Suddenly she thought: Not lay down, but lie down.
The green-brown water between the beach and the sandbar was warm. Elizabeth turned and waved at her parents, who were watching her from the blanket. The nasty little man was also watching. Her mother was sitting in the chair again. Yes, watch me. Watch over me. Because one day it will be too late.
She waded up to her waist and stood for a while, turning her shoulders from side to side and dragging her fingertips along the top of the water. She half-remembered a game of her childhood, and cupping a hand she held it just under the surface. You tried to trap a little spot of sun. It was called a fisheye. She couldn’t remember how to do it. It didn’t matter, really. Maybe you needed a bit of seaweed. But even the seaweed didn’t seem to help. No: there it was. A spot of yellow floating in her palm: a yellow eye. The man had stared at her behind. She hoped he enjoyed it: she had a good one. Men staring at women’s behinds. She wished she had an eye back there: then she could wink at them. Just fine, thanks. And you? People standing around half-naked on beaches, looking each other over. Or pretending not to look, to be above it all. Boys looking over girls, girls looking over boys. But the real killer: girls looking at girls, women at women. It was the cruellest look she knew. A look of hungry, harsh appraisal. Her this is too that. Mine is bigger. Hers is better. One day she and Marcia had invented a wonderful new bathing suit. It would cover all the parts of the body left uncovered by old-fashioned bikinis, and expose all parts now covered. They called it the Negative Bikini. It was revolutionary. It was worth a fortune. It cracked her up.
Elizabeth waded out to the sandbar and walked along the wet dark shine to the firmer sand in the middle. A fat little girl was sitting in the mud, spreading it carefully over her arms. Even she was wearing a bikini. Two boys raced; the sound of their feet on the solid wet sand was beautiful. It sounded like softly clapping hands. Beyond the sandbar people were swimming; the water was breast-high. Elizabeth waded out and went for a little swim. She swam poorly, but at least she knew how to swim. She had never been much of a beach person. She wanted to get her hair wet, she wanted to be wet all over. She wanted to dry out in the sun.
She came back up the beach toward the blanket, glancing at the woman in the red bikini as she passed. The man lay on his stomach, his face turned away.
Elizabeth stood dripping on the blanket; water streamed from her hair. She rubbed her head hard with the towel.
“Here, Dad,” she said, and flicked waterdrops at him, laughing.
“Don’t do that,” he said sharply, jerking his face away.
“Did you have a good swim?” said her mother. “It’s such a lovely day.”
Elizabeth lay down in the sun. Farther up the beach, where a few scraggly trees grew in the sand, some boys were throwing a baseball back and forth. The smack of the baseball in the leather gloves, the shouts of children, the low waves breaking slowly in uneven lines and drawing back along the sand, soothed her like soft music. A faint tang of saltwater rose from her skin. She smelled delicious to herself. Her father had wounded her for no reason. A sharp word was a knife. She lay grieving in the sun.
Dr. Halstrom said, “The tide seems to be coming in now, if I’m not mistaken. It’s a good thing we didn’t lay our blankets down by the water. We saw you bending over in the water, Bess. Were you looking for something?”
Then it was nothing. She was too emotional. Excessive.
“No. Yes, in a way. I was trying to make fisheyes: you know, those spots of sunlight? I did it, too.”
“You used to think you could bring them back,” he said. “You tried to bring me one, once.”
“Oh, come on. I don’t remember that. Really?”
“Absolutely. You thought they were pieces of gold. You kept holding the water in your hands and running up the beach. But when you arrived it was all gone.”
“It sounds a little sad.” She felt sad. The poor child! Gold running through her fingers.
“Not at all. It was a generous, noble, and beautiful thing to have done. Your mother and I were extremely touched. I explained to you that it was sunlight, and not gold, but that in another sense, a more important sense, it was gold, and that you had accomplished what you set out to do.”
Elizabeth felt so full of love for this man, this father, who gravely called her noble and generous, that she knew she could only disappoint him. She was bound to let him down, in the long run. She felt that if he knew the truth about her he would never forgive her. And yet she had no particular truth in mind. It was just how she felt.
“A fine mouthful for a five-year-old child,” said Mrs. Halstrom. “Poor Bess! She didn’t know whether she was coming or going.”
“I’m certain she understood what I said to her.” As if aware of the sharpness he added, “Or else she pretended to.” He laughed. “But that would have been nobler still.”
It was an absolutely perfectly lovely day. The sun burned down, the baseball made smacking noises. The sun warmed her clear through, filled her with lazy golden warmth. She was a golden girl, lying in the sun. She thought of the slow barge lazily sunning itself like a great lazy cat of a barge, stretching out its great barge-paws, slowly closing its drowsy barge-eyes. Beside her she heard her father take up a book. The turning of a page was a beautiful sound. Under the hot blue sky Elizabeth felt a pleasant drowsiness. She felt more and more relaxed, as if some tightness were flowing out of her. She felt calm and clear as a glass of water. A page turned. The turning of a page was like a low wave falling. The sun shone down. To fall asleep in the sun.
Elizabeth seemed to start awake. “Good gracious!” It was her mother’s voice. Her father was staring at the water with lips drawn tight. Elizabeth sat up and saw.
A boy who looked about sixteen was walking along the beach down by the water. He wore heavy bootlike shoes, black denims, and a dark, heavy parka fastened up to his neck. His hands were thrust so hard in his coat pockets that he seemed to be tugging down his shoulders. He walked quickly, furiously. Sweat streamed along his dark-tanned cheeks. He had black hair and black furious eyes. His face was so taut with fury that his high sharp cheekbones seemed to be pushing through the skin. His tense tugged-down walk made him look as if he were holding himself tightly in place to keep from blowing apart. His black eyes looked as if a black bottle had exploded inside him and flung two sharp pieces of glass into his eyeholes.
“Imagine,” said Mrs. Halstrom, “wearing a coat like that in weather like this. What on earth do you suppose is wrong with him?”
“Don’t encourage him with your attention,” said Dr. Halstrom, turning a page harshly.
All along the beach people turned to look at the dark parka. The boy tramped with hard angry strides along the firm wet sand at the edge of the beach. Water slid over his boot-toes but he tramped splashing on the water, indifferent, wrapped in his rage. Sweat glistened on his dark cheeks. Two girls on a blanket exchanged smiles. A little girl in the water pointed at him and yelled with excitement. On a blanket crowded with teenagers a muscular boy in tight turquoise-blue trunks stood up with his fists on his hips, but did not move or speak.