First Light (7 page)

I'm not sure what to make of this, but it's tempting to observe that there are two kinds of people in this world: surf casters and fly fishermen.

Of course, there really
are
two kinds of people: those who think there are just two kinds of people, and those who understand that there are many more than that.

Anyway, being a fly fisherman, I walked for about a hundred yards down the beach along the Gut until I'd put plenty of space between me and the last fisherman in line, and then I started casting a big white Lefty's Deceiver out into the water. A little current had started running into the pond, so I cast a bit to my right and let the fly sink and swing past before I began to twitch it in.

I soon got into the rhythm of it—throw it out there, swing it around, strip it back, take two steps to my left, throw it out again. Time becomes fluid and irrelevant out on a quiet beach in the evening twilight, and I may have been casting for an hour, or maybe only for ten minutes, when my fly stopped halfway through a swing. It just stopped, as if it had snagged a piece of sunken wreckage. I instinctively pulled straight back on my line, and I felt the hook bite into something. I raised my rod. It was on something solid, and whatever it was didn't move.

A rock, I thought.

Then it exploded, yanking my rod down and ripping the line out of my fingers.

Then it was gone.

I stripped in my line and saw what I expected to see. My fly had been bitten off.

A bluefish.

A big, razor-toothed bluefish.

Small bluefish slash and crash at bait—and flies— but big bluefish sometimes just chomp down and hold on, the way stripers do. That's what this one had done.

Damn. A really big bluefish. Gone.

Without a foot of wire at the end of your leader, bluefish of all sizes will bite you off.

I sat down on the dry sand, laid my rod across my lap, and lit a cigarette.

My hands, I noticed, were trembling. Hell, that was a
big
damn bluefish. I'd caught enough blues on the fly rod to know the difference, and I'd been attached to this one long enough to feel its weight. That was my Derby winner, right there, in the first hour of trying.

I figured I'd blown my one chance by neglecting to add some wire to my leader, and I could fish my ass off for the rest of the week without hooking another fish that big. The Fishing Gods rarely gave you a second chance.

I was glad that my bet with Billy required me only to go fishing, and not to actually catch anything.

I was aware that the sun had set and darkness had settled over the beach. The breeze had died down, and some fog had begun to gather. The fishermen off to my right were faint, fuzzy shadows, and across the Gut from where I sat, the island was a dark, shadowy mound.

After a while I stood up and trudged back to Zee's Jeep. In my haste to get fishing, I'd forgotten to stick my box of extra flies and my flashlight into my pockets.

When I got there, Zee was sitting on the front fender. Two smallish bluefish lay on the sand next to her.

I sat beside her and pointed my chin at her fish. “Good going,” I said.

“They won't win any prizes,” she said. “But they're perfect eating size. What'd you do?”

I showed her the frayed end of my leader. “Blue, huh?”

I nodded. “Guess so. Felt like a good one.”

She smiled and shrugged, and I was grateful that she didn't give me a lecture about using wire when there were bluefish in the water. “Hungry?” she said.

I realized I hadn't eaten since early afternoon. “Starved, actually.”

Zee got out the cooler J.W. had loaded for us, and we sat there on the front bumper of her Jeep eating sandwiches and watching the ghostly fishermen cast into the misty black water. J.W. had made a salad of smoked bluefish, with mayonnaise and horseradish and chopped onions. Spread on thick slices of homemade bread, it tasted like tuna, except better.

“So how's Alex?” said Zee after a few minutes. “We split,” I said.

She nodded. “I'm sorry. I liked Alex.”

“Me, too.” I'd brought my then–lady friend Alexandria Shaw down for a weekend with Zee and J.W. the previous summer. Alex and Zee had hit it off.

“So,” she said, glancing sideways at me. “You, um, dating anybody?”

“Dating?” I laughed. “At my age, I don't date. Haven't for a long time. There is a woman …”

Zee looked at me, shrugged, and said, “Oh.”

“Her name is Evie Banyon,” I said. “She's the assistant administrator at Emerson Hospital.”

“Is it serious?”

“Serious?” I looked out over the dark sea. “I don't
know where it's headed. I'm here and she's there, if that tells you anything. Why?”

Zee was quiet for a few minutes. Then she said, “Well, I have a friend.”

I laughed softly.

“I'm sorry,” she said.

“No, no,” I said. “Tell me about your friend.”

“She's been through some tough times. Came down here to get away, start over. She'll be heading back to America in a few weeks.”

“Where in America?”

“The South Shore somewhere. She's bright and very pretty. Your age, I'd say. Maybe a few years younger. J.W. disapproves of me playing matchmaker. I think he's worried that it would spoil our friendship. Yours and ours, I mean.”

“Why would it spoil our friendship?”

“I don't think it would, or I wouldn't've mentioned it.”

“I don't see how it would, either,” I said.

Zee and I fished in the darkness for a few more hours, and neither of us caught anything. We quit a little after midnight.

It was a long drive over the nighttime beach, back all the way around Cape Pogue, across the Dyke Bridge to Norton Point Beach and then across the island to the Fairchild place in West Tisbury. It was around one-thirty when Zee dropped me off at the front door.

“One of us will pick you up at cocktail time tomorrow,” she said as I climbed out of the Jeep and
gathered my gear from the back. “It's J.W.'s turn to fish. Maybe he'll be a better guide than I was.”

“You put me on to a big fish,” I said. “I had my chance.”

“J.W. might keep you out all night,” she said. We were talking in whispers, standing in front of the Fairchild house, which was dark except for the glow of an orange bulb over the front door that they'd left on for me. “He loves to fish at first light.”

“Suits me,” I said. “Fish till you puke, I always say.”

“Fits right into the Derby mentality,” she said.

She waved and putted up the driveway. I raised my hand, then went into the house.

I suddenly realized I was exhausted. One night of fishing had about done me in, and I had six more to go to win my bet with Billy.

Maybe he was right. Maybe I was getting old.

I slept late on Sunday and spent the morning doing paperwork. When I took my coffee out to the patio early in the afternoon, Eliza and two men I didn't recognize were sitting at the table passing around a pitcher of Bloody Marys. Eliza was wearing a white sleeveless blouse, a short white tennis skirt, and sandals. The two men, who appeared to be in their late twenties or early thirties, wore pastel polo shirts and shorts and wraparound sunglasses and admirable tans. One had black hair and a big mustache, the other had straw-colored hair and a pronounced widow's peak.

Eliza waved me over. “Have a Bloody,” she said.

I held up my coffee mug. “I'm fine, thank you.”

“Brady,” she said, “I want you to meet a couple friends of mine. This,” she said, indicating the dark-haired guy with the bushy mustache, “is Luis Martinez.”

I shook hands with Luis Martinez. He had great white teeth and a manly handshake.

The other guy's name was Philip Fredrickson. He had nice teeth and a good grip, too.

“Sit with us, Brady,” said Fredrickson.

I remained standing. “I've got work to do, Mr. Fredrickson.”

“Oh, don't be a poop,” said Eliza. “I've been telling Philip and Luis about you.”

“What about me?”

“That you're Mother's lawyer,” she said, batting her long eyelashes and flashing her seductive smile. “That the future of the Fairchild estate rests squarely on your gorgeous shoulders.”

“Why should Philip and Luis care about that?” I said.

The three of them exchanged who-wants-to-tell-him glances, and then Martinez cleared his throat. “Actually, Brady,” he began, “Eliza asked us over to meet you. We—”

I held up my hand. “Whoa,” I said. “Stop right there. I meet with people when I schedule a meeting. Otherwise, I don't do business. Period.” I turned to Eliza. “Don't ever do this again. Do you hear me?”

She shrugged. “You don't have to get all bristly, darling. No one's trying to do anything underhanded. Luis and Philip”—she put her left hand on Philip's leg and her right hand on Luis's shoulder—“are friends of
mine, and they're up from Hilton Head to play some golf and tennis, do some sailing, get some sun.”

“Then why did you invite them over to meet me?” I wondered if she was screwing them both at the same time, or if they were taking turns. “This doesn't have anything to do with turning the Fairchild estate into the Fairchild Country Club, perchance?”

She smiled wickedly. “Well, of course it does. You know perfectly well that I'd love to see that. Philip and Luis represent the Isle of Dreams Development Corporation. They've put together some lovely courses on Hilton Head and in Florida. They've brought some financial projections and computer models, and we were hoping—”

I waved my hand. “Good-bye. Nice talking with you.” And I went back into the house.

A woman carrying what looked like a doctor's black bag was walking through the living room as I was walking into it. She was tall and slender and had short curly blonde hair. She wore a pink-and-white-striped blouse and a blue skirt that stopped at her knees. She looked to be in her late thirties or early forties.

I said hello, and she stopped and nodded and smiled.

I jerked my head at the bag she was carrying. “Are you the doctor?” I said.

“Not quite.” She had a very pretty smile. “I'm the visiting nurse.”

“Where's your funny-looking cap and your crisp white uniform?”

She laughed softly. “Here on the Vineyard we visiting nurses don't wear uniforms. We dress for glamour.”
She held out her hand and said, “Molly Wood,” just about the time I read the plaque that was pinned over her left breast. It read
AMELIA WOOD, RN.

I shook hands with her. “Brady Coyne. I'm the family lawyer. How's Sarah doing today?”

She shrugged.

“That good, huh?”

“I gave her her shots. She's comfortable right now. She's been very up and down lately.”

“Okay if I visit with her?”

“I'm sure she'd love it.”

We stood there awkwardly for a minute, and then I said, “Well …” and she smiled and said, “Well,” and she headed for the front door and I headed for the sunporch.

Sarah was in her wheelchair in front of the television, which was showing the Red Sox game with the sound turned off.

I sat in the chair next to her. “Who's winning?”

“We are,” she said. “I just love Nomar, don't you? You should've seen the play he just made. Went way to his right, backhanded the ball on the short hop, and winged a bullet over to first.” She frowned at me. “What's the matter?”

“Oh, nothing,” I said.

“It was Eliza and those two lapdogs of hers, right?”

“She brought them over to lobby me,” I said.

“I guessed that's what she was up to. Figured you could handle them. They appear to be a couple of lightweights.”

“I didn't really handle them,” I said. “I just walked away.”

“That's what I meant.” She turned to look at me. Her face was pinched, and I saw the glow of pain deep in her eyes. She took a long breath, and the glow dimmed. “Please don't hold it against Eliza,” she said. “I want you to make the best decision regardless of her.”

I reached over and took her hand. It felt bony and flaccid. “I know that,” I said gently. “Personalities have nothing to do with it. This is business.”

She laughed quickly. “You sound like the Godfather. Oh, look.”

I glanced at the television in time to see a man in a Red Sox uniform jogging around the bases.

“I always hoped they'd win a World Series before I died,” said Sarah. “Alas, if it's not this year, it's not going to happen.”

“I hate to tell you,” I said.

“I know,” she said. “It's September and they're nine games out. It's not going to happen.”

We watched the game in silence. Sarah held my hand in her lap with both of hers, and when I glanced at her a couple of minutes later, her eyes were closed and her chin had slumped down onto her chest. I gently retrieved my hand from her weak grip. Then I tucked her blanket around her, touched her cheek with the palm of my hand, and slipped out of the room.

When I went into the living room, I saw Patrick standing by the window peering out. Both of his fists were clenched, and he held them pressed tight against his thighs.

I walked over to him. Through the window past
his shoulder I could see Eliza sitting there with Luis and Philip. They were drinking their Bloody Marys and laughing and pawing at each other, and as I watched, Eliza turned to Luis, the one with the black mustache, and kissed him hard on the mouth.

Philip, the blond guy sitting on the other side of her, was stroking her hip.

Patrick apparently didn't notice me standing behind him. He mumbled something that sounded like “Whore.” It came out as a low growl.

I cleared my throat, and he whirled around. “Oh,” he said. “Brady. Hi.”

“If you don't like it,” I said, “you shouldn't watch.”