Stony River (27 page)

“Save the riverbank for last,” he advised her. “The flowers that bloom here are some of the best around.”

“I’ll remember that.”

“It won’t be long now. Seems like they’re always at their peak about the time I head for summer pasture.”

Sevana never liked it when he mentioned his leaving. Each time it reminded her that things could not go on as they were, with the two of them in such agreeable accord. It was the age-old problem of wanting to hold onto the happiness in one’s hand—while time would not oblige and kept marching on, changing all things.

But Joel’s attention was on something in the river. “Sevana, see the dark shape on that boulder? That’s an otter.”

She exclaimed as she spotted it: “I see it!”

The otter, alerted by their voices, raised a smooth, furry head their direction. One inquisitive beady-eyed look, one quiver of the whiskers, and he slipped off his sunning bed into the river. But almost instantly, a sleek brown head poked out of the water, surveying them with bright eyes before ducking underwater again. Carried down the river in the mild current, the otter seemed to be playing a game of hide-and-seek, popping up to spy on them, then disappearing from view, only to reemerge seconds later in an entirely new location.

Sevana almost forgot to breathe as she followed his antics, trying to guess where he would next appear—but in his movements he was wildly unpredictable, sometimes materializing on the extreme edge of the river and sometimes in the middle, as though purposely intending the element of surprise.

“Was he playing a game, or did it just seem that way?” she asked, when the otter had floated around the bend out of sight.

“He was playing.” Joel sounded sure of it. “And maybe showing off for us a little, how at home he is in the water compared to most mammals.”

Sevana was warmed by what she’d seen. She truly hoped no one was poaching those endearing little animals.

Joel guessed her thoughts. “Any progress on the case?”

“Not that I’ve heard. Mr. Radnor hasn’t been around for quite a while.”

Joel picked up a stone and gave it a flick. It bounced all the way across the watercourse and landed on the far bank, ruffling the grass. Sevana gasped out loud, causing Joel to laugh. “Still remember how to skip rocks?” he asked.

“I think so.” Hunting up a stone, she stepped to the river’s edge and proceeded to sink it so promptly and thoroughly, that after their spontaneous hoots of laughter had subsided, Joel spent some time trying to talk her through her technique. But when she found the moving water even more challenging than the placid lake surface, she gave up in preference of sitting on the bank and leaning back on her hands.

The Stony flowed with a gentle rippling, its dinnerplate-size stones magnified under the transparent water. “The river has a whole different character than when I first saw it,” Sevana observed poignantly. “I liked the power of highwater, but I like the beauty of the shallow water even more.”

“You’d like it in winter, too,” Joel answered from beside her. “When it freezes over, it stretches like a broad snowcovered road, and you can walk on it bend after bend—going places you can only dream of in the summertime.”

The novelty of the thought fascinated her. “I’d like to see it. Maybe I’ll come back this winter—maybe for Christmas.” She was warming in enthusiasm for the idea. “I can cook Christmas dinner for Fenn. And I can hike up through the snow to see you.”

He seemed to approve of the plan. “I’ll put it on my calendar.” But next minute, in searching for another stone, his hand brushed against a sprig of flowers in the grass. He reached out and plucked it as if suddenly transported to a different realm in his mind.

Sevana fancied the flowers resembled miniature forget-me-nots. “I’d better check on Fenn,” she said, feeling all at once excluded from his thoughts. She got to her feet.

Joel stood to oblige her, tossing the flowers pensively from his hand like a mourner casting a bouquet upon the monument of unfulfilled desire. But Sevana rescued the discarded spray from the ground. “What are these called?”

“Blue-eyed Marys,” he replied, as she tucked them into her hair for the ride home. “Although I’d have to say your eyes are bluer than Mary’s,” he concluded, studying the effect.

At the homestead, he helped her down. “You’ll be all right tonight, then?”

“Yes, Joel—thank you. Bye, Flint.” She gave the stallion a pat on the nose as she passed because he was such an obliging horse.

But after Joel had ridden away in the last of the evening sun, Sevana felt less confident than when she’d had the assurance of his presence. She went in the house fervently hoping nothing would disturb the quiet of
that
night.

But at midnight again, she woke uneasily. Somewhere in the house a light was shining. She followed its source downstairs. A kerosene lamp burned on the fireplace mantle, and Fenn was standing at the living room window, staring into a black night he couldn’t see.

He turned at the sound of her. “What’s the matter—can’t you sleep?” he demanded, annoyed at the intrusion.

She took a step back at the sight of him, for it seemed that some of the blackness from the window behind him had gotten into his eyes. She wondered if it could be the low-burning lamp making them look that way. “N-no,” she stammered. “Why does the wind blow so at night? Is it going to storm?”

“No storm, just a downdraft from the mountains. Go back to bed, Sevana.”

“Aren’t you?”

“Been sleeping too much.” He turned back to the window in dismissal of her.

Sevana started up the stairs, but peered around once again to the silent figure gazing into the night. Then, slowly, she climbed to her room. She lay in the dim glow coming up the stairs, strangely afraid. The same darkness was close about the house again, the same wailing wind. She wished Joel had stayed at the barn—but no, that was foolish; there wasn’t anything truly wrong. Fenn was no longer sick as he had been. There was only a grip of darkness and fear which she felt, but couldn’t explain.

In her window the sky burned with friendly nighttime stars as usual, and the familiar guardian mountains kept watch over the homestead with their strong, protective presence. But Sevana couldn’t get back to sleep that night until she had pulled the covers over her head.

Early in the morning she found Fenn shaving at the stove. “Are you going to work?” she asked dubiously.

“Of course I am,” he retorted. But he poured a shot of whisky into a cup and downed it straight before he poured his coffee; and Sevana thought the hand holding the bottle might have been shaking—although perhaps it was just her imagination, trying so hard to detect anything wrong. She helped him all she could with his breakfast and lunch, then watched him leave the house with his shoulders straight—a man who would bear whatever he had to, alone.

A little later she went to the meadow. She told Joel that Fenn was better and had gone back to work. But she didn’t tell him of the darkness she’d sensed, for it seemed foolish to mention in that sunny morning. She listened as he played songs on his fiddle, and the lively tunes helped lighten her heart from the strange, secret burdens it carried.

That morning also, Joel gave her a violin lesson—teaching her to play the folk song,
Down in the Valley.
It was a fitting song for someone looking over a grand-scale river canyon, she mused. She’d sung the song in music class, but it had held no meaning for her then. For a moment she was lost in reflection, thinking how this life had given her a new perspective in the way she looked at—everything, really. A limited view, perhaps—as narrow as the mountainsides that defined that close-walled valley—but one that suited her surprisingly well. She could never have predicted how much she would appreciate the simplicity and beauty of that basic mountain life.

She practiced the tune until Joel said it was right, and felt the satisfaction of learning something new. But she didn’t forget about Fenn, and went home early to make him a good dinner. She was afraid a hard day’s work had proved too much for him, and he would be the worse for it.

But when Fenn came home, he swung across the yard with his usual vigor, his face ruddy and eyes clear-blue and bright. He was angry because Hawk was sending him to Nelson to haggle over a complication with the contract administrator. He unleashed a few imprecations describing what he thought of his boss in general, and a few more concerning the assignment in specific. Sevana listened to his curses and saw the familiar hardness in his eyes—and felt the irony of relief, that she could be glad he was his old self again.

But as time went by, she found she was mistaken in thinking he was back to himself entirely. Sometimes in his face she saw evidence he hadn’t slept well the night before; he acted more restless than before. He was withdrawn, speaking only when spoken to—not as though spending his energy resenting her presence anymore, but as if scarcely aware she was even there. She didn’t know if the change was the result of the fever, or if something else was bothering him, nor did she ask. But she felt very tender toward him, treating him with as much kindness as she dared—and was not met with hostility as much as just distance.

Neither did she forget the glimpse she’d been granted of a more open, approachable Fenn. But whether she would be privileged to see that side of him again, she could not guess.

CHAPTER 18

The riverbank bloomed in a profusion of bright-red Indian paintbrush, purple lupine (quite decorative despite its negative digestive impacts on sheep), white bog orchids, papery bluebells, yellow arrowleaf, and clusters of pearly everlastings with tiny stiff flowers that retained their strawlike perfection even after they were picked. The sitting rock seemed fairly haunted by a lissome woodsprite, who slipped daily down the mountain to record the brilliant flowers and the water that hid none of its stones…and not only these, but also—if possible—the peace of the place, the feeling of being flanked by an immeasurable silence in which the Stony’s unhurried song was no more than a faint refrain.

Sometimes she would lean back against the stringy gray bark of the old cedar and feel the humid draft of cool river air on her face. It carried with it the scent of fresh, moving water and flourishing green plants—a distinctive smell she could now mark and recognize as characteristic to that place. At such times she forgot she was going places, in pursuit of ambitious ideals. It was enough to sit on the bank and let the water flow past—there one second and then gone, never to return. It was enough to watch the river go places.

On one such dreamy afternoon she lost all track of time while the sun moved overhead, warm and lazy-bright, glinting on the endlessly flowing water—and suddenly she was on her feet and running for home. She had forgotten she had dinner to get for a hungry logger, whose early morning departures allowed him an early arrival home.

As she hurried up the road, Joel overtook her in his truck and offered her a ride. Elated to see him, she slung off her pack and climbed in the passenger side huffing a bit. To his remark that he hadn’t seen her for a while, she said the flowers were blooming at the river and she’d been down there painting almost a week.

She expected him to say he would to get down to see them soon, but quickly learned his mind was not on such ordinary things. He told her he was just back from calling Chantal. She was flying home and wanted to meet him on the way. So he would be going to Nelson in two days to tell her they had to call it off for good. It was bittersweet, for he was looking forward to the chance to see her, even while knowing what he had to say.

An envelope fell to the floor as the truck bumped uphill, and Sevana retrieved it for him and put it back on the seat. “That was the only letter in my mailbox today,” Joel noted. “Quite a surprise, too. A fiddle shop in Vancouver offered me a job completely out of the blue.”

“Are you going to take it?”

“No. It’s flattering they would want me, and so is the sum they’re offering—more than I could ever make on my own, because they pay by the hour plus a pension; but I have no desire to change my status or fortunes in life.”

Sevana could not question his decision. His life was so full of soaring heights and colors, such a wealth of meadows and free breezes and sunlight, she thought he could be no richer than he already was.

As he stopped alongside her house, he said he had something for her, and set the brake while he searched through a box in the truck bed. Handing over a package of flower seeds with a touching eagerness, he explained he’d hoped to get them for her sooner, but maybe there was still time to get them planted.

She was almost speechless at the kindness, and thanked him quite inadequately, she thought, standing in the road to wave as he drove on.

When she went into the house, she lost no time in concocting a canned tuna casserole—but her haste proved unnecessary, for that was another night Fenn didn’t come home for dinner. This time she wasn’t so worried by his absence. It was Saturday, and he hadn’t been to Cragmont in some time; it wasn’t hard to guess where he might be. She ate alone, then planted the Iceland poppies in the flowerbed. Despite the lateness of their sowing, she felt they could do nothing but flourish. No one had ever paid her as much consideration as Joel. It was as though he could sense the inner workings of her heart, understanding the hopes and fears that lay hidden there. For a passing moment she allowed herself to speculate that perhaps after he told Chantal goodbye, he might find room in his life for her. She didn’t even dare to dwell on how much that idea appealed to her.