The Body in the Kelp ff-2

by Katherine Hall Page

  She was pretty sure Samantha had had a crush on Roger, and it was making life very difficult for her now. When she'd mentioned it to Pix, her reply had been, "Why, Faith, he was old enough to be her father! I'm sure not. Besides, she would have told me. She hasn't gotten to the stage yet where she keeps things back.”

  Faith was under the impression that that stage went all through childhood for most children, but she didn't disabuse Pix of her conviction and instead kept Benjamin away from Samantha and let her have her grief to herself. When Samantha came to get him on Tuesday, she looked more like her old self and picked Ben up, tossing him high. "I've missed you! Have you guys been busy?" Ben went into paroxysms of joy at the sight of her, and Faith murmured something in explanation, then went into the house to get her purse and the car keys.

  “I'm sure this won't be long, Samantha," she said. "That's all right, Mrs. Fairchild, we'll have fun, don't hurry. “

  Which is more than I'll have, Faith thought as she drove to the cemetery. Pix had gone with Eric earlier.

  After today the summer can return to normal and we can pick up where we left off, she told herself. There was still so much of the island to explore and so many precious hours of idleness to leave unfilled.

  When she got to the cemetery, she had to park quite far down the road. It looked as if the entire island had turned out for the service, and she might have known that Roger would have made so many friends in his own quiet way. She walked over to where Pix was standing with Eric and Jill next to John Eggleston, who had donned a robe for the service and was perspiring profusely.

  Looking around at the crowd, she recognized a few faces. The Fraziers, Bill Fox, Freeman and Nan Hamilton, who gave her a slight smile. The rest seemed to be a combination of all the different groups on the island and a few off-islanders standing in an uneasy group together. Faith had heard some New York friends were coming, and there could be no doubt that these were they standing uneasily in well-cut dark suits and sober black-linen sheaths. One woman wore a large black cartwheel hat that would be long remembered.

  It was a beautiful cemetery, and Faith suddenly realized it mattered to her where she ended up. She didn't believe she would notice her surroundings after death, but she liked the idea of selecting the spot. It was a little like choosing a house or apartment, and you would certainly be there a lot longer. She wouldn't mind a final resting place like this one. Thecemetery was surrounded by tall pines and clumps of white birches. The neatly mown plots were bordered by the ferns and mosses of the woods that circled them. Wildflowers were everywhere, along the paths and even mixing with the plastic flowers and VFW flags placed in memory by the headstones. Some of the stones were old, the white marble covered with green lichen. There were a few large memorials, including one with a schooner in full sail carved at the base of the obelisk. Most of the headstones were granite, highly polished pink, gray, and black, glistening in the sun.

  John Eggleston stepped forward and looked around. He seemed satisfied that everyone was there and started to intone the service. The fullness and beauty of his voice startled Faith. She had placed him in the pulpit-thumping category. He started quietly. The air was still, the crowd of mourners silent.

  “I am the resurrection and the life, saith the Lord: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die.”

  There was a long pause, and Faith, who had been looking down at the soft green grass feeling unutterably sad, wondered why he had stopped.

  It was Bird. She was at the entrance to the cemetery walking quickly. When she got near the group, she slowed down and appeared to be searching for someone. Bill Fox stepped toward her and she went to him. She was wearing a long purple gown apparently fashioned from one of those Indian print bedspreads. There was no rosy hue to her cheeks despite the heat and long walk she had had from her house. Her hair was loose and shone in the sunlight. She looked noble and tragic and beautiful. Tennyson, Shakespeare, a Beatles lyric—there were any number of lines that would have described her perfectly. The baby was hanging from a sling at her hip, as silent as its mother. Faith realized she had never heard either of them make a sound.

  John Eggleston gave a nod of welcome, acknowledgment or something, and continued.

  It was a long service, and Faith began to tune out. She heard the familiar lines from Ecclesiastes without really listening: "A time to be born and a time to die," until John reached the lines about wickedness. "That iniquity was there." The voice was no longer lyrical, but harsh—and he was right. There had been wickedness and iniquity, evil had been done to this man. It was not his time to die.

  At the end of the chapter, Eric stepped forward, pulled a card out of his pocket, and started to read: "Roger Barnett was the closest friend I ever had or will have. Many of you know how we have worked together over the years, but may not have known how much was due to Roger. He brought us to this beautiful island, which I cannot think of as the cause of his death but rather the place he would have wanted to be for eternity.

  “As potters we knew that the clay was alive and our task to fashion it into the objects our imaginations saw. In the same way, I was Roger's clay and he shaped me with as sure and steady a hand as he did a bowl or vase. In Japan when the potter is very pleased with a piece he has taken from the fire, he bows to the kiln in thanks. I would like to do the same.”

  He walked slowly to the open grave and bowed. "Thank you, Roger.

  When he got back to Jill, the tears were running down his cheeks. He was not the only one.

  John Eggleston finished the service with a reading from The Prophet, which seemed quite appropriate for the forever-youthful feeling generated by the day. Faith's own copy of the book had been a junior high graduation present from Hope and was reverentially inscribed, "To my sister, Faith. I hope you gain understanding and knowledge from this book. Love forever, Hope.”

  Gibran's words and Eggleston's voice were a good match.

  For what is it to die but to stand naked in the wind and · to melt into the sun?

  And what is it to cease breathing, but to free the breath from its restless tides, that it may rise and expand and seek God unencumbered?

  Faith often got a lump in her throat when she heard Gibran quoted—the memory of Hope's words and of the time when these phrases had seemed to supply all the answers. The answers weren't quite so simple anymore, but today's lines had been well chosen. She swallowed hard and blinked away the tears that had started.

  Then it was the Lord's Prayer, ashes to ashes, and the final benediction. The service seemed to pick up speed, impelled by its own "restless tide," just as Roger had been engulfed by them. A few gulls screamed raucously; then it was quiet again. And still.

  John picked up a handful of dirt from the mound next to the grave and threw it in, Eric followed him with Jill, and the three walked slowly toward the road. Faith and Pix fell in behind Bill Fox and Bird patiently waiting to make this final gesture. Bill dropped his handful on the simple wooden casket and stood aside for Bird.

  She was taking the baby out of the sling. Her eyes darted about and settled on Pix. Placing the baby firmly in Pix's surprised grasp, she crouched down next to the grave and jumped in without a word. Her long hair streamed out behind her and disappeared as she hit the coffin with a resounding thump.

  The crowd gave a collective gasp and people started running. Aware that something out of the ordinary was occurring, John, Eric, and Jill stopped and turned back.

  Faith was stunned. She had seen the way Roger had looked at Bird, but that it had been reciprocated, and to such an extent, was a total surprise.

  Clearly, no one knew what to do.

  The baby was quite content to be in Pix's arms and gave her a smile that revealed several pearly teeth, happily oblivious of the fact that its mother was trying to get herself buried alive two feet away.

  Eric arrived at the edge of the grave and looked down.

  Bir
d was lying stretched out on top of the coffin with her eyes closed and her arms crossed at her breast, waiting for the earth to cover her. If it had been a funeral pyre, her task would have been more easily accomplished.

  “Bird," Eric implored, "this won't bring Roger back. Please stand up and we'll help you out.”

  She didn't move.

  He continued. Was there an edge of irritation to his voice? Faith thought there was and with good reason. It wasn't exactly the tribute to Roger that Eric had envisioned.

  “Bird, Roger would definitely not have wanted this. Now please get up and come back to the house with me.”

  Bill Fox moved next to Eric. "I'll stay with her and get her out. Don't worry. It's hit her very hard, and this is her way of showing it. I should have held on to her, but it didn't occur to me that she would really do it."

  “You mean you knew?" Eric clearly didn't like it.

  “I knew how upset she was, and given that, this was the natural gesture."

  “That's an odd choice of words, Bill, but you know her better than I do." Eric shrugged. "This is the worst day of my life, or rather Saturday was and it's just going on and on. Compared to what's already happened, this just doesn't matter at all. If you think it will help to bring her back to the house and talk with people who knew Roger, please do so."

  “I don't think she'll want to do that, but thank you."

  “No, thank you, for taking care of this.”

  Eric gave one last helpless look at the motionless figure in the grave, trembled slightly, and left.

  Everyone else was leaving too, many after a curious peep at Bird first. The Fraziers offered to stay with Bill, but he said it would probably be better if no one was around. Jim Sanford, the gravedigger, mumbled something about his dinner and coming back later before throwing his shovel in the back of his old pickup and bumping down the road.

  Finally only Bill, Pix, Faith, and the baby were left. At Faith's suggestion she, Pix, and the baby had moved away to sit under the trees. The baby proved to be older than they had thought and a girl—a sturdy one-year-old on the point of walking, despite her unhealthy pallor. She was happy and sat playing with some pine cones, cooing and burbling softly. She was also soaked, but they couldn't do anything about it. Bird apparently didn't carry a diaper bag, but relied insteadon the absorbency of several layers of cloth. They were on the point of telling Bill that they would take the baby home for the day when they saw him kneel down and pull Bird out of her untimely grave. She didn't bother to brush the dirt out of her hair or off her dress, but walked over and took the baby as calmly as she had relinquished her. Then she reached for the hand Bill offered, and they started off down the road. Halfway to the cemetery's entrance, she sat down abruptly on one of the stones in the Sanford plot and exploded.

  “It's not true! It's not Roger!" she screamed over and over, through violent tears. She clutched her child to her breast. Bill held her tightly.

  Feeling like voyeurs, Pix and Faith crept away, leaving Bird to the realization of the enormity of her grief, and the patient consoler ready beside her.

  Always beside her.

  5

  Faith swept her hand over the thick carpet of shiny green leaves emerging from the stiff gray lichen and quickly began to pick the tiny ripe wild cranberries that appeared.

  That morning Pix had arrived at her door bright and early with Samantha and berry-picking containers in tow. "After yesterday I decided we desperately needed a return to normalcy, and picking berries is about the most soothing thing I can think of," she had announced.

  Faith had to agree. Short of a day at Elizabeth Arden.

  Unlike Tuesday, Wednesday was sunny with a cool breeze. The sky was brilliant blue with the kind of Rorschach clouds that assume shapes—an elephant, a dog running, the sixth-grade teacher you hated.

  They were picking far out along the Point, on rocky outcroppings at the edge of a meadow that, judging from the old cellar hole and ancient fruit trees, must have been part of someone's farm in the past. In the large open field there were still some blueberries the birds had missed, and Samantha was concentrating on them, picking a handful, then feeding them to Ben, who was beginning to resemble one of the Picts from the juice.

  The berries weren't making that saçisfying ping as they hit the pail, and Faith saw she had already picked several pints. She began to think about recipes. Of course cranberries and game, but a scallop-and-cranberry dish began to take shape. She also wanted to continue her quest for new and differentchutneys to please what seemed an insatiable market. It would not have surprised her to see Charred Seaweed Chutney or Cherry Pit Butter the next time she was at Dean and Deluca. Wild cranberries and caramelized onions? That was a possibility. And what about shrub? It suggested long-ago childhood lunches with her grandmother at Altman's Charleston Gardens or The Bird Cage at Lord & Taylor, a tiny frosted glass of pulverized fruit. Refreshing in summer. Shrub instead of sorbet as a palate cleanser?

  Her hands picked automatically as her mind stirred the pots. When Pix started talking, it took a moment to turn down the flame.

  “I had to tell her. She would have heard from Arlene, and I was afraid she'd be terribly upset."

  “Sorry, Pix, I haven't been listening. You mean you told Samantha about Bird?"

  “Yes, and I needn't have worried. She made a face and said, `That's the grossest thing I've ever heard! What did she look like, Mom? Ugh, think of all that dirt in your mouth and hair!' “

  Faith laughed. It was good to find something in all this to laugh about.

  “But Faith, you know what was interesting? She wasn't a bit surprised to hear about Bird and Roger. It seems he has been talking to Samantha about her all summer, how beautiful Bird is and what a rotten time she has with Andy. He takes off whenever he wants and she never knows when he's coming back."

  “Then why didn't you ever see Roger and Bird together?"

  “Samantha says that Bird feels she has to be loyal to Andy. I guess she really loves him, and after all he is the baby's father. Also I gather he can be violent, and she was afraid to have him find out. Lately she has been trying to decide whether to leave him for Roger, and judging from her behavior yesterday I guess she did. Thinking back, I do recall seeing them in the boat together, and Samantha said Bird was supposed to go with him on Friday. They were going to have a picnic somewhere, but the baby was sick."

  “Somewhere in the boat or on the island?"

  “I don't know. Samantha didn't say."

  “If she had been in the boat, she might have been able to save him. No wonder she's so upset. She must be blaming herself.”

  Faith thought for a moment about Bird and the men in her life before speaking. "Aren't you glad you're married, Pix? I can't imagine going through all that emotional turmoil. Not that marriage is totally without turmoil, but at least it's the turmoil you know."

  “Exactly." They continued to talk about the funeral. It was destined to go down in the annuals of island history as the most talked-about funeral of all time, just edging out Virgil Baldwin's, where the bereaved widow wore a bright-red dress to show how happy she was that the old tyrant was finally gone.

  Those who had attended yesterday's obsequies had gained a sudden popularity and found themselves besieged by sidelong invitations to come around for a cup of coffee or some tomatoes from the garden or whatever from those who were kicking themselves for missing it all.

  Pix and Faith picked steadily, well satisfied with themselves and their labors, until it was time to stop and eat lunch. They went down to the rocks by the water, where Samantha was trying to show Ben the harbor seals sunning themselves on the rocks offshore. Every time she placed the binoculars against his eyes he tried to grab them, and eventually she gave up.

  Faith had piled anything she could find in the fridge on her sandwich—fresh tomatoes, red onion, sprouts, lettuce, and Boursin—and was having a hard time controlling the drips, which were running down her fingers stained bright p
ink from the berries. Samantha was trying to keep from laughing. "I'm sorry, Mrs. Fairchild, it's just that I never see you like this. A mess!"

  “Mess, mess!" Ben chortled.

  “Sharper than a serpent's tooth,"'Faith said to Pix. "Just wait," Pix replied.

  “Hey, watch what you're saying, Mom. You should countyourself lucky. It's not like we're delinquents or druggies or anything."

  “Indeed. I am thrice blessed." Pix smiled.

  “You know, it's really sad about a lot of the kids on the island. Arlene has been telling me. There is nothing to do here. Absolutely nothing. Especially in the winter. Can you imagine, the nearest mall is up in Bangor? So there are quite a few druggies. A kid Arlene really liked this year got really messed up and totaled his car, and her parents won't let her see him anymore, but she thinks she can help him.”

  The Joan of Arc syndrome, recalled Faith, as several pathetic, needy, albeit handsome faces in her own past marched past.

  “But where could kids on this island get drugs?" Pix asked.

  “Oh, Mom, kids can get drugs anywhere if they want them enough, and anyway mostly they drink. But it's the same thing.”

  They sat contemplating the cove. The breeze had stirred up the water, and several sailboats were skimming across the top, white sails and whitecaps. The schooner The Victory Chimes sedately made her way across the horizon.

  There are so many layers to life here, Faith thought. Or rather it's like life anywhere, but we are so seldom visitors to the places we live. On the island she had a sense of being only at the surface of things as a summer person, and a transient one at that. Finding Roger's body and the funeral had been dips below, and the auction, too, with its undercurrents of tension; but she really had no idea what life on Sanpere was like for most of its residents.