–Niko is rapidly running out of time as he and Bayless move towards Ladawambuck–
They had just pushed off from camp. Bayless still held the gun and had not taken his eyes off of Niko
“You’re acting like I’m going to steal something from you,” Niko said as he settled into his seat at the oars. He looked over his shoulder in Bayless’s direction. He had chosen the rear seat for the return trip.
“That noise in the woods last night spooked me a little.”
“Having you up front would be helpful. Keeping the bow down helps me steer, and you’re right in the way of the motor.”
“I like it back here. I damn sure paid enough to pick my own seat.”
Niko’s mind flashed to the money back at the fly shop. He had always lacked a desire to acquire wealth for its own sake, and he never developed the foresight to anticipate monetary needs months or years in advance. This was not about money, but Niko felt a sharp stab to think that the cash is what initially tempted him, what opened this possibility.
He had betrayed himself as his ambition in life had always been peace — a desire to quiet the mind and soul and sink into the moment. To absorb a river at dawn, the electricity of a woman’s hair brushing his arm in an evening breeze, a glowing wood stove as snow fell outside the cabin. Those moments were his currency. He collected them, worked for them, saved them in his soul’s safe for times when there was no fire to be had, no woman to kiss, and when the river itself was danger.
“You feel better now that you have spread those ashes?” Niko asked.
“So so. Still a few loose ends, but that was a big step for me.” He paused and looked around. “Run the motor. I’d like to speed this up.”
“Burned most the gas on the way up. The river is pretty fast though.”
“Burn what we have.”
“Pretty standard to keep a little in case we need it for emergency navigation.”
“Good god Niko. How blunt do I need to be? Run the damn motor till there’s no more gas. I paid your entire season.”
Niko thought again to that thick envelope. He looked at Bayless, smiled and nodded all while thinking, you would have handed me a million knowing you were going to take it all back a few days later. He thought of Bayless in his fly shop, collecting his bribe, rummaging through the drawer, smiling at his own calculations and clearness.
“Fine.”
Niko stood on the rocking boat and leaned over the man, bumping his chest on Bayless’s head as he reached around him to turn the motor. They set off, and the morning and the landscape disappeared with an astounding speed. Niko knew that time was relative in both a physical and metaphorical sense, but he had never been so bluntly confronted with this truth.
His previous trip home on this river was brutally slow as he suffered starvation and hypothermia without the knowledge that he would ever arrive at his destination. This trip, carting his own death and Tracey’s death, directly to the spot he wished to avoid, could not have been more different. Hours passed like minutes, and Niko could think of no way to stop it.
They approached a set of rapids, and Niko had to repeat the same awkward dance move around Bayless in order to raise the motor. As he leaned over the man, he scanned for any advantage he may have. Bayless still held the gun. Niko noticed that the safety was off.
“Be easier if you were up front,” Niko said.
“Deal with it.”
Niko fell back into his seat and grabbed the oars to steer the drift through the rapids. He considered just wrecking right there, hit a boulder head on and bust the hull and see what happens.
No, that won’t work. Should have bought a shittier boat. Thing old thing won’t break for anything. Just smile, point to the horizon, and wait for a solution.
Once through the rapids, Niko climbed back and dropped the motor and headed on. It didn’t take long for the motor to sputter out and stop.
“Out of gas,” Niko said.
Bayless grunted in affirmation, and the two remained quiet as the boat slowed and drifted once again at the speed of the river.
Niko was relieved by the slowness. He had spent the day estimating their proximity to town by the landmarks on the river. The log jam where he lost Richard. The spot where he encountered the deadfall in the woods. The rotting-fish dinner, the little beaches where he waited out rain storms.
Each minute of silence further broke the façade between the two men, and each moment brought them closer to Ladawambuck.
No longer if, but when.
Niko considered turning and fighting many times, but it’s hard to turn towards a gun, to face the menace you know is behind you, to decide this is the moment to take a chance.
Then, they came around a fairly sharp bend in the river, and Niko spotted in the distance the very spot where he laid in the mud when his stomach turned on him three years ago. He had vomited and shat and shivered with fever for days. And he didn’t like to think about it, but it was right there that he decided that he would stop trying. He gave himself to the river and the bug in his gut.
They floated on, and Niko knew it was just about a quarter of a mile past that spot to the Ladawambuck landing. He knew Bayless was holding the gun behind him. He knew there were no more rapids to wreck them on — a foolish plan to begin with. Niko considered floating past the landing on purpose.
For what? To delay?
It wouldn’t help. A mile past the landing they would pass a bridge and Bayless would know they had missed the destination. The fight would be there, right by the road, a clear path back to Ladawambuck and to Tracey.
They were now right at that muddy spot where Niko had given up before. He could see where he had curled up and hugged his knees to his chest because there was nothing else to do. Where he would have crawled into the river and drowned himself if he had the energy.
“We close?” Bayless asked.
“No, we still have a ways,” Niko lied. He thought of his father.
I guess Chamonix’s lie sometimes.
The sun was approaching the trees on the west side of the river.
“Thought you said we could make it by nightfall.”
“We will.” Niko refused to turn, not wanting to see what was behind him.
“Then we must be pretty close.”
“Couple of miles and few more rapids.”
Niko remembered the third day at that muddy spot years when his body miraculously stopped purging and his fever broke. When he heard Tracey’s voice, floating like the hum of a distant motor on a still afternoon. He figured he was hallucinating or already dead, but the thought of seeing her once again moved him, literally. He got up and grabbed a log and pushed off into the frigid river. He didn’t know how close he had been, and he figured the proximity of the landing was part of the hallucination. He emerged from the river and found the path and collapsed, and then Tracey saved him.
And now, he was there again, with a choice to make. Riding along with death on that unstoppable river as he navigated by the reminders of his experiences and traumas and wounds, knowing all along exactly where he was heading. A loaded gun behind him and a river in front dragging him home no matter how much he didn’t want it to go.
His mind flashed to Bernard swinging the oar at his face, to advice he received from people much better at violence than he was, you have to charge a gun. To his father telling him once and only once, “I’ve actually lied a few times. Some for good reasons and some for bad. But, the secret is to never lie to yourself. If you avoid that, you’ll never have to wonder if you can trust yourself.”
“We must be close,” Bayless said.
Niko felt Bayless move behind him as the boat rocked. Niko lifted the right oar from its lock.
First, last, and only chance.
Niko stood and swung the oar in a single swift motion, but Bayless was ready. He ducked and leaned with the boat and the oar flew out of Niko’s hand. Bayless raised the gun and shot.
…
Check in next week as we head into the final episodes of The Chamonix Chronicles.