The Last of the Lumbermen (31 page)

“They look any good?” he wants to know.

“One of the better teams, I suspect.”

“Good,” he grins. “Where ar
e you guys in the draw?”

“In the first draw, playing a bunch of teenage
missionaries from Idaho. It seemed like the decent
thing to do for them. They'll get one game before they're slaughtered.”

“Better
you than the Roosters,” he agrees, and heads towar
d the registration counter Jack has set up outside
our dressing room. It occurs to me that he's
brought the Bears into the tournament out of loyalty and
tradition, not because he thinks they have any chance of
winning. Blacky's no dummy, so maybe he's recognized
that these games might be the last the Bears will
ever play. Whatever his motives, he's unmoved about playing
a hot team in the first draw. Maybe he wants to go out quick and clean.

The other teams drift in
as the afternoon progresses, and they pretty much
confirm Jack's theory: the Hinton Locomotives drive in from
Northern Alberta in a snazzy silver bus that turns out
to be another mobile brewery. The Grande Prairie Huskies,
who arrive a few minutes later, and the Fort
St. John Drillers are from the same league; they'
re more or less sober when they pull in,
but they're a little green around the
gills from the rickety school bus that's had them sucking
exhaust fumes for four hundred fifty kilometres,
and they seem pretty eager to hit the bar
and flush out the carbon monoxide. The Roosters begin to appear
in their fleet of Camaros around three,
but Old Man Ratsloff doesn't show until nearly fou
r. The last team to register is the Burns
Lake Cowboys, from just one hundred fifty miles west.
They were in and out of the
NSHL
until
a few years ago, and from the look of
them they've entered the tournament strictly for a lark. They
appear in a fleet of four rented minivans, via the minor miracle of drunk driving.

By showing up last
the Cowboys have drawn the Roosters for the three
AM
Coliseum game. They aren't happy about this, but their manager isn't sober enough to
raise a coherent objection. Cowboys is what they
call themselves, but it'll be more like cows in a slaughterhouse.

I hang around the Coliseum running errands for Esther
and Jack most of the afternoon. Around four
, Gord shows up and Jack sends the two
of us off to the Columbia Hotel to deliver
the first draw to the Battleford and Creston
teams, and to make sure they know where they'
re playing. Since both teams are staying at the
Columbia — which hints that they're dedicated drunks coached
by idiots — we're really there to
roust them. The clerk at the hotel desk rings both
coach's rooms, gets no response from either, and suggests the obvious. We head for the ba
r.

It's the Columbia's usual weekday crowd: bikers, unemployed loggers,
and the small portion of the business community that still
isn't convinced that eating croissants and drinking decaf cappuc
cino will make HQ executive asses taste sweeter when they
have to kiss them. About half the Creston players a
re sitting over on one side with their coach,
gulping down glasses of beer, watching the strippers, and wolfing
down hamburgers. I don't see any Raiders in the
bar, but their coach is sitting in a corner
nursing a glass of Pepsi and poring through what look
like computer printouts.

I walk over to his table while Go
rd sits down with the Cougars. “Hi,” I say. “I'm Andy Bathgate.”

He looks
up at me, then nods. “Sure you are,”
he deadpans. “And I'm Punch Imlach.”

A smartass. I drop the sheet with
the draw on it, pull up a chair, and sit down anyway
. “Don't see any of your players around.”

He's not as dumb as the Creston coach.
“They're upstairs,” he says, “putting their heads together after
last night. I figured they'd play better if they
got the partying out of their systems before the games start.”

“Makes sense
to me. You clear about where your first game is, and when?”

He names the arena and time without looking at
the draw sheet. “Somebody gave us a map when we
checked in,” he says. “We'll make it there okay. Who're we playing?”

“First come,
first play, so you draw your pals over the
re.” I point to the table of Creston players.
“The big guy is just giving them the lowdown.”

“He might have to
stand a few of them up,” the Raider coach laughs. “And
then carry them out to the bus. They've been load
- ing up pretty good.”

I glance over at Gord, who is
tapping his finger on the Creston coach's chest,
no doubt explaining that it's time to get his players out
of the bar and up to the arena. As
I watch, Freddy Quaw wanders in and stands
behind Gord like a giant exclamation mark.

“I think they're
getting the word on that, too,” I tell the
Raider coach. “Should be a pretty easy opening draw for you guys.”

He straightens in his chair. “I'm Joe
Pisconti,” he says, offering me his hand.

I reach over and grasp
it. “Most people call me Weaver. But the last name
really is Bathgate.”

“Oh, right,” he says, brightening for the first time.
“A couple of my guys played with you years back.
They were wondering if you'd show up. Nice to
make your acquaintance. You coaching the Mantua team now?”

There's no malice
in his voice, so I play it straight. “I'm still
playing. Must be the climate around here. W
orks as a preservative.”

“Pulp mills,” he grins. “Don't they
use some of those same chemicals to cure bacon?”

I grin back without
answering. Across the room, with a tableful of beer
glasses between them, I've spotted a pair of what look like
uniformed bus drivers. One of them is the driver I
glimpsed behind the wheel of the Chilliwack bus while they were unloading a few hours ago.

“Listen,” I say to Joe Pisconti. “I'll catch you later
. Got a small matter to take care of.”

“Sure thing.”

I amble over to
the Creston table just as Gord concludes his
lecture. He stands up and rolls his eyes. “These
guys are three sheets,” he grumbles. “Let's get out of here.”

“Just a sec,”
I answer. “I need you to back me on
something here. You too, Fred. Come with me. And look convincing.”

They follow me over
the bus driver's table and stand behind me as I
sit down. The Chilliwack bus driver glances dully at me
and reaches for his beer glass. I put my hand
on top of it and lean forward.

“Let me make
this very clear and simple for you,” I say.
“If I catch you within ten yards of another
alcoholic beverage in the next few days, I'm personally going to
rip off your scrotum and pull it over your head.”

The man's eyes
widen momentarily, then harden. “Oh yeah?” he sneers.
“So who appointed you to the police commission? Who are you, anyway?”

“Never mind who I am,” I say. “Have a
close look at my two friends here.”

He looks up at
Gord and Freddy, who have their arms
crossed and are glowering at him. “What about
them?” he squeaks.

“Think about what they're going to
do to you after I'm through.”

“Geez, man,” he
whines. “Cut me some slack here. I'm just having a few beers.”

“No
slack,” I answer. “No drinking until you've got that
bus back to Chilliwack.”

“You're serious?”

“Oh, I'm serious. Believe it. You
stay dry this weekend. Now get the hell out of here, and stay out.”

Both drivers scurry out,
and Gord and Freddy sit down at their
table while I glue myself back together. Gord understands what I just did, but Freddy is in the
dark. “What's with you old guys, anyway?” he wants to know.

“Nothing you need to
know about,” Gord answers. “Weaver's just making sure history doesn't repeat itself.”

Freddy looks up at the ceiling momentarily, and
then he taps one of his big fingers on his fo
rehead. “Oh, right. I heard what happened after that
last tournament. What's that got to do with Weaver?”

“He was
there,” Gord says. “And he has a thing
about drunk bus drivers.”

Freddy is silent for a moment,
still trying to fathom my weird behavior, but
then he remembers why he's in the bar. “Oh
yeah. Jack wants both of you over at the Coliseum.”

“How come?” Gord asks.

“Well, a thirteenth team has shown up.”

“What?”

“Yeah, no shit. A
bunch of rock musicians from Vancouver called the D
.O.A. Murder Squad, or something. In a
great big rock tour bus with about two hundr
ed colours painted on it. They're really something,” he adds. “Wendel's down there with them.”

“Didn't
some team with a name like that try to enter
the tournament?” Gord asks me.

“Yeah, I think so,” I answe
r. “They called in about two weeks after everyone else, and Jack kind of blew them off.”

THE
D.O.A. MURDER SQUAD
bus is parked in f
ront of the Coliseum when we get there, and
Freddy has underplayed the paint job. There's four hund
red colours, from the look of it. But the
Murder Squad itself isn't a joke. They're all
musicians, sure, but if size is anything to go by
they'd make a better showing than the Idaho Saints will,
even if you pumped the Saints up with a couple
gallons of steroids.

It takes us a while to sort out the story. D.O.A., in case you're not familiar with the term, means
Dead On
Arrival
, but this particular D.O.A. is the name of a
hardcore band famous enough that even I've heard
of them. Seems they sponsor a team in the V
ancouver Rec Leagues. A couple of the D.O.A. band members occasionally
play on the team, too, although it isn't clear if they're here now.

Jack has already told them they
can't play in the tournament, and they're being amazingly
amiable about it. As far as they're concerned the whole
trip is a lark, and they're prepared
to watch a few games, hang out in the
several bars that feature bands, play a few guest
sets, and bite the heads off a few hund
red weasels.

The only difficulty Jack's having is that Wendel
has lost his mind over them. He's a D.O.A. fan,
and he's acting like a nineyear-old at his first
rock concert, wanting Jack to kick the Saints out of
the tournament so the Murder Squad can play.
Jack isn't having any of it, naturally, but
he does pick up on Wendel's enthusiasm enough to friendly
up with them, suggesting a couple of hotels the musicians might
want to stay in (and wreck). He also
offers them free passes for the games. “They
should,” he whispers to me, “liven things up.”

I have to collar Wendel and drag him inside the Coliseum when it's time to prepare for the game.

THIRTY-THREE

I
T'S A FEW MINUTES
before seven
PM
when I
step onto the ice for the warm-up to the
tournament's first game, us against the Idaho Saints. The
Coliseum is nearly full, and, for a few minutes,
rumbling with confusion: where are the Mohawks?
Once the crowd realizes that it's us in
the green uniforms the rumble changes to cheers,
and when the cheers build it's clear they like
us, and maybe the uniforms and the name change even
more.

When the game starts at seven on
the dot, Jack sends me out to take the opening face-o
ff. I'm not about to get a swelled head over
this even though my father and stepmother are at
the game, standing behind our bench with Esther and cheering louder
than anyone. The honour is ceremonial, because I'm no
longer on the team's first line. Over the weeks I've been
out, first line honours have evolved to Artie, Gord,
and Freddy, with Wendel doubleshifting the second
and third lines, playing with whoever Jack throws out
with him. Wendel will get his share of
goals even if his linemates are a pair of fence posts.

In this game I'll draw
third line work centering Wendel and hope I'll be
more use to him than a fence post. But
mostly I'm going to sit. I haven't played full contact in nearly two months — not that the Saints look interested
in contact — and I don't have a clue what I've got. It might be nothing.

If I
don't have anything, a game like this is the best
I could ask for. When I watched the Saints
come off their bus I suspected they wouldn't be
able to beat us even if we were playing
with broomsticks and wearing gumboots, and when Wendel scor
es while I'm trying to get off the ice my
suspicion is confirmed. I've even got an assist to pr
ove it. By the end of the first period the sco
re is eight-nothing, and we haven't even been trying.

The crowd loves it, and none of us
are exactly suicidal about playing a laugher. Except Gus.
He takes the incompetence of his American compatriots personally.
Just over ten minutes in, he scores a goal by
flipping the puck high in the air, retrieving
it himself inside the Saints blueline, and plunking it behind
their goalie — but he doesn't celebrate. Instead, he skates
past the Saints' bench and stops to jaw at their coach.
I lean over the boards to catch what he's
saying. The Saints' coach, it seems, had his players going door
to door all day trying to convert the local
heathens, and Gus is chewing him out for it.

“These sorry fucking specimens of yours are supposed to
play hockey,” he says loud enough for our
bench to hear. “And you've had them out all day
trying to bust these fine heathen folk around
here with your silly Oral Roberts crap about sin
and damnation. You think anyone around here car
es about damnation? We're all fucking damned. Why else would we be living here?”

The coach doesn't have an
answer, so Gus goes on to explain, in graphic
detail, what's going to happen to his team if they
keep playing hockey in the missionary position. To hear
Gus talk, you'd have thought he was born in Mantua.

Larry Godin is refereeing, and he lets
Gus blather on a while before threatening him
with a delay-of-game penalty. Gus won't listen. He goes into
another rant about arrogant Americans screw- ing
Canada out of its birthright, which Godin decides is too
far off the topic. Up goes Godin's arm, and when Gus
still
won't give it up, he lays a misconduct on him. Gus storms
off to the dress- ing room to chill
out, and I can hear him cursing all the wa
y. After he's gone, though, the Saints take a little
more interest in hockey, and we don't score on them for nearly five minutes.

During the
intermission Jack gives us a little inspirational speech of his own
— aimed mostly at Gus, who's still mumbling about missionaries
and other disgraces to the US Constitution. Jack is being mo
re practical. He just tells us he doesn't want us
getting chicken blood on our new uniforms, and although he
can't quite bring himself to say it out loud, he
makes it clear he doesn't want any cruelty.

“This is going to
be a long tournament, and not all of us a
re as young as we used to be,” he concludes,
tapping his cast and pointing at Gus, Gord, and me.
“There's more than one team in this
tournament capable of cleaning our clocks, so let's save the tough stu
ff for when it's needed.”

His point is made, sort of, and we coast
through the second and third periods as if
it's a practice. For me it's exactly what I need.
I play three or four shifts each period, just
enough to test my timing and my sternum. Four assists
tell me that my timing is at least in synch
with Wendel's, and when, early in the third period,
I have to dive over a Saint defenceman when he
trips over his own skates, I hit the boards
hard enough to give me the health clearance I want.

The “sort of”
is Gus, who's still annoyed. He doesn't lecture
the Saints again, but early in the third he
can't keep himself from slamming one of their defencemen against
the boards from behind. It's the only serious
hit in the entire game, and it's so fla
grant Godin tosses him.

The final score is fourteen to one, and it's
over by nine-thirty. We rag the puck through
most of the third period, and it would have
been easy to shut them out. But as the thir
d period begins I hear Jack lean over and tell Bobby
Bell to let them score one so Junior's
head will still fit inside his mask when the serious games start. Bobby isn't too subtle about it,
either. He picks up the puck in the corner during
one of the few times the Saints manage to get
it inside our zone, sees one of them standing about
ten feet in front of Junior, and lays it
right on his stick. The kid looks surprised, but he knows what to do.

WENDEL,
JAMES, AND I
join the rest of the family
in the stands to watch the Bears play Chilliwack. Well,
I watch, anyway. Esther and Claire ar
e swishing back and forth in the shorthand they've developed, alternately
discussing dinner on Sunday — now a weekly event —
and talking about the pair of breeding New- foundlands
that're coming in a couple of weeks. Wendel,
who is trying hard to hide how eager he is
to get to the bar where several members
of the Murder Squad are playing sets, is
chatting up my father about some complication in the non-profit
society they incorporated last week to enable the community scaling
yard. They're pretty much birds of
a feather, at least when it comes to
politics and trees, which they agree are
one and the same. I guess I shouldn't be surprised.
Wendel had to inherit that super-serious side from
somewhere, and he didn't get it from me
or his mother. I can't get a word
in edgewise with either conversation.

At least I have James to
watch the game with — or I do until Gord
stops by. He just happens to have the autopsy
results on the bear, and I lose James
to that in two seconds. I listen distract- edly as
Gord relates the details, which aren't pleasant.
The animal's tissue was so riddled with
PCBS
it should have
been glowing in the dark. Someone — chances ar
e we'll never know who — unloaded enough transformer oil in
that equipment dump to contaminate it for a couple of hundred years.

I lean over to inter
rupt. “Fabulous. That means Mantua's now got it's very own Love Canal.”

Gord doesn't blink. “Depends on how far into the water table the
PCBS
have penetrated,” he says. “They'll be running tests
out there most of next summer.”

I tune them out, all of
them, and try to watch the game, which is very good
hockey but not much of a contest. The Bears, to
a man, play as hard as I've seen in
a couple of years, but they're outclassed and outgunned.
The Lions are younger, faster, and better skilled.

During the intermission Wendel takes off for the ba
r, and Gord leaves with Jack to catch
some sleep. They're going to need whatever sleep they can
get, since they're more or less running
the tournament.

James and I watch the second period with my
father, whose new interest in hockey is more
family loyalty than passion for the game, while Esther and
Claire stroll around the Coliseum concourse
arm-in-arm, talking up a storm. It's a curious or
ganism, this family that's settled around me.

The easiest relationship to settle was the one
with James, which is the one I would have pr
edicted would be the hardest. But ever since I've gotten
the taste for dealing the cards off the
top of the deck whenever I see they're not
marked, things like this are easier. With him, I simply told the truth.

About a week after the mauling, I sat him down
and told him I didn't know I'd had a brothe
r, and that I thought my father was dead. I
left a few hesitations and blank spaces in the explanation for
what I
don't
know, and for a couple
of discretions he doesn't need to trouble himself
with. He didn't need to live with what I thought I
did all those years ago, or with what his father
did fifteen years before he was born, so
I skipped the part about the bus accident, and I didn't
say I spent twenty-five years think- ing my father was
wandering around drunk or living in a detox.
Being a kid with no discretion at all, he
asked about my mother, and why she and Dad b
roke up, and I answered that I really wasn't
sure except that they didn't get along. Like I
said, there are some secrets that don't need to be revealed. My mother's grievances against his father aren't his responsibility.

He took it p
retty well. He'd had a few days to think things
over, and I got the impression he'd
already forgiven me short and long: short for walking
into the bear and getting myself treed, and long for
, well, existing.

For sure, he took it differently than
Wendel did when Esther finally told him I was his
genetic father. Wendel exploded with laughter, yelled “Give
me a break,” and stomped out of the house.
We didn't see him for three days, and when
he arrived for dinner unannounced on the fourth day he
didn't say a word about it. Still hasn't, either.

ESTHER
AND I LEAVE
after the second period, with the
score five to one. I hear later that it ends
that way, but if the puck hadn't been acting
like it was playing for the Bears all night, the score might have been eighteen to one.