Some Great Thing (19 page)

“Do you honestly believe that?” Mahatma asked.

“I wouldn’t write it if I didn’t believe it,” Lawson said. “I don’t expect you media folks to agree with me, but you owe it to the public to take dissenters seriously.” Lawson went on for a few minutes about the Franco-Manitoban issue. Suddenly, three phrases jarred Mahatma: “I don’t say ban the language. That would be premature. I won’t complain if they speak it in the privacy of their homes.”

Mahatma scribbled the sentences in his notepad. Then he asked, “Why do you refer to a takeover of Manitoba? What takeover?”

“Throughout this century, English has been the increasingly dominant language of Manitoba. Ukrainians, Poles, Germans, Icelanders and others have accepted English as the language of our legislature, our courts, our government, our businesses. Speaking it didn’t diminish your ethnic roots; it just meant you were Manitoban. Canadian. But all of a sudden, the French want to jump the queue. They want the same status as the English. But what about the rest of us? Why recognize only the French? What makes them so special? Population-wise, they are smaller than the British, the Germans and the Ukrainians in Manitoba. Why should they impose their language on us?”

“You believe you won’t be able to function in Manitoba without speaking French?”

“My children won’t. If they want a good job but they can’t speak French, forget it.” Mahatma took a few more notes. The inaugural meeting in two weeks would be followed by a protest rally. “When the government comes clean and
announces its French plans, Manitobans are going to kick up a fuss the likes of which people haven’t seen in decades.”

Mahatma hurried back to the newsroom. After calling the Francophone Association of Manitoba and the premier’s office for reaction, he wrote the story.

A Winnipeg school teacher has founded a league to battle what he claims is the pending “takeover” of the province by Franco-Manitobans.

“I have nothing against French,” said Wilbur Lawson, 46, “as long as it is spoken in the privacy of one’s home…”

As he passed the Manitoba Legislature on his walk home, something struck Mahatma as bizarre. Why was Don Betts so good-humoured that night? Why did he happily authorize Mahatma’s overtime pay sheet?

Don Betts got precisely what he expected. Grafton’s story was well written. It included comments from critics of the league. It was good reporting. Which made it one hundred times better than the story filed on the same subject by Chuck Maxwell. Which set Chuck up for a suspension due to incompetence. Betts dropped the note on Chuck’s lap at work the next morning.

Chuck emerged from the city editor’s office in tears. He ran up to Mahatma, who was staring at disbelief at
The Herald
. His health seminar stories hadn’t run at all, but the blurb on Lawson had hit page one.

“They suspended me for two weeks,” Chuck howled.

Everyone in the newsroom was watching. “Why, Chuck?”

“Because you scooped me.”

“I
what?
”

“You double-covered me on that Lawson story. But how could you know? I fucked up and you scooped me!”

Mahatma walked with Chuck to the coat rack, walked with him to the elevator, rode down to the first floor with him, and then took four flights of stairs, very slowly, back up to the editorial room. He walked past the city editor’s desk, ignoring Betts. He walked past Lyndon Van Wuyss’ secretary, who was talking on the telephone, and opened the managing editor’s door. “Revoke Chuck’s suspension,” Mahatma said.

Van Wuyss stared blankly at him. Betts ran into the office.

“It’s totally unfair,” Mahatma said. “Chuck assumed he had to finish that story before his shift ended. He had ten minutes to talk to the man. I had an hour. He didn’t have time to call other people. I did. He isn’t familiar with the issue. I am. You used me to hurt him and that is insulting to both of us. Revoke the suspension.”

“Don told me Chuck had all afternoon to get that story,” Van Wuyss said.

“That’s a lie,” Mahatma said. “I was talking to him at four o’clock when Betts assigned him the story.”

“Don?” Van Wuyss asked.

“What’s it matter?” Betts said. “He fucked up. He always fucks up.”

“He had ten minutes to talk to the guy and ten minutes to write the story,” Mahatma said. “He lost the rest of the time in rush-hour traffic.”

“Is that true, Don?” Van Wuyss said.

“His copy was a mess. He’s useless, Lyndon.”

“You could have had another reporter fill in the gaps,” Mahatma said. “I resent being manipulated, especially to hurt another reporter. Revoke the suspension or I’m quitting.” Mahatma felt a surge of freedom. Of power.

“You don’t have to get dramatic about it,” Van Wuyss said. “I’ll revoke the suspension because Don misled me about the situation. I am, however, giving Chuck three weeks off. With pay. He needs a rest. You can get back to work now.”

As he left the managing editor’s office, Mahatma heard Betts grumbling, then raising his voice. Mahatma passed the secretary and entered the newsroom and could still hear Betts shouting. So could several other reporters. They crowded around Mahatma, demanding details, slapping him on the back.

“What’s Betts doing in there?” someone asked.

“His wild man routine,” someone else answered.

“We should phone Chuck.”

“Yeah, let’s call Chuck. Let’s tell him about it.”

But Chuck wasn’t home. His phone went unanswered all day.

Mahatma broke his big story two days later. It ran across four columns over the fold on page one. It was moved by Canadian Press and picked up by
The Toronto Times
,
The Toronto Star
, the French and English dailies in Montreal, and other major newspapers across the country. It sent reporters from
The Times
,
The Star
and all the Manitoba media scrambling to match the story.

Premier Gilford has agreed to amend the Canadian Constitution by making French an official language of Manitoba.

In a tentative accord with the Francophone Association of Manitoba and federal officials, Gilford has agreed to translate 450 public statutes, double the number of bilingual civil servants and entrench a constitutional obligation to provide more government services in French,
The Herald
has learned.

In exchange, FAM has agreed to drop plans to ask the Supreme Court of Canada to invalidate thousands of Manitoba laws that have been enacted in English only…

Television, radio and newspapers zoomed in on the language accord. Radio talk shows were deluged with calls accusing the provincial government of “ramming French down our throats.” Anti-French graffiti reappeared in St. Boniface.
The Herald
was swamped with angry letters. Media coverage raged for three days and was beginning to die down when Edward Slade broke a scoop in
The Star
about the Princeton-St. Albert hockey riot.

Manitoba Provincial Police have quietly charged a 17-year-old English-speaking boy with killing Gilles Baril, the francophone youth slain here last November in a bench-clearing hockey brawl.

Police arrested the accused youth in his Princeton home late Tuesday afternoon. He was driven to the Winnipeg Detention Centre and held overnight.

On Wednesday, instead of appearing in the Winnipeg Youth and Family Court—which is closely watched by reporters—the boy was returned to a smaller court in Raleigh, a town 20 kilometres southeast of Princeton.

The case was remanded for two weeks. The accused, who by law cannot be named by the media, was granted bail on condition that he remain in Princeton in his parents’ custody.

The hockey brawl made national headlines when…

Every media outlet in Manitoba scrambled to match the story.

Wilbur Lawson pushed ahead the date for the first public meeting of the League Against the French Takeover of Manitoba. He also changed the place of the meeting, calling on Manitobans to converge in Princeton in support of the town’s English community. Lawson advertised the time, place and purpose in
The Herald
and
The Star
. People showed up at his door ahead of time and volunteered to help. He had to disconnect his phone to sleep at night. In a rented church basement in Princeton, the first meeting of the League Against the French Takeover of Manitoba attracted eight hundred people.

“Fellow citizens,” began the bearded orator. “I have a question to ask. You, undoubtedly, have a question to ask. Will anybody answer us?” He was greeted by thunderous applause. “I’m not worried for myself. I can survive. You, surely, are not worried for yourselves; you are industrious people. My question is, what is the future for my children? Where are they going to work? Why do they have to learn French? Who has the right to change the rules in the middle of their lives?” The audience roared. Media coverage was guaranteed. Mahatma had attended the meeting. So had reporters from
The Winnipeg Star
,
The Toronto Times
,
CBC-TV, six radio stations and Montreal’s
La Presse
. To the rolling cameras and ready pens, the crowd jumped to its feet and picked up a cry from the back: “No More French. No More French.” Wilbur Lawson waved his arms in protest. After five minutes, he got the crowd to settle down. He called out for tolerance. He said that he had nothing against the French and that they had every right to live in Manitoba. He just didn’t want them taking over the province.

“But who started the hockey riot?” shouted a voice from the crowd.

“And who murdered the English kid, on the highway?” someone else cried out. “Why haven’t the cops nabbed
his
killer?”

Applause burst out again. Lawson waited it out, told the crowd to leave criminal matters to the police, and outlined a strategy to end the French takeover. He urged LAFTOM members to write to public officials and to prepare to attend the next meeting, which would be a rally in front of the Manitoba Legislature.

A marriage proposal by Yoyo—the second within two weeks—prompted Helen to break off their affair. The first proposal made Helen chuckle. But the second frightened her. The man was serious. “But you are my woman,” he argued. “You will have my children. You will come to Cameroon and become my mother’s daughter.”

“No. Is that clear? No. I don’t want to see you again. And I will certainly not marry you. Ever.”

Yoyo kept his dignity. He didn’t argue any more. And he didn’t call her again.

One of Mahatma Grafton’s articles left Helen spellbound. It was the story about Wilbur Lawson. “I can’t believe it,” she muttered. Lawson was still at it. After all these years. She thought back to public school, to her sudden refusal to speak French as a child, to all the years she had detested all that was French in her. Helen recalled everything about Lawson. For years she had tried to forget the incident; now she lingered over it.

She had been six years old. In grade one. Betty Perry, sitting behind her, had yanked her pigtails; Hélène, as she was known then, swivelled in her chair. “Stop it Betty.” “I don’t want to.” “Stop it!” “You’re just a little brat!” Betty told her. “Et toi,” Hélène hissed back, slipping into the language in which she knew insults, “tu es la plus stupide de toute la classe!”

Betty raised her hand. Her words rang out in the class, terrifying Hélène. “Mr. Lawson!” Betty cried out. “Mr. Lawson, Helen is saying bad things in French!”

“Is that true, Helen?” Mr. Lawson said. She said nothing. “Come to the front of the class and repeat what you said.” Hélène shook her head from side to side. “To the front of the class!” Walking up between two columns of desks, Hélène thought she was going to die. “Tell us what you told Betty,” Mr. Lawson said.

“I said…”

“Tell us in French.”

“J’ai dit qu’elle était la plus stupide de toute la classe.”

“Say that again, Helen.”

Hélène said it again.

“Does anybody understand what Helen is saying?” Three other girls in the class were francophones. Hélène spoke with them in French in the school yard, in the school corridors and when they played at home. But Cécile, Linda and Sophie remained mute when Mr. Lawson asked the question. “Nobody understands what you said, Helen.” The teacher’s hand gripped her shoulder. “Do you think that’s fair? Would you like it if somebody talked to you in a language you couldn’t understand?”

“No.”

“Are you going to speak in French again to Betty?”

“No.”

“Then tell Betty you’re sorry.”

“I’m sorry, Betty.”

“You may sit down now.”

The next day, Mr. Lawson again called Hélène before the class.

“Tell everybody how to say ‘hello, how are you?’ in French.” Hélène said nothing. “Go ahead.”

“Bonjour, comment ça va?” she whimpered.

“Say it again.”

“Bonjour, comment ça va?”

“Did everybody hear that? ‘Bonjour, comment ça va?’ means ‘hello, how are you?’ in French. Would some of you like to try saying it? You don’t have to if you don’t want to.” The class mumbled the new sounds. “That’s it. Now you know how to say ‘hello, how are you?’ in French. That’s one language. It’s okay to speak in French if everybody knows
what you’re saying. But English is the language we speak in class. Isn’t it, Helen?”

“Yes, Mr. Lawson.”

“You may be seated.”

Around that point, Hélène started calling herself Helen.

Helen thought about it for a week. But after Mahatma broke the scoop about the language accord, and after he continued writing about the Franco-Manitoban controversy, she decided to speak to him. She came to him in the newsroom, where he was writing a feature about French history in Manitoba. “Hat, when we were at Polonia Park, I promised to tell you about myself one day. Speaking French, and all that.” He looked at her now with interest. “How about tonight, at seven, at the Lox and Bagel?” Helen said.

“Great.”

That evening, they sat in a café serving hefty soups and muffins. Mahatma heard the espresso machine produce a rushing gurgle of steam; he watched the man pour frothy milk over coffee and dot it with cinnamon. A waitress brought them two mugs of café au lait. “So you speak French after all, but you don’t like to admit it,” Mahatma said.