The Lucky Ones (6 page)

“They’re hermit crabs,” Natalie told him as he peered into the bucket when the boys hurried past. “What else did you get, Cecile?” she asked.

“A few jellyfish and a ton of snails.”

“Oh, snails,” said Natalie. “Whoopie.”

“We got three horseshoe crabs, but we let them go.”

“Where have
you
two been all day?” Jenny asked in a coy voice, looking at her brother. Cecile longed to pinch her.

“That’s for us to know and you to find out,” said William.

He sounded as if he were eight. Natalie knew it, but she laughed anyway, saying, “I showed William around the island.”

“I bet
you
didn’t catch anything,” said Jenny. “Other than each other, that is,” she added under her breath.

“I can get all the fish I need right here,” William said. He grabbed the rope tied around a piling and started to pull it up, hand over hand.

“That’s King’s bait trap,” Cecile said.

“I told him that this morning, Cecile,” said Natalie.

The top of the bucket appeared above the water and made a great sucking noise as William pulled it clear.

“Did you tell him King doesn’t like people to fool around with it?” said Cecile as William pulled the bucket all the way up to sit on the dock. “Not even people he knows?”

“Don’t be such a brat,” said Natalie.

“He doesn’t, Natalie. You know he doesn’t.”

“Down, Fido! Sit!” William commanded, grinning broadly when Natalie laughed.

“King really is a beast about people touching it,” she said as she rested her hand on his arm.

“I certainly wouldn’t want to offend a king, now would I?” said William. He let go of the rope and pushed the bucket toward the edge with his foot. It hurtled down and slapped against the water before sinking out of sight. “Whew,” William said, wiping imaginary sweat from his brow. “Maybe now the king won’t behead me.”

Look at them, Cecile thought disgustedly when Natalie laughed. Natalie, trying to sound like Mom, and William puffing out his chest like a silly rooster. She longed to hit him, to somehow puncture William’s air of confidence and send him hurtling down, too. “You’re not supposed to drop it like that,” she said, her eyes blazing.

“Who’s she, the dock keeper?” William said to Natalie with a rude jerk of his thumb.

“My little sister’s very strict,” Natalie said. “Aren’t you, Cecile?”

“I’m not your little sister.”

“Very strict, indeed.” Natalie shook her finger in
William’s face in a perfect imitation of a teacher. “If she knew half the things you said to me today…” William tried to grab her finger, but Natalie quickly hid it behind her back.

“I am not strict, Natalie,” Cecile said loudly.

But Cecile wasn’t there for Natalie, only William. When he reached around her with both arms, she twisted and turned inside his embrace as if delighting in the feel of it. Her shirt rose up as she did, and William put his huge hands on her waist. Squealing, Natalie ducked and ran laughing up the dock. William was fast on her heels.

She could have been leaving Cecile once and for all, Cecile felt so bereft. Have fun with your playthings, children, I’m gone. How
could
she make fun of her own sister like that in front of a stranger? Cecile thought as she looked blindly into the bucket. An Interloper. Everything blurred.

“I told you he was girl crazy,” Jenny said proudly beside her.

It was horrible, horrible, that this pudgy girl should be allowed to think her pudgy brother was so
wonderful. But for Natalie to think so, too?

“Don’t do that,” Cecile snapped when Jenny idly stuck her hand into the bucket, causing the minnows to dart frantically. “Now look what you did.” As if no one ever stuck their hand in a bucket with minnows before! a voice in her head chided. As if they wouldn’t settle down the minute Jenny withdrew her hand.

“Sorry.” Jenny’s voice was gratifyingly meek, but Cecile couldn’t forgive her.

“You probably frightened them to death,” she said. She snatched up the bucket. “We’d better get them into the water before they die. If they do, their blood will be on your hands.”

What blood? Imagine! Cecile could have laughed. But Jenny had fallen willingly into the mood; her face was a tragic mask of turned-down lines. She could have been mourning the loss of a beloved hamster, with her hands so piously clasped. “I can make music,” Jenny offered.

“What kind of music?”

Jenny rested her hands on the rise of her soft
belly and intoned, “Dum, dum, de-dum, dum, dedum, de-dum, de-dum…”

“All right, but not too fast.”

Holding the bucket out in front of her as if it were an offering, Cecile solemnly led the way to the beach. Both girls wore grave expressions suitable to conducting a funeral. Cecile knelt down at the water’s edge and beckoned for Jenny to do the same. Somberly, oh, so somberly, she tilted the bucket in the shallow water until three still bodies bobbed lifelessly out.

The mourners looked at them in silence. Then, miraculously, “Made you look! Made you look!” If fish could shout joyfully, these fish would have; they sprang into life, darted away from the shore, and were gone.

“You did it!” Jenny cried, clapping. “You saved them!”

Cecile forgave her completely.

L
ucy went first, clutching the bag of bread crumbs Sheba had entrusted to her care as they made their way slowly across the lawn toward the inlet. Jack walked behind her, brandishing his stick. Cecile trailed last, with Granddad. He held her elbow gently; she kept her arm bent in a stiff crook. Ice cubes clattered from the terrace as her father dumped them into the bucket at the bar. Her mother was upstairs getting dressed.

Granddad’s white linen pants and shirt gleamed in the setting sun. His silver hair was slicked back from his forehead in neat, straight rows like the furrows in a field. He looked at Cecile and squeezed her arm. “Happy?” he asked.

“Yes.”

Granddad’s cheeks were gently bellowing in and out. Cecile had learned, over time, that it meant he was thinking. He ran a large newspaper in the city and was often preoccupied. He had a black phone in his study that he got important phone calls on; no one other than him was allowed to answer it. When the children were young, they often stood in the doorway and stared at it, as if expecting it to explode.

Granddad’s driver, Jimmy, came and went throughout the month, delivering messages and important papers. On Sunday, he’d drive Granddad and their father back into the city, where they’d spend the week at their jobs before Jimmy drove them back to the Island on Thursday night. Cecile felt proud to have Granddad to herself now; proud but anxious. She wondered whether he would talk to her and ask her questions. She dreaded disappointing him. She was happy to skirt the corners of adult conversation and know him in that way.

“Red sky at night, sailor’s delight!” Jack called back as they neared the water.

“Take Lucy’s hand,” Cecile said officiously.

“She won’t let me!” he reported.

“Lucy…?”

At the sound of Granddad’s voice, Lucy took Jack’s hand. There were rules to be followed, even when it came to feeding the greedy clutch of seagulls Granddad called his “pals.”

“What do you say we go feed my pals?” he’d say when he came down from taking a shower after golf. “Anyone interested?” He’d look around uncertainly, as if they didn’t all rush to join him every summer, night after night.

“How can they be hungry when they steal food from people’s picnics and smash those poor defenseless mussels against the rocks all day?” their mother would protest. She said seagulls were worse than rodents, but Granddad loved them.

His pals had seen them coming. As if summoned by a dinner gong, dozens of them had materialized in the inlet and hovered over Lucy and Jack, screeching and laughing as they darted and swooped.

“Can we start?” Jack asked when they came up to him.

“Go ahead,” said Granddad.

Jack’s first piece flew straight up and was attacked by several gulls. Lucy threw her entire handful, all at once. The pieces scattered on the ground in front of her like confetti.

“Not like that, Lucy,” said Jack. “One at a time. Like this.”

He bent his knees and then shot straight up, leaning back as he hurled the bread high over his head. A seagull picked it neatly from the air before it could start back down. Cecile took a few pieces and threw them out over the water. Granddad threw his one at a time, carefully, like Jack. He handed his last piece to Lucy and said gravely, “Let’s see what you’ve learned, Lucy.”

Lucy tossed it. It rose hopefully into the air and dropped back down, bouncing off her hair onto the ground, where a gull hopped over and nabbed it.

“Better watch out for those curls,” Granddad told her solemnly. “My pals might think they’re worms.”

Lucy clamped her hands over her head and ran in
delighted circles, shrieking. “Seagulls don’t eat worms,” Jack tried to tell her, but Lucy was giddy with the idea of her hair, alive. She started back up the lawn toward the house, zigzagging crazily, with Jack running behind her, waving his stick, a loyal sheepdog directing a stray sheep back to its pen.

Their mother stood up from where’d she’d been watching and walked toward them over the grass. Lucy grabbed her mother’s hand and shook her head vigorously; her hair flew out around her like sparks. Her excited voice, raised in explanation, floated through the evening air.

“What’ve you been telling Lucy, Dad?” their mother said laughingly as Lucy and Jack raced up to the terrace. “More of your nonsense?” She linked her arms through his and pulled him against her, smiling back quickly at Cecile as if to say, Mine, all mine. She leaned her head against her father’s shoulder; Granddad planted a kiss on the top of her hair.

It was almost dark. Ahead of them, the house was coming alive. Candles flickered in small lamps
scattered on the tables around the terrace. Cecile could see Sheba through the French windows. She was moving slowly around the living room, stooping to turn on lamps, to straighten a magazine, to fluff a pillow. She picked up an empty tray from the sideboard and moved back across the windows to stand in the screen door, a dark silhouette.

“The children’s dinner is ready,” she announced through the dusk.

“Thanks, Sheba.” Their mother let go of Granddad’s arm and led Lucy over to the door as Sheba swung it open. “Would you make sure Lucy washes her hands, please. There’s no telling what germs those horrible pals of Mr. Hinton’s carry around.” She turned and beckoned to Jack and Cecile. “Come on, you two. Sheba worked hard to cook you a wonderful dinner.”

“I’ll go up and get Natalie,” Cecile said.

“She went down to the dock.” Her mother ushered Jack through the door and kept it held open. “She forgot something, so I told her she could go and get it. You go ahead and eat. Natalie can have hers later.”

“What’d she forget?” Cecile said.

“I don’t know. Come on now. Don’t keep Sheba waiting.”

“I’ll go get her.”

“Cecile!”

But Cecile was walking away on stiff, determined legs around the corner of the house. “I’ll be right back!” she cried, breaking into a run. She sped across the grass.

Natalie didn’t forget anything. She was meeting William, Cecile was sure of it. Just because she was fourteen, she was acting like she was old enough to skip dinner with the babies and meet her
boyfriend
. How dare her mother act as if Cecile should eat early but Natalie didn’t have to?

Cecile flew down the drive in the deepening dusk, an avenging angel. And there they were: standing together at the end of the dock with their shoulders almost touching as they watched the sun setting over the bay.

“Natalie!” Cecile shouted as she ran toward them. Natalie quickly shoved something into
William’s hand as she turned around. William bent and put it on the dock behind a piling.

“What are you doing here?” Natalie said, her face tight with defiance.

“What’s that?” Cecile asked, craning to look. Whatever it was, it had made Natalie nervous. Cecile’s own nerves tingled with her sister’s alarm. Then, “You’re drinking beer?” Cecile said, incredulous.

William stepped quickly in front of it.

“It’s not mine,” said Natalie. “It’s William’s.”

“But William’s not allowed to drink either.”

“God, your sister’s a pain,” William muttered. He turned and raised his foot, bringing it down angrily on the can to flatten it. “Beer? What beer?” he said as he kicked it over the side.

“You can’t do that!” Cecile cried. “Natalie, tell him.”

“You’re the one who made him do it,” Natalie said, her face flushed. “If you’d minded your own business, he wouldn’t have.”

It seemed impossible. That Natalie would still side with him against her. “It’s time for dinner,” Cecile insisted. “Mom said to come get you.”

“Tell her I’ll be up in ten minutes.”

“She said to come now.”

They stood glaring at each other, eyes locked, the way they had when they were little. But she wasn’t going to be the one who backed down anymore; she was too old. “What else were you doing?” Cecile said accusingly.

“Nothing,” Natalie said, tossing her head.

“Nothing?” said William. “Thanks a lot, Natalie.” He grabbed her arm and started dragging her toward the edge of the dock. “I’ll show you nothing,” he said.

“Don’t you dare!” Natalie shrieked, planting her feet and straining against him. “I’ll get my hair wet!”

“Nothing, huh?” William repeated heavily.

“Kick him in the shins!” Cecile shouted.

William had to be a lot stronger than Harry to be dragging Natalie the way he was. Natalie was an expert on not getting thrown into the water. She and Cecile both were. Harry had tried a million times. Now William was inching Natalie closer and closer
to the edge. His face looked positively scary: His cheeks and neck were flushed. His mouth hung open to reveal huge teeth.

Cecile grabbed Natalie around the waist and pulled.

“Let go!” Natalie’s face when she rounded on Cecile was so full of fury, Cecile dropped her hands. Natalie surged forward again, shrieking louder than before.

“Take it back,” William ordered her, his open mouth glistening. “Say you were having a fascinating conversation.”

“I was having a fascinating conversation!” Natalie shouted. She showed all of her teeth, too.

“The most fascinating in your whole life?”

“The most fascinating in my whole life!”

“All right then.” When William stopped pulling, Natalie sagged gratefully against him. She shut her eyes and put the palms of her hands against his chest, as if exhausted.

But she wasn’t exhausted at all; she’d loved every minute of it. Natalie had pretended to be weak so
William would feel strong. Even more amazing to Cecile was the fact that William actually believed it. He looked so smug, so proud.

Natalie, leaning against him, watched Cecile through narrowed eyes and looked every bit as victorious.

It was all a game.

“You’re not coming up, are you?” Cecile said.

“Tell Mom ten minutes,” said Natalie.

“Tell her yourself.”

Her legs might have turned to stone, they felt so heavy. Cecile walked away from them without looking back. She heard William laugh and knew he was laughing at her. They were both laughing at her. She walked stiffly up the steps.

The sun had set. The sky was black. Cecile located the three stars of Orion’s belt and the Little Dipper above her head. A screen door slammed at the pump house. A phone rang. Fireflies flickered the length of the drive.

Why was it that sounds made at night seemed so much sharper, so much more full of significance,
than those heard during the day? It was all soft, reassuring sounds when the sun was out: the faint cries of seagulls, the hum of distant lawn mowers, the heavy buzzing of bees feeding on the privet flowers.

Natalie, drinking beer. Better not to think about it. Whatever she did, she couldn’t tell her parents. There’d be a scene; scenes couldn’t happen on Gull Island. Maybe she should say she’d seen William drinking beer; that might work. Their mother would warn Natalie to be careful. Cecile felt suddenly desperate that someone warn Natalie to be careful. Quickening her pace, she shouted out with relief, “I found her!” as she rounded the corner of the house. Then, abruptly, she halted. The intensity of the floodlight in the corner was startling, yes, but it wasn’t that. Something was odd here, too.

The terrace looked empty. All of the hustle and bustle of preparing for dinner was gone. No. Someone was lying in the far, dark corner on Granddad’s lounge. Cecile stood, blinking dumbly, as the reclining figure broke apart and became two.

“Where’s Dad?” Cecile said in confusion when she saw who it was.

“Is something wrong?” King’s arm slid from around her mother’s shoulders as she stood up. “Is Natalie with you?” her mother said.

“She’s at the dock.” Cecile couldn’t stop her eyes from darting between her mother and King; they had a life of their own. “Where’s Dad?” she cried.

“For heaven’s sake, Cecile. You made it sound as if something terrible had happened.” Now that her mother wasn’t worried, she was impatient. “Your father’s inside. What difference does it make?”

“But what were you doing?” Cecile said. “What’s King doing here?”

“Excuse me?”

“It’s just…I thought…” Cecile’s voice trailed off in the face of her mother’s scornful eyes. “It’s just that Dad and Granddad were here when I left,” she went on in a faltering voice.

“You’re rude.” Her mother’s voice was ice.

Cecile looked down, her face burning.

“I’m afraid I’m imposing on your parents’ goodwill
again tonight and staying for dinner.” She looked back up to meet King’s kind eyes gratefully as he came up behind her mother. Another set of gleaming teeth in a huge smile. But this was King. Surely she could trust King?

“Anne,” he said quietly as he rested his hand on her mother’s arm. “It’s all right.”

“No, it’s not.” Her mother shook off his hand. “She was rude, and she knows it.”

“She’s only a child,” King murmured.

“I am not a child,” Cecile said.

“Then stop acting like one,” her mother said, smiling the satisfied smile of a cat who’d successfully trapped her mouse, “and go and have your dinner.”

“That’s where I was going,” Cecile said. Her hands were clenched as she walked to the door. Back stiff, she opened it and went inside. Banished, like a bad little girl, to eat with the other children in the kitchen.

But Jack and Leo weren’t in the kitchen, only Sheba. “People in this family are behaving badly,” Cecile said as she flung herself into a chair.

Sheba laughed. “You sound like your grandfather,” she said, shutting the refrigerator door.

“Well, they are.” Cecile kicked the chair legs. “Natalie’s at the dock, flirting. You might as well throw away her dinner.”

“You just hold on to yourself,” Sheba said, “and don’t worry about your sister.”

“Who says I am?”

“Nobody has to say a word.” Sheba opened the oven door and slid out a plate. “You’ve been my worrier all your life.”

“I have?”

“Since you were a tiny thing.” Sheba lifted the lid off a pot on the stove and began spooning food onto Cecile’s warm plate. “Lord, the way you used to carry on. About the snails Jack tried to take back to Connecticut in his bucket, and the fact that lobsters were still alive when I put them in the pot…” Sheba shook her head.