Who by Fire (34 page)

“Wow, Mom. That seems unbelievable.”

“It is hard to believe but it has happened.”

“He doesn’t even curse?”

“Not around me. And he’s trying to quit smoking. He won’t succeed, which is sad, but he doesn’t smoke in the house.”

“Is that going to be enough for you?” She didn’t mean smoking or cursing; she meant the marriage, which of course was a much tougher question to answer.

Not long after, Jeannie phoned to say she had handed in her notice to the school. Right after that, she had told Hal she was leaving him. Ella asked if Jeannie wanted her to tell Tom.

“Will he flip his lid?”

“My guess is not.”

“You might as well tell him, then.”

Ella gave Tom the news over breakfast. She told him about the teaching job first. She let that soak in. Then added, “She’s given Hal notice too.”

Tom cocked his head. “Does she know what she’ll do?”

“She’s saved quite a bit of money. Donna is helping her make travel plans.”

“Where?”

“She thinks Australia. She wants to teach there, maybe at an Aboriginal school.”

“I always thought I’d like to go to Australia,” he said.

As Tom was finishing his coffee, and beginning to show his nervous need to get outside and smoke, he said, “I know she’ll think I’m on Hal’s side. I’m not. I want her to be happy. Would you tell her that?”

The days and weeks of that summer passed quickly. There were no frosts, so the succession of wildflowers was uninterrupted. Every time Ella looked up, it seemed, more of the farm work was done than seemed possible. By the end of July, every hayfield was cut and baled. By the middle of August, all the bales were in the pile.

At the beginning of that month, Tom had asked Ella if she would mind if he sold the cattle and rented out half the land. Of course her answer was yes. It was something she had wanted for years. He also asked whether, with the cattle gone, they should stay on the farm or go. Lance claimed he was going to fix the plant, modernize it, reduce its pollution, he said, but, if Ella wanted to move, Tom was willing.

The surprising man had been working it all out in money terms: what the cattle and the land would bring, what they had in savings, what a small house in town would cost. In the better grain years, they had saved money for the children’s education. Jeannie’s program hadn’t been long. Donna had gone straight to work. Billy was receiving scholarships. All in all, if they were frugal, which was the only way they had ever lived, they could retire.

Ella surprised herself by saying she was content to stay on the farm, for now at least. Maybe they could think of moving to town when they needed to.

Tom brightened. She thought he was just glad not to have to uproot himself, but there was something else.

“If we stay, I think I’ll keep a few cows, maybe twenty.”

“What for?”

“A show herd. People ask me what I did all these years, I’ll point at them and say, I did that.”

Twenty head would hold them down almost as securely as a hundred and twenty. They would still have to be fed and looked after. But before the thought could get out of her mouth, she understood how lost he would be without any work to do, and said nothing.

Tom asked Billy to help him choose the cows he was going to keep. The boy reacted as if it was an unreasonable favour, something outside their contract.

“I don’t have time.”

To agree to evenings of stacking hay and yet balk at leaning over a fence to say “That cow’s better than this one” made no sense, but Tom let it be.

After he’d thought about it more, he decided Billy’s reluctance to help choose the show herd was similar to his own reluctance to listen to his son talk about the plant. For years, Tom’s greatest wish had been to have someone, anyone, tell him how a sour gas plant worked. Now he had a son champing at the bit to tell him, and he could barely make himself listen. He really did not give a damn anymore what they cooked and served up there. His thoughts were on cows: whether to keep the Simmental crosses or to concentrate on the old breeds; how much hay land he should keep out of the rental contract for summer grazing and winter feed.

Then one Saturday, Ella came back from a supply trip to town with the Lethbridge paper. A big headline on page one said Dry Fork had won a settlement. Tom understood what it meant before he read the article. It was a settlement out of court, something the companies would never have dreamt they’d have to pay. As Purcell had said, society was moving against corporations on air pollution. Alberta’s new government had brought in tougher air pollution rules. So the company wanted to put an end to things. The families, Arsenaults, Darbys, took the money. It was more than they believed they’d ever see.

As he read the article, he could feel Ella watching him closely. He recognized her fear that the news would bring him to a boil. And it did crank some old starter in his chest, to see his friends at Dry Fork victorious when he had never won a thing. It also touched the old fury to know that the settlement meant nothing was proven against the plant. The sour gas companies had not admitted a thing. Not one gassed farmer, not one dead pig, was laid at their door.

Geoff Purcell was quoted. “If in future anyone takes on an oil company for a complaint such as this, it will be less difficult than it has been for us. It’s like climbing stairs. The next person starts on the highest step the last person reached.” Tom did not even know if it was true but could imagine Geoff needing to say and believe it.

He closed the paper and pushed it away. “Good for them.” He did not know what else to say.

As the summer drew to its end, Billy’s desire to talk about the plant waned. When he and Tom were together, they settled into a routine of talking about the farm, about cows mostly. Whatever had made Billy not want any part in choosing the show herd was gone. In the cool of evening, they often walked among the cattle, reminiscing.

“Remember that old girl? The spring her calf was born dead? I wanted to get rid of her, but you talked me into giving her a second chance.”

“I remember.”

The day the cattle liner came to haul the Ryder cows to the auction mart, Billy took the morning off. Ella came out to watch, but was crying so hard after the first dozen cows boarded that she returned to the house and stayed there. Tom could not have explained why he was in a good mood, but he was. He felt young that day, had a real hop in his step. While Billy and the trucker hazed the cattle into the chute, Tom hung over the side and watched them go, recognizing each and every one. When a cow stopped, usually to shy at the blackness inside the truck, Tom would give her a nudge. If that didn’t work, he’d twist her tail and launch her through.

When the inner doors were closed and they were down to the last fifteen, they were dealing with the hard cases: stubborn, wily old girls. One of these went halfway up and stopped. The trucker yelled and gave her a boot in the muscle of her hip. She lay down, filling the chute.

Tom watched the cursing trucker head for his cab and knew he was after his stock prod. On the way back, he zapped it against a post to make sure it was working. By then, Tom had hopped over the wall and stood at the base of the chute, between the trucker and the cow.

“Nope,” he said. “No one’s ever used one of those on these girls, and no one ever will—not on this farm anyway.”

The trucker cursed more and threw his prod back in the cab. He came back and stood with his thumbs in his belt loops. “I got another load to pick up today,” he said.

“Tell you what,” said Tom, reaching for his shirt pocket. “Let’s
have a smoke. My guess is, by the time we light up, that old girl will be sick of lying there.”

Tom was licking his cigarette closed when the cow rose and walked aboard.

Tom followed the truck to Haultain Station. He wanted to see as much of the cows as possible before they were gone. In the corrals at the auction mart, he was standing by the fence looking into their pen when the part-owner of the mart came over and shook his hand.

“End of an era,” Herb said with a sadness he did not feel.

“My era,” said Tom.

“They’re lovely animals. Since you listed them, I’ve been telling everyone I could. A lot of guys said they’d be in for the sale. See if they could pick up some Tom Ryder cows.”

“They’re Ella Ryder cows too. Every one carries blood from her parents’ herd.”

“Your son’s not interested?”

“He’s going to be an engineer.”

“Too bad these young fellas aren’t much for ranching these days.”

“Not too bad for them.”

“That may be a good way to think about it.”

At home, Ella was angry.

“Billy’s gone to Waterton with Lance Evert to have a meal at the Prince of Wales. On his last night home! I have a nice roast in the oven.”

“That’s too bad.”

“I’m not blaming Billy. He felt bad about it. But what’s Lance Evert thinking? Has he not had enough of Billy’s time?”

They ate the roast themselves. Tom complimented Ella on it. She laughed at him. It was the same kind of roast, cooked the same
way, as they’d had every second Sunday forever. It was only then he realized it was Friday.

“The Pope might mind,” said Ella, “but I doubt God cares.”

Tom was down in the corral with a flashlight, checking on his remaining cows, when a car came over the hill and entered the yard. The night was clouded and black. A solitary frog called from the slough across the fence. The car sat running. Tom imagined Billy and Lance Evert in the front seat, saying their farewells.

After the car drove off, the gate hinge creaked. Billy came walking.

“Enjoy your meal?”

“All right. Rather have eaten at home.”

“Last time I spoke to Evert, he was pretty high on you. ‘That Billy’s smart as a whip.’ ”

“I heard that about six times tonight. Lance got kind of plastered. He hardly drinks usually.”

“Sounds like he had something to tell you.”

Billy hesitated, then said, “Yeah. He’s quitting here. He thought he could get this plant modernized, but his bosses won’t spend the money. He’s got another job to go to. Better plant. He offered me a job there, for next summer.”

“Where is it?”

“A few hours north.”

Tom had the flashlight on an old sprockle-face. Her jaw revolved as she chewed her cud. “Remember this one?”

“Oh yeah. I was surprised you kept her.”

“She’s the only one in the bunch that shows the Shorthorn. Cochrane Ranch paid a thousand guineas for a Bates Shorthorn from England. Record price for a cow at that time.”

“Tomorrow’s the big day,” said Billy.

“You’ll be heading back.”

“I meant the cow sale.”

Tom moved the flashlight to another cow, a younger Simmental-Hereford. She spooked to her feet.

“Ah, hell. I should leave these girls rest.”

He snapped off the flashlight. It was coal dark until their eyes changed. A cat came and twined around his legs.

“I’m fine with it, you know,” he said. “I imagine Ella thinks I should retire completely. Can’t imagine hitting a little ball around a field, though.”

“There’s probably other things to do,” said Billy.

“Guess so. Guess I’ll find out what they are.”

The next two summers, Billy worked for Lance Evert at Sulphur Falls. The plant was new and enormous, set a long way back in the bush south of Jasper. During his second summer there, Lance asked Billy if he would join their company full-time, after he finished his degree. Because of all the experience he would have by then, he could start as junior plant engineer. Of course Billy said yes. It would put him years ahead of the usual trajectory for an engineer in his field. A dream job.

Once, Billy had stood outside Lance’s office door and listened to him brag up his protégé on the phone: “Billy Ryder will be no average BEng when he graduates. He’s already a member of our professional organization and has delivered his first paper at a technical meeting.”

The paper compared analyzer performance in complex CO
₂
and
H
₂
S
gas streams, and even though Lance had coached him through it, it was ground-breaking stuff. Billy had received whiz-kid accolades, and it all seemed easy.

In his last year of university, Billy became engaged to Ginny Maier, Lance and Judy’s favourite niece. They planned to get married
after he graduated. Beyond the wedding and honeymoon, their destination would be High Brazeau, the town closest to Sulphur Falls. They would live in a wood-frame house Billy had bought for a song and renovated during his evenings.

Brazeau was a rough little town left over from a coal frontier, and Billy knew it was not a place Ginny would like. He hoped that wouldn’t matter. They wouldn’t be downing pitchers at the local tavern or watching the street fights on Friday night. More likely they’d spend their evenings with Lance and Judy, who lived there too. Billy liked being in the bush where there were no farmers and ranchers, just a few squatters living out antique lives in the woods. He would never have to deal with smell complaints and sickness.

Ginny was an industrial lab tech, and there was no immediate job for her at Sulphur Falls. A capable Chinese guy ran the lab, and it would be hard to convince him he needed more help. Lance had to be careful too how he brought his niece onto the payroll, now that Billy was almost family. Nothing was perfect, the two men reasoned, but it would sort itself out in time.

The work was what Billy liked. The field at Sulphur Falls was enormous, and the hydrogen sulphide content was double what it had been at Aladdin Hatfield. They were making mountains of sulphur, mostly for Japan, and they were doing it right. Outside their specialized world, few wanted to hear the details; few could even understand them. Even Ginny, whose background was in oil and gas, glazed over. But it was interesting to Billy. He knew exactly what he was doing and why.

As for Tom and Ella, Billy did not see them much. They were still on the farm. Aladdin Hatfield was still choking down gas across the road, but it wasn’t the same situation. There had always been two fields at Hatfield, one more sour and higher pressure than the other.
After Lance left, the company sold the more sour field to another plant better equipped to deal with it.