The Sea is a Thief (13 page)

“You're just a young one, you are, my Anna,” she said, shaking her head slowly from side to side. “Young and yet so badly hurt.  If your father were still among us I might not feel as I do.”  The pipe was not fully lit; she leaned over the fire with the cedar splint and worked on it until she was satisfied.  “You're smart, though, and not easily fooled.  A young man such as you describe must have something to offer.  Why don't you bring this Sam out here to ride?”  Anna could scarcely believe what she was hearing.  Perhaps she had been able to express her feelings to Elizabeth after all.  “Let the ponies get the smell of him.  See what opinion they hold.”  

Anna's smile was broad. “I will, Elizabeth!  I surely will!”  She leapt from her seat and embraced the medicine woman, squeezing her tightly around the neck.  In her heart she knew that Sam would feel as she felt about Assateague, and Elizabeth.  

She would bring him to the island, as she had promised him, and soon.  

When she left Elizabeth to return to Chincoteague, Anna's spirit soared.  She leaned into her oars, rowing towards the setting sun.  As she beached the skiff on the banks of the creek behind her home, the twilight sky was as dark as the ink from an inkwell, but the horizon was a tangle of orange flame.  On Assateague, the sun rose over the water and set over the marsh. On Chincoteague, sandwiched between the barrier island and the mainland, the sun set each day over the wide, sparkling channel.  As the last of the skipjacks found their way to port and the seabirds winged southwards to gather on beaches for the night, widening streaks of copper and red fanned across the sky until the sun was finally snuffed out like a smoldering wick.  Many times Anna would stand at the edge of the channel watching the colors change, waiting for the perfect moment when the sunset to the west matched exactly her memory of that morning's sunrise to the east.  If she closed her eyes at that moment and reopened them again, she could not tell if a day was beginning or ending.  

This, she thought, might well be such a day.
 

 

CHAPTER SIX

Competing Interests

 

The door to the Bagwells' pantry was temperamental.  Sticky in summer, it rattled in wintertime and created an annoying draft in the dining room.  The pantry had once been a simple storeroom.  Some time ago, it had been fitted up with cabinetry by a local fellow who was known for doing things his own way—that is, not the way anyone else would ever do them.  He owed Edmund Bagwell a sizable sum of money and could find no other means to repay it.  Thus the pantry and its frustrating door were built.  Ruth Broadwater complained about it all the time.  About once a year she coaxed George into attempting a repair, but the last thing George claimed to be was handy.  So far he had accomplished nothing.  

One day at supper, as the door squeaked on its hinges, a thought occurred to Edmund Bagwell.  “Let's have the young sailor from Captain Sharpe's boat come in to fix that blasted thing,” he proclaimed.  

“A fine idea,” agreed Arinthia. “You said he did excellent work elsewhere.  Why not here?”

A request was sent to Captain Sharpe.  A reply was returned promptly, and early the next morning, as his companions dispersed to other parts of Chincoteague, Sam Dreher stood at the large front entrance to the Bagwells' home, tools in hand.  He was concerned about what the day might bring.  His concern was well justified; it was Nancy Bagwell's home.   

Of course Sam could offer no objection to Captain Sharpe's directive.  As far as the Captain knew, Sam worked at a different home each day; why not for his new friends Edmund and Arinthia?   The Captain understood the value of a favor returned.  His dinner with the Bagwells had been pleasant and his warm reception among the villagers had inspired confidence.  He was most agreeable to the modest proposal that the Ship's Carpenter should spend a day or two at Bagwell's personal residence.  The Captain had gone even further, offering the carpenter's services for as long as he might prove useful.    

That was unsettling to Sam.  Carpentry was carpentry wherever it was done, but he was uneasy spending so much time with such a well-known family.  So far he and Anna had enjoyed privacy and freedom; this assignment might endanger both.  He did not want to imagine what would happen if they were discovered.  

When Nancy Bagwell answered the door on that cool morning, Sam's fears took wing.  Her smile was menacing in its very pleasantness.  “Mr. Dreher!” she cried.  “We
have
been expecting you.”  Nancy, for one, had very high expectations.  Her planning had begun the moment she found out that Sam was coming. That morning she arranged her hair carefully, covering it at the back with a clever silk cap.  Perfect little curls framed her forehead.  Her outfit was well chosen: an emerald-green daytime dress with ivory trim, brought last spring from London, with matching dark-green patent-leather shoes.  Their high gloss would not survive ten minutes on Chincoteague's muddy main street.  On her father's thick oriental carpets, however, they were perfectly appropriate.  

For a girl of barely sixteen, Nancy's sense of style was keenly developed. She could thank her father's connections to international shipping for that.  It was more difficult to say how she had come by her sense of social intrigue.  It might simply have been a gift.  Any town harbored its share of gossip and rumor about its eligible young men and women.   On Chincoteague, most of it could be traced back to Nancy Bagwell.  Parlor politics were her passion.  Someday she hoped to be the mistress of a fine home and family; her search for the man who would share it was already underway.  So far it had not been fruitful.  The truth was that no one actually liked Nancy very much.  As attractive as her family's rising fortunes might be, each boy who caught her eye soon retreated from her persistent advances.  

That included Beau Daisey.  Though his circumstances were unfortunate, something about him held a powerful allure for the young girl.  Others found his dark and moody nature alarming; to her, it was captivating.  Her parents cautioned her strongly against him. That doubled her attraction to him.  Her overt flirtations seemed to annoy him.  That doubled it again.  In most things, Nancy got her way, usually because of her powerful parents.  The money and reputation of the Bagwells had the opposite effect on Beau; it served only to drive him away.  He coldly resisted her every advance.  Eventually he managed to discourage her by making it his business to stay out of her path.

Nancy was a strong-minded young woman.  Still, when Beau rejected her, she was hurt.  Shortly she recovered, and resolved to do even better for herself, but whenever she saw him she felt a little pang in her stomach.

Her search continued.  

Today she would venture into more exotic territory: the handsome young officer of whom her mother and father had spoken so well.  True, he was a Yankee, but she had met many northerners and liked them. There was the additional problem of his service with the Navy.  She was confident that her father could deal with this problem as well, should the need arise.  One sailor could not possibly be indispensable to an entire Navy.  There was no point in fretting over future obstacles.  The first order of business was to get to know the young man.  After that, she would take matters one step at a time.

And so Nancy Bagwell, as meticulously prepared as any general on the eve of battle, positioned herself strategically at the door to her home when Sam Dreher rang the bell that morning.   She knew that her father would be off attending to business.  That left only her mother and the Broadwaters to be dealt with.  Nancy handled that problem by sending a message for the butcher to make his regular delivery just before the hour when Sam Dreher was expected.  She was sure the Ship's Carpenter would arrive exactly on time.  A delivery from the butcher a few minutes beforehand would ensure that her mother and her staff would be occupied in the kitchen.  Nancy would hover in the foyer, ready to greet Sam.   

Thus far, her plan was working well.  There stood Sam, an intoxicating sight in his blue Federal uniform.  His shoulders were broad, his posture tall and straight.  The embroidered
Louisiana
cap sat purposefully askew on his head, framing his thick hair and resolute brown eyes.  For a moment Nancy Bagwell was at a loss for words.  She recovered quickly.  “Please do come in, Mr. Dreher,” she continued, stepping aside as Sam entered the Bagwell home.  “Allow me to show you the subject of my father's message.”  He followed the young girl towards the pantry.  She was far smaller than he, but moved with authority.  With any luck, she thought, they could converse for quite a while before anyone noticed that he had arrived.  

While Nancy told Sam about the difficulties with the pantry door, her mother entered, followed closely by Ruth Broadwater.  It seemed to Arinthia that the conversation had lasted only a few moments.  So Nancy had intended.  Actually, a remarkable amount of information had already changed hands, most of it in her direction.  Nancy knew, for example, that Sam hailed from a little town in Pennsylvania, which she imagined to be very near Philadelphia.  She told him that her father did a great deal of business with Philadelphia merchants; Philadelphia loved oysters and purchased huge quantities of them.  Many of the best-loved items in her closet had come from there.  Sam attempted to describe the distance between the thriving city of Philadelphia and the tiny village far northwest of it on the Little Schuylkill River, but Nancy was undeterred. Both were in Pennsylvania. That was good enough for her.

Nancy also knew that Sam was an experienced carpenter who would have no difficulty repairing the pantry door.   She would have to find other things to keep him busy if she wanted to keep him around longer than a day.  She was already calculating what those things might be.  When she inquired about which other families on the island Sam had visited, he grew suddenly quiet and had little to say.  
How odd,
she thought.  She filed the moment away for future reference.  Nancy also noticed that Sam seemed very uncomfortable around her, especially for a sailor who was several years her senior. How intriguing that was!  Surely there had to be a reason for his uneasiness, but she could not put her finger on just what it might be.  In time it would become clear.  

After an exchange of pleasantries, Arinthia excused herself and her daughter. “We will leave you to your work,” she offered breezily.  How many times she had stepped in to end conversations between her daughter and a young man at the appropriate point.  Nancy had no sense of timing in such matters.  Off the two went upstairs, Nancy somewhat annoyed at her mother's usual attempt to manage her social life. In a few more minutes, the conversation might have become even more interesting.  She knew better than to defy her mother's wishes openly; she would find some pretext to return later.   

Left in peace, Sam Dreher surveyed the pantry.  It hardly measured up to the finery of the neighboring rooms.  Its plain cabinetry and trim was in keeping with its purpose as a work area for the household staff.  The pantry seemed built as an afterthought by a carpenter who preferred to hide problems rather than solve them.  Sam applied his level and carpenter's square to several points around the room.  He found nothing either level or square.  The door frame was the worst offender. In order to fit closely in its off-kilter opening, the door itself would have to be rebuilt in an irregular shape.  

He could see the marks left by plane and chisel where someone had tried in vain to adjust it.  It would be better to remove and rebuild the door frame square and true from the ground up; then the door, or a new door that he could construct, could be made to match.  He began to stack his tools on the floor.  This would take some time.  

As he sharpened his chisel on a whetstone, his thoughts flew to Anna.  What would she be doing at this hour?  Washing dishes from the morning meal, or perhaps helping her mother in the sewing room?  He pictured her hands turning a hem.  He saw her gazing out the window that he had repaired.  He hoped that a fire burned in the stove to keep her warm.  He wanted with all his heart to go to her, but he could not.  There was a great deal of work to be done here, for an extremely important family with an exceptionally inquisitive daughter, all of whom knew the Daiseys very well. Sam Dreher could not afford to jeopardize his situation by displeasing any of the Bagwells.  He removed the door from its hinges.

 

On the first day, Nancy managed to slip downstairs on several occasions to strike up conversations. To be distracted by small talk during a complicated job was among the things Sam Dreher despised most.  It tested his patience when know-nothings insisted on hovering over him while worked, commenting and questioning. It happened all the time when he repaired canal boats.  The pilots, suddenly finding themselves with lots of time on their hands, would saunter over to his workbench with mugs of beer in their fists to chat while he wrestled with the timbers of their boats.  He had to tolerate them.  They were all far older than he; some had been traversing the river for decades, and he couldn't offend his uncle's most loyal customers.  Slowly he learned the art of appearing to listen, even talking a bit, while saying nothing. This usually satisfied them, and they went away happy, their boats made whole once again.  

Not so Nancy Bagwell.  She was unrelenting.  A remark that would satisfy a grey-bearded old river pilot merely brought a little smile to her lips.  Sam would offer some vague answer to a pointed question, and she would dig right in.  “Is that so, Mr. Dreher,” she would comment, tilting her head.  “Now, what exactly do you mean by
that?”
  There was no avoiding her.  She would speak, for example, about Chincoteague's excellent oysters.  He would say that he did not much care for oysters.  She would take the opportunity to ask him just what sort of food he did care for.  He did not want to tell her, but felt for some reason that he must. At each turn he feared where the conversation might lead.