Flight
Tonight… Saying Goodbye: Well, he may have been one of the men behind the hit song “Staying Alive”, but tonight, Maurice Gibb is dead… One Flu Over: New research showing that a rare form of the bird flu can in some cases lead to a deadly psychological condition for babies, has a Canadian connection… Here’s Conny: The city of Toronto is overcome with excitement as the host of a nightly talk show comes from New York to record an episode in Canada… Welcome to the Canadian Nightly News, with Marnie Gordon…
Well Canada, we have a lot to cover tonight, with a mysterious injury to the Pope having rocked the Roman Catholic world, and with the announcement that celebrated Canadian David Funk has been selected to be Canada’s next astronaut.
But first, let’s turn to our lead story, the beginning of a new project said by well-placed political insiders to be “crucial for the future of Canadian unity.” Here’s Donald Campbell, our Canadian culture specialist, reporting from here in Toronto…
Thanks Marnie. I’m here in Toronto’s storied Macdonald Hall, where I’ve just attended an historic meeting of the storied Canadian Society for Heritage, Identity, and Tradition. I’m talking with Professor Gordon Donald Clark, the prominent Canadian Literature specialist from Toronto’s famous Albert College, who has just announced that he is taking on a revolutionary research project - to find our elusive Canadian identity. Beginning in the Maritimes and ending on the west coast, Professor Clark will abandon the ivory tower for coffee row, talking to real Canadians and gathering real stories of their lives, and their ideas about what it means to be truly Canadian.
Professor Clark, what motivated you to undertake this historic journey?
Uh, I’m uh, not Professor Clark, I’m the fam- uh, the publisher, Zulecken.
Oh, uh, my apologies, sir, I -
But, I’m uh, well, I’m also going on this journ-, this que-, this tri- uh this uh odyssey, joining Professor Clark in my uh, my uh capacity as a former Professor of Canadian Studies and an influential publi -
Canadian Studies - how is that different from Canadian Literature?
Well, you know, we don’t just read the fiction, we look uh, at uh -
And what will be the first adventure in your epic quest for our national spirit?
Well uh, we’re going to dip our feet in the Atlantic ocean at St. John’s, and then go take part in a local custom, called uh, screeching -
Don’t you think that some Canadians will find it offensive that you’re adopting the symbolism of Terry Fox’s inspiring 1980 Marathon of Hope?
Well, actually, we hoped uh, it was Professor Clark’s idea, he hoped everyone would find it uh, fitting that -
Well there you go, Marnie. It seems that Professor Clark here has found that his ambitious attempt to discuss Canadian unity is mired in controversy from the very start. Shades of Meech Lake? Back to you.
Thanks, Donald. It seems we may have a new national unity crisis on our hands?
We’ll have to wait and see, Marnie, but I imagine Canadians from coast to coast will be following the professor’s progress very closely.
Thanks, Donald.
Good night, Marnie.
“Tabernak!” Gaston muttered under his breath, as he quickly stowed his headphones in his pocket and, with a practiced movement, put away the iPhone he had been using to watch the previous evening’s nightly news broadcast.
“What was that, Gaston?” asked Clark, who was seated next to him in their taxi, as they made their way to Pearson Airport.
“I said, uh, ‘Quelle débâcle,’ sir. The Pope, you know…”
“Ah, yes, you’re from a Catholic background, of course. I assume he is receiving the best attention….”
Gaston nearly replied that he was about as Catholic as the Pope was a Nazi, but recovered himself in time to remember that it was very important for this project, and therefore his academic future, that he allow Clark to persist in his belief that Gaston was, in accordance with the stereotypes of les vielles Anglos, a true francophone. This, of course, meant that Gaston would on occasion have to demonstrate that he held some lingering sympathy for the Roman Catholic church, which he associated with vague memories of a stern grandmother, a boring ma tante méchante, the confused look of contempt and shame on his magouilleur father’s face when the local priest would occasionally come to his home for a visit, uninvited, meaning that little Gaston would have to wash up and behave himself in front of this unsettling stranger, and of course with the fact that Quebec had been settled before the revolution and had taken about 200 years to catch up to France on the subject of religion - almost.
In truth, however, Gaston’s mind was far from such thoughts at the moment, for he had more pressing matters to consider. While he knew that Clark had not seen the news broadcast the night before, since the professor and his assistant had both been attending a late dinner for various academic and cultural luminaries at that anglo absurdity known as the Queen Mother restaurant, Gaston was worried nevertheless that the news would indeed follow their story and present it in a manner that would make it appear ridiculous, in that curious and unique way that the Canadian news media seemed to be able to make everything and everyone appear ridiculous, amateurish and sophomoric, no matter how serious the issue or event at hand. And of course if Duncan had seen the segment, though Gaston doubted the poet watched the news regularly, he would certainly have been offended that he had been neither interviewed for, nor mentioned in, that particular segment. Gaston did know, however, that Zulecken knew about it, given the fact that he had himself been in it, and had undoubtedly felt humiliated by the fact that the reporter had mistaken him for Clark. But Zulecken’s humiliation, at least, brought with it the advantage that he was unlikely to bring up the interview with anyone else.
Media anxieties aside, Gaston had been further aggravated late at night by a flood of calls from Duncan, and emails from Zulecken, and last-minute demands from Clark, as the three men confirmed Gaston’s fear that the graduate student would be expected to be at their command for every minor desire and irritation they would encounter from the fishy coasts of the Maritimes to the weedy mountains of British Columbia. They were certainly successes in their respective fields, thought the young Quebecker, these experts in Canadian letters; but they were hopeless out in the world, which seemed somehow to cause them simultaneous surprise and dismay. What was that line, that a hero is respected by everyone, with the exception of his butler? And was that what he, Gaston, had become - a mere servant, a subordinate in a larger project, utterly beyond his control?
Clark, gazing out the window on his side of the back seat of the cab, was occupied with other matters. He was very excited by the journey that lay before him, sincerely hopeful that his work would enable him to write the definitive work on the nature of Canadian identity. But his plan, as complex and thoroughly considered as it was, had been badly disrupted by the shocking declarations of Duncan and Zulecken the previous evening. There were many apparently small but in fact quite important details that had to be worked out now, that would have been entirely unproblematic had he been alone on the journey. For example, he thought to himself, who would be the first in the trio to dip his foot in the Atlantic? Should it be the representative of Canadian Literature, Canadian publishing, or Canadian poetry? Who should go last? Should the order be reversed when they made it to the west coast? And wouldn’t that leave someone in the unremarkable second position at both ends and thus, symbolically, all across the country? More problematically, could the middle be construed as the most Canadian position, and would it therefore be Clark’s duty, as the leader, to come second? And what if the others had the same thought, and if they did, would they all end up fighting with each other to be in between the others?
Clark took a deep breath and shook his head, having managed somehow to confuse himself, and tried to direct his mind to simpler but still portentous problems. For example, when he was scheduled to have dinner with the Governor General, would Duncan and Zulecken be invited? Most importantly, who would be in charge of making such decisions, and would the others follow his orders if he gave any? For now, Clark felt that he was still the primary authority in charge of the project, but of course Duncan and Zulecken could just choose to ignore him, and that authority would in any case fade over time as Duncan and Zulecken began to feel like they had as important a role to play in the project as Clark himself did, in spite of the fact that the whole thing was Clark’s idea. Most importantly, this confusion would of course disrupt their interaction with their subjects, and would influence the picture of Canadian identity that would emerge from their research….
Some minutes later, their separate anxieties unresolved, both Clark and Gaston came to themselves when the car came to a stop outside the airport’s departure terminal, and the driver, instead of getting out of the car to help them with their bags, instead kept the doors locked, muttered something, and pointed through the windshield to an unexpected spectacle unfolding before them.
Directly in front of their cab, a cabby was involved in a heated altercation with a man who was clearly his fare. The trunk of the cab was open, and before it stood the cabby, pointing to the empty trunk and shouting, and in front of him stood a man who was alternately pointing at the luggage on the ground in front of him and back at the empty trunk. The natural impulse of passers-by to stop and gawk was in this case magnified for two reasons: first, the loud spat was happening at an airport, which was precisely the worst place to make a violent scene; and second, the rather amusing contrast between the tall, slim cabby, and the short man with the impossibly round stomach, and the red face under a bright white Tilley hat, with whom the cabby was arguing.
Clark and Gaston were also suitably shocked and amused, until they paid closer attention to the short man, and both drew in their breath in simultaneous surprise. Clutching his assistant’s arm, Clark said loudly “Gaston! It’s - ” at which point Gaston muttered bitterly, “En majesté, dodu Canadien…”
For the angry, pointing fare, our hero and his young charge had realized, was none other than Zulecken, whom they had never before seen in his travelling garb, which appeared to have been designed to give the distinct impression that the diminutive professor was about to go canoeing. Between his pristine Tilley hat on top, with its strap snugly tightened beneath his chin, lest a strong wind should start and blow the rugged thing away (and presumably onto the lake, where it would, by design, float rather than sink), and the meshed, waterproof, ankle-high hiking shoes (marred by nary an offending scratch) on his feet, the intrepid Zulecken wore a white t-shirt, emblazoned with the cartooned logo of a resort lodge, which no one could see, because over the t-shirt he was wearing a forest-green fleece vest (to give a hint of camouflage in case that became necessary), thoughtfully designed to keep you warm and cool on the lake (and to prevent your torso from getting wet when paddling your canoe), and bright, off-white cargo pants (with their extra pockets, useful for all kinds of storage), from the waist of which he sported a mini-carabiner to secure his keys, presumably in case he should fall out of the canoe (and to invoke the spirit of mountain climbing), and, completing the ensemble, barely visible just below the point where the ties at the bottom of his pants had been tied (to keep the black flies out, of course), thick grey wool socks.
What does the man believe, Gaston thought to himself, is going to happen on the airplane, that he should find it necessary to dress himself like some douchy Ottawa wasp who has managed to escape from his horrid suburban boredom for a weekend to go and be boring somewhere else, in what the anglos called, rather horribly, “cottage country“, which had always sounded to the young Quebecker like English slang for a yeast infection?
But Clark, who was naturally predisposed to be disturbed and embarrassed by any kind of conflict, was more disturbed by Zulecken’s behaviour, than he was with his hardy sartorial proclivities. Determined to put at end to the altercation at once, Clark jerked on the handle of the cab door, but found it was still locked. The cabby heard this and, without turning around, remarked in an even voice: “I don’t think it would be a very good idea to get out right now - that short fat guy with the funny hat looks pretty pissed off, and the cabby he’s shouting at, man, I know that guy, he studies Brazilian jiu jitsu and really loves all that MMA shit. One time I heard - ”
Clark, indignant at being locked into the back seat like a child, and now a little frightened for Zulecken, who surely had never studied any jiu jitsu in his life, replied in a high-pitched voice that he wanted out immediately, and jiggled and jerked the handle until finally the cabby deigned to release the lock.
As Clark levered himself out onto the curb, followed closely by the cool Gaston, he heard the tall cabby shouting, in an elegant Indian accent:
“How many times must I assure you, sir, that you did not have a garment bag with you, before you will concede that I am telling the truth?”
Zulecken once again raised his hand to point at the trunk and opened his mouth to shout back, when Clark interrupted him.
“What’s going on here, Zulecken?”
Zulecken, his hand still raised, turned to Clark, and the colour in his face changed from that shade of red commonly associated with anger, to that other shade of red, most commonly associated with embarrassment.
“Professor Clark! I - this man - I have been trying to explain to him that I could not have forgotten my garment bag. It has my suit in it! My suit - ”
The cabby interrupted, now addressing Clark, in a calmer tone: “Your short friend here says he gave me a garment bag along with the other luggage when I picked him up at his home. But he did no such thing. Then we get here, and of course when I open the trunk, there is no garment bag inside, because there was never one in there in the first place!” This last was directed with a gaze of proud defiance down at Zulecken.
Clark, having had some experience with Zulecken’s propensity for directing anger at others when he was covering for his own mistakes, replied to the cabby:
“Well, sir, of course we believe you.”
It was a response which, had it been calculated deliberately to offend Zulecken, could not have been better formulated. Stunned, Zulecken’s pointing hand, which had been held aloft this whole time, began to falter, as the shade of embarrassment on his thoroughly confused face began to mix dangerously with the returning shade of that other ruddy colour.
“Clark! How can you - but it’s impossible - my suit!”
“But my dear Zulecken!” Clark said, calmly placing a hand on his colleague’s shoulder, “I merely meant that unless your garment bag has become invisible, you must come up with some explanation for where this man has hidden it. If you did bring it out to the cab, where could he possibly have put it, except in the trunk, where it clearly is not?”
Zulecken considered this, and was about to reply that of course the cabby could have forgotten it on the street instead of putting it away in the trunk, when he realized that of course he would never have put his tailored, Savile Row suit - a great prize he had saved up for for some time, and had bought a few years earlier during a trip to London, and which he not only cherished in itself, but which he relied upon to produce what he considered a grand effect on those present when he wore it - on the ground, or permitted anyone else to do so. This reminded him in turn that as he was leaving his house he had hung the garment bag on a coat hook by the door, so he could bend down to tie his shoes… and of course, the garment bag must still be hanging there, quiet and alone in his silent house, guarding the noble suit snugly within its red, silk-lined interior.
At once, although Zulecken was definitely embarrassed both by his mistake and his mistaken behaviour, the feeling that conquered his mind for the moment, now that he was certain his precious suit was safe, was relief. Raising his eyes to meet first those of Clark and then those of the cabby, he smiled gently, and decided that, since there was no way out of this situation which would not involve some sort of capitulation, a gentlemanly apologetic incoherence was called for. “Yes - well - I didn’t mean to cause any - I was excited and I suppose I - well, I must have left the - the - behind.”
The cabby crossed his arms and nodded. “That is what I have been trying to tell you all this time.”
Clark, seeing that the situation had been resolved, quickly added Zulecken’s luggage to his own cart, which had been brought over by the resourceful Gaston, and, motioning Zulecken to take the cart and move on, said to the cabby: “I’m sorry, sir, for my excitable friend here. We are at the beginning of an historic journey across Canada, to find out from real Canadians what they think about Canadian…”
“I’m more interested,” the cabby cut in with a stern voice, “in which real Canadian is going to pay me real Canadian dollars for the real Canadian time your execrable friend wasted shouting at me.”
“Uh, I said, “excitable“, not -“
“I know what you said. My time is money and this man wasted it. Do you want me to lodge a complaint to the airport administration?”
As it happened, the cabby chose exactly the right way to pose his gentle exercise in legitimate extortion, for nothing could strike more fear into the hearts of the delicate professors than the possibility that someone might “lodge a complaint” - and to an administration, no less! Clark, who had to think quickly, and did not want to be associated personally with the dirty business, and who had been abandoned by Zulecken, who had in the meantime surreptitiously fled with the luggage cart, suddenly thought of Gaston, who had been dealing with their own cabby and had just walked up to Clark.
As he spoke, Clark endeavoured to catch his assistant’s eye. “Well, sir,” he said to the cabby in a manner that almost achieved its goal of emulating magnanimity, “yes, you have a point, but I’m not very good at this sort of thing, and I certainly, well, uh, don’t want - a complaint, you say! Well, perhaps…”
Throughout this stammered speech, Clark had managed to catch Gaston’s eye, and of course the young Quebecker knew what the professor wanted. Gaston, however, was both amused by Clark’s discomfort and at the same time a little annoyed that he, Gaston, perhaps because he was not English, would be expected to know how to handle such things. So the young man let Clark suffer a moment, before interrupting him and speaking to the cabby.
“Look, what my friend ‘ere is trying to say,” said Gaston respectfully but forcefully, and accentuating his accent with a hint of the Beauce, “is that ‘e’s sorry, but ‘e need to get in der to catch ‘ees flight and ‘e don’ ‘ave time to ‘elp you out ‘imself. Professor Clark” - here Gaston turned to the professor - “you just go inside and get things sorted out for yourself, and I’ll sort things out here with this gentleman.”
Clark, seeing that the cabby appeared satisfied, nodded quickly and turned to leave, tripping nervously along the path Zulecken had taken inside.
“Sorry ‘bout dat,” Gaston said to the cabby, as they both stood and watched Clark move off quickly and awkwardly through the dispersing crowd and into the airport. “Ten buck ok?”
“Ok, ok,” the cabby said, taking the money from Gaston, “but tell me, what does your fat little friend need a suit for anyway, if he is going camping?”
Inside the airport, Clark found Zulecken standing under large screens showing airlines and sections and maps, and the two professors collaborated on solving the puzzle of where to go to check in, using the opportunity to signal indirectly to each other that they would pass over the incident with the cabby in silence.
When they finally found the Air Canadia section, they made their way through the crowd to what they hoped was the appropriate cordoned customer lane, settling in for what they hoped would be a brief wait in line. They noticed as they approached the barrier that there was a full complement of three Air Canadia clerks working behind their desks, checking people in; but then, to their joint chagrin, one, and then another, of the clerks left their desks, and the line began to grow quickly. Clark checked his watch and saw that even with this delay they should still have enough time to make their flight, and, wondering what to do with the time, decided to have a little talk with Zulecken about the aforementioned delicate matters that had preoccupied him since the previous evening.
“Well, Rod, it was kind of Gaston to arrange your travel details on such short notice, wasn’t it?”
“Yes, it certainly was, he is a - a very resourceful young man,” replied Zulecken, who met Clark’s eyes only briefly, and grabbed at some little cards with elastic strings on a stand next to him, in order to fill them out and attach them to his luggage. Trying desperately to avoid the conversation, Zulecken began studying the cards and strings in deep concentration, holding a wire-bound pen from the stand aloft.
Zulecken was in reality quite nervous, for he had a sense that Clark was going to chastise him for hijacking his project. And that hijacking, in spite of the grand rhetoric with which Zulecken had described it to the crowd, had of course been an impulsive decision, based more on the feeling of shame and perhaps even envy that had overtaken the publisher on the stage, rather than on any real desire to go on a lengthy and expensive journey across Canada. The truth, in fact, was that the little publisher was rather frightened at the prospect of the journey, and half of him was secretly hoping that Clark was about to find a polite way to say that he was not, in fact, welcome, and should put down his pen, pick up his bags, and go back home to his books, and his lonely suit.
“Yes, he is very resourceful, a sort of latter-day courer de bois, you might say, one whom we can trust to go off and carry out whatever task has been set to him, and to do so with good humour.”
“Mm-hmm,” replied Zulecken, beginning to wonder where this was all going, since Clark had very deliberately said “our” journey without any irony or bitterness. He focused even more intently on writing his name and address on the little cards.
“Resourceful as he is, however,” continued Clark, “we should, I think, make it clear to Gaston that while we will be relying on him to manage the, as it were, mechanical details of our journey, it is crucial that the more important details, the very crucial, the organic details, those of symbolic and - and academic professional import - are left in the hands of those with more experience, and authority, in matters relating to the overall purpose for our project.”
“Certainly, certainly,” replied Zulecken, still unsure where Clark was leading him, though it was clearly along what was rather obviously a Socratic path, designed from the start to trap the interlocutor into a larger commitment than his seemingly minor agreements along the way would suggest. Still trying to avoid Clark’s gaze, Zulecken picked up another luggage card and inspected it closely before he began to fill it out, though it was clearly identical to the four cards he had already filled out for his three pieces of luggage.
“For example, now that there are three of us - a poet, a publisher and a professor - directing this symbolic journey, there will be many decisions of an historic nature, and great cultural sensitivity will be required.”
“Mmm-hmm,” replied Zulecken, still filling out the fifth card, but starting to see, to his relief, where Clark was heading.
“And so I think we should make it clear to everyone - to Gaston, I mean - that it should be to my authority, as his supervisor in this project, to which we - I mean he, rather - should defer in the case of these more significant and complex matters.”
Ah, so that’s it, Zulecken thought with some relief, as he attached yet another card to an already becarded strap on his carry-on bag. Clark merely wanted to establish his power over the direction of the project, rather than to castigate Zulecken, and by extension Duncan, for hijacking his plans. This changed everything: Clark was accepting him on the journey, and on terms that suited Zulecken perfectly. Indeed, this was precisely what the professor had wanted to hear, without knowing it. It meant he could tag along in his accustomed manner, as an observer of the decisions made by others, as an interpreter of their choices and their actions, without having to bear any responsibility for what was actually carried out in their name, or any consequences left in their wake. With this thought, Zulecken felt his gnawing anxiety lift, replaced with a sense of well-being and confidence that naturally manifested itself in him as something falling just short of genuine magnanimity.
A new man, Zulecken turned away from the stand with the travel cards, straightened himself and looked up into Clark’s eyes, communicating an unspoken acknowledgment that he knew what Clark was really saying, and that he was fully prepared to cede authority for this project.
“Well, yes,” said Zulecken somewhat sternly, “as capable as Gaston is, he is still a young man, inexperienced in the complexities of Canadian discourse, and authority for the most important decisions should clearly fall to you, as the leading figure in the project. And the one who has been granted the council funding, after all.” At this, Professor Clark, himself relieved, returned his colleague’s accommodating look with humble, and slightly apologetic, grace.
Their conflict thus resolved, both Clark and Zulecken noticed that the line in front of them had slowly moved forward, and, followed by the angry eyes of those waiting impatiently behind them, the pair quickly moved to the front of the tightly switchbacked, green-cordoned corridor.
When they reached the head of the line, for some reason they found themselves spontaneously adopting the self-conscious stance of soldiers being observed by a commanding officer whose favour they were required to curry, and after a short time they were motioned over by the lone airline clerk at the check-in counter. As our heroes approached politely, trying their best to exude a sense of their own deliberate resourcefulness, the stern clerk looked down at her screen and began tapping away at her keyboard, her eyes intently focused on the screen before her.
TAPPITY-TAP. TAPPITY-TAP-TAP-TAPPITY-TAP.
After a brief pause and an even more focused study of the screen, the clerk looked up at Zulecken and Clark, who were waiting with a sort of patient anxiety at a polite distance from the counter, and then abruptly lowered her eyes and went back to typing.
TAPPITY-TAPPITY TAP-TAP TAPPITY-TAP. TAP. TAP. TAP-TAP-TAP-TAPPITY-TAPPITY-TAP TAP. TAP. TAPPITY-TAP-TAP-TAPPITY-TAPPITY.
As she paused to stare even more intently at the screen, Clark slowly stepped up to the counter, efficiently holding his printed itinerary in his had, and said politely: “We’re going - ”
TAPPITY-TAPPITY-TAPPITY-TAPPITY. TAP. TAP-TAP. TAPPITY-TAP TAP-TAP. TAP.
“As I was saying, we’re - ”
TAP.
Clark, somewhat confused, turned to look at the equally confused Zulecken, when the clerk, without looking up, said: “Destination.”
Assuming this was a question, Clark eagerly turned back to the clerk and replied: “Yes, my colleague here, and I, we’re on the seven-thirty flight to St. John’s, and - ”
TAPPITY-TAPPITY-TAP-TAP-TAP-TAP-TAP-TAP. TAPPITY-TAP. TAP TAP. TAPPITY TAPPITY. TAP-TAP TAPPITY-TAPPITY-TAP. TAP TAP TAP-TAPPITY.
“I have my itinerary here, which my assistant printed - ”
TAPPITY-TAP-TAP TAPPITY TAP-TAP-TAPPITY-TAPPITY-TAP TAP TAPPITY TAP… TAP… TAP-TAP… TAPPITY. TAP. TAPPITY-TAP. TAP.
“Names?”
“Well, yes, uh, I’m Professor Gordon Donald Clark, and this is my colleague, Professor Rod Zulecken…”
TAPPITY. TAP TAP TAP-TAP TAP-TAPPITY-TAPPITY TAP-TAP-TAP. TAP TAP TAPPITY-TAPPITY-TAPPITY TAP… TAPPITY-TAP-TAP-TAP-TAP-TAPPITY-TAP-TAPPITY. TAPPITY TAPPITY TAPPITY. TAP TAP TAP. TAPPITY. TAP-TAP-TAP-TAP. TAP TAP TAPPITY TAP TAP TAP. TAP-TAP-TAPPITY. TAP TAP.
“Do you have your itineraries?”
“Yes, they’re right - “
TAPPITY-TAP-TAP-TAP TAPITTY TAP TAP TAPPITY TAP. TAP TAP. TAP TAP TAP. TAPPITY TAP-TAP TAP TAPPITY TAPPITY TAPPITY TAPPITY TAPPITY TAPPITY TAPPTY TAPPITY TAPPITY TAP TAP TAP-TAP-TAP.
“Please hand them over to me,” the clerk said sternly, holding out her hand while still staring at the screen, as though Clark were presenting an obstacle to her progress.
Resourcefully, Clark had anticipated this demand, and handed over both pieces of paper at once, while he and Zulecken stared, mesmerized, as the clerk’s hands again flew over the keyboard, following their own hypnotic logic - TAP-TAP-TAPPITY-TAPPITY-TAP-TAP-TAP TAPPITY TAPPITY TAP TAP TAPPITY TAP TAP TAP-TAP TAPPITY TAPPITY TAPPITY TAP - before she quickly passed the bar codes on the itineraries under a scanner.
She stared at the screen for a moment, and Zulecken worked up the courage to say: “I assume everything is in order, we - ”
TAPPITY-TAP. TAP TAP TAP. TAPPITY-TAPPITY TAP TAP TAP TAP-TAP TAPPITY-TAPPITY TAP TAP TAPPITY-TAP-TAP-TAP. TAP. TAP. TAPPITY. TAPPITY-TAPPITY TAP TAP TAP TAP-TAP-TAP-TAP-TAP. TAPPITY.
Clark and Zulecken stared hopefully at the clerk’s hands as she moved one of them from the keyboard over to the mouse, searched the screen, then clicked, and stared at the screen. Their faces fell, however, when the clerk suddenly dropped her hands to the keyboard once again, without looking up.
TAPPITY. TAP-TAP-TAP TAPPITY. TAP TAPPITY-TAPPITY. TAP-TAP-TAP. TAPPITY. TAP-TAP-TAP-TAP-TAP TAPPITY. TAP. TAP. TAP. TAP. TAP. TAPPITY-TAP-TAP-TAP. TAPPITY-TAPPITY-TAP-TAP-TAP. TAPPITY-TAP. TAPPITY… TAP.
“Luggage?”
Perhaps it would be best for the moment to leave Clark and Zulecken, captivated as they were by the mysterious typing of the clerk, and turn our attention back to the redoubtable Gaston, who, when he had finished paying off the cabby and shared a cigarette with him, had entered the airport and checked in at the Air Canadia self-check-in terminal, and then moved off to the side to look for Clark and Zulecken. There he found our poet, Duncan, dressed with a view to cultural authority, boarding pass in hand, staring at the long lineup, where Clark was talking to Zulecken, just as the latter was beginning to fill in his fifth luggage card.
“Why are they standing in line?” asked Duncan sternly.
“I’m not sure, sir,” replied Gaston. “Perhaps they don’t fly much.”
“One does not have to be a frequent flier to remark the signs for self-check-in terminals.”
“No, sir.”
“As it happens, young - Gaston is it?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Well - as it happens, young man, I am in fact grateful that those two fools have given us a chance to have a little talk.”
Gaston, who had been looking at Clark and Zulecken as they now waited patiently to be motioned over by the clerk, looked up at Duncan, trying to control his expression. What was Duncan up to? Was he going to try to compromise Gaston’s ostensible loyalty to Clark, and trap the graduate student by coaxing from him an insulting comment about his commanding professor? Or had Duncan perhaps heard at last about Gaston’s brief, and presumably resented, romantic encounter with his granddaughter, Lucy? And what would be the consequences for his career if he managed to offend Duncan in any way? The graduate student clearly needed to find a strategy to handle the old poet, and soon, for these situations and uncertainties were otherwise bound to multiply in frequency and importance throughout their expedition.
Ignoring Gaston’s silence, Duncan continued imperiously. “You see, Gaston, I am a frequent traveller, but I have always chosen to travel in the classically Canadian fashion - by train, on that great… how shall I put it… following the tracks of that great benevolent mechanical animal that first united our country.”
“That is a very commendable - ”
“Commendable is not the word for it. Symbolic - that is the more appropriate word. For I not only write my poetry in accordance with the symbolism of the construction of this nation, I live my life in accordance with that symbolism. And so, I have always travelled by train. But the suddenness of my decision to take part in this journey has prevented me from doing so in this case - and so I have had to sacrifice my tradition, the tradition, in order to accommodate the urgent contingencies of this, this very important project, from which, I must say, I was somewhat offended that I was to be excluded.”
“A meaningful sacrifice, sir.”
“Yes, exactly, young man, a meaningful sacrifice. But as happens so often when one has committed oneself to the warp and woof… to the ups, yes, to the ups and downs, as it were, of the world - I find myself confronted by an uncomfortable dilemma, and I find that I require your assistance.”
“Assistance, sir?” Gaston replied curiously, surprised that Duncan’s imperious speech and manner had led to this rather aggressive request for a favour. “Whatever it is - ”
“It is a form of assistance that requires two acts on your part, both of them, I assure you, quite noble and fitting, given your position as a trusted assistant.”
“Yes, sir?”
“The first act is to keep a secret, and the second is to help me overcome the difficulty that you must keep secret. Can I trust you, Gaston?” At this, Duncan, who had been averting his gaze, turned to face Gaston directly, and fixed him with a meaningful look.
Although Gaston was worried about what he was being drawn into, he was nonetheless relieved that it did not appear to be related to any betrayal of Clark, or Duncan’s granddaughter. “Certainly, sir.”
“Well, you see, young man, although my decision to travel by train has always been motivated by the purest motives of poetic significance, of the highest poetic significance, one might say, it remains the case that I have - that I have - you can be trusted, can you not, Gaston?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Well then - it has always been the case, purely by accident, that it is fortunate that it has been my destiny to travel exclusively by train, for since my earliest youth, I have had a - not a fear, but - well, you understand that my world is one of - of nature, and history, and engagement with the land, connection to the earth, you see…. And so I can,” the poet continued heedlessly, “even at my age, hike a difficult mountain trail, swim across a lake shortly after it has lost its wintry cap of ice, I can canoe up and down the, uh, the downy rapids, and indeed carry a canoe myself in the most demanding uphill portage, battling all the way with mud and black flies, and make my way intuitively through the harshest of prairie blizzards and the most blinding of coastal rains, I can even command a fishing vessel in a storm, experienced as I am with the sea - you understand this, do you not?”
“Yes, certainly, I am familiar - “
“And this has brought with it a fitting, and if I may say, indeed necessary, association of my person, my national persona - on a symbolic level, no less - with great courage. You understand that it is important - not just for me, for in and for myself, I am of no matter - but it is important, nay, if I may, crucial, for the meaning of this country, for its culture, for its very unity - that this persona be sustained in the public mind, and for posterity?”
“Yes, sir,” replied Gaston, who thought he may have seen through Duncan’s vanity to the issue that the poet was finding it so hard to express.
“Yes, good. Well then, to the point - it just so happens that my, my traditional sensibilities are not suited to this modern contrivance - the airplane.”
So the great man is indeed afraid of flying, thought Gaston, and afraid also to admit it. “I understand, sir,” he replied respectfully, “to be flying thousands of feet in the air in a large metal tube that is kept aloft by what is in fact a sustained explosion, for hours on end, it is an unnatural thing.”
This was a description of flight that Duncan had clearly never heard before, and his deliberate pride drained from his face. “A sustained explosion… yes… unnatural,” the poet muttered to himself, turning to look off into the middle distance, truly afraid.
It was the sight of a trembling lip in the practiced, noble visage of a man who had surpassed Gaston’s own father’s age by two decades, that finally convinced the young man that perhaps he had been too cruel to the sensitive poet, who was clearly undergoing a serious internal trial. And so it was for the sake of pity that the noble Gaston chose to forgive Duncan his imperiousness. Indeed, Gaston began to feel real guilt for having abused the poet’s fear, and even worse, his trust, for the sake of a moment’s cruel and private fun.
“You would like me to get you something to help you get through the flight, sir?”
“Yes!” said Duncan, turning to Gaston and grasping one of his shoulders so tightly that his hand turned a lighter shade of white.
Gaston winced. “Well,” he said, setting his creative and persuasive mind to work in spite of the pain in his shoulder, “well, sir, I wonder - well - I do have something, but it may be beyond your strength to bear, given your age….”
“Ha!” said Duncan, his fear somewhat distracted by this poke at his pride, precisely as Gaston had intended. He let go of the young man’s shoulder and balled his hands into fists before him, in a gesture of offensive strength. “I am as strong as a moose, young man, fit as a lusty caribou, I assure you! What is it you have?”
“Well, sir,” replied Gaston, looking carefully to his right and left, as though someone might be listening, “you see, I do have something, but it’s not the kind of thing that can be discussed openly - ” here Gaston gripped Duncan’s own shoulder with one hand, and fixed him with a conspiratorial stare - “if you take my meaning, sir.”
Duncan’s eyes retreated for a moment in some confusion at Gaston’s sudden familiarity; he was not accustomed to being handled in this way. To compound his confusion, it happened that Duncan did not at all take Gaston’s meaning - until the light, as it were, began to dawn, and he brought his eyes back into focus to meet Gaston’s gaze.
Drugs, in fact, were almost a complete mystery to Duncan. But as a poet he had always known it was expected that he should know something of such things, and he had developed over the years various attitudes and expressions which sufficed indirectly to convince his usually even straighter Canadian interlocutors that he was indeed learned in the lore of illicit substances.
“Yes, young man,” he replied in a knowing tone, as he too looked carefully to his right and then to his left, “I do indeed take your meaning.”
“So what I tell you, will stay between us?”
Duncan turned his experienced countenance back upon Gaston, and offered a knowing nod.
Gaston stepped closer to Duncan and, looking away while he spoke, as though he were surveying the crowd, explained:
“You know, sir, how difficult and fast-paced life is for young academics these days, what great pressure there is on us.”
“Yes, it is very different than it was in my day, when the life of a scholar - “
“And have you noticed that some of us appear to be able to handle incredible amounts of work?”
“Yes, although I have also noticed that along with this increase in so-called productivity, the quality of thinking - ”
This old man’s imperiousness really is remarkable, thought Gaston. Even when he asks me for help, he cannot help himself moving on to his habitual, narrow-minded insults. Well, he thought - there are favours, and then there are favours.
“Perhaps then you will not be surprised to hear that we use means beyond hard work and determination, to, how you say in English, perform our enhancements?”
“Ah - yes,” replied Duncan, getting Gaston’s drift and focusing his attention again on the matter at hand. This was truly a revelation to him, something he had never encountered and certainly never considered before, even given the powers of his vast imagination. He knew students typically took drugs for recreation - but to improve their academic performance!
“In particular, this can mean that from time to time we need to manage our sleep very strictly. For me in particular, this is difficult, because I have always been a night person, and especially with this journey coming, and Clark being a morning person, I became very worried that I would be unable to sleep when I must. So, I ‘ave a friend ‘oo is in the medical school, and I go to ‘im wit’ my problem, an’ it turn out - you must keep this secret, you understand?”
Duncan nodded, slightly worried about where this was going, and that he may have exposed his secret to the wrong kind of person.
“Well, my friend is training to be a psychiatrist - an’ ‘e give me some very top-of-de-line, very expensif, experimental pill, dat put you to sleep immediatement, two hour for each pill you take. Is that not remarkable?”
“Yes, it is,” replied Duncan, genuinely amazed.
“So I can give you two of deez pills, and you will sleep for de ‘ole flight, and your problem, she ees solved! It is very fortunate that you came to me with your problem.”
Duncan, who was mechanically nodding his head slowly, was in fact beginning to feel that he did not entirely agree. What if there were something illegal about this whole thing? What if he were caught in a - a drugs scandal? It was something Canadians simply did not do - and if they did, it was as though they had become suspiciously American, or something of that sort. It certainly would complicate any future grant applications he might make, or indeed endorse - the government could not be seen giving money to people who might spend it in such inappropriate ways! And what of the reaction of his colleagues? If he could no longer recommend young poets because of his tarnished reputation - think of the influence over the future of Canadian culture that he would lose!
At this troubling juncture, Duncan noticed that Gaston had stopped speaking altogether and was looking at him intently, as though expecting some kind of response. What do I do? thought Duncan, feeling genuine fear - and it was this feeling that propelled him to his decision.
No, he thought, he had too many years behind him to surrender to fear! What had the purpose of his lifetime of poetic endeavour indeed been, what had been the meaning of all of those symbolic engagements with the challenges of the land, if they had not taught him - courage? And he was, after all, a poet - should he not be willing to take such chances as this? And if he gave in here - would people attribute it to his age, and would he thus enter that terrible living hell that the young visit upon the old, second-guessing them and treating them like children who require protection from themselves? No!
“Yes,” said the poet, stiffening his stance and holding up his chin. “It is indeed fortunate. I’ll take them now.” At this, with a flourish, the poet stuck out his right hand, palm up.
Gaston instinctively leaned in, quickly grasping the startled poet’s hand and shaking it, and catching his eye with a significant look. “Well, sir, there are two matters we should settle before I give you any of my pills,” he replied, placing a slight but deliberate emphasis on the word “my” and looking about conspiratorially.
“Well?” expostulated Duncan, impatient to take action now that he had made his decision, and removing his hand from the student’s grasp.
“Well - you should not take the pills until you are in fact on the plane and seated, as they take effect immediately; but in any case, don’t you think it would be rather risky for us to make the exchange here, and for you to take the pills through security yourself?”
Duncan went slightly pale and was at a loss to reply.
“Of course I’m sure you’ve had more than your fair share of experience with this sort of thing - considering the oft-acknowledged fact that being resourceful and cunning with the authorities is necessary for the survival all social radicals, and above all, poets, who are by nature somewhat seditious.”
Duncan saw the opening and took it. “Yes, young man, if you knew half the stories” - here the poet gazed into the high distance and shook his head slowly, as though recalling dark exploits hidden in his past - “and of course my experience, given my commitment to traditional Canadian modes of transport, has not allowed me any knowledge of the innovations of airport security.”
Gaston was slightly impressed by Duncan’s only slightly contradictory evasiveness. He certainly knows how to shield his pride from the truth, the young Frenchman thought to himself, before replying: “And there is, of course, the rather vulgar matter of - payment.”
This too had not occurred to Duncan, and again he was at a loss to reply. His proud expression became rigid. Being given some pills as a favour by this young Quebecker was one thing, but to actually pay him brought the matter home in a different, and rather sordid way. Wouldn’t it make it really illegal if he actually paid for the pills, he thought nervously?
Gaston saw Duncan’s hesitation and again offered him a way out. “Ah, I see you are an experienced negotiator - waiting for me to set the price, eh?”
“Yes, of course,” said Duncan, retreating to his pride in spite of his worry, and fixing Gaston with a hard look.
“The pills are really very effective, and as they are exp - ”
“No, I do not agree with your opinion of the poetry of F.A. Horowitz, young man,” Duncan said loudly, quickly shifting his eyes over Gaston’s shoulder, having seen an excuse to change the subject suddenly. “There is nothing of any significance beneath the dull exterior of his work.”
Gaston, somewhat startled at this transition, turned to look over his shoulder, and saw Clark and Zulecken approaching, which of course explained Duncan’s abrupt evasion. Dragging their rolling carry-on bags behind them with their right hands, the pair were each of them triumphantly holding out, in their left hands, their boarding passes, which they had finally procured after surviving the encounter with the endlessly typing clerk.
“Ah, you are discussing Horowitz, Duncan?” said Clark. He gladly dove head-first into a literary discussion quite naturally, his actual situation forgotten, entirely and immediately at home in his discursive element. “I contend that it is a mistake to see his work as merely dull. The dullness is indeed part of the point.”
“And what point is that?” asked Duncan in a superior tone.
“A very important, and a very Canadian point - which is simply that we should not allow ourselves to be distracted from the boredom of our reality by the fantasy of excitement. Real life takes place in the space in between adventure, and it is a very American innovation - and a typically American trap - to place a positive value on the flash and the bang, rather than the dull and the - the whimper.”
“Well, that is a very academic way of putting things, and reflects an academic’s understanding,” Duncan replied aggressively. “From the perspective of a poet…”
Gaston took the opportunity presented by the inevitable argument to extricate himself from the small group and make an essential trip to a small magazine shop nearby. Indeed, he was relieved to have a reason to leave the men to themselves, for the argument, he felt, would inevitably be at best tiresome, and mostly irritating, given the mean nature of its subject - the celebrated poet F.A. Horowitz.
Fêted by most of the prize-givers and poem-publishers in Canada - and thus a rival to Duncan, who routinely courted what passed for controversy in the timid national poetry community - Horowitz’s work focused almost without exception on subjects that were designed to appeal, and could perhaps only appeal, so Gaston suspected, to professors who had entered the latter stages of middle age, and who had already put their second mismanaged marriage behind them, along with a sad, fearful youth lost in the race for the patrician permanence of tenure. Filled with the kind of imagery that was supposed to demonstrate, in the eviscerated body of Canadian letters, some kind of wild familiarity with things sensual - as though every human being in existence were not rather good proof that people are generally quite familiar with the body - Horowitz, like many of his contemporaries, merely managed to embarrass himself and his readers with his clunky, naive imagery.
Particularly annoying were lines where the poet kept hammering away in a sham attempt to force the quite willing reader to be shocked by things not in fact shocking, such as the classic opening line to his award-winning poem “The Anus’s Openness”:
Fart, burp, and barf, pee, dirt and semen falling in latrines.
Nice try, mon ami, the Frenchman winced as he recalled the awkward line. Is this the best a Canadian poet can do when he is trying to invoke the spirit of the great Rabelais? Nerds should not be allowed to write poetry, he thought absently. And if farts and burps do indeed fall there, Horowitz’s faculty toilet at the University of Toronto must have a very special gravity indeed.
Shaking that banal failure at poetic expression from his mind, Gaston approached the counter and bought a pack of nondescript mints. He hoped they weren’t a brand Duncan was familiar with. However, he supposed, the possibility that Duncan might recognize the taste of the mints was minor in comparison to the very likely possibility that the ruse would fail entirely.
In any case, he knew his trick would have to work, or else things would turn out very badly. If Duncan stayed awake on the flight, there was no telling what the crazy old man would do, trapped somewhere between his pride and his fear at 30,000 feet. And if it emerged that Gaston had attempted this ruse, as surely it would if he failed, he knew he would be sent on the first flight back to Montreal and to academic penury, perhaps forced, in the end, to live the academic nightmare, taking a job as a sessional lecturer, wasting time forever in bitter professional limbo, with the reputation of a failure, which would only be magnified by the promising achievements of his youth.
As Gaston turned back to where he had left his superior charges, his eyes widened and he quickened his pace. A small crowd had gathered where they were standing, and there appeared to be some sort of commotion. Pressing through the wall of spectators, Gaston finally saw what had caused them to gather.
Clark and Duncan were leaning in aggressively towards each other and speaking in loud and angry tones, and appeared close to coming to blows, with only Zulecken between them, his Tilley hat hanging off its cord to one side of his neck, as he endeavoured to ensure the men remained apart.
“Take it back!” Clark was saying, a steady finger pointing at Duncan’s flushed visage.
“It is a point of principle, not a matter for debate!” replied Duncan, pointing his own steady finger up at the sky - whether at heaven, or at the realm of the Platonic forms from which his apparently unwavering principle emanated, Gaston could not tell for certain.
“Please, gentlemen,” pleaded Zulecken, whose twisting, as the men slowly circled each other, had brought his hat around, below his face.
“But a matter of taste cannot be a matter of principle! Et de gustabis, you know!”
“Bah, like all English professors, you have not read enough philosophy, and what you have read, you have failed to understand. According to Kant…”
“Kant, shmant!”
“Disputandum, shitsputandum!”
As though things were not already bad enough, with the puzzled crowd gaping at the two intellectual eminences and recording with their phones this eloquent impasse in an argument on the nature of aesthetics, Gaston saw some very serious-looking security officers, hands in the general vicinity of their weapons, coming through the crowd.
“Clark! Duncan! Silence, les policiers,” he hissed loudly, pointing past them to the officers.
As soon as they heard his voice, Clark and Duncan turned to look at their assistant haughtily, but at the mention of the police, they followed the direction of his finger and turned their heads the other way, just as one of the officers stepped forward from the others and confronted the group.
“What’s going on here?” the lead officer said, her feet firmly planted, and an unblinking look of well-trained situational awareness, strength and superiority on her face - a face which, in spite of its deliberate officiousness, had some remarkably attractive features, and not just for a cop, Gaston thought to himself.
Clark and Duncan immediately began to look somewhat sheepish, softening their aggressive stances and lowering their fingers.
“What? Who’s that?” asked Zulecken, who could not see anything, as his hat was now fully covering his face, but who was still holding out his arms, nobly attempting to keep the now separated antagonists at bay in spite of his optical disadvantage.
“Put your hands down, sir,” the officer said sternly, clearly working hard to suppress a smirk.
“What! Whose hands!” Zulecken said, spinning around slowly, arms extended, now as much for balance as anything else.
“Yours, sir.”
“Are you talking to me?”
Seeing that Clark and Duncan were unwilling or unable to help, Gaston stepped slowly into the center of the ring of spectators, which had been growing in size and anxiety since the appearance of the officers, and said in an even voice, while looking into the eyes of the lead officer reassuringly: “Professor Zulecken, please remove your hat.”
Zulecken, his arms now spread out in front of him as though he were groping in a dark room, turned towards the Quebecker’s voice. “What? Gaston?” he said loudly, and finally brought up his hands to his hat, which, with an instinctive motion, he placed back on his head.
What Zulecken saw surprised him, and he immediately went still, his hands dropping to his sides. Behind the calm and dapper Gaston was a large crowd, and as Zulecken turned around to find Duncan and Clark, he saw that the crowd was large enough to have fully encircled them. Duncan and Clark were standing silently with their heads bowed, and looking sheepishly at what appeared to be a group of police officers, who did not look at all pleased, much to Zulecken’s bewildered alarm.
“Thank you, sir,” said the officer, who motioned to her fellows to relax after Zulecken lowered his arms. “What’s this all about, then?”
Neither Clark, who now appeared to be engaged in a thorough study of his shoelaces, nor Duncan, who appeared to be involved in a similarly detailed study of the officer’s knees, nor Zulecken, who was looking directly at the officer but was apparently stunned into unblinking silence, made any move to respond. The officer turned her attention to Gaston, who had walked over to her slowly, his passive posture indicating that he was indeed associated with the silent trio.
Gaston gave the officer a reassuring look and turned to the three cowed men, who were looking at him earnestly, in search of assistance. “Professor Zulecken - perhaps you can enlighten the officer.”
Zulecken, who was not at all pleased that he had been singled out to provide an explanation, nonetheless opened his mouth to give some kind of answer, before discovering he was at a loss for words, whereupon he closed it again, and altered his gaze, as though he were trying to tell the time on Gaston’s watch.
“Well, sir?” the officer insisted.
Zulecken swallowed. “It’s nothing, really.”
“It didn’t look like nothing to me. You do know that it is very inappropriate to create disturbances at the airport?”
“Yes, but -“
“And you must know that it is our responsibility to treat every disturbance as though it might represent a threat.”
“I - I uh - there was certainly no threat, sir, ma’am uh, I mean, officer sir -“
“No physical threat was at stake, madam,” interjected Duncan haughtily, “but this man” - he had raised his finger again, this time to point at Clark - “made a remark that threatened the cultural fabric of our nation - ”
“I did not! Quite the opposite!” Clark responded angrily, the blood rushing to his face as he raised his voice, and a finger, pointing up: “I simply asserted that Canadian poetry need not always be about Canadian - “
The fight, apparently, was back on. The lead officer, who along with her colleagues now looked more curious than worried, turned to Gaston and, keeping one eye on the feuding men, asked quietly: “Are they drunk?”
Gaston smiled at the pretty officer. “No, they are not drunk, officer, I can assure you of that. These three men are simply - well, they are intellectuals, and they take matters of culture very seriously.”
Suspecting that he was playing a game with her, the officer turned her eyes to look directly at Gaston, and the young man was pleased to see that she appeared to like what she saw, though she hid it under a mask of professional appraisal. “What do you suggest we do with them?” she asked.
Gaston looked deeply into her dark brown eyes. “If you exercise your authority, I am sure they will submit to you, and do whatever you ask. Perhaps if you suggest indignity and… exposure?”
The officer’s focus retreated slightly, then returned to meet Gaston’s gaze with a barely discernable but decidedly playful glint. She opened her mouth to say something, but closed it and favoured Gaston with a slight smile instead, and then turned sharply and marched up to Clark and Duncan, who were again being kept apart by the diplomatic Zulecken.
”You three!” she spat at them in a commanding tone.
The men turned to look at her.
“If you don’t shut up I’m going to arrest all of you.”
The word “arrest” shocked Clark and Duncan out of their argument.
“You - ” she pointed to Zulecken - “you tell me what this is all about.”
Zulecken looked a little stunned. Not only was he surprised at having been singled out again - after all, he had clearly been trying to put an end to the fight - but he was being placed in a rather impossible situation, for if he described the argument in a manner that seemed to favour one side rather than the other, he would inevitably alienate himself from either Clark or Duncan.
“Out with it!” said the officer, who had grown somewhat impatient, as indeed had the crowd of spectators, some of whom had by this time moved on, though there were others who had remained, eager to hear what the fight had been about, and to see if there was any more excitement in store for them in the unfolding spectacle. Flashes of light flickered over the scene from outstretched phones.
“Well uh,” Zulecken began, keeping his eyes fixed firmly on the officer’s shoes, “officer, the uh, argument began when Professor Clark” - here Zulecken extended the index finger of his left hand to point to Clark - “who is a celebrated professor of Canadian literature, disagreed with Mr. Duncan” - here Zulecken extended the index finger of his right hand to do the same to Duncan - “who is a celebrated Canadian poet, over the meaning of the manifest dullness in the poetry of A.F. Horowitz” - here Zulecken looked confused and his pointing fingers faltered, before he finally pointed them both at the ground - “who is a celebrated poet and professor here in Toronto.”
Zulecken raised his eyes and saw that the remaining spectators were listening intently to what he was saying, and when he recognized that he had an audience before him, the authority of the professor, who spends his career speaking to captive audiences of systematically subordinate people whose very presence is an acknowledgment of his hierarchical superiority, returned to him quite naturally, and he turned his eyes to the officer, his confidence renewed, and steadily met her steady gaze.
“Mr. Duncan, being a man with powers in his own field of expertise that are as exceptional as those of Professor Clark are in uh, in his own, pursued his argument in spite of the professor’s contradiction, reasserting and expanding upon his prior claim that the dullness and indeed the insipidity of Horowitz’s poetry had no special meaning connected with Canadian or any other identity, and that the poetry is, to put it crudely, just plain boring. At this point Professor Clark responded with what - yes, Clark, I must put it this way - with what was an unfortunate reference to the authority he commanded on the topic of poetry by virtue of his many years teaching it, which made the argument rather personal. Duncan responded with a matching reference to the authority he commanded on the topic of poetry by virtue of his many years actually writing it. The professor then replied with some heat - you must understand how important these matters are” - here Zulecken, having found his stride, stared at the unmoved officer rather sternly, and reached out for a cup from which to take a sip of water, and, finding none there, pointed again at the now silent and attentive combatants - “you must, I say, understand how the opinions of these two men not only shape but give voice to our culture, and cultural, uh, theory.
“The professor replied, as I was saying, that the assessment of poetry is the proper province of the critic and not the poet, just as the interpretation of dreams is the proper province of the analyst and not the dreamer; to which the poet replied, himself growing rather heated - yes, Duncan, I must admit this too - to which the poet replied provocatively that a professor was not a critic, and that the proper province of a teacher is his classroom, where he talks to children, at whose level he not only talks but also thinks. The professor then stated, his fists having become clenched - yes, officer, I am very observant, you see - with his fists clenched he stated that the government should make a law that academics, rather than poets, who clearly had contempt for the readers they presumably wrote for, should dominate the bureaucracy guiding Canadian culture, to protect it from the misguided interventions of scribblers with no knowledge of the wider philosophical and historical issues at stake in the process of disseminating the grants that form the foundation of every Canadian artist’s career. This prompted the poet to reply that those who teach do not do, and thus systematically distance themselves from any responsibility for the creation of the culture they feed upon like parasites, and destroy our culture by virtue of their constitutional uncreativity and secret hatred for those who actually write the works that people read, and their open contempt for almost everyone else, with the exception of other professors who share their opinions.
“And so, you will see, officer, how serious the discussion had become, for the protection of Canadian culture, and therefore Canadian society, our national cultural security, you might say, was now at stake, with the professor claiming a greater power to protect us than the poet, and the poet a greater power than the professor. And while I do not believe that either man would have descended uh - descended to the level of, as it were, leveling the other, I should admit that I am in fact in part responsible for the escalation of the conflict, for by placing myself between them and attempting to find a middle ground between their incompatible positions, I only confirmed the implication that they might indeed come to blows, by removing its actual possibility altogether. Thus, and rather paradoxically I must say, with a buffer, meaning myself, between them, they could each of them posture more aggressively than they would were there no one between them. And thus a dire rhetorical threat could now be made precisely because of the impossibility that it could be carried out….”
While Zulecken carried on, the officer stepped a little closer to Gaston. Though she kept her eyes on the diminutive orator, who gave no indication by tone or manner that he had approached anything like the end of his explanation, she turned her lips toward the young man and whispered: “Seriously, is he drunk?”
“No, officer, he’s simply very sincere.”
The officer looked hard at Gaston closely, almost let out a smile again, then turned and said firmly to Zulecken: “I understand.”
Zulecken, carried away by the full force of his oration, his hands now held out before him as though he were balancing two balls, stopped talking, but kept his mouth open in astonishment, as he and his two colleagues turned their direct attention to the officer.
“You see, we have a similar argument in my profession. The lawyers, like your professors, work in safe rooms, dealing with - aftermaths, and precedents, making arguments, and spending years beforehand studying the details and philosophies of the law as a theory. The officers, like your poets, have a working understanding of the laws, and they are the ones who bring criminals to court to be debated by the lawyers. They are also the ones whose failure, and sometimes whose success, means harm to themselves - in effect, they take the risks. And so when we argue about what we are doing, we do so from two very different perspectives, and disagreement is inevitable. Our feelings are inevitably hurt. But underneath it all we know that we are each carrying out crucial and complementary activities, however incompatible they are in some ways.”
Gaston was impressed, not only by the appropriateness of the analogy, which the officer had clearly constructed on the spot, but also by the extent to which she had achieved her intended result. Zulecken had let out his air and looked relieved, perhaps of his responsibility for mediating the dispute, while Professor Clark was leaning back on his heels and nodding, clearly pleased at being compared to a lawyer, while Poet Duncan had folded his arms and spread his legs wide, clearly pleased at being compared to a cop.
“Exactly,” said Clark in an authoritative tone.
“Well said, young lady,” said Duncan, in his deep performance voice.
“Am I to understand that your dispute has been settled, then?” the officer said professionally.
“Well,” said Clark, “the dispute, as you implied so well, is in a sense irresolvable - “
Duncan frowned, the officer frowned, Zulecken looked bewildered, and the resourceful Quebecker quickly took action, possessed by no doubt that Clark was capable of extending the conflict in spite of all, when there were in fact far more pressing matters at hand, including a plane to be boarded.
“Sir,” said Gaston, gesturing politely to Clark, “I think we should thank the officer here for resolving our situation so effectively, and for being so patient with us while we clearly created some difficulties for her and her colleagues.”
Clark looked at Gaston sternly, aware that what the young man was saying was right, but naturally offended at having been interrupted. “And if we don’t get moving, we’ll miss our flight.”
At the mention of missing their flight, the attention of our three Canadian heroes was immediately focused. Clark glanced quickly at his watch and nervously thanked the officer for her forbearance, while Zulecken looked around with a kind of anxious relief, having suddenly realized that anyone in the departing crowd could easily have taken off with their carry-on bags while they were arguing. Duncan, having found his bag, moved closer to Gaston, trying almost successfully to bury his own mounting anxiety beneath a stoic countenance.
Gaston would have liked to have said goodbye to the officer, but she had already begun walking away, surrounded by the backs of her wider colleagues, and, in any case, he was already surrounded by his superior charges, who were nervously asking him where to go, and what to do, and how to get to security, and how long it would take, and would they be late, and from which gate would their flight depart? As he turned away from his examination of the officer’s back, he let out a sigh and began to guide the men to the plane, wondering silently: if the professors are the lawyers and the poets are the police, then who are the judges? And who are the criminals?
Clark, Duncan and Zulecken, somewhat chastened by their brush with the authorities, and perhaps simply tired after their morning’s adventures, made it through security without any meaningful mishaps, though Zulecken had to go through the detector multiple times, on each occasion removing yet another camping item - hat, carabiner, and such. After Zulecken had carefully reaccoutred himself, the little group made its way through the airport silently, their carry-on bags trailing solemnly behind them on their rollers, until at last they reached their gate, following Gaston’s efficient lead.
They were among the last passengers to board the plane, and found that none of them were seated next to each other - by Gaston’s unspoken design. None mentioned this and none complained.
Up to this point Duncan had followed Gaston stoically, deliberately focusing on everything but the fact that he had just entered the metal tube which was to be blasted aloft and kept up there by a sustained explosion before they reached St John’s. The old man even managed to stow his bag and sit down in his window seat, pretending that he was on a train for yet another journey to Ottawa, or somewhere equally unthreatening.
But when an Air Canadia flight attendant, looking every bit like Stéphane Dion, came by and, with his curiously soft, white hands, indicated to Duncan that he must fasten his seat belt, the poet lost his ability to suspend disbelief and began to feel panic instead. He looked out the window, guided by some subtle instinct for escape, and, instead of seeing what he was accustomed to seeing when he travelled - the countryside, trees, farms, houses, all naturally at eye level - what he saw set his powerfully trained imagination to work.
He was, he saw, seated right on top of the wing! There was an engine on it - was that where the explosion was sustained, he wondered? Presumably there was another engine on the other wing. How could both possibly be sustained at the same rate and power for any period of time? What if one explosion slowed down? Would they start flying in a circle? What if one engine stopped entirely - would that mean the wing it was on would fall, and that the plane would be sustained by the other wing, flying perpendicular to the earth? Or would it crash down in an arc, driven even faster to the earth by the force from the engine that hadn’t stopped? And if both engines stopped - would there be time to put on their parachutes? Surely there were parachutes? And presumably the engines were powered by fuel - but where was the fuel kept? Presumably in the belly of the plane - which meant that they were seated on top of a giant tank of fuel designed and intended - to explode! No, surely the whole thing was impossible, he concluded frantically.
The flight attendant began going through the standard security motions, accompanied by a video shown on a screen on the back of each seat. Duncan listened with rapt attention, prevented from hyperventilating only by the strength that came from his need to find out where the parachutes were. He could block out everything else, perhaps, if only he knew where those cloudy silken saviours were stowed. But the attendant made no mention of parachutes and neither did the video - though there was an odd reference to what to do if they landed in the water, a possibility which had been beyond even Duncan’s powerful facility for fantasy, and which he managed to block out entirely, even as the details regarding the life jackets were being relayed by the Stéphane Dion-lookalike, who turned his head and pretended to blow into a tube attached to the bright yellow life vest he was now wearing, and then turned his head, rather comically, in the other direction, and pretended to blow into a red plastic whistle, also attached to the vest. Confused, and deluding himself with the comforting thought that the incompetent flight attendant had simply forgotten about the parachutes, Duncan picked up the security guide from the seat back in front of him, and searched frantically for any hint as to where they were kept.
The dawning realization that there were, in fact, no parachutes, began to fill Duncan with a new feeling, one that almost matched his fear in its intensity: despair. He could either fly, and surely die, or else create a disturbance by getting off the plane, at which point he could surely no longer hide from the country the fact that he, the great Duncan, was afraid to fly. And that too would mean the death, not of the man, but of the author, of the personality who was presumed to inform the meaning of each and every one of his lifetime’s worth of works. And on top of everything else, it would expose him as being terribly provincial - what kind of sophisticated intellectual has never been on airplane? - by virtue of being very poorly travelled: how worldly could a man be, after all, if he had never been very far away from home? Or overseas? His international reputation would be ruined, and those graduate students and professors who did not abandon reading his work, would surely begin to read his fear of flying into everything he had ever written. Lines like:
Flew the blue jay through the sky The north’s true champion ascendant Over the eagle, reversing Its cruel inversion
… instead of being understood as a hymn to Canada’s first World Series victory, would instead perhaps be understood as mere wish fulfillment or even a projection of inferiority, a backhanded acknowledgement of weakness. Worse yet, his remaining readers might begin to psychoanalyze his particular fear and read that back into all of his work, and presumptuously even into his life, even those parts that appeared to have nothing to do with flying. What was it Freud had said about the fear of flying? And perhaps worst of all, rather than being regarded as the poet of the Canadian landscape, the relater and indeed the definer of the traditional Canadian relationship to the land, he would be seen instead as a sad conservative clown, an old man stuck in a previous age, and all of the tenets and principles of Canadian culture he had spent a lifetime creating and endorsing and spreading would be seen as belonging to a time that was past, and could not be recovered, and was, indeed, based, in the end, on fear, and weakness, and deceit.
The engines, whose hum Duncan had not noticed, began to get louder, and he realized that the door in front had long been closed. The funny-looking flight attendant with no chin was nowhere to be seen. Duncan’s field of vision seemed to shrink, the interior of the plane to grow darker. But no, the poet thought, he must not stop the plane, he must think of his reputation, which meant he must also think of his country. He grasped the armrest as tightly as he could - having unconsciously crumpled the security pamphlet into a ball in his left hand - and gritted his teeth in determination.
But then the noise of the engines grew even louder, and the plane lurched forward, and Duncan looked out the window and saw that something within the engine had begun to spin, impossibly fast. All those moving parts - what if there were one mistake - just one - the plane was mechanical but the men who made it were not infallible - what if just one screw was loose? No - it was impossible - it would never work - surely the pilot would stop the plane - yes, it was all a joke.
But then he saw, out the plane window and beyond the engine, another plane take off in the distance, and knew at once both that it was no joke at all, and that there was no way he could possibly let the plane he was on take off.
“Monsieur Duncan,” he heard a calm voice say from behind him, just as he had began to fumble with his seat belt, and had opened his mouth to demand an immediate halt to the plane’s progress, for the sake of his own exit. Surprised, Duncan turned his head and saw that Gaston was seated behind him. “Would you like a couple of mints, Monsieur Duncan?” the young Quebecker asked again.
Duncan’s mouth remained open. The great poet was about to commit an act of cultural suicide, and here he was, being offered mints!
“They are the new kind I was telling you about in the airport - they act immediately,” urged Gaston, seeing the mixture of fear and incomprehension on Duncan’s face.
Duncan had indeed, and perhaps understandably, forgotten entirely about Gaston’s promised pills throughout his recent ordeal. He had tried to push everything associated with airplanes and airports from his mind during the concentrated exercise in self-imposed repression he had undertaken as he boarded the plane. But now that he was reminded of the young man’s drugs, Duncan’s mind, perhaps inspired by his fear, began working more quickly than usual, and he immediately recovered himself.
“Ah - yes, young man, that is very kind of you,” he replied, responding subtly to Gaston’s subtle wink.
Gaston leaned forward and reached out his right hand between the seat and the plane window, his palm closed and down, until it was over Duncan’s right hand, palm up and open. Deftly Gaston opened his hand and retracted his arm, while Duncan, without closing his palm, brought his hand up to his mouth and immediately swallowed the pills without even looking at them.
He turned again to look at Gaston. “They work immediately?”
“Count backwards from ten in your head, and by the time you reach zero they are guaranteed to take effect.”
“Thank you,” replied Duncan, turning back and resting his head on the seat, and beginning to count back from ten. As the engine noise grew louder, and the plane began to move faster, he closed his eyes and focused desperately on the numbers. Ten - nine - eight - seven - six - five -
And, miraculously, just as the plane took off, Duncan’s tormented face went slack, his mouth fell open, and he fell fast asleep, dreaming about Stéphane Dion blowing a whistle and swinging a baseball bat, upside-down.