Seven Days Dead (16 page)

“They’re not looking straight at you?” Frank asks, looking hard at Roadcap, who shrugs.

“They’ll look at everybody. They have to. It’s their job. They’re going to ask if Angela didn’t do it. Or Hollister. Or Frank. Or Chip.”

“Or you,” Chip counters.

“Yeah. Or me. Why not? I’m not immune.”

“Don’t let them railroad you, son.”

Roadcap enjoys another swallow, then shoots a glance at Frank. He sincerely wants to reassure him. “You can take that to the bank. I’m not going to let that happen anytime soon.”

The men are thoughtful awhile and return to their drinking and their quiet. Chip gets another beer for himself and one for Hollister, who pays him when he brings it over. Angela eyeballs the coins in the dish. Sufficient, just short on tips. She’s asked herself before and does so again: How can she get these guys to tip, if not on a daily basis then at least weekly? Either that or she’ll raise her prices, and she knows they won’t like that. They’ll boycott for a month. They’ll return eventually, but a month without their contributions will be hard to bear.

Della Rae gets up and crosses the floor. She’s so quiet that Roadcap doesn’t notice her coming until she taps him on the shoulder. He smiles, then lets her slide over a knee and she snuggles into him as he tucks an arm around her. The other men are watching, and in a way they are marveling, although this is a sight they have seen for years. They’ve heard Angela’s admonition before, but she feels that the matter bears repeating. She doesn’t even bother to look up from her knitting to say it, either.

“That’s a privilege Aaron has earned, gentlemen. Don’t none of you other guys get your ideas.”

They always have ideas, everybody knows that. Ideas can’t be helped, but rules are rules, and they not only understand the edict but accept that its repetition is undoubtedly necessary.

Kai rises and drags his chair with him. He fits it in closer to Roadcap’s. He leans forward to speak very quietly to him while the child is on his lap, although the others, if they strain their ears, can hear, too. Della Rae observes Kai as he talks, while growing sleepy.

“This changes things, Aaron. Don’t it, you think?”

“What does?” Roadcap asks.

“You know what I mean.”

“The preacher being dead? What does that change?”

“Not Lescavage,” Kai says, and Roadcap understands him now.

“Orrock.”

“Don’t it change the way the wheels turn? Hell, don’t it change the dirt we walk on? The rain that falls? I swear to God, I hear the fucking whales talk about it when they come up for air. The tide might not come back tomorrow, they say. We had a day to get used to the idea, but I can’t. You?”

Perhaps the girl’s sleepiness influences him, but Roadcap stifles a yawn.

“I suppose it changes things somewhat,” he says.

Kai leans farther in. “Any suspicion on you, get out from under that, Aaron. Get me? You don’t need shit like that. It can muck things up. Now’s the time for action. Right? Am I right?”

Rather than answer, Roadcap asks, “Who made you my adviser in chief?”

Straightening in his chair, Kai prepares to stand and move away again. But he has more to say. “Just remember who your father’s best friend was, Aaron. Remember that before you go forgetting who your own friends are. You always think you don’t have none. That’s not the only thing you’re wrong about. Some of us, we have your back.”

The two men stare each other down, then Roadcap makes an infinitesimal gesture with his chin and Kai understands to lean back in again, this time to listen. Roadcap leans in also, so that they’re close together, with the girl between them.

“Any time you’re with me, out on the flats or wherever, don’t be at my back, Kai. Just don’t guard my back ever. Don’t stand behind me. Stay out in front of me where I can keep an eye on you.”

“Aaron, don’t talk like this.”

“Stand where I can see you at all times, Kai. Take this as a solemn warning. And yeah, you’re right. You couldn’t be more right. What happened today. Orrock’s death. That changes everything. Just so you know.”

“I think we understand each other,” Kai says, loudly enough for everyone to hear.

“I’m not sure that we do.” Roadcap gestures for the man to lean in close again. He whispers directly into his ear, so that even the girl sitting on his lap can’t hear. “Don’t strike a match in my vicinity, Kai. Nowhere near my property. If anything of mine burns, I’m going to assume it was you who did it, even if it wasn’t, and you get to pay the consequences, whether you deserve it or not.”

“That’s not fair,” Kai objects.

“I’m not selling fair. I’m giving away a free warning. Don’t strike a match. Make sure nobody else does, either.”

The man backs away from their close contact.

“I was a friend to your father,” Kai attests. “You should remember that.”

“That was then. This is now.” He gestures for him to lean in again, and reluctantly Kai does so, but only partway. “Have you never asked yourself why you’re still alive? That’s why. But that ticket’s been punched. Its final destination is coming up soon. Get off that train, Kai. Get out of the caboose. I don’t want to hear about your old friendship again. You said things have changed? Right. From now on, only what’s happening in the present counts. That’s what’s changed.”

Kai can tell there’s no beating down the other man’s animosity. He stands and starts to return his chair to its old spot, but instead puts it down and walks off the porch. He disappears along the descending trail. Roadcap doesn’t bother to watch him go, and rocks Della Rae lightly on his thigh. It’s dark out. He sips his beer, and she closes her eyes in the gloom and curls more tightly into him.

Everybody heard a good chunk of what he said.

They are free to imagine the rest.

Angela says, both emphatically and gently, “Anytime you speak to somebody like that again at my house, kindly take my daughter off your kneecap first. Before any fist gets swung.”

The girl seems ready for a deep sleep, and closes her eyes against him.

“So, Aaron,” Hollister asks, “is there a war on? Like a war on of some kind?”

Roadcap adjusts the girl’s weight across his lap and lets her lean more fully into him. He seems to be contemplating the question. “Let’s put it this way,” he suggests. “You know what we say when we’re out cutting dulse on a good day?”

The query receives no reply.

“Come on, what do we always say?”

Frank takes a stab at it. “I guess that would be, keep your knives sharp.”

“Keep your knives sharp,” Roadcap warns them.

Hollister utters a little surprised cough, then says, “I hear that.”

Nobody dares utter another word as they stare out into the night. At their backs, the moon’s rising. Although they can’t see it yet, they do see its reflection on the dark surface of the sea.

FOURTEEN

Madeleine Orrock is not accustomed to being disorganized. She is also not accustomed to housework, and doubts that she ever did any in this home while growing up, other than to keep her own room tidy to blunt her father’s commentary. He entered her bedroom only when it got really messy, so that was sufficient motivation to clean up.

Yet her second morning on the island finds her both disorganized and doing housework. She knows that other matters ought to take precedence, in particular the funeral arrangements, which have been thrown to the wind with the demise of her local minister. Now she’s not sure which way to turn and is intimidated about going back on the street to ask anyone. She needs to get over that, and overcome an internal lassitude that’s settling unnaturally upon her, so she undertakes the vacuuming, hoping that a dose of physical activity will jump-start her synapses and firm up her resolve to broach what is necessary.

She’s just put the machine away and is staring out the front window when her father’s housekeeper comes up the walk. She recalls that her name is Ora, with an
O,
as the young woman is proud to say. At times in her life she’s introduced herself as “Maddy” and thought to interject, “But I’m not mad.” She was never wholly confident that she was justified to utter the line, as it might be untrue. Ora, on the other hand, breezes through life correcting the mental spelling of everyone she meets, first thing, wanting the world to know that she’s nobody’s aura.

Maddy has the door open before she’s halfway up the steps.

“I’ve got cookies!” the housekeeper exclaims. She has a way of mounting stairs that seems cumbersome, even oafish, although on a level footing she’s not that way. Her grin is wide and bright and perhaps that’s what has Maddy glad to see her. Either that or she’s finally in the mood for company. “Lo and behold, hang on to your silverware, I’ve got muffins, too!”

Unlike yesterday, this time Maddy lets her in.

Nervously, they wander into the living room together and Ora Matheson agrees to sit, although that feels odd to her and she makes a point of saying so. “I never thought these chairs were built for a bum like mine. I mean, a poor girl’s.” She finds that her anatomy fits quite well, and squiggles around some. “Of course, I thought if I sat in one during working hours and your father caught me, this is before he got sick, he’d swat me with a broom. Maybe the stick end. Now I’m scared he still might!”

Maddy offers coffee.

Ora accepts tea. “We can have a muffin! I made them myself.”

“With butter?”

“Loads!”

Maddy figures she might as well have tea, too, and allows a pot to steep in the kitchen, bringing out just the cups and saucers first, then the milk and sugar.

“My goodness,” Ora says.

“What?”

“Usually, that’s me doing the serving. If my mom could see me now, she’d be screaming. She’d want me begging your forgiveness for my unbridled—that’s what she’d call it, most likely—my
unbridled temerity!
My mom
loves
big words. All strung together. You should hear her talk sometimes, though she’s been quiet lately. I think because she smashed up the truck. Ran it into a ditch. I told her, ‘Mom, no biggie, it was already smashed, often,’ but I think her pride hurts the most, though her face took some knock. Ugh. Black and blue. I’d say more blacker than bluer.”

“I see,” Maddy says.

“But you don’t want to hear about that,” Ora says, and Maddy excuses herself to fetch the teapot.

When she returns they each remark on the beauty of the day and agree that a run of good weather would be nice. They are awkwardly quiet awhile until Ora conveys that she’s not sure if she is expected to pour the tea or if Maddy will. “I don’t know myself what’s right,” she says.

“Not a problem, Ora. I’ll pour.” Still, she lets it steep another moment or two, which is when she realizes that she has her father’s knack to make the other person uneasy. She probably takes a measure of her father’s enjoyment in observing others grow frustrated with their own unease. She pours, smiles, and simultaneously they take a sip before biting into the muffins. Maddy compliments the chef. “I’m usually not into these things, but these are pretty good.”

“Thanks. The cookies—I shouldn’t say so, but. The cookies are to die for.”

“I’m not into cookies, either, but based on the muffins, I believe you.”

They sip and munch and release little smiles.

Then Ora says, “It’s been my best-paying job, working for your old man, so a bit of hit in the pocketbook, if you know what I mean, him dying and all, so I was wondering, you know, if you had a chance, as they say, to reconsider.”

“Reconsider?”

“My employment. I’m good at doing the cleaning, the washing up, making the beds and all that. I can look after the place for you, while you’re here and after you’re gone away again, if you go away again. Are you going to sell?”

“Do you think I’d find a buyer?”

“Beats me. Out of my price range. In your range, I have no clue. Somebody from off-island, I suppose, with the big bucks. You never know.”

“Hmm,” Maddy ponders.

“Like another professor, like all those professors up the hill.”

“Yes,” Maddy says, as she knows about them, “the Harvard gang. I teach there myself although I’m not part of their club. They’re well-heeled—this house, though, is too rich for their blood. The thing is, Ora, I’ve already done the cleaning, and there’s no washing up to speak of. Right now, I feel the need to do my own housework.”

“That’s not how rich people behave,” Ora scoffs.

“Isn’t it? How many rich people do you know?”

Ora thinks about it, then with a sheepish grin sticks up one finger.

“And he’s dead now, right?”

Ora agrees. Maddy cocks an eyebrow to claim victory for her point.

“What about the businesses?” the younger woman asks. “Are you selling them, too? I guess you have to, hey? What do you know about salmon or dulse or the fish plant? Too bad your daddy had no sons. Ha-ha, for more reasons than one.”

Putting her cup down on a side table, Maddy knows she’s about to be mean. The impulse surprises her, as it comes upon her so naturally. At least in this house it does. “Actually, Ora, I know everything there is to know about dulse, salmon farming, the fishery and the fish plant. I was born and raised on this island, don’t forget, my father’s daughter. You obviously don’t know this—he had me working at his side and at sea, hard at work, since I was a toddler.”

“Really? I didn’t know. I didn’t think rich girls—Of course, I’m younger than you, so I never saw you at it, I was too young to be looking, if you know what I mean. So, since you know all about the businesses, are you selling them off?”

As she turns away, Maddy smiles, and in a way she is finding her own reactions more humorous than anything else. Still, she asks Ora, “Are you asking for yourself, or for the whole island?”

The young woman bursts out laughing. She needs a moment to control herself. “You’re right,” she says. “You’re right! There’s really no difference. Tell me, you tell the world! My mom will agree with you on that. Of course, if you tell
her
something, you might as well send a radio signal throughout the entire
universe.
”