“You mighta heard the other day ’bout Grandma Moses—”
“Painter up there on Woodbury Ridge?”
“That’s where she lives, with her ol’ boyfriend—”
“Haven’t met him. Or her for that—”
“—but she is known and he is, well, he’s dead.”
“He’s dead? Too bad, I guess, for both of ’em.”
“He died behind the wheel.”
“That so? Crazy puttin’ heart attacks into the other lanes—”
“And that was Grandma Moses’ role. She’s ridin’ shotgun, notices he’s slumped, tries to steer against his rigor mortis grip or bump his lead foot off the gas—”
“Nearby their house? That curvy road?”
“It all went down on County H, with curves enough to make ya think of other things, and who know what was on the dead man’s mind. Coulda been a thousand glimpses of his eighty years, coulda been the opposite—”
“—a clean slate, like a baby, or canvas that his gal might paint.”
“Instead, she fought against the throttle plate. And dodged the charging bulls. She got through crossroad County Q, layin’ heavy on the horn. Someone called the sheriff, but—
“What the hell’s he s’posed to do?”
“Damn straight. Try to close the road and sit ’n wait.”
The pause was worth a swig or two of beer. Hunters in a deerstand, break of dawn, autumn in an endless year. One opined a silent thought, the other did the same, guessing Grandma Moses would get up on her feet again.
“What did the trick, y’know—”
“—like a magic show?”
“You might say that. A doe jumped out a ditch and—”
“—’xploded on their grill?”
“—bounced the pickup to the other side, into a slough where Grandma made it glide.”
“Good on her. And the doe?”
“Maybe comes our way. Got dibs.”
“You’d kill a guardian angel?”
“Hadn’t thought of it that way.”
~
“Wonder f’she will paint again.”
“You seen anything she done before?”
“Nope. But I heard she hung some at the co-op store.”
“Tha’s true, about a hundred bucks a shot. You musta seen ’em, then—”
“Nah. Get my groceries at the Stop-n-Go. Hot burrito and a fill o’ gas to boot.”
“You should step into the world more.”
The forecast was for Indian Summer, whether not the frost ran chaos on the harvest. In the gradual bulge of amber sun, the thing to do was chill. Talk above a whisper just to keep awake, but not too much to scare the deer away. Not that they were massing in the range of riflesite; mammals tend to eat their memos once the word is out.
“What kinda things she paint?”
“Oh, y’know. Flowers an’ stuff. Not bouquets. Nothing really Valentine.”
“Think they worth a hundred bucks?”
“This beer cost me a clear percent—I'm not the guy to ask. After this, assuming we’ll bag a doe or two, I’ll take you to the co-op, and there you’ll be—”
“—not interested. Got a reputation to maintain.”
“Above it all?”
“Mundane.”
“Hey! Shh—see one.”
“Where’s one there be another.”
“Don’ know that yet. She’s on the edge and flirting with the field.”
“Maybe there’s a buck the other side she’s sniffin’ out.”
“Think that goes the other way around, but quiet now, an’ get your rifle out.”
“The cat ’n’ mouse is killin’ me. Why the hell she—”
“Shut it, will ya? She knows a step beyond the line o’ trees is…”
“… her destiny?”
“Ours, maybe. Jus’ chill and maybe pray instead of speak.”
“Blessed are the meek?”
“Say what? No, don’ say anything ’til this one is complete.”
The doe had understood too much and ducked within the cover of the woods. The hunters gnashed their teeth yet tacitly agreed the wait was worth, a playing field as level as should be. Experience sometimes underscored: you don’t kill arbitrarily. Experience also rubbed it in when opportunities escaped.
“It’s done.”
“That doe? ’s only one.”
“The cooler full o’ beer.”
~~
“Think she’ll paint the slough?”
“The one she skidded through? Corpse of lover by her side? Would you?”
“Maybe not the actual event—hard to know what makes an artist tick.”
“Or anyone. Cuckoo clocks we are.”
“You aint cuckoo, sittin’ in this nest with me.”
“How’re you so sure?”
“’Cuz you care for Grandma Moses. And cared to make me care.”
“Almost noon, and you’re battin’ back a snooze.”
“Could do. Gotta urinate, at any rate.”
“So how ’bout this: we take a break, go into town and grab a bite, fill ’er up with Miller Light to get us through the afternoon.”
“Deer come out at dusk. Might as well check out the slough and maybe then the co-op.”
“Can do. Or maybe co-op then the slough. Get to know her style a little while.”
The on-hold hunters clambered down the jackpine ladder and hiked three-quarters of a mile to where their pickup seemed to smirk, glad to have no payload. Wordlessly they trundled over logging chips and gravel, wise to keep some focus for a stretch.
“You okay to drive?”
“You bet. I didn’t drink as much as you—”
“—that’s prob’ly true, but factor in the eyelids, too.”
“Then tell a joke or anecdote, somethin’ int’resting.”
“Not boring, for a change? Le’s see. There was this gun-shy doe…”
“That’s it? She never took a risk?”
“’Cording how I told it. You can say another way—”
“I won’t contrive a story of a creature I might kill.”
“… as a curtain call, it’s better than it seems.”
“Dodgin’ death on curvy County C? A dead man in the driver’s seat?”
“Woulda died in his sleep. And she’s alive, so,…”
“That’s the way you’d wanna go? You may be cuckoo, after all.”
The co-op came into view. Both imaginations travelled to the slough, in part because they knew the doe would possibly be there and not remotely here. Interest has its patience and its path.
~~~
Daniel Martin Vold Lamken (2020)
