The Sky Fisherman

by Craig Lesley

  Now Billyum swore, pushing Squeaky out of the way. He tried start ing the motor with one hand, then both, pulling so hard he broke a stitch, but it wouldn't catch. "Come on, Jake. Shake clear." He rapped his knuckles against the front of the tribal boat.

  The flickering light reached the head of Deer Island, gaining speed as it hit the swift current. The light went in a crazy half circle, first pointing to the shore, then sweeping the flooded trees of the island.

  "Something spun him around," Billyum said. "Hit that damn tree, maybe."

  Near the foot of the island, the light winked out.

  Nobody spoke.

  Buzzy took off in the Stearman, and the plane's roaring overhead offered comfort, even though we knew he couldn't help Jake directly. We traced the plane's dark silhouette against the night sky until it disappeared downriver. Buzzy didn't use running lights because he never dusted at night.

  We waited, holding our breaths, half expecting the light of Jake's boat to reappear at the head of Deer Island. But there was only darkness and the deep churning of floodwaters.

  When the faint sound of a motor droned from the distance, the outline of Buzzy's plane reappeared. Lining up on the burn barrels and the illuminated Texaco lights, he landed on the frozen air strip behind the Totem Pole. Billyum and I were waiting when he climbed out.

  "What happened to Jake?" Billyum asked.

  Buzzy took off his aviator glasses and shook his head. The glasses were wet and his jumpsuit was soaked. "Snag or a big stump maybe. I could see roots tangling the boat. Jake couldn't get free."

  "Did he jump?" Billyum asked.

  "I followed him as far as Picture Canyon. I think he was still in the boat. It was awful goddamn dark, and I had to watch those narrow walls."

  "Was anybody else with him?"

  Buzzy shrugged. "I kept making passes over the boat. A couple times I thought I saw someone, but it might have been a big root over the top. To tell the truth, my night vision is shot."

  After Buzzy had been back awhile, old Sylvester went down to the water's edge and picked up some dirt and grass. Letting these sift through his hand into the water, he began chanting, bringing the empty hand to his heart. Continuing to chant, he reached into the medicine bundle he kept tied around his neck and tossed something into the water.

  "What's he doing?" I asked Billyum.

  "Sort of praying. Asking the river not to keep Jake."

  "I hope it works," I said, remembering how things had turned out for Kalim.

  "Don't worry about your uncle," Billyum said. "He's got more lives than a tomcat. Has more fun, too."

  The longer Sylvester chanted, the more compelling his voice became. Billyum went down to join him, then Juniper, finally Squeaky and some of the other Indians. They didn't know all the words, but joined in the chant now and then.

  I stood off a little way, saying my own prayers. It was best to go at it from all sides, I figured.

  About fifteen minutes passed before Billyum left the group. "Let's drive down the railroad grade as far as we can. Maybe he jumped and Buzzy missed it."

  "Sure," I said, glad to be doing something. Like Billyum, I wasn't certain if Buzzy had seen things clearly at all. He had to work pretty hard at not smashing his plane against the narrow canyon walls.

  Others had started up their four-wheel-drive rigs and climbed the hillside to the old railroad grade. It went downriver almost a mile before dead-ending at a blasted tunnel. Now the drivers positioned themselves at spaced intervals, turning on their headlights and spotlights, forming a kind of beacon row along the flooded blackness. When I realized they were keeping watch, I wanted to cry.

  "Look." Billyum pointed to the opposite hillside. Studying the high bluffs, I thought stars were coming out of the clouded night sky. Then I realized the lights were coming from Indian rigs high above the black basalt cliffs. They, too, were standing vigil.

  For two hours we searched the flooded shoreline, poking among the piles of debris and calling out for Jake. Dozens of others joined us, but there was no sign.

  When we found a waterlogged sofa that had floated down from Hollywood, Billyum said, "Let's take a break. I'm about asleep on my feet." He swept the flashlight beam across the sofa. "Wish old Jake was here taking a little snooze."

  "Me too," I said.

  Billyum shone the light in my face, just for a second. "Did your uncle have a fishing pole with him?"

  "I didn't see one. Probably he had fishing gear stored up front."

  Billyum put the light on his own face, so I wouldn't miss the grin. "If that sneaky bastard swam to the Indian side and is poaching our fish, I'll ticket his white ass, flood or no flood."

  In spite of my weariness and worry, I grinned, too. "Hope he's catching some lunkers."

  Billyum nodded. "More power to him ... as long as they're on the white side." He focused the beam on his stitched hand. A crust of blood had formed across the broken stitch. "No kidding, Culver, we better get some rest. At first light, we'll take the boat down Picture Canyon."

  "Sure thing," I said, then paused. "What boat?"

  "If you got a spare set of store keys, we'll buy a new motor for the tribal boat. That'll be a hoot when old Jake has to pay you a big commission."

  "I got keys." I could barely say the next part. "Think we'll find him okay?"

  Billyum slapped some mud off his trousers with his good hand. "As Jake would say, 'Don't go thinking any negatory thoughts.' Remember, bullshit floats and he's full of it. Clear up to the gills."

  "I hear you," I said. "Maybe old Sylvester's chanting will work, too."

  Billyum lowered his voice. "If you promise not to tell, I'll level with you. The fact is, I put a lot more faith in Jake than I do in old Sylvester. But don't go spreading that information." He glanced around, but no one was near. "See, Sylvester misses more than he makes. Even his prophecies are all over the place. Take the World Series. I won bets off him five of the last seven years. My hunch is we'll find Jake tomorrow, if he isn't already walking out of the canyon tonight."

  "That's good news," I said, but behind the hopefulness of Billyum's words I sensed his doubts. I didn't know exactly what to think, and remembering the way that boat light had spun around made me nauseous. I could feel slivers of doubt piercing my own heart.

  "Listen, Billyum. There's one thing I need to ask, if you don't mind."

  He turned to face me. "Sure, kid."

  "When you and Jake were fishing and taking sweats, did he stay on the river the whole time? I'm just wondering if he left at all."

  His features turned somber in the lantern light. "How come you ask?"

  "No real reason, exactly. I just keep thinking about that business with Meeks and Chilcoat. I know Grady and the newspaper editor keep trying to stir things up, but it is funny how those two drove so far out there and then burned up. Pretty weird." I wanted to tell him about the night Sniffy had come into the store telling the wild stories, and I wanted to ask about the time I saw the three of them in Billyum's rig outside the Alibi, but I didn't know how. Even so, I believe Billyum understood my drift.

  "No need to go worrying about Jake," he said after a while. "He stayed with me all the time. Right there on the river."

  "That's pretty much what I figured all along," I said.

  Although I settled for Billyum's answer, I was too worried about Jake to sleep. Homer had shown up with fresh bakery goods, and throughout the night I helped him carry them to the men and women waiting in their rigs along the railroad grade. When they rolled down their windows to take the baked goods we offered, I smelled the coffee, cigarettes, air freshener, and damp wool. Now those scents mingled with the yeasty odor of doughnuts, butter horns, and bear claws. All these warm human smells offered comfort, a welcome contrast to the rising damp odors of the flood.

  The people inside the vehicles kidded around about Jake, trying to make me feel better. "Don't worry about that crazy bastard," one said. "He'll ride that snag all the way to the
ocean if he has to. He's a regular wild boat buckaroo." Another added, "Jake'll use that stump for a battering ram and knock out a couple dams along the way. Should help the steelhead and salmon return. And old Jake will be here waiting with his pole and a big fish-eating grin."

  31

  AFTER TAKING MY STORE KEYS, Billyum drove to town for a new motor. Attempting to get back on Billyum's good side, Squeaky and his relative installed it while Billyum caught a few winks. By first light we were on the river. Squeaky brought a chain saw to cut through brush and debris, if we needed. I didn't like the search dogs, two bloodhounds Billyum borrowed from a trainer. They smelled so bad I didn't understand how they could follow any scent other than their own. In the boat they seemed too anxious. On the riverbank, each time they nosed into a pile of debris, I caught my breath.

  All that day we searched. Other boats tried, too, including one manned by Ace and a couple Redwings. Buzzy flew numerous passes over the river but failed to spot Jake or the boat. Once I found half a package of waterlogged Fig Newtons and showed them to Billyum. He shrugged and said lots of Hollywood people ate them, so they might have washed down from anywhere.

  When we returned at dusk, the rigs had lined the old railroad bed again; some flew banners with Jake's name from their antennas. Gab had driven my uncle's pickup to the grade, so it sat there, keys in the ignition, waiting.

  He reported that downriver, near South Junction, they had found two victims of the flood, both white, but neither was Jake.

  "What do you think?" I asked Billyum that night when he dropped me off at our place.

  Reaching across the pickup cab, he squeezed my shoulder. "Sylvester thinks he's dead and started the death chant. That gives me hope." He squeezed again. "I figure Jake and me should grow old together, cussing and spitting all the way to the grave."

  After five days of fruitless search, I was convinced that Jake, like my father, had gone under to stay and that the boat had been ground to flotsam. But they found Jake a week later, after the water had receded. He and the boat lay smashed under a black stump, gripped by its tangle of roots. From the water the boat was scarcely visible, and only Billyum's persistence with the dogs led to the discovery. The temperature had dropped below freezing once again, so Jake's body was preserved. The broken boat and wiry roots sealed him away from the scavenger coyotes, and the sharp-beaked magpies couldn't reach his eyes.

  For most of an afternoon, Billyum and Squeaky tried cutting him free with the chain saw but the effort failed, and Squeaky went upriver for help while Billyum built a warming fire and stayed with the body. He spread tobacco around to keep away the Wet Shoes.

  The following morning they brought in a logging helicopter to lift the stump and then finished cutting free the boat and body. Billyum had the helicopter take out the smashed boat, but he brought Jake upriver himself. When he passed the vehicles standing watch along the riverbanks, they turned off their headlights one by one.

  Billyum, Squeaky, and I carried Jake up from the river. The Gateway Fire Department ambulance crew wanted to put Jake in back, but we weren't ready to let him go. "I think he'd want to ride home in his truck, boys," Billyum said, and we loaded the body bag into the back of his rig. The keys were still in the ignition.

  I expected Billyum to drive, but he climbed into the passenger seat, so I started her up and followed the ambulance's pulsing red light. We'd driven only a few miles when I started to sob. Billyum reached across the seat and squeezed my thigh. Then I settled down.

  "I know how you feel," he said. "A fool's born every minute, but a good man died this time."

  We arranged the service for the high school gymnasium, since no other facility in town could hold the crowd. The overflow sat in their pickups around the football field, and the janitor hooked up the outdoor loudspeakers so everyone could hear. Oars lashed into a cross, Jake's guide boat stood behind the makeshift pulpit. Flowers filled the boat and a couple dozen fishing creels. On the funeral program they used the Bible passage where Christ tells the disciples he will make them fishers of men. I figured old Harold would like that.

  Everyone came—the guides and outfitters, the Elks, Indians from on and off the reservation, dudes with their wives and children, old high school chums, salesmen, Ace and the Redwings, game wardens, Fish and Game Commission officials. A few people thought they saw the governor, but it was actually the secretary of state. I recognized dozens of people with long-term outstanding bills at the store and realized this would probably be their excuse never to pay. Juniper was there, of course, Doreen, my mother. A few other decked-out women claimed to have been Jake's girl at one time or another.

  I glimpsed Riley at the graveside service, but he slipped away before I could say anything. He wore a sports coat and tie, indicating better times, and I hoped his story about the rich widow was true. Franklin spotted him, too, but didn't let on. After the service we found divorce papers stuffed behind our screen door, so Riley had visited the house.

  When they had finished the food and drinks at the hard-drinking wake, the back-room boys draped a big GONE FISHING banner across the front of the store. Sharing attention with the red-nosed deer and sleigh, the banner looked peculiar, but I liked the sentiment. Billyum turned Jake's coffee cup upside down next to Seaweed's.

  Throughout that night and the next, Gab stayed on the air so listeners could call in and reminisce about Jake. I listened until three in the morning, enjoying the yarns even though I doubted half of them were true. Gab's voice coming out of the illuminated radio brought comfort to my darkened room. He played interviews with Jake from the year he started up the guide service and when he'd served as captain of the volunteer fire department. Hearing Jake's voice seemed magical, and I drifted off to sleep, nothing lost, since Gab was recording the entire program.

  ***

  The following spring we built the memorial for Jake, my father, and the other river guides on Whiskey Dick Flat. After Billyum brought down the smashed boat, my mother used it as a kind of giant flower planter. Balsam root, lupine, phlox, and Indian paintbrush bloomed until late summer.

  Most of the trees Jake planted continue to grow. Fishing guides, their dudes, even the rafters, have all lent a hand watering them. People seemed compelled to leave mementos at the memorial or imbedded in the boat. Hand-tied flies, beat-up lures, feathers, river agates, adorn the gunnels. Juniper attached a bronze steelhead mask to the largest alder and no one has touched it, although it's a valuable work of art.

  You probably know how her career took off after her paintings of the Havasupai were displayed all across the Southwest. And now her work is featured in major national museums. Still, she returns to Mission a couple times a year to offer workshops.

  On the whole, things turned out well for my mother, so Gateway did offer a new start, although in a different way than either of us would have guessed. She and Franklin married—no children. She quit her job and does volunteer work at the library and Gateway's new hospital. Summers they travel. If anything, the excitement has made her more beautiful.

  A couple of the mill boys moved away with their parents who were looking for jobs, and Thatcher was killed in a car wreck, so our basketball team barely scraped a winning season my last year of high school. I attended college in another state, where they had a good journalism program, and I suppose that was Billyum's doing, although he probably wouldn't take credit for giving me the nudge. Maybe I was tempted to hang around Gateway and follow Jake's footsteps, but Billyum laid a big hand on my shoulder once and said, "Cut your own trail. If you stay around Gateway, you'll always be Jake's nephew."

  The store and the house both went to Mom, and she sold them after trying to ensure that the fellas who bought the store would try to run it pretty much the way Jake had. And they did for a while, but their style differed from his, so things changed as they always do. The new owners started carrying merchandise for new brands of dudes—water-skiers, rock climbers, cyclists. They even carry some golf equipment. Maybe
Jake would have changed, too, but I doubt it. When I go to see Mom and Franklin at Christmas, a deer and sleigh still adorn the store roof. The deer came from a taxidermy shop in Central, and I know Jake's objection to that. I miss the mangy critter touched up with marine paint and held together by catgut. That was Jake's way.

  32

  WHAT I DON'T THINK MUCH ABOUT anymore are those events that remain unclear but still cast long shadows on my days and haunt my nights. My father's drowning. My mother's infidelity. The mystery surrounding Meeks and Chilcoat. After Jake's funeral, I kept thinking of the ambiguity of Billyum's words. While he was vouching for Jake, he also might have been covering for himself. The two of them might have left the river to settle the debt themselves.

  And I don't think much more about the Wet Shoes, words I haven't heard since the long night of the flood. I don't believe Jake saw my father's face in the window or that my father's hand reached out of the chill water to pull Jake in. My uncle was in the wrong place, and a snag hit the boat. The face he saw in the window—that's anybody's guess. The mind can play tricks. A reflection of light, as Billyum said.

  I kept Juniper's painting of Kalim on the basketball court. She had planned on taking it with her to Albuquerque, but I offered to buy it. She seemed pleased but wouldn't take payment, just gave it to me with that generous way Indians have when you admire their craft.

  Over the years I marvel at the way Juniper got Kalim's expression exactly right. The quick surprise you imagine at first is really in the posture, the turn of the head. After studying the work longer, you see the penetrating eyes that realize the calamities the rest of us fail to notice in our day-to-day routines. Maybe that vision is truer for Indian people because they've experienced so much loss, still experience it. But after that time in Gateway, I understand loss, too, at least partway.

  While the other players huddle heads down to concentrate on the coach's instructions, Kalim's staring at whatever's coming toward him. And now I realize what he sees—restless horses on a snowblind road, a slick black stump with tangled roots grasping like a claw, the snag of betrayal lying just beneath the smooth bright surface of a faithless lover's eyes.