Cowboy. Louis Hamelin

a kind of likeable lost cause, a young thinker out of his element who spent most of his time daydreaming, opening his mouth, like a fish, only to breathe. I didn’t miss any of the Old Man’s words, that prolific gossip where each sentence, like a roof tile, partially covered another. I took advantage of the peace and quiet they allowed me to spy with impunity. I secretly scribbled notes, feeling the rest of the story would throw me into a role for which I had to prepare immediately. I soaked up all those ceaselessly repeated words, discharged with heavy throat clearings. I’d become a sensory sieve, a selective strainer. When the lump 1 imagined to be necessary would crop up amid all this mash, my prospector’s ear would go off like a valve. I’d then be able to grasp that dark nugget hidden in the passage of time, and extricate it from the sand, exposing it to the light, making it the jewel which, one day, would redeem all.

      Folks in Grande-Ourse always returned to the same story, the famous one nobody said much about, but which was deeply repressed in everyone’s psyche. The Affair ate at Grande-Ourse’s social fabric, and Salome somehow sprang from the tragedy which tormented the village like a burning thorn in its paw. The hotels threshold had been the cradle of the curse which poisoned exchanges. It was a delicate topic, a build-up of explosive forces that had been swallowed by the darkness. The embers still glowed, watching over like a scar; even the Old Man, when broaching the subject, displayed a temperance that contrasted surprisingly with his customary frenzy.

      An Indian man and woman drive up to the front of the hotel in an old pickup. It’s night and they re drunk. The man heads to the door, unsuccessfully trying to open it. He knocks. No one answers. He insists with heavy blows. His companion stayed behind. He wants one more beer, despite the late hour Behind the door, a voice urges them to leave. The discussion is animated. The Indian man finally heads back to the pickup, shouting imprecations. He threatens with his fist. He’s lost sight of his girlfriend. He fiddles around the vehicle for a moment, and heads back towards the hotel wielding a heavy axe whose sharp head shines in the darkness. Swinging the tool, he deals a terrible blow to the door. The crash of broken wood echoes in the night. And he repeats the manoeuvre, enraged. Blows thunder in cadence, slow and heavy. Soon, he opens a breach. Then the door topples over, torn off its hinges. The only sound from the interior is an oppressed silence. The Indian now utters incoherent words. Someone hands him a beer through the demolished entrance. He grabs it and drinks without asking questions, still belching a string of hazy words. He turns back, walking unsteadily, beer in one hand, axe in the other. He walks with difficulty, shouting his head off, bellowing wild chants. As he’s about to reach the door of his vehicle, the first shot rings out. The Indian doesn’t fall right away, only staggers a little more. Several gunshots will be needed to bring him down and stretch him out properly. The salvo then rattles the night, shaking his back with heavy shivers. He finally tumbles forward, spreading out full length, trying to hang on to the opened door.

       Grande-Ourse hasn’t finished hearing those gunshots. The door is summarily put back into place. Not a trace is left of him. Nothing. His silhouette can be seen lying on the ground, legs stretched out as though making a final broad stride and trying to enter the earth itself

      The Old Man was informed and came over. He picks up the body. A dead man is heavy, he thinks, slipping his hands into the armpits. Destination: the cold room, beneath the Outfitters storehouse.

      That’s what happened.

      That’s what would’ve happened, if a long story could be cut short....

      They could be seen approaching at a snails pace across the railway, the entire band piled into an old verdigris pickup specked with rust. The scrap heap’s contrasting candy-pink hood was touching to behold. The head of the clan, César Flamand, was holding the steering wheel. He was fascinating to observe up close: totally wizened, ugly as three sins, taciturn as a grave. His features were always twisted by elaborate twitches and scowls, as though he’d wanted to keep flies away from his face without using his hands. His shoulders had portaged numerous summers and he was easily twice as old as the age anyone might’ve given him. Romeo, the young man who’d fallen under the bullets twelve years earlier, was his son. Salomé was the daughter of this Romeo, and, therefore, César’s granddaughter. He’d stopped drinking in the wake of the famous incident, and now dragged his sadness everywhere, as though it were tethered to his forehead. Fernande was his second wife, with the exception of a few casual cohabitations. Mature and deeply wrinkled, yet just recovering from childbirth, she snuggled up to him on the seat, beer squeezed between her thighs in the mild evening. They looked like a pair of teenagers heading to the drive –in. A raft of colourful children dangled over the side in the back as the tires rolled over the gravel. Many of the kids belonged to César, who still wasn’t thinking of abstaining from the pleasures of procreation. The others, snatched from bad mothers whose breasts spurted more alcohol than milk, had been placed in the couple’s good care. Flamand’s reputation for abstinence, and paternal kindness taken to the point of self-denial, reassured social workers.

      Salomé appeared calm and introverted amid the noisy fray. Dressed all in red, she was shy and anxious, averting her eyes. Her sisters, half-sisters, brothers, and half-brothers, a howling swarm, swept through the entire store. The smallest ones, unsure and incredibly cute, jolted along the aisle in short, hasty, and conquering strides. Flamand and his wife wandered amid this brood with indulgent smiles. All they wanted was to linger tenderly. They had all the time in the world while the Old Man taunted them amicably, “Hail! Hail César! Hail Fernande!”

      They were the only Indians that Benoît and the Old Man saw as not covered in war paint. This laudable effort at tolerance was mainly due to the austere Aboriginal’s tacit vow of sobriety. As well, Flamand was fond of Benoît, perhaps because of his morbid dolorism, and respected the Old Man, since that pale morning when, suspenders dangling, the latter had gone to pick up his son, back riddled with .303 bullets, in front of the hotel. Without ever recognizing it openly, Flamand was deeply grateful to the Old Man for having spontaneously performed the gruesome task.

      Though he’d forsaken the bottle, you could see at first glance that César Flamand had drunk a great deal, to the point of saturating his yellowish flesh, and that before stopping completely, he’d had to go to the bottom of things, to where truth and horror lie. Whenever Flamand spoke, you always took a few seconds, at first, unsure whether that chain of imperceptible chin movements corresponded to a living tongue.

      As soon as the mercury climbed a few degrees, the sale of Mister Freezes increased by leaps and bounds. It’s crazy how much I’d sell of this frozen pasteurized water(as specified on the product label). I expected the parent company to send me a bonus at any moment. The craving for something cold spread among the young people, each wanting a small column of ice wrapped in cellophane. And Flamand, following the customary protests, would take grumpy pleasure in organizing the distribution. Salomé deliberately leaned on the fridge, where she remained still, literally seated on the supply of Mister Freezes. With a glimmer of defiance in her eyes, she waited for me to feign pushing her to tumble down gracefully. My fingers became several stems running aground. She again hoisted herself to the same spot, staring at me unexpectedly, pensively sucking her colour crystals, oblivious to the awful insolence of the purple stick liquefying in her mouth. Flamand coughed up the cash.

      Rounds of Mister Freezes wouldn’t have been complete without Admiral Nelson. He’d burst into the premises, inquisitive, as though he’d been able to sniff the chemical colourings from a distance. Little girls made fun of him, but he paid no attention and made do with claiming his share. Dealing with other humans was painful to him.

      Admiral Nelson was a solitary boy, already accustomed to the minimal compassion the world offered him. He was a young Indian, about 10 years old, cheerful as the devil but able to be serious. Afflicted with a harelip, he chattered like a magpie and looked like a squirrel: he was prescient and nervous. Since he was called Nelson, his surname had followed quite