Eleven (7 page)

Onji pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket and wiped his face. “It's pouring out. Let's close up here and I'll fix us something to eat.”

Sam looked back over his shoulder. “I'll be right over.”
Go, Onji, please.

“I'll check the back windows while you finish doing nothing,” Onji said.

Sam listened to him go around the workroom, humming off-key under his breath. There was no help for it. Sam went down the stairs and met him at the door.

But suppose Mack came back before they finished eating? Came back to see the attic door gaping open over the bed? The quilt rumpled and muddy? How would Sam explain that to Mack?

He raised his hand. “Listen, Onji,” then stopped. He followed Onji out, locking the door, and ran to the deli without a jacket.

Inside, the rain pounded on the windows; the panes were so steamy that everything outside was hidden. The door to Onji's office was open. Sam could see the computer and the photo of Onji's daughter, Ellie, on top.

Ellie was smiling and pointing to someone just out of the picture. Sam knew he was that someone, he'd heard it often
enough. He'd just fallen into the water out back and was dripping wet, with reeds stuck to his legs.

“You're soaked, Sam.” Onji wiped his hands on his huge apron and tossed him a towel. “We'll have trout, grilled, a twist of lemon, some slivers of almonds.” He opened the massive refrigerator. “What could be better?”

“Can I help?” Sam tried to think of a reason to go back next door. “Did I lock the door? I'd better check.”

Onji dumped a couple of carrots on the counter in front of him. “See if you can chop these up without cutting your fingers off. We'll eat them cold, crunchy. And don't worry, we locked the door.”

The hands clicked off a minute on the clock on Onji's stove. Strange, when he wanted the time to go by in school, the clock hardly seemed to move. But now, time was flying, almost six o'clock.

Sam tried to figure when Mack would be back. Thirty minutes down to the outskirts of town at the most, say an hour or so at the auction, thirty minutes back. Thirty and an hour or two, plus another thirty—

“Are you listening?”

“What?”

Onji shook his head. “I was telling you how I caught this trout right under the bridge. It was cold in that river even with my hip boots and jacket. A skinny thing like you would have frozen to death.”

“Hope you wore a cap.” Sam looked at the rim of hair
around the edge of Onji's head, smiling, but still trying to add up the time.
Two hours.
Would it give him enough time to eat and to do something about the bedspread?

“Never mind about my cap.” Onji pointed to the freezer with his thumb. “There's enough fish for both of us for weeks. We'll eat like kings every time Mack isn't around.” He ran his hand over his head. “Imagine, Mack doesn't like to eat fish.”

Easy to understand. Doesn't like the water, doesn't like fish.
Sam took a breath. What could he say to Mack about being in the attic?
I know I don't belong here? I know I'm not your grandson?

And then what?

He and Onji sat on stools at the high table in the middle of the deli kitchen, the fish on a platter in front of them, potatoes boiled and still steaming, and grilled tomatoes with breadcrumbs sprinkled across the top.

“Unique.” Onji grinned at the carrots, cut into thick stumps. “A kid who can cut a piece of wood straight and true but can't manage a carrot.”

“Knife's not sharp enough.”

“Any sharper and you'd cut your hand off at the wrist.” Onji slid a portion offish onto Sam's plate, and the rest onto his own. “Good, right? The best. When we were kids your age, Mack and I, we'd fish outside the house even after dark trying to catch a walleye, or maybe one of those really big guys, muskellunge. What we did catch, Mack would give me.” He pointed his fork at Sam. “Best friend I ever had. What would I do without him?”

Sam felt a lurch in his chest. But then he glanced up at the clock. Six more minutes gone.

“Five or six feet, those muskies.” Onji leaned back on his stool. “Every summer there's a contest to see who can catch the biggest one. You'd have been too young to remember all that. Once on the boat, Mack came so close to catching a muskie. He was married by then. The fish yanked away the line, the reel, the rod.”

Onji stopped to spear a piece of potato. “Mack was furious, jumping around. What a temper.”

Sam looked up, really listening now.

“Other summers,” Onji said, chewing, “Mack would be out before it was light, throwing stones up at my window. ‘Go ahead,’ I'd call down. By the time I was dressed he'd be out on the river in the boat. I'd just about see those white sails going under the bridge—”

Mack sailing? In the water? “Here? Was it here?”

Onji made a large curve with both hands. “A real bridge, huge, not like the one down the road at all.”

Sam took a little of the tomato. “But Mack hates the water.”

“Mack? Mack loved the water, swimming, sailing.” Onji stopped suddenly, and bent his head toward his plate.

Sam kept eating; he made himself finish the last bite of fish before he asked, “So where did you fish, Onji, you and Mack?”
The place 1 was too young to remember.
Sam asked it easily, as if he were just talking, as if it weren't important. He pushed aside his plate.

Not easily enough. Onji had said more than he wanted.

Onji stood up, stretched, went to the refrigerator, and brought back a brick of ice cream. “Love this rocky road.”

“Where did you say—” Sam didn't look at Onji; he stared at the empty fish platter.

“Try it.” Onji slid a huge scoop of ice cream into a bowl for him. “I'll probably sell enough of this during the summer to make me rich.”

He kept talking, never giving Sam a chance to ask. And then they heard the rattle of Mack's pickup truck as he pulled into the lot.

“Have to go,” Sam said. He slid out from the table, hardly caring now what Onji might think. He slipped out the back door, across the muddy path.

Inside he yanked off his sneakers and tore up the stairs, banging the door shut up over the bed, wiping frantically at the mud, then darted into his bedroom.

The door opened downstairs, and Mack called up to him. “Sam, are you up there?”

“On my way down.” Sam pulled the clipping out of his pocket, but there was no date, no place that might be written on top that he could see.

“Ready to go to Anima's?” Mack called.

“Sure, almost. Did you get any furniture?” Sam folded the paper carefully, slid it back into his pocket.

“Terrible pieces, not worth it.”

“Sorry.” Sam tried to catch his breath. “Listen, go on
over to Anima's. I'll be there in a few minutes. Homework,” he said vaguely.

Another lie.

He listened as the outside door shut. He went to his room and found a piece of paper, a stubby pencil. He began to write: M.
ENGRY.
BIG FISH M. He drew the quick shape of a boat, a swimmer, Mack. What else had Onji said?
BR1GE.
On the bottom he wrote, I
WAS THER. 2 ung.

He looked at the paper. He could read his own words even though no one else could.

He went downstairs to Anima's to listen to another Iroquois legend. “Masks,” she read. “They were famous for their face masks, all with crooked noses. They were in honor of a giant who had a huge nose, and had frightened away the Spirit of Sickness, who'd come to prey on the people in the longhouse.”

Mack was looking across the room at him, smiling a little.

Later that night Sam fell asleep, glad he hadn't opened the armoire. He'd never have been able to smile back at Mack. When he awoke it was early, five o'clock or so, and Night Cat didn't budge as he dressed and went down to the workroom.

He cut a piece for the base of the castle and began to work on the columns. By that time, he could smell bacon cooking at Onji's. Night Cat padded in, and overhead Mack stirred. It was time for breakfast.

“Let me tell you—” Sam began as the class line snaked its way to the music room.

“No, let me tell you,” Caroline whispered back, a smudge of lipstick on her braces. “Call your grandfather and tell him you're coming to my house after school today.” Before he could answer she held up her hand. “Don't ask. You'll see.”

“All right.” There wasn't time for more, anyway.

When the dismissal bell rang he hurried down the hall. He hoped Caroline wouldn't know he was embarrassed about going to her house.
“Hanging out with girls?”
Eric would joke.

Caroline knew, though, and hung back until they
reached the corner. “That Eric.” She nudged Sam. “All right, your turn to talk.”

He gave her the clipping, and she leaned against a tree, staring at it. “No date, no name. Too bad.”

He took the clipping back. It would have been so easy, too easy. “I have the other papers for later.” He touched his pocket, then handed her his own paper. “I took notes.”

“Whooo. Who could read—”

“I can.”

“I'll tape it in the book, then.” Her eyebrows were raised over her glasses. “But you'd better translate.”

He began with Onji telling him about Mack's temper, though Sam had never seen Mack angry once. He told her about the boat, and swimming, though he knew Mack was afraid of the water. He told her about huge fish, fish that he was too young to remember. “I was there, Caroline, where they grew up.”

And something else. “I dreamed—” He broke off. “I think it was all nearby, all together: a river, the house where I'd lived with my mother, another place—” It was vague in his mind. “All near where Mack and Onji grew up.”

By the time he finished, they were walking up the path to the boxy blue house where Caroline and her family were staying. Sam glanced at the windows: no curtains, but her mother was standing there, Caroline's little sister next to her, both of them waving.

“My father's painting on the river somewhere,” Caroline said.

Her mother opened the door. Her sneakers were untied, her hair down almost to her waist. It was about the same color as Caroline's but it looked as if she hadn't combed it in a week.

It was easy to see why. She was running a pencil through her hair with one hand, pushing tangled strands off her face with the other, making the whole thing worse. And what was that stuff under her fingernails? Had Caroline said something about clay?

Her mother led the way into a tiny kitchen, bending down to open cabinets, and then the refrigerator. “I was supposed to get something for you to eat—”

“That's all right.”

“No, I did get something. It's just a question of where I put it.” She smiled at Sam over her shoulder. “Ah, here, strawberries.” She looked a little uneasy. “You do like strawberries, right?”

“Sure.”

She pulled a pot out of the closet underneath the counter, and a couple of chocolate bars from a drawer. “We'll melt these, and dip—”

She was like Caroline, just like Caroline. “Chocolate-covered strawberries,” he said. “Cool.”

“And we have cookies, so we can dip them, too.” She swept a pile of books and papers off the table onto a chair.

They sat at the table, chocolate dripping on the white top. Little Denise ran her finger across it, licking off the drips.

Caroline looked happy with all this. “Just wait, Sam.”

And all this time, her mother stared at him. “You're right,” she told Caroline. “I can do this. He has an easy face.” She turned to Sam. “Don't take forever with that. Eat fast, we have things to do.”

They went into what was probably supposed to be a bedroom, but instead was the mother's workroom. It was a gigantic mess.

Sam loved it.

“I didn't have time to set up my kiln,” she said. “I guess Caroline told you we'll be leaving soon.”

He didn't want to think about that. Instead he looked at the things taped to the walls: paint swatches, a shamrock, an old paper fan, and on a table, jars filled with brushes and sharp little knives. In the center was a mound of clay.

“Sit there, right in front of me.” Caroline's mother pointed.

She pulled a chair up in front of him and closed her eyes. “Excuse me.” She ran her fingers, a little sticky, over his face, his nose, his chin.

He didn't move; he knew his face was red.

She opened her eyes, sat back. “A snap.” She reached behind her for bits of clay, and began to shape the clay into a figure.

“She's going to make knights for the castle,” Caroline said, “with your face. She'll make one or two with those things over their heads—”

“Helmets?”

“Yes. So you won't see that it's you, but the rest—”

Caroline's mother held up the figure and tilted her head. “Almost.” She smoothed the head and shoulders. “Would it be too nerdy,” she asked, “to have one lady? And young knights?”

“Squires,” he said. “Why not?”

Moments later, she set the finished figure on the table. “A bold knight,” she said.

Caroline peered over Sam's shoulder. “You have to look closely to see that it's you, but it really is, isn't it? Even the little scar above the eyebrow.”

He raised his hand to his face and ran his fingers over his forehead, his nose, as she had done. She had captured him exactly. “How did you do that?” He stopped. He thought of something else. “What did you say?”

“A bold knight,” she said.

Had he dreamed that? A bold knight? A bold castle?

But he had no time to think about it. Caroline was dragging him into their family room. There was a television at one end, a couch, a table, and a couple of chairs at the other. Boxes were piled against the wall.