Duma Key(95)

Elizabeth was in her wheelchair with the remains of a breakfast pastry scattered across her tray. It looked to me as if he'd also managed to get some juice and half a cup of coffee into her. She was staring out at the Gulf with an expression of stern disapproval, looking this morning more like Captain Bligh of HMS Bounty than a Mafia don's daughter.

" Buenos d as, mi amigo, " Wireman said. And to Elizabeth: "It's Edgar, Miss Eastlake. He came for sevens. Want to say hello?"

"Piss shit head rat," she said. I think. In any case, she said it to the Gulf, which was still dark blue and mostly asleep.

"Still not so good, I take it," I said.

"No. She's gone down before and come back up, but she's never gone down so far."

"I still haven't brought her any of my pictures to look at."

"No point right now." He handed me a cup of black coffee. "Here. Get your bad self around this."

I passed him the envelope with the sample contract in it. As Wireman pulled it out, I turned to Elizabeth. "Would you like some poems later today?" I asked her.

Nothing. She only looked out at the Gulf with that stony frown: Captain Bligh about to order someone strapped to the foremast and flogged raw.

For no reason at all, I asked: "Was your father a skin diver, Elizabeth?"

She turned her head slightly and cut her ancient eyes in my direction. Her upper lip lifted in a dog's grin. There was a moment it was brief, but seemed long when I felt another person looking at me. Or not a person at all. An entity that was wearing Elizabeth Eastlake's old, doughy body like a sock. My right hand clenched briefly, and once more I felt nonexistent, too-long fingernails bite into a nonexistent palm. Then she looked back at the Gulf, simultaneously feeling across the tray until her fingers happened on a piece of the breakfast pastry, and I was calling myself an idiot who had to stop letting his nerves get the best of him. There were undoubtedly strange forces at work here, but not every shadow was a ghost.

"He was," Wireman said absently, unfolding the contract. "John Eastlake was a regular Ricou Browning you know, the guy who played the Creature from the Black Lagoon back in the fifties."

"Wireman, you're an artesian well of useless information."

"Yeah, ain't I cool? Her old man didn't buy that harpoon pistol in a store, you know; Miss Eastlake says he had it commissioned. It probably ought to be in a museum."

But I didn't care about John Eastlake's harpoon gun, not just then. "Are you reading that contract?"

He dropped it on the tray and looked at me, bemused. "I was trying."

"And your left eye?"

"Nothing. But hey, no reason to be disappointed. The doctor said -"

"Do me a favor. Cover your left peeper."

He did.

"What do you see?"

"You, Edgar. One hombre muy feo. "

"Yeah, yeah. Cover the right one."

He did. "Now I just see black. Only..." He paused. "Maybe not as black." He dropped his hand again. "I can't tell for sure. These days I can't separate the truth from the wishful thinking." He shook his head hard enough to make his hair fly, then thumped his forehead with the heel of his hand.

"Take it easy."

"Easy for you to say." He sat silent for a few moments, then picked the piece of breakfast pastry out of Elizabeth's hand and fed it to her. When it was tucked safely away in her mouth, he turned to me. "Would you mind her while I go get something?"

"Happy to."

He jogged up the boardwalk and I was left with Elizabeth. I tried feeding her one of the remaining pieces of breakfast pastry and she nibbled it out of my hand, bringing back a fleeting recollection of a rabbit I'd had when I was seven or eight. Mr. Hitchens had been its name, although I no longer knew why memory's a funny thing, isn't it? Her lips were toothless and soft, but not unpleasant. I stroked the side of her head, where her white hair wiry, rather coarse was pulled back toward a bun. It occurred to me that Wireman must comb that hair each morning, and make that bun. That Wireman must have dressed her this morning, including diapers, for surely she wasn't continent when she was like this. I wondered if he thought of Esmeralda when he pinned the pins or secured the ties. I wondered if he thought of Julia when he made the bun.

I picked up another piece of breakfast pastry. She opened her mouth obediently for it... but I hesitated. "What's in the red picnic basket, Elizabeth? The one in the attic?"

She seemed to think. And hard. Then: "Any old pipe-dip." She hesitated. Shrugged. "Any old pipe-dip Adie wants. Shoot!" And cackled. It was a startling, witchlike sound. I fed her the rest of her breakfast pastry, piece by piece, and asked no more questions.

xiv

When Wireman returned, he had a microcassette recorder. He handed it to me. "I hate to ask you to put that contract on tape, but I have to. At least the damn thing's only two pages long. I'd like it back this afternoon, if that's possible."

"It is. And if some of my pictures actually sell, you're on commission, my friend. Fifteen per cent. That should cover both legal and talent."

He sat back in his chair, laughing and groaning at the same time. " Por Dios! Just when I thought I couldn't sink any lower in life, I become a f**king talent agent! Excuse the language, Miss Eastlake."