The house stands on a swell of pink and grey granite — a piece of the Canadian Shield softened by sunset. Is it possible that this ravishing evening light can erode stone, painting it day after day with pastel rays? Veins of mica glitter like strewn diamonds, clefts in the rock cast shadows on patches of moss, grey, green, gold and black, the house itself is burnished ochre at this hour. A wooden ramp zigzags up to the front door.
A dog rounds the house and trots, barking, toward her car: ears erect, sturdy, with a white and grey coat. He escorts her up to a level patch where a shiny Dodge pickup is parked. Nearby is an open shed — firewood neatly stacked floor to ceiling, snowmobile, battered snowplough blade, tools and tire chains, along with several large dog crates and leather harnesses. On the other side of the shed, a vintage Ford Thunderbird rests on blocks, hood propped open like a grand piano, mess of greasy engine guts on the ground. She pulls up and parks.
The dog is part husky, judging by the curl of his tail and the song he is singing now, head thrown back, eyes still on her, one blue, one brown. The rest of the canine chorus is coming from somewhere beyond the shed. She gets out of her car and the dog wags his tail but resumes barking, glancing back toward the house as though waiting for permission to drop the guard-dog schtick.
She can smell a barbecue going. She has arrived unannounced at suppertime. After twenty-three years.
Someone comes out from behind the house. A tall figure. Denim cutoffs. Sneakers and a T-shirt. Lean and brown.
Madeleine shades her eyes with her hand and says, “Hi Colleen.”
The dog has stopped barking but he is still at her side, awaiting instructions.
“It’s Madeleine.”
“I know.” Colleen’s voice, still smokey and brief but with the added weight of adulthood.
Madeleine says, “Can I come up?”
“What for?”
She hesitates. She is reminded of the day long ago when she met Elizabeth, and Colleen challenged her, Well say her name, can’t you? Elizabeth. That would explain the ramp up to the veranda. She says, “I’ve brought you something.”
“What?”
Something that belongs to you.
Neither has moved. As though each is waiting for the other to jump from the teeter-totter.
A story.
Madeleine goes to her car and reaches into the back seat.
What remains?
Story. Yours, or one like it, in which, as in a pool, you might recognize yourself.
Memory. Mixed and multifarious, folding itself down, down, for the journey. Story is memory rendered portable. Your memory, or many like yours. Unfold it like a tent. It can shelter a world.
Madeleine holds up her father’s air force hat.
Memory breeds memory. The very air is made of memory. Memory falls in the rain. You drink memory. In winter you make snow angels out of memory.
So much remains.
One witness.
Tell.
After a moment, Colleen disappears behind her house. Madeleine follows, accompanied by the dog. As she comes level with the house on her left, she sees, off to the right beyond the shed, a compound set half amid the trees. A long low wooden building with several small doors at intervals, like a miniature motel, painted hunter green. Covered runs lead from the doors and open onto a fenced-in acreage of mown grass and trees, canine Shangri-La. Eight or ten adults bound along behind the fence, Labs, yellows, browns and blacks, noses crammed through the mesh, tails wagging.
She rounds the house. The curve of rock obscures the shore, so that the granite’s pink is juxtaposed with the open water that stretches to meet the horizon. In between, the blue expanse is dotted with stone islands flat as pancakes, their pine trees permanently wind-tilted and shimmering in the heat like northern palms. A far-off ferry boat inches along, plying the route between the mainland and Manitoulin Island. Beyond where the eye can see lie Michigan and the U.S.
Colleen is tending the barbecue and doesn’t look up. Madeleine walks to the crest of the smooth stone, and a dock comes into view below. Water laps at the wooden posts and glitters with the intensity of early evening. She can almost hear the ting of light rippling gold and silver, like notes on a xylophone. A battered aluminum outboard rocks against the dock, bleached-out life-jackets mildewing in the bottom where a sawed-off plastic Javex bottle floats, purpose-built for bailing. On the shore, a few feet above the waterline, a canoe rests overturned, casting a longboat shadow on the stone.
There is a wheelchair at the end of the dock. A woman is sitting in it, facing the water. It’s not Elizabeth. This woman has long gleaming black hair, straight and loose. A head pops out from under the dock — a child. He hauls himself up, water sliding in gleaming sheets from his bare chest. He flops naked onto the dock, a long braid slicked down his back, and stands up. He is a girl.
“Mom, everybody, watch!” she shouts, bounding up the dock, turning to pelt back down again, splashing the silvery wood with ragged black footprints, past the woman in the wheelchair and off the end, cannonballing into the water. The dog rockets down the slope, onto the dock and in after her. They both emerge, one panting, one laughing. Madeleine looks over at Colleen, who is watching the child from her post at the grill. Mom.
Down on the dock, the wheelchair is turning. Madeleine can see from here the sinews in the forearms, tanned and strong like Colleen’s, red cotton sleeves rolled up, faded jeans over thin legs. Cowboy boots. The person looks up, a hand raised to shade the eyes. Beautiful smooth face, high cheekbones, cords in the neck rising from the hollow between the collarbones. His hand goes up in greeting.
Madeleine walks tentatively, hat in hand, down the warm stone, feeling through her sandals how welcome it would be to the soles of bare feet.
“Hi, Ricky.”
She takes his outstretched hand. He pulls her down to him — there is not as much strength and substance to his arms as was suggested by the slanting light. He hugs her. “How you doing, Madeleine?”
“I’m okay,” she says. “How are you?” There is no question that is not inadequate.
“Can’t complain.” His voice has thinned, but it’s clear. Light. How is that possible? “You’re beautiful,” he says.
She has no reply.
He is beautiful.
His brow is smooth, the only signs of aging the slight hollows under his black eyes. He is both older and younger than he was. What happened to him? She wants to touch his face. She sees him notice the hat in her hand.
He says, “How are your folks?”
She swallows back tears. She was unprepared for kindness. Why can’t he be more like Colleen?
“You staying for supper?” He wheels himself up the dock toward the stone, where a ramp traverses the far side. As he rolls past, his black hair swings and the sun catches streaks of silver. He is three years older than her brother would have been.
Feet plunk along the dock behind her; the little girl runs past, droplets flying, followed by the dog, who sideswipes Madeleine with his wet fur, his good wet-dog smell. The girl grabs a crumpled piece of cotton from the rocks, slips it over her head and suddenly she is wearing a dress.
She looks up at Madeleine. “Hi.” Ice-blue eyes; the downward tilt at their corners lends them a permanently amused expression. Sharp like Colleen’s, but unsuspicious.
“Hi,” says Madeleine. She pauses. “I’m Madeleine.”