Katherine had arrived early for the service and sat in the center of a rear pew. There were a few people already at the front, mostly old people, weathered and stiff in Sunday-morning clothes worn out of order on this afternoon. As the time approached for the service, a few more slipped silently past her, genuflected on the worn red carpet runner that ran down the center aisle, and added to the hushed rows at the front. The people knew each other and touched hands across the tall wood backs.
If Katherine had known the empty rows would not fill, she would have sat closer to the front. She had not wanted to be in the way, but the gap was too wide. It must seem intentional to those in front.
Maria stopped abruptly at the row where Katherine sat, and Sam had to backtrack a little to rejoin her. He nodded to the girl that they would sit with Katherine, and a nervous innocent smile brightened Maria’s face as she sidestepped into the pew. Katherine’s smile held through her greeting. She wished the service would begin.
Maria wore a simple black dress. It was new, as were her black, low-heeled shoes. In contrast Sam wore a long-used gray suit with the coat unbuttoned. His brown shoes didn’t match.
They waited silently for the silence to end. The music had stopped, and there was no other sound to fill the empty space. Everyone sat still, unmoving, and expectant. The priest appeared at the altar, and the service began.
With some hesitancy in the beginning the three strangers followed the actions of the parishioners and stood and sat in unison with them, although they didn’t kneel with the others. The priest spoke in Spanish and English so that everyone understood. It was a sad day, he said, when a mother and child, both so young, were put to rest together. It was sometimes difficult to understand God’s will. Katherine agreed with that. She could not understand it at all. While he went further into the idea of God’s will, her mind stayed fixed in the ashes of the mother and daughter, side by side or perhaps even mingled together in the same casket. She heard the priest speak of hope. If he had heard the boy’s infernal laughter, would he speak of hope? And as she thought of it, the laughter suddenly filled the church and echoed in the tall arches that reached heavenward just as it had in the basement on First Avenue. Tell me, priest, how to understand that laughter.
Maria was crying. Her hand rose secretly to her face to remove tears before they fell. Katherine guessed that her tears came from many places. Why would Sam bring her to the funeral? He should have spared the girl this final ordeal.
Sam put his arm around the girl, and his hand, so close to Katherine, patted Maria softly. Maria tilted her head briefly in his direction, and Katherine thought she saw the girl smile despite her tears. The smile was enough of a miracle that she didn’t need to imagine the one the priest was offering. She decided to refrain from further judgment.
Katherine thought back to Sam’s voice on the telephone as he explained that he was taking time off and would not be at the dock. She wondered if he would ever be there again, or if she would. Katherine remembered the girl’s face upon recognizing her mother’s name. Gloria? He calls his kayak Gloria?
The service ended, and old men picked up the heavy casket and carried it down the aisle. She wondered why there was such a large box. Perhaps Mr. and Mrs. Sanchez had to have something substantial to see and to touch. Why were there no young people to carry the load? Where were her friends? Some boy must have kissed her once. Some girl must have played with her on the swing. Did her young friends think that she had fallen from grace and they were different? Did they think that they could hide from the old men who carried the casket holding mother and child or from the sad, worn faces who followed it?
Mr. Sanchez and his wife, Olivia, were first behind the casket. Mrs. Abbott walked between them. They stopped when they came to the row of outsiders. Sanchez held his hand out to Sam, who stood awkwardly in the narrow space between the church pews. The whole procession stopped, including the priest who led the casket and the old men who carried it.
“Come out with us,” Mr. Sanchez said.
Sam reached for Maria’s hand and she stood with him.
“Come,” he said simply, and with his hand included Katherine.
She also stood up and followed his instructions. Katherine found herself immediately behind the casket. She looked for an opening to drop back in line, but there was no time and no opportunity. The procession began again and she was in it.
As they walked down the front steps of the church, the old man ahead of her stumbled and nearly lost his balance. Katherine instinctively reached for him and then for the casket. The old man turned to her and smiled with embarrassment. “Gracias, señorita,” he said. There was sweat on his brow and he appeared ill. Katherine looked to see how far they would walk. The cemetery was across the street from the church, and the grave with its canopy was at the far end. She moved closer so that she could assist more ably and lifted the handle at the rear corner of the casket.
“It is not necessary,” the old man said with great dignity. “I have done this many times.”
“It would be an honor,” she said, surprised by her own words that had so readily adopted his dignity.
“Then by all means,” he replied. “And you, señorita?” he asked Maria, who had also tried to help but had found there was little room to contribute.
“Yes,” Maria said.
“Fernando,” he called across the casket, “make room on your side. We shall have something new today.”
Maria went to the other side and the casket bearers shuffled forward a little and redistributed the load.
Katherine took small steps behind the old man as they descended to the street. They crossed the street to the cemetery gate and then followed a gravel path. Mostly she saw the gray hair of the old man ahead of her. It was oiled and combed, but resisted regulation and stood straight in the back.
Until then someone else had always carried this load of mother and child—the detectives and coroners with their carts and bags, the undertakers, the old men. It was better to feel some of the weight, although all of it now was from the casket. The mother and the baby weighed nothing.
At the graveside the priest prayed again—this time, only in Spanish. When he made the sign of the cross, the casket bearers gently lowered the box. Maria and Katherine stood aside as there were not enough canvas straps for everyone, but the old man whom Katherine had assisted took her hand and put it on a strap that they lowered together.
Instead of the casket she saw the baby, curled into a tiny ball in the small empty room. Too short a life, too brutal a world, too many who would not hear her cry. Listen, she told herself. Hear her cry.
Chapter 42
Beneath the deck Sam lifted the new kayak off the sawhorses and dropped it upright on the ground. He opened the rear hatch and stuffed in his work belt and a canvas bag that held an assortment of tools. He walked down to the beach and looked east where there was a hint of predawn light. A much brighter light came on in Georgia’s house. A silhouette appeared in her window. He raised his hand and waved slowly and carefully. Georgia responded in nearly exact duplication. Then she moved away from the window, and the light behind her went out.
He walked back to the kayak and pulled the hammer out of his work belt. He looked at Georgia’s house again and then pounded the hammer on the creosote post supporting the deck.
“Let’s go,” he yelled.
“I’m coming,” said the voice from above.
Maria ran down the steps with her hands engaged in the last steps of tying back her hair. She wore blue jeans and heavy laced boots and pulled fishing gloves out of her waterproof jacket. She zipped a life jacket over her coat and tossed his life jacket to him. He had never worn a life jacket in the kayak, but she wouldn’t wear one unless he did. He zipped it over his sweatshirt.
“Front or back?” he asked.
“I’ll steer,” she said.
“You’ll be sorry if you get those boots wet.”
“I won’t get them wet. Do you
need any help with that?” She pointed to the open hatch.
“No. I have everything,” he said.
He fastened the hatch cover down and reached for the grip on the bow of the new kayak. Below the grip was the freshly painted name, North Star. She grabbed the rear grip and they carried the boat to the water. She held the stern while he got into the front cockpit and cinched the waist skirt tightly around him. Then she pushed the kayak forward until her feet were at the farthest reach of the water. The bow was buoyant. He steadied the boat with his paddle while she lowered herself into the rear cockpit. When he urged the kayak forward with his paddle, she stuck hers into the sand and pushed them off the beach. In deeper water she released the rudder and joined the rhythm of his strokes.
“Good job,” he said. “Just like an expert.”
“It’s easy when all the weight is in front.”
Sam decreased the angle of his paddle so that at the completion of a stroke it broke the surface and threw a stream of water toward her. He expected retaliation, but she only laughed.
She had become stronger, and it was now possible to leave ten minutes later than when he crossed alone. He had not adjusted his alarm yet. He still believed she would come to her senses and decide to sleep in. Nevertheless she had been ready every day except those when she was not working. When he went alone in Gloria, it seemed more than a ten-minute difference.
Today, Sunday, they had slept later, which may have accounted for her lack of retaliation. Today they would build something. If everything went right and there were no surprises, they would finish by the end of the day. It was Maria’s idea, but he had planned the details. She had quite a few ideas, and he wasn’t sure he had details for all of them.
She liked to sit in the rear cockpit so that she could steer the North Star with the foot pedals. Also, when she sat behind him, he couldn’t see how hard she paddled. At first her arms had hurt so much that they felt like they would fall off, but she was becoming used to it. She had learned to pace herself and not dig her paddle so deeply in the water.
“Do you think Silve will have breakfast ready?” she asked.
“I hope so. I’m starved,” he said. “How much time?”
They passed the rock jetty that had become their first mark.
“Thirteen minutes, ten seconds.” It was her job to track the time.
“The best so far. You must have slept well.”
“I did. How about you?”
“I slept well,” he said. “Silve seemed a little nervous yesterday. Do you suppose he’s having second thoughts?”
“No, but he’s worried about getting everything done before he opens tomorrow. He says that all he knows about saws and hammers is that one cuts off your finger and the other smashes it.”
Her father did not stop paddling even as he laughed.
“I wish Katherine would be there to meet us,” Maria said.
“Way too late. She’s long gone by now. Look. You can see Silve’s windows from here.” He pointed with his paddle. “Above the Viaduct,” he said. “The only windows that are lit.”
“You should call her,” she said.
“What are you talking about?” he asked. He stopped paddling and turned to look at her.
“I was just wondering if you shouldn’t call her.”
“How do you know what I do? You’re not around all the time.”
“So, do you call her?”
“None of your business. Anyway, what about you? Not that I’m encouraging anything.”
She flicked her paddle forward to shoot water his way—delayed retaliation. He turned to the front again, dug his paddle deep into the water, and yelled over his shoulder, “Get in gear, or we won’t beat our record.” Then he felt the surge that came when their strokes were synchronized and both were pulling hard. This time he was going to push her. He wasn’t going to ease off. That ought to keep her quiet.
She maintained a serious stroke longer than he expected and called out the time when he asked for it. At the buoy marking the final third of the distance, they were way ahead of their previous best, and he slowed to a normal pace. If he did not, he would lack the strength to walk up the hill to Silve’s. He looked back at her determined face and saw her struggling to keep up.
“Still with me?” he asked. He could still only wonder that she was there.
“Barely.”
“I’m dying, too,” he said, believing the opposite.
When they climbed the final steps that wound up Post Alley to Pike Place, they stopped for a moment to rest. Sam looked down Pike Street across First Avenue toward the Donut Shop. It was still closed. Otherwise the street had not changed. What had it all been about then?
Maria looked down the street with him. She had his tool belt slung over her shoulder and looked like a lumberjack with a pretty face. The wound above her eye had almost disappeared. He put his arm on her shoulder, over the tool belt, as they walked toward Silve’s.
Sam tapped on Silve’s window, and the old man raised his knife in recognition from behind the stove. He hurried to the door.
“Good morning, sir,” he said. “And you, Maria.”
“Good morning, my friend,” Sam said. “Has he got you working already, Henry?”
“Yes sir,” said the other little man, who continued scrubbing a blackened pot at the triple sink. “Lots to do today.”
“He comes early,” Silve said. “I told him today we would start late, but he comes early anyway.”
“What time did you come?” Sam asked Silve.
“I wake up, so I come. Are you hungry?”
“Yes. Maria wanted to take the kayak so we worked up a good appetite.”
“Are you crazy? You take that little boat today? Maria, you better be careful. You will be strong as your papa if you keep that up. Big muscles. The boys will be afraid.” He laughed in his way that forgot everything—from the belly with his head tilted back, his body shaking, and the knife in his hand becoming dangerous.
“I like that idea,” Sam said. “Big muscles so the boys will be afraid.”
“Sure. Then you don’t have to worry so much.” Silve began his laugh again, but he heard a noise from one of his steaming pots and cut it short. He hurried back to the stove. “Scrambled eggs with special adobo sauce. Breakfast style,” he said while concentrating on his work.
Maria carried the tool belt down to the dining room and put it on the floor. Then she went back to the kitchen to help Silve with breakfast. He was teaching her his secrets. He had already taught her to make the adobo sauce, something he would not teach her father.
She liked standing at the stove beside the old man. He talked to himself and to her in the same sentence. If he bumped into her, he didn’t apologize, and she didn’t feel that she had to get out of the way. He showed her how to shake a pan across the flame so that the meat would simmer evenly. He made noise when he cooked, sent fire into the air, and took chances with spice. Try it, he would say, and she would.
No matter what her father said, her adobo sauce was not as good as Silve’s. She hoped it might never be.
Sam walked down the steps and put his hand on the wall separating the kitchen and dining room. He pushed it to see if it would move. It did not. It was a simple idea to take it down and replace it with a counter, but he had never thought of it. Nor had Silve, who often talked about what it had been like before the new design that separated him from his customers. Maria had seen it. It was as though she were the only one whose mind was not trapped by the wall. Moving the steps and extending the kitchen platform was a little complicated, but the basic idea was simple. The wall supported nothing and should come down.
When the eggs were ready, the four of them ate together in the booth next to the wall. Silve wanted to sit in the booth one last time before they pulled it out. He wanted the last bit of use from wasted money.
“I will pay you for this work,” Silve said.
“I don’t want to be paid,” Sam replied. “I
f I’m paid, I have to work too hard.”
“Then the coffee will be free when you come in the morning.”
“No. It’s better the way it is.”
“I will make oxtail for you.”
“Good. One dinner. That will be enough.”
“Not for all this work.”
“Wait until we’re through before you say that. Maybe I’ll owe you money when we’re done.”
“No. This Maria had a good idea,” Silve said. “I should have hired her instead of that architect who could only draw the lines.”
“Maybe she should become an architect,” Sam said. “Tell Silve about the university,” Sam said to Maria.
“I’m starting winter quarter,” Maria said. “But it won’t change my hours here. I’m taking classes in the afternoon.”
“You must think of school first,” the old man said. “If you have classes in the morning, that’s all right. An education is very important.”
“I want to work here in the morning. This is an education, too.”
The old man raised his head and smiled. “Two educations, then. I will teach class in the morning, and those others can do it in the afternoon. Will you still come with your papa?”
“Yes. I’ll take the bus to school after work.”
“But then he will have to go home alone. He will get very tired paddling that boat by himself. Since you started, I think he has gotten lazy. Maybe you should get a motor, Sam. I would have a motor, and I would fish at the same time. Maybe catch a salmon. I would never paddle that boat with my hands. You should try that.”
“When I come with a motor, then you’ll know I’ve gotten lazy. Are we ready to go to work?”
“See, now he makes us work,” Silve said. “I should have said nothing about lazy. Yes, we’re ready. Today, you are the boss. Tell us what we should do.”
While Silve and Maria covered the kitchen with Visqueen, Sam and Henry began taking apart the booth. It was the place where he always sat in the morning. Where would his place be now? At the counter, watching Silve and Maria prepare food for the day, or at another booth, farther back? The wall had given him privacy. He could anonymously scratch on his sheets of paper without anyone knowing. Would he have come if the wall had not been there?
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