High Tide at Noon (34 page)

She hung up the dish towels and walked over to where Owen sprawled in a rocking chair, one long leg over the arm. He looked up at her, smiling. “Hi, Tiddleywinks. What's on your mind?”

“Is there anything to this story about Trudy Loomis?”

Owen laughed. “What kind of a damn fool do you take me for?”

“A proper damn fool,” said Alec. “She's been worried sick.”

“Only because I didn't want Mother to hear the story,” Joanna defended herself sharply. “If it's all a lot of hot air, why do you let her talk like that?”

“Oh, it makes her happy,” said Owen benevolently. “She's a forlorn little bitch. And if the rest of 'em want to talk about me, they'll give somebody else a rest.”

“If you wouldn't hang around Brigport so much, there wouldn't be any chance for chew.”

Owen was in rare good temper tonight. He laughed at her. “I've found out all I want to know about those Brigport tramps. I'm in love with a new
she.”

His smile tried to be casual, but it was suddenly eager and excited. He reached into the pocket of his plaid shirt and took out a folded paper. With a curious gentleness in his big brown hands he unfolded it and laid it on the table. Alec and Joanna moved close to look, not knowing what they would see.

It was a drawing of a boat, neatly and painstakingly done. Such a sleek, handsome boat as Owen had always dreamed of. He had been forever drawing her, from the time he was twelve years old. She changed occasionally in the flare of the bow, the sheer of the bilge, the type of cabin, the placing of the wheel; but Joanna knew that in her brother's heart it had always been the same boat, the one boat. And she was on paper again, and lettered tidily on her bow was her name:
White Lady
.

It was a strangely self-conscious Owen who said, “I figured I'd been running the
Old Girl
long enough. She's a tough little critter. Tomboy, sort of. I'm going to have a lady for a change.”

“Tough little tomboys can take a lot of punishment,” said Joanna loyally. But she leaned over to admire the drawing; Alec and Owen were engrossed in it, their eyes following the long, harmonious lines of the hull.

“I'm going to start her in April,” Owen said with quiet assurance. “Oh, I've said that a hell of a lot of times. But this time I mean it. Jud Gray's renting me his place. I know just how much lumber to get, I can build a model from scale, and I'm ready to go.”

Alec put his hand on Owen's shoulder, his face alight with enthusiasm, and Joanna had a sudden sharp image in her brain of the money box. Since Margaret's visit Alec had made a sincere attempt to clear things up, giving her extra money when the hauls were good, playing poker only seldom, and then not going above the five-dollar limit, as far as she knew. She hadn't begrudged him his card games; he showed no signs of the gambling fever Margaret had told her about. But since she'd taken the money from the box to pay the most urgent bills, there hadn't been much to put back. And how could Alec face another winter in that old boat, which he called
The Basket
because she was forever springing a new leak?

There was always some part of her engine to be brought home and thawed out in the oven, there were precious hauling hours lost when, on a good day, he couldn't start her up, and must work on her while the other boats left the harbor. And if it wasn't Alec's own engine, it was somebody's else's, she thought with grim humor.

Owen and Alec were deep in technical talk now. Joanna listened; Alec was telling Owen what sort of engine he should have, and the exact details as to how it should be placed. She marveled at his happy, unselfish interest in Owen's plans. Didn't it bother him, didn't he feel the slightest envy because Owen had three hundred dollars saved to start the
White Lady
, while he had nothing at all except what was in his pockets and Joanna's purse?

Owen was smiling at his plans with the expansive pride of a new father, and Alec gave all indications of being a fond uncle. They looked as if they saw her in the drifting tobacco smoke. The wind was howling outside, and the day behind them had been long and cruel, but they had gone ahead into April now, into the long, soft blue days when the Island's breath would be warm and sweet once more. It was taken for granted that Alec would work on the boat, along with Nils.

“And we'll turn a hand when you get yours underway,” Owen said. “Seems to me it won't be long now, will it?” Alec said easily, “Oh, not so long. But you'd better get the
Lady
launched before you start building mine.”

“And we'll launch her by midsummer.” Owen stretched with the slow and powerful grace of a big man. Beside him Alec was slight and almost pale; but Joanna, looking at them both, loved the gentleness of her husband's look, the quick humor in his eyes. Humor that was always kind. Owen had plagued her so many times into furious tears.

But tonight he radiated good nature. “I'm going down to the Eastern End,” he said as he put on is mackinaw. “Coming, Alec?”

“In this gale?” Joanna asked, and Owen gave her a rough squeeze.

“Not half so bad as it sounds. Don't be one of those Aunt Mary wives, Jo. She won't let Uncle Nate stir.”

“Alec can go from here to Portland for all I care,” said Joanna with dignity.

“I'm only going as far as the Eastern End, my dear.” Alec rumpled her head. “We'll see how Charles thinks the
White Lady
stacks up with the
Sea-Gypsy
.”

“The
Gypsy
's a sweetheart,” Joanna warned them. “Take that bunch of magazines down to Mateel, Alec.”

“You ought to get down and see her, Jo,” Owen said. “The kid started walking last week and she wants to show him off to you.”

“When the weather clears,” she promised vaguely, and Owen gave her a sidewise glance.

“Never knew the weather to hold you up when you really hankered to do something.”

She felt the blood in her cheeks, but she only smiled, and held up her mouth for Alec's unabashed kiss. He was so completely unabashed that Owen had long since given up his sardonic observations. When they had gone out she sat for a long time staring at the pages of her book without really seeing them. Owen was right, she didn't really want to go down to see Mateel, and watch young Charles stagger across the floor to clutch his mother's knees with a chuckle of mad delight. She didn't want to see Mateel, shining-eyed, bury her face in her son's neck and kiss it on what she called “the 'oney-spot.”

She told herself now that it was foolish and selfish to feel that odd nagging pain in her breast, to shrink from picking up her nephew's warm little body and holding it close to her. It wasn't as if she wasn't going to have children of her own; it was just that she wanted them
now
, and the boat must be built first, and sometimes it seemed as if the money box would never be full again. And sometimes she felt a queer coldness, almost like terror; terror that Alec's child would never be born to her.

And then, when she was in despair, the natural buoyancy of the Bennetts bore her to the surface again. It always happened like this; for no matter how she might worry, no matter how many moments of panic she knew, she knew something else too—that she loved Alec with her whole heart and soul and body, that he was her man just as she was his woman. And they lived on the Island; it was enough to make her grateful for living. What if there was a little wind and weather in these first few years? A chop wouldn't necessarily drown you; you kept your bow pointed into it, and laughed at the wind, and before you knew it there was smooth water under you.

Joanna went to bed, feeling a quiet but radiant peace. In moments like this it seemed as if the smooth water was just a boat-length away. Any time now, they'd reach it. . . .

She woke up with the sensation that she'd been asleep for a long time. The wind still battered at the front of the house and the surf made a constant hollow booming in the little cove. Alec hadn't come in yet. She smiled in the darkness, imagining them sitting around Charles' kitchen talking boats, not knowing how bone-weary they were from the long day of off-shore hauling. These days they went out ten or fifteen miles to the east and southeast of the Island, out beyond Matinicus Rock, in the lanes where the big fishing trawlers passed. There the fifty-fathom traps were set. It was an hour's run in the bitter cold, with the freezing vapor flying against their faces. Then there was the long day under lowering skies or wintry sunshine webbing the rolling sea with a gunmetal gleam, the soaked mittens, the water freezing on the washboards, the boat pitching and wallowing under cold feet all day; and then the return in the late afternoon, with a purple dusk creeping over the sea, and perhaps a rising wind and a cold spit of snow.

They came into the harbor, past the white fury of the harbor ledges, wondering if they'd ever been so cold before, but by the time they reached the car, and had swung the heavy crates and kegs of lobsters onto the scales and received the slip with Pete Grant's scrawl on it—thirty-five or fifty or seventy-five dollars to be collected when they went into the store—they knew it was a good life. They cursed it sometimes, and swore they'd never put in another winter like it, but somehow they could whistle as they rowed in from the mooring.

And you forgot about the burning cold of the vapor, and the everlasting wind, in the evenings when you had the plan of a boat laid out on the table before you, to talk about now, and to build come April.

Joanna lay in bed and thought about the men. They didn't know what time it was when they were talking boats. She turned over and burrowed down into the warm bedclothes like a kitten and fell asleep again.

When she woke up, the first gray light, faintly flushed with rose, was filtering through frost-brocaded windows. She knew before she opened her eyes or moved that Alec wasn't beside her, but from the kitchen she heard the sounds that go with building a fire. She must have been too sound asleep to wake up when he came in last night, or when he got up this morning; and he was going to surprise her with coffee and hot muffins that were amazingly light.

But when she opened her eyes, she saw that he hadn't slept in the bed at all. She lay there for a moment, not liking the way she felt. Little by little the cold sensation faded away. Of course they'd talked till all hours and suddenly realized how tired they were, and bunked on the couch in Charles' kitchen until daylight. She'd have some fun with Alec about this.

Moving swiftly in the chill air, she slid into her bathrobe and slippers and ran downstairs. The coffee was bubbling and aromatic, and Alec was taking cups out of the cupboard. In the pale light he looked gray with weariness, his eyes red-rimmed and dull.

“Hello, darling,” she said, going confidently toward him for his kiss.

“Hello, Jo.” He smiled at her, but it was an effort, and she knew it.

“Have you boys been talking boats until you're out on your feet?” she asked. “After you worked all day, I'd almost think you'd be ready for bed at night.”

“Well, we didn't notice the time. Maurice and Jake came in, and . . . oh, you know how it is.” He gave her a shamefaced grin. “A little cold water will fix me up.”

He turned icy water into the basin and splashed his face. Joanna brought him a fresh towel. “Mateel must think she's running an all­night dive.”

“Oh, she went to bed early. She doesn't care, and even if she did, Charles wouldn't give a damn.” Before the mirror, he parted his wet sandy hair and brushed it back, his eyes narrow with concentration. “Charles is the head man down there.”

Joanna leaned against the wall and smiled up at him. “Well, aren't you the skipper aboard this vessel?” she asked demurely.

Alec laughed. “Sometimes I wonder.”

“You wonder! And here I stand, mine not to make reply, mine but to do or die—”

He leaned over and kissed her. “Yours but to pour some coffee. And then I'm going to climb the wooden hill.”

“You're a disgrace to the clans of Douglass and Bennett,” she told him, shaking her head. “Rolling home at dawn, after a boat­building spree. Here's your coffee.” She looked at his fatigue with tender eyes, wanting, as always, to cradle his heavy head in her arms till he fell asleep.

When he put down his empty cup he kicked off his boots and started toward the stairs. Joanna, laying her clothes over the oven door to warm them before she dressed, grinned at him. “Wait a bit, Cap'n Alec. If you're going to sleep till noon, I need some money to get your dinner with, unless you want boiled salt herring again.”

“What's the matter with herring?”

She went to the foot of the stairs and looked up at him, her black hair tumbling over the shoulders of her dark red robe. “Alec, you growled when you said that. What
isn't
the matter with herring when we've been eating it for almost a week? And Pete's getting some meat today. Think of it, Alec, nice juicy steak!”

It sounded wonderful to her. Alec looked over her head and sighed. Apparently it didn't sound wonderful to him.

“I know you're tired, Alec,” she said quickly, “but just toss me down one of those bills you had last night. We've lived off the pantry and cellar shelves for a week, and we deserve something special today.”

Alec said heavily, “Joanna, we can't afford steak.”

“Why?” she asked blankly. Before this it was always Alec who brought home the expensive luxuries from Pete's store, and looked blank when she said they couldn't afford it. “Why, Alec?”

“Because I haven't any money. No more than two bits. We'll eat herring and like it till I haul again.”

She leaned against the wall and said in a flat voice, “Why haven't we any money, Alec? You had plenty left from your haul yesterday.”

“If you have to know, we had a little poker game last night and they cleaned me out.”