He kissed her once more, then stood up and crossed the small room to look out through the window. “The lake’s beautiful,” he said easily. “Want to swim a little?”
“I love you,” she said.
He drew the shades. Then he went outside and closed the door to wait on the porch while she changed into her bathing suit He smoked a cigarette and looked out at the lake.
He was twenty-six, two years out of law school. In a year or so he would be a junior partner in his father’s firm. He was married. He loved his wife.
A heavyset man waved to him from the steps of the cabin next door. He waved back. It was a good day, he thought. It would be a good three weeks.
Jill was a better swimmer than he was. He spent most of his time standing in cool water up to his waist, watching the perfect synchronization of her body. Her blond hair was all bunched up under her white bathing cap.
Later she came over to him and he kissed her. “Let’s go sit under a tree or something,” she said. “I don’t want to get a burn.”
“Jesus, no,” he said. “Sunburned on your honeymoon—”
“You sound like that drunken old woman.”
He spread a blanket on the bank and they sat together and shared a cigarette. Their shoulders were just touching. There were small woodland noises as a background, and once in a while the faraway sound of a car on the highway. That was all. He dried her back and shoulders with a towel and she took off her bathing cap and let her hair spill down.
Around five the man from the cabin next door, the one who had waved, came over to them carrying three cans of Budweiser. He said, “You kids just moved in. I thought maybe you’d have a beer with me.”
He was between forty-five and fifty, maybe thirty pounds overweight. He wore a pair of gray gabardine slacks and a navy-blue open-necked sport shirt. His forearms were brown from the sun. He had a round face, the skin ruddy under his deep tan.
They thanked him, asked him to sit down. They each took a can of beer. It was very cold and very good. The man sat down on the edge of their blanket and told them that his name was Joe Carroll and that he was from New York. Dave introduced himself and Jill and said that they were from Binghamton. Carroll said he had never been to Binghamton. He took a long drink of beer and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. He asked them if they were staying long.
“Three weeks,” Dave said.
“You picked a good spot. We been having good weather, cooler now than it was, with sun just about every day. A little rain the week before last, but not too much.”
“Have you been here long, Mr. Carroll?” Jill asked.
“Joe. Yeah, most of the summer. I’m just here by myself. You can go crazy for somebody to talk to. You kids been married long?”
“Not too long,” Dave said.
“Any kids?”
“Not yet.”
Carroll looked off at the lake. “I never got married. Almost, once, but I didn’t. I’ll tell you the truth, I never missed it. Except for kids. Sometimes I miss not having kids.” He finished his beer, held the can in one hand and looked at it. “But what with business and all, you know, a man stays pretty busy.”
“You’re in business.”
“Construction.” He waved a hand in the general direction of the lake. “Out on Long Island, Nassau County, the developments. We built oh, a whole lot of those houses.”
“Isn’t this your busy season?”
He laughed shortly. “Oh, I’m out of it now, for the time being.”
“Retired?”
“You could call it that” Carroll smiled as if at a private joke. “I may relocate,” he said. “I might pull up stakes, find a better territory.”
They made small talk. Baseball, the weather, the woman who managed the lodge. Carroll said she was a widow, childless. Her husband had died five or six years back, and she was running the place on her own and making a fairly good thing of it. He said she was a minor-league alcoholic, never blind drunk but never quite sober. “The hell,” he said, “what else has she got, huh?”
He told them about a steak house down the road where the food wasn’t bad. “Listen,” he said, “you get a chance, drop over to my place. We’ll sit around a little.”
“Well—”
“There’s more beer, I got a hot plate for coffee. You know gin rummy? We could play a few hands and pass the time.”
They ate at the steak house that Carroll recommended. It was just outside of Pomquit. The steaks were thick, the service fast, and the place had the atmosphere of a Colonial tavern, authentic without being intrusive. There was an old copper kettle hanging from a hook on one wall, and Jill wanted it. Dave tried to buy it but the manager said it wasn’t for sale. They stood outside for a few minutes after dinner and looked up at the moon. It was just a little less than full.
“Honeymoon,” she said. “Keep a-shining in June. But it’s September, isn’t it?”
“The drunken old woman said it’s better this way. You don’t want it too hot on a honeymoon.”
“Oh, no?”
“Now who’s the lecher?”
“I’m shameless,” she said. “Let’s go back to the cabin. I think I love you, Mr. Wade.”
On the slow ride home she said, “I feel sorry for him.”
“Who, Carroll?”
“Yes. He’s so lonely it’s sad. Why would he pick a spot like this to come to all alone?”
“Well, he said the fishing—”
“But all alone? There are livelier spots where the fishing must be just as good as it is here.”
“Listen, he just sold his business. Maybe he’s got problems.”
“He should have gotten married,” she said. She rolled down her window, let her arm hang out, tapped against the side of the Ford with her long fingernails. “Everybody should be married. Maybe he’ll marry the drunken old woman and she won’t drink any more and they can manage the lodge together.”
“Or tear it down and build up a tract of ugly little split-levels.”
“Either way,” she said. “Everybody should be married. Married is fun.”
“You’re incorrigible,” he said.
“I love you.”
He almost missed the turnoff for the lodge. He cut the wheel sharply to the left and the Ford moved onto the private road. He drove past the lodge itself and followed the path back to the cabin. The lights were on in Joe Carroll’s cabin. She said, “Mr. Carroll wanted us to stop in for coffee.”
“Some other time,” he said.
He parked the car and they walked slowly together up the steps to the cabin. He unlocked the door, turned on the light. They went inside and he closed the door and turned the bolt. She looked at him and he kissed her and she said, “Oh, God.” He turned off the light. The room was not completely dark. A little light came in, from the moon on one side, from Carroll’s cabin on the other.
He held her and she threw her arms around his neck and kissed him. She was a tall girl, a soft and warm girl. His. He found the zipper of her dress and opened it partway and rubbed her back with his fingers.
Outside, a car drew up slowly. The motor died and the car coasted to a stop.
She stiffened. “There’s somebody coming,” she said.
“Not here.”
“I heard a car—”
“Probably some friends of Carroll’s.”
“I hope it’s not some friends of ours,” she said, her voice almost savage. “I hope this isn’t some idiot’s idea of a joke.”
“They wouldn’t do that.”
“I just hope not.”
He let go of her. “Maybe I’d better check,” he said.
The bolt on the door was stuck. He wrestled it open, turned the doorknob, opened the door, and stepped outside onto the porch. Jill followed him, stood at his side. The car, empty now, was parked in front of their cabin by the side of the Ford. It was a big car, a Buick or an Olds. It was dark, and he couldn’t be sure of the color in the half-light. Maybe black, maybe maroon or dark green. The two men who had been in the car were walking toward Carroll’s cabin. They were short men and they wore hats and dark suits.