five fantastic literary novels in one great sampler!

7/27/2019 Five Fantastic Literary Novels in One Great Sampler!

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A P E R M A N E N T

M E M B E R

O F T H EF A M I L Y

R U S S E L L

B A N K S

Alfred A. Knopf Canada


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1

F o R M E R M A R I N E

Aer lyin in bed aae r an hur, Cnnie nally ushes

bac he blanes and es u. Is sill dar. Hes bare and

shiverin in his bxers and t-shir and a lile hunver r

ne beer any a 20 Main las nih. He snas he bedside

la n and reses he hersa r y-ve sixy-ve.

the burner aes a hun sund and he an ics in, and

he sell ersene dris hruh he railer. He as his ne

hearin aids in lace and eers u he bedr ind.

Sn is allin acrss a ale slash lalih n he lan. Is

a ee in Aril and i uh be rain, bu Cnnie is lad is

sn. He reves his .45-caliber Cl service isl r he

draer he bedside able, checs be sure is laded and

lays i n he dresser.

By he ie he has shaved and dressed and driven n


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r u s s e l l b a n k s

2

in his icu, hree and a hal inches heavy e sn have

accuulaed. the n ls and sal rucs are already u.

the lae lass inds he M & M Diner are ed ver,

and r he sree yu can see he hal-dzen en and

en inside eain breaas and ain l-viced, s-

radic cnversain ih ne anher.

By chice, Cnnie sis alne a he bac he r, read-

in he srs secin he Plasburh Press-Republican. Hehas nn everyne in he lace ersnally r s heir

lives. they are all n heir ay r. He, hever, is n.

He calls hisel he Reiree, even huh he never cially

reired r anyhin and nbdy else calls hi he Reiree.

Eih nhs a he as le by Ray Piai a Rays Aucin

Huse. Le . Lie he as a heliu-lled balln n a srin,

he ells ele. He seies adds ha yu n he ecny

is in ruble hen even aucineers sar cuin bac, indica-

in ha is n his aul hes unelyed, usin d sas,

n Medicaid, scrain by n scial securiy and unelyen

benes ha are abu run u. Is he ecnys aul. And

he aul hever he hells in chare i.

Cnnie has already rdered his usual breaas

scrabled es, sausae ay, ased Enlish un and

ceehen his eldes sn, Jac, ces hruh he dr. Jac

nds and siles hell he her diners lie a an runnin r

ce and as he airess, Vivian, n he shulder. He shucs

his heavy ray bber jace and ulls his iner rer


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F o R M e R M A R I N e

3

ha, hans he n a all h nex his dads Carhar and

res reen eece balaclava, and aes he sea acin he dr,

sie his dad.

I as sarin hin i as ie ac ha su

aay, Jac says.

Cnnie says, one y dda hearin aids jus ld

e, Baery l. Lie I can ell hen is dead and has hy

I ein n recein. Man y ae, his baeries are alaysl, r chrissae. I dn need n hearin aid ell e.

Yur hearin aids al yu?

Is a ay e e buy ne baeries bere I really

need he. Ill rbably buy y exra baeries a year, ne a

ee, jus e y dda hearin aids s ellin e y

baerys l.

Seriusly, Dad, yur hearin aids al yu? Yu hear-

in vices?

Yeah, I a reular schiz. N, is hese ne c-

uerized unis Medicaid n subsidize. over six rand! I

shuldn have lisened ha dda audilis and buh

he subsidized cheas insead. wih hese, heres a lile lady

inside hisers ha yur baerys l. Als ells yu ha

channel yure n. I ve channels ih hese unisr

lisenin usic, r quie ie, reverse cus and ha hey

call aser. Masers he huan cnversainal channel. And

heres als ne r hne. I can ell he dierence beeen

any e, exce hne, hich hen yure n acually al-


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4

in n he hne is lie a dda ech chaber. I des hel

e hear ih a cell hne, huh.

Vivian ses Cnnies laer d and cee in rn

hi. tha nna be i, Cnrad?

Please, Viv, r chrissae, dn call e Cnrad. only

y ex-ie called e Cnrad, and hanully I haven heard i

r her in nearly hiry years.

I iddin, she says ihu lin a hi. Cnnie,she adds. She aes Jacs rder, aeal ih il and a cu

cee, and heads bac he ichen. Fr a e secnds, hile

his aher dis in his breaas, Jac sudies he an. Jacs

been a sae rer r elve years and sudies eles be-

havir, even his seveny-year-ld ahers, ih a learned, cal

deachen. Yu see sr aiaed his rnin, Dad. Ev-

eryhin ay?

Yeah, sure. I as jus easin Viv abu ha Cnrad

business. Bu i is rue, yn, nly yur her called e

ha. She used i ive e rders r criicize e. Lie she as

araid Id ae advanae her seh i she riendly

enuh call e Cnnie.

Yu rbably uldve.

Yeah, ell, yur her bere I really had a

chance ae advanae her. Sar al. She qui bere I

culd re her.

thas ne ay l a i.

Yu have le i , Jac. She didn an he jb, and I


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5

did. In he end, everybdy, includin yu bys, ha hey

needed.

Yure rih, Dad. Yure rih. theyve had his ex-

chane a hundred ies.

Vivian ses Jacs cee and aeal in rn hi and

scs aay as i a lile scared Cnnie, cin hi. Jac

siles areeably aer her and shaes u he rn secin he

nesaer and scans he headlines hile he eas. Cnnie esbac he srs ae.

Jac says, Ls lie e hruh March ihu

anher ban rbbery. Maybe ur by has headed suh, lie

Buch Cassidy and he Sundance kid. He is he rn ae

ver and es n nainal nes.

Aer a e inues, ihu lin u, Cnnie says,

Yu al Buzz and Chi recenly?

Jac ls ver a his aher as i execin re, hen

says, N, n in he las e days.

Everyhin he sae ih he hese days?

Mre r less. Far as I n.

wives and ids?

Ye, he sae, ar as I n. All is ell. N nes is d

nes, Dad.

I uldn ind any ind nes, acually.

theyre busy, Dad. Is easier r e, I dn have a

ie and ids. Plus Buzz has ha ln drive every day u

Dannera and bac, and Chis ain criinal jusice


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6

curses nihs a Nrh Cunry Cuniy Cllee dn in

ticndera. And hey bh live ay he hell ver in keese-

ville. Dn ae i ersnally, Dad.

I dn, Cnnie says and es bac readin he srs

ae.

Jac nishes his aeal, shves his bl ne side and

cus his u cee in his lare red hands, arin he.

Hes hinin. He suddenly ass, Yu ever cnsider i a lileeird ha all hree us en in la enrceen? I se-

ies nder abu i. I ean, i isn lie yu ere a lice -

cer. Lie e and Chi. or a risn uard lie Buzz. I ean,

yu ran aucins.

Yeah, bu dn re, I a rer Marine. And yure

never an ex-Marine, Jac. S ha as he sandard yu bys

ere raised by, he Unied Saes Marine Crs sandard, ese-

cially aer yur her . I y aher had been a rer

Marine, I rbably uld have ne in la enrceen . I

alays ind rereed nne yu bys ere Marines.

Dad, yu can rere sehin sene else did r

didn d. only ha yu yursel did r didn d.

Cnnie siles and says, See, has exacly he sr

hin a rer Marine uld say!

Jac siles bac. the ld an auses hi. Bu he r-

ries hi . the ld ans in denial abu his nances, Jac

hins. Hes be rse han bre. Jac es u r he

able, als he cuner and ries ay Vivian r bh heir


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7

breaass, bu Cnnie sees ha hes u . He jus r

his sea and slides beeen his sn and he airess, avin a

eny-dllar bill in her ace, insisin n ayin r bh his

and Jacs eals.

Vivian shrus and aes Cnnies eny, jus e i u

her ace.

She hands hi his chane, and aher and sn al bac

he able, here bh en ull heir cas and has n. Yuae care he i, Cnnie says. Mae i bi enuh s yu

and I ce u even and Vivian ends u rivin e r bein

an asshle.

Dad, yu sure yure ay? I ean, nancially? Is

be a lile ruh hese days.

Cnnie desn anser, exce ae a ulled-dn

ace desined ell his sn he sunds ridiculus. Absurd. o

curse hes ay nancially. Hes he aher. Sill he an he

huse. A rer Marine.

it s a thirty-mile drive r Au Sable Frs Lae Placid,

ry-ve inues in d eaher, ice ha day. the rads

are led and assable bu slic all he ay verslin

a cree hruh wilinn Nch, here he aliude is

re han husand ee and he allin sn is nearin

hieu.

Is a quarer en hen Cnnie ulls his hie, -


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8

heel-drive Frd Raner in Cld Br Plaza. Hes lled he

bed he ruc ih a quarer n baed ravel ive he

vehicle racin in eaher lie his. the ruc is seven years

ld ih a rus bel under he drs and aln he seas he

bed. He ars i he indless side he Lae Placid

branch he Adirndac Ban, a l -u buildin n

uch larer han a duble-ide. there are n her vehicles

in he arin area. Nbdys usin he drive-hruh r heAtM. He nices in he elyees l behind he buildin a

ne Subaru oubac and ne hse hubaced Pniac

SUVs he haes lin a because heyre s uly.

the indshield iers bu acrss runnels ice r-

in n he lass, and he ns he shuld e u here ih a

scraer and clear he ice, bu decides le he derser hea

he lass r inside and el i. He can liner. t easy

run in sene he ns, even his ar r he. He ses

he eerency brae, rabs he reen y ba he r be-

side hi and ses r he ruc, leavin he r runnin

and he derser and heaer n hih. He als arund he

ruc, ain sure ha bh license laes are cvered in hard-

ened rad-slush. when he es he ban enrance, he urns

aay r a secnd and yans dn his eece balaclava, rans-

rin i in a si as, a n unusual sih n a sny day in

a si n lie Lae Placid. then he ulls en he heavy lass

dr and eners he ban.

there are slender yun ellers behind he ches-hih


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9

cuner, irls in heir early enies h aear be cun-

in ney bac here, and a iddle-aed ban cer sand-

in a he en dr her lassed-in cubicle. All hree er

hi a elcin aze hen he ces hruh he drhe

rs cuser he day. the ban cer hlds a nary sa

ress in her hands as i is a recius i. Shes a redheaded,

rund-aced an earin a -iece reen l sui and

anerine-clred bluse. t Cnnie she ls lie a scialrer, he ind h inervieed hi r Medicaid and d

sas. tha hubaced Pniac is rbably hers. the ell-

ers are dressed re casually, in achin ray leaed sirs,

blac ihs, ln-sleeved bun-dn shirs and eece vess.

they bh have ud-clred shulder-lenh hair and rsy

chees. Cnnie hins hey us be ins and dress alie n

urse. Buzz and Chi, h are ins, used d ha in hih

schl. Jus cnuse ele, he reebers. these irls are a

lile ld r ha.

He leans bac aains he cuner and says he ban -

cer, wuld yu l a his, lease? He us his le hand

dee in his jace ce and hlds u he y ba ih his

rih. She ces u hi, and he hands her he en ba.

She urrs her br, uzzled, ary, bu laces he n-

ary sa ress n he cuner anyh, aes he ba and

eers in i. Is ey, exce r ve rds hand-rined in

caial leers ih a blac Maic Marer n a hie shee

aer: FILL wItH CASH. owNER ARMED.


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oh, dear, she says. She aes he y ba and, avidin

his eyes, asses hruh he l ae and es behind he cun-

er here he cnused ellers sand and ach.

Cnnie says he ellers, Yu irls jus se bac a e

ee r he cuner here and dn uch anyhin. kee yur

hands here I can see he. thisll all be ver in a inue. t

he hie-aced ban cer he says, Less han a inue, acu-

ally. thiry secnds. I cunin, he says and cences cun bacard r hiry. By he ie he reaches elve, she

has eied he cnens he cash draers in he y ba.

She zis he ba clsed and asses i hi.

Is nice and heavy, abu hree unds ney, he

uesses. He hans her ih a nd and, sill cunin u lud,

bacs quicly aay r he cuner ard he dr, rih

hand hldin he y ba, le hand dee in his jace ce

clasin he ri his reliable ld Cl M1911 ser vice isl.

A ve he is uside he ban, and a ne hes in his ruc, hen

releasin he hand brae, and he has baced he ruc u and

urned, unseen, and headed es u n n old Miliary

Rad.

In he allin sn rac is lih and sl vin. A

ile beynd he ciy liis, here he rad eners he hale

Ray Br, a air sae lice cruisers, heir lihs ash-

in, seeds ard hi, and he ulls slihly he rih

le he z as. A inue laer he asses he Ray Br

sae lice headquarers, here unil a year a his sn Jac


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as sained. I Jac ere headquarered here day, hed

liely be drivin ne hse cruisers ha jus ble by, and he

ih have recnized his dads hie, rused-u Frd Raner

and ndered ha he as din ay ver here. Bu Jacs sa-

ined in Au Sable Frs n, n Ray Br, and has hy,

aer rbbin ur branches hree dieren bans in Essex

and Franlin Cunies in he las seven nhs, Cnnie has

aied unil n rb he Lae Placid branch he Adirn-dac Ban and hy aerard he drve es, aay r Au

Sable Frs and he. He desn an his sns as hi any

quesins ha he can anser ruhully.

he drives through the town Saranac Lae, lin

via Rue 3 radually nrh ard Plasburh, here he

sends he res he rnin in he aernn hanin

u a he Chalain Cenre all lie a bred eenaer. wih

he y ba lced in he icu in he arin l and he

ney uncuned, unexainedr all he ns i culd

be hree unds ne-dllar bills, alhuh re liely is

ens, enies, ies and hundreds, lie he hershe ras

hruh he l dearen a Sears and dris n he

d cur, here he eas Chinese d, and hen es a

2:00 p.m. screenin Lincoln, hich he lies in sie bein

surrised ha Abraha Lincln had such a hih, squeay

vice. while hes achin he vie, he eeraure u-


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side rises in he id-hiries and he allin sn dindles

and nally ss. Is als 5:00 p.m. hen he ces blin-

in u he ulilex and decides is sae n drive bac

Au Sable Frs.

the six-lane Nrhay is uddled ih saled snel

and slush. In keeseville, sill en iles r he, he exis

r he urnie n he ide, seein -ra Rue

9N. keeseville is here his yuner sns and heir a-ilies live and is n s daned ar r Au Sable Frs ha

hey culdn dr by visi nce a nh i hey aned ,

he hins, and in rder er he ruc hruh he curve,

Cnnie uns i. the quarer n baed ravel in he ruc

bed has shied he eih he vehicle r he rn ires

he rear, and he cenriual ull he urn causes he rear

ires lse heir ri n he aveen and sli sideays he

le. Cnnie auaically is he seerin heel he le,

he direcin he slide, bu he rear end hisas bac

he rih, uin he ruc in a sl 180-deree sin, bac

rn, unil hes acin he ay hes ce and he ruc is

slidin sideays and dnhill ard he -ra uardrail a

abu ry iles an hur.

it s only a concussion and a bused cllarbne, Jac ex-

lains his aher. Bu he cllarbne bre in laces and

as a resul is in hree searae ieces. they called in ne he


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srs dcs r Lae Placid, uy h rs n si accidens

all he ie. He eraed and u ins in i, bu iven yur ae

and bne lss, he desn hin he insll hld i yu e hi in

ha area aain. He said yull have rec yur rih side

lie is ade lass.

H ln as I u? Cnnie ass. Hes jus realized

ha Chi and Buzz are in he r, sandin sehere be-

hind Jac. Hes zy and cnused abu here he is exacly,alhuh he can ell is a hsial r. Hes in a bed ih an

IV suc in his ar and an ey bed nex his and a chair

in he crner and a ind ih he curain ulled bac. Is

dar uside.

Yu ere u hen I he ruc, hich as n

re han en inues aer he acciden, Id uess. A ciizen

ih a cell hne in a car rih behind yu sa he ruc

ver and called 911. I haened be drivin nrh n 87

jus bel he exi. Yu cae in he abulance, bu hey

nced yu u hen yu en in r surery. Yu dn re-

eber he abulance and all ha?

Las hin I reeber is he ruc in in a slide.

Hell, bys, he says Chi and Buzz. Srry brin yu

u lie his. they l rried, brs urred, unsilin,

bh in unir, Buzz in his Dannera risn uards uni-

r and Chi in his Plasburh lice cer blues. All hree

his sns ear unirs ell. He lies ha. He yu didn

have leave r r his.


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Chi says ha he as n duy, bu since ha had hi here

in Plasburh, i as n bi deal ce rih ver he hs-

ial, and Buzz says ha he as jus ein he hen Jac

called, s i as n bi deal r hi, eiher, drive bac

Plasburh. Edie sends her lve, Buzz adds.

Yeah, Jan sends lve, , Dad, Chi says.

Cnnie ass abu his ruc. He has jus reebered he

y ba.Jac says, taled. Nrhay Sunc cae ver and

ed i u. Yu really u i all he ay he ra and in

he ds. thice sall birches sed yu. gd hin

i asn a ull-rn ree r yud have ne hruh he ind-

shield. Yu eren earin a sea bel. where ere yu c-

in r?

Plasburh. the vies a Chalain all. I aned

see ha vie abu Abraha Lincln everybdys alin

abu.

All ur en are silen r a en, as i each is ls in

his n huhs. Finally Chi says, Dad, eve as yu

a cule uh quesins. Jac and Buzz nd in areeen.

Cnnies hear is racin. He ns has cin.

Chi says, Is abu he ney in he ba.

wha ba?

Jac says, the EMt uys ave e he ba, Dad, he y

ba, hen hey ulled yu u he ruc. I didn en i ill

aer yu ere in surery. I asn ryin. I ened i in case


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15

here as a ble in i ha ihve bre r sehin. Al-

huh I dn hin yu ere drinin, he adds.

N, I asn! N a dr all day! I as he sn and ice

n he rad ha did i.

Chi says, we need n here yu he ney,

Dad. theres a l i. thusands dllars.

Buzz says, And e need n hy yu ere carryin

yur ry-ve.Is n illeal, Cnnie says hi. N ye, anyh.

Jac says, Bu he un and he ney, heyre cnneced,

aren hey, Dad? Ive been uin and eher, yu

n. Cnnecin he ds, lie hey say. Fr insance, nder-

in here yu he ney r hse hearin aids ha Medic-

aid uldn ay r.

I din ay ney-ise. I had se savins, yu

n.

Buzz says, I n ha es n inside risn, Dad. Is

rse han anyhin yu can iaine. I dn an yu here.

Bu yure lin a hard ie. Ared rbbery. Yull be

here he res yur dda lie. wha he Chris ere yu

hinin?

o he hree Buzz is he nly ne h ls sad. Jacs

ace and Chis sh n ein, n even curisiy, bu has

because heyre rained lice cers. Cnnie says, I dn

n ha yu uys are alin abu.

Buzz says, Dad, ha he hell d yu an us d? wha


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16

d yu hin e shuld d? whas he rih hin here, Dad?

Yu dn have d anyhin. As an Aerican ciizen I

can carry y service isl i I an, and I can carry y ney

arund in cash in a dda y ba i I an. wh can rus

he dda bans hese days anyh?

Jac says, Is n yur ney! I belns he Adirn-

dac Ban branch in Lae Placid ha as rbbed his rn-

in. Rbbed by a uy in a si as and a Carhar jace iha y ba ha had a ne in i ha said, Fill ih cash, ner

ared. the nes sill in he b he ba, Dad. Under

he ney. I checed.

Yu checed? S yu ere snin? Invadin y

rivacy?

Buzz says, Jesus Chris, Dad, ae sense! theres

us sandin here h can arres yu! Is ha ha yu an? t

be arresed by yur n sns? And ae he hird yur risn

uard?

Cnnie ls acrss he r a he ind and

hruh he lass in he darness beynd. He nders i is

lae a nih r very early in he rnin. He says, Sunds

unny hen yu u i ha ay. Lie I aned i haen.

Bu is n ha he aned haen. when his sns

ere lile bys and heir her abandned he all s she

culd live ih an aris in a hiie cune in Ne

Mexic, Cnnie held i eher ih disciline and devin

duy. All by hisel, he held he r and erec a-


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17

herly care his sns. And aer hey raduaed hih schl

he aid r Jac cllee a Paul Sihs and r Buzz

a Plasburh Sae r hse years hen he aned be

a radilis. He aid r Chis Haaiian hneyn ih

Jan. He even care he hen hey ere in heir early

hiries by ain u a secnd rae and he equiy lan,

brrin aains his railer and he land in Elizabehn

he inheried r his aher, s his sns culd buy heir rshuses. He aned ae ieccable care his sns, and he

did. And aer he bys re u and n lner needed hi

ae care he, he lanned n cninuin hld he aily

eher by bein able ae ieccable care hisel. tha

as he ln-rane lan. they uld sill be a aily, he ur

he, and he uld sill be he aher, he head he huse-

hld, because yure never an ex-aher, any re han yure

an ex-Marine.

Bu he ay hins urned u, he can ae care hi-

sel. H can he exlain his his sns ihu he hinin

hes aheic and ea and suid? Firs he real esae are

aned, and neiher he railer nr he land his aher le hi

as rh as uch as he ed n he, s even i he aned

, he culdn sell he reries r enuh ay he lans

and ve in a vernen-subsidized r r sudi aar-

en in n. whd buy his railer and land anyh? Hed

sill e he bans ens husands dllars and uld have

n ain he nhly ayens. then he ls his jb a


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18

Rays Aucin Huse. wihu i he culd n lner ae he

ayens he bans, and hen he issed cnsecuive

nhs, he bans layers hreaened seize his railer and

he land. He as abu bece an ex-aher.

H lae is i? he ass.

Jac says, Lae. Quarer hree.

wha d yu an us d, Dad? Buzz says aain.

Cnnie ass he ha heyve dne ih he ney,and Jac says is sill in he y ba, hich he u n he

shel in he clse he hsial r, here hey hun his

clhes and ca.

wha abu y service isl? wheres i a? A ans

un is n be disurbed, esecially hen he an is yur a-

her and a rer Marine.

Is in he ba ih he ney, Buzz says.

S nbdy else ns abu his ye, exce r yu

hree?

Jac says, thas rih.

Cnnie says, then nbdy has d anyhin abu

his nih, rih? Is lae. Yu bys e se slee, and

rr he hree yu si dn eher and decide ha

yu an d. Is yur decisin, n ine. I n ha ha-

ever yu d, bys, ill be he rih hin. Is ha I raised yu

d.

they see relieved and exhale als in unisn, as i all

hree have been hldin heir breah. Buzz reaches dn and


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19

usles he ld ans hin, sandy ray hair, as i rufin he ur

a avrie d. He says, oay. Sunds lie a lan, Dad.

Yeah, Chi says. Sunds lie a lan.

Jac nds areeen. Hes he rs u he dr, and he

hers quicly ll. they cach u hi in he hallay, and

he hree al side by side in silence he elevar. they re-

ain silen in he elevar and dn rs and all he ay

u he arin l. they s beside Jacs cruiser r a sec-nd and l bac and u a he lare square ind heir

ahers r. A nurse dras he blind clsed, and he lih in

he r es u.

Jac ens he dr n he drivers side and es in. Yu

an ee r breaas and ure u has nex?

where? Chi ass. Ive he nn--nine shi, s

breaas is d.

M & M in Au Sable Frs a eih? the ld ans avr-

ie breaas jin.

I can ae i ay, Buzz says, bu I have be n he

rad Dannera by nine.

Chi says, I uess e already n has nex, dn e?

Buzz says, His isl, is i laded?

I didn chec, Jac says, ein u he car. Buzz is

already alin very as bac ard he hsial enrance,

and Chi is runnin cach u, hen r heir ahers r

n he secnd r hey hear he unsh.


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A Permanent Member of the Family

By Russell Banks

A sterling collection of short stories from the author ofRule of the Bone and The SweetHereafter--his first in almost fifteen years--including six never-before-published works.

One of our most prestigious writers, Russell Banks is a literary icon whose works probe the

recesses of the human condition. His novels and stories offer rich portraits that are profound

and deeply resonant--appearing regularly in anthologies and collections such as The Best

American Short Stories and The PEN/O. Henry Prize Stories. This collection of twelve short

works showcases this master at the peak of his intuitive powers. As he did in such works as the

classic The Sweet Hereafter, the reveredRule of the Bone, and the hauntingLost Memory of

Skin, Banks limns provocative and morally complex themes with pathos and sharp insight. Each

of the stories in this powerful collection demonstrates the range and virtuosity of his narrative

prowess and startlingly panoramic vision.A Permanent Member of the Family is a stunningaddition to the canon of a writer "whose great works resonate with such heart and soul" (Janet

Maslin, The New York Times).

Buy a copy of A Permanent Member of the Family

Hardcover

Amazon | Indigo

eBook

Amazon Kindle | Kobo | Sony Reader| iBookstore | Google

Excerpted from A Permanent Member of the Family by Russell Banks. Copyright 2013 by RussellBanks. Excerpted by permission of Knopf Canada, a division of Random House of Canada Limited. Allrights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing fromthe publisher.
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THE SON

OF A

CERTAIN WOMAN

WAYNE JOHNSTON

alfred a . knopf canada


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F S S

Most o the people who knew my mother either slept

with her or wished they had, including me, my aunt

Medina and a man who boarded with us; though he

was neither old nor someones ather, he went by the name o

Pops. I know thats ambiguous, but its better let ambiguous or

now. As or me wanting to sleep with my mother, i you disap-

prove, try spending your childhood with a ace that looks long

past its prime, with hands and eet like the paws o some prehu-man that oraged on all oursand then get back to me. Or better

yet, read on.

Its hard to describe what your own ace looks like. Its hard

to be honest, but its also hard, period, because most aces dey

description. Mine inspiresdescription. They used to say that the

Inuit had a hundred words or snow. Thats about as many ways as

my ace has been described. Someone once told me it looked as i

it had been worked on by an abstract tattoo artist. A boy asked me


27/124

w a y n e j o hn s to n

i my mother had eaten more than the medically recommended

amount o beets on the day she had me. Another said that I should

wear a mask three hundred and sixty-our days o the year and go

outside withoutone only on Halloween.

You may have seen people with birthmarks like mine. Something

like mine, anyway, or mine are at the ar worst end o the spectrum.

Doctors call them port wine stains even though no one, when

they see one, thinks o port. Theyre also described as strawberry-

coloured, even though theyre not. My mother said they call them

strawberry to put the best ace on it, then apologized or whatshe said was an unintended pun.

When asked, I would try to explain that my birthmark was

called a birthmark because it was discovered at birth, not because

my ace was marked bybirth, but most people couldnt let go o the

idea that something must have gone wrong asI was being born.

My mother said they didnt like the idea o a etus that was beet-

aced, just lurking there in her womb, waiting to come out and

spoil everything, because it made my birthmark seem more like

Gods mistake than hers. She added that people didnt like the idea

o etuses at all, so it was doubtul that one with a ace that could

stop a clock would change their minds.

For my rst two weeks I was thought to have some kind o rare

congenital syndrome. What I in act had was the benign version

o that syndrome which mimics the real thing or a short while

ater birth until the most sinister eatures simply ade away and allthat remain are port wine stains and, in my case, oversized hands

and eet. The alse syndrome is even rarer than the real thing. Its

called False Someone Syndrome. FSS. The Someone stands or

three someones, three doctors with hyphen-joined last names who

convinced my mother and the doctors at St. Clares that I was

doomed. The more names in ront o a syndrome, the worse it

istwo hyphens, three names, a syndrome that took three doctors

to discoveror invent, as its oten seemed to me.


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5

The doctors warned o possible complications that might

maniest as I grew older. The stains, the ones on my ace especially,

might darken, spread, swell, blister, become inected, require tend-

ing to by dermatologists, the nearest o whom was in Haliax, ve

hundred miles o the North Atlantic away, to the west o St. Johns,

which itsel is at the ar eastern end o the island o Newoundland.

People like me are apparently just one gene away rom some

major disability, and we so closely resemble those who havethat

disability that we are oten mistaken at birth as having it. The only

way to be sure is to wait to see i the sinister symptoms go away ina couple o weeks.

My mothers doctor didnt wait two weeks. He told her I had

Someones Syndrome, told her I was unlikely to make it through

my teens and would have to live in a special home o some kind.

But two weeks latertwo weeks I spent in hospitalhe told her

that I had FSS, a kind o watered-down version o the syndrome.

I had an overabundance o blood-engorged capillaries that, luckily

or me, stayed clear o my brain. She told me that when he gave her

word o what she called my reprieve, she cried more than when

she thought I was as good as gone, then sought him out and told

him he was a watered-down version o a doctor. She said it wasnt

like nding out that Id been healthy all along, but as i Id been dead

and had come back to lie merely because someone had changed his

mind. I was so happy, Perse, she said. The doctor seemed oblivious

to the change in my mothers mood, so thrown o was he by herattractiveness. A couple o weeks ater having a baby and she looked,

he said, like Elizabeth Taylor. My mother pointed to his wedding

ring with the nger on which she wore her engagement ring.

Flustered, the doctor then said that he was thrown o in his

diagnosis o me by the local gigantism that was almost always a

symptom o the real syndromelocal gigantism not meaning

that you grow to eight or nine eet tall, but that parts o you are

oversized, most oten the extremities. In my case, as I said, my


29/124


hands and eet werein addition to being stained like my ace

larger, which was better than having just one or two toes or ngers

that were oversized, as is sometimes the case, and which would

have made it necessary or me to have custom-made, and very

odd-looking, gloves and shoes.

I know youre wondering i a certain other part o me was over-

sized. It wasnt, but that didnt stop people rom assuming that it

was, or speculating, or gossiping about it, and o course it didnt stop

me, once I reached a certain age, rom claimingit was oversized.

My large hands looked as though they were stained with blood,ront and back, and fopped aboutor so it seemed to meon

the ends o my wrists like empty gloves attached by a string lest

I lose them. Hairless hands the size o a grown mans, a butchers

begrimed and exoliated by his proession, they might as well have

been grated onto me. They barely t into the pockets o my slacks

and my blazer, and when I withdrew them, my pockets turned

almost completely inside out. I always looked as i I were wearing

shoes or boots that were ar too big or me, boots handed down

rom a ather or much older brother because my parents couldnt

aord to buy me ones that t. Hands and eet like ns I had,

except there was no webbing between the ngers and the toes. My

red eet made it look as i Id stood or ar too long in ankle-deep,

scalding water. I had a swollen lower lip o the sort associated with

a lack o intelligence and that made me speak as i there was still

some reezing let rom a trip to the dentists. What did the peopleo St. Johns see when they looked at me? A slobbering, jabber-

ing aberration, I suppose, whose mind, character and personal-

ity must likewise be aberrant, altered or the worse by whatever

something had marred me rom the moment o my conception,

some God-willed confux o mishaps in my makeup, in the chaos

that attended my creation.

That my mother named me beore the good news has always

made me eel a little as though I bear someone elses name, that o


30/124

7

the poor inant who lived or just a ew weeks and whose death

was not mourned but celebrated. Sometimes, perverse though it

seems, Ive ound mysel eeling sorry, even guilty, about that other,

helpless Percy whom I supplanted, Percy the First, whose reign

was brie, illusory.

My mother told me she had chosen the name Percy beore

I was born. Percy in case o a boy. I named you ater the poet,

Percy Bysshe Shelley, she said. You came this close to going

through lie named Bysshe.

So I missed total catastrophe by a genetic whiskerand woundup with a watered down catastrophe. Despite countless reassur-

ances, I worried that this whisker in my makeup would wither

or be worn away and the real version o the syndrome would be

activated. I told my mother I had heard someone say theres a rst

time or everything.

Its just an expression, Perse, she said. There isnt a rst time

or everything. Most things have never happened and never will.

But what i it happens?

It cant happen. It wont happen. It has never happened and it

never will.

During the rst two weeks Id spent in hospital ater I was born,

my mother believed that she would never take me home, that I

would never speak, that I would be blind, and that my other senses

would be almost as badly compromised. She believed that she

would visit me in a home as oten as she could stand to or how-ever long I had on earth.

And the prospect o all this hit her, she said, just seven months

ater my ather had lit out or what he must have thought was

greener grass.

My mother still wore her engagement ring. Call me Miss Havisham,

she oten said, though at the time I didnt know what she meant.


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My ather ran o when my mother was two months pregnant,

making me the bastard child o Penny Joyce. Born out o wedlock,

though my parents were engaged. My mother changed her last

name, which had been Murphy, to Joyce. It was wrongly assumed

she did this because, even though her anc Jim Joyce had let

her, she still loved him and wanted their child to bear his name. I

like to wear the engagement ring, she said. It has a discouraging

eect on men, those who know me and those whod like to.

The boys at school said it was because my parents couldnt

wait or marriage that I was born beet-aced. Some said that itwas because mymothercouldnt wait, a woman who wouldnt take

no or an answer rom her anc. They had planned to marry on

the one-year anniversary o their engagement. Although it was the

general opinion that making your ance pregnant would not be

held against you in the long run, it being so common, the widely

repeated version o the story was that Jim Joyce had run o out

o shame or what hed done. But the most widely held belie was

that there must be something more to the story, that perhaps I

was not Jim Joyces son, which he would have been certain o i he

and my mother had never done it or had done it at a time that

did not jive with that o her pregnancy. My mother, i not exactly

regarded with suspicion, was the subject o many wink-and-nudge

jokes and much skeptical speculation. The truth is that Jim Joyce

is, or washe might be long gonemy ather. There will be no

surprise revelations to the contrary.The eternally engaged Penelope Joyce, a ance orever.

She had a Gallic complexion, was said to be descended rom

the Black Irish, the children supposedly born rom the mingling

o those who survived the sinking o the Spanish Armada with

Irish women who took them in ater the British blew their feet

to smithereens, Spaniards who crawled, swam, thrashed and

washed ashore on the east coast o Ireland and were hidden by

the English-loathing Irish. There was not a single authenticated


32/124

9

instance o this having happened and thereore no recorded

instances o Black Irish emigrating to the New World, but about

one in ten Newoundlanders was Latin-looking or no other even

hal-convincing reason that anyone could name. My mother was

one o the ten percent, or rather one o the ve percent o exotic,

hot-blooded, passionate, reputedly uck-loving women.

The Catholic Black Irish were known as Black Micks to

Protestants, and even to those who lived on the Mount. I was not

a Black Mick. Jim Joyce wasnt one. Genetically speaking, having

a Black Mick mother didnt make you more likely to be a BlackMick than anyone else. That portion o me that was not port wine

coloured did not bear the complexion o someone long tanned

by the sun. It bore the complexion o someone who, like most

Newoundlanders, was long deprived o sunlight. My hair was not

as slick and black as my mothers, nor my eyes as dark as hers.

Many people on the Mount who didnt know, or pretended not

to know, what Black Irish meant took it to mean that blacks rom

Arica perched somewhere, somehow, in the amily tree, that my

mother was coloured, that her being coloured had something to

do with my being miscoloured; how much mixing o races could

there be beore the result was a calamity like Percy Joyce? Priests,

nuns and other missionaries were dying in Arica in an eort to

convert the pagans o that continent to Christianity, and here at

home were the Joyces, unconverted blacks or coloureds o some

kind, my mother a recalcitrant, non-churchgoing maverick andme an unbaptized, non-denominational renegade, walking there-

ore the high wire above the abyss o damnation, liable to all at

any time yet allowed to go on working without the net that others

(including my mother) hadthe saety net o baptism by which

the allen are caught ar short o Hell.

The thing about rumours, hal-truths, misconceptions, is that

people believe them all, so it doesnt matter i one contradicts the

otheryou are credited and blamed as i all o them are true.


33/124


I was black. I was a Mick. I was a Black Mick whose ace just

happened to be purple. I was a Catholic because my mother was

onethe whole not being baptized thing was just a technical-

ity. But my mother was a lapsed Catholic, which was worse than

being non-Catholic. There was hope or non-Catholicsthey

might someday be convertedwhereas someone who had been

shown the truth and had turned away rom it, well, that was what

rebel angels such as Satan and Lucier had done. My mother was

looked down on by some or being a Black Mick, a sexual animal,

a descendant o the same people as the Spanish shermen who,smoking their oul-smelling cigarettes, prowled the St. Johns

waterront in search o whores. She was lusted ater by most men

or having that little bit o Spanish blood that supposedly made

her such a re-uck.

I oten compared mysel to my mother.

The acial stain extended rom my scalp to within about an inch

o my Adams apple, which made it look as i every other inch o

my torso must be thus discoloured, even though I have no other

stains on it except a small one that has my belly button at the

centre. My mother was relieved that I had no stains on my back-

side or on what she said might be considered the worst possible

place. I sometimes complained o the unairness o the stain on my

ace, which could just as easily have been discreetly located on the

soles o my eet or in my armpits, but my mother reminded me o

how close I had come to a lie in which the location o my stainwould have been the least o my problems.

And my mother? My mother was ve-eight, big-breasted,

wide-hipped, bust and waist in perect proportion, ull-lipped,

high-cheekboned, the Sophia Loren o the Mount. I can only

aintly remember a time when my ardour or her was not at least

equal to the most Penny Joycepining, Black Irish cuntcoveting,

balls-aching adolescent on the Mount, the name or the hill on

which St. Johns is built. And orget Freud. I Mrs. Clancy next


34/124

11

door had been my mother, I wouldnt have, couldnt have, thought

o her in that way.

Id be happy to trade my looks or yours, Medina said to my

mother.

Would you be happy to trade your looks or mine? I asked my

mother.

Sure I would, squirt, she said, and kissed me on top o the head.

Youre araid to kiss my cheek, I said. And suddenly she was

stamping my ace all over with kisses as i it were a well-travelled

passport. Kiss, kiss, kiss, kiss.Medina, my aunt, Jim Joyces sister, had a kind o Betty Boop

look: short, tightly curled black hair, round, dark, lashy eyes. She

was more attractive than she gave hersel credit ortall, large-

boned, with long, lanky legs that were a touch too thick just below

her bum.

I was rst known throughout the neighbourhood as the Joyce

Baby, a euphemism that stood both or my stain and or my ather

being on the lamthe expression used until it was clear he wasnt

coming back. When I was old enough to walk with my mother

about the neighbourhood, I became known as the Joyce boy. My

mother said people made too big a deal o my birthmark. She said

they probably thought that i Helen Keller had been given the

added burden o my limbs and ace, shed never have amounted

to anything. Some thought that physically maniested within me

were the qualities o the sort o man who would desert his preg-nant anceand so I would orever be a reminder to the world,

as well as to my mother and mysel, o his inexplicable oence

though my mother also thought that people believed she was

somehow to blame.


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The Son of A Certain Woman

By Wayne Johnston

Longlisted for the Giller Prize

Percy Joyce, born in St. Johns, Newfoundland, in the fifties is an outsider from childhood, setapart by a congenital disfigurement. Taunted and bullied, he is also isolated by his intelligenceand wit, and his unique circumstances: an unbaptized boy raised by a single mother in a fiercelyCatholic society. Soon on the cusp of teenagehood, Percy is filled with yearning, wild withhormones, and longing for what he cant havewanting to be let in...and let out. At the top ofhis wish list is his disturbingly alluring mother, Penelope, whose sex appeal fairly leaps off thepage. Everyone in St. Johns lusts after herincluding her sister-in-law, Medina; their payingboarder, the local chemistry teacher, Pops MacDougal; and...Percy.

Percy, Penelope, and Pops live in the Mount, home of the citys Catholic schools and most of itsclerics, none of whom are overly fond of the scandalous Joyces despite the seemingly benignprotection of the Archbishop of Newfoundland himself, whose chief goal is to bring little PercyJoyce into the bosom of the Church by whatever means necessary. In pursuit of that goal,Brother McHugh, head of Percys school, sets out to uncover the truth behind what he senses tobe the complicated relationships of the Joyce household. And indeed there are dark secrets to bekept hidden: Pops is in love with Penelope, but Penelope and Medina are also in lovean illegalrelationship: if caught, they will be sent to the Mental, and Percy, already an outcast of society,will be left without a family.

The Son of a Certain Womanbrilliantly mixes sorrow and laughter as it builds toward an

unforgettable ending. Will Pops marry Penelope? Will Penelope and Medina be found out? WillPercy be lured into the Church? It is a reminder of the pain of being an outsider; of the sustainingpower of love and the destructive power of hate; and of the human will to triumph.

Buy a copy of The Son of A Certain Woman

Hardcover

Amazon | Indigo

eBook


Excerpted from The Son of A Certain Womanby Wayne Johnston. Copyright 2013 by WayneJohnston. Excerpted by permission of Knopf Canada, a division of Random House of Canada Limited. Allrights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing fromthe publisher.
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C R A I G

D A V I D S O N

C A T A R A C T

C I T Y -

a N o v e l

d o u b l e d a y c a n a d a


38/124

d u n c a n d i g g s

-

O the 2,912 nights I spent in prison, two were the longest: the

rst and the last. But then, most cons would tell you the same.

That rst was endless, even more so than those long-ago

nights in the woods with Owen when the wind hissed along the

earth and the darkness was ull o howling. In the woods an animal

might rip you to shreds, sure, but it had no goal other than to protect

itsel and its ospring. The Kingston Pen housed animals whod

fatline you or looking at them cockeyed or breathing their air.

My cot elt no thicker than a communion waer, coils cork-

screwing into my spine. Penitentiary darkness was dierent than

the outside-the-walls variety. A prison never achieves ull black:

security lamps orever burning behind mesh screens in the highcorners o the cellblock, hourly fashlight sweeps. Your eyes

become starved or true nightanything is better than granular,

gummy semi-dark where shapes shit, hal glimpsed, at the edges

o your sight.

Still, you get used to it, in time. You get used to everything.

Then comes that last night. Wed talk all about it, you know?


39/124

4 c r a i g d a v i d s o n

Some guys had been in and out a ew times; it didnt mean as

much to them. But or most o us it was . . . listen, its like my

buddy Silas Garrow says: We all owe, and were all paying. What

else is prison but the repayment? Then they set you loose. But

some part o you gures you havent quite paid enough. Youve

paid what the law demands, sure, but some debts exist beyond

that. Blood dues, you could say. And those arent collected in the

usual way, are they? Those ones tiptoe up behind you like a

sneak-thie.

That last night I lay in my cota new one, still pricklythinkingId die. The dread certainty entombed itsel in my skull. It wouldnt

be anything crazy, nobody was going to stab me in the neck with a

sharpened toothbrush or anything like that. No, itd be a boring

and commonplace kind o death. An itty-bitty shred o plaque

might detach rom an artery wall, sur through my bloodstream,

lodge in a ventricle and kill me dead. That would be air and right,

too, because Id killed a man mysel. A air one-to-one transaction,

blood cancelling blood. Fairer still that it should happen in the

hours beore my release. Youve got to gure that s just the way such

debts get repaid: with a gotcha.

I mustve sweated o hal my body weight that night. You couldve

wrung my cot like a sponge. When the rst wave o sunlight washed

across the cell foor . . . to be honest, I didnt know what to make o

it. I could still die two steps outside the gates, I guess. Thatd meet

the accepted terms just as well.And so it happened that one aternoon, nearly eight years ater

Id scrubbed with delousing powder and donned an orange jumpsuit,

my prison term ended. I collected the items Id been admitted with:

$2.32 in change, hal a roll o cherry Lie Savers stuck with pocket

lint. I shook a ew quarters out o the manila envelope and slid them

into the prisons pay phone.


40/124

c a t a r a c t c i t y 5

It was a surprise to everyone who I called. Truth? I surprised

mysel.

Exiting the penitentiary was a shocking experience. Maybe its

meant to be.

Two guards led me down a tight hallway, hands cued. A steel

door emptied into a small yard, its clipped grass shadowed by the

high wall. Jesus,grass.

One guard removed the cus while the other stood with a

shotgun at port arms. I rubbed my wristsnot because the cuswere tight but because Id seen it done in lms when the jailers took

the cus o a criminal. Which I was. The act cold-cocked me. For

the past eight years Id been a red sh swimming in a tank with

other red sh. But Id be reed into a sea o blue sh, law-abiding

sh, and I was earul Id stick outthe prison bars permanently

shadowing my ace, even in clean sunshine.

The guards opened another door set into the grey wall. I walked

between them. No tearul goodbyes. The door locked sotly behind

me. I stood in an archway ten eet rom a main road. The Saint

Lawrence Seaway was a strip o endless blue to the south. Cars

motored up and down the hill, entering and exiting my sightline

with strange suddenness. I hadnt seen anything move so ast in

eight years; my eyes needed to adjust.

I took a ew tentative steps. A tight group o onlookers clustered

on the ar sidewalk, gawking at me. Id heard about these people;they hung around the gates hoping or this exact sightthe rst

umbling steps o a long con as he squinted into the new sunlight,

his legs trembling like a newborn oals.

Ghouls. I ought to fip them the bird! But the idea o doing

so lled me with shapeless earI pictured one o them making

a call, then the prison doors opening to swallow me up again.


41/124


What charge? A red sh ailing to swim submissively amongst

the blue sh?

Owen leaned on the hood o his Lincoln, his right kneethe

bad oneslightly bent to take the weight o.

Thanks or coming, I said.

His ace tilted upwards, smiling at the sun. Hop in, man.

The Kingston Pen stood atop a hill, a monstrosity o conical

turrets and razorwire. Id orgotten how beastly it looked rom

the outside. I unrolled the car window. Wind curled over the

earth, pulling up the smell o springtime grass. I inhaled deep,dizzying breaths.

Owen drove down a switchback and hit the highway. My breath

came in a shallow rushI was nearly hyperventilating. Stands o

Jack pine blurred into a green wall topped by a limitless sky. I hadnt

seen unbroken sky in so long. Its too easy to orget the sheer size

o the world. We didnt speak at all until we hit Cataract City limits.

It wasnt uncomortable.

So, Owen said, do I need to watch my ass?

Well, old buddy, its like this. Every night or the past eight

years Ive lain in bed with a three-hundred-pound schizo squealing

in his sleep underneath me. You gure Id want to wrongoot you i

it meant winding up back with all that?

Owen said: Fair enough.

We reached our old street, driving past the house Owe used to

live in. Not much had changed. The cars were rustier. I got out,then leaned in through the open window. Theres something Ill

want to talk to you about.

I thought we just settled that.

Yeah, we did. Dead issue. This is something else.

Remember what side o the law Im on, Dunk.

I cocked my head. Arent we on the same side?


42/124

c a t a r a c t c i t y 7

He gave me a quick hal-smile. O course, same side. Run it by

me any time.

The ront door to my parents house was locked but the key was hid-

den under a chunk o pinkish granite in the fowerbed, where itd

always been. The house was untouched: same photos in their amil-

iar rames, foorboards squeaking in the same spots they had when

as a teenager Id sneak out to watch the stock-car races. The TV was

new but the ridge was the same aded green number my olks had

owned since Moses wore diapers, running on a compressor my dadscrounged rom the Humberstone dump. A note sat on the kitchen

table, written in Moms neat cursive.

Sorry not to be home, Duncan. Both at work. Make yourself at home

and this IS your home, for however long you need it. Love, Mom & Dad.

My room was pretty much as Id let it. The poster on the wall o

Bruiser Mahoney was yellowed and curling at its edges, but the

sheets on my bed were resh.

I knelt at the closet door as Id done so many times as a boy and

peeled back a fap o carpeting. Pried up the loose foorboard and

took out the cigar box my ather had given me: Sancho Panza, it

said. My dad had passed it around the waiting room ater my birth,

back when smoking in hospitals wasnt a crime.

I sat on the foor cross-legged, opened the lid and pulled out an

old Polaroid: Me and Owe and Bruiser Mahoney, snapped in the

change room o the Memorial Arena. I turned it over, read the wordson the back.

To Duncan and Dutchie, two warriors in the Bruiser Mahoney

armada. Yours, BM.

I lited out the boxs nal item. It had remained in my backpack

next to my hospital bed when I was twelve. Nobody had bothered

to poke through the pack: not the cops, not my olks, nobody. When


43/124


my parents drove me home rom the hospital Id placed the item in

the box under the foorboards, where itd sat now or . . . how long?

Over twenty years.

The silver nish was tarnished but the weight was true. I cracked

the cylinder, spun it, spellbound by the perect coin o light that

glinted through each empty chamber.


44/124

Cataract City

By Craig Davidson

Shortlisted for the Giller Prize

Owen and Duncan are childhood friends who've grown up in picturesque Niagara

Falls--known to them by the grittier name Cataract City. As the two know well,

there's more to the bordertown than meets the eye: behind the gaudy storefronts

and sidewalk vendors, past the hawkers of tourist T-shirts and cheap souvenirs live

the real people who scrape together a living by toiling at the Bisk, the local cookie

factory. And then there are the truly desperate, those who find themselves drawn to

the borderline and a world of dog-racing, bare-knuckle fighting, and night-timesmuggling.

Owen and Duncan think they are different: both dream of escape, a longing made

more urgent by a near-death incident in childhood that sealed their bond. But in

adulthood their paths diverge, and as Duncan, the less privileged, falls deep into

the town's underworld, he and Owen become reluctant adversaries at opposite ends

of the law. At stake is not only survival and escape, but a lifelong friendship that

can only be broken at an unthinkable price.

Buy a copy of Cataract City

Hardcover

Amazon | Indigo

eBook


Excerpted from Cataract Cityby Craig Davidson. Copyright 2013 by Craig Davidson. Excerpted bypermission of Doubleday Canada, a division of Random House of Canada Limited. All rights reserved.No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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45/124


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The Luminaries

E L E A N O R C AT T O N


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M ERC URY I N S AG IT TA RI US

In which a stranger arrives in Hokitika; a secret council isdisturbed; Walter Moody conceals his most recent memory;

and Thomas Balfour begins to tell a story.

The twelve men congregated in the smoking room of the Crown

Hotel gave the impression of a party accidentally met. From the vari-

ety of their comportment and dressfrock coats, tailcoats, Norfolkjackets with buttons of horn, yellow moleskin, cambric, and twill

they might have been twelve strangers on a railway car, each bound

for a separate quarter of a city that possessed fog and tides enough

to divide them; indeed, the studied isolation of each man as he pored

over his paper, or leaned forward to tap his ashes into the grate, or

placed the splay of his hand upon the baize to take his shot at bil-

liards, conspired to form the very type of bodily silence that occurs,

late in the evening, on a public railwaydeadened here not by theslur and clunk of the coaches, but by the fat clatter of the rain.

Such was the perception of Mr. Walter Moody, from where he

stood in the doorway with his hand upon the frame. He was innocent

of having disturbed any kind of private conference, for the speakers

had ceased when they heard his tread in the passage; by the time he

opened the door, each of the twelve men had resumed his occupa-

tion (rather haphazardly, on the part of the billiard players, for they

had forgotten their places) with such a careful show of absorption

that no one even glanced up when he stepped into the room


48/124

might have aroused Mr. Moodys interest, had he been himself in

body and temperament. As it was, he was queasy and disturbed.

He had known the voyage to West Canterbury would be fatal atworst, an endless rolling trough of white water and spume that

ended on the shattered graveyard of the Hokitika bar, but he had

not been prepared for the particular horrors of the journey, of

which he was still incapable of speaking, even to himself. Moody

was by nature impatient of any deficiencies in his own person

fear and illness both turned him inwardand it was for this reason

that he very uncharacteristically failed to assess the tenor of the

room he had just entered.

Moodys natural expression was one of readiness and attention.

His grey eyes were large and unblinking, and his supple, boyish

mouth was usually poised in an expression of polite concern. His

hair inclined to a tight curl; it had fallen in ringlets to his shoulders

in his youth, but now he wore it close against his skull, parted on the

side and combed flat with a sweet-smelling pomade that darkened

its golden hue to an oily brown. His brow and cheeks were square,his nose straight, and his complexion smooth. He was not quite

eight-and-twenty, still swift and exact in his motions, and possessed

of the kind of roguish, unsullied vigour that conveys neither gulli-

bility nor guile. He presented himself in the manner of a discreet

and quick-minded butler, and as a consequence was often drawn

into the confidence of the least voluble of men, or invited to broker

relations between people he had only lately met. He had, in short,

an appearance that betrayed very little about his own character, andan appearance that others were immediately inclined to trust.

Moody was not unaware of the advantage his inscrutable grace

afforded him. Like most excessively beautiful persons, he had stud-

ied his own reflection minutely and, in a way, knew himself from the

outside best; he was always in some chamber of his mind perceiv-

ing himself from the exterior. He had passed a great many hours in

the alcove of his private dressing room, where the mirror tripled his

image into profile, half-profile, and square: Van Dycks Charles,

though a good deal more striking It was a private practice and one

4 A Sphere within a Sphere


49/124

condemned, by the moral prophets of our age! As if the self had no

relation to the self, and one only looked in mirrors to have ones

arrogance confirmed; as if the act of self-regarding was not assubtle, fraught and ever-changing as any bond between twin souls.

In his fascination Moody sought less to praise his own beauty than

to master it. Certainly whenever he caught his own reflection, in a

window box, or in a pane of glass after nightfall, he felt a thrill of

satisfaction but as an engineer might feel, chancing upon a mech-

anism of his own devising and finding it splendid, flashing, properly

oiled and performing exactly as he had predicted it should.

He could see his own self now, poised in the doorway of the

smoking room, and he knew that the figure he cut was one of per-

fect composure. He was near trembling with fatigue; he was

carrying a leaden weight of terror in his gut; he felt shadowed, even

dogged; he was filled with dread. He surveyed the room with an air

of polite detachment and respect. It had the appearance of a place

rebuilt from memory after a great passage of time, when much has

been forgotten (andirons, drapes, a proper mantel to surround thehearth) but small details persist: a picture of the late Prince

Consort, for example, cut from a magazine and affixed with shoe

tacks to the wall that faced the yard; the seam down the middle of

the billiard table, which had been sawn in two on the Sydney docks

to better survive the crossing; the stack of old broadsheets upon the

secretary, the pages thinned and blurry from the touch of many

hands. The view through the two small windows that flanked the

hearth was over the hotels rear yard, a marshy allotment litteredwith crates and rusting drums, separated from the neighbouring

plots only by patches of scrub and low fern, and, to the north, by

a row of laying hutches, the doors of which were chained against

thieves. Beyond this vague periphery, one could see sagging laun-

dry lines running back and forth behind the houses one block to the

east, latticed stacks of raw timber, pigpens, piles of scrap and sheet

iron, broken cradles and flumeseverything abandoned, or in

some relative state of disrepair. The clock had struck that late hour

of twilight when all colours seem suddenly to lose their richness

527 JANUARY 1866


50/124

bleached and fading. Inside, the spirit lamps had not yet succeeded

the sea-coloured light of the dying day, and seemed by virtue of

their paleness to accent the general cheerlessness of the roomsdecor.

For a man accustomed to his club in Edinburgh, where all was

lit in hues of red and gold, and the studded couches gleamed with

a fatness that reflected the girth of the gentlemen upon them;

where, upon entering, one was given a soft jacket that smelled

pleasantly of anise, or of peppermint, and thereafter the merest

twitch of ones finger towards the bell-rope was enough to summon

a bottle of claret on a silver tray, the prospect was a crude one. But

Moody was not a man for whom offending standards were cause

enough to sulk: the rough simplicity of the place only made him

draw back internally, as a rich man will step swiftly to the side, and

turn glassy, when confronted with a beggar in the street. The mild

look upon his face did not waver as he cast his gaze about, but

inwardly, each new detailthe mound of dirty wax beneath this

candle, the rime of dust around that glasscaused him to retreatstill further into himself, and steel his body all the more rigidly

against the scene.

This recoil, though unconsciously performed, owed less to the

common prejudices of high fortunein fact Moody was only mod-

estly rich, and often gave coins to paupers, though (it must be owned)

never without a small rush of pleasure for his own largessethan to

the personal disequilibrium over which the man was currently, and

invisibly, struggling to prevail. This was a gold town, after all, new-built between jungle and surf at the southernmost edge of the

civilised world, and he had not expected luxury.

The truth was that not six hours ago, aboard the barque that

had conveyed him from Port Chalmers to the wild shard of the

Coast, Moody had witnessed an event so extraordinary and affect-

ing that it called all other realities into doubt. The scene was still

with himas if a door had chinked open, in the corner of his

mind, to show a band of greying light, and he could not now wish

the darkness back again It was costing him a great deal of effort



51/124

any unorthodoxy or inconvenience was personally affronting. He

felt as if the whole dismal scene before him was an aggregate echo

of the trials he had so lately sustained, and he recoiled from it inorder to prevent his own mind from following this connexion, and

returning to the past. Disdain was useful. It gave him a fixed sense

of proportion, a rightfulness to which he could appeal, and feel

secure.

He called the room luckless, and meagre, and drearyand with

his inner mind thus fortified against the furnishings, he turned to

the twelve inhabitants. An inverted pantheon, he thought, and

again felt a little steadier, for having indulged the conceit.

The men were bronzed and weathered in the manner of all

frontiersmen, their lips chapped white, their carriage expressive of

privation and loss. Two of their number were Chinese, dressed

identically in cloth shoes and grey cotton shifts; behind them stood

a Maori native, his face tattooed in whorls of greenish-blue. Of the

others, Moody could not guess the origin. He did not yet under-

stand how the diggings could age a man in a matter of months;casting his gaze around the room, he reckoned himself the

youngest man in attendance, when in fact several were his juniors

and his peers. The glow of youth was quite washed from them.

They would be crabbed forever, restless, snatching, grey in body,

coughing dust into the brown lines of their palms. Moody thought

them coarse, even quaint; he thought them men of little influence;

he did not wonder why they were so silent. He wanted a brandy,

and a place to sit and close his eyes.He stood in the doorway a moment after entering, waiting to be

received, but when nobody made any gesture of welcome or dis-

missal he took another step forward and pulled the door softly

closed behind him. He made a vague bow in the direction of the

window, and another in the direction of the hearth, to suffice as a

wholesale introduction of himself, then moved to the side table and

engaged himself in mixing a drink from the decanters set out for

that purpose. He chose a cigar and cut it; placing it between his

teeth he turned back to the room and scanned the faces once

727 JANUARY 1866


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suited him. He seated himself in the only available armchair, lit his

cigar, and settled back with the private sigh of a man who feels his

daily comforts are, for once, very much deserved.His contentment was short-lived. No sooner had he stretched out

his legs and crossed his ankles (the salt on his trousers had dried,

most provokingly, in tides of white) than the man on his immedi-

ate right leaned forward in his chair, prodded the air with the

stump of his own cigar, and said, Look hereyouve business, here

at the Crown?

This was rather abruptly phrased, but Moodys expression did

not register as much. He bowed his head politely and explained

that he had indeed secured a room upstairs, having arrived in town

that very evening.

Just off the boat, you mean?

Moody bowed again and affirmed that this was precisely his

meaning. So that the man would not think him short, he added that

he was come from Port Chalmers, with the intention of trying his

hand at digging for gold.Thats good, the man said. Thats good. New finds up the

beachshes ripe with it. Black sands: thats the cry youll be hear-

ing; black sands up Charleston way; thats north of here, of

courseCharleston. Though youll still make pay in the gorge. You

got a mate, or come over solo?

Just me alone, Moody said.

No affiliations! the man said.

Well, Moody said, surprised again at his phrasing, I intend tomake my own fortune, thats all.

No affiliations, the man repeated. And no business; youve no

business, here at the Crown?

This was impertinentto demand the same information

twicebut the man seemed genial, even distracted, and he was

strumming with his fingers at the lapel of his vest. Perhaps, Moody

thought, he had simply not been clear enough. He said, My busi-

ness at this hotel is only to rest. In the next few days I will make

inquiries around the diggingswhich rivers are yielding which val-



53/124

I intend to stay here at the Crown for one week, and after that, to

make my passage inland.

Youve not dug before, then.No, sir.

Never seen the colour?

Only at the jewellerson a watch, or on a buckle; never pure.

But youve dreamed it, pure! Youve dreamed itkneeling in

the water, sifting the metal from the grit!

I suppose . . . well no, I havent, exactly, Moody said. The

expansive style of this mans speech was rather peculiar to him: for

all the mans apparent distraction, he spoke eagerly, and with an

energy that was almost importunate. Moody looked around,

hoping to exchange a sympathetic glance with one of the others,

but he failed to catch anybodys eye. He coughed, adding, I sup-

pose Ive dreamed of what comes afterwardsthat is, what the

gold might lead to, what it might become.

The man seemed pleased by this answer. Reverse alchemy, is

what I like to call it, he said, the whole business, I meanprospect-ing. Reverse alchemy. Do you seethe transformationnot into

gold, but outof it

It is a fine conceit, sir,reflecting only much later that this

notion chimed very nearly with his own recent fancy of a pantheon

reversed.

And your inquiries, the man said, nodding vigorously, your

inquiriesyoull be asking around, I supposewhat shovels, what

cradlesand maps and things.Yes, precisely. I mean to do it right.

The man threw himself back into his armchair, evidently very

amused. One weeks board at the Crown Hoteljust to ask your

questions! He gave a little shout of laughter. And then youll spend

two weeks in the mud, to earn it back!

Moody recrossed his ankles. He was not in the right disposition

to return the other mans energy, but he was too rigidly bred to con-

sider being impolite. He might have simply apologised for his

discomfiture and admitted some kind of general malaisethe

927 JANUARY 1866


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his rising gurgle of a laughbut Moody was not in the habit of

speaking candidly to strangers, and still less of confessing illness to

another man. He shook himself internally and said, in a brightertone of voice,

And you, sir? You are well established here, I think?

Oh, yes, replied the other. Balfour Shipping, youll have seen

us, right past the stockyards, prime locationWharf-street, you

know. Balfour, thats me. Thomas is my Christian name. Youll

need one of those on the diggings: no man goes by Mister in the

gorge.

Then I must practise using mine, Moody said. It is Walter.

Walter Moody.

Yes, and theyll call you anything but Walter too, Balfour said,

striking his knee. Scottish Walt, maybe. Two-Hand Walt, maybe.

Wally Nugget. Ha!

That name I shall have to earn.

Balfour laughed. No earning about it, he said. Big as a ladys

pistol, some of the ones Ive seen. Big as a ladysbut, Im tellingyou, not half as hard to put your hands on.

Thomas Balfour was around fifty in age, compact and robust in

body. His hair was quite grey, combed backward from his forehead,

and long about the ears. He wore a spade-beard, and was given to

stroking it downward with the cup of his hand when he was

amusedhe did this now, in pleasure at his own joke. His pros-

perity sat easily with him, Moody thought, recognising in the man

that relaxed sense of entitlement that comes when a lifelong opti-mism has been ratified by success. He was in shirtsleeves; his cravat,

though of silk, and finely wrought, was spotted with gravy and

coming loose at the neck. Moody placed him as a libertarian

harmless, renegade in spirit, and cheerful in his effusions.

I am in your debt, sir, he said. This is the first of many customs

of which I will be entirely ignorant, I am sure. I would have cer-

tainly made the error of using a surname in the gorge.

It was true that his mental conception of the New Zealand dig-

gings was extremely imprecise informed chiefly by sketches of the



55/124

the dustand a dim sense (he did not know from where) that the

colony was somehow the shadow of the British Isles, the unformed,

savage obverse of the Empires seat and heart. He had been sur-prised, upon rounding the heads of the Otago peninsula some two

weeks prior, to see mansions on the hill, quays, streets, and plotted

gardensand he was surprised, now, to observe a well-dressed gen-

tleman passing his lucifers to a Chinaman, and then leaning across

him to retrieve his glass.

Moody was a Cambridge fellow, born in Edinburgh to a modest

fortune and a household staff of three. The social circles in which

he had tended to move, at Trinity, and then at Inner Temple in his

more recent years, had not at all the rigid aspect of the peerage,

where ones history and context differed from the next man only in

degree; nevertheless, his education had made him insular, for it had

taught him that the proper way to understand any social system

was to view it from above. With his college chums (dressed in capes,

and drunk on Rhenish wine) he would defend the merging of the

classes with all the agony and vitality of the young, but he wasalways startled whenever he encountered it in practice. He did not

yet know that a goldfield was a place of muck and hazard, where

every fellow was foreign to the next man, and foreign to the soil;

where a grocers cradle might be thick with colour, and a lawyers

cradle might run dry; where there were no divisions. Moody was

some twenty years Balfours junior, and so he spoke with deference,

but he was conscious that Balfour was a man of lower standing

than himself, and he was conscious also of the strange miscellanyof persons around him, whose estates and origins he had not the

means to guess. His politeness therefore had a slightly wooden qual-

ity, as a man who does not often speak with children lacks any

measure for what is appropriate, and so holds himself apart, and

is rigid, however much he wishes to be kind.

Thomas Balfour felt this condescension, and was delighted. He

had a playful distaste for men who spoke, as he phrased it, much too

well, and he loved to provoke themnot to anger, which bored him,

but to vulgarity He regarded Moodys stiffness as if it were a fash-

1127 JANUARY 1866


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confining to the wearerhe saw all conventions of polite society in

this way, as useless ornamentationsand it amused him, that the

mans refinement caused him to be so ill at ease.Balfour was indeed a man of humble standing, as Moody had

guessed. His father had worked in a saddlery in Kent, and he might

have taken up that mantle, if a fire had not claimed both father and

stable in his eleventh yearbut he was a restless boy, with frayed cuffs

and an impatience that belied the dreamy, half-focused expression he

habitually wore, and the dogged work would not have suited him. In

any case, a horse could not keep pace with a railway car, as he was

fond of saying, and the trade had not weathered the rush of chang-

ing times. Balfour liked very much to feel that he was at the vanguard

of an era. When he spoke of the past, it was as if each decade prior

to the present year was an ill-made candle that had been burned and

spent. He felt no nostalgia for the stuff of his boyhood lifethe dark

liquor of the tanning vats, the rack of hides, the calfskin pouch where

his father stored his needles and his awland rarely recalled it,

except to draw a comparison with newer industries. Ore: that waswhere the money lay. Coalmines, steelworks, and gold.

He began in glass. After several years as an apprentice he

founded a glassworks of his own, a modest factory he later sold for

a share in a coalmine, which in due course was expanded to a net-

work of shaft mines, and sold to investors in London for a grand

sum. He did not marry. On his thirtieth birthday he bought a one-

way ticket on a clipper ship bound for Veracruz, the first leg of a

nine-month journey that would take him overland to theCalifornian goldfields. The lustre of the diggers life soon paled for

him, but the ceaseless rush and hope of the fields did not; with his

first dust he bought shares in a bank, built three hotels in four years,

and prospered. When California dried he sold up and sailed for

Victoriaa new strike, a new uncharted landand thence, hear-

ing once again the call that carried across the ocean like a faery

pipe on a rare breeze, to New Zealand.

During his sixteen years on the raw fields Thomas Balfour had

met a great many men like Walter Moody and it was a credit to his



57/124

and regard for the virgin state of men yet untested by experience, yet

untried. Balfour was sympathetic to ambition, and unorthodox, as a

self-made man, in his generosity of spirit. Enterprise pleased him;desire pleased him. He was disposed to like Moody simply for the

reason that the other man had undertaken a pursuit about which he

evidently knew very little, and from which he must expect a great

return.

On this particular night, however, Balfour was not without

agenda. Moodys entrance had been something of a surprise to the

twelve assembled men, who had taken considerable precautions to

ensure that they would not be disturbed. The front parlour of the

Crown Hotel was closed that night for a private function, and a boy

had been posted under the awning to watch the street, lest any man

had set his mind on drinking therewhich was unlikely, for the

Crown smoking room was not generally celebrated for its society

or its charm, and indeed was very often empty, even on the week-

end nights when the diggers flooded back from the hills in droves

to spend their dust on liquor at the shanties in the town. The boyon duty was Mannerings, and had in his possession a stout bundle

of gallery tickets to give away for free. The performanceSensations

from the Orient!was a new act, and guaranteed to please, and there

were cases of champagne ready in the opera-house foyer, courtesy

of Mannering himself, in honour of opening night. With these

diversions in place, and believing that no boat would risk a landing

in the murky evening of such an inclement day (the projected

arrivals in the shipping pages of the West Coast Timeswere, by thathour, all accounted for), the assembled party had not thought to

make provision for an accidental stranger who might have already

checked in to the hotel some half-hour before nightfall, and

five fantastic literary novels in one great sampler!

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