[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
.What could his grandfather be doing with all this? What possible use could the old man have for so many guns? Ezra rushed back to the third box and pushed open the lid."You should not be here, Cabra."Ezra jumped at the sharp voice behind him and spun around.Ruiz was sitting on the stairs.He was a few steps up from where Ezra had laid the shotgun.His friend's face was grave and he did not look like himself."You should not be here, Cabra," he repeated."Ruiz, what is all this?""It does not concern you," said Ruiz angrily."Now, I do not know what we will do about this.""What do you mean?" Ezra asked, stepping under the light and facing him."I mean all of this." He motioned toward the boxes."This is very important for myself and the others.""You mean this isn't Harold's?" Ezra asked, surprised he had used his grandfather's first name."No.""Does he know about it?""No.""Ruiz, what the hell is all this?" Ezra raised his voice nervously."These are our weapons, Cabra.The instruments of our cause.""Cause? What cause?""Nectario and me and the others, we are all Zapatista.There is a war going on among the people of the sun, Ezra.We are its messengers, and its soldiers.""Ruiz, what the hell are you talking about?""Calm down, Cabra.Sit with me for a moment," Ruiz said.Reassured at the appearance of the friend he knew, Ezra sat down, his back against the wall, at the bottom of the stairs.He could see the black, oiled, shotgun barrels gleaming in the nearly dark room.Ruiz told him of the struggles of the Zapatista in Mexico, of the corruption of the Mexican government, and the aid and complicity of the Americans.It was difficult for them to get good weapons at home, so while they worked here they bought them, and then, through bribes and cunning, snuck them across the American/Mexican border into Chiapas.They were smugglers."And the other windmills?" Ezra asked.Ruiz nodded silently."Where do you get the guns and amunition?""It comes by boat from a man who brings it from Columbus, Ohio.""And how do you keep it a secret?""It comes late at night, in the dark.Of course your grandfather does not know.He is old, and leaves the upkeep of the windmills to me.""I can't believe this." Ezra shook his head."You can never tell anyone about this, Cabra."Ezra sat silently at the bottom of the steps."Cabra, you must never speak of this.""And you'll use these guns to kill?" he asked, ignoring what Ruiz had said."If we must."Ezra stood up quickly."I can't be part of this." An image of himself being cuffed again flickered before his mind's eye."Are there other things besides guns?""Yes.""What?""It is best if you do not know.Put the gun back in the box, Cabra.It is time to go."Ezra snatched the gun off the stairs, placed it back inside the box, covered it with the burlap bag, and shut the lid.The two men walked back through the vineyard without talking.Before Ezra headed off in the direction of his grandfather's house for dinner, Ruiz placed his hand on his shoulder, then let him go his way.Two days later, after they were finished boxing, Nectario passed Ezra a small box without Harold seeing.Ezra waited until they were gone before he opened it.It was a bullet.It was heavy and bronze, like the ones he had seen hidden in the windmill foundation.Rough letters were carved onto its length.He held it up to his eyes to read it: "Bullets and books have their own destinies."That night Ezra returned to the Maison Saltimbanques for the first time since he had discovered the secret his friends had been carefully keeping from him.Nectario was playing his guitar, lost in the song at the other end of the room.Ezra watched him.It took a while before the young man looked up, still playing his instrument, and smiled at him.Ezra smiled back.He would never say a word.ARIADNETraining camp did not go well.He was in great shape but had difficulty catching the football.Coach Walsh had him work at tight end and, although he surprised most of his opponents in contact drills, all the passes he dropped poisoned his confidence.It was not fear that prevented him from catching the football; the ball itself felt foreign to him when it hit his hands, and he could not explain why.Alex DaLivre was in camp too, but Ezra did not speak to him.Although Alex showed flashes of the same acuity displayed during the previous season, he had clearly lost some of his fire.The drugs and drink had killed his hunger, and it showed in his stride and in the steps that defenders had gained on him.Ezra was not afraid or uncomfortable around him anymore.Like Ezra, it was Nick Carraway's first season of senior football.He played back-up running back and he and Ezra walked home from practice together every night.Nick's parents still attended the Pentecostal Assembly but, taking the example of their lord and savior, they had apparently forgiven Ezra and still welcomed him into their house.They did not suspect that Ezra had begun to doubt that he needed forgiveness at all."Ezra Mignon! You're going to get only one chance to run that play tomorrow.One chance! If you can't do it, I'll find someone who bloody well can!" It was the fifth pass that Ezra had dropped during practice, and Coach Walsh stormed toward the back of the scrimmage.It was the day before the first game of the year, Belle River's annual exhibition game against London.The next morning he sat at the front of the bus by himself.He was wearing his football pants but his helmet rested on the floor beside him.Gord and Elsie were driving to London to watch the game.Ezra had a football with him and he held it in his lap.But it was not football he was thinking about as they took the ramp and merged onto the highway bound for London, Ontario.The man driving the bus wore a three-piece suit and tie, which struck Ezra as a strange choice of clothing for a bus driver.It was an old suit and a little threadbare, but he wore it nobly.He had very low classical music playing in the front of the bus and a high, neatly stacked, pile of cassette tapes on the ledge beside him.He watched the man closely without being noticed and came to understand that the man did not just listen to music, but that he was in fact musical.Not musical in the sense that he could play an instrument, though perhaps he could, but musical in the sense that it was a standard by which he lived.The bus driver's hands rested on the large steering wheel as if upon the keys of a piano.He played his instrument surely and easily, according to its needs.Ezra picked up the football in his lap but did not take his eyes off the driver's hands upon the steering wheel.A strange sense of strength and energy seemed to grow into his own hands as he took possession of the ball and subdued it under his new power.Ezra knew that although it was a football in his hands, it could have been anything; a steering wheel, a sword, the lyre or guitar, a pen, clay, bronze, or stone.The energy that flooded his hands reached out and touched the dark river of his blood and then, tidal and gravity blessed, rushed his mind.Yes, his action would become his eloquence and his hands would become the living expression of his heart, whatever they reached out for.He turned the ball quickly, gripped it, and felt it give way.Before everything happened, he knew.Doubts and fears fell away, he did not know how, and the hour delivered him into a freedom he was not the cause of [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]