LEGACY





Everything seemed smaller than I remembered.

This was no big surprise to me. After all, the last time I'd
stood on the porch of my uncle's fishing cabin I was maybe
fourteen years old. Looking up at the impossibly tall trees
and listening to the quiet sounds of nature, I felt a sudden
urge to whip out my pocketknife and find a chunk of wood to
whittle on.

As tempting as that was, I had work to do. I dug through my
pockets and found the thin wire key ring that the attorney
had handed to me after I'd signed the papers. It was my
place now. *Don't sell it straight away*, my uncle's last note
had said. *Spend a few weekends there first. It's a great
place to reflect and to heal.*

Someone had covered the furniture with plain white linens.
It wouldn't have been Uncle Jim-he'd been too ill for the
last year or so to come near this place. The lawyer hadn't
said anything about a caretaker, either. Then I recalled the
neighbor. A widow, if I remembered right-another of my
uncle's generation. They'd been close enough that my dad
used to joke about Jim and his woodland trysts. She must
still be around. I made a mental note to call on her in the
morning.

By the time the natural light began to fade, I had Jim's
clothes and personal things packed in boxes on the front
porch waiting to be loaded into my truck. He didn't have
much up here to go through. I'd inherited the cabin and
contents, so I kept most of the gear and figured I'd find a
charity near home that would take his clothes.

The stove still worked. I rubbed some garlic and crushed
pepper onto a thick steak and tossed it onto a cast iron
pan, and kept an eye on it while I threw a few mixed veggies
into some of the drippings and ad-libbed a quick stir-fry.
Even simple food smells a thousand times more appetizing in
the clean air of the mountains. I ate out of the pan-a
bachelor's prerogative-and washed it down with a beer so
cold I could feel the chill well after the bottle was empty.

Sleep came easily for the first time in months.

*****

I woke up to find a crowd of tiny people looking down at me
from the windowsill. The morning sunlight cast almost life-
sized shadows of them on the wall opposite, forming a lineup
of long-legged, still shapes.

I'd kept them for sentimental reasons, lining them up on the
sill as I'd found them around the room. Most of them were my
uncle's work. There was a fisherman, complete with rod and a
tiny fly, and a trio of rifle-toting hunters with well-
burnished noses and cheeks. Several of the carvings were of
the same pleasant-faced, matronly woman in various
poses-holding a baby, kneeling down with a gardening tool in
hand, carrying a plate of lovingly detailed cookies,
knitting a tiny sweater in the comfort of her rocking chair.
There was also a younger-looking version of the same woman
with a backpack and walking stick. A few of the carvings
were mine, too. I found the rocket ship, my first
project-I'd been so proud of myself for finishing it without
drawing any of my blood. Next to that, the totem pole I'd
done to practice carving faces. There was a deer and a bear
of mine, and then the magnum opus of my whittling career: a
rough, hand-carved figurine of a young girl. What was her
name again? It was too many years ago-the name wouldn't come
back to me.

The agenda for the day was supposed to be simple: load up
the truck, lock things up again, and head back to the city
apartment that I lived in but still couldn't call home. When
I opened the front door and felt the morning sun embrace me,
the motivation to hurry evaporated. I plopped down on my
uncle's whittling stool and relaxed against the side of the
cabin. My mind quieted and began drifting from thought to
thought. Uncle Jim figured largely in them, of course. He'd
sit on this stool carving his little characters and
dispensing worldly advice while I'd sit cross-legged on the
floor and listen. Well, sort of listen.

I thought about my wife, who was now someone else's wife,
and the child we'd wanted but never had. Just as well, I
kept telling myself, considering how the marriage turned
out. Maybe if I'd have listened a bit more closely when my
uncle was waxing philosophic I could have saved myself a lot
of pain.

"A man needs a woman who's got her head on straight," his
voice echoed in my mind. "Don't matter how pretty she is if
there's a mess between her ears."

*How right you were*, I rued.

"Take that Martha Engle, for instance," my uncle had said.
"Marrying her was the smartest thing Phil ever did, and Phil
is no slouch in the brains department. She may not be a
beauty queen, but she's strong and she's sharp and, thirty
years from now, she'll still be that way. If I were you,
boy, I'd get real close to that girl of theirs-she's made of
the same stuff."

A musty closet in my memory opened and an image fell out: a
girl, all elbows and knees, with brown hair and freckles.
She came up with her parents on occasion, as I did with my
uncle. While the men stood waist-deep in the stream fishing,
she and I would walk through the woods and trade stories
about school and parents and what we'd do if we had a
million dollars. We'd have picnic lunches out at the old
stone chimney and swim in the nearby pond under the watchful
eye of Mrs. Engle. Alice, I finally recalled. Alice was the
girl's name. I hadn't thought about Alice in twenty years.

Thinking about her then reminded me that I needed to go
visit the current owner of that cabin, if only to return her
linens. It was a beautiful morning, so I opted to walk the
mile or so instead of driving. I folded the linens, put them
into a duffel bag that I'd found in the closet, and set off.

Way back when, there had been a dirt path through the woods
from my uncle's cabin to the Engle1 place, but I wasn't
positive it would still be recognizable. Instead, I hiked
down a hundred yards or so of crushed stone driveway and
followed the main road. A few vehicles passed in each
direction but paid me little attention. The most memorable
was a tan SUV with Virginia tags and a blonde-haired kid
waving at me from his back seat window. I waved back. Why
not?

About a mile later, the old signpost came into view. I
remembered a thick timber post with a wooden carving of a
leaping bass on the top and a plaque that said ENGLE in
raised letters. The bass was there, looking weathered but
still recognizable, but the sign was gone. In its place,
reflective stickers on the post itself spelled out HENSEN.

The Hensens' drive was about as long as my uncle's, winding
up the hill and curving around. There were no vehicles in
front of the place, but I recalled that the Engles had
usually parked around back. The front door was open behind a
screen, so I stepped up to the porch and knocked on the
doorframe.

Running footsteps heralded the arrival of a blonde-haired
boy with a familiar face. He stopped about three steps shy
of the door and backed up a little. "MAAAAA-aaaam! Gramma!
It's that guy from the road."

A thirty-something woman in relaxed jeans and a yellow tank
hustled out from the kitchen area. Her hand stopped briefly
on the boy's shoulder as she passed him to stand in the
doorway. She opened the screen door and studied my face.
"Will? Is that you?"

I'd like to say that I recognized her. Truth to tell, I had
a hard time seeing bony, gangly Alice in the filled-out,
healthy-looking woman at the door. The way she looked at me
made the inference inescapable, though.

"It's me, all right. Hello, Alice."

Before I could say anything else, she had me in a warm hug.
I returned it, noting the smooth, firm contours of her back
and hips. While I was still trying to connect the memory of
Alice to the new reality, she took my hand and drew me into
the house.

"Mom," she called out, "Will Delaney is here."

The smiling figure of Mrs. Engle came out of the kitchen and
took my hands. "It's good to see you again, William. Your
uncle talked about you so much I feel as if we've been
neighbors all this time. I'm so sorry he passed." The
sincerity in her face and voice were clear.

"Thank you," I said inadequately. "But I'm confused-who is
Hensen?"

"That would be me," Alice replied. "Alice Hensen. And this
guy over here is my son Josh." She roughed up the boy's
hair. He grinned and hugged her legs. "Josh, Will and I were
friends when we were teenagers, before I met your dad."

The boy regarded me with wonder. "Wow, you're that old?"

While his mother and grandmother laughed, the former a
little self-consciously, I bent over and assumed the posture
of an octogenarian. "That's right, Sonny," I croaked. "I
knew yer maw when she was knee-high to a stegosaurus."

"That's nonsense," Mrs. Engle scolded. "We didn't have
stegosauruses in this neck of the woods. The saber-tooth
tigers kept them away."

Little Josh looked from me to his grandmother and back
again. "You're both silly," he pronounced. "Mom, can we go
fishing now?"

"Not just yet," Alice told him. "We have company."

"I don't want to keep you," I assured them. "I just thought
these linens might belong to you." I opened the duffel bag
and showed the contents.

"Oh, those," Mrs. Engle said. "Some do, and some your uncle
had on hand. It doesn't really matter. We weren't using them
for anything."

"Well, thank you for them. And for taking care of the place.
I was expecting to find everything rusted out, covered with
dust, or just falling apart. There's got to be something I
can do for you in return."

Mrs. Engle would have none of it. "Nonsense, William. Your
uncle was a good man and a good friend. A little dusting and
oiling while he was ill was the least we could do for him."

"Still, I'd like to return the favor somehow."

"All right, then," she replied. "Come on into the kitchen,
sit down, and have some fresh coffee. I put some on when we
got back from the store and it should be about ready to pour
itself by now."

The coffee was strong but not yet mean, as my uncle used to
put it. We adults drank it and talked in the kitchen while
Josh went out to the porch and amused himself with a
handheld video game. I learned that Phil Engle had died of
cancer while I was in college and that Alice and her mother
came up here most spring and summer weekends. The tradition
continued after Alice married. When her husband was taken in
a car accident, my Uncle Jim had embraced her son and taught
him to fish. Josh was eight now and could tie simple flies
by himself.

After a while, Josh came in looking bored. He sat at the end
of the table with his fishing rod and toyed with it
aimlessly. Alice smiled at him. "I think someone's trying to
drop a hint that he'd like to go fishing now."

I was about to excuse myself and go but Mrs. Engle preempted
me. "I have an ingenious idea. Josh, why don't you show Mr.
Delaney your secret weapons while your mother and I fix a
picnic lunch?"

The chance to show off his handiwork brightened the boy's
face. "Okay," he agreed, "but don't take too long. The fish
won't be as hungry after lunch."

Several of my uncle's favorite designs appeared in Josh's
collection of hand-tied lures. He went through each one,
careful to tell me which he'd gotten from "Mr. Jim" and
which he'd tied by himself. At the bottom of the tackle box
I spied a small chunk of wood and a pen knife. "What's
this?"

"It was gonna be a fish," Josh explained. "Mr. Jim said he'd
teach me to whittle like he does. Like he did, I mean. That
was before he got sick."

The women found us then. Mrs. Engle was wearing a canvas hat
covered in fishing lures and a matching vest and Alice had a
large wicker basket. "Time to go, Joshua," Mrs. Engle said.
"Let's get to the fish before they fill up on real food."
Her eye turned to me. "And while we're gone," she added
pointedly, "your mom and Mr. Delaney can go visit one of
their old favorite picnic spots and do some catching up."

I tried suggesting that we all go fishing, but Mrs. Engle
was having none of it. Alice kissed her boy and wished him
luck, then grabbed a walking stick from its place by the
door and led me the other way.

The path that I'd been hesitant to try turned out to be in
decent condition after all. We followed that, Alice leading
the way, to a fork about halfway between our properties. The
right path would lead to my uncle's cabin. We took the left,
which led downhill toward an old haunt of ours. It was
interesting watching Alice. Her gait reminded me of the
gangly girl of twenty years ago, but her body had none of
the awkwardness of that age. Instead, it reminded me of the
little wooden hiker figure I'd found in the cabin.

We kept a brisk pace and so didn't talk much on the way.
Soon we reached the old stone chimney, our old favorite
spot. "Remember this place?" she asked.

"Of course." We'd spent a lot of time here on summer days.
The story of the place was never really clear. Apparently, a
previous owner of my uncle's plot had started to build a new
lodge next to a pond at the back edge of the property. There
was a foundation with a flagstone fireplace and chimney
built into it, but nothing else. The project was never
finished. The fireplace made a great outdoor stove, though,
if one felt inclined, and the foundation walls were the
perfect height and width for sitting and talking. A few
yards away, a clear freshwater pond seemed built for
swimming.

"I still come out here whenever I can," Alice told me.  She
set the basket down and stretched, arching her back and
reaching for the sky with wiggling fingers.  The action was
familiar enough to bring back memories of a twiggy girl in a
red bathing suit.  "I don't think I ever told you this,
Will, but our little picnics out here were the highlights of
my summers."

"For me, too."  Just being in the place was like opening an
old box from the back part of the attic. Countless happy
memories, things I hadn't thought about in decades, came
easily to mind. "I seem to remember an experimental kiss
behind the fireplace, for instance."

A touch of red crept into Alice's face. "Which my mother
saw, by the way."

"Really? She never said anything."

Alice shrugged.  "She liked you too. Now, let's see what
goodies we have today."

We spread out one of the linens from the duffel bag to cover
the ground and sat cross-legged on either side of the
basket. Alice produced from the basket cold cut sandwiches,
some deli potato salad, and a chilled bottle of wine. I
poured for us while she unwrapped the food.

The familiar location put me more at ease than I could
remember being in a long time. It was easy to talk to Alice
despite the long gap in years. Before I knew it, we were
talking about my uncle, recalling more happy times.

"He missed you," she told me. "He talked about you all the
time."

"I missed him too. The summer weekends up here are some of
my favorite memories."

She refilled our glasses. "So why'd you stay away so long?"

I sipped and sighed. "The family moved, for one thing.
Coming up here from DC was easy-it just took a little
driving. But we moved to St. Louis, and then to Portland,
and then to Boston. My folks and Jim lost touch. He and I
wrote and phoned, but there was college, and then the job,
and then the wife."

"He told us about that," she said. "I'm really sorry. That
must have hurt you a lot."

A tiny measure of it swelled up in my chest and stomach. I
took a deep breath and sighed through it. "It did," I
admitted. "There's a tendency to withdraw, to focus on the
details of each day. Work more, work harder, distract
yourself with this and that. But it's done, it's over. Time
to move on."

She looked closely at my face. "Have you?"

"Hm?"

"Moved on."

More wine, another breath. "Mostly. I came back to DC, got a
new job and a new apartment. I'm still settling in. You?"

She also took a drink and a breath. "Mostly," she echoed. "I
focus on being there for Josh, and on making opportunities
to spend time with him and my mother. She and Jim were very
close. But you knew that."

I nodded.

"So what next?" she asked.

Alice's manner was casual, but there was something about the
set of her jaw and the steadiness of her gaze that suggested
a stronger interest.  I gulped down the rest of my wine. "I
haven't decided yet. Uncle Jim figured I'd sell the place,
but he urged me to use it for a few weekends first. It's
tempting to keep it, if I can handle the taxes and upkeep. I
don't know. I'm still sort of living in the moment."

There were little beads of sweat on my brow. From the sun, I
wondered, or from something else? An impulse struck me. I
stood up and started peeling off my shirt. "And in this
moment, I think I need a swim."

Alice's eyes widened and her mouth opened in a surprised
look that quickly shifted to amusement.  She chuckled and
put down her glass. "Bad planning on my part," she
confessed. "I didn't bring my suit."

"Neither did I." I grinned as I proved it by dropping my
pants and boxers together. "Good thing your mom isn't
watching us now." Without waiting for a response, I hopped
over the wall, ran to the edge of the pond and dived in.

When I came back up for air, Alice was standing by the edge
of the pond. "You're nuts," she said. "We don't have any
towels or sunscreen or anything."

"Quit thinking like a mom," I chided.

She laughed and shook her head. "I can't help it-I *am* a
mom!"

"Even moms need a little crazy time. Are you coming in, or
will you just stand there and watch?"

It only took her a moment to decide. "Okay, I'm coming in,
but you'd better not laugh."

"Scout's honor."

Alice kicked off her shoes and socks, then unzipped the
jeans and let them fall before pulling off her tank top. She
set the clothes aside on a nearby rock and stopped. "You're
staring."

She'd caught me. "You don't look like a boy anymore." That
was an understatement-standing there in a white strapless
bra and low-cut bikini panties, Alice looked nothing like
the twiggy tomboy of our youth.

"Thank you for noticing." Her tone and posture cried out
"Duh!" but even from that distance I could tell from her
face that she was pleased. "You can turn around now."

I did. A few moments later, I heard a splash as she entered
the water. I caught a blurry glimpse of her approaching and,
while I was trying to make out details, her hands broke the
surface and sent a heavy spray of water into my face.

"Got you," she sang as I stepped back and shook my head like
a dog drying his fur.

"Paybacks are hell," I cried, splashing back with enough
vigor to send her bobbing backward.

We played like kids, but the feel was far from childlike.
I'd never really had sexual thoughts about Alice
before-heck, for the last twenty years I hadn't had any
thoughts at all about her-but now I couldn't seem to have
anything but. The water was nowhere cold enough to keep the
obvious sign of my arousal from manifesting itself, either.

Splashing turned to racing, with Alice daring me to keep up
with her. I did, despite the extra drag of my extended
rudder. I put on a burst of speed and pulled past her just
before our appointed finish line.

"Cheater," she accused teasingly. "You stayed back there
until the last minute just to check out my ass, didn't you?"

"Of course," I teased back.  "The view was superb, too."

"Perv," she laughed. Her hands shot to my ribs and flexed,
finding all those places that I'd forgotten existed.

I yowled and jerked at the tickling, laughing and yelling at
the same time. "Stop it, girl."

"Make me!"

She used to be ticklish too, I remembered. Dodging and
turning as best I could, I reached for the sweet spot just
below the armpit. I missed-instead of bone, I felt something
soft and round.

"That's not my rib," Alice needlessly pointed out. She moved
my hand slowly, dragging it across the front. A firm, erect
nipple danced across my palm.  Our eyes met and for a few
moments the world stopped moving while I drew her to me and
kissed her.  Her lips yielded to mine and she pressed her
body against me in response.

I don't know how long we stayed there like that.  I felt a
strong, focused desire that had been missing from my life
for too long and I didn't want it to end.  But then Alice
was pushing away.  She drifted back, gently pushing off
against my chest.  "Everybody out of the pool."

Alice backstroked toward our picnic spot. I followed up to a
point and then stopped to enjoy the view as she emerged from
the water. She took one quick peek over her shoulder and
kept on going past her pile of clothes to the stone
structure beyond.

When I caught up to her Alice had pushed the basket and
debris to one side and was stretched out on our picnic
cloth. I sat on the wall and looked down at her, admiring
the way the sun sparkled off the wet contours of her body.
She planted her arms and rose up to a semi-sitting position
that did a beautiful job of showing off the teardrop shape
of her gleaming breasts. "You're staring."

"You're breathtaking."

She looked me over, letting her eyes linger between my legs.
"How long has it been for you?"

"Three years, two months, ten days." I think I blushed a bit
when I realized how quickly I'd come up with that figure.
"Give or take a few. You?"

"Five and a half years. Not since Tom-my husband, that is."
Her wry smile told me that she felt the same.

"So you'll understand if I'm a little rusty," I remarked.

Alice lay back and stretched her arms toward me. "Take your
time," she said. "We've both earned it."

Her eyes stayed fixed on me while I slowly stood and walked
over to the cloth. I dropped to my knees in between her feet
and ran a hand down the outside of each moist thigh, around
her bottom, and back up to the knees. Her eyes closed and a
sigh of anticipation escaped her mouth.

She came quickly the first time, less than a minute after
the first soft brush of my lips against her button. I held
on through the bouncing of her hips and the crushing force
of her legs around me. I tried everything I'd ever done to a
woman with my lips and tongue, learning what Alice felt and
responded to the most. She didn't know what to do with her
hands-they alternated between clawing at my head-which was
all they could reach of me-sliding over her belly and
breasts, and thumping the ground on either side of her. I
think she came twice more before I slowed down to let her
catch her breath.

"This is divine," she gasped during the lull, "but, if you
keep it up, I may pass out before I can return the favor."

So I took the hint, hopped over her leg and crawled forward,
kissing and nuzzling my way over her belly. I paused at her
breasts and toyed with them until she grabbed me with both
hands and pulled my face to hers for some deep kissing. I
freed up a hand to fondle her breast some more and she
reached back with hers to tickle my balls. That got my hips
moving and my breath ragged. She read the signs and started
to roll me over.

"Have a seat," she said into my ear.

I pivoted and sat, propping myself up with one arm while
Alice crawled up and went down on me. Oh, but she was good.
I used my free hand to stroke her back, but my head kept
wanting to drop back and my body wanted to flop backward and
go limp from the blood rushing to my groin.

Alice moved to straddle me, pulling me up into a full
sitting position. I held her close and we kissed some more
while she slid herself onto my shaft. Our breathing
synchronized with the rocking of her hips. The tempo
increased as the motion increased until Alice cried out and
leaned back.  I felt the pressure of her inner muscles
squeezing on me, saw her chest heave and that was it-I hung
on with eyes closed as I felt the rush of my orgasm. Seconds
stretched out into minutes as we clutched each other and
writhed together in slow motion. Then all my strength
drained away, and I fell onto my back.

Alice dropped with me and slid off to one side, resting her
head on my bicep and an arm across my chest. "A little
rusty, eh?" she breathed. "I'd love to see what you're like
after you've had some practice."

"So would I."

*****

By the time we dried, dressed, and got back to Alice's
place, it was almost time for dinner. Josh was waiting for
us on the back porch, and ran to meet us.

"Finally!"

The exasperation in his voice was comical. Then again, maybe
we were just feeling generally giddy. "What have you two
been doing all day?"

I spied Martha Engle standing in the doorway. The knowing
smile on her face told me she could have answered the boy
quite accurately if she wished. Alice and I just laughed and
let Josh yank us by the hand to the house so he could show
us the fish they'd caught for dinner.

We broiled the fish with herbs and butter and ate it, with
rice and mixed veggies, on the picnic table in the back
yard. Josh regaled us with tales of their battles in the
stream while Mrs. Engle watched the two of us with
undisguised pleasure.

The sun sank low and I knew it was time. "I'd love to keep
this up," I said, "but I need to get back on the road. I
managed not to get lost on the way here, but I'm not sure I
can follow the path back to my uncle's place in the dark."

Mrs. Engle was ready for that. "No need for that. Alice, why
don't you give Will a ride back to his place? Maybe you
could stay a while and show him where the controls are for
the pump and the septic system. Take some fuel for the
generator, too, if you want." Her eyes twinkled as she added
one more suggestion. "And don't feel like you have to hurry
back here, Alice. I suspect Josh and I will be turning in
very soon."

Uncle Jim was right: Martha Engle was still one very sharp
lady.