The Hauntings of Hood Canal

Recent Pooler History

Sugar Bear’s gingerbread house and voluminous workshop nestle among firs and cedars. A cliff stands behind the house, and above that, land rises in a sharp slope to forested mountainside. Swallows nest in the cliff, hawks float overhead, owls pounce during owl light, a few gold-bricking sparrows hang out at a bird feeder, and a house wren blesses the place with the flash of red on her tummy.

Inside the house, after the fisherman knocked and entered, matters looked pretty thin. The fisherman set the six-pack on the kitchen table, popped beers, and passed them. “You’ll forgive it,” he said to Sugar Bear, “I’ve seen days when you looked better.”

“Some kind of crap is happening,” Sugar Bear said. “We can’t figure it.” Sugar Bear looked furry as ever, but there were gray streaks in his beard and wrinkles around his eyes. “…like trying to punch a hole in fog.”

“Slowly, slowly.” The fisherman looked around the place, saw it immaculate in a way too pure for a Sugar-Bear-happy-go-sloppy life, and figured Annie was to blame. Next there would be chintz curtains and salt shakers shaped like little duckies… “You’ve brightened the place,” he said to Annie.

She sat, more beautiful than ever. Her face seemed thinner which accented her dark eyes. Long hair framed her face. Her hands, always beautiful, always one of the pretty things about her also seemed thinner; hands streamlined and practical, hands that could make everyday magic along with other magics. Annie, who the fisherman knew was fond of him in a sisterly way, was clearly on defense as she tried to figure out who she could trust.

“Tell me,” he said to Annie.

It was, the fisherman would later muse, like one of those dark and improbable Russian plays where everybody does right things for wrong reasons, and wrong things for stupid reasons; and then stands hollering in the wind, or kneeling broken and bent before one or another altar. A ‘course, the fisherman would also later reflect, this wasn’t Russia. Besides, Annie was Greek, and Sugar Bear was a mongrel.

The part about Chantrell was easy. Nobody would want to hurt the poor sap, but a scorpion, even of innocent intent, was still a scorpion.

The part about Petey wasn’t easy. It looked like Petey and the cop had a date with destiny. Instead of the cop chasing Petey, Petey chased the cop.

“Not, a ‘course, like anything real obvious.” Sugar Bear puzzled, looked around the immaculate house that made him even more puzzled. “But wherever the cop shows up, Petey shows up. Like he’s checking the cop out. Could be the cop is getting nervous.”

“And that’s good,” Annie murmured without explaining why. As near as the fisherman could tell, Annie ran a number on herself. She didn’t look unhappy, but she didn’t look particularly happy.

“Makes ‘police harassment’ take on new meaning,” the fisherman mused. Then the fisherman realized something. He brightened. “It’s a hustle. Petey’s a hustler. He’s running a hustle on the cop.”

Sugar Bear had probably not smiled in a long time. Now he looked delighted. Annie giggled, but the giggle was tense. The fisherman realized matters were just a little less than hysteric. He tried to take advantage of what cheer existed.

“So what’s his hustle?”

“Hustlers got a world of their own, so there ain’t no way of telling.” Part of Sugar Bear’s delight came because he could think of somebody else’s troubles.

“A hustle depends on letting the other guy believe he’ll get what he wants.”

“So what does a cop want?”

“He wants to hurt somebody. He wants to solve a case. What does a cop ever want?” Annie, the fisherman realized, was not as subdued as she seemed. Anyone who came after Sugar Bear would have to deal with Greek thunder. Big time.

“Easy answer,” the fisherman told Annie. “Sooner or later we’ll think it through.” He looked at Sugar Bear. “And there was a pool tournament?”

“I shoulda gone,” Sugar Bear said. “The cash-stash is running a little low.”

To the fisherman it seemed Sugar Bear was large as ever, but if you looked close his clothes hung a little loose. If he did not have that faceful of fur, he might even look thin.

“As well you didn’t,” Annie told Sugar Bear, then looked to the fisherman. “I know those people.”

And yes, the fisherman recalled, Annie had emigrated from the development, so, yes, she knew those people. He listened as the sordid story unfolded.

It was clear that, in the case of the tow truck kid, only the optimism of youth could possibly have walked into that polish situation and driven away with a half-paid-for Dodge pickup, driving toward doom and utter darkness; or, maybe, at least, coasting toward perdition. Plus, a ‘course, a Canal story went with it.

The story said the kid showed up with a team of beetle-lady­champions wearing purple bowling shirts. The champions were a mixture of Beer and Bait, and Rough and Randy regulars. Under the beetle-lady’s tutelage some of them actually learned to speak words instead of grunts.

Arrayed on the other side, and clad in pastel golfing togs, a team of business jocks wielded seven-hundred-dollar pool cues above a pair of tables so big they looked like soccer fields. Standard plastic balls rolled on the table, but a classic set of ivory balls, yellowed with age, and under lock and key, nestled like diamonds in a small case on the wall. They seemed like memories of antique conquest, of the white man’s burden, and of jolly excursions up dark and exotic rivers.

A well-stocked bar sat at one end of the room, and around the bar sat gowned ladies who wore the colors of butterflies. Subdued music, sorta churchy, or opera-type, came from the tape deck. Autographed pictures of Republican presidents and secretaries of state hung on the walls. Cigar smoke from hundred­buck havannas magically whirled away on warm air circulated through a filter system. Drinks were on the house.

Free booze caused the boys of Rough and Randy to experience sweat in their armpits, and wonder into what type of cow plop they had just stepped. Free booze was the oldest hustle in the book. Either these rich guys were secret hustlers, or so damn dumb it made a fella’s mouth water just to think about it.

The whole deal, the story continued, turned into that kind of cuss-and-cream-soda-hustle you’d expect from a smarty-type kid backed by frowsy regulars. That is to say: indelicate.

The rich guys actually held their own for an hour. The rich guys were gracious. They complimented the bar guys on good shots. The rich guys whispered like co-conspirators, and even demonstrated a little know-how when it came to setting their partners up. As the rich guys settled into their game they pulled off some pretty showy action.

Meanwhile, the butterflies did not actually do handsprings, stand on each other’s shoulders, or any cheerleader-type stuff, but they grew pretty boisterous for butterflies. As Mr. Jack Daniels lowered inhibitions, clapping and smiles increased. By the end of an hour the butterflies turned from a flock of flowers into a howling wolfpack—which, as anyone has gotta admit, is mixing a couple metaphors, but that generally happens in Canal stories.

At the end of an hour the rich guys began to fade. They started forcing their shots. Their cues no longer hung loose in their hands, and sweat in their palms asked for increasing amounts of talcum. Little wrinkles around eyes deepened, and eyes narrowed and looked snarly. The whole show did a one-eighty as rich guys began missing shots. If the butterflies had turned into a wolfpack, the bar guys now turned into wolverines.

The rest is Canal history. The bar guys did their best as they tried for a sophisticated hustle. It didn’t work. They still sounded like a used car salesman urging a reluctant customer toward something that needs a valve job. The rich guys put up with it, because the rich guys knew the hustle had started. And, being rich, the rich guys could not believe they could lose. As matters grew serious, the tow truck kid made out best. He was so damn dumb he played for the whole pot every time, and got on a roll.

At the end of it, as butterflies drifted off with great indifference, the rich guys managed to remain civil. The bar guys tried not to act like the kind of boys they are. Still, it turned into a long night, and the worst part was the indifference of the butterflies; indifference worse than scorn. The bar guys departed the premises with no small amount of cash, but with feelings most uneasy.

“And that’s where it stands,” Annie explained. “Now we’re waiting for the other shoe to drop.”

The fisherman, mildly alarmed, told of the rich guy at Beer and Bait, and how that guy fired the tow truck kid. He told how the rich guy and the beetle-lady were married. The fisherman told about little-finger stuff, and as he talked he felt scary because rich guy promised another joust at pool.

“He’s running true to form,” Annie murmured. “That kid thought he was hustling, but rich guy pulled the hustle.”

Annie was, the fisherman told himself, either sharper than he was, or else talking to herself.

“Bait and switch,” Annie explained. “The kid thinks this deal is about pool. It’s about something else. Hard to say what!” She looked through the kitchen window into the forest. Shadows lay deep, and moisture feathered the needles of trees like silver. If Annie saw important stuff out there she did not say. Instead she talked about the housing project.

“It’s a game to them. They’ll spend two thousand dollars and two months planning a way to cheat their brother out of a hundred bucks. Then they’ll spend a thousand dollars more on a party in their brother’s honor.” She looked back into the forest where shadows lay deep. “I don’t know enough,” she whispered. “I should have paid more attention.” She sounded sad, and she definitely was not speaking to the fisherman or Sugar Bear.

“Maybe all this is good,” Sugar Bear said. “If we get a lot of flak then everybody worries about the flak. They’ll talk about other stuff. The cop snoops someplace else.”

“Don’t get too hopeful,” the fisherman said. “How come you’re looking poorly?”

“I can’t work,” Sugar Bear told him. “That’s the deal. I go along for a while, get to feeling good, do a little work, and get sicky. I piddle around, get to feeling good again, fire up the forge and get sicky.” He looked at Annie, his look sweet as his name and gentle as his nature. He was clearly smitten. “The best thing in the world happens, and here I am, breaking down. I can’t work.”

And that, the fisherman thought, had to be the worst possible thing that could happen. Even the biggest goldbrick in the world did something buildable. True, some guys built, and some tore down, but doing was a damn infliction. Even poor dopey old Chantrell had built visions.

“The dead guy…” Sugar Bear began, and was interrupted. “Forget the dead guy. He’s zip. Gone. Take care of what’s here, right now.” Annie turned to the fisherman. She did not exactly ask for anything, not exactly; but her look asked for help he wanted to give and couldn’t. He didn’t see how to get a handhold on the problem.

The fisherman absentmindedly tapped a finger against his beer can and tried to look encouraging. This was the woman he loved and lost, but he’d already spent nearly a month learning to handle that. And, he told himself, he was sorta handling it.

Plus, Sugar Bear was his best friend. A thoughtful guy ought to come up with something. Then, for no reason he could see, the fisherman thought of the tow truck kid. The kid had looked scared in spite of his smart mouth.

“The key to the cop might be the kid,” the fisherman mused. “They work together.”

“Cops ain’t that mysterious.” Sugar Bear studied the problem like a man about to take a test for a seaman’s ticket. “If mystery stuff is happening, I don’t see how a cop plays any part.”

“The cop is lonesome. I do know that.” Annie told how, on one hot day, she watched the cop from the forest. He looked lonesome then, and hot, and miserable. If he hadn’t been a cop she would have taken him a lemonade.

“So is Bertha,” the fisherman said. “Lonesome. But she don’t know it.”

The three people looked at each other in disbelief. “Naw,” Sugar Bear said. “Can’t happen.”

“Anything can,” Annie told him. She once more turned to the fisherman. “I don’t see how this feeds into our problem.”

“Maybe it doesn’t, but it’s one thing we don’t know about. And, the kid knows something. I’ll quiz the kid.”

“Or the cop,” Sugar Bear said. “But who’s gonna do discussion group with a cop?”

“Me, maybe,” Annie told him. “Also with Bertha. Bartenders know everything that’s going on.”