Elizabeth Gilbert - Stern Men

Most of the islanders were afraid of Angus Addams. Ruth’s father liked him. When Ruth’s father was a boy, he’d worked as a sternman for Angus and had been a smart, strong, ambitious apprentice. Now, of course, Ruth’s father had his own boat, and the two men dominated the lobster industry of Fort Niles. Greedy Number One and Greedy Number Two. They fished in all weather, with no limits on their catch, with no mercy for their fellows. The boys on the island who worked as sternmen for Angus Addams and for Stan Thomas usually quit after a few weeks, unable to take the pace. Other fishermen-harder drinking, fatter, lazier, stupider fishermen (in Ruth’s father’s opinion)-made easier bosses.

As for Ruth’s father, he was still the handsomest man on Fort Niles Island. He had never remarried after Ruth’s mother left, but Ruth knew he had liaisons. She had some ideas about who his partners were, but he never spoke about them to her, and she preferred not to think about them too much. Her father was not tall, but he had wide shoulders and thin hips. “No fanny at all,” he liked to say. He weighed the same at forty-five as he had at twenty-five. He was fastidiously neat about his clothing, and he shaved every day. He went to Mrs. Pommeroy once every two weeks for a haircut. Ruth suspected that something may have been going on between her father and Mrs. Pommeroy, but she hated the thought of it so much that she never pursued it. Ruth’s father’s hair was dark, dark brown, and his eyes were almost green. He had a mustache.

Ruth, at eighteen, thought her father was a fine enough person. She knew he had a reputation as a cheapskate and a lobster hustler, but she also knew that this reputation had grown fertile in the minds of island men who commonly spent the money from a week’s catch on one night in a bar. These were men who saw frugality as arrogant and offensive. These were men who were not her father’s equal, and they knew it and resented it. Ruth also knew that her father’s best friend was a bully and a bigot, but she had always liked Angus Addams, anyway. She did not find him to be a hypocrite, in any case, which put him above many people.

For the most part, Ruth got along with her father. She got along with him best when they weren’t working together or when he wasn’t trying to teach her something, like how to drive a car or mend rope or navigate by a compass. In such situations, there was bound to be yelling. It wasn’t so much the yelling that Ruth minded. What she didn’t like was when her father got quiet on her. He got real quiet, typically, on any subject having to do with Ruth’s mother. She thought he was a coward about it. His quietness sometimes disgusted her.

“You want a beer?” Angus Addams asked Ruth.

“No, thank you.”

“Good,” Angus said. “Makes you fat as all goddamn hell.”

“It hasn’t made you fat, Mr. Addams.”

“That’s because I work.”

“Ruth can work, too,” Stan Thomas said of his daughter. “She’s got an idea to work on a lobster boat this summer.”

“The two of you been saying that for damn near a month now. Summer’s almost over.”

“You want to take her on as a sternman?”

“You take her, Stan.”

“We’d kill each other,” Ruth’s father said. “You take her.”

Angus Addams shook his head. “I’ll tell you the truth,” he said. “I don’t like to fish with anyone if I can help it. Used to be, we fished alone. Better that way. No sharing.”

“I know you hate sharing,” Ruth said.

“I fucking do hate sharing, missy. And I’ll tell you why. In 1936, I only made three hundred and fifty dollars the entire goddamn year, and I fished my balls off. I had close to three hundred dollars in expenses. That left me fifty to live on the whole winter. And I had to take care of my goddamn brother. So, no, I ain’t sharing if I can help it.”

“Come on, Angus. Give Ruth a job. She’s strong,” Stan said. “Come on over here, Ruth. Roll up your sleeves, baby. Show us how strong you are.”

Ruth went over and obediently flexed her right arm.

“She’s got her crusher claw here,” her father said, squeezing her muscle. Then Ruth flexed her left arm, and he squeezed that one, saying, “And she’s got her pincher claw here!”

Angus said, “Oh, for fuck’s sake.”

“Is your brother here?” Ruth asked Angus.

“He went over to the Pommeroy house,” Angus said. “He’s all goddamn worried about that goddamn snot-ass kid.”

“He’s worried about Webster?”

“He should just goddamn adopt the little bastard.”

“So the Senator left Cookie with you, did he?” Ruth asked.

Angus growled again and gave the dog a shove with his foot. Cookie woke up and looked around patiently.

“At least the dog’s in loving hands,” Ruth’s father said, grinning. “At least Simon left his dog with someone who’ll take good care of it.”

“Tender loving care,” Ruth added.

“I hate this goddamn dog,” Angus said.

“Really?” Ruth asked, wide-eyed. “Is that so? I didn’t know that. Did you know that, Dad?”

“I never heard anything about that, Ruth.”

“I hate this goddamn dog,” Angus said. “And the fact that I have to feed it corrodes my soul.”

Ruth and her father started laughing.

“I hate this goddamn dog,” Angus said, and his voice rose as he recited his problems with Cookie. “The dog’s got a goddamn ear infection, and I have to buy it some goddamn drops, and I have to hold the dog twice a day while Simon puts the drops in. I have to buy the goddamn drops when I’d rather see the goddamn dog go deaf. It drinks out of the toilet. It throws up every goddamn day, and it has never once in its entire life had a solid stool.”

“Anything else bothering you?” Ruth asked.

“Simon wants me to show the dog some goddamn affection, but that runs contrary to my instinct.”

“Which is?” Ruth asked.

“Which is to stomp on it with heavy boots.”

“You’re terrible,” Ruth’s father said, and bent over laughing. “You’re terrible, Angus.”

Ruth went into the house and got herself a glass of water. The kitchen of the Addams house was immaculate. Angus Addams was a slob, but Senator Simon Addams cared for his twin brother like a wife, and he kept the chrome shining and the icebox full. Ruth knew for a fact that Senator Simon got up at four in the morning every day and made Angus breakfast (biscuits, eggs, a slice of pie) and packed sandwiches for Angus’s lunch on the lobster boat. The other men on the island liked to tease Angus, saying they wished they had things so good at home, and Angus Addams liked to tell them to shut their fucking mouths and, by the way, they shouldn’t have married such lazy fat goddamn whores in the first place. Ruth looked out the kitchen window to the back yard, where overalls and long underwear swayed, drying. There was a loaf of sweetbread on the counter, so she cut herself a piece and walked back out to the porch, eating it.

“None for me, thanks,” Angus said.

“Sorry. Did you want a piece?”

“No, but I’ll take another beer, Ruth.”

“I’ll get it on my next trip to the kitchen.”

Angus raised his eyebrows at Ruth and whistled. “That’s how educated girls treat their friends, is it?”

“Oh, brother.”

“Is that how Ellis girls treat their friends?”

Ruth did not reply, and her father looked down at his feet. It became very quiet on the porch. Ruth waited to see whether her father would remind Angus Addams that Ruth was a Thomas girl, not an Ellis girl, but her father said nothing.

Angus set his empty beer bottle on the floor of the porch and said, “I’ll get it my own self, I guess,” and he walked into the house.