Cotton Grass Lodge

by Woodbury, DeNise

  “Now you’ll know why I made you set a fire in the sauna. Go spend half an hour out there while I get finished with supper.” Nell pointed to the back door.

  “But, it’s too early,” Duncan protested. His watch contradicted the light of the afternoon. “Is it really seven?” From the porch he looked at the sky to confirm, a band of brilliant sunshine slit the gray overcast at the horizon.

  “Go.” Nell jammed her finger again toward the door.

  Frustrated, Duncan went back outside and used the boardwalk past the outhouse to the sauna. He went into the warm eight-by-eight changing room. He hung his clothes on one of a dozen nails hammered into the rough-cut spruce wall. The towel he pulled from a stack on a high shelf was rough but smelled line-dried and fresh.

  He opened the door to the dark, hot room of the sauna itself, fumbled with the string attached to another forty-watt light bulb. Little of the heat and humidity escaped the room. Duncan could hardly breathe when he closed the door.

  “God, this is such a waste of time.” Duncan sat cautiously on the hot wooden bench. Nothing to read, no radio, quiet. Dense wood-heat from the barrel stove seeped deeper and deeper into his bones.

  Sweat beaded, collected in the cracks of his body and ran in tickling rivulets toward the slatted floor. His muscles twitched at the unaccustomed relaxation. He was surprised when his shoulders sagged. He hadn’t realized he held them so tight.

  What a confounding day. Duncan’s attempt to put it into perspective failed.

  His mind wandered first to the termination meetings with Regent. He’d trained and managed and organized for them, regularly working twelve and sixteen hour days for years.

  His new assistant project manager was accomplished and he might add, gorgeous. The newest San Francisco hotel would soon be at the point in construction for him to take control in just a few weeks. The best project he’d ever taken on and he’d quit.

  The agony of John’s funeral soured his stomach again. He didn’t understand why except that John’s suicide shook him to his core.

  No one except Carl could know how important the next six months would be. Should he have listened to Carl and given up everything he’d worked for? He began compiling an exaggerated list of Carl’s lies and shortcomings regarding Cotton Grass Lodge.

  Heat-induced lethargy came to an end when his head bobbed and he woke up, embarrassed. He used a squeeze bottle of harsh peppermint soap and dipper after dipper full of hot water from a bucket next to the stove to wash and rinse. As he dressed, his watch informed him the sauna had only taken forty-five minutes. Two hours seemed to have disappeared.

  Duncan came back into the lodge just as Nell was putting a garage-sale jumble of dishes on the table. None of them matched, but they did appear to be clean.

  He’d noticed Hanna taking the garbage out earlier. Fortunately, the compost smell of the kitchen was gone too.

  Nell had changed her shirt, and a bright blue-checked tablecloth covered one end of the table. “Feel better?” she asked when he came into the kitchen.

  “I’ve never felt this clean or this relaxed in my life.” He wasn’t prone to exaggeration, but his wobble-jointed knees and elbows were only held together by taut, warm skin.

  “Good, I told you you’d be glad you started a fire. Now, sit.” Charm may not have been her strong suit, but she had obviously planned for his visit. She brought in a salmon roast from the bar-b-cue on the back porch. There were home-canned vegetables from her garden, and she proudly served a mixed Alaskan berry cobbler.

  Duncan ate more than he planned and enjoyed every bite. When he helped Nell clear the table and offered to wash the dishes she laughed. “No. You’re gonna get your fill of kitchen duty before the end of the summer. You go check the stove in the front room.”

  She waved him away from the kitchen, and he went into the untidy lodge room.

  On the far wall on either side of the dusty stone hearth were several trophy mounts of moose and caribou. Cobwebs swaged each set of antlers. A cozy collection of hard-worn leather club chairs complemented a long couch draped in Hudson’s Bay blankets.

  Stairs followed the wall to his left and opened onto a landing running the entire width of the building. A dusty black bear rug replete with bared teeth hung along the stair wall. Under the stairs were bookshelves, with books, native baskets and carved bone and jade native art.

  The alcove included a built-in office desk, the only reflection he’d seen of business operations. Ledger books with the year hand written on the spine of each one were lined up above the desk. He pulled the one for the year previous and flipped it open. Immediately he found addition errors and wondered how an accounting firm could possibly have done taxes every year.

  He went back through the kitchen and retrieved his loafers from the mud room, put them under the wood stove on the hearth, and then put another stick of wood on the fire. He stood at the windows. The sliver of sun was gone, but the sky still reflected enough light at nine-thirty to read a paper. A rosy glow peeked under the clouds in the west.

  As she came into the room, Nell said, “I don’t keep booze for the clients.” She was drying her hands on a small kitchen towel. “I’d need a license.” She folded the towel. “Besides, they get stupid. Do you drink scotch?”

  Duncan nodded. “I’ve been known to drink scotch.”

  Nell chuckled. “I keep a personal bottle. If we’re toasting an agreement, I’ll go get it.”

  Duncan nodded again. “Why don’t you do that?” At least he was only into this fiasco for half the money being thrown away.

  Nell returned with two glasses and a bottle of extraordinary Glen Livet. “To a deal.” She lifted her glass in a toast.

  Duncan lifted his glass. “To Carl.” I’m going to break every bone in his body. He nursed a single glass for two hours as Nell regaled him with funny and sometimes cautionary tales of life on Cotton Grass Lake.

  During one such story, Duncan stood and stoked the fire again. “Are the bugs really as bad as I hear?”

  “Oh, hell yes, if you aren’t prepared. And the man I was tell’n you about was an idiot to begin with. One of those guys with more money than brains.” Nell readjusted the orange-stripped cat on her lap and took a sip from her glass. “Everything he brought was brand new. The tent hadn’t ever been out of the package. He said he was an experienced camper, but sometimes folks from Outside just don’t have a clue.”

  Duncan reached to rotate his Italian leather loafers drying on the hearth under the woodstove. “Humm, imagine?”

  “Ya gotta watch out for ’um all the time. We’ve never had anybody die. Well, guests I mean. There’s always a few local fools willing to mix booze and snow machines.”

  “What about the experienced camper with the new tent?”

  “Oh, he set up his camp on the south end of the lake by the marsh. We told him it wasn’t a good idea. He told us he’d camped on three continents, real snotty like. The morning he got here he hiked out the old mine road. Said he was communing with nature, he had dinner here at the lodge and went back to his camp. The next morning about five he came banging on the door. Woke up everybody and the dog. ‘Get me outta this hell-hole. I don’t care what it takes’ he kept yelling.” Nell’s eyes twinkled as she related the rest of the story. “Poor fool was swoll up like a pumpkin. He couldn’t hardly see. It was too hot to crawl into his arctic weight sleeping bag. He didn’t believe in bug dope. Don’t ask me why he didn’t put some clothes on, it would’a helped. We called Charlie, and he flew out and took the fella to the hospital in Anchorage. He didn’t even break his camp down, said we could keep it all, he was never coming back.”

  “Kind of seems extreme. He just left all his stuff?”

  Nell drained her glass. “Half the resources in Alaska are here ’cause somebody didn’t want to take the time or money to haul ’um out.

  “Folks come to Alaska on vacation. They ooh and ahh and decide they gotta live here. They pack up the wife and a few kid
s and buy a piece of land on a lake and start to put up a cabin. The mosquitoes and the hard work and the freeze in June and the sixty mile commute, if there’s even a road, in freezing fog and the price of a gallon of milk put a whole new face on the beauty.” She slid the cat off her lap onto the floor and stood. “I’m goin’ to bed. Take any room upstairs.”

  “Do you want me to lock up?” Duncan reached to collect Nell’s empty glass from the coffee table.

  “Lock what up?” Nell squinted at Duncan. “There ain’t no locks. If they steal it where’re they gonna go with it?” She shuffled through the kitchen and down the hall.

  She had a point.

  Duncan walked into each room upstairs. They were cold and smelled of potpourri and dust the way an unused room can smell of disuse. A set of sheets were folded neatly on the foot of each bed. Duncan chose the room with one double bed. He made the bed, and the plump down comforter warmed him quickly. He slept without dreaming.

  Early the next morning, Duncan woke to the quiet. A breeze whistling through a crack in the almost open window sounded like the distant roar of a freeway. Occasionally the loose tarp on the roof snapped. He snuggled further under the down comforter and wished the fire would magically start itself. A full bladder convinced him to get up. The cold floor shocked his bare feet, and he slipped them, sockless, into the worn-out shearling slippers. His inappropriate shoes were still down stairs drying. Hell, when Carl said casual he didn’t explain. Casual here meant hardcore outdoor gear on steroids, lug soles, and down jackets.

  No wonder Hanna made fun of him. Now, there was a piece of work. She wasn’t like any woman he’d ever met. Fresh scrubbed face, rough hands, she didn’t walk, she seized each step. She was—what was she? Solid, but who could tell for sure under all those layers? Brown Carhartts snugged across her backside, and the ragged unhemmed edges of the legs looked as if she’d used a serrated knife to hack them off at the right length.

  Nothing like Victoria. The Amazing Victoria. The woman his mother had handpicked for him to spend his life with. Duncan couldn’t help remembering the scene at dinner three nights ago, or was it four?

  The evening hadn’t started well. “Mother, please, stop playing matchmaker for me,” Duncan had said.

  “Duncan, you simply must commit to this girl. She won’t wait forever you know. She’s perfect.”

  “Yes, Mother, I know she’s perfect. I like Vic, but we stopped dating in college. I haven’t even seen her since Christmas. Please, I just want to enjoy this meal with the two of you. I haven’t seen you in a month. I’ve made some decisions I want to tell to you about.”

  Pamela Mahoney had patted him on the cheek. “It’s nice to see you too, dear. With your new project right here in San Francisco, we’ll be able to have these little dinners more often.”

  “Right. About the project.” Duncan had twisted his glass, watching the ice float, unmoving in the tawny liquid. “One of the reasons I wanted to see you this evening has to do with this California project.

  “John’s death made me think about my life, the direction of my future. Carl has proposed a business venture I find very interesting right now.”

  His mother had glanced up and feigned surprise, “Oh, look who’s here.” She’d smiled warmly across the elegant dining room and watched the maître d’ guide Victoria, the caricature of her perfect daughter-in-law, toward them. Duncan could even see his mother’s vision of petite, perfect grandchildren dancing along behind.

  “Mom?” Duncan had lost his appetite. He turned in exasperation toward his father. “Dad.”

  Paul Mahoney had raised his empty glass toward a passing waiter. “Accept your fate my boy.”

  Duncan picked up his own glass, drained it, and raised it as well. “I’ve quit my job with Regent. I’m moving to Alaska. Carl and I bought a lodge. I’ll run it for the next six months, and we’ll sell it next year.”

  After his mother’s gasp of indignation, it had been a long, blurry evening, and successful too, apparently. They still hadn’t returned his calls.

  He’d been rude to Victoria, and he truly was sorry. She’d simply accepted a dinner invitation. On the other hand, she had to know what his mother had planned.

  Duncan crept out the door and down the landing onto the stairs. The orange tabby he’d met last night was curled on the hearth and immediately came across the living room to meet him at the bottom of the stairs. Duncan didn’t much like cats. This one stalked into the kitchen and paced expectantly in a tight circle. A rumbling purr all but echoed into the room.

  Duncan passed through the kitchen toward the back door. The cat rubbed his chin against the corner of the cabinets.

  Duncan said quietly, “I’m still a guest, leave me alone.” When he returned from his brisk walk to the outhouse, he tested the kettle of water for fullness and lit the stove. The propane caught, and he walked down the short hall toward what he deduced was Nell’s bedroom. She lay with her hair spread across the pillow, her chest rose and fell in deep sleep. Sliding the door closed, he went back to the kitchen. While Duncan waited for the water to boil, he considered the kitchen. The cabinets had been made of home sawed lumber and were sturdy but in desperate need of paint and hot soapy water. Not necessarily in that order. There were sad, dirty little curtains made to cover the bottom cabinets. He pushed one aside to assess the pots and dishes. The painted plywood floor was chipped and worn completely off in spots.

  The orange tabby made an impatient meow and sat, watching him open and close drawers and peer into the dark pantry as he looked for the things he needed to start the coffee ritual. The cat’s wide, yellow eyes bored into the side of Duncan’s head and its stubby ears twitched. “What?”

  “His name is Frosty,” Hanna said from behind him.

  Duncan turned with a start. “Where did you come from?” he asked softly. She was prettier this morning. Yesterday’s painfully overloaded senses were back to normal. He also noticed she wore no make-up, and quite honestly didn’t need any.

  “I’m an early riser. My cabin isn’t far.” Her stocking feet padded into the room, and she sat on a tall stool at the counter.

  “How come his ears look all chopped off?” Duncan asked.

  “Frostbite.” Hanna shrugged. “Alaska’s hard on critters.”

  “Humm.” Duncan nodded down the hall. “She’s still asleep.” He finished measuring the coffee into a large French press, and the kettle started to squeal just as he grabbed it with a potholder. “I closed her door when I got up, and she didn’t move a muscle.”

  Meow. The cat curled figure eights around the stool Hanna was sitting on.

  She slid off the stool and with sure, graceful movements waved the impatient cat out of the way. She took out a scoop of cat food from a covered bucket, in the one cabinet he hadn’t inspected, and took it into the mudroom by the back door. Duncan heard the tinkle of the pellets hit a tin pan. Then, the back door opened and closed as Hanna went out.

  He got another mug off the pegs covering the back splash of the counter. Interesting woman. He liked interesting women.

  ****

  When Hanna returned, a mug of coffee was waiting on the drain board. She picked it up and quietly carried the armload of wood she’d brought with her into the lodge room and dropped it into the wood box by the hearth. “Thanks for the coffee.”

  “My pleasure.” Duncan stood with his back to her, looking out the large windows toward the lake. His head jerked and bobbed as he strained to see something, and Hanna walked up close to him to see as well.

  “Moose,” she said. “Cow and last year’s calf.”

  “They’re so big.” His eyes danced with the excitement a tourist had when seeing the rough, gangly animals for the first time. The snow had melted into a wide circle around a tree. The calf crawled on his knees grazing in an open patch of sprangled dry grass and twigs next to the spruce tree.

  “And unpredictable and dangerous.” She added, “Never trust one, never.”

&nb
sp; “Carl said this would be a good place to get a better handle on my life. He didn’t tell me everyone would be so serious.” Duncan’s eyes sparkled.

  Did she see a hint of humor? It was a better start to the day than with yesterday’s uptight jerk.

  “Is changing your life why you bought the lodge?” Her grandmother in Dillingham would never have asked such a personal question. Old cultural habits are like carrying old baggage, so Hanna had to force herself not to be too reserved. “Last night I thought about Carl. We hung out a few times while he was here at the lake. He was a big help for Harry and Nell. Harry was very sick, he died in late fall. They would have had to close up if not for Carl. He could do just about anything.”

  “Yes, Carl’s accomplished all right.” His eyebrows lifted, and he puffed through narrowed lips. “He once told me how to tell the difference between seven different kinds of hammers. Hammers, who knew?”

  She nodded. “He had some great stories from college, too. You were part of an odd threesome, right? He was the blue-collar, school and work for twenty-four-seven guy. There was the partial trust fund guy and one was mister mega-bucks…”

  Duncan lifted his cup in salute, “That, would be me.”

  “Which one of you had dozens of car wrecks? Dozens. Now, that was an amazing story.”

  Duncan’s eyes widened in mock innocence. “But, I only totaled three of those cars. The rest were just a nuisance for the family lawyer.”

  “Euuw, Mr. GQ is a poor little rich bad-boy.”

  “Fast cars were my drug of choice.” Duncan closed his eyes briefly. “I OD’d on the last one and spent three months in traction.”

  “You’ve changed your image—I hope.” After this morning she anticipated a changed man from the boy he described.

  “Yeah, didn’t have much choice, really.” Duncan drank from the cup. “The wreck got my attention. I had some growing up to do. During a year’s worth of physical therapy, John and Carl kept me grounded while I got my act together. They were the brothers my parents never gave me. They wouldn’t let me get away with anything.”