Cutter's Run

by William G. Tapply

  The beavers had taken advantage of what they’d found. They’d braced the end of their dam against a big hunk of old concrete that was half embedded in the earth beside the stream. Susannah had said that old man Cutter, for whom the run was named, had operated a tannery on its banks, and that it had used waterpower to turn its machinery. Cutter undoubtedly had used the stream itself to flush away his tanning chemicals and animal parts and anything else he wanted to get rid of, too. That was standard practice in those days, and it might’ve killed the trout that lived downstream of the tannery. In those days, nobody cared.

  That old milldam must have been right here, and the remains of it had given the smart beavers a solid anchor for their own dam.

  When I scrambled up onto it, I was able to see that it had backed the water up for a hundred feet or so. The pond, I guessed, covered nearly an acre. The beaver lodge was constructed of woven sticks and mud, like the dam, and it sat in the water off toward Noah Hollingsworth’s side of Cutter’s Run.

  Back through the stumps and trees that poked out of the water on that side, I spotted several hunks of half-submerged crumbling concrete, a section of foundation, and a couple of crumbling brick chimneys. The ruins of Cutter’s tannery, I assumed, now half submerged under the beaver pond. A historic place in Garrison, Maine. An archaeological site.

  I saw no beavers, which did not surprise me. They would’ve heard me moving through the woods and slipped into the sanctuary of their lodge through its underwater entry, where they would remain hidden and safe until I left.

  The pond’s surface was flat and glassy. I squatted there atop the dam to study it. I hoped to see the dimple and ring of a trout sipping an insect off the surface. I saw a few mayflies and damselflies sitting on the water. There were plenty of mosquitoes clouding over it, too.

  But for the length of time it took me to smoke a cigarette and belatedly slather some insect repellent on the back of my neck, I saw no evidence that a trout lived there.

  I dipped my hand into the water and guessed its temperature to be around sixty. Ideal for brook trout.

  As I sat there in the silence of the late-August morning gazing at the pond’s smooth skin, I became aware of the gurgle of running water. Beaver dams, of course, are not designed to hold back every drop that flows down a stream. Enough water seeps through the interlaced twigs of even the tightest dam to allow the stream, although greatly diminished in volume, to continue along its course. An absolutely watertight dam, no matter how sturdy it was, would eventually burst from the ever-growing pressure of the water accumulating behind it. Beavers understand hydraulic engineering well enough to build safety valves into their structures.

  But when I looked along the length of this dam, I saw that down toward the other end the water had broken a V-shaped chunk out of the top and was cascading through, spilling in a little waterfall to the streambed downstream.

  This fissure in the dam, I figured, was slowly draining the pond. It explained the wet mud around the rim: The break was so recent that the mud had not yet dried and hardened. All the relentless force of the held-back pond was focused on this weak point. As gravity pulled on it from downstream, the water would eat away at that vulnerable spot, making it bigger and bigger and releasing more and more water until, if the beavers didn’t repair it, it would blow out the dam.

  Now the stream below the dam was only six or eight feet across. I judged by the dry rocks and mud that bordered it that it was normally twelve to fifteen feet wide.

  I tight-roped my way across the top of the dam to the breach in it. When I knelt down to look at it, I saw the water tear a couple of twigs loose from the dam and carry them away. At this rate, the dam would be blown out the first time a big rainstorm swelled the stream. The pond would then cease to exist, and Cutter’s Run would again be twelve or fifteen feet wide, as it had been before the beavers had chosen it for their homesite.

  And then it occurred to me that the beavers must have already abandoned their pond and all the labor they had invested in it, because if they still lived here, they would have kept their dam repaired. The legends don’t exaggerate. Beavers work hard, and building and tending their dams and lodges is their main job.

  I wondered what had happened. A community of beavers eventually eat all the bark and twigs in an area, and then they must move on. But they’re smart enough to choose homesites that provide a long-term food supply, and there still seemed to be plenty of delicious poplar trees and alder bushes for them around the edges of this pond. Maybe a persistent predator—a bobcat or a pack of coyotes, or even Charlotte Gillespie’s dog or housecats—had convinced them that this was an unsafe place to live. Or maybe a predator had actually killed them.

  Beavers are a vital part of Mother Nature’s grand ecological scheme. They create wetlands, vital habitat for countless species of flora and fauna. But when beavers build their dams near human civilization, their ponds tend to flood roads and backyards and cellars and septic systems. They contaminate water supplies. Then state fish and wildlife experts are called in to trap them and dynamite their dams.

  This beaver pond did not threaten anybody’s water supply. Somebody might’ve trapped the beavers, but no one had destroyed the dam.

  Whatever had happened to the animals, their dam was disintegrating, and the pond they had made would eventually disappear. If I was to catch a trout from it, now was the time.

  I slipped a fly box from my vest and selected a size 14 Adams, a generic gray-brown floating pattern that vaguely resembled a lot of different insects without looking precisely like anything. An Adams is usually close enough to tempt wild brook trout, which are always beautiful and spooky, but which are not noted for being fussy eaters. I tied the fly to my leader, checked behind me for trees that might snag my backcast, and flicked it out onto the glassy water. It landed as softly as milkweed fuzz, but I knew that any nearby trout would spot it and cruise closer for a better look. I imagined a trout darting toward my fly, then slowing and hovering, suspended directly beneath it, its body tilted slightly upward, its nose just millimeters under it, trying to decide whether to eat it.

  Cautiously I tightened my line and gave the fly a tiny twitch. It’s alive, I was saying to that trout. Eat, quick, before it flaps its little wings and escapes.

  No trout poked its nose through the water’s surface and sipped in my fly. After a couple more twitches, I lifted it from the water and cast again, this time beyond where my first cast had landed, so that it would get the attention of any trout that had not seen it where it had settled the first time.

  And as usually happens when I’m casting a dry fly onto quiet water and no actual trout are eating it, I caught several imaginary ones, and I was neither bored nor discouraged. I crept along the entire length of the dam, casting here and there, letting the fly sit on the water, twitching it, waiting, and visualizing the trout that might have darted over to eye it.

  By the time I had worked my way back to the end of the dam where I had first climbed onto it, the sun was high in the sky. I reeled in, snipped the Adams off my leader, put it back into its proper compartment in my fly box, un-jointed my rod, lit a cigarette, and crouched there atop the dam.

  I’d just spent a couple of hours catching no trout. I was disappointed that, based on my highly unscientific survey, no wild brook trout appeared to be living in Cutter’s Run. But it had been engrossing, and it did not occur to me that I had wasted my time.

  I’d had no thoughts of Charlotte Gillespie or swastikas or poisoned dogs or threatening phone calls. I hadn’t wondered whether I was losing Alex, and I hadn’t felt sad that Noah Hollingsworth was dying.

  I’d been fishing. It had completely occupied my consciousness.

  People who don’t cast flies for trout sometimes tell me they’d like to try it, although they think they lack the patience for it. If they didn’t catch a lot of fish, they say, they’re afraid they’d quickly become bored. They don’t think they’re contemplative enough. They’ve got
too much on their minds—implying, of course, that people like me can’t have much of anything on our minds, and that we must have a high tolerance for boredom to devote all that time to not catching fish.

  I’ve given up trying to explain how, when I’m fishing, my mind is fully and actively engaged, and that while I may be moderately contemplative, I am also actually quite an impatient man. Casting dry flies for trout is never boring. Trout of both species—real and imaginary—are endlessly fascinating.

  I glanced at my watch. It was eleven o’clock. Time to get back and meet the sheriff.

  CHAPTER 18

  I’D BEEN CROUCHING THERE on the dam for a couple of hours, and when I stood up—too fast—I felt dizzy and nearly lost my balance. So I squatted there, taking deep breaths against the dull nausea that squeezed my stomach until the dizziness passed. Then I pushed my way through the undergrowth, aiming for the meadow, where the breeze and the sunlight would clear the blurriness from my brain.

  I heard a voice and looked up. On the edge of the meadow in front of me stood Arlo, Susannah Hollingsworth’s horse. There was no mistaking him for a moose. And when I broke through the thicket into the open, I saw Susannah herself. She was sitting cross-legged on a gray blanket. She wore raggedy low-riding cutoff jeans and a little white halter top that left her flat stomach bare. I couldn’t see her eyes behind her sunglasses. A beer bottle sat by her elbow.

  She lifted her hand. “Hi.”

  “Hi yourself.”

  She plucked off the glasses and smiled. “You’re a sight.”

  “Why thank you, ma’am. You are, too, if I might say so.”

  “That fishing must be hard work.” she said. “Look at you. You’re all muddy and sweaty and your neck is bleeding. Grab yourself a beer from Arlo’s saddlebag and bring it here.” She patted the blanket beside her.

  “A beer sounds good.” I found three bottles of Dos Equis and some half-melted ice cubes in a soft plastic cooler in Arlo’s saddlebag. I fished out a bottle and pressed it against my forehead. The cold was a shock. I thought I might have a fever.

  “Hey,” said Susannah. “You okay?”

  I put my rod and fishing vest on the ground and slumped down beside her. “Just a little light-headed. Too much sun, I guess.” I twisted the cap off the beer bottle and took a long swallow. I was very thirsty. The beer felt good all the way down.

  She reached over and laid the back of her hand against my forehead. “I don’t think you’ve got a fever.” She squinted at me. “But you look kinda peaked, as my mother used to say.” She pronounced it “peek-id.”

  I smiled at her. “You followed me.”

  She nodded. “Sort of.”

  I lit a cigarette and held the pack to Susannah. She pushed herself onto her elbows, took one, and steadied my hand as I held my Zippo for her. Then she flopped back onto the blanket.

  I took another swig from the beer bottle and said, “So what’s up?”

  “Up? Nothing’s up. Around here, nothing’s ever up. I was out on Arlo and saw your car, and I remembered you’d mentioned trying to catch a trout. Thought I’d wander down and see what luck you had.”

  “No luck,” I said. “I don’t think there are any trout in the stream.”

  “I’m not surprised,” she said. “I’ve tried to tell my father that you can’t spread chemical fertilizers on a hundred acres of orchard and spray the trees about six times a year without affecting the environment. All that stuff has been leeching into Cutter’s Run for decades.”

  I nodded. “It’s happening to trout streams everywhere. Pisses me off.”

  She smiled, “You could’ve stayed home, avoided the mud and the bugs and the sun, and caught just as many fish.” Her hand moved up to my neck. “What happened here?” She showed me her finger. It was wet with blood.

  “I don’t know. Didn’t notice it. Briars, probably. Or maybe it’s where I scratched at a mosquito bite.”

  She sat up, took a tissue from the pocket of her shorts, wet it with her tongue, and dabbed it at my neck. “Nasty scratch,” she murmured. Her face was so close to mine that I could smell her perfume. “Looks like a briar got you.” She touched my cheek with her fingertips, then sank back onto the blanket. “Can I ask you a question?” she said.

  I nodded. “Sure. I guess so.”

  She propped herself up on her elbows. “Did my father say anything to you?”

  “About what?” Noah had told me he was dying. He’d also told me that he hadn’t told Susannah.

  She shook her head. “I don’t know. Something’s going on with him. I know him. Something’s wrong. But he wouldn’t tell me. He’d want to protect me. I thought he might’ve said something to you. He’d talk to another man. That’s how he is.”

  “What about Paul?”

  She smiled quickly and shook her head. “He wouldn’t talk to Paul. He thinks Paul’s a lightweight.” She smiled quickly. “Daddy doesn’t trust a man who’d wear an apron.”

  “Susannah,” I said gently, “if Noah had confided in me, I’d have to respect his privacy.”

  She narrowed her eyes. “I’m his daughter. I’ve got a right to know.” Tears brimmed her eyes. “He did tell you something, didn’t he?” She rolled onto her side and laid her cheek on my thigh. I hesitated, then touched her hair. She put her arm around my waist and pushed her face against my stomach. Her shoulders began to tremble, and I knew she was crying.

  I stroked her bare arm. “Talk to him,” I said. “Tell him what you told me. That you know something’s wrong, and that you’ve got a right to know what it is. I can’t tell you. It’s between the two of you.”

  She rolled onto her back. Her head was on my lap, and she looked up at me with wet eyes. She seemed to be studying my face, and a moment later she gave a little nod. “I’m right, aren’t I?” she whispered.

  I shook my head. “I’m sorry.”

  She reached her arm up, hooked it around my neck, and drew my face down to hers. I wanted to resist her. I knew I should. But I didn’t. Her mouth opened under mine, and I felt the flick of her tongue, and her lips were soft and encouraging. Then a little cry came from her throat, and she pulled me down beside her on the blanket. I tried to think of Alex. But Alex was fuzzy and distant, and Susannah was pressing against me, with her fingers in my hair and her hips moving on me.

  I forced myself to slide my mouth away from hers. “Hey,” I whispered, tilting my head back to look at her.

  I read sadness in her eyes. “I’m sorry,” she said. She flopped back on the blanket. “God, Brady. I am sorry.”

  I shook my head. “It’s my fault.”

  She closed her eyes. “He’s really sick, isn’t he?”

  I touched her cheek, and her hand came up and held it there. Her eyes opened and peered into mine, and I nodded.

  She tried to smile, and the tears came again. She grabbed the front of my shirt and pulled me down, and this time her mouth and the taste of her felt familiar, and when she lifted herself against me, my arm went around her as if it had its own will, and my fingers began to stroke her back, exploring the skin under her halter top and along her shoulders, touching the side of her breast, then moving down along the knuckles of her spine until I was holding her butt and guiding her rhythm as her hips rolled against me, and then it was Susannah who put her palm on my chest, twisted away, gave me a gentle push, and whispered, “Wait.”

  I flopped onto my back and blew out a long breath. “Jesus, Susannah.”

  “I did not intend for this to happen,” she said. She sat up, picked up her beer bottle, and took a long swig. Her throat worked as she swallowed, and a trickle of beer dribbled down her chin. She lowered the bottle and wiped her mouth with the back of her wrist. “Want to get me another one?”

  “Sure.” I stood up, steadied myself until a moment of dizziness passed, fished out another beer from Arlo’s saddlebag, and brought it back to her.

  “Thanks.” She pressed the wet bottle against the side of her neck. �
�I came here hoping I’d find you,” she said quietly. She was sitting cross-legged, staring down at the blanket.

  “To seduce me?”

  She frowned at me. “Of course not.”

  I shook my head. “I’m sorry. That was uncalled-for. It was my fault, not yours.”

  She gazed off into the distance. “No,” she said quietly, “maybe you’re right. Maybe I did think about kissing you.” She took a sip of beer. “I apologize. It’s our secret. No harm, no foul.”

  “I’ve got to tell Alex,” I said.

  “Don’t be silly.”

  “It’s not good to have secrets.”

  “Everybody has secrets, Brady. It was just a kiss, for God’s sake. Nothing happened.”

  I shook my head. “That was not just a kiss. Something happened.”

  Susannah nodded. “Do what you think you have to do. Just keep in mind that Alex is my friend, and if you tell her that we—that you kissed me—I’ll probably lose her friendship. And I know,” she said quickly. “We should’ve thought of that before.”

  I sipped from my beer and said nothing.

  “It was nice, though,” she said after a minute. “Wasn’t it?”

  I nodded. “Yes. It was nice.”

  She smiled at me. “Would you kiss me again?”

  I shook my head. “I don’t think so.”

  Her hand slithered under my shirt and crept up my back. “Hey,” she said softly.

  I looked at her, and she tilted up her face, and I touched her cheek and bent to her, and I kissed her again, and this time it was gentle, almost sexless, and when we broke it off, I kissed her eyes and hugged her against me. “Noah does want to talk to you,” I said into her hair. “He will if you make it easy for him.”

  She nodded.

  I pushed myself to my feet and picked up my rod and vest. My light-headedness seemed to have passed, but I felt weak and faintly nauseated. “Come on,” I said to Susannah. “Give me a ride back to my car.”