Russell Banks - Affliction

“For what?” I asked.

“What do you mean, ‘for what?’ To help Jack, of course, and to nail those sonsofbitches, the two Gordons, as old Alma calls them. Jesus Christ, Rolfe, whose side are you on in this?”

“Yours, naturally,” I assured him. But his intensity and the ferocity of his feelings alarmed me. And his chaos and apparent lack of focus, in spite of his obsession with this case, were causing me to react carefully. He switched from topic to topic, tone to tone: one minute he would be railing against Mel Gordon, the next he would be complaining about his toothache, which had persisted for weeks now; he spoke with anxious sympathy about Jack Hewitt, seeming almost to identify with the man, and then rambled on at tedious length about his car’s being in the garage and having to borrow Margie’s car and being unable to leave Pop alone in the house for very long; he turned bitter for a few moments as he spoke about Lillian and his custody suit, as he referred to it, and then practically wept when he recounted how Lillian was keeping him from being a good father to his own daughter.

It was an anxiety-producing conversation, to say the least, and I felt one of my old migraines coming on, as if a penlight inside my skull were being shined directly at my eyes from behind. I wanted to get away from him, so I took over the conversation and spoke with perhaps more authority than I normally would have. I do believe, however, that this was precisely what Wade wanted me to do and why he had called me in the first place. While he was talking, once it became evident to me that he had become hopelessly confused, I made notes on the yellow pad I keep by the phone, numbering his individual problems and putting them into relation to one another: this is, after all, one of the ways I solve my own problems, by naming them and by placing them in order, so that solving the least of my problems leads finally to the solution of the largest. Why not try to solve Wade’s problems the same way? Thus, when I decided to take over the conversation, I was able to speak with clarity and force. He listened and, for all I know, may have been taking notes himself, because as it turned out, he followed my advice to the letter. Which is why I feel today less than innocent, less than blameless for what eventually happened. Of course, I had no way of knowing how Wade would botch things, no way of predicting how simple circumstances would thwart him and no way of anticipating the forms he would eventually discover to express his increasingly violent feelings.

Wade got off the phone with me and, as I had suggested, immediately called Merritt’s garage to arrange to pick up his car. It was Chick Ward who answered, and when Wade said he was calling about his car, Chick laughed, a sneering knowing laugh, and said, “Wade, old buddy, there’s good news and bad news. Which do you want first?”

“Just give me the facts, Chick. I’m in a hurry.”

“Okay, the good news, old buddy, is we haven’t got to your car yet. It only came in yesterday afternoon, you know. That’s the good news, you understand.” His voice was loud, as if he were talking for the benefit of an audience of listeners other than Wade.

“What the hell are you up to?”

“You want the bad news?” Wade could picture Chick grinning at the other end, standing in the garage and flashing a knowing wink at Chub Merritt and anyone else who happened to be there resuscitating LaRiviere’s drowned pickup truck.

“Just tell me when you’ll have it fixed. It’s the starter motor, I’m pretty sure, it’s been giving me trouble—”

“The bad news,” Chick said, interrupting him, “is, the reason we ain’t got to your car yet is we got a problem here with a truck somebody drove through the ice last night. Figured you’d know something about that, Wade.”

Wade was silent for a second. “Yeah,” he said. “I know about that.”

“Yep. Figured. Chub also says to tell you that Gordon LaRiviere won’t let you bill your job back to him. You’ll have to pay for it yourself. Probably come to a couple hundred bucks, if it’s a starter motor, like you say.”

Wade said nothing. Money … he had none. No job, no money, no car, nothing.

“That okay with you, Wade?”

“Yeah. That’s fine with me.”

“Oh, I got some more of the bad news, Wade. You want to hear it?”

“Not particularly, you sonofabitch.”

“Hey, I’m just the messenger, you know. I just work here.”

“Tell me.”

“Well, Chub, he says you’re fired, Wade.”

“Fired! He can’t! He can’t fire me! LaRiviere already did that this morning.”

“Oh, yeah, Wade, he can. He’s one of the selectmen, and he said to tell you to turn your badge in and clean out your office down to the town hall and leave your office key with his wife there. She’ll be in the Board of Selectmen’s office all day. He says he’ll pull the CB and the police light off your car while he’s got it down here. I guess they’re town property, Wade.”

“Let me talk to Chub,” Wade said. “There’s some things he ought to know. Put Chub on.”

Chick muffled the phone for a few seconds, then came back on and said, “Chub says, he says to tell you he’s too busy drying out your ex-boss’s pickup truck to talk to you. Sorry.”

“Look, you sonofabitch, put Chub on! I know a few things he ought to know, goddammit. Before he fires me, he should know what I know about a few people in this town. You put him on, you hear?”

Again, Chick muffled the phone. A moment passed, and then Wade heard the receiver click, and a dial tone buzzed in his ear.

Slowly, Wade laid the receiver back in its cradle. So Chub was in it too! Chub Merritt was working with them. He was probably taking a cut from Gordon LaRiviere and Mel Gordon, and as one of the selectmen, he had as much access to the tax records as LaRiviere did, so his job was to keep quiet about Northcountry Development Corporation and, among other things, help keep Wade out of the way.

The throb in his jaw seemed to continue the buzz of the dial tone, distracting him abruptly from his mania — for by now it was that, a mania — and made him remember my second piece of advice, to call a dentist, for heaven’s sake, and get that tooth pulled. Take care of the little things first, the things that are distracting and handicapping you in your attempts to take care of the big things. Get your own car back, get your tooth pulled, let Pop take care of himself while you get your facts in order, and take your facts over the heads of the locals, whom you cannot trust, straight to the state police. Let the state police go to work on this. And then maybe try to get Jack Hewitt to turn himself in. But do it calmly, peacefully, rationally. Do not chase him around the countryside or go up against him in a bar or in LaRiviere’s shop, where there will be other people around. Talk to his girlfriend or his father, talk to somebody he trusts, and explain what is at stake for him here. Jack no longer trusts you, Wade, so you might have to let someone else convince him that he must confess his crime and incriminate the others. Save that young man, and break the others. And while you are doing that, instruct J. Battle Hand to pursue your case against Lillian. Now that you have given him information that not only tarnishes Lillian’s good-mother image but also implicates her own attorney, your Mr. Hand should be able to cut a deal that will force Lillian to give you back your rights as a father. In a few short weeks, before Christmas, maybe even before Thanksgiving, Wade, everything that now seems out of control and chaotic will be under control and orderly, and you and the fine woman who will soon be your wife and your lovely daughter Jill and your father will sit down to Thanksgiving dinner in the old family homestead together, and you will offer up a prayer to thank the Lord for all that He has given to you this year. And maybe I myself will join you at that table.