Peter Geye - Safe from the Sea

Noah rolled the chart back up and returned it to the shelf. Standing at the window, he thought, That’s it then. That’s the dead come back to life . “I’ll have some dreams tonight,” he said.

Olaf set his teeth on the counter. “You’re lucky enough to still dream, huh?”

What a sight the old man made. On one end of the couch his bushy-rimmed head rested on a pillow. A collage of quilts covered him, leaving only his clownish feet — snug in thick wool socks — dangling over the other end of the sofa. His arms were folded over his chest, the sleeves of his union suit coming apart at the cuffs. He might have looked like this in a coffin, Noah thought as he walked past, slid on a pair of boots, and stepped outside.

A ribbon of beguiling fog curled up the trail from the lake, and he followed it down. Pockets of complete darkness still haunted the woods on either side of the path, heavy, wet, and eerie in a polka-dotted dawn. He could see the lightness above the lake and the still-black water exhaling mist. He thought again of Natalie’s arriving today.

When he came to the beach he walked to the edge of the water and kicked at a clump of limp grass. He wore only a sweatshirt and his boxers, and the cold air gripped his legs. He flexed his body to stave off the chill. All around the rim of the lake the woods hoarded a darkness that didn’t seem to make sense — coming, as he had, down the faintly lit path — but when he turned around to look back at the house, it too was gone in the darkness.

Across the lake, above the rolling treetops, the sky was turning a muted red that faded upward, seamlessly, through a hundred shades of pink and back to black. He stepped onto the dock, the planks and pilings creaking under his weight. The boat sat in the water, tied to the dock by two expert knots that appeared ready to hold the old thing there forever. Noah tiptoed into the boat and sat on the splintered thwart, watching the ripples roll out on the otherwise placid lake. Natalie will love this place, he thought. He could picture her on a warm summer afternoon, sitting on the beach with a magazine and sun hat under the shade of an umbrella. She would squint at him and smile and lick her thumb before turning the page. At lunch she would tell him peaches were out, blueberries in, according to the latest health craze she’d just finished reading about. He’d make himself a summer-sausage sandwich and look at the kids, two of them — twins, he’d decided — three years old and sitting in the clearing in the yard, on a picnic blanket in the sun. Fair-skinned and straight-haired, they picked at a caterpillar. He’d touch Nat on her knee and bowl into the sunlight, arms wide, to scoop them up. The kids would jump up and scream happiness and stutter-step in circles until he captured them. Nat, clearing the paper plates, would watch them, shielding her eyes from the sun with her hand.

A fish rolled lazily out of the water beside the boat, a big fish, and Noah’s reverie was lost. She’s sleeping , he thought, looking at his wrist for the watch not there. She’ll be on her way soon . In that instant he realized — almost as if he’d always been aware of this fact — that his father’s story mattered only if Noah could someday tell it himself, to a son or daughter, to another Torr who could keep it alive — here, on a blustery November night — for a third generation. He stood up, thankful for Nat’s fortitude, and started back toward the house.

Midway up the path, though, he froze. The trees swayed and murmured, and when they went silent he heard something else in the distance. It was faint, lilting, and it stopped almost as soon as it started. He took another step and froze again, turned back toward the lake, and heard it again, louder and more mournful this time. A howl, a wolf’s howl. One wolf usually meant many.

He tried to move in a lull after the second cry but couldn’t — he was spellbound. The light had come fully up but was still drab. A third cry went up, and he walked back to the beach. God, it’s beautiful , he thought. And no sooner had he thought it than the howl was answered. The wolf song permeated the air, seemed even to warm it. He fixed his eyes on the shoreline, scanned it from the cliff face they’d fished off the other day to the impenetrable spruce stand on the north shore of the lake. He couldn’t see them, but the howling had entered him. It filled him the way the foghorns had as a child.

They sang for a long time. He wondered if the hunt was over and they were celebrating their kill, or if they’d simply been lost in the night and were calling each other back to the den. Maybe there were pups, maybe it was a long call to danger.

When they stopped he started back for the house. He considered its black windows as though from a distance they might let onto something other than what was really there. He saw a light flicker on in one of the windows and his father’s head appear. It looked like a scene from an Impressionist painting. But the image only lasted for a second before the old man turned and disappeared from the light.

“BRIGHT-EYED AND BUSHY-TAILED,” Olaf said. “You hear the wolves?”

“I looked for them.” Noah stopped in the kitchen.

“There’s a pack in the neighborhood. Their turf comes right up to the shore across the lake. Far as I can tell anyway. If you’re quiet and sit still long enough, sometimes you can see them watering themselves in the morning.”

Noah filled the kettle and put it on the stove.

“I saw you down there listening. Awfully brisk morning to be out in your skivvies.” His father’s union suit hung on him, and he had the afghan slung over his shoulders like a shawl. “Twenty-eight degrees according to the thermometer.” He pointed out the kitchen window.

“I’ll bet it’s five degrees colder once you get away from this house. You’re killing me with these fires.”

“I can’t feel it,” Olaf said, dropping back on the sofa. “I can’t get warm enough.”

“That why you slept on the couch last night?”

Olaf nodded, settling back under the quilts. “The bedroom gets so cold.”

Noah sat in the chair. “I’ll get back at that tree in the gulch today. We’ll restock this place with firewood yet. And I’m going to get that chain. I’ll leave as soon as I finish the coffee. You want to come with?”

“I’ll stay put. But you can take my truck again if you want. Knutson’s opens at seven. Better fill the gas can, too.”

“I will.”

Olaf laid his head down on the pillow and let out a long, quiet sigh. “I feel better today, out here on the sofa. Like I’m on vacation or something. A night at the Ritz.”

“If only we could call for room service,” Noah said, getting up. “I could use one of those breakfasts you were talking about last night.”

“They’ve got good cinnamon rolls at the Landing. Bring a few back with you.”

“I’ll do that. Don’t go anywhere.”

A smile turned up half of Olaf’s mouth.

AT THE HARDWARE store a half-dozen men, all as old as Olaf, milled about a deer stand that, according to a handwritten sign, had just arrived in stock. Each of the men had a Styrofoam cup of coffee in his hand and wore a plaid or blaze-orange hunting vest. Noah walked to the back of the store and rang the service bell on the counter. One of the men in the group excused himself and hustled back to help Noah.

“ ’Morning. What can I do for you?”

“I need a length of chain.”

“Any particulars?”

“Is there such a thing as three-quarter-inch. . something? Polyurethane coated? I need twenty feet of it.”

“Let me show you what we’ve got,” he said, motioning with his long arm for Noah to follow.