by Tim O'Brien
The forest was closing up fast as the gray nightcrust came sliding in. “Harvey!” he called, a war game or something, just a tattered remnant of childhood, there lay Harvey shot dead, tumbling dead to the river, freezing in fun. “Hey, Harv!” he called. Harvey looked young, even with the frosted beard and red skin and play-dead pose.
He was tired. He sat down. The day was brittle and the shadows were still coming. Had he slept? They needed a fire. He turned, saw that the river bent sharply, twisted once more, then continued south. They could not stay on the river. He got out the map. He unfolded it and spread it against the railing and began searching it for a bridge and a river and a road. He was tired and cold. Squinting and bending over the map, he searched it top to bottom. He stopped once to look down at Harvey. The bad eye was still open, dull. “It’s all right, Harv. Old Harv.”
The map was yellow, encased in plastic. It had belonged to their father. Scribblings and cryptic X’s and dotted lines had been traced on it. In red letters, stencilled across the western width of the map, it said: World’s Greatest and Only Exclusive-Canoe Country. Canoe country. Ski country. Indian country. Camping country, lake country, pine country, old forest, lost country. It confused him. His eyes hurt, he needed his glasses. It was too simple and easy. On the map, everything was unmistakable and clear, nothing dangled and no height or depth. The great forests were reduced to a pale green sheen. From bottom left to top right ran the sharp coastline of Lake Superior, a sheaf of blue that formed the Arrowhead’s cutting edge. At its tip was Grand Portage, stopping place for the voyagers, the Indian reservation. Fucking greasy Indians, the old Swedes said. A sliver of land, the tip of the Arrowhead stabbed into Superior at a place called Pigeon Point. Perry had once been there. With his father and Harvey. It was all rock and pine and still wild, and his father had pointed out at the lake and called it the cleanest lake in the world. He’d taken them along the portage trail, lecturing, explaining that La Vérendrye landed there in August of 1731, that the French used the place as a launching pad for the great Northwest Passage quest, that later it became a bustling English fur outpost, stockaded, growing, doing big business in beaver hides and bear and moose. And they’d walked along the portage trail and his father had lectured and Harvey’s eyes gleamed and dreamed, and they came to the Pigeon River and the pathway west into rainy river country, saw old Fort Charlotte, the site anyway, and it was all history, the Glacial Age, the Stone Age, the French and British and the coming Swedes and Finns and Norwegians and Yankees, opening it up. Perry stared at the map. He was cold. Harvey lay on the river below, his yellow parka still shining. The map was a maze. The country was thick with lakes. He tried to count the blue splotches, forgetting himself, forgetting Harvey frosted below, and he counted until losing his way in a tangle of channels and unnamed lakes and long blue stretches of lakes merging with other lakes. The whole history was there, printed on the map, all the moraines and blazed boulders, the sweep of the giant glaciers. And the names, some Indian, Lake Kawishiur and Lake Gabimichigami. French names, like Caribou and Brule, and English names and Swedish names and half-breed names, and when all the names ran out and still other lakes were discovered, the lakes were called by number, Lake Number Three, Lake Number Four. A pity, Perry thought.
Entranced, he stared down at Lake Number Four, hypnotized. He darted back and forth in memory, and Lake Number Four intrigued him: not at all a small and unimportant lake, rather a very large and interesting chunk of blue on the map, shaped like an upside-down deer with small islands where the heart and kidneys would be. The name, Lake Number Four, thumped mechanically through his head, solid, a solid name, countable. Number Four in the land of ten thousand lakes. An injustice. Deer Lake would be better. Peri Lake. No, deer-shaped, Deer Lake. He looked closer and found a dozen other Deer lakes; then Elk lakes and Moose lakes and Reindeer lakes and Beaver lakes and Bear lakes and White Bear lakes.
He was cold. The map shivered. Harvey was still down there, still on the frozen river.
It was so big. He looked to the cutting edge of the broadhead, the string of towns along the coast—Tofte, Lutsen, Silver Bay, Hovland, Grand Marais. And the starting point, Sawmill Landing, a black dot, inland slightly, a dot representing all those wooden buildings, the tar strip of Mainstreet, Route 18. He touched the dot. He traced his finger north, through the heart of the Arrowhead, up to the northern edge where a chain of lakes and rivers and portages formed the intricate border with Canada. Somewhere in the broadhead, between the cutting edges, somewhere along a river where there was a bridge and an old logging trail. He looked carefully, squinting, bending over the map. The wind began and the gray nightcrust swept down the river, across Harvey and then under the bridge.
“Harvey!” he called.
Hugging him like a doll, Perry pulled his brother up, removed his skis and made him walk.
The river ice snapped and the day was late and crystal sharp and cold. The snow cracked into sheets. They walked in a circle. Perry had no hope. Twice he stopped to massage his brother’s thighs.
Harvey’s arms dangled.
“Come on, Harv, come on,” Perry clucked. “One step one, two step two, three step three, easy, easy.” Morphia, each step.
Harvey began to cough. He held a choking grip on Perry’s throat.
“Harvey?” Perry at last stopped.
“I’m sick.”
Perry waited for the coughing to stop.
“I was sleeping. I’m sick.”
“We have to get off the river. We’re going up to the bridge.”
Harvey coughed. “I don’t … No, I don’t think so.” His voice had an icy, nasal tinkle. It was his old voice hollowed out.
“We have to climb the bank.”
“Shit.”
“I’ll help. Can’t stay on the river. Can you hear me? The river goes the wrong way. There’s a road up there. We’ll go up and make a fire and tomorrow we’ll take the road.”
“I’m hot.”
Perry kneeled and rubbed Harvey’s thighs and ankles. His own hands were getting numb. The winter moon was already up.
“Bloody hot,” Harvey coughed. “I’ll take the coat off.”
“No, you won’t.”
“I’m hot.”
“It’s the fever. You’re keeping the coat on. Later I’ll build us a fire. Take hold now.”
“I’m sick.”
“Yes. You’re climbing the bank. You’re leaving the coat on. Take hold.”
“I don’t want to.”
“Doesn’t matter. Take hold.”
Harvey pulled an arm from his parka. “I’m … let me get this coat off. I was sleeping, you know.”
“You were freezing.”
They stood facing each other. Harvey suddenly smiled. He started to laugh and the cough caught hold, a dry hack. “You … You don’t know what you’re doing.” The bad eye shined. “You don’t know what you’re doing.”
“Take hold then.”
“You … You don’t know a hell of what you’re doing, do you?”
“You’re climbing that bank.”
“All right then. But you don’t know.”
Harvey climbed recklessly. It was Harvey, his old carelessness and certainty, climbing as though daring the bluff to cast him off. He climbed to the top and smiled down at Perry, then, grinning and coughing, he curled in the snow while Perry scaled the bank for the final time, bringing up the skis and poles.
Perry used the last light to gather wood. He shaved splinters from a rotted bridge plank and used it for kindling to build a fire.
He tied the nylon tarp to an iron railing, unrolled the sleeping bags. Harvey lay by the fire. His eyes were listless and wide open and he did not move.
As the night went on, Harvey’s breathing settled into the forest background, replacing the wind. From time to time Perry fed him hot water, holding the pot while Harvey breathed the steam.
Perry slept well. He woke once, rebuilt the fire, then slept again.
“Get up,” Perry said.
“This is the end.”
“What?”
“You aren’t facing it,” Harvey said.
“Get up.”
Harvey kept grinning. “You don’t even know the end. This is the end, brother. I’m not going on, I’m sick.” Perry stood back. He watched and did not go close.
He watched until Harvey slumped against the railing.
“Get up.”
“You don’t even … don’t understand,” Harvey muttered. “This is, just look into it. For Christ sake, this is the whole purpose of it, don’t you see that? We did all right. This is forest here. This is wild stuff, don’t you see that?”
Perry blinked. “No.”
Harvey shrugged and grinned. “Well, I’m staying behind. I’m through.”
Perry put on his rucksack. “You’re not,” he said. “You’re coming.”
Harvey grinned like a wolf.
“You are coming,” Perry repeated.
“Don’t have to be so afraid.”
“What?”
“You can stop fearing it. You’re always so goddamned afraid.”
“Get up.”
Harvey began his cough and Perry took the chance to get him up and into the skis.
“You’re coming,” he said.
“You’re afraid of everything.”
“That’s right.”
“You’re lazy and you never learned a thing. You’re afraid, you’re afraid of everything,” then he coughed again and Perry strapped him into a rucksack.
“Don’t you like to talk?”
“No.”
“I want to talk,” Harvey said.
“Then you talk. Let’s go.”
“I want to talk about being brave and doing things.”
“We’ve done that before.” Perry started across the bridge.
“Let’s talk about you then,” Harvey grinned. “Let’s talk about brother Paul Milton Perry, how’s that? How’s that?” he crowed. “How’s that?”
Perry waited for Harvey to push off, then he skied off the bridge and on to the road and into the woods, checking to be sure Harvey followed.
“Yeah,” Harvey crowed behind him, then coughed, then crowed: “Let’s talk about you, brother. See? See here, brother. You came with me. Came along free and clear, you hear?”
Perry now led the way.
“Free and clear! You hear? You could have stayed home. Didn’t have to come, nobody forced you. Came free and clear. You hear me? Let’s talk about your shining moments in the great history of things. You hear? You hear me? Let’s talk about you awhile. Let’s talk … Let’s talk about your great shining love for your father. You hear me? You want to talk? Nobody forced you out here. You just came, you hear? Let’s talk about our father awhile. Let’s sit down and talk about how you treated him, your great love for him. Let’s just stop and talk about that … Nobody made you come out here. You think I feel sorry? Wrong! You’re wrong, buddy. You hear?”
Perry skied straight ahead. Harvey was far behind him. The trees were growing everywhere, full pine and spruce, and the land sloped down.
He led the way.
The trees went on and on. He tried counting them.
At midday he stopped and motioned for Harvey to sit down. They rested on their rucksacks. Harvey had thin blue veins marking his forehead. His face was wet.
“I’m taking off this coat,” Harvey said.
“You’re not.” Perry did not look up.
“I’m sick.”
“I know that. You’re keeping the coat on.”
Perry sat and looked up the trail and tried to think it out. He was hungry but he felt all right. He admired the trees. They were green as summer, long and short needled spruce. Further ahead, up the trail, they turned to birch but beyond they turned to pine again. All over, the snow sparkled. It was a fine bright day and he saw everything clearly. The brightness made him close his eyes.
“I’m taking this coat off,” said Harvey.
Perry got up and slung the rucksack behind him.
“Did you hear me? I’m taking this coat off.”
Perry buckled on his skis, leaned on his poles and watched Harvey until he got up.
He waited, then without a nod he pushed off down the trail. He couldn’t get over how bright and clean a day it was, as though the blizzard had scrubbed everything like steel wool. On each side of the trail, the trees grew in neat rows. He was hungry again. It struck in strange places. The hunger had moved from his belly to the back of his brain, in some primitive transferal of sensation. The hunger would strike for a moment, throbbing as if it had been plucked like a guitar string, then it would shimmy and make him dizzy, then slowly give out and he would be clearheaded again and in control. He was leading. Lean at last, and clearheaded and cleareyed.
They skied up the center of the trail. Perry leading. He skied with his eyes closed. He wondered if a man could sleep and still go on, eyes closed, maybe even snoring, while the skis simply carried. Each time he opened his eyes, the snow was brighter.
The road was hypnotic in its stretches of long forest and snow and bright blue sky. All quite beautiful. The trail sometimes was very wide in places where the loggers had stopped to cut, and other times it was impassable, grown over with saplings and coppice. Except for the sound of their skiing and the undertone of cracking in the snow, the forest was still, and the old trail swept through the woods like a river.
For a time they were followed by a hawk that dipped down on them, wings fluttering in a slow graceful breaking motion, then jerking suddenly upwards and disappearing high over the forest, then later returning to screech low over the trail, winding over their heads and jerking up and away again. But except for the lonely hawk and the sound of their skis and the sound of the cracking snow, the day was dumb and empty, a long track of light and snow along the trail. Perry played his counting game: trees, strides, breaths, memories, saplings, spurts of hard hunger, minutes, hours, backward, forward. He ran out of things to count, or they stretched on so far that he grew restless with the prospect of never reaching the end.
The forest kept coming and it was always there. The birch trees gave out to acres of evergreens. He could close his eyes and ski and imagine himself finally stopping and freezing and fossilizing and sprouting needled branches and joining the pines in a perfect communion. One of millions. Each the same. No cold, no hunger, no memories and no fear. An element among elements in the elements. He thought about it and followed the trail, sometimes not thinking at all, other times thinking: the road had no ditches. No rest stops. No fuel stations or scenic overlooks or picnic tables. No refracting road signs, no speed limits, no limits at all. Limitless. The trail was its own perfect logic, for it went from one place to another place, starting and ending, and they were following it so that sooner or later it would empty them either at the starting place or ending place. It was perfect, hypnotic logic. Then he began to think he was an adventurer. He would have some fine story to tell. He could tell it to the son Grace wanted. He could tell it in the drugstore, and people would listen, the whole place would go quiet and Herb Wolff would ring his cash register while people listened and drank coffee, and he would have a great thing to remember and ponder. He could tell about this very moment. The very moment: the trail there before him, the big scary-looking pines walking in from both sides, the sound of Harvey’s cough behind him, the hawk now and again swooping down with its screech and talons, now, the hunger at the back of his brain, he could tell them all that. He could tell them he was, at that moment, just at that particular moment in that adventure, he could tell them he was absolutely and undeniably unafraid, fearless, simply acting, thinking of the things he would tell them. He was thinking. He was not sure about Harvey. Old Harvey, such a bull. He was not sur
e. The cough was bad. It was genuine sickness, all right. He would tell about Harvey’s sickness, how the cough always started with the fluid sound deep in the lungs and then came out in a flood of mucus and then ended in a whooping wheeze, and how they would stop for Harvey to catch his breath, and how Perry would then turn and begin to ski and how Harvey would finally follow, now following. The trees went on and on, and the trail wound on and on.
When they stopped for rest, Perry consulted the map, looking again for some correspondence between the lay of the land and what was printed under the plastic. A few county roads cut into the Arrowhead, none of them seeming to go anywhere in particular, winding into the forest from the cutting edge of Lake Superior, roaming about, then either ending entirely or twisting in a circle back towards the lake.
Harvey started coughing and Perry had to stand him up. When the coughing got bad, Perry leaned him over and clapped his back, clucking to him gently like a mother at bedside. The coughing eased off and Harvey sat down on his rucksack, his head in his hands, and Perry went back to the map. Surprising himself, he realized he was developing a new and not entirely desirable capacity for treating suffering with clinical dispatch, solving a crisis, moving himself to do what had to be done and nothing more or less, then moving on to the next thing. The next thing was the map, finding a way out. He’d stared at it so often that it somehow seemed an inscrutable but still friendly companion, as if offering something in a language Perry did not understand. The map seemed to stare back at him. Saying: look closer. Look at the elevations. This chain of lakes here, this river connecting them. He peered at the map and the green and brown map peered back at him, and at last he slowly folded it and returned it to his parka pocket.
“Are you ready now?” he asked Harvey. He stated the question.
Harvey coughed again. Perry stood him up and clapped him and helped him into his skis.
“Awhile more,” he said, “just awhile more and we’ll stop and I’ll boil you water.”