The Whiskey Sea

by Ann Howard Creel

  His mood had shifted like a curtain falling over a candle. She continued the massage, softening and stretching out the tight areas up near his neck, hoping to work out this inexplicable melancholy that had overcome him. She should’ve kept her mouth shut, but questions had a way of seeping out of her. Maybe she was seeking assurance that his depressed mood had nothing to do with her. “Do you really hate the idea of law school?”

  He sat up straighter, his new position revealing that anger was beginning to overcome sadness. “I can’t wait to pore over old books in musty old libraries, memorizing cases.”

  She said nothing. If he went, that was exactly the way she would want to picture him: studying, learning, making a future, and remembering her.

  With barbs of irritation shooting at her, he said over his shoulder, “Don’t you see that’s why I’m here? So I can put it out of my mind?”

  She stopped massaging and walked around to face him. “Couldn’t you do something else instead? If you like the sea, couldn’t you stay, maybe open a business? You have the means.”

  He laughed. “That would not be up to the standards my father has set for me.”

  “A successful businessman?”

  Staring out to sea, he stubbed out the cigarette. “Now, this is where we differ. You have no idea.”

  That stung, too, even though it was probably the truth.

  He looked up at her. “What will you do after the summer’s over?”

  She shrugged. “I don’t know. More of the same, or maybe I’ll quit running. I think I have enough put away for Bea. Eventually maybe I’ll get my own boat.”

  “And it’s your choice, right?”

  She nodded.

  He faced away, and the wind lifted his hair. Frieda brushed hers away from her face.

  “This is what I’m struggling with. You get to make your choices. I don’t. I know you’ll find this hard to believe, but I envy you people down here.”

  A hot bloom of anger. “You people?” she shrieked, astonished.

  “You know what I mean. No one is telling you what to do with your lives.”

  “We’re limited by so many things!”

  He gazed out to sea again. “I was afraid it would come to this. We have much in common, but it’s not enough. You don’t understand me, and I don’t understand you. You envy me; I envy you.”

  “Be careful what you wish for. You’ve romanticized a simple life by the sea. It’s harder than it looks. People are making money now, but it hasn’t always been this way, and how long will it last? We have worries you cannot even comprehend. There’s nothing original about a hardscrabble living.”

  With a chilly focus in his eyes, he tipped an imaginary hat. “Fine response, Frieda, and I do so enjoy our verbal battles. Money is to be made everywhere in this country. Opportunities abound; one has only to be bold. Look around you; that’s what has happened here. Running for rum, even though it’s illegal, is the kind of thing Americans do. Take the bull by the horns so to speak; tackle a new problem and create a way to best it. Come up with new ideas, new solutions. I’m part of a cursed class that doesn’t have that option. We must do as we’re told.” He paused and raked a hand through his hair, and that sadness which Frieda had always seen barely concealed in his eyes bloomed to life. He lowered his head and grasped it in his hands as if he could exorcise the demons roaming around in there. “Perhaps I did come here looking for something . . . But more than anything I want to be understood.” He lifted his gaze and squinted at her. “And now I see that I won’t find that here.”

  His words tore into her like the ragged edge of a blade. She wanted to understand him and to know him more than any other person in the world. Perhaps . . . perhaps Charles’s life had been empty. Perhaps he had been alone. Perhaps wealth and all its trappings really weren’t things to always yearn for. She let those thoughts seep into her, a realization about a way of life in a world beyond her reach, and apparently beyond her understanding. She shook her head without meaning to. Then why did so many people desire to be wealthy? But her prying and continuing in this way would only push him away. “I understand you more than you know. I’m trying, at least. But no more talk of the future.”

  He reached out, put his arm around her waist, and sighed. “Yes, please.”

  Frieda went back to the massage and intently listened as Charles resumed talking.

  Under her touch, Charles’s mood seemed to lift, whereas a strange heaviness entered her. With the rubble of responsibilities on her shoulders, how she longed for the ability to put questions and uncertainty aside, to live only in the current day, the current moment. Charles, despite his self-pitying, could live for the present a lot better than she could. Perhaps the differences in their backgrounds were in fact impossible to brush away.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  “I have a favor to ask,” Frieda said to Charles a week later.

  She had spent the previous night at his summer house, and they were sharing steaming cups of coffee on the veranda in the morning that had dawned only an hour earlier, warm and yellow. The Pauline was on hiatus because of a big moon, and Charles and Frieda were planning to return for another night in the city, to take Bea with them to paint the town red.

  Frieda stood at the rail without looking at him, while he lounged behind her in a chair. “I’d like to arrive in Atlantic Highlands an hour or so early, before the ferry comes.”

  “Sure,” he said. “What for?”

  Frieda chewed on a nail. “Someone I need to talk to.”

  “Why, love, that’s kind of mysterious. Do you want to tell me about it?”

  She glanced back at him and said, “Not yet,” then gazed over the bay and gauged the conditions of the water.

  When they arrived at the ferry station later that afternoon, Charles went in search of lunch, having expressed no further curiosity about Frieda’s favor, leaving her to her own devices. She wore Bea’s dress again, topped by a wide-brimmed hat, and as soon as Charles was out of sight she asked around for Whitey and was promptly directed to his boat.

  The marina in Atlantic Highlands was similar to the one in Highlands. As she came upon Whitey’s boat, down near the end of one of the piers lined with boat slips, those slips filled with everything from crude fishing boats to new luxury yachts, she was momentarily taken aback by its similarities to Dutch’s. Named Sally, she was fifty feet long, another Jersey sea skiff built for running. The sun reflected off Whitey’s near-colorless hair, gleaming in the brightness of day. He sat on the transom, a cigar in one hand, the other one pointed at a teenaged boy, whose face was hidden under a hat. It looked as though Whitey was giving the younger man a good talking-to. But as she approached, he stopped, looked up, and straightened his back.

  A skinny, bearded old codger stepped up from the engine compartment. All three of them stared at her suspiciously, as if there were cause for immediate concern about a nicely dressed young woman coming near them.

  She walked to the end of the slip, where the boat was backed stern in, and looked at Whitey, into eyes that were so much like her sister’s. She tried to contain herself, to not let her rage boil over. She had waited for a moment like this for a long time and didn’t want to spoil it with hysterics. “Might I have a moment of your time?”

  He spat a bit of tobacco from his mouth over the side of the boat. Then he set an unwavering gaze on her face. “What’s your business?”

  “Personal.”

  A man on a boat in the next slip whooped. He was the size of a bear and just as grizzled. “Personal, you say? Why old Whitey here? Why not me?”

  She gazed around. Other men on other boats were paying attention now, too. One of them wolf-whistled. She turned her attention back to the matter at hand as Whitey sat still, appraising her. Slowly he lifted himself and said, “Sure.”

  She hadn’t remembered him as being so tall and ruggedly built. When she’d first seen him, her impression had been that he was of average size. But this man was more Viking
warrior than Dutch was. She’d imagined slapping him, but her hand would probably just bounce off this monster.

  He walked behind her up the pier as many sets of eyes openly followed them. She led him to the gravel-covered parking area, where a few cars were beginning to arrive for the next ferry and people were going about their business, not paying them or their little drama any attention.

  “What’s this about?” Whitey said as he stood before her, the cigar clamped between his teeth, his hands at his sides.

  Frieda worked hard to keep her voice steady. “Do you remember Della Hope? The whore from Highlands? She was my mother.”

  Slowly he reached up and took the cigar out of his mouth. Its acrid smell wafted over to her, but his eyes had filled with instant realization. A bit of fear, a bit of interest, a bit of caution in them, too. Good. She wanted him to be nervous. “I remember her. I heard she passed on a long time ago. Sorry for your loss.”

  “I have a sister who looks just like you. Bea, Beatrice Hope.”

  He simply stood there, as if a hundred little gears were cranking to life inside his head. His gaze was softer but not shamed. Finally he said, “I figured this day would come.”

  “So you knew?”

  He gestured around and shuffled his feet a bit. “This area ain’t nothing but a bunch of small towns. People told me there was a girl, one of Della’s daughters, who could be mine.”

  “And yet you did nothing about it.”

  “Wasn’t much for me to do. I didn’t know nothing for sure, and I was about nineteen when I went to see Della. Bachelor night, you know? I got married the next day.”

  “How does someone do that? What kind of person can do that? You knew you had a daughter and yet you kept away.”

  “By the time I found out it was likely, I was married with kids. And I knew you girls was being taken care of. What was I supposed to do? Based only on looks, I was supposed to come and claim her?”

  Frieda pulled in a ragged breath, not sure what she was feeling or how to react. She had imagined lashing out at him, calling him names, and even shaming him in front of others. But now with Bea’s absence, Silver’s condition, and the mystery of Charles, it seemed much of the fight had been taken out of her, and her desire to strike out at him was waning. Her heart, which had been racing, slowed, and she found herself at a loss.

  He said, “What do you want?”

  Frieda shifted her purse from one hand to the other. The sun was near blinding, and it hurt her eyes. She shielded her face with the flat of her hand. “I-I’m not sure.”

  “Well, if you’re aiming to ruin a man’s life, go on ahead. I’ll march you right up those streets and take you to see my wife. She’s a good, God-fearing, churchgoing woman, and it’d break her heart. But tell her all of it, if that’s what you’re aiming to do. I’d rather that than waiting around for it to happen.”

  “That’s not why I came.”

  “Then what?”

  She thought about the tiny rooms where she had lived for the first five years of her life. Though she could barely remember it now, thoughts of that place still brought only sorrow and hopelessness. “Did you care anything about my mother?”

  “She was a sweet woman. But I hardly knew her, to tell you the truth. I went to her that one time. I was a kid doing a foolish wild thing right before getting married. You weren’t there, and I had no idea Della would be getting in the family way. I only heard about you two girls years later. Guess when people began to see your sister out and about they put two and two together.”

  Nodding, Frieda dropped her hand from her eyes.

  “Why aren’t you looking for your own father?”

  She snapped back. “I have one. His name is Silver. He never knew my mother, at least not in the biblical sense, but he raised Bea and me. He has been our father.” But the truth was she hadn’t looked for her own father, because it was easier to hate a nameless, faceless person than a real one. Today had shown her that for certain. If her natural father turned out to be decent, what would she do? She would be lost. Besides, she had Silver. She had no need for another father.

  He glanced away, then stared into her face, still flushed with outrage. He spoke with more gentleness than she imagined such a big man would possess. “I know Silver. A fine man. I heard he’s took sick.”

  This nearly rocked Frieda off her heels. He knew Silver? If these two men knew each other, then Silver had to know that Whitey was Bea’s father. She stuttered out, “He . . . he’s doing fine.”

  They stood in silence, the minutes ticking by as brilliant sunlight poured down.

  “If it’s money you’re after, I’ve been doing well for myself lately. I can send some for Beatrice.”

  “No, no, it’s not money I’m looking for. I have plenty for her. Did you know your daughter is very bright, very kind, too, and that she was accepted into NYU? She’s in the city now. I’m going to be seeing her tonight, in fact.”

  A new expression entered his eyes, what seemed to be a mix of sadness and pride. “I’m glad to hear that.”

  “You’d be proud of her.”

  He said softly. “I am. From what you’re telling me, I already am.”

  She was having a hard time gathering up her emotions and sorting through them. She had expected him to be a monster, but he wasn’t. Just a regular man who had “sinned” once and nothing more.

  “What else?” he asked.

  Finally she centered herself. “Nothing else. I just thought you should know. But apparently you already did.”

  “I’m sorry if I’ve gone and disappointed you. Do you aim to tell Miss Beatrice?”

  She shrugged. “I don’t know yet. She’s never expressed much interest in her natural parentage. I’m not sure I’d do that to her.”

  “What’s your name?”

  “Frieda.”

  “Well, Frieda, I’m pleased to’ve met you, despite what you may be thinking. And I want to thank you for not saying anything in front of my boy. That young man on the boat back there, he’s my oldest son. At a turning point in his life. Stuck in that place between boy and man. Don’t think it would have set well with him if he found out about this.”

  “What will you say when you go back?” she asked, and gestured in the direction of the piers.

  “I’ll think of something. Maybe I’ll say that you’re sweet on me.” He smiled but not in a leering way, more like an apology.

  She could find no more to say to this man. All her imagined recriminations had gotten up and walked away. All the elation she had imagined feeling from this confrontation had disappeared. It had been easier to hate him.

  Finally she asked, “Why Sally?”

  “That’s my daughter’s name. My oldest daughter.”

  “How many kids do you have?”

  “Four—two girls and two boys.” He stared down at his feet. “Guess if Beatrice is mine, that means I have five.”

  “Well . . .” She drew in a long breath, prepared to end this.

  He looked at her pleadingly, but he was not the kind of man who’d ever beg. “Frieda, let me know about Beatrice from time to time. Come and see me, will you?”

  She nodded and felt tears about to bloom, but she buried them down.

  Once the ferry began to surge over the bay waters, Frieda finally experienced a bit of the elation she’d expected to feel while confronting Whitey, but it had little to do with him. She realized anew that she didn’t want or need to know her natural father. Would she ever see Whitey again? Would Bea want to know? Would she in time tell her?

  She didn’t know.

  The strength of the ferry’s engines jolted through her, and its groaning filled her ears. The ferry pitched forward against the chop in the bay, and the movement gave her a sensation of solid forward momentum, of change.

  Once in the city they headed straight to Bea’s apartment, and Frieda was relieved she remembered the way. At the door, just as she was prepared to knock her eyes landed on a note sli
pped between the bottom of the door and the threshold. It read:

  Sorry I won’t be able to make it tonight. I’ve joined a fan club for people who are intrigued by Mrs Dalloway. Couldn’t miss it. I’m having so much fun and learning so much. Hope you have a swell night. Love, Bea.

  Frieda swallowed before speaking, and as she folded the note she said to Charles, “She can’t make it. A previous commitment.”

  Charles knew she had written to her sister and had planned the evening over a succession of letters. He knew how excitedly she had been looking forward to it.

  “Perhaps baby sister doesn’t like the idea of you and me,” Charles said.

  Frieda shook her head. “She’s not like that.” She couldn’t imagine what had gone wrong. Despite the geographical separation from her sister, Frieda had still sensed an invisible filament connecting her with Bea across space and time. But now it felt missing. She couldn’t imagine that Bea had felt her fan club more important than her sister. Then again, Bea was exactly the kind of girl to be swept away by the city. She’d probably been whizzed into a circle of people who were very like her: smart and visionary, maybe a little flighty. People who wouldn’t think that much about missing a prearranged meeting.

  She whispered, “How could a book be so important?”

  “Have you read it?”

  She shook her head.

  “I’ll give you my copy.”

  “I-I don’t really read.”

  His face fell. “You don’t know how to read?”

  Insulted, she looked up. “Of course I know how to read. I finished high school. I just don’t read for pleasure.”

  He gently rubbed her upper arms. “You’re upset about your sister, but I think it’s actually good news. She’s met a group of friends. She’s not sitting around waiting for us. Didn’t you want that for her? Plus that means that tonight I have you all to myself.”

  “But I have money for her. She might need it for her tuition; I’m not sure when it’s due.”