The Hauntings of Hood Canal

Easy Summer Girl Talk

Sugar Bear’s iniquity became a sea story long before even a thoughtful fisherman could predict. Rumor extended south to Lee’s China Bay Taverna where the bartender, in spite of being wise, could not keep word from spreading. Original rumor said some guy with hot pants hassled Bertha then disappeared. In that form it didn’t amount to much.

There are some awful sinners down at China Bay. By the time the story got elaborated, told and retold for a couple weeks, it bloomed like a lawn full of dandelions. By the time the story faded it included conspiracies and agents from the FBI, plus unofficial execution(s) by noose. The body/bodies (depending on the stage of the story) was/were hanging from its/their neck(s) back in the mountains where ravens pecked out eyes.

Hardly any guy who attends Saturday evening services at Beer and Bait did not get credited for the execution. Suspicion largely ignored Sugar Bear who has the reputation for being a sweetie. The suspect who received the most attention was Chantrell George because he is weird. That caused Chantrell to feel both guilty and glad, which was a bad thing for a story to do. When that version drifted north from China Bay, every other man at Beer and Bait felt indignant and rejected.

Then people further north got into it. At Rough and Randy the story claimed all credit for some unknown warrior up in that direction. Rough and Randy tried to steal the Beer and Bait story. For a few days nobody laughed.

All of this happened in early summer. Through the summer, other stuff happened, some normal, some not. Anyone who is thoughtful would just naturally make a list:

Chantrell rolled his bike along the road in an increasingly timid manner. He did not exactly lose touch with reality, although reality had never been a big priority. He retreated into innocence, becoming more childlike.

Men are not supposed to cry, and, of course, Sugar Bear did not after that first early shock. He grew more quiet. He sang softly and sad when at the forge, whereas before the murder his voice rang lusty and flat and joyous and obnoxious. Nighttime often found him wandering near the Canal where the dead guy doubtless still curled in the trunk of his drowned car. Sugar Bear spent late afternoons or early evenings at Beer and Bait. He brooded, became depressed and considered religion. He confided to Bertha that he thought of joining the Baptists, because the Baptist version of hell seemed more friendly than anything the Adventists had to offer.

And Annie spent more and more time in the woods. In her less-than-twenty-three years Annie had seen a lot of natural violence; spiders trapping bugs, owls catching mice, and a couple of bar fights that went nowhere. A flying hammer changed her worldview. She spent even more time thinking about Sugar Bear, worrying about him. For a time she could not decide if she wanted to run away from him because of fear, or run to him and try to help. Annie, had she been told of the Rubicon, would have made a mental note.

Although Navy ships, submarines, yachts, and sailboats dotted the Canal, no one reported movement beneath the water. It seemed like the creature, or spirit, or whatever it was that moved out there reserved itself for local residents. In other words, things went on as usual until Annie made a decision. Sugar Bear was kind, and nice, and gentle when it came to everything except perverts and boilerplate.

Annie experienced a problem peculiar to her sex. She needed another woman to talk to, someone who knew the score. A man would not do. Annie thought Bertha the smartest person around. On more than one occasion Annie had watched with interest as Bertha escorted a logger to the doorway, usually by firmly grasping his ear. If Bertha could bounce a logger there seemed no limit to her knowledge. Annie felt that, to Bertha, men were simple creatures easily tamed. Annie headed for Beer and Bait.

Rain covered the forest and patted on the Canal. Beer and Bait sat as restful as Jubal Jim who snoozed before the bar. Early afternoons are generally quiet. A boat or two may nose up to fuel pumps at the finger pier, or a tourist may stop for directions. Bertha uses those hours to sharpen up the joint—furniture polish on the piano, glass polish on the mirror behind the bar, wax on the dance floor, or play pool with Petey. Petey, though, had not yet returned from hustling the lower and middle elements of Seattle.

Bertha looked up to see the slim figure of a woman standing in the doorway. The woman stood framed in gray light from the chilly day. Bertha, were she less practical, would say the woman materialized out of mist. The light being what it was, Bertha could only see a slim figure with long hair, a figure wearing a dress far too stylish for early afternoon. To Bertha, wise in the ways of other women’s seductions even if her own did not work, the woman looked like a lady on the hunt. Either that or a hooker.

“We’re open,” Bertha said. “You just passing through?”

Annie stepped into bar light and away from grayness of the day. When Bertha recognized her Bertha played at being miffed. “Don’t ever cut the clowning. It’s too amusin’. Where’s your jeans and sweatshirt?” Bertha looked Annie up and down, saw hair washed and glistening and nearly silky. She saw a greeny-silky dress hitting an inch below the knee, and a face nicely washed and pretty without benefit of makeup.

“You’re a good-looking kid.” Bertha did not try to hide her astonishment. “You ought to do something with it. Make a name for yourself.”

“I gotta talk to you,” Annie’s voice sounded like a confused girl, not like an attractive young woman. “I’d love to talk about lots of stuff but I’m afraid somebody will come in and interrupt. I got man problems…”

“Who hasn’t?” Bertha grinned. “Hell, men have got man problems, what with chainsaws and pickups and marriage.” Bertha swiped at the bar with a bar rag and looked Annie over very, very carefully. “You preggers?”

“No.”

“You ain’t wet, either. How can you walk in here out of the rain and not be wet?”

“It happens sometimes,” Annie told her in a vague way. “Something to do with weather satellites I expect… How do you get a man to like you?”

If Bertha figured this would be the blind leading the blind she did not let on. “Depends on the man. If he’s like most of the bums who come in here you just show a little cleavage.”

“Sugar Bear,” Annie said, her voice shy. “He needs help… or something… I don’t know.”

“Sugar Bear,’ Bertha mused. “You won’t get anywhere helping him, not if he knows it. Times when a man like that needs help are the same times he resents it.”

“You help without him knowing it?” Confusion deepened Annie’s voice. “I’ve tried spells.”

“…and you’re not trying to help him, anyway,” Bertha told her. “Get honest. You’re trying to get him interested.”

“That’s helping. I’m sure it would help.”

“Tell it to a frog.” Bertha grinned and Jubal Jim thumped his tail. Then Jubal Jim eased onto a warm spot where breezes blow from the heater. His hound ears spread perfectly flat along the floor. He snuffied once, then dozed.

“Besides,” Bertha said, “sooner or later Sugar Bear will get busted. Too many people are talking. The talk will keep up until one of our jock cops decides to play like he’s on television.”

“They wouldn’t… they would. They really would.” Annie looked toward the Canal. In the distance water swelled, moved like the burp from a giant carp. “He can’t get busted.”

“Anybody can,” Bertha told her. “He’ll convict himself because he’s green when it comes to lying.” She also looked at the Canal. “It’s humping again. It must mean something.”

“It’s a Fury,” Annie said absent-mindedly, “maybe the only Water Fury in the whole world. It’s not even a very good one.”

“Child,” Bertha said, “it’s time for you to settle down.”

“That’s the plan,” Annie said. “As soon as I get him interested.”

“There’s lots of men,” Bertha told her. “You haven’t lived long enough to know all the kinds of men there are.”

“Maybe if I fixed my hair different, or got a cut…”

“Clean up your act,” Bertha told her. “You look real pretty. Try that first, and hope the stories stop before cops get interested.”

Inspiration shone in Annie’s eyes. “If they have something else to talk about they’ll forget to talk about Sugar Bear.” She reached to touch Bertha’s hand. “You’re so smart. I never would have thought of that.”

“Somebody did,” Bertha admitted, “but I can’t remember doin’ it.”

Determination can be a scary thing. When Annie left, her narrow shoulders were squared. She would make the world a better place by getting it to talk about something besides Sugar Bear. Also, she felt prepared to wear dresses and ribbons.