Nick’s parents were amicably divorced. Deborah, only child of Arthur’s first marriage, was a school principal in Australia. The boy lived with her but was taking school holidays with his dad in Vancouver. When Nicholas Senior asked to deposit his son at Blunder Bay for a couple of weeks “to give him a healthy rural experience,” Arthur had pretended to be overjoyed.
Mary Something called Kurt Zoller’s name. “This is under the Water Taxi regs, Your Honour. Charge of failing to produce a safety gear certificate.”
Arthur sensed something rancid behind him, like last night’s beer. “I don’t get it, Arthur.” Cud Brown, at his left ear. “Of the two A-list creators on this island, one is busted for weed and gets the counsel of his choice. The other is wrongfully charged with murdering a fucking judge and gets Brian fucking Pomeroy…”
Arthur hadn’t been answering Cud’s calls. Now he was being stalked by him.
“What is it, man? I hope it’s not because I spent two weeks up a tree with your lady.”
Arthur turned, annoyed. “Of course not.” He felt a flush of embarrassment at this lie. “We’ll talk after court.”
He wasn’t going to take any more of this nonsense. Arthur had done his last murder trial. The previous year, coerced by the firm he’d supposedly retired from, he’d defended a wealthy financier, an adulterer who shot his wife on a hunting trip and pleaded accident. Arthur had to count it a victory when the jury compromised on manslaughter, but in his heart he believed his client deserved worse than seven years’ jail time.
Arthur felt sick after that case. He was going to retire from unretiring. Since quitting practice eight years ago he’d been dragged back to the arena half a dozen times, always swearing this would be the last time.
Nick removed his headphones long enough to hear Zoller droning on in his own defence. The boy’s expression said, I knew this was going to be bad, but not this bad. Back went the headphones. Arthur had insisted he come, to observe the consequences of illegal behaviour.
Having given up trying to follow Zoller’s convoluted logic, Judge Wilkie sat impatiently to the end, then fined him three hundred dollars-the man responsible for the cold drafts was getting no breaks in this courtroom.
“I see Mr. Beauchamp is in the audience,” the judge said.
“Oh, I didn’t notice him hiding back there.” Mary Something smiled at Arthur, who motioned his client to join him at the folding card table set out for defendants and their counsel.
“I note here,” said the judge, “how your client told the probation officer he was growing this marijuana for his own use, four hundred and fifty pounds of it.”
“I was gonna freeze it, Your Honour. Enough to last me a lifetime.” McCoy got this out before Arthur could hush him, but no harm done. Wilkie was chuckling, maybe at the Newfoundland accent. Loif-toime.
“Mr. McCoy, you could grow as old as Methuselah and never smoke all that weed.”
“Aye, but I was going to give it a mighty try, Your Honour.”
Everyone was laughing, including the judge. “Stinks to high heaven, I guess that’s why they call it skunkweed. Let me see some of it, while I hear counsel make their submissions.”
Constable Pound, still in his own peculiar space, didn’t budge. When Wilkie repeated himself, the officer snapped awake and began working at the knotted twine around the sacks. It was unclear why he’d hauled all that pot in here for a sentencing, unless out of vanity over the biggest bust of his career.
The hall’s lights flickered three times then died.
“Now what?” Wilkie said.
Someone at the back explained. “When the lights sputter like that, it’s usually a leaner falling on the line.” A tree, he meant.
The windowless hall offered little ambient light. Flashlights came out. Emergency oil lamps were found, candles set on tables, a drill known to most who frequented the community hall in the windy winter.
Arthur carried on stoutly during all this, extolling his client’s talent and virtues, urging that he be discharged after a period of community service. “Do not condemn this senior citizen, this celebrated artist, to live his sunset days with a criminal record.” Reporters scribbled away by candlelight.
There came a ripping sound from the back. Frustrated by the knots, Pound had cut one sack open. Several flashlight beams converged on the great dollops of sticky, melting cannabis spilling from it. Pound found a discarded newspaper, deposited some of the gunk onto it, and showed it to Judge Wilkie under a flashlight beam. Wilkie squinted at it, making a disgusted face.
McCoy looked like a fierce, hairy elf in the glow from a stubby candle. He tugged at Arthur, whispered, “What’s this blather about community service? I’ve a mind to do time instead.”
“Ridiculous. You don’t want a criminal record.”
“I don’t owe this community nothing. They let me down, b’y. They turned me in.”
Wilkie turned to the prosecutor: “What do you think of Mr. Beauchamp’s idea of community service?”
“I won’t oppose.” A glowing, candlelit smile for Arthur. Such an excellent prosecutor.
“So we just have to decide on some task…Who’s the local government on this island?”
Once again Kurt Zoller rose. “I have the privilege of being our elected trustee.”
“Okay, I want you to get together with other leading members of this community and recommend an appropriate project for Mr. McCoy to pay his debt to society.”
“I’ll speak to my advisers, Your Worship.”
The matter was adjourned. McCoy nattered as he and Arthur walked toward the door. “That hypocritical shit. ‘I have the privilege of being trustee.’ He’s the rat, b’y, count on it.”
He suspected Zoller of squealing. The two of them were among a dozen property owners clustered around Potters Pond, all sharing the same power line. In the morning, when McCoy switched on his banks of grow lights, their kitchen lights would dim and their toasters lose their glow. Of the neighbours, only Zoller, an auxiliary coast guard, fit the usual profile of a snitch. Few other residents were particularly bothered: after all, marijuana was the number-two industry on Garibaldi after tourism but ahead of sheep and chickens and arts and crafts.
Arthur hoped to hustle home for lunch but wanted to dodge Cud Brown-who was no longer in the hall, maybe lurking outside. He would let McCoy leave first and then peek outside.
Nick was still looking as if he’d rather be somewhere else, online. He was at his laptop constantly, playing games or downloading stolen songs or looking at porno or whatever they do. Arthur didn’t know what fourteen-year-olds did. If they were like Nick, their reading consisted solely of computer printouts and arcane texts with phrases such as “eighteen-bit recapture protocol.” To give him credit, he seemed adept at computer arts, was rebuilding Margaret’s broken-down machine, enhancing it.
“Bob Stonewell,” Mary called out. “Unsightly Premises Bylaw.”
Word was passed outside, and in a moment Stoney was peering in, holding the door open for McCoy, ushering in a cold wind that blew out some candles.
“Shut that damn door!” someone yelled.
Arthur could see his stalker out there, so he stayed inside. McCoy slammed the door behind him as he left.
Ill-adjusted to the dimness, Stoney stumbled into the cannabis sacks. “Yow, this stuff is really working.” Constable Pound tried to pull him away, but Stoney resisted. “Hey, man, this hemp is heating up.”
“What’s the problem over there?” Judge Wilkie was standing.
“Mr. Stonewell is trying to interfere with the exhibits, sir.”
Stoney spoke with urgency: “Your Honour, I have some experience in these matters, and this here skunk is dangerous, it’s cooking…”
Pound gave his arm a tug. Stoney went off balance and their momentum carried them against a post, knocking a kerosene lamp off its hook. It fell on the sacks. There were loud gasps as the superskunk quietly ignited, giving off an otherworldly blue glow.