Last Night In Twisted River

mine. And it was an accident.”

Of course the cook was thinking about Constable Carl; in the constable’s world, there was no such thing as a no-fault accident. In the cowboy’s mind, if you could call it that, good intentions didn’t count. You can’t save yourself, but you can save your son, Dominic Baciagalupo was thinking. (And for how many years might the cook manage to save them both?)

For so long, Danny had wanted to see Jane undo her braid and let down her hair-not to mention how he had dreamed of seeing her enormous breasts. Now he couldn’t look at her. “I loved Jane!” the boy blurted out.

“Of course you did, Daniel-I know you did.”

“Were you do-si-doing her?” the twelve-year-old asked.

“Yes,” his father answered. “I loved Jane, too. Just not like I loved your mom,” he added. Why was it necessary for him to say that? the cook asked himself guiltily. Dominic had truly loved Jane; he must have been yielding to the fact that there was no time to grieve for her.

“What happened to your lip?” the boy asked his dad.

“Six-Pack smacked me with her elbow,” the cook answered.

“Were you do-si-doing Six-Pack, too?” his son asked him.

“No, Daniel. Jane was my girlfriend-just Jane.”

“What about Constable Carl?” young Dan asked.

“We have a lot to do, Daniel,” was all his dad would tell him. And they didn’t have a lot of time, the cook knew. Before long, it would be light outside; they had to get started.

IN THE CONFUSION and sheer clumsiness that followed, and in their frantic haste, the cook and his son would find a multitude of reasons to relive the night of their departure from Twisted River -though they would remember the details of their forced exit differently. For young Dan, the monumental task of dressing the dead woman-not to mention bringing her body down the cookhouse stairs, and toting her to her truck-had been herculean. Nor did the boy at first understand why it was so important to his father that Jane be correctly dressed-that is, exactly as she would have dressed herself. Nothing missing, nothing awry. The straps to her stupendous bra could not be twisted; the waistband of her mammoth boxer shorts could not be rolled under; her socks could not be worn inside out.

But she’s dead! What does it matter? Danny was thinking. The boy wasn’t considering the scrutiny that Injun Jane’s body might soon come under-what the examining physician would conclude was the cause of death, for example. (A blow to the head, obviously, but what was the instrument-and where was it?) The approximate time of death would need to be factored in, too. Clearly it mattered to the cook that, at the time of her death, Jane would appear to have been fully clothed.

As for Dominic, he would forever be grateful to Ketchum-for it was Ketchum who’d acquired a dolly for the cookhouse, on one of his drunken binges in Maine. The dolly was useful in unloading the dry goods from the trucks, or the cases of olive oil and maple syrup-even egg cartons, and anything heavy.

The cook and his son had strapped Jane onto the dolly; thus they were able to bring her down the cookhouse stairs in a semi-upright position, and wheel her standing (almost straight) to her truck. However, the dolly had been no help getting Injun Jane into the cab, which the cook would later recall as the “herculean” part of the task-or one herculean part, among several.

As for the instrument of death, Dominic Baciagalupo would pack the eight-inch cast-iron skillet among his most cherished kitchen items-namely, his favorite cookbooks, because the cook knew he had no time, and scant room, to pack his kitchenware. The other pots and pans would stay behind; the rest of the cookbooks, and all the novels, Dominic would leave for Ketchum.

Danny scarcely had time to gather some photos of his mom, but not the books he’d kept her pictures pressed flat in. As for clothing, the cook packed only the bare necessities of his own and young Dan’s clothes-and Dominic would pack more clothes for himself than he did for his son, because Daniel would soon outgrow what he was wearing.

The cook’s car was a 1952 Pontiac station wagon-the so-called semiwoodie Chieftain Deluxe. They’d made the last real “woodie” in 1949; the semiwoodie had fake wooden panels outside, offset against the maroon exterior, and real wood inside. The interior had maroon leather upholstery, too. Because of Dominic’s lame left foot, the Pontiac Chieftain Deluxe came with automatic transmission-in all likelihood making it the only vehicle with automatic transmission in the settlement of Twisted River -which made it possible for Danny to drive the car, too. The twelve-year-old’s legs weren’t long enough to depress a clutch pedal all the way to the floor, but Danny had driven the semiwoodie station wagon on the haul roads. Constable Carl didn’t cruise the haul roads. There were many boys Danny’s age, and even younger, driving cars and trucks on the back roads around Phillips Brook and Twisted River -unlicensed preteens with pretty good driving skills. (The boys who were a little taller than Danny could depress the clutch pedals all the way to the floor.)

Considering the contingencies of their escape from Twisted River, it was a good thing that Danny could drive the Chieftain, because the cook would not have wanted to be seen walking through town, back to the cookhouse, after he drove Jane (in her truck) to Constable Carl’s. By that early hour of the morning, in the predawn light, Dominic Baciagalupo’s limp would have made him recognizable to anyone who might have been up and about-and for the cook and his son to have been seen walking together at that ungodly hour would have been most unusual and suspicious.

Of course, Dominic’s maroon semiwoodie was the only car of its kind in town. The ’52 Pontiac Chieftain might not pass unnoticed, although it would pass more quickly through the settlement than the cook with his limp, and the station wagon would never be parked within sight of where Dominic would leave Jane’s truck-at Constable Carl’s.

“Are you crazy?” Danny would ask his father, as they were preparing to leave the cookhouse-for the last time. “Why are we bringing the body to the constable?”

“So the drunken cowboy will wake up in the morning and think he did it,” the cook told his son.

“What if Constable Carl is awake when we get there?” the boy asked.

“That’s why we have a back-up plan, Daniel,” his dad said.

A misty, almost imperceptible rain was falling. The long maroon hood of the Chieftain Deluxe glistened. The cook wet his thumb on the hood; he reached inside the open driver’s-side window and rubbed the spot of dried blood off his son’s forehead. Remembering his goodnight kiss, Dominic Baciagalupo knew whose blood it was; he hoped it hadn’t been the last kiss he would give Daniel, and that no more blood (not anyone’s blood) would touch his boy tonight.

“I just follow you, right?” young Dan asked his dad.

“That’s right,” the cook said, the back-up plan foremost in his mind as he climbed into the cab of Jane’s truck, where Jane was slumped against the passenger-side door. Jane wasn’t bleeding, but Dominic was glad that he couldn’t see the bruise on her right temple. Jane’s hair had fallen forward, covering her face; the contusion (it was swollen to the size of a baseball) was pressed against the passenger-side window.

They drove, a caravan of two, to the flat-roofed, two-story hostelry where Six-Pack was renting what passed for a second-floor apartment. In the rearview mirror of Jane’s truck, the cook had only a partial view of his son’s small face behind the wheel of the ’52 Pontiac. The Chieftain’s exterior visor resembled that of a baseball cap pulled low over the windshield-eyes of the eight-cylinder station wagon with its shark-toothed grille and aggressive hood ornament.

“Shit!” Dominic said aloud. He had suddenly thought of Jane’s Cleveland Indians cap. Where was it? Had they left Chief Wahoo upside down in the upstairs hall of the cookhouse? But they were already at Six-Pack’s place; not a soul had been on the streets, and the dance-hall door had not once opened. They couldn’t go back to the cookhouse now.

Danny parked the Pontiac at the foot of the outside stairs to Pam’s apartment. The boy had squeezed into the cab of Jane’s truck, between poor dead Jane and his father, before Dominic noticed Injun Jane’s missing baseball cap-young Dan was wearing it.

“We need to leave Chief Wahoo with her, don’t we?” the twelve-year-old asked.

“Good boy,” his dad said, his heart welling with pride and fear. Regarding the back-up plan, there was so much for a twelve-year-old to remember.