In the Heart of the Canyon (14 page)

“Okay, cowboy. Go to sleep.”

Then Mark came back and lay down on his mat beside her. He smelled of sunscreen. Everybody smelled of sunscreen.

“Thank you,” she whispered.
Thank you for finding the inhaler. Thank you for not criticizing him for not having it
.

“I’m glad you organized this,” he whispered, after a while.

“Good,” she said. “Me too.”

“The boys are having a good time, don’t you think?”

“Yes.” She lay flat on her back, gazing up at the spattered runway of stars; on either side, black cliffs loomed, voiding out the rest of the world. She had never seen anything so beautiful. What other worlds were out there, and where were they all going? She reached out and splayed her palms on the cool, velvety sand. A sense of hugeness, of being able to wrap her arms around the universe, came over her. At the same time, she felt as tiny as a pinhole.

“I hope I get to paddle Crystal,” he said, after a while.

She felt jolted. “Why wouldn’t you?”

“A lot of people are going to want to paddle Crystal,” he said. “I heard Mitchell talking.”

“Ssshhhh. He’s right over there.”

“Mitchell hasn’t lifted a finger,” Mark whispered, “compared to all the water I’ve pumped.”

She reached over and took his hand. “Look at the stars, Mark,” she whispered. “Count them,” and he fell silent, as she hoped. And they lay there, floating on the sand, counting stars, while the ever-present sound of moving water lulled them to sleep.

I
t was midmorning the next day when their three boats floated into the confluence of the Little Colorado River. Instantly JT could tell that it hadn’t rained upstream, for the tributary was running its strange, aquamarine blue. On a hot summer day, the Little Colorado could get as crowded as a suburban water park, but JT decided to stop anyway, and not just because Mitchell had been talking about it all morning. People of all ages liked the Little Colorado; the water was warm, and they could lounge and play in its series of pools and waterfalls.

There must have been a dozen boats at the confluence that day, and JT had to do some tight maneuvering to find space to pull in. As his passengers eagerly scrambled out of the boats, JT warned them about the crusty travertine ledges; using Abo as a model, he showed them how to fasten their life jackets upside down, diaper-style, to avoid scraping themselves. Then he let them loose, and they ran upstream and joined the throngs, shrieking, splashing, sliding down waterfalls and hitching themselves into clumsy trains that broke apart, limbs in the air, hands grabbing for feet, frenzied laughter the likes of which JT was used to here on the Little Colorado but which most of the adults had not experienced since grade school.

While they reveled in the warm blue waters, JT went from boat to boat in search of gauze, for that morning, Lloyd had taken it upon himself to change the bandages on Ruth’s cut. He did a thorough, precise job, wrapping her leg liberally, which would have been commendable in a hospital but was unfortunate down here on the river where they were so low on gauze to begin with. By the time JT realized what was happening, Lloyd had already ripped open the last packet.

Hadn’t Ruth remembered they were low on gauze? Why didn’t she stop him from using so much? Sometimes it baffled him, how good, intelligent people could get so spacey

But today he got lucky, for the pontoon crew had a few extra rolls to spare. Thus at least partly replenished, he leashed the dog and hiked up a small hillside to a spot where guides left messages for one another.

It was here, years ago, that he’d left love notes for another guide, a girl named Mac, always a trip behind him, it seemed, until finally they managed to synchronize their schedules, and then it was just a question of whose boat to sleep on, his or hers. After three years together, they drove up to Vegas one night and got married, and within a year Colin was born, taking Mac off the river for a couple of seasons, which she never really forgave him for. JT, that is, not Colin; Colin she doted on, but she and JT never managed to figure out the parenting thing, not as two river guides anyway, and Mac resented JT every time he left on a trip, and JT reminded her it was her choice not to go off for two weeks and leave the baby, he’d be glad to take Colin so she could do a couple of trips each season. But it didn’t work. The resentment spilled from her eyes every time he came back from a trip, and they finally decided it was more important for Colin to have two relatively happy parents than one unhappy parental unit, and that was how JT found himself a divorced father with a son to raise, a son he had every intention of infusing with the river spirit but who now worked for a law firm in Phoenix and criticized his father for not having a real job with a retirement plan.

There were no love notes today, just a pink-petaled bathing cap that another guide had left for Abo. “Thinking you might need this,” the scrap of paper read. It was clearly a woman’s handwriting; JT wondered how long it had been there and where the woman was now. Sometimes he had the feeling that the guides’ love-ghosts haunted the canyon, showing up here and there in the form of heart-shaped rocks, or shooting stars—or campy pink bathing caps.

Back at the river, Dixie and Abo were shepherding everyone toward the boats—a giddy bunch, all of them, waddling with their life jackets
drooping below their hips. It was while they were unfastening and refastening them into correct position that JT noticed one of Matthews buckles hanging by a thread.

“What happened to your life jacket, Matthew?”

Matthew looked down.

“How long’s it been like that?” said JT.

“I don’t know,” said Matthew.

The black nylon strap was ragged and stringy; judging from a few other spots that looked suspiciously like tooth marks, JT guessed who was responsible.

“Do you have a needle and thread?” Jill asked.

“Yes, I’ve got a needle and thread.” He didn’t mean to sound curt, but he could tell from the look on Jill’s face that he did. He got out his sewing kit and mended the strap, and when he was done, he warned everyone to keep a close eye on their gear.

“That dog chews something of mine and he’s history,” said Dixie.

“When’d you get so evil?” Abo said.

“You’re not evil,” Peter told Dixie.

“Oh yes I am,” said Dixie.

“Load up,” said JT. “We got miles to go, people.”

“‘Miles to go before I sleep,’” quipped Evelyn.

“Who wrote that?” asked Lena.

“Walt Whitman,” said Mitchell.

Amy caught Peter’s eye, and they both stifled their smiles.

Jill and Mark remained on the beach while the others got in the boats. Jill was repacking her day bag.

“What
is
it with these boys,” Mark said, shaking his head. It was a statement, not a question, and Jill sensed that he expected she would know exactly what he was talking about and fondly commiserate.

Instead she said, “What do you mean?”

“Every time we turn around, they’re getting into trouble. They have the worst luck! Sam with the red ant the first day, now Matthew with this. Sheesh,” he said, shaking his head. “It’s like they’re cursed.”

Jill didn’t think an insect bite and a chewed strap indicated a curse.

“It’s not the end of the world,” she said.

“Oh, I’m not saying it is! Not at all!” And here Mark laughed, in such a way that was designed to curry her favor, when in fact he really felt he had a legitimate point to drive home. “All I’m saying is, if there’s trouble, our guys will find it.”

“Ruth got tripped by the dog. Are you saying she was looking for trouble? Or cursed?”

“Don’t get snippy,” said Mark. “I’m just saying we should look out for the boys a little more, maybe. Nip things in the bud before they happen. I don’t see what’s wrong with that.”

Jill straightened up. “What’s wrong with it is that you’re kind of ruining things for me, Mark.” She didn’t know exactly what she was going to say next and hoped she didn’t overdramatize. “I really wish you’d relax,” she went on. “I’m trying to have this cool family vacation, and you’re kind of throwing a damper on things by worrying about every this, that, and the other.”

“You completely misunderstood what I was saying.”

“What were you saying?”

Mark shook his head and looked downriver.

Jill put her hands on her hips. “What were you saying, Mark?”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“Do you have to do this? Here? Now? Did we not just swim in the most beautiful place on earth?”

Mark said something about clear mountain lakes.

“Never mind,” said Jill. “I’m going to enjoy the trip my way, and you can enjoy the trip your way.”

“Well, I just hope we all make it off in one piece,” Mark said, climbing into the paddle boat.

Jill stayed behind on the beach for a moment, taking long slow breaths. Then she walked over to Abo, who was coiling his rope. “My arms are kind of tired,” she told him. “I think I might take a break from paddling, if it’s okay. Maybe ride in one of the oar boats.”

“Sure, babe,” said Abo.

It was late in the afternoon when they pulled into camp for the night. The beach was long and flat and stretched far upriver. People had their routines down by now, and they unloaded the boat and set up their campsites quickly.

JT appreciated their independence at this particular point, but he was still troubled. Ruth’s leg had looked worse this morning than it had the day before; twice last night, he’d dreamt of helicopter evacuations. At breakfast, she was limping; at the Little Colorado, she did not go with the group but simply settled herself in a pool with her leg elevated on a dry ledge. She asked Lloyd to stay with her, but he refused.

“No sirree Bob,” he said, traipsing off after the others. “I’m going to enjoy myself today.”

Also, JT had overheard everything between Mark and Jill back at the Little Colorado. He had watched his share of marriages disintegrate during these trips; the canyon could strip the veneer off a marriage, make placid people restless, suddenly aware of imperfections. Just as you could fall in love at the drop of a hat, so too you could fall out of love. He hoped this wasn’t going to happen with Mark and Jill.

In any case, it was not a time for worries, or clefts. They were just above Hance Rapid, entry point to the Inner Gorge, the Land of the Giants, where the walls would narrow in again and they would lose a billion years in geological time as they traveled down into the Vishnu Schist. This was the oldest, blackest rock you would ever see. This was where the river got serious, and unforgiving, where the walls closed in before you could say good-bye to the sky, where a flip meant a long swim before somebody might haul you out of the water. JT had seen real ghosts in this section of the river, ghosts in the water and ghosts in the rock, which was all there was, fundamentally, rock and water—and current. Always the current.

Some people loved this section, and some people were spooked by it. It depended on a lot of things: the weather, the flow, the people you were with. JT couldn’t make any predictions with this group. It could go either way.