Trial of Passion

by William Deverell

  I listen to his reminiscences with a tight smile as we bump up Centre Road. He obliges me by stopping at the general store, where Mr. Makepeace hands me a week’s worth of junk mail and a postcard from Bayreuth. “Your ex is coming back for the winter season. Going to be doing Hansel and Gretel at Christmas.”

  How blurred in memory has Annabelle become; how lightly throbs the pain of yesterday. I hope she has found happiness with her Musikmeister. (I expect flouncy François Roehlig shares my curious passion for strong-willed women. He has the advantage of youth and may last her out.)

  A quick run up Potter’s Road, and while I dash into the house, Malcolm wanders across the yard. Someone has delivered George Rimbold’s fishing gear. Its presence beside my unlocked door causes another brief pang of loss. I quickly change into country garb and return outside to find Malcolm gazing wistfully over the fence at his former homestead.

  Now we head towards Breadloaf Hill to the fair grounds. Cars line the road as we come around the final switchback atop the hill, where a couple of hundred smiling islanders have gathered, all bedecked in their country finery. To whom do I report to take on the duty of overseer of children’s games? Where is Margaret?

  A stage has been slapped up by the wall of the community hall and trophy winners are being summoned to it. Best handicrafts, best goats, best float in this morning’s parade. The master of ceremonies, Scotty Phillips (island bootlegger, respected businessman, president of the local Lions Club), has an unnaturally loud voice, which he delights in amplifying through the microphone.

  “Best overall veggies. Who wants to guess?”

  Ah, there she is at the front, walking sprightly up the steps to the stage, accepting a trophy in the shape of a phallic corncob.

  “Bloody obscene,” Malcolm says. He laughs: a throaty, sensual sound.

  “Now, you just stay right here, Margaret,” Scotty booms. “You got three more coming in a row.”

  I am exuberant in my applause each time, easily outdoing Malcolm, who probably must protect his sensitive hands.

  “Egg toss coming up in ten minutes,” Scotty announces, “so choose your partners.” Margaret flits from the stage with her booty, then turns and starts when we descend upon her.

  “Arthur, goodness, you made me jump. Malcolm, it’s so good to see you. How are you?” She seems flustered and, laden with her trophies, hugs me awkwardly. After I relieve her of them, she takes Malcolm in a disturbingly close embrace.

  “You look great,” he says as they part.

  “A few years older, not much wiser.”

  “I’d been meaning to come over. Too busy picking up all the pieces.” Pieces of what? He is not talking about broken china. . . .

  “So. You’ve met. You two.” Margaret seems unable to find words. “Okay, well, um, I’m off duty at last, let’s go sit down. It’s been a crazy day. Already it’s been a crazy day.”

  Trilling like a nervous songbird, she takes us each by an arm and marches us to a roped-off area near the crown of Breadloaf Hill, where we sit on makeshift benches. Ginger Jones, our waitress, serves us beer and pop. “Watch out,” she whispers to me. “Emily’s on the prowl.” She looks the three of us over, sees possibilities for scandal here; who will make it with whom?

  Malcolm hefts the corncob trophy. “Where’s the battery compartment?”

  From Margaret’s throat issues a raunchy chortle. I laugh nervously.

  The emcee’s booming voice: “Arthur Beauchamp. Arthur Beau-champ. Wanted at the kiddies’ three-legged race.”

  “Hurry back,” Margaret says. She waves me away and leans towards Malcolm. I hear her say, “What was Africa like?”

  I have passed out one red ribbon, one blue ribbon — and, to the ten third-place winning teams of the three-legged race, ten white ribbons (the judicious practice on Garibaldi: No child may be allowed to return home without a share of glory). I have presided as marshal over the tug of war (a titanic struggle during which seven-year-old Peggy Kane bit ten-year-old Ronnie Cruller on the hand, causing his team to lose). I have wisely refereed the scarecrow contest, awarding the cherished Rosekeeper Trophy to twelve-year-old Winston Bigelow for his clever rendering of a black-robed vampire (carrot-fanged, the mouth drooling catsup).

  Between events, I wander about, seeking vantage points to observe Margaret and Malcolm:They haven’t moved from their table except to fetch more beer, and they are far too gay and chatty. But they have former times to share, a pot of memories to stir up.

  The fair organizers, duly impressed by my Solomon-like adjudications for the children’s games, reward me with a substitute’s role as judge of the pie-baking contest (replacing Nelson Forbish, who is in the first-aid tent, sickened on caramel apples and candy floss). I am led to a table laden with a dozen succulent entries, apple, rhubarb, blueberry, lightly crusted, oozing their syrups. I nibble at each, muttering words of praise, wondering why my appetite has suddenly vanished. When will I be allowed a little uninterrupted taste of Margaret? When does Malcolm go off to play his guitar?

  I pin a ribbon on the proud chest of Mrs. Nancy Stiles, creator of a zesty concoction of apple and blackberry, and I wander off again. They are still in the beer gardens, absorbed in each other. I feel a stranger, outside their space. I am exhausted from the tension of this much-anticipated day, dispirited, my energy sapped by jealous worry. Beware. She’ll turn on you.

  The day’s brightness has begun to fade, and a brisk evening breeze has whipped up, tossing scraps of paper across the lawns, sending smoke spiralling from the barbecue pit behind the community hall, where a queue has formed for the sacrificial lambs. I stroll past the volunteer fire fighters and their polished old red truck, past the RCMP exhibit, a canopied anti-drug display. It is deserted but for Stoney, who is standing in the lee of the wind, brazenly lighting a hand-rolled cigarette. He joins me, his breath reeking of marijuana.

  “You gotta catch this sunset, man.”

  Lethargically, I follow him past the beer gardens, our passage unnoticed by Margaret and Malcolm, who are laughing over some ancient escapade at the Earthseed Commune.

  The sunsets from Breadloaf Hill are fairly held to be among the finest on the island; barren of all but a few Garry oaks, our knoll offers a vast canvas south and west, beyond islands and channels to the green spine of Vancouver Island and the towering snowy tops of Olympic Park.

  But the sunset is disappointing; the wind has chased the clouds, and we see only the darkening sky and the red orb of the sun. It disappears behind the sea like fading hope, and blinks out like a light bulb. Three ravens flap darkly past our view like winged omens, uttering imprecations, gliding, swooping, then disappearing among the steeples of Douglas firs below us.

  Now comes a distant guitar melody, and I turn and see Malcolm Lorenz at the microphone, entertaining folks who have filled their plates and are nestling down on blankets before the stage.

  “You been home yet?” says Stoney.

  “I stopped in quickly.”

  “Did you, ah, check the garage?”

  I have come to recognize a certain inflection to Stoney’s voice when he is about announce one of his catastrophes. There have been ill auguries: the sudden cold breeze, the ravens with their raucous warnings, Zoller with his curse.

  “Why?”

  “Well, ‘cause we finished the roof. Dog and me worked day and night. Lots of overtime. Won’t cost you extra.”

  In that case, he is hustling for a big tip. But I am relieved that his news is good. “I’ll do an inspection in the morning.”

  Stoney clears his throat. “Only one other thing . . .”

  I wait for him to complete. Deer have breached the garden fence. The house has collapsed. Stoney’s garage burned down, with the Phantom v inside it.

  But Stoney just shrugs and walks away. “Well, you’ll find out.”

  I utter a soft oath. I am about to pursue him, but hesitate when I hear Margaret’s voice from behind me.

  “Here you are.”<
br />
  She peeks mischievously from behind a scraggly oak tree, a child playing hide and seek. Laughing, she hugs the tree. I fear she has had a little too much to drink. Now she is at the top of the knoll, looking out at the sunset’s afterglow. She spreads her arms, empress of all she surveys. She is flushed — with the beer she drank? Or has Malcolm kindled more than memories?

  “I’m feeling so spaced out today.”

  A poor drinker, she seems flighty, gawky in her movements.

  “Let’s go down and listen to Malcolm, then we can eat and dance, and you can tell me all about the trial.” She takes my arm. “How are you feeling, you look a little blue.”

  “Hangover from the trial, I suspect.” I wonder if I remember how to dance. Doubtless Malcolm is lithe of foot, with antelopelike grace.

  We park ourselves at a picnic table near the stage. Malcolm’s eyes are closed as he plays a melodic largo, to which Margaret listens raptly. Suddenly, I am shivering. I wonder if I should tramp back to the house and get a sweater. I wonder if I need even bother coming back. Why spoil Margaret’s good time? Thanks to the ministering of Uncle Arthur, she is freed of her fixation upon her husband, and now her heart can pursue other goals.

  But I am being made irrational by that baneful by-product of love we call jealousy. I am confused by my emotions, made ill by them: a paranoid neurosis. She missed me — she told me that on the telephone. I think of you a lot, too— that’s what she said.

  They’re just good friends.

  Now I must fill our plates before the food disappears. As Malcolm begins a final encore, I slip away to join a line-up that is still crawling sluglike towards the food table. And I am suddenly feeling an old need. I am suffering the same kind of niggling urge for strong drink that visited me during Annabelle’s frequent bouts of perfidy.

  But now Emily Lemay joins me, planting an impertinent wet kiss on my lips that tastes of peach brandy. I ask if her current swain is present, the tugboat operator.

  “Ancient history. Found out he had one in every port. By the time he got back here he was too beat to do anything. Not that he ever did much anyway. Some day, I’d like to meet a man. Someone who can keep up.”

  Though Emily continues to flirt with blatant gusto, my own recent rumblings of potency have stilled; the loins do not stir, I do not rise to her challenge. Pressing against me with thigh and bosom, she leans to my ear with a secret: “That Malcolm Lorenz — he sure knew how to keep it up.”

  As the server slaps chunks of meat on my three plates, I feel a queasy loss of appetite.

  I make my escape from Emily. I see the Garibaldi Blues Band tuning up on stage. Malcolm has disappeared from it . . . and Margaret has vanished from her place at our picnic table.

  I lay food and cutlery down, and search for them in the community hall, where Margaret must be showing Malcolm her prize veggies. Inside, I wander among tables arrayed with produce and handicrafts. No sign of them here. The door that exits to the parking lot is open, and after taking no more than two steps outside it I am brought to a sudden stall. In a sheltered alcove near the parking lot Margaret and Malcolm are in close embrace, passionately kissing.

  I slowly retreat into the hall. I feel my heart racing, breaking, shattering. I fly away, I fly away.

  I am sitting in the darkness, all lights off but that of the moon, which sneaks through my window like a cold-hearted thief. I am rigid in my club chair, paralysed with grief, too emotionally withered for tears to come.

  I hear a distant pounding of bass, a whine of amplified guitar, rising and falling, carried on the harsh wind from Breadloaf Hill. Outside my open window, trees sway in the breeze under the ghostly light of the moon. (What further evil has been visited upon me? Stoney knows. You’ll find out.)

  How could I have ever conceived I was a masochist? I dread the kind of hurt for which I have found but one effective antidote. Isn’t that so, Annabelle? Was that not your experience? I tend to drown pain. I cannot handle it. Not this particular kind, a bastinado I feel up into my very guts.

  And now I am suffering a thirst I have not felt for years. But it has been years. I wonder if I am now able to handle alcohol. Finally, after nine years of abstinence, can I control my old addiction?

  The moon sends a long, shivering slice of light across the choppy waters of the bay, Diana’s arrow. They were entwined like vines. Had their mouths been open as they kissed? Ah, love and pain are twin sisters indeed, and delight in torturing their bound and helpless victims.

  At the sound of a vehicle entering the yard next door I snap to attention like a man on the rack. A barking dog. A male voice. Her tinkling laughter. I close my eyes and clasp my hands over my ears, yet I see and hear them gaily entering her house, Slappy the spaniel dancing around their ankles, showing them the way to the bedroom.

  I rise and stroll in a not-quite aimless fashion around the house, through the living room to the kitchen, where, behind a cupboard door, stands a bottle of Seagram’s, recently purchased and set aside for entertaining.

  I pluck this precious, dangerous cargo from its hiding place. A dram or two, that’s all. I seek not oblivion in these amber waters; a minor deadening of the nerves will suffice, a slight surcease of care. Clearly, I have beaten my addiction. If I can just get through this night . . . why, tomorrow I will be back on top of things. In my garden, harvesting my brussels sprouts.

  I open the bottle. I sniff, sucking in its pungent ethers. Spirits, light my fire. Burn me, burn the pain away.

  You are possessed of the devil, my son. Repent at once.

  George, leave me alone.

  You are an alcoholic.

  No longer.

  Bullshit!

  The bottle tilts. But my hand is restrained by a power that seems almost physical: the grip of the ministering angel Rimbold, descended from the AA chapter above.

  Say it!

  I am an alcoholic.

  The sweet, addicting syrup flows into the sink and down the drain.

  Ah, you impious bastard, George, I am a stronger man than this. I will survive. I will.

  And then I feel the weakness subside. A strength, a peace, comes over me. I have survived loss before. I have plunged into the fire of love and I have lived. I am truly not the whimpering invertebrate I used to be. Perhaps all those years of sweaty labour to conserve a bad marriage have given me muscle. Or perhaps like my rutabagas I have grown healthy and hardy in the gardens of Garibaldi. Have I not just won a notorious trial? Have I not attracted the lurid attentions of Emily Lemay? Yes, I am feeling quite possessed. Unruffled. Calm.

  I slip on a wool sweater and walk outside among the rays and shadows of the moon. I shall not think of Margaret.

  (But now I see her in its solemn face, hear her in the whispering wind in the trees, in the scolding slap of waves upon the beach.)

  I stroll down the path to the water, and to prove my courage I glance at Margaret’s house. It is in utter blackness. I am strong. I will survive. But unbidden comes a vision of heated naked bodies, and I am nauseated by it and speed to the ocean’s edge. I stand there for a few moments panting, but nothing comes up.

  I stare at the sea for a long and wretched time: the moonlit dancing waves, the foam-whipped channel, flickering lights on distant islands, the star-fat sky. I become aware of a distinct feeling of dampness around my toes and realize the tide has been flowing, saturating my shoes.

  Now something is tugging at my pant cuffs. Am I about to be eaten alive by crabs? It seems a sufficiently ignominious way to end it all. I turn, and Slappy licks my hand.

  “What the hell are you doing?” Margaret is at the top of the path, under the arbutus tree, looking down at me.

  Slowly, I turn to face her. She starts to come down the trail, wobbling, lightly impaired by her several beers. “Talking to yourself, wandering into the ocean. Why did you run off anyway?”

  My feet are wet and I am paralysed.

  “I looked all around for you.” She stops about a yard in
front of me, studies me for signs of injury or mental illness.

  “I, uh, I’m sorry, I just thought you and Malcolm wanted to be alone for a while.”

  Slappy keeps tugging at me, and I follow him to dry land.

  Margaret takes my hand and looks searchingly at me. “Oh, Arthur, I think I hurt you tonight. I know what happened.”

  “What happened?”

  “You saw me kissing him goodbye in the parking lot.”

  “Kissing him . . . goodbye?” I croak.

  “He had to get the nine o’clock, but insisted on coming by to look at the house. I really couldn’t say no. Anyway, he took off right after that for the ferry. I looked for your car — why didn’t you bring it to the fair?”

  “My car?” I am in utter confusion.

  “You haven’t looked in your garage?”

  Zombie-like, I let her lead me there: the Phantom v proudly squats within, festooned with ribbons.

  “Stoney drove it in the parade this morning, didn’t he tell you? That’s a steering wheel from an old Massey-Harris tractor.”

  I have managed to loosen up enough to laugh a little, though with the slight edge of hysteria.

  She turns to face me and takes both my hands. “I’m sorry about. . . you know, the thing you saw with Malcolm. He, ah, really leaned into me.”

  “I will admit to a raging jealousy. It was unworthy of me and insulting to you.”

  “Yes, well, I felt very awkward all day. Not used to all that male energy. I suppose he was coming on a little. I told him I couldn’t put him up.”

  “I read your feelings differently.”

  “You boob. It wasn’t that much of a kiss.”

  As she presses her lips to mine I smell a pleasant beery aftertaste. Her mouth works mine apart and her tongue searches deeply into it, and I am intoxicated by the delicious womanly scent of her body, by her narcotic exhalations. Her hips close with mine, gently shimmying, and I am transported, rabid with desire, and I melt in her heat, feel myself diving, diving, into the flames of passion. . . .