Free The Hockey Sweater and Other Stories by Roch Carrier Page A

close to changing that situation.
    Monsieur Juste was a blacksmith by trade, but horseshoes were no longer a sufficiently broad field for him; he dreamed of business, of firms, he dreamed of big chimneys spitting black smoke. When the joke about the carloads of buttons was told in his presence, Monsieur Juste would say that if they wanted, it could stop being a joke and become reality.
    â€˜There’s no reason’, he said, ‘why the products from our village shouldn’t be sold in every store from Halifax to Vancouver.’
    Monsieur Juste, perceptively, had observed for some time that during milking the cow’s tail swings to the left andright, sometimes slapping the farmer in the face, which is unpleasant. He had also observed that the animals’ hind feet were constantly twitching and sometimes kicking out, which puts the pail of milk in great danger of being overturned. It was a serious problem. Monsieur Juste searched through several catalogues of farm products, he leafed through his collection of the
Bulletin des Agriculteurs,
he even went and looked in the cure’s encyclopedia, but he found nothing. He came to the conclusion that never before had mankind thought of solving the problem of the restless legs and tails of cows. Monsieur Juste reflected for a few weeks; with his thick blacksmith’s pencil he made many drawings on his bags of chewing tobacco. Once the bag was empty he would throw it out, always forgetting his drawings, and begin again. Then one day he found it! His dream, his idea, his project — now he could begin to create it in iron.
    Bent over his anvil, he twisted the iron into the shape of a hook, into large manacles that would be fitted to the cow’s hocks. Such a hook would be placed on each of the animal’s legs. Between the hooks, Monsieur Juste arranged an adjustable chain that could hold the recalcitrant limbs firm and motionless. To this chain Monsieur Juste welded a smaller one, whose purpose was to hold the swinging tail in place. A great problem, then, had been solved: it was, no doubt, a step backwards for the cows, but a great leap forward for mankind.
    Monsieur Juste made a few of these devices but when he suggested them to the farmers in the village they simply laughed in his face. Monsieur Juste didn’t grow discouraged; he had read in magazines about the lives of great inventors; he knew these great men were always misunderstoodby those around them. He decided, then, to turn to the world outside.
    With his wife, he wrote a letter describing his invention, praising its usefulness. His letter ended with these words: ‘In the modern era one cannot live without the invention of Monsieur Juste’. Then he had the letter translated into English by the postmaster: in fact, Monsieur Rancourt had learned English in the army during the First World War. And that was how Monsieur Juste’s invention was given the English name ‘Anti-Cow-Kicks’!
    Madame Juste carefully wrapped her husband’s invention in tissue paper, folded the letter translated into English and attached it to the chain; she placed the precious object in a box, carefully wrapped the box and, as the postmaster had told her, she wrote: ‘From Juste Industries Ltd., Sainte-Justine, Canada. To the I-Don’t-Know-What Company, Texas, U.S.A’. Monsieur Juste had noticed the address in one of his farm magazines.
    Monsieur Juste waited. His shop grew silent. The hammer no longer struck the anvil. Monsieur Juste did not work. He spent days beside the fire, sitting on the anvil, telling how the idea had come to him of dealing with the United States.
    â€˜If you want to be successful in business’, he would say, ‘you have to dive in horns first, like a bull. The money’s there in front of you! Now us French Canadians, we’re afraid of money. But I’m gonna prove to you that I can be successful.’
    A month later, a letter arrived from