Secrets Haunt the Lobsters' Sea

by Charlene D'Avanzo

  Patty stacked the bowls and joined her mother in the kitchen. I turned to Malicite. “Have Duprises been trapping off Macomek for a long time?”

  “You bet,” he said. “Off the mainland too. Great-great-granddaddy name of Gaspard Dupris came down from Canada in the eighteen hundreds an’ ended up out heah. I spent time in Quebec when I was a kid. If we have a party out heah, with my brothahs, uncles, aunts, nieces an’  nephews, too many cousins to count, we can only get togethah when it’s warm,  ’cause there’s no place we all fit.”

  “Sounds like you’re a lucky guy,” I said.

  “It can get pretty wild out heah with the weathah an’ all the rest. But family, it’s the only rock I know that stays steady,” he said.

  “Lobster communities along the Maine coast are pretty tight,” I said. “People the lobstermen know well and their families are absolutely everything to them. I’d guess it’s even more so out here.”

  “’Tis. It’s a funny thing, guys workin’ the watah. We compete for bugs at the same time we take care of each othah. Talkin’ on the radio all the time we’re out. Askin’ what’s goin’ on. Like you said, that’s true everywhere in Maine. But on the island all we’ve got is each othah. It’s, I don’t know, more intense.”

  And I’d thought that islanders might more readily welcome me because my grandfather had been a fisherman in another state. How naïve I’d been.

  “I assume that intensity includes defending trap territories even more forcefully.”

  “That’s right. I hate the term ‘lobstah war’  but maybe that’s what it is. Guys on Macomek’ll do anything an’ everything to defend all our trap strings.”

  Besides taking care of each other, what do you especially like about lobstering?” I asked.

  “Ya know,” he said. “That’s a real good question.” He drummed his fingers on the table for a moment. “I think it’s that we take care of our catch. We might grumble sometimes ’bout throwin’  back berried females or makin’ sure bugs we keep aren’t too small or too big. But all of us know it’s keepin’ the industry safe an’  we lobbied for some of those rules ourselves. We’re not gonna wipe out lobstahs like some fishermen did with cod.”

  “And V-notching one of the female’s flippers is voluntary?”

  “Ayuh. We notch the inner right one. When traps’re comin’ up fast, it makes findin’  females to throw back a whole lot easier.”

  Abby walked up to the table. “Either of you want dessert? I got brownies.”

  I shook my head. “I’m full.”

  Malicite patted his stomach. “Abby, I love your brownies, but my pants’re getting’ kinda tight.”

  “You’re too young for that, Malicite Dupris. I’ll wrap up a couple so you can bring ’em home for your little one.”

  “Malicite, before you go, I’d love to hear about the e-lobster project,” I said. “What kind of data you’re getting, if it’s useful, that type of thing. Maybe tomorrow?”

  With dark chestnut eyes and a full head of black ringlets, Dupris was a good-looking guy. His eyes lit up. “Be happy to.” He rubbed his chin. “Tomorrah I’m out on traps, but it might be poor weathah late. So I’ll probably be back early. ’Bout middle of the afternoon, I’d guess. My boat’s moored, I’m back. Abby knows where I live.”

  Adding that he was “gettin’ up at four” Dupris stood, thanked Abby, and left. Patty took the seat Malicite had just vacated. “I’d better be going too. Gordy’s talks about you a lot, so it’s great to finally meet you.”

  “I’m lucky he’s my cousin,” I said. “But before you leave, do you mind if I ask why you and Gordy are so sure Tyler…um.…”

  She blinked. “You mean why he’s the one who killed the guy you found?”

  “Yes.”

  “It’s got to do with drugs. You know that’s a big problem out here, right?”

  I nodded. “Like on the mainland.”

  “Worse. The isolation, not much to do. Lots of money when the lobstering is good, but nowhere to spend it. It was pretty obvious Tyler was addicted. He always had a temper, you know, but it got a whole lot worse. Besides that, he looked awful. Lost weight, got edgier.” She leaned forward. “A couple of months ago, he got nasty with Angel. Things like real sarcastic comments, telling her what to do. Angel wasn’t about to take that. So she told him to go to hell and took up with Buddy. Tyler and Buddy used to be friends, so Tyler was ripped at Buddy. And he let everyone know it.” Patty sat back in the chair and crossed her arms over her chest.

  “All that sounds pretty bad,” I said. “But we’re talking about murder. Do you have any proof?”

  Her eyes narrowed. “I didn’t see him do it, if that’s what you mean. But I’m positive he’s guilty.”

  Tyler, Angel, Buddy. Three young lives in shambles. The situation was raw, and this was not the time to debate the critical importance of evidence. I softened my voice. “Those narcotic drugs, the cost is dreadful. Thanks for the explanation.”

  Patty unclenched her fists, relaxed her arms, and stood.” It was very nice to meet you, Mara.” In the kitchen, she kissed her mother on the cheek and left me alone with Abby.

  I carried the silverware to the kitchen sink. Abby didn’t comment on Patty’s claim about Tyler, and I sensed she didn’t want to talk about it. Maybe she was just tired of the whole subject.

  “Thanks for dinner,” I said. “Seems like you’ve got two great daughters.”

  She beamed. “They’re the best. Smart too. Angel teaches the little ones out heah. Patty used to do that. Like a female lion protectin’  her cubs, she was. She’s still that way even though they’re grown-up teenagers. Patty’s been talking ’bout nursing school. We’ll see, but once she sets her mind, not a thing stops that girl. You got brothers and sisters, Mara?”

  “Um, no. My parents had me late, when Mom was nearly forty.”

  “Aunts, uncles, cousins? ’Sides Gordy, that is.”

  I shook my head. “Both my parents were from small families and their siblings are gone now too.”

  “But surely, you know your othah cousins.”

  Knowing where this conversation was heading, I could feel the heat creep into my cheeks. “Actually, no.”

  “And you’re not married.”

  “No.”

  She tipped her head and looked at me like I was a creature from Mars. “Don’t think I’ve ever met a person with no family whatsoevah. No parents, brothahs, sistahs, cousins, husband.”

  “My godfather Angelo is like a father to me.”

  “Well, that’s something.”

  Desperate to change the subject, I said. “Abby, I’m super tired.”

  She rolled her shoulders. “Come to think of it, I am too. Lovely to have you heah, Mara. I’m for bed. Bathroom’s down the hall.”

  Upstairs, I changed into my PJs—happy they were flannel ones—and arranged pillows against the bed’s headboard. Hugging my legs, I sat like that for a long time. Abby’s interrogation about my lack of family had unsettled me more than such questions usually did. I didn’t try to explain that I’d studied my butt off in college and grad school and didn’t have time for family. Someone like Abby wouldn’t understand that rationale at all.

  To avoid weighing Abby’s reasoning against my own, I thought instead about Patty’s accusation. It troubled me that she was so certain of  Tyler’s guilt but had no direct proof. On the other hand, she obviously knew the players well. On top of that, I understood little about drugs, addiction, perilous jobs, and life on the edge twenty-odd miles from shore. Given my ignorance about the Macomek community, who was I to question her?

  I yawned. It had been a long, long day, and I didn’t have the mental energy to reason through the conundrum. I slid down into the bed, rearranged the pillows, and pulled up the covers. But despite my exhaustion, sleep would not come. Wisps of the past floated around the dark room—my mother’s perfume, Dad’s laugh, peculiar expressions they used. Each time I tried to capture t
he memory, it vanished before I could grab a hold.

  Finally, I got out of bed and padded across the cold floor to the windows. Below, movement caught my attention. A child I knew to be a little girl walked across the bit of lawn, stopped, and turned to look up at me. Our eyes met for an instant before she turned back and slipped into the forest. I squeezed my eyes shut and popped them open. She was gone.

  I stared at the spot where the girl had pushed the branches aside and disappeared. I had no doubt that this thing—ghost, mirage, dream, memory—had a message for me. Also, the message was clear.

  During the eleven years since my parents’ death, I had retreated from the world and buried myself in work. Certainly, there was plenty to do—grad school exams, my PhD research at sea, grant proposals and research papers to write, a job to secure, more proposals and research, more time at sea, professional meetings to attend. I’d ended up with the perfect job at Maine’s only oceanographic research institution, so it had all paid off.

  But there was a cost I hadn’t considered or, to be truthful, even acknowledged. I’d allowed no time or emotional energy for a deep relationship with a man. Sure, I’d had boyfriends. Some may have looked to others like serious loves, but I’d always found a reason why they were lacking. Sometimes they were. Once, a guy I’d been dating for a while had cheated on me. Harvey found me sobbing in MOI’s bathroom and took me outside to vent. While her generosity led to our friendship, I quickly realized my distress had more to do with hurt pride than anything else.

  Ted’s arrival at MOI earlier in the year had challenged my independence. Being with him was easy and a joy. We talked about everything from the latest marine ecology papers to the likelihood that the Boston Red Sox would win the pennant again. Besides that, the sex was terrific. Without thoughts of anything more serious, I was happy to bounce along just as we were. Then Ted changed everything with the word “marriage.” I freaked out, backed away, and ran. Hurt, Ted said he wanted more from me, and if he couldn’t have it, declared we should just be “friends and colleagues.” That was two months ago.

  What Abby’s questions and home stirred in me were not only memories from three decades ago. The longing for human intimacy was inside me now—crying for attention.

  9

  At daybreak, I woke to the distant low rumble of lobster boats heading out of the harbor. On Macomek, like every other Maine fishing community, the low gurgle hardly registers. It’s as much a part of the soundscape as traffic noise in New York City or cows mooing in Wisconsin’s dairy lands.

  Abby fed me scrambled eggs, hot-from-the-oven oatmeal muffins, and strong coffee. As I ate, she warned me about the dangers of Macomek’s waters.

  “That’s an awful skinny little boat,” she said.

  I licked a bit of butter from my forefinger. “No worries, Abby. I’ve paddled it up and down the Maine coast.”

  She frowned. “Alone?”

  “Not usually, but I’ll stay close to shore. I do need your help with the weather report. My weather radio’s at home with a battery that won’t charge.”

  Abby carried the radio to the table and turned it on. The computer voice announced, “Winds ten-to-fifteen knots, seas five feet and rising close to shore.” She flipped it off. “Good report. Still, you be careful.”

  By eight, I was on the beach clad in all my paddle gear. With the ocean a cold fifty degrees, a full wetsuit, neoprene booties and gloves, turtleneck and fleece pullover, waterproof paddle jacket, and fleece hat were essential additions to the usual sprayskirt and life jacket. Ordinarily, my hand-held VHF marine radio would be tucked into my lifejacket front pocket next to waterproof binoculars. The radio had to be within easy reach if I capsized. I didn’t like paddling without it, but the report on Abby’s radio was pretty good, especially given my location twenty-odd miles from the mainland.

  “You be careful out theah,” Abby had said. “It’s not like the mainland. Water’s coldah, winds breeze up fast, waves grow like somethin’ fierce. Remembah, you don’t have your VHF to call for help.”

  I’d looked at NOAA’s wind and wave data for Macomek’s waters and knew Abby wasn’t exaggerating. I resolved to hug the shore.

  High tide made carrying the fifty-pound kayak down to the water’s edge easy.  There, I positioned the chart under bungee cords on the front deck so I could read it, adjusted the compass, snapped the two halves of my paddle together, wriggled my bulky self into the snug cockpit, and shoved off.

  The first minutes in my sea kayak always remind me why I’m passionate about the sport. Quickly sliding into the meditative rhythm of paddling, I was free to drink in the soft slap of ocean against the boat, wind cooling my cheeks, and sun sparkling off the water. Inches from the sea’s surface, I could watch twenty-foot-long kelps wave back and forth beneath me with the grace of ballet dancers. A glittering curtain, silver fish in a school wound their way through the seaweed, scattered, and regrouped in an instant.

  Drifting alone in my little boat, I often marveled at the simple wonder of water—so sturdy it holds me up, so gentle it flows, so abundant it covers over half of Earth. I looked toward the open ocean. Out there somewhere—and hundreds of times in a day—Macomek’s lobster boats circled traps and slid to a stop as their captains leaned over to pull their prizes aboard.

  Boats forty to fifty feet long. So very small in a sea that’s awfully big.

  Small craft like that are vulnerable in storms. The open ocean, especially twenty miles from the coast, can transform from tame to vicious in minutes. In summer, thunderstorms with winds over fifty knots can turn little vessels into bobbing corks. In winter, the seas sometimes boil with waves that can flip lobster boats and throw captain and crew into an ice-cold grave.

  I poked along the rocky coast, circled Macomek’s harbor, and poked along some more. A cluster of large marine birds called common eiders kept me company. My father had once explained that the bird’s Latin name translates to “very soft” because the eider’s nest is lined with eiderdown from the female’s chest. Like a little armada of boats, Macomek’s eiders rode the swells boiling off a rocky outcrop. Up and down, up and down, they were mesmerizing to watch. I whooped when a large swell carried the squad safely through a fissure in the rock. Off the mainland, I’d have to try that trick in the kayak.

  I sheltered in the lee of a hillock on the north side of the island and squinted at birds circling above a tiny island less than a mile offshore. The binoculars gave me a closer look. For a marine ecologist in particular, what came into focus was a glory of nature. Puffins were everywhere—in the sky, on the rocks, floating in the water.

  Atlantic Puffins are one of Maine’s most popular birds for a reason. The stocky little guys breed off the Maine and Canadian coasts, mate for life, and produce one adorable chick each summer. After breeding, they travel the oceans over a home range of five hundred thousand square miles. Pretty impressive for birds less than a foot tall.

  The birds’ appearance makes them especially lovable. Puffins could be Disney characters. Like penguins, they are “tuxedo birds” with white bellies and black backs and wings. It’s their head, though, that arrests your attention. Huge, triangular, parrot-like beaks—gaudy orange when they breed—give them the nickname “sea-parrot.” At the same time, their white faces and small black eyes bring to mind a clown with wings.

  Nearly everyone I knew well—Harvey, Connor, Angelo, Ted, and even Gordy—had taken a puffin cruse at one time or another to visit one of the offshore rocky colonies. “Fabulous trip,” they all said. “You’ve got to do it.” But I never did, maybe because it was such a touristy thing.

  As a result of my tourism snobbery, I’d never seen Fratercular artica up close. But now they were right there, an easy paddle away. To kayak among puffins as they popped out of the water and circled screeching above, how could I pass that up?

  I squinted at the island. Getting out there would be a piece-of-cake, half-hour paddle. On the other side of my rock outcrop shelter, the
waves had increased a bit but were still only a foot or so high. I scanned the sky. A few cumulous clouds formed puffy mounds. Nothing to worry about there. No dark storm clouds darkened the horizon to the east, west, and north. I couldn’t see the southern horizon because I was below a knoll that blocked my view in that direction.

  What the heck, I thought. The little puffin adventure would be an absolute blast. If the seas picked up, I’d head back and be on shore in less than an hour.

  I aimed the boat at the little island, checked the compass reading for a straight shot there (sixty degrees) and back (three hundred), and left Macomek Island behind. Less than a half-mile from shore, I nearly rammed the boat on a rock with a razor-sharp edge just under the surface. Luckily, a telltale ring signaled the rock’s presence below. Closer to shore, boaters relied on charts that designated submerged hazards like rocks. On the edge of nowhere off Macomek, local knowledge was the best protection against such dangers.

  Paddling as fast as I could, I made excellent time until halfway though my crossing when the waves increased to two feet. Annoying, but nothing I couldn’t easily handle. I passed a largish island with a cove on the south side, considered taking a break there, and decided to keep going.

  The growing cacophony of screeching puffins drove me on. Panting and laughing like a crazed loon, I slid into a little protected bay on the Macomek side of the bird-covered island.

  I named the place Puffin Rock.

  Once my breathing had returned to normal, I poked the boat out into the confused sea. Birds were everywhere and didn’t seem to be bothered by their visitor. Skyward, hundreds upon hundreds of screeching puffins circled in disarray. Some zipped right over the boat. The rapid beat of wings broadcast the struggle to keep their squat bodies aloft. Puffins dove down into the water only a yard or two from the kayak. The sea was so clear I could see their wings beating underwater until the birds disappeared into the depths. Puffins, I knew, could dive hundreds of feet down in their search for fish.

  Careful to avoid the slosh of waves against rocks, I began to circle the little island. Onshore, countless puffins bobbed up and down as they scrambled over slick rock. Their gaudy orange feet splayed out behind when they launched themselves into the air. The puffin show so absorbed me that I didn’t notice the sky until I rounded a ledge.