by Sally Mandel
“Spring fever,” Will commented to him. He didn’t answer, but every now and then his feet would skip over a watery spot in unconscious imitation. Then he would quickly slow up again.
At the end of the road was the pond, fronted by a small clearing. A ramshackle boathouse slouched at the water’s edge. In an ancient chair by the doorway sat a very old man. When he saw them, he rose with surprising agility and approached on legs that appeared to have spent half a century wrapped around a horse. His face was withered and brown like a dried-apple doll’s.
“Early this year,” he remarked to Will.
“Yeah. Good day for perch.”
“Should be.”
The presence of the auburn-haired girl and the small black boy seemed to cause the old man not a moment’s puzzlement. Will reached into his pocket, but the man waved his hand. “Pay me later.” He gave them a coffee can full of dirt and worms and gestured toward a battered blue rowboat.
“Come on, troops,” Will said. He and Quinn held the boat while Harvey hopped in. It bobbed gently under the boy’s weight. Quinn got in next, then Will planted one foot in the stern and shoved off from the dock with the other. Harvey looked impressed.
“Took me a few times of landing in the drink before I could pull that off,” Will said. For the first time that day Harvey offered him a quick grin.
“Just out of curiosity,” Quinn said, “are we legal? Don’t we need a license or something?”
“The old gentleman isn’t much of a stickler when it comes to state regulations. He’s very independent.”
Quinn gazed across the water. Birch trees lined the shore, their white bark dazzling against the dense woods behind. As Will pulled on the oars the boat slid rhythmically toward the center of the pond.
Quinn sighed. “All I need is a parasol.” She let her hand trail overboard. “Shit, that’s cold!” she yelped when her fingers hit the water.
Harvey looked at her, measuring, and Will said, “What’re you trying to do, scare away our fish?”
“I beg your pardon,” she said in a stage whisper. “What I meant was, shit, that’s cold.”
This elicited a wan smile from Harvey. Ah hah, thought Quinn. Perhaps entry to this kid’s heart is via profanity.
Will showed them how to thread worms on the hook.
“Don’t that hurt ’em?” Harvey asked.
“Supposedly not, and I’d just as soon believe it,” Will answered.
“Yeah,” Harvey echoed fervently. He draped his rod over the edge of the boat and stared into the water. “Come on, you fish.”
“It might take a few minutes, Harve,” Will cautioned.
“I got the whole entire afternoon. Fish, I’m gonna get you.”
Quinn tossed her line in and Will settled back against the stern and closed his eyes.
“Hey, don’t go to sleep, guide. What do we do if we get a bite?” Quinn asked.
“You just let me know,” Will murmured. Quinn glanced at Harvey, and they exchanged their first look of mutual exasperation. Encouraged, Quinn averted her eyes before the moment could cool.
Then they sat. They sat for twenty minutes without moving, lines trailing in the water. Harvey and Quinn stared into the shiny depths. Nothing happened.
“Hey, man,” Harvey said. “How long we gotta wait here?”
“Peaceful, isn’t it?” Will said sleepily.
“You gettin’ a suntan and we just sittin’ here like a cork in a bathtub. Maybe all the fish went south.”
“Mm,” Will said.
“Let’s do something, Harvey,” Quinn suggested. “Uh … maybe a word game?”
“Ah, shee-yit,” Harvey said.
“You got a better idea?”
He thought this over. “What kind of word game?” he asked.
“Botticelli.”
“Never heard of it.”
Quinn explained the rules. She was pleased at Harvey’s interest, however grudging.
“Let me go first,” he said when she was finished. “C.”
“Is this somebody who wears a bright red suit in December?”
“It’s not Santa Claus,” Harvey answered instantly.
“Okay. Is this another December big wheel? A long time ago.”
Harvey thought for a moment. “Jesus Christ!” he answered triumphantly. Quinn shook her head, hunting for a person she was sure he would know. Harvey tried not to look pleased.
“All right, I’ve got you now,” she said. “Is this an American scientist who figured out what to do with peanuts?”
“Not George Washington Carver!”
They both laughed.
“You’re a true pain in the ass, you know that?” Quinn said. “I’m never gonna get a free question.” The only names she could think of were Czerny and Clementi, from her early piano-lesson days. Harvey would never know them. “There’s not a single C left in my head. Sure you don’t want to switch to M?”
Harvey shook his head, grinning, and Quinn turned to Will for assistance. She prodded his foot where it dangled over the gunwale. “Help me, Will. This kid’s too smart.”
Will replied with an incoherent grunt.
“I don’t think I’m very impressed with fishing,” Quinn said.
“Hey!” Harvey exclaimed suddenly. His line had dipped, tugging the end of the fishing rod down into the water. “I’ve got somethin’!”
Will opened his eyes. “Reel him in, Harvey.”
“Come on, you mother,” Harvey said.
“Look at that, look at that! It’s a big one!” Quinn yelled.
The fish slapped its tail along the surface, splashing wildly. In his excitement Harvey stood up too abruptly, setting the boat rocking. He arched his body in a sudden violent motion, trying to right himself without giving up his death grip on the rod.
“Sit down!” Will commanded. He leaned toward Harvey, but the boy teetered out of reach. Just as he was about to plunge over the edge, Quinn stood up and hooked him by the belt. She yanked him back onto his seat, but the force of the movement sent her off-balance and the boat began to tip even more wildly. At this point Will stood up too. Quinn grabbed his arm, and both of them plunged tailfirst into the pond.
When they surfaced, gasping with the cold, Harvey was beaming down at them from the boat. He held tightly to the gunwale with one hand, and with the other he displayed a fourteen-inch rainbow trout.
Quinn shouted, “Look at it! He got it!”
“Terrific,” Will sputtered. “If you’re so damn smart, Harve, how about fishing us out of this ice water?”
Will maneuvered their reentry into the rowboat. It was difficult with their soaked clothes weighing them down, and Quinn was rendered helpless by laughter. Finally, firmly ensconced, they examined Harvey’s catch respectfully.
“Some fish,” Quinn said.
“How’s it gonna die?” Harvey wanted to know. “We don’t kill it, do we?”
“Not unless you’re so inclined,” Will said, starting to row.
“I didn’t get your C,” Quinn said.
“Want me to tell you?”
“Oh, damn it. No. Yes. Tell me.”
“Cassius Clay,” Harvey said with a grin.
“Beautiful,” Quinn said. “You wait. I’ll get you.”
Back at the boathouse the old man observed them expressionlessly as Quinn and Will dripped puddles all over the dock. “Good-looking fish,” he remarked. Quinn decided his comment referred to the soaked, half-frozen bipeds rather than Harvey’s trout.
“Coulda caught more, prob’ly, if they didn’t fall in,” Harvey said.
The old man disappeared into his shack and emerged a few moments later with two wool jackets that smelled of mildew. Quinn was reluctant to borrow the jeans that were offered, suspecting that they were the boatman’s only extras. But the old man took her by the hand, nudged her inside the boathouse, and waited outside until she had finished changing. The one l
arge room was surprisingly neat. There was a faded poster of the Eiffel Tower above the fireplace. Quinn wished she knew everything about the old geezer. She hauled on her soggy pantlegs until they finally unpeeled with a cold, sucking sound. Truth to tell, she wished she knew everything about everybody.
When they boarded the bus, Quinn and Harvey broke into giggles at the loud squishing noises from Quinn’s and Will’s shoes as they walked to the back. But the seats were warm, and by the time they reached the North End, Will’s backside at least was dry. They delivered Harvey to his building and stood in the doorway downstairs.
Harvey eyed Will’s sodden pantlegs. “I don’t know if … well, maybe Leroy’s got something,” he said tentatively.
Will knew that the man who shared Harvey’s mother’s bed was vain about his clothing and would never allow anyone to touch his things, certainly not soggy white folks.
“We’ll take a cab from here, Harve,” Will said. “Be back on campus in a few minutes. But thanks.”
“You caught your family some fine dinner,” Quinn said. She held out a near-frozen hand. “I’m proud to know ya’.”
Harvey took it, and the two grinned at one another. Then the boy gave Will an affectionate rap on the arm and went clattering up the stairs with his fish carefully cradled in its newspaper blanket.
“Well, then, it was worth it,” Quinn said with a shiver. “You poor guy, you must be a block of ice.”
Will dug into his clammy jeans to check the money supply. “I have to tell you that my enthusiasm for fishing’s somewhat dampened.”
“Glad to hear it,” Quinn said.
Between the two of them they scraped together enough for the long ride back to campus, then took long, hot showers to get their frozen blood circulating again, and recovered without even so much as a runny nose.
Chapter 23
Will had reluctantly agreed to accompany Quinn to New York. Heading south on the bus, he asked himself how it had happened. Maybe it was the sad desperation in the way she had asked him, with none of her usual cracks about how she’d written ahead to make sure all the thieves had left town for the annual Mugger’s Convention in New Jersey. When he said all right, her eyes had welled up and she buried her face in his sweater.
As they left the Berkshires behind, the snow outside the window seemed to melt away, as if they were watching a series of time exposures. Neither of them had spoken for nearly an hour.
“What about your mother?” Will asked.
“What?” She had been trying to anticipate the questions Ted Manning might ask her tomorrow.
“If you get the job, what about Ann?”
“She’s doing so much better. I think it’s happening for her, Will. I talked to Jake this morning and they’re even going to a party at the O’Malleys’ tomorrow night. And I can commute home every weekend.”
He was silent.
“I know you don’t want me to get it.”
“That’s not fair.”
“It’s something I’ve wanted for, well, forever. I’d be right in the middle of everything, I’d be involved with people who make things move, Will.”
“Where the action is.” The words were uncharacteristically sarcastic.
She winced, and he took her hand in apology.
“I hope you snow the hell out of him. Who knows, maybe I’ll love it so much you won’t be able to force me back to school.”
Quinn lifted his hand to her mouth and held it there. “I’d be your devoted slave forever,” she murmured against his fingers.
The Port Authority terminal was teeming with rush-hour bustle. A stampede of commuters heading for the New Jersey buses hurried past. People jammed against stairways marked “Subway,” pressing impatiently against one another. In the center of the station bewildered tourists turned around and around like windup toys, hoping for a shove in the right direction.
Quinn set down her bag. “Isn’t it wonderful?” she exclaimed.
“Let’s try this way,” Will said. He steered her toward the nearest exit.
As they emerged onto Eighth Avenue, panhandlers sidled over to them with their grimy hands extended. Quinn looked at them curiously, but Will prodded her past and began walking uptown toward Forty-second Street.
“Manning did a thing on those guys a few weeks ago,” she gasped. “You know, some of them make over a hundred a week, tax-free. Jesus, you can move when you want to. This is the wrong direction, you know. The hotel’s downtown.”
At the curbside an elderly man stood beside them with his hand clutching the door handle of a taxi. The door was stiff and the old man was feeble, but finally he pried it open. As he let go to pick up his suitcase, a man in a trench coat, henna toupee askew, hurtled into the backseat and slammed the door behind him. The taxi sped away, and the old man’s fingers, still outstretched for the door, trembled.
“We’ll get you a taxi,” Quinn said. Then she stepped out onto Eighth Avenue, flagged down a Checker cab, and ushered the old man into the backseat with his suitcase.
Will gaped at her.
“I wish I’d had the presence of mind to snatch the wig off that bastard’s head when he flew by,” she said. She spun around on the pavement. Lights flashed, advertising peepshows and pizza. “I love it, I love it, I love it!” she yelled. Pedestrians, unfazed, merely adjusted their paths to accommodate her swirling arms and moved on down the sidewalk. Will shook his head.
The lobby of the Hotel McAlpin on Thirty-fourth Street was humming. Groups of students, knapsacks drooping from overload, stood jabbering in Italian, French, and something liltingly Scandinavian. Perfectly coiffed airline stewardesses threaded their way through the tumult with their automatic smiles.
“I hate to go upstairs,” Quinn said.
Will signed the register. “I hope you gave us a quiet room,” he remarked to the clerk.
While they waited for the bellboy, Quinn’s head swiveled from one point of interest to the next, as if she were watching a crazy tennis match. Will leaned against the reservations counter and stared at an empty corner of the lobby near the Thirty-third Street exit. It was good to look at something that didn’t move.
In the elevator two young women with heavy makeup kept up a dialogue punctuated with the snap of chewing gum.
“So I walked troo duh door and it’s rainin’ like a pump,” said the tall girl with the maroon lips. “Like a pump.”
“Ya shoulda went right home,” answered the round girl, who exuded a cloud of Ambush with every ripple of her jaw muscles.
“Yeah, but I din’t.”
The elevator stopped on Nine. Will and Quinn followed the impassive bellhop out into the hallway.
“Was that English, or were they with the foreigners?” Quinn whispered.
“That’s what happens after a couple of months in this town. Renders you completely unintelligible.”
Their room was small and dark. Will tipped the bellhop while Quinn plunked her overnight case down on one of the twin beds.
“Let’s go over to the Empire State Building,” she said. “It’s just down the block, in person.”
Will flopped onto the other bed and kicked off his boots. “Go ahead. The view suits me fine right here.”
“Ugh,” Quinn said, staring up at the water-stained ceiling. “I don’t want to go without you.”
“Aren’t you worn out?”
“No. This place gives me energy.”
“As if you needed extra.”
Will’s voice had begun to fade, and Quinn knew he was already drifting into sleep. “Take a nap and then maybe you’ll feel like going. We’ve got to eat anyway.” She bent to give him a kiss. He draped his arm around her shoulders, pinning her down, but she extricated herself. “Oh, no, you don’t. We mess around now and we won’t get out of this cave until tomorrow.”
“Yrm,” Will said.
When he woke up, Quinn was sitting at the window staring down at Thirty-fo
urth Street. Even her back looked eager.
“Don’t jump,” he said.
“They’re making a movie or something out there, right in front of Macy’s. Nobody even pays attention.” She sat down on the edge of his bed and opened her mouth to speak, but before the words could come out, her stomach interrupted with a long, delicate arpeggio. They both listened in fascination.
“Care to repeat that for the nice folks in Staten Island?” Will said, poking her navel.
Her stomach retorted with a short, erratic harrumph. They laughed.
“All right already. I’m coming,” Will said, and reached for his boots with a groan.
The desk clerk glanced at their faded denims and recommended a health food store around the corner on Thirty-third Street. It was packed with foreign students who puzzled over their menus, trying to decipher the Swedish or Thai equivalent of “ambrosia deluxe.” Will and Quinn waited a quarter of an hour for two seats together at the counter.
Finally a wheezing waitress plodded toward them carrying menus and a soggy towel that had met misfortune in the carrot juicer. She swiped at the Formica, catapulting crumbs onto Will’s lap. Then she coughed on Quinn’s menu and retreated to the assorted salads.
“I think I’ll have the tuberculosis special,” Quinn whispered. “Look at that chef.”
At the far end of the counter the cook alternated between stuffing pita bread with bean sprouts and blowing his nose. His neck was scaled with a mean-looking skin affliction.
“Let’s get out of here before we catch something fatal,” Will said. As they were on their way out the door a janitor struggled to sweep the rubble from under the seats. He was missing half an arm, the left one severed at the elbow. Quinn and Will spotted him at the same moment and flung themselves out onto the street before they burst into laughter.
“It’s not funny,” she gasped. “Poor man.”
Will grabbed her hand. “I don’t think health food has much of a future. For Christ’s sake, let’s go find a Howard Johnson’s.”