David (28 page)

Ferguson had found his rowing rhythm by now, the boat was disappearing down the Thames into the dark.

“If you're not cheating, lad,” I heard Burwell say, “you're not really trying.”

I put the bottles in the back of the wagon and started home. Thankfully, I was too tired to stay angry. I had more important things to expend my time on. I had blood to scrub out of my floor.

*

Busy getting Sophia's ready for business, I hardly had time to eat or sleep, never mind notice a stray dog. When I did finally spot him, though, it was just a furry flash. As soon as he saw me see him, he rabbited out of sight through the line of trees at the back of the lot. I emptied my bucket of dirty water and chlorine and stood up straight, stretched. There weren't any nearby neighbours, the closest thing being the brick rear wall of the bank several hundred feet from the front door of the house, so whomever he belonged to, or had belonged to, they weren't likely anyone who lived close by.

Then the dog and I began our cat-and-mouse game. Every time I would re-emerge outside with a fresh dirty bucket, there he'd be, waiting for me at the back edge of the property, lingering amidst the trees, but only long enough to see me see him before darting off until the next time, when we'd start all over again. I wanted to get a better look at him, but knew that if I made a move in his direction or even attempted to lure him closer, not only would he probably run away, he might run away for good.

All that was left to do before I could transfer downstairs the tables, chairs, and bottles of booze I'd stockpiled was to
rid the basement floor of the bloodstains I'd discovered hiding underneath the layers of mould I'd worked so hard to remove. Compared to the blood, eliminating the mould had been easy, like trying to erase the green of a leaf after first wiping away the morning dew. I told myself I'd give the floor one final scrub and that was it; if it wasn't blood-free by then, I'd admit defeat and start looking for a rug. And this time, whatever the washing result, when I emptied out the bucket, I wouldn't look at the dog. Not directly, anyway.

It was the middle of the afternoon, but, lacking windows, I'd hung up oil lamps in every corner of the basement to go along with the one I kept beside me wherever I was working. The stain looked to be the end result of several different stains, like a number of slim rivers of blood had congregated to create a large lake of blood. The floor tilted slightly toward the middle of the room, so it made sense as far as that went, but where the blood had come from stumped me. I soaked the brush in the bucket and scrubbed the floor so hard I only stopped when it felt as if my wrist was going to snap. Duller, slightly diluted maybe, but still there. “Fuck it,” I said, standing up, bucket in hand. I was running an illegal tavern, after all, not a luxury hotel.

From the moment I stepped outside, I made a point of not looking anywhere but at the ground or the bucket, kept at my task without even once so much as glancing at the dog. When the bucket was emptied and it and the brush were set out in the sun to dry, I occupied myself with whatever chore was at hand—pulling weeds, picking up rocks, gathering up debris. Even when I ended up as far as the middle of the lot, dragging a charred log back toward the house, as long as I didn't look directly at the dog, he stayed where he was. From the corner of my eye I could see he'd even sat down now, like he was amused to watch me go about my business. I could also see, aside from the patches of fur missing from his black
coat, that a good chunk of his right ear was gone, looked as if it had been bitten right in half, and that one of his eyes was permanently shut tight. Given the condition of the rest of him, I didn't doubt that the socket underneath the closed lid was empty.

I stopped myself from doing what I wanted to do—turn to him, talk to him, tell him not to be afraid, that I wasn't a threat, that I wanted to help—and walked as nonchalantly as possible back inside the house, but not down to the basement this time. Except for my books and the furnishings and supplies I'd been steadily assembling for Sophia's and the few things I needed to cowboy it out on the parlour floor—a mattress, a suitcase of clothes, a bar of soap—the house itself was still as empty as the day I took possession. The kitchen was even barer: a bottle of whiskey, a water pitcher and a glass, a loaf of bread, and a couple of tomatoes. I didn't have anything else to give him, so I tore off a chunk of bread. In spite of his wounds, it was obvious he was still alert and energetic, so he must have been drinking from the Thames, didn't need any water.

I shut the screen door behind me, careful not to let it slam, and walked in a straight line to the middle of the yard with my eyes focused on my feet. I got down on my knees and held out the bread in the palm of my right hand, stared at the earth directly beneath my chin. I could feel the dog creeping toward me a foot or two at a time, always stopping to reassess the situation, to be careful, to be sure. About twelve feet from where I was kneeling he stopped for good, sat down like he had when he was watching me working in the yard. I knew he wasn't coming any closer, at least not for now, so I placed the piece of bread on the ground and walked back to the house.

From the kitchen window, I watched him wait to make sure I'd gone inside before grabbing the bread in his mouth and running off through the trees at the back of the lot. I
wasn't disappointed he hadn't let me feed him; if it had been me, I would have done the same thing. A stray has to be vigilant. A stray has to be self-reliant. If he decided to come back tomorrow, I'd make sure to have some meat for him. And a name, too. I decided I'd call him Waldo.

*

I knew Thompson was doomed the day he was moved to testify about Walt Whitman. I remember the precise date—July 11, 1887—because it was the first time he came into Sophia's, only the second night I was open for business.

It wasn't difficult to acquire an instant clientele. It might have been hard to find anyone—especially anyone who considered himself a respected member of Chatham's business community—who didn't publicly support the Scott Act, but if you paid attention to the eyes of the strangers you passed on the sidewalk or the faces you encountered while looking for roofing nails or a new sledgehammer at the hardware store, it was obvious that something was wrong, some stubborn collective itch wasn't being scratched, some essential numinous nutrient was lacking in the local diet. The
Planet
cheerfully reported that church attendance had increased by more than fifteen percent since the implementation of prohibition, but it wasn't God that packed the pews and heavied the collection plate, it was the need to get drunk. Which is just a different way of pronouncing
God
anyway.

The whiskey was barely drinkable and the basement smelt and was still damp and what we were all doing down there wasn't legal, but within forty-eight hours of opening for business I'd already recouped my start-up costs. I was still finding my pouring/charging/refilling rhythm when I had my first security scare. Standing directly behind two bearded men pressing up against the bar with their outstretched empty
glasses was another man I recognized but couldn't quite place—rarely a promising combination. I served the two bearded men their drinks and took their coins and prepared myself to do whatever had to be done. One way or another, I wasn't going back to the graveyard by choice.

“Well, well, hello again,” the man said.

As soon as the first Scot-splattered words flew from the man's mouth, I remembered who he was: Thompson, the lawyer who'd sold me the house whose basement we were both standing in. Which still didn't explain why he was here. Most of my customers were workingmen, drinking and smoking and doing what workingmen do and will always do, trying their best to forget the workday done and the too-soon one to come.

Thompson removed a five-dollar bill from his leather billfold and placed it on the bar. “Whiskey, please, Mr. King,” he said.

I looked at the bill then back at him. “Whiskey is twenty-five cents a shot,” I said.

“And given the present circumstances, quite reasonably priced at that,” Thompson answered, pushing the five dollars my way. “I was wondering, however, if I might pay in advance for tonight's libations. I'm afraid that occasionally, when I'm enjoying myself as I expect to do this evening, I have a tendency to forget to settle my tab. Not for reasons nefarious, of course, but simply out of innocent absent-mindedness.”

“You want to pay in advance for twenty shots of whiskey?” I said, still not picking up the bill. Anyone who planned to drink that much alcohol in one sitting likely wasn't anyone I had to worry about. Not to notify the police, anyway.

“Oh, no, of course not,” Thompson said. “That includes a dollar tip for what, I'm sure, will be your more than able service as well.”

I poured him his drink and took the money.

By the end of the night, three things had become clear. First, if I continued to provide alcohol and a safe place to consume it, it wasn't unrealistic to imagine myself a very wealthy man someday. Second, that providing alcohol and a safe place to consume it weren't my only job requirements; at the conclusion of every night's labour I could expect to be as filthy and exhausted as I had ever been as a grave robber, with the added insult of smelling as if every cigarette and cigar smoked that night had used me as its ashtray. And third, working among the drunken living as opposed to the recently deceased wasn't necessarily an improvement in working conditions. Over the course of that night's twelve hours alone, I'd had to stop two arguments before they turned into fights, confiscate two blackjacks and one fishing knife, mop up a belch of vomit and a sleeping drunk's pool of urine, and listen to enough lies, self-pity, and out-and-out twaddle to keep any confession-hearing priest busy until the arrival of the twentieth century.

Thompson won the job of being my sole work-shift voluntary acquaintance by default: didn't get cantankerous, no matter how much he drank; didn't carry any weapons; didn't lose control of his bodily functions; and didn't talk about himself unless directly asked, and even then remained elusive to the point of outright evasion. He liked to talk, but only about things that excited him. His own life, apparently, wasn't one of those things. Walt Whitman was.

Wiping down a nearby empty table and noticing him desultorily pecking away at a small notepad, I'd asked, jokingly, if he was writing a poem. What I really wanted to know was if he had any idea where the bloodstains I'd discovered on the basement floor of his former client's house came from, but I thought it best for now to separate work from pleasure, at least until I got a better fix on him. Thompson
shut his notepad and deposited it in the inside pocket of his suit jacket and leaned forward with both elbows on the table and didn't stop talking until he'd said what he had to say.

“There is only one poet alive today, and that man's name is Walt Whitman. Walt Whitman the joyful liberator. Walt Whitman the unrepentant fornicator. Walt Whitman the secular man's saviour. Walt Whitman the proud apostle of democracy, science, and steam. And yet, and yet—” Thompson gulped what was left in his glass, like he was afraid of something getting stuck in his throat. “And yet Walt Whitman remains a neglected martyr, continues to live in despair and loneliness and want, and whose immortal poems in their public reception have fallen stillborn in this country as well as in that of his native United States, immortal poems that have been met with denial and disgust and scorn and even charges of outright obscenity, and, in a very real pecuniary and worldly sense, have most certainly destroyed the life of their author.”

I'd finished cleaning the table just in time for three men just off their jobs on the railroad to sit down. Before I could get them their whiskey, Thompson continued. A little of the pleasant affability of before returned to his voice.

“Don't misunderstand me, though. All of these admittedly unfortunate circumstances are no more than he himself expected. He had his choice when he commenced upon his task. But Walt Whitman bid neither for soft eulogies, big money returns, nor the approbation of existing schools and conventions. He has had his say and has put it unerringly on record that Walt Whitman's value thereof will be vindicated by Time and Time alone.” Thompson noticed the empty glass in his hand. “I'm afraid I'm going to have to trouble you to replenish my drink, Mr. King.”

All three men from the railroad were now staring at Thompson. It was difficult to determine what they wanted more: their whiskey or Thompson's neck.

I turned to the biggest, dirtiest one. “A bottle and three glasses, coming right up,” I said. And to Thompson, “Why don't you sit closer to the bar, nearer to me?”

Thompson smiled. “So we can talk some more,” he said.

“Exactly,” I replied.

*

It's time for Loretta to leave for Montreal again. Twice a year, every spring and fall, six nights and seven days of preening, pampering, and all-around polishing. She always stays at the same luxury hotel, the Rasco, supplements every breakfast, lunch, and dinner with plenty of beluga caviar and very cold Mumm champagne, and for several years has employed the same elderly female German masseuse, who arrives at her hotel room every morning at ten to give her her hour-long wake-up working-over. None of it is an indulgence, however, she never fails to point out, particularly when attempting to convince me to join her. Inevitably, it always comes back to my clock.

“No matter how well made a clock is, it still needs to be rewound, does it not?”

We're both looking at the long-case clock standing in the corner of the library, watching it patiently counting the seconds and minutes, mindful of minding its own ticking business.

“Just like people,” I say, knowing my part.

“Yes, just like people. And remove that foolish grin from your face. This mocking of yours of things you do not understand, this is as good a reason you need to go away from time to time as any other.”