Road Ends by Mary Lawson Page B

that point aside too. The mill was a pretty spot, he said. There were some nice birches on the lot. People would love it. He’d talked about it with Reverend Thomas and Reverend Thomas thought it was a wonderful idea, so much so that he’d told Joel he’d vouch for him if I asked for a reference.
    That took me aback, I have to say. If Reverend Thomas had wanted to ensure that I turned Joel Pickett down, he could hardly have thought of a better way. Still, I reminded myself that personal feelings have no place in professional decisions, and I carried on. I asked Joel why he was so set on the Beller’s Creek site and whether he would consider a lakeside property instead. At that he uncrossed his legs and sat forward in his chair. He’d won the property in a poker game, he said, and the moment he’d set eyes on it he’d known it was perfect for a lodge. He said it aggressively, as if challenging me to make something of it, and all of a sudden I realized what it was about him that made me uneasy: he reminded me of my father. My father had the same totally unjustified confidence in himself—not the confidence of a man well versed in his subject but the confidence of a man who has no idea how little he knows—and the same instant aggression towards anyone who challenged him.
    Needless to say, the similarity wasn’t in Joel’s favour, but I am clear in my own mind that neither it nor the endorsement of Reverend Thomas influenced my decision. I told Joel, courteously, that I didn’t think his plan was viable in its present form and I brought the interview to a close. As far as I was concerned that was that.
    It didn’t surprise me when I later learned that after he’d left the bank Joel Pickett got blind drunk and began spreading his version of the story around town. Everyone in Struan knew his word meant nothing. It didn’t even concern me unduly when a couple of nights later a rock was thrown through the bank’s window. Joel was seen by two people, one of whom happened to be Sergeant Moynihan.
    None of that surprised me. What did surprise me—what rendered me speechless with astonishment and still does whenever I think of it—was that, a few days after our interview, who should come into the bank requesting a few minutes of my time but the Reverend James Thomas. We had not spoken since the day of Henry’s death but of course I offered him a chair and asked what I could do for him.
    He began by saying he had not come on his own behalf but on the behalf of a “deeply troubled man.”
    “A few days ago,” he said, “a member of my congregation applied to you for a loan to help him start up in the hotel business.”
    I held up my hand. He stopped, but I was so incredulous that for a moment I couldn’t think what to say. Finally I said, “Mr. Thomas—”
    “Reverend Thomas, please.” (Said with that smile of his.)
    “Reverend Thomas. The bank does not discuss the affairs of its customers with other people under any circumstances.”
    “It isn’t the bank I’ve come to talk to, Mr. Cartwright. It is you.”
    “In my capacity as manager of the bank.”
    “No, in your capacity as a human being.”
    “As a human being I have no authority to grant loans.”
    He smiled, as if at a particularly stubborn and foolish child. “All right,” he said. “I concede the point, as it troubles you so much. Let me just put a hypothetical case to you.”
    He put the tips of his fingers together so that they formed a little steeple and touched them to his lips. I wondered if in thecourse of his day he ever made a single gesture that was not contrived.
    “Let us imagine a man who has made some serious mistakes in his life,” he said. “Some bad decisions, which have affected not only him but also his wife and his five young children. Let us suppose that by God’s grace and through the unceasing prayers and support of those in the church community who have refused to give up on him, he has put all that behind him. He