The Naked Gardener

by L B Gschwandtner

  Good girl. I thought for an instant.

  Then we rammed the dock with a great force that tipped me forward. As I went down, I held my paddle up and it smacked against the old wooden dock. The waterpushed us up against it and we bobbed there with the waves running over the side of the canoe. I grabbed a dock board and then a hand came out of nowhere, took mine andpulled me up. Instinctively I reached up with my other hand and whoever was up there took that one and pulled me up and onto the dock where I lay with my waist against the deck boards and my feet still in the canoe.

  “Help her,” I heard my own voice but it sounded far away. The world looked crazy from my perspective lying on the rough dock boards. Water lashed the dock and I saw trees scattered all over the land. It looked as if I had landed on some alien planet. Nothing made sense for those first seconds and then the disembodied hand let go of mine and I thought maybe I had only dreamed that part. That no one had pulled me up. At the same time I heard another canoe smack into the dock. Water splashed up the back of my legs and I felt the extra weight of my wet clothes dragging me back down into the canoe. I pulled with all the force I could muster, straining against the hard wood, aware that the rough edges were digging into my arms, tearing at the thin cotton of my summer sweatshirt. Then I clung to the dock with my arms splayed out in front of me, exhausted. By inching my way up, my legs cleared the canoe and I was able to hike one knee slowly over the deck boards. With more than half my weight now on the dock I could pull the other leg up until I rolled over on my side to get my wind back. I was facing the land and for the first time in what seemed like days I was not seeing water.

  Above me patches of bright blue scattered through great clusters of rolling gray clouds. I heard the roar of the river and then another smack as the last canoe hit the dock. Someone yelled “Hold on.” Above the roar of the water, someone else screamed “Grab my hand.” I heard the water, heard the voices, but nothing seemed real at that moment. It was as if I was looking down from somewhere high up and all this was happening in slow motion a great distance from me.

  When I rolled over onto my other side, Erica was reaching over the dock to help Charlene out and yes, there was another person. A small man wearing overalls and work boots, with gnarled hands that reached down to take Hope’s arms and pull her from the second canoe.

  I roused myself then, pushed up onto my knees, stood, rocked a little back and forth. I felt dizzy, weak in the knees for a moment before I could make myself run down the dock to the last canoe. I reached down as the water splashed up and over the dock. On the crest of each swell, the canoes rode high in the water, almost ready to slide over the dock but then came the troughs and the canoes dropped again, bumped against the dock just low enough to hold them from being carried downriver on the current. When a trough came, it was harder to reach down to anyone inside the canoes. With the canoes rolling up and down it was impossible to get a good hold on the dock unless your canoe hit at exactly the right moment on top of a wave.

  I tried to grab Roz’s hands but she lost her footing and bounced back into the bottom of the canoe. The others, Erica and Hope and the man wearing work boots were beside me, all of us reaching for Roz and Valerie. And then a huge swell carried the canoe towards us. The man grabbed a gunwale and pulled hard moving back parallel to the dock toward the land.

  I realized what he was doing. I grabbed the bow thwart and, on the next upward swell, we yanked as hard as we could. And then, with Valerie and Roz splayed in the bottom, the canoe was on the dock and we were all safe. Dazed, exhausted, some of us bruised, wet and disoriented, but safe.

  The man grabbed the other canoes, one at a time, and pulled them onto the dock beside the first. Valerie and Roz sat in theirs for a few more moments, as if they were not yet sure whether they really had landed. With Erica and Hope helping, they climbed out but I just could not move. It felt as if my arms had torn loose from my shoulders. The swells still swept up onto the dock, splashing me again and again.

  “Come on,” Erica took my hands. “Let’s get off this dock and onto solid land.”

  As she helped me to my feet, we heard a high pitched voice that sounded forced, as if it took the speaker some effort to raise it high enough to be heard.

  “Lewis, what’s going on out there? Who are those people? What are they doing out there after this storm?”

  Lewis turned away from the water and called out, “I don’t know yet, Missus. Got to get these here boats off the dock. Water’s still comin’ up.”

  My hands had begun to shake. I couldn’t stop it. All I could do was watch old Lewis hauling our canoes onto the land. His work boots thumped on the decking. He had no trouble pulling the canoes since we had left the broken gear back at the campsite. When he was done, he turned to face us all standing there on the dock, unsure what to make of our situation or what to do next. He smiled, a shy, confused, little smile at the corners of his lips.

  Behind him, an old lady hobbled down the worn path that led to the dock. She had trouble getting through all the storm debris. For a time an uprooted tree stump spread out in a huge circle of earth and roots hid her from view until she got around it. She leaned on a cane. Her gray hair was swept back in a loose ring around her head. She wore blue rimmed glasses, a dark blouse, and long cotton skirt. She squinted at us and raised her cane in the air as a pointer.

  “Who are you?” she called to no one in particular. “And whatever are you doing out on that river?” As if there was more than one river.

  I couldn’t tell if she was confused in her head or just resentful that we had landed on her property. She stopped where she was and stared at the three canoes and then at us. Lewis walked closer to her. “Well, Lewis?” she said to him.

  “I don’t know yet, Missus Ward.” He shook his head.

  I felt as if I had landed in a dream somewhere, someone else’s dream maybe. Like the whole day had not happened and I was about to awaken in the tent in my sleeping bag with the birds singing their dawn chorus and we would make breakfast and set out for our last day on the river.

  But then Erica spoke up and I snapped back to the moment.

  “We’re so sorry, Mrs. Ward. I’m Erica Marston.” She strode over to the old lady and stuck out her right hand.

  Mrs. Ward just stared at her, head slightly cocked to one side. I thought maybe she was hard of hearing.

  “Lewis,” she barked in that high pitched voice. “These girls look a mess. Bring them up to the house.”

  She turned away from Erica and hobbled back the way she had come, thumping her cane hard on the ground with each step. I watched her disappear behind the uprooted tree.

  “Excuse me, your name is Lewis?” I turned to the man in work boots. “I wonder could we use the phone? We have to call our homes and let them know we’re all right.”

  “No phones,” he said and gave one last yank to a canoe then dropped its bow with a thump where he stood. He turned and started up the way the old lady had gone. “House is up this way.”

  “Hey, I don’t know about the rest of you but I peed myself on one of those waves and thought I’d never see land alive again so I’m all for heading to the house, no matter what’s up there,” Charlene told us.

  “This is all kind of weird, don’t you think?” Valerie looked from one to the other and Hope looked as if she was still fighting the waves.

  “She’s just an old lady who lives alone,” Erica said. “There’s nothing to be afraid of.”

  She reached out and took my hands to help steady them.

  “I think I must have pulled some arm muscles or maybe the tendons when we collided with the dock,” I told her. That would have explained the shaking, although it had calmed down some.

  “Maybe it’s fear,” Roz stood by my side. “I know I was scared shit the whole way.”

  “Yeah but it was kind of exciting, too,” Charlene grinned. “I mean except for the river.”

  “What else was there except the river?” Hope asked.


  “We’d better catch up with old Lewis before they lock the doors on us,” Erica said and let go of my hands.

  “What do you think he meant by no phones?” I asked.

  “Yeah, what are they out here, some sort of wilderness survivalists?” said Charlene.

  “Shakers maybe,” I suggested.

  “You mean the ones who didn’t use buttons or anything and pray in silence?” asked Roz.

  We skirted the uprooted tree.

  “No that was Quakers. The Shakers were the ones who made all the very simple furniture and didn’t believe in procreation. So they died out.”

  “Oh that’s a helluva religion.”

  We were giggling by then. As we walked it was clear the storm had ravaged a huge swath of the whole area.

  “Jeez, look at that.”

  Someone pointed to a tree that looked as if it had been twisted like a corkscrew.

  “Tornado.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Will must be worried sick.”

  “Lewis must have meant the phones are all out from the storm.”

  “Maze is going to kill me when we do get back.”

  “Must not be any electric either.”

  “Oh God, the one thing I really wanted was a hot shower.”

  “I’m starving.”

  “And someone smells like pee.”

  “Her hands are still shaking.”

  “Maybe we should get her to a doctor.”

  “How exactly?”

  “The roads must be a mess, too.”

  “I’ll be okay. They’re getting better.”

  “That was some scary canoe trip.”

  “I don’t know. Now that it’s over I think it was kind of fun.”

  We stopped at the top of the grassy slope that led to the house and looked back at the river. It rushed on, wild, murky, foamy, roaring with power.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  THE OLD WOMAN

  We stood on the back porch for a moment. My legs felt like jelly and I held onto the porch railing for support.

  Although the railing and the porch floor had an old coat of gray paint, pealing here and there, the house itself was constructed of dark gray granite blocks that gave it an austere, permanent stature. Sloping gently down to the dock, the carefully tended lawn was a deep green. I imagined the old man who had pulled us out limed it every spring and rode one of those giant mowers up and down in summer during the growing season, his knobby old knees poking up above the seat. Our canoes sat on the wet grass. The river roared behind them. Downed trees, broken limbs, and general debris from the storm lay over everything. But the three story stone house, flanked by enormous old oak trees and forest all around was impassive, solid and unyielding to momentary passing events. At one time, people must have flocked to this house I thought.

  Tall leaded windows on the ground floor gave the house a solemn, gothic look. On the second and third floors, smaller windows had little balconies overlooking the view to the river. The way the house had been sited, once you climbed the steps and stood on the back porch, you could see downriver to the mill and dam beyond. Whoever designed the house and built the mill obviously wanted to be able to stand here and watch what went on downriver.

  I tried to imagine what it must have been like to live here when the mill was in operation, the water wheel turning constantly, the big mill wheel grinding flour, workers loading it into sacks, horse drawn carts carrying them over the bridge to the store in town. It must have been quite a hub for this remote area.

  Life always seems simpler looking back. In one hundred and fifty years people will look back at us as living in simpler times with fewer problems. One day far in the future our era will be as far removed from humans then as we are from our seed gathering ancestors who roamed the plains when the earth was cooling down and giant animals roamed at will. I think I must have taken to the garden in order to feel connected with that inexorable march of time. And there I stood, on the steps of that old house, which will be there long after I am gone, wondering what it must have been like back when this old woman’s great great great grandfather built the mill, the town, the house, took down the trees, planted this lawn, carved out an existence. But the women were chattering and my attention snapped back to them.

  “We made it anyway.”

  “I had doubts when I saw that water. I’d never have believed we could paddle like that.”

  “You were right, Katelyn. Better than sitting around waiting.

  “Anyway it was exciting.”

  “Will is probably camped out at the police station.”

  “It’s going to be ugly when I get home to Maze.”

  “It wasn’t your fault.”

  “This house looks a little ghoulish.”

  “I hope the bathrooms are working.”

  “I feel completely disgusting.”

  “We all do.”

  “What I wouldn’t give for a hot bath.”

  * * *

  “I put a few pots of water to boil as soon as the power went out last night.” The old lady stood at the door, squinting in the afternoon light. “Well, come on in,” she made a sweeping motion with her cane as she stood back to let us pass.

  We were all a bit tentative, as if we expected to find a steaming cauldron in the kitchen and dried toads’ feet hanging from the rafters. I must say we weren’t far off,because inside the house, with its extra high ceilings and old furniture in dimly lit rooms, was dark and a bit creepy. Although the leaded windows were huge, they faced east and now that the sun was in the west, and with the oak trees shading the house, even on a sunny morning that house would be dark. I remembered my grandmother’s house by the river, with shades drawn against the weak rays of sunlight that managed to break through the leaf canopy and actually peek in a window. In those days, every woman was afraid of two things, moths and sunlight. God help the woman who let light fade herfurniture or moths chew her rugs.

  We filed in one at a time and followed her through the main hall, past the living room, which looked as if it hadn’t been used in decades, into the kitchen. This was obviously where she did most of her living.

  On the floor by a huge fireplace – the kind where before there was electricity people used to hang iron pots full of food over the fire – a golden retriever lay on an old blanket. He thumped his tail when he saw us, but didn’t move from his spot. A small fire kept the room overly warm for July but the rest of the house we’d walked through was as cool as if it had been November. I wondered if this house even had central heat and when I saw the gigantic wood stove in one corner of the kitchen I had my answer. I figured bow legged Lewis must be busy all year long to keep this place functioning.

  “However did you girls get caught out in the storm?” Mrs. Ward asked.

  Erica started to explain what had happened but Mrs. Ward bustled around the kitchen hauling pots of hot water from the wood stove, replacing them with others, and didn’t seem to hear her. So Erica offered to help her but Mrs. Ward was not a woman who accepted help easily.

  “Here,” she handed Hope a big bucket. “You go on out to that hand pump to the right of the porch and fill this one up. “And you,” she handed one to me, “take this one and do the same.”

  The way she said it meant no discussion would be tolerated so we took the buckets. I looked sideways at Erica with raised eyebrows as if to ask, “What am I supposed to say?”

  She shrugged and smiled at Mrs. Ward.

  “Go on,” she waved us off. “If you girls are going to wash up you’ll need enough hot water for all six of you. With the storm the electric pump’s out. We ran out of water this morning so you may as well use a little elbow grease.”

  “That’s Wally,” she pointed at the dog as we headed for the door. Wally’s ears perked up. He cocked his head when he heard his name but after a second laid it down and sighed deeply. His eyebrows arched a little and he looked at all of us as if he wasn’t sure what to make of this invasion but it was j
ust too much effort for him to investigate.

  We pumped the water, something I had never done. But Hope seemed to know what she was doing and we filled the buckets.

  “We had a well and hand pump in Africa,” she whispered. “My parents helped the villagers dig and install it when I was a little girl. I grew up pumping water by hand. It was a big deal in a village to get a well.”

  “Do you think she’s senile?”

  “Who?”

  “Mrs. Ward.”

  “Oh no. I think she’s lived alone so long she doesn’t have any patience for the social niceties anymore is all.”

  “If she ever did,” I mumbled as we hauled the heavy buckets back up the porch steps.

  * * *

  With us following like a Brownie troupe, Mrs. Ward thumped through the main floor of the house, using her cane as a pointer.

  “I stay on this level nowadays,” she explained. “You.” And here she motioned with her cane at Charlene, “can use my bathroom. Careful you don’t spill anything or break anything now. There are fresh towels in there.”

  She pointed at what I assumed was a linen closet.

  Charlene leaned over to me and whispered, “I think she must have smelled my pee stained shorts. Nothing gets past prison matron.”

  I poked her in the side to shut her up.

  “Now what about those clothes? I suppose you all want to get into something clean.”

  “That would be wonderful,” Erica nodded and again tried to engage the old woman in conversation.

  “You see we were out camping and … ”

  “Don’t want to hear about that now. Got some old clothes and robes and things in a room upstairs. You,” she pointed at me, “go on up to the first room on the right and see what you can find. Look in the closet and in the old trunk in there. Don’t care what you wear in this house. Nobody’s coming calling anyway. And who knows how long it’ll be until they get this power back on.”

  “Do you have a car?” Valerie asked.