pleasant," said Margaret. "Sometimes faster, too."
The cop turned on Cordelia in her lair behind the seats.
"That true?"
"Yes, it is," Cordelia answered, sounding like her mother.
"This lady your mom?"
"Yes, she is."
"You family too?" the officer asked Donny.
"No," Donny said. He showed the officer his top-of-the-line smile. "Hired help."
"That right?" he asked the ladies.
"Well, yes," Margaret answered a bit impatiently. After a moment the officer handed Donny the registration and license.
"Have a nice day, ma'am." He took a last glance at Donny Slash. "Drive carefully, sir."
When the cop had vanished from sight, Donny and Cordelia whooped with joy.
"Oh, Moms! You're like so great!" She was, in the end, her mother's greatest admirer.
"Hey, Slim," Donny yelled. "You're awesome, man."
He took one hand off the wheel to offer Margaret a high-five. She condescended to return it.
"Everybody loves you when you're somebody else," she explained.
The Wine-Dark Sea
O N A VERY FOGGY late-autumn morning, a man named Eric Floss was wandering the quaint streets of a preserved Connecticut whaling town. He found himself walking scrubbed brick sidewalks that fronted the marble steps of exquisite Federal-style houses. Old ironwork bordered gardens grown with lilac bushes and hedged in boxwood. There were warmly lighted shops soon to open for the sale of antique ornamental pieces and vintage furniture. One place had antique willow-patterned china from the ginseng trade. Most of the windows, though, offered midlevel, tourist-standard marine studies. There was scrimshaw from the lathes of the Philippines and here and there some genuine old pieces, crude but authentic. A few shops had rows of jade and amber jewelry for sale and the odd lissome ivory apsara.
Floss had come to the town because it was where a ferry crossed many times a day to Steadman's Island, the only habitable point on a reef of rocky islands, a low-key resort where large holdings and a paucity of space and fresh water had made summering expensive and restricted. One section of Steadman's Island was called Heron's Neck, the site of the island's largest and most ornate summer cottage. The big houses were all called cottages.
It had become generally known that the owner of Heron's Neck, a friend of the Secretary of Defense, had made the place available to his friend for a few days. The Secretary liked to summon his political retainers to remote and inconvenient meeting sites to inform them of his wishes, and the island had become a favorite. That fall week he had called a conference to sic the dogs of his department on some of their opposite numbers in other government agencies.
Eric was a freelancer whose demonstrated unreliability had limited his prospects of journalistic advancement. It was not his reporting or the soundness of his prose that had failed to satisfy, but his tendency to overlook deadlines and even entire assignments once undertaken. This time he had signed for an article on the reaction of the year-round island population to the presence of the policy conference on its shores. The journal was a post-pornographic monthly that had passed into the hands of an old colleague of his. That fall, both Eric and the magazine were attempting to find their way back to seriousness. The magazine was cutting back on its ration of sexual fantasy and hard-core pix, running an occasional piece of political revelation. Eric had nearly stopped drinking and using recreational drugs.
The theory behind the story was that the locals might have some comments worth recording on the combination
of mystery and ostentation that surrounded such a high-level, high-security event. Moreover, Eric had what he thought might be a useful local connection. One of the year-round inhabitants, Annie Shumway, was the sister of a woman with whom Eric had traveled in the Middle East. It would be an interesting beginning, he thought, to visit them.
The fact was that his enthusiasm for
The cop turned on Cordelia in her lair behind the seats.
"That true?"
"Yes, it is," Cordelia answered, sounding like her mother.
"This lady your mom?"
"Yes, she is."
"You family too?" the officer asked Donny.
"No," Donny said. He showed the officer his top-of-the-line smile. "Hired help."
"That right?" he asked the ladies.
"Well, yes," Margaret answered a bit impatiently. After a moment the officer handed Donny the registration and license.
"Have a nice day, ma'am." He took a last glance at Donny Slash. "Drive carefully, sir."
When the cop had vanished from sight, Donny and Cordelia whooped with joy.
"Oh, Moms! You're like so great!" She was, in the end, her mother's greatest admirer.
"Hey, Slim," Donny yelled. "You're awesome, man."
He took one hand off the wheel to offer Margaret a high-five. She condescended to return it.
"Everybody loves you when you're somebody else," she explained.
The Wine-Dark Sea
O N A VERY FOGGY late-autumn morning, a man named Eric Floss was wandering the quaint streets of a preserved Connecticut whaling town. He found himself walking scrubbed brick sidewalks that fronted the marble steps of exquisite Federal-style houses. Old ironwork bordered gardens grown with lilac bushes and hedged in boxwood. There were warmly lighted shops soon to open for the sale of antique ornamental pieces and vintage furniture. One place had antique willow-patterned china from the ginseng trade. Most of the windows, though, offered midlevel, tourist-standard marine studies. There was scrimshaw from the lathes of the Philippines and here and there some genuine old pieces, crude but authentic. A few shops had rows of jade and amber jewelry for sale and the odd lissome ivory apsara.
Floss had come to the town because it was where a ferry crossed many times a day to Steadman's Island, the only habitable point on a reef of rocky islands, a low-key resort where large holdings and a paucity of space and fresh water had made summering expensive and restricted. One section of Steadman's Island was called Heron's Neck, the site of the island's largest and most ornate summer cottage. The big houses were all called cottages.
It had become generally known that the owner of Heron's Neck, a friend of the Secretary of Defense, had made the place available to his friend for a few days. The Secretary liked to summon his political retainers to remote and inconvenient meeting sites to inform them of his wishes, and the island had become a favorite. That fall week he had called a conference to sic the dogs of his department on some of their opposite numbers in other government agencies.
Eric was a freelancer whose demonstrated unreliability had limited his prospects of journalistic advancement. It was not his reporting or the soundness of his prose that had failed to satisfy, but his tendency to overlook deadlines and even entire assignments once undertaken. This time he had signed for an article on the reaction of the year-round island population to the presence of the policy conference on its shores. The journal was a post-pornographic monthly that had passed into the hands of an old colleague of his. That fall, both Eric and the magazine were attempting to find their way back to seriousness. The magazine was cutting back on its ration of sexual fantasy and hard-core pix, running an occasional piece of political revelation. Eric had nearly stopped drinking and using recreational drugs.
The theory behind the story was that the locals might have some comments worth recording on the combination
of mystery and ostentation that surrounded such a high-level, high-security event. Moreover, Eric had what he thought might be a useful local connection. One of the year-round inhabitants, Annie Shumway, was the sister of a woman with whom Eric had traveled in the Middle East. It would be an interesting beginning, he thought, to visit them.
The fact was that his enthusiasm for
Similar Books
