Howard Norman - Devotion

People lost their way. They sometimes made a wrong turn off the two-lane into the estate. Tourists, visiting relatives of folks in Parrsboro, it might be anyone. At least a dozen times while lying in bed at night, or sitting on the screen porch, he’d heard a car radio. One night he heard a car approach, laughter, then, “Not here, Charlie, can’t you see it’s private property,” then the sound of the car leaving. That had been at 3:30 A.M., the night still young.

The car seemed almost to materialize out of the crepuscular light, crunching gravel under its hubcapped tires, headlights sweeping the main house. David stood ten or so feet from the bank. When the car stopped, he saw it was a 1956 Buick, the exact model and year his family had owned in Vancouver. No doubt he’d heard “Duke of Earl” on the car radio; his mother used to listen to the pop station. “A big stupid American car,” she’d say, “but at least I have one. Some divorcées of my acquaintance don’t.” The mind plays tricks, if it does anything it plays tricks, but this was not the ghost of his father, the ghost of his mother, arrived to Nova Scotia after driving around in the afterlife of Canada all these years. And yet what were the odds of a 1956 Dynaflow suddenly appearing? Seeing as Buick had manufactured thousands of these cars, the conundrum — the uncanny aspect of it here at the estate — was, of course, meaningful only in the context of his own childhood.

The Buick now turned around. Just someone lost, David thought. He swam a little — look, the swanherd’s hardly a graceful swimmer. The swans kept near the opposite bank. David sidestroked awhile. Then stood again, the water rimming his body, giving him the memory sensation of when he’d stood next to the leather examination couch in Dr. Steenhagen’s office, shivering in his skivvies as the doctor held a metal tape measure around his body at chest level. Ardith had brought him in for the swan bite, but Steenhagen decided to add a general checkup, too. He wrote down David’s chest measurement, listened to his heart and lungs through the stethoscope, all routine stuff.

“Things look fine,” he said to Ardith. “I assure you, this bite is nothing to worry about. No worries here at all. You might expect David to have some soreness, but no infection. It’ll heal on its own. Just put the ointment on twice a day as prescribed. Change the bandage. He’ll be just fine.”

The Buick came back. The headlights were off. David could scarcely make out the car’s full definition. Something wrong here.

The car stopped. The driver’s-side door opened but didn’t close. The engine idled. David waited, staring at the car. Five or six minutes went by. He then heard a shotgun blast — thundering echo in all directions, it seemed, the pond, the trees, the guesthouse. David saw a figure running from the main house to the car (he hadn’t seen it go to the house, a trick of light), then heard William’s voice, straining but loud and clear, cracking in midsentence: “You broke my window, you cowardly little shit!” William fired off another round; David saw the flash. He heard a branch fall through other branches and hit the ground. William had aimed high on purpose, when he could easily have hit the car. The car door slammed. The car was jammed into gear, wheels spun, the car lurched into reverse, sending up a dust cloud, the spray and hover of gravel dust slightly illuminated when the taillights came on. Then it disappeared.

David witnessed the incident as if it took place in a netherworld of shadow puppets. What snapped him back to his senses was hearing the swans’ distress. He turned and saw wings fluttering in the dark, heard wings roiling up water. David scrambled up to dry ground, threw on his shorts, hopping forward the whole time. He ran to the house, yelling, “William, it’s me — David! It’s me — David!” so as not to be shot.

When he got close to the porch, he stopped, held up his hands as if under arrest, said, “It’s me — David.”

“Jesus Holy Christ in heaven, will you please stop introducing yourself!” William said.

“I was in the pond.”

William did not respond right away, but finally said, “Hey, now’s an opportunity to knock your lights out, eh? But I guess a shotgun’s a bit extreme for that purpose.” William laughed hard, coughed a little, cleared his throat. He was wearing a bathrobe and unlaced work boots. He broke open the shotgun, held it slantwise, barrel pointing down and away from David. He stepped off the porch. “Daring nighttime robbery. The little bastard interrupted my favorite opera. Did you get a look at him?”

“No. Too far away.”

“I can’t tell you how many times I’ve wanted to take a dip myself, sweltering in my goddamn invalid bed as I was for so long.”

“Are you all right, William?”

“I’m the one had the shotgun.”

“I didn’t even know you owned one.”

“Under my bed the whole time.”

“No kidding.”

“This shotgun was my father’s in Scotland. Once in a blue moon I go quail hunting.”

“We should call the authorities now.”

“The thing is, I know that boy. The hooligan.”

“Good, you can identify him. I’ll put in the call.”

“Oh, hold on a minute,” William said. “Hold on. Let me tell you something.”

“I’m making the call,” David said. “It’s a Buick Dynaflow he was driving.”

“I know the car. I know the boy who drove it. His name is Toby Knox. He’s not so bad. He works at the drive-in movie in Truro, or did last I heard, but he’s from Parrsboro here. Toby’s one of those kids you might first theorize was knocked on the head, maybe playing hockey, and never quite recovered. But you’d be wrong. He’s got native intelligence. Though he keeps a good secret of it. Anyway, he’s the one broke into the house. What puzzles me, Toby’d likely have known I was in the house, because I’m so seldom not in it. Plus, there were a few lights on.”

“William, what does it matter? He broke in. A report has to be filed.”

“I’m not filing any goddamn report.”

William went back into the house; David walked back to the pond. The swans were huddled out of the water. Without visible cue, they stood in unison and, like a weary encampment of white-muslin-clad infantry given marching orders by the wind, moved off along the bank into the cattails, out of view. Yet a few moments later they seemed to pick up the sound of the returning car before David did; the cattails rustled as the swans emerged and bellied out onto the water, their safest haven.

“Alert the Mounties,” David said. “The Duke of Earl’s back.”

He walked to the main house again. The car door opened, a figure stepped out, slammed shut the door. David saw a match flare, caught a glimpse of the young man’s face, slicked-backhair, a Hawaiian shirt. The ember of a cigarette like a firefly impaled to the dark. The man took a few steps, then stopped. “I’m the one Mr. Field shot at,” he said.

“Toby Knox, I’m telephoning to get you arrested.”

“Seems only right.”

“It is right.”

“Give me a minute to apologize to Mr. Field first. Please.”

“You tried to break in and you want me to let you in?”

“You’re the temporary caretaker, right? David? David, isn’t it?”

“That’s right.”

“Naomi Bloor’s my next-door neighbor. See, just now I told you where I live. Mr. Field’s known me all my life. I’ve known Maggie my whole life too. I’m giving myself up.”

“Good for you.”

David went up on the porch and opened the door and stepped inside. He heard an aria on the phonograph; he didn’t know the language. He went to William’s room. William lay on the bed with his eyes closed. David knocked on the open door and said, “Toby Knox is outside. He wants to talk with you.”