At this time Leo was sixty-five years of age, and reflecting on his life. After Cynthia left, Leo dressed and went to a Knights of Columbus meeting with his son-in-law.

In Rudy's pocket were the plans for the marina; in his mind was his sales pitch to his father-in-law. If he did not get this marina, he would be destitute.

In Rudy's soul was an unquenchable fear that he would as always be refused the money. In his heart was his hope that this marina would rekindle Cynthia's interest in him, if only to keep her from betraying him.

So, driving along the reserve with its small incomplete houses, and children sitting out on porches in the last hour of the day, the rays of sun falling on patches and slanted roofs, on shingles shining and dull, on empty dog tins, and the green grass at the back of the house, cool in the evening air, Rudy waited his moment.

Bellanger saw all of this, saw it all, and kept going over in his mind what he would say to Leo and when he would say it.

When we get to Carl Francis's house, he would tell himself. But the Francis house would be passed by; the porch, the dark second-storey window, the small speedboat with its fancy red flag.

Bellanger knew Leo McVicer was at the height of his power, even though, at sixty-five, he had almost ended his years of work. His decisions, always final, came quickly and without any thought. The car progressed, as well as the silence. But suddenly Leo moved in his seat, looked over at Rudy, and said: "Son of a bitch, a goddamn marina!"

"What?" Rudy said.

"It's what the people up in town have almost finished - surprised you didn't know? Amalgamation is coming and they are going to make us into a city - so of course we must look like a city. Now we don't have scows or boats or working people like I grew up with, and you grew up with too, Rudy - we have pretty little sailboats -"

"Where did you hear this?"

"Just heard." Leo sniffed. "Just heard."

He did not tell Rudy that he had known of Rudy's plans for three years and had been quietly working to build a marina in town with a small consortium of trusted pals. That he had convinced himself that Rudy had stolen his idea; and that this marina, of which he owned 37 percent, and which he pretended he hated, would be opened officially next July first.

They passed the entrance to the church ground, the last place Rudy had reflected on before the old man had spoken.

FIVE.

Only a few Knights made it to the meeting, and fewer stayed for mass.

Leopold's mind was not on church. It was on a variety of things men's minds are on when they go to church. Sports flitted to boxing, to ridicule in his youth, to the laughter he had had to endure as the son of a drunkard, to his mother's death, to his mistakes in business that resulted in an argument with his men and the collapse of his sawmill.

Saint Augustine wrote that men always believe they can con God into serving them, asking not for direction in their lives but for gain if they do right in service of Him, and he uses Cain's discussions with God to prove this. Though my father and I had read Saint Augustine, and perhaps Leopold McVicer had not, Leopold was a personification of this particular wry truth on this particular dusky fall evening.

He wanted to have a relationship with Cynthia, and he wanted God to believe that he was hoping for Gladys's well-being and thus sanction this relationship as being in the interests of his daughter. He also wanted the insurance money from his lost store and promised God a stained-glass window.

He wanted his sins forgiven, but sins he was not willing to admit to. Those sins he was not willing to admit to he wanted overlooked; they had to do with his mistress and the treatment of his three other children; and his mill, and the initial spill into the upper levels of Arron Brook.

People never knew how clever this old man really was. He had understood things for a long while now. He knew only Connie could have turned off the floodlights, only Mathew could have frightened him enough to do it; and Rudy was involved. Why? Because of the tag from the inside of Elly's skirt that had been left on the carpet that day, and the way the vacuuming had stopped, so that the creases on the floor were different. And Rudy's boots running down the road, which would never have been noticed, except the native boy Darcy Paul had helped Leo with his deer and had mentioned it peculiar; someone running with cowboy boots on the wrong feet. All of this had Leo suspicious, as did a speck of blood on the tile behind the carpet. He was sure there had been an attempt at an assault. It took him longer to decide Rudy was involved in the robbery, to cover his assault, and the bridge to cover up the robbery. He was still uncertain until a few months ago. But this is why he never gave Rudy the marina.

This week or the next he would tell Gladys what he had discovered, and let her decide how she wanted to proceed. Well, actually he would tell her how to proceed. And Rudy would be gone from their lives.

He stayed on his knees and prayed. He prayed for forgiveness and grace and peace of mind. And he prayed to get back at those who had sabotaged his bridge. He did not take communion.

SIX.

After mass Leo went into the vestry to speak to Father Porier about Vicka, the girl from Yugoslavia who, along with five other children, claimed she had seen the Virgin Mary.

The week before, Leo had promised to write a cheque to help cover Vicka's visit and he now wanted to know if Porier thought Vicka was a crook or was she on the up and up.

"Oh I think so," Porier said. "She is just a child who has had a wonderful gift and wishes to share it with the world."

Leo looked at one of the young altar boys who was leaving the room, and then looked back at Porier. He said he would help with her visit but he would be surprised if there was a miracle. Porier asked him if he believed in miracles.

"I don't know why God gives messages to Vicka and not to - oh, someone on T.V. like Regis and Kathie Lee - you know what I mean."

Porier nodded, and waited as Leo lit his pipe.

"You know, Leo, what you just said reminded me of something -"

Leopold, forever suspicious, suddenly felt he was being chastised.

"I was thinking of the little albino girl - the poet - what's her name?"

"Autumn Henderson?"

"Ah, Henderson - and how she came here with her little brother - yesterday - what's his name?"

"The little one - Percy."

"Ah yes - Percy - and that old dog of Trenton Pit - the little dog with the pointy ears and flat face - what's its name?"

"Scupper Pit," Leo said.

"Ah yes, Scupper Pit," Father Porier said. He smiled and went into some kind of reverie, and then looked at Leo.

"Well, what did they want?" Leo asked.

"Who?"

"The children - the children - not Scupper - I don't feel Scupper wanted much - except to follow the children - but what did the children want?"

"Well, the children. Autumn had the little girl with her too - what's her name - the little Pit girl?"

"Mother Teresa Pit."

"Ah yes, Mother Teresa Pit. Autumn asked for a blessing of her because of her heart. Then Percy wanted me to bless Scupper Pit. So I blessed Scupper. Percy wanted to pray at the bones of our saint for Teresa Pit and for his mother, who is sick."

"Their mother is sick? Elly?"

"Very sick - very sick -" Porier said. "She has had numerous miscarriages, you see - and - well, with herbicides et cetera -"

Porier lowered his eyes sadly. He knew who McVicer's three children were, where they went and who baptized them as theirs - and this knowledge gave him a certain power over McVicer.

"Percy is wonderful, and he lifted Teresa up for me to bless her. I told him that there were no saint bones in the church. And the little boy said to me, 'But there are!'

"'Oh,' I said, 'are there saint bones in my church?" (Here he affected astonishment.) "And Leopold, do you know what Percy said?"

"No, I don't," Leo said. "I don't know what Percy said. How would I know what Percy said? Percy may have said anything."

"Percy said, 'If there are no saint bones, then there is no church - you cannot have one without the other.'"

Leo was exasperated. He was exasperated because he didn't know what the child had meant, didn't know why it was a great thing to say, yet was jealous of the little child for saying it, especially after he had written a cheque for the visit of Vicka. Could Percy do that? No, he could not It was always up to him, McVicer.

"Children say all kinds of things," he said. "I have said similar things myself."

"You have?" Porier said.

"Of course I did - lots of smart things. Anyway," Leopold said, "I know Mathew Pit did it - the robbery."

"What - How - ?"

"You know the five hundred dollars? I bet my pocket money Elly never confessed to it at your confessional. Why? Because she never did it."

"Oh -"

"Mathew Pit - he had me fooled for a day or two - no, not even that long!"

The light had gone from the room and only a few electric candles burned. The altar boys had all gone.

"You see, no matter how long, things get figured out."

"You are right," Porier said. "All things unseen will be seen."

This struck Leopold not as comforting as he left.

The autumn night was warm, and smelled of rain through the oak doors. In the autumn night Porier stood, turned out the lights, and locked the back church door, from where he could see the white marble altar glowing faintly. He could not admit to himself the sexual misdeeds he had committed on the two poorest children in his ward thirty-five years before - his one lapse in all this time - Sydney Henderson and Connie Devlin.

Sydney had survived in some fashion. But it had ruined Devlin's life, so that he became a cheat, a drunk, and a liar in the world. Porier saw in Devlin's weak mouth and small, deceitful eyes a vague yet discerning moment of himself, of his own sad soul. He was hoping for God's forgiveness, without wanting to bear any further cross.

He knew who McVicer's other children were.

He knew. He knew who had burned the store, and who asked to have it done. He probably knew my father was innocent of every crime ever bestowed upon him.

Leo went home. He sat and thought a long time. Now the natives were saying he had stolen their land and were demanding restitution. And Dr. David Scone, who had once sat at his table, had taken their side; and so too had Diedre Whyne. Perhaps he would lose it all. But not if he was smart. He took off his uniform and sat in a chair near his bed. All his friends were now dead; others whom he had fed and clothed had turned against him in their piss-arsed pants. The premier, a man he had helped get elected, had snubbed him last Christmas. David Scone was publishing a book on the injustices against the First Nations. It was being serialized in the local paper. Seven times in the first three chapters Leo's company was mentioned, the wood he had cut, the roads he had dug out. And Scone wrote his reports against him in an office building his lumber had built and on paper his softwood had supplied.

Whyne was dead, Ike Pit was dead; those who had once offered him a Senate seat in Ottawa were dead, their pictures stiffly hanging on the walls of the Legislature. Unfortunately he was not dead. He was old, and his time had gone.

He loaded his shotgun as he did now every night.

Man can be defeated but not destroyed, he thought, and took some comfort in this, as a freezing man takes comfort in a small patch of sunlight on the snow.

Yet he thought of Percy, helping lift Teresa Pit so Father Porier would bless her, and was sad. He gave a prayer that he would build the church roof as long as God left him in peace. But when he closed his eyes, he saw only Percy Henderson, hauling Scupper Pit in his wagon, up to the church to pray for sweet, gentle Elly McGowan.

SEVEN.

Some nights Percy would sit by Mom, playing cards or checkers as she rested on the couch. She would tell him stories about long ago, when Autumn and I were children.

Often I was out, poaching, or drinking. If the poor rabbits knew I was selling their dead bodies for wine, they would be heartbroken.

Many nights I stood outside of a dance shivering because I didn't have the three bucks cover charge. I smelled of woodsmoke and iron, my eyes were deep brown, my skin the colour of poverty. I had colds that would not stop, I coughed night and day, or when I sat at the table in my thin shirt, sipping from a quart of smuggled-in wine, with a pack of Export "makins" sticking out of my pocket. Girls would pass my table and not look in my direction, frightened I would ask them over. Many times I could smell the balsam fir on me because I had loaded wood. Looking at old pictures, I realized that I resembled Roy Henderson, even to the clothes I wore. I had drifted back into the nineteenth century.

So what did it matter that I could quote Plato, or that my father had read to me as a child? I knew nothing about music. When once asked if I knew who the Beatles were, I said: a small armoured bug with mandible. I had fought back, I had learned. I had, like Autumn, taken certain courses in the frivolity of the world, only to sound ridiculous when I sang the lyrics coming from the age of yuppies, of Bright Lights, Big City.

On Thanksgiving Saturday there was a dance, and I came home drunk. Elly said that Dad had phoned. He had wanted to talk to me, and they had left the phone line open for a half hour. She told me he would be home for Christmas. She never told him she was sick - never that I was drunk. Mom asked me if I would go to church the next morning for her. She had never been drunk. I on the other hand had taken to being what my neighbours thought I was. For, once I became what they had delighted in saying I was, they feared me.

Still our old house belied my monstership. I wasn't even a thief in my heart. I sought not darkness but light. So such a rebellion as mine was a heartbroken one. And little Autumn knew this.

Whenever I saw the faded palm leaves from an old Palm Sunday behind a picture of Saint Bernadette of Lourdes, I would tremble. In the never-forgotten stories from my childlike mother I would remember that when our Virgin was speaking to Saint Bernadette, the voices from hell arose, and one look from the Virgin's quiet face sent them into howling submission and final silence. I would remember that Saint Bernadette's body in its glass resting spot had never corrupted. And I would realize that I had miserably failed these childhood stories, but I had never in my heart outgrown them. Never had I really disbelieved them.

More fool I to believe something I could not commit to and damn myself for my human weakness each and every day, when millions who mocked my belief never suffered a pang.

Mom believed. She believed in miracles just as she gave money she could ill afford to Save the Whales, Save the Seals, Save the Children. In this was her response to miracles in her life. So leave her to them. She believed in Saint Therese of the child Jesus, of little Saint Flora beheaded for her faith. There was in this, in the rains of autumn, or in the scent of the lilac of late spring, a feeling of quiet wonder and of peace.

Still, my mother had a peace beyond any I had experienced. She had a picture of a sperm whale that someone told her her money had helped keep alive. Christ, did they not know my mother had not a nickel?

I had just come from the dance. Our community centre was an old one-room school moved out on skids to the highway, and a bar and a dance floor put in. I went there, now looked upon as the failure I was.

And what had I done that very night to prove myself? I had attacked the fisherman Hanny Brown. And what was the reason? Well, he was six foot three and strong as a bear, but hadn't I proven to myself I could hit like a mule?

He had no idea why I attacked him, and I needed a reason. I yelled, so everyone would hear, that he had called my mother a whore.

"That is not true, son - I would say that to no woman."

I started to turn away but saw Cynthia Pit by the bar looking across at me. I threw a short right and I felt his legs buckle within the very vibration of my punch. He put his hand up to cover his mouth, and I came back with a left hook. And Hanny dropped. His wife started crying - his face was covered in blood, his shirt and tie spotted bright red, and he rolled over and pushed himself up.