Russell Banks - The Angel on the Roof

“Fish, mostly. A man can live a long time in this climate on fish and whiskey.”

“Very interesting. And you use lake water for washing, I suppose?”

Merle grunted.

“How long do you plan on staying out here, Mr. Ring?” Leon took another drink from the bottle and passed it back.

Merle said nothing.

As if his question had been answered, Leon went on. “And do you do this every winter, Mr. Ring? I mean, stay out on the ice, isolated like this, living off fish and whiskey and solitude?” He chuckled again. “I’m relatively new to the park,” he explained.

“I know.”

“Yes, of course. Well.” He wrestled himself free of his parka and flexed his shoulders and hands. “Say, it’s really comfortable in here, isn’t it? Smells a bit of whiskey and fried fish, though,” he said with a light laugh. “You wouldn’t mind if I had another sip of that, would you? What is it, by the way? It’s quite good! Really warms a man’s insides, doesn’t it?”

Merle handed him the bottle. “Canadian Club.”

Leon unscrewed the cap and took a long swallow, then slowly screwed the cap back on. “Yes. So, yes, I was saying, do you do this every year?”

“Man and boy.”

“But why ?”

“It makes the rest of the year more interesting,” Merle said wearily.

Leon was silent for a moment. “I wonder. Yes, I’ll bet it does. I couldn’t stand it, though. The isolation. And the cold, and the darkness.”

“It’s a good idea to get used to the idea. Like I said, it makes the rest of the year more interesting.”

Leon’s voice was tight and frightened. “Are you talking about dying?”

“I’m talking about living.”

“Speaking of living,” Leon said, suddenly hearty again, “you are probably wondering why I came all the way out here this evening.”

“Not particularly.”

“Yes. Well, anyhow, it has to do with the Grand Prize Drawing next week. You know, the state lottery?”

“Yep.”

“Folks in the park have been wondering, Mr. Ring, if you plan on attending that drawing over in Concord, and if not — assuming you win, for you just might win, you know — folks are wondering how you plan to pick up the prize money. You have to be there in person to pick up the prize money, you see…,” he trailed off, as if waiting to be interrupted.

Merle said nothing.

“Well. It occurred to some of us that you might not care to take the time off from your fishing to go all the way in to Concord and deal with those state officials and the reporters and so forth, seeing as how you enjoy your privacy and like to spend your winters alone out here on the lake, and we thought you might be able to empower someone else to do that chore for you. So I did a little checking around at the bank, which is where I’m employed, and, sure enough, you can empower someone else to pick up your prize money for you!” He waited a few seconds, but nothing more than the crackle and spit of the fire came out of the darkness, so he went on. “Anticipating your reluctance to leave your fishing at this time of year, I went ahead and took the liberty of having the necessary document drawn up by the bank attorney.” He went into his shirt pocket and brought forth a crisp, white envelope. “This document empowers me to act as your agent, should you win the Grand Prize Drawing,” he said, handing the envelope to Merle.

The old man took out the paper folded inside, and, at the sound, Leon snapped on his flashlight. “Where do I sign it?” Merle asked. His voice was strangely woeful and riddled with fatigue.

Leon directed him to a line at the bottom of the paper and handed him a pen.

Slowly, the old man placed the paper against his knee and scrawled his name on it. “There,” he said, and he handed the paper, envelope, and pen back to the bank clerk, who doused the light. “It’s your problem, now,” the old man said.

“No problem at all, Mr. Ring. None at all,” he said, as he stood and pulled his parka on. “I assume,” he went on, “that, if you win, you’ll want your check deposited in a savings account down at the bank.”

“No.”

“No?”

“Bring the money here.”

“Here?”

“In cash.”

“Cash?”

“Cash. No point letting some bank make money off my money. The government owns all the money anyhow. They just let us use it for a while. It’s the banks that foul everything up by getting in the middle. You bring me anything I win in hundred-dollar bills. You might use one of them to buy me a case of Canadian Club. I’ve always wanted a case of Canadian Club,” he said wistfully.

Leon seemed to have been struck dumb. He moved toward the door in the darkness, groping for the latch, and finally found it. Then he let himself out.

From here on out, it was as if everyone who knew Merle knew that he was going to win the lottery. Consequently, his solitude rarely went a day without being broken by a visit from someone who wanted to congratulate him and talk about the money. Also, the weather broke into what’s called the January Thaw, and people found the half-mile walk over ice and log floes of crusted snow less formidable than before. The wind died, the skies cleared to a deep blue, and daytime temperatures nudged the freezing mark, so at one time or another during the week following the visit from the bank clerk, practically everyone else in the park found an occasion to visit the old man. Even Claudel Bing (though he had not lived at the trailerpark for several years, he was still paying for a trailer there and, in his fashion, was courting Doreen Tiede, and as a result had kept up his links with the park) came out to Merle’s bob-house early one sunny afternoon.

He was already drunk when he arrived, a not uncommon occurrence that year, and, therefore, he wanted to talk about luck. In particular, his own bad luck. As compared to Merle’s good luck. Luck was Claudel’s obsession that year. It was the only way he could understand or even think about his life.

“You, you sonofabitch, you got all the luck,” he told Merle, who silently arranged his lines in the tip-ups and scooped ice chips away from the holes. “And that means there’s none left over for people like me! That’s the trouble with this goddamn country.” Claudel had brought his own bottle of whiskey, which he held between his legs and every now and then swigged at. “Now you take them fucking Commie bastards, like that Castro and them Chinese, their idea is to get rid of luck completely, so nobody gets any. That’s as bad as what we got here. Worse, actually. What I’d like to see is a system that lets everybody have a little luck. That’s what this country needs. Nobody gets a lot, and nobody gets none. Everybody gets a little.”

“How about bad luck?” Merle asked him. “Everybody going to get a little of that, too?” His beard and face and hands were pale green in the light from the holes, and as he moved slowly, smoothly over his traps and lines, checking bait and making sure the lines were laid precisely in the spools, he resembled a ghost.

“Sure! Why the hell not? When you got a little good luck, you can handle a little bad luck. It won’t break you. If I had money, for instance, it wouldn’t bother me that Ginnie run off with that goddamn sonofabitchin’ Howie Leeke,” he said earnestly. “But you wouldn’t understand. Not with your kind of luck. Shit,” he said and took a long drink from his bottle. “You ever lose a woman you loved, Merle?” he asked suddenly. “No, of course not. You’ve had all them wives, got wives and kids scattered all over the country, but none of them ever left you . No, you left them . Right? Am I right?”

“Can’t say exactly that I intended to leave them, though,” Merle said. “I guess I just willed it. You can will what you actually do, but what you intend is all you accomplish in the end.”