The portraits of Joe Grey were more reserved. Tomcat dignity, she thought, amused. Drawing Joe was like drawing draped satin or polished pewter-the tomcat was so sleek and beautifully muscled, his charcoal-gray coat gleaming like velvet.
But his gaze was imperious. So deeply appraising that sometimes he made her uncomfortable. Sometimes she could swear that she saw, in Joe Grey’s eyes, a judgment far too perceptive, a watchfulness too aware and intense for any cat.
Charlie didn’t understand what it was about those two; both cats had a presence that set them apart from other felines.
Maybe she just knew them better. Maybe all cats had that quality of awareness, when you knew them. Her thoughts fled to last night when she had stood alone in the moonlit village looking up at the black rooftops, stood touched by that vast, wheeling space, and had glimpsed two cats leaping between the rooftops across the pale, night sky, and she felt again a wonderful delight in their freedom.
She had gone out to dinner alone, hadn’t felt like a can of soup or peanut butter and crackers, which was all her bare cupboard had offered. And she didn’t feel like calling Clyde. Their dating was casual; he probably would have been happy to run out for a quick hamburger, but she’d wanted to be by herself. Besides, she’d been with him half the day, working on the house. She’d been tired and irritable from dealing with a hired carpenter, had wanted to walk the village alone, watch the evening draw down, have a quiet dinner and then home to bed. When she had taken on the job of refurbishing Clyde’s newly purchased relic of an apartment house, she had bitten off almost more than she could chew. She’d had no intention, when she started Charlie’s Fix-It, Clean-It, of becoming a remodeling service. The business was meant to be just what it said: minor household repairs and painting-replacing a few shingles, spiffing up the yard, window washing, gutter cleaning, a good scrub down, total maintenance for the village homes and cottages. Not tearing out and replacing walls, supervising workmen, replacing ancient plumbing. She had no contractor’s license, but Clyde was, for all practical purposes, his own contractor. All they had to do was satisfy the various building inspectors.
She’d gotten home from work as the summer twilight faded into a clear, chill night, had peeled off her sweaty jeans and shirt, showered, put on clean denims and a warm sweater. Leaving her apartment, she had walked through the village down to the shore ten blocks south, moving quickly between wandering tourists. This was the beginning of the Fourth of July weekend, and along the narrow streets, NO VACANCY signs glowed discreetly among climbing nasturtiums and bougainvillea.
She had chosen a circuitous route, cutting across Ocean to the south side of the village, slowing to look in the windows of the Latin American Boutique, enjoying the brightly painted carvings and red-toned weavings, admiring and coveting the beautiful crafts and trying not to make nose prints on the glass.
She had met the shop’s owner, Sue Marble, a white-haired woman of maybe fifty who, people said, kept the store primarily so she could claim a tax write-off on her frequent Latin American trips. Not a bad deal, more power to her.
But as she had moved along beside the window, a Peruvian death mask gleamed through her own reflection, an ugly face superimposed over her face, framed by her wild red hair. The image had amused her-then frightened her. Swiftly she had turned away, hurried away toward the shore.
She hit the beach at Tenth Avenue, and had walked south a mile on the hard sand, then turned back up Ocean to The Bakery, thinking that a glass of Chablis would be nice, and perhaps crab Newburg. She thought sometimes that she led herself through life only with these little treats, like beguiling a mule with a carrot.
But why not treat herself? Tuck some bits of fun in with the hard work? Hanging Sheetrock all day was no picnic-and the heavy work had left her ravenous.
The Bakery, a rambling structure of weathered shingles, had been a summer-vacation house in the early 1900s. A deep porch ran along the front, facing a little seaside park of sand dunes and low, twisted oak trees spreading like dark, giant hands over the curves of sand and sweeps of dark ice plant. She’d been disappointed that all the terrace tables were taken, but then had spied a small corner table and soon was settled facing the darkening dunes, ordering wine and the Newburg, quietly celebrating the first gallery exhibit of her drawings.
After her father died, it was her mother’s subtle control that had eased her in the direction of art school, to develop the talent her mother thought was her strongest. Her mother would not consider that her skills at repair work and at organizing the work of others had any value. Sipping her wine, Charlie thought about her mother withregret and disappointment. Her mother had died a year before she finished art school.
Beyond The Bakery veranda, the breaking waves were tipped with phosphorescence, and above them the night sky flowed like surging water, its light seeming also to ebb and change. She’d been so physically tired from the day’s work that the Chablis had given her a nice buzz, and the conversations around her were subdued, a relaxed ambience of soft voices against the hushing surf. When her Newburg arrived she’d made herself eat slowly, not wolf the good dish but savor each bite-had to remind herself this wasn’t noon on the job, eating a sandwich with the work crew and with Mavity and Pearl Ann and Clyde, all of them starved. Had to remind herself this was not supper with Clyde. Eating with Clyde was much like eating with the carpenters; she was inclined to follow his lead, devour her meal as if it would remain on the table only briefly and must be consumed before it got away.
But Clyde was good company. And he was honest, quick to see the truth of a situation. If he was lacking in some social graces, who cared? There was nothing put-on or fake about him.
That first morning, when they went up to look at the five-apartment building after he signed the escrow papers, he’d been so excited. Leading her in through the weedy patio and through those moldering rooms, he’d been deep in the grip of euphoria, imagining what the place would look like when they’d refurbished it-imagining he could do most of the work himself, just a little help from her.Just a little paint, Charlie. A bit of patching.They’d agreed to exchange labor. She’d help with the house, presenting him with bills that he’d honor by working on her declining Chevy van.
Of course there was more needed than patching, but the five apartments had nice large rooms and high ceilings, and Clyde had envisioned the final result just as clearly as he saw the possibilities in restoring an old, vintage car.
The difference was, he knew what it took to restore a car. Beneath his skilled hands the Mercedeses and BMWs and Bentleys of Molena Point purred and gleamed, as cared for as fine jewelry. But Clyde was no carpenter. To Clyde Damen, carpentry was a foreign language.
In order to pay cash for the building, he had sold his five beautifully restored antique cars, including the classic red Packard touring car that he so loved. The sales nearly broke his heart, he had done every speck of work on those cars himself in his spare time. But he was too tight to pay interest on a mortgage, and she didn’t blame him.
As the dining terrace began to empty, she had dawdled over her dinner enjoying her own company, quietly watching the surf’s endless rolling, feeling its power-spawned by the interplay of wind, the moon’s pull, and the centrifugal whirling of the earth. The sea’s unending motion seemed to repeat the eternal power of the universe-its vast and unceasing life.
She relished her idle thoughts, her idle moments, the little pauses in which to let her mind roam.
After the Newburg she had treated herself to a flan and coffee, and it was past midnight when she paid her bill, left the veranda, and headed home through the softly lighted village. The streets were nearly empty. She imagined the tourists all tucked up in their motel rooms, with maybe a fire burning on the hearth, perhaps wrapped in their warm robes nursing a nightcap of brandy.