Duma Key(192)

"Nan Melda told Libbit what she had to do. And she told Libbit she had to do it no matter what she saw in her head or how loud Perse screamed for her to stop... because she would scream, Nan Melda said, if she found out. She said they'd just have to hope Perse found out too late to make any difference. And then Melda said..." I stopped. The track of the lowering sun was growing brighter and brighter. I had to go on, but it was hard now. It was very, very hard.

"What, muchacho?" Wireman said gently. "What did she say?"

"She said that she might scream, too. And Adie. And her Daddy. But she couldn't stop. 'Dassn't stop, child,' she said. 'Dassn't stop or it's all for nothing.'" As if of its own accord, my hand plucked the Venus Black from my pocket and scrawled two words beneath the primitive drawing of the girl and the woman in the swimming pool:

dassn't stop

My eyes blurred with tears. I dropped the pencil into the sea oats and wiped the tears away. So far as I know, that pencil is still where I dropped it.

"Edgar, what about the silver-tipped harpoons?" Jack asked. "You never said anything about them."

"There weren't any magic goddam harpoons," I said tiredly. "They must have come years later, when Eastlake and Elizabeth returned to Duma Key. God knows which of them got the idea, and whichever one it was may not have even been completely sure why it seemed important."

"But..." Jack was frowning again. "If they didn't have the silver harpoons in 1927... then how..."

"No silver harpoons, Jack, but plenty of water."

"I still don't follow that. Perse came from the water. She's of water." He looked at the ship, as if to make sure it was still there. It was.

"Right. But at the pool, her hold slipped. Elizabeth knew it, but didn't understand the implications. Why would she? She was just a child."

"Oh, f**k," Wireman said. He slapped his forehead. "The swimming pool. Fresh water. It was a freshwater pool. Fresh as opposed to salt."

I pointed a finger at him.

Wireman touched the picture I'd drawn of the ceramic keg sitting beside the doll. "This keg was an empty? Which they filled from the pool?"

"I have no doubt." I shuffled the swimming-pool sketch aside and showed them the next one. The perspective was again from almost exactly where we were sitting. Above the horizon, a just-risen sickle moon shone between the masts of a rotting ship I hoped I would never have to draw again. And on the beach, at the edge of the water -

"Christ, that's awful," Wireman said. "I can't even see it clearly and it's still awful."

My right arm was itching, throbbing. Burning. I reached down and touched the picture with the hand I hoped I would never have to see again... although I was afraid I might.

"I can see it for all of us," I said.

How to Draw a Picture (XI)

Don't quit until the picture's complete. I can't tell you if that's the cardinal rule of art or not, I'm no teacher, but I believe those six words sum up all I've been trying to tell you. Talent is a wonderful thing, but it won't carry a quitter. And there always comes a time if the work is sincere, if it comes from that magic place where thought, memory, and emotion all merge when you will want to quit, when you will think that if you put your pencil down your eye will dull, your memory will lapse, and the pain will end. I know all this from the last picture I drew that day the one of the gathering on the beach. It was only a sketch, but I think that when you're mapping hell, a sketch is all you need.

I started with Adriana.

All day long she has been frantic about Em, her emotions ranging from wild anger at him to fear for him. It has even crossed her mind that Daddy has Done Something Rash, although that seems unlikely; his grief has made him torpid and unresponsive ever since the search ended.

When sunset comes and there's still no sign of Em, you'd think she'd become more nervous than ever, but instead she grows calm, almost cheerful. She tells Nan Melda that Em will be back directly, she's sure of it. She feels it in her bones and hears it in her head, where it sounds like a small, chiming bell. She supposes that bell is what they mean by "woman's intuition," and you don't become fully aware of it until you're married. She tells Nanny this, too.

Nan Melda nods and smiles, but she watches Adie narrowly. She's been watching her all day. The girl's man is gone for good, Libbit has told her this and Melda believes her, but Melda also believes that the rest of the family may be saved... that she herself may be saved.

Much, however, depends on Libbit herself.

Nan Melda goes up to check on her remaining babby-un, touching the bracelets on her left arm as she climbs the stairs. The silver bracelets are from her Mama, and Melda wears them to church every Sunday. Perhaps that's why she took them from her special-things box today, slipping them on and pushing them up until they stuck on the swell of her forearm instead of letting them dangle loose above her wrist. Perhaps she wanted to feel a little closer to her Mama, to borrow a little of Mama's quiet strength, or perhaps she just wanted the association of something holy.

Libbit is in her room, drawing. She is drawing her family, Tessie and Lo-Lo very much included. The eight of them (Nan Melda is also family, as far as Libbit is concerned) stand on the beach where they have spent so many happy times swimming and picnicking and building sand castles, their hands linked like paper dolls and great big smiles running off the sides of their faces. It's as if she thinks she can draw them back to life and happiness by the pure force of her will.