"No, I'm sure not. I don't want her. Please take her back to your father."

"He told me to bring her here to you. She is yours now, truly. And she is hungry. You must feed her."

"I don't know what she eats, I can't keep her."

"She eats anything. It's not important."

"No, please, take her to your father. I will talk to him later."

"No," said the girl.

"Yes," insisted Gerald.

"No." She laughed and looked suddenly animated.

"Please take her back to your house."

"No. And anyway you need her, for the work. I can work too if you want. I will come every day and help you."

"No, thank you. I'm going to do all the work myself."

"Ahhh." She smiled, swaying.

"Good day," said Gerald. He turned and climbed up the hill out of sight.

The donkey's braying began again. When he came down to the house, the girl was gone. Lupe was nibbling a bush.

In the afternoon Gerald walked into town and spoke with Lestrado Puig, who confirmed that he owned all the equipment that came with the property, including the donkey. Gerald asked where he could sell the donkey. Puig told him he would find out and let him know.

He woke again in the night and lay beneath the sheet and looked toward the open window. Not a breath of wind in the trees-his trees now-not a good night to be at sea.

Names and lines from The Odyssey floated through his brain. Laistrygonians . . . and Cyclops, angry Poseidon-don't be afraid of them . . . Hope the voyage is a long one . . .

That wasn't from The Odyssey, but from Cavafy's "Ithaka."

Gerald half rose off his mattress with the urge to look through his books, but remained propped up on an elbow . . . He didn't have the poem with him. He lay back down. He could write to Pocock and tell him to look it up. He didn't remember it all: As you set out for Ithaka hope the voyage is a long one, full of adventure, full of discovery.

Laistrygonians and Cyclops . . .

Hope the voyage is a long one . . .

How did it go . . . ?

. . . Keep Ithaka always in your mind.

Arriving there is what you are destined for.

But do not hurry the journey at all.

Better if it lasts for years, so you are old by the time you reach the island, wealthy with all you have gained on the way, not expecting Ithaka to make you rich.

Ithaka gave you the marvelous journey.

Without her you would not have set out. . . .

Something in there, perhaps? Ithaca in Mind? By Gerald Rutledge. Was that the sort of thing they wanted, Pocock and the savants at John Murray? Poetic and Homeric enough for you?

He lay on his mattress and looked at the opaque blue-gray trapezoid of night framed by the bare walls. Around it, the walls and ceiling of the dark room seemed to move, closing in, drifting outward, pulsing erratically with tricks of perspective and the dim light.

Ithaca the Marvelous Journey. By Gerald Rutledge. Except it was hardly that, was it? Mostly a wretched, storm-tossed misery, full of wrong turns and monsters. And some very nasty females.

Seven.

A motor noise from the distant road, the sort of thing he never noticed beneath the cicadas, but did now because it grew louder and began to whine with effort, until Gerald finally realized it was coming up the hill. A visitor.

He came around the side of the house and saw a young woman pulling a Vespa backward onto its stand.

"Buenos dias," she said. She was wearing a crisp white shirt, a blue skirt, proper shoes. Her black hair was pulled tightly back into a braid at the back of her head.

"Buenos dias," said Gerald.

"How do you do. I am the daughter of Lestrado Puig," she said.

"Oh. I am Gerald Rutledge. Pleased to meet you."

"Yes, I know. We have sold the donkey. Someone will come and take it. Here is a check for the sale." She handed him an envelope.

"Thank you."

"De nada. Now I take you to meet Calix who will buy everything, all the produce."

"Pardon me?"

"Comestibles Calix. Here in Cala Marsopa. They will buy everything that is produced on the farm: olives, almonds, lemons, carobs. At a good price. It is there that Gonzalo sold before."

She turned to her Vespa and with a firm, practiced motion stamped on the kick-starter with her small black shoes and the engine started easily. She pushed the scooter forward off its stand and sat on the front saddle seat, one leg stretching from her tightened skirt with that foot on the ground. She looked at Gerald. "Get on."

"I go with you?"

"Yes."

"Where are we going?"

"To meet Calix."

Gerald was hesitant. She was small and he didn't see how they would remain upright if he got on the seat behind her.

"It's all right," she said. "I carry my father everywhere. He is bigger than you."

Gerald approached. He raised a leg over the seat and slowly lowered himself. She brought her hand back and pointed at the handle immediately behind her tightly skirted rump between Gerald's legs. "Hold here. Take off your hat." Gerald removed his straw hat and she half turned and pushed it for him under his arm.

The scooter slid forward, turned, and plunged down the hill, bumping on the rutted track. Gerald remained stiffly upright, afraid even to lean his head to one side or the other in case he threw her off balance. She paused briefly at the road, looking quickly right and left, and Gerald felt the warmth coming off the back of her neck against his face, and he smelled perfume, and then the scooter leapt forward and they flew down the road. The speed seemed terrific but now there was no sense of precariousness. He watched her hands efficiently working the throttle and clutch. They were unconscionably close: she appeared to be sitting in his lap, they were spooning in a seated position. He tried to keep his legs away from her thighs. The back of her shirt flapped against his arms, errant strands of her hair flicked across his face.

She sped through town. Gerald tried to anticipate her turns to maintain balance as she and the scooter leaned in and out of the turns, but he was unable to prevent his legs, one or the other on each turn, rubbing up against her thighs.

She slowed abruptly on a side street and came to a stop. "You can get off," she said.

Gerald released the handle, swung a leg off, and stood trembling with the memory of the motor in him as she shut off the machine and briskly pulled the scooter onto its stand.

"Come, please," she said.

They walked through a curtain of beads into the dark cool interior containing shelves of food, baskets of fresh produce.

"Hola, Paloma!" said a broad woman wearing an apron, smiling at them both as they came in.

When they were finished at Calix, she offered to ride him back up the hill to C'an Cabrer. Gerald thanked her and told her he had some business in town and would walk home. She shook his hand-very firmly-started the Vespa, and shot away like a hummingbird.

Unusual girl, he thought, the daughter of Puig.

Eight.

After their siesta, Bernie and Luc walked slowly along the dirt road beside the rocks until they came to the little beach called Son Moll. Lulu didn't like the beach, so she never came with them or took Luc to the beach, even if Bernie was working. He spread out a blanket. They ran in and out of the lapping waves, and built sand castles at the water's edge.

"Papa! We go see pirates?"

"Yes, Luc, mon brave! Let's go see if the pirates are here today."

Crouching, wading on his knees, Bernie carried Luc into the natural cave inside the large rock formation that breached like a whale from the shallows at the western edge of the beach. He had to hold Luc up close to his face to pass through a cleft where there was just room enough for their heads above the water between the two Brobdingnagian clamshell rocks almost closed against each other that made the great whale. They reached an inner grotto, where, Bernie told Luc, the pirates used to hide, and could even reappear at any time. Inside the cool space, lit by shards of sunlight from the imperfect joints of the clamshells, the water made chocky, echoing sounds.

"Arrrgghh, me hearties!" Bernie called out. "Avast, Blind Pew!"

"Bline Pooh!" cried Luc.

"Billy Bones! Black Dog! Long John Silver! Show yourselves, ye swabs!"

"Fifteen men!"

"Ah-ha-harrgh! Fifteen men on a dead man's chest, yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!" they sang together.

After a while, Bernie said, "Right, then, young 'Orkins. I don't see no pirates today, matey. We best be off."

"'Orkins!"

Clutching Luc to his chest and face, Bernie waded out again through the water that glowed pale blue from the light beneath the rocks. He felt the smooth wet skin of his son against him, beneath his hands, and the life inside this most perfect bundle, and the trust his son felt that no matter how dangerous the cave looked and what might appear there, Bernie would keep him safe.

Luc fell asleep in his arms as he walked back along the road to the Rocks.

Coming toward him, he saw the man he'd noticed several times on this road, walking between the beach and the town. Not a Spaniard, obviously: sandy-haired, northern Europeanlooking, but not a tourist. Thin to the point of emaciation, tanned, threadbare clothes, a decrepit straw hat; he looked like a manual laborer of some sort.

Bernie nodded to him, and the man nodded back as he passed.

Rafael Soller was on the quay as Nereid approached at less than a walking pace. His shirtsleeves were rolled up, his thick arms covered with black hair held away from his body, eager to push off, to catch, to help as needed.

"Bon dia, Gerald."

"Bon dia, Rafael."

The boat drifted alongside, squeezing gently against the hemp fenders hanging down the side of the hull. Gerald stepped onto the quay holding the bow and stern lines.

"Give me one," said Rafael. Gerald handed him the bowline and Rafael wrapped it many times around a small bollard and threw in two knots for good measure. Gerald tied the stern line to an iron ring set in the concrete. They shook hands.

"So, Gerald-" Rafael was suddenly unsure of what to say next. He looked at the Englishman awkwardly. "How are you?"

"I'm all right," Gerald answered. He looked up at Rafael. "Have you seen my wife?"

"Yes." Rafael's eyes flicked over the boat, away from Gerald. "She returned a week ago. I have seen her, but I have not spoken to her."

"Is she still here?"

Rafael looked up at Gerald and lifted his chin in the direction of the house above the rocks across the harbor. "Maybe at the house. I don't know."

Gerald too looked across the harbor for a moment, his eyes squinting as if to focus better. He looked back at Rafael. "Rafael, there was an accident. I'm going to sail to Palma to have some work done on the boat. May I leave some things here with you, in the bar? Some bags, some books? To have them off the boat while the work is being done? I will take them when I come back."

"But yes, of course. When do you go?"

"Today. Very soon."

Rafael was surprised. "You are leaving again today?"

"Yes."