Cotton Grass Lodge

by Woodbury, DeNise

  Her question wrinkled Duncan’s forehead. “Yes.” He tried to remember what happened last night, a door left ajar, a light left on, he’d gotten distracted and—

  “You didn’t get the bag all the way to the garbage shed.” There was the look again. “’Cause Nameless has it strewn all to hell and gone over the lane by the machine shed. I’m not pickin’ it up, and aren’t you glad it was the dog and not a bear?”

  The way she’d appropriated his kitchen and her smart mouth might have garnered a trip into the personnel department in San Francisco, but Duncan was eternally grateful. He put the coffee cup down and went out the back to pick up the offensive garbage.

  A few minutes later, he came back into the kitchen and washed up. His hand worried absently at three angry mosquito bites on his forehead.

  On June first, when Nell returned with the groceries, she’d gone to her old bedroom. She’d never questioned where she was going to sleep, she just complained about the new paint. The ensuing argument escalated to a shouting match. It only stopped because of Duncan’s sensitivity to his customers perceptions. All they saw was him being mean to the old lady.

  Duncan had spent the last six agitated nights in a room in the unfinished bunkhouse. A room with no screens.

  “Do you have anything in particular for me to do today?” Alice asked.

  Duncan considered for a minute. “Yes, when Nell gets up, your job for the day is to keep her as far away from me as possible. Do some kind of soup for lunch and have salmon salad for sandwiches. Tom is supposed to be sober enough to show up today, so I plan to work with him on the bunkhouse.” Duncan took his cup and went out onto the front porch to contemplate his day. Alice was working out very well.

  The gray morning held the sound of a loon echoing across the lake. A welcome drizzle overnight had washed the dust off everything around the lake. A cow moose and her new calf browsed on alders at the edge of the yard.

  His heart leaped when Hanna walked out of the brush from the direction of her cabin. She stopped walking and cautiously appraised the leggy cow. Then she continued her approach making a wide detour away from the animal.

  “Good morning,” Hanna said as she mounted the steps and joined him. The mist had gathered on the fine hair around her face, and it sparkled like a tiny tiara.

  “Good morning yourself.” Duncan liked the way she moved. He wished he could see how she looked in something besides Carhartts. “Coffee?”

  “Nope, thanks. I’ve had all I need. Is Nell leaving today?”

  “I don’t know.” Duncan scrubbed a hand over his face and found the sore, itchy bug bites. “She’s like one of these.”

  Hanna scrunched her face up in sympathy. “I’ll bring you some salve. I have a friend who makes organic ointment. It takes the itch away.” She whispered, “Might not work on Nell, though.”

  Duncan took a deep breath. “What am I going to do with her? I’ve left several messages for her daughter in Wasilla. I haven’t heard back, yet.” His pulse raced, he was going to need pills for high blood pressure at this rate. Why didn’t Nell’s family do something? Didn’t they care enough to call him back? “Do you know her kids? Are they idiots?”

  “No. Busy I guess. Look, I’m leaving for Anchorage this morning.” Hanna moved from where she leaned against the porch rail to the chair across the small table from Duncan. “Do you want me to take her with me?”

  “I’d jump at the chance to have her gone. But, no. If no one’s going to be there to pick her up, she’s better off here. Damn it.”

  “After today, I’ll be gone for a couple of weeks, maybe longer,” Hanna said. “Charlie will be making the flights up here. Like I said before, you’re welcome to use my guest cabin in a pinch. I was going to have Alice house-sit at my place. Then, if it looks like you won’t need it, she and Emily can move into the little cabin for the rest of the summer.”

  “Thanks,” Duncan said. “She has a long way to come down the lake from Jacob’s.”

  His heart pounded with curiosity and disappointment. “Where are you going to be gone to for longer than two weeks? You’ve gotten to be a fixture around here. I’ll miss you.”

  Hanna’s eyes widened. “Why, Mr. Mahoney. Have you changed your mind about me?”

  “Yes, have you changed your mind about me?” Had he really said it out loud? He liked her more than he wanted to admit.

  “No.” But there was a smile on her face. “I’ll be gone to my real job, and then I’m covering for one of the other pilots.” She grinned. “It’s a nice trade. Extra hours mean more savings, and by the end of the summer, I’ll have the money for my own plane. And he’s fishing with my uncle in Bristol Bay, so I’ll have fish for my freezer, too.”

  Alice came to the door. “Duncan, there’s a call for you.”

  Duncan reluctantly pulled himself away from his conversation with Hanna and went to answer the call. The smell of toast drifted over him as he crossed toward the desk under the stairs.

  Tom nodded at him from the kitchen. He hadn’t been able to work at all yesterday. His blood-shot unkempt look didn’t bode well for today, either.

  “This is Duncan. How can I help you?”

  “This is Nell’s daughter, Petra Ivan. We got your message. My husband and I will be coming out to the lake to talk to Mother today.”

  “Talk to her? She doesn’t live here anymore.” Duncan deliberately controlled the tone of his voice. “You really need to come get her.”

  The woman’s shrill exclamation took Duncan’s breath. “Get her? She has a deal with you to stay on for the rest of the year.”

  Duncan slid fifteen years of cold businessman into place. “We have no such deal. There has never been such a deal. I verbally agreed to let her come and visit whenever she wanted to but in essence she never left.” Duncan hardened his tone. “There is no other agreement. The woman has to leave.” Understanding only went so far. Nell charged flights and groceries and taxis and even a hotel room in Anchorage to the lodge account.

  “I should know what she told me.” The woman continued her fury filled rant. “You got that lodge for a song. You took advantage of an old lady, but you aren’t going to walk on the rest of the family. We might just contest the sale.”

  “You can waste your time and money, but I own the Cotton Grass Lodge. Nell is no longer welcome.” Duncan decided Nell’s daughter lived in the strange parallel universe her mother lived in. Before he could say anything else the phone went dead.

  He pinched his eyes shut for a moment, annoyed. Hanging up the phone he went out the back door of the lodge.

  “What’s up, Boss?” Tom asked from where he sat on the back porch step nursing a cup of coffee.

  “Don’t call me that.” Duncan didn’t want his foul mood to slop over on Tom, but he’d been forced into manager-mode too early in the day. “We’re going to throw a lot of effort into the bunkhouse.” Duncan reminded his hand not to scratch the irritating bites on his forehead. “If you’d start, I’ll get the guests squared away and join you as soon as I can.”

  Tom nodded and took a drink from his coffee cup. His hand shook, and his puffy face seemed off color.

  “Are you going to make the day?” Duncan asked. Duncan liked Tom. Except for once a week or so, when he was too hung over to show up.

  “Sure. Just need another cup of coffee. I’m fine.”

  “And some food. Eat something before you get on the roof. That’s an order,” Duncan said.

  Tom may have been easy to work with, and he was a patient teacher. Duncan needed his patience, what he didn’t need was Tom falling off the roof

  Tom followed Duncan into the lodge. The CB radio crackled at more or less the appointed time, he talked to Mathew and confirmed a fishing trip for the couple who unexpectedly showed up last night.

  They’d been visiting the cabin of friends on the other side of the lake. When they ran out of gas for the generator and propane for the stove, all at the same time, the fun of roughing it
was gone. They had dinner at the lodge, booked a room for the night, and a flight to Willow after their fishing trip.

  The informal way things got done at the lake made Duncan uncomfortable a month ago. Now, impromptu vacationers hardly fazed him. Duncan wondered what he would think by September.

  So far the only real problems he couldn’t fix with a joke or an extra piece of pie was the weather—and Nell.

  Chapter 12

  When Hanna finished talking to Alice about house sitting at her cabin for the next two weeks, she went down to the plane and called Charlie on the airplane radio. She finished her pre-flight and went back to the lodge.

  “Duncan.” Hanna motioned to him to come out of the dining room. “The plane’s ready for your guests.” She smiled. “Do you have window screen on your list?”

  Duncan lifted his hand to roughly handle the red welts on his forehead. “Yes.”

  “I talked to Charlie and confirmed my schedule. Nell’s daughter had already called the office, and she’s coming out here this afternoon, are you going to tell Nell?”

  Hanna looked over his shoulder and watched Nell, still in her nightgown, pouring juice for one of the guests at the breakfast table.

  “Great.” He shrugged. “I guess I’d better. She’s almost her old self this morning.” His fingers massaged his closed eyes and finished by working the muscles of his shoulder. “Her daughter’s really angry. I don’t know what Nell told her, but I can’t babysit for the rest of the summer. I feel like…” his voice trailed off as he shook his head.

  “You’ve been more than kind, maybe this time Petra will see how bad Nell has gotten.” Hanna went back into the dining room where Nell lectured on the importance of a good breakfast.

  Duncan had gone out of his way to be considerate of Nell. Hanna loved the woman Nell used to be, but the progression of this dementia was unsettling and Duncan hadn’t known Nell before. His compassion now made him even more admirable.

  Hanna stood at the head of the table and made her announcement, “Folks, I’ll be leaving for Anchorage as soon as you’re finished with breakfast. The weather may not hold, so I don’t want to wait any later in the morning.”

  “Will we miss our flight to Seattle?” A woman clutched her husband’s arm. “Should we leave now?”

  Hanna reassured, “We’re on schedule. I just don’t want to wait too long.”

  While Hanna fielded a flurry of other questions, Duncan drew Nell into the living room. She watched sympathetically.

  “She’s come’n out here today?” Nell said, her voice carrying into the breakfast area. “Well, won’t it be nice. I haven’t seen her in months.”

  Hanna listened. Duncan’s voice, level and smooth, caressed the back of her neck and ran warmth down the back of her arms. “Nell, you were in Wasilla, at your daughter’s house, in May.”

  “Pufp, I ain’t seen her in months. I’d remember—she is my daughter you know.”

  ****

  After she’d flown the guests back to Charlie’s Air Service, Hanna dawdled in the office.

  “What the hell are you hangin’ around for?” Charlie asked. “Thought you had things to do before you go to work tomorrow morning.”

  “Don’t you want me to finish my paperwork?”

  “Paperwork, hell. What are you waitin’ on?” He snapped the newspaper he had been reading and folded it to the next page. Dog lay beside him on the couch with her head in his lap.

  Hanna swiveled her chair to face him. “I hate when you flip me shit.”

  “Well?” Charlie couldn’t be subtle. It wasn’t in his nature. Hanna had liked his straight-forwardness when she started working for him at seventeen, but she wasn’t seventeen anymore. “Spit it out, girl.” He bent toward the engine cylinder at his feet to stub out the hand-rolled cigarette. It had been used as an ashtray for as long as Hanna had been around. Smoke rose and eddied around his knurled fingers.

  “I want to take the last run into Cotton Grass Lake this afternoon. I know I’m not on the schedule, but it’s not a bad day and—”

  Charlie interrupted, “It’s a shitty day. You got ragin’ hormones.”

  “I do not,” Hanna snapped indignantly. “Be nice to me.”

  “I’m not nice to anybody.” Charlie dropped the newspaper to fold itself beside him on the couch and got up. “Get the hell outta here and bring me a burger. The flight’s gonna leave at two. You gotta have the plane back tonight though. I run a business here, ya know?” Hanna listened to his boots scuffle into the hanger. Her heart warmed. If she’d known her father, she expected he’d be like Charlie.

  “Hey,” he called out, “let the damn dog out when ya leave.”

  Dog lifted her head and watched Charlie leave the room then she turned her head and gazed at the door. Hanna stood, patted her thigh. “Come on, Dog, let’s take a ride. I’ll buy you a burger too.”

  Dog slid off the couch and agreeably ambled on three legs toward the door.

  ****

  Nell’s daughter, Petra, and her husband got to the hanger at one-thirty. Hanna tried to keep a distant and professional attitude when they came into the office. She didn’t want to stick her nose into Duncan’s business, but Nell was becoming a problem, not only for Duncan but also for Charlie’s Air Service.

  Duncan was still willing to foot the bill for her flights out to the lodge, but Nell charged her taxi fare too, it came out of the till at the office until Duncan paid his bill.

  “We can get you under way just as soon as we get the flight paid for,” Charlie said to Petra.

  Petra’s husband waved a hand dismissively. “Just charge it to the account.” He turned and put a hand on the small of his wife’s back to steer her toward the door leading outside to the plane.

  “Ya’ll don’t have an account,” Charlie said.

  Petra whirled around. Her husband looked confused. “Of course we do. The lodge account.” The man seemed genuinely flummoxed.

  “Ya’ll aren’t on the lodge account. I’ve made exception for Nell lately because Duncan said to, but ya’ll ain’t on the list.”

  “My mother will have a fit, Charlie.” Nell’s daughter flushed, anger and frustration plain on her face. “How dare that man.”

  “Petra, I been flyin’ your family out to the lodge for a lotta years, but Nell don’t own it anymore. Are you goin’ or not?”

  “Momma said he was going to let it fall down, he doesn’t know anything about how it works out there. You know it was worth twice what he paid. He took advantage of her, and she didn’t tell us she was going to sell. We wanted her to scale back to just the summer season, but we didn’t think she would sell the whole thing.” The woman took a breath. “We’re thinking about contesting the whole damn sale. She must not have been in her right mind when he talked her into it. He’ll hit it with a coat of paint, and next year he’ll sell for more than we ever got.”

  “When was the last time you went out to visit your mom?” Hanna asked.

  “Momma usually comes to visit us. She needs to get away from all the hard work.”

  “Yes, but when was the last time you went out to the lodge?” Hanna persisted.

  “Last year sometime, but the generator went out, and we had to haul water, and I hate using an outhouse,” the woman said.

  “Nell replaced the generator two years ago,” Hanna emphasized. “Things have changed in two years.” Hanna’s throat tightened. She swallowed hard. It wasn’t like she needed to defend him. He wasn’t going to stay, and her stupid infatuation could only end in pain and humiliation. She was defending Charlie, and the business, and Nell.

  “Duncan Mahoney has worked like a dog since he bought the place in April, and Nell is slipping faster all the time. I’ll pay for your flight out. You can look around, and I’ll bring you back. Today. But only if you bring Nell with you.” Hanna blushed and blamed it on the confrontation.

  Charlie watched the transaction unfold and shook his head at Hanna, muttering under his breath
, “Ragin’ hormones.” He walked out into the hanger.

  Chapter 13

  Duncan stood up to stretch the cramp in his shirtless back. Even with the high overcast, the roof of the bunkhouse was hot and sweat tickled down his spine. He and Tom were almost finished screwing the new steel roofing down, one less thing to worry about.

  A plane came into view, and Duncan squinted and tried to recognize it. He decided he liked learning a new language, Cub, two-o-six, tail dragger, one-eighty-five, high-wing, the list went on and on and those were just the airplanes.

  “Duncan, my screw gun battery just quit.” Tom was out of sight on the other side of the roof.

  “I’m finished with this side. Here.” Duncan carefully walked up to the peak and slid the battery down a groove in the steel roofing into Tom’s waiting hand.

  “Thanks.” Tom in turn tossed his dead battery up to Duncan.

  “There’s a plane coming, I’ll go down to the strip. When you finish you can knock off for the day.” Duncan slipped into his shirt and carefully started down the roof to the ladder.

  Nell’s head popped up over the side of the building. “There’s a plane. Aren’t you going down to meet it? Do I have to do everything around here?”

  Duncan willed his heart back to a normal rhythm. “Nell, go down the ladder. Slow. I’m on my way.”

  “Well, hurry up. Hanna called and cleared her airspace, so it won’t be long. You can’t be lackadaisical when it comes to visitors.”

  “Charlie is making the afternoon run, Nell.”

  “I know what I heard. Don’t be a smart-aleck, or you’re gonna have a chat with your dad in the woodshed.” Nell got to the bottom of the ladder and waited.

  Duncan took his time favoring his tender knee. The pain didn’t offset his irritation. Once, just once could the woman leave and not come back?

  “Hurry up, what’s wrong with you?”

  Duncan gritted his teeth. He took a deep breath and begged Alice to forgive him. “Nell, our guests might need some refreshments. Why don’t you see what you can put together?”

  When Duncan got to the strip, the plane had turned around, and Hanna was helping a man and woman exit the plane. His throat constricted when he saw her. Nell had been right for a change.