Honeymoon for Three

by Alan Cook

  “Well…I’m in the process of moving. I’ll let you know where I am after I’m settled. If you’d like to give me your information….”

  Penny was already writing it down. This was much easier than calling somebody in Fenwick. He wasn’t about to let them know that he’d been living so close to Penny. Better to have them believe he was living in one of the many cookie-cutter communities that people might have heard of but couldn’t exactly place.

  Los Angeles was such a big metropolis that two people could live there for a hundred years and never run into each other. Unless they wanted to.

  CHAPTER 11

  It was raining off and on, but that didn’t daunt Alfred. He felt invigorated as he drove toward Grand Coulee Dam on a scenic road that ran alongside a pretty blue lake. He drove with one hand and fingered his bellybutton with the other. He felt like a new person. There were good reasons for his feelings. Penny liked him. She really liked him. She liked him well enough to leave Gary for him.

  He was sure of it. She had given him all the signals. Of course, she couldn’t come right out and say so in front of Gary. It was his turn to take action. He was the man. He had to claim his property.

  First, she gave him a big hug when she spotted him. Then she asked him to have dinner with them. She readily gave him her address and phone number. And she hugged him again when they said good-bye.

  On top of that, she was upset with Gary because he had corrected her about the plums. A small thing, perhaps, but a harbinger of what was to come. She understood that. She was a smart girl. She would dump him now before they became too entangled. She was just waiting for Alfred to make the first move.

  This revelation had come to him during the night as he tossed and turned in his motel room, unable to sleep. He had figured the whole thing out. He was proud of his logical mind—a steel trap—when he chose to use it. Well, he was using it now.

  First, he had eaten some crow. He had to admit his mistake in not approaching Penny before this. When he had moved to Lomita a year ago, he should have made himself known to her. It would have saved a lot of grief on his part and a lot of dating errors on her part. There never would have been a Gary. He, Alfred, and Penny would be going on their honeymoon together, not Penny and Gary.

  But Alfred had been suffering from a recent rejection when he arrived in California. A rejection it had taken him months to get over. Psychologically, he wasn’t in any shape to say anything to Penny. Well, that was over and done with. He had recovered his poise. He was ready to talk to Penny the way he should have long ago. He was ready to be a man.

  His shyness and insecurity had played him false before, but he had overcome them. He knew what he wanted, and he would go after it like a bull in a curio shop. He would get the girl, and they would ride happily ever after into the sunset.

  They would be going on his kind of honeymoon. A honeymoon not so outdoorsy, with more creature comforts. Perhaps to a luxury resort. Penny would love it. She was just doing this roughing it thing because Gary wanted to. But she had wised up about Gary.

  Once Alfred had figured everything out last night, he had to make a decision. Should he wait until Penny was back in Torrance, or should he act immediately? The answer was obvious. He had to act now. Strike while the poker was hot. Penny would expect it of him. He expected it of himself. He had a head of steam going, and it would lead him to victory.

  Penny and Gary had graciously verified their schedule for him at dinner. It was almost the same as the one outlined in the notebook. They planned to stop at Grand Coulee Dam today, probably for lunch. Alfred had gotten smart. He had his lunch with him. He was sure he was ahead of them. He would be there when they arrived.

  ***

  Gary was singing off-key along with a country song playing on the car radio. “I can’t help it if I’m still in love with you.”

  “What’s the matter?” Penny asked. “You look as if you’ve lost your last friend.”

  He realized that he had a pained expression on his face. “That’s a hurtin’ song. Written by Hank Williams. That’s how you’re supposed to look when you listen to that type of music.”

  “It’s too mournful. If it affects you that much we’d better turn it off.”

  Gary clicked off the radio. Penny was right. This was a time for joy, not sorrow.

  “I can’t believe we’ve been married five days,” he said.

  “It’s four days since August twenty-ninth.”

  “I’m counting the day we got married as one.”

  “All right, Mr. Mathematician. Have it your way. Are you going to try to call Henry again?”

  Gary had forgotten about his old roommate. He hadn’t been able to reach him in several phone calls. They hadn’t had any problems since the day of their wedding.

  “No, I’m going to write off my brush with the law as a bad dream.”

  Gary couldn’t believe how happy he was about being married. Although he had never been actively unhappy in his life, there had always been something missing. Penny filled that void. It was true that he had been in love his last few months of college. However, there had been several strikes against that affair from the start.

  One was that he had long planned to go to California the day he graduated, leaving Michigan where he was a student at the U of M, and Western New York where he had grown up, far behind. That was the guillotine hovering above the heads of his girlfriend and himself. They both knew it would drop at a preordained time. And it did.

  Another problem was the age difference. Alice had been a first semester freshman, too young, too smart, too ambitious to get married, or to follow him to California. And Gary, himself, had not been ready for any kind of permanent commitment. The romance ended the day he boarded a plane for Los Angeles. He had not seen her since.

  The echoes of Alice had reverberated for the first two years he was in California. He compared all the girls to her and found them wanting. He had bouts of living like a monk and at times verged on depression. Even after he got his dating act together, he had not found any fish worth keeping. He had thrown them all back. These failures had led him to join Human Inventory. It was one of the smartest things he had ever done.

  “Viewpoint for the dam ahead.” Penny brought him out of his reverie.

  He turned the car in the direction the sign indicated, and they were soon sitting at the foot of the largest concrete structure in the world—producer of hydroelectric power, irrigator of farmland.

  “Darn this rain,” Penny said. “We’ll melt if we go out there. We’ll just have to eat lunch in the car.”

  Fortunately, they had plenty of food with them, including pineapple juice, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, cookies, potato chips, and a can of peaches.

  “A feast fit for a king.” Gary was particularly addicted to potato chips and made sure he got his share.

  “Look at that car over there. Except for the color, it’s just like mine.”

  Gary directed his gaze at a 1959 Ford Fairlane parked about fifty yards away, whose occupants apparently were also looking at the dam. He couldn’t see who was inside the car. The two-tone, green and white model had wings that were less pronounced than those of the 1957 model had been. It looked stylish, but it was a gas hog. Which is why they had opted to drive his economical Volkswagen on this trip, even though Penny’s car, given to her by her parents, would hold a lot more baggage.

  ***

  Alfred saw their car pull up to the viewpoint. He had guessed right about their destination, but he had parked far enough away so they wouldn’t see him inside his car. They didn’t know what his car looked like yet. It was just the car of another sightseer. He was safe for the moment. Soon they would know his car, but it would be because Penny was leaving in it with him.

  He could sit here and plot his next move. The immediate problem was the rain. It was coming down in sheets, and they showed no inclination to get out of the VW. It must be cramped in that little car, especially with all the stuff t
hey had in the backseat. He was glad he had the roominess of his Ford, even though buying gas for it was rapidly depleting his cash supply.

  As long as Penny stayed in the VW, he wouldn’t be able to isolate her so that he could talk to her. He needed to catch her away from Gary. How could he do that? Alfred finished his lunch. Penny and Gary stayed in their car. Alfred thought about creating some sort of disturbance that would get their attention and separate the two of them long enough for him to do what he had to do. It was raining too hard.

  While he dithered, time passed. Before he could come up with a workable plan, they drove away.

  ***

  Penny wasn’t sure why she felt the way she did. The feeling was not one of terror, but the prelude to terror, when the hairs on the back of your neck tell you that something really bad is going to happen, but you’re not quite sure what it is. Why should she feel this way at a pleasant campground in Little Round Pond State Park near Sandpoint, Idaho?

  They were cooking their dinner on the Coleman stove and contemplating camping here for the night. Gary was busy tending the stove and seemed to be as happy as a mouse sitting on a mountain of cheese. They had come through Spokane, Washington, in intermittent rain and then crossed into Idaho. At Coeur d’Alene they had purchased some groceries and then headed north through beautiful scenery—trees, hills, the occasional lake. One thing the U.S.A. had in abundance was beautiful scenery.

  It was cool but not cold. The sun would be setting in a while. Its rays were being filtered through the evergreen trees. The air had that fresh, foresty aroma, the aroma of an outdoors with clean air and no Los Angeles smog.

  The ranger in charge of the campground was being very attentive to them. He had the time to be attentive because they were the only people in the campground. He was middle-aged and mild-mannered. He wore glasses and a ranger uniform. He looked as if he wouldn’t hurt a mosquito.

  He was chatting with Gary at the moment, asking where they had come from, where they were going. Why had they decided to elope to Reno to get married? Didn’t they have family? Friendly questions. Nothing to be concerned about. Questions that anybody might ask. Questions that an ax murderer might ask.

  Since it was the end of the camping season, the chances of anybody else showing up at this campground tonight were slim. All right, the chances of the ranger actually being an ax murderer ranged from slim to nonexistent. He was no more an ax murderer than Gary was. Penny admitted to herself that her fears were completely irrational. But irrational fears destroyed many a night’s sleep.

  Maybe it was the ghost of Emily, coming to haunt her. Making sure that even when everything seemed idyllic, she had something to worry about. Things were going too well. That was a crazy thought, perhaps, but Penny couldn’t shake it.

  Before they put up the tent, she broached her fears to Gary. She didn’t say that she thought the ranger was an ax murderer. She said that the campground felt creepy since they were the only campers. He was surprisingly sympathetic. He didn’t tell her she was crazy. He said that if she felt this way they would go on and stay somewhere else. She got the impression that he felt the isolation too.

  CHAPTER 12

  The landscape was getting wilder and wilder. Alfred had not known that large portions of the United States were completely uninhabited. While driving across the country he had encountered the emptiness of the plains, but at least there had been scattered farm houses.

  He didn’t know where Penny and Gary were. He hoped he was ahead of them, because that’s what his plan called for. He had stayed the night at a motel in Sandpoint, Idaho, and gotten an early start this morning. Today, he knew that they planned to go into Glacier National Park on the Going-to-the-Sun Road. They had talked about hiking to a place called Sperry Chalet where they would stay overnight. That was complete madness, and Alfred would put a stop to it.

  He ate an early lunch in Kalispell, Montana, because his map didn’t show anything beyond it that looked civilized. He had been picking up maps at gas stations as he went. Fortunately, most of them were free. As far as dinner was concerned, he expected to be back here by then, with Penny sitting happily beside him.

  He drove into Glacier National Park and alongside Lake McDonald. He knew that the trail to Sperry Chalet started from the lake. He drove carefully on the road that some halfwits might call scenic, looking for signs. With trees on one side of the road and the lake on the other, unbroken expanses of green and blue, it was almost impossible for him to know exactly where he was. He was afraid that he might have passed the trail when he saw the sign. He pulled into a parking lot at the trailhead.

  His heart sank as he spotted the green Volkswagen, sitting among a handful of other cars. Penny and Gary were nowhere to be seen. Alfred parked his car and walked over to the VW. It was locked. They were already on the trail.

  ***

  “Do you remember when we climbed Mt. Manual in the Big Sur?” Gary asked as they stopped to take a breather.

  “Do I ever.” Penny sipped water from her canteen. “It’s a good thing I had my hiking boots. If Grandpa hadn’t sent me the ten dollars to buy them… Do you know that you’re my first boyfriend he’s ever approved of?”

  “You must have told him a good story.” Gary had never met her grandfather. In fact, he hadn’t met any member of her family except an uncle and aunt and a couple of cousins who lived in Goleta.

  “I told him all about you in my letters. And, of course, I saw him when I went back east. I think the thing that sold him on you is the fact that you’re not Catholic.”

  “Then for my sake, I’m glad I’m not. Anyway, Mt. Manual was a good training hike for this one. And I’m the one who got blisters.”

  “That rattlesnake scared the bejesus out of me. I almost jumped off the mountain.”

  The snake had skittered across the trail in front of them. They had been hiking alongside a cliff, and for a moment Gary had been afraid that Penny was really going to jump off. That was when he found out how scared of snakes she was.

  “I wouldn’t have made it if it hadn’t been for you,” Penny continued. “Remember, I sat down and said I couldn’t go another step.”

  Gary had been sure they were very close to the top. He went on ahead and spotted the peak. Then he returned and persuaded Penny to go the rest of the way. She staggered to the top, sank down on the ground, and took off her shirt to cool off. She looked very appealing, sitting there in her white bra, but neither of them had the energy to do anything about it.

  Gary commented on that and Penny laughed. “As I recall, we were sharing the peak with a herd of wild pigs, so we would have had spectators if we had started messing around. Anyway, this trail is duck soup compared to that one.”

  After they had left the campground last night, they had driven on to the thriving wilderness city of Libby, Montana, and stayed at the Hotel Libby. It was a nice room, but they weren’t sure whether they were sharing their bathroom with others. This morning they drove to Kalispell, picking up purple and green rocks on the way for a table they were planning to make. The rocks were to be inlaid in plastic to form the tabletop.

  In Kalispell, they cashed travelers' checks and purchased groceries. They arrived at Lake McDonald shortly after noon and ate in the car because the meadow hummed with bees. Then they set out for Sperry Chalet.

  This trail wasn’t really easier than Mt. Manual. It was longer, at 6.7 miles, with a 3,300 foot gain in altitude. They had to hike through stream beds, and sprinkles of rain fell on them from time to time. They were both holding up very well. Gary figured they might make it to the chalet in three hours, which was certainly faster than the average bear.

  That thought made him look around. They were indeed in bear country, including grizzlies, and they wanted to stay clear of those big bad bears that could be killers. If Penny thought rattlesnakes were scary… He didn’t mention this to her, but they should keep moving. He shouldered his pack and said, “Time to hit the trail.”

 
***

  The fates were conspiring against Alfred. Yesterday it was the rain at Grand Coulee Dam. Today they had beaten him here, somehow. He thought they were going to sleep at a campground near Sandpoint last night. If they had, he would have arrived here before them. They usually dallied along the way, and he had come directly here with only a couple of short stops.

  All of the hope and optimism he had acquired as a result of the meeting in Seattle had evaporated. Now he was faced with few options. He could go home. If he had started for home two days ago, he would be getting home today. Now he was farther away from L.A., and it would take longer. It wasn’t a trip he was relishing.

  He could try to figure out where they were going next and meet them there. According to the notebook, they were planning to visit Glacier and Yellowstone parks for the next few days. He was not planning to do any more camping, and other options were few inside the parks. It would be difficult to keep tabs on them. Besides, his money supply was approaching the precarious stage, and he couldn’t afford to keep doing this forever. He needed to have the Penny situation resolved quickly.

  He could wait here tomorrow morning and meet them when they came down from the chalet. That would mean going back out of the park to find a place to sleep and returning in the morning. It might work, but among the other things he was running out of was patience for waiting.

  Or—and this would have been unthinkable a couple of days ago—he could hike up to the chalet and have it out with them there. They wouldn’t be able to avoid him in an isolated environment. The more he thought about it, the better he liked the idea.

  There were a few niggling problems. He didn’t have hiking boots. However, the start of the trail looked fairly smooth. Maybe he didn’t need them. He didn’t have a pack. But then, he didn’t have anything to carry in a pack. He had his jacket with a hood, so he shouldn’t be cold. When the temperature was warm enough that he didn’t have to wear it, he could tie it around his waist.

  On the plus side, he had a bottle he had filled with water that he could carry with him. It had contained orange soda, originally. It was made of glass; he would have to be careful not to drop it, but it couldn’t weight much over two pounds filled. He would travel light and move fast.