Wynn in the Willows (12 page)

Wynn dug for her camera and began snapping shots. “These orchids bloom for just one month and then they'll be gone for another year.”

They sat under the shade of a striped maple—and to Wynn's knowledge it was the first one to be seen on a Wisconsin island. She considered not logging this find into her record book. The fewer people who knew of it, the safer it would always be.

“You have emeralds hanging from strands of your hair,” Doug smiled, pulled them out and opened his palm where little caterpillars squirmed. He gently placed them into the treasure box of ferns.

They sat still for the better part of an hour, just listening to the sounds of the valley, breathing in the fragrance of orchids.

“It's time we head back to the coast.” Doug put on his backpack and picked up hers.

“I can take that,” she told him as she slid the straps onto her shoulders. “What kind of wildlife is supported by the island?”

“The island has gray wolves that feed off small game. They thrive here.”

“I thrive here, too, so I can understand that.”

“I once planned on building a cabin to retire right here. As you know it's good hiking and the fishing is pretty good, too. But when my engagement fell to pieces, I couldn't see living here alone for the rest of my life.”

“It seems to me that this island would be your healing,” Wynn said.

“Finding the Lord was my healing balm. And this is a good place to pray.”

“Pray, huh? My aunt hasn't said it in so many words, but she wants me to pray in front of her Bridge Club to accept the Lord.”

“You're not up for that display of emotions?” His smiled was cockeyed and a bit bothersome.

“No, I'm more private. If I was to do something, I would do it alone in a place like this and look up at the sky and talk right out loud to God, not be all scrunched up with five sets of eyes watching and listening...analyzing.” Wynn didn't tell him about her first and only session with God.

“What would you say to Him?” His gaze was far off where distant flora met the blue horizon.

“I'm not sure—it depends on the moment and what I feel. But at the right time it'll bubble from my heart right up to the surface and out my mouth.”

“This island sure worked for me at the time of my break-up. I was searching for a way to let go of my pain.” Doug winced, and held out his arm where a paper wasp had just stung him. He shook his arm and it flew off. He scraped his skin with a small folding knife and applied ointment from his pack, as if he did that sort of thing every day.

Which, as a landscaper, she supposed he did.

“With my business I can't get away too often during the summer, and in the winter it's nearly impossible to make it over here. But I come more frequently since spotting a family of feral cats roaming around. I don't want them to get at the federally protected birds that make their nests here, and I don't like the idea of the wolves making an easy meal out of them, so I've set traps for them. On our way back down I better check them.”

“How did the cats get here?”

Doug led the way down the trail taking a different route back. “I'm guessing boaters. Sometimes people have something they don't want so they drop it off and make it someone else's problem.”

“Boy, can I relate to that.”

The sun was dropping behind the furthest hill and the sky was purple with something deeper than lavender.

“This is where I've seen the cats.”

“Looks like campfires have been made here, too. Yours?” Wynn asked, while kicking some ash in a fire pit.

Doug didn't answer.

Wynn sat on a log and waited for him as he thrashed through the brush finding the traps.

Every now and then Doug would holler about how the food was gone and the cages were still empty. He walked out of the brush carrying a live trap.

Inside was a young orange tabby. It looked frightened as it slammed its body about and growled like a full-grown lioness.

“What a spitfire.” She wiggled her fingers through the bars.

Doug yanked it away. “Careful!”

“What are your plans for this wild kitten?” she asked, sliding her hands down into her pockets.

“There's a lady just outside of Kewaunee who runs a feral cat rescue and preserve. It's a wonderful place on acres of land with huge outdoor cages with trees and rocks, and other feral cats. Of course, this one will get its shots, and then be spayed, or neutered first. There it can live out its natural life in relative freedom without harm and without harming.”

“Ah, could this lady possibly be your former fiancée?”

A long silence grew. Clearly, he didn't want to answer any personal questions.

She'd have to wait for him to tell her of his own accord.

With the trap in one hand, he started towards the trail that would take them down to the beach. By the time they reached the dinghy, the sun was a sinking tangerine disk in the scarlet heavens, the perfect colors of an eight o'clock sky on a summer evening. As they paddled to the schooner the wolf serenade began.

Wynn stepped up. Doug handed off the packs and the trap to her. She set it all at the keel as he climbed in stern side, taking care of the rubber dinghy. Next, he cranked in their anchor.

Wynn stood in the hull and took pictures of the sky. She couldn't remember being happier in her entire life. She was on the water with life under her feet, and rare plants on an enchanted island. She knelt to talk to the kitten.

“I can't get the boat going.”

“Why not?”

“It seems we're out of gas.”

“I thought great skippers always looked out for their ships.”

“We do…but there isn't much we can do when the line is cut.” He wriggled the gas line in the air to show her.

“How did that happen?”

“Sabotage.”

“Who would do something like that, and why?” Wynn looked around but saw no one, nor a single vessel.

“One can only guess the pranks kids play when no one is looking.” Doug got the jib ready, and then pulled the halyard lines to hoist the sails. “Looks like we're in for a moonlight sail back to Willow Island.”

“That sounds quite nice.” Wynn settled back into her deck chair. “Anything I can do to help?”

“There's always something to be done on the schooner. I'll have you help with the rudder in a minute. Anyway, there's a beam wind out tonight so we should be back to dock in a little while.”

“No hurry.”

Wind filled the sails. His tacking left a wide wake. “How's our little traveler doing?” He nodded towards the cage.

“Frightened.”

“Here.” Doug pulled a towel from the haul. “Wrap this around the cage and it'll give the animal a sense of security.”

Wynn wrapped the wire cage in the soft towel and immediately the kitten quieted. “If you don't mind, I'd like to keep it.”

“What? You should know that a feral cat can't be tamed, not even a young one.”

“I want to try. With it being so young, I might have a chance. It just seems so lonely and afraid. Maybe I can get it to trust me.”

“Let's get the kitten checked out, vaccinated, and fixed. If Clara says it's healthy, then you can try taming it. If you find it's too much to handle, just admit it, Clara will gladly take it off your hands.”

“So your ex's name is Clara.”

“How did you figure that out? Nevermind.” He smiled. “Want to help steer?”

“Sure!”

“This is known as the rudder,” he explained as he allowed her to take over the steering device. “Let me show you how to tack.” He worked the rudder back and forth and the ship easily sliced through the black waters. The moon's reflection wobbled directly in front of their craft as if it was the road home. Dozens of waves, perfectly aligned and shaped, moved past them.

Between Doug and the end of the schooner, the space was so narrow, that her cheek now and again rested on the surface of his shoulder. She kept pulling away, but if she was to be comfortable, the position couldn't be helped.

“Today was nice. I feel like I got a sense of who you are,” Doug said with an air of satisfaction.

“I think it was the island.”

Doug got up to work the rigging on the mainsheet.

Roxie was wrong about Doug. He had a deep commitment as the islands' unofficial guardian and caretaker, perhaps because his family had owned them at one time. His knowledge and understanding of her research, and the desire to show her more of what he loved was enlightening. She suddenly realized she might be a little bit in love with more than the sea.

The sails began to flap as they slowed considerably.

“What did I do?”

“It takes a while to get the hang of this,” he told her, taking the rudder back into his own hands.

The closer they sailed to Willow Island, the clearer the sounds that crackled over the water.

This was the most settled and peaceful she had felt since coming to the island.

Doug hadn't gnawed on a straw since this morning. Perhaps he was being healed, too.

She felt silly suspecting Roxie of something sinister concerning family information. Wynn decided get back to studying plant life—not human motives. Somehow coming home again had gotten her off kilter. Today had been the best day; good medicine to shake off the mantle of sadness about her father that Willow Island evoked.

Set free on the sea and island exploring had been the perfect medicine. It was time to look ahead, not back. There was plenty of work on her project. She might include getting to know Doug better, too.

“Look ahead, starboard.” Doug pointed “What do you see?”

“Is that beam from a lighthouse?”

“It certainly is. But not just any lighthouse. My lighthouse.”

“That is so very cool. So, you live in a lighthouse?”

“That I do. Still renovating. Want to see it sometime?”

“I really would like that.”

“I'd really like to show you.”

She was happy. She'd often felt challenged or content, but simple joy eluded her. She had found a place here in the beauty of untouched raw nature.

Wynn checked on the kitten to find she had calmed. As Wynn sat down something sharp poked her on the wooden seat. She pried it out. It was a brooch, a cameo.

Agatha's?

 

 

 

 

16

 

An old man was selling sweet corn from a pickup truck. He sat on the tailgate, tapping his shoes together as he read a newspaper.

Seagulls fluttered over the crescent shaped beach as sunbathers relaxed on sand as white as granulated sugar. In the water, a couple paddling a kayak had trouble. Giving up, they got out and swam towards shore, laughing as they pushed the kayak in front of them.

Not surprised to find several other cars already there, Wynn parked at the beachfront in front of a “NO DIGGING FOR JOESPH REED” sign in the shape of a shovel. In the back pocket of her jeans was her to-do list. Wedged in-between emailing the first part of her report to her professor and finding a new area of the island to explore for flora, was a visit to a particular beachside shop; Sheri's, in fact. Perhaps the shopkeeper would have something left of her dad's store inventories. It was a long shot, but it was worth asking.

A large sign printed in black, “Sandy Beach Treasures,” hung near the building's roof peak. Wynn walked into a painted shop. The pungent scent of sandalwood offset local artist paintings, ranging from modern to abstract, displayed at the front of the shop. The room's low ceilings, salmon colored walls, and light linoleum floors were the perfect backdrop for the abundant cornucopia of doo-dads that crammed every inch of each shelf.

On the far wall was a clock, a black cat whose swaying tail ticked the seconds of the day.

Wynn stood still, suddenly remembering a morning like this one, but spent in her mother's kitchen. A memory buoyed with faraway laughter.

 

****

 

“When a gyrocompass is properly mounted it will always point to true north. This clock will keep me turning the latchkey in the shop door on time.”

They had an ordinary life, defined by ordinary moments, which made it exquisite. She had been wrapped up in it, held in it, kept safe there. Dislocated from her past she now floated emotionally out to sea—drifting with the waves while waiting for a rescuer who would put together all the pieces of her life so she could move forward into her future.

 

****

 

“Wynn, is that you?” Sheri waved from behind the counter. “I wondered when you'd get around to coming.”

“I've been busy, but here I am.”

“I know why you've really come.”

“Oh?”

“You've heard the news.”

“News?” Wynn braced for yet another dead, or missing, husband.

“You haven't heard? Oh, good, I get to tell you. The authorities believe the body in Boone's casket might be none other than Joseph Reed in the flesh—what was left, at least!”

“Now that I think about the condition of the body, that sounds about right. The hot sand and cold winter snow would have served as mummification agents to help preserve him. I guess it's time for the man to have a Christian burial. Too bad Anna is deceased, but he sure has enough relatives on the island to see to it.”

“That would most likely be Owl.”

Wynn picked up a bejeweled seashell. “Interesting item.”

“Isn't it? I thought it could use some bling around here to help balance the ambiance of the shop.”

Wynn returned the encrusted shell to the shelf. A remnant of glitter remained on her fingers.

Sheri moved the item to a lower shelf. “This is where it belongs.”

“Has the corpse been identified as that of Joseph Reed?”

“I guess all the signs about no digging will have to be taken down if it is. Owl is having DNA analysis performed on him on the mainland and they're taking mouth swabs from all of his living relatives. Listen to this.” Sheri moved closer. “Doug Reed is the only one who refused to partake in the testing. He thinks it's silly. Know what I call that? Suspicious.”