John Casey - Spartina

Captain Goddamn Pierce. His saying “Goddamn” wasn’t the worst thing — it wasn’t necessarily the hard-ass sons of bitches that humiliated you.

Dick wasn’t all that worried about the old man, but he was sorry about Tran. The way things had gone, Tran would have rather pedaled home on his bicycle.

Dick still couldn’t figure what he liked so much about Tran. Part of it was Tran reminded him of when he’d been the kid on board. Let the kid do it, that way he’ll learn. And Tran reminded him of a different way to take it — he wasn’t as sour as Dick had been. Tran was quiet and serious and earnest about it all, reminded Dick of Charlie. And for all his being a bronze-colored fellow, what with his small hands, his small bones dwarfed in the foul-weather jacket, he reminded Dick of Elsie. He’d even picked him up bicycling on Route 1, took him home, and caused trouble.

Dick said “Goddamn” again and laughed. He was still in that other trouble.

D ick had another surprise when he got back to Eddie’s. He’d figured May would get on the subject of when he was going to get their house fixed. He and May went to the bedroom. May sat on the bed. She had something on her mind, but it wasn’t the house.

He gave her the money for the month and told her about the Vietnamese family. He said he’d like to put some of the money into buying a bunch of pots cheap. May nodded, said at least the food bills were low, what with Eddie having cooked up pots of stew with the meat that had thawed at the edges when the power was out. Then she asked him for a hundred dollars for herself. When he asked her what for, she was embarrassed. She wouldn’t say right off.

Dick said, “Look, I’ll give you the money, May. What the hell, it’s not even a quarter-trawl of cheap pots.”

May twisted her mouth at that, not angry but peevish.

Dick tried to brighten things up. “I’ll give you the money. It’s coming in regular for a change.” He opened his wallet and held out five twenties. She took it and put it away in her purse. He saw she was peeved with herself. With her back to him, she said, “I’m going to spend it on a makeover.”

“Good,” he said. “Whatever it is, good.”

“I’ll tell you what it is,” she said.

“Don’t have to,” he said cheerily.

May said, “It’s a beauty treatment. You learn what makeup and what kind of hairstyle and what color clothes you ought to wear.” She was furious now.

“You look pretty good to me.” No help.

May said, as if Dick was dragging it out of her, “Eddie invited over that woman he’s been helping out. The one he met when she was lost in the woods. He cuts wood for her, fixes her storm windows. He was over to her house cutting up a tree across her driveway, and he asked her to come back for supper.” May paused and said, “She’s the same age as me. The boys have seen her, she works at the library and she substitute-teaches. She has a daughter the same age as Charlie. When she told us about her daughter and her thinking of where to go to college, Charlie and Tom couldn’t believe it, she looked so young. They said so. Eddie laughed and said, ‘It is hard to believe, isn’t it.’ All three of them stared at her till she was embarrassed and talked about something else.”

Dick cleared his throat. “I know who you mean. I don’t think I’ve seen her, but Eddie’s mentioned her.”

He heard his own voice come out far off like an echo. For a second he feared he’d said, “Elsie’s mentioned her.”

May said, “She looked at me when they were all looking at her. She just took a quick look sideways.”

May didn’t say anything for a while. Dick didn’t see what he could say.

May said, “She didn’t get dressed up to come here. She was wearing a checked shirt and slacks. Her hair was nice, all clean and fluffed up. She had on a little bit of eye makeup. And a little bit of lipstick. Her hands were pretty. Her slacks were kind of baggy with pleats, but she had this wide belt so her waist was pinched in. You could see her toes in her sandals. She didn’t paint her toenails but they were nice too. She had little tiny pearls in her ears—”

Dick said, “Well, hell, May, she did get dressed up.”

“No, she didn’t. It’s not just getting dressed up. It’s every day. She takes care of herself. She gets her hair cut right. Her shirt was just a regular checked shirt. It had brown and pink and white and real little blue lines, but it was just right for her. Of course her skin was good anyway. She just knows how to take care of herself.”

Dick said, “Well, she’s a divorcee.”

May looked at him until he felt dumb. She said, “That makes a woman better-looking, does it?”

“All I meant was—”

“You spread that secret around, everyone’s going to try divorce.”

“All I meant is, she don’t have much else to do all day.”

“If you mean she’s not cleaning up after a bunch of oafs tracking low tide through her house, you’re right about that.”

Dick said, “The boys not doing their share around here?”

May sighed. “The boys’re doing their share all right. And Eddie does a lot. Cooks some too. I have more free time around here than I ever had.”

“Well, good, May, you deserve it.” Dick thought of the goddamn dishwasher again. And then of the free time May would have to think about things.

May said, “You got your boat now, and when you’re ashore you got the boys and Eddie to do your will. And you go to the Neptune, and you’ve got Parker to get into trouble with. When I picked crabs at Joxer Goode’s, I at least had all of the other pickers to talk to. He didn’t mind us talking so long as we filled our boxes. You told me to quit, so I quit. Here comes this divorcee of Eddie’s, she says she likes living alone. Alone! She sees Miss Perry every Sunday, she’s friends with both Buttrick girls, she goes to their parties. She’s friends with the librarians and the teachers, and she goes to see friends in Boston. That’s on top of Eddie running up there as soon as there’s something she can’t fix herself. Alone!”

Dick didn’t say anything.

“The boys’re getting grown up and on their own,” May said. “Tom’s fifteen. When school’s out, he and Charlie spend more time with Eddie than with me. They work with him all day, every Saturday.”

“Pretty soon we’ll all go work on our house together,” Dick said. “The insurance money’ll come through.…”

“Did you ever ask what I thought about your spending three weeks out of every month at sea?”

Dick was stung. He was about to say, “What the hell you think I was building a boat for?” He swallowed it. May got up from the bed and looked at her watch. She said, “The boys’ll be back from school in an hour. You want to take your shower?”

“Eddie still out?”

“He comes back late these days. Around six.”

Dick didn’t want to go to bed with May in her state, but he was afraid he’d cause more trouble if he didn’t want to. He said, “Maybe you’ll feel better back in your own house.”

May didn’t say anything for a while. Then she said, “It’s funny. I didn’t think I’d like living at someone else’s place. But it’s nice here.”

“It is,” Dick said. “Eddie’s handy at making things homey. Steady Eddie. You ever think you’d have been better off married to someone like Eddie? Nice and homey. Good disposition.”

May surprised him by laughing.

“Poor old Eddie,” she said. “He’s never going to get anywhere with that woman. It’s not just on account of her being up there with the big-house people. I don’t know about that. But if she was interested, he’s too nice. It’s okay the way he helps you out, the way he is with the boys. But with her he’s too bent-forward and agreeable.”