The Years of Fire Read online

  Céline knocked on the door and asked him to help her with her homework, but her voice sounded so worried that he knew it was only a pretext.

  “Leave me alone, Céline,” he sighed after a moment. “I don’t feel like seeing anyone right now.”

  The day had started with such bravado, such glory, and now look how it was ending. In misery.

  Steve happened to telephone him towards the end of the evening and, despite the lateness of the hour, managed to persuade him to go out. They rambled along rue Ontario for a while, pushed by a brisk wind; Charles told his friend about the unhappy incident at Chez Robert earlier that day, then confided his worries about the hardware store, which seemed headed inevitably into bankruptcy.

  For once, Steve didn’t try to turn everything into a joke. He listened to Charles gravely and attentively and did his best to raise his spirits. Then he stopped walking and turned to face his friend.

  “You’re really stressed out, man. That’s not good. All those dark thoughts, they’ll only bring you down. I’ve got something that’ll fix you up.”

  Charles looked at him, taken aback.

  “We’ve got to find us a quiet space, my man, where we can blow our minds. Know what I’m saying?”

  And from the pocket of his windbreaker he took a small plastic bag filled with some kind of brown substance. Charles knew what it was immediately. He’d been seeing the stuff around for some time. He’d even been invited to “have a toke” a few times, but for some reason he’d always put it off.

  “It’s better than tobacco, Thibo, my man. Those dark thoughts will just vanish into thin air. You might even see things from a thousand light-years away. You’ll be so laid back you won’t believe it!”

  Charles smiled nervously. He felt as though he’d already been to the moon and back that day, and he wasn’t sure he wanted to go on another “trip.” But Steve was insistent, and soon they found themselves on the bench in the little park on rue Coupal, which at that hour was dark and deserted.

  Charles took a drag and started coughing. Steve teased him, then encouraged him to try again. Then before he knew it, all of life’s difficulties seemed to have lifted from his shoulders. He was on a high plateau that extended smoothly and peacefully before him as far as he could see. He stood up and began walking, his nose to the wind, his hands thrust deep in his pockets, laughing at the way his feet moved.

  On December 20th, 1979, the Lévesque government laid before the National Assembly the wording of the question for the referendum on Quebec sovereignty. The idea of a public referendum on separation had been feeding stormy debates within the Parti Québécois for some time. Many were of the opinion that the election of an openly separatist government had itself been enough justification for a declaration of Quebec’s independence, and for the beginning of negotiations with Ottawa to bring it into effect. They were called the hard-liners. The moderate faction were diametrically opposed to this view, urging a much more gradual approach. According to them, the election of a sovereigntist government had to be followed by a period of good governance, in order to inspire confidence in the electorate. Once that confidence was gained, voters could be appealed to by means of a referendum to determine the political future of Quebec.

  In 1973, Claude Morin, known as “the father of phasing-in,” a former senior Quebec bureaucrat and a very influential figure among the independentistes (although revelations of his secret contacts within the Royal Canadian Mounted Police would discredit him a few years later), had presented the idea of a referendum to the Parti Québécois leadership, and it had been rejected. The next year, however, he had put the idea forward again and it had been adopted. From then on the referendum project had been an essential plank in the party’s platform.

  The hard-liners considered the moderates to be a bunch of wimps, hiding their lack of courage behind a smokescreen of complex stratagems and endless negotiations. The moderates, in turn, treated their adversaries as a gang of fanatics. Whatever the truth of the matter, it was the moderates who were carrying the day.

  After having let the debate drag on year after year, René Lévesque’s mandate was drawing to a close and he had finally come to a decision. And so, on December 20th, 1979, the referendum question was sent out to every newspaper in the province.

  Whereas the government of Quebec has made known its intention to come to a new understanding with the rest of Canada, based on the principle of the equality of all peoples;

  And whereas this understanding will allow Quebec to assume exclusive power to make its own laws, collect its own taxes and establish its own foreign relations, which is the definition of sovereignty, and, at the same time, to maintain an economic association with Canada, including the use of the same money;

  And whereas any change in political standing resulting from these negotiations will be submitted to the population by referendum;

  Do you therefore give the Quebec government a mandate to negotiate the above understanding between Quebec and Canada?

  After having read the question three times while standing in an aisle of his hardware store, Fernand turned pale, then violently red, then gave a long groan that would no doubt have caused little stir in a jungle but which produced a very marked effect in the store. He then shut himself in his office and informed everyone that he was not to be disturbed under any circumstances.

  He stayed there for three hours, and no one ever knew what he did. But that night at home he declared to Lucie that Quebec was being run by fools, and that he’d have to be a fool himself to let them go ahead on such a disastrous course of action without doing anything about it.

  “There’s a special meeting tonight in Claude Charron’s riding,” he said. “We don’t live in that riding, but I’m going to go to that meeting, and I’d like to see anyone try to stop me!”

  At eight-thirty he was already there, seated in the second row. Despite the fact that it was a bad time for political meetings, there was a large crowd present. Everyone was in high spirits, associating the coming emancipation of Quebec (of which they had no doubt whatsoever) with the upcoming Christmas and New Year’s celebrations. Fernand shot surly glances at those around him and groaned, but quietly this time, because he felt quite alone surrounded by such naive people, with their delighted faces.

  Minister Claude Charron arrived and was greeted by fists raised in triumph. He walked in smiling, calling out greetings, galvanizing the faithful. The meeting got underway. It obviously had to do with the referendum. Some attendees expressed misgivings, but most wanted the referendum to be held as soon as possible – even the next day. One old gentleman, an almost perfect replica of Colonel Sanders, with flowing white hair and white goatee, proposed holding a contest for the creation of a national anthem.

  Claude Charron burst out laughing.

  “Maybe we should wait until we have a nation,” he said.

  At nine o’clock, Fernand made his way to the microphone, his legs a little wobbly.

  “Sorry to rain on your parade, but in my view this referendum question should be tossed into the garbage. Has anyone really read it? One hundred and fourteen words! By the time you get to the end of it, you’ve forgotten how it started! And complicated! It’s asking people for permission to come back later and ask them for their permission. And all that after negotiations with Ottawa, and no one in the room knows how they’ll turn out. In fact, with all due respect, Mister Minister, the whole thing smells of fear. Fear and petty-minded calculation. Just you wait: that whoreson Trudeau is going to accuse us of trying to pull the wool over the people’s eyes. In this kind of dealing, Mister Minister, just like in all important things in life, you have to be clear and concise. These twistings and convolutions will kill the cause. That’s all I have to say.”

  He sat down. The room had fallen glacially silent. Someone sniggered behind his back, and Colonel Sanders shot him a withering look, as though he had just assassinated the national mascot in the public square. Claude Charron was slight
ly embarrassed (did he share some of Fernand’s misgivings?); he cleared his throat and then, in that familiar, comforting, infinitely seductive voice for which he was famous, spoke to the assembly.

  “I think, my friends, that you will all agree with me when I say that this is no longer the time for endless discussion and analysis. It’s time to spit on our hands and get the job done! Of course nothing is perfect, of course we could go back to the drawing board and come up with a better way of explaining the problem of the future of Quebec to Quebeckers. But, as far as I’m concerned, that would be a case of spending so much time polishing the pot that we never have time to make soup … and we’d die of hunger! No, my friends, there’s a fresh wind a-blowing, we’ve got one hell of a crew, and Canada has made it clearer than ever that the only way they want to see us Quebeckers is on our knees with our hands out. Well, now’s the time to act! Let’s go forward! And long live sovereignty!”

  The hall broke out into delirious applause. In three minutes Fernand’s intervention had been swept aside, forgotten. Despite his anger he stayed until the meeting was over. Leaving early would have drawn attention to his defeat. But he was also gnawed by doubts. What if he were wrong? But how could he be wrong when he was just using common sense? Could complicated arguments convince someone of such a simple thing?

  When the meeting was over and as the hall was emptying he succeeded in having a few last words with Claude Charron.

  “René Lévesque likes you, Monsieur Charron. Everyone knows he considers you next in line for premier. I’m begging you, get him to change the question before it’s too late.”

  “Listen to me, my good man,” replied the politician, smiling broadly. “This is politics, not Hollywood. You can’t just rewind the film and start over. You have to keep going forward, doing the best you can with what you’ve got. If you’re so unhappy with the question, well then, stay home on voting day. But I guarantee you,” he said, taking Fernand’s hand with a big smile, “that by then you’ll be out there with the rest of us, voting YES!”

  While an emaciated Roberto spent his days lying on a hospital bed, his face blank and dark, not speaking, not even opening his mouth except to say he was getting out of the restaurant business, Rosalie searched frantically for a new cook. They were coming up to Christmas and its incessant shopping, one of the most lucrative times of the year.

  When she reappeared behind her counter, Charles thought she looked older, more worried and impatient. She took Liette to task for the least little thing, not letting her get away with the smallest error. Her new cook, Rémi Goyette, was a tall man with large ears that stuck out from his head. He had a taciturn manner, an expressionless face, and a thick moustache that made him look like a Tartar. He had learned his trade in lumber camps and knew how to conduct himself in front of a stove well enough, but he sometimes came to work drunk and would turn the kitchen into a circus! One morning, without warning, he didn’t turn up at all. Rosalie managed as well as she could for the day by herself, and when he showed up the next morning, explaining that he’d had laryngitis and had had to stay in bed burning up with fever, she pretended to believe him and swallowed her anger as best she could. She needed him.

  Three weeks later it happened again. This time she didn’t say a word. She began looking for a replacement, and as soon as she found one she stopped the Tartar as he was going out the door one evening, and with a perceptibly shaking hand gave him an envelope and told him not to come back. He favoured her with a tight smile, took the envelope, and bowed her way without saying a word. As he was leaving, however, he stepped hard on her left foot and slammed the door so violently that the glass cracked and Mademoiselle Galipeau, who worked in a ladies’ dress shop, spilled her tea on her lap, causing, as she complained endlessly to Rosalie for the next several weeks, a severe case of skin irritation on her thighs.

  A black cloud seemed to have settled over Chez Robert. Hardly had the year 1980 begun than the new cook was seized by a bout of homesickness and decided to return to the Magdalen Islands. Rosalie found another, this one so terrible the customers started complaining. On February the 14th a cold snap hit Montreal and a water pipe burst, flooding the restaurant. Two weeks later Roberto reappeared, looking grey and pale but smiling bravely, and, to the great delight of his wife and their customers, resumed his place in the kitchen. But his illness had greatly reduced his abilities, and after a few days they had to hire an assistant, which was an extra expense. Business, meanwhile, for them as for everyone else, was not what it had once been.

  In fact, the country was in a recession that showed itself in a thousand depressing ways. The neighbourhood became poorer and shabbier as the more successful elements began to move out. Houses and storefronts became vacant, very suspicious fires broke out, and factories that had been operating since the turn of the century, even earlier, shut their doors.

  There was less and less work for Charles at the restaurant. Rosalie shook her head sadly to see him sitting in a booth, sometimes for an hour or more, reading a newspaper or with his nose in a book, waiting for the telephone to ring with a delivery order and the usual tip.

  One particularly slow Saturday evening, as he was watching the television suspended from the ceiling in a corner of the restaurant, trying with a couple of customers to whip up an interest in a particularly slow hockey game, she brought over a cup of hot chocolate and a plate of cookies and set them down on the table in front of him.

  “You didn’t have to do this, Madame Guindon,” he said to her, smiling broadly. “I had a big supper.”

  “Bah!” she replied. “You need a few calories in you with this wind blowing outside. If you ever have to go outside, that is,” she added with a frown. “Which doesn’t look likely …”

  She sat down heavily across from him, watching him attack his food.

  “Charles,” she said. “I need to speak with you.”

  Her serious tone made him look up quickly, his eyes wide with surprise.

  “It might be best for you to start looking for a job somewhere else. I don’t have a lot to offer you here, and it hurts me to see you wasting your time like this. You need to earn money just like the rest of us, after all.”

  Charles pursed his lips as if to contradict her and looked away, chewing.

  “I’m serious, Charles.”

  The boy placed his hands on the edge of the table and looked at her with such gravity that it made her smile in spite of her worry.

  “Madame Guindon,” he said sternly, “you should be ashamed of yourself, talking like that. You should have more faith. Things will pick up around here, you’ll see. Roberto has only been back for two weeks and there are still a lot of people who don’t know that yet. Besides, I like working here. I feel as though this were my home. If you want me to go you’re going to have to fire me, the way you did those cooks.”

  Rosalie took his hand and kissed it, a very unusual gesture for her; Monsieur Vlaminck, a retired plumber who had come down to get away from his wife for a few moments, was amazed by it.

  But despite Roberto’s efforts, the business did not get back on its feet. Even more serious, the cook began to find his work distasteful. “It’s a killer; it’ll lead to the graveyard before the year’s out.”

  One morning in March as they walked to school, buttons announcing YES pinned proudly to their windbreakers, Charles and Henri saw a sign in the restaurant’s window. Roberto and Rosalie had put the place up for sale. Charles stopped for a moment in stunned silence, then shrugged his shoulders and continued on his way.

  “It’s best to sell, don’t you think?” Henri said, trying to console his friend. “Roberto can’t take it any more. Would you rather he worked himself to death?”

  “I’m sure it’s never going to be like it was before,” was all Charles could reply.

  He was downcast for the rest of the morning.

  The school year ended with no further fireworks between Charles and the principal. Doyon maintained his constant
and meticulous surveillance over his student, but the latter had decided to knuckle down and play it safe, behaving as well and with as much discretion as was possible for a boy of thirteen in his first year of junior high school. There were a few clashes, but they were over things so minute that the principal found no excuse in them to awaken the full majesty and invoke the power of his authority.

  Chez Robert closed its doors at the end of spring. Roberto had put aside a bit of money, and he decided to go on a long vacation with Rosalie in the Laurentians. They rented a cottage and put the sale of the business in the hands of an agent. On closing day they held a goodbye party for all their friends and regular customers; they gave out free beer and soft drinks and pizzas – the last pizzas, Roberto swore, that he would ever make in his life. There were a lot of teary eyes. Rosalie seemed tired but happy, and she bestowed kisses on everyone in the room. In his deep, resounding voice, Fernand delivered a comical eulogy to the departing couple, his attempt to turn a sad event into a cause for laughter. Monsieur Victoire took a different tack and veered off into lofty sentimentality. He stood between the cook and his wife, his arms around both, and with his sumptuous voice soon had most of the room in tears, and even choked out a few sobs himself. Charles sat alone in a corner, a can of pop in hand, contemplating the scene with a pensive eye.

  Perhaps it was puberty. Blonblon had pretty much abandoned the appliance repair shop, thereby delivering a mortal blow to his associate’s interest in their small business as well. He now preferred to spend his spare time ambling down the streets of the neighbourhood with Charles and Henri, a much less lucrative occupation but one that seemed to hold a great deal more interest. They drifted down rue Ontario and hung around the Frontenac metro station, checking out the telephone booths for forgotten coins, picking up returnable cans and bottles, falling into occasional conversations with strangers, and absorbing as much of what the street had to teach them as they possibly could. Lucie began worrying about this sudden change in Henri’s and Charles’s behaviour. She confided her concern to her husband, who thundered about the house, imposed stricter rules, issued threats, and pointed out moral consequences, all to very little effect. Afterwards he told himself that the boys’ natural goodness, along with the penchant for reading that Charles still displayed, meant that things would sort themselves out eventually. On the other hand, he read with careful attention a long article in The New Observer on the dangers of drugs, which their friend the notary, Parfait Michaud, had passed on to him one evening with a significant look.