“A pleasant smile is better than the wisecracks I’ve been getting,” I said. “Let’s get started.”
“I don’t think we can get any more in the Land Cruiser,” said Zee. “So I’ll join your crew, too. With three of us working, we’ll be done in short order.”
And we were, because there was plenty of seaweed. While we filled the back of the pickup, Zee and Eleanor chatted about this and that but never touched on the midlife crisis that had led Mike, Eleanor’s ex, to divorce her and marry the woman known to Eleanor’s angry friends simply as “the Bimbo.” When the truck was full, Eleanor drove away via the road over the big sand dunes, and we put the rods on the roof rack, then climbed into the truck, turned around, and retraced our route to the Cape Pogue cliffs.
“She seems to be doing okay,” said Zee.
“How come you didn’t talk about the divorce?” I asked.
“We didn’t want to talk about the Bimbo.”
Ahead of us I saw the children nearing the cliffs.
“The Bimbo must have a name,” I said. “What is it?”
“I wouldn’t know.”
I glanced at her pants but saw no flames. So much for moral poetry.
We caught up with the kids at the cliffs and loaded them aboard. It was a tight squeeze because of the bags of seaweed.
When we got home, I emptied the bags out by the garden. We had a good pile of seaweed but would need more by planting time.
I was putting some wood in the living-room stove when the phone rang. It was Clay Stockton.
“I’m catching the next boat. It’s about to pull out of Woods Hole.”
“I’ll meet you in Vineyard Haven. I’m glad you’re coming.”
“No gladder than I am, buddy.”
The sound of his voice rolled time backward. I was almost thirty years younger and Clay and I were sitting in a bar in West Palm Beach. I had been telling him about my plans to join the Boston PD and start college when a man came in and sat down beside us.
2
The man looked about forty and was trim. His hair was short and blond.
After he had picked up his glass, he looked at Clay and said, “Tom Gilbert tells me you’re the guy who brought the Miramar II down from Boston.”
“That’s right,” said Clay.
He put out his hand. “I’m Fred Marcusa. Tom speaks highly of you. Glad to meet you.” He looked at me and arched a brow.
I gave him my name and he nodded and turned back to Clay. “That had to be a pretty rough trip, especially for somebody short-handing a boat that size through that gale off Hatteras.”
“I didn’t do it alone,” said Clay. “Tom told me he had a crew for me but the guys didn’t show up the morning I was leaving, so I talked J.W. here into coming along.”
Marcusa nodded. “Booze or women probably.”
“Probably.”
“So you left anyway.”
“We didn’t see any reason to wait.”
“I’ve seen the Miramar. Tom’s glad to have her here, but she took a bit of a beating coming down.”
“She’d have taken the same beating if I’d had a bigger crew.”
“It must have been pretty hairy out there.”
“It could have been worse.”
Marcusa sipped his drink, smiled at me, then sipped again and said, “You boys have any plans for the next few days?”
I shrugged. “Go back to Boston, I guess.”
“I don’t have any plans,” said Clay, taking another drink.
We sat in silence for a while, then Marcusa said, “If you’re interested, I can give you some work. A guy wants me to take a forty-four-foot yawl out to Freeport and then bring it back here. I can probably do it by myself but I’d rather have a crew that can handle things if something happens to me. It’ll only be a two-or three-day job, but the pay is good.”
He mentioned the pay and it really was good. Too good. “You boys interested?” he asked.
“What could happen to you?” I asked.
He smiled. “Oh, it’s not going to be dangerous or anything like that, but you’re both sailors, you know that things can happen out there. You can get sick, you can make a mistake and break something. I’d feel better with people aboard who could take over if they had to.”
I thought about the pay. If Fred was offering me that much, he must be making a lot more himself.
“You just need a crew going and coming. No more than that?” asked Clay.
“No more than that. We’ll sail to Freeport, tie up for a few hours, then come back. You ever been to Freeport?”
“No.”
“Great town. Free trade zone. Lots of cruise ships. Lots of action. You’ll get half your pay when you go aboard and half when we get home again. What do you say?”
Two or three days. Half the money up front. Clay and I looked at each other.
“Sounds okay to me,” I said, and Clay nodded.
The Lisa was fast-looking and had a pretty sheer. When I went aboard, Fred handed each of us an envelope. Mine was full of fifties. I put it in my duffle bag, and we headed out.
We took turns at the helm and lines, the three of us working smoothly together just as Clay and I had done on the Miramar II, and were well offshore by sunset. Fred cooked up a good supper, and during the night we took four-hour shifts at the helm. Fred struck me as one of those rare people, like Clay, with whom I could companionably sail long distances. We had a smooth trip and the next day we tied up against a pier in Freeport.
“There’s a bar right down there,” said Fred, pointing. “Owner knows me. You boys go have some lunch. I’ll go find the guys with our cargo. We’ll load up and be out of here before you can say Jack Robinson.”
He stepped ashore and walked out of sight. He hadn’t mentioned cargo before, but it was what I’d been expecting. Clay smiled and said, “Cargo. Why not?”
We walked down to the bar and sat down. The bartender came over and nodded toward the door. “Fred just stuck his head in and told me you’d be coming along. Said to put what you want on his tab. What’ll you have?” We enjoyed beer and sandwiches before heading back to the boat.
The cargo arrived not too much later in the form of several closed boxes marked with the name and logo of a well-known television manufacturer. The crew of Bahamians, directed by Fred, stowed the boxes in the center cabin. When the Bahamians left, Fred grinned. “I bet you never knew these things were manufactured out here in the islands.”
He was right.
“I have to see a guy,” he said. “Have another beer on me, and when I get back we’ll cast off.”
He went ashore and we went back to the bar, where we had another drink and talked with the bartender, who seemed to like Fred.
By and by, Fred came in. “Okay,” he said, “time to make sail.”
“Maybe not,” I said, looking through a window and seeing a half dozen armed uniformed men coming along the pier.
“Damn,” said Fred, looking out the window. “I’d better see what this is all about. If I can’t get rid of these guys, deliver those televisions by yourself. Somebody will meet you when you get to West Palm.”
He stepped outside and went to meet the uniformed men. They surrounded him and when they took him away with them, they left one man behind guarding the boat.
Clay and I exchanged looks and bent over our glasses.
“Guard’s got a rifle,” said Clay.
The bartender had taken everything in. He was busy for a few minutes, then came over with a bottle of beer in his hand. “Fred always treated me right,” he said. “I don’t know how long they’re going to keep him, but I think you boys and the boat better be gone before too long.”
“There’s a guy with a gun out there,” I said.
“I know that lad with the rifle,” said the bartender. “He likes his beer. Go chat with him and give him this bottle.”
He moved to the far end of the bar.
Clay and I took our glasses and step
ped outside, glanced around and saw that no one was watching, then went to the guard and looked in the direction his companions had gone with Fred.
He shrugged and followed our gaze.
“Hot day,” I said. I handed him the bottle of beer. “Here. It’s on me. I was in the army once, and I know what guard duty’s like.”
He grinned, checked to make sure no one was watching, and pulled on the bottle.
“Good,” he said. We touched our glasses to his and we all had another drink.
By the time he finished his bottle, the guard seemed about half asleep. I led him into an alley and sat him against a wall behind a barrel while Clay threw the rifle into the harbor.
“I wonder what the barman put in that beer,” said Clay. “Pretty fast-acting.”
“Let’s not wait to find out,” I said.
We went aboard and cast off the bow and stern lines and motored out of the harbor. Clay and I didn’t say much. Nobody followed us, so about an hour out of the harbor, we put up the sails and turned off the engine. The creak of the rigging and the hiss and slap of the water were the only sounds. Clay and I looked astern and still saw no other boats, then we looked at each other and shook our heads, grinning.
The next day we tied up at the dock in West Palm where we’d boarded the Lisa a couple of days earlier. We were ashore with our duffle bags when a man came down the dock.
“Where’s Fred?”
“The last time we saw him he was walking off with the Freeport police,” said Clay.
He frowned. “You two brought the boat over?”
“Yes,” I said. “But so far we’ve only gotten half our pay.”
He gave me a look, then turned back to Clay. “You take a peek at the cargo?”
“No,” he said. “We’re not interested in TVs. Why don’t you go aboard and check for yourself. None of the boxes have been opened.”
“I’ll do that.” He went down into the cabin and came back. “Everything looks fine.”
“Is Fred going to be all right?” I asked. “He seemed like a nice guy. I wouldn’t want anything to happen to him.”
“He’ll be okay,” said the man. “They don’t have any evidence against him, thanks to you guys. How much does he owe you?”
We told him and he grinned and said, “Cheap bastard. I’ll have to get it for you from the bank. Come on.”
We followed him to two banks where he cashed two checks and gave us the money. As I put mine away with the other fifties, he studied us and said, “You fellas interested in more work?”
“No thanks,” I said. “I’m going back to Boston.”
“Not right now,” said Clay.
“Well, if you change your minds…”
“I’ll look you up if I do,” I said.
But I didn’t look him up because back in New England I passed my examinations and joined the Boston PD, and then started taking classes at Northeastern, using my Palm Beach money to pay my way.
As far as I knew, Clay never saw him again either, because he used his money to take flying lessons, then went out west to find work. He’d heard there were a lot of jobs for pilots out there along the border and apparently there were, because a couple of years later, he came to Boston with a new wife and enough money to rent himself a nice apartment and get his BA from Boston University.
By that time I was married, too, and the four of us saw a lot of each other before he and his then wife sailed his now completed ketch south so he could take a job he’d been offered.
And now he was coming again.
“What are you thinking about?” asked Zee, bringing me back to reality. She had a quizzical smile on her face. “You haven’t moved since you hung up the phone.”
“That was Clay,” I said. “He’s on the next boat. Hearing his voice, I got to thinking about a couple of sails we took together. I think I’ve mentioned them. One down to Florida from Boston and another out to the Bahamas and back.”
“I remember you telling me about the one to Florida, but I don’t remember the other one. Wasn’t the Florida sail the one where you ran into a bad storm?”
“Yes. You know what they say about sailing: hours of boredom interspersed with moments of stark terror. But it was a good boat so we lived to tell the tale.”
“Tell me about the Bahamas trip.”
“Not much to tell. No storms. No problems. We sailed the boat out to Freeport, then sailed it back to West Palm. Fair winds both ways.”
“What’s Freeport like?”
“All I saw of it was a dock and the inside of a bar.”
“I should have guessed! Well, you’d better get started if you’re going to meet that boat. I’m looking forward to getting to know the mythical Mr. Stockton.”
“You’ll like him.”
I drove to Vineyard Haven and had no problems finding a parking place in the Steamship Authority parking lot. The wind had shifted to the northeast and was coming off the water, so it was chilly. I stood inside the ticket office and watched the brand-new ferry, the Island Home, come into sight around West Chop. The Island Home was the pride of the Great White Fleet, and rightly so. It was only unpopular with those people who thought there were already enough people on Martha’s Vineyard and didn’t want to encourage more to come.
There weren’t too many passengers aboard, and as they streamed down the gangplank, I immediately saw Clay, backpack slung over his shoulder, traveling light as always. He looked good.
I went out to meet him as he walked toward the ticket office and we wrapped ourselves in each other’s arms, then stepped back and looked at each other, grinning.
“Haven’t changed a bit!” Clay said.
“A thing of beauty is a joy forever.”
“How long’s it been?”
“We’ll figure that out over martinis at home. Come on.”
As we walked to the Land Cruiser, he glanced once back toward the boat. Then, walking on, he slapped my shoulder. “We have a lot of catching up to do.”
“You don’t get to leave until I know everything.”
“Suits me. You sure your wife doesn’t mind me visiting?”
“She thinks you’re a myth. You get to prove you’re not. It may take some work because I’ve been telling lies about you for years.”
“Probably better than telling the truth!”
“Probably!”
We drove out of Vineyard Haven and headed for Edgartown. The bare trees let us see deep into the woods on either side of the road, revealing houses that were out of sight during the summer. There weren’t many cars on the road.
“Never been here in the winter before,” said Clay. “Last time I came here, we were both in college.”
“That was a while back. Our place has changed a bit. New rooms for the kids, another bathroom, a woodstove in the living room. The bunk room is the guest room now, and my dad’s bedroom is the master bedroom.”
“Any work available this time of year?”
“If you build houses or wooden boats,” I said. “Not much else. Most people think of rich people when they think of the Vineyard, but the island is one of the poorest counties in the state. When the tourists aren’t here, there’s a lot of unemployment and all of the problems that go along with poverty. A lot of it’s generational: fathers beat up their wives, and their sons beat up their girlfriends. Brainless parents produce brainless children. The same kid steals from his mother, gets his girlfriend pregnant, drives his car into a tree. That sort of thing. Five percent of the people cause ninety-five percent of the cops’ problems.”
“Sounds like every small town.”
“Or city. The percentages don’t change much. You looking for work?”
“Maybe. But don’t worry. If I decide to do that and if I can find a job, I won’t be mooching off you. I’ll get a place of my own.” He laughed that good, infectious laugh of his, and I heard my own laughter in response.
“You can stay as long as you want,” I said. “Hell, it’ll take a
month just to catch up on what you’ve been doing since the last time you wrote.”
We passed the Felix Neck Wildlife Sanctuary and a bit later, turned down our long sandy driveway. I parked in front of the house beside Zee’s little Jeep, and we both got out and went through the screened porch into the living room.
Zee and the children came to meet us.
“You must be Zee,” said Clay. “I’m Clay.” He put out his hand and took hers, holding it just long enough. “It’s very nice of you to allow me into your home.”
Her eyes danced. “It’s a pleasure.”
“And you must be Joshua and Diana. Your father has told me of you in his letters.” He shook their hands and said, “He’s very proud of both of you.”
They beamed.
I pointed to the guest room. “You can put your gear in there, Clay, and I’ll fix us some drinks.”
He excused himself and disappeared into the guest room, and I went to the kitchen and got the Luksusowa out of the freezer. I poured three glasses, added two olives to each, put the glasses on a tray with crackers, cheese, and smoked bluefish, and came back into the living room just in time to find Clay introducing himself to Oliver Underfoot and Velcro and distributing small gifts: perfume to Zee (her favorite; how did he know? I must have mentioned it in a letter), a pocketknife to Joshua (his first; I’d only recently decided he was old enough for one, but hadn’t told him so yet), and a tiny blue sapphire ring for Diana (just the right size, too).
“How about me?” I asked, putting the tray on the coffee table next to my delighted family members.
He gestured at them. “You already have everything here a man could want.”
I looked at Zee, who was smiling at everyone in the room. It had taken me years to capture her heart. Clay had done it in five minutes. Even the cats were rubbing against his legs.
I felt good. I picked up my glass and raised it. “Here’s to us all,” I said. “God bless us, every one.”
3
The next morning, Zee was back at work in the hospital ER, and the kids were in school by the time Clay came yawning into the kitchen, where I was reading the paper and having another cup of coffee.
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