Shipping News, The - E. Annie Proulx [101]
Mrs. Bangs saw it in a flash. “Was you looking for a house for the all of yous? I knows the Burkes been talking about selling their place for good and moving to Florida. They go down every winter. Got friends there now. A bungalow. They live in a Florida bungalow with a verandah. Mrs. Burke, Pansy, says they have got two orange trees and a palm right in the front yard. Picks the oranges right off. Can you believe it? Now that is a place I’d like to see before I die. Florida.”
“I been there,” said Dawn. “You can have it. Give me Montreal. Ooh-la-la. Beauty clothes. All those markets, you never saw food like that in your life, movies, boutiques. You can have Miami. Buncha rich Staties.”
“What’s the Burke place, then,” said the aunt offhandedly.
“Well, it’s up on the ridge. The road that goes out to Flour Sack Cove, but at this end. Like if you was to go outside and face the hill and start climbing—if you could climb right over the houses, [229] you know—you’d about come on it. Grey house with blue trim. Very nice kept up. Mrs. Burke is a housekeeper. An old-fashioned kitchen with the daybed and all, but they got conveniences, too. Oil heat. Dishwasher. Washing machine and dryer in the basement. Basement finished off. Nice fresh wallpaper in all the rooms.”
“Umm,” said the aunt. “You think they’d rent?”
“I doubt it. I don’t believe they wants to rent. They been asked. I believe they wants to sell.”
“Well, you know, actually my nephew is going to take that English fellow’s trailer. Works at the paper. Mr. Nutbeem. He’s leaving pretty soon.”
“So you’d want a separate place, then.”
“Ye—es,” said the aunt.
“I believe the Burke place would be too much for one person,” said Mrs. Bangs. “Even if you was prepared to buy it. It’s got nine rooms. Or ten.”
“I’ve put quite a bit of money into the old house. It’s a shame. Just to use it for a camp. But getting back and forth is a problem. Like they say, what can’t be cured must be endured. I’ve took a room at the Sea Gull for the rest of the week while we work something out. Nephew and the girls are staying with Beety and Dennis. Kind of cramped, but they’re making do. Don’t want to get caught by the snow. But let’s not worry about it right now. What have we got on the schedule for today? The black cushions for the Arrowhead.”
“Dawn and me’s finished them black cushions Friday afternoon. Shipped ‘em this morning.”
The aunt looked at her mail. “You’re way ahead of me,” she said. She turned over a postcard and read it. “That’s nice,” she said, voice needled with sarcasm. “I thought we’d be seeing the Pakeys on the Bubble this week. Now here’s their postcard and they say they can’t risk coming up here at this time of year. Fair weather sailors, they. No, it’s worse. They’re having the job done by Yacht-crafter! Those bums.” The aunt threw down the postcard, picked up a small package.
“Who do I know in Macau? It’s from Macau.” Tore it open.
[230] “What is this?” she said. A packet of American currency fell on the table. Tied with a pale blue cord. Nothing more.
“That blue ...” Mavis Bangs hesitated, put out her hand.
The aunt looked at the blue cord. Untied it and passed it to her. With a significant look. It was not a cord, but a thin strip of pale blue leather.
29
Alvin Yark
“The bight of a rope ... has two meanings in knotting. First,
it may be any central part of a rope, as distinct from the ends
and standing part. Second, it is a curve or arc in a rope no
narrower than a semicircle. This corresponds to the
topographical meaning of the word, a bight being an indentation
in a coast so wide that it may be sailed out of,
on one tack, in any wind.”
THE ASHLEY BOOK OF KNOTS
THE SINGLE advantage of the green house was clear at once. Quoyle, yawning and unshaven in a corner of Beety’s kitchen,