Touch by Alexi Zentner Page B

believe she had once carried me. I adjusted the pillow and I heard her suck in her breath. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I’m trying to be gentle.”
    She nodded but closed her eyes, and in a few minutes she was sleeping.
    I stared at my mother while she slept. The logs burned in the fireplace, and it was at that moment, watching the fire, that I knew there was nothing I could do to stop her from dying.
    A child should never be allowed to watch his mother sleep.

    THE NEXT AFTERNOON , Martine and Franklin walked through the forest and up the hill. In the clearing, three large frames held logs off the ground. Each frame featured a sawyer standing underneath with another above, the men taking turns pulling on their ends of the eight-foot-long saws. The blades tore at the wood and sent shivers of sawdust floating down onto the men who were below. A few men hauled a straight, bucked tree into the clearing, while off to the side another man stacked a small pile of rough-cut boards.
    Across the meadow, a thin man who seemed no older than Martine stepped out of a squat, crooked cabin. He stooped over to rub the muzzle of a shaggy gray dog that lay near the door, and then he looked up and appeared to see Franklin and Martine.
    Martine had seen my grandfather when he and his crew built the store, but she had not talked to him before. In some ways, though, she felt that she knew a lot about him—she had heard men in the store talk of the young Frenchman who had first discovered gold in Sawgamet but who had found himself more lucky cutting trees than along the river—but she was surprised by the accommodations he kept for himself.
    “That’s his house?” she asked.
    “First one built in Sawgamet,” Franklin said. “Wintered here alone with that dog.”
    “It looks a little …” She paused, searching for a word. “Forlorn.”
    Franklin laughed. “He’s eighteen and without a wife. What does he need more than that for?”
    Jeannot wiped his hands on a cloth as he walked across the clearing, the dog trotting behind him at close attention. Martine was struck by the way that my grandfather carried himself, and how, when Franklin said, “My sister’s wanting a house,” Jeannot only glanced sideways at her, like he was afraid to look at her directly.
    The thought almost made my grandmother laugh—and both my grandfather and my great-aunt Rebecca did laugh when they told me their versions of this story—and I can understand why. My great-uncle Franklin was not the sort of man who usually inspired concern, and my grandfather,though not a large man, had the sort of face that made it clear that he did not mind settling disputes with his fists.
    Jeannot turned and looked at the gang of men working for him, seeming to consider something, and then he turned back. “I’m sorry, Franklin,” he said. “I’ve been selling it for one hundred fifty dollars for a rough-cut thousand feet.”
    “I can pay,” Franklin said quickly. He glanced at Martine. She had the distinct feeling that he was for some reason afraid she might suddenly turn on him if he did not get her what she had asked for. Franklin had his coat off and his sleeves rolled, and she could see sweat building at the top of his forehead, but my grandmother shivered a little, as if she had never known the touch of the sun. “And I’ll hire you on to construct it if you’re willing.”
    “I’m willing, but I can’t,” Jeannot said with a sigh. “I’d be happy to sell it to you, Franklin.” He paused, gave a little cough, and, still not looking at my grandmother, added, “And to your sister. But it’s not mine to sell. The wood is already spoken for through September, even at these prices. I don’t pretend to understand all of it that the miners need—if I knew about mining, I’d still be working the river myself—but there’s sluice boxes and rockers and props, and even more, there are men who are worried that next winter won’t be so mild. You aren’t