by Paula Fox
“If the conductors found out you were on one of their trains, they’d make sure the car was pushed onto a siding. Then it would rust, and weeds would grow as high as the windows, and stray cats would be your only visitors,” said Deirdre.
“Perfect!” said Aaron delightedly.
Gran had begun to tell a story about being locked out of a house. The children fell silent to listen.
“My father got a part in a gangster movie—just a small part, really—but on the strength of it, he and my mother rented a house in Hollywood. I recall it had a waterfall you could turn on and off with a switch. I was living then with my aunt Emma. They sent for me, and Aunt Emma and I went west on the train. While she was in San Diego visiting a friend, I renewed my acquaintance with my parents. They went out the first night I was there, leaving me alone. I must have gotten worried, or curious, and I went out the front door of that big house. The door slammed shut and locked itself. So there I was, about six, I think, in the Hollywood Hills.”
Aaron gasped. “I’d like to get locked out,” he whispered excitedly to Elizabeth.
“Anytime,” Deirdre said.
“I ran into the garden to look at that waterfall,” Gran was saying. “My father had neglected to switch it off before they left for their party. The water fell into a big pool full of goldfish. Something about the dark garden, the falling water, the orange glimmer of fish, must have startled me. I ran back to the front of the house. I had begun to be scared. Soon, a man came along who’d heard the waterfall and thought he’d left his lawn sprinkler on. He took me to his house, and his wife cut up a banana and poured cream on it to give to me. She put me to bed. I can still see the quilt she covered me with, its diamonds of bright colors, though it’s sixty-eight years since I last saw it.”
“Heavens, Cora!” exclaimed Mrs. Herkimer. “My parents would never have left me alone!”
“There’s another part to the story,” Gran went on. “Before Elizabeth was born, when my son and her mother were living with me in the farmhouse, I locked myself out for the second time in my life. I’d gone to a painter friend’s opening and party in Boston. I got home around two A.M. It was winter and very cold, and I’d misplaced my house key. Elizabeth’s father, my dear son, let me in. Now and then, life balances out.”
“Could you tell that story again?” asked Aaron.
“When you come to visit me,” Gran said.
Mrs. Herkimer rose. “I’ve made blueberry duff from an old family recipe,” she said.
“Help your mother clear, Deirdre,” ordered Mr. Herkimer.
“Do I have to?”
“No. You can retire to your room instead.”
Elizabeth was preoccupied. Why did she feel so uneasy? Was it because Gran had looked only at her as she talked? Was it because Gran had revealed how different her life was from other people’s lives?
She shouldn’t have told the Herkimers—especially the Herkimers—about being left alone and locked out. Wasn’t being a painter different enough? Yet everyone had paid attention to her. And Mrs. Herkimer had even appeared to be interested.
She had walked back into the dining room by then, carrying a dish crowded with squares of dough covered with blueberries. “My specialty,” she said as she set down the dish.
“But what did your daddy say when he couldn’t find you after he got home?” Aaron asked.
“That’s still another part of the story,” Gran said, smiling at him. “I’ll tell you another time.”
“I was so fortunate in my parents,” Mrs. Herkimer said with a long, gratified sigh.
“Yes,” Deirdre snapped. “You might have been born in an old trailer and had some lady swear your mattress was full of money when you couldn’t afford to buy one of your own lobsters!”
“Deirdre, that will do!” said Mr. Herkimer sternly.
“I think the sky is so starry tonight we might not need our flashlight,” Gran said quickly.
His mouth full of dessert, Aaron said to Elizabeth, “Let’s go back to the cemetery tomorrow.”
“We’ll see,” she replied.
“You sound like one of them,” he complained.
She started to protest, but Gran, Deirdre, and the Herkimers were moving into the entrance hall. Aaron stayed in his chair, picking blueberries out of the dough squares and stuffing his mouth with them. Elizabeth joined the others. Mrs. Herkimer drew her aside at once.
“Aaron really does like you,” she said. “If you could keep him company once in a while, you could think of it as a summer job—we’d pay you—”
“You won’t pay her,” Gran said, walking to where they were standing.
Elizabeth felt a flash of resentment. It wasn’t up to Gran. At the same time, she knew she was right. And in any case, she didn’t want to be a baby-sitter on Pring Island.
Deirdre was gesturing at her. She went to the staircase, where the girl was leaning against the newel post, holding the teddy bear in one hand. She didn’t seem to be aware of how fiercely she was clutching it.
“You really are lucky,” she said in a low voice. Her face worked as though she were thinking very hard. Then she said, as Elizabeth stood there awkwardly, “Your luck is that you weren’t born into a family that thinks it’s more wonderful than any other family in the history of the world.”
Elizabeth still felt the surprise of Deirdre’s words as she and Gran walked through the meadow. When they were well out of earshot of the Herkimer house, she said, “That’s some bunch of people! They all seem crazy except Mr. Herkimer, and he’s like their keeper.”
Gran laughed and the sound of her laughter was comforting in the cool dark night. She had turned on the flashlight after all. The vast sky glimmered through a thin cloud cover. “Families are pretty crazy when you see them close up,” she said.
They had reached the stony beach. Water lapped softly.
“Is Deirdre always so angry?”
“When I first knew her, she was like a sweet bird playing in the meadow. A merry little girl. Growing up is hard, and then there’s their absorption in Aaron.”
“I’ll never be like Deirdre,” Elizabeth said.
“Don’t say ‘never,’ Elizabeth,” Gran said.
They rounded the sand spit. The cottage rose before them, a small, black cliff. Grace meowed nearby.
“Oh!” Gran exclaimed. “I locked her out!”
“When you came home that morning in Hollywood, what did your parents say?”
“As I recall,” Gran said, “they didn’t notice I’d been gone.”
7
El Sueño arrived at the Herkimer dock, which was larger and sturdier than Gran’s, early the next morning.
Everyone gathered in silence, after muttered “good mornings,” to observe the boat’s slow approach into the cove. Elizabeth thought, We’re just like the birds that come to sit on the sand spit in the late afternoons.
They all came closer to the dock as a thin boy of fifteen or so moved quickly to tie up the boat and began to unload boxes and bags of groceries and bundles of mail. Old Jake Holborn would point wordlessly to a box. The boy would heft it and dump it from deck to dock.
Jake looked much older than Gran. A black watch cap covered his head. His dark blue sweatshirt was spotted with paint stains. Elizabeth noted the much-knotted laundry string that threaded the eyelets of his old-fashioned sneakers. An unlit cigarette hung from the corner of his mouth.
“I don’t see my eggplant,” complained Mrs. Herkimer.
“I couldn’t find none,” Jake said, the cigarette bobbing as he spoke. “Eggplant shortage all over the state of Maine.” Mrs. Herkimer looked offended.
Aaron darted to Elizabeth’s side. “Come and get me as soon as you can,” he said. “We’ll go to the cemetery.”
“When I’m able to,” she said with a touch of irritation. He would gobble up all her time if she let him. He was watching her face closely.
“Please,” he asked mournfully.
“Okay. In a
while,” she said.
The Herkimers were trailing across the meadow with their supplies. Jake Holborn came over to Gran. “This is your grandchild?” he asked, staring at Elizabeth.
“Indeed she is,” Gran replied.
“Looks like you in a way,” he said. “Greeley, help these folks take their stuff to the cottage.”
“Would you like a cup of tea, Jake?” Gran asked.
“No time today, Cora. I’ve got two more islands. Some new people over at Staghead with what looks to be about twenty kids.”
“I’ve nearly finished the drawing of El Sueño,” Gran told him. “I’ll have it for you next trip.”
The old man’s face lit up with his smile, and the cigarette fell out of his mouth. He caught it with his spotty, gnarled hand. “That’ll be nice,” he said. “A comfort when winter comes.”
Later, after he and the silent Greeley had chugged out of the cove, and Gran was putting away groceries, Elizabeth asked to see the drawing. Gran went to look among her canvasses and sketchbooks. She found what she was searching for and handed it to Elizabeth.
Taped to a pasteboard was a drawing of El Sueño, Jake in his watch cap standing on the deck.
“Someone in Molytown actually owns the launch,” Gran explained. “But Jake can’t help but feel it’s his. He’s been running the service to the islands for thirty years. I know he’s scared about how much longer he can manage. He asked me to take a few snapshots of the launch. I decided to do a drawing, too.”
“Does he have children?”
“None. He’s alone.”
“Aaron asked me to go with him to the cemetery again.”
“Do you want to? You’re not obliged, you know.”
“I like him all right, but not feeling I have to spend time with him.”
“It’s up to you, Elizabeth. Maybe you can be a substitute sister. One of these days, Deirdre might stop being horrible. I’m going to work now. You can have a big lunch today. Fresh eggs, tomatoes, Swiss cheese, among other good things.”
Gran went across the room into her work territory. It was as if she had left the cottage.
Elizabeth went to her room and opened To Kill a Mockingbird. But she couldn’t concentrate. Her glance strayed to the windows. She caught sight of the sparkle of water, the dark vigorous green of pine boughs. She didn’t see how she was going to get through two novels before school began. She used to read all the time. This last year, something had changed. Every book was a heavy weight. She was struck by an idea. She could read one of them to Aaron.
After looking at the first chapters, she decided the Hemingway story might hold Aaron’s attention. Short sentences for short boys, she told herself.
After she’d made a sandwich and eaten it, she left the cottage. Gran didn’t look up as Elizabeth went out the door.
The island looked washed clean, as if the tide had risen to cover it briefly, then left it to dry in the sun. At the Herkimer house, Aaron was waiting for her, sitting on the ground, a sack of cookies balanced on one knee.
“You came! I’ve been waiting a hundred hours!” he cried.
Mrs. Herkimer came to the screen door.
“We don’t want to impose on you, Elizabeth,” she said. “My family never imposes. Are you sure you want to play with Aaron?”
“And be responsible for him,” Mr. Herkimer said as he joined his wife. “Is that too heavy a responsibility perhaps, even for a serious girl like you?”
“I’m light as a feather,” Aaron said.
“I want to,” Elizabeth said in what was nearly a shout. At the moment, she found the Herkimers unbearable and wished only to get away from them.
“For God’s sake! What can happen to him on this stupid pile of rocks and gull guano?” Deirdre’s exasperated voice came from somewhere above. Elizabeth looked up and saw her sitting in the crotch of a small oak, a book in one hand.
“Don’t speak so coarsely, Deirdre,” said Mrs. Herkimer. “Elizabeth will think we’re a low family.”
Aaron suddenly leaped up and took off to the back of the house, and Elizabeth followed, hearing the Herkimers calling Aaron’s name reproachfully. There was a mocking falsetto echo of their voices from Deirdre.
“Here’s a game,” Aaron said as she caught up with him beneath one of the white-barked trees. He stood with his arms circling the thin trunk. “In the cemetery, you can pretend to be an Egyptian mummy. I’ll dig you up—then you’ll tell me what it was like in those olden days.”
He let go of the tree and raced on ahead of her.
“I don’t know about mummies and Egypt,” Elizabeth cried after him. He paused and turned.
“Make it up,” he ordered. “You just need a little bit of a thing to start a story. Pretty soon, there’s everything!”
He jumped over a fallen branch and ran on. As she emerged from the woods, he streaked across the long meadow. When Elizabeth reached the little cemetery, he was reclining against a gravestone, chewing a stem of grass.
“Ready?” he asked.
Elizabeth lay flat on the ground and crossed her arms over her chest. She shut her eyes against the blue glare of the cloudless sky.
“I’m sure there’s a mummy here,” Aaron said loudly. “You assistants be careful as you dig! More to the left! There it is!”
Suddenly, his breath was warm against her ear as he whispered, “Now you have to sit up. Begin to talk.”
Elizabeth slowly raised herself from the waist.
“Look, men! The mummy is alive,” he cried.
Elizabeth stifled a laugh that was rising in her throat like a bubble in a bottle. She felt nervous, too, as though she had to speak a part in a play she hadn’t learned.
“I am an old Egyptian,” she began in a deep voice. “I live by the Nile River. In the mornings, the crocodiles come up to sun themselves on the banks.”
“What did you have for breakfast?” Aaron asked as he sat down on the ground in front of her.
“Cornflakes, burned toast, and blueberry jam.”
“Oh, Elizabeth!”
“All right … all right. I had coconuts and dates.”
“Good! And after, did you play with all your friends, the other mummies?”
“I played with all my friends,” Elizabeth intoned.
“What?” he asked impatiently. “What did you play?”
“Chariots,” she said. “We have toy chariots and we race them and the crocodiles watch. Then we do our schoolwork on papyrus sheets. Then we have lunch.”
“What’s papyrus?”
“It’s a kind of paper made from water plants.”
He had been watching her intently, but now his gaze grew unfocused. She could see interest fading from his face like light dimming in a room. He looked down at the bay.
“Could you take me out in our sailboat?” he asked. “I know what to do if a storm comes up. Daddy said you have to tie yourself to the mast and let the sail fly. That way you won’t be washed out to sea.”
“I don’t know how to sail,” she said.
“We could find a bigger island. We could get lost and build a shelter of branches.”
“I really can’t sail,” she said.
After that, they went toward the ridge. Elizabeth found still another path, this one with a few rough-hewn stone steps at the steepest part. Had those early settlers built them to be able to reach the sea more easily?
It was thrilling to go from the peaceful meadow, over the ridge, to the black rocks, to hear the boom of the water as it rolled across the stones, into coves, snaking into deep crevices and sending spray high into the air.
They drifted along the shore, sometimes together, mostly apart. For a long time, they sat at the edge of a tidal pool sunk into the middle of a large boulder. Through greenish scum, they saw tiny crabs move with mysterious haste, and tiny fish like grains of rice dart in and out of clumps of weed. The sun was like a hot towel pressed to their heads and shoulders. Abruptly, Aaron said he had to go home, he was hu
ngry. They must have been together for hours by then.
A picture of the kitchen in her own home flashed in Elizabeth’s mind, and she felt restless, suddenly bored. She was glad to leave that harsh, glittering place.
When they came to the stone steps, Aaron asked, “Do you think stones can feel us walking on them?”
She replied that she didn’t know.
In the cottage later, she repeated his question to Gran. “Stones are inorganic, without life,” Gran said. “At least, as far as is known.”
“Aaron sees the smallest things. I get tired of so much noticing.”
“It’s a way of making a private world,” Gran said, and drank from her mug of tea.
“You said he liked the poem about Prudence Baldwin,” she said a moment later. “I’ve written down another by Robert Frost that’s even shorter. Maybe I’ll find a one-liner before you go home. Here.” She reached into a pocket and took out a scrap of paper that she handed to Elizabeth. The two lines were printed in pencil:
We dance round in a ring and suppose,
But the Secret sits in the middle and knows.
Elizabeth read it.
“Aaron’s a secret,” she said.
“Aren’t we all?” Gran asked in a weary voice. Elizabeth stared at her. Her head drooped. Her skin was pale. Gran looked back at her. “I’ll go lie down,” she said almost shyly. “I worked too long, I think.”
Elizabeth watched her as she climbed the stairs, one hand gripping the rope banister, the other pressed against the wall.
For a few minutes, Elizabeth sat motionless at the table, hearing again Gran’s words: “a one-liner before you go home.” She had been angry at home, and angry here on Pring.
She had wanted to bicycle away with Nancy to escape the grip of anger that woke with her in the mornings, and kept her awake at night when Stephen Lindsay’s cries sent her parents whirling through the house.
Though it was only the third day she had been on the island, the grip had loosened. As she gazed around the room that had, at first glance, looked so strange, even senseless, it seemed almost beautiful, almost like a person she had begun to love.