The Summer Guest (39 page)

She laughed a little at that, and I was glad I’d eased her out of the worst of it. “But you’re happy.”

“Mostly,” I agreed. “Not always. Happiness may be overrated, Kats. I do know I’m happy I’m your dad.”

She lifted her face to look at me. “Well, that’s my point.”

“How’s that your point?” But as I said it, I understood, and my heart cracked like an egg.

Not a boy: me. She didn’t want to leave me.

“It’s okay,” I said, and unwound my legs from the picnic table to stand. Everything was suddenly swimming. I cleared my throat and held out the keys to the rental. “You feel like driving?”

She took the keys and looked at them strangely. “They’ve gotten lost,” she said in a distant voice. “They’re like children, lost in the woods.”

“Kats? Who’s lost?”

“You don’t have much time, Daddy,” she said. I felt myself rising, lifting away. “You’re cold. You should go through the dam.”

Go through the dam.

My head snapped back, my eyes flew open: I beheld the night sky and stars, and remembered where I was. A memory that had become a dream, or something else: an answer.

Go through the dam.

“Joe, listen-”

“We’ll do it together,” I said quickly. “Listen to me, I know this’ll work. We can go through the drain to the other side.”

“Joe, that’s crazy. We’ll fucking drown. I don’t think I can swim at all.”

“You won’t have to.” It was all coming clear. Sixty feet down, another hundred or so through the empty turbine tube. The tower would be tight, and there was a hard turn somewhere at the bottom, but the pressure would yank us through. If we didn’t get stuck somewhere or beaten to death against the sides of the tube, we’d shoot out the other side like rifle bullets, into the deep pool at the dam’s base.

“I’ll hold on to you. It’s just fifty yards. I know what I’m talking about.”

I twisted my neck to look for Pete, sitting on the edge of the dam.

“Pete, go down below! We’re going through the drain!”

He cupped an ear. “What?”

“The outlet!” I did my best to wave him in the right direction, hoping he could see me in the dark. “Just go! We’ll be coming out there!”

Pete rose to his feet, then headed at a trot across the catwalk to the trailhead. I braced the soles of my feet against the wall of the tower to push off. Our best chance to negotiate the turn at the bottom was a clean entry, straight through the gate and down the drain.

“Joe, this is suicide.”

“Maybe. But it’s the best idea I’ve got.”

He managed a laugh. “You’re one brave son of a bitch, you know that?”

I wanted to laugh too. I would have, if I weren’t so afraid. A crazy anticipation whirled inside me, half wild desire, half raw terror. It made me feel weirdly alive. I shifted my feet against the tower, tensing the muscles, preparing to spring.

“I’ll tell you a story about that later, if you want. Ready?”

I didn’t wait for his answer. I released the bar, wrapped my arms tight around his waist, and pushed away hard. We didn’t make it a yard before the whirlpool took us, a thousand pressing hands; I had just enough time to fill my lungs with air and think how stupid this was, how truly, truly stupid, we were going to drown for sure, before we hit the gate, rolled headfirst, and plunged into the darkness.

A night of waiting: after Harry and Jordan had set out, I returned to the lodge; there was still dinner to think of, and guests to feed. I found Patty in the kitchen, crying as usual, and I surprised myself by speaking to her curtly, then softened with guilt, gave her a motherly hug, and sent her home for the night. A little teenage heartbreak wasn’t what was bothering me; I still hadn’t heard from Joe. Usually he returned by six, making him, by the time we were sending out dessert-the apple pies I’d baked that morning-at least two hours overdue.

The last empty dessert dishes were coming in when Hal entered the kitchen. I knew he hadn’t eaten and had kept a plate of swordfish warm for him.

“Any sign of them?” I asked.

He sat at the table and shook his head. “Not a peep. And it’s gotten awfully dark out there.”

I put the plate in front of him. He picked at it politely, though I could tell he wasn’t hungry. I shooed Claire from the room, dried my hands on a dish towel, and sat across from him.

“You should eat.”

Hal put his fork aside. “Yeah, I know.”

I covered his hand with mine. “They’ll be okay, Hal. Jordan knows what he’s doing. Probably they just got into some fish. I bet they’re having a high old time out there, just like your dad wanted.”

Hal said nothing. We both knew how late it was. With no moon up, the lake would be dark as an inkwell.

“Joe back yet?”

I shook my head. “No, and to tell you the truth, I’m a little worried about him, too. It’s not like him to be out this late.”

“So there we are.”

I nodded. “There we are.”

I cleared away his plate and excused myself to go check the radio. This was pointless, I knew; I’d long since given up any hope of raising him, but I felt I had to do something. I sat at the console and set the dial.

“Station tango-yankee-juliet-two-zero-one-seven, this is Crosby Camp, looking for Joe Crosby. Over.” I released the button and waited. The night was clear and reception should have been good. For a moment I heard nothing but the empty hiss of the open channel. Then:

“Lucy, that you?”

I jolted upright in my chair. But the voice wasn’t Joe’s. I wanted to cry with disappointment.

“Hey, Porter. Just looking for Joe. He took a party down to Zisko Dam this morning, and I haven’t been able to raise him. He’s way overdue. Over.”

For a moment the line was clogged with static. I adjusted the squelch, recapturing Porter’s voice in midreply.

“… truck about an hour ago. Over.”

A truck, I thought hopefully: he was talking about Joe’s truck. “Say again, Porter. Over.”

“Said a rescue truck went tearing out of here an hour ago. Headed south on County 21, could be toward the dam. Over.”

What happened next seemed to happen all at once: I dropped the mike, ran outside to the car, stopped, thought to go back in and call Darryl Tanner, then to go find Kate. A rescue truck, headed toward the dam. It could be anything, I told myself, could have nothing to do with Joe, or if it did, it didn’t have to be Joe himself, but someone else in his group-one of the lawyers with their fat cigars and diets of whiskey and butter.

It could be, but it wasn’t. It was Joe. All day long I’d been thinking of Harry, and it was Joe.

Kate stepped out of the darkness toward me. “Mom?”

She was looking at the car keys in my hand. I was so flustered I’d completely forgotten where I’d thought to go. The dam? The hospital?

“Honey, your father-”

“I know, where the hell is he? Because I really think we need to put together some kind of search team for Harry and Jordan. Hal’s down at the docks getting a boat ready. I thought I’d take one too, so we can cover more area.”

I didn’t know what to say, how to explain. All I had was a snippet of Porter’s voice on the radio.

“Kate, your father… on the radio…”

“Mom, are you okay? Because I actually wanted to tell you something else.” She took a step closer, into the glow of the porch light. “Don’t be mad, but I went to talk to Harry this afternoon. I knew you wouldn’t go, because of Daddy. I sort of… well, I sort of pretended I was you.”

I was lost, completely at sea. “You did what?”

“I told you not to be mad. I didn’t mean to. It’s just kind of how things worked out.” She took me by the elbow. “He really loves you, Mom. That’s what he told me. I just thought you should know.”

“Oh, Kate, what have you done?”

Then the trees were full of light, flashing red and white, so much whirling light we both looked up, amazed. I heard the engine and looked down the drive just as Darryl Tanner’s police cruiser made the last turn and his headlights hit us dead-on.

“What’s he doing here?” Kate said.

The cruiser rolled to a stop. I stood stock-still, listening to the tick of its engine. I thought, Joe is dead, drowned in the river. Darryl has come to tell me my husband has died.

But then the passenger door opened and Joe climbed out. The breath I was holding came out of my chest in a rush. He was barefoot, and as he stepped forward I saw in the glare of the headlights that he was dressed in an ill-fitting sheriff’s uniform. A towel lay around his neck.

“Joe, my God, what happened?”

He put his arms around me and held me, hard. His hair was damp and cool between my fingers. Behind us, Darryl climbed out of the cruiser and stood with his hat in his hands.

“Joe, what is it?”

“I’m all right,” he said. “I’m all right, I’m all right.”

Still he held on. No one moved or spoke. When at last he pulled away, I saw his eyes were different, full of something-not fear or sorrow or even relief, but Joe himself. They were simply full of Joe.

“Tell me,” I whispered.

He looked past my shoulder to Kate, standing behind us, and then returned his eyes to me.

“Where’s Harry?” he said.

For a time I simply rowed. Harry didn’t ask me where we were going; I’d mentioned the river mouth and that was enough, and in any event it was the obvious place, as clear to Harry as it was to me. So, in silence, I pulled on the oars; the wind had died, the lake was glassy calm, but the boat was heavy and not meant for rowing, so it was hard, involving work, getting Harry where he needed to go. I thought about Kate, whom I loved, and Joe and Lucy, whom I also loved, and about my father, his spirit soaring in the stars above and his body gone under the sea; I thought about the sounds the trees make in December when there’s no one around for miles, and about my mother’s voice on the phone when she told me of that sad day when she was just a girl; I thought how time passes, and how love is just another word for time. I thought all these things and rowed, rowed, rowed, feeling the sweat cool on my shoulders and brow as I watched the camp disappear over the stern when we rounded the point; and soon Harry, silent since our departure, tipped his old head forward and slept.

It was dusk by the time we reached the inlet. I pulled the oars in, letting the boat drift, and watched the lake bottom to see where the drop-off was. Above us to the north, the river entered the lake, forming a shallow delta where the current spread like the fingers of a hand; about a hundred feet from shore, the bottom dropped in a sheer wall from five feet to more than twenty. Close in, the water was the color of weak tea, and just as clear; when we reached the edge, I’d know. Trout might hold on either side, and our best chance would come at nightfall or just after, when the air cooled and some fish might rise to feed on the surface.

I positioned the boat just above the drop-off on the shallow side. Harry was still sleeping, his chin resting on his chest. A shock of white hair fell over his forehead; his body was slack and calm. We nosed into the current and I set the anchor. The shadow of the mountains to the west lay long across the lake water, drinking up the last of the light.

Harry lifted his head and blinked at me. “We’re there?”

“Yes, sir,” I said.

He scootched up a little on the cushions, wiped a bead of moisture from his chin, and gave a squinty look around. “Marvelous,” he said.

“It’s the best time, isn’t it?”

Harry slid a hand into his vest and removed an envelope. I guessed that it contained the deed to the camp, or a letter more or less explaining that fact. He held it out to me.

“This is for you, Jordan.”

I took the envelope and examined it. The paper was heavy and felt like cream in my hands. The upper-left-hand corner bore the name of a New York law firm-Sally’s, I guessed-etched into the paper in a curvy script, like the writing in a hymnal. I imagined the great office from which it had come: the deep carpeting, the heavy wood furniture, the smell of cigar smoke in its silent boardrooms long after everyone had gone for the night. It was just paper, but it felt like a letter from the very heart of the world. I decided not to open it, and placed it in the picnic basket that Lucy had prepared for us, in with the sandwiches wrapped in waxed paper and the thermos of spiked coffee and the bag of peanut butter cookies.

Harry frowned. “You’re not going to look?”

“There’s no need,” I said. “You’ve always been very generous. You don’t have to give me anything, really. It’s a pleasure just to be out here on a night like this.”

“Hal told you.”

I nodded. “We talked. I guess you could say yes, he told me.”

“Well, I thought he might,” Harry said. He took two deep breaths, exhaling through his mouth. His lips were dry and cracked, and he licked them with a slow, heavy tongue. “Oh, Hal’s all right. I don’t think he meant to spoil anything. Do you accept it?”

“The camp?” I said. “Yes. Of course.” I stopped. “It’s my home.”

Harry smiled weakly. “Then that’s all I need to hear. We don’t have to say anything more about it. It makes me happy that you’ll be here, looking after things. I’m very sentimental about this place, Jordan.”

A shiver snaked through his body, running the length of him like an electric current from toes to jaw. I took the blanket from the pile of gear in the bow, and without quite standing, I laid it across him, tucking it under his arms.

“My father brought me to a place like this when I was nine,” Harry said. “I hate to tell you how long ago that was. He was a great man. Hard, in his way, but there was kindness in him. I remember him whenever I’m here.” He paused and shook with a tight, dry cough. “The real problem isn’t the dying, so much. It’s being sick before you die. I can barely fucking move, Jordan. There’s no justice in it.”

The light was almost gone; full-on dark was maybe thirty minutes away, but the sun had dipped below the mountain ridge, etching the jagged line of its peaks into the deepening sky. The water around us was fantastically still.

“I’ve got some dinner packed here,” I told him. “You never know when we might have some risers. You should keep your strength up.”

Harry eyed the basket, then shook his head. “You know what I’d really like, Jordan?” A smile crept over his face. “A cigarette. I’m dying of lung cancer, and all I want is a cigarette. I haven’t smoked for thirty years, not since that surgeon general thing.”

“It couldn’t hurt now, I guess. I don’t have one, though.”

“It’s just as well. Franny would smell it,” he said. “Franny would smell it, and there’d be hell to pay.”

“I have some whiskey, if you want. I mixed it in with the coffee.”

I removed the thermos from the basket and poured the coffee into two aluminum mugs. I handed one to Harry and guided his finger through the handle. The coffee was bitter and old, but with the Scotch and the cream and sugar it was at least drinkable, and its warmth filled my chest. I wondered how long it would be before someone came to find us.

“It’s good,” Harry said. He took another sip, struggling to swallow. “But I don’t think I can drink. You go ahead, though.”

“I brought some nymphs and streamers along. It might be worthwhile, drifting something in the current.”

“Not just yet,” Harry said. “Something may rise.” He gave me a wink. “We may get lucky yet.”

“There’s always a chance.”

“I hope that’s true,” Harry said. “I believe it’s true. How many times have we fished together, Jordan?”

I sipped my coffee and tried to count. “A lot. Thirty or forty, anyway.”

“Was it your father who taught you?”

“My father died when I was small.”

“Of course,” Harry said. “Forgive me, Jordan. I knew that. He was a pilot, wasn’t he?”

I nodded. “I had a stepfather, though. I learned a lot from him. And from Joe.”

“There’s no one better,” Harry said. “You know, I don’t think I can fish, Jordan. I thought I might feel up to it, but I was wrong.” A deeper exhaustion suddenly came into his face; it was like nothing I had ever seen, or wanted to. He breathed deeply, holding each gulp of air in his chest as if to keep it there as long as he could; as if it weren’t just oxygen, but something marvelous-a beautiful memory of air. He closed his eyes and let his head rock forward. I thought he was going to sleep, but then he looked up, letting his eyes rove across the lake before lighting them on me again.

“ Jordan, I have something to ask you. Would you help me into the lake?”

“You want to fish from shore, you mean?”

We looked at one another, and then I understood.

“Dying hurts, Jordan, but that’s not the reason. Pain is nothing, really. I’m afraid I won’t die here. They’ll take me back, and I couldn’t stand that.”

I sat and thought awhile. I didn’t doubt that it was sincerely what he wanted, but in the end, I knew what I was going to say.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Wainwright. I just can’t. I more or less told Hal I wouldn’t, too.”

Harry nodded, considering. “Well. You’re perfectly right. I hope you can forgive me for asking.”

“It’s not something to forgive,” I said. “I would if I could. It’s just not something I’m capable of. I’m truly sorry.” And I was, too. “Hal expects me to bring you back. Franny too.”

“I could climb out of the boat on my own,” he said. “It wouldn’t be easy, but I could manage it somehow.”

I nodded. “You could,” I said.

“What would you do then?”

I tossed the rest of my coffee over the side. “I’d have to say I’d probably go in after you, Mr. Wainwright. Then we’d both be wet and cold, and the fish would be spooked. No use wrecking our evening like that.”

He smiled then, and so did I, and I realized that the moment I had feared was now behind me. The lake had turned a deep black-blue, the same color as the sky, and all around and above us the stars were poking through the twilight, their pinpoints of light doubled in the lake’s still surface. Harry’s shivering had returned, but I didn’t think it was the falling temperature that was doing it. I poured myself another cup of coffee and sipped it slowly. Harry’s arms and neck grew loose, and for a while I watched him, his thin chest rising and falling under the blanket. When the coffee was gone I rose from the bench, negotiated my way across the boat, and wedged myself in behind him. Straddling his back, I crept my weight forward until he was leaning against me. It was cold, and I had begun to shiver too; I wished I’d thought to put on my sweater before I’d moved, but there was no way to get it now. I wrapped my arms around him. We are adrift in the heavens, I thought.

Sometime later, Harry awoke. “Franny?201D

“It’s Jordan,” I said. “I came behind you, to keep you warm.”

“Oh,” he said. “Not Franny?”

“No, sir,” I said. “She’s back on shore, waiting for you.”

“Lucy?”

“Her too. Everyone,” I said.

Once again, he slept. Night fell, and fell some more. It was time to head home, I knew. Harry’s head lay against my chest, a ghostly halo of white, and I thought, touching his hair, what dreams are these? What last sweet dreams of life on earth?

And then it happened; all around us, suddenly, a great swarm, as if the stars had freed themselves from gravity’s pull and ascended from the waters. A hatch. And everywhere, breaking the stillness, the sound of trout rising, the bright splash of their tails as they slapped the water to feed on the insects that spun on the surface. The rods lay on the benches before us, out of reach, forgotten. It didn’t matter. We floated among them. I closed my eyes and listened until the splashing faded, feeling only pure happiness that I had been there to witness it.

And then, sometime later, I saw the light, then heard the motor that churned behind it. It blinked around the point, tangled in the trees, rounded the corner again; it raked across us, making me blink against its brightness. Hal and Franny. The light split-a second boat, I realized, Joe and Lucy running beside them-and then peeled off again: Kate. They floated toward us in the darkness.

“ Jordan?” I felt Harry stir. “ Jordan, should we go to them?”

I watched the lights come on. “Whenever you’re ready, Harry.”