Chapter 11

The next week, I took my bike out to do some shopping. Goldbalm must have been watching for me because he approached inside the store. I pushed the shopping cart down the aisle when I heard, "Jeff, will you take a few moments to have a chat with me?" I was shocked and frightened.

We were in a grocery store, a location that was public enough for me to feel slightly safer. I screwed up my courage and said, "Goldbalm you start a conversation as if we had been introduced or that we had at least said hello. For your information we have not. I find your attitude not only unprofessional but also offensive to me. I do not want to talk to you now or in the future. I told you to leave me alone before and now I'm telling you again. Leave me alone! Do not come near me. The same thing goes for my family and friends." My voice has slowly risen so that it was easy for shoppers to hear what I said. I dearly hoped that some would come near.

I turned and just pushed the cart a few yards away and looked at a can of peas. I didn't want the peas or to be pushed around by this man.

Goldbalm came close instead of leaving. He put his hand on my shoulder and squeezed. I had no open sores but his grip was still painful. As a doctor, he knew just where to pinch.

The man said, "I only want to talk for a few — "

I was groaning in pain, though I was being theatrical. When I looked around, I saw four women were looking at me in shock. I bent over more and said, "You are hurting me, stop!" At the same time that Goldbalm was talking to me.

The back of my fist caught Goldbalm in the nuts. His grip left my shoulder. My other hand came back with the can of peas and I drove it into the man's face as he was already contorted in pain. Once was enough. He fell to the floor and the women raced to me. I groaned in pain though it was not as bad now.

The police came and I gave my statement, as did one of the four women that stayed to back up my claim of being attacked. The manager of the store was there also. He had been nice after hearing all four women's story before the police came. I added about Goldbalm pursuing me and not leaving me alone when asked. The witness had heard me say this and corroborated my statement.

Goldbalm though showed little emotion, although his eyes now seemed to glow with more interest. It was as if the pain had happened to someone else.

I finished my purchases. At the register with the battered can in my hand, I asked the manager, "Do you offer discounts for scratched and dented cans?" The man laughed and put the can into my bag.

A stock boy of about seventeen helped me get the groceries into the carrier on my bike and even gave me a push to get me going.

The girls were upset about what had happened at the market. I was more troubled than I let on. I still didn't see Goldbalm leaving me alone. The girls were extra careful now and not only watched for odd cars but went home during the daylight or caught a ride.

There was more money to use thanks to my angels, so I talked to a few lawyers in town. All were incredulous that I would want to hire them. Some were more sympathetic; and the best one of these I hired.

James Mason was a young lawyer and quite angry at the radio and now a particular television show. The station had a very popular program about a brilliant lawyer by the name of Perry Mason. My suggestion to capitalise on the name instead actually got him more business.

Last time, in the mid sixties, I was nineteen and in the Air Force. The songs that I played and sang then were from a variety of singers. I remembered the songs because I would play them for my fellow airmen. The 'Stones' had 'I Can't Get No Satisfaction. This was easily remembered because I had used my guitar and entertained many of my new friends. Elvis came out with 'Crying In The Chapel'. The Beach Boys had 'Help Me, Rhonda'. Although I didn't sing it to the guys I did sing 'Downtown' while seeing mental pictures of a miniskirted Petula Clark.

The words came easily but I had to remember the music with the guitar. It took me three weeks to finish the songs. I then took them to the high school music teacher to see if there were any obvious mistakes. The woman had heard of my ability with math, so she freely helped me finish the four works.

James (Perry) Mason, as he was called in later years, filled out the forms and got the four songs registered for copyrights. I sent the songs to various Canadian studios to see what they would offer me for any or all of the works.

Goldbalm had his day in court and left town. I saw him back skulking around a week later. He had a court order now to stay far away from both my family and me. The restraining order didn't seem to bother the arrogant man. I went through many defensive measures with the girls including running to any nearby house and banging on the door. Usually a very good scream would frighten somebody off. The girls talked of self-defence training and I was all for it.

A week later, I came across a small Asian community in North Bay. There were only five families so I was fortunate that some of the children could speak English. The various martial arts take many forms from slow, subtle movements, to striking with body parts, then up to the use of various hand weapons. Many Asian people, even the elderly, see this as a sport to be practised, and not just watched.

I was in luck when I found one old gentleman who could do some of what I wanted. He was an amateur himself and didn't know very much but he did know more than the girls did. I had gone to the dojo for a few years when I was younger to develop my speed. I used a gym at home for strength and development. My incentive was not just my own body but a beautiful Chinese woman that I was trying to convince to marry me. Her family accepted me and I learned some of their rich culture and some of their spoken language, unfortunately the girl escaped me.

The language, I partially knew, was of no help in the here and now. I found a boy of ten to interpret for me. I explained my needs and in a safe environment made slow moves that I wanted taught.

The grandfather's words, through the boy, were, "Why do you want me to teach if you know what to do?"

"My body has been damaged by lightning." This had a lot of symbolism for these people. "I must learn myself to move again and this will help me too. Many others may wish to learn from the Chinese and Japanese if there is a place to do so. Your family knows many others that in turn know even more people. Surely there is someone that is suited to teach one of the many forms of fighting. A business grows slowly like an oak tree but will be very strong when your descendants shelter under it."

The actual dojo was a long time coming, and in fact it took two years. The old man and the boy helped the girls in the mean time to throw each other and to strike at vulnerable points. This was all a mishmash of styles but it was better than nothing. When karate became popular, then this would change. Now there were very few places for an Occidental to learn this sport.

One day near the end of May, I noticed a small mouse under Angela's eye when she came to visit us. She didn't want to talk about it but I persisted. It was her brothers again.

"Phone your parents and ask if you can invite a young man over for supper tonight."

"But you won't like Italian food. We eat tripe sometimes and squid."

"I don't like trippa that much but I like calamari if it's done right. Sometimes it's chewy but still a lot better than some things I've tasted. Tell me where your family came from and you can teach me some of the ways their dialect is different from the Italian I know."

"You know Italian?"

I knew a bit but of one particular dialect. I spoke slowly now in this way. "I can speak only a few words. It's what a child would know plus some words used in electronics. I learned to curse and swear but I'm sure your brothers know much more. Do you understand my words?"

In English she said, "The words are close to what we speak so I have to think hard about each word. Some of the endings are different and some of the words I have to guess at."

In English I said, "Many of the simple words are different. You would be amazed though at the words that are almost exactly the same for Italian, Latin, German, French and English. They are the words that are usually never used and thus never get a chance to be altered by common usage.

"Now go to the telephone and call, or am I too ugly and deformed to let you feel comfortable with me at your home?"

When she called, I heard the dialect. I knew how Angela felt. The words were difficult to follow and she spoke too fast as well. Her words were not really fast. The vowels came quickly and when I missed a word, I lost track of the conversation.

I had learned some Latin in school. This had helped with the French I needed for the military, my friends and my business acquaintances. Italian was an easy language to learn especially when it shared so many of the same roots as the other languages. German though stood mainly by itself but even if it did have some Latin roots. The last half millennia of the Roman Empire was policed and run by the Germanic peoples. The Roman citizens were too busy following their own pursuits to join a poorly paid army.

After Angela came back, Susan was whispering to her. It was probably about the new ability I just displayed.

Angela's parents gave their ok. Most people in the world are naturally gregarious. They would give you their last crumb to eat and the shirt off their backs. After the Second World War things began to change. Still, in 1958, honour was very important and a handshake and a person's word was usually contract enough. By 2008, it took a battalion of lawyers to preside over even the simplest transaction. As time went on there were too many people that would take advantage of this till it was what we had in 2008. This was usually true of the peoples who worshipped money and what it would purchase. It was the poor people, the ones who thought of family first, who were the nicest and perhaps the sanest.

Angela had difficulty speaking in Italian to anybody not family. Though I was family in a way I was still a 'manga cake', a cake eater; or a person that was not an Italian.

Angela and I built up a number of nouns from identifying those articles around us. Verbs came from spoken English. I, in turn, gave the Latin words to show the similarity if there was any. Idioms abounded, we just had difficulty recalling them. It was fun pointing out body parts because there was slang in each language. Here I didn't know the Latin name because I had not gone into medicine. Nature shows and the various articles about a medical discovery were the best I could do. I only recalled a few words explained by doctors that had to do with the medical equipment I repaired.

When the time came, I walked my bike and talked more to Angela. Not many boys would take a bike on a date. I had to get home and I was both comfortable with my girls and didn't have too many preconceived and faulty adolescent ideas.

I greeted the parents in their own dialect which amazed them. They thought they knew all the local Italian families.

The father, Giovanni, was short and strong with hair coming out his collar much like I would have in later years. The mother was rotund but was still quick on her feet. She held her weight well and had me sitting at the kitchen table as soon as possible. I even kicked off my shoes because of the pile of shoes near the door.

"No, no leave them on. My floors are dirty."

They weren't, but I said by way of an idiom, "I see no dirt; and when in Rome, do as the Romans do."

Giovanni spoke too quickly to understand but then slowed down for me. In less than a minute I had a small glass of homemade wine and some sliced meats. I complimented the tastes though the prosciuto was salty.

"Where did you learn to speak our language?"

"I can speak Latin and French. Italian is much easier to learn then. Some of my fiends spoke Italian but not your dialect. Your lovely daughter has been giving me a lesson since she phoned you."

Angela replied in English and I found that the parents didn't understand very well so I asked her to speak in Italian so I could learn.

The boys were soon called and I shook their hands though they didn't see this as proper for a person of my age. They all looked like their father in build. The oldest was nineteen and working at the same mine my dad had worked at.

The others ranged in ages from Stephano who was almost twenty, Flavio at eighteen, Mario a twin of Angela's at sixteen and Carlo, a boy of fourteen. The boys were not as friendly as the parents but stayed for our meal.

The conversation was steered to their homeland and the province they came from. I had been to Italy three times and one time happened to be in Calabria where the family originated. Geography and history were very interesting and the area had lots to offer a tourist. There were scores of ruins with information about what had happened in certain battles and even why some of the wars were fought. The leaders were mentioned that took part in the battles, especially if they were famous.

I started to repeat all that I remembered about the area north of Cosenza. Giovanni and his wife had been farmers as their predecessors had been. They believed, like many Canadians in 58, that the education of women beyond a certain level was a waste.

The parents had not even known many of the things I mentioned. My focus was to point out honour in every instance I spoke about. Sometimes it was couched in terms of losing honour when attacking, while those that lost a battle seemed to have a flaw in their character that caused this.

I had a captivated audience now. I explained the geography and even the fruit that was seldom found anyplace else in the world. I talked of the more recent history and again hammered honour as the reason for success, or the lack of honour as the reason for failure.

I didn't have that much material to work with so I had to do the same travelogue but about other areas of Italy. It was easy to slip in the emperors this way. I named the bad emperors and what they were like and what they had done, then went onto the good emperors and extolled their honour and how their people prospered.

When it looked like my point had sunk home, I asked my host about the farm he was born on. This was a good topic to them and they basically rehashed stories of old relatives and how good it was in Italy. It was not just them, but most people that immigrated to North America thought that it was great or better at 'home' but forgot the hard facts that had drove them to our shores in the first place.

The conversation broke up and I managed to get the boys alone, although the oldest wanted to leave.

Stephano sat with his brothers in one of the bedrooms upstairs. Everybody was sitting on a bed except me.

"I wanted to talk to you guys," I said in English. "Tonight I talked of your ancestors and what honour brought them. Any of those people mentioned could have been one of your family even though some were two thousand years ago in the Republic.

"The honour of your own family though is tarnished. Your ancestors would be ashamed at you. Hadrian would have been very severe if he were a close relative. You would be banished to some uncivilised place and left to rot. He would hope that the rest of the family forgot all about you."

Carlo the youngest stood up ready to fight, "I have honour. You can't say that to me."

The boy was four inches taller than me and even outweighed me by a good thirty pounds. I stared at him and said, "Yes I can because it's true. You're without honour and your family should disown you."

He came closer menacingly with a fist. I quietly said but with a sneer, "Hit a boy younger and, smaller than you and one that needs a cane to get around. Hit me and show us how much honour your family really has."

He stopped but stood over me thinking that he could still frighten me into taking my words back. "My family has more honour than yours does."

"You're not only a man without honour but you're blind."

"I'm not."

"When was the last time you beat a woman up Carlo? A man of honour protects any woman. A man of honour protests his family. Will you beat your wife and whip your children? Tell me why you have honour."

" — she deserved it."

"You're a pitiful excuse for an Italian. You beat your sister because of words. Are you afraid that you're only part of a man that you need to pick on a woman?"

Mario the next oldest tried to defend his brother. "Angela has a big fucken' mouth. She tells us what to do. I don't have to take any shit from her."

"So you have big balls and no brains. I heard about you. You have the brains of a mouse and think you're smart. She says you're a pig and from what she tells me you are."

"I'm not."

"Let's go to your room, pig, and see if you live in a house as a human or in a pig sty."