“You’ve ruined him.”
“Maybe, but I’ll never fill his shoes... I noticed something. I mean, last night I found out why he clicks. Jack, it’s because he’s so slow and poky and silly. When somebody that mopey can turn up with the right answers, it is amazing, not to say amusing and highly laughable. But me, I’ll just be a smart brat — that is, if they try to promote me.”
That’s how it turned out. She got the right answers, but they didn’t tune in. But somebody like that, of course she didn’t need a tutor any more, so a little before my first summer working in the hotel I got fired. I missed her the worst way. I had got to look forward to those roughhouses.
The summer I graduated, right after I started working regular at the hotel, Mr. Legg took a place at Gibson Island, which is on the bay not far from Annapolis. The whole family stayed down there, though of course Margaret was driving into town all the time to buy this, that, and the other for the wedding. Every week end, naturally, I’d be invited. But it turned out that Helen, once more, needed help. Because, what with having a rep as a mathematical whiz, and actually being a mathematical punk, things had got crossed up at the school, and she’d been promoted too fast, and was in trouble again, this time with algebra. I’d hate to tell you how glad I was, that they’d send her up to me, at the hotel, by Sandy every day, so I could explain to her why (a + b) (a — b) = a2 — b2, and how upset I was, one of my first week ends at the island, at what Mr. Legg had to say about the people that had taken the cottage next door: “The Finleys, one of the best families in the state, Lee Finley’s in the Fidelity and Deposit, she’s a Dawson, from Prince Georges County, the boy, Dick, goes to Gilman — I was delighted when I heard who the place had been leased to... But, Jack, that boy runs liquor. He’s in and out with that boat he’s got at all hours of the night, he has a pistol, and he’s thick with Zeke Torrance.”
“Who’s he?”
“He runs the Log Cabin.”
“Oh — that place near Glen Burnie?”
“That’s the man. If Dick’s car is parked outside of there, it might be a wild boy stopping for a drink. But when Zeke is down here, it’s business, and Zeke has only one business. I complained about the pistol, but Finley only got disagreeable. It seems it’s owned under permit, and the boy uses it only for target shooting as he’s permitted to do. But — he wears it. It’s on him all the time, and he goes around with a silly grin on his face, giving a fifth-rate imitation of some character in a ninth-rate movie, and I don’t like it. And — he keeps tagging after Helen.”
“What?”
“‘Let’s go get a soda, ‘Let’s got to the picture show,’ ‘How about a swim’—”
“Does she go?”
“No. She thinks he’s funny. But — I don’t know anything in years that has made me so nervous. He keeps following her around, and looking at her.”
The next morning was Sunday, and Margaret wanted to fish from an outboard boat they had, so I was on the porch fixing hand lines, knives, and bait, and the rest of them were out front on canvas recliners, reading the papers. I had just checked my snoods when I saw this wild-looking boy cross over from next door, in dungaree pants and rough shoes and checked shirt. He was around seventeen I would say, fairly big, and heavy sunburned, with shaggy hair and a hangdog grin. He sat down, though I didn’t notice anybody ask him to, and then Mr. Legg said something and Helen looked surprised and came inside the screened-in porch, where I was. “Well, Jack, what’s the big idea?”
“Whose?”
“Dad’s. ‘Go put on your beach robe.’—?”
“The young visitor, maybe.”
“Dick? He’s a child.”
“Little children got big eyes.”
“And all this talk whenever Dick wants a date. ‘We don’t want her taken out yet, she’s much too young to be going around.’ What am I? Little Eva or something?”
“Going around with him, maybe your father means.”
“Well, who would?”
“He’s got to be told something.”
“But—”
She looked down at herself, where she was, just a sliver of brown in a wisp of blue bathing suit, and then went inside and I could see her looking at herself in a mirror. Then she came out with the robe and began putting it on. “I don’t know my own strength, apparently.”
I swear it happened that quick. What went in was a child, that you’d look at because she was pretty and graceful and friendly, but not for any other reason. What came out was a woman, only twelve years old yet, but one you couldn’t take your eyes off of, for all the reasons there are. She wrapped the robe around her and knotted the belt, then rolled her eyes in a resigned kind of way and went switching out there.
By that time darling Dickie was gone, but when I got out there with my gear he was back, and had his gun on him, in a holster, over his right hip. He started to talk, but Helen kept snickering like he must be crazy, and Margaret and Mr. Legg and Mrs. Legg kept looking at each other in a nervous kind of way while he talked: “Honest, folks, I don’t think you’ve thought this thing through. I’m not taking out Helen in any formal way, you understand. I’m only asking her to the picture show tonight. It’s not like she was making her debut or something. And frankly I think it would be good for her. If you ask me, Mr. Legg, she doesn’t go out enough.”
“I wasn’t asking you, Dick.”
“Oh? Oh? Oh?”
The little grin kept coming and going, and Mr. Legg kept licking his lips and looking at the gun. I don’t smoke, but there was a package of cigarettes in the sand and I picked it up and stuck a cigarette in my mouth and began slapping myself like I wanted a match. Then I stepped over toward Mr. Legg, like I would borrow one from him. Dickie paid no attention. I caught him on the chin with everything I had and he went down soft, which meant he was out. I unbuckled the holster, pulled it clear, then gave him some toe under the ribs. He rolled over. “Get up.”
“What are you doing to me, you big—”
“I said get up.”
I yanked him to his feet and he staggered around a little but pretty soon he could stand. Out of the tail of my eye I could see another boy, about his age but quite a lot bigger, come out of the Finley house and stand there watching. I gave Dickie a cuff on the jaw and said: “Now you cheeky little louse, suppose you get out and stay out or there’ll be more of the same, only a lot more. And leave Helen alone. Don’t speak to her or look at her or think about her, or it’s going to be most unfortunate. And don’t bring any more guns. What do you say?”
“So O.K., you hit me when I wasn’t looking, you—”
I clipped him again and he went down and when he got up I impressed on his mind he was to call me sir and he did it. Then he went stumbling through the sand to his house and the pal began looking at the marks on his face. Mr. Legg said: “Thanks, Jack.”
“Sometimes it’s the only way.”
“I’ll take that gun. I’m making an issue with Finley about it. This thing has gone far enough.”
“I’ll save you the trouble.”
I swung the holster and gave it a heave and it and the gun went flapping through the air about a hundred feet out into Chesapeake Bay. That was the one dumb thing I did. Because I was no sooner unarmed than the pal said something and here the two of them come, one piling in on one side, one on the other. They hit me and I went down but jumped up and backed away. Mr. Legg said something about phoning the state police and Margaret and Mrs. Legg ran into the house. A shell clipped Dickie on the head and he ripped out some cussword and turned. My heart jumped when I saw it was Helen that had thrown it. Mr. Legg began shooing her into the house.