Skin River1Flashlight beams play in the dark spaces between the trees as the search party fans out. Its movement forward is slow. The men stop to check the uneven ground, regain their sense of direction, and brush moths from their faces. The air hums. On all sides mosquitoes spin together in patches, and walking through them is like breaking through a series of thin nets. Here the forest is choked with weeds, and their decomposition smells polluted. Floating particles make the air fizz. Breathing in stings. Faint through the moisture, a wisp of marijuana smoke drifts like the mark of a sailboat in an otherwise empty harbor.Hidden ten feet beyond the reach of the flashlights, a man who calls himself Goatskinner sucks the last life from a joint he holds daintily on the end of a toothpick. The tiny paper flares and disappears. Comfortable in the dark, he stretches back on the hood of the car. He rubs the warm tip of the toothpick with his thumb, then tucks it between his molars, biting down and tasting the smokiness in the wood. The man relaxes, and as the car takes his full bulk, the shocks creak. Large bugs land and walk on his powerful chest. They travel in erratic paths across him. When they buzz, the electricity in their feathery legs and wings tickles like new hair growing beneath his shirt. The lights approach, sweeping the trees that form a lush, broken fence between him and the men aiming the beams. For a lingering moment, splintered light enters through the gaps in the leaves, making the car seem to glow.With his eyes half-open he witnesses the transformation. The plant life surrounding him changes to black and haunted shapes. His body and the stolen Pontiac turn a faded, milky green. He thinks that he can hear, in the distance, the ocean. Impossible because they are more than a thousand miles from salt water.Inside the Pontiac, the girl has regained consciousness. He perceives her terror as if it were a vibration in the ground or colored smoke gliding through the cars open windows. The men with the lights are calling out her name. Neighbors voices mixed with the hoarse shouts of her father, brothers, and boyfriend. The man has confidence in the rope and tape holding her quiet across the length of the backseat. The inevitability of what will happen during the rest of the night is so fixed it feels like the past to him.“The only one not afraid of the woods tonight is me.”His voice is loud but drowned out by the noise from the search party. It isnt clear if hes speaking to the girl or to himself. He stares with true interest at the insects settling on him, the flat ones like buttons on his skin. He wants to laugh, but the lights move on.Instead, Goatskinner sleeps.
Buddy Bayes cabin faced Dark Cloud Lake to the south, and to the west, past the one cabin wall that had no window, the Skin River fed the lake and provided a good location for fishing all year long. It took Buddy ten minutes to negotiate the path, overgrown with summer brush, as it hooked and dropped gradually from the side of the cabin to the river mouth. If he had wanted to, he could have taken a hatchet and cleared the intrusive branches, made an easier walk for himself, but he preferred the look of the path the way it was. Just worn enough for the passage of a stocky man carrying two fishing rods, a clear plastic tackle box the size of a hardcover novel, and a soft cooler that fit a ham-and-cheese sandwich, two beers, and a blue ice pack.From early spring to late autumn, Buddy would hear the river before he saw it. The sound of its rush made his approach more tantalizing. The trees ended a couple of yards short of the riverside. At the place where the path led out, a clump of white birches grew. Buddy slipped past the final, waist-high green branches, and felt, as he always did at this point, like he had entered a private spot. Rocks lined the near bank. Buddy set down his equipment on a flat square boulder the size of a delivery truck. As he bent over, he saw the curlicues of snipped fishing line and muddy boot prints that stamped the rocks along this side of the river. It was no remote site, the water hardly pristine. Fallen branches and trash rolled along twenty feet down in the brown water. The number of vacationers using the Skin River increased every year.But this morning Buddy was alone and would not have to come up with small talk about weather changes, bait, and how pretty the sunrise looked. From his tackle box he chose a lure and picked up the longer of his two rods. He pushed the sleeves of his windbreaker back to his elbows. Buddy tied on the chartreuse spinner and cast it along the dark, submerged cracks in the rock.Light wind stirred the already warm morning air. To his left, the lakes tinsel waves sparkled. Buddy worked the lure smoothly as he walked toward the river mouth and back again to where his equipment lay. He kept his attention on his hands, feeling the action of the spinner blade as he pulled it through the water. He waited for the rap-rap-rap signifying a fish.The sun burned off the last traces of fog close to the ground. Across the lake, the sound of an outboard droned then vanished. Slow tension drew Buddys line taut and bent his rod. He snapped his arms upward and heard the loud clicks from his drag as line continued to go out. It didnt feel like a fish. He opened the reel to free spool. The rod straightened. Buddy watched his line peel away and sink into the current. Probably a snag. The river carried debris for miles.He waited a few seconds more. Sometimes the hook freed itself, untangled in the slack. Buddy broke his line there at least once a week. The river was tricky. It sucked your lure down between rocks and cut the line, or tied it fast to a hundred pounds of dead wood floating south. Buddy started to reel in. First the line came back easily. Warm drops flew off the reel onto his forearms. Then he felt what might have been a pull, and he yanked back. The resistance lessened. Buddy knew a large northern pike or a musky could be mistaken for a snag. Guides told stories about catching giants they thought were logs until the surface water blew up into froth.Whatever he snagged was coming in. Slowly.A cardinal exploded from a thicket behind him. The blur of red feathers passing overhead zapped Buddys concentration. By instinct, he slammed back on the rod. Bitten or stretched to the point of breaking, the end of the line whipped out of the river and sailed over Buddy into the space where, a second before, the bird had flown.As he gathered up his line to replace the lure, Buddy saw the cardinal spying on him from the vantage of a long spiral branch on the opposite bank. The cardinals slurred whistle dropped in with the sound of the flowing water. Its red body mimicked the shape of a flame. Buddy imagined the birds tiny eyes shimmering like oily beads. A jittery life poking the grass searching for the tips of worms. With small tools the creature met its needs. Buddy knelt next to his open tackle box and when he stood up, he noticed another fisherman, upriver.The man came nearer, keeping his head down and switching his gaze, back and forth, from the river to the trees. Buddy saw the man carried no sporting gear but gripped a two-way radio in his left hand. The other hand he raised to wave hello. The two men recognized each other.“Good morning, Vic.”“Wish I could say so, Buddy. I take it you havent heard the news about the Teagles girl?” Vic closed the remaining distance between them.“No, I havent.”They shook hands. Vics tone of voice said the situation was critical. He kept his smile in check. Both men skipped the protracted greeting of friendly neighbors in deference to the matter before them. Vic judged it to be serious, and Buddy trusted Vic enough to follow his lead.“Melissa. Thats her name. A good girl from what Ive heard. Home from college on summer break. Last night she goes out to Pee-Jays Pizza Shack to pick up dinner. And she never came home. Len and Marie drove to Pee-Jays. The kid working there said she didnt show. He still had their pizza in the warmer. That was two hours after she left the house. Len went home, dropped Marie off to call the sheriff, then he rode around hoping hed spot her car. He stayed out till eleven oclock or so. Marie called her boys and some friends. We were all there when he got back. We divided up. Searched all night long. Nothing. No car. No Melissa. Nobody who remembers seeing her.” Vic coughed. “Thats about where were at this morning.”Vic Presser owned a service station in town, and he was still wearing his uniform shirt. Sweat stains looped under his arms. The smell of engines clung to him. Buddy guessed he hadnt changed shirts since the previous day. Above Vics breast pocket, black cursive letters spelled out his name. Vic reached into the pocket and withdrew a cigarette from a flattened pack of Winstons. One days worth of grizzled beard roughened his chin. He clicked a green plastic lighter, sucked smoke deep into his lungs, and dropped one hand to his side. His other hand returned the lighter and pinched softly at the cigarette filter he held between his lips.“Theres no chance she just took off on a road trip without telling anyone? Maybe she went to meet a boyfriend, and they lost track of the time,” Buddy said.Vic shook his head. “Len says everything was normal. They were going to eat pizza and watch a movie on TV. Shes dating Bill Harkins son. Bill and his boy helped us with the search. The boy says he last talked to her yesterday. Noonish. They went swimming at the sandy beach right around the corner from here. He says things were good between them. Guess we cant know for sure. But something sure happened to her.”Buddy would have put his money on an ordinary explanation. He had seen small-town parents underestimate their kids ability to develop adult problems. They came into his place still trying to figure out what happened. To fathom how they got blind-sided by children who grew into the strangers living in their house. But there was probably an equal share of parents who lived apart from their offspring, numb to their problems, distracted, overcome by their own dissatisfaction with life. Blame cropped up on both sides. Either way, Buddy suspected that the girl was safe, if not sound. And her predicament, when it became clear, would probably be a familiar one.Both men let their gazes wander over the burnt blond grass at their ankles. Vic used his pinkie to dab at a speck of tobacco sticking to his tongue. The cardinals whistle repeated. Buddy asked if there was anything he could do.“Somebody who stops in at your place for a beer mightve seen something on the road. Ill get you her picture to post at the bar. Putting the word out might help. But, to tell you the honest truth, Bud, I really dont know what we can do. Wait and see. Thats about all at this point.”Buddy figured Vic to be the type used to fixing problems. A leaky trans, maybe a rattle in the exhaust, or a worn tire. Cars were mysteries he could solve. Vic fidgeted. Buddy guessed that looking for the Teagles daughter made him feel inept.Then Vic admitted hed been thinking about his own little girl, Tina, who lived with his ex-wife in Traverse City. Last Christmas she served him invisible food on miniature china plates from Santa Claus. He remembered the careful way she bent her wrist to pour him a cup of imaginary coffee. How he pretended to stir and drink it. The thought of losing a daughter was too horrible.Buddy felt Vic might be jumping the gun. It was still early. The Teagles girl hadnt been gone long.“Anyone check along this river yet?” Buddy asked his question as though the flowing water had materialized a moment ago.“Nope. I think Im the only one thats been this far away from town. Ive been over this stretch back to Ketchel Road, where I parked, but Im pretty tired. I mightve missed things. Hell, everythings starting to look out of place to me. I thought I saw something next to a stump way back there,” Vic jerked his thumb in the direction he had come from, “and, goddamn it, I swore Id found that girls body. Curled up naked in the dirt with her little knees and elbows sticking out. When I walked up to it … just a patch of wild mushrooms.” Vic massaged the side of his head with the palm of one hand. “Uh, Len and Marie must be going out of their minds. If it was my Tina …”Buddy detected Vics fatigue, and the guilt he was trying to push away. Buddy figured it was hard for a man like Vic to accept the secret gladness he was experiencing, knowing his own child was safe in another town. He offered to take up Vics part of the search.“Why dont you go home and sleep. Ill look around this side of the river from the sandy beach to the bridge, then Ill cross and walk back along the other side.”Vic nodded his thanks and said hed drop off Melissas picture at the bar. He handed over his radio, and Buddy watched him walk off until he rounded a big curve in the river.
Augustus Bodine uses his finger to scoop maraschino cherries from ajar. He adds them, one by one, to a drinking glass filled with Jack Daniels. Country music jangles from a cheap radio propped on the windowsill. He sinks the fourth piece of fruit, and the whiskey brims, the brown fluid swirling with cherry syrup.Augustus leans forward and, without touching the glass, sucks the top of the sweetened whiskey through his lips. He is at home, relaxing in his kitchen.Freshly showered, Augustus wears nothing but a soft, raggedy pair of jeans. His bare feet leave damp prints on the linoleum when he walks to the back door. Theres a lake breeze. But the stirred air is hot like a blow-dryer pointed in his face. He pushes his nose against the screen. His tongue darts out and licks the metal.A muffled clinking of musical chimes. Augustus steps back and turns to the interior of the house.“Just a minute,” he says. He reaches for a clean shirt draped over one of the kitchen chairs. He puts it on and fastens the buttons as he walks into the living room. From a tin on the coffee table, he picks up a mint wrapped in a twist of plastic. The chimes ring again.“Im coming,” Augustus answers. He scans the room for signs, but there are none. As he opens the front door, he crinkles the plastic off the candy and slides the mint into his mouth. A sheriffs deputy stands waiting in the cup of shade beneath his awning.
Buddy concealed his gear in the brush near the paths opening. When he backed his way out of the woods, a loose branch slapped the knuckles of his left hand, and a row of thorns nipped him. He used his handkerchief to wipe the dots of blood. The two-way radio clipped to his belt crackled with static, followed by the voice of a man and an engulfing swoosh of interference. Buddy couldnt make out what the voice said. He unclipped the radio, turned the volume down, and transferred it to his bleeding hand.New droplets replaced those he had cleaned away. He kept the handkerchief pressed down over his wound and felt foolish, strolling along the rivers edge holding his hands out in front of him like a prisoner.The sandy beach turned up nothing. At the grass fringe, the County Park Service had stationed a blue garbage barrel. Beachgoers overfed it the remains of their picnics, perforated inflatable toys, and spent beer bottles with sand molded to their bottoms. Litter mounded next to the can. Down the slope of the beach, the discarded items were more singular.Buddy located an aqua pair of toddlers swim trunks, a tower of sun-bleached Pepsi cans, and a punched-in chicken box from Hardees. Inside the box were chicken bones, napkins, two empty peach wine coolers, and a condom wrapper.The land slanted into the water, and the sand washed away in the shallows. The remainder of the lake floor seemed to be composed of little burgundy stones shaped like internal organs. Half of a sopping-wet, gold Nerf football bobbed on the lakes easy wavelets. Farther out, a gutted watermelon took on water and capsized in the reeds.Buddy kicked through a cluster of white and brown filters from extinguished cigarettes. He found a heads-up penny and put it in his pocket. The ripe stink coming from the trash can chased him back to the river.He retraced his steps to where hed been fishing. From there, he followed the dirt trail Vic had come down. Soon he reached a lane stamped in the weeds, veering off to a turnaround on the edge of Ketchel Road. Vic had parked here. Two grooves in the white gravel showed where he had steered his truck in and out. Buddy abandoned the lane and kept close to the river. A bass jumped in the cagey branches of a lightning-struck willow. The dead part of the tree hung in the water.Buddy never had a sister, wife, or daughter. In fifty-two years, no occasion called on him to rescue a woman or defend one from the violence of a man. He had argued with men over the subject of women but not once had he fought another on a womans behalf. Women were, in his experience, a source of finite pleasure and lasting perplexity. He sought their company on rare occasions. Margot, the girl who lived above his tavern with her baby, was an exception. He didnt know how to classify their relationship. Friends, he guessed. It could be more. She was young, fit, and her sly smile said game as hell. He didnt need that kind of trouble. Not that trouble ever stopped him. But she was too young and hed make a fool out of himself if he made a play and she declined. Seeing it go that way in his minds eye was enough to slow him down. Women in his life were scarce as vacations. A few he remembered well.Grandma Nan raised him and his younger brother, and her spirit hovered over his childhood memories, her scent a mixture of talcum powder and baked bread. Marti Logan became his first love, a girl remarkable for no other reason. She eloped with a truck driver from Janesville when she turned eighteen. Then there was Cassie, a leggy strawberry blonde grad student at UW-Madison. He met her when he was taking a few classes paid for by the GI bill. A more beautiful woman than he was capable of attracting before or since, she taught him about drugs and free love. He had a soft spot for hippies because of her, though shed been too smart and realistic to be a true hippie. For those same reasons, he made a poor soldier. Their relationship was an exercise in exposing the hollowness of the people they were pretending to be. Mostly they got high and screwed on the shag carpet.Of course there were others. Tight skirts, well drinks, nylons skimmed off in a haze. Buddy lifting up quietly from sheets smelling of cigarettes. Ducking out. Skies still showing stars. The physical part was like exercise, a good run on the beach. He didnt go to the beach often enough. Always working. Making rain.Buddy wondered about Melissa Teagles. Would he recognize her if she walked into the bar asking for a draft? Probably not. He didnt want to think about seeing her body floating by, her face turned away underwater, the bones in her neck broken. He blinked sweat out of his eyes and trudged on.Northward, as Buddy approached the bridge, he clambered up a steep incline. Below him, the river tapered between ledges of rippled gray rock. In the shade of the rock walls, the river surged black, except for where the water creased between two jutting stones, or where, for a short stretch, it thinned over the caps of rocks lodged in a sickle pattern-there the water glittered silver as though chains were pulling just beneath the surface. The air in the narrow gap filled with spray, and the misting river water carried the thick smell of minerals, tangy and greased, like a box of old nails.Buddy slid a beer can from the pocket of his beige nylon windbreaker. He had taken it out of the cooler earlier. He popped the tab and drank. The beer was warm from riding on his hip. Perspiration slicked his chest and dribbled down his spine. Buddy tilted the can, drained it, and put the empty back in his pocket. Then he removed his jacket, folded it neatly over the bridge rail.A half-centurys accumulation of names, initials, and dirty insults gave the wooden bridge character. The fresh carvings were the plain color of toothpicks. In certain places the older words were illegible, worn smooth, giving the illusion that the grain had repaired itself, the way a river did.The bridge was wide enough for a single car to pass. Buddy seldom witnessed anyone using it in the daytime, but he knew local teenagers dared to speed over it in the middle of the night. With their headlights doused, they followed the shallow ruts, looking for a hiding place to drink and smoke, searching for privacy so they could mess around with each other. He had seen Vics yellow wrecker up there on a couple of rainy mornings, dragging junks out of the sticks and leaves.Buddy peered over the rail into the water. He leaned far out over the edge to see under the bridge. Halved Firestones were lashed around the pilings to bumper boats passing through. Down there, a nest of fallen branches jammed against one of the pilings, suspended, for the moment, from its inevitable journey downstream-delayed by one dry black limb curled over the lip of a tire. In the center of the branches, a ball of clothing rested, inches above the Skin River.Buddy skidded down the embankment, trailing his hand along the underside of the bridge supports to keep his balance. The long grass blades flattened and ripped, squeaking under his boots.Beneath the bridge, the river was as wide as a neighborhood street, the water too murky to judge depth. Buddy crouched and extended his hand to the tangle of branches. They wobbled in the current just short of his reach. In the knotted clothing he could see denim-he couldnt tell if it was a jacket or pants-a torn shirt of green-and-black flannel, and a dingy white towel. Vic hadnt told him what Melissa was wearing. Buddy blamed himself for not asking. He grabbed a tuft of fat weeds with his left hand, anchoring himself on the shore. Then he stretched the right half of his body out over the river. His fingertips grazed the branches, but he could not take hold. The weeds uprooted, Buddy teetered, and he dunked his knee in the tepid water. Almost falling in.No long sticks lay under the bridge or along the bank. Buddy didnt want to chance the time it would take to walk back and get one of his fishing rods or even to go up to the tree line and break off a bough. The river soon would work the branches free and swallow them, the clothing, too, as it made its churning progress south. Buddy removed his belt and wrapped the end with the holes twice around his fist. He hoped the square buckle would catch in the branches so he could to drag them closer.On the fourth try, the buckle caught. He wrested the branches off the tire. They began to jumble and sink. Buddy hauled them in the best he could. Their network interlocked deep beneath the surface. The washed-away ruins of a beaver dam.He plucked the ball of clothing from its basket not a second too soon. Snapping and clicking, the pile moved against itself and plunged from sight.Buddy shook water off the silver buckle. Then, tucking the ball of clothing under his arm, he threaded the wet leather through the loops of his jeans. When he finished, he let the ball drop to the ground. And with his boot, he toed it onto a whorl of hard dirt. In the broken shade of the bridge beams, he crouched again and tried to convince himself that unraveling the clothes would reveal nothing. The vomit-covered remnant of some kids drunken night in the woods.But he could not push down the acid rising at the back of his throat or ignore the nerves bristling in his fingers. Buddy touched the pant legs, distinguishable now and bound at the knees. A simple knot held the bundle together.The sun cut golden knife shapes on the riverside around him.He loosened the jeans.
Augustus pats the large folded knife in his back pocket. He unlatches the screen door. He frowns. His mouth opens and the deputy smells mint.“What can I do for you, Officer?”“Are you Augustus Bodine?”“Yessir, you bet I am.”“Well, a friend of mine tells me that when you mount a fish, it looks so real that a person might swear it would swim off the wall.” The deputy says this and smiles at his cleverness.He sees the taxidermist is smiling too.
The copper starburst spread across the seat of the jeans was a bloodstain. Its dark center shone wet, almost black. Buddys pulse drummed. His vision blurred, cleared. With gentle pulls, he unfolded the towel wrapped inside. The cotton was sticking. He pried it apart. Long bronze finger-smears radiated to the towels edges. In one corner were the marks where someone had wiped a sharp tool clean.Buddy inhaled the chemical smell of acetone rising from the bundle. He heard no sound. The air was warm, breezeless. He fought the urge to stand up, walk to his cabin, and forget this shit. Forget it because it did not yet involve him. He wanted to enter the familiar space of his rooms, to see his things as he left them, to sit in his chair and read the paper. Maybe entertain the idea of Margot making pancakes for him some cold morning. Red flannel shirt, bare legs, and an over-the-shoulder smile.He started at what he thought were maggots squirming in the bundle. They were wood shavings and sawdust, trembling from his touch. He sensed coldness and found two cloudy ice cubes snuggled at the center of the package. They dripped over a raw chicken breast.No.It was a hand.The fingers were clenched, making a small fist. A lock of long curly hair wove, up down, up down, between the knuckles.Red hair.Buddy remembered that Melissas mother had red hair. And cinnamon freckles like the ones dusting over the delicate blue veins on the back of this hand, trailing to the wrist. Touching only the towel, he turned the hand over. The fingernails were short, dull. They had broken through the skin of her palm. Buddy wavered. The final sticking bits of cotton released. He stared down at the unmistakable abruptness of bone.On his knees, he laid the opened bundle in the grass. Squeezed his thighs to stop their shaking.
Deputy Carl Sherry opens his cruisers trunk. The Styrofoam cooler screeches when he pulls the top off.A twenty-pound northern pike lies straight and cold on a bed of ice. Augustus dons half-moon glasses to inspect the length of the fish. Specks of blood mar its open eye. The small dent behind the eyes came from a billy club hit. Pulpy holes through the upper lip show where the hooks from a black bucktail cut through and held. He runs a finger rapidly over the slimy scales. Pushes his hand into the belly and fondles the thin bones there. Bends forward. Lowers his face in close, kissing distance.“Colors gone out a bit. When did you catch her?”“Friday night. In Flambeau. Right in the weedbed off Medicine Rock. She slammed my Mepps like fucking gangbusters. First cast.”Augustus nods. “More than twenty-four hours. You shouldve wrapped her in a wet towel. Or newspapers. She wouldve preserved better that way. For next time, now you know.”His fingers invade the gill slit. He lifts.“Cmon baby.” Walking back to the house, he tells the deputy, “Ill have her ready for you in three weeks. Come back tonight for the meat.”Though he cant figure out why, Deputy Sherry is no longer excited.Hes suffered a strange loss.SKIN RIVER. Copyright © 2004 by Steven Sidor. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, address St. Martins Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.