Deep North (A Brenda Contay Novel Of Suspense Book 2)

by Barry Knister

  “Did you think there was something funny at dinner?”

  “All that college stuff? It came off sort of fake to me.”

  “Twenty-some years,” Brenda said softly. “He talked like no one else was there, it embarrassed me. We’re all nodding away, a captive audience. He didn’t seem to notice.”

  “Yeah, I think you could say Louis is pretty much thinking just about Louis.”

  “I mean, it was, what? A year they were together? Fine, first love, everyone remembers that. But enough’s enough. It’s not like a marriage.”

  Wreathed in smoke, Charlie said nothing, and Brenda felt another wave of pointless attraction. It had grown all through dinner, but now, here, it no longer seemed pointless. He held the cigar before his mouth and looked at her, as he had when passing plates. Pouring wine. Lowering his voice next to her, intimacy between them at a crowded table. When she got up for clean forks for the pie, she had grazed his shoulder with her left breast. Intentionally? She wasn’t sure, but Brenda had felt it right down into her midsection, and below. She’d seen that he, too, felt something.

  “You mean my wife, Lillie,” he said.

  “Yes.”

  “No, it’s not like me. Make that twenty-eight years, not one.”

  “This place must be all memory for you.”

  She was sure now it had been wrong to bring up marriage. A misstep. It would lead Charlie Schmidt to old thoughts of sadness and loss. To memories that would wipe away the chemistry between them. Resigned, feeling selfish, she breathed deeply. But once you were in, you were in, and she drew on the cigar.

  “Did she like it here? I can’t think she didn’t.”

  “We were real good together,” he said. “She hated the bugs, liked to swim. Whatever it did for her, she was mostly here for me and Andy. Our son. He’s twenty-four. There are two older girls, twins, Patty and Laura. Both married. They aren’t much younger than you.”

  “They come up?”

  “Andy still does.” He waved at his boat. “That’s what this thing’s for, tearing ass all over. He has a business keeps him out of trouble now. Plus his girl wants him home. That’s why I said yes to Louis, to get some use out of it. I’m pretty much alone up here. Pretty much alone in Milwaukee, for that matter.”

  Clear enough. No lady back in town, riding shotgun in his truck. Facing him, she sipped her beer and puffed the cigar.

  “How about yourself, Brenda?”

  “You don’t want to know, Charlie.”

  “Try me.”

  “Maybe some other time, not here. This is a beautiful place. My story doesn’t fit the decor.”

  He regarded her a moment, looked away and flicked his cigar toward the shore. It hit the water with a hiss. “You’re right, not here. Not tonight. I’m an old guy, lots of mileage, but I’m very attracted to you. Here and now, which I think you know. I’m sure my son could tell me all about it, a wild and crazy guy.”

  “Back in the day.”

  “You too? Wild and crazy?”

  “Mileage like you wouldn’t believe,” she said. “Mad as a hatter, and glad it’s over.” She had said it to reassure him, and now felt ridiculous. The painted woman rehabbed. But it had the virtue of being true. She was glad it was over, and she hoped he saw she meant it.

  “I want to take you someplace,” he said. “The weather’s not predictable. You got lucky today, but that could be the end of it. It’s something you should see.”

  “Do we have time?” She looked up. The sky was now a darker blue, the moon a gray disk, almost full.

  “It’s not far. I’ll get you back safe.”

  She believed he would, and climbed down from the bow. She fixed her lure to the top guide on the rod as he secured his own. “See you later!” he called to the Lund. “Back soon!”

  Voices called in answer. She returned the waves and lowered herself into the passenger seat. Take me for a ride, she thought facing forward, ready to go most anywhere with Charlie Schmidt.

  ◆◆◆◆◆

  At full throttle on calm water, the Stratos flew. The motor was deafening. Holding on, exhilarated, she narrowed her eyes against the wind. Yes, a boat bought for a son. She thought she knew just how it would feel to be eighteen or twenty with him on the thing. Hair whipping, laughing each time the hull came down hard. She liked the idea, the father taking over the son’s role. Charlie Schmidt, widower, out on a date with some redhead that took a shine to him. Showing her what the Stratos could do. Taking her for a ride.

  In what was left of the evening, small islands came and went, the shoreline a blur. She felt him pat her arm, and looked where he pointed. Ahead, something off to the left was floating, perhaps a log. The engine dropped suddenly to a growl, and the hull slumped forward. As they dipped in the backwash, she kept her eyes on whatever it was, seeing now the size of it, a huge head with antlers, the neck coming up, sinking back.

  “Cue the moose,” he said. “A bull. No boat for him.”

  They chugged closer and passed, the head pushing up and forward, not turning. “What’s he doing?”

  “Whatever he wants,” Charlie said. “He owns the place.”

  She shook her head, amazed by the size of it, the nose and muzzle, donkey ears flapping. She wondered how much more of it must be down there, hooves working. Once they passed it, the motor revved again, throwing her back. She saw he was pleased. Her hands were freezing, and she shoved them between her legs.

  “Too much? Want to go back?”

  She shook her head.

  Now, just ahead she saw they were nearing the opposite shore, and what must be the falls. The shoreline curved inward to form something like a separate pool. It was perfectly calm. A long dock extended from the left, and to the right, floats separated the pool from the spillway’s final path before Kettle Falls.

  Again the boat slowed. Charlie angled them toward the dock. The pilings were whitewashed, the sheds too, stark before pines. Meeting the pier and curving up out of sight ran a gravel road. As they slowed to trolling speed, she heard a steady, muffled thud.

  “It sounds big,” she said.

  “Big enough.”

  He spun the wheel, then put the engine in neutral. For a moment she was scared, feeling the hull taken by the current, moving with the water’s will. No barrier stood before them, nothing but floats. This was no whitewater torrent, or rafting thrill seeker’s kick. It was something different, and she stood to see.

  Level with the lake, a hundred feet of cement wall extended from either shore. Centered between the walls was the spillway, perhaps fifty feet across. Over the lip, like a bronze cylinder in constant motion, fell the lake.

  Charlie again put the Stratos in gear, moved closer to shore, and levered to neutral. He would keep the engine running until they were secure. Relax, she thought. This is something people here do all the time. Brenda went forward and prepared to catch a piling. In the seconds that followed, she listened to the thud of the falls. Felt lulled by the sensual roll of bronze water falling off into nothing—she couldn’t see beyond the lip.

  She got ready. The current eddied around the dock’s pilings. Now they were there, and she grabbed one. Charlie jumped to the dock, tied the bowline, then the stern. He held out his hand and pulled her up. For a second she felt dizzy, feet and legs trembling from the memory of the boat’s powerful motion. This gave way to vibration underfoot, a tremor many feet below that survived as a thin shock where she stood.

  “I can feel it,” she said. “Where to now?”

  He held out his hand, and she took it. Their boat shoes moved in unison on the hollow dock. They reached the gravel path and started up.

  “This goes to the hotel,” he said. “It’s not open for guests yet, but the bar should be, later in the week. The damned floor’s so warped, one end is two feet lower than the rest. They use cinder blocks to level the pool table.”

  She felt her frozen hand being warmed in his. “Lots of tall tales,” she said.

&nb
sp; “Yeah. Lots of beer, lots of lies.”

  Where the main road passed up into trees, a dirt path branched to the right. They took this, and now climbed in silence through the dim light of the forest. Still exhilarated, smelling leaf mold and pine, Brenda felt expectant. A girl on a first date. It should be funny to her, but wasn’t. Walking uphill, feeling the work of it in her thighs, she saw herself in the Chevy Suburban, all at once focused on David Santerro.

  She wondered now exactly how many first dates she’d had. Very few had survived in her memory as more than a face or gesture, or perhaps a single phrase. Here and there, the chain had been broken by real attachments, connections that ended slowly and painfully. The long goodbye, leading eventually to boredom or contempt. But the sudden goodbyes—the few men she’d been moved by who left her quickly, for whatever or whomever—those men had carried off something of herself. In the aftermath, seeking distractions, she had known herself to be smaller in some permanent way. Diminished. When this happened, she declared war on hope. And knew that eventually, when she won that war, she would be lost.

  Feeling his hand tighten slightly in hers, she felt herself withdraw from him.

  “Watch your step—”

  She tripped and recovered, holding on, darkness concealing tree roots. Brenda glanced at him and down at her feet. His face looked lost in thought. In memory. Like Marion after her fax from Drew. Charlie was with her right now, his wife Lillie. Up here again, for Charlie and their son. A swimmer. In it for the long haul.

  No. He was just scared. On familiar ground, but not with her. She’s no kid, but she’s too young—that’s how he would see her. But she wasn’t, she stopped, and pulled him back.

  When he turned, still holding his hand she moved into him, drew his arm into the small of her back and kissed him. He answered and pressed into her, cradled her head and kissed her for real. He tasted of cigar. She relaxed. At least she’d learned something from all that experience. Learned how a kiss tells you about people, this one full of wanting, desire, a very good kiss.

  But she didn’t want him to know too much. Not yet. Feeling his erection, she lowered her head. Lost, eyes closed, he blinked and stood away, holding her hands.

  “Maybe we should go back,” he said

  “Is that what you want?”

  “No.”

  Again he led the way. He kept her hand, moving faster, up the incline. The falls had been there all the time but now grew loud, the trail winding. Ahead, light penetrated the gloom—and this was funny to her. Something from movies. A moment flooded with stock images of desire—pounding water, beaches, emerging from dark tunnels into sunlight. One scene of pop-culture ecstasy after another. Watching her feet, she thought of Louis Rohmer. It had been that way with him, all through dinner. An account of romance, punctuated with heavy-handed irony. There we were, he said. Marion and me in Paris, on the Alexandre Trois Bridge. In the rain, saying goodbye. All that was missing was a soundtrack. At that, everyone laughed, and Charlie had pushed away from the table. End of romance, he said. Time for Johnson Bay.

  The trail leveled. They stepped from the trees and now faced an observation site, a concrete slab fitted with wooden rails. He drew her forward and they walked to the end of it, cantilevered over the falls.

  Looking down, she held back her hair and watched. Smooth where it left the spillway, water fell in static freefall for forty or fifty feet. There, it slammed down on massive slabs, boulders, upended trees. Beyond the point of impact, water roiled and eddied for another fifty feet before fanning out into a new lake. This one, too, was dotted by islands. Brenda looked back down at the falls. Feeling the force of it in her thighs, she was no longer amused.

  He was saying something. She looked at him, shook her head and waited, this time closing her own eyes, then feeling his mouth, tasting tobacco, stirred by the press of his groin. She reached down and pulled at his belt, then let him do it, let go and looked at him as she unbuttoned her jeans. She shucked them down with her panties—she was doing this a lot today—kicked free, and waited for him. He did the same and stepped again to her, smiling now, amused himself. He shoved her gently into the apex of the railing, and she raised her right foot to the lower rung, high enough. Pulling him by the shirt, she spat into her palm, warm from his hand, and held it out. He spat into it and she grabbed his penis, worked the wetness, then guided him.

  How did we get here?

  She was feeling him now, the rhythm of it, still thinking her question, thinking she would have to go back to the nail on the road. Perhaps clear back to the Mesabi Iron Range. All the movies she wanted, it wouldn’t matter. Not when push came to shove. She held on, being raised by him and helping, smelling him, his shirt and soap, Charlie Schmidt all cleaned up to come see her.

  And so you did, she thought, holding on. Indeed you did.

  “How’d you people do?”

  “They knew when you left,” Rohmer called. “They stopped hitting right after.”

  Marion stood next to him on the upper deck, looking down as Charlie slowed the Stratos. Brenda waved from her seat, relieved to be back. As Rohmer started down the ladder, she turned to Charlie. “How about a nightcap? One for the road.”

  “Better not, getting late. But you should take advantage—” He looked up. “It’s still clear. The temp’s dropped pretty good. We’ll get clouds soon, maybe some rain. But in the next couple hours you might see something.”

  “Northern lights?”

  He nodded, looking at her one last time before putting on a different self for others.

  She, too, made ready, glad that windburn would explain her glow. He brought the Stratos alongside the houseboat and held it until she was on the deck. Still topside, Marion watched as Rohmer stepped into the Stratos and took Brenda’s seat. He put on his hat and looked up.

  “It was great, Marion. Thank you.”

  “Yes, Louis, you take care of yourself. Charlie, what can I say?” She blew him a kiss. “I’m not ever going to forget Johnson Bay. It was… You know what it was.”

  “You’re not done here,” he said. “Mica Bay, Lost Bay. Lots of things you ladies are going to see. Brenda and I checked out Kettle Falls, you’ll like it. I’ll call Gus, he’ll know when the hotel’s open. Sometime this week. We’ll do that too.”

  He took his cap from the control panel. As he put it on he winked at Brenda, the peak concealing his eyes from others. She smiled and waved as the boat backed off. Quickly she climbed the ladder and joined Marion at the railing. They watched the speedboat pass out into the lake.

  Hands in the pockets of her windbreaker, she felt the box of cigarettes. “What are Heather and Tina up to?”

  “Very tired. Reading or asleep.”

  Brenda got the Marlboros out and lit one.

  “Sonny’s in quarantine outside,” Marion said. “He got in while we were gone. Tore a hole in the screen. I don’t suppose you’re going to tell me anything.”

  “What’s to tell? We went for a ride.” Brenda leaned on the railing, smoking, watching the Stratos. It angled right, and began moving west.

  “Okay, that’s fine. But I know what I know.”

  “And a rose is a rose is a rose,” Brenda said. “What’s this, a deposition? I’m not the one with the old beau who comes calling twenty-plus years later. “

  “God…” Hands on the railing, looking out, Marion shook her head. She had pulled on the fishermen’s knit sweater and was again wearing the captain’s hat. “What can I say? I tell you, people stay themselves forever. This self-help nonsense about change? Forget it. He lost his hair and grew a beard, but Louis Rohmer has not moved on. It’s too bad.”

  “Charlie said he lost a lot of money in real estate and the stock market.”

  Again Marion shook her head. “Somehow that figures. Magic tricks and gambling on the stock market go together.”

  The Stratos now slipped from view, behind the cove’s hill. “But you did have a thing with him. He didn’t make it up.”<
br />
  “Oh, it happened. Actually I was nuts about him. For about a year. He was funny and a very good actor.”

  “And now he’s neither.”

  “No,” Marion said, looking out and smiling. “But it was serious enough. I thought we’d get married. He had a car, we’d go to Chicago. That’s how I ended up in art school there. I was a year ahead of him, he came to visit every weekend. I remember he wrote great letters. I must’ve told him that, he asked if I’d kept them.” Marion looked at Brenda. “Do you believe that? The ego? He clutched his heart when I said no. Said he’d kept mine, which you know has to be bullshit. Give me one of those.”

  “No way,” Brenda said. “You don’t smoke.”

  “Neither do you. In college I smoked like there was no tomorrow. This is college night.”

  Brenda got them out, gave her one, and lit it. Marion leaned again and inhaled. She coughed and banged her chest.

  “So this was serious,” Brenda said. “You thought you’d get married. What happened?”

  Marion was still banging her chest. “I made the mistake of pressing him on it. I really did want to get married. You know me, I was no hippy. I ironed my hair and smoked pot, but I was actually straight as they come. He wasn’t the first. I’d had this summer fling with a Frenchman my junior year abroad. That was the glitch for him, I’d been to Europe and he hadn’t. Louis said he wanted to go, too. First. To sow his wild oats. That didn’t work for me—my guy says he loves me, but he wants to go to Europe and screw around first? It got me thinking.”

  “So you dumped him.”

  Marion inhaled and coughed again. “Not right away. We fought about his going to Europe, but we were still together when he left. We wrote. Then, in art school I met this guy. A painter. If I had a ‘wild phase,’ that was it. I suppose I was punishing Louis, at least in part. So my painter and I, we went to Europe. On nothing. He had just enough to buy a used motorcycle. The guy took off, and I ended up an au-pair girl for a French couple with a little girl. Mademoiselle Renee Tremont. All dressed up like a Laura Ashley ad, with her American nanny in the Luxembourg Gardens. In Paris. You remember Paris.”