slalomed through the rigging and bounded nimbly into the cockpit.
“Where’s the catch? I was expecting a mouthful of bass.”
Instead he gave me the privilege of scratching under his chin for a few seconds before scooting down the companion-way to join the Shih Tzus.
Our point of sail exposed us to the full brunt of the rising sun as it crested the top of the short ridge that ran like a leafy spine down the center of the South Fork. Along the coast were little bay-front cottages like mine, slowly but inevitably succumbing to demolition and rebirth. I’d been watching the process from the dirt side as I jogged along the coastal sand roads, but you could see it better out here on the bay. Some of the new houses were very beautiful, architectural jewels crafted by gentle, thoughtful people in cool, sophisticated studios in East Hampton, or Amagansett, or high above the tangle of city streets. Others were clumsy or idiotic derivations, prideful, foolish assertions of self-importance or blind ignorance.
As it always was, as it always will be.
“What say we haul over to Jessup’s Neck, then come back around to drop you off,” said Hodges. “We’re doing over six knots. Gives us plenty of time.”
“No argument here. All I have to do today is help stick a Giant Finger Up the Ass of Authority.”
“I thought you were on a reform kick.”
“Technical assistance only.”
I told him what I knew about Butch Ellington’s project; Amanda had left me a note that the Council Rock was in session later that afternoon. Hodges made some trenchant comment about the dynamic tension between the forces of abstract and representational art, though not quite in those words, but otherwise kept his concentration on steering the boat toward Jessup’s Neck, the sandy wooded peninsula and bird refuge that defined the line between the Little Peconic and Noyac Bays. He took us just shy of the shallow water along the beach before cranking the wheel hard and bringing us about, interrupting the breezy peace with the clamor and commotion of flapping sails as we stuck the bow through the wind and retrimmed for the trip back.
“I never had what you’d call a cuddly relationship with authority myself over the years,” said Hodges. “But I’m not sure I’d want to be sticking them with any fingers, assuming you could find the point of entry.”
“Always the danger they’ll stick you back.”
“That’s my thinking.”
In what felt like a few minutes we were off the pebble beach at the tip of Oak Point. I furled the jib and Hodges dropped the mainsail into a loose pile between the lazy jacks, and Eddie bounded up from below to watch me drop the anchor off a roller on the bow. He knew all this activity preceded a trip to shore in the dinghy, another chance to set a bold figure at the bow of the inflatable as it shot across the water. I cinched a piece of dock line around his collar just to be safe, while Hodges manned the smelly antique outboard that drove the dinghy into shore. I’d seen my cottage, and what was once Reginas, from the water side a million times, though the sight never quite lost its novelty. The houses from a distance looked like miniatures, scale models dwarfed by the surrounding oak trees and the wooded hills beyond.
As we closed in on the beach I could see Amanda in her recliner settled in with book and bikini. Next door was another figure, sitting in one of my Adirondack chairs. Also a woman, with a flare of kinky strawberry-blond hair and a white eye patch. She looked agitated, even from several hundred yards, waving what looked like a big beige- colored envelope.
“Yeah, she’s better all right,” I yelled to Hodges over the snarl of the old two-cycle outboard. “God help me.”
NINETEEN
EDDIE AND I waded in the last few feet so Hodges could spin the dinghy around without grounding the propeller and head back to his boat, affording Jackie the special joy of being greeted by a wet, sandy dog.
“Love you, too, Eddie, get the hell off of me. That heap of yours was in the drive, so I thought you were jogging.”
She looked a lot better than the last time I’d seen her. Someone had evolved my bandage redesign into something even more elegantly discreet. And her color was back. Kind of a fleshy spotted pink.
“You were half right. Want some coffee?”
She held up the envelope, which turned out to be a manila file folder.
“Yes. And a conversation.”
I really didn’t need any more coffee, I just wanted to get the taste of Hodges’s hand-picked beans out of my mouth. When I got back she had the folder open on her lap, with a binder clip securing the short stack of papers against the breeze coming off the water. She had a pen stuck in her mouth and a pencil behind her ear, probably forgotten there.
“The first thing to decide,” she said, “is whether to burn these right away or wait until tonight when we might need the heat.”
“Okay I’m listening.”
“Most of the stuff is blacked out. Understandably, given the risk he was already taking.”
“Who?”
“Web.”
“You did it.”
“Kind of. Took a protracted game of twenty questions. More like twenty thousand. And things like, if I’m getting warm, hum a few bars of
“Takes persistence.”
“And a little tit, per your suggestion. Though I’d have done that anyway.”
“And?”
She pulled a piece of yellow legal paper out of the middle of the stack and clipped it on the top. It was covered with her handwriting. She put it up to her chest and cleared her throat.
“Where do you think Jonathan ranked in his class at the Harvard Business School?”
“Is this another twenty questions?”
“Come on. You’d do it to me.”
“I don’t know. First.”
“Sure should’ve, given his performance. Though it’s hard to graduate at the top of your class when you never graduate.”
“Really.”
“Or even matriculate. Not according to Harvard. And they’re sticklers on things like admission and tuition.”
“He didn’t go?”
“Not officially. He somehow managed to sneak into some courses and even submitted papers that impressed his professors, until they discovered he wasn’t actually enrolled in the school.”
“Gosh.”
“All I have is the copy of a memo from one of his professors to the Dean of Admissions. Alternately apologetic, or defensive, about getting snookered, and full of admiration for the quality of Jonathan’s work. It ends with something like, if Mr. Eldridge ever decides to engage with the university in an appropriate fashion, assuming the absence of legal encumbrances, I fully recommend we consider his candidacy very seriously, yadda, yadda.’ I think Web let me see this as a good summary of the situation. Took me about three stanzas into the French national anthem, but I got the gist.”
I struggled to remember the drab little office in Riverhead. One of the few adornments was a wall partially covered with framed documents, the kind with Old English script inked in with the name Jonathan Eldridge. I thought I could visualize a diploma from Harvard, but it might have been a manufactured memory, born of another file I got from Joe Sullivan that held Jonathan’s resume.
Jackie had the look of canary-fed cat.
“Okay I bet there’s more,” I said to her.
