History of Wolves(17)

“It’s in the name,” I said.

“Chocolate?”

“Mousse.” I raised my eyebrows.

Paul looked up at the moose head mounted over the door, antlers wide as a man’s flung-open arms, nostrils big as bowls.

The canoe ride was a tougher sell. He was fussy about it from the beginning. He didn’t want to get his shoes wet getting in, so I waded through the water in my boots, Paul in my arms, and set him down on the hull near the prow. This seemed more stable than getting him to perch on the seat. Then I gave him his pretzels and a mildewed life vest to sit on, sultan-style. I told him to stay still as I paddled: don’t rock back and forth, just look straight ahead. That day the water was calm and black, absorbing each dip of the paddle. Paul got so bored he fell asleep. Head down, arms crossed over the portage pads, water clunk-clunking beneath us. I had to carry him back to the house with his legs wrapped around my waist like a baby. I had to leave the canoe half-beached in the rocks, where it could have been carried away if the wind picked up. I didn’t have a free hand to drag it.

And even then, he was whiny in my arms. Fighting me and refusing to be put down. Going, “Stop it, stop it, Linda.” As if I had been tormenting him with the pleasure of a canoe ride. With the gift of a perfect day.


I’m not saying he was especially difficult to manage. But he did have a ferocious streak; somewhere in him there was a sharp line drawn between order and chaos. He did not tolerate, for instance, any break in his routine. If occasionally I lingered after I brought him back—if Patra laid out an extra plate and showed me how to whisk oil and lemon for a dressing—Paul would grow increasingly clingy. Possessive. All through dinner, he’d beg to sit in Patra’s lap, and by the end he’d work his way up and nuzzle her neck. She’d fork lettuce into her mouth with one hand, pet his blond hair with the other.

There was one night in particular. Paul was whiny, and Patra was casting about for something other than trains and bath time to talk about. I remember how she pushed back her bowl, set her chin in her palm and pointed herself at me.

“O-kay, Linda,” she said. There was something unsettled about her that night, a frenzy of tiny movements in the skin around her eyes. “Tell me. You’re one of those girls who wants to raise horses or something, be a vet, when she grows up. I can tell. I’m right, aren’t I? That’s what you want to be.”

I wasn’t one of those girls, actually. I didn’t think much about the future, but when I did, all I could come up with was the weird image of a semitruck, white and floating down the highway. Of course I couldn’t say that. I couldn’t say truck driver, so to stall I looked across the table at Paul, who was inching from his chair to the floor.

Singing: “I want to be a phy-sic-ist. I want to be a phy-sic-ist.”

Patra was just teasing, though, I could tell. She didn’t really care what I said, as long as I played along. She wanted something to do before clearing the table, before coaxing Paul toward bed. A distraction before the husband called.

“I could be a vet,” I said, offering myself up. “Sure.”

“Or, no!” Patra pulled one bent leg under her. “I’ve got something better for you. I’m good at this kind of thing. Let’s see, you, Linda, you deserve something you haven’t seen—a city to explore, you know? A bunch of people trying to get in your doors. You should be—” She snapped her fingers, flashing a grin. “A hotelier. A restaurateur.” She looked so pleased.

“A restaurant-er?” Paul asked.

I grunted to keep from smiling. “Like a waitress? I did that already.” I swept my hand across the room, like, what’s all this then? “I quit for you.”

She widened her eyes, feigned shock. “You left the restaurant business to be a babysitter? That’s a whole lot of pressure for us here, isn’t it, Paul? We should give you a better title then. Where did the word ‘babysitter’ come from, anyway?”

I shrugged.

“An ugly word, right? Should we call you nanny instead? No, no, that sounds like an old lady. What about governess? Oooh, let’s call you governess.” She was laughing now. “That’s so much better. A babysitter would never be hired for Flora and Miles. You’ve read The Turn of the Screw? Or, a babysitter couldn’t fall in love with Mr. Rochester, right? And be the heroine. Governess you are.”

“Governess!” Paul shouted from under the table. He waited for Patra to define it, and when she didn’t he pulled a fist of pebbles from his stash in the glove and threw them.

“Watch it,” I told him. To Patra: “I don’t know. I’m not sure. Sounds like kind of a sissy thing to be. Plus, people will think you’re, like, millionaires or something.” I was trying to keep from grinning at her.

“You’re right.” Patra pouted.

“Time for my bath.” Paul pouted, too. He crawled from the floor onto her lap.

Patra let him nestle into her chest while she stroked his hair. She patted his cheek, but her eyes were on me. “You’re right, Linda. You’re right. People here already think I’m a snob or something. An anomaly.” She furrowed her brow, following a new train of thought. “I’m still figuring this place out, what’s what. It’s funny. I’ve been to the diner with Paul four, maybe five times? For lunch? I see the same people every time I go in, and they all look at me. They all smile and say hi. But no one has asked me one thing about myself. Not my name, not a thing. People are nice in a way, but also—”