She borrowed Ben Franklin’s rod and reel and made for the dock. She was forbidden to go out in Randy’s boat alone, but since she was already involved in one criminal act, she might as well risk another.
At noon Randy had not returned and Elizabeth McGovern Bragg climbed to the captain’s walk where she could be alone with her fears and anxiety. Her father and Dan Gunn had walked to town that morning. With some volunteers from Braggs Troop, they had begun to clean up and repair the clinic. So there was no man in the house and she was afraid for her husband. He had told her there would be no danger but in this new life the dangers were deadly and unpredictable. She kept her face turned steadily to the east, where the Admiral’s striped-awning sail should appear at the first bend of the Timucuan.
She told herself that she was silly, that Randy and the others, if they found the place at all, might tarry there for hours. They would undoubtedly feast on crab, and she couldn’t blame them. They might find it difficult to load the salt. Anything could delay them.
From the grass behind the kitchen Helen called up, “Lib!” She leaned over the rail. “Yes?”
“Is Peyton up there with you?” “No. I haven’t seen her.”
“Is she out on the dock?”
Lib looked out at the dock and saw that Randy’s boat was missing. Before she told Helen this she scanned the river. It was nowhere in sight; Randy had sailed in the Admiral’s cruiser, and the boat should be there.
At five that evening the Fort Repose fleet sighted Randy’s house. There was no doubt that it had been a triumphant voyage. The five boats were deep with salt, the thirteen men were filled with boiled crabs, lavishly seasoned, so they were all stronger and felt better, and in every boat there were buckets and washtubs filled with live crabs.
The Admiral ran his boat alongside Randy’s dock and turned into the wind. “You unload what salt you want here,” Sam Hazzard said, “and that washtub full of crabs, and I’ll sail back with the Henrys’ share, and mine.”
Randy unloaded. He had expected that Lib would be down at the dock to greet him, or certainly watching from the captain’s walk. Coming home with such rich cargo, he was chagrined. He lifted the washtub to the dock and then two fat sacks of salt. Fifty pounds, at least, he thought. It would last for months and when it was gone there was an unlimited supply waiting on the shores of Blue Crab Pool. He said, “So long, Sam. See you tonight.”
The Admiral pushed away from the dock and Randy picked up the washtub, deliberately spilled some of the water that had kept the crabs alive, and walked to the house.
The kitchen was empty except for four very large black bass in the sink. He lifted the largest. An eleven-pounder, he judged. It was the biggest bass he had seen in a year. It was unbelievable.
There was a plate on the kitchen table heaped with roasted meat. It looked like lamb. He tasted it. It didn’t taste like lamb. It didn’t taste like anything he had ever tasted before, but it tasted wonderful. He thought of the crabs, and their value dwindled to hors d’ouevres.
It was then he heard the first sobs, from upstairs, he thought, and then a different voice weeping hysterically somewhere else in the house. In fear, he ran through the dining room.
Three women were in the living room. They were all crying, Lib silently, Florence and Helen loudly. Lib saw him and ran into his arms and wiped her tears on his shirt. “What’s happened?” he demanded.
“I thought you’d never come home,” Lib said. “I was afraid and there’s so much trouble.”
“What? Who’s hurt?”
“Nobody but Peyton. She upstairs, crying. Helen spanked her and sent her to bed.”
“Why?”
“She went fishing.”
“Did Peyton catch those big bass?”
“Yes.”
“And Helen spanked her for it?”
“Not that. Helen spanked her because she took out your boat and drifted downstream. We didn’t know what had happened to her until she rowed home an hour ago. She said she couldn’t make it sail right.”
Randy looked at Helen. “And what’s wrong with you?” “I’m upset. Anybody’d be upset if they had to spank their child.”
Florence wailed and her head fell on her arms. “What’s wrong with her?”
“Somebody or something came in and ate her goldfish.” Florence raised her head. “I think it must have been Sir Percy. I’m sure of it. I did love that cat and now look how he behaves.” She wept again.
Randy said, “Isn’t anybody going to ask me whether I got salt?”
“Did you get salt?” Lib asked.
“Yes. Fifty pounds of it. And if you women want it, you’ll take the wheelbarrow down to the dock and lug it up.”
He went into the kitchen to clean the beautiful bass and put the crabs in the big pot. It was all ridiculous and stupid. The more he learned about women the more there was to learn except that he had learned this: they needed a man around.
Then he found a tattered goldfish in the gullet of the eleven pounder. He examined it carefully, smiled, and dropped it into the sink. He would not mention it. There was enough trouble and confusion among all these women already.
So ended the hunger of August. In the fourth week the heat broke and the fish began to bite again.
In September school began. It was impractical to re-open the Fort Repose schoolhouse-it was unheated and there was no water. Randy decided that the responsibility for teaching must rest temporarily with the parents. The regular teachers were scattered or gone and there was no way of paying them. The textbooks were still in the schoolhouse, for anyone who needed them.
Judge Braggs library became the schoolroom in the Bragg household, with Lib and Helen dividing the teaching. When Caleb Henry arrived to attend classes with Peyton and Ben Franklin, Randy was a little surprised. He saw that Peyton and Ben expected it, and then he recalled that in Omaha-and indeed in two thirds of America’s cities-white and Negro children had sat side by side for many years without fuss or trouble.
In October the new crop of early oranges began to ripen. The juice tasted tart and refreshing after months without it.
In October, armadillos began to grow scarce in the Fort Repose area, but the Henrys’ flock of chickens had increased and the sow again farrowed. Also, ducks arrived in enormous numbers from the North-more than Randy ever before had seen. Wild turkeys, which before The Day had been hunted almost to extermination in Timucuan County, suddenly were common. Randy fashioned himself a turkey call, and shot one or two every week. Quail roamed the groves, fields and yards in great coveys. He did not use his shells on such trifling game. But Two-Tone knew how to fashion snares, and taught the boys, so there was usually quail for breakfast along with eggs.
One evening near the end of the month Dan Gunn returned from his clinic, smiling and whistling. “Randy,” he said. “I have just delivered my first post-Day baby! A boy, about eight pounds, bright and healthy!”
“So what’s so wonderful about delivering a baby?” Randy said. “Was the mother under hypnosis?”
“Yes. But that’s not what was wonderful.” Dan’s smile disappeared. “You see, this was the first live baby, full term. I had two other pregnancies that ended prematurely. Nature’s way of protecting the race, I think, although you can’t reach any statistical conclusion on the basis of three pregnancies. Anyway, now we know that there’s going to be a human race, don’t we?”
“I’d never really thought there might not be.” “I had,” Dan said quietly.
In November a tall pine, split by lightning during the summer, dropped its brown needles and died and Randy and Bill felled it with a two-man saw and ax. It was arduous work and neither of them knew the technique. It was at times like this that Randy missed and thought of Malachai. Nevertheless they got the job done and trimmed the thick branches. The wood was valuable, for another winter was coming.