Baiting & Fishing

by Meredith Rae Morgan

  While they feasted, he looked up at her and said, “Okay, lady, I want to know where in the sam hill you learned to fish like that.”

  She paused for a very long time, chewing carefully in the manner of fish eaters everywhere, testing for bones. It was very clear she was considering how to answer him. Eventually she took a deep breath and looked him directly in the eye. She held his gaze for a long time and said, “You're a reporter. I have managed, with some difficulty and at considerable expense, to keep my background private and out of the news. If I tell you my story, am I going to read it in the paper tomorrow?”

  He shook his head. It was his turn to think for a minute. How much privacy was he willing to give her? What if she revealed something he could use? He decided he would cross that bridge when he came to it, and said, “This is a private conversation. It won't go any further than this table.”

  She stared at him for a few minutes, clearly weighing whether or not to trust him. Finally she sighed, “Okay. I'll tell you. Obviously, I didn't learn to fish, clean fish or cook fish like that in any fancy finishing school. My dad was a charter boat captain out of Destin. I'm an only child. My mother died when I was ten. During summers and school holidays, Dad would take me out with him. I started out as second mate. I learned to bait hooks and clean fish from the mates. I learned to navigate and find fish from my dad and from some of the really great fishermen who fished out of Destin. I went to school because the law said I had to, but I spent virtually all of the rest of my time on the boat with Dad.

  “On the rare occasions we were able to take a vacation, we went fishing on lakes and rivers inland. Dad also liked to go fly fishing in the Keys. I have to confess, I never enjoyed fly-fishing as much as he did. It's just too damned much work. And it makes my arms tired. I go strictly for volume of fish. I like to catch fish I can eat, except for tarpon which is catch-and-release fishing for fun and excitement. I don't like trophy fishing, although we used to take people out to fish for the big ones. God, it is beautiful to watch someone bring in a sailfish, but I always wanted to let them go, which pissed everybody off.”

  Ray laughed.

  She went on, “Anyway, in many ways the ocean is my true home and fishing is the thing I love more than anything.”

  He munched on a hush puppy, which was fantastic, and considered very carefully the next question he wanted to ask. Before he quite got up the nerve, he heard her chuckle. She said softly, “Your next question would be: so how did you get from the docks of Destin to high society in Atlanta?”

  He looked at her and said very softly, “I'm dying to know, but I appreciate that you are a very private person. I know that I'm nosy by profession; I'm trying hard not to pry.”

  She laughed. “Thank you. I'm sure that coming from you, that is an enormous sacrifice. I won't go into the details, but I'll give you the highlights. My dad had a client who was from Chicago. He was a fabulously rich businessman. You would probably recognize his name if I told you, but who he was doesn't matter. He chartered Dad's boat a couple of times a year for several years. The summer before my senior in high school he chartered the boat for an offshore trip lasting several days. It was just Dad and me, the client and a lady friend of his. She was seasick most of the time. One night after the lady went to bed, the three of us were up on the deck, drinking beer and watching the stars. The client asked me what I was going to do after high school. I told him I planned to work for my dad full-time and maybe run a boat of my own someday. He asked my dad what he thought about that plan. My dad shrugged and said it sounded good to him. Dad had never done anything but fish. It seemed logical to him that I would do the same thing.

  “The client threw a fit. He said that was no life for a girl. He asked me how many of dad's clients had made passes at me. I shrugged and told him a few had made remarks or even advances. That's why I kept my knife on my belt at all times.” She smiled, lost in her thoughts, “You know, I always carry a blade even today except when I travel by air. I think the reason I don't like to fly is because I can't take my knife with me any more.

  “Anyway, the client told my dad that I had the excuse of not knowing any better, but he was a bad parent because I was so ignorant. The man offered to pay for me to go to college. He said if I wanted to go back and fish for a living after I got out of college that was my business, but at least I'd have an education to fall back on if I ever came to my senses and decided to get a decent job and live like normal people. “I had no intention of taking him up on his offer.

  A couple of months later, my dad found out he had lung cancer and wasn't expected to live very long. Other than the boat and an old ramshackle house, we didn't have anything in the way of material possessions. Dad didn't have any insurance for cancer treatments, so he decided not to waste money on treatment other than pain medication. He sold the house, and we moved onto the boat. We sort of putzed around taking out fishing charters as long as dad could manage that. When he got too sick to fish or to easily get on and off the boat, we sold the boat and moved into a cheesy apartment near the Air Force base in Ft. Walton Beach. Dad lived long enough to see me graduate from high school. Actually, he was too sick to go to the graduation ceremony but he saw me in my cap and gown beforehand and he saw me with my diploma afterwards.

  He died a couple of weeks later. After I paid his final expenses, all I had left for his lifetime of backbreaking work was five thousand dollars. That, and a high school diploma, were what I had on which to build my future.

  “I had planned to work on a fishing boat for my dad. I knew better than to try to get a job on a fishing boat run by anybody else. Even as good as I am with a knife, I knew for sure that something bad would happen to me if I tried to do that. So, I guess in the manner of solo women since the dawn of time, I turned to a man for protection. I called upon the only man I knew who might help me: my dad's rich client. I asked him if his offer to send me to college were still open and, if not, I asked for a job.

  “He told me to close up my affairs in Florida, buy a plane ticket to Chicago and let him know when I would arrive. I packed all the half-way decent clothes I had, which wasn't much, along with my dad's captain's logs and the purple heart he got in WWII. That didn't even fill up a backpack. I boxed up the rest of our meager possessions and put it out on the sidewalk in front of the apartment building, free to anyone who might need it. A neighbor took me to the airport.

  “It was July. I thought it was hot in Florida. Chicago was having a heat wave and it was much hotter and more humid and more utterly miserable there than I had ever experienced in Florida. From the minute I got off the plane until the day I left four years later, I hated Chicago.” She chuckled. “I thought it was bad in the summertime. Oh, my lord, that first winter I thought I would die....

  “Anyway, my mentor had a big house on The Loop that had air conditioning. I had never been in a building other than a movie theater that was air conditioned. I thought that was extravagant to the point of obscenity, but, to be honest, I got used to it pretty damned fast.

  “I stayed with him and his wife-du-jour that summer. In the fall, he rented me an apartment near the campus of Northwestern University and set up a trust fund which provided income for me to live on and enough money to pay for my books and tuition. I had always hated school, although I had earned very good grades. I wasn't really interested in much of anything, but I had agreed to go to college so I had to study something. The only thing I knew anything about was the ocean, so I decided to major in marine biology. That turned out to be a good fit for me. I struggled with a lot of other classes, but I never had any trouble with science. I was almost the only girl in most of my upper level science classes. I guess I was kind of a nerd before that word was invented.

  “Boys had never paid any attention to me in high school because I was considered to be that crazy chick who worked on a fishing boat, and could out-cuss, out-spit and out-fight almost every boy in the school. I guess I probably don't have to tell you that reputation di
dn't get me a lot of dates.

  “It was different at Northwestern. My mentor's wife, who was only a couple of years older than me at the time, took me shopping and bought me some really cool clothes. She was kind of an idiot, but she had really great fashion taste. She took me to a stylist and had my hair cut by a professional for the first time in my life. Up until then, my dad cut my hair, or I cut it myself.

  “Before I arrived in Chicago, the closest I had ever come to wearing makeup was putting on chap stick when the salt spray caused my lips to break open and bleed. She took me to the cosmetic counter at a department store and they taught me how to put on makeup. Who would ever have guessed I was sort of pretty? Anyway, I got plenty of male attention, some good and some not-so-good.

  “I managed to get by without having to pull my knife on anyone in Chicago except for a homeless guy who tried to mug me one night when I came home late from the library. I didn't cut him, but I scared the hell out of him. He must have spread the word because none of the neighborhood bums or panhandlers ever bothered me after that.

  “Anyway, I ended up with a certificate to teach science. My trust fund was still chugging along pretty nicely, so after graduation I decided to move to Southern California and get a graduate degree in marine sciences. USC had a good program for that and Southern California didn't have winters like Chicago plus it had an ocean nearby. Lake Michigan is beautiful, but it is not an ocean. I had never been to California nor did I know anybody there, but it seemed like a good place to go.

  “Shortly after I left Chicago, my mentor died. He left me a lot of money.” She paused for effect, “A whole lot of money.”

  She laughed, “You know people often said that I married Roland for his money. Actually it was the other way around. I was the one with the money.... , although Roland never knew that.”

  He put up his hand. She stopped, and he said, “Sorry to interrupt you, but I want to interject this. Please don't tell me anything about your husband or Tectron that has not already appeared in the press. I agreed to keep your story to myself. I don't want to know anything about that other story that I might even be tempted to use.”

  She looked at him for a long time, with a very sad look. Then she put her hand over his and said, “You are indeed an honorable and upright man. That's what I have been told about you.”

  She thought for a minute. “In that case, I guess that's about as far as I can go other than to say I began post-graduate work at USC, but being an heiress was just too tempting. I started traveling. I was sort of a gypsy for several years. I didn't have a permanent address. The Trustee's firm took care of my affairs and they deposited money in my checking account. I sort of flitted around the globe partying with the jet set. It was fun for a while. Then it became boring and I decided to try to do something useful. I kind of got involved in some environmental organizations and embarked upon a career as a do-gooder. Soon after that, I met Roland and you know the rest of that story.”

  She was finished. She took a sip of beer and then shrugged. “So you see, Mr. Bailey, the reason I have gone to great lengths to hide my background is because I just simply don't want my rich society friends to know about my tough childhood and the fact that I am basically the beneficiary of a rich man's charity.”

  He started to protest, then he realized she was right in a sense.

  She continued, “I also don't want people to know who my benefactor was because he was a rather notorious womanizer and, as I said, his last wife was not much older than me. I always feared that people would think he gave me money in exchange for sexual favors. That was not the case but I am quite certain no one would believe me.”

  He put his hand over hers as it lay on the table, “Where on earth did you get your impeccable manners and regal bearing?”

  She laughed, “From an actress who was playing the part of a queen in a movie.” He looked dubious. “Honest, I did! When I first moved to LA, I lived near the USC campus. A neighbor of mine was an actress. She wasn't exactly an A-List movie star, but she was a really good character actress who worked regularly. She'd never had a starring role in a major movie but when I knew her she was only in her early sixties and she had been in more than 150 movies, and countless TV shows. She wasn't rich but she was financially comfortable. She was also very kind. Since I was more or less alone in the world, she took an interest in me and mothered me in a way. Or at least she did the closest thing I ever had to 'mothering'.

  “At the time, my manners were appalling. I had learned to dress and fix my hair and wear makeup while I was in Chicago, but I smoked, drank and swore like a sailor. I often got into fights with strangers. In Destin, my blade was always the best protection around. It was not likely to help me in LA where so many people carried guns. My lack of social skills was not just unattractive; in LA it was dangerous.

  “My neighbor took it upon herself to teach me to behave like a lady. Maybe she went too far. There are a lot of people who say I carry myself like royalty. In America, that is not necessarily, or even usually, a compliment. I think that has worked against me because many people perceive me as arrogant or someone putting on airs. The latter accusation, of course, is true.”

  She looked at her watch. “Oh, my. It's very late. I have bent your ear and ended up taking up your whole day. I should call my driver.”

  He squeezed her hand. “Honestly I'm not going to do anything but go for a run. Why don't you let me take you home?”

  She considered that for a minute, “Okay. If you're going for a run anyway, why don't you change into your running clothes. Let's run on Longboat Key before you come home.”

  “Sounds good.” He went into the bedroom to change while she cleaned up the kitchen.

  She lived in a gated community on Longboat Key. Her condo was large and beautifully decorated, but neither opulent or gauche. It struck him as odd that she would have such wonderful taste given what she had said about her background. He assumed she paid expensive decorators to get the look just right. Whoever was responsible for it, her home was beautiful.

  She was back in a flash in running clothes. He waved his arms around the room and said, “I thought you said you were messy.”

  She laughed out loud, “I'm positively a pig. Fortunately, I have an excellent housekeeper.”

  They ran for a long time; eventually running out of gas altogether, they walked the last mile or so back to her condo. She invited Ray inside. He agreed to take a bottle of water, but said he needed to go. She walked him to the door and, as he started to leave, she put her hand on his arm, saying, “Thank you for today. It was the best time I've had in ... in a very, very long time.”

  He smiled at her and said, “I love to go out on the water, but I don't like to go out alone. Anytime you get a hankering to wet your line, call me. I'll be happy to take you out.”

  She smiled at him and said very softly, “I'll hold you to that promise.” She lifted herself up on her toes and kissed him quickly on the cheek.

  He responded by putting his hand on her cheek. Then he turned and left her before he embarrassed himself by throwing his arms around her and kissing her on the lips.

  Chapter 11

  The next few weeks were busy for Ray. The wife of one of the sportswriters was seriously injured in an auto accident and her husband took a leave of absence to take care of her and their children, leaving a hole in the sports staff during the height of football season. Since football is the state religion of Florida, that was practically a catastrophe for the Sports Department.

  Ray loved sports and volunteered to fill in. He agreed to attend high school events on Friday nights in exchange for occasional tickets to college and pro games. That meant his workload increased dramatically, and he worked from Friday night through Sunday afternoon nearly every weekend. The paper agreed to let him take off a couple of days during the week -- once in a while, when his editor remembered, and only if he continued to turn in his regular quota of stories.

  That was okay with Ray
. He loved being busy and he had always rather envied the sportswriters because they got to write about fun things and their schedules were usually predictable. He was happy to have the opportunity to try the life of a sportswriter.

  He took Marcella out fishing one day during the week. She caught almost as many fish as she had the first time. They kept part of the catch and gave the rest of it to a bunch of tourists who had spent a bundle to charter a boat and come back empty handed. Ray directed them to a nearby restaurant where he knew the chef would cook their catch for them.

  The marina regulars didn't know who Marcella was, but she became known on the docks as “Ray's squeeze, that woman who can fish.” They exchanged emails several times a day and spoke on the phone every couple of days. From Ray's perspective, they were becoming good friends.

  One day Victoria called Ray and invited him to stop at her house after work for tea. When he arrived they chatted for a while, mostly about upcoming events in the society circles that Victoria wanted to publicize. Ray made notes. He shared with her some of the stories he was working on.

  After the conversation petered out a bit, Victoria cleared her throat and said tentatively, “I know it is absolutely none of my business, but I think you should know that it has been noticed around town that you and Marcella Wilson have been seeing each other.”

  “Do people know what we do and where we go?”

  “I've heard you run together sometimes on Siesta Key, sometimes near her condo. You've been seen at a couple of restaurants.”

  “Anything else?”

  She looked puzzled and shook her head, “What else is there?”

  He laughed and said, “Nothing, really. I've taken her out in my boat a couple of times. I am surprised you hadn't heard that.”

  “You don't keep your boat at the Yacht Club. My sources tend to come from that circle.”

  He howled, “Compared to most of those monstrosities at the Yacht Club, my boat wouldn't qualify as a dinghy.”