Summer's End (11 page)

The third cabin was called the “log” cabin because it was made of logs, not just sided with them. “It's pretty dark. So my brother's and sister's families alternate years—one year Phoebe and Giles stay in the new cabin, the next in the log. Everyone likes it when it's their year in the new cabin.”

“So your parents stayed in the main cabin, your brother and sister traded off between the other two,” Holly said. “Where did that leave you?”

“Usually in Amsterdam or somewhere like that. I don't come very often anymore. But there's a bunkhouse. I suppose that's where we'll all be staying.”

“A bunkhouse?” Holly didn't sound happy.

“It's okay, but the mattresses are kind of crummy, and there're no lights or mirrors or anywhere to put your clothes.”

Jack imagined that she was used to lights, mirrors, and
places to put her clothes. “So why do they put you there?” He hadn't said anything in a while.

She looked up at him. “I'm never there for as long as the others, so it doesn't make sense for me to take one of the better beds.”

“But doesn't sleeping on a lumpy mattress tend to make your stay even shorter?” Holly asked. “It would mine.”

Amy smiled and wrinkled her nose, her answer obvious.

“There's no reason for us to whine about this.” Jack had no patience for martyrs. “If the mattresses are lumpy, we'll go into town and buy new ones. And how far is it from the propane tank? Why not trench a gas line out to the place and put up a light? How long could it take?”

“Two years if you're lucky,” Amy laughed. “More likely five. You have to understand the culture up there. They don't make changes.”

Well, they were going to have to. Jack knew that his mother expected her two children to be good sports. She expected them to be accommodating, to respect the fact that the Legend family had been coming to this place for years and years. She would put up with endless inconvenience herself and expect them to as well. But she would draw the line somewhere. And Holly having a decent place to sleep would probably be it. He didn't know how that would sit with the travel-soccer, Cub-Scout-Blue-and-Gold-banquet parents, but they would have been at this precious lake for twenty-four hours by now. They were at last going to have to admit that changes were taking place.

Phoebe got in the backseat with the kids. She didn't want to sit in the front with her brother. If she did, he would start to fuss and complain, and she didn't think she could stand that.

The drive outside the cabin was narrow, a pine-needle—covered lane threading between the birches and pines. Ian had to concentrate, steering the car as tightly as he could so that the boat trailer didn't crash into the trees. But once he was out on the road, an open, sandy trail that circled the lake, he could drive with more ease.

He hooked his arm over the back of the seat. “Weren't you surprised that the power boat wasn't put in? Mom and Dad always launched the boat first thing.”

It's not Mom and Dad anymore, Ian. It's Dad and Gwen now
. “I don't see that it's any big deal.”

“I didn't say that it was. I was just surprised, that's all.”

He was lying. But then so was she. It did seem important. Last year had been horrible. Coming up here without Mother had been so awful that they had all left after a week and a half, but this year, with Gwen and the changes…it almost seemed like this year was going to be worse.

It had started with the milk. On their way up to the lake yesterday, she and Giles stopped to buy milk. Of course they had. That's what they always did.

All three of the cabins had refrigerators, but they were old and small, very small. They couldn't be replaced because they ran on propane, and no one in the United States manufactured refrigerators like that anymore. When these finally died, they would have to send to Sweden for new ones.

As a result, there was never enough cold storage when the whole family was there. So on the way to the lake people stopped and bought milk. That's the way things were done.

But yesterday after all the flurry of greetings, as Giles lifted the cooler out of the back of the station wagon, it was clear that Gwen hadn't expected them to buy milk. She had plenty of milk. She had been to town the day before. Every inch of every refrigerator was full. There was nowhere to store three gallons of milk.

“We'll put it in the lake and hope for the best,” Gwen had said.

The little kids, Alex and Claire, had loved the idea, putting milk in the lake. They had danced down to the water, happy as could be, to rig up some infinitely elaborate system of storing milk under the dock.

“Putting it in the lake, that's a good idea,” Giles said as he closed the cooler. “I wonder if it will work.”

“It won't.” Phoebe was not feeling very gracious. “You're supposed to store milk at forty degrees, and the lake's nowhere near that cold. It will spoil before we have a chance to drink it.”

“It's only a couple gallons of milk,” he said mildly. “We'll survive the loss.”

She knew that. But she had made a mistake. She didn't like that.

There was a system to everything here. There had to be. The kitchens were so small, the arrangements so primitive, town so far away, that you needed good systems. Phoebe's mother had established them. And Phoebe knew them. She knew how to store the boats, she knew how to light the refrigerators, she knew how to prime the pumps. She knew where the tea towels were kept, how the latrine was cleaned. She understood life at the lake.

But it had all changed. Someone else was buying the groceries; someone else was putting the tea towels away.

At least it was her family's turn to have the cheerful, airy new cabin. As great as all summers up here were, the best years were when she, Giles, and their kids had the new cabin. Earlier in the spring Ian had tried to suggest that his family should have the new cabin again this year. “I know last summer was our turn, but we were there such a short time that it shouldn't really count.”

“Forget it,” she had said. That's why they had such a careful system of taking turns so that they didn't have to negotiate everything every year.

But yesterday as she was unlocking the top carrier, Dad had spoken. He told them about Amy coming. “So with her and Holly and Jack, we need to rearrange how we sleep.”

Phoebe handed Giles the first duffel bag. “Aren't they going to be in the bunkhouse?” That's where Amy had slept the last time she had come.

“No. That's not fair to them. We want Holly and Jack to feel welcome and comfortable. They're a part of the family now.”

He outlined the plan. All of the school-age children
were to sleep in the bunkhouse. Ian and Joyce, Phoebe and Giles, were to each have one of the bedrooms in the new cabin. Thomas, Phoebe and Giles's toddler, the one born after her mother's death, would be in with his parents, and the other three adults—Amy, Holly, and Jack—were to be in the log cabin.

“We've discussed every other arrangement,” Hal said. His voice was firm, this decision was made. “This is the best.”

“The kids will like all sleeping together,” Giles said. He reached up for another duffel bag.

Something in Phoebe shrieked.

She hated to admit it even to herself—and she would have never said a word to her mother or father—but Giles, her dear, wonderful husband, was not crazy about the lake. He never complained, he came year after year because she loved it so, but he would have been happier at a resort where a tanned college girl in track shorts and a tank top served frozen margaritas on the beach.

Giles was disabled, having been born with a withered leg. With his special built-up shoe, he could walk adequately, but there was enough of a lurch to his step that hiking was no pleasure. He certainly couldn't water ski or bike.

Two things made the lake tolerable for him—fishing in the old wooden rowboat that he had restored himself and having his own family all in one cabin. They spent the day with everyone, but mornings and nights were theirs, just the five of them—now the six of them. At night the kids would pile into bed, and Giles would read and read to them. Then once the kids were sleeping in the other bedroom, she and Giles would make love under heavy quilts as quietly as they could, listening to rain fall on the roof.
In the mornings she would often go over and help her mother get breakfast started, but Giles would stay in the cabin with the kids, chatting, playing games, doing all the things that you did when there was no newspaper to read, no TV to watch. He never cared whether they were in the log cabin or the new cabin, as long as he and she were in it alone with their children.

Phoebe watched him swing the duffel bag onto the pile with the others. He was a realist; his disability had made him so. It made him great at his job; he was one of the most able general counsels that the University of Iowa had ever had. He accepted setbacks, he moved on, he didn't look back, he didn't regret.

But he was disappointed with these new arrangements. Phoebe could tell. And she minded for him, she minded terribly.

They had to unload quickly because the car was needed. Mother and Dad had stopped driving a big family car a couple of years ago, and so Phoebe and Giles's station wagon was used to pick Ian's family up at the little airport an hour away in Hibbing.

It was a sensible arrangement, the wisest thing to do, but there were problems. Ian didn't really like it that her family was already settled and organized before his. On the other hand, it meant that she and Giles had to make their plans around Ian's, and sometimes it did seem that he chose a flight precisely so that it would be inconvenient to them.

The top carrier was empty. Phoebe hopped down and nodded to her father. The car was ready.

“Are you coming, Gwen?” He spoke to his new wife.

She turned to Phoebe. “Do you need some help with the children? I'll be happy to watch them while you unpack.”

In the past Giles had watched the kids while she and her mother unpacked. Phoebe had always liked that hour or two, that private time with Mother. Then her mother would leave her alone, and she would have the cabin to herself. She could arrange it just as they liked it, shifting a few little odds and ends that Joyce and Ian had rearranged the year before. “No, we'll be fine. If you want to go into town, go on.”

“I am eager to meet Ian and his family.”

Phoebe picked up Thomas so he wouldn't stagger behind the car, and holding his sturdy little body, she leaned against Giles. Together they watched the station wagon ease out of the narrow drive. The kids' bags had been set in front of the bunkhouse, and down the woods-lined path that ran parallel to the road, she could see her and Giles's suitcases set in front of the new cabin.

She felt Giles's arm close around her shoulders. “Let's not unpack. Let's just swipe the best room, make a big mess, and go swimming.”

It was a wonderful idea. They called out to fourteen-year-old Ellie, telling her to get the little blue bag, that all the kids' suits were in there.

Giles changed quickly and hurried back to the bunkhouse to help Ellie get Alex and Claire ready. This was one problem with the kids being in the bunkhouse. Ellie was going to end up working harder, doing more for the younger ones. If she would be helping with only Alex and Claire, Phoebe would not have minded. But Ian's kids were also going to be in the bunkhouse, fifteen-year-old Maggie and little Scott and Emily, who were the same ages as Alex and Claire. And Maggie was not helpful. It was going to be a struggle all month long to be sure that Ellie didn't end up responsible not just for her own little brother and sister, but for Maggie's too.

Phoebe changed slowly. She could hear voices down at the lake, the first splashes and shouts. She found her book, gathered up Thomas, and crossed back toward the main cabin. On this side of the lake the bank was steep, and a set of logs embedded in the sand served as steps leading down to the water. A short dock ran about fifteen feet into the lake, and anchored out in the deeper water was a wooden raft.

It was a beautiful afternoon. The lake was a rough oval, about three-quarters of a mile in length, perhaps a half mile across. The bottom was sand, trees ringed the shoreline, and the water was tinged a rust red. They had always thought that the redness of the water was from the rich veins of iron ore that lay under this part of Minnesota, but recently some people had suggested that the color might come from the needles of the tamarack trees. Phoebe didn't know which was right, and it didn't seem to matter.

They had a wonderful time. They swam, they swamped the canoe, and they sat on the raft in the sun. Phoebe had brought down cards, and they played Hearts and King's Corner on a towel spread over the planking of the raft. It seemed all so normal, to be at the lake again, with the sun shining on the water and the kids splashing. Thomas fell asleep inside an inflated ring. Phoebe covered him with a towel. It was so good to be back. She couldn't imagine life without the lake.

“Mom, we're starving.” Ellie splashed over to the raft. “Can I go get us something to eat?”

“Sure. Do you want me to go?”

“No, no, I'll be glad to.”

“Then go see what Gran has.”

Phoebe watched her older daughter scramble up out
of the water and hurry up the bank. It was like watching herself. She remembered doing that, offering to help, liking to help, feeling important because she was the one helping. She knew what it would be like for Ellie to walk into the cabin alone, feeling so pleased to be responsible, to be the one whom your mother trusted. That's how Phoebe had always felt when she had helped her mother. They were in a line, the three of them, Eleanor, Phoebe, and Ellie, each one the oldest daughter. It meant something.

“Mom?”

Phoebe looked up. Ellie was back down on the bank, empty-handed. “Mom, would you come up here?”

“Sure, sweetheart.”

She checked to be sure that Giles knew she was going and then splashed back to the dock. “What is it?”

“I don't know. I wasn't quite sure what to get.”

Phoebe followed her daughter up the steps and across the narrow lakeside porch of the main cabin. Ellie held back. Phoebe opened the screen herself.

The table was set for dinner. That was the first thing she saw. Then she realized that she hadn't been in the main cabin yet this year.

All the furniture was in the same place. The little braided rugs, the candlesticks and hurricane lamps, were all in the same places. The mugs were stowed on cup hooks, the books were on the right shelves.

But it was all different. It was so
clean
. The windows sparkled. Every single tiny little pane had been washed inside and out. The floors had been oiled. A faint lemony, woodsy smell rose from the narrow pine planks. The globes of the gas lights shone. Even the dark build-up around the edges of the door latch was gone.

Gwen must have cleaned for days and days. Washing all those tiny window panes would have taken forever.

Why had she done it? The cabin had always been good enough, clean enough.

Mother had looked down on people who were fanatic about cleanliness. It seemed petty to her, small-minded.

A bouquet of wildflowers was set in the center of the table. They were tansies, a vivid yellow flower with button-like blossoms. They were arranged in a blue pitcher that had been in the back corner of one of the upper cupboards. Phoebe didn't think that her mother had ever used the pitcher. It was always the wrong size, too big for a creamer, too small for anything else.

Why had Gwen set the table so far in advance of dinner? Of course, it made sense. They would all be getting back from the airport just at dinnertime, but still Mother wouldn't have done it, and there would have been a mad scramble to get everything ready. But Mother had been no more afraid of a mad scramble than of a little dirt. These careful preparations felt too fussy to Phoebe. It seemed bourgeois to worry about details like that.

This was not getting the children their snack. Carefully Phoebe went into the kitchen, her mother's kitchen, the kitchen she had been working in for more than thirty summers at her mother's side. She felt like a stranger. It too was immaculate. Every window pane, the edge of every shelf, every canister, gleamed.