"It might be dark on Monday before Hero and I get home," Ketchum had warned Danny. There would be no locating the old logger over the long weekend; Danny didn't even try. Ketchum had gradually accepted the telephone and the fax machine, but--at eighty-four--the former river driver would never own a cell phone. (Not that there were a lot of cell phones in the Great North Woods in '01.)
Besides, Danny's flight from Toronto had been delayed; by the time he'd landed in Boston and had rented the car, the leisurely cup of coffee he'd planned with Paul Polcari and Tony Molinari turned into a quick lunch. It would be early afternoon before Danny and Carmella Del Popolo left the North End. Of course the roads were in better shape than they'd been in 1954, when the cook and his twelve-year-old son had made that trip in the other direction, but northern New Hampshire was still "a fair distance" (as Ketchum would say) from the North End of Boston, and it was late afternoon when Danny and Carmella passed the Pontook Reservoir and followed the upper Androscoggin along Route 16 to Errol.
When they drove by the reservoir, Danny recognized Dummer Pond Road--from when it had been a haul road--but all he said to Carmella was: "We'll be coming back here with Ketchum tomorrow."
Carmella nodded; she just looked out the passenger-side window at the Androscoggin. Maybe ten miles later, she said: "That's a powerful-looking river." Danny was glad she wasn't seeing the river in March or April; the Androscoggin was a torrent in mud season.
Ketchum had told Danny that September was the best time of year for them to come--for Carmella, especially. There was a good chance for fair weather, the nights were growing cooler, the bugs were gone, and it was too soon for snow. But as far north as Coos County, the leaves were turning color in late August. That second Monday in September, it already looked like fall, and there was a nip in the air by late afternoon.
Ketchum had been worried about Carmella's mobility in the woods. "I can drive us most of the way, but it will entail a little walking to get to the right place on the riverbank," Ketchum had said.
In his mind's eye, Danny could see the place Ketchum meant--an elevated site, overlooking the basin above the river bend. What he couldn't quite imagine was how different it would be--with the cookhouse entirely gone, and the town of Twisted River burned to the ground. But Dominic Baciagalupo hadn't wanted his ashes scattered where the cookhouse was, or anywhere near the town; the cook had requested that his ashes be sunk in the river, in the basin where his not-really-a-cousin Rosie had slipped under the breaking ice. It was almost exactly the same spot where Angelu Del Popolo had gone under the logs. That, of course, was really why Carmella had come; those many years ago (thirty-four, if Danny was doing the math correctly), Ketchum had invited Carmella to Twisted River.
"If, one day, you ever want to see the place where your boy perished, I would be honored to show you," was how Ketchum had put it to her. Carmella had so wanted to see the river basin where the accident happened, but not the logs; she knew the logs would be too much for her. Just the riverbank, where her dear Gamba and young Dan had stood and seen it happen--and maybe the exact spot in the water where her one-and-only Angelu hadn't surfaced. Yes, she might one day want to see that, Carmella had thought.
"Thank you, Mr. Ketchum," she'd said that day, when the logger and the cook were leaving Boston. "If you ever want to see me--" Carmella had started to say to Dominic.
"I know," the cook had said to her, but he wouldn't look at her.
Now, on the occasion of Danny bringing his father's ashes to Twisted River, Ketchum had insisted that the writer bring Carmella, too. When Danny had first met Angel's mom, the twelve-year-old had noted her big breasts, big hips, big smile--knowing that only Carmella's smile had been bigger than Injun Jane's. Now the writer knew that Carmella was at least as old as Ketchum, or a little older; she would have been in her mid-eighties, Danny guessed. Her hair had turned completely white--even her eyebrows were white, in striking contrast to her olive complexion and her apparently robust good health. Carmella was big all over, but she was still more feminine than Jane had ever been. And however happy she was with the new fella in her life--Paul Polcari and Tony Molinari continued to insist that she was--she'd held on to the Del Popolo name, perhaps out of respect for the fact that she had lost both the drowned fisherman and her precious only child.
Yet on the long drive north, there'd been no bewailing her beloved Angelu--and only one comment from Carmella on the cook's passing. "I lost my dear Gamba years ago, Secondo--now you've lost him, too!" Carmella had said, with tears in her eyes. But she'd quickly recovered herself; for the rest of the trip, Carmella gave Danny no indication that she was even thinking about where they were going, and why.
Carmella continued to refer to Dominic by his nickname, Gamba--just as she called Danny Secondo, as if Danny were (in her heart) still her surrogate son; it appeared she'd long ago forgiven him for spying on her in the bathtub. He could not imagine doing so now, but he didn't say so; instead, Danny rather formally apologized to Carmella for his behavior all those years ago.
"Nonsense, Secondo--I suppose I was flattered," Carmella told him in the car, with a dismissive wave of her plump hand. "I only worried that the sight of me would have a damaging effect on you--that you might be permanently attracted to fat, older women."
Danny sensed that this might have been an invitation for him to proclaim that he was not (and had never been) attracted to such women, though in truth--after Katie, who was preternaturally small--many of the women in his life had been large. By the stick-figure standards of contemporary women's fashion, Danny thought that even Charlotte--indisputably, the love of his life--might have been considered overweight.
Like his dad, Danny was small, and while the writer didn't respond to Carmella's comment, he found himself wondering if perhaps he was more at ease with women who were bigger than he was. (Not that spying on Carmella in a bathtub, or killing Injun Jane with a skillet, had anything to do with it!)
"I wonder if you're seeing someone now--someone special, that is," Carmella said, after a pause of a mile or more.
"No one special," Danny replied.
"If I can still count, you're almost sixty," Carmella told him. (Danny was fifty-nine.) "Your dad always wanted you to be with someone who was right for you."
"I was, but she moved on," Danny told her.
Carmella sighed. She had brought her melancholy with her in the car; what was melancholic about Carmella, together with her undefined disapproval of Danny, had traveled with them all the way from Boston. Danny had detected the latter's presence as strongly as Carmella's engaging scent--either a mild, nonspecific perfume or a smell as naturally appealing as freshly baked bread.
"Besides," Danny went on, "my dad wasn't with anyone special--not after he was my age." After a pause, while Carmella waited, Danny added: "And Pop was never with anyone as right for him as you."
Carmella sighed again, as if to note (ambiguously) both her pleasure and displeasure--she was displeased by her failure to steer the conversation where she'd wanted it to go. The subject of what was wrong with Danny evidently weighed on her. Now Danny waited for what she would say next; it was only a matter of time, he knew, before Carmella would raise the more delicate matter of what was wrong with his writing.
ALL THE WAY FROM BOSTON, he'd found Carmella's conversation dull--the self-righteousness of her old age was depressing. She would lose her way in what she was saying, and then blame Danny for her bewilderment; she implied that he wasn't paying sufficient attention to her, or that he was deliberately confusing her. His dad, Danny realized, had remained sharp by comparison. While Ketchum grew deafer by the minute, and his ranting was more explosive--and though the old logger was close to Carmella's age--Danny instinctively forgave him. After all, Ketchum had always been crazy. Hadn't the veteran riverman been cranky and illogical when he was young? Danny was thinking to himself.
Just then, in the high-contrast, late-afternoon light, they drove past the small sign for ANDROSCOGGIN
TAXIDERMY. "My goodness--'Moose Antlers for Sale,'" Carmella said aloud, attempting to read more minutiae from the sign. (She'd said, "My goodness," every minute of the drive north, Danny reflected with irritation.)
"Want to stop and buy a stuffed dead animal?" he asked her.
"Just so long as it's before dark!" Carmella answered, laughing; she patted his knee affectionately, and Danny felt ashamed for resenting her company. He'd loved her as a child and as a young man, and he had no doubt that she loved him--she'd positively adored his dad. Yet Danny found her tiresome now, and he hadn't wanted her along on this trip. It was Ketchum's idea to show her where Angel had died; Danny realized that he'd wanted Ketchum for himself. Seeing his dad's ashes sunk in Twisted River, which was what the cook had wanted, mattered more to Danny than Ketchum making good on his promise to escort Carmella to the basin above the river bend, where her Angelu was lost. It made Danny feel ungenerous that he thought of Carmella as both a burden and a distraction; it made him feel unkind, but he believed, for the first time, that Paul Polcari and Tony Molinari hadn't been kidding. Carmella truly must be happy--with her new fella and her life. (Nothing but happiness could explain why she was so boring!)
But hadn't Carmella lost three loved ones, counting the cook--her one and only child among them? How could Danny, who had lost an only child himself, not see Carmella as a sympathetic soul? He did see her as "sympathetic," of course! Danny just didn't want to be with Carmella--not at this moment, when the dual missions of sinking his father's ashes and being with Ketchum were entirely enough.
"Where are they?" Carmella asked, as they drove into Errol.
"Where are what?" Danny said. (They'd just been talking about taxidermy! Did she mean, Where are the dead stuffed animals?)
"Where are Gamba's remains--his ashes?" Carmella asked.
"In a nonbreakable container, a jar--it's a kind of plastic, not glass," Danny answered, somewhat evasively.
"In your luggage, in the trunk of the car?" Carmella asked him.
"Yes." Danny didn't want to tell her more about the container itself--what the contents of the jar used to be, and so forth. Besides, they were coming into the town--such as it was--and while it was still light, Danny wanted to get his bearings and have a look around. That way, it would be easier to find Ketchum in the morning.
"I'll see you bright and early Tuesday," the old logger had said.
"What's 'bright and early'?" Danny asked.
"Before seven, at the latest," Ketchum said.
"Before eight, if we're lucky," Danny told him. Danny had his concerns about how bright and early Carmella could get up and be fully functioning--not to mention that they were spending the night a few miles out of town. There was no proper place for them to stay in Errol, Ketchum had assured Danny. The logger had recommended a resort hotel in Dixville Notch.
From what Danny and Carmella could see of Errol, Ketchum had been right. They took the road toward Umbagog, past a general store, which was a liquor store, too; there was a bridge over the Androscoggin at the east end of town, and a fire station just west of the bridge, where Danny turned the car around. Driving back through town, they passed the Errol elementary school--they'd not noticed it the first time. There was also a restaurant called Northern Exposure, but the most prosperous-looking place in Errol was a sporting-goods store called L. L. Cote.
"Let's have a look inside," Danny suggested to Carmella.
"Just so long as it's before dark!" she said again. Carmella had been one of the earliest erotic stimulations of his life. How could she have become such a repetitious old woman? Danny was thinking.
They both regarded the sign on the door of the sporting-goods store with trepidation.
PLEASE NO LOADED FIREARMS INSIDE
"My goodness," Carmella said; they hesitated, albeit briefly, at the door.
L. L. Cote sold snowmobiles and all-terrain vehicles; inside there were dead stuffed animals, the regional species, enough to suggest that the local taxidermist was kept busy. (Bear, deer, lynx, fox, fisher cat, moose, porcupine, skunk--a host of "critters," Ketchum would have said--in addition to all the ducks and the birds of prey.) There were more guns than any other single item; Carmella recoiled from such a display of lethal weaponry. A large selection of Browning knives caused Danny to reflect that probably Ketchum's big Browning knife had been purchased here. There was also quite a collection of scent-elimination clothing, which Danny tried to explain to Carmella.
"So that the hunters don't smell like people," Danny told her.
"My goodness," Carmella said.
"Can I help you folks?" an old man asked them suspiciously.
He was an unlikely-looking salesman, with a Browning knife on his belt and a portly appearance. His belly hung over his belt buckle, and his red-and-black flannel shirt was reminiscent of what Ketchum usually wore--the salesman's camouflage fleece vest notwithstanding. (Ketchum wouldn't have been caught dead in camouflage. "It's not like a war," the woodsman had said. "The critters can't shoot back.")
"I could use some directions, maybe," Danny said to the salesman. "We have to find Lost Nation Road, but not until tomorrow morning."
"It ain't called that no more--not for a long time," the salesman said, his suspicion deepening.
"I was told it's off the road to Akers Pond--" Danny started to say, but the salesman interrupted him.
"It is, but it ain't called Lost Nation--almost nobody calls it that, not nowadays."
"Does the road have a new name, then?" Danny asked.
The salesman was eyeing Carmella disagreeably. "It don't have a name--there's just a sign that says somethin' about small engine repairs. It's the first thing you come to, off Akers Pond Road--you can't miss it," the old man said, but not encouragingly.
"Well, I'm sure we'll find it," Danny told him. "Thank you."
"Who are you lookin' for?" the salesman asked, still staring at Carmella.
"Mr. Ketchum," Carmella answered.
"Ketchum would call it Lost Nation Road!" the salesman said emphatically, as if that settled everything that was wrong with the name. "Is Ketchum expectin' you?" the old man asked Danny.
"Yes, actually, he is, but not until tomorrow morning," Danny repeated.
"I wouldn't pay a visit to Ketchum if he wasn't expectin' me," the salesman said. "Not if I was you."
"Thank you again," Danny told the old man, taking Carmella's arm. They were trying to leave L. L. Cote's, but the salesman stopped them.
"Only an Injun would call it Lost Nation Road," he said. "That proves it!"
"Proves what?" Danny asked him. "Ketchum isn't an Indian."
"Ha!" the salesman scoffed. "Half-breeds are Injuns!"
Danny could sense Carmella's rising indignation--almost as physically as he could feel her weight against his arm. He had managed to steer her to the door of the sporting-goods store when the salesman called after them. "That fella Ketchum is a Lost Nation unto himself!" the salesman shouted. Then, as if he'd thought better of it--and with a certain measure of panic in the afterthought--he added: "Don't tell him I said so."
"I suppose Ketchum shops here, from time to time--doesn't he?" Danny asked; he was enjoying the fat old salesman's moment of fear.
"His money's as good as anybody's, isn't it?" the salesman said sourly.
"I'll tell him you said so," Danny said, guiding Carmella out the door.
"Is Mr. Ketchum an Indian?" she asked Danny, when they were back in the car.
"I don't know--maybe partly," Danny answered. "I never asked him."
"My goodness--I've never seen a bearded Indian," Carmella said. "Not in the movies, anyway."
THEY DROVE WEST OUT OF TOWN on Route 26. There was something called the Errol Cream Barrel & Chuck Wagon, and what appeared to be an immaculately well-kept campground and trailer park called Saw Dust Alley. They passed the Umbagog Snowmobile Association, too. That seemed to be about it for Errol. Danny didn't turn off the highway at Akers Pond Road; he simply noted wh
ere it was. He was sure Ketchum would be easy to find in the morning--Lost Nation or no Lost Nation.
A moment later, just as it was growing dark, they drove alongside a field encircled by a high fence. Naturally, Carmella read the sign on the fence out loud. "'Please Do Not Harass the Buffalo'--well, my goodness, who would do such a thing?" she said, indignant as ever. But they saw no buffalo--only the fence and the sign.
The resort hotel in Dixville Notch was called The Balsams--for hikers and golfers in the warm-weather months, Danny supposed. (In the winter, for skiers certainly.) It was vast, and largely uninhabited on a Monday night. Danny and Carmella were practically alone in the dining room, where Carmella sighed deeply after they'd ordered their dinner. She had a glass of red wine. Danny had a beer. He'd stopped drinking red wine after his dad died, though Ketchum gave him endless shit about his decision to drink only beer. "You don't have to lay off the red wine now!" Ketchum had shouted at him.
"I don't care if I can't sleep anymore," Danny had told the old logger.
Now Carmella, after sighing, appeared to be holding her breath before beginning. "I guess it goes without saying that I've read all your books--more than once," she began.
"Really?" Danny asked her, feigning innocence of where this conversation was headed.
"Of course I have!" Carmella cried. For someone who's so happy, what is she angry with me for? Danny was wondering, when Carmella said, "Oh, Secondo--your dad was so proud of you, for being a famous writer and everything."
It was Danny's turn to sigh; he held his breath, for just a second or two. "And you?" he asked her, not so innocently this time.
"It's just that your stories, and sometimes the characters themselves, are so--what is the word I'm looking for?--unsavory," Carmella started in, but she must have seen something in Danny's face that made her stop.
"I see," he said. Danny might have looked at her as if she were another interviewer, some journalist who hadn't done her homework, and whatever Carmella really thought about his writing, it suddenly wasn't worth it to her to say this to him--not to her darling Secondo, her surrogate son--for hadn't the world hurt him as much as it had hurt her?