"No, I think I would have remembered."
Which earned me a quick smile . . . and then she was done with me, her attention back on Tomlinson. "Hurry up now! I don't care a thing about seeing your skinny little butt. Hand me your wet stuff." She grabbed the ball of clothes out of Tomlinson's hands. Tomlinson, naked, gave me a wan look, shrugged, then followed her into the house. Heard her say, "Well, you got hair like a woman, but that's 'bout as far as she goes. Towel off in the bathroom. Jimmy's stuff may be a little big around the shoulders, but it'll do. Might as well just keep it. Lord knows, Jimmy, he won't need it no more."
"Raymond Tullock is like most men. His balls tell him he should be in charge, but his brain's just not big enough to steer the load. You want ice tea? I had some Co-Colas but I handed them out to the cops."
I was sitting in the small living room on a rattan couch waiting for Tomlinson to come out of the bathroom. He was showering. The water had just started. Hannah was puttering around in the kitchen. She had the clothes dryer thumping on the back porch; something was simmering on the stove: smelled like black beans, a cumin and bay leaf smell.
"Raymond used to work for the marine extension agency, a government job. Worked with the oystermen, the netters, tellin' us how we could do our business better. A liaison—you know what I mean?"
I said, "Sure."
"Now we've got a woman. She was down here . . . Tuesday? No, Monday. Brought another woman with her to tell us how to make low-cost meals, where to go for food stamps. Getting us ready for welfare handouts because of the net ban. Had a meeting at the Community Center, all these island women sitting around in their print dresses. What they did was treat us like a bunch of snot-nosed kids who'd starve if they weren't there to show us how things're done. Know what the government woman said? Wendy something. Wendy graduated Duke, knows everything there is to know. Wendy says, 'I strongly recommend you try to limit fats in your families' diets. Too expensive and bad for the heart.' She says, 'Seafood is a good low-cost substitute, the cheaper grades of fish.' "
Hannah poked her head out from the kitchen to see how I'd reacted to the punch line. "Get it? This bossy college woman, teeth like ice, tellin' us to eat fish now that we can't net them. Jesus! She says, 'I recommencl broiled fish as opposed to frying. Peanut oil is so expensive.' That's exactly what she said. I grew up cookin' for my daddy and brothers up in the Panhandle, Cedar Key, down here. Knowin' how to cook. But there's Wendy, an easy government job and all the gall in the world, telling us about fish."
I said, "I can see why you find that offensive."
"Damn right we were offended. After the meeting, this little old lady,
Miz Hamilton—she's some relation of mine, way, way back; little bitty thing—Miz Hamilton totters up to Wendy, and she says, 'Missy, if the gov'ment paid you a dollah to come heah' "—Hannah had thickened her own accent, making it sound real—" 'the gov'ment paid you a dollah too much. I think them micra-waves done boiled your brain!' "
I sat there listening, smiling. The woman seemed to be on a talking jag, and I wondered if it was because she was trying to avoid the subject of her husband's death. Denial is the first stage of mourning. So far, the talking jag was the only slim sign of bereavement that Hannah Smith had displayed.
"That's what he did up till about three years ago. Then he went into the private sector." She was back on the subject of Raymond Tullock. "I guess he got tired of the bad pay, carryin' a clipboard around. Driving those white state cars everywhere he went. You know they got to keep track of every single mile? With all the connections he had, Raymond got himself appointed to the state Fisheries Conservation Board—'bout the only one on it who talked against the net ban. And he set himself up as a kind of wholesale seafood agent. A restaurant needs softshell crab up on the Chesapeake? They call Raymond and he works it out, top price. He's the one that found our Japanese buyers for mullet roe. Some other place, too— Indianesia? He goes to those places, scouts around. So instead of Arlis Futch sellin' to the big fish wholesalers, we sell direct to the buyers from over there. A better deal for them, a lot better price for us, and Raymond takes his piece off the top. Does it all over the phone and fax, doesn't even own a boat. Pretty smart, huh? For a man like Raymond."
She appeared long enough to hand me a mason jar of iced tea, wedge of lime, then carried a second glass into the bathroom. Heard her say, "Don't be leaving hair in the tub, neither!" Heard Tomlinson make some enthusiastic reply; couldn't understand the words.
The tea was made with local water. Had a heavy, sulfuric musk to it that she had tried to cover by making it very sweet and strong. Tasted as if she had mixed in some New Age herb for spice. Boil any dried leaf, they call it tea.
It was different, but good. So I sat there with tea, feeling the house shake beneath me. Whenever Hannah walked—whenever anyone walked—the whole house vibrated. It was one of those old Florida cottages built of heart pine on foot-high shell-mortar blocks, raw shell beneath. The living room had a varnished oak floor and a brick fireplace. On the mantel were arrangements of dried flowers in wicker baskets, a feminine touch. There were also four or five small glass spheres, dark green in color. The spheres were smaller than a tennis ball; reminded me of old glass net floats. Hanging from the ceiling were mobiles made of seashells, and on the walls, a couple of strange paintings: dark backgrounds with fluorescent loops and whirls. The furnishings were inexpensive, simple. Wood frames and bright cushions, beanbag chairs, a rocker, a Lay-Z-Boy, and a Sony television mounted on an orange crate in the corner. A small foyer with jalousie windows faced the bay. There was a breakfast table there covered with baskets of food, cakes, a roast chicken. The kind of gifts that country people bring when there has been a death in the family.
I tried to picture the charred creature I had held in my arms sitting at that table, eating a meal, sipping coffee after a hard night on the water. Tried to picture him walking to the refrigerator for a beer, plopping down on the couch to watch a ball game . . . pictured him taking Hannah into the bedroom.
But the imagery didn't work because the props wouldn't fall into place. There was no man-spore around the house. No heavy boots on the stoop, no tangle of clothes in the corner, no sports page folded beside the Lay-Z-Boy, no tools scattered around the porch. It had been only, what? sixteen hours since Jimmy Darroux had come tumbling out of the flames. My eyes drifted up to the manteclass="underline" no wedding picture. Married couples who are childless (I saw no sign of children in the house) usually keep a wedding picture prominently displayed—a gesture I have always found touching. It is as if they are reminding themselves that they are, indeed, a family.
"Sounds like your friend's enjoying his shower. But he surefire can't sing worth a flip. What's his name again?" She was still in the kitchen, but didn't have to talk loud to be heard, The place was so small.
"Tomlinson," I said.
"He always so happy?"
"Always." Why tell her that Tomlinson also had a dark side? Twice since I had known him, he'd descended into a depression so emphatic that he did not eat; would barely speak.
She said, "He's kind'a different. No offense."
"None taken."
"I didn't mean it bad, because I like people who are different. I really do. The poet types, people who paint. That sort. See, because I'm kind of like that myself. Different. Since I was a little girl, always sort of, you know—weird. Even my daddy said so. I think I scared him."
Because I could think of no other reply, I said, "You seem normal enough to me."