By The Sea, Book Three: Laura Read online

  "Just the shells? What for?"

  "Pills, jewelry, ground cover. Who cares?"

  It was a foul and smelly business; Laura wrinkled her nose at the prospect. Sam pulled a ferocious face in mockery of hers, whereupon Laura stuck out her tongue at her husband and he grinned.

  Despair was widespread, but it was not yet universal.

  Chapter 2

  The Virginia was returning from New York—empty of cargo, unfortunately—and bound for Newport harbor. As she rounded Fort Adams, the wind that howls off that flat spit of land caught her sails and laid her over on her ear. She hesitated, gathering energy, then went charging forward, pushing a white, curling wave ahead of her, a lively dog with a bone in her teeth. No one would have guessed that she was sixty-two years old.

  She was a show-stopper, all right, and one of the reasons was that her captain was wrapped around her fore topmast, eight and a half stories above the water, working madly to free up the fore topsail halyard which was jammed in its block. Someone might have asked why Captain Powers hadn't dropped his topsails before now, but that would've been unkind. The fact was, Captain Powers—despite his Downeast caution—liked to put his vessel through her paces now and then, and this was one of those times. It was just bad luck that the halyard jammed.

  From her position behind the wheel, Laura understood perfectly well that they were running out of time, running out of room. Sam had to get the topsail down soon or she'd have to take the Virginia back out into the Bay, where they'd have the room he needed to clear the block and drop sail. She squinted up at her husband, then scanned the anchorage area. There wasn't room to swing a cat. The America's Cup Races were in town (for the second time), and so were a lot of important yachts. An Astor or a Vanderbilt entering the harbor just then would have been looking around for a peer; Laura was looking around for a hole.

  From eighty feet above her she heard the cry, "Round up!"

  She found a narrow slot, put the helm over, and headed into the wind. To her relief she saw Sam take in the topsail, bundle it, and lash it. Quick as a flash Billy, part monkey, scrambled up the ratlines of the foremast, swung himself up onto the crosstrees, and did the same to the main topsail while young Neil gazed aloft longingly from deck level and glared at his mother the tyrant who never let him do anything important. Within seconds both brothers had scrambled back down to deck level and were bringing in the jibs. By the time the Virginia was about to lose way, the five-hundred pound anchor was pulling the first fathoms of chain through the hawsepipes. It was a nice recovery to what could have been an embarrassing display of overconfidence.

  The grin on Sam Powers's face as he walked aft to his wife was a little defensive. "You damn near stuck the bowsprit up the ass of that steam-yacht ahead, girl," he said, getting in the first punch.

  "It's not as though you gave me much warning," Laura said sharply.

  It had become a tender subject, this issue of seamanship, ever since it became clear that Laura's grasp of celestial navigation was better than her husband's. Laura was good, and Sam was jealous. But she did not—she could not—handle the helm as well as he, and he liked to remind her of it whenever it was convenient.

  "Hey now, he said with a gentle smile of remorse, chucking her under the chin, "you're not half bad for a girl."

  She knew that he meant it as a rave review, but it irritated her just the same. "Don't do that! Don't patronize me."

  "Paternize? Meaning I wonder what?" He put on his stupid look, the one he preferred to wear whenever Laura ventured past his working vocabulary.

  She was too tired to fight. "Meaning we're out of rice and almost out of coffee. I'll have to go ashore before supper. I need some money."

  "Yeh, and the starboard water barrel's about dry as well," he said, throwing his shoulders back in a stretch and rubbing his ribs. "Me 'n Bill will tend to that while you're gone. Will you be taking the boy? We can use him to steady the skiff."

  "Well, that depends. I don't suppose there's enough for me to buy Neil a new pair of overalls? He ripped his everyday pair again." She was still smarting over her husband's remark. "They're beyond mending, you know," she added cuttingly, drawing blood; Sam Powers hated to be found wanting as a provider.

  "I don't know as the little ruffian deserves to cover his nekkedness," he said gruffly. "The next time I see him skylarkin' in the ratlines, I'll shoot him down like a Canada goose. Damn scalawag."

  But secretly he was pleased by his son's fearlessness, so he added, "I reckon them cuffs ain't been within four inches of his ankles for months now." It was settled: new overalls for Neil.

  Laura was happy; she liked to buy things. She favored her husband with a summer smile and whispered, "I'll bring you a treat."

  "Never mind about treats," he growled. "Just bring me supper."

  Laura looked around her: Neil and Billy were busy lowering the yawl-boat from its davits. No one else was near. Before Sam knew what hit him, she pressed her lips to his in an electric kiss, then quickly withdrew with a look of devilish innocence.

  "Ay. Get back soon," said her husband in a surprised and husky voice.

  Ashore with Neil, Laura felt as she always did when she stepped off the decks of the Virginia: as if she'd been catapulted into the future. The narrow, crowded streets were filled with autos and trucks. Grim, impatient deliverymen bobbed and weaved among pleasantly bewildered tourists. Sailors, yachtsmen, locals, ex-millionaires, shoppers, and the unemployed were all thrown together, creating a potluck ambience that set Newport apart from other towns its size.

  The town was filled with people Laura should have understood: people on the move. But she felt no more kinship with them than she did with the clannish, tightly knit citizens back in Danske. She held herself apart from mankind, brushing up against its edges only occasionally. It's because I haven't yet found what I want, she told herself. It's out there somewhere; I just don't know where.

  "Mama, can I have an ice?" asked Neil, whose head was swiveling left and right to take in the sights around him. Newport was his favorite harbor.

  "However can you ask? Do you suppose money grows on trees?" She hurried her son along. Shops would be closing soon.

  "Those fellows are eating ices," said Neil, jerking his head toward two young dandies his age clad all in white.

  "You are not those fellows, and lettuce costs six cents a head. As long as there's a drought and produce costs so much, there won't be ices. Besides, they rot your teeth."

  "Can I join a baseball team then? I hardly know how to play."

  "I don't think so, Neil. They wouldn't be very tolerant of your travel schedule. Besides, Billy plays with you quite a lot."

  "Billy plays catch with me. It's not the same at all," said Neil, scarcely hiding his contempt of his mother's ignorance. "I don't know anything about sliding into second base, or stealing third, or about sacrifice flies. Nothing except what I've read. What good is that?" he demanded with disgust.

  His mother smiled distractedly and yanked him quickly between two cars that were stalled in traffic. "Are you planning a career with the Yankees, then?" she asked when they were across the street.

  "I might be, if I knew something about it," he answered in a sullen voice.

  Laura straightened his hair with the palm of her hand, amused by his martyr's air. "You claim to have no use for New York City. Lord, look at your face. How do you get so filthy? I can't take you into a shop looking like that!" She whipped out a handkerchief, spit on its edge, and scrubbed his cheek clean.

  He endured the mauling, then said with dignity, "I don't have any friends, Mama. Not one single one."

  "What? You don't count Billy?" Laura sighed and straightened the collar of his shirt, then said softly, "I know, sweetheart. Sometimes it can be hard for you."

  They went into the haberdasher's after that, with Laura worrying that her son was all too right. This was new, this ability to articulate what was bothering him. Up until now when he was unhappy, he tended to bro
od, usually up in the forecastle which he shared with Billy. He was somewhat shy, probably because he was being schooled aboard the boat, and introspective. If Neil felt that life aboard a boat had become so intolerable that he had to blurt it out to his mother, then things must be pretty bad.

  Inside the dimly lit shop, Laura pulled up short. "Oh! I must have walked into the wrong store," she said, looking around in confusion. The familiar bins that used to hold neatly stacked overalls and Big Yank work shirts were filled with more formal trousers and linen shirts. Gone were the corduroy knickers and long socks, the school suits, breeches, and boys' caps, all replaced by Arrow shirts and dark blue blazers, and even a few straw boaters—out of fashion now, but still the hat of choice for the formal yachtsman. (Even Laura knew that in Newport, the skimmer hat was a fixture on the waterfront.)

  A smartly dressed middle-aged man who had been tidying a rack of red bow ties took one look at them and said, "You're looking for O'Brien's Men's and Boys' Wear, I presume."

  "Yes. They were here just a few months ago."

  "A change of proprietorship. We're Taylor and Son now," he said with a lift of his brow. "Perhaps you missed the new sign?" His look plainly said that he couldn't imagine how.

  Laura shrugged. "I never thought to look. I've been coming here for a while … though I admit, not lately." She looked around and sighed. "O'Brien's carried a line of the best overalls for boys," she said. "Such a soft denim, but it wore like iron—which you really need, aboard a boat."

  The salesman perked up. "Oh? You have a boat?"

  "We do," Laura answered. His condescending manner was annoying her, so she decided to trump it with her boat card. "A two-masted schooner."

  She could see that he was impressed. No doubt he was picturing a sleek yacht built by a master boat builder, all spit and polish with acres of varnish and a crew to keep it that way. Fine. Let him.

  "A two-master!" he said. "A large yacht, then."

  "It's not small," said Laura with a coy smile.

  Neil couldn't resist. "It's the best boat in the harbor, and that's the truth!"

  "Well, young man, I have no doubt," said the salesman. Warming to them now, he added, "You're a tall lad, I can see. I believe that we may well have something in a man's long pant that would suit you."

  Oh, no. There was absolutely nothing in the shop that they could afford, so Laura said quickly, "Perhaps another time. Today we are in search of a pair of denim overalls." She added in a confidential tone, "You know how rough and tumble boys can be. When we have no guests aboard, I prefer to dress him in rugged wear."

  "Mama! We never have—"

  "Shh, Neil, I'm talking now." To the salesman she said, "Do you know anyone in town who sells Moran Mills overalls? I'm in a bit of a hurry and would love to save the time looking."

  "Ah. Moran Mills. I can see why you are particular about the brand. We carry some of their more formal wear ourselves. Fine, fine apparel. The workmanship is first class. I have always said that their products are the best because the mills are owned by a woman. The attention to detail is something you don't always see."

  A woman with an eye for detail and a head for business. Laura, a free-thinking, adventurous female herself, was pleased to hear it. "Have her mills been affected by the textile strikes, do you think?" she asked the salesman. She was wondering whether there were any overalls of any brand to be found in the shops that lined Thames Street.

  The salesman frowned and puckered his lips, then took off his eyeglasses and began polishing them with a folded handkerchief he took from his pocket. He was thinking.

  "No," he said at last. "I believe not. Tess Moran is known to pay her workers above-average wages; naturally they are very loyal to her. Her machinery is also the very latest in technology, so the conditions in her mills are more tolerable than in most others. She has earned the respect of her employees, that I will say. Never mind that she lives in Beau Rêve, one of the biggest mansions in town—Mrs. Moran can still be found on the floors of her mills each and every week. Hands-on, she is, as only someone of her beginnings can be. They say not a thing gets past her; that she is hard but fair. And that, madam, is why you appreciate her overalls."

  Laura was curious about the "Mrs." Part and said, "But if she's married, how does her husband fit in? Or does he have other enterprises to oversee?"

  The salesman cast a quick look at Neil, who'd wandered outside the store to pet a dog that someone had tied to a pole. He lowered his voice and said to Laura, "Oh, there is no Mr. Moran. Everyone knows that. Moran is her birth name. She does not, and cannot, hide the fact. Well, how could she, with a scandalous past. She does have a sister who lives with her in Beau Rêve, and also a son, now married."

  He lowered his voice even more and added, "But the son is definitely illegitimate. And that's a fact. She is a grandmother now, and still—to this day!—is known to entertain a certain distinguished gentleman at Beau Rêve for periods of time every now and again. It has been going on for years. Not that there isn't room enough in the place for a guest, mind you," he added in a bland tone.

  But his look said volumes, and Laura resented it. It reminded her of the looks she got back in Danske when she happily and naively announced that she was bound for Cuba: knowing and insinuating.

  "But would that be anyone's business but hers?" she asked, coolly challenging the clerk.

  He took the rebuff personally, as she had intended it. "Well, I'm sure I can't say. As for where to find those overalls, madam, I'm sure I can't say that, either."

  She was dismissed.

  After combing the shops up and down Thames Street, Laura ended up buying overalls that were far inferior to the well-made but sold-out Moran Mills version, and paying more for them besides. There would be no cantaloupe for Sam aboard ship that night.

  ****

  When they got back to the docks they found Neil's little rowing dory tied up and waiting for them; Sam would not be meeting them with the yawl-boat, then. Laura shaded her eyes from the low-slanting sun, scanning the harbor. She could see no yawl-boat hanging off the broad, flat stern of the Virginia.

  "I bet he's on Long Wharf having a pint with Billy," said Neil, rocking back and forth on his heels, strutting in place. He was acting much, much taller in his new pants.

  "Oh, I hope not," answered his mother grimly. She had seen the women in the taverns there: street women, layabouts ... and Sam spoke their language. She had seen that, too. She swept her jealousy aside, like fish guts off a worktable, and compressed her lips. "All right, then. I'll have to row us back."

  "Mama!" Neil was scandalized. "It's my boat. I'll row."

  "Not in those new pants, you won't. They'll be crusty with salt before your father ever sees them. Didn't I tell you not to wear them? But, no, you insisted. If you want to row you'll have to slip between those sheds and change into your old pants. Take your choice."

  It was no contest. The thought of being ferried by his mother in front of everyone in the harbor would have been a humiliating blow to his self-esteem. With a long face Neil withdrew to the place designated, to change into his old torn pants.

  Laura, feeling a bit guilty about having taken out her odd little bout of jealousy on her son, was relieved to see the yawl-boat steaming toward the Virginia from points south. Sam had not been to the bars, then. She watched as Sam dropped Billy off on the Virginia, then headed the yawl-boat toward her dock. Neil returned, a gangly ragamuffin once more.

  Your father's coming, after all," she said, smiling. "If you want to change back into your new pants, we'll just tow the dory behind us, and that way you won't get wet."

  It was a masterful stroke of diplomacy. Egos were saved; spirits lifted. By the time Sam came alongside in the yawl-boat, his son was ready for him: tall, proud and pleased.

  But for some reason the father seemed taller, prouder, more pleased than his son. Sam was bursting with news and never noticed Neil's new pants until Laura quickly pointed them out.

&
nbsp; "Oh, ay, right, right. Well, you can wear them to shuck quahogs. I'm thinking it's fancy worsted might look more suitable from now on."

  "Have you found a sunken treasure, Dad?" asked his son as he tied his dory to the yawl-boat.

  Sam laughed. "No. The treasure's still afloat, and not far from here. Would the name 'Rainbow' mean anything to ye?"

  "Well, sure, Mr. Vanderbilt's yacht—"

  "And what have you to do with the Rainbow?" interrupted Laura.

  "Just this: the Commodore himself wants to add me to his crew roster for the Cup races, that's all. I'm not guaranteed to race," he added scrupulously. "But then again you never know if someone won't break a leg. Of course, if the Rainbow ain't chosen after the August trials to defend the Cup, then I'll be back with you in a few weeks. But the scuttlebutt is that Vanderbilt will be picked to defend." Sam did his best to toss off a nonchalant shrug.

  "Mr. Vanderbilt?" squealed Laura. "Has asked you?"

  "None other."

  "But why? How?"

  "Seems he was taken with my aerial act as we sailed in, early on. Now me, I would've said roaring in under full sail showed a certain lack of judgment," Sam admitted candidly. "But around here they seem to credit that sort of thing. Well, well, they can push the Rainbow till she sinks, for all I care. Ain't my boat."

  He turned to Neil, who was looking quite dazzled by events, and said, "Here, boy. Take the tiller. You'll need to know your way around the heavy traffic in this harbor for the next few weeks. It'll be home."

  A look of ecstasy lit up the young boy's face. He jumped up, ready to assume command, but his mother said carefully, "Neil doesn't have a steam-license, Sam. He's eight years old."'

  "Aagh. We didn't have a license to run that load of you know what last year either, but that didn't stop us. In times like these you do what you have to. Anyway, I expect I'd have a bit of pull, happens we need it," he said with newfound swagger.