Chapter 13
MARTHA
We decided that I would take the first stint in the driver’s seat as Erin would probably have more stamina than me and could easily take over later in the day when I would be more tired.
Looking at the map, we hoped to get to Jasper by the end of the day.
That would break the back of the journey and we’d have fewer miles to cover tomorrow.
We really wanted to be on a bus or a train from Edmonton to Banff as soon as possible.
Neither of us were sure if we could camp on the roadside but I was prepared to do it if we had to. Erin wasn’t so sure.
‘I think I’d feel really vulnerable on the side of the road,’ she said.
‘We can go off road a bit into the woods then,’ I suggested.
‘Oh God, that sounds worse,’ she said, and I sighed.
‘Let’s not worry about that now. We have over 900 kilometres to cover before we need to make that decision. And even if we don’t get that far today, Jasper is only one place en route. We can just stop when we’ve had enough.’
The roads were wide, long and fairly straight in places and it was easy to cover a lot of ground quickly.
And we had a lot of ground to cover, that was for sure.
Mountains and trees and lakes were our constant view as we travelled.
We marvelled at the beauty of the landscape for a while and then fell silent.
I would never get bored of the view but there were only so many ways you could gush over it.
Noah told us a little about his life living just outside London with his wife and their daughter. She was in primary school and he missed her terribly.
‘I’ve never been away from them for so long before.
We’ve been Zoom calling a lot but to see my daughter’s little face and hear her voice almost makes it harder.
Who knew that parenting meant traversing such an emotional landscape,’ he said with a wry smile, but then he caught my eye and must have thought about what he’d said because he added, very quickly and almost apologetically, ‘Of course, I realise how lucky I am. I’m in no way complaining. ’
We stopped for a lunch of beans on buttered bread in a lay-by at the side of the road next to a beautiful expanse of lake.
There were a couple of picnic tables and benches and nobody else around.
We had a gas bottle to heat up a saucepan but there wasn’t electricity for the toaster.
We used another pan to heat water for tea and settled down to eat and to enjoy the view.
It hadn’t been all that hot since we had arrived in Canada but that was fine for the travelling and dashing around we’d been doing.
It was late May but there was still snow on the mountains and the evenings and mornings had been cold.
Erin and I were both glad of the coats we’d brought with us and a couple of times I’d also pushed a pair of gloves onto my hands.
We had yet to see any rain though, and with no easy way of getting a weather forecast, we remained blissfully unaware of any potential problems.
Cally turned up shortly after us with sandwiches and coffee for herself and Noah. I really wanted to ask her how the other contestants were doing but I didn’t because there was really only one person whose progress I was interested in and I had promised Erin I would focus on us and our race.
We set off again with Erin driving. She offered and I was happy to pass over the reins to her – well, the steering wheel.
I settled back in the passenger seat and was a little embarrassed to realise I’d nodded off.
I woke to the sound of Erin and Noah discussing his hobby of speed puzzling.
I thought I must still be asleep and dreaming but no, Noah, it turned out, was on a team of jigsaw puzzlers and had competed in an international competition in Paris.
‘That is amazing,’ Erin was saying. ‘I didn’t even know there was such a thing. I haven’t done a jigsaw for ages but I love how relaxed I feel when I’m doing one.’
‘Believe me, there’s nothing relaxing about speed puzzling. It’s actually quite stressful in the moment but the adrenaline propels you to keep going. I love it and my teammates are such great puzzlers.’
‘What did I miss?’ I asked, having decided not to pretend I hadn’t been asleep. What was the point? I wouldn’t be fooling anyone and I was sure that Noah had footage of me with my head lolling.
‘About 200 kilometres,’ Erin said, ‘and that we have a champion jigsaw puzzler with us.’
‘Not a champion,’ Noah said. ‘Not yet anyway, but we’re working on it. We’re going to the world championships in Spain in September. We have a lot to do between now and then.’
It was a world I knew little about but that made me all the more fascinated and I asked him about his best times compared to the current world’s fastest puzzlers.
To be honest I wasn’t personally into puzzles of any kind but Noah talking passionately about what he loved was very compelling.
It also sounded like, with some luck, he might find himself close to the podium at his next event.
‘So, you’ve been practising puzzles on this trip?’ Erin asked him. ‘I knew I’d seen you in Vancouver.’
‘I’m buying them as we go but I did also bring a couple. If you get bored at the next checkpoint you can always come and help me.’
‘I might just do that.’
Erin was happy driving, that was for sure, and I was happy in the passenger seat.
Noah had his camera in the back but had also rigged up his other one in the front to catch all the angles.
I could only imagine what an epic task it would be to edit all the footage, not just from me and Erin but from all the other contestants too.
Cally was in sight behind us, following on and sending messages to Noah or phoning to make suggestions of beauty spots we could stop at for good footage.
The landscape wasn’t as mountainous on this stretch.
Looking at the map, it was clear we were between mountain ranges but once we got closer to Jasper it would change again.
And Erin was covering the miles quickly, so I could see that we could easily be in Jasper before nine.
I began to look at possible places on our map to stop overnight.
The trouble was that the map was so huge it wasn’t overly detailed.
We would just have to wing it the nearer we got.
The best bit about having the motorhome was the on-board toilet and I asked Erin to pull over so I could use it. Cally’s car hovered a little way behind us and Noah got out to talk to her.
‘I was just letting Cally know about you planning to camp overnight outside Jasper, but you can’t.’
‘How come?’ I asked him.
‘They had a devastating wildfire in 2024 and there’s a park pass in place for anyone who isn’t just driving through.
It means that if you want to stay overnight on the side of the road you have to buy that pass.
But if you’re just driving through, you don’t.
You can go to a proper campsite though, and there’s a big one just south of Jasper. Just don’t tell Cally I told you that.’
We were back in the mountains again now and closing in on Jasper. It was clear the closer we got that there had been a tragedy here. The once abundant trees were gone and the landscape was littered with leafless trunks. A lot of them had either been, or were being, cleared away.
‘Oh my God!’ Erin said as she drove.
There wasn’t much more we could say and Noah took some footage of the devastation which would no doubt be spliced together with a commentary about what had happened.
We found the campsite and managed to get a pitch.
It felt right to be handing over some cash for a night’s stay here rather than parking for free.
Our few dollars might help to contribute in some small way to the rejuvenation of the area.
We drove around the site to find our pitch and it was clear where all the trees had once stood.
There were stumps everywhere. We could only imagine how lush and secluded this area had been before the fire.
Now it was an open site and you could see all the way up to the mountains.
Noah and Cally had left and then it was just the two of us for the first time in a while.
It was late and we were both tired, so I heated a tin of soup and we had buttered bread with that before crawling into our sleeping bags which we stretched out on the long sofas either side of the table in the back of the van.
I thought that Erin had gone to sleep. It was dark and despite the fact the heater didn’t work we were cosy but then, after a short while, her voice came from inside her sleeping bag.
‘Do you think Mum would have done a better job at this than me?’
‘Oh, love. Of course, I wish your mother were here to see us complete our race but even if she were, I’d only want her cheering us on because there is no one I’d rather race with than you.’
There was silence for a moment and then a muffled sob. I wanted to crawl out and go to her and I almost did but she then sniffed and said, ‘Nana, I have to tell you something.’
For a moment I did what I always do when a young woman either says she feels sick or she has to tell you something.
My mind immediately thought she was going to tell me she was pregnant.
And all I could think was, not with that idiot Hamish – please not him.
And then I remembered what she’d said at the lake, so it couldn’t be that.
Erin poked her head out of her bag. I could only tell this in the darkness because what she had to say next was clear.
‘I met Sam the night before the race started. I met him in the bar at the hotel when you were asleep in our room.’
‘What?’ I sat up in my sleeping bag even though I couldn’t see my granddaughter. Somehow the darkness made my other senses more acute.
‘Please don’t put a light on. I need to tell you this in the dark because I’m so embarrassed.’
I wanted to tell her that she should never be embarrassed saying anything to me but my hairs were prickling on the back of my neck. Was this going to be about Harrison?
‘You were asleep and I was feeling twitchy. I couldn’t settle, so I went for a walk and decided to get a drink in the bar.
Sam was there. He seemed really nice and we got talking.
He bought me a vodka. I thought he was lovely, to be honest. He called himself Samuel and then asked me to tell him all about this race we were on that he claimed to know nothing about.
He let me prattle on about the show for a bit but then we really got talking and I was honestly quite drawn to him.
He seemed really interested in me and I was really interested in him.
He had plenty of opportunity to tell me he was a race contestant but he didn’t.
I felt so stupid when I saw him walk into the dinner with Harrison. ’
‘Oh, Erin.’
‘I know, I know, I’m an idiot. He completely duped me.’
‘Sounds familiar. Like great-uncle, like great-nephew.’
‘Exactly.’
‘But, Erin, it was a silly thing for him to do but it’s not as bad as you might think. Maybe he just wanted to play by the rules. We weren’t supposed to be talking to anyone, if you remember.’
‘That’s very generous of you, Nana.’
‘I’m a very generous woman,’ I said and chuckled into the darkness. I could see how Erin might have felt after making a connection like that. Sam was a very handsome young man. I might be delighted for her, even forgive him for that initial faux pas.
‘But it wasn’t just that he feigned ignorance about the race, he asked me about you too,’ she said, and I felt my hackles prickle again.
‘And of course you didn’t tell him anything because why would you?’
The silence stretched out and made the small space in the gap between our beds seem vast in the darkness.
‘Oh, Erin,’ I said again.
‘I told him how a man had beaten you to the finish line by seducing you and making you miss the train, and how you held such a grudge you were absolutely going to win this time. I’m so sorry, Nana.’
‘Did you also tell him my address? What size knickers I wear? Erin! What were you thinking?’
‘I wasn’t thinking. Actually, I was thinking that a nice man was interested in me. And then my mouth got the better of me. I’m an idiot.’
I sighed and lay back down. And my shame was complete.
I could only imagine Harrison having a good old laugh at how his behaviour had affected me.
Now, of course, I had to rally, though. Erin had obviously been feeling terrible since this race had started.
We had a long way to go to get through all the checkpoints between here and Newfoundland.
We couldn’t do this unless we were both on the same page with the same mindset and focus.
‘It doesn’t matter, darling. It was a long time ago and it’s me that needs to untether myself from such childish grudges. I think you’ve done me a favour, to be honest.’
‘Really?’ Erin asked, her voice small again from inside her sleeping bag.
No, I wanted to say, of course not. I want to throttle you for being so bloody gullible. Because I want you to not be as stupid as me.
Instead, I decided a different tack was possible and as I began to think the words, I realised they were true.
‘Actually, Erin, you have given us a reason to beat them. We have both been hoodwinked by those men now. Let’s carry that grudge like a beacon of hope.’
Erin giggled in the darkness and then I could hear rustling as she got comfortable in her sleeping bag.
‘I thought we were sacking off the grudges, but I can work with that. So, are we good then?’ she asked.
‘We are so good,’ I said and then listened until her breathing became deeper, slower and I was sure she was asleep. I inwardly sighed. For Christ’s sake. I now carried second-hand embarrassment for her stupidity as well as my own. We were really going to have to pull out all the stops from now on.