Water Lessons (24 page)

Walter slapped his hands lightly on the table. "Now we have a working plan. After all, I moved your butt down here for a reason. I need a
good
man over that shop. I know you love the job. And my little princess can't have her way
all
the time."

"I agree wholeheartedly, sir."

"One must set some precedence, my boy. As Truman once said, 'The buck stops here.'" He jabbed an index finger into the tablecloth.

A woman of perhaps eighty appeared at the table, squinting, her hands clasped before her in expectation. "Is that Walter Henretty?"

She wore a velvet dress, plum-colored and ankle-length. A string of pearls encircled her neck. Her two earrings seemed like Victorian mini-portraits done in some kind of ivory-like material. Jim had seen those before, in antique shops. Her hair was gathered up on her head in a stately, but not excessive, manner and was secured with tortoise-shell clasps. The lady wore scant makeup, in true New England fashion. Her eyes were of a rare greenish hue and emitted a gentle warmth. Surely she had once been a great beauty.

"Is that Ms. Gwendolyn Shippey?" Walter said as he began to stand.

Jim followed suit, but the old woman motioned for them to sit back down. The men sank into their seats.

"And what if it is? How are you today, Walt? Corrupting this young man?" Her voice rose in mock frustration. "Teaching him how to be up to no good?"

"Me?" Walter touched his own chest in disbelief. "But of course, Gwen!"

"Hmmph. Who is this young man?" She stepped closer to the table.

Walter made introductions. Then he continued, "Jim was a star at my securities firm. Now he runs my boat business here in town. He also dates Maureen."

Ms. Shippey said, "They make a cute couple. She moved back home?"

Jim said, "She's still up in Boston."

"Egads! That is a distance, all right. You from down south?"

"You guessed right, ma'am," Jim said.

"A wild rebel in our midst," she said, glaring at Jim with feigned ire.

"Ms. Shippey grew up with me in Osterville," Walter said. "Or at least when I lived in Osterville during the summer months. Hey, by the way, where's Tom?"

"He's around. I'll tell him to stop by," Ms. Shippey said. "He doesn't know you're here." She turned and glided out of the main dining room into the kitchen.

Within moments a man of perhaps sixty appeared in the threshold. He surveyed the room, spotted Walter, and walked into the dining room. The man stopped two feet before them. "Is that Admiral Halsey reincarnate?"

Walter clapped his hands, rose, and then squeezed the man in a bear hug. "Tommy! How are ya, my boy?"

"Tired, but I can't complain," the man sighed. "We just hosted a writer from
Yankee Magazine
for two nights and we had to be in tip-top shape."

Jim studied the man's slightly wavy, silver hair, the piercing blue eyes, the square forehead, and the strong jaw. The man stood several inches taller than Walter, but was somewhat portly. He was clad in pressed light cream khakis and a blue button-down oxford shirt with rolled-up sleeves. All about the man swirled an interesting mixture of unmistakable authority and youthful levity that seemed familiar.

"Jim, meet Tom Shippey," Walter said. "You just met his mother. Tom owns the Bartley Inn."

Jim stood and shook Tom's hand. "I like this place," Jim said. "And I hear y'all do a great Portuguese fisherman's stew."

"Y'all?" Tom laughed. "Where do ya hail from, kid?"

"Louisiana," Jim said. He wondered if he had cringed when he answered the man. Was one of those edgy comments to follow?

"You should taste our bouillabaisse. It's just spicy enough. Probably nowhere near what you're used to, but you might like it."

Jim and Walter seated themselves.

"By the way, Tom," Walter said. "I brought you something." He handed Tom a small book he had pulled from some pocket.

Tom took it, glanced at the cover momentarily, and then held it close against his hip.

"A little collection by Cheever," Walter said in a hushed tone. "I figured you'd like it."

"I appreciate it, I really do," Tom said. "I better get back in the kitchen, ensure my guys are keeping up with all these lunch orders. We just hired a new sous-chef. See you in a bit."

Soon the waitress unloaded their food.

Jim sampled the stew. As expected, it was superb. When Jim looked up, the old man had stealthily dumped a sautŽeéd scallop, still steaming, onto Jim's empty butter plate. Jim cut a piece from the scallop and tasted it. "Wow. Garlic, butter, a trace of green onion."

"That one's for your good work, son," Walter said. "Now get dirty up to your elbows when you get back. Bust your behind tomorrow on that boat. Then knock off work early and drive up to see my little girl!"

"I couldn't object to that. What of that sounds like work?"

After their meal, when they passed through the dining room toward the foyer, all eyes rested on Walter, a man the onlookers venerated, loved, and to a degree, envied.

"Where to now, Commodore? You had an errand to run," Jim said as they crossed the parking lot toward the truck.

"That was it, my boy!" Walter said with gusto, raising his fist.

"Eating at the Bartley?"

"That, and giving the book to Tom Shippey."

Jim sensed an oddness in his friend's response, a certain evasiveness, which flattened into dead silence for half a minute.

"And floating the offer of you moving back closer to Maureen."

Jim felt anxious, even bewildered. He had just grown accustomed to his new role, and a happier role at that.

Walter puffed away at his pipe and stared out the window as the great maples and the white-barked birches and the cranberry bogs shot by in a blur.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

Jim clutched the first of the cardboard boxes of supplies as the keypad beeped. He turned the knob and entered the warehouse. Inside, the men had settled back into their work. A Bob Seger song blared on the stereo. Inside, only Bill and Donovan remained.

"Hi-yah, Jimmy," Bill called.

"We're good now," Jim said. "There's more provisions in the truckbed." After setting the box at Bill's feet, he studied the leathery, ruddy face set in relief against the light blond-and-gray ponytail. "So where are our friends, Chief and Romeo DaSilva?"

"Oh, they'll probably be by any second," Bill said. "How was lunch?"

"Excellent," Jim said. "But first I had to see that old curmudgeon Carrington at the hardware store."

"He's an interesting one, a real doozy. Guy owns a store that caters to tradesmen, but he's got an obvious scorn for men who work with their hands. So was he a pissant to you, too?"

Jim said, "Until he saw I was with the Commodore himself."

"Oh, I bet he changed his act then! Did ya get to see him sweat?"

"Like a turkey on Christmas Eve."

"Your Commodore's given him a small fortune over the decades, that's why. So, where did you guys eat?"

"The Bartley Inn on Main Street. I had—"

"He took ya to the old
Bartley
?" Bill dropped his jaw and stared at Jim, egg-eyed with surprise. "See that old widow with the earrings like outta some ol' Civil War daguerrotype? Shippey is the name. And her son, Tom? Kinda heavy-set?"

"They seem to like the Commodore a good bit."

"I bet so," Bill said. "Another two souls the old man often helps out."

"So what's their story? You don't like the Shippeys?"

"Nah. Good people. It ain't that," Bill said. He looked in the bags, then snatched them up. "Thanks for getting these."

"This load was on Carrington, by the way," Jim snickered, and went to find Donovan. Jim spotted him by the boat.

The keypad beeped. In walked Chief, with his perennial sidekick DaSilva in tow.

"Greetings, Your Highnesses!" Donovan yelled. "Glad ya could join us!"

Chief sauntered toward them, rubbing his belly with contentment, an expression of regal nonchalance playing upon his face. "Lunch was gooood!"

He stopped just short of the supplies Donovan and Bill had arranged on the cement floor. He stood looking down at the paint cans, sandpaper pads, tape, and other items with curiosity.

"Where did y'all go?" Jim said, expecting a good story.

"Young Joey here has
another
admirer," Chief said. "She is an older woman to him, twenty-four. She and her roommate, they did some pot roast. It was so good. That new one ya like, Joey, ya oughtta marry. A sweet, hot girl, and she cooks like that? Not many kids today your age wanna cook."

Joey blushed. "Ah, we'll see."

"So you get these ladies to share their food with you, too, huh, Joey?" Jim shook his head.

The boy pulled his hands from his pockets and made a what-me-worry gesture, palms upward. "Well, I can't stand ta cook."

"So, you end up at their places and just outright mention you're ravenously hungry, maybe make a few puppy-dog faces?" Jim said. This deceptively shy heartthrob of Cape Cod always amused him.

"Or I mention how great they cook or how I wanna taste their cooking."

"Ah, Joey, you're a man of many appetites," Jim chuckled.

The men all laughed.

"And not all of them exactly wholesome. Now, how are those supplies I got?"

"Good job," Donovan said. "Let's you and me fetch the rest outta the truck. Hey, Jimmy, you up for fishin' after work? Bill and me are goin' out a ways into the Sound again."

"Count me in, podnuh."

"Podnuh? You
are
from south Louisiana. Heard you guys saying that when I was down there in the Navy."

"Joey and Chief aren't coming?" Jim said.

"Chief has ta take his ol' lady to her night job," Bill said. "And, of course, Joey is chasin' his new dame."

"Well, Don Juan," Jim said to DaSilva. "At least you'll get a French kiss and a hot rump roast for your efforts."

"Jim, you're supposed to be a good Catholic boy!" Donovan said.

"All right, all right," Jim said. "Now, before Walter fires us all, let's jump back to work. After we bring in the boxes, Donovan, I'll help you and Bill on the hull. Chief and Joey Casanova, y'all stick with the deck."

"Aye aye, Cap," Chief said.

Two hours later, Jim plodded up the rolling stairwell and stepped on deck. Chief and DaSilva were working away. For the next few hours, Jim helped them lay, level, and nail the replacement boards. Throughout the shop, the raspy, bluesy voice of Bob Seger resounded from the portable stereo. After Jim returned to the deck with another armful of boards, the radio died out below.

"What happened?" Chief yelled. "We neglectin' you guys down there?"

DaSilva shouted, "You know we can't work without good music!"

Bill's mischievous voice sounded below. "Hey, Swamp Thang up thar! Hey, the hard-livin' and hard-prayin' Jimmy boy!"

"You called?" Jim stood at the rail.

Donovan stared up at him, his hands on his hips. "Bill's got somethin' for ya!"

"Let's hear it!" Jim said.

The stereo kicked on. A very familiar song welled up all around him.

"Now, hah ya like that, Mistah Scoresby?" Bill called. He looked like an old Key West beach bum with his long hair, Hawaiian shirt, and his leathery skin, red and tanned to oblivion. His blue eyes flashed like the devil's.

"Tune reminds ya of the old homeland, eh?" Donovan said.

Jim laughed just as the first verse began. He clapped his hands a few times and smiled down at the men.

"'Born On The Bayou'… well done, guys."

Jim returned to Chief and DaSilva. "Well chosen. I love Creedence and John Fogerty. He really had the best attempt at a backwoods version of a generic south Louisiana accent."

"A'ight, professor," Chief laughed.

Jim grabbed a board from the small pile on the deck and slid it into place next to the last one they had nailed. The chorus began. Chief and DaSilva sang along. The boy, with all of his trust in the big man, held the nail in place. Chief drove it home with a few hammer swings. Jim walked over to get the next board. The guitar solo Jim loved had ceased, and his favorite verse commenced, the one about taking the fast train with his Cajun Queen to New Orleans.

For the hundredth time the verse shot a chill down Jim's spine. He held the board in place. DaSilva steadied the nails, and Chief worked the hammer.

came the final verse. It seemed like Fogerty's appeal to a native son cast by an act of God, man's error, and his own desperation thousands of miles from his home.

Fogerty sang, "Do it… oh, get back, boy."

Jim rose to his feet. He turned, stretched, and walked across the deck for a fresh board from the pile. His eyes welled up, but for a moment.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

That night, Jim returned from two hours of fishing with Bill and Donovan. Sunburned and stinking of brine, fish oil, and fish blood, Jim stumbled into his apartment and called Maureen.

"Yes, Jim, what is it?"

She was not crying. He could not think of a time when she had wept. Her voice merely held that same dull monotone, bereft of any womanly feeling or tenderness. It was as if another spirit, another soul far different from the one he had come to love their first month together, had inhabited her. He could not bear much more. He had reached near the end of his tether, yet it sounded like she might be even further along.

The next afternoon, before work ended, Jim merged from Route 3 onto Interstate 93. The wind whipped inside the truck's cab, tousling his hair. Jim stared ahead, dazed.

Even if the old man hadn't asked him to visit his daughter that Tuesday afternoon, Jim would have done so. He did miss her. But that was not it entirely. Jim knew their relationship was threatened. Maureen had regained her short fuse, that dreaded irritability. When that darker side had first cropped up, their relationship had never quite been the same. Their bond slightly weakened, Jim knew, since those first ecstatic four to six weeks of their courtship.

Yet there had been ephemeral peaks all along, as was that extended weekend when they rode the Amtrak Acela down to New York City. This irritability, Jim guessed, revealed her unhappiness with their union, and this filled him with worry and frustration.