Killing Down the Roman Line (6 page)

“You two can be sold,” she scolded them. “In a heartbeat.”

The goats lowered their heads and chewed, turning their behinds towards her.

Emma kneeled down to inspect the damage. The tomatoes might survive but the peppers would never bear fruit now, the stalks devoured up along with the buds. She brushed her hands off and straightened up, catching sight of the pickup roaring onto the road and pluming dust as it steered towards town.

Where the hell was Jim going?

She dug her phone from a back pocket and hit the number for Jim’s cell.

“Yeah.” His voice crackly down the line.

“Where are you going?” Emma strode out of the rows, angling the phone for a better reception. “Is everything okay?”

“I gotta talk to Kate. Somebody just screwed us over.”

Click. The line gone dead. She hated it when he got cryptic. Was she supposed to guess what that meant?

To hell with it. Emma knelt back down to uproot the mangled pepper plants.

5

THE OAK STEM Diner was the place where business was conducted over eggs and bottomless cups of coffee, had been since the sixties. Business had slackened the last few years when the new Tim Hortons coffee shop landed further out on the strip, siphoning off customers but the Oak Stem held its own with its booths and swivel stools. A universal truth; you couldn’t negotiate a deal under a sign declaring a twenty minute minimum.

The bell over the door rang as Jim entered but staff and patrons alike were deaf to it now. Jim scanned the tables and spotted Kate in the last booth. Sitting across from her were Hitchens and Tom Carswell, the manager of the Pennyluck Savings and Loan. All three looked up when Jim approached.

Jim nodded to the two men before squaring his eyes on the mayor. “We need to talk.”

“Jimmy, sit down,” said Hitchens. “We were just talking about you. And your new neighbour.”

“Is that so? You know about this guy?”

“Sit down.” Kate’s tone was conciliatory although her eyes seemed troubled.

Hitchens slid over and Jim sat. “He said his name’s Corrigan. Where the hell did he come from?”

“No idea,” said Kate. “John found him on the steps of the county office this morning, waiting for it to open. He filed a claim on the property.”

“So some yahoo walks in and makes a claim? If I knew it was that easy, I woulda done it ages ago.”

Tom Carswell clinked his cup back onto the saucer. He had that puffy faced, worn out look some men get sliding down the other side of forty. Swollen looking hands that were oddly dainty holding a cup. Jim had never liked the man, disliking his air of superiority. He guessed that handling other people’s money did that to a person. Carswell spoke slowly. “He had a formal statement of claim. ID, proof. If everything checks out, the property is his.”

“I thought it belonged to the county.”

“It’s in trust to the county.” Carswell clucked, the way a school teacher does. “Has been forever.”

“But it’s still Corrigan property.” Kate shrugged, like everyone knew this but Jim. “Weird, I know.”

“But there hasn’t been a Corrigan for years. How could it still belong to them?”

“It’s still in their name. Held in trust” Carswell said, as if this was all over Jim’s head. “The land’s been for sale since Adam but never sold. It’s complicated.”

Hitchens snorted. “Who the hell would want that creepy old place?”

Jim zeroed in on Kate, telegraphing a simple message.
I want it.
He said, “So?”

Kate folded her hands together. “So the land remained in the Corrigan name. This man, William, is it?” Carswell nodded, she went on. “He filed proof that he’s a descendant of the original family and lays legal claim.”

“And just like that, you believed him?”

“We believed his money.” Carswell slurped his coffee. “He paid the outstanding back taxes for the last ten years. Didn’t even blink an eye about it either. Just cut a cheque.”

Jim sank back into the bench. “So that’s it? It’s his land and how’s your mother?”

“There’s a process, Jim. Nothing’s written in stone yet.”

“Yeah.” Jim slid out of the booth, turned to go.

Hitchens called after him. “What do you care, Jimmy?”

Kate watched him storm out. She’d explain it to him later when he cooled off.

Hitchens swung back to the table. “What’s his problem?”

“Covetousness,” Carswell said.

“Don’t gossip, Tom.” Kate pushed her coffee cup away. Her sixth and it wasn’t even noon. She looked up to see old Mr. Gallagher staring at them from his perch at the lunch counter. Openly eavesdropping. “Can I help you Mr. Gallagher?”

“That name,” he said. “What was that name you said?”

Hitchens looked at him. “You mean Jim?”

“No, ye idiot.” Gallagher waved his hand as if to shoo Hitchens off. “The other name.”

Kate was in no mood for the old man’s carrying on but Carswell piped up. “Corrigan?”

The old man winced as if stung. “That one. What’s wrong with you people anyway? Don’t ever utter that name.”

Hitchens laughed, looking at Kate and Carswell. The old geezer was in form today. “Why not?”

Gallagher turned away. “It’s bad luck.”

~

Driving home, Jim felt a gaping black hole yawning open under his feet. It would swallow him whole. His wife, child, home. He pulled to the shoulder and clambered out to be sick but nothing came up. He stayed doubled over, hands on his knees.

His whole plan had popped like a balloon with the appearance of this man at the old property. Without the new acreage, Jim was painted into a corner with no way forward or back. He’d go under and with it, they’d lose it all. The bank and the creditors would pick the bones clean. Turkey vultures. Everything lost because of his ineptitude.

His teeth felt gritty and burned when he turned back into his driveway. He was surprised to see Travis mowing the front lawn, a chore he normally had to cajole and harass the boy to do. Emma must have scolded him into doing it, anticipating his mood. Jim waved at his son as he rumbled past him, drove on towards the barn. He heard the lawnmower shut down and Travis crossing the yard towards him. The boy would have a million questions, none of which Jim wanted to face, let alone answer.

“So this carpetbagger just shows up out of the blue. Says the place is his. Weird looking guy too.”

Travis sat perched in the tractor seat, legs dangling. “What’s a carpetbagger?”

“City people. Con artists. They’ll steal your wallet while shaking your hand.” Jim lifted out the air filter and slotted the flathead into the idle screw. Tweaked it a hair. “Try it now.”

Travis hit the ignition and the engine sputtered up. The idle too fast. Jim turned it back until it slowed and then waved at Travis to cut it. “Dollars to donuts, he’s got some scam going.”

“Where’d he come from?”

“Dunno. Out east, I guess. Probably run out of the last town he was in for pulling something stupid.”

“Uh… Dad?”

“You can tell a shyster by the look in his eye. You know—”

“What happened up there?” Emma stood just inside the barn door, hair wet from the shower. Listening to his tirade. He gave her a brief rundown of the stranger in the house, his talk with Kate at the diner. Carswell and his condescending tone. “So why are you talking trash about this guy?”

“Because he just screwed us over.”

“You don’t know anything about the man.”

“Don’t need to.”

“Yes you do. Go back and invite the man over for coffee.”

He looked at his wife like she had suddenly grown two heads. “No way.”

“Yes way. Go be neighbourly. Let’s find out about our mystery man.”

Jim dropped the filter back in, replaced the cover. Refusing to budge. Emma looked up at her son in the cab, shielding her eyes from the sun. “Travis, take your dad over there and invite our new neighbour over.” She looked back at Jim. “Or I’ll do it myself.”

~

Travis sat in the box, bouncing on the wheel well as Jim drove back to the decrepit house. The debris pile in the yard was even taller now. Lengths of mouldy sheetrock and lines of cast iron pipe. Travis hopped out of the pickup and joined his dad in the overgrown grass. He looked over the mess. “What’s he doing? Gutting the place?”

“Looks that way.” Jim frowned. The guy was settling in fast, already tearing down for the inevitable home reno. Good luck with that. He’d be better off just bulldozing the whole thing and starting from scratch rather than renovating this husk of a house.

Travis drifted off to where a big square of framed plywood leaned against the porch rail. Painted white with letters stencilled neatly in black, waiting to be filled in. A sign.

THE CORRIGAN HORRORSHOW

~ Historical tour and attractions ~

“What’s that supposed to be?”

Jim didn’t have a clue. Sitting a few yards away were two posts braced with triangular footings. A frame to nail the signboard to. Whatever it meant, he didn’t like it. The odd sign simply confirmed his earlier suspicion of a con man or opportunist.

“Watch your step.” He went up the porch, pointing to the broken steps. “The boards are rotted through.”

Jim rapped on the doorframe and called out. A crash from somewhere inside. The stranger demolishing more walls. Then the voice bellowed up and blasted their ears. “Cocksucking son of a whore!!”

Jim winced at the language and looked at his son. “Pretend you didn’t hear that.” Travis tried not to smirk. He followed his dad over the threshold, eyes widening at the dark and foul interior, tripping over the uneven boards. They followed the cloud of profanity towards the back of the house.

Will Corrigan hauled on a prybar, wedging a length of bulkhead from the kitchen ceiling. The wood popped and the whole piece crashed down onto his head in a plume of dust, pummelling Corrigan to his knees. “Rotten motherfucking bastard!”

Jim leapt forward and pushed the mess off of the crumpled man, crashing it to the floor. Corrigan teetered up and backed away, coughing. He gripped Jim’s arm until the coughing jag passed. He spat onto the floor, wiped his chin. “Thank you.”

Travis retreated back from the dust cloud, watching.

Jim held the man’s arm, waiting for him to find his balance. Uncomfortable as hell holding some stranger, their faces inches apart. Politeness forced him to endure. Corrigan’s cheeks blew out as he coughed some more and then he tapped Jim’s arm, signalling he was okay.

“You might want to get a spotter,” Jim said, “if you’re doing demolition.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” Corrigan squinted at Travis. “Who’s this?”

“My son. Say hello, Travis.”

Travis stuck out his hand. “Hi.”

“Pleased to meet you, Travis. What brings you two out here?”

“My mom wants you to come for dinner.”

“
We
,” Jim corrected his son, “would like you to come over. Say hello and all that.”

Corrigan smiled at the boy and nodded. “Well that’s very neighbourly of you, son. I’ll have to take a rain cheque. Too much to do around here.”

“You fixing up the place?”

“Not exactly. Ripping stuff out. Look at this shit.” Corrigan bashed out a reluctant strip of framing. “All this reno that was done ages ago. Poorly made and shabbily installed. The work of some cocksucking Orangeman I’d wager.”

Jim winced again at the language. He himself had sworn and cursed a hundred times over in the presence of his son but always slips. Not like this, delighting in the curse. “Could you hold back the cussing? Just around my son…”

Corrigan held out the prybar to the boy. Nodded at him to have a go. “Here son. Take a whack at it.”

Travis took the hold of the tool and looked to his dad for approval. Jim shrugged and Travis bashed at the old drywall. The first hit bounced off and Travis swung harder, piercing the wall.

“Atta boy.” Corrigan turned to Jim. “I’m going to strip it all back to the original timberframe. Just like it was back then.”

“Back when?” Jim raised his voice over the racket Travis was making.

“How it was back in eighteen ninety-eight.”

Travis stopped bashing the wall. “What for?”

“Do they not teach history in this town?” Corrigan addressed the boy but levelled his gaze at the father.

Travis soured. “History’s boring.”

“Ignore him,” Jim said. He cocked a thumb towards the front door. “What’s that sign out front?”

Corrigan stared at Jim, as if expecting something else. He shook his head, pulled the prybar from Travis’s hands and strode for the back door. “Come on. I got something to show you.”

Corrigan led them out the back, stepping past another debris pile. The backyard was choked with tall grass and raspberry bushes. A pathway had been freshly mowed through the weeds, winding out of sight up the hill. A wood handled scythe leaned against the back veranda, the rusty blade still green from the cutting. Corrigan picked it up and strode on down the path he had mowed. “I spent most of the morning cutting down all these damn weeds back here. For a while there I was afraid I wouldn’t find it.”

“Find what?” Travis watched the toes of his shoes turn green.

“Come see.”

The pathway snaked around the trunks of apple trees, the orchard barely recognizable in the undergrowth. Corrigan’s scythe trailed along the wet grass into a copse of ancient weeping willows. The hanging branches rustled and swayed around them where a larger clearing had been cut through.

Corrigan stopped and tapped the scythe blade against a squared stone on the ground. Granite, no larger than a cinderblock. “This,” he said.

Travis knelt and brushed the dirt from the stone. Jim right behind him. The stone held an inscription chiselled into the top-face. A single word.

James

Travis went wide-eyed. “Is that a grave?”

“Yes it is.” Corrigan swept back stalks of unmowed weeds to reveal another stone, also inscribed.
Bridgette.
“There’s four others here hidden under the weeds.”

Travis’s eyes were saucers as Corrigan swung the long scythe and cut low the weeds, revealing one stone after another.

Unlike his son, Jim did not register or shock or horror.