Аврам Дэвидсон - Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 67, No. 3. Whole No. 388, March 1976

He telephoned back in ten minutes and told Elinor that the workmen would arrive the next morning, probably quite early.

The workmen came at eight a.m. After speaking with the two men, Elinor took Chris with her in the car to the library in Hartford. She deposited Chris in the children’s book section, and told the woman in charge there that she would be back in an hour for Chris, and in case he got restless she would be in the newspaper archives.

When she and Chris got back home, the pond was empty but muddy. If anything, it looked worse, uglier. It was a crater of wet mud laced with green vines, some as thick as a cigarette. The depression in the garden was hardly four feet deep. But how deep was the mud?

“I’m sad,” said Chris, gazing down.

Elinor laughed. “Sad? — The pond’s not the only thing to play with. Look at the trees we’ve got! What about the seeds we bought? What do you say we clear a patch and plant some carrots and radishes — now?”

Elinor changed into blue jeans. The clearing of weeds and the planting took longer than she had thought it would, nearly two hours. She worked with a fork and a trowel, both a bit rusty, which she’d found in the toolshed behind the house. Chris drew a bucket of water from the outside faucet and lugged it over, but while she and Chris were putting the seeds carefully in, one inch deep, a roll of thunder crossed the heavens. The sun had vanished. Within seconds rain was pelting down, big drops that made them run for the house.

“Isn’t that wonderful? Look!” Elinor held Chris up so he could see out a kitchen window. “We don’t need to water our seeds. Nature’s doing it for us.”

“Who’s nature?”

Elinor smiled, tired now. “Nature rules everything. Nature knows best. The garden’s going to look fresh and new tomorrow.”

The following morning the garden did look rejuvenated, the grass greener, the scraggly rosebushes more erect. The sun was shining again. And Elinor had her first letter. It was from Cliff’s mother in Evanston. It said:

“Dearest Elinor,

“We both hope you are feeling more cheerful in your Connecticut house. Do drop us a line or telephone us when you find the time, but we know you are busy getting settled, not to mention getting back to your own work. We send you all good wishes for success with your next articles, and you must keep us posted.

“The color snapshots of Chris in his bath are a joy to us! You mustn’t say he looks more like Cliff than you. He looks like both of you...”

The letter lifted Elinor’s spirits. She went out to see if the carrot and radish seeds had been beaten to the surface by the rain — in which case she meant to push them down again if she could see them — but the first thing that caught her eye was Chris, stooped again by the pond and poking at something with a stick. And the second thing she noticed was that the pond was full again. Almost as high as ever!

Well, naturally, because of the hard rain. Or was it naturally? It had to be. Maybe there was a spring below. Anyway, she thought, why should she pay for the draining if it didn’t stay drained? She’d have to ring the company today. Miller Brothers, it was called.

“Chris? What’re you up to?”

“Frog!” he yelled back. “I think I saw a frog.”

“Well, don’t try to catch it!” Damn the weeds! They were back in full force, as if the brief draining had done them good. Elinor went to the toolshed. She thought she remembered seeing a pair of hedge clippers on the cement floor there.

Elinor found the clippers, rusted, and though she was eager to attack the vines she forced herself to go to the kitchen first and put a couple of drops of salad oil on the center screw of the clippers. Then she went out and started on the long grapevine-like stems. The clippers were dull, but better than nothing, and still faster than scissors.

“What’re you doing that for?” Chris asked.

“They’re nasty things,” Elinor said. “Clogging the pond. We don’t want a messy pond, do we?” Whack whack! Elinor’s espadrilles sank into the wet bank. What on earth did the owners, or the former tenants, use the pond for? Goldfish? Ducks?

A carp, Elinor thought suddenly. If the pond was going to stay a pond, then a carp was the thing to keep it clean, to nibble at some of the vegetation. She’d buy one.

“If you ever fall in, Chris—”

“What?” Chris, stooped on the other side of the pond now, flung his stick away.

“For goodness’ sake, don’t fall in, but if you do” — Elinor forced herself to go on — “grab hold of these vines. You see? They’re strong and growing from the edges. Pull yourself out by them.” Actually, the vines seemed to be growing from underwater as well, and pulling at those might send Chris deeper into the pond.

Chris grinned, sideways. “It’s not deep. Not even deep as I am.”

Elinor said nothing.

The rest of that morning she worked on her law article, then telephoned Miller Brothers.

“Well, the ground’s a little low there, ma’am. Not to mention the old cesspool’s nearby and it still gets the drain from the kitchen sink, even though the toilets’ve been put on the mains. We know that house. Pond’ll get it too if you’ve got a washing machine in the kitchen.”

Elinor hadn’t. “You mean, draining it is hopeless?”

“That’s about the size of it.”

Elinor tried to force her anger down. “Then I don’t know why you agreed to do it.”

“Because you seemed set on it, ma’am.”

They hung up a few seconds later. What was she going to do about the bill when they presented it? She’d perhaps make them knock it down a bit. But she felt the situation was inconclusive. And Elinor hated that.

While Chris was taking his nap, Elinor made a quick trip to Hartford, found a fish shop, and brought back a carp in a red plastic bucket which she had taken with her in the car. The fish flopped about in a vigorous way, and Elinor drove slowly, so the bucket wouldn’t tip over. She went at once to the pond and poured the fish in.

It was a fat silvery carp. Its tail flicked the surface as it dove, then it rose and dove again, apparently happy in wider seas. Elinor smiled. The carp would surely eat some of the vines, the algae. She’d give it bread too. Carps could eat anything. Cliff had used to say there was nothing like carp to keep a pond or a lake clean. Above all, Elinor liked the idea that there was something alive in the pond besides vines.

She started to walk back to the house and found that a vine had encircled her left ankle. When she tried to kick her foot free, the vine tightened. She stooped and unwound it. That was one she hadn’t whacked this morning. Or had it grown ten inches since this morning? Impossible.

But now as she looked down at the pond and at its border, she couldn’t see that she had accomplished much, even though she’d fished out quite a heap. The heap was a few feet away on the grass, in case she doubted it. Elinor blinked. She had the feeling that if she watched the pond closely, she’d be able to see the tentacles growing. She didn’t like that idea.

Should she tell Chris about the carp? Elinor didn’t want him poking into the water, trying to find it. On the other hand, if she didn’t mention it, maybe he’d see it and have some crazy idea of catching it. Better to tell him, she decided.

So when Chris woke up Elinor told him about the fish.

“You can toss some bread to him,” Elinor said. “But don’t try to catch him, because he likes the pond. He’s going to help us keep it clean.”

“You don’t want ever to catch him?” Chris asked, with milk all over his upper lip.

He was thinking of Cliff, Elinor knew. Cliff had loved fishing “We don’t catch this one, Chris. He’s our friend.”