"Oh, Elsie," Sally said. "Jack is just being helpful."

"And all I'm doing is pointing out that using Miss Perry's rental cottage as a waiting room for his Sawtooth enterprise isn't exactly steering clear. I'm just trying to help him be Caesar's wife."

Jack glared at her. "I was merely making a point of comparison. Never mind. Sometimes you have the attention span of a kitten. Pouncing at shoelaces. Take the G.o.dd.a.m.n paper home. When you get stuck, call the lawyer. And don't be a pain in the a.s.s with him."

"Jack," Sally said. "Sometimes-"

"Sometimes," Elsie said, "he's more bearable when he's cross."

Jack swirled his brandy snifter. "You see," he said to Sally, "if I let her have the last word, she's not so unbearable herself."

Once when Sally was tipsy she'd told Elsie that Jack liked his spats with Elsie. She'd added, "In fact, afterward he can get quite amorous."

That thought, not one to dwell on at the best of times, was enough to start her gathering up Rose's things and then Rose in her car seat.

chapter eleven.

Phoebe Fitzgerald called to ask if she could come over. "It won't take a minute. I'm a little bit up in the air about something ..."

May just had time to make biscuits. When Phoebe came in, May put the teakettle on and got out a jar of her rose-hip jelly. May didn't feel so slow around Phoebe as she had at first. She'd figured out that Phoebe went through a half-dozen little items while she worked her way to the main thing on her mind. May didn't think Phoebe meant to fool anyone, just that Phoebe wasn't sure how to get where she was going. According to Eddie she wasn't that way with clients-she let them say their say while she nodded and smiled and took notes. Eddie was crazy about her handwriting-he'd unfolded a page to show May. Poor Eddie.

Phoebe asked after the boys, ate a biscuit with a dab of jelly, wondered how rose hips could be so sweet, repeated after May "apple slices and lemon juice," as if that's what she'd come to hear. She asked if May knew any of the pink ladies at the hospital; she'd thought of volunteering but she'd heard that a man had come in carrying his cut-off thumb, held it out in the palm of his hand. She said, "I don't know how I'd be. I'm afraid I might come apart. You know about Miss Perry?"

May nodded. "Apparently Elsie b.u.t.trick found her. One of the pink ladies ... I was at the hospital asking about volunteering, and she started to tell me about it but a nurse cut her off. She-the pink lady-said that a neighbor ... Miss Perry only has two neighbors and I'm one of them. Of course, there's Mr. Salviatti, but he's farther away and he's not ... I've never even met him. Have you?"

"Not so as he'd remember. He had a boat in the yard when d.i.c.k worked there." May tried to think of something else about Mr. Salviatti, hoping to steer clear of Elsie b.u.t.trick. "It was a funny color, sort of raspberry. Some people made jokes about it: 'There's Mr. Salviatti in his pink yachtie.' That was back before Mr. Aldrich bought Sawtooth Point. Of course, Mr. Aldrich married into part of it."

"Yes, Sally Aldrich. So it was Sally and Elsie's family who bought it from d.i.c.k's grandfather?"

"Great-uncle. Uncle Arthur."

"Didn't he build the Wedding Cake? Why on earth did he sell it?"

"Had to. Ran out of money. He put money into a little factory that made silk stockings just when nylon came along. It was all way before my time. d.i.c.k only knew Uncle Arthur as an old man. d.i.c.k joined the Coast Guard out of high school, and when he got back, Uncle Arthur was dead."

"But still ... I mean, Arthur must have been a rather significant figure. The Wedding Cake is very grand."

"Arthur Pierce was a sheep farmer who had a few good years and got ahead of himself. Nothing grand about him, except his notions. Even the Wedding Cake wasn't all that grand. It got added on to later, the wings and porches. Back then this wasn't a place people came to. Not like Newport or Watch Hill. It was farming and fishing. Most of the people who lived here had no idea that the pieces of land they grew up on would ever be worth much. When Uncle Arthur sold Sawtooth Point it was just not-so-good farmland. It's too rocky and salty for potatoes or corn, and raising sheep got so it didn't pay. They used to mow the marsh gra.s.s to make salt hay for the sheep. I guess that got too expensive; it took a whole gang of men. Anyway, it's all different now. Those new cottages on Sawtooth Point go for three or four times what a regular house ought to cost."

"Well, you get more than the cottage. There's the tennis club and the yacht club, and there's going to be a spa. That's why people pay so much."

"That's what Uncle Arthur missed out on. People pay better than sheep."

Phoebe laughed. "Oh, May, that's very funny." May hadn't thought to be funny, she just got caught talking, trying to avoid saying anything about Elsie. Phoebe said, "But right now I have a problem with Miss Perry. I don't even think Miss Perry knows about it-I mean, she's still in the hospital. I got a letter from her lawyer. Or rather from a lawyer acting on behalf of Elsie b.u.t.trick, who's somehow managing things for Miss Perry. I've never had an official lease, just a handwritten note. This new thing is a form letter-boilerplate with lessor and lessee and so forth, but the part that's filled in is the rent. It's simply staggering. So I was wondering-you seem to know something about everyone. How well do you know Elsie b.u.t.trick?"

May's face went numb. May felt the same way she had at the baseball game, that she was the one who'd done something wrong.

Phoebe said, "Eddie says she's perfectly nice. That one time when he shot a swan ..."

May took a breath and said, "Yes, she did Eddie a good turn. And she's close to Miss Perry, so it's natural she'd look after things." Her voice sounded loud and far off.

Phoebe touched her hand. "I think I hear a 'but' in there."

May looked at Phoebe's small hand. Then at Phoebe's pretty, wide-eyed face. Was this what Elsie b.u.t.trick could do? Put her little paw out, tilt her face, and look creamy?

Phoebe leaned back but kept her fingers on May's. "May-honestly. You look so fierce." Phoebe let out a short high note, maybe a laugh, and said, "It's a little bit scary."

May looked at the floor and compressed herself. She couldn't pretend much now. Couldn't make up some c.o.c.k-and-bull story about ... anything else.

"Oh, May. Whatever it is, I'm on your side." May jerked her head at that. Phoebe was no fool. She'd said "whatever it is," but she wouldn't stop at "whatever it is" for long. "I feel terrible. I came over with my little problem ... If it's anything I can help with, just say."

May was tired. She'd meant to turn over a good part of the garden. Now she felt a weight. It wasn't Phoebe's talking. Listening to all that was like watching a hummingbird. It was Elsie up there in her sunny little house with her baby daughter and her friend Mary. And d.i.c.k on his boat, and from the little he'd said, as pleased with his crew as with the other parts of his life at sea. And here she was carrying around the secret, carrying it to the ball field, to the grocery store, bringing it home, not able to let it go in her own kitchen. And here was Phoebe looking at her with her big green eyes. May wondered how Phoebe would look at d.i.c.k if she knew-would she draw back? Or was she the other sort of woman? One who'd come close enough to see if she could get his attention. One dark look she could wonder about.

Phoebe said, "We can go on to something else. Just tell me I haven't made you mad at me. I'd really be at a loss without our little get-togethers. I mean, right this minute I am at a loss. There we were having a lovely talk ..." Phoebe tucked her chin in but kept looking.

"I'm not mad," May said. "I just thought of something and it got hold of me."

"Well, I certainly know what that's like. Anyway, now that we've gone this far, I'll say one more thing. I absolutely will never tell anybody else anything that we talk about. Never."

May felt stuck to the chair. She knew that if she didn't say anything, Phoebe would go on. It was her own fault. Just let everything knot up inside her and pull her face apart.

Phoebe said, "Oh, May. I have this little problem, and now I've ... without meaning to in the least. But I'm sort of stuck. If I just get up and leave, it would be heartless. I mean, it wouldn't be heartless, it just might seem heartless. But if I don't say anything else, then you'll be left wondering. I mean, you'll be left wondering what I'm wondering. I suppose I could promise I won't even wonder. Maybe if I were like Eddie. Eddie is someone who can just not wonder. You know Eddie built another room up there since Mary Scanlon moved in? Since I was doing the time sheets I asked what kind of a job it was, and he said a bedroom and a bath on the east side and walling in the screen porch on the other side for when the baby needs a room of her own. It was as if it were just another detail, like what kind of windows. Eddie can be amazing that way, he just looks at the job. It's not that he doesn't have an imagination. He can imagine what things will look like, he can say, 'If I fix it that way it'll look funny, but if I do this ...' It's just that I've never met someone as uncurious about people."

May felt an odd relief, as if Phoebe's chatter were in the future-everybody knew and n.o.body took much notice anymore-Elsie b.u.t.trick's child just another piece of small change, worn smooth by jingling with all the others-Mr. Salviatti's company's repaving Route 1, the red-crab packing plant's hiring, Captain Teixeira's retiring again ...

Phoebe said, "So of course I said, 'What baby?' but Eddie started talking about whether Miss Perry would make a fuss about his going past her house. For an instant I thought that Eddie ... that it was Eddie."

May sat up straight. She didn't say anything right off. Then she wondered just how well Phoebe knew Eddie, for all the time she spent with him. Of course, it could be that Eddie was changing; maybe he'd changed enough so he'd seem more of a risk. Used to be he'd just as soon be alone in the woods, but if you needed something done and didn't mind waiting, he'd get around to it. People would say, "If you need a new dock you can get one at the boatyard, you don't mind paying. Or you can get Eddie. Keeps to himself, but he's handy." Phoebe had said Eddie was "uncurious," as if that was a fault. Maybe where she came from it was. That was of a piece with the way Phoebe dished out praise. No holding back. When Eddie put in a new porch railing at the Teixeiras' store, Captain Teixeira gave it a pat and said, "That's not the first one you've built." Captain Teixeira might speak Portuguese at home, but he knew just what to say to Eddie without any extras.

Right now, whether she meant to or not, Phoebe had got her backed into a corner-all those extras, all that hovering and darting.

May looked her in the face and said, "It's not Eddie."

"Oh," Phoebe said. "How do you know?" She put her hand over her mouth. Phoebe looked away, squinting over the next question. It didn't take her long. She said, "So if Mary Scanlon is moving in, it's to help out."

"That's right."

Phoebe said, "If it's Elsie's baby, then who ..."

May watched Phoebe take it in. She was relieved Phoebe didn't say anything. Then May felt a greater relief. She was in the kitchen, her kitchen. She felt it was her house for the first time since it got fixed. She said, "I'm going out to the garden." She looked at Phoebe's shoes. "You can put on Tom's boots if you want to come along. They're by the back door."

When Phoebe got the boots on she fluffed her skirt. She looked like she was looking around for a mirror. May handed her a basket and said, "You know how to tell a ripe tomato?" Phoebe raised her eyebrows. "Give it a turn and see if it falls into your hand."

Phoebe admired the vegetable garden, the new garden shed. May said, "The shed's in the same place d.i.c.k built Spartina. His shed was bigger, big posts and beams so he could use a chain hoist. Covered it all with canvas. When the hurricane hit, the canvas didn't tear off. It caught the wind like a sail. Carried the beams right into the house. You saw what that was like. d.i.c.k kicked himself about it later. At the time he was running around, getting his boat out to sea."

Phoebe said, "I always wondered-why out to sea?"

"He thought he could get her out past the storm. But even if he didn't, she stood a better chance at sea than in the harbor. Half the boats smashed into each other. One got picked up and rolled onto Route One. He had some idea about how it'd be, so he fueled her up and took off."

"What did he say to you?" Phoebe said. "I mean, did he ask you?" May laughed. She said, "No more about that than the other thing he got up to."

Phoebe's eyebrows climbed up her forehead. Phoebe opened and closed her mouth. She finally said, "I'm sorry, I guess that was another joke. It's good that you can put things at a distance ..."

May pointed across Route 1. "If it wasn't for those trees we could see Elsie b.u.t.trick's house." She pointed to the creek. "If you throw a stick in there, it'll float right by her sister's house. d.i.c.k didn't get his baby on some hula-hula girl in the South Seas. It was right over there. Pretty soon I'll be in the supermarket and I'll run into Elsie b.u.t.trick with her baby in her grocery cart and I can either fall over in a faint or I can say, 'Well, look at that. She's got d.i.c.k's eyes.' So I don't see where there's much distance."

Phoebe blinked and her eyes teared up some. Phoebe's bit of weepiness was probably nothing more than crying at the movies. May didn't doubt she did a good deal of that. Let her take it whatever way suited her. May was breathing easier. She'd wrestled with forgiving d.i.c.k until she didn't know what it meant. And there was no talking to d.i.c.k-he was walking on eggsh.e.l.ls. She sometimes liked him that way; other times it made her feel the two of them were drifting around inside a gray day that wouldn't turn into anything but kept her on edge waiting for something.

Phoebe started picking tomatoes. She made slow work of it-each time she stooped she smoothed her skirt over her rear end and held it against the backs of her knees. Then she twisted the tomatoes so delicately that even some of the ripe ones didn't fall. When she did pick one she laid it in the basket as if she was making a flower arrangement. Then stood up, moved the basket, stooped, smoothed her skirt.

May said, "You don't need to be so dainty. Here." May knelt beside her and picked three in short order.

"I'm sure it's going to be all right," Phoebe said. "I mean, here you are with everything he could want. You're so good and beautiful in a real way." She held her hands out wide. "I mean, it's as if all this is a part of you."

May felt the side of her mouth twitch down.

Phoebe said, "I know, I know. I should just think those things."

May picked two tomatoes and another two. She said, "That's more than enough. You'd better take some home with you."

"I'm going back to the office," Phoebe said. "I'm probably late; I am late. They'll be all right in the car?"

Phoebe left in a flurry, shuffling to the back door with a pair of tomatoes in each hand, shaking off Tom's boots, trotting out the front door in her high heels, waving out the car window.

May stood on the porch, a little let down. At first she thought it was because she'd been talking too much. Then she thought, what if d.i.c.k was to find out? No, that made her cross, not sad. d.i.c.k was out to sea, where he didn't answer to anybody but himself. No reason why she shouldn't do what she pleased in her own place. Then she had a suspicion that Phoebe had got round her, had got the better of her. No to that, too. Phoebe was clever enough behind all that giddiness, but she didn't think Phoebe meant her any harm. Phoebe was lonely, was aching to find a friend.

So what did it mean that Phoebe picked her?

chapter twelve.

Elsie reread the instructions for hooking up the answering machine, one of the many small items on her list. In fact, they were all small, Lilliputians wrapping their tiny ropes around her just when she wished to do something big. She'd imagined that Miss Perry-Miss Perry's situation-would require largeness of spirit, a beaming of will and encouragement. Instead she felt like an IBM typewriter ball tapping out one minuscule letter after another. The day nurse had immediately taken command of Miss Perry's bedroom. On this first day she'd popped out four times to suggest things Elsie could do. All perfectly sensible. All elaborations of doctor's orders. An electric heater, at least until Elsie got the plumber to bleed the radiators. A hot-water bottle. A tray with legs for meals in bed. As soon as Elsie arrived with one thing the woman would meet her in the front hall wanting another. And now this answering machine with instructions that seemed to be translated from j.a.panese.

The day nurse came down the stairs and said, "Lydia's asking for you. Don't stay long. Oh, we need baby aspirin. And I couldn't find coffee. There's tea, but I prefer coffee."

"Baby aspirin?"

"Yes. Adult-strength would irritate her stomach, but we need a small dose as an anticlotting agent."

"Okay. Baby aspirin. While I'm out, why don't you see what you can do with this answering machine ... It'd be a big help. I'll put coffee on my list. Oh, by the way, it's Miss Perry. We all say Miss Perry. Only Captain Teixeira ... but he's her oldest friend." The nurse lifted a hand. Elsie said, "I'll bring my coffeemaker, and we'll have a chance to chat about everything tomorrow. Oh. We're having meals brought over from Sawtooth Point, whatever's the special. Once the answering machine is hooked up, just turn the ringer off and it won't bother you anymore. And let me know if there's anything you can't eat. You're okay with seafood? No problems with clams, lobster, squid?"

"I haven't ever had squid."

"Okay. No squid. After I see Miss Perry, I've got to run, but I'll be back to meet the night nurse. Do you know her?"

"No. I don't know who-"

"One of the Tran girls. She's an angel. If you have any trouble with the answering machine, she's very handy. They're all very bright. The young ones all have perfect English."

As she went up the stairs Elsie thought she'd just done a Jack. Not the stony-faced wait-'em-out Jack but the nipping-at-your-heels border-collie Jack. Couldn't be helped; the woman was driving her nuts.

She trotted up quickly, a last little display of border collie. She slowed in the dark hallway. She'd never been in this part of the house. She stopped short in front of the half-open door. To go into Miss Perry's bedroom seemed a terrible intimacy.

She knocked. Miss Perry's voice floated to her, a single unsteady note. She went in. The light from the windows silvered the large lenses of Miss Perry's gla.s.ses. In her long white nightgown and bed jacket, she looked like a snowy owl.

"Elsie."

The sound of her name went through her. It had the odd effect of erasing her. It was a relief. It brought her to Miss Perry as a very simple organism.

"Elsie. Sit here." Miss Perry moved her hand across the bed. Elsie sat. At this angle she could see Miss Perry's eyes, one opened wider than the other. "I want to talk." She waved her right hand back and forth without lifting it from the bedspread. She looked at her hand and said, "That means I'm laughing." The right side of her mouth smiled.

"Yes," Elsie said. "What are you laughing at?"

Miss Perry crooked her forefinger and slowly raised it. At last it reached the top of her head and tapped once. Then her hand seemed to dribble down back to the bed. She said, "Think."

"All right. I'm thinking. You said my name ... You know Captain Teixeira?"

Miss Perry shook her head. "Things." She looked out the window.

"Tree."

"Yes. Tree."

She waved her right hand. Not a laugh. "Things you know. I know. More words for trees."

"Oh. Ash. That tree is an ash."

"Yes. Ash. Say a tree I don't see."

"Beech. The copper beech in front." Miss Perry nodded. "All right. Sycamore. By my pond. It always looks like it's peeling," Miss Perry added. "And there's the white oak beside it." Miss Perry moved her hand, this time a laugh. Elsie said, "What's funny?"

"Quercus alba." Miss Perry touched her head again and said, "Odd. I know Latin. I don't know beside."

Elsie was afraid she was going to cry. She squinted and squeezed her nose as if stopping a sneeze. She said, "Beside." She held out one hand, put the other out. "This hand is beside that hand."

"Odd," Miss Perry said. She closed her eyes. She lay back and waved her hand at her hip.

Elsie said, "Do you want to lie down?"