Northern Lights (11 page)

“The trees will be turning,” he observed.

“Look closer,” Addie said. “They
are
changing.”

“Not much. In a week you’ll see something.”

“I already see it. Look close.”

“Where the devil is Harvey?”

“He’ll be along. Don’t be silly, stop worrying about it.”

“I just asked where he was.”

“He’ll be along soon. Do you see what I was saying about the leaves?”

“Yes, I see. I saw it before.”

She was tall. He was glad they were lying on the beach. Long brown muscles ran up her thighs. The calves were long and all bone.

The trees above them were elm and sweet maple. Across the lake it was all pine.

“Are you taking Grace on a vacation this winter?”

“I guess so. I don’t know. She’s been talking about Iowa. I guess she wants to go down.”

“Good God.”

“Yeah. Not so good. She has her family there.”

“Iowa, good God.”

“She likes it,” he said.

“Well, when do I get my vacation? You promised to take me on a vacation.”

“What?”

Addie laughed. “South Dakota, the badlands. The badlands are actually quite spectacular. God’s gift.”

“It sounds terrible.”

“You have to go there, just like Harvey says. We can find a nice motel and play stud poker. We can have a big shoot-out at high noon.”

“You’re always teasing, aren’t you?”

“It requires a lot of imagination.” She stretched out. “This is the last of the sun, I’ll bet. Another week. I like it when the air is cool like this and the sun is still there. It’s the best of everything.”

“The fall is nice.”

“Now Harvey. Harvey hasn’t got imagination. He’s a pirate and pirates don’t have the imagination the rest of us have. Harvey never teases. He’s silly, he’s so blasted serious. He’s always talking about Africa and wherever, and the bomb shelter—it’s his favorite spot. It’s all serious.”

“I wonder where he is.”

“He’ll be coming.” She got up and stood over him. “Now let’s you and I swim.”

“Not me.”

“We’ll race. But you can’t touch my legs.”

“Now you’re teasing, Addie.”

“Okay for you, crumb.”

She stayed in a long while. When she came out, he pretended not to watch. She shook her hair and dried herself and draped her towel beside him.

“Wasn’t that a swim!” she said. “Are you sleeping, Peeper? Wake up, I’m back, you can wake up, silly.”

She knelt down. Her thighs flattened and spread out. Beads of lake water twinkled. She took his glasses from the sand and put them on his nose. “Peeping Paul.”

“Stop that.”

“Don’t you like your pretty glasses?”

He pulled them off.

She was breathing up and down as if still swimming. Her skin was dark. She lay down. She was athletic and a great risk.

“You’re pretty,” he said.

“What we need is some food. I hope dumb Harvey doesn’t forget the food. Did you say I was pretty? That’s a compliment. That’s nice. You’re nice, aren’t you?”

He deliberately closed his eyes.

“Did you say I was pretty?”

“Yes.”

“Well, in that case you have to look at me. You used to look at me all the time.”

“That’s over, Addie. Be nice now.”

“Peeping Paul. You have to stop looking at people. People will think you’re obscene, you know. Smile now. You never smile, just pull the corners. See, like this. Everybody can learn. You aren’t a silly mutant, are you?”

“You sound like Grace.”

“Fine, Grace’s on the beam.” Her back arched and she stretched a mighty cat stretch. Perry imagined raw meat. “Ah,” she groaned, then collapsed, her arms spread out on the sand. She was athletic looking. “You’re getting wrinkle marks on your tummy,” she said. “Now that’s a sign of aging. It means you were fatter and now you’re not so fat.”

“I’m in good shape, don’t you think?”

“You have wrinkle marks on your tummy, right here. What’s the big word for tummy?”

“Stomach.”

“No, the bigger word.”

“Abdomen.”

“Abdomen. That’s it. You have wrinkle marks on your abdomen. That’s a hard word to pronounce. I can’t say it without hearing someone else say it first. Do you ever have that problem?”

“Only when I try to talk French.”

“Have you been there?”

“Once, not for long. We were in Paris.” He stumbled on the collective we, tried to slur over it.

She laughed. “A honeymoon, I’ll bet. Am I wrong?”

“It was just a trip.”

“Well, you’ll have to take me on a trip, too. Nothing else will do. The badlands.”

“Where do you get this badlands stuff? Harvey’s thinking you’re crazy.”

“Imagination. You have to have it.”

Cold rain drizzled down through supper and the summer seemed to end at 6 p.m. sharp. Harvey did not come.

“Scrabble?” Grace said brightly.

“No.”

“You don’t want a game of Scrabble?”

“No, I don’t want a game of Scrabble.”

She pouted.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “Let’s walk. How about a walk?”

“It’s raining.”

“Do you good to get wet.”

“You’re a clown.”

“Aren’t I? I wonder where the devil Harvey is.”

“With Addie. You told me, remember? Don’t they make a nice pair? I think so. I do. Karen Markham thinks so, too. She thinks they’ll get married and she asked me what I thought and I said I didn’t know. Addie’s good for him. You know? She keeps him … You know.”

“I know.”

“She’s nice, too. Addie. Don’t you think so? I wish I could be that way sometimes. I don’t know. Shall we just watch television?”

She washed the dishes and he dried them. The rain was cold, and he smelled the winter coming.

“Do you want to just watch television? Or we can listen to records.”

“You’re one for excitement.”

“I was just …”

“I know.” He pretended to smile.

“You’re a kidder,” she said. She looked relieved. Her teeth clicked together.

They finished the dishes and watched television, then Perry got up and put on his raincoat. She didn’t say anything. Gently, he closed the screen door and stood on the porch. The yard light illuminated a narrow swath of the forest. Behind him, slightly muffled, he heard the sound of the television, Grace moving across the kitchen floor, hesitating then moving away. He zipped up the coat and put his hands in his pockets. He felt foolish, no longer restless, and for a moment he considered going back in. He heard Grace inside, running water, rinsing something. The rain let up, turning to mist and fog in a combination of great depth. He stepped off the porch and hurried blindly across the lawn, on to the path, and towards Pliney’s Pond. The earth smelled of salamanders and pine, and it was cold and wet and deep, and the earth sank beneath him, and the fog transmitted faraway sound, and faraway stillness, and above him the pines were dripping, he heard water lapping somewhere, his shoes sucking on the forest floor. He came to the pond. It was dark, almost a part of the land. It was too cold to sit on the rocks. He stood with his arms folded and hugged himself and looked out on the pond. The summer stink was gone. The air was sharp. The pond was perfectly still. Sea of swamps, mother marsh, womb of man.

“So,” he murmured at last. “So,” he murmured, as if settling something.

So, he thought, a historic discord, linguistics and tone, a cataclysmic blindness, a pathless thicket of twisted meanings and intentions and desires, a guttural and inarticulate melancholy, passion without vision, simple elements.

Behind him there was a noise. A shadow came from the woods, dressed in fog. “I been lookin’ for you,” the shadow said.

“Who is it?”

“I been lookin’ for you, all over.”

“Who is it?” Perry said.

“Shit, you blind, son?”

“Who is it?”

“I been lookin’ for you, son.”

“Oh. Jud. What is it?”

Jud came hidden in fog, bent low.

“What you doing here?” Perry called.

“Ha!” the mayor said. “I could ask you the same thing, son. I could ask you the same question.” He stopped and coughed and blew his nose like a trumpet. “I been lookin’ … Goddamn cold. Gonna be one bitch of a winter, tell you that right now.”

“Jud, what you doing out here?”

“Lookin’ for you, son, just lookin’ out for you.” The mayor came to the rocks. The fog twisted about his face like a mask. He smelled of mothballs. He blew his nose, stuffed the handkerchief in a pocket, dropped his hands to his hips.

“Jud?”

“Just lookin’ for you,” he said. “Grace told me … One crazy place on such a night, expected to find you floatin’ face down. Such a night. I had me a notion. Had a notion driving out. You gotta be careful, son. Here, you better swig on this. Helps y’ see clearer, that’s all. Seeing clear. Had a notion when I drove out, Paul Milton Perry floatin’ face down. Take some of this, son, take it.”

“Jud.”

“Take a swig, son, take it. There. Ack, such a night, winter, winter. Phew. I had me a notion, all right, just in time.” Jud coughed, spat into his handkerchief.

“Jud.”

“Time’s comin’, son, it’s comin’. Cold as shit, ain’t it? Winter, winter. Here now, take some of this. There. Fuckin’ winter.”

“Jud?”

“Now,” said the old man, “now what’s this about sellin’?”

“Selling?”

“Ha!” the mayor cackled.

“Jud, you’re sick, come on.”

“Tell me about sellin’, son, tell me. What’s this about sellin’ out?”

“Nothing, Jud. Come on. You’ve got it mixed up.”

“You’re sellin’, I heard it, I know it. Had a notion drivin’ out, you’re sellin’ and leaving, I know it.”

“Jud.”

“Here, take a swig of this, son, take it.” Jud handed the flask through the dark.

“Jud, what’s this about selling, tell me.”

“Sellin’?” Jud turned to the pond. “Sellin’, I don’t know. Had a notion. You sellin’?”

“No.”

Jud shivered.

“Come on.”

“Jesus, son. What the shit you doin’ here on such a night?”

“Come on, Jud.”

“No need to sell,” Jud said.

“I know. I know that. Now let’s go get some coffee, what do you say?”

Jud pulled away. He backed off and slipped into the fog. For a moment it seemed he had gone. Then he cackled. “And, hey! Tell Harvey I got him his parade. You hear? Tell him I got his parade for him. Tell your pa, too. You hear? We’re all heroes, you hear? Hee, hee. So long, now. We’re all of us heroes, you hear, even you, down to the last man, hee, hee.”

I
t was an early snow, but Grace was ready for it. The firewood was stacked, the windowsills were puttied, the larder was full of canned tomatoes and peas and string beans from her garden. Burrowing in, she’d prepared the house for winter, spreading a new Hudson Bay blanket on the bed in time for the first snow. All summer she’d worked on it, quietly foreseeing winter, a blue and yellow blanket with the design of ripe orchids. There were warm clothes from the attic, rubber boots ready on mats by the door, a full tank of heating oil, potatoes in the cellar.

The snow started as a wind, then rain, then an expansive pale sky, then snow.

Perry watched it develop from his office window. It was Friday. Cheerfully detached, he watched the snow develop with the relief of knowing he would not have to anticipate winter any longer. He felt fine. The farms would be locked in, which meant that his work would end until spring, a dead-end job mercifully
cut short, and the Swedes would lie low and hope for a better spring, better soil, another chance, good luck and fair weather, corn from boulders and water from granite. Sometimes he did not hate the town. Sometimes it didn’t matter one way or the other. He whistled a little tune and watched the snow. It was always a new emergency, people scurrying before his window as if they’d never seen a snowfall before, as if they’d never seen winter, drawn faces pointing to the pale sky, anxiously conferring. There was nothing more to do. He swept down the office and when he saw that the snow would be permanent he pulled down the blinds and latched the door and left early. It was early winter.

The snow melted. For a week the skies were clear. Then it snowed and the snow hardened to ice, the pines turned stiff, then it snowed again.

Harvey began talking about winter camping. Ski racing, finding a job, leaving the town, leaving the state, becoming a mercenary in Africa, writing a book, rejoining the army, going to college. Some days he spent with Perry in the office, drinking coffee and elaborating on his plans, cajoling Perry into agreement or argument, persuading him. He talked of adventure. His bad eye would seem to roll. He talked about the cross-country ski races in Grand Marais. He talked about ice fishing, the hardships of cold weather, the exhilarations of the spirit. Perry listened and nodded. He had no better ideas. Evenings, Harvey would take the car to visit Addie, or Addie would come for supper and the four of them would sit at the fire and play cards or Scrabble, and Harvey would talk about adventures, always planning and always insisting that he be taken seriously, demanding that they all play together, drawing them all in. Perry would nod and Grace would quietly disagree, but only Addie could control him, teasing him out of plain nonsense, puncturing fictions, bridling him.

“Well,” Harvey would mutter, “you can’t live in your small worlds forever.”

“What about Vietnam?” Addie would tease.

“What about it?”

“Some magnificent adventure.”

“What about it?”

Pointing to his dead eye: “That,” she would say, challenging him. “Tell us about that.”

Startled, puzzled, Harvey would reach to it. “Oh. That’s nothing. That’s part of it. You see, I’d forgotten. Taking chances, that’s all.”

Addie would keep after him. “So tell us about it! Tell us how it happened. You haven’t said a word about it. Tell us about your heroics.”

“It’s not important. It happened, that’s all.”

“Oh,” she would grin, egging him on. “Did it hurt? Did you feel great adventure when it happened?”

“Hurt? Well, yes. Sure it hurt. What do you think?”

“Was it worth getting hurt? I mean, if it hurt, you must have thought something about it. You don’t just lose your eye and forget it.”