Lauchlin of the Bad Heart

by D. R. MacDonald

  “Thanks. I don’t get much mail and I like yours.”

  Frank looked down at his foot, flexed it slowly. “I feel like I have a wooden leg. It’s not a bad feeling. It’s definite, specific, noteworthy and not without interest. It reminds me that I’m here, and of my mortality. I need one more whisky for bed. Next thing I know the grey people will be whimpering in my ear.”

  “What grey people?”

  “The people we meet on the other side, as our folks would say.”

  “Come on, Frank. I’ve never heard you say that.”

  “How often do you hear me say anything anymore? I see death every day.”

  “But spirits?”

  “Is that what they are? They’re one step away. This life, to that life.”

  “And what kind of life would that be?”

  “Like nothing we’ve known, nothing. That’s all I can tell you. Any heaven that resembles this life is terrifying to contemplate, any afterlife within a sense of time. And eternity is time in all its awfulness, a prescription for insanity. We would have to feel no time, to be relieved of all sense of time, all feeling of it. What that’s like I cannot imagine.”

  “It would take a religious man to know, or a philosopher.”

  “Or maybe just a frightening imagination.” Frank looked around the room, focused on the postcard photo of the graceful nude by the rowboat. “We have to leave this place behind. Every bit of it. I know that much.”

  “And love?”

  “Sexual love? Can’t have that in heaven. It’s an unsinning place.”

  “That’s not what I meant necessarily. I suppose religious joy is better than sex, isn’t it?”

  “You’d be the man to test that theory, Lauch, not me.” He lifted the bottle to the light. “Go ahead, there’s a touch left in her.”

  “Thanks anyway. I’m coasting.”

  Frank squinted at him. “Jesus, you look ready for the ring, boy. You wouldn’t make welterweight though. More like light-heavy.”

  “I’m ready for bed, is what I’m ready for.”

  “I was hoping you could tell me something about it, Lauch, this thing a married woman has about other men.”

  “I don’t know anything useful, Frank. I can barely handle my own predicaments.”

  “You don’t love women for the long haul, do you, Brother? It’s just not in you.”

  “Could be. But maybe Elaine’s just having her fling, she’ll get over it, through it. They do that, it’s not the end of everything.”

  Frank rubbed his eyes. “Why can’t I ever get it out of my mind then? Why does it cut me at the oddest goddamn times? I’m talking to a patient. I’m listening to a particular piece of music I like. Smoking a cigar. I might be happy even, flushed with feelings for my wife. And there it is, fresh as a cold kiss. Brings me down, I can tell you. I can hardly talk.”

  “Did you tell Ma?”

  “God no. It’s all fine, as far as she knows. We’ll keep it that way if we can.”

  “I’m sorry, Frank. It…I’m sorry.”

  Frank stood up, loomed under the ceiling light, swaying. “I come back here when I’m wounded. If I could stay longer, I would. I always came home for a spell when things got too much for me. Until I married Elaine. Then she took care of that. I’m going to say good night to Momma. That’s a good thing for a son to do. Her light’s still on.” He laughed, sheepish. “Many’s the time she burned it for me, waiting. You too.”

  “Her waits are over, I guess.”

  “Are they?”

  TWELVE

  THE morning after Frank left, Lauchlin rose earlier than his mother and walked down to the store, certain that its familiarity would, like the mist on his face, cool his heated mind. His brother’s marriage had seemed solid enough to him over the years, and it countered somehow his own life, gave him, even, a kind of licence. That it might be coming apart troubled him, and that he was being no help to Frank at all. He climbed the stone steps and twisted the worn key in the lock. A car flew by behind him and honked but he didn’t turn around.

  Inside, the smells seemed to take hold of him—a touch of fuel from the oil stove, a vegetable odour of apples and cabbages and potatoes, of lingering tobacco smoke—the way a person’s might: Ah, it’s you. His feet found the same creaks in the floor, his hands reached without thinking to straighten a loaf of bread, to flick a light switch, to open the cash drawer, to poke the soil in the window cactus—bone dry, as he expected. He plucked a bad onion from the bin and carried it to the back door, took pleasure in firing it into the trees. From a recent windstorm two thin spruce, almost parallel, lay half fallen in the arms of a big white birch. Not far into the backwoods the old ash pile, where they used to toss bottles and cans, broken glass and metal, was hidden. You could dig down a ways and find bits of the store’s slim history. In Harris, the history ran deep and long in the landscape and his brother would be there soon, taking it in, and here Lauchlin was, in flyover country. He swallowed a taste of regret—his brother was hurting, he’d seen it in his face that night in the bedroom. But who was to blame if Elaine had taken to another man? That was in her, always had been in her, she couldn’t help it any more than Lauchlin could. That’s how it worked. He’d never wanted more than a tumble with her, and if it hadn’t been him, it would have been someone else. Frank was right—Lauchlin was no good for the long haul. Amen, Morag would say.

  There was an east wind speaking through the trees, riffling the grey surface of the strait. Nothing changed on the mountain, east or west its deep green pelt lay mute. It seemed more thick and concealing than ever: how little you could see into it. Lauchlin sniffed the damp, balsamy air. An unseen raven sent out its raucous croak above the trees and far off another echoed it. Was Tena up? What was she listening for? Soon Clement would be leaving for his work.

  In the dim light of the backroom the bag hung. He prodded it with a forearm, put a shoulder to it as he might greet a pal, then the other in a slow, nudging weave, setting the swivel squeaking, why he never oiled that thing he couldn’t say, maybe he’d come to like the noise. But he felt listless, a workout with the bag, now, alone, had no appeal, feeling the heat come into his face, the sweat. He stepped back and cocked his fist just for the motion, holding it as he heard a truck slowing.

  From the counter he saw Clement’s van pulling in, the silver codfish glide by the big window. He didn’t want to see Clement this early: the sight of him brought back the call to Tena the other night, his confused feelings about himself. Lauchlin watched her husband climb out of the van. He looked stooped, his wide shoulders hunched. He stood dragging deeply on a cigarette before he flicked it away.

  “I saw your lights, Lauch,” he said, closing the door behind him. “You’re early at it. Frank was home, was he?”

  “A couple nights. Off to the Highlands and Islands now, he is.”

  “Looking for MacLeans I suppose?”

  “It’s more the MacLeods he’s after, Johanna’s people. Not MacLean country where he’s going, I think, that part of the Hebrides.”

  “Damned if I know what part of it my people are from.” Clement patted the counter softly as if trying to remember something.

  “Tena keeping well?” Lauchlin said.

  “Quiet. Doesn’t go outside as much as she did. She put in a good little garden. All by touch, you know, try that sometime. Give me a box of those crackers there, Lauch, and some of that plastic cheese. I need a bite for lunch.”

  “You still at the milling?”

  “Finishing up. Puts a sour taste in my mouth now, the whole business. It feels like I have company sometimes, and I don’t mean rabbits or deer. More like a coyote.”

  “Two-legged breed?”

  “I can’t say for sure. But I can tell you that when this job is done, there’ll be a portable mill for sale. You interested?”

  “No, thanks, Clement. I’m not much of a woodsman.”

  “Fifteen hundred feet of one-by-twelves in a day, if you keep t
o it.” Clement looked out at the van. “Bad rumours at the fish plant. It might go under like everything else around this goddamn place. I should’ve stayed out west.”

  Lauchlin was about to say, Then you wouldn’t have Tena, but he caught himself. “Things are better out there in some ways, jobs and such. They’ve got their problems of course. Bobby MacMullin is back from Vancouver. Too expensive, too much crime, he says.”

  Clement looked at him, then moved closer, his voice low. “You know, Lauchlin, I love that woman, but it’s harder now, with her blindness. She’s not the same woman she was. Of course that’s to be expected, isn’t it, it came to her so late, so fast. But it’s like she’s pulled into herself now. I don’t know what’s going on in there.”

  “It’s hard to put ourselves in her shoes. I know.”

  “She said you called the other night.”

  “I did, Clement. You were out.”

  “I was, yes.” He scanned the shelves behind the counter. He had a dark beard coming in streaked with grey, and he’d let his hair grow longer. Just that seemed to give a different expression to his face, like a man living in the wilds or at sea. “Jesus, I wish you carried cigarettes.”

  “Tell my mother. She might listen to you.”

  “I wish Tena would listen to me. Of course we’re all in the mix, aren’t we?”

  “Mix?”

  “You too. Tena, me, and that strange bird I was bound up with. I’d like to kill him sometimes, the way he gets into my head. Some nights I come home and I can’t think straight. It’s not fair to Tena but I don’t want to talk. I worry where we’re headed, I get this awful tightness about it.”

  “About what?”

  Clement shook his head slowly. “She’s a pretty woman, isn’t she?” he said. “Such a simple thing, that, a pretty woman. One time it was anyway. Blind she seems prettier than she ever was, her face changed some way, you know? Something different’s come into it.” He pulled a cigarette from his shirt pocket and lit it quickly. “Things are going on there I don’t understand, I guess.” He looked out at the road where a pickup was passing. “There goes Walter, the gravedigger,” he said almost inaudibly.

  “Grace Bannerman,” Lauchlin said. “She’ll be buried at the point.”

  “Up above the water, best place. Death with a nice view. Listen, give me a couple big bottles of that Coke there, and then I’m off.”

  Lauchlin opened a plastic bag and set the items inside.

  “I’ve heard gossip out and around, Lauchlin. You too, probably.”

  “What gossip in particular, Clement? I don’t hear all of it.”

  “You and Tena.”

  Lauchlin flushed but clamped his anger down. This man was her husband after all, rumours would cut him too, cheap though they were. But he felt less defensive or guilty than distant, cool somehow toward Clement, as if what mattered to him now was not steadying a friendship and giving solace, as he might to Frank, but protecting what he had with Tena, which seemed at the moment, though threatened, above accusation, almost innocent, unselfish, mainly for her good. How could it be tarnished by lies, trimmed out in God knew what ways?

  “I won’t even ask what you heard, but there’s nothing to hide, nothing’s been hidden, Clement. You know I visit, and when. She tells you, doesn’t she?”

  “I know, I know. But they see your truck there, coming out the driveway, and…”

  “What are you saying then? That I shouldn’t come when you’re not home, or that I should find a way so they don’t see me? I read to her, I talk to her, you know. I took her on a drive a couple times.”

  “I don’t mind you coming around, reading to her, she likes that and I can’t do it, read to her like I used to. I can’t sit there with her like that, with her just listening to me. I get nervous, it’s like stage fright or something.”

  “You could get over that,” Lauchlin said, but he made no effort to conceal his doubt. He had always liked Clement, they’d had an easy and affable friendship, but here was Lauchlin thinking about his wife, about the woman who was his own, as if he and Clement hardly knew each other. Lauchlin’s affection for her had pushed Clement aside.

  “I’d like to say to hell with them,” Clement said, blowing smoke, squinting through it, “Let them talk. But Jesus, I got enough on my mind, that queer fish following me around, I don’t need people yanking my balls.”

  “If you don’t trust me, or Tena either, I’ll stay away then. That should solve it.” Lauchlin regretted that as soon as he said it, not just his wounded, indignant tone but that Clement might agree.

  “No, no,” Clement said, waving his hand, “that wouldn’t solve nothing. They’ll believe what they like anyway, you could leave town tomorrow and never come back and the gossip wouldn’t quit. I don’t like her alone so much, not now, and when I get this job wrapped up, I’ll…” A confused look passed over his face, he frowned, and Lauchlin nearly reached out to touch him, to reassure him, but of what he did not know.

  “There’s always people who love to think the worst,” Lauchlin said. “We know the truth, you and Tena and myself. That’s what matters, isn’t it? As friends?”

  “She’s nervous in the house these days. I can tell that much. She walks the road sometimes, you know, I can’t stop her. She walked all the way to the church and back the other day, Matilda Moore drove by her but couldn’t get her to take a lift.” Clement sighed, gathered in his hand his bag of groceries. He shook his head, a habit of his now, as if he were rejecting what was passing through his mind, or couldn’t make sense of it. “Anyway, you go down and see her when you get a chance. To hell with them.”

  “Maybe I should wait till you’re there. That’s better, I think. We’ll keep the talk down.”

  Clement paused at the door, raised his hand as if to wave but just nodded. “Tell your mother I’ll have her some good fish tomorrow.”

  LAUCHLIN WENT AT THE HEAVY BAG hard for a few minutes, but the elbow was sore and his hip stiff, so he cooled off at the back door, wiping his face with a towel. Foolish to have told Clement he’d wait. He wanted to see her, pure and simple. Later in the day he would.

  It was still early and he left the “closed” sign in the door while he fell to small tasks he’d been ignoring, rewiring a lamp, oiling a stuck latch, nailing down a loose floorboard in the backroom. He didn’t mind being by himself, there was something about the cave hike he wanted to hold on to, coming out of it into the sea light, the cold rush of the swells, tossing him, fighting his way free, his brother behind him, chuffed and grinning. He’d needed that, maybe his heart had too, it gave him no grief. When would he get a letter from Frank? He wanted to hear from him, whatever he was feeling, about himself, about where he was.

  He was sorting out papers he’d stuffed into a desk drawer when the front door opened slowly and shut with its familiar rattle. He hadn’t heard a car.

  “Look who’s here,” he said, coming out of the backroom. “I never expected I’d see you this morning, Tena.”

  “Surprise, then. I wasn’t sure you’d be open yet but I had a feeling.”

  “I’m glad you had it. How nice to see you coming in the door.”

  Her hand rested lightly on the back of Malcolm’s chair, she’d remembered its location. He wanted to put his arms around her exuberantly, but they were not on the edge of a cliff, and he could feel the big window next to him. “Would you like to sit down, Tena?” he said, reaching out to her.

  “I think we had that conversation already, Lauchlin, right in this room in fact.” She smiled. Her nose was freckled from sun. “Remember?”

  “My worries about you on the road still apply, but here you are.”

  “And not tired at all. I might walk clear to the highway just for the hell of it.”

  A small rucksack hung from her shoulder and she slipped it off, felt around inside and carefully removed a small basket of blueberries wrapped in clear plastic, setting it on the counter. “For you and your mother, I picked th
em yesterday. Taste one.” Lauchlin peeled back a corner of the covering and plucked out a berry.

  “Sweet. Should be a good summer for them. Thanks, Tena, that’s kind of you. Johanna loves blueberries and ours are gone to grass long ago.”

  “There’s a good patch up by the barn, full of them. But you know, I don’t want to go to it now. They seemed all picked over yesterday and I can’t understand who would have done that.”

  Lauchlin looked at her face, her eyes, not as fiercely bright as they had been, but muted, slightly wary, as if she had finally given up trying to make them work. “Maybe raccoons,” he said. “Foxes eat them too.”

  “Really? Then I’ll blame it on them and be done with it. Look.” She held up the empy rucksack. “This time I came to shop. Clement does most of it in town.”

  “What’ll it be, Mrs. MacTavish? Brown sugar?”

  “Oh, a box of cornstarch. Salt. A quart of milk. A bag of those chocolate candies Clement likes. He said he gets them here. And a turnip and a bunch of carrots if you have them.”

  “The carrots aren’t that fresh, Tena…”

  “They’re only for a stew. He likes stew.”

  “He stopped in this morning.”

  “Did he?” She turned her face toward the window. “We had a small quarrel. We’ll get over it, we always do.”

  Something was teetering, it could fall forward or backward and he couldn’t have said right then which way it might go. A stranger glancing in might have thought this man and woman hardly knew one another except commercially, the storekeeper safely behind the counter, waiting to serve her. It seemed a charade and he hated his role in it. All he needed was a white apron, a pencil behind his ear, a ready line about the weather.

  “Was it about us, by any chance?” he said.

  “Us? You and me?” She tapped her cane softly on the floor a few beats. “Not really. Things are kind of swirling around us right now. I’m glad you called, I felt a little down that night. And I was afraid you were avoiding me for some reason.”