Ann-Marie MacDonald - Way the Crow Flies

Except that a little girl is dead.

Jack’s forehead rests on the back of his hand and he gives the weight of his head to the fencepost. A child has died. He sees in his mind’s eye a little girl with brown hair tousled around her head, lying on her back in a field. She has his daughter’s face. He cries. There is no one around. In his mind he hears his daughter’s voice, Daddy . He sobs into his arm. Oh God . A child has died. His face in both his hands— dear God. A child .

“Oh God,” he says, sniffing, wiping his nose with his forearm — the words coming up like crumpled paper. Breathing in through his mouth, both palms smearing his face. Not my little girl, but a dear child. Taken. Just like that. He slams his fist onto the fencepost, Jesus —and again, Jesus —let him alone with the likes of that , whatever it was that killed her — he wrenches the post in the earth like a bad tooth— smash him, tear him apart. With my bare hands .

He lets go of the smooth wood. His eyes still streaming, he starts for home, pulling his shirt out from his trousers to dry his face, blow his nose. His hanky is in his uniform jacket on the back of the kitchen chair at home, he has come out in his blue shirt-sleeves, and now he realizes that it’s cold, April’s sharp end.

He is grateful that no car has come along, for he is half out of uniform, no jacket, tie or hat. LMF . The initials come to mind — perhaps because he knows he is a poor sight at the moment. Lack of moral fibre . When he was in training, he knew a man who was turfed from the air force for that. It could mean anything. Usually it meant cowardice. Failure of nerve. Breakdown after a bombing run or, during training, the inability to go back up.

Madeleine stands still as a statue outside Mike’s bedroom door. It is closed, but she can hear Maman softly singing. Her voice is muffled, but Madeleine recognizes the tune. “Un Acadien errant.” Mike’s favourite song. Maman has not sung to him in a long while, not since they moved here. He has not required songs, he has required privacy for himself and his sacred airplane models.

Madeleine knows Maman is probably rubbing his back, warm beneath his hockey pajamas. Mike is lying on his stomach with his hazel eyes open, calmly gazing into the dark. Madeleine listens, standing so still she is convinced that, were she to move so much as a finger, it would creak and give her away.

It’s like waiting outside an operating room to see if the patient will pull through. Mike is going to be thirteen in a few months. He would kill Madeleine if he knew she was out here spying. But he is too wounded at the moment to kill anyone. Maman is bandaging him up. Inside, her voice softly rises and falls — the tale of a wandering Acadian, far from his home.

Henry Froelich sees Jack rounding the corner of St. Lawrence Avenue. He is out on his front step with the porch light off. “Good evening Jack.”

Jack squints at the Froelichs’ house, shielding his eyes from the street light that spreads like a stain.

“Is that you, Henry?”

“Ja .”

“How’s she going?”

“Not too good.”

Jack has no choice. He walks up the driveway, his eyes still dazzled by the smear of light; he can see part of Henry Froelich at the edge of a yellow orb. “If there’s anything I can do….” His voice sounds high and reedy, does Froelich notice?

“Jack?”

“Yes?” He clears his throat.

“When the police have interviewed everyone today, they interviewed you too, ja?”

“Yeah they did.”

“What do they ask you?”

“Let’s see, they asked me if I was out driving last Wednesday. Out on Highway 4. Asked if I saw anyone.” He coughs.

“You are ill.”

“Some kinda bug floatin’ around.”

“Do they ask if you have acquaintance with a war criminal?”

Jack’s surprise at being asked point-blank is genuine, no need to pretend and no need to lie, for the police did not ask him that. “No, they didn’t.” He half smiles, triggering twin throbs at his temple. “I’d’ve remembered that one. Why?”

“Do you wish a glass of wine, Jack?” Froelich’s hand is on the door.

“Hank?” It’s Karen Froelich from an upper window.

“Ja, mein Liebling?”

“Lizzie’s asking for you, baby. Hi Jack.”

Jack shields his eyes to look up and makes out her silhouette at the lit screen. “Hi Karen.”

“This thing is so screwed up,” she says, and he is struck again by how young she sounds. “The cops kept Ricky for hours before they even charged him, no lawyer, never even called us.”

“That oughta be enough to get this thing thrown out right there.”

“I’ve got a friend at the Star , I’m going to get him to come out here and—” A baby cries and Karen’s outline withdraws.

Froelich says, “Sorry, Jack, I go.”

“Get some sleep, eh?”

“You too, my friend.”

“What does your lawyer say?”

“We meet him tomorrow morning. Before the bail hearing.”

“Let me know if there’s anything I can do.”

“Mimi has been already very kind.”

The yellow orb has shrunk to a splotch and Jack can see most of his neighbour quite clearly now. There are tears in Froelich’s eyes. He extends his hand. Jack takes it.

“You are a good neighbour,” says Henry Froelich.

Madeleine’s foot has gone to sleep, crouched as she is outside Mike’s door. Bugs Bunny is asleep too, his ears criss-crossed over his eyes to block the night light. The only good thing about Ricky Froelich being arrested today is that no one has noticed the cut in Madeleine’s palm. She has kept it hidden, curled in her hand. It has scabbed over nicely and ceased to sting. She looks at it now in the semi-dark — a speck of moisture gleams at one end of the seam, she is tempted to see how far she can open her hand without causing it to bleed afresh. She hears the front door open downstairs, and steals back to her room as quietly as possible on pins and needles. Dad is home.

Mimi has left the kitchen light on. She has made him a meatloaf sandwich and placed it on the counter under Saran Wrap. Jack puts it in the fridge. He reaches to the cupboard above it and takes down the bottle of Scotch. A bottle lasts a long time in this house, it is still half full from last fall. Johnnie Walker Red. He pours a shot and swallows it. Puts an ice cube in his glass and pours another.

He takes off his shoes and creeps upstairs with his drink. The night light is on in the hall. His daughter’s door stands half open; he looks in on her. She is asleep on her back, curved like a fish, halo of hair on her pillow. He wipes his left eye, which always seeps after a headache. It was good to cry, he’s not made of stone. The ice snaps softly in his glass but she doesn’t stir. The room is full of her child’s breath, flannel, toothpaste and dreams. My little girl is safe.

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer lies on her bedside table next to a tattered Golden Book, Pinocchio . She is a scallywag. She will grow up to be anything she wants to be. My little spitfire. “Good night, sweetie,” he whispers.

Madeleine doesn’t answer, nor does she open her eyes when she feels his hand upon her forehead. He thinks she is asleep. She doesn’t want to disappoint him.

Before he turns to leave, she thinks she hears him say, “I love you,” and this is surprising because he always says, “Maman and I love you kids very much.” But she has heard it, and it’s one more reason to allow him to think she is asleep. Through the slits of her eyelids she sees his back silhouetted by the night light, and she moves her lips soundlessly—“I love you, Daddy.”