Free Who by Fire by Fred Stenson

said. “A letter to who about what?”
    Tom had thought this through. “A letter in which we describe the trouble we’re having and how it connects to the plant. I don’t think our MLA will help. He’s too concerned with staying in good with the premier. I was thinking we could send it to Ormond Cardwell.”
    “You can’t complain to someone else’s MLA, can you?” said Johnny. “Why not send it to Manning? Go to the top.”
    “Clearly,” said Bertha, “it should go to the health minister. That’s Mr. Onge. I’ll make a carbon copy and send that to Mr. Sturgeous, the MLA for Haultain.”
    “We should pass the letter around to everyone who’s affected here,” said Vic. “More signatures, the better.”
    “Paul Gersten should sign, that’s for sure,” said Tom. “He gets more gas than we do. And Hughie McGrady. I can take the letter to those two.”
    “
Gertie
Gersten,” said Bertha, staring coldly at Tom. “All the wives should sign. Your Ella should certainly sign.”
    “What about Don Harbeg?” asked Vic.
    “I don’t know,” said Tom.
    “Why not?”
    “He works at the plant.”
    “So you don’t trust him.”
    “Oh hell. Ask him, then. If he doesn’t want to sign, he doesn’t have to. But as soon as he hears about it, the plant will know.”
    “Can we get started on the letter?” said Bertha.
    Each man stated his family’s complaints. Bertha translated aloud while she wrote. It was amazing how she could take what each of them said and turn it into her kind of language on the fly. It was better the way she said things.
    As Tom was getting ready to go, Bertha said to him, “I assumed Ella would be coming today.”
    “Ella doesn’t like to leave Billy right now. He’s been sick.”
    “Because of the plant?”
    “They’re testing his blood.”
    “She could have brought him too.”
    “He’s sicker than that.”
    “You take this to her.” Bertha gave him a pie covered in wax paper.
    Sitting with his truck running, Tom pulled out his makings bag and rolled a smoke. He had not been allowed to smoke in Bertha’s house. Vic and Johnny idled their trucks for a minute and left, each man waving, but Tom sat rooted.
Why have you kept Ella from coming? Make sure you let Ella sign the letter
.
    For a few seconds, Tom thought of going back inside. He imagined telling Bertha Kenhardt, straight out, that he was not a tyrant in his marriage. If she didn’t believe him about Ella and Billy, she should phone Ella and ask. Then he heard in his mind what that would sound like, and was glad to have said nothing.
    It was Friday, Billy’s most frustrating day. Though the girls likely did not miss him at all, Billy missed them badly when they were at school. It became worse as Monday marched toward Friday.
    By afternoon, Ella could no longer placate him with games of fish. He had been harping about one of the barn cats that had recently had kittens, so she dressed him in his antique snowsuit (his father’s when he was a boy) and led him to the barn. She would not let him climb to the hayloft but went up herself. She walked around heavily so Billy would hear the creaking and believe she had done a proper search. But while she was up there, Billy called that he’d found the cat family in a manger. The kittens were old enough to run away but did not. They were in a daze of kneading and suckling.
    Then came a loud noise in the north end of the barn, and the cat ran with a kitten in her mouth. In half a minute they were all gone from the pocket of straw.
    Billy slammed his hands on the polished rail just as Lance Evert’s head appeared over the box-stall gate. Billy plunged out the small door in the gate’s bottom, pushing Lance’s legs out of the way. Lance looked after him, confused.
    “Never mind,” Ella said. “You scared some kittens.”
    But there was more on Lance’s face than that.
    “Oh, Lord, what now?”
    “We’ve had an accident at the plant, caused by a bad leak. Alf Dietz says