The Girl of the Lake Read online

  At length, already famished, Chick reached the northern tip of the island, a rock promontory he’d often seen from the sailboat, granite in tumbled slabs and cubes, nothing rounded, all of it gripped by lichens in several colors and shapes, the rock faces fissured and laced with quartz, lovely stuff. He sat. Why hadn’t he thought to bring along just one single leg from that chicken? The breeze had freshened nicely. He sat on the rock, enjoying the air in his face, pulled out his pot, put it back, pulled it out again—hell, why not?—rolled an expert joint, thinking of his friends at home: Chris Zucco, Tim Collins, Merriweather Peters. Merriweather had his queer name but he also had Martha Linborn, most beautiful girl in school, and they made no secret of their love life, which was torrid and which Chick enjoyed vicariously and envied viciously. Chick struck a match, struck another, lit the joint. His summer’s worth of marijuana, an amount carefully calculated during an hour’s discussion with Chris and Tim to last three months, was more than a quarter gone, and summer barely underway. He wondered, puffing, if Mr. Parmenter would bring out a case of beer if he asked, or a bottle of gin more likely, since that is what Grandpa had drunk and wouldn’t Grandma like a little? He still had one of the twenty-dollar bills Dad had pressed into his hand at the bus station. The other had gone for the long cab ride from Keene.

  The breeze was heavenly in his face. What would it take to restore the sailboat? A sail, for starters. He carefully saved two-thirds of his joint, placed it in the pot bag, jammed this in his pocket. Merriweather and Martha, wow. He’d seen her with her shirt up once, what might have been an embarrassing moment but wasn’t. Just that glimpse of her two breasts like fourteen-knot gusts and whitecaps before Merriweather’s hand had blocked the view and Chick, having burst in through the screen door excited with some news or other, retreated from the gazebo in Merriweather’s vast yard.

  All alone on the perfect rocks of a perfect island, and nothing to eat, besides! He challenged himself to walk the perimeter of the island anyway, not retrace his steps for mere sustenance. He vaulted boulders, scurrying happily till the shore turned impossible, trotted up then into the spruce woods and ran on the soft duff, slapping branches away from his face, taking cuts on his legs. He dove out of the woods, raced down the length of a long sand beach that had only then gotten the morning sun, heavenly bright heat, sprinted till the beach ended at thick brush and boulders. He leapt back up into the woods, hot into his lone competition, noted the shift to white pines, tall, thick-boled trees, plenty of space in among them for a Spartan messenger to run full speed from his pursuers, then sunlight and a large meadow, well overgrown and blown with dandelion seed and dozens of tiny blue butterflies tumbling in pairs, rattling poplar trees taking over the far corner, crowding like Mulvaneys. He stopped to breathe it all in, pulled up a fistful of daisies—Grandma loved daisies—made a leaping pirouette, now a dancer, heard a steel jingle, turned in time to see a large black lab bounding toward him.

  His breath caught, his heart started in his chest. This huge dog, racing silently at him. But it pulled up short ten feet away, still silent, dog grin, intelligent dog face, warm dog eyes gazing at him. Chick gazed back, a long locking of eyes, the sort even trusting dogs will only sometimes allow. Heavy golden chain for a collar. Golden tags, hanging. No wag of the tail. Just the gaze, the seeming smile. And then the creature bounded off the way it had come.

  So someone else was here. Chick breathed. He stood watching the way the dog had gone. The scare dropped down through his legs and left him slowly. The thing was to simply continue on his way, and maybe he’d run into them, whoever they were. Plenty of people must paddle out here. Chick crossed the meadow into blueberry scruff. Maybe this was where he and his cousins and siblings had come with Grandpa. What else to do but continue his perimeter march, clear to the southern point of the island, rough going through blueberry bushes knee and thigh high, the berries so close to ripe but not, no handfuls to ease his hunger. All along the way he inspected the shore, visited every beach, but no boat, no footprints of dog or man. Quickly he made the south point, which was a sandy spit that drew itself out under water, a place he’d often grounded his sailboat in order to swim awhile, sunbathe.

  No footprints. No boat. The dog bounded in Chick’s mind. Lunch beckoned. The western shore was difficult walking, his stomach rumbling, but he kept up the pace, crossed into the far end of the meadow in which he’d encountered the dog, hurrying.

  And fell into a basement hole.

  HE STOOD SLOWLY WHERE he’d landed, found himself shoulder deep in the ground, happy to be unhurt. He knew where he was immediately: the ruins of the Shaunessey mansion. The wall visible in front of him wasn’t just glacial granite but blasted blocks of great dimension, placed for the ages. The soil at his feet, grown in with weeds and the feeble shoots of crowded and ill-fed birch trees, would be old beams, burned and fallen in, long rotted. He climbed out easily, paced off the rest of the foundation, gradually picked out the dimensions of the house. He’d come right back here after lunch. And he vowed he’d come back daily and do some digging!

  He ran, starved, excited. Come to think of it, his knee was sore from the fall. He checked out a little cove—no boats. He barreled through a hemlock grove and into a stand of old beeches—lovely, open forest on a high bluff. Then back into spruces, thick. He spotted his beach, but it wasn’t his beach—it was another, its shape a mirror image of the first. He froze. A young woman was just then wading in from a swim, and she was naked. The dog leapt beside her, bounding from the water, seemed to catch scent of Chick, pulled up short. The girl looked where the dog was pointing and caught Chick’s eye. He thought she’d shriek, but she only grinned and waved and kept coming, the lake dripping from her hair, her pale skin, her black diamond of pubic hair. She cocked her head and twisted her dark hair and wrung the water from it and kept Chick’s eye, kept her grin. There was no boat. She walked to him much as the dog had done earlier, not bounding like the dog but walking purposefully, strode right to him across the little beach in a fond hurry as if she’d grab him and hug him and kiss him but stopped suddenly several yards away and only looked at him grinning, yes, much as the dog had done. Her face, wet in the bright shade, was somehow incandescent. Chick broke her gaze, looked lakeward so as not to look at her bare self: Where was her boat? Where was her bathing suit? But she kept staring. Chick looked back, quickest sweep of her body, then carefully into her eye, her unchanged, enamored expression.

  “Hi,” he said, heart pounding.

  The young woman held his gaze just a moment more, said nothing, motioned with her head for him to follow, and darted prettily up into the spruces the way Chick had just come, the dog at her heels. Chick lingered a moment—where was her boat?—then followed. But in the vast openness of the woods the young woman and her dog were simply gone.

  GRANDMA HAD MADE DINNER, of course. She was so thin, yet ate so much. They were quiet during the salty bean soup, and quiet during the main course, which was a pork roast with potatoes, but during Mr. Parmenter’s garden asparagus, Grandma said, “I saw you paddling back from Spruce Island.”

  Chick just nodded.

  Grandma gave him a long look. “What did you find out there?”

  “Blueberries aren’t ready.”

  “I’ve never been.”

  “Well, at the north end there are rocks. South end is sand. Lots of big trees—really big trees.”

  “It was Charles’s favorite place,” Grandma said.

  “He took us every summer.”

  “Grandpa, I mean. I’m glad you like it, too.”

  “I like it very much.”

  Grandma got up, cleared the plates for the salad course, greens and radishes and some very tiny carrots from her own garden, with a dressing of her herbs in vinegar. Dessert was still to come.

  Chick got up, too, cleared the table. There wouldn’t be another word till every dish was done and dried and put away and dessert on the table. And soon enough, there it was, a raspberry
tart fresh from the wood-fired oven.

  They sat and briefly prayed once again, then dug in. Grandma with whipped cream on her nose said, “Chick, I burden you.”

  He shook his head—no, no—she couldn’t possibly. He thought of the young woman on the island, thought better of telling Grandma.

  “Grandma, the trees out there are the biggest ones I’ve seen anyplace.”

  “Oh, they’ll cut those for lumber first thing.”

  “There were no footprints in the sand anywhere.”

  “Then there will be a cable sunk for power, and lights all night. Eventually a motor-ferry service, I imagine.”

  GRANDMA DRESSED HERSELF FOR an hour—prim blouse, hint of scent, rustling skirts, stockings, who knew how many layers of heavy cloth and unguents on the hot morning. Chick walked her up to wait by the jeep for Mr. Parmenter, who arrived punctually. Chick helped him pull the new sail in its canvas bag from the back of the truck. Grandma had banking to do, and some visiting, even an appointment at the hospital all the way down in Keene to certify her mental health for some changes in her will, and a stop at the lawyers to discuss that document and strategies in the fight against Uncle Bob and Aunt Lauren. Grandpa’s wishes were to be preserved! “Would you like to come along?”

  Chick took his chin in hand comically, making a show of having to think very hard, which was not altogether an act. It was so windy there’d be no way to paddle to Spruce Island. Then again, there was nothing whatever to do in town. Except maybe talk with Philomena at the gas station. Her father, Mr. Hardy, was not only a mechanic but also first selectman of Beemis Corners (Mr. Parmenter had let it be known in response to Chick’s discreet inquiry) and was famous for having memorized the entire text of Ralph Waldo Emerson’s long essay Nature, which he’d declaim with some drama at town meeting. Chick saw himself just sort of sauntering up to the pumps while Grandma did her errands, saw himself making easy conversation with the gas girl, despite his personality. Her father was nice—he wouldn’t mind. Mr. Parmenter, on the other hand, was impatient. Chick would need to comb his hair. He’d need to change into long pants. “No, no thanks,” he said.

  He lugged the new sail down to the boathouse, pulled out the J-boat’s mast, puzzled over how to proceed, went to work. For a break he drove the jeep: roar up the hill, turn around, roar back down, turn around, roar up the hill to the very crest of Race Road. There he looked both ways a dozen times, worked the clutch expertly, and pulled out. The jeep had to climb through deep potholes to make it, popped onto the pavement with a lurch, and stalled broadside across the entire road. Chick pumped the gas pedal several times before he fully realized what had happened; when he tried to restart the engine, of course, the carburetor was flooded. In fact, it seemed to him that the whole forest smelled of gasoline. His stomach lurched, his heart raced. Mindful of the license plates four years out of date, he leapt out the door, opened the hood, waved at the gas fumes. You had to wait. He paced on the road. No car came, but what if one did? At length, he remembered a trick Grandpa had taught him, leapt back in, pushed the gas pedal to the floor. When he turned the key again the engine caught with an explosion, ran smoothly. Chastened, Chick reversed straight back into the sanctuary of the driveway, kept backing, right down the hill, left the jeep in its place, trotted to the cabin, made himself a king’s luncheon of leftovers.

  And then back to the sailboat. He finished lacing the new sail onto the mast and boom, then rigged the boat. It was dirty from years of disuse. He pulled it into the lake, found the big sponge, washed the hull and cockpit for an hour at least, every crevice, Grandpa’s voice in his head: a clean boat wins. The tiller would need a sanding and varnish, the centerboard, too, but with the new sail and the wash, the J-boat looked pretty yar to Chick’s eye. He set out for a test run but soon found himself sailing to the island, a slow process into a stiff breeze, long tacks north and south, gains upwater of a hundred yards at most, a couple of hours before he made the southern sandbar and pulled up.

  He looked at the huge trees in front of him, the disarray of boulders. Quickly he tied up, waded ashore, walked inland. He made the meadow quickly, found the basement hole, looked into it, looked around. No sign of a dog. No sign of the young woman. He made his way in a froth to the place he’d seen her, pushed his way out of the forest. Her beach was empty. His footprints were there, just where he’d stood, somewhat faded.

  She and the dog had left none, no trace.

  AND SUMMER WORE ON. Chick sailed daily, and made a daily stop on Conflagration Island, never another sign of the island girl or her dog. He dug fervently for a few afternoons around the foundation of the Shaunessey mansion and found a tiny silver spoon, but that was all. This, he kept in his pocket. And one afternoon as he pulled up he spotted a canoe beached—he investigated in some excitement but found only a father and two young boys setting up a tent, getting ready to camp a few days. “We saw your dog,” the father said warily.

  Chick gazed at him long.

  The man said, “Scared us half to death!”

  The boys nodded.

  Chick turned and walked into the woods, sprinted silently across the duff and to her end of the island. He waited at the foundation of Aine’s house. He waited longer at her beach. He felt that she was near no longer.

  CHICK PULLED WEEDS WHILE Grandma harvested radishes and spinach and two kinds of kale and pole beans. She took frequent breaks, sat on the large rock Mr. Parmenter had hauled and positioned as a bench so long ago. Chick thought of Grandpa, of Aine. He’d never been that near a grown girl naked before, for one thing; he’d never expected his pure response to such a sight, for another. It wouldn’t be like that with a living girl.

  The conversation with Grandma continued in starts. “Something to tell you,” she said abruptly. Clearly she’d been saving whatever was coming, rehearsing her lines. She and Mr. Parmenter had made two more trips to town, and from each one she’d come back more beatific, all but glowing, charged with a secret cheer, but characteristically tight lipped.

  “About time,” Chick said wryly. They’d gotten awfully comfortable with one another in six weeks.

  “Well, in a way it’s rather simple. Let me just come right out with it.” But she waited, beaming at him.

  “What?” Chick said.

  “Well, dear, you’ve bought an island.”

  “Me?” Chick said.

  “Yourself,” said Grandma.

  “How on Earth?”

  “I’ve got some papers for you to sign in Mr. Parmenter’s presence.”

  “You mean Conflagration Island?”

  “I mean Spruce Island. I have made you a gift of funds from my estate, such as it is, a gift that will doubtless make my children unhappy, since it leaves me impoverished. But my first allegiance is to Grandpa, and you are his only hope. Listen closely, would you? As your trustee, I’ve arranged to invest your newfound money in a certain well-defined piece of New Hampshire land. Yes, Spruce Island! Don’t blink so! Are you with me? It’s not so complicated as it seems. The island is yours, to do with as you wish. It seems I can also make you an outright gift of our land—not more than your share, of course, just exactly one-sixteenth the old Northern Paper tract, five hundred acres more or less. But your share will be the five hundred acres on the lake: Grandpa’s Mile.” She smiled again, couldn’t help herself.

  Chick grinned, but it was the Flexhardt grin, a shield to hide his surprise and his fear.

  Grandma said, “We’ve arranged to set you up with a reasonable legal fund, too, just in case, although Mr. Milligan, Esquire, has revised my last will and testament so as to disinherit anyone implementing a lawsuit against the arrangements I’m outlining. Your grandpa’s will was far too loose, would have left the land to everyone in a block. Mine was the same. My new will divides it precisely. Your uncle Bob will get his half a thousand acres, and surely he’ll not want to jeopardize his ownership! It’s the land up there along both sides of Highway Four, which begs for development. T
he rest of your kin too, everyone gets a share in large tracts behind yours—your parents, your siblings, your cousins and aunts and uncles—fair portions of deepest woods, beautiful cabin sites abounding. They might persuade the, um . . . the lakefront owner . . .” And here Grandma folded her hands dramatically and faintly bowed her head as if to a great lord. “They might persuade such a man to grant easements for footpaths to the water, nothing more. But, Chick, only he who loves it will get the lake.”

  AT BREAKFAST ON ONE of the perfect days of mid-August, still no notion in the wind that the season might ever end, Grandma asked Chick if he wanted ee-coff.

  Chick laughed. “Ee-coff?” he said.

  “Ee-coff,” said Grandma.

  “I don’t drink ee-coff, Grandma.”

  She grinned sheepishly, charmingly, laughed at herself, and that had been that.

  At lunch she said, “Look at me, Charles,” and Chick looked a long while. She looked so beautiful, so square and strong and happy.

  After dinner—which was one of Mr. Parmenter’s chickens, roasted perfectly, tiny potatoes, string beans with almonds, chocolate cake, a delicate discussion about her favorite music versus Chick’s (Italian opera not so different from Miles Davis, they decided, at least in its effects on the soul)—she said she had a drumming headache.

  The next morning she stood vacantly in the kitchen, simply stared at Chick, a block of raw bacon in her hand.

  “Grandma?”

  She grinned sheepishly, said nothing.

  “Grandma?”

  Chick accepted the bacon from her, put it back on ice, gathered her up in his arms—surprisingly heavy for such a little bird—enveloped her and heaved her up the walk to the jeep, sat her in the passenger seat, where she retained her posture. One time his sister had gotten stitches from a doctor somewhere near, but he had no idea where, or who. Of course there was no phone. He drove carefully up the humped driveway to Race Road, pulled out over the potholes at the proper speed to beat them, drove stiffly twelve miles to Beemis Corners, twenty-five long minutes without conversation. At the gas station he pulled in and honked long and loud. Mena flounced out, annoyed at the honking till she saw Chick and blushed. He asked politely where he might find a hospital. She looked at him closely, then at Grandma. “Oh my,” she said. “The hospital is in Keene. It’s twenty miles. Mrs. Flexhardt?”