Caretakers (Tyler Cunningham) (12 page)

Green Island, Upper Saranac Lake, 7/15/2013, 7:16 p.m.

“It’s not gonna work Tyler, so don’t you even fucking try,” Barry said, apparently reading my mind.

“What’s not going to work? Finding Dee Crocker, switching Hope’s dog food to the senior formula, finally getting behind the scenes at the museum in Blue Mountain Lake for some research, fitting more Cokes in the Coke-fridge using the new stacking plan I dreamt of last night … what?”

“Driving away before we talk. If you get in this silly car, I’ll have to try and get in also, and it will ruin the illusion. We both know that I could never fit in a size-two like that car. So I suggest that you lean on the hood for a minute and listen before you knock off for the day; yes, I know you’re planning on bandit camping on the lake, so you can get a feel for all’a the big camps near the Crockers.”

“Great camps, Barry, they call them great camps; and that’s working, by the way.”

“Yah. Anyway, hold your hand up by your ear so that guy behind you doesn’t have you carted off to Arkham.” I had wondered about this reference the first few times Barry used it in this context, and eventually decided two things: that he must have mentioned it in one of our few actual conversations, and that he was referring to the D
C comic universe rather than H.P. Lovecraft’s stories. I held my hand up though, mimicking a cell-phone conversation (
hopefully well enough that nobody would notice that I didn’t have a phone in my hand
).

“Your date with Deputy Dawg seemed to go well, but it sounds like he’s gonna blow what little cover you left yourself on those fliers when he talks with his pappy’s friend about you. You’re not as low profile around here as you once were, Tyler. People know who you are, and they know what you do. Not exactly, but everyone in the Tri-Lakes is related or dated (
that sounded like a rehearsed saying, but it was also mostly true
), and you’ve helped and pissed off enough folks that people know. Gibson will tell ‘Dougie’ (
said with a smirk, which is a facial expression that I haven’t bothered trying to learn/mimic yet
), and he’ll tell everyone he knows with thumbs inside of an hour. Those old-timers, caretakers and guides, they’re the worst gossips on the planet.”

“So … at this point there’s nothing productive I can do about Frank or ‘Dougie
,’ and I’m not interested in not following through with this, so where does that leave me/us?”

“Exactly where you were a couple of minutes ago, but maybe a bit smarter and better prepared. That spiderweb camping (
Barry enjoys mocking my hammock-camping
) you like is prolly a good idea, but sleep somewhere new every night, and don’t be seen going there if you can help it. You’re exposed and trapped when you go to your office, or home, or whatever the fuck it is; the door-bar is good, but I coulda gotten in through that, either talking or with my boot. What you need is some portable form of weapon that can even the playing field between a puny guy like you, and any hoods that want to stop you pokin’ your nose where you shouldn’t; if only there was something like that so regular, decent folk could get to defend themselves from guys like me and Justin.”

“No guns!” I said, too loudly for my faux cellphone conversation, and I could feel attention shift towards me for a second.

Barry smiled at me and said, “No Capes!” He had been a fan of “The Incredibles,” and liked to quote it at me from time to time (
I’d been forced to watch it one night with Dot and Lisa last fall, and when the phrase came up one time, I paled … so now he quoted it whenever possible
).

“I think you’re whacked, not wanting a gun. You never would have gotten the drop on me and Justin last year without one, and we’da dropped you in that fuckin’ pit in the woods, instead of the other way around; but you’re the one who can touch and buy stuff, so you win. I still think you should get something to protect yourself, though; just sayin’ is all.”

“I hear you,” I replied; and I did. I never wanted to own a gun, or shoot someone with a gun (
again
). But the truth is that my investigations often make people angry, and they’re usually angry at me (
which isn’t fair/just/right no matter how you look at it, because I don’t start people’s problems, I just happen to be good at sorting problems out
). While I didn’t want to shoot/kill anyone, I also didn’t want anyone to shoot/kill me, which presented a challenge: how to balance risk and protection in a manner that kept me out of the hospital/morgue and also out of jail (
for weapons charges, the state of New York has strong feelings about firearms and other lethal devices
).

“I’ve got a few ideas to bolster the door-bar, and help out when I’m on the road or camping also. Thanks, Barry,” I said, and closed my fake cell phone, thus ending my real conversation with the ghost of a man I’d killed 10 months earlier (
the curse, ‘may you live in interesting times’ is attributed to the Chinese, although I’ve been unable to verify its origins when, over the years, my life has been ‘interesting’ enough to warrant giving the curse some thought
).

Barry gave me a desultory ‘yah’ and a wave over his shoulder as he wandered back towards the waterfront, muttering something about hot waterskiers, and I drove back into town, parking behind what I thought of as the SmartPig Building (
although it housed other people and businesses as well
), and walked up and into my own personal batcave.

Hope seemed happy to see me, but gave lots of sniffs and judging looks around my hands and face and shorts; she could smell my lunch and was jealous. Hope and I met under adverse conditions made manageable by
shared donuts and jerky and canned beef stew and ice cream; her love of junk food is an integral part, possibly a cornerstone, of our relationship, and she sulks when I indulge without her. I managed to talk her out of a snit with the offer of a walk, sweetened with a slice of Velveeta cheese before we headed out; the combination was apparently irresistible, and we were friends again. I took a nearly freezing Coke from the Coke-fridge, scratched Hope’s butt, and stepped lightly down the stairs after her stiff and slow thumping steps.

Walking down the (
thankfully Irish Setter free
) street, I got a few ideas for death/injury/crime/jail preventative methods of making myself a bit safer if things took a violent or angry or aggressive turn. I didn’t think that they would, but neither had I thought that the previous year, until I was already neck deep in trouble; so I decided to make the small investment in time and money, and hoped that I would feel foolish about it later.

Hope pulled at my arm, intent of getting to the dead sunfish that someone had left by the water as we walked through Riverside Park towards the boat launch, drew me back, reluctantly, to her. It didn’t make sense to me that someone would/could hurt my ancient and gassy beagle mix, but I tend to underestimate people’s capacity to act illogically (
and violently
) in almost any given situation, especially stressful/criminal ones. It would probably be safer for her if she stayed with Dot and Lisa for a few days, but living with Hope is not always a picnic; she hates the cats in their apartment, and has been known to get between the ladies in bed and then growl at Lisa, wanting Dot all to herself. The real reason for my reticence was twofold I suspected: I didn’t want things to get out of hand like they had last year, and I didn’t want to be alone. Neither of those were good/logical enough reasons to warrant putting Hope in danger, so after some quality growling at geese, and a quick off-lead swim, we headed back to SmartPig, where I had decided to call Dot and ask about a sleepover for Hope (
at least for a few days
).

Dorothy said that she and Lisa would love to have Hope come and stay for a few days (
an exaggeration, I’m certain
), but hinted during our conversation that she wanted to help me out, especially if it got ‘tricky.’ It made me feel good that she wanted to help … less alone. It also reinforced my decision to avoid putting her in harm’s way, especially before I knew which direction harm/danger/threats might come from this time around.

I packed Hope’s bed and toys and bowls and a five-gallon bucket of kibble for her visit. For myself, I grabbed a Bushnell monocular that I like to bring along for scouting paddling/camping options, a gravity-feed water filter which is basically a bag that you hang on a tree and let gravity pull the water through a filter … (
pump water filters are for chumps, I either use the gravity filter or Clorox at 3-4 drops per liter
), a gallon Ziploc bag with Tyler-kibble (
which is enough for 3-4 days, more if I didn’t mind going hungry, which I do, so I don’t
), and shoved six ice-cold cans of Coke into the stuff-sack … they wouldn’t be cold for long, but the lake would keep them cool-ish, and the worst Coke I ever drank was pretty good.

We were in Dorothy and Lisa’s little house out near the TLAS, conveniently located for the shelter, but not much else (
beside “The Red Fox,” a restaurant that always feels just slightly too fancy to me, but has great fresh bread that they bring out in tiny loaves, throughout your meal if you eat as much, and tip as well, as I do
). “Tyler, promise me you’ll give me more to help out with than babysitting Hope. That mess last year was cool; scary, but cool. I know you’re nervous about me helping with your stuff, but don’t be. I want to help, especially because it’s Kitty; her help over the years kept a hundred dogs like Hope alive and fed and warm.”

This last made sense to me, so I acquiesced. “If something comes up that you can help with, and I’m reasonably certain that it won’t put you and/or Lisa and/or Miss Hope at risk, then I’ll get in touch.” I bent down to give Hope a kiss, and Dot surprised me with a hug, and whispered into my left ear to be careful. I told her that I would and walked out and away from two of my favorite lifeforms on the planet.

I stopped twice on the way out of town, at Blue Line Sports (
which is the only store for sporting goods in town
) and at Aubuchon Hardware (
which isn’t the only, or even the best, hardware store in town, but I’d seen the items I wanted in there a week ago, so I knew they would have them
). I opened one of the Cokes, and downed it while speeding by the hospital facing Lake Colby. I was tempted briefly to buy an ice cream cone at Donnelly’s, but was able to resist the pull, knowing that their one flavor
(‘you choose the size, we’ll choose the flavor’
) was ‘nut surprise,’ my least favorite in their flavor rotation. I made the turn onto Route 186, and found myself keeping an eye on my rearview mirror. The concept of ‘a tail’ in the Adirondacks is almost silly, as there is generally only one way to get from anywhere to anywhere else up here; if I picked up a tail, losing it would be quite a chore. At any rate, I didn’t see anyone following me, and just in case they were really good, I neglected to use my turn signal when I made the right-hand turn into the boat launch for Follensby Clear Pond (
something that would have disappointed both Mickey and Niko’s father, who had taught me to drive … a skill my father thought useless when living in Manhattan
).

There were some people struggling to get their canoe and gear from an overnight trip out of the water, and into/onto their cars; I offered to help, in the interest of helping to empty the parking lot. Once they
rolled cautiously out and onto Route 30, towards Tupper Lake and points west, I crossed the street and ran into the woods before anyone came along the road from either direction. It was somewhat nasty bushwhacking through the woods: buggy and sweaty and scratchy, and the confusion and tangle of dead and down and new and growing trees did their best to pull my backpack (
containing my camping gear and supplies
) from my shoulders. Giving in to my paranoia, and feeling rightly/properly foolish about it at the same time, I stopped every few minutes to listen to the dense woods behind me for anyone following; there wasn’t … it would have been impossible for anything other than a blackfly to move through those woods without making enough noise for me to hear.

I moved west parallel to the road, but staying roughly thirty feet in, and eventually found my canoe and paddle, just where I’d left it. I debated making two trips, and decided that I had no desire to cover this ground any more than was absolutely necessary. I found that I could balance the Hornbeck canoe on my head, and make reasonably good (
not fast, but faster than I had thought
) time towards the lake. In about the same amount of scratches and bug-bites (
a better measurement than time when traversing the deep woods
) as it had taken me to find the canoe, I found the lake … admittedly a bigger target. I stopped to breathe for a minute, and to definitively kill a deer-fly that had been harassing me inside my canoe-hat for the last few hundred yards, and then climbed into the water.

I paddled along the shore northerly for a bit, and then pulled out, so that I was fifty yards out, which seemed right to maximize my view of the camps and buildings and occupancy levels, while minimizing the notice of people on the docks and boathouses and walking around the camps. One quarter of the camps that I passed seemed occupied only by people working on the buildings in some fashion. I had learned from my conversation with Mike Crocker and with others, over the years, that the great camps always have one or more roofs in need of repair, as well as frequent plumbing and electrical needs, stemming largely from their age and the seasonal nature of their occupancy. Some great camps are jointly owned by a group of the grandchildren and great-grandchildren of the people who originally built the camp; these collectives often rent the camps for much of the summer to support the maintenance and tax costs of owning a piece of Adirondack history. Others, like Topsail, are still held by the patriarch or matriarch of the family, and are often visited by the owners only during the long-preferred month of August (
a part of my back-brain wonders if this will change as climate change continues to rampage across the globe, including this corner of the Park
). I tried to guess which camps were peopled by renters versus owners, doing repairs versus opening camp for the season, and which were some combination; it was interesting to try, but I kept finding myself back in the Topsail boathouse, living the life of people who could/would stay for a month or more, like the Crockers.