Life in the Court of Matane (21 page)

“I don't understand why Glooskap would have given you the right. He didn't ask for anything in return?”

“Oh, very little...”

“All the same. Nothing's free in this world. That's what Anne Boleyn always says.”

“She's not wrong there.”

“You're looking very thoughtful. What do you owe Glooskap in return?”

“The wind.”

“The wind? You make the wind for him?”

“Yes, it's as simple as that. All the wind in North America is produced by the beating of our wings. Look! Just look at that wingspan! That's what I call a set of wings, my friend! Of course, we have to be careful. A long time ago, one great horned owl went a little overboard and got himself into a bit of bother. Since then, they've asked us to tone it down a little.”

“I think I know the story. The Micmac broke one of his wings, right?”

“Indeed. Aren't you a bright young thing?”

“So you can make wind to order?”

“In theory, yes.”

“And if one day, I don't know, someone should ask you to make a little more wind, enough to fly away on, enough to be carried far, far away, would you be able to?”

“Of course. Child's play. But who would ever want to leave here? What a strange idea!”

“I don't know, someone who wanted to go somewhere else. Someone who had had enough of it around here. Someone who is very unhappy here.”

“That makes no sense at all! But I like the idea of flying someone away. Do you mean you? Would you like to leave now?”

“No, no! Not exactly. I'm not quite ready yet. We should agree on a signal for when the time comes.”

“Why not? You live just there at the bottom of the field.”

“Yes, but with the king, you never know when we might move.”

“Move? Migrate you mean, like birds? That's a sign of weakness, you know. Leaving because the environment no longer suits you is a sign of weakness.”

“It might be, but I don't have any choice there either.”

“We always have a choice, I tell you. Now, let's
choose
the signal you will send me the day you would like to leave.”

“A rocket?”

“No, it'll be gone in a flash. I have excellent eyesight, but I might miss it. And how would I know it came from you? Lots of people set off rockets for all kinds of reasons. The risk of misunderstanding is simply too great. I have a better idea. Why not poetry?”

“You want me to send you a poem as a signal?”

“Yes, a poem. Owls love poetry. When the time comes, recite a poem. There we go. Do it outside and make sure a chickadee can hear you. They can never keep anything to themselves. It will be so surprised, it will sing it all over the forest,
Chicka-deee-deee-deee-deee
. The white-throated sparrow will take up the song in its language,
Frederiiick, Frederiiick, Frederiiick
, then the wood thrush will strike up in its reedy, crystal clear tones. That's the part I'll hear. That will give you time to pack your bags and get ready to leave.”

“That seems reasonable to me. And which poem should I recite?”

“Let's see now... Which ones do you know?”

“Mostly songs by Jacques Brel, which you don't seem to know. Maybe Nelligan's ‘Vaisseau d'or'?”

“Too sad.”

“‘Le bateau ivre'? But I can't remember all of it by heart.”

“Too long. There's no way the chickadee is going to translate all that!”

“Baudelaire's ‘Albatross'?”

“Hmm, a bird. That's interesting. No, you shall recite ‘Owls' by the very same Baudelaire. The message will be clear. It's my favourite poem. Truth be told, it's the only one I know by heart. I learned it because it's about me.”

“I don't know that one. It's funny you don't know Brel, but you know ‘Owls' by heart.”

“For something to be of interest to me, it has to speak about me directly.”

“That reminds me of a lot of people... But that means I'll have to learn the poem by heart!”

“Great! That way you'll have plenty of time to think before you leap. After all, leaving one's homeland is a serious undertaking. I'd never survive.”

“You're a great horned owl. It's different.”

“I must confess you have a point.”

“But tell me, great horned owl, I'm willing to learn ‘Owls' by heart, but how will the thrush know that the poem came from me and not someone else?”

“Have you lived here long?”

“Going on five years. Why?”

“How many times have you heard someone recite Baudelaire's ‘Owls' over the past five years?”

“Fair enough.”

“Believe me, if someone starts reciting Baudelaire around here, everyone will soon know about it. It can only be you. My dear friend, our plan is flawless. Rest assured that I will obey the moment I hear the signal, and you shall have your wind. No one can ever say I don't support the youth of today! Now, go find your king and make sure word of this conversation never crosses your lips.”

“Thank you, great horned owl. May Glooskap protect you. Can you tell me how to get home?”

“It's very simple. I shall fly to the river and hoot to you from there. All you have to do is follow my hoot. From there, you will see the lights of your home.”

“But you'll be right beside the river people. It's late; you might wake them.”

“Do you really think they are asleep?”

“Yes, tomorrow is Monday. They have to get up early.”

“How sweet! Right then, off I go. I shall guide you through the shadows. Farewell, young man! You will find ‘Owls' in
Les fleurs du mal
. Good luck!”

The great horned owl kept his first promise. I found the king and my sister at the edge of the wood, walking hand in hand, forming a blurred silhouette against the tall grass.

Shortly after my encounter with the great horned owl, the court proclaimed Edict 4567, putting an end to the pastoral period of my childhood. Under the new edict, the entire court was to leave the territory by way of Route 4 to return to Matane. The king defended his decision by noting how close we would be to schools, businesses, and sources of entertainment. Boxes were packed, a change of address form was filled out for the Canada Post Corporation, and there was a new postal code to learn. The entire court moved into a red brick home by the side of a busy road in the small town. The king was right about entertainment being close at hand. The local paper was quick to give us all the proof we needed. One Wednesday, on page 8 of
La Voix gaspésienne
, the whole town was able to admire a photo of the uniformed king alongside a bubbly young lady none of us knew, visibly charmed by the king. Piqued, the queen brusquely retired to her quarters. The king began to come home very late. The palace doors began to slam again. The age of ice-cold stares, whispers, and yelling had returned. Everything fell back into place.

It was also at this time that my sister and I were sent to high school, a huge place with an enormous library where you could hide away and flee the movement and commotion of the ground floor. The pecking order at school in Saint-Ulric, while unpleasant, was at least clearly defined. The pecking order at the cavernous henhouse that was the high school in Matane was complex and fragmented. Various interest groups lived alongside each other in the huge school, each paying no heed to the other. Well-defined, watertight groups based on social class, postal code, and the price of their members' clothing formed, chose a clearly defined corner of the henhouse, and marked their territory. The school, in spite of its limitations, failings, and indescribable violence, had the advantage of having been designed by architects familiar with the pecking order. On days when the library was closed, you could hide under the stairs or at the end of deserted corridors to flee the deafening movement and commotion of the lockers and cafeteria. There, in the half-light, you could read in silence and block out, if only for a moment, the school's foul-smelling reality.

I had inflated expectations regarding my high school education. After the enormous void of elementary school, I had imagined my new school would be a place of reading, scintillating discussion, and unforgettable discoveries. I was quickly brought down to earth with a bump. First of all, I had three times as many teachers. To my horror, I quickly discovered that the school cherished math and science above all else. Teachers more like sorcerers than pedagogues taught biology, math, and physics. Math, in particular, was an especially serious form of worship you had better engage in if you hoped to have any sort of future. Languages and the humanities were about as useful as orchids, subjects for wandering, fickle minds. In my three years of high school there, I was given two novels to read. The first,
Of Mice and Men
by John Steinbeck was handed out in October; we were to read it by November 15. Trembling with happiness, I twice devoured the sad tale of Lennie, the simpleton overly fond of soft things. The queen was a big help. It turned out she knew exactly which questions to ask about the novel. She quizzed me on George's responsibility toward his companion in misfortune. “Was he right to kill Lennie out of love?” I didn't know. I could feel something else in the air, but it wasn't me or my boring chemistry classes that were going to be done away with out of love. She even suggested I read other books by the same author, a big favourite of hers. I read
East of Eden
over her shoulder, and was shaken to the core.

And so I feverishly prepared my observations on
Of Mice and Men
for November 15. Convinced that my time to shine had come, I even went so far as to link the author's moral dilemma to the story of Cain and Abel, as Anne Boleyn had suggested. I felt ready to answer any question, however obscure and convoluted. The day came. I consulted my reading notes one last time before the class that was going to make my name as a student. The class began with tedious grammar exercises, followed by a dictation. There were only five minutes left when the teacher suddenly glanced down at a note he had scribbled to himself on a scrap of paper. He had clearly forgotten something. “Oh yes! The book!” he exclaimed. There were only four minutes left. We would have to be brief. “What did you think of it?” he inquired, looking at his watch. I had expected every question bar that one. What had I thought of it? He wanted a two-minute answer? Right now? In front of everybody? “No one wants to answer? So was it good or not?” I had never imagined it was possible to treat literature like a brand of canned soup. A girl ventured a response. “I haven't finished it. I didn't understand everything that happened.” The teacher looked indifferent, glanced at the back of the book, pulled an uncertain face, and said, “Well, I think that says it all.” Then the bell rang. We never spoke about
Of Mice and Men
, or any other book, in French class again. Although we often talked about the film classes our teacher had taken years ago at Laval University in Quebec City. The experience seemed to have left a lasting impression on him. I concluded that literature was impenetrable, that at the end of the day all it was good for was calling out to the animal gods in the forests of Canada and that its only purpose was to bring about sudden, windy change when all else failed. Clearly, I wasn't there yet. Literature was to once again become an unspoiled continent that I would continue to explore alone, armed with a machete and a rifle, discovering behind each moss-covered rock whole worlds whose only purpose was to change mine, little by little. I never found out what “Of Mice and Men” meant. I still read it today, wondering if it is possible to kill someone or something out of love.

After this brief literary episode, the waltz of equations and Cartesian diagrams started up again, more vigorously than ever. Physics was added to the biology-chemistry-math cocktail. At age fifteen, the world of my education could be summed up as a terrifying egg-shaped quadratic curve, dropping down through my exercise books like a nuclear warhead.

Events moved fast at the royal palace. The incident of the photograph in
La Voix gaspésienne
took on worrying and unexpected proportions. The lady who had brought scandal upon the court was called Jane Seymour, a notorious courtesan from Matane who had set her sights on becoming queen. Aside from the political and sentimental intrigue, the reasons behind such a move were not altogether in Jane Seymour's favour. She was childless, worked off and on in some office or other, and her only attribute was a finely honed appreciation for fashion and accessories. While Anne Boleyn was an expert when it came to compound interest and making money, Jane Seymour knew nothing of mathematics—but she sure knew how to spend. The contrast between the new pretender to the throne and the incumbent surprised outsiders, but those close to Henry VIII barely batted an eyelid.

And so the king charged an internal commission with coming up with grounds for separation. He needed something that would be deemed acceptable by the public. All spoke up against deposing the queen. No edict provided for her replacement. No one had ever imagined that her powers might be suspended, let alone that she might be deposed or sent into exile. The king called on the advisers who had helped him get rid of Catherine of Aragon round about the time of the 1976 Olympic Games. These conscientious and scrupulous advisers nevertheless had to admit they could provide the king with no counsel on the matter. They could undo an unhappy marriage and legitimize a divorce in the eyes of the people, but since Anne Boleyn and Henry VIII had never been married, their expertise was of no use. “We cannot annul what does not exist,” they declared, before throwing in the towel. Replying to Henry VIII in this tone was not without risk. Once they had finished, the king sentenced them all to death and set up a new council tasked with coming up with convincing arguments for the commission that would allow and legitimize the deposition of Anne Boleyn and the coronation of Jane Seymour. The former advisers were decapitated by a celebrated executioner, the same one who had executed the clergy responsible for the king's unhappy childhood. The ceremony had a galvanizing effect on the new advisers appointed by the king against their will to help get him out of this matrimonial impasse.