The River Queen Read Free

traveling with us.
    â€œYeah,” Tom says. “She’s a little territorial about the car.” He goes over and bends his face toward the rat terrier. “Aw, she’ll get used to you after a while. Just don’t go near her or try and pet her or anything like that until she comes to you. Sammy, you be a good girl now. That’s right. Gimme five.”
    And the dog slaps his hand with her paw.
    As I head back down to the boat, I ponder why I am doing this. I have a nice house, a loving husband, a dog that doesn’t want to kill me. Surely I could have stayed home. But for whatever reason, this river has gotten under my skin. Shuffling through a shaded picnic area, I pass two old guys, one pudgy, one thin, pouring their morning coffee from a thermos. I smell the rich, dark liquid steaming in their plastic mugs.
    I’m sniffing the air and trying to sneak by when one of the men—moon-faced with glasses—says, “So you going downriver with those fellows?”
    â€œYes, I am,” I say. He takes a big sip of coffee. If he offered me some, I wouldn’t say no. But he doesn’t.
    â€œAnd that dog?”
    â€œThat’s right.”
    He raises his mug at me. “Well, I wish you luck.” He goes back to looking out at the river. “I used to keep a boat and a slip here.”
    I sit down at a table a few feet from theirs. “You don’t take her out anymore?”
    He shakes his head. “My wife’s got Alzheimer’s. She’ll tell you the day of the week when our daughter was born, but she can’t remember if she left the gas on. Can’t leave her alone anymore.” His eyes gaze down the bank and settle on our boat. A pair of swans with their cygnets swim by. “I’m gonna sell mine soon.”
    â€œYou ever been downstream?” I ask them.
    â€œOh, yeah,” the thin man says. “But I like it up here between Wabasha and Dubuque.”
    â€œNaw, I like it further south,” his friend chimes in. “From Davenport to Alton. There’s more to see.”
    â€œIt’s God’s Country where we are,” the other replies. “Hey, that big guy, Tom, he used to work on boats before, didn’t he?”
    â€œBefore what?” I ask.
    â€œI don’t know. I think something happened.…”
    â€œWhat happened?” I ask.
    He waves it off with his hand. “Oh, if he’s going downriver with Jerry, I’m sure he’s a good guy.”
    â€œYeah,” the thin man nods as if he’s trying to convince himself. Suddenly Tom emerges from the boathouse, holding up the manifold in a clenched fist like a barbarian with his spoils. He shouts down to the boat to Jerry, “I think she’ll hold for now!”
    â€œFor now?” I ask, “What does that mean?”
    Tom looks at me through disgruntled eyes. “For as long as she holds.”
    This seems to satisfy Jerry, who begins transporting the food he’s been keeping in the marina workshop fridge onto the boat and into the cooler on the deck. Eggs, orange juice, the largest loaf of Wonder Bread I’ve ever seen. Milk, a two-pound slab of Wisconsin cheddar. A family-size package of Chips Ahoy, which Tom stows above the fridge and devours by the fistful. There’s also two loaves of chocolate bread and a huge tin of molasses cookies.
    One of the cronies turns to me and says, “I’ve never seen so much food going into Jerry’s boat. Lotsa beer. But never that much food.”
    Jerry carts cases of diet Mountain Dew, diet Coke, and La Crosse beer in a wheelbarrow, and I follow in my flip-flops and robe. “Beer’s for ballast,” Jerry quips as he dumps a case into the cooler and smothers it with ice.
    My husband, Larry, suggested running a background check on these guys, but I resisted. I was seeing myself as Katharine Hepburn in the African Queen, but Larry was thinking Natalie Wood. Traveling