Happy just sat there looking puzzled.
"Come on, Hap. You remember those boys ..... the twins, Millard and Milton English." It didn’t take much to get exasperated with Happy.
Immediately, Happy’s expression cleared. "Jesus, the English twins. Haven’t thought of those two in years. What the hell made you think of them, Wanda?"
"Don’t really know." shrugged Wanda, "must be getting old. I’m starting to spend a lot of time these days thinking back over my life and the people I’ve known."
She took a sip of her coffee. "Which twin was it, Hap, who had the problem? Do you remember?"
"Oh sure," replied Happy firmly, bobbing his head up and down. "That would be Milton. Never met anyone who could tuck it away like that boy could." He couldn’t help himself, there was admiration in his voice when he spoke. "Finally killed him in the end, though. Christ, his liver must have been completely pickled through and through."
They both sat silently for a few moments, then Happy said, "I was there the day they took Milton to the hospital on the mainland. Pronounced dead, he was, by the time the ferry docked at Bass Harbor. We got him loaded into the waiting ambulance and they were just about to slam the doors shut when old Milt sits straight up, sheet flying away from his face! "Bring rum, boys!" he yells, as they close the doors on him. Jesus, the driver of that ambulance almost shit himself!" Happy roared with laughter at the memory. "Damnedest thing I ever saw!
Course, Milton died for good on the way to the hospital."
Happy, his body practically doubled over from laughter, had tears streaming down his craggy face. He fished around in his back pant’s pocket for his handkerchief.
Finding it, he proceeded to blot his eyes and wipe the tears from his face.
When Happy’s laughter had subsided, Wanda asked, "What ever happened to his brother, Millard?"
Happy looked up with surprise. "Why, Wanda, don’t you remember? Millard moved away to New Hampshire and became a Baptist minister. Last I heard, he had his own Sunday morning radio show down there."
He gave his eyes one last, good swipe with the bandanna. As he bent over to stuff it back into his pocket, something fell out of his left eye and tumbled with a clink onto the kitchen table.
"What the FUCK is that?" Happy pushed himself away from the table so fast that his chair almost went over backwards.
Wanda leaned forward, picking the strange object up and held it in her hand turning it over curiously. She put on the reading glasses that were hanging around her neck for a closer look.
It was smaller than a dime, round in shape and slightly concave. It’s color was milky white and it vaguely reminded Wanda of marbles they used to play with as children ...... only this one had been broken in half. The sides of this thing, though, had been smoothed and, as she peered more closely, she could see a tiny hole that ran all the way through the center of it. No doubt about it, whatever this thing was, it was machine made.
"Jesus Jumping Up," exclaimed a badly shaken Happy, "what the hell is it and just what the HELL was it doing in my goddamn eye?" He poked at the object suspiciously, as if he were afraid it would bite him.
In the kitchen on the other side of the house, Martha wasn’t scrambling the morning eggs for her family ..... she was beating them.
Kevin shook his head as he watched her scurry about from sink to stove, slamming everything in her path. His wife had been this way ever since she’d gone over to Sam’s the morning before.
"Would you calm down?" He said, giving her a friendly swat on her butt on his way to the breakfast table. "Sam is just fine."
"Sam is not fine, you idiot!" Martha replied hotly, slapping an overflowing plate of eggs, sausage and toast down in front of him. "Something’s happened."
"Well, maybe she’s finally found her little green men." Chuckling at his sudden flash of wit, Kevin began to devour his breakfast.
Chapter 14
"Gentlemen," Jake Gorham said solemnly, "may I present Dr. Samantha Coley."
Sam was escorted into the conference room by the plain clothed security guard who had been standing at attention outside in the corridor where she had been impatiently waiting for the past hour.
Why am I not surprised to be the only woman in this room? Sam silently asked herself.
As she placed her attache case on the spacious mahogany table, she quickly looked around the room at the nine faces turned expectantly towards her. Not counting Jake, there were two SETI representatives that she recognized. The remainder of the group were made up of suits and military.
Rapidly realizing her ex-boss was not about to waste valuable time with social introductions, Sam set about giving a brief overview of her findings.
She talked and answered intense questions for the next four hours. Time seemed to pass by in a blur. When finished, she was politely asked to remove herself from the room. Jake walked with her down the hall to the row of elevators.
"Good job." Was his only comment to her.
"Where do we go from here?" Sam asked tiredly.
Jake came to an abrupt standstill in the middle of the hall. "WE don’t go anywhere. It’s entirely out of our hands now. The government has the ball." He moved to hold the elevator door open for her.
Sam stepped into the waiting elevator. As the automatic doors started to slide shut, Jake distincly heard her ask, "Doesn’t that make you nervous?"
Once on the ground floor, Sam joined the flow of office workers emerging from the building outside onto the late afternoon Boston street. She stood there for a moment, as if perplexed, wondering what to do next. Crowds of harried people jostled by her.
All Sam wanted to do was to go home. Funny how quickly the Island had become that once again. But she knew that even if she made the long drive back to Maine now, she still would have missed the last ferry over. She resigned herself to having to spend the night in town. Probably all for the best, she realized. She was worn out from her presentation and the intense question and answer period that had followed.
Sam quickly decided against looking up any old friends and instead took a room for the night at the downtown Sheraton on Boylston Street. From there she took a cab to the Northend where she treated herself to a good bottle of wine and a quiet dinner at one of her favorite restaurants. After all, she didn’t know when she would get back to Boston again.
Chapter 15
Sam was back on the Island by mid-day. As soon as the ferry docked, she drove directly to Minturn. She owed Martha that explanation.
She found her coming from her grandmother’s apartment, loaded down with dirty laundry.
"Wash Day?" she asked cheerfully, bending over she picked up the items Martha was dropping.
"No," Martha bit off, not slowing down her pace one small iota, "I’m on my way to go dancing."
Sam could see that she had her work cut out for her. Martha knew how to hold a grudge. While her friend put the laundry in, Sam went into the kitchen and rummaged around in the cupboards. She was looking for the bottle of brandy that she knew would be hidden away somewhere. Martha’s father used to call it his ‘cough medicine’. Sam had a good couple of fingers poured into a pair of juice glasses by the time Martha walked into the room.
"What are you doing?" Martha asked, spying the bottle sitting on the counter. "It’s barely past noon."
"We’re celebrating." Sam handed her the glass with Fred and Wilma Flinstone on it.