John Casey - Compass Rose

“So that’s where that’s from. Captain Teixeira said it one day and I couldn’t place where I’d heard it.”

Tom said, “Bet you don’t know which is the rock and which is the whirlpool.”

May was afraid Tom was asking Dick, but Charlie said, “Scylla’s the rock.”

“That’s just ’cause I said ‘rock’ first. Bet you don’t know where the word tantalize comes from.”

Charlie said, “Sure I do,” but Dick said, “Wait. I remember that one. Hold on a second.” May couldn’t think of the last time Dick had played with the boys like this. “It’s in there somewhere,” Dick said. “In that same book.”

“Tantalus,” Charlie said. “He did something, I can’t remember what, and the gods got mad and put him up to his neck in a pool of water, but when he bent over to get a drink, the water went down, so he was always thirsty and always an inch from drinking.”

“There you go,” Dick said. “Like Eddie with Phoebe.”

Charlie and Tom laughed. May said, “Dick—”

“They’re not kids anymore.”

“It’s not that,” May said. “Phoebe’s getting to be a friend of mine.”

“All right,” Dick said. “But leastways you can see the boys paid attention to Miss Perry’s books.” He leaned back in his chair. “I’m glad you boys had that. I’m not saying you’d have turned out like Walt Wormsley without it, but I guess part of how you turned out so good is on account of Miss Perry.”

May was stunned. She was so stunned she didn’t notice for a bit that Charlie and Tom were stunned, too. Dick had sometimes looked over a piece of work that Charlie or Tom had done and said it was good — a sheet bend or an eye splice, or how they’d gutted a mess of flounder. Nothing as big as this. May was glad for the boys. She was so glad that she snipped off a bud of suspicion that Dick was setting things right with them against the day they’d learn about Rose.

Dick didn’t seem to notice. He was staring at the corner of the table. “Wormsley and Son won’t work out. But neither will Pierce and Sons. Different reason. There’s not an Atlantic fishery has a future you can count on. Not cod, not scallops, not lobster. The government gave away half of Georges Bank to Canada just to get some oil pipeline, so there goes the cod and pollack. They’re overfished, anyway. Red crab is an oddity. Nobody knows much about them. If the red-crab plant loses the Boston market, then Captain Teixeira and I are out of luck. I won’t grouse about it, least not if I get another few years. But what about you boys?” Charlie and Tom shifted in their chairs. Dick heard either the creak of the wood or the change in their breathing. He looked at them, and May saw he was still far off, as if this was how his mind worked when he was lying in his bunk aboard Spartina . Dick said, “I don’t know any more than you. You’re going somewhere I don’t know much about. We know some college-educated people. There’s Miss Perry, of course. And there’s Jack Aldrich. There’s the guy who started the packing plant. Some folks with sailboats, that whole crowd. Walt Wormsley went to URI and so far as Eddie can tell he learned to drink beer, chase girls, and ride his motorcycle. It’s not like the Coast Guard, where there’s rules about everything down to how you put your socks in your footlocker. You’ll be on your own. What’s more, you’ll be on your own with a little money in the bank. When I was your age, I felt things squeezing in. The only place I didn’t feel squeezed was on the water. I joined the Coast Guard like a dumb cluck — thought I’d put the uniform on and they’d give me a boat. Being dumb is one thing, going on being dumb is dumber.”

Tom laughed. Charlie was too wide-eyed to laugh. Dick didn’t appear to hear Tom’s laugh. Dick said, “I somehow had the idea it was wrong to ask questions. I thought it was better to keep what you knew and didn’t know to yourself. I knew a couple of things I’d picked up here and there. I watched what was going on. But I didn’t want anyone finding out what was going on inside me. I thought if you ask about things someone’ll get inside you. Keeping myself clammed up like I did was dumb. All I’d’ve had to do was ask. I wasted a lot of time.” Dick closed his hands tightly, then opened them. “So when you go over there to your college, you learn to ask.”

Charlie said, “So how did you get to know all the stuff you know?”

“Too slow. And that was just the nuts and bolts. I didn’t begin to figure out what other people are like until …” Dick turned away. May’s head lifted, and she thought, Elsie. Dick said, “I get along with my crew. Course that could be ’cause they’re good at getting along with me.”

May tried to keep on being glad for the boys that Dick was talking to them, but she felt bleak. If he was keeping away from Elsie, it wasn’t on account of the comforts of home. His comfort was at sea. He’d told Tom, “Don’t be a smart-ass with your mother,” and she’d gobbled up that crumb. Then there was Charlie, all admiring, saying, “So how did you get to know all the stuff you know?” She could bring it all down in a second.

It was terrible to be that close to wickedness.

Elsie woke up with all the symptoms — the languor from hip bone to hip bone, fractions of scenes as jumpy as movie previews. Some were of her own movements, her hands reaching out. Others of him (not necessarily but probably Johnny Bienvenue), medium close-ups of him turning toward her, touching her hip, her shoulder, or, more shyly, her elbow. Various dresses, various places. Some calculations of when and where. Then further reveries — the stammering of undressing, the fluency of skin.

As she brushed her teeth she saw one funny part. The poor guy still asleep in Woonsocket without a clue that he was being considered for the role. As she fed Rose, she cooled. She carried Rose up to Mary’s room and put her in bed with groggy but welcoming Mary, and she started thinking again: she wouldn’t call him. See how energetic he was about calling her.

She spent the morning at her desk, in a better mood than if she’d just been filling out reports. She alternated official paperwork with thinking of possible babysitters, wondering if Jack and Sally would give a party — Sally wouldn’t mind if she asked that Johnny be included. Elsie saw herself in her red dress, her blue dress, a blouse and skirt — deflecting any old suitors in favor of Johnny in his not-off-the-rack but rumpled brown suit. Or would it be simpler to arrange a tennis lesson, not in her sweat suit. But even on the indoor court it wasn’t warm enough for a tennis dress. Maybe one of her bicycling outfits, the red spandex uni-suit. If she still wasn’t thin enough for the uni-suit, meet him at the court in a dress, let him think about that. Come out of the changing room in tights and a sweatshirt.

By lunchtime she felt clogged with fantasy.

At the end of the day she felt herself stir again when she pulled the seat belt across her lap.

When she picked Rose up at Sawtooth, she asked Mary if anyone had called during the morning.

“Anyone?” Mary said. “Look, he left his number yesterday. Don’t be coy. Or if you’re going to be coy, don’t be all jittery about it. And that reminds me — Rose needs a bigger playpen; she crawls back and forth in this one like a caged animal. Maybe one of those expandable baby corrals. I saw one in Wakefield — it’s like an old-fashioned elevator gate — not the door but the lattice thing that the operator folded to one side and said, ‘Fourth floor, ladies’ lingerie.’ Except the baby corral is a circle and it’s made of wood and—”

“Fine.”