In-Laws and Outlaws (14 page)

I twisted around and looked up at Tom Henry standing behind me. “Hello, Tom.”

“You looked like a kid out there, Gillian. I was watching from the back deck.” He hunkered down beside me. “What's wrong with your leg? Cramp?”

“Muscles I don't use much are acting up, I guess.”

“Here, let me.” His gentle surgeon's fingers probed the calf of my leg until they found the knotted spot and then gently worked it loose. “How's that?”

“Much better—thank you.” I felt I owed him an apology. “I'm sorry I ran out on you last night.” I stopped him when he started to protest. “My only excuse is that it had been a long day, and when I saw the gun … well, I got rattled, that's all.”

He shook his head. “I'm the one who should do the apologizing. I use your house without permission and then I wave a gun at you. Can you forgive me?”

“Oh, you
had
permission, Tom—to use the house, not to wave the gun. I told the twins when I left that it was the family's house from then on. But about that gun … do you actually carry it with you when you can't sleep at your own place?”

He gave a sad little smile. “No, I keep one there, and one in my own house as well. Paranoid, huh?”

Sensible was what I'd call it, and I said so. “You're taking precautions, which is more than the others are doing. Not like the Kurlands—they act as if there's no danger at all.”

“It's their way of coping. Keep pain at a safe distance and it can't destroy you. The twins have always been like that, never letting things get too close. And Rob …” He trailed off with a shrug.

“Rob's another twin.”

Tom actually laughed at that. “It seems that way sometimes, doesn't it? Rob might as well have been born a Decker—he's certainly become one.”

We fell silent, watching Joel skimming along over the surface of the water. He disappeared around a little spit of land; and when he came back two other windsurfers were with him, two boys of about his own age, I thought—it was hard to be sure at that distance. They were trying to work out some maneuver in unison, but the wind died on them.

“They are special, aren't they?” Tom murmured.

He didn't mean the three boys, or at least not all of them; he was talking about the Decker clan.
They
, he'd said. Tom must have been feeling more and more like an outsider the closer he came to his divorce.

I looked at the man sitting next to me. Tom had always been a little different from the rest of the family. He didn't have the flair for the theatrical that the others had, for one thing. Maybe because he didn't need it; it seemed to me Tom had more solid accomplishments under his belt than any of the rest of them. This man saved lives, not money.

But even Tom's appearance was different. He was of average height instead of tall like the others. He'd probably have a weight problem when he got a little older; the Deckers never would. That curly, sandy-colored hair stood out like a lighted match in a dark room among all the ebony-haired Deckers. The Deckers tended to marry people who fit their own physical type; Rob Kurland was the perfect example. Connie was tall and dark-haired; Oscar Ferguson had been too until his hair turned gray. And yes, I fit the pattern as well. I was taller than most women; and while my hair wasn't that shiny Decker black, it was a dark enough brown to satisfy the requirement. I'd once teasingly accused Stuart of wanting to marry me because I had the right look. He'd never really denied it.

And here sat Tom Henry, probably feeling every bit as much out of it as I did. Attracted to the Deckers, but wanting to break free. Preparing himself to leave, but hanging on just a little longer. I wondered if anyone ever really walked away from the Deckers.

We heard a
Hello!
and turned to see Michelle coming down the steps to the beach. She was wearing white shorts and a simple white top that probably cost more than I earned in a month at the museum. Tom sighed, quietly; he had to see Annette every time he looked at her sister.

Michelle came over to us in a casual lope that she managed as easily on sand as she did on solid surfaces. “Gillian, I'm truly sorry Joel put you through that. Windsurfing, of all things! I should simply have forbidden him to bother you.”

“I'm glad you didn't,” I grinned up at her. “I liked it.” And I liked the look of astonishment on her face.

“Well, you're still full of surprises, aren't you?” Her tone of voice made it a friendly remark. “Tom, I haven't seen you in two days.”

He waved a hand. “Just didn't feel like coming out of the house.”

“Well, you're out now—and about time, I say. Gillian, I want you to bring Connie to lunch. Twelve-thirty, thereabouts. Rob's in Vineyard Haven right now, but he'll be back by then. You haven't made other plans, have you?”

“I haven't. And I don't think Connie has, either.”

“Good. Let's keep her as busy as we can until she finds her own pace again. And Tom, I expect you to lunch too.”

“Oh, no, Michelle, I don't think so.”

“Now, don't say no. I want you to come—we all do. Gillian, tell him to come.”

Oh my. “I'd like for you to come, Tom,” I said obediently.

Tom looked straight into my eyes for a couple of moments without saying anything. Then he turned to his other sister-in-law and said, “All right, Michelle—I'll be there.”

The obviousness of that little interchange made me uncomfortable. He wouldn't go for Michelle, but he would go for me. I wasn't at all sure what that meant.

When I'd dried off, Tom went back to the house with me to say hello to Connie, only to find she had a guest. The visitor was a woman in her seventies—small, wiry, with short iron-gray hair and skin like a roadmap. She was a longtime friend of the Decker family, but for the life of me I couldn't recall her name. She was wearing a denim skirt and white sneakers, and it came to me that that was what she always wore, even ten years ago when I knew her. Only the shirt varied.

Connie fluttered her fingers at Tom and said to me, “You remember Mrs. Vernon, don't you, Gillian?”

Vernon
, that was it. “Of course I do. How are you, Mrs. Vernon?” Her first name was Florence or Thelma or something old-fashioned like that, but no one on the Vineyard ever called her anything but Mrs. Vernon. In this playground of unceremonious living, she was always and ever
Mrs
. Vernon.

The redoubtable Mrs. Vernon came over and planted herself in front of me, barely reaching my shoulder. “So you've come back, have you?” she said. “Well, I hope you have sense enough to stay this time.”

Dear
Mrs. Vernon. Tom stepped in quickly and said something cordial to the old lady, letting me escape having to answer. Mrs. Vernon had a bluntness to her speech that the rest of the family claimed to find amusing and/or eccentric; I simply found it irritating.

But blunt she was, and she went right on being blunt. “I was just telling Connie that she ought to bypass the usual mourning period. Raymond wouldn't want her to withdraw into a cocoon—would he, Tom?”

“Probably not,” he conceded.

“So don't stay shut up in this house all the time you're here,” back to Connie, “but stir yourself, go out every day, try to live a normal life.
Do
things, Connie dear.”

Connie dear smiled at her; she seemed to like being told what to do in this no-nonsense way. “You're most likely right.”

“Damn right I'm right. You mustn't let yourself brood. You feel a depression coming on—nip it in the bud! Exercise, do something physical!”

“We had talked about going sailing,” Connie answered vaguely. “Gillian wants to learn how.”

Mrs. Vernon looked at me in surprise for not knowing how to sail, but then shook her head. “No, not sailing. That's not sweaty enough. You need something more physical, like tennis. You and Gillian play a couple of sets every day and you'll stay out of the doldrums, you'll see.”

“I don't play tennis,” I said without thinking.

The older woman stared at me. “You don't sail, you don't play tennis—what do you do?”

I stared right back. “I think beautiful thoughts.”

Again Tom stepped in, and this time I wished he hadn't. “You should have seen her windsurfing about an hour ago,” he said with a laugh. “She was able to keep up with Joel—and that takes some doing!”

Don't justify me, Tom!
But Connie looked at me with curiosity and said, “I'd forgotten that's what you were doing. How did it go?”

“I liked it,” I admitted sheepishly. “It's a kid's game, but I did enjoy it once I got the hang of it.”

The stern look faded from Mrs. Vernon's face. Windsurfing might not be up there with sailing and tennis, but at least I was making an effort. “Well, I'll be going,” she said. “I want to talk to Oscar and Elinor. Are they home, do you know?”

“Oscar's sunning himself on the beach,” Tom said. “I don't know where Elinor is.”

“Either one will do.” Tell one, tell all; Mrs. Vernon knew all about the lively communication network the family maintained. “We've got a fight on our hands this summer. McDonald's is going to make another try.”

Tom groaned, and Connie said, “But I thought all that had been settled several years ago!”

“So did we, dear. They must have found some new legal ammunition or they wouldn't be back.”

I wasn't sure I understood. “McDonalds—people or fast food?”

“Fast food,” Mrs. Vernon said indignantly. “We fought 'em off once before, and we can do it again! But it's going to be harder this time.”

Tom walked her to the door and I wished her luck; fast food franchises were so out of keeping with the character of the Vineyard that I was surprised McDonald's had the nerve even to try. No, on second thought, I wasn't surprised.

“Were you really able to keep up with Joel?” Connie asked me.

I shook my head. “He let me. Being nice to the neophyte.”

“We'll have to help,” Tom said, coming back from seeing Mrs. Vernon out. “More particularly, Connie,
you'll
have to help. Everybody in West Chop knows you and likes you. You're just the one to rally the troops.”

A look of something like panic crossed Connie's face. “Oh, I don't think I should … it's so soon after the funeral and …”

“Connie, listen to me. Mrs. Vernon was right, you know. You need to get out of yourself. It'll be good for the family and you'll be helping the Vineyard as well.”

She mewed like a kitten. “I don't know, Tom …”

“I'll make you a deal,” he said with a smile. “I'll stop moping in my house if you don't start moping in yours. You help Mrs. Vernon, and I'll help you. What do you say?”

“Sounds like a good deal to me,” I volunteered. “I'd go for it, Connie.”

She looked back and forth between the two of us and then smiled anemically. “Well, all right.”

“Good!” Tom said with forced heartiness. “We'll get together with Oscar and Mrs. Vernon and map out a strategy. Unless she's already got one planned, which wouldn't surprise me in the least. Either way, we've got our work cut out for us.”

“All right,” Connie repeated, but this time more in the spirit of things. “Where do we start?”

“Next door,” I said. “Lunch with the Kurlands.”

10

Rob Kurland was looking a hundred percent better than the last time I saw him. He had the beginnings of a tan and some color in his cheeks, and his bones no longer seemed ready to poke out through the skin. Even the rasp had gone from his voice. He was healing.

Joel wasn't there (eating at a friend's house, his father said). Talk around the lunch table centered mostly on the upcoming fight against the exploiters and despoilers, as Michelle put it. Once I caught Rob and Michelle exchanging a glance over Tom's animation and Connie's interested compliance. Everybody was healing.

During a lull in the talk, I asked, “Were those the same sneakers and denim skirt Mrs. Vernon was wearing the last time I was here?”

Michelle laughed. “There's a rumor that she gets them wholesale from L. L. Bean. I've never seen her wear anything else—have you, Rob?”

He said he hadn't. “She could buy L. L. Bean out of her pocket change. I guess she just wears what's comfortable.”

I said, “I forget—does she live here all year round?”

“She does now,” Tom answered me. “She used to be just a summer resident, like us. But then—oh, six or seven years ago—she moved here permanently. When she wants a vacation, she goes to Boston. All of seventy miles away.”

A summer resident
like us
, Tom had said. He still thought of himself as part of the family. Michelle evidently noticed it too, for she picked that moment to say, “I got a call from Annette this morning. We were expecting her back this week, but she's been delayed.”

Tom looked up from his plate. “Anything wrong?”

“Not really. She ran into a little snag with three of the four bright young men she was investigating in Paris.”

“The software distributorship,” I said, remembering.

“Oh, she told you about it? Well, it seems only one of the four has all the ideas. The other three are just leeching on to a good thing. Annette's trying to persuade the idea man to dump the other three.”

“That reminds me,” Rob said, patting his mouth with a napkin. “I'm going to have to spend the afternoon on the phone. The Mirren-Whipps deal,” he said to Michelle. She nodded.

“Working on your vacation?” I asked.

“There are no vacations in ventures,” Connie remarked in a mechanical tone of voice. It must have been something she'd heard Raymond say.

Rob smiled. “Something ventured, something gained. What are your plans for the afternoon, Gillian?”