Nightwoods - Charles Frazier [44]
Some memory of country etiquette learned in childhood from his grandfather kicked in, and Stubblefield tapped the chrome horn ring, the briefest of friendly toots, before getting out of the car. Even then, he couldn’t bring himself to walk right up the footpath and climb the steps and knock on the front door. He waited below the porch and called out, Hello?
Across the lake, mounds of pale grey and silver clouds rose in convincing mountain shapes so high into the sky that Stubblefield became confused about what was heaven and what was landscape. Have to be in Tibet to validate some of those upper peaks.
—Hey? he said.
Off to the far side, past the row of rockers, two small heads popped up over the rim of porch boards. Hair like dried shucks, and dark eyes glaring at him. Then they ducked back down. Stubblefield walked around to the end of the porch, but the children were gone. Whose children, by the way? Grandchildren of the hermit spinster’s?
In the backyard, no children. Just a clutch of chickens pecking at the ground and a slim girl. Or, rather, since she appeared to be about Stubblefield’s age, a woman. Wearing black pedal pushers and a white blouse and scuffed black penny loafers. Standing at a chopping block splitting kindling with a double-bitted axe, the shape of its flared blades echoing deep into Iron Age history, some Viking or Celt thing. Whack, and two yellow-faced pieces of pine fell away from each other and landed in a pile of their fellows.
—Hey, Stubblefield said.
The woman swept back dark hair with her wrist and glared, about as welcoming as the children. She said nothing for an uncomfortable stretch of time.
—So, again, greetings, Stubblefield said.
Just then, he realized that an empty pony bottle still dangled from his right fist. He shook it, pretending to throw it away but it wouldn’t go. A Red Skelton bit surfacing into his life all of a sudden.
The woman raised the axe to whacking level and propped its helve on her shoulder.
—Help you? she said.
—No, Stubblefield said. Or, possibly, yes.
—Which?
—My name’s Stubblefield.
—He died.
—Grandson.
—Ah.
—So, I guess Grandpa, what? Mentioned me?
—A time or two.
—And he hired you to, what?
Nothing from the woman but a neutral straight-on look. Put a level to her eyebrows and the bubble would stay inside the lines.
Stubblefield glanced off toward a set of fading ridges or clouds or whatever. Some big bird passed overhead. A shadow of wings brushed him but he didn’t even look up to see hawk or raven or buzzard. Instead, he watched the shadow waver away across the grass and become broken up by the ragged garden.
As if making an apology, he said, I guess I own this place now. And I need to … He paused and started to say, Make some decisions. But before he could get all confessional about what hard choices they were likely be and what a mess his grandfather had dumped in his lap by dying with everything in such disarray, he factored the lack of upwelling sympathy in the woman’s demeanor. The axe, but not just the axe. Something about her eyes. So Stubblefield revised his sentence on the fly, like lighting a fresh cigarette off the butt of an old one, and said, Have a look at my inheritance.
—Look all you want, she said. It’s yours. And by the way, there’s a fair chance the children burned down the house.
She set another section of pine onto the chopping block and whacked it, scenting the air with piney odors, sharp and clean. And then before Stubblefield could go, What? in relation to the house, some instant memory flashback washed over him. Something about the sway of her hair, or a glint of light off angles of cheekbones and jawbone. Seventeen memories came rolling in from some useless brain attic that usually opened up only to inform Stubblefield exactly where he was and what he was doing and what the weather was when he