Factors

While traveling aboard the new mobile school-cars, a math teacher meets an elusive student in a strange northern town.
Story by Phillip Psutka

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Transcript

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Phillip Psutka

Thank you for joining me in this strange small town in northern Ontario. My name is Phillip Psutka. If this is your first time visiting, I’ll be your guide; if you’re a familiar face, it’s good to have you back. The town embraces newcomers and old friends alike, but be warned: it doesn’t easily let you go.

So dim the lamps. Settle in. Welcome to Dark River.

Richard McGibbons had nearly been killed and he couldn’t have been happier. Like many men in Northern Ontario at the turn of the century, he had only a few trades to pick from, namely logging, pulp and paper, mining, or hunting for the fur trade. Eager to prove to himself that he was a capable man who could provide for his family-to be, he landed himself in a lumber camp and fought through the long hard days. The accommodations were terrible, but there was always an abundance of good food to keep them going so he pushed through. 

The spring thaw had opened the rivers up, which meant that it was the log driver’s heyday. Back in September of the following year, the swampers and fellers had taken down the first trees in the area and used them to build the main bunkhouse and the tote roads leading into the bush. This allowed the men to work all through the winter when the skidders and haulers took over. 

Richard was a hauler and the log that almost killed him had fallen off a brag load during a friendly competition with another nearby lumber camp. The men had stacked fifty giant logs on a massive sleigh and were encouraging the two horses at the front to try and pull it. When the conditions were just right, they could do it despite the mammoth load. Richard had been cheering them on from behind the sleigh when it finally started to move and a giant pine log near the top shifted, sending a cascade of lumber toppling down. Richard’s leg was pinned and he blacked out immediately. 

The men had created a rough splint and reset his bone while he was out, as there was not aesthetic available. His “weakness” as some of the other men called it had saved him from the worst of the pain. He was then confined to his bed where he would spend his next few weeks and, without knowing it at the time, lay the groundwork for his new life.

 Before the accident, he would stay awake late into the night. The bunkhouse was lined with individual compartments with beds in them, which the men affectionately called muzzle-loaders as, once they disappeared into their nightly chambers, only their feet could be seen facing towards the central fire for warmth. 

Forgoing precious sleep, Richard would slip out of his muzzle-loader, pulling out his most prized possession that he kept hidden from his fellow bunkmate: a book of algebra. Advanced. 

He would quietly slip out and sit next to the fire for warmth and light. Each snore or shift from any of the men caused him to snap the book closed lest it be discovered. One thing was certain: lumberjacks were judged based on their brawn, not on their brains, and he would be laughed out of camp if he was found with it. 

The formulas were his sanctuary; the numbers, his salvation. Each day he would quietly repeat the previous night’s study under his breath, drilling it in. Before long, he saw the world around him as a pattern. The trees seemed to grow with mathematical precision, stretching towards the sky as if working towards life’s solution. A grand design was beginning to materialize in front of him, each day bringing together another piece of life’s puzzle. 

Now, one of those pieces had fallen on him. It seemed the grand design had other plans for Richard McGibbons, and he couldn’t help but see this turn of events as a blessing. Despite being constantly in pain, he could now study for hours on end from the comfort of his bunk without fear of being caught. 

The rest of the men had just left for the day. He gingerly pulled himself to the end of his bed, wrapping the wool blankets tightly around him, for it was still cold at this time of year. Snow remained on the ground through much of April and only began to dissipate in May; however, the work didn’t wait and on this particular morning he found himself thinking of home. If only I’d managed to get at least one full month in, Richard thought, then at least I could have told Gwen that I’d managed for a stretch. It looks like I tried to get the damn tree to fall on me. But regret faded away quickly as he wrapped himself in his warmth and study.

“What’s that you got there?” 

He nearly dropped the book. For a brief moment he thought the small figure near the foot of his bed was a ghost, or that he was dreaming, for he hadn’t heard a sound before the small voice broke the silence. Then, his mind caught up and he recognized Allen. 

The boy was new to the lumber camp. He had just turned eight and his father felt it was time for him to help out, to start his path into adulthood. Young boys often stayed with their fathers at camp and earned their keep. True to form, Allen was holding a pile of wood he had just split for the fire.

“Damn if you’re not quiet,” said Richard. “What are you sneakin’ around for?”

“The door was left open, sir. Didn’t mean to startle you, you just looked like you were real focused. Didn’t want to disturb, sir,” Allen replied, as he put the pile next to the fire, adding a couple of logs to the coals. They flared to life almost instantly.

Feeling it was safe with the boy there, Richard opened his book once again. 

“That’s funny lookin’ writing, sir.” 

Damn if that boy didn’t float on air! Richard had turned back to an equation and without so much as causing a floorboard to creak Allen was now at his side looking down at the large book in wonder.

Richard asked him if he read and the boy replied that he didn’t, but he’d seen plenty of books before and none that looked like this one and was it a different language? Richard told him that, yes, technically it was, and it was a language that was universal – people all around the world understood it no matter if they spoke English, French, German, or what have you – and he couldn’t help but laugh when Allen said that he had never heard of the language Wuthavyoo. 

Before he knew it, Richard was explaining math to the boy, teaching him basic addition. Two plus two is four; four plus four is eight, and so on. Allen proved a quick learner and was hungry to keep going. 

“You best get back to work now,” said Richard. “Otherwise the men will notice and your father wouldn’t take too kindly to you shirkin’ your work for this kinda thing.” 

Allen protested, so Richard struck a deal with him: they would continue the lessons in secret. Every armful of wood the boy brought in would earn him a few minutes of learning. From that moment on, the fire was never without wood and Richard was almost never without company. 

The boy was a quick learner – and, as it turned out, an excellent teacher. At first, Richard spoke in complex terminology he took for granted. Allen just stared as if he hadn’t heard him. “Mathese,” the boy called it whenever Richard got carried away. So Richard was forced to strip it back to the basics, to choose his words carefully, and to explain the same thing in five (sometimes ten) different ways. When Allen’s eyes lit up, he knew he’d gotten through. And before long, Allen began speaking Mathese back to him. Richard had never experienced such joy. Who would have thought that he’d find a kindred spirit in a small boy at a lumber camp?

But spirits go as fast as they come, and about a week into their lessons Allen didn’t show up. Richard waited all day, anxious for both fire and knowledge to be fed and shared. Instead, the boy’s father hunched in and stated in no uncertain terms that no son of his would be learning useless nonsense that would get him nowhere in life. He was a worker, and by God he would provide, not waste his time on imaginary numbers. 

After that, the book was Richard’s only companion. It continued to speak to him, he continued to listen. But a void had been created that could no longer be filled here. 

Richard left the camp as soon as his leg was healed enough to walk. The weather was getting warmer, the snow was starting to melt (despite there still being five feet of it on the ground), and the men ceased bringing in more logs for the fire. “A waste of time and wood,” they said. 

It sure was, thought Richard. 

He stayed in bed for five days after returning to his small house. He had built it fifteen years before when he had originally moved to the north. Brochures from the Ontario government had promised cheap land and a way to carve your fortunes and your name into the history books. This land was for the taking and the resources were limitless. 

But when he arrived he had to clear his own plot of land and had no equipment to do it. He turned to the help of already-established locals and a nearby farmer took him and his wife in and loaned them equipment. He had worked tirelessly all summer to erect his small cabin and clear the land for the two gardens: the main one in the field for subsistence vegetables and the smaller kitchen one that Gwen would tend to. As things came together for him, he took in the wildness around him. Northern Ontario: a vast expanse of beauty. 

Now, he saw nothing of the beauty around him, but only the beauty that he’d lost: a summer of work to help them through the hard winter, a student to share his passion with. Both gone. And where could math possibly take him anyway? Equations don’t put food on the table. 

His book remained closed by his bedside. 

As his leg healed, his soul languished. His love of math had faded … no, not so much faded as replaced by a greater desire: the need to pass his knowledge along. 

But to whom? Gwen? She had never shown any interest in it. And for what? With him temporarily out of commission, she had to attend to both the kitchen and the larger garden, which was usually his responsibility. She would come in sweating and caked up to her calves in mud and snow from clearing and tilling with their horse, Old Simon. The last thing she wanted to hear about was how to find the Determinant of a 3x3 Matrix.

And it was during one of these long days in bed that he first heard about the school-cars.

By this time, multiple railways had webbed their way into the far North, including the Temiskaming and Northern Ontario Railway and the Canadian Pacific Railway. Now that Northern Ontario was far more accessible, efforts had been made to supply additional educational facilities to remote towns, which led to the creation of the mobile classrooms. All they needed were teachers. 

To Richard, it was as if the forest had heard his wish and made sure the news reached his ears, passing the information from one tree to the next. In fact, it was a neighbour that had told him, but that made no difference. His opportunity – his life’s true work – had finally arrived along the tracks. 

Two months later, now on crutches, he hobbled aboard his classroom and their new home. The sweet smell of wood and the ripe scent of old books hit him as he entered the car for the first time. 

It was even better than he could have hoped for. Though not large, the car brimmed with treasures. Curved vaulted ceilings allowed for storage of supplies above and an aisle ran down the centre of the car from one end to the other. Rows of folding desks lined each side (he counted fifteen of them), with a small table at one end for him. At the far end, a short pine staircase led to the entrance into the next car, which would serve as their living quarters. And, best of all, the walls on either side of the stairs had permanent bookshelves built into them, stuffed to the brim with knowledge. Small Pandora’s boxes, waiting to be opened. 

While his wife ventured on into the living quarters, he took some time to get acquainted with his first official classroom. He ran his fingers along the books before coming to the math collection. With a good tug, he excavated an algebra book that he hadn’t seen before. The books were so tightly crammed together that he wasn’t sure he would be able to get it back in. 

At least they won’t fall out while the car is moving, he thought. 

“What was that, dear?” He hadn’t been aware that he was speaking out loud, nor that Gwen had just reappeared in the doorway. 

“Oh, nothing,” he replied. 

They began further south and worked north. Of course, neither of them had to coordinate the stops or worry about their travel arrangements. Instead, they focused on adjusting to their new confined life-on-the-move. While Richard took to their new lifestyle quickly, Gwen struggled.

“It’s as if we’re always leaving home behind,” she confessed to him one night as the car rocked along, the clack of her knitting needles suddenly silent. Richard furrowed his brow, but she continued on. “We no longer live on the land, we ride above it. There’s no single place to call home.” 

“Isn’t that what makes it exciting?” Richard replied. “Home is where we wake up the next day.” 

“All familiarity, all connection … all gone,” she replied. Then, after a brief silence, she said: “We built our life there.” 

“It was for the best,” he said. “And besides, we still have the home to go back to.” 

“Not all of it,” she said. 

He nodded, but didn’t say anything further. They had sold Old Simon when he took this position. A hole in their life now. He confessed that he missed their old friend, which seemed to help, for Gwen gave him a half smile and her needles came alive again. But the heaviness remained, for they were facing a new hole in their life – one that couldn’t be filled by other people’s children. And one that they might not be able to fill themselves either. 

They stopped at each town for three or four days before moving on to the next one. Although there were only fifteen desks, more than twenty students would squeeze themselves into the classroom – sometimes as many as thirty, which barely left any room for Richard. He had to wait until the end of the lesson when half the children had left for the day before he was able to escape from his corner desk with his crutches, so he always double checked to make sure that he had all the supplies he needed for the class before the hoard arrived. 

Initially, the children were so fascinated by this classroom on wheels that Richard had a hard time getting them to focus. They were constantly standing up to look out the windows or gazing up at the curvature of the small ceiling. And most of the questions had nothing to do with the lesson at hand. “Can we go for a train ride while we have class?” seemed to be the most popular. After a few stops, Richard learned to allow some room in the first class for their inevitable wonder. 

He soon realized that he wasn’t just teaching math, he was also an ambassador for a new way of life – one with technology that allowed people to travel and have new experiences. And this next generation would be part of these advancements, so why not encourage their interest? Perhaps we will have more great minds and inventors in the future, thought Richard. Perhaps math will be a shining light forward for many more into the north. And with this comforting thought, he dug into the work. 

It wasn’t until he reached a town farther north that his confidence in a grand design was shaken. 

It was late May when they arrived in Dark River and much of the snow had vanished. It was unusually warm for this time of year and they opened the school car doors. It had felt like an eternity since they were able to let fresh air flow through their small living space and they welcomed it. After Richard had gotten everything in order for the next day, he retired and was asleep in no time, as was often the case after a long day of travel. 

He awoke to find himself walking along a field that he didn’t recognize. A river ran along the left side of the path and … that was strange, a road followed him to his right. Looking down, he realized that he wasn’t walking along a path, but along the tracks. Instinctively he looked behind him, but there was only a vast stretch of field lined with trees. No train in sight. 

He turned back and saw that the road dipped before winding its way along the countryside further ahead. Then, he heard something. 

Horses. At first he couldn’t make out whether they were coming along the road, or were nearby in one of the fields, but the sound of carriage wheels confirmed their location. It grew steadily louder. The carriage still wasn’t in sight. 

He strained to see over the crest of the hill. The sound was nearly on top of him. How could that be? He turned to look behind him once more, thinking that he’d made a mistake. Nothing. 

And he turned back in time to see the train just before it hit him. 

He thrashed frantically, his arm hitting the side of the bed, his eyes rolling to regain focus. He was back in the train-car and his wife was above him, in bed, “are you alright?” and “it was just a nightmare.” His breath slowed as the dream faded. The sun was beginning to creep over the horizon, chasing the last wisps of the horses away. 

The children piled eagerly in that morning. As was the case with each of the towns before, the excitement was palpable in the air. If only it could be this way for every one of my classes, thought Richard. 

He welcomed everyone and introduced himself once they were all seated. Well, all that had room to sit, that is. As usual, there were more than fifteen students crammed together, so he assured them that they would switch seats and take turns. Sharing desks was a necessity, but for now none of them seemed to mind. They assaulted him with their usual barrage of questions about the car and he did his best to answer each one in turn as quickly and succinctly as possible, for there were more exciting things to get to. The world of math awaited them and he was their gracious host. 

One girl in particular caught his eye. Amidst the cacophony of voices, hers was the only one that didn’t mingle. In fact, she remained almost perfectly still, watching him. She was standing in the front corner of the car, near the entrance, directly opposite him. He smiled at her. There was always a shy one. He would make sure to include her in some of the early questions as a way to boost her confidence, for it often only took a few times getting the timid ones to participate. 

They started with basic addition and subtraction for the younger students and moved on to fractions for the older ones once the first group was hard at work and soon the squeak of chalk on the small chalkboards filled the car. He would bring up a few children in turn from each age group to stand at the front of the class and answer questions, as there were always those eager to show off to their friends, relishing the limelight. 

The girl at the back remained still, watching him. He couldn’t be sure that she had even picked up her chalk, much less written anything on her board. But – as was always the case for the first day – he had his hands full and couldn’t attend to the needs of every student. He would include her the first opportunity he got. 

Which came shortly thereafter. The older kids were tackling their multiplication tables and, on a whim, he decided to jump ahead with the younger students, eager to show them his favourite trick. 

“We’re going to start with multiples of nine,” he proclaimed. Seeing their wary looks, he assured them that there was a hidden method to this one. The group immediately perked up. Even the older children stopped what they were doing, as they weren’t about to let the younger ones be party to a secret they hadn’t learned. 

“Who can tell me what nine times one is?” Hands shot up in the air, from the older ones as he suspected. He humoured them by letting a boy from that group answer. “And nine times two?” Again, a girl from the older group. From there, he briefly explained to the baffled younger ones how multiplication worked, that it was like the addition they were doing before, but with groups of numbers, not just the number one. 

“But here’s where it gets fun,” he said, throwing a mischievous look across the room. “You can figure out multiples of nine not with your head, but with your hands.” You could have dropped a feather in the room and heard it hit the ground. And he thought he could see a slight smile creep across the shy girl’s face before it flitted away again. He took the cue. 

Balancing his elbows on the table, he held out both hands wide open in front of him, turning his palms towards himself. “For nine times one,” he told them, “I lower my first finger. I then count all the remaining fingers still up. How many is that?” This time, multiple voices rang out without raising their hands in an effort to be the first to catch on to the trick. 

“For nine times two, I lower my second finger – my index finger. Try it.” They all held up their hands and mirrored him, dropping the index fingers of their left hands. “Now how many fingers are still up to the left of your lowered finger?” This one took a bit longer before someone was able to decipher what he meant. “And how many are still up to the right of it?” That gave the room the numbers one and eight. “Put those numbers side by side,” he exclaimed, “and you get what number?” 

A triumphant “eighteen!” exploded from the lips of one of the younger boys before he could help himself. When Richard commended him on being correct, the red of initial embarrassment mixed with the red of excitement in the boy’s face. This is why I do this, thought Richard. 

He turned to the girl at the back of the class. “Nine times seven,” he said. 

She didn’t move. Leaning forward, he propped his elbows on his desk again to hold up his hands and dropped his left ring finger, the one that held his wedding band. He looked up to make sure that she could clearly see his hands. 

She couldn’t because she was no longer there. 

To his credit, he recovered almost immediately, for even the children sitting closest to where she had been just seconds before seemed not to notice. They were fully engaged and watching him, a sea of hands in the air ready to shout out, “sixty-three!” 

He assigned a number of problems for each group to work on before stepping outside through the front door of the car. Once the door was closed behind him, he quickly scanned in all directions, but the girl was nowhere to be seen. Long gone, he thought. Perhaps this one was too shy after all. Crestfallen, he returned back inside to finish the day’s lessons. 

Later that evening, he told his wife about it while getting ready for bed.

“She just didn’t seem as if she was that uncomfortable at first,” he confessed. “I didn’t peg her as a runner.” 

“Children can be hard to pin down,” she replied. “They’re not as predictable as your math equations.” 

“Additional factors,” he mumbled to himself. 

That night the track, the horses, and the sudden train visited him once again before ejecting him from the nightmare back onto the floor of the school-car. 

And though he didn’t see any sign of the girl the next morning, or the morning after, the dream kept him company night after night. 

He awoke to a foggy morning on the fourth and final day in Dark River. Spectres of evaporation drifted across the open field, erasing the trunks of the trees beyond. The little remaining snow was grey in the early morning light, as was the sky as far as the eye could see. He was happy to be moving on. Something about this place was putting him off. 

He had the homework prepared for the different age groups when they arrived that morning. They’d work through a few of their assignments now so that he could correct their initial mistakes. Often, he would have to help students re-learn things when the school-car returned to the towns weeks later, but we wanted to give them a fighting chance with this new language before he departed. 

He had just finished checking over one young boy’s fractions, when he looked up and his breath caught in his chest. The girl was there, standing right in front of him in her usual place near the entrance.

“Welcome back,” he said, calming his breath and allowing warmth to return to his face once again. 

True to form, the girl didn’t reply. She just stood there, staring at him. 

“You know,” he said, “there is one multiple of nine with a single digit that doesn’t work with the hand trick.” 

The smile crept back across the girl’s face, warming his spirits enough to encourage a return smile from him. 

“You know it,” he said, heartened. “What is it?” 

Then, without taking her eyes from his, she did an extraordinary thing. 

Thank you for listening thus far. In a moment, we’ll return to the school-car. But first I’d like to let you know that we now have new original spooky stories coming every three weeks, so follow the show on your favourite platform so you never miss an episode. And, if you enjoy your time in this haunting town, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts and tell your friends and family about it. Word-of-mouth is far and away the most powerful way to share the show and I would be sincerely grateful to introduce more people to Dark River. For those who already have, Thank You. In this time of isolation, sharing stories is one of the best ways to bring us together. But now, let’s join Richard in the school-car once again.

Without taking her eyes from his, she did an extraordinary thing. 

“Ow!” said one of the boys as Richard tripped over his foot, stumbling back in shock. Even after he fell hard on his good leg, his eyes didn’t leave the spot where the girl had stood just seconds before.   

“Mr. McGibbons?” The voice pulled him back and he glanced around the room. All the children were looking at him. 

“Yes?” he replied before he could think of anything better to say. 

“Are you alright?” the voice said again, which was coming from an older girl near the front of the class. 

“Yes, fine, fine,” he said, getting back to his feet with as much grace as he could muster. 

But she didn’t look convinced. Instead, she said: “You look like you seen a ghost.” 

He mumbled that he was fine once again and to return to their work, before squeezing himself outside the car. 

He breathed in the spring air deeply. It cooled his lungs and calmed him. Even though he didn’t need to look around to confirm what he knew to be true, he did anyway, scanning the empty fields. The fog was lifting and the sun was breaking through. The trees were coming back into focus. 

They visited town after town, but nothing like that happened again. The girl, it seemed, was content to stay behind with the dreams. 

After a while, Richard found himself almost missing his life at the bunkhouse, his book hidden under his bed until it was safe to pull it out, his secret studying. His time alone. 

No, not quite alone. His time with Allen. Their first lessons. He missed the warmth of the well-stoked fire: Allen’s ticket to the world of math. He missed the unwavering attention of a single captivated student. He missed the boy’s smile, his energy, his spirit. 

A few nights after leaving Dark River behind, Richard sat down before going to bed and began to write.

Dear Allen, 

I do not know if you will find this letter, or if it will fall into someone else’s hands, but I’m willing to take that chance. I have been traveling from town to town, teaching math as I did for you. I want you to know that no student has surpassed you in talent. You have a gift for the language, and it is my sincere hope that you will not let that gift go to waste.

The language is all around us: in the sky, the trees, the earth, and the rivers. A grand design waiting to speak to those who care – and have the skill – to listen.

Despite the infinite wisdom of this grand pattern, there is no way for me to decipher if we will see one another again. That knowledge is beyond any language we have the capacity to access. But my hope is that you will not forget the time we had together, as I shall not forget my first and brightest student. 

And, it is my sincere hope that, if this letter finds its way to the fire before meeting you, then my wishes shall be released into the air and, by being dispersed upon the wind, one small part of it may reach you. Somehow.

As I have learned, things departed have a way of leaving a trace behind. 

Until we meet again, however that may be, 

Richard

He resolved to return to the lumber camp the next time the school-car passed by and tuck it into the woodpile next to the bunkhouse. He knew the odds were that Allen would never see it, but math was always there to comfort him. Even grand designs, once simplified to almost nothing, could always be expanded again.

This has been a tale from Dark River written by me, Phillip Psutka. I also produce the show, as well as compose the music for it. The podcast artwork was done by Chris Psutka and Lindsay Bellaire assisted with editing this story. For more history of small town life in Northern Ontario in the early twentieth century, be sure to follow our Instagram @darkriverpodcast. Though based on actual history, this story is a work of fiction – any resemblance to persons living, dead (or other) is entirely coincidental and unintentional.

Thank you for stopping by, and see you soon.