"Who'd you pray to, Corrag?"
"I don't know. God?"
"God?"
His look was angry. It was Ben. For an instant all the time dropped away. They looked each other in the eyes, and the search for solace and understanding was the same for both. A man ran up and called out.
"Colonel Calder, sir. You'll miss the boat." Ben stood and gave her a chilling look, a deathly look just before his focus faded and he turned.
"You're right. A common acquaintance. A boy we once both knew. Thanks for coming back for me, Kurts."
In that final look and turning away Corrag had seen all she needed to see. She was left with the portrait of a tortured soul, trapped in a world not of its making. The augmented mind had claimed a crooked victory, stealing away the boy of her youth, the dream she'd once had of completeness in another human being. For the second time Ben had been lost. This time Corrag saw a way out. She knew what she had to do to put the sting behind her and carry on. Her child was the completion of her purpose, and in her dedication to his well being she would find the way forward. It was a simple formula, but effective and true for her. She walked back to the Fisherman's Hall and smiled at the men and women mingling at the door with drinks in their hands, the look of connoisseurs, savants, victors against the common enemy -- the winter, the icebergs and the endless Atlantic. Corrag joined their party, but not without the feeling of a heavy heart, of a weight not shared.
What had Ben traded up for, what was his life like? She wondered occasionally, but less and less as time went on. The summer gave way to the return of the lengthening night. She took Arthur out and showed him the stars, remembering the names his father had used for the constellations. He seemed to respond to the sounds in her mouth of those strange words, the desert words that had spawned the idea of his creation in her mind. She loved the way he would look at her but not look at her, looking beyond her as if waiting for more, as if the words for the stars were their own source and they would appear in the air self-generated, and sometimes she believed they would.
In the mornings, Corrag walked Arthur in a stroller down the road to the water's edge, going slowly to savor the sun's light on their faces. Arthur asked the names of things he saw, and Corrag pronounced them. There was a flock of geese in a wavy V flying overhead. There was a seal ducking under the water. Arthur loved the town road worker who filled potholes on the road with the excavator's claw full of steaming, smelly asphalt. A group of schoolgirls gathered at the entrance to the town's high school, giggling at them. There was a new, mean-spirited edge to their laughing, brought on by the coming winter. Corrag was not hurt by their sly taunts, she realized that there was a fault line in the town between the Jonah cult and the others, and none of the girls in the school entrance belonged to the Jonah. That fault line, the division that ran through every group of people she'd lived among, lay inside human beings, not in the settings in which they lived. It was part envy, part pain, and it ran as deep as any love. The pleasure of its expression was as great as the joy of human solidarity. She rushed Arthur along, not wishing to expose him to the corrosive elements in the air.
On Sundays, The Jonah congregation, calling itself the New Church of the Remonstrance, met in Fernanda's large living room, which spilled out onto an enclosed porch. Corrag was beginning to recognize the many hymns. She sang along with a voice that was gaining in strength. Afterwards, the congregants surrounded her, and Arthur was passed around from person to person as he smiled silently and craned his little head to see where he was. They treated her and Arthur like royalty. Eventually the meeting dispersed and Candia, Corrag, Fernanda and Euclive were in the living room putting up the folding chairs and sweeping the floor. The baby was in a pen playing with some toys. Charles Fugel, who led the service most weeks, and Mrs. Green, the music teacher at the high school, were watching him. When they were done tidying, Fernanda brought out a tray of chocolates that they passed around the table.
"He is a joy," said Mrs. Green, referring to Arthur, who just laughed at Fernanda's Cairn terrier Joey.
"He loves that dog," said Candia. She was waiting for the opportunity to excuse herself and see if Eddie was outside, lingering, as was his recent habit, by the remains of the picket fence destroyed by several consecutive years of winter storms. She and Eddie had decided to announce their engagement publicly at the last fishermen's ringo scheduled at the end of the month. Eddie was not a Jonah, but Candia had told Fernanda she thought he could be pressed into a commitment, that he wasn't actively hostile.
"Yes, he does," said Corrag, helping the conversation along without pressing. There was always an expectant air to these Sunday gatherings, as if Arthur and she were about to perform a sign of the coming age.
"He loves it here in Red Bay if I do say," said Fernanda. "He is really a happy little fellow."
"Shame he doesn't seem to have any father figure in his little life," said Mrs. Green.
"That's not important!" said Charles, shocked. "Corrag, are you happy here?" he asked.
"Yes, of course," she said, a slight, defensive tremor in her voice.
"You would leave, though, if you could," he said.
"I don't know."
"The body of the Jonah has many needs. The evangelists are the wings of the Jonah message, spreading it to the four corners, preparing the way for the Third Day."
"What are you suggesting, Charles? The girl is hardly in a position." Fernanda acted shocked, picking the lint out of the folds of her skirt.
"She is in a position. She hasn't been home to Democravia. It's a very unsettled country where the Whale has been resisted. It's back in full control, yes, but there are great opportunities for us to win many converts, people who need to hear the truth about the Jonah and the hope of salvation we bring. For Corrag it would be a risk, yes, but also an opportunity to continue her spiritual growth in the service of the Gospel. Would you like to go home, Corrag?"
Corrag didn't answer, picking Arthur up out of the crib, as he was about to cry. She took him in her arms and rushed to the window. The sight of the little finches flitting in the trees where Fernanda had placed a feeder always distracted him. As the conversation continued behind her, she felt her heart beating in her throat. She couldn't tell if she was more frightened or excited by the possibility of going home to Democravia. The prospect had dropped out of the blue so suddenly. It was as if her childhood home no longer existed except in her memories, and she feared going back to find only the ruins, an unrecognizable land, and her parents dead, or worse, in such a desperate condition that her presence and Arthur's would not bring them relief. She had failed in so many ways to come to an adult, stable place, that going home was a shameful proposition. And yet, behind the fear was a rush of undifferentiated emotion, of longing and pain. She was scared to admit it, but she wanted to go very badly.
"Papers and what not. Emund Montaquila can fix it with his work. It would have to be soon. The passage will be shut in a month."
"But we can't just send her in blind."
"Of course not. We have people. Known friends."
It happened quickly after that. Every day there were sessions with Fernanda and Charles Fugel reading with her from the tablet of the Book of Remonstrances, channeled originally by Ian Winterstone, a truck driver living in Surrey, from the angel Yuriel. Winterstone had been a sickly child, picked on by his peers, and one day, after being thrown in a lake on a school picnic to Wales in 2015, he had heard Yuriel urging him to write down what he said. Winterstone went on to record the Book of Remonstrances on several versions of early tablets of Indian and Chinese manufacture. On this point Charles expressed some minor distaste. He was a purist who wrote his letters by hand in an elegant cursive he'd learned from his father, the first principal of the Red Bay elementary school. Mrs. Green had been his music teacher.
The B of R, as the Jonah members called it, basically told of the rebirth of civilization following the dark ages of the Whale. Life inside the Whale's belly was f
ull of bile, an acidic reflux born of waste and wantonness, especially the luxuriousness of the virtual life. For the Jonah, bile was a metaphor for the toxic lifestyle of the Repho, the competitive individualism rooted in original sin that had been reborn. They held the old Democravian system in equal contempt for its liberal fluffiness, the lack of moral fiber. Now of course it was moot as the old order in that part of the country had withered on the vine.
Like her time of indoctrination and training with the Korazan, Corrag took to the daily sessions with Fugel and Fernanda with a natural passion for Winterstone's prophetic vision, the large ideas, the way she could easily see the world changing with her entrance into the secret life of the elect.
"The islands have seen it and fear. The end of the Whale is coming and the earth trembles and the seas rise up to wash away evil in the last hour. That's how it goes, Corrag."
"Yes, I know."
"Can you see it?"
"I think so."
"'And they aproach and come forward and help one another and say be strong. And that's where you come in."
"I do?"
"Exactly. You're a midwife and will help in the birth of the Jonah people and Arthur will be a shepherd with a flock of his own."
"Yes. I like that."
"You like that."
"I do."
The readings were all on tablets that were handed around from congregation to congregation in the Maritimes and beyond. The Jonah people wrote letters to each other on the snail mail and afterwards the letters were transcribed into the tablets of one of the leaders of the respective congregations before they were carefully burned. Fernanda couldn't see very well and so she had handed the duty of transcription to Candia. Corrag was breastfeeding Arthur in the back of the house while the dog played with a bone, the ham bone left over from the Sunday dinner with the elders of the Red Bay congregation. Fugel looked out the window.
"The dog is playing with that bone left by the Ebionites," he said. He always smiled sadly when he called the Jonah members that. Corrag asked Fernanda about it as Fugel was using the bathroom.
"Fernanda. What are the Ebionites?"
"They were a people who were wiped out by the Romans. Charlie has confessed to me that he believes we've all been Ebionites before. We get our souls from them. That's what he believes," she whispered.
"Do you think so?"
"I don't know. Why not?"
Candia called her over through the open back door. She was typing from the letter on the portable keyboard with the tablet propped on the top step.
"Look at this, Corrag."
"What is it?"
"This is where you're going. Big-time, girl. You and Arthur are going to be stars."
"Don't keep it to yourself. Let me see."
It was the letter from Edmund Montaquila they'd been waiting for. Everything must have been arranged in Quebec for Corrag and Arthur to come. Corrag put Arthur down. She read aloud:
Dear Red Bay Crowd,
Keep your remonstrances coming. Have no fear about us here. As they say in the best families: Laissez Le Bon Temps Roulez. There is no life without death. It is a cause of terror to the sinner.
I know you are wondering if we have room at the inn for the travelers. That and more as we also have the necessary documents and passage for Corrag and her boy. We await word from you. Note that the feelings are running very strong here against the recent consolidation of the augment/mind/whale vis a vis Kupertini-Chagnon merge. We have had some major falling back in strength with the deaths of our lay deacon Osorio Benjamin due to an aneurysm that struck in the night. His final days were spent planning retreats in the Iron Range of Michigan for our missionary teams. Hundreds attended the wake and we gained some new conversion candidates who are currently in the evangelizing house out near the Norm Lavecque.
You were asking about getting some money from the treasury for small-bore training. I believe that would be possible but I must ask in return for accountability since you well know we have had instances of the old three card monte in some of the Jonah. I am not naming names, but when I say Goss Falls, New York you will know what I mean.
Corrag stopped reading. Candia had stood up and put her arm around Corrag's shoulders. There were tears in her eyes. Arthur was trying to climb the wooden steps. The dog was pulling at his diapers. It was a scene of domestic bliss, but something was not right. The letter dropped from Corrag's fingers.
"What's wrong?"
"I'm scared."
"You scared?"
"Yes. I don't know who I am. What am I supposed to do?"
"Take it one day at a time, Corrag. Let it happen. Just concentrate on the little things. Don't worry about the big things."
"They wanted me to be an emissary, Candia. I never accomplished much of anything."
"You don't need to. Just be you. Look at me. I'm happy. Eddie and I want to be happy. You just need to want something bad enough. You taught me that, Corrag. Do you want to be happy?"
"I want everyone else to be happy. I don't care about myself."
"Care about yourself more, Corrag."
The two were crying and Arthur started bawling also. Even the dog started in howling. Fernanda came to the door to see what was the matter.
Two weeks later the boat was ready at the pier early on a cold morning. Seagulls screeched over the houses and along the cliffs. Charles Fugel, Mrs. Green, Wilders, Euclive and Eddie Fox stood on the road by the remains of the picket fence. Fernanda and Candia were going to walk them down to the water. Corrag was trying not to cry and urging Arthur to wave. The little boy was dressed in a jumpsuit that Fernanda had found in an old plastic bag in the spare closet where all her old childrens' clothes were kept.
"Everything good comes to an end," Charles was saying. "Corrag let this end be a beginning. Breathe in the salt air on your journey. Fill your lungs with goodness, and you will carry us all with you on your way."
Corrag walked around to them all and had Arthur grab their fingers. Corrag tried to personalize her farewells.
"Charles. I love your words. Keep them coming. Mrs. Green, I will always remember your voice, especially on Morning has Broken. Wilders, if it weren’t for you, I probably wouldn't be here. Eddie, you better take good care of Candia."
"I'll try, Corrag," he said and stuck his hands further in his pockets. Corrag loved all of them. She turned to where Candia had her bag and Fernanda stood out on the road and stepped away from the fence. She had always been a good Democravian girl, a star in the firmament of her parent's world, but nothing had prepared her for the dissolution of that world and the long road she had embarked upon when she'd stepped away from the Spring Fest with Ben Calder almost three years before. She felt like the aspects of her personality that had kept her alive through the recent past had been hidden, laying dormant, unsuspected, and she was still not sure they were hers.
The boat was a fifty-foot Scottish schooner retrofitted with Yanmar solar electrics and nanofiber icebreaking shields in the bow. It was called the Belle Enfant, homeport of Trois Rivieres. It sat low at the pier rocking slowly while the tide came in and icebergs congregated out in open water. The captain, Bob Anselm, was a bearded veteran of the Canadian brigades that had fought in the Basin with Democravian troops in the first decade of the Nativist wars. His wife Beth was his first mate and there was a deckhand, a boy with slitted green eyes named Oddgeir. Beth was a nurse from Vancouver. Corrag and Arthur were the only passengers, but there was a load of Greenland rock in the hold that they were bringing to several parties south of Quebec City, as Bob put it when asked. They welcomed Corrag and Arthur aboard. They would have the forward cubby in the bow while Bob and Beth slept aft next to the engine room and Oddgeir took the berth in the galley. Arthur cried all the time down below, so Corrag took him on deck, sitting in the cockpit behind the wheel while Oddgeir steered by the compass setting and watched for icebergs. The icebergs came alongside and then slipped away, their ice faces revealing rainbows in the sl
uicing fractures. The clouds on the horizon were an exotic bestiary that Corrag and Arthur tamed by giving them the names of people they'd known. Since Arthur's knowledge of people was limited to their Red Bay circle, Corrag took the opportunity to introduce him to the people of significance in her past. There was Ms. Schilling in the front of the class lecturing on the significance of the word solidarity in the song by the same name by the Grupo Chumaya, one of her favorites. There was Ricky about to sit down to his dinner and Alana dressing for a dinner party, applying synthetic pearl dust to her face in the bathroom. There above them was Beithune, flying through the air in a swirling high kick. She couldn't see Kevin anywhere.
"It doesn't matter," she told Arthur. "You have his face so you'll get to know him by looking in the mirror."
She couldn't see Ben anywhere either.
"The fact is, Arthur. We don't know where we're going or what will happen when we get there. The past is just a comforter. It's better than sucking your thumb, though."
"Why don't you come below and have some tea," said Beth, poking her head through the companionway.
""But what about the icebergs? Oddgeir can't do it alone, can he?"
"I'll take the watch."
Corrag accepted a steaming mug from Bob and sat at the chart desk while he watched the instrument panel and listened to the crackle of the maritime satellite channels he had hacked into on the Loran receiver. She set Arthur down on the pillow beside her and he flopped over into her lap and proceeded to fall asleep.
"How's the wee one?" asked Bob.
"Finally asleep," said Corrag.
"He's a great little guy. Congratulations. Who's the father?"
"Long story. Lost him in the Nenkaja. Actually never saw him again after Alpha battle. We were knocking out the augment system in Sandelsky when they took us both prisoners."
"The Korazan insurgents?"
The Victor's Heritage (The Jonah Trilogy Book 2) Page 25
