Shipping News, The - E. Annie Proulx [108]
“Did it fix your sister’s arms?”
“Oh yes, boy. Her arms come smooth as silk, they did, it was a pleasure to be squeezed by ‘em. So they all said. I hope that’s not the extent of your foreign news, Nutbeem, hair removal in Ontario.”
“Well, there’s the cholera epidemic in Peru. Argentina and Paraguay now refuse to play soccer in Peru. Fourteen thousand cases have been reported in the last six weeks.”
“Good. We’ll run that story next to the one on unknown insects biting employees in the Social Service office in Misky Bay after a recent influx of Peruvian immigrants.” He looked at Quoyle. “Have you got a wreck, buddy?”
“Um,” said Quoyle. Giving nothing to Tert Card.
“Well, then, what is it, where is it and did you get pictures?”
[247] “The ship collision on Strain Bag. Then I shot a couple of frames of a vehicle fire—unexplained causes. Truck was parked in front of the funeral home and just burst into flames while the family was inside. Looked like a roasting pan on fire.”
“That’s a very good tip, Quoyle. If we ever get hard up for pictues we can get a roasting pan, fill it up with oil and set it on fire. Jiggle the camera a little when we take snaps. Who’ll ever know?”
“Something in Misky Bay. Apparently a grudge between twin brothers, Boyle and Doyle Cats.”
“I know them,” said Billy Pretty. “One of them drives a taxi.”
“Right. Boyle drives the taxi. There’d been some trouble the night before. Something to do with a drug deal, they think. On Wednesday afternoon Boyle picks up a passenger at the fish plant, makes a U-turn, and is ambushed by a masked man on a late-model blue Yamaha snowmobile with the word PSYCHOPATH painted on the cowling. His brother Doyle is alleged to own such a snowmobile. The snowmobile rider fires a shotgun at the taxi and speeds away, the taxi’s windshield is blown out, the vehicle swerves and ends up on the loading ramp of the fish plant. Minor cuts and lacerations. The snowmobile got away.”
“Is there snow down there?”
“No.”
“I’m going to remember this place for many things,” said Nutbeem. “But most of all for the inventive violence and this tearing-off-of-clothes-in-court business. Seems to be a Newfoundland specialty. Here’s a fairly simple arson—some chap set his boat on fire—maybe you’ve got this one too, Quoyle-possibly for the insurance, and he’s been sitting in the pokey for a few days. This morning they go to bring him into court and he did the regular.”
“Tore off his clothes,” droned through the room.
“I can do something with that,” said Billy, tapping on the keys.
“Tert,” said Nutbeem. “That sister of yours. Is she the one you told us that swallowed the sea wolf?”
“Sea wolf? You stun mope, she swallowed a water wolf. A sea wolf is a submarine. Come down in the dark and took up a dipper [248] of water and swallowed it. When she was a kid. Said she felt something go down. Soon after that she commenced to eat like a horse. Eat and eat. Oh, the old woman knew right away. ‘You’ve swallowed a water wolf,’ she said. Nutbeem, I got your S.A. stories running down my computer screen. You writing it by the yard, now? Seven, eight, nine—you got eleven sexual abuse stories here. We put all this in there won’t be room for the other news.”
“You ought to see my notebook. It’s an epidemic.” Nutbeem turned to the file cabinets behind him. The khaki metal rang as he wrenched a drawer open. “All this since I’ve been here. What are you going to do when I’m off, then?”
“Jack’s problem. Among others,” said Tert Card with a mouthful of satisfaction. “You still leaving Tuesday?”
“Yes, I’ll be heading out of the lashing snow sailing on my way to the Caribbean,