“Annow lazygentamun anawyoo youngsters! (crack!) whatcha all been waiting for (crack!) inna the first ring feachuh act the Tumblin Twosome from Tuskyloosa (crack!) givum a hand folks! (crack!) inna second first time this side a the Atlantic comin to us from (crack!) and riding on a unicycle (crack!) whatsat rocket you carrying there George watchout! (crack!) and high above without a net those flirters with death (crack!) defying the lawza gravity (drumrolls and whipcracks!) you say it’s a new secret weapon yer workin on for the guvmint George? well howzit work? (crack!) nothin but her teeth folks between her and the other world! (fanfare!) and his trained thoroughbred Arabian hawsesi (crack!) now don’t tell me you’re gonna light that big thing in here George! (crack!) and rode by the Thin Man and the Fat Lady haw haw givum a big hand folks (crack!) look out!”
QUENBY AND OLA, SWEDE AND CARL
Night on the lake. A low cloud cover. The boat bobs silently, its motor for some reason dead. There’s enough light in the far sky to see the obscure humps of islands a mile or two distant, but up close: nothing. There are islands in the intermediate distance, but their uncertain contours are more felt than seen. The same might be said, in fact, for the boat itself. From either end, the opposite end seems to melt into the blackness of the lake. It feels like it might rain.
○ ○ ○
Imagine Quenby and Ola at the barbecue pit Their faces pale in the gathering dusk. The silence after the sudden report broken only by the whine of mosquitoes in the damp grass, a distant whistle. Quenby has apparently tried to turn Ola away, back toward the house, but Ola is staring back over her shoulder. What is she looking at, Swede or the cat? Can she even see either?
○ ○ ○
In the bow sat Carl. Carl was from the city. He came north to the lake every summer for a week or two of fishing. Sometimes he came along with other guys, this year he came alone.
He always told himself he liked it up on the lake, liked to get away, that’s what he told the fellows he worked with, too: get out of the old harness, he’d say. But he wasn’t sure. Maybe he didn’t like it. Just now, on a pitchblack lake with a stalled motor, miles from nowhere, cold and hungry and no fish to show for the long day, he was pretty sure he didn’t like it.
○ ○ ○
You know the islands are out there, not more than a couple hundred yards probably, because you’ve seen them in the daylight All you can make out now is here and there the pale stroke of what is probably a birch trunk, but you know there are spruce and jack pines as well, and balsam firs and white cedars and Norway pines and even maples and tamaracks. Forests have collapsed upon forests on these islands.
○ ○ ○
The old springs crush and grate like crashing limbs, exhausted trees, rocks tumbling into the bay, like the lake wind rattling through dry branches and pine needles. She is hot, wet, rich, softly spread. Needful. “Oh yes!” she whispers.
○ ○ ○
Walking on the islands, you’ve noticed saxifrage and bellwort, clintonia, shinleaf, and stemless lady’s slippers. Sioux country once upon a time, you’ve heard tell, and Algonquin, mostly Cree and Ojibwa. Such things you know. Or the names of the birds up here: like spruce grouse and whiskey jack and American three-toed woodpecker. Blue-headed vireo. Scarlet tanager. Useless information. Just now, anyway. You don’t even know what makes that strange whistle that pierces the stillness now.
○ ○ ○
“Say, what’s that whistling sound, Swede? Sounds like a goddamn traffic whistle!” That was pretty funny, but Swede didn’t laugh. Didn’t say anything. “Some bird, I guess. Eh, Swede? Some god damn bird.”
“Squirrels,” Swede said finally.
“Squirrels!” Carl was glad Swede had said something. At least he knew he was still back there. My Jesus, it was dark! He waited hopefully for another response from Swede, but it didn’t come. “Learn something new every day.”
○ ○ ○
Ola, telling the story, laughed brightly. The others laughed with her. What had she seen that night? It didn’t matter, it was long ago. There were more lemon pies and there were more cats. She enjoyed being at the center of attention and she told the story well, imitating her father’s laconic ways delightfully. She strode longleggedly across the livingroom floor at the main house, gripping an imaginary cat, her face puckered in a comic scowl. Only her flowering breasts under the orange shirt, her young hips packed snugly in last year’s bright white shorts, her soft girlish thighs, slender calves: these were not Swede’s.
○ ○ ○
She is an obscure teasing shape, now shattering the sheen of moonlight on the bay, now blending with it. Is she moving toward the shore, toward the house? No, she is in by the boats near the end of die docks, dipping in among shadows. You follow.
○ ○ ○
By day, there is a heavy greenness, mostly the deep dense greens of pines and shadowed undergrowth, and glazed blues and the whiteness of rocks and driftwood. At night, there is only darkness. Branches scrape gently on the roof of the guests’ lodge; sometimes squirrels scamper across it. There are bird calls, the burping of frogs, the rustle of porcupines and muskrats, and now and then what sounds like the crushing footfalls of deer. At times, there is the sound of wind or rain, waves snapping in the bay. But essentially a deep stillness prevails, a stillness and darkness unknown to the city. And often, from far out on the lake, miles out perhaps, yet clearly ringing as though just outside the door: the conversation of men in fishing boats.
○ ○ ○
“Well, I guess you know your way around this lake pretty well. Eh, Swede?”
“Oh yah.”
“Like the back of your hand, I guess.” Carl felt somehow encouraged that Swede had answered him. That “oh yah” was Swede’s trademark. He almost never talked, and when he did, it was usually just “oh yah.” Up on the “oh,” down on the “yah.” Swede was bent down over the motor, but what was he looking at? Was he looking at the motor or was he looking back this way? It was hard to tell. It all looks the same to me, just a lot of trees and water and sky, and now you can’t even see that much. Those goddamn squirrels sure make a lot of noise, don’t they?” Actually, they were probably miles away.
Carl sighed and cracked his knuckles. “Can you hunt ducks up here?” Maybe it was better up here in the fall or winter. Maybe he could get a group interested. Probably cold, though. It was cold enough right now. “Well, I suppose you can. Sure, hell, why not?”
○ ○ ○
Quenby at the barbecue pit, grilling steaks. Thick T-bones, because he’s back after two long weeks away. He has poured a glass of whiskey for himself, splashed a little water in it, mixed a more diluted one for Quenby. He hands her her drink and spreads himself into a lawnchair. Flames lick and snap at the steaks, and smoke from the burning fat billows up from the pit. Quenby wears pants, those relaxed Bided bluejeans probably, and a soft leather jacket The late evening sun gives a gentle rich glow to the leather. There is something solid and good about Quenby. Most women complain about hunting.trips. Quenby bakes lemon pies to celebrate returns. Her full buttocks flex in the soft blue denim as, with tongs, she flips the steaks over. Imagine.
Her hips jammed against the gunwales, your wet bodies sliding together, shivering, astonished, your lips meeting — you wonder at your madness, what an island can do to a man, what an island girl can do. Later, having crossed the bay again, returning to the rocks, you find your underwear is gone. Yes, here’s the path, here’s the very tree — but gone. A childish prank? But she was with you all the time. Down by the kennels, the dogs begin to yelp.