North of Boston (33 page)

The sun has shrunk to a red pinprick on the horizon. I watch it wobble, disappear. Instantly, the ocean goes black, and the night sky comes alive. A deep, dark, velvety blue. No moon. Flickering stars. Cold, clean air, and a sense of expectancy.

My fingers have no sensation, but with my palms I can feel the thick knot that attaches the net to the enormous buoy, which is not cork at all, as Martin said, but rubber, like a mooring, and much, much bigger than it looked from shore. There's some kind of wire involved in the fastening, and a chain like a plumb line that sinks to the seafloor and keeps the bottom from drifting up. I have no idea what to do. I want to cry out in frustration, in fury at myself. I'm naked, half drowning, and hypothermic. I certainly did not bring a knife. What was I thinking? How can I possibly move a buoy in the ocean, or a huge megapound net?

Now, with the goal so close, but impossible, I begin to shiver violently. My teeth rattle; my ribs feel like they could break. It's as if the opening of a chink in my willpower (or was it just delusion all along?) is making my body break down, too. I try, but my stiff hands will barely curl around the knot. There's nothing to be done. The net is firmly connected.

I think about everything ending here, like this, in this frigid water, and call myself a fool. So close to the bay, I feel a current pulling me. The tide's going out, leaving the inlet. Unless I can grab hold of something, I risk being pulled out to sea.

I wrap my legs around the top rope of the net, hook one arm around the bottom of the buoy where it attaches to the anchoring chain. I will have to stay here until someone comes for me. Where are Martin and Parnell? Sweet Martin, he took me at my word. He would have told Parnell my secret by now, told him to let me go. One-armed Parnell probably can't swim anyway. If either of them tried, chances are they wouldn't make it this far anyway, much less back to the beach while dragging me. And there's no boat.

I should swim back now, before I'm even more exhausted. But the prospect makes me weak with dread. I've lost my stamina, my edge, and the way back is cluttered and dangerous.

Maybe I can get to the rock face behind me and pull myself along until I find a place to crawl up. Maybe. I can hear quiet splashes where the water meets the cliff. Or should I pull myself along the top of the net to the other buoy, and try my luck on the side of the inlet where the rock face isn't as high? Or I could let the current gently wash me toward the
Galaxy
, get myself to the stern ladder somehow, and crawl aboard. Naked and spent, a doomed fish flopping on the deck.

It all feels difficult, very difficult. The more I think, the more the choices multiply. Can one be right, when they all look bad?

When adult narwhals come up to breathe, it's only the tops of their heads that break the surface. Their eyes, nearly blind anyway, stay below. That's why something as simple as a seal net can catch them. To them it's a soaring wall.

The calves occasionally jerk their heads up when they breathe. Not yet graceful in the water like their parents, not yet well behaved. Although I can't see it in the dark, I hear flaps and slaps from the little whale that followed me, as if it's rolling and twisting around. Now, suddenly, I feel a powerful rush as its bulk passes close by me in the water. It's swimming right over the net where my body has slightly depressed it. Under its weight, the net is depressed even more. I'm dunked; the buoy's pulled down and rolls on top of me. I lose my grip, panic, grab at something floating on the surface, and realize I'm holding a loop of rope. It feels loose. Why?

Then, in a flash, I get it. The knot I felt wasn't to the net at all; it was to the chain underneath. The top of the net is hooked over the buoy with a simple loop. The loop feels loose right now because the buoy is momentarily submerged. Still underwater, I swim down and away, pulling the rope with me as the whale passes like a thundercloud overhead. The loop clears the submerged buoy, and the rope is torn from my hand as the heavy net falls away quickly through the blackness. The buoy bobs back up after the narwhal passes. I come up after it, gasping and sputtering, grab hold of it again. The net's still attached to the buoy on the other side of the inlet, but now, on this side, there's a huge gaping exit to the bay.

I look for the calf. It's gone.

A minute passes. Sounds begin: chattering, clicking, whistles, creaks.

The current seems to shift; the water churns.

The narwhals begin streaming out. The enormous bodies pass one after the other, three and four abreast; one clips me with a flipper. I hug the buoy tighter, wrap my legs around the chain to keep from being sucked along in the watery stampede.

They keep passing. Ten, twenty, more than I can count. Out in the bay, heads occasionally break the surface, glisten in starlight. Raised tusks glow white.

For a minute, I long to go with them, to fall in with that beautiful stream and swim far out to sea. Back to the place where I felt death waiting. Ever since the collision, he's been calling me back, whispering
I'm here. You know me now. You know you'll come to me soon.

Not now
, I whisper back. Not now.

When the whales are gone and the surface of the bay lies flat and unbroken, I swim slowly down the inlet toward the beach. I'm comfortable enough, don't feel particularly cold. I don't know when my body flipped its switch. I only know it did. Still, it's a great relief to get through the bumping narwhal corpses and stagger onto the sand. Parnell catches me, wraps his coat around me. Martin's got a flashlight; his drawn face is visible in its wavering beam. While I was swimming, Jimmy arrived, bringing the torches to help us get back to the plane.

My clothes are shoved at me. I'm shivering too much to put them on, so Parnell helps me, kneeling down to tie my sneakers. His back to the others, he says in a husky voice, “If I asked you never to do that again, what would you say?”

“I can't help it. It's who I am.”

He nods. “Then I guess I won't.”

When I'm ready to go, we head back across the tundra. I scoot next to Parnell, lean in to his left shoulder, and he puts his arm around me as we walk.

W
e spend the night next to the lake at the base of Mount Duval. Jimmy, unfazed and grinning, produces a half-full bottle from his backpack and offers it around. Martin, Parnell, and I decline, so he empties it himself and goes off to sleep in the tent. The three of us sit in the short grass near the plane, surrounded by dark tundra, talking aimlessly about simple subjects, but with the kind of intimacy that comes from having been through something together. We have no fire, since there's nothing but grass to burn, but I'm wrapped in a sleeping bag and feel fine. I'm mesmerized by the glowing bands of green light swirling lazily in the night sky.

We're airborne at daybreak, flying south across the Hudson Strait. By midmorning we've landed in Hopedale. Martin, Parnell, and I throw our bags in the bed of Martin's pickup, while Jimmy, smiling broadly, waves good-bye from beside his Piper Cherokee. Once home, Martin strides through the kitchen, past Tiffany's breathless questions, to the phone in the living room. Soon we hear his usually supple voice, grown hard with urgency, giving the exact location of the
Galaxy
and the narwhal slaughter to the Canadian authorities. Parnell opens his laptop on the kitchen table and begins pecking at the keyboard, composing the first draft of his story. I disappear into the bathroom to shower off sand, salt, and whale blood. Tiffany lends me some clothes.

As Martin and Tiffany prepare lunch, I retreat to the quiet living room to make my round of necessary phone calls. But first I have to think, try to sort things out. I sit on the sun-dappled couch, curl my legs under me. There's a handmade purple afghan on the back of the couch and bright plastic toys scattered on the coffee table. Cheerful, mundane objects that feel comforting.

My first impulse is to call the Boston Police Department with information about Mrs. Smith's murder. But there's no evidence she
was
murdered. I'm sure Johnny covered his tracks extremely well. If I accuse him out of the blue, with no evidence to back it, I'll only end up looking like a fool.

I have no doubt that Johnny's been searching for Parnell since the night Parnell was beaten on the waterfront. It appears that Parnell has succeeded so far in giving him the slip. It's lucky that I wasn't followed to the rooming house in Charlestown or the place in Rockport. I guess I have Troy's spotty work ethic to thank for that. In any case, as long as Parnell stays away from the Salem Street apartment, he can probably elude Johnny awhile longer.

As for me: Johnny obviously considered me finished business the moment I stepped aboard the superyacht. A virtual prisoner for the first leg of the voyage, I was expected to make a lifeless journey to the bottom of the Labrador Sea. His complacency would have been shattered Wednesday night, when Hall would have let him know that I'd escaped. No doubt he's been looking for me since; today or tomorrow, when the story of Ocean Catch's involvement in a narwhal slaughter breaks, his motivation to do away with me will exponentially increase.

Johnny has no idea where I am right now. All he knows is that Hall showed me the video of Noah, so at some point I'm going to arrive in Boston to make sure that Noah's safe. I doubt that Johnny will go after Noah until he has me in view. A missing child creates a lot of news that he would want to avoid, and he needs Noah to be available as bait. Even if he had tried to kidnap Noah at some point during the last few days, he wouldn't have had any luck. Thomasina and Noah left their apartment the day after I escaped. If Johnny had staked out the place, he would only have wasted a lot of time figuring out that they weren't actually there.

Johnny's no fool. He knows me, probably figures I called them as soon as I could. Then I gasp out loud, and my stomach falls away.
He knows me.
I'm suddenly stricken with panic at the thought that he might make the educated guess that Thomasina and Noah are at my father's house on Beacon Hill.

Forget the Boston police. My first call is to Thomasina, who doesn't pick up. My second is to Jeffrey, who does. “You've got to get Noah out of that house. He could be found there. I can't explain any more than that right now. I'll be in touch, I promise. Just take him and Thomasina somewhere, and do it soon. Right away. Now.”

“Hold your horses, Pirio. I don't like the sound of this. Who are these people?”

“One's a guy named Max. Thomasina knows him. The other is John Oster, a fisherman. He doesn't want Noah; he wants me.”

“Why aren't you going to the police?”

“The police won't do anything. I have no evidence, and by the time they figure anything out, Noah could be harmed. Please, Jeffrey. You've just got to believe me and get Noah out of there.”

A ragged sigh. “Where will I take them?”

“I don't know. A resort? A summer house? Someplace you can get to fast.”

“And you? What about you?”

“I have a friend with me. I'll be OK.”

“Pirio, this is crazy stuff. You need to tell me right now what the fuck's going on.”

“I will; I promise. Just not right now. I need a few more days.”

“Pirio. What are you doing?”

I've heard that tone of voice so many times before. When I was five and bringing garden worms into the kitchen. When I was ten and refusing to talk. When I was fifteen and slamming doors. When I was twenty and drunk.

I hold the phone tighter, press it into my ear. “You were always there for me, Jeffrey. You took my side when no one else would. If it weren't for you, I don't know where I'd be. Please. One last time.”

“Oh, crap,” he says, giving in.

“Let me talk to Thomasina if she's there.”

“She's helping Maureen rethink her wardrobe. It's amazing how well they get along.”

“See if you can tear her away.”

Two minutes into my conversation with Thomasina (basically just a repeat of my conversation with Jeffrey), I realize with a jolt that she's sober. She's irritable, focused, defeated, and grounded as hell. No bullshit, no stories, no excuses. Just two bare feet on the burning coals of reality. Even so, it's hard to gauge how much of what I'm saying she's really taking in, and I'm grateful that Jeffrey at least understands the urgency.

“I can't sleep. I have insomnia. The guest room's way too floral. I can't keep anything down. Your stepmother is emptying out her closet. And now you tell me this,” she says disgustedly.

“How about a spa in Vermont? Picture a hot tub, a masseuse. Just stay away from the bar.”

“Don't give me advice, OK? Do me that one favor. From now on, keep your advice to yourself.”

I want to reach through the phone and hug her. “How many days?”

“What the fuck difference does it make?” A pause. “Since Foxwoods, fourteen.”

“Don't let Maureen talk you into a glass of wine.”

“Oh, God. I'd rather she was pushing booze on me than trying to help. She's worse than you with all the advice she has.
Did you know you could be a candidate for delirium tremens? I called AA and printed out a meeting list. The B vitamins are very helpful. I can recommend a good psychiatrist.
” She sighs. “Jeffrey's awesome. It's been nice to have his help with Noah. I've been going to two meetings a day. Whoever thinks Beacon Hill is ritzy should look to see who's in the basements of the churches around here. Pirio, nothing bad's going to happen to Noah, is it?”

“No, nothing bad. As long as you do what I say.”

“Good. Because I couldn't handle that. You want to talk to him?”

“No. Just tell him I said hi.” I'd love to hear his voice, but I am incapable of making cheerful godmother noises into the phone when I know that John Oster's out there, with Noah, me, and Parnell in his sights. I privately vow that the next time I talk to Noah, he'll be safe. We all will be. I have no idea how that's going to happen, but I won't rest until it does.

Thomasina continues, “Last night he watched
The
Maltese Falcon
with your father. Now they're upstairs listening to Rachmaninoff.”

Oh, Milosa,
I think.
Please don't give him a cigar.

—

We all gather round the kitchen table when lunch is ready. Matilda is placed in her high chair, where she squirms, fusses, and starts to cry. Tiffany picks up her teething daughter and holds her on her lap, rocking and humming a little to soothe her. Parnell sits next to me, and it feels good to have him near. I'm glad for the hot coffee and hearty meal, but there's a strange foreignness to everything. As if I were gone too long, or traveled too far, and now must relearn how to use silverware, drink from a glass, and wipe my mouth with a napkin. With each rise and fall of my breath, I'm conscious of the ocean, the narwhals, and a sense of freedom singing in my blood. The house in comparison feels constricting, overcivilized.

Something's been nagging me since the last time I was here, but I can't put my finger on what it is. I keep flashing to the painted cedar box with Roger's letter to my mother and the photos. After lunch, when Tiffany takes Parnell into town so that he can check his e-mail, I notice the black bird face peering down from the top of the bookcase, and ask Martin if I could look at it again.

“Of course,” he says, handing it to me.

I sit on the couch and open the box, remove the letter and photos. The only things left are a pocketknife on a thin knotted rope, and a small brown vial.

I hold up the pocketknife. “Is this . . .”

“Yes,” Martin says with an uncomfortable nod. “He made carvings. I'll show you some later.”

“I wonder why he wanted my mother to have it?”

“Maybe it would have meant something to her. It was one of the most precious things he owned.”

I replace it a little sadly, wondering about him.

Then I pick up the vial, and before I've finished unscrewing the plastic top, my heart is racing. I know what I hold in my hand.

When the cap is off, I raise the vial to my nose, inhale the escaping molecules, and it's as if she's standing in the room. No, even closer: living in the air I breathe. Flowing emotions, cascading memories—a hundred reactions fill me at once. Wonder, love, and disappointment. Anger and longing, contentment and pain. Her laugh is a bright, clear bell in my ear; her cigarette burns in the ashtray; I see her eyebrow arch. Her thin fingers, strong and warm, caress me, and the straightness of her back is what I strive to attain. I can't get enough. I hold the vial like a chalice and breathe my childhood, the wildflowers of Labrador, the cool dust of July. In a vision, she stretches lazily on the chaise longue on the deck of the architect's house, drops her book to the ground, and complains that no one knows how to write a good story anymore. Then she smiles, and there are crinkles at the edges of her eyes. As I lie in bed, she leans down to kiss my forehead, then sits up straight and whispers,
Listen. Do you hear them? The seals are barking on the rocks.

“It's my mother's fragrance,” I explain to Martin, blinking back tears. “She made it one summer up here in Labrador, and always wore it.”

He takes the vial and holds it under his nose. He gives a thoughtful nod. “It's nice.”

“It brings her alive again,” I say with urgency, trying to explain the inexplicable. “Like she's suddenly here.”
It's a highway to the unquenchable heart of me
, I might have added, if I had the courage to be grandiose.
To the place where my mother and I wrapped around each other and were one. It's the story of my childhood told in molecules that only I can understand.

Martin tries another inhalation, holding the vial gingerly between two fingers. Frowns with serious intent. “Yeah. I like it. It's nice.”

I end up laughing. I can't help it. “Martin! It's more than nice. It's perfume genius!” The emotional associations, I realize, can only ever be mine.

He looks a little upset, knowing he's come up short. Gives a third earnest sniff, which results in a flared nostril and a shake of the head. “I said I liked it.”

“Sweet Martin,” I say, folding my almost-brother in my arms, rocking him back and forth with joy. “How very lucky I am.”

“Wait! Don't spill it!” he says, laughing. He unwraps my arms, closes the vial tightly with the plastic top, and presses it firmly, ceremoniously, into the middle of my palm, as if it were the exact wrench I needed to do some important carpentry work.

—

Parnell and I are in the backseat of a yellow taxi coursing through the soot-smeared Sumner Tunnel. It's Monday, midmorning. We got a flight from Hopedale to St. John's yesterday afternoon but had to wait until almost five this morning for an Air Canada flight to Boston. As we were leaving Logan, Parnell told the taxi driver, “Sumner Tunnel.” Now, as the end of the tunnel approaches, and more specific directions are needed, Parnell says “North End” and I say “Storrow Drive” at exactly the same time. The driver throws up his hands in a dangerous release of the wheel. “Make up your mind!”