“I'll wait for you here, outside the lodge,” Logan said.
Agent Jack lurked right next to him, making no pretense about his presence. He was not here primarily to ski, and neither was he making sure Faye was all right. He was baby-sitting me. It was time to make it clear to Jack that I didn't need a nanny, and to Logan that I was not his date. “No, you fellas go on with the others,” I said firmly. “I'm going to work on the basics. You go on up and carve yourselves some mountain.”
Logan's brow knit briefly and then unknit. He said, “Okay, but let's get together later on. Meet here for lunch at eleven-thirty, avoid the rush.”
“Fine.”
Logan left. As I watched him glide away, I thought,
Em, you are an idiot.
That thought was underscored ten seconds later as I turned and saw Ray arriving from the parking lot. With Katie. And Ava. And the “friend” from Saint George. I was out of my bindings and into the lodge quicker than a coyote with its tail on fire. I completely forgot about Jack Sampler.
“Faye,” I gasped when I'd finally found her, having somehow navigated a staircase with my feet locked up in those iron maidens they call ski boots. “Ray's here.”
She was bending over one in a line of sinks, rinsing her mouth.
She looked slightly green. “Ung,” she grunted. “This could be interesting.”
“Noooo, no no no no. Interesting, I do not need. Ix-nay on the interesting-ay.”
Faye gave me a long, grouchy look. “Of all the juke joints he had toâ”
I spoke quickly. “Fact is, I knew he was coming here today. He said he was taking his sister Katie. But I figured they'd be at the top of the mountain already and I could just stay down on the beginner's slopes and stay out of trouble. But it's worse. He's got his mother with him, andâ” I almost gagged on my words, because just then, Ava walked into the bathroom.
When Ava saw me, she came to an abrupt halt, stared at me, then straightened her jacket, gave me a prim smile, and, with evident discomfort, murmured, “Em, how are you. I thought you didn't like skiing, dear.”
So that's how this is going to be,
I decided.
I'm going to be held accountable for being in a public place where she does not want to find me.
I thought of saying, Don't worry, I won't mess with your precious son, but I figured that such candor would about tear things, if there was anything left to tear. So instead, I blurted out something more factual, which was, “This was Faye's idea. You remember my friend Faye?”
Faye straightened up to her full five-foot-ten and turned to face Ava with an austere smile, one queen to another. “Good morning, Ava. I didn't know you skied,” she said, her eyelids suddenly grown heavy. “What fun. Perhaps you'd like to join us. I've brought Em up here to socialize with some of my geological colleagues, a memorial to Dr. Smeeth. Em's getting quite involved with this earthquake thing, you know.”
Faye's words had a surprising effect on Ava. She flinched and shot a nervous look my way. Whatever had caused that reaction, she quickly covered it. “Oh. How interesting. No thank you. I just needed to ⦠ah ⦠get some tissue.” This she did, grabbing
a strip of toilet paper out of the nearest stall as quick as a chicken nailing a june bug. She waved it at us as if to prove that was what she had had in mind and scarpered. Zip. Vanished. Gone.
Faye narrowed her eyes and folded her arms across her chest. “Now, is it just me, or did you-all notice anything funny in that behavior?”
“Hmm. Dunno, but if all she wanted was to swipe a bit of TP, then why was she taking her jacket off and unzipping her swanky bib overalls on the way in here?”
Faye smiled like a cat. “Why, Emmy B., you're a right âun. It looked for all the world like Mizz Ava was in some kinda hurry getting herse'f ready to pee, and here she done run for it the minute she seen you.”
“No, the minute you saidâwhat was it you said?”
“Something about geologists. Or earthquakes.”
“Yeah.” I started to laugh giddily.
“What's so funny?”
“I must be flunking Buddhism one oh one, because I'm having this nasty thought: I want to see Ava trying to take that first run still needing to relieve herself that badly.”
Faye pursed her lips, still watching the doorway through which Ava had appeared and so quickly disappeared. “Even Buddhists have their days, dear heart.” Then she turned and looked at me. “And not to confuse the uses of the word, but if you're thinking that, then I'd say you're a little bit pissed yourself.”
I found I could not meet her gaze. “Yep,” I said through my teeth. “More than a little bit.”
“Figured out yet who you're pissed at?”
It is not always easy being Faye's friend. I considered ignoring her question, but I reached down inside and took a look at that burning coal I called a heart and said, “I am mad at Ava, and I'm not sure why. Hell, I'm mad at the whole damned family.” I took a breath. “And at Ray.”
“You figure out yet what you're going to do about it?”
The image of a fleeing rabbit zigged across my brain. “No,” I answered. “But whatever it is, I reckon I'm going to have to do it soon.”
THE THING WAS, I HADN'T TOLD FAYE YET ABOUT THE woman I'd seen Ray flirting with in Ava's kitchen. Because old friend, new girlfriend, or whoever the woman in the kitchen was to Ray, that was exactly what he had been doing with her, and that was a humiliation I had to face. I hadn't told Faye because, even though she was a dear, dependable friend, there had been a limit to the amount of confession my pride could endure all at once. Hell, the evening before, I hadn't even been ready to admit the truth of Ray's behavior to myself.
“Faye,” I said as we ski bootâhobbled up the stairs from the bathroom together, “there's something I got to tell you. Let's go into the restaurant here. I'll spring for the tea.”
“Great. Let's sit out there on the deck.”
“Noooo. Inside. Out of sight.”
Faye said, “Listen, Em, you have every bit as much right to be here as he does.”
“That is currently not the point.” We were at the top of the stairs. There stood Agent Jack Sampler, bubba turned ski dude, waiting for us. For me. I gave him a weary flick of a smile.
He nodded.
“Gimme a minute, Jack,” I said.
I sat Faye down and got the teas. When I had maneuvered
myself into another chair at the same table, I told her about the scene Monday evening in Ava's kitchen.
Faye began to nod her head in wide arcs, very slowly. “Ooooooh, now I see. If Ava looks that squirmy, you think it's because the âfriend' from Saint George is out there with Ray and she doesn't want you all to meet.”
“Precisely. They're out there all right. And neither do I want to meet them. Faye, I'm not tough enough. And there's more.” I told her about the uncomfortable dinner with Ray the evening before, and about his confrontation with his brother-in-law Enos Harkness.
Faye shook her head side to side and said, “Weeeeeeeird.”
“Yeah, and now Ava's jumping like a cat on a hot griddle when she sees me, and running for the high timber when you say something about earthquakes. I have no idea what this all means, but I'm telling you, instinct tells me to play it kind of cagey just now.”
“Gotcha.”
“Yeah. So let's send Agent Jack here up the hill to get a pail of water or something and go sit in the car until we're supposed to meet Logan and the others at eleven-thirty. Ray and his family will have cleared out of the lower slopes by then, because they'll no doubt have their lunch at the upper lodge, halfway up the mountain. Much more romantic,” I said, unable to keep a trace of bitterness out of my voice.
Faye was looking out the window at nothing, or so I thought. Her eyes had taken on a thousand-yard stare. “No, I'm staying here. We came in Logan's car, remember? And he locked it. But listen, you and Jack go back up the east lift and get some practice in, try to have fun.”
“But what ifâ”
“No, I really don't think you have that particular problem to worry about at this instant. What's Ray's poisonous sister look like? I've never had the pleasure.”
“Dark, like Ray. Almost his height. Athletic build.”
“Any of his sisters blond?”
“No.”
“How about Honeycup Saint George?”
“Blond, shorter, softly shaped. A real pink-and-powder blue type. Why?”
“Because someone answering to that second description just got on one of the other lifts with Ray. They're going for the upper mountain, just as you said. You go back up the lift to the east.”
“But what if they change their minds and come down that slope? Faye, I can't see him here, especially not with her!”
She picked her fanny pack up off the floor, pulled out a trail map for the ski area, and consulted it. “It looks like ⦠they could possibly do that, but it's highly unlikely. Look, you go on up the east lift. Take Jack. He's trained in everything from bodyguard to lounge lizard, by the looks of him, and it's obvious he's here to look after you. For some reason that you and Tom are not telling me, I might add. I'll just sit out there on the balcony and keep an eye on things.”
“But what if they do come down the same slope? Faye, I'd shit little green nuggets! She's all pink and blue and blond and I'm the bag lady who got loose in the smart set.”
Faye patted my hand, then opened the pack and pulled out what looked like a little transistor radio with a fat antenna a few inches long. “Take this. I'll have its mate.” She showed me that there was another still in the pack. “Set it for channel ⦠let's see ⦠twelve. Privacy code ⦠ten.” She fiddled with the dials, bringing the numbers up bright and clear on the displays. “Yeah, that doesn't have any traffic on it. You turn it on here, set the squelch there. Carry it in your breast pocket. If I see them coming down the hill, I'll give you a holler.”
The thing suddenly spoke to me, but the voices were faint. “Who's that?” I asked Faye.
“Don't know,” said Faye. “Here, if that bothers you, I'll change the channel. How about good old thirteen?”
“Isn't that bad luck?” I asked bleakly.
“No. But everybody else thinks so, so we'll probably have it all to ourselves. These things are getting popular on the slopes.”
I hefted the little radio, still uncertain.
Faye unbuckled her boots and put her stocking feet up on another chair. “You'll be better hidden on the beginner's slopes, and God knows, you need the practice. Me, I've got a date with a saltine cracker and a crossword puzzle.” She unfolded a sheet of newspaper out of her pack, pulled a out a short pencil, and bent to her work.
“You sure figured all the contingencies,” I snarled.
She didn't even look up. “Someday you'll thank me. Now git.”
I was starting to get as steamed at Faye as I now felt at Ava. However well intended her harebrained scheme to improve my love life or broaden my professional network had started out, she now had me up a canyon with no personal means of escape, looking stupid in bad ski clothes and falling off of chairlifts, and with no one but the unnerving Jack Sampler to look stupid with because she had the tummy crummies. Without saying good-bye, I headed for the door. Agent Jack fell in a few paces behind me as I stomped out onto the deck of the lodge.
It being my day for bad luck, I took one stride outside the door and bumped right into Katie. Literally.
Wham.
Dropped the damned radio. I was so awkward in those ski boots that it took me a moment to squat down and reach for the thing.
Katie was dressed in fuchsia from head to toe, but was still in her street boots, so she was quicker than I was, quicker even than Jack, being another of the Raymond family athletes. She ran five miles each morning, and it showed. She was as trim and muscly as a sprinter. She bent down and snatched the thing up before I could get my hand even six inches from it and examined
it with interest. “Very fancy,” she said. “These radios are all the rage now. I didn't think
you
would have one.”
I forced myself to take a deep breath before replying, during which time I got past my urge to say, Go piss up a rope, but, mentally chanting one of Faye's mantras about putting myself in my opponent's shoes, I told myself that Katie was probably ⦠threatened by me, so I managed to say nothing.
This woman's husband had to be disciplined in public for not coming home often enough. And she's had to move back in with her mother. She's on edge, spoiling for a fight. I won't give her one.
Agent Jack sidled up next to me and measured Katie up and down. He said nothing. Just then, I was damned glad that he was big and burly and, for the moment at least, downright presentable.
Katie ignored Jack and looked
me
up and down. “Nice outfit, Em,” she drawled. “Why aren't you wearing that nice pink sweater I had Ray buy for you for Christmas?”
Again, I said nothing. I do admit that I indulged myself in snapping my sunglasses down from the top of my head to the place where they belonged. No reason not to look as intimidating as possible.
Katie still held the radio. She said, “Let me guess. Ray told you he was coming up here, so you had to tag along, huh?” She still ignored Jack Sampler. Clearly, she was not as easily cowed as her mother. She was going to hold on to my radio and keep on dishing out barbs until I said something back. It took everything I had not to react. But I decided that there was no harm in seeing if the words
geologist
and
earthquake
would have had the same effect on Katie as they'd had on Ava. I took one more deep breath and said, “No, that's not how it is, Katie. I'm up here with a bunch of geologists.” This got no particular reaction from her, so I added, “Who study earthquakes.”
Jack Sampler now reached out one of his big meaty hands and
locked it around my upper arm, reminding me that I was skating pretty damned close to topics I was not supposed to discuss.
Now Katie could not avoid noticing Jack's presence, and I wondered how she was going to play it. Would she threaten to tell Ray that I was there with another man? No, her gaze shifted to the hand that gripped my arm, but she still refused to look him in the eye. She said, “You mean you're hanging out with the guys who think Heavenly Father's going to open up a big crack in the ground and swallow Salt Lake City.” She laughed unpleasantly. “Yeah, Enos told me about that earthquake stuff. Well, maybe that's going to happen, but not until
we
're done with it.”
She had emphasized
we
not to include me, but to indicate the Mormons, the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-Day Saints. She was testifying to her belief that the Earth was in its latter days, its last millennium, or whatever the particular spin was. The Earth would be destroyed and some would go to heaven and the rest of us ⦠well,
pfft.
I didn't need to take a deep breath this time. For all the impact her words were having on me, I may as well have been watching a barking dog on closed-circuit TV; her intentions might be questionable, even frightening, but her beliefs were merely disturbing.
Now Jack spoke. “Thanks for picking up her radio,” he said. He reached out a hand, palm-up.
She dropped the radio onto it, still refusing to look at him.
“Thanks,” he said, and began to draw me gently but firmly away.
Following his lead, I lumbered ungracefully across the deck and away from the lodge, stepped into my bindings, picked up my poles, and headed for the lift. Foolish me, I thought I'd won that round. I did not know yet that Katie was carrying an identical radio.
Â
Â
As I SAT down in the chairlift, I turned to the center, it being an old center-pole lift, and gave Jack a nod. “Hello,” I said. “Thanks for the help back there.”
“Hello to you,” he replied, making light of things. “The name's Jack Sampler, from Howe's Bayou, Louisiana. Just up here for a spot of skiing. You?”
“Em Hansen. Chugwater, Wyoming. Just up here to bruise myâoh, you know the parts.”
Jack chuckled. “Not much of a skierâis that what you're trying to say?”
“Rotten. In fact, I hate the sport.”
This seemed to tickle Jack Sampler back into bubba mode. “Well now, that's great. I like an honest gal. Well, why'n't you ski with me for a while? Maybe I can show you a thing or two.”
I said, “Mr. Sampler, sir, I'm so full of vinegar just now, I'd probably curdle your whole day.”
“Nonsense.” His tone shifted back. “So who was the chick with the nasty disposition back there by the lodge?”
“Katie Harkness. My boyfriend's sister. She never has liked me.”
“Is that Harkness of the Salt Lake Harknesses?”
I squinted at Jack, trying to figure out what he was really up to. “Damned if I know. Her husband's name is Enos. Why, you grow up around here and learn to hate him in Eagle Scouts or something?”
He shook his head. “No'm. I done growed up in Mudlump, Mississippi, like I said. It's right down the road fromâ”
“Okay, that's enough.” I turned my face away, stared into the rocks and leafless aspen trees past which the lift was now carrying us.
Jack gave me a friendly elbow in the ribs. “Lookee here, there's an art to skiing. First, you got to enjoy the ride up the mountain. Here, take your sunglasses off so you can see the true
color of the snow. Yeah. I like them blue shadows on the sparkly white. Ent it purty?”
I did as he said, and smiled, even though the glare hurt my eyes and the cold made them tear. We were high up now, passing the upper limbs of a grove of evergreens. Down below, the snow did indeed sparkle, and the icy air seemed to stand like mute spirits between the trees.
Which in turn made me melancholy in a new way, as it brought to mind the people who had lived here ages before my fellow whites came and broke the quiet with our progress. I wondered what the valley had been like before it was carved up for ski trails and jacked full of monsters like Katie in brash synthetic clothing and discontented people like me, whisking along on iron seats through the silence of the trees. I decided that the Indians most likely never saw the mountain with snow on it. The Indians might have padded through here in moccasins, hunting mule deer in the summers, but through the frozen months, the mice and the trees would have had the mountain to themselves. Had the trees and tiny rodents felt the giant earthquakes Hugh Buttons spoke of? What would that have been like? In the winters, strong shaking might have loosed avalanches, but there would have been no one here but the mice to suffer. The ancestors of these trees might have swayed, and a few rocks might have rolled from the heights, but there were no brick homes or soaring skyscrapers to fall on the first Americans.