Duma Key(193)

Nan Melda could almost believe it possible. The child is powerful. Re-creating life, however, is beyond her. Re-creating real life is even beyond the thing from the Gulf. Nan Melda's eyes drift to Libbit's special-things box before going back to Libbit herself again. She has only seen the figurine that came from the Gulf once, a tiny woman in a faded pink wrap that might once have been scarlet and a hood from which hair spills, hiding her brow.

She asks Libbit if everything is all right. It's all she dares to say, as far as she dares to go. If there really is a third eye hidden under the curls of the thing in the box a far-seeing mojo eye it is impossible to be too careful.

Libbit says Good. I just drawin, Nan Melda.

Has she forgotten what she's supposed to do? Nan Melda can only hope she hasn't. She has to go back downstairs now, and keep an eye on Adie. Her man will be calling for her soon.

Part of her cannot believe this is happening; part of her feels as if her whole life has been a preparation for it.

Melda says You may hear me call yo Daddy. If I do, you want to go pick up those things you lef' by the pool. Don't leave em out all night for the dew t'git at.

Still drawing, not looking up. But then she says something that gladdens Melda's frightened heart. No'm. I'll take Perse. Then I won't be scared if it's dark.

Melda says You take whoever you want, jus' bring in Noveen, she still out there.

It's all she has time for, all she dares when she thinks about that special probing mojo eye, and how it might be trying to see inside her head.

Melda touches her bracelets again as she goes downstairs. She is very glad she had them on while she was in Libbit's room, even though the little china woman was put away in the tin box.

She is just in time to see the swirl of Adie's dress at the end of the back hall as Adie turns into the kitchen.

It is time. This is going to play out.

Instead of following Adie to the kitchen, Melda runs down the front hall to the Mister's study, where, for the first time in the seven years she's worked for the family, she enters without knocking. The Mister is sitting behind his desk with his tie off and his collar undone and his braces hanging down in slack loops. He has the folding gold-framed pictures of Tessie and Lo-Lo in his hands. He looks up at her, his eyes red in a face that is already thinner. He doesn't seem surprised that his housekeeper should come bursting in unannounced; he has the air of a man beyond surprise, beyond shock, but of course this will turn out not to be so.

He says What is it, Melda Lou?

She says You got to come right away.

He looks at her from his streaming eyes with a calm and infuriating stupidity. Come where?

She says To the beach. And bring at-ere.

She points to the harpoon pistol, which hangs on the wall, along with several short harpoons. The tips are steel, not silver, and the shafts are heavy. She knows; hasn't she carried them in the basket enough times?

He says What are you talking about?

She says I cain't be takin time to explain. You got to come to the beach right now, less you want to lose another one.

He goes. He doesn't ask which daughter, or inquire again why he should want the harpoon pistol; he just snatches it off the wall, takes two of the harpoons in his other hand, and strides out through the open study door, first beside Melda and then ahead of her. By the time he reaches the kitchen, where Melda has last seen Adie, he's at a full-out run and she is falling behind even though she's running herself, holding her skirts before her in both hands. And is she surprised by this sudden break in his torpor, this sudden galvanizing action? No. Because, despite the blanket of his grief, the Mister has also known that something here is wrong and going wronger all the time.

The back door stands open. An evening breeze frisks in, stirring it back farther on its hinges... only now it's actually a night breeze. Sunset is dying. There will still be light on Shade Beach, but here at Heron's Roost, dark has already come. Melda dashes across the back porch and sees the Mister already on the path to the beach. He's only a shadow. She looks around for Libbit, but of course she doesn't see her; if Libbit is doing what she is supposed to be doing, then she's already on her way to the swimming pool with her heart-box under her arm.

The heart-box with the monster inside it.

She runs after the Mister and catches him at the bench, where the path drops down to the beach. He is standing there, frozen. In the west, the last of the sunset is a sullen orange line that will soon be gone, but there is enough light for her to see Adie at the edge of the water, and the man who is wading to greet her.

Adriana screams Emery! She sounds mad with joy, as if he's been gone a year instead of a day.

Melda shouts No, Ade, keep away from him! from beside the frozen, gaping man, but she knows Adie will pay no attention, and she doesn't; Adie runs to her husband.

John Eastlake says What and that's all.

He's broken free of his torpor long enough to run this far, but now he's frozen again. Is it because he sees the two other forms, farther out but also wading toward shore? Wading in water that should be over their heads? Melda thinks not. She thinks he is still staring at his oldest daughter as the dim figure of the man coming out of the water reaches for her with his dripping arms and lays hold of her neck with his dripping hands, first choking off her glad cries and then dragging her into the surge.

Out there in the Gulf, waiting, ticking back and forth on the mild swell like a clock that tells time in years and centuries rather than minutes and hours, is the black hulk of Perse's ship.