The Sky Fisherman (34 page)

One by one, the boys drifted out into the rain; Gab stayed and tried another slice of jelly roll. "Appetite's coming back. I'm not paying for this slice, though."

Jake didn't say anything. He washed the boys' cups and replaced them on the rack. He took a couple of the other cups, including Seaweed's, and washed them, too. As he watched Gab lick jelly from his fingers, Jake paused. "How can you eat after a story like that?"

"I'm a radio man. A newshound. That's news."

"You don't even know who it is yet," Jake said. "Don't go stirring up rumors."

"Doesn't matter. It's still news, unless it was Indians on a toot. Then it's just news on the rez."

"Those fellas were hard cases," Jake said. "Maybe they finally hit a brick wall." He hung up the dish towel and replaced the liquid detergent. "Anyway, you're not the news director. You're head of advertising and promotions. That's why you're always hanging around dipping your hand in my pocket."

"I wear many hats.
Versatility
is the key to my success."

"You also married the station owner's daughter," Jake pointed out. "That didn't hurt."

Pretending to be stricken, Gab brought his hand to his heart. "It does hurt deeply, Jake, the way you belittle my talents. I'm a regular Renaissance man burdened by a small town's lack of sensitivity." He took a long breath. "As for Priscilla, she got a bargain."

Jake rinsed his own cup. "I wonder if Meeks and Chilcoat might have set that mill fire."

Gab stroked his chin, intrigued by the idea. "Now that would be something. Live by the sword..."

"Die by the sword," Jake finished.

Gab's mouth flew open in mock amazement. "Why, Jake. You're a Renaissance man, too."

"You, me, and Franklin," Jake said. "Tight as ticks."

O
NE SMALL ADVANTAGE
to moving from school to school was that none of my teachers realized what projects I had completed before, so at new schools I kept updating old projects, thereby minimizing homework. In Gateway this allowed more time for basketball practice and hanging around the sporting goods store. I had a pretty good report on Argentina that I'd updated twice for social science projects and one on the 1919 Centralia Massacre. In Washington State, Wobblies and veterans had clashed violently over labor rights during an Armistice Day parade, and several men were killed. Riley had put me onto that topic. According to him, the railroad needed more strong union sentiments. My mother never suspected I reused a lot of these projects until I mentioned I planned to enter a volcano in the Gateway science fair. Then she protested that I'd worked on a volcano two years before in Grass Valley.

The Gateway High School Science Fair was heralded with a lot of hoopla by the teacher and the local paper. Belief in American scientific know-how had suffered a setback with the early success of Russia's Sputnik program and other space launches. From the flyers the school sent out, one would think a successful fair at Gateway would enable our country to surpass the Russians. And when my science class had turned in ideas for the fair, the projects included a model satellite, Titan missile, torpedo, and similar hardware. I submitted a volcano.

I knew pretty much how these events worked because I'd seen smaller versions of the science fair at other schools. The best projects were made by the farm kids with access to their parents' machine shops and car
pentry skills. Although adult hands-on help was taboo, it was pretty clear none of the sophisticated models were actually conceived and crafted by Junior. My little papier-mache volcano with red food dye, baking soda, and vinegar lava seemed puny by comparison, but at least it met my mother's insistence that I enter the fair while keeping my time investment to a minimum. To her credit, I imagine she felt a blue-ribbon satellite or missile project would launch my career with the space program or at least open the doors at the Air Force Academy. But I was playing another angle, although I realized it was a long shot.

After the Science Fair, the next big project was the Future Farmers of America Livestock Show, where the ag boys demonstrated their cattle, sheep, and horses. Roughly a third of the Gateway boys belonged to FFA, and each Thursday they swaggered around in their blue whipcord jackets with gold lettering. While I had no use for a horse or cow, I wanted a dog and suggested to Mom that I could enter one in the small animal competition.

"A dog?" my mother said, glancing up from her ironing when I raised the idea. "Are you crazy? They live ten or fifteen years. In a couple years when you're off at college, I'll be stuck with a dog. Scratching up the drum table. Shedding hairs all over the love seat." She was working up a head of steam.

"I could take the dog with me to college," I offered.

"Culver, you know better. A dog would distract you from your studies. A dog is definitely out. Anyway, we can't afford a dog."

"Maybe I won't go to college. I might just stay around here and work at Jake's. Learn the business."

She put down the water bottle she used to squirt clothes. She had a steam iron, but the steaming holes had plugged up with minerals from the hard water in Grass Valley. "Don't even think about it. Do you want to wind up like Jed? Seventy years old. Perched on a stool selling worms and salmon eggs?"

"Not exactly." I had always imagined myself more like Jake—running the guide service. I'd get someone else to package worms.

"I should hope not. I should hope you'd have a little more ambition."

"That's why I need a dog," I said. "You told me to go a hundred percent at school. I can't even enter the FFA fair without an animal."

"When I said one hundred percent I was referring to your general studies and the Science Fair," she said. "You don't need to trot around the ring with some poor dumb animal." She paused. "Dogs. When we lived at that horrible siding in Black Diamond, the stationmaster kept
two enormous dogs. I don't know what kind, but they were supposed to be a big deal. He was afraid those dogs would be run over by a train, so he kept them attached to the clothesline on long leads. I couldn't hang up clothes there because they pooped and peed under the clothesline all summer. Even after Riley went out and cleaned it up, that place still smelled so bad I wouldn't walk under the lines. We sure don't want any dogs." Red-faced, she returned to her ironing with a passion.

I knew I wouldn't win the dog round, but I'd scored a point about her not letting me enter school projects one hundred percent. In that peculiar manner of compromise each family has, what I'd gained was the option of making another volcano instead of committing to a more ambitious project.

Franklin had suggested a scale model of the Sunrise Biscuits plant and had been so helpful as to draw a model. With the railroad siding, tall grain storage elevators, flour mill, and business offices, I had to admit it could have made a terrific project, but I just didn't want to invest the time, even though both Mom and Franklin were a little disappointed.

Whatever I did was okay with Mr. Maxwell, the science instructor. To tell the truth, I think Maxwell had a thing for my mother. He had given her a pretty good lookover on parents' night and she had dressed up for the occasion. She had a bit of mystery about her. In those days single parents were not common, and I suppose Grady had spread the word about Riley. She was beautiful and might be dangerous.

Maxwell was an okay guy, too. He loved the desert and spent each summer there studying rocks and fossils. He wore flannel shirts and boots, so he looked like the guys who hung around Jake's. During summer, he had been in Jake's to buy gold pans and rock hammers and we had discussed his hunting plume agates and thunder eggs out in Oregon somewhere. I was pleasantly surprised to learn this fellow was going to be my science teacher.

On the night of the fair, half the town hurried to the high school gymnasium. During the afternoon, a committee of judges had awarded ribbons, but no one knew who had won until that evening when the doors opened. I didn't expect a ribbon, nor did I get one, although the volcano did receive an honorable mention certificate. I suspect Maxwell put it there himself, since he was sweet on my mother and I was a model student, paying attention most of the time, not goofing around with the chem lab, avoiding scraping mud on the chair rungs in front of me like the ag boys did.

Blue ribbons went to the Titan missile and satellite. A scale model of
the Gateway Irrigation Project received a red ribbon, as did a study of pesticides and the insects they killed. I was a little embarrassed because these were costly, knockout projects that put mine to shame. However, for two hours I stood gamely behind my volcano and answered questions if anyone stopped to ask. Except for family, only a few did. The most memorable was a slightly tipsy ex-sailor who had seen volcanoes up close in Hawaii.

Across from me was a project entered by Alvina Toopah, sister of Thatcher Toopah, starting guard for the Gladiators. Her model was devoted to thermal energy and showed the reservation hot springs they used to heat the lodge and the swimming pool. She had won a red ribbon, too, and as far as I could tell, was the only Indian with an entry.

I was decked out in my blazer and felt a little uncomfortable because most of the other boys were wearing sports shirts and slacks. But my mother had insisted. "Parents and professional people will be there," she had said. "And you want to look your best. First impressions are always important." I think she even felt some Central people might come down, although I had no idea why they would. Their own high school was five times the size of ours.

That night my mother wore a green wool dress she had bought on sale. After the purchase, she had to lie down a little while, because strapped as we were, spending that much money on herself made her dizzy. But she looked terrific and several men's eyes cut her way when she and Franklin came through the door. "Pretty snertzy," she had said, trying on the dress again at home.

"Those your folks?" Alvina asked.

"My mom and her friend," I said. "Your folks coming?"

"I think so."

My mother and Franklin spent a long time looking at all the science projects, and my mother asked about each one, then listened politely to the explanations. When she saw my certificate, her face glowed, and I'm sure she saw Stanford or MIT just around the corner.

Jake and Juniper came, too, and seemed to spend almost as much time with each project as Franklin and my mother had. Juniper paused to study Alvina's model. "Mom used to grow the best vegetables out there at the hot springs. And the biggest. Everybody wanted some because they tasted so good. Maybe it was the minerals."

"I didn't know anyone lived down there," Alvina said.

"Before your time," Juniper said. "We had to move when those springs got sold off to a white doctor and he built the bathhouses. While I was
growing up, Mom had a free pass, so we could use the bathhouse anytime we wanted. See, they saved one for Indians only, and I thought that was pretty great." She paused. "Until I realized that was to keep us out of the white bathhouses."

"I never could figure how he bought the land," Jake said. "It was on the reservation. The tribe should have kept it."

"Something was fishy," Juniper said. "Later, when the tribe wanted it back, that land cost us millions. And I imagine the doctor got pretty well situated."

"It's too bad you can't move back," Alvina said.

Juniper nodded. "They tore our family house down, those old bathhouses, too, when they built the lodge. But I have memories of sitting in there with my mother, feeling the good heat, the hard stones on my feet. And sometimes I hear those grandmothers, talking in the old language."

Juniper touched Alvina's model and fell silent, as if the heat from the stones warmed her hand and she could still hear the voices.

No one spoke for a moment. Trying to lighten the mood I asked, "Did you know what you wanted to do after high school?"

She laughed, shaking her head. "What I knew mostly was that I didn't want to be a teenage mother. They had us all take these aptitude tests. The counselors said I should try to be a checker in the grocery store or a typist. Right then, I knew something was wrong. I couldn't even type."

When she and Jake moved closer to my volcano, I asked if they wanted the complete spiel. Jake shook his head. "All this science is making me thirsty," he said.

One of the gymnasium tables was set up with sugar cookies and loganberry punch. Things were winding down, so I shucked my blazer and headed for the goodies. Maxwell was there, too, talking politely with all the parents and trying to figure out Franklin's exact relationship with my mother. His eyes seemed a little sad. But Franklin was asking him very intelligent questions without seeming like a weenie or anything and Maxwell was impressed by his knowledge of science.

Gab came in with a tape recorder and microphone. He planned to interview some of the exhibitors and play the show by delayed broadcast.

"When will this be on the radio?" my mother asked. "We want to be sure to listen." She had hurried over when she saw Gab bringing in the gear.

"Six o'clock tomorrow morning. It's a little early, but we have to sneak it in before the regular network program. Specials are kind of hit and miss."

"We'll be up, listening." My mother motioned for me to return to my booth. "Put your coat back on, Culver. It's more professional."

Even though no one could see radio, I followed her instructions.

Gab spent a few minutes with the first-place winners and lingered over the Gateway Irrigation District project. I figured a lot of farmers would be listening at six in the morning. Then Gab approached me.

"Now here's a hot exhibit. This one will shake, rattle, and roll. Culver Martin has constructed a terrific model of a volcano. Culver, can you say a few words about it?"

"Certainly," I said. "Happy you asked." And I launched into the spiel I remembered from the science fair in Grass Valley, the same one I'd used for the text to accompany the project.

"Although many people fail to realize it, we live in close proximity to an active volcano range. Magma and hot lava exist just a few hundred yards beneath the earth's surface. While the mountains were being born, during a time of tremendous geological upheaval, all of this land was covered by lava flow." I took a breath.