what I have to say?” Then everything stopped making sense. His hand slapped back against his shoulder. He couldn’t understand how it happened. A jolting hum washed through him. He couldn’t hear properly. The hall was filled with noise. He could not move. Could not speak. He felt impossibly weak. He just stood there, trying to go on with his speech, but he could no longer read the words. The page was all messy. It was blotchy with something, and at first he thought these blotches were in his eyes and then he saw they were coming from his hand, which hovered over the paper, still ready to turn to the next page when he had finished reading. Almost all the words had vanished now, and the blotches spread and mingled, filling the pencil-ledge of the lectern, spilling onto his shoes and the floor. Then Mackenzie held up his hand and he could see right through it to the crowd. There was a huge hole in the middle, with red and blue veins hanging down like jungle vines across his palm and the flesh was titanium white. It was bl
ood on his speech. He had been shot. He understood that now. His breath slopped like scalding porridge into his lungs.
He took one step backward. Nausea rushed up to meet him. He did not feel himself falling or the moment when he hit the floor, but he knew he had fallen because he was staring at the ceiling. The pages of his speech slipped through the air above him, flitting first one way and then the other and then skimming across the stage.
Everyone seemed to be screaming. Chairs tipped over. He heard the clang of metal as they hit the floor. Please, he wanted to tell them, give me time to finish my speech. He wanted to gather the fallen pages and continue reading. But slowly the knowledge was reaching him. There would be no speech. He realized now that Shelby had not just been pointing. He had been aiming a gun. Faces crowded around. I’ve been shot, he thought. So this is how it feels.
Mackenzie wanted desperately to get to his feet. Not to need help. To walk home and for everyone to stop staring all slack-jawed with horror. But he couldn’t get up. He couldn’t even remember how to get up. It seemed as if his mind had forgotten which nerves connected to his legs and his arms. His brain sent out signals but none of them went to the right places. Instead they sent back messages of pain, which scattered like embers through his body.
Then Mackenzie saw Shelby standing over him. He was still holding the gun. He’s going to finish me off, thought Mackenzie. He imagined it would be the same as in the old film footage he had seen of Frenchmen who had collaborated with the Germans being shot at the end of World War II. The firing squads let loose a volley and then an officer walked past the bodies, putting a bullet into the head of each one to make sure the job was complete. He felt strangely calm about it. Shelby set the gun against Mackenzie’s forehead, but it did not go off. Shelby swore and tried to cock the slide but it was jammed. Then he was gone, out through the little side door.
