Ice-Out Page 4

  Jerry snugged down his bowler hat and shot Owen a lopsided grin. “Yeah, guess I would, too.”

  Owen punched Jerry’s arm and they both laughed. They fell back into their usual banter without missing a beat.

  On a rutted, jarring road, they drove east of Ranier. A whole year had passed without seeing Jerry, but now that his friend was back from the East Coast, it felt as if he’d never left. Owen thanked Jerry for showing up at the funeral.

  “You bet,” Jerry said.

  “Hey Jer,” Owen pressed. “I didn’t hear from you for a whole year. You could have dropped a postcard in the mail. Something.”

  “Yeah,” Jerry said. “Probably should have, huh?”

  “Ah, don’t worry about it. So what were you up to? Besides the girl you trailed out there? Did you find a job of some sort?”

  “Yeah, a few.” Jerry didn’t seem much interested in talking about his past year, so Owen let it go. “So you’re working for Pengler now?”

  “Isn’t everybody?” Jerry said with a laugh. “Apparently, you signed up, huh?”

  Owen laughed. “No, not really. Just tonight. Part of our agreement to import specially rigged Studebakers.” He told him about the dealership and the lot that would soon be filling up with new vehicles.

  “Whiskey Sixes?” Jerry asked.

  Owen nodded. “Yup. That’s what they call ’em. After those arrive, I’m steering clear of bootlegging. Staying on the sidelines.”

  “That so?” Jerry kept one hand on the wheel. “Hey, how are things with your little lady, anyway? Did you score one for the team?”

  First, Owen wasn’t going to feed Jerry or anybody the details of his relationship. That was between him and Sadie Rose. Second, he wasn’t even sure there was a relationship anymore. If Senator Worthington learned of Owen’s foolish dealings with Pengler, he might try to ban Owen from seeing Sadie Rose, his newly adopted foster daughter. He didn’t answer.

  “Whoa. Things are that bad?” Jerry asked.

  “Let’s not talk about her right now,” Owen replied.

  “Life’s one big risk, Owen. You jumped into your own business, assuming you’d be making money hand over fist. Am I right?”

  It was true that Owen was optimistic, but he replied, “It’ll take time to make a go of it.”

  “If you get stuck with expensive inventory, Pengler’s still going to expect you to pay on your loan.”

  Owen mulled this over.

  “My point is, Owen, that to be alive is to take risks every single second of every single day. You think those folks who’ll buy your cars don’t know that? They could get in a crash driving around; they could die. But is that going to keep them from getting themselves a set of shiny wheels? No, it’s not. And that’s why you’re going to sell your stock, because there are lots of folks who just want to get behind the wheel of something fast and beautiful and see where it takes ’em.”

  Owen tilted his head at Jerry, as if seeing his friend for the first time. “You’ve actually thought about all this.”

  “Surprised? That I have brains?”

  “I mean, you’re a philosopher,” Owen said. “You’ve given life some thought.”

  Jerry grinned.

  “I don’t know about that, but there’s book smart, street smart, machinery smart, and even animal smart. Whatever you call it, everybody has brains. It’s just a matter of whether they use ’em or not.”

  A snow-covered field turned silver beneath the hazy glow of a full moon. Between the towering barn, chicken coop, and newly built farmhouse, a lone white pine stood guard.

  “So this is Pengler’s place?” Owen said.

  “Yup. He’s a smart one. Before Prohibition went national, he was getting ready. He’s got tunnels between the coop and the barn.”

  “Tunnels?”

  “Sure. Crates of booze. Stills. And over there”—he nodded toward another shelter toward the water’s edge—“a bunkhouse for workers. You wouldn’t believe the network he has operating. Needs more guys all the time. We’re lucky, y’know, to get in while we could.” Then Jerry hopped out, leaving his Model T running. “It’ll take me half a second. You take the wheel. All you do is follow ’til we unload.”

  As Jerry slipped into the barn, Owen opened the passenger door and stood under the expansive sky. The air was mild and damp, twenty-five degrees or so, he guessed.

  To the north, somewhere on the frozen lake, or from the forest on the Canadian shore, a wolf howled. A single melancholy voice threaded through the air. Then another wolf joined in, deep as a cello, followed by another, its voice shrill and as high as a violin. And then another, and another joined in until a chorus rose up. The sound was so primal, so unnerving, that it penetrated Owen’s skin, straight to his marrow. He shivered involuntarily. The wolves could be a mile away, or just beyond the barn, he couldn’t tell.

  A good time, he decided, to climb into the driver’s seat.

  When the barn doors swung wide, a dump truck appeared. The Packard was solid steel on heavy-duty wheels; its bed was mounded with hay to disguise the load of sugar destined for stills near Kettle Falls.

  Another figure appeared. Pengler, tall and wide shouldered, walked from the barn toward Owen, sitting behind the wheel.

  Owen rolled down the driver’s window. “Mr. Pengler.”

  “Owen,” he said. “You boys stay where the ice is thick. I’ve got a lot riding on this delivery.”

  “Got it.” The last thing Owen wanted to do was go through the ice. He left his window rolled down, just to be on the safe side should he need a quick exit.

  Jerry drove the truck alongside the Model T. With a big smile, he waved at Owen to follow.

  They drove a few miles east, then veered off onto a boat landing and rolled down the embankment onto snow-covered ice. He assured himself, this time of year, the ice was two feet thick. Nothing to worry about.

  Wheels crunched as they skirted between islands, following the “ice road” and hints of tire tracks heading east. At a half-football-field distance, Owen followed, glad that the heavy truck helped plow a path through new snow for the Model T. Owen’s only job was simply to follow, just in case the sugar-loaded truck hit a bad patch of ice—and unload at their destination.

  A thirty-plus-mile journey each way. It was a windless night and a faint ring wavered around the moon, casting enough light to illuminate their path, but not as bright as a spotlight. Owen thought about the fellow found by the dam with a bullet in his back. The last thing he and Jerry needed was to get caught by federal agents out to score a few career points.

  As the miles of lake passed by, Owen yawned, forcing his eyes open and fixed on the dump truck’s moving silhouette.

  Out here, only two summers back, he’d had the crap kicked out of him by a couple of bootleggers. It was the year Prohibition went nationwide, and lots of folks were looking for opportunities to make a few extra bucks. Stills sprouted up everywhere. The day Owen found seven wooden crates of scotch whiskey in a caved-in root cellar, he wasn’t surprised, but he didn’t exactly know what to do either. His family was scraping by. On the other hand, booze was the very thing that had ruined his father for so many years. He walked away from the stash, but with each step, the old saying “Never look a gift horse in the mouth” clanged in his head. He thought about how a horse’s teeth grow and crowd with age, making the front teeth protrude over time. Finding that stash was like getting a horse as a gift, and then peering into the animal’s mouth to determine its age and whether it was up to your standards. In other words, a guy should be grateful when a gift comes his way. He decided if the stash had not been claimed, then he had no choice but to see it as an opportunity.

  Eventually, on boat deliveries to summer island residents and tourists, he added bottles of Canadian whiskey with fresh milk, butter, and cheese that he kept on ice in a seat bench. But word got around, and after Owen made deliveries east of Brule Narrows, two guys jumped him. They said they’d let him live if he re
turned the rest of the whiskey—and the money he’d made from their inventory. When Dad asked, “Where’d you get the shiners?” Owen told him. True to their word, the bootleggers showed up at the creamery to collect their remaining hooch. Dad stood beside Owen, rifle cradled in his arms where the bootleggers could see it. They took the four remaining cases and the cash from Owen’s outstretched hand.

  “That’s it, then?” Owen asked.

  One of the men grunted, and they left. To his credit, Dad never mentioned the incident again. Thinking of that time, an ache suddenly filled Owen. He wished things between him and his father had ended differently. But there was nothing that could be done. Dad was gone. And whether he approved or not, those Studeys were rollin’ in soon. Another gift horse he would be stupid to refuse. He’d keep the creamery going, but he’d find a way to build his own future, too.

  He drove on, hitting an occasional ice ridge that rattled his teeth. They’d covered ten miles, at most, with another twenty to go. He kept his eyes on the phantom truck ahead.

  Somewhere east of Diamond Island the dump truck turned sharply, heading closer and closer to a steep island.

  “Cripes, Jerry! Where are you going?” Owen shouted. His friend must have fallen asleep at the wheel. Owen honked.

  The truck kept moving and cut around the southeast side of the island.

  “This is not the time for a shortcut!”

  Owen had no choice but to follow. As he rounded the point, the truck was nowhere to be seen.

  It had vanished.

  “What the heck!” Owen scanned the expanse of ice toward Canada. He looked to the right and a cluster of islands. He hoped his eyes were playing a trick on him, but honest to God, there was no truck.

  Then he spotted the dark patch ahead. Open water framed with jagged ice.

  He put on his brakes. Go any closer and he’d be down, too.

  “Nooo!” He pounded on the steering wheel and swore.

  Owen clutched the medal at his neck. “Don’t let Jerry go this way. Please . . .”

  The patch of water quivered like molten silver.

  Who knows how far the truck was down . . . still sinking . . . If Jerry had his window open, maybe he’d escape. Maybe climb out.

  Time became a sharp-edged blade pressed under his throat.

  He couldn’t breathe.

  Couldn’t feel.

  Couldn’t think.

  He couldn’t dive down and save his friend in pitch-dark, deep, and freezing water.

  In frustration, he pounded the steering wheel and swore again.

  And then as he stared, a head bobbed up, a hand and another hand, swinging wildly toward the ice.

  Owen leapt from Jerry’s car. He took off his jacket and, holding it in one hand, lowered himself to his belly and crept across the ice to the open water. The ice beneath him protested, and he was certain he felt a crack run under him, from his head to his toes.

  “Jerry!” he called, inching closer. “Hang on! Grab my jacket!”

  Hand over hand, Jerry hit the surrounding ice with sharp cracking sounds. Ice picks! He had ice picks! Lots of folks carried them in their pockets when they went out on the ice, just in case. With handheld picks, Jerry slowly pulled himself forward onto the edge of ice, and then kept inching steadily closer and closer to where Owen stretched out. When he was in range, Owen tossed his jacket toward Jerry. It fell short. He tried again, and this time, Jerry latched on and held fast.

  Owen began moving backward, pulling his friend’s weight.

  Jerry wheezed and coughed and moaned.

  When they drew closer to the Model T—Owen felt certain they were far enough from where the truck had gone through—he rose to his feet, grabbed Jerry under his arms, and dragged him to the car. Jerry’s hands were bare and icy. His hat was gone and water dripped from his head. Owen tossed him like a sack of potatoes onto the passenger seat.

  “Jerry, you scared the living daylights out of me!”

  “Gotcha,” Jerry managed, as if he had just pulled off the biggest prank in the world, but then he fell silent.

  Owen threw his jacket around Jerry’s body. He removed his own hat and put it on his friend’s wet head. He slammed Jerry’s door, raced around to the driver’s side, and climbed in.

  With a roar of the engine, he sped back toward town, talking at Jerry, smacking his shoulder every now and then, trying to keep him awake. Engine heat spilled through the flow vents, barely warming the car’s floorboards.

  Not until his tires reached the mainland did Owen roll up his window.

  Not until he passed the turnoff to Pengler’s farm did the enormity of it all hit him.

  Not only had he nearly lost his best friend, they’d lost Pengler’s heavy-duty truck and all its costly cargo.

  7

  TIPPER MET HIM AT THE DOOR, THUMPING HIS TAIL hard against the table leg. He licked Owen’s hand, as if he understood the anguish Owen had gone through and had been waiting for him to make it safely home.

  “It’s okay,” Owen whispered. When he’d dropped off Jerry, a light had gone on in the Melnyks’ house. Owen helped Jerry—skin blue-gray and eyes half-mast—into his house.

  “Too much drink?” Mr. Melnyk asked. “Rotgut no good.”

  “Not rotgut,” Owen said. He said they’d been out walking on the lake when Jerry went through the ice. It was almost true.

  With relief, Owen drove away, knowing Jerry’s family would take care of him.

  He yawned and shivered, suddenly aware he was chilled to the bone. He was glad for a warm home. “C’mon, Tipper. Let’s get some sleep.”

  In moments, Tipper was snoring softly at the foot of his bed. Owen lit the small lamp, took paper and a pen from the bedside shelf, and began to write.

  Dear Sadie,

  Then he held his pen above the paper, unsure how to continue. He wanted to tell her how much he longed for her, how tonight, more than ever, he realized how in an instant, you and those you love can be pulled under. Just one bad decision. Just one simple error in judgment. And what you love—who you love—could be gone.

  He closed his eyes, seeing the open water again, feeling sharp panic run through his body. What if Jerry hadn’t surfaced? What then?

  He stared at the two words and simple comma on the paper:

  Dear Sadie,

  No, he couldn’t say all that. Finally, eyes heavy, he turned down the lamp and drifted off. His sleep was anything but peaceful. He woke often, reliving the sense of utter helplessness he felt when the truck disappeared. And when he slept, his dreams were nightmares. He dove underwater trying to rescue Jerry and bumped into his friend’s lifeless body. Hold your breath! Hang on to his arm! He kicked upward, but as he reached the shaft of moonlight, he bumped into a ceiling of ice. The hole had iced over, and he slammed his fist against it. It wouldn’t break. He tried again and lost his grip on Jerry, who slipped away, down again . . . He woke in a sweat, tangled in the sheets, his head crammed against the headboard.

  At dawn he was relieved the night was over. Tipper stood up and shook himself before hopping off the bed. Quickly combing his fingers through his hair, Owen glanced in the small mirror above his narrow dresser. He looked terrible. Ashen pools formed under his eyes. His lips were chalky dry. Between his eyebrows, a line of worry. What a night—one he didn’t want to relive.

  His stomach grumbled and he headed downstairs.

  “Mom, where’s Erling?” Owen asked, taking a seat at the kitchen table with his brothers. Her back was to him, her ruffled apron tied in a bow as she fried eggs and turned sausage patties on the stove.

  “He didn’t want to wake you, Owen. He said you came in pretty late. So he headed off to do the morning run.”

  “Huh.” Weirdly, Owen felt Erling had filled in for him, the way Owen used to cover for Dad. It struck him with a pang of guilt. He’d taken stupid risks, and for what? To help Pengler keep booze flowing. Speakeasys and blind pigs can’t operate without importing booze from Canada or ma
king their own with necessary ingredients. He’d agreed to unload sugar, but what of his responsibility to his brothers? He was as reckless as Dad had been in those early years. Just a different kind of reckless.

  “Mom, Erling has school today,” Owen said. “You let him cover for me when he needs to be at school?”

  His mother turned. “Owen, he’s fifteen. You think I can stop him? You were sound asleep.”

  He nodded and held back everything about last night. He needed to go see Jerry. See if he’d caught pneumonia. And they had to talk. They were in a fix. They had to tell Pengler what happened. And he wasn’t going to be happy.

  He walked across the street to the creamery just as Erling pulled in with the Jensen Creamery truck.

  “Hey, Erling,” Owen said with a nod. “I got the rest of this covered. Ride shotgun. I’ll drop you off at school.”

  Erling seemed to study him, as if to assess if Owen was wallpapered or not.

  “No,” Erling said. “We’ll unload together, then you can drop me off.”

  “Fair enough. I’m heading out that way anyway.”

  As they worked, Owen vowed to keep Erling in school. His brother wanted to play professional baseball someday. Well, why shouldn’t he? If he could stay in school, finish high school, then he’d have a shot at a baseball scholarship. Play college ball for a few years . . . He laughed at himself. He was sounding just like Dad, thinking he knew what was best for someone else.

  On the outskirts of Ranier, they rolled to a stop, and Erling lumbered off like a moose toward the square building and schoolhouse door. From the snow- and ice-covered grounds rose a flagpole and American flag, flapping in the breeze.

  Behind the school were two outhouses. Girls and Boys. When Dad had informed him he was needed full-time at the creamery, Owen took out his frustration on the last day of school—with the help of Jerry and Netty Storm—to tip over the boys’ three-holer. Miss Engerson made them upright it, replace the shingles, put on a new door, and give it two coats of fresh paint. When they were finished, the outhouse had never looked better. Only two years ago he’d been at school, but it seemed like ages.