going to be all right.”
“We’re going to be fine, my dear.”
“Do you love me?” Her lips pressed against his neck and he could feel the heat coming off her.
“I love you.”
“I love you, too, Douglas, I do. You know I do.”
“Of course you do.”
Her display of affection and need, so raw, and out here where the neighbours could see them, made him uncomfortable. But he also felt himself harden inside his trousers. He drew her hands away from his neck and held them down at his side.
“Will you come inside?” said Margaret. “I’ll make tea. Scones. With currants, just as you like.”
“I was thinking I’d go for a walk.”
Margaret felt the tears coming again. She did not want him to go for a walk. She wanted him to stay and have tea and they would be a family and she would be a gracious wife and he would see that and not disapprove of her. But there was no way to insist without being exactly what she did not want to be. The sour taste of resentment made its way up into her mouth.
“I could come with you,” she said and was a little surprised to hear herself.
“Come with me?” Douglas said as though it was an odd idea. “Do you want to?”
“Yes,” she said, and stood up straight. She would go for a walk, like any other woman, with her arm linked through her husband’s, and they would talk of pleasant things and he would tip his hat at the neighbours. But her hair was a mess, and the neighbours would gawk and ask where she’d been and why didn’t they see her these days, and she would have nothing to say. And there was the canning. It was so important to have enough food. She was tired then, thinking of all the things she had to do, and the idea of walking out on the busy streets made her heart beat a little too quickly.
“No,” she said, her shoulders slumping. “I don’t suppose I should go. But don’t be long, will you? I’ll be making supper soon.”
“I won’t be long,” Douglas said, and tried not to sound relieved. He looked up again and saw Irene watching them. “Why not have tea with Irene?”
“We’ll wait for you,” Margaret said.
“As you like, my dear.” He kissed her cheek. She smiled up at him, just as she should. He waved at Irene and told himself it would be just a short, quick walk, and his two girls would be fine together.
He lifted the latch on the back gate, stepped out into the alley and started toward Carlton Street. The Rupert was not open for business on a Sunday, but there was always a place or two in Cabbagetown where if a man knew the right people he could get something with which to wet his whistle.
A week later, Irene had a nightmare. She was in the yard of a house where she shouldn’t be, although she’d lived there once. It was an empty white house, filled with the kind of silence that made you think someone waited behind the door to jump out at you. She had to get out before anybody caught her, and she started to run up a great snow hill. She hadn’t taken more than five or six steps when the crust broke and she plunged into a hole. She stopped, but could feel nothing below her but soft snow that could give at any moment. Her hands were trapped at her sides, and the daylight, the lip of the hole, was such a long way above her head. Someone was out there and she called softly, afraid if she filled her lungs to scream that she would push the snow aside and tumble down into the middle of the earth, or else the snow would fall in and she would suffocate. She whispered a thin, “Help me!” A face appeared at the top of the hole, silhouetted against the unforgiving blue sky. It was her father’s face, yet she was not reassured, for she couldn’t tell from the look on his face if he had any interest in rescuing her.
She woke up crying, but she did not cry out. It was the first time she had not called for her parents after a nightmare. Soon she fell asleep again, and when she woke to the morning sound of sparrows in the hedge, she had no recollection of the dream.
1930
Just outside of Estevan, David runs alongside the moving train. His feet slip and twist on the gravel. He hears a voice hollering and looks up. A face, and hands reach out for him, and with a final burst of speed, muscles nearly snapping, he grabs for them and jumps. For a moment he dangles, legs dangerously near the churning wheels, and then, with a rasp of wood along stomach, he is in the car.
"Come on, young fella, you're all right now." The man is maybe thirty, maybe fifty, his face stamped with sleeplessness and hunger. He wears a cap low over his eyes and a lumber jacket that smells of wood smoke and long wear.
The boxcar is clotted with shadows, and his eyes will not adjust. He feels blind and a little dizzy. He lies gasping on the wooden boards, hugging his pack, too winded to say thank you.
"First time?" says the man after a few minutes.
He nods, swallowing hard. The man’s voice is low and sounds kind.
“You gotta grab the ladder, boy, don’t try and jump in an open door. You’ll slip that way; lose a leg if you’re not careful. What's your name?"
He tells him and as he does his voice cracks.
Laughter comes from a pitch-dark space in the corner. He turns toward it, but can make out only a blacker shadow within the first one.
"Christ, how old are you?" This voice does not sound as kind.
"Old enough to take care of myself."
"Sure you are, son," says the man who'd hauled him through the door. He holds out his hand. "My name's Jim. That's Fred in the back there. We travel together. You just leave home?"
The hurt of it is still inside him. He had not told his father he was leaving. Could not bear seeing how his parting would add to the old man’s worries, seeing new lines corrode his vein-threaded cheeks. His father spoke so little these days, just raked his fingers through his whitened beard, looked at the sky, rubbed earth between his fingers and shook his head. But staying meant worries, too. With Toba and the new baby and no money to build another room. Jacob had now found a girl and would marry in the autumn. His father could move to the loft, but the boy would have to move to the barn. He’d told his brothers of his plans, and they promised to give his letter to their father after he was gone. He would be back, he vowed, and with some money in his pocket. He’d hire out as a hand for the season and return in fall, in time for harvest. Isaac squinted up into the cloudless, rainless blue and then spit on the ground. His brothers said there was nothing out there, shuffled their big feet in the dirt, but didn’t try to stop him. They knew a bad year was coming. They knew they might be hard pressed to feed all these mouths. And they understood the road-lust. They’d never gone farther than Estevan, and he could see his own restlessness mirrored in their eyes.
“Yeah, left a couple of days ago.” He shakes the man's hand. The grate of callus against callus.
"Where's home?"
"Not far from here."
“Farmer?”
He says he was, and the man nods as though this explains everything. They are from Winnipeg
