Way the Crow Flies (112 page)
Read Way the Crow Flies Online
Authors: Ann-Marie Macdonald
Out on the lake a loon flies low across the water, feet skimming to a landing. It releases its effortless liquid cry and is answered within moments from farther down the shore.
“Here!” says Vivien, and thrusts a guitar almost the size of herself into Rick’s arms. He takes the pick from behind the strings of an upper fret, places it between his teeth and begins to tune the instrument. He strums—“Not so good at picking any more, eh? But I can still chord some.”
“How’s your mum?” ventures Madeleine.
“She’s great,” he replies, “still crazy after all these years.”
“She runs a nuthouse,” says Colleen.
“A halfway house,” says Rick. “For bag ladies. In Toronto.”
“That’s great.”
“Yeah. Look her up if you ever lose your marbles.”
Vivien says, “Gran is a Quaker.”
“How about your baby brothers?”
“Roger and Carl.” Rick shakes his head and smiles. Colleen is chuckling.
“Carl’s a biker—” Rick starts laughing. Colleen pokes the coals, laughing now too. “And Roger’s a cop.” He begins to strum a series of chords.
Madeleine asks quietly, “What about Elizabeth?”
Neither of them answers, and Madeleine is somewhat relieved that they seem not to have heard her. But after a moment he says to his guitar, “She died, pal.”
He starts playing a tune. The little girl takes two spoons from the table and starts rattling time with them, a serious expression on her face.
Rick says, “Lizzie got flu.”
“She was too sad to get better,” explains Vivien. “She’s with her dog Rex now.”
Madeleine gets up and goes to Colleen. “I’m going to leave now. I’ll put it all in a letter for you. I’m going to get in touch with the McCarrolls too.”
Colleen finally looks at her. Madeleine is startled, the way she was when she was a child. Wolf eyes.
Colleen reaches into her pocket for her knife. Yellowed bone handle, thumb-faded. Blade curved with age. She slits open the foil and steam escapes. Two big trout.
“Ricky and Viv caught them,” she says. She reseals the foil and lifts the package onto a platter. “You’re funny, I guess you know that, eh?”
“I know it’s weird, me just showing up like this out of the blue—”
“No, I mean … you’re good at what you do.” And now Colleen is smiling. She sets the platter on the table. “Want to see the dogs?”
“Okay.”
Rick and Vivien sing softly, “‘So hoist up
the John B
. sail. See how the mainsail sets. Call for the captain ashore, let me go home…’”
The two women walk up to the kennels. Soft muzzles at the fence, a Bremen choir of barking. Colleen unlocks the gate and holds out her hand to Madeleine, palm up. There is the scar. Madeleine takes the hand and squeezes it, then lets go and follows her friend along the dog runs, hands out for licks and pats, wet teeth grazing her flesh.
Colleen says, “Tell me now.”
Madeleine does. It doesn’t take long.
The fish is still warm when they return to the table and join the others.
A
N AIR-RAID SIREN
is a beam of sound more terrifying than any other. During the Second World War it was terrifying but now it is more terrifying, because it was a normal sunny day until the siren went off. Birds were flying, the fields were buzzing and kids were riding bikes. The siren screams over wading pools and backyard barbecues, it says, I was here all along, you knew this could happen. It pauses for breath, resumes its pitiful rise, mourning its own obscenity, mounting to obliteration. It is everywhere—it makes all places into the same place, turns everyone into the same person. It says, Run to where there is no shelter. When the planes come, run, but only because you are alive and an animal.
And then it stops. The summer sky is empty. Turn on the radio, the television. Come up from the basement, get up from the ground. It was a birds’ nest. In the siren atop the wooden telephone pole that stands near the gates to the old air force station at Centralia. Crows. Who knew the old siren was operational after all these years?
Municipal workers from the nearby town of Exeter climb the pole to clear away the nest and remove the siren altogether. Bits of tinfoil, bottle caps, a key glint amid the straw—the shiny things that crows collect. And a tiny silver charm. A name.
Claire
.
OURCES AND
A
CKNOWLEDGMENTS
Grateful acknowledgment is made to the following. Every effort has been made to contact the copyright holders; in the event of an inadvertent omission or error, please notify the publisher.
Lyrics from “This Land Is Your Land,” words and music by Woody Guthrie. TRO © Copyright 1956 (Renewed) 1958 (Renewed), 1970 and 1972. Ludlow Music, Inc., New York, NY. Used by permission.
Lyrics from “Whatever Will Be Will Be” by Raymond B. Evans and Jay Livingston. Used by permission.
Lyrics from “Swinging on a Star” by Johnny Burke and Jimmy Van Heusen. Used by permission.
Lyrics from “Moon River” by Henry Mancini and Johnny Mercer. Used by permission.
Lyrics from “Button Up Your Overcoat.” From
Follow Thru
. Words and music by B. G. DeSylva, Lew Brown and Ray Henderson. Copyright © 1928 by Chappell & Co., Stephen Ballentine Music Publishing Co. and Henderson Music Co. Copyright renewed. International copyright secured. All rights reserved.
The epigraph to “Welcome to Centralia” is from
Camelot
. Words by Alan Jay Lerner. Music by Frederick Loewe. Copyright © 1960 by Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe. Copyright renewed. Chappell & Co. owner of publication and allied rights throughout the world. International copyright secured. All rights reserved.
Jack’s thought, “God watches over your first solo, after that you’re on your own,” comes from Royal Canadian Air Force lore recounted in Ted Barris,
Behind the Glory
. Toronto: Macmillan Canada, 1992.
The epigraph to “Here’s to Being Above It All” comes from “Organization Theory: An Overview and an Appraisal,”
Journal of the Academy of Management
, Vol. 4, No. 4 (April 1961). Briarcliff Manor, NY: Academy of Management.
The epigraph to “The Mayflower” comes from “How America Feels” (Gallup survey),
Look
, January 5, 1960.
Lyrics from “Unforgettable” by Irving Gordon. Used by permission.
The epigraph to “How Sweet It Is” comes from Heloise,
Heloise’s Kitchen Hints
. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall Inc., 1963.
The poem that begins “Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth” is “High Flight” written in 1941 by John Gillespie Magee Jr., an American who served with the Royal Canadian Air Force during the Second World War.
The Dion song quoted is “The Wanderer,” composed by Ernest Peter Maresca.
The
Time
magazine quotes that Jack reads are from August 31, 1962, Canada edition, Vol. LXXX, No. 9.
Excerpts from Madeleine’s
Girl Next Door
reader come from W. W. Bauer, Gladys G. Jenkins, Elizabeth Montgomery and Dorothy W. Baruch (eds.),
The Girl Next Door
. Toronto: Gage, 1952.
Wernher von Braun’s mother’s comment, “Why don’t you take a look at Peenemünde? Your grandfather used to go duck hunting up there,” is quoted in Michael J. Neufeld,
The Rocket and the Reich: Peenemünde and the Coming of the Ballistic Missile Era
. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1995.
The epigraphs to “Oktoberfest” and “Duck and Cover” come from Doris Anderson’s editorials in the July 1962 and February 1962 issues of
Chatelaine
, respectively.
The rhyme that begins “There was a turtle and his name was Bert” is from “Duck and Cover,” an educational film produced in 1951 by Archer Productions, Inc. and sponsored by the U.S. Federal Civil Defense Administration.
President John F. Kennedy’s comments regarding the Cuban Missile Crisis are taken from his television address of October 22, 1962.
The epigraphs to “I Cannot Tell a Lie” and “Flexible Response” come from transcripts quoted in Ernest R. May and Philip D. Zelikow,
The Kennedy Tapes: Inside the White House During the Cuban Missile Crisis
. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1997.
Lyrics from “Where Have All the Flowers Gone?” by Pete Seeger © Copyright 1961 (renewed) by Sanga Music, Inc. All rights reserved. Used by permission.
Norman DePoe’s comment regarding the easing of tensions surrounding the Cuban Missile Crisis was made on CBC’s
Newsmagazine
on October 28, 1962.
The epigraphs to “Indian Summer” and “Requiem” come from Mary Eleanor Thomas,
Developing Comprehension in Reading
. Toronto: J. M. Dent, 1956.
Lyrics from “Bei Mir Bist du Schon.” Original words by Jacob Jacobs. Music by Sholom Secunda. English version by Sammy Cahn & Saul Chaplin. Copyright © 1937; Renewed 1965 Cahn Music Company (ASCAP) and Warner/Chappell (ASCAP). Rights for Cahn Music Company administered by Cherry Lane Music Publishing, Inc. and DreamWorks Songs. International copyright secured. All rights reserved.
Lyrics from “Sloop John B.” by Brian Wilson © 1966, renewed New Executive Music. Used by permission.
The epigraph to “Sleeping Dogs” is reprinted with permission of Simon & Schuster Adult Publishing Group from
The Drowned and the Saved
by Primo Levi. Translated by Rayond Rosenthal. English translation Copyright © 1988 by Simon & Schuster, Inc.
The epigraph to “Flying Up” comes from
The Brownie Handbook
. Toronto: Girl Guides of Canada, 1958.
Excerpts from Walt Disney’s copyrighted feature film
BAMBI
used by permission from Disney Enterprises, Inc.
Excerpts from Walt Disney’s copyrighted
BAMBI
Story Record are used by permission from Disney Enterprises, Inc.
Froelich’s lines “When I saw Dora, it was no longer a mystery how the pyramids were built,” “I have a trick. I imagine that I have lived before these experiences,” and “I heard once two secretaries from the office, one to say to her friend, ‘Hurry up, you miss the legs’” are paraphrased from Jean Michel’s descriptions of his own reaction to Dora in Jean Michel,
Dora: The Nazi Concentration Camp Where Modern Space Technology Was Born and 30,000 Prisoners Died
. Austin, TX: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1975.
Simon’s line “I heard one say he’d trade the whole pack of these former Nazis to the Soviets for a dish of caviar” comes from a remark attributed to an American officer quoted in Linda Hunt,
Secret Agenda: The United States Government, Nazi Scientists and Project Paperclip, 1945 to 1990
. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1991.
The epigraph to Part Four, “What Remains,” comes from Primo Levi, “Lead.” In
The Periodic Table
. New York: Schocken Books, 1984.
The epigraph to “And That’s the Way It Is” comes from T. S. Eliot, “The Waste Land.” In
The Waste Land and Other Poems
. London: Faber and Faber, 2002.
Lyrics from “What a Wonderful World” by George David Weiss and Robert Thiele © 1968, renewed. Published by Abilene Music, Range Road Music and Quartet Music. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
The Marianne Faithfull song quoted is “Broken English,” composed by Marian Evelyn Faithfull, Joe Mavety, Barry Reynolds, Terence Philip Stannard and Stephen David York.
René Steenbeke’s comment on the part Dora played in launching modern space travel is quoted in “Survivors of Mittelbau-Dora Commemorate Liberation” by Richard Murphy, found in the Jewish Virtual Library at
www.us-israel.org
.
“You deserve a break today, so get up and get away” used with permission from McDonald’s Corporation.
The poetry that Madeleine, Mike and Jocelyn listen to in Le Hibou is from Margaret Atwood, “Procedures from Underground.” In
Procedures from Underground
(Copyright © Margaret Atwood, 1970). Used by permission of the author.
The epigraph to “Hers” comes from Leonard Cohen, “You Have the Lovers.” In
Stranger Music
. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1994. © Leonard Cohen 1994. Used by permission.
The epigraph to “The Air Force Cross” comes from Stevie Smith, “Not Waving But Drowning.” In
Not Waving But Drowning
. London: Andre Deutsch, 1957.
The epigraph to
“Prête-Moi Ta Plume, Pour Écrire un Mot”
comes from Gwendolyn MacEwen, “Dark Pines Under Water.” In
The Shadow-Maker
. Toronto: Macmillan, 1972. Permission for use granted by the author’s family.
UTHOR’S
N
OTE
The ordeal of Stephen Truscott, his spirit and courage, have been a major inspiration in the writing of this book.
Occasionally throughout the book, there are phrases of colloquial Acadian French, as well as phrases in the Michif language. In neither case are there hard and fast rules of spelling since both reflect an oral tradition. In both cases, the author has consulted native speakers of the relevant generation, and the translations and spellings reflect those speakers’ experience.
Thank you for your generous help: Theresa Burke, Louise Dennys, Honora Johannesen, Malcolm J. MacDonald (Royal Canadian Air Force retd.), Alisa Palmer, Clay Ruby and the Ruby-Sachs family, Lillian Szpak and Maureen White.
Thank you also to the following individuals and organizations for invaluable research information and, in numerous cases, the pleasure of many conversations: Irving Abella, Augustine Abraham, Ginette Abraham, Alice Aresenault and the Bouctouche Museum, Margaret Atwood, Bnai Brith, Professor Stephen Brooke, Professor Chalk, the staff, past and present, of
Chatelaine
magazine, Dr. Trudy Chernin, Charles Clarke, Michael Claydon, Professor Ramsay Cook, Deb Cowan, Olenka Demianchuk, Department of National Defence Directorate of History and Heritage—especially Richard Gimblett, William Rawling, Isabel Campbell and Donna Porter—Mike Englishman, Hugh Halliday, Peter Haydon (Royal Canadian Navy retd.) Geoffrey Hopkinson and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation archives, Malcolm Johannesen, Sigurd Johannesen (Canadian Forces retd.), Linda Kash, Dan Kaye (RCAF retd.), Douglas Lantry and the USAF Museum, Anne-Marie Lau and The RCAF Museum Canadian Forces Base Trenton, Linda Laughlin, Lindsay Leese, John Hugh MacDonald (Pipe Major, CF), Mary T. MacDonald (RN retd.), Tricia McConnell, Henry Melnick, Montana, National Archives of Canada, Almark Books, Michael J. Neufeld and the National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution, Ontario Archives, Ontario Institute of Studies in Educations, University of Toronto Archives, Doreen Keizer (Girl
Guides of Canada), Danielle Palmer, Jacob Palmer, Gloria Peckam and Dog Guides Canada, Eric Price, the producers of
It Seems Like Yesterday
, Jeanette Richard, Rick Rickards, Bill Randall (RCAF retd.) and the Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum, Alti Rodal, David Rudd and the Canadian Institute for Strategic Studies, Harriet Sachs, Andrea Schwenke, the Simon Wiesenthal Centre, John Starnes, Gina Stephens, Dave Sylvester, Patrick Szpak, Betty Twena, Tulin Valeri, Cylla von Tiedeman, Lorraine Wells, Joseph White (RCAF retd.) and Zsa Zsa.
Thank you as well to the staff of Knopf Canada and Random House of Canada, especially Nina Ber-Donkor, Deirdre Molina, Scott Richardson and Jen Shepherd. Special thanks also to Susan Broadhurst and an extra special thanks to Gena Gorrell.
I am personally indebted to the spirit and work of Tiff Findley.