Vineyard Fear (6 page)

Manny made a small adjustment on the sight. “Shooting right,” he said in that loud way people have of speaking when they have muffled their ears. He raised the weapon in one smooth motion. The red dot bounced on the target and then steadied. The gun jumped and boomed. “Better,” said Manny. He emptied the clip carefully into the target, jacked out the clip, and slid in a second one. He put the gun on safety and laid it on the table and we walked up to the target. There were fourteen bullet holes near the center. We covered them with tape. It didn't take much.

“You try it,” said Manny. “Just remember that the red dot tells you where your bullet is going to go. Don't yank the trigger, just squeeze it.”

I plugged my ears, put on my shooting glasses, and took up the pistol. The red dot danced all over the target. I steadied my arm and the dancing slowed. When the dot touched the bull's-eye, I squeezed off the shot. A bullet hole appeared six inches to the left. Not good, Kemo Sabe. Again the red dot touched the bull's-eye and again I fired. High. I fired again. Closer, this time. Eleven more shots. One in the bull's-eye. It took fourteen pieces of tape to cover the holes.

“Well,” said Manny, “if it'd been a man, you'd have hit him most of the time.”

“If it'd been an elephant, I'd have hit him every time.”

“We don't shoot many elephants on Martha's Vineyard,” said Manny, reloading the clips.

“There used to be mastodons or woolly mammoths or some such creatures out west before you red-skinned savages killed them all,” I said.

“I think those other guys did that,” said Manny. “The ones you say we ran off when we came over the land bridge. Here, try again.”

We shot his new pistol for a while and then shot another one, since Manny always shot more than one pistol when on the target range.

Two trucks pulled up beside my Land Cruiser and Manny's Bronco, and guys with guns and satchels got out.

“I guess we've used up our time,” said Manny. He put his guns and gear away. I put my earplugs and glasses in my pocket and got our targets. “What do you think of the scope,” asked Manny, as we walked.

“I think that Crazy Horse or Sitting Bull or whoever it was that did in Custer had a bunch of them at the Little Bighorn.”

“Red dot, red power,” grinned Manny, raising a clenched fist.

I gave him some money for my share of the ammunition we'd shot up and went home. After lunch I went to the Eel Pond and spent an hour and a half on my hands and knees digging soft-shelled clams. When I had my bucket full, I went home and put them in a bigger bucket full of salt water, so they could spit out the sand in their systems. Tomorrow I'd freeze them. You can steam frozen clams just like fresh ones and never know the difference, and I always liked to have a batch on hand in case an irresistible clam boil urge came over me unexpectedly.

Manny thought digging clams was a nonsensical way to spend time. I liked it. He liked to shoot guns at targets. Everyone to his own madness, I say. Almost everyone, that is. Some madness can be fatal.

It was mid-July and hot when I discovered I had to actually go downtown into Edgartown. This is a venture I undertake in the summer for only the most serious of motivations, since the lovely, narrow streets of Edgartown are filled with tourists and jammed with cars and there is never anywhere to park.

But I was out of books and the big book fair in West Tisbury was still days away, so I had to make a run to the library to keep myself going. Normally I have at least one book to read, since I keep one in each place I expect to be. I have a bedroom book that I only read before sleeping, a bathroom book that I only read while on the throne (poetry here, since it comes in appropriately short slices), a kitchen book, two living room books, and a car book for traffic jams. However, a cruel fate had touched my life: I had finished all of these books within days of each other and was suddenly bookless.

So downtown I went.

Edgartown is so quaint and lovely, so filled with flowers and greenery, so fairylandish and make-believe, that pedestrians think that cars are just part of the scenery and the middle of the street is as much for them as for automobiles. They are surprised and even resentful when they discover some car attempting to occupy the street they are walking in while ogling the sights, and only reluctantly move to the brick sidewalks as the car inches by. Edgartown summer cops do their best to keep both drivers and pedestrians moving, and actually do a pretty good job of it by late summer. In mid-July, they are still a bit green and have a hard time untangling traffic, and need wise advice from the chief.

I found him, walking down North Water Street, Edgartown's classiest street as well as the location of its excellent library. This surprise was almost as great as the one I had experienced only moments before when a car parked right in front of the library had pulled out just in time for me to pull in. Shocking.

“You look pale,” said the chief, “and I don't blame you. An actual parking place.”

“Perhaps you'll take my arm and lead me to a chair before I faint. What brings you up to this part of town? Don't tell me that the weed of crime is bearing bitter fruit on North Water Street.”

“The weed of crime in this case was a lady in that big house there who phoned that somebody was trying to break through the back door. It turned out it was her cat that she'd forgotten she'd put out, trying to get back in out of the heat.”

“Your story has done much to make me feel more secure on these mean streets. How's the summer going?”

He wiped his brow and replaced his hat. “Be glad you've turned in your badge. We have more jerks in jail than I can ever remember having before.”

In every community the size of the island's winter population, there are about twenty people who cause ninety percent of all the problems. They are the vandals, the drunks, the druggies, the car racers, the thieves, the people who rob their parents, who beat up women and children, who trash houses, who hate cops, and who never seem to change.

“If you'll give me immunity and a whole lot of money, I think I know some guys who will shoot the guys who are giving you most of your trouble,” I said.

“Hell,” said the chief. “If you could just move a couple of families off of the island, I could retire. How's Zee?”

“Fine, I guess. I haven't seen her for a while.”

He nodded and his eyes floated down toward the four corners, where Main met Water Street. Many cars were
not moving there. A summer cop in traffic trouble. The chief tugged on his hat brim and started on down the walk to do his duty.

“Protect and serve,” I called after him and turned to see Geraldine Miles coming down the walk from the library.

She was wearing a wraparound skirt and short-sleeved shirt, and the bruises were no longer apparent on her arms. She was tanned and looked happy. There was a man with her, a tall, strong-looking guy about her age wearing new summer clothes: Vineyard Red shorts and a white shirt that said “Frankly scallop, I don't give a clam.” He carried a canvas beach bag. His face and arms were tanned, but his legs were still white.

She looked at me, reached into her memory and came up with my name, and smiled.

“J.W. How are things on the beach?”

“You're looking well,” I said.

“I am well. I'm very well. I'd like you to meet Lloyd Cramer. Lloyd, this is J.W. . . . I'm sorry, but I don't think I know your last name . . .”

“Jackson.”

“J.W. is a friend of Uncle Dan.”

Lloyd had a mouthful of good teeth and a strong grip. There was a tattoo of a skull on the arm attached to the hand that took mine. There was a tattoo of a knife with a wavy blade on the other arm.

“Any friend of Dan's is a friend of mine,” said Lloyd in a hearty, Midwestern voice. “Pleased to meet you, sir.”

Sir. I was only six or seven years older than he was.

“You're new in town,” I said.

“I wrote to him and he came all the way from Iowa City just to visit me,” said Geraldine in a happy voice. “Isn't that sweet?”

Lloyd shuffled his feet and put his arm around her shoulders. “After she left home to visit Dan and Jean, I realized how important she really is to me, so I just took
some time off and came right here to tell her that. We've got a lot of things to talk about and we're having fun doing it. Isn't that right, honey?”

“That's right,” said Geraldine, taking his hand. “We're getting everything straightened out. Isn't this weather just wonderful?”

I thought that right now Geraldine would feel that a hurricane or a blizzard was wonderful weather.

“I'll let you get on with your talking,” I said.

Lloyd put out his big hand again and I took it in my big hand.

“Nice to have met you, J.W.,” he said as he gave me his friendly smile.

“How long are you going to be around?” I asked Geraldine.

She looked up at Lloyd and smiled. “Oh, not too much longer, I imagine. I think maybe I'll be headed back to Iowa City soon.”

Lloyd beamed down at her. “Great to hear you say that, sugar. Hey, let's hit the beach. I gotta tan up these legs before I go back home.” He looked at me. “You got a really beautiful island here, J.W.”

He showed me his fine teeth and she waved and they walked up North Water Street, headed, I guessed, for Lighthouse Beach. They looked like a happy pair. I hoped that it would last, but I didn't share the belief of many women that their men would reform if given one last chance.

I thought, Good luck to you, Geraldine Miles, and went into the library.

Libraries are some of my favorite places. They're filled with books and information and give you the good feeling that no matter how much you've read there's an endless amount of reading material still ahead of you, so you never have to worry about running out. It's a nice certainty in an uncertain world. I calculated the time left before the West Tisbury book sale, and got myself three
books, including one about the popular inclination of conquering armies to burn books and destroy libraries.

The idea of destroying libraries was one that irked me, and it occurred to me that maybe I took the book because I was already irked that Geraldine Miles had gotten back together with Lloyd and irked even more that I hadn't gotten myself loose from my resentment that Zee was going off to New Hampshire. Reading of the destruction of the great libraries of Alexandria and Constantinople was only one more irritant in my irritated life. I apparently wanted an excuse to be out of temper. I turned this notion over in my mind and was not pleased with what it told me of myself. I went home and called the hospital and invited Zee to supper. She accepted.

She was still wearing her white uniform when she got out of her little Jeep. She inhaled as she came into the house.

“Ah, another delicious meal from the kitchen of J. W. Jackson.”

“Indeed. But first this.” I gave her a perfect martini and waved her back out the door. We went up onto the balcony and I put a plate of smoked bluefish pâté, Brie, and saltless crackers on the little table between our chairs.

We looked out over the garden and Sengekontacket Pond to the sound where, in the haze of the summer afternoon, sailboats were leaning with the wind as they beat for evening harbors. Along the road between the pond and the sound the cars of the beach people were pulling out and heading home.

“I was beginning to wonder whether I was ever going to get another invitation to come here,” said Zee.

“It's been a while,” I agreed.

“In fact, we haven't seen each other very much since May.”

“True. My nose has been out of joint ever since you told me you were going away next month. I've been sulking.”

“But you're over it now?”

“Over enough to want to see you a lot before you go off on your pilgrimage.”

“Good. Me too. You're really over it?”

“I don't like sulkers, especially when one of them is me. I want to make up for the time I've lost. I know I'll miss you, but I'm not mad about it anymore.”

“Good.” She got up and came around and leaned over and kissed me. I kissed her back. She went back to her chair.

We sat and drank and ate and looked across at the boats and cars.

“I doubt if New Hampshire is as nice as this,” said Zee.

“Well, you can always come home early.”

“No, I'm going to do it all.”

“A woman's got to do what a woman's got to do. A manly man like me understands that. It's a kind of code you have to obey.”

“You're so sensitive I sometimes wonder how you survive. What's for supper?”

“A simple but elegant Scandinavian baked fish served with little boiled potatoes and fresh beans from my very own garden. Madame will find it quite satisfactory.”

“Tell me more.”

“Normally the chef never reveals his secrets, but I know I can trust you to be discreet. You cook a bunch of sliced onions in a skillet with butter until they're soft, then put them in a baking dish, put a pound or so of fish on top, add a couple of bouillon cubes and cover the whole thing with a couple of cups of roux. Easy and mega-delish. I like to use fish with white meat best, by the way. Today you're having cod caught up off Cedar Tree Neck. First, though, another drink.”

I brought more martinis and we worked our way through the hors d'oeuvres. I felt happier than I had in a while. When the time was right, I went down and got
supper going. At seven, we ate, washing everything down with a nice Graves I'd been saving. Zee ate everything in front of her, leaned back, and patted her lips.

“Yum. You have not lost the touch, François.”

“Note my modest smile. If you will place yourself on the porch, I will bring the coffee and cognac.”

She did and I did and we watched the night darken around the house. She put her hand in mine.