Celine

TWENTY-SEVEN

Lamont made coffee. He had not had a visitor in twenty-three years so his social graces were rusty: He pulled out a pine chair for Celine at the rough table. The only chair, she noticed. The cabin was log, one room, neat, the plank floor swept, and two jackets—a canvas Carhartt zip-up and a Gore-Tex raincoat—hung on hooks by the door. Shirts and pants and wool sweaters, all old and patched or faded, were folded in wooden egg crates against one wall. A single bed against another wall, under a four-pane window on a side hinge. On the sill of the window, two books. She could read the spines: Poems of the Masters translated by Red Pine, The Great Fires by Jack Gilbert.

She counted two Aladdin kerosene lamps, and candles stuck to saucers on the windowsills. A very old sheet-metal sheepherder’s woodstove in the northwest corner. Two cast-iron frying pans hung on nails in the wall above the stove, and two stainless cook pots. An orange-bodied STIHL chain saw rested on the floor by the front door. Lamont knocked the handle of the woodstove and let the door swing open. He tossed in a couple of chunks of firewood and latched it and ladled water from a five-gallon plastic pickle bucket into the smallest pot and spooned in a pile of coffee grounds from a red tin of Folgers and set it on the stove. Cowboy coffee. He didn’t look at them. “Just a sec,” he said without meeting their eyes and went out the door. He carried in a pine stump, tall enough to sit on; thudded it down on the floor. Went back out for another. “There. Please.” He motioned to Pete.

He concentrated on the coffee and did not say another word. Celine watched him. His whole life must have been boiling up in his mind, his heart, just as the coffee would in a couple of minutes—boil and rise, and the crust of grounds would crack open and the water would bubble through.

When it did boil, he knocked the pot twice with a spoon and sprinkled in eggshell from a bowl. Must be a chicken coop out back. In no hurry, he let the grains settle. A steel sink stood against the back wall. Upside down against the rim of the sink was a chipped coffee cup with a pink Disney World castle. Something about it made Celine wince. He turned it over. On a plank shelf were three jelly jars. He brought two down. Poured the coffee and handed Celine the palace mug. “You,” she said. “I’ll take the jar.” He nodded. Brought down a glass sugar bowl from the same shelf. One spoon.

He sat on the stump. Celine studied him. The tautness in his cheeks was ascetic. He ate lean, lived lean, clearly kept his thoughts lean. An acolyte to past mistakes. His lips were cracked with sun and they quivered just a little as he stirred a heaping spoonful of sugar into his coffee. His one indulgence, she guessed. He was still very handsome. His eyelashes were long, his eyes clear if a little bloodshot, his graying sandy hair down over his collar, which hung loosely and revealed a welted scar running from his left ear to his collarbone. She reminded herself that she did not like this man. He was weak, and he had abandoned his only daughter horribly—and twice. She thought again of the tiny girl standing on a stepstool meant to help children brush their teeth—standing on it and cooking her own dinner in her own apartment, alone.

Celine sipped the piping hot dark coffee and said, “How did you die?”

He told them. But first he looked at them steadily, first Pete, then Celine, and said, “The chopper took off. So you must have settled something.”

“We did,” Celine said. “I promised them that you would stay dead. I told them that the photographs you took of Peña de la Cruz would stay buried.”

Lamont started, flinched so hard that he spilled his coffee. He put the mug down, stared at her.

“How else do you think we’re all still sitting here?” she said. “And not being buried by the lake?”

He nodded slowly.

“You took pictures in the palace that afternoon, of the body.”

He stared, nodded.

“And next to the body, an American, a government official. Important enough then, but now very high up. Very.”

He didn’t move. Not a twitch. The absolute lack of motion spoke volumes.

“We’ve had good—” She stopped. “Well. We’ve had long lives. Full. I don’t mind, really. But I was thinking of Gabriela.” He nodded. “And her son.” Another flinch. Poor man. He started to speak and she held up a hand. “We’ll get to that. Good,” she said and took another sip. “Good coffee.” She took a deep breath. “Salvador Allende did not commit suicide, did he?” She sipped. “Nor did poor Peña de la Cruz. They would not worry about a crackpot adventure photographer who had been drinking too much vodka and maté—sorry—railing about the CIA killing a minister of finance. Who would believe him? Not I. Who cared that much, after all, anymore? Water under the bridge. Sadly. But. Photographs would be a different story. A picture, like the others I assume you’ve got, of an American, in a suit, a very important American standing with a gun over the dead body of a member of the cabinet, that would be a different story. That would rock the world and rewrite history at just the wrong time. This time, this critical time, when the States are swimming in international sympathy and clearly trying to pull together a coalition. Very bad timing. So I told them that if an ounce of harm came to any of the three of us, or Gabriela, or your grandson, or my family, that it would trigger the release of the photographs to the press. I mentioned The New York Times, The Washington Post.”

Lamont stared at her.

“Old poker player.” Celine smiled. “We’ve found one of the pictures, and wherever the rest of those photographs are, you’d better set that up. We can help you.”

So they drank coffee. Through the afternoon and into the dusk. No one was in a hurry. He lit the lamps and scrambled up eggs in olive oil—he did have a chicken coop—and they ate them with strips of elk jerky, the best dried meat Celine had ever had. He made another pot of coffee and they drank more after supper. Celine told him everything she knew of Gabriela’s life, and of her son, who was now eight. Lamont listened like a man who was half dead from thirst, half dead and now drinking cold spring water. It was like pouring water into the pot of a dried and yellowing geranium, they could see the firmness coming back to limbs, the color. He said very little. What could he say, Celine thought. After everything. He had made his choices. Hard ones.

He told them how he’d died, how he’d studied and carved bear tracks out of wood and picked a night of coming storm, and cut his own wrists for blood. He knew it didn’t have to be perfect, because he knew the agency would want him dead and would go to great lengths to put him there, at least in the official records. He did not speak of the bigger decisions except to say, “Gabriela needed a life. Needed out from under the Woman. Needed to inherit. I needed out of the work. With them. They knew I had the photographs and they knew my personality—that I was impulsive and rash and maybe, ah…”

“Self-destructive?” prompted Celine helpfully.

He nodded. “Right. That if they even tried to threaten me with say, Gabriela, I would blow it all open. So if they couldn’t find me after I disappeared, maybe they didn’t try all that hard. Probably relieved to have it all go quiet. But then—”

“Then we traipsed through the ashes. Made everybody sneeze.”

He almost smiled. His face, Celine thought now, had been chiseled by sadness. Now it nearly smiled. She wondered if the muscles even knew how anymore.

Celine set down her fork and said, “You had a beautiful family and you screwed it up and caused immense pain.” His eyelashes fluttered and he looked down at his plate. “Especially to your daughter. You made bad choices and you were weak. You suffered terribly when Amana died.” His hand touched his own cheek, reflex, as if to make sure he was still living. “I get that. But many many people suffer terribly and go on to live lives of grace. You know, I am terribly fond of Gabriela. She’s an extraordinary young woman. She’s made a good life despite losing her mother, despite the wrecking ball she had for a father. I think she is going to want to come to see you. Soon. I think you ought to get another chair and another coffee cup.”

The man turned on his stump away from them, to face the little window. He leaned forward. His elbows went to his knees and his hands went to his face. Celine let him be. Finally, she said, “Will you walk us to our truck now? We’re exhausted and it’s getting truly dark. We could use a guide.”

She could see him nod. “Of course,” he said huskily. “Of course.”