Chapter 17

We briefly meet George Jeckell, the chief mining officer in Whitehorse. Schubert and Peters pursue a lead only to be stymied again. 

Chapter 17

December 20, Whitehorse. Even though smallpox decimated the aboriginal people of Canada, the lure of gold was like an infection running through the veins of Whitehorse and unlike smallpox, it infected whoever it chose. The obviously affected—prospectors and miners—had been seduced ounce by ounce. If there was an ounce, maybe there were two, or sixteen. A fortune for the dedicated waited just below the surface—there had to be. All it took was perseverance and some luck. The disease once caught bloomed into greed, fist-fights on street corners or the saloons—murder, even. The illness gradually killed everything it touched. It had touched George Jeckell, P.Eng., and slowly killed him, too.

George was a tired man. Sure, it was the end of the day, but his fatigue ran deeper. It lived in his body and was grinding his bones. It had snuck up on him, like the slow accumulation of ice on a window. He’d wondered what the source of his fatigue could be and even though he’d been unaware of its slow, plodding growth, the realization finally hit him.

He pulled the roller blind on the front window of his shop and flipped the sign to read ‘Closed.’ He couldn’t remember experiencing this kind of exhaustion; his ability to understand what was happening remained absent, it was so totally overwhelming. It wasn’t purely physical either. It was a kind of detachment, like his spirit had been crushed and his body about to be. It reminded him of the long nights he’d cared for his wife, when the headaches stole her sleep; the hours in darkened rooms because without warning, any amount of light would send Annette screaming; the bleeding nose, off and on, until one day the bleeding wouldn’t stop and he arrived home to find his wife unconscious, her auburn hair haloed in a pool of blood and the doctors. Those goddamned doctors who let my Annette die! he thought.

There’s nothing we can do for her, George. It looks like brain cancer, a tumour, but we don’t know.

‘There’s nothing we can do for her, George.’ Those words had mocked him day and night, dogging his heals like a starving beggar, never sated. He hated those words, for on that day, they had killed him as surely as the thing growing in Annette’s head had taken her life. 

As he leaned against the counter at the end of the day, a day no different from the hundreds which preceded it, a flood-gate opened within him. He cursed the boredom of his existence: another day filing claims and denying claims due to incorrect paperwork; another eight hours of customers hurling vile language and threatening physical harm, perceiving him to stand between them and unimagined wealth; another interminable spell where the façade of the unflinching man of moral courage and social temperance unravelled a few more threads. A few times, he’d balled his fist, ready to lash out at the men who entered his shop, accusing him of dishonesty and favoritism. 

Without warning, he slammed his fists on the counter and threw all the paperwork to be filed off his desk; he hurtled chairs against walls, laughing as they punctured plaster and shiplap. For the first time in his life he swore loud and long. A file cabinet stood open and a stream of filth poured from his mouth while he urinated on claims between the letters “G” and “M.” He laughed so hard he kept missing the files and peed on the floor. He thought about shitting on them but he hadn’t eaten since breakfast and try as he might, nothing came.

No matter, he thought, his eyes wild and his mind cascading in on itself, if I can’t shit on them, I’ll burn them. He grabbed a lamp and dumped kerosene on the files, his desk, the counter—everything. He paused, his chest heaving. He inhaled deeply, warmed by the source of his salvation. The scent of kerosene rose to meet him like sweet incense; he gave in to the seduction. It felt like a first communion, finally giving in to the hatred within him. He fumbled in his coat pocket for the lighter Annette had given them on their wedding day. The inscription read “George—a man of strength.” Laughter roiled up from within him; he flicked the lighter open and tossed it onto his desk. Flames ballooned, licking the wood, turning his papers into ash.

A tiny flame began to snake its way across the floor, seeking the source of its incarnation. George watched its approach, not unlike a puppy would run to its master. He wanted to pick it up, the cradle it but at the last second decided he would choose to die another way. He’d never had a drop of alcohol in his life. Tonight, he would reverse that mistake and any other one committed for the sake of his beliefs: those threads of truth that finally had snapped. He embraced this downward spiral and relished the moment he would finally hit the ground, dead.

Jeckell walked away from his life’s work, his business, as the flames consumed the office. He was a block away when an explosion rocked the night air. There was a brief moment where the clatter of glass scattering on the boardwalk and frozen earth could be faintly heard.

On his way home, Jeckell stopped at Madam Tussauds. A few regulars were surprised to see him, but he was largely ignored. He sat at the bar and ordered four whiskeys. The bartender muttered something incomprehensible. Jeckell nearly choked on the first—he wasn’t prepared for the fire in his throat. By his fourth, the burn had left and his head swam. He ordered three more.

Jeckell threw a ten dollar bill on the bar and left without another word, stumbling out of the bar, his coat flapping in the cold, night air. He felt somehow liberated but from what or whom, he was too drunk to know. He stopped at a corner store and purchased six bottles of bourbon. They were the first and last bottles he would ever buy. Now he sat in his living room, dead-drunk, shouting curses at the darkness and hurling vile words to imaginary enemies. 

Unknown to Jeckell, two men stood in the shadows outside his home, watching. Paddy O’Daly and Seamus Fagan listened to the man raving inside.

“Ach shite,” Fagan whispered. “The man is fuckin’ drunk.”

O’Daly smiled in the darkness. “Good. Most of our work’s been done. You got the papers?”

Fagan nodded. 

“Well then, let’s get on with it, shall we? Sooner we’re done, sooner the whiskey will be soothin’ our gullets.”

Jeckell was pouring another bourbon when he heard a knock on his door. He should’ve been surprised since no one ever visited, now that Annette was dead. But the alcohol had deadened his senses and memory: whatever thoughts he had floated atop a cesspool of hatred, for himself and every person in his town.

“Fuck off,” Jeckell whispered, giggling, thinking himself clever. “Fuck, fuck, fuck-off!”

O’Daly kicked in the door. It slammed against the wall, pulling a hinge from the frame. The devil had finally come to visit him, or so Jeckell thought. A big man filled the space. And there was a demon standing behind him. 

“Little late,” Jeckell slurred, unfazed by Satan or his demon. “Go back to hell, where you belong.” His words sounded garbled. “I renoun’cya in the name a’Jizuz!”

Fagan began laughing. “God almighty! This feller’s on the full razzle, he is. Smells like a gin house ‘n here,” he said, waving his hands.

O’Daly stepped towards Jeckell, papers thrust in front of him.

Jeckell leaned back, waving him away. 

“Be gone, Satan!” He threw the remainder of his drink at the specter approaching him.

“Mad yoke thinks you’re the Quare One,” Fagan said.

O’Daly lashed out with the shillelagh, smashing Jeckell’s knee. The man roared in pain, falling forward onto the floor.

“Yeah, ya stupid Prod, that be me. You’re gonna sign your soul to me, here ‘n now,” O’Daly said in his high tenor. “Fagan, get him to sign the bloody thing and let’s be off.”

Fagan knelt down next to Jeckell. 

“I’m the Quare One’s demon. Give us your name here,” he said, pointing, “Or the Sluagh will be comin’ next.” 

Jeckell took the pen, his hand trembling, unable to write. 

“Get the man a drink first or his scrawl will be worth nuthin’,” O’Daly said. “I can feel his tremors as easily as you can see ‘em.”

Fagan grabbed Jeckell’s head and poured a long shot down his throat. 

“Open up, Proddy, here comes the courage.” 

Jeckell swallowed a mouthful and coughed, spitting the rest on Fagan. 

“Fer feck’s sake!” He slapped Jeckell. “Now, sign,” Jeckell heard the demon say, shoving a pen in his hand. Jeckell scratched his name onto the paper. 

“Is but a scrawl, but should do,” Fagan said, placing the document in his coat.

O’Daly leaned in close to Jeckell. A cloud of cheap bourbon rose to meet him. 

“Your soul’s mine now, ya hear me? Speak a word of our deal ‘n you’ll feel some true wrath of God.” 

Jeckell crawled back to the corner, shaking. A slow warmth spilled into his crotch. He took no notice, but his knee spoke to him, throbbing with a righteous, white-hot message: God was speaking through his agony! Kill Satan and his demon! He grabbed the oil lantern and quickly threw it. His actions were erratic, almost feral. Jeckell fell further back into the shadows, giggling like a school boy. The lantern bounced off Fagan’s back, smashing the glass chimney. 

O’Daly turned and in one motion kicked the lamp. It burst open, spilling flames around the room. 

Jeckell welcomed the flames, their warmth, their singular devotion. For the first time in months, or was it years, a calm descended that could only have come from God himself. He had been forgiven! The flames licked closer, first to consume his clothing and then his flesh. Delirious and dying he muttered “Thank you” to the apparition, now leaving his home. He closed his eyes and embraced the cleansing fire of God.

Outside, the two Irishmen watched the flames rising higher. 

“Crazy fucker right roasted himself!” Fagan said, laughing. “I mean, wot ’a ting!”

O’Daly was in no mood for Fagan’s quips. 

“Shut it, Fagan. Get back to camp and give the paper to Quinn afore the whole town wakes.” He grabbed Fagan’s arm. “No booze, you hear me? And don’t you be doin’ something daft. You’ll feel the love from my shillelagh as right as that arse Jeckell did. Now move!”

The crackling of timbers and the roar of the flames filled the night air. Fagan was long gone but O’Daly had loitered behind. The smoke and the sound of flames took him back to Ireland. It was going on twelve years since his wife, Sylvie died in County Cork. A fire had started in their home, he had panicked, running from room to room but the flames gradually smothered Sylvie’s screams.

He listened a moment longer, hearing the flames whisper the name of his love. In the darkness, a tear escaped and he gave into his grief, falling to his knees, begging to be forgiven for a loss he would blame himself for until the day he died.