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Authors: Andre Alexis

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     Elizabeth chose to walk toward Regina and it was at Regina that she first saw
Father Pennant, the priest who, it seemed, would preside at her wedding.
     On this, his third afternoon in Barrow, Father Pennant was on his own. Lowther
Williams had gone to Wyoming to deliver a supply of unconsecrated hosts to the
church there. Before going, Lowther had recommended that Father Pennant visit ‘Regina,' Barrow's third mystery. Regina, source of the Thames River, was discovered in 1905 by
an Englishman named John Atkinson. Regina was a vein of glass-clear fresh water
that sprang from the ground, ran for six feet and returned underground. The
water was cold enough to rattle teeth, in summer or winter. It ran in a narrow,
stony depression that tapered at its ends so that, if your imagination was so
inclined, the source of the Thames resembled a vulva, which is why Atkinson,
attempting wit, named it ‘Regina' to rhyme with ‘vagina.' The name stuck, but it was now more often called ‘the Queen' by the people of Lambton County, and it had become a kind of shrine where
pregnant women – farm girls, mostly – went to pray for healthy children.
     Father Pennant was unprepared for Regina's beauty. The water ran so fast and constant, it was as if it did not run at
all. Regina was like a solid section of crystal. Father Pennant kneeled to
touch it and was surprised when his fingers parted the cold water.
     It was like this that Elizabeth saw Father Pennant for the first time, coming
upon him as he withdrew his fingers from the water. Startled, she apologized.
     – Oh, not at all, said Father Pennant, rising. I was just admiring the Queen.
Lowther told me how lovely it is, but it's really something, especially here in the middle of nowhere.
     – Yes, answered Elizabeth. Are you Father Pennant?
     – Yes, I am. And you are?
     – Elizabeth Denny. You met my aunt the other day. Anne Young?
     – So I did. I remember. She seems like a nice woman.
     They shook hands and then the two of them began walking toward the highway.
Beneath the shade of the trees, neither could see the other properly, but when
they came to the edge of the woods the sun was still shining and each saw the
other as if for the first time. Father Pennant saw a striking young woman with
light brown hair, a narrow nose, a gap between her front teeth. She was dressed
in slightly baggy blue jeans, and a man's work shirt beneath which she wore a pullover with three buttons (unbuttoned)
at the neck. She wore wire-rimmed glasses that distracted, somewhat, from her
eyes: hazel, expressive and beautiful. As they walked and spoke, he found
himself happy in her company.
     Elizabeth, for her part, did not take Father Pennant quite so deeply in. He was
taller than she was and his hands were large, almost ungainly, like the paws of
a young dog. Much more than that she did not register. He wore the uniform of
the priest: black suit with a white clerical collar. Nondescript. Still, she
was not uncomfortable in his presence.
     They walked in the direction of town. Elizabeth would have to turn back long
before they reached Barrow some seven kilometres away, but she was happy to
converse, and their talk turned quickly from the general to the specific. That
is, they began to talk about marriage, Elizabeth's wedding, its arrangements, the changes marriage would bring to her life, the
love she felt for her fiancé.
     – Have you ever been in love? she asked.
     – Yes, answered Father Pennant. I know people don't think priests live full lives, but yes, I've been in love.
     – Did you … ? Have you … ? You know … If you don't mind me asking?
     – I don't mind, but let me keep that to myself until we know each other better. It's very personal for me. But I have been in love and I do know what it's like to want someone.
     (Father Pennant knew very well what it was like to want someone. He remembered
the taste of salt, the smell of a room in Italy, the touch of a hand on his
back. And at the memory, the hair on the back of his head tingled as if he had
been caressed.)
     – Why did you become a priest, then, Father? I'm sorry if  …
     – No, don't apologize. I became a priest because I thought it was my calling. It's the way I wanted to be in this world. I believe in God and I think, as a
priest, I can do good.
     The occasional car or truck passed as they walked along the side of the road.
The air smelled of the woods (a slightly fungal exhalation) mingled with the
smell of the dirt road, the smell of weeds, the smell of spring.
     – People tend to focus on our vow of chastity, Father Pennant continued. And I
understand, because it's an unusual choice. But it isn't as if I have had an unfortunate accident. I've chosen the life I lead. I've had to learn the discipline. And I think it's made me more sensitive to the things I've given up. But even if I've given up physical love, I haven't given up on love itself. That would be perverse. I believe love is the most
powerful thing in our lives. An earthly miracle. It's what makes marriage so precious.
     – You were in love, Father, but you weren't married. Why should marriage matter, if love is such a miracle?
     – Marriage is a way of saying love exists, saying it aloud, a way of sharing the
thing inside you with your community. It's an act of generosity made by two people. Maybe in the past it was about other
things, but times have changed.
     All of which was fine and true or fine and not true, as far as Elizabeth was
concerned. Either way. She had no problem with love or marriage. Her problem,
insofar as it was a problem, was with doubt and apprehension – not big feelings, small ones, but just as distracting. She would not be
completely at ease until she knew what her doubts meant or how she was to take
them. But she was grateful for Father Pennant's advice.
     When it came time for them to part, she for home and he for town, Elizabeth
thanked the priest and shook his hand again before heading off. Father Pennant
smiled and said
     – See you soon
before turning his attention to the walk home.
     In the distance, the sun was setting. A pink tinge grew slowly more scarlet on
one side of the clouds and evening insinuated itself from above, turning the
upper arch of sky indigo.
II
MAY
F
ather Pennant's move to the country – away from civilization – was not without its inconveniences. The rectory's wiring was ancient and unpredictable. Though the freezer and stove were
reliable, the lights in the house sometimes cut out without warning and
returned just as unexpectedly. It would have been too expensive to have the
rectory rewired, so they learned to deal with the fickle lights. Father Pennant
now understood his predecessor's thing for candles. He made use of the many Father Fowler had collected. Every
room in the house had its own brass candle holder and he grew accustomed to
reading by candlelight, to sepia darkness punctured by candle flame.
     The town took to its new priest without difficulty. Most of the Catholics in
Barrow thought him likeable and sympathetic. The rest of the town treated him with the deference due a priest. So, it was not
long before he felt welcome. Of course, the hallmark of welcome is being let in
on gossip and, as is the case in any small town, there were innumerable rumours
circulating, rumours about his parishioners and stories about people he did not
know at all. The gossip Father Pennant heard most often concerned Lowther. No
one said anything terrible about the man, not directly, but a number of people
felt they had to warn Father Pennant about Lowther's ‘lack of discretion.' In other words, Lowther was considered a snoop, a tattletale and a man to be
avoided.
     As it happened, the person who most insisted on Lowther's bad character was the first to die under Father Pennant's rectorship: Tomasine Humble. Tomasine was no more specific about Lowther's sins than anyone else, but she seemed to take personal offence at Lowther's personality. So, hers were the bitterest condemnations. Mind you, Tomasine had
never been known for the good she had to say about others. She was not,
herself, fondly remembered, and there were few people at her funeral, when it
came. Five, to be exact. Her light, narrow coffin was as simple as could be
without being a pine box. It stood in the centre aisle of the church,
unencumbered save for, atop the coffin, a framed black-and-white picture of
Tomasine Humble as a young woman. Neither beautiful nor homely, the younger
Tomasine was merely the beginning of a long distortion whose end was the bent
and unhappy old woman Father Pennant had met on his first day as St. Mary's rector.
     Tomasine's funeral took place of an afternoon. Light came through the stained-glass
portraits of Zenobius and Zeno. The church smelled of the floral perfume one of
the mourners wore. Mass was said into the silence of late afternoon in a small
town, most of whose inhabitants worked elsewhere. When the service was over,
Father Pennant walked from the church with three old women, one of whom
matter-of-factly said
     – Poor Tomasine. She had a soft spot for priests, you know.
     – I thought we were a disappointment to her, said Father Pennant.
     – Oh, not at all, said the old woman. Father Fowler was the only man she ever
loved. Do you know what ‘carrying a torch' means, young man? Well, she carried a torch for that man, poor dear.
     –Did Father Fowler know?
     – Of course he knew. He loved her too. He joined the priesthood after she married
Bill Humble.
     – I don't understand, said Father Pennant. Why did she marry Mr. Humble if she loved
Father Fowler?
     – We'll never know, said the old woman. They were quite strange, those two.
     Startled by sunlight as they left the church, the old woman gripped Father
Pennant's arm and went carefully down the steps, all thought of Tomasine and Father
Fowler gone as she tried to keep herself from falling. Her companions held on
to the railings and cautiously stepped down, as if stepping into uncertain
waters.
     At the end of the day, after Tomasine had been buried, Father Pennant asked
Lowther what he knew about Mrs. Humble and Father Fowler.
     – Nothing, answered Lowther.
     – Did they love each other?
     – I really don't think so, Father. In all the years I worked for him, I never heard Father
Fowler mention her more than a handful of times.
     – Well, Tomasine's friends were convinced …
     – I think Tomasine was convinced too. But she was an odd woman. No offence to the
dead. She never had a kind word for Father Fowler.
     – You know, I'm not sure she had a kind word for you either.
     – Yes, I know. But she's not alone there. Not many people trust me.
     – I'm very sorry to hear it.
     – No, no. They're right. I haven't always been the best of men.
     It wasn't clear to Father Pennant what type of man Lowther wished to be or what type of
man Lowther would have called ‘good.' Lowther's dislike for his own younger self seemed to be the point. He had been born in
Petrolia in 1949, his parents' only child. His father, a bitter and angry man, died when Lowther was twelve.
After that, Lowther had become the man of the house, spoiled by a mother who
doted on him. By the time he was fourteen, he was, he said, good for nothing.
He lied, stole, drank and did things of which he was now deeply ashamed.
     He would almost certainly have lost his soul, but that he was intelligent and
sensitive despite himself. The cruel things he did began to seem tiresome,
mindless and insignificant. So, at twenty, he moved to Sarnia and, for no
particular reason save that he saw a help-wanted ad in the
Observer
, found work as a private investigator. His work as an investigator was what
earned him his bad reputation. He was good – that is, ruthless – at the work's many stations: skip tracing, process serving, testing the fidelity of husbands
and wives. For years, he did very well. He earned all the money he wanted
until, one day, he abandoned that road as well. Why? There were, it seemed, a
number of reasons. Among them was that Lowther could not be certain he was not
adding to the misery of the world. He pitied the men and women who couldn't pay for their cars or who lacked the discipline to be faithful to their
spouses. They were, he thought, versions of himself. So, in a moment of
contrition, he quit his job and deliberately chose to do the things that, at
the time, appealed to him least. He moved to Barrow and began to work for St.
Mary's. He taught himself to live on next to nothing, and he gave himself completely
to menial work.
     The first years of his life in Barrow were almost unbearably tedious. He
maintained the church's Volkswagen and cooked for Father Fowler. He did the same things, day in and
day out. He forced himself to do them without complaint, though the
insignificance of his new life ate away at his self-esteem. He began to think
that no man who respected himself would settle for the life he had chosen.
     And then the moment came without warning: he learned to surrender. It was early
spring, a year before Father Pennant's arrival. Lowther had walked out of town in the direction of the Queen. The sun
was up. There was a cold wind. And he was at peace with himself. That's all and that was it: nothing sacred, nothing grand or earth-shattering,
nothing that could be shared or passed on. A cold wind. A blue sky. But from
that day on, his tasks became fascinating to him. The way one washed or wiped
dishes, the way one swept a floor or drove a car: all these duties seemed human
and inexpressibly interesting. Less had finally led him to more.
     – You learned to live differently, said Father Pennant. You became a good man.
     – I learned to live differently, but I'm not a good man, answered Lowther.
     – What makes you say that? After everything you've told me, you seem like an exceptionally good man. Not many people change
their lives the way you did.
     Lowther smiled noncommittally and said
     – We can talk about this later, if you're still interested, Father. I really should practise now. Otherwise I won't get my two hours in. Is that all right?
     – Yes, said Father Pennant. Of course. Sorry to keep you.
     Lowther went up to play the cello.
     It was difficult for Father Pennant to understand why Tomasine Humble had been
so vicious about the man.
Though it's sad to admit, Tomasine Humble's death was not significant in the way the death of a popular person is
significant. Her funeral service was not a memorable occasion, save perhaps for
the five old people who attended, for Father Pennant who presided and for the
men who dug her grave. Then again, the least death has a weight or sensation to
it. A community eddies, if only slightly, to fill a place that had been
occupied, and it does so mournfully or happily or with indifference. In very
little time, all those who had known her, however well, however vaguely, knew
that Tomasine had died and that she had been buried. The circumstances
surrounding her death were important to some – especially those her age who felt their own deaths were just around the corner – and insignificant to most. That she was dead was the meaningful thing, along
with the fact she had left no heirs, no money, no property.
     
After Tomasine's burial, the ground in the graveyard was more dense than it had been, with
another body – like cold, curdled earth –
 to digest. The currents of air that visited Barrow had one less person to circle
or caress. And the wind as it blew through town made a sound ever so slightly
altered. The ants had one less hazard, the birds one less predator, the worms
one more meal. The foxes and coyotes could now go about their business without
Tomasine Humble in mind. The fish – carp, bass, minnows and catfish, mostly – would have been very unlikely to feel anything at all, save that, in spring and
summer, it had been Tomasine's secret pleasure to put her feet in the Thames from time to time, to feel the
cold water run gently over them. No more of that hazard for the fish.
     But in the end, Tomasine's death was most significant for a series of events it triggered.
     George Bigland, the sheep farmer, was Tomasine's second cousin twice removed. Like most in Barrow, he had always found her a
sour and unpleasant person. Still, blood is blood, and he would have attended
her funeral had he known when it was. Instead, he found out about his cousin's funeral days after Tomasine was dead and buried. He was indignant. Perhaps
because he was already having a bad day, this indignation over a slight stayed
with him and, at ten in the morning, he decided he'd do no more work for the day. Instead, he spent hours at the Blackhawk Tavern,
luxuriating in resentment, drinking a fermented cider called Bad Apple.
     Now, because Bigland did not get home until afternoon, he could not correct a
problem created by his son: a gate left open. The sheep, Clun Forest ewes, most
of them, though unused to gates being left open, were not impressed. They stood
around, nibbling distractedly on the grass in the pen. Four of them, however,
drawn by the haunting smell of the woods, the trees, the earth in spring,
wandered from the pen, going out in search of grass or clover or other things
low to the ground. After a while, three of the escapees, having discovered they
were not where they thought they were and missing their sisters, began to
bleat. Hours later, these three were returned to the pen by Bigland's son. The fourth, however, went off into the woods.
     ‘Eighteen,' the daring sheep, was a striking ewe: thick whitish coat dark with dirt and
redolent of lanolin, black-faced, black ears that pointed straight up and
twitched at the slightest sound. Her tail was docked and her lower feet and
hooves were black. By the time Eighteen discovered she was alone and that there
was not much to eat in the undergrowth, she was lost in the woods. She began to
bleat, ears twitching, and wandered farther still until she came to the edge of
the woods, which was the side of the road. Then, spooked by a sound in the
woods behind her, Eighteen ran to the middle of the road where she was struck
and killed by a car. Her body flew up, smacked the car's windshield and was thrown to the side of the road.
     As it happened, the car was driven by Jane Richardson. Beside her, Robbie Myers
had not put on his seat belt. He flew forward, his head smacking hard against
the windshield. He hurt his neck, shoulder and back. He had a concussion and
muscle strain, and he was in shock. But there was blood everywhere, so his
injuries looked even worse than they were. Without a second thought, Jane, who
had not been hurt, drove to the hospital in Barrow.
     It's exaggerating very little to say that everyone in Barrow who knew Jane
Richardson or Robbie Myers learned of the accident within minutes of it
happening. ‘Everyone' naturally included Anne Young, who was disheartened by the news, and Elizabeth
Denny, who now knew for certain that there was an unclear connection between
her fiancé and Jane Richardson.
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