The Snowman Page 2

eerie little smile, and George added the hat and an old scarf Mamie had found. They were finishing the arms when the phone rang, and she went to answer.

  As she put the phone down in the hall and stepped into the living room, she caught a wisp of something, a flicker by a window—a bird, perhaps, though it seemed bigger.

  "It's for you, George," she called from the porch door.

  Mamie was watching Bobby adjust the charcoal, giving the snowman even more of a smirk, when George's voice rang out from the front hall a moment later: "Mame, where's that list of supplies I made we'll need to repair the shed? I thought I had it but can't find it. Jim at the hardware store wants to place the order for the wood."

  She found the list sticking out of a book in the living room and took it to him, and as she passed back through the room this time, she saw a distinct swatch of yellow out in the yard, and by the time she'd gotten quickly to the window, it was gone.

  Mamie returned to the porch, but only the snowman stood by the shrub, watching her, its arms held out in that funny little pose it had been given. She opened the door. "Bobby?" Again she called. And again.

  "What's the matter?" George asked behind her.

  "Bobby's…gone, I guess. He doesn't answer."

  "Probably hiding." He stepped outside and walked with a ducking motion, expecting any moment to be peppered with snowballs. "His tracks lead to the path to the river. Probably went to see his ma and pa. Bobby?" He entered the path in the woods, and Julie and Sam emerged from the trees, laughing and holding hands, ice skates slung over their shoulders. "Bobby with you?"

  They stopped smiling.

  The others had a five-minute head start. The wind brought their voices to her as she hurried through the woods toward the river, and she found herself calling his name. She was cresting the low rise before the descent to the water when an unearthly wail stopped her in her tracks.

  It cried out again. "Naaawwoooo!"

  Mamie forced her legs to move forward and heard running steps approaching around the final bend. Julie streaked towards her, eyes wild and brimming, hair streaming back. "Julie, what's happened?"

  She passed Mamie, seeming not to know she was there, and was swiftly out of sight. "Bobby," floated in her wake.

  Mamie forced her legs against her will, and from the clearing saw the bottom half of a man sticking out from a hole in the ice near the edge of the river. Sam pulled out of the water, drenched to the waist, brown hair plastered to his head, face ashen and gasping for air. He went in again, nearly slipping fully into the hole. George stood there, rigid, silent, holding a single mitten. "Hold his legs!" Mamie screamed. "For God sakes, hold his legs!" George didn't move.

  She'd done it herself.

  His deterioration increased dramatically, each morning presenting her with a thinner, weaker George until she was no longer surprised. She set-up the daybed in the den downstairs and moved him there. The doctor wanted to move him to the hospital. It was the only way he could be kept alive. Mamie knew George wouldn't want that—he'd miss the porch. Besides, it didn't matter where a person was if he'd given up.

  Another morning. Another day. But different. She knew it was practically useless to hope, now, but as she watched Bert Givens back-up his monster pickup truck to the snowman and hitch a thick chain to it from his back bumper, she felt there was at least a chance. She needed help. Julie and Sam had been the only ones besides herself who'd known about the snowman. They'd visited infrequently, all smiles, all conversation half-hearted. Bobby had dragged them all through the ice, frozen their hearts, left a chill in the house. When they saw what was happening in the backyard, they came less often.

  Mamie had sworn Givens to secrecy, telling him a ridiculous story about how her son-in-law was a chemistry teacher and had decided to conduct an experiment by dousing the snowman with a concoction he'd cooked-up in a laboratory to see if he could preserve it. "By gum, Mrs. Desjardins, it sure looks like he succeeded," Givens had declared as he'd inspected the thing. "Maybe he's invented something here."

  "Maybe so, Bert, but it's time for this one to go." She had put her finger to her lips and he'd followed suit.

  The truck's powerful engine whined, the chain straining with Givens' effort to pull the snowman over. The tires began to spin, and Givens put the pickup in neutral and got out and walked up to the glacial piece of work and scratched his head. "Might have to dig up the lawn some, sorry to say," he called over to her.

  "Go right ahead."

  He must have put the truck in another gear, for now it roared, railing against its effort, the chain appearing to stretch. The huge tires started to sink into the ground, throwing dirt back on the snowman. Suddenly the truck's rear bumper gave, and the vehicle slid away, Givens jerking it repeatedly out of spins as it barely missed the corner of the house. Mamie could hear cursing.

  Bert Givens marched back to where his back bumper lay attached to the chain. He gave his head a shake, stuffed his hands in his pockets and ambled over to where she stood by the porch steps, his head down. "I'll pay for that, Bert."

  "What do you want to do, now, Mrs. D.?"

  She looked back at her husband sitting so still in the rocker, as always, seeming to be unaffected by attempts to destroy his and his grandson's creation. She shook her head.

  "I can get a backhoe in here. Scoop 'er out."

  Mamie didn't think she wanted to have to pay for a broken piece of equipment that large. "I'll let you know."

  She had to face the prospect of life without her husband. Why couldn't he pull out of it? Why wouldn't the snowman go away? Somehow they were connected.

  Mamie was making lunch a short while later, and the sound at first was lost in the whine of the blender. The day had heated-up rapidly, and she'd decided to make something cooling and healthy and had combined several ingredients with ice, and if he wouldn't eat maybe he'd drink this, damn it. The sound broke through as soon as she turned the blender off. It was a moaning, a mumbling—it was George.

  She went to the porch. He was trying to get out of the rocker, his speech garbled and weak. At least he's talking, she thought, then looked through the screen at the lawn bathed in sunlight and saw a young girl in a yellow dress standing in front of the snowman. She held something in her hands. Mamie opened the door. "Hello?" The girl was talking, and Mamie called again.

  The girl turned. "Oh, hello." She made no attempt to leave the spot and reached to touch the object of her fascination.

  Mamie heard more struggling behind her. "What do you want?"

  The girl's hand stopped, and she looked at what she held in the other. She turned, finally, and walked towards the porch, glancing back at the thing that had no right to exist. She had long brown hair and green eyes and looked to be ten or eleven. "My name's Mary Cater. My aunt and uncle live—"

  "Yes, I know them," Mamie interrupted. She looked at what the girl held, and her heart beat faster.

  The girl held them up. "I was bringing these."

  "Naww, nooo." George tried to stand but fell back, the chair rocking gently with the impact.

  "Quick, go around to the side where he can't see you," Mamie urged. The girl obeyed, and she turned to her husband. "Darling, it's all right." She patted the bony shoulder and caressed his forehead. He stared at her through tired, watery eyes. His breathing was shallow and labored and he was trembling. It was hard seeing him like this. How much longer? "You mustn't exert yourself like that. I'll be right back."

  Mary Cater was waiting at the side of the house. "I didn't mean to upset him."

  "It's all right. You didn't know." She stared at the mitten, hat and scarf. They were Bobby's. She shut her eyes. Once the ice had broken up and dispersed, the river had been dragged for days. But the river was swift and deep. "Where did you find those?" she asked at last.

  "Well, you know my aunt and uncle have a farm, and the river flows by some of their land. I
was picking wildflowers along a bank when I saw the scarf caught on the branch of a log in a shallow part. I went down and found the mitten and hat, too, in some sticks under water next to the log."

  How could she ask, but she did: "Nothing else?"

  "Oh. No. I heard what happened. I'm sorry." The girl's voice seemed to echo, and Mamie shut her eyes again as she took the soggy clothes. "Mrs. Desjardins?" A deeper echo, now, and she shifted her weight to steady herself, keeping her eyes closed.

  "Mmm?"

  "How can you have a snowman in summertime?"

  "Magic, I guess," she answered with as much frivolity as she could muster, turning toward the house. "What else could it be?"

  "It's real, isn't it?"

  It was out of sight, but her head moved involuntarily towards it. "Why wouldn't it be, Mary? It stands there in the yard day after day."

  What was it about this girl that was beginning to pull at her?

  "I think it's wonderful."

  "Please don't tell anyone you found these, but even more important, please, please don't tell anyone about that snowman. My husband feels very, very badly, and…it might do him a lot of harm if people knew his secret. Our grandson is dead. We don't need anyone coming here to bother us."

  "I won't tell. I promise." The girl's eyes seemed to change color, but what color were they, anyway?

  "Thank you, Mary. Now…would you like some punch and cookies?"

  "No, thank you. I should be getting back." She