Dick said, “No thanks.”
Dick was having a little trouble with the bareness of the four bodies, particularly the two van der somethings. They looked barer than the Goodes. All four of them had early-summer pink-brown tans. Dick looked away and thought it might be the fact that both the van der somethings had perfect sets of tight blond ringlets.
Joxer had the knack of prying open the beer now. “Would you like a sandwich, Dick?” Dick hesitated. Joxer’s wife handed him one and he couldn’t resist. It was fancy egg salad with bacon strips in it. He wished he’d taken a beer.
Joxer said, “Come on ashore. I’m glad I ran into you — I’ve got a favor to ask.”
Dick didn’t want to scrape the bottom of his skiff on the sand. He tossed the stern anchor out, rolled up his boots, and waded ashore with the bow anchor. The skiff rode in a foot of clear water. Joxer looked at the boat. “She really is a beauty.” He turned to the others. “She’s not typical — Dick puts a higher prow on his boats. And a little more sheer — is that right, Dick?”
Dick nodded. He was uncomfortable, but pleased. Joxer said, “And all you need is that little twenty-horse there … and she flies along.”
Joxer pried open another beer. “Dick’s family used to own Sawtooth Island, Schuyler. You and the Pierce family are going to be neighbors in a way. Dick lives up that creek.” Joxer pointed out the creek and then turned back to Dick. “Schuyler and Marie bought the Wedding Cake house last year. That used to be your grandfather’s — or was it your great-uncle’s?”
Joxer handed Dick the beer he’d just opened and sat down on a flat rock. The others sat on their towels in the sand. Dick leaned back against a round boulder. Barbara Goode said, “I love your boots. Don’t you, Marie? I love the way all those folds gather under the knee. They go all the way up the thigh, don’t they, when they’re unrolled? How do they stay up?”
Dick finished chewing a bite of sandwich.
“They hook on to the belt.”
“For when you have to go wading, is it?”
“That, and when you’re working in a cockpit just got a wave dumped in her.”
Dick wondered that Mrs. Goode didn’t know all this. Or maybe she was just trying to draw the other woman out. If the other woman was like May, Mrs. Goode was wasting her breath. And making a fool out of him in his boots. When it was the two ladies that were barely covered.
Schuyler sang, “ ‘I am a pirate king! I am a pirate king! It is, it is a glorious thing to be a pirate king!’ ”
Marie had pulled a spare towel over her shoulders like a shawl.
Dick envied people who could just open up and sing. Parker would do that in bars every once in a while, just as if he was a guinea, knew some guinea songs too, he’d puff up his chest like a bird on a twig and let go. He’d do guinea opera songs, Elvis Presley, Roy Orbison.
Joxer and Barbara Goode smiled at Schuyler’s singing. Dick recognized himself in Marie now — when Parker started singing, Dick slouched down in his chair.
Dick finished his beer and stood up. Barbara Goode said, “Dick, before you go, we’ve got a couple of favors to ask. Joxer and Schuyler are doing a clambake here on the island and they need some help from someone. Could we get you to help? I mean, if we could buy the clams, and maybe some lobsters from you. And if you could show them how to dig the pit. And where to put the fire and the stones and the seaweed. Joxer thinks he knows, but I know you know. We’re going to have thirty people and I don’t dare let the two of them get it wrong.”
Dick said, “I’m going out in a couple of days, I’m going to be fixing up a boat for a friend of mine.”
Schuyler cocked his head. “You’re going out on the ocean in a fishing boat?”
“Yup.”
“I’m doing a little film — that’s what I do, is make films. You don’t suppose I could go along? Me and my camerawoman?”
Dick was taken aback. “I don’t know. It’s for four, five days. It’s not like it’s … I suppose I could ask Parker.”
Mrs. Goode said, “Well, let’s get the clambake settled first. Joxer, you and Dick have a little talk.”
Joxer walked Dick over to Dick’s skiff. Joxer said, “This would be a big help. You can see how it is. Barbara’s getting worried, this is her shindig, along with Schuyler and Marie. Barbara wants them to get off on the right foot now that they’re moving in. So let’s say five hundred dollars to cover the raw materials. You know the stuff — steamers, quahogs, potatoes, corn — I don’t suppose there’s any corn this early. Can you get thirty lobsters?”
Dick didn’t know what to make of this. Even for thirty people, lobster, quahogs, steamers, and potatoes would come to less than two hundred dollars. Dick thought with regret of the barrel of steamer clams he’d just sold to the dealer. He didn’t dare go back to the bird sanctuary with the tractor, but he might send the boys back. Drop them off in their boat with a couple of baskets. But Dick couldn’t figure the five hundred. He said, “That’s a lot of money.”
Joxer said, “Well, Barbara figures it’s a lot of work. And she’s right. What with digging the pit, gathering the driftwood, the seaweed. And I think she hopes you’d give me a hand ferrying people from the point to the island, so there’s the use of your boat.”
Dick began to see. He couldn’t see it all, but he began to get the picture. A lot of the independent lobstermen he knew had made deals with families who had summer houses. They drained the pipes in the fall, fixed the screens in spring. It started that way. Then they’d get a call that the family wanted to spend Christmas at the beach house if they could have the water turned back on, the heat, maybe a load of firewood. And if it wouldn’t be too much trouble, get that Eddie what’s-his-name to plow the driveway. And if there was a nice pine tree that would do for a Christmas tree, if it wasn’t any trouble, just cut it and leave it on the porch. Half the lobstermen Dick knew got a nice Christmas check that way. And another nice check in the spring. He’d swore he’d never do it. But here it was. Five hundred bucks. Dick looked at the quahogs lying in his basket. He looked across the channel to the Wedding Cake. At least they weren’t asking him to drain the pipes.
Joxer said, “Schuyler’s an old school friend of mine. He’s sort of a funny guy, but he might end up doing a lot of business in the area. He’s talking about getting a boat built, I told him you were the one to see.”
Dick said, “The only boat I’m building these days is my own.” It occurred to Dick he’d better just say what he wanted. He said, “I’ll do the clambake—”
Joxer said, “Terrific.”
“If you’ll do something.”
“What’s that?”
“You come over to my place and take a look at the boat I’m building.”
Joxer said, “Sure. I’d love to see any boat you’re building.”
“This isn’t any boat.”
5
Dick swore to himself not to take it out on the boys. He was bound to be in a foul mood what with fixing the clambake and working on Parker’s boat. He’d bit off too much, and he was working for two different people. Dick dropped the boys off on the sea side of the bird-sanctuary beach. Charlie was nervous about going back there to dig steamers. When Dick tossed three peck baskets ashore, Charlie said, “The limit is a peck apiece.”
Dick said, “I’m the third. I’ll be back after I pull my pots. If the Natural Resources people come along asking you where you were the other night, you just say ‘home.’ You got a job to do and you can’t stop to talk.”