Misery Bay Read Online Free PDF

down the road, right?”
    “Misery Bay Road, yes.”
    “You know why they call it that?”
    “What, Misery Bay?”
    “Yes, is there a story behind the name?”
    He scratched his head. “I’ve heard two stories. Not sure which is true. One is that there was a big Indian battle there, and the other is that a French fur trader got stranded there, and he was so miserable he called it Misery Bay.”
    “That’s it?” With such an evocative name, I was expecting a lot more.
    “Yeah, although if it was the French guy, you’d expect it to have a French name, wouldn’t you? So maybe the Indian story, except for the fact that it’s not an Indian name, either.”
    “Okay, either way. But it’s right down that road.”
    “Sixteen miles. If you go too far, you’ll be in the lake.”
    I was about to leave. Then I figured there was no harm taking a shot in the dark.
    “I heard there was a suicide down there. In January.”
    The old man’s smile evaporated. “Yeah, hell of a thing. A boy from Tech hanged himself.”
    “Did you know him? Did he ever stop in here?”
    The man shook his head. “No, I didn’t know him. Hell of a thing, though.”
    “Thanks for the Coke, sir.” Then I was out the door, back in my truck, and heading down that sixteen-mile road.
    There was a small sign around the halfway point. It read simply, MISERY BAY , and it had a deer’s head beneath the letters. There were thick trees on either side of the road and as I got closer to the end I could see a small river moving through random holes in the ice and snow on the left. The Misery River, feeding into Misery Bay, at the end of Misery Bay Road. It kept bothering me that the man didn’t even know where the name came from. I mean, if anybody in the world would have known …
    Enough, I told myself. You’re already letting the place get to you and you haven’t even seen it yet.
    Then I did. I turned the corner at the end of the road and found the small parking area near the break in the trees. In the summer, this was probably a boat launch, but here in the last month of winter it was just an empty pocket of level ground, mostly cleared of snow, with a view westward across the lake and facing directly into the cold wind. There was a great oak tree at the far end of the lot, and I could see a red ribbon tied around the trunk. This must have been where it happened.
    I turned off the truck. I sat there for a moment, listening to the silence, wondering why anyone even bothered plowing this place. I didn’t see any snowmobile trails, although I figured there had to be at least one or two out there in the woods somewhere. I didn’t see anything but snow piled high in the shadow of the trees and the open water in the lake swirling where the river emptied into it.
    As I got out of the truck, I took out the photograph Raz had given me. Young Charlie Jr., not quite as fair as his father, maybe some of his mother’s coloring in the mix, but the same strong, confident face. In the picture it’s summertime and the young man is standing on the end of a dock, with a fishing pole in his hand. He has turned toward the camera and the sun is going down behind him. I didn’t know where the picture was taken. Maybe on another part of this very same lake, on another day not that long ago. Just a matter of months and yet look at where he ended up.
    I went over everything Raz had told me. His son came home for Christmas break. He seemed a little down, a little more quiet than usual. He didn’t say anything at all about his girlfriend or about his classes. He slept in late every morning. He went back to school a couple of days early, saying he wanted to hit the New Year’s Eve parties. There may have been a few words spoken on the way out the door, about his decision to switch from criminal justice to forestry. The last words his father would ever say to him.
    But no, I thought. No way. Sons make their own way and sometimes their fathers don’t understand. It’s