wraps. Could be Josef and this Sauerkraut did the bank job and the cops were afraid Sauerkraut would hole up if the papers had it?
“Hell with all this guessing, let's stick to Rose. They didn't have a thing on her or they wouldn't have released her. She's shocked, broke, bewildered... and then she finds the loot Josef stashed in her dressing room. Rose has only one idea—to run. Suppose the cops do get her—
I killed my cigar and stood up and flapped the sheets to cool them off. Then I jumped back in the sack and went to sleep.
I awoke late in the afternoon and felt so good I took a shave. I swam out to the boat, the salt water a bracer on my face. Ansel was sitting with Rose, both of them busy reading the magazines and papers I'd brought. Ansel's pot-belly was hanging over an old worn pair of khaki trunks almost the color of his skin.
Rose looked great, her big body relaxed, hair blowing slightly with the little breeze. She had this habit of moving her lips as she read. I was swimming out to a great boat—which was mine—and to a babe who was also mine, and probably one of the most beautiful women in the world. What more could I ask of life?
I went below for a sandwich and cold beer. The trouble was I did want something else. I wanted to know if Rose's story was true. I told myself I
I went on deck. Rose grinned at me from behind the fashion mag she was reading. Ansel cut open the last of the drinking nuts I'd tied to the rigging in Haiti. In his usual talkative mood he slipped off into a lecture on how history books under-rated the poor coconut. They called bread the staff of life while the coconut not only provided food for a good portion of the peoples of the world, but also clothing, plates, oil, boats, mats and building material.
Ansel was knocking himself out. I wasn't listening; I was watching Rose.... my favorite hobby. Not studying her directly but staring at her reflection in the calm water. Schools of tiny chrome colored anchovies raced by now and then, making it a cracked mirror. Rose was in a happy mood, commenting on the new movies —which should reach the island theatres in about ten years—laughing at the fashion news.
The trouble was, if I told her about going to New York it would be obvious I didn't trust her and she might be mad enough to walk out on me. That I didn't want—ever. I might work the motor repair deal as an excuse for returning to the States. But if I was a clever fellow—and I wasn't—I'd work things around so it would seem as if New York was her idea.
I watched the water, pleased with what I saw. Then the sky clouded and it grew muggy. What breeze there was died. I turned on my back, stared up at the thin clouds. Ansel announced it would rain before morning. Rose said we'd better start ferrying the stuff to the hut. While she was busy in the cabin, Ansel helped load the dink and managed to get some stuff I'd brought for him into his battered rowboat. As he was about to shove off he asked if I was interested in hunting pacas before supper? Some had been seen in a nearby swamp. A paca is about the size of a small dog, sort of large rat with brown and white spots. It's very tender when roasted and I like it, but Rose won't touch it because it's a rat. I told Ansel I was too tired. The islanders are so crazy about it that when one was known to be around so many people went hunting a guy could get himself shot. It would be a dumb accident like that to keep me from seeing New York City.
After Ansel left, Rose started ferrying the stuff ashore. I washed down the decks, cleaned out the cabin, and made the Sea Princess ship-shape. I took care of the engines and the sails, then I helped Rose. It was twilight and the air thick with heat by the time we got everything into the hut. We were both sweating and as we started for the water and a final swim, the rain hit. We stripped and took a fresh water shower.
I thought it was going to be a long rain but in the morning, or rather at noon, when we awoke, the sun was out bright. I still hadn't caught up on my sleep. Rose started opening cans and we stuffed ourselves with tins of tongue and beef, even caviar, along with fancy cakes, corn—anything else we felt like eating. We went back to bed and slept some more. Some time in the middle of the night we got up and took a dip. The sky was lousy with stars and we returned to the hut and started playing the new records, keeping the sound down, drinking a little. We awoke in the middle of the next afternoon. It was hot and sunny and we did a lot of swimming and some spear fishing. Rose decided she wanted pancakes so we cooked and ate stacks of them, finished with ice cream, and went through the records again. Rose sang with some of the older numbers, told me about the time she lost twenty-six pounds in a week for a part she never got. She didn't eat a thing but drank coffee all day long and by the end of the week her nerves were so raw she was ready to be put away. She said, again, “I sure was a simple broad, in those days.”
When we got up the following morning it was raining, hard. It rained steadily for the next five days. I didn't mind, I can sleep fine in the rain. Rose started playing her records, but the hi-fi set would hardly work: too many people were using the island current. At Ansel's store you had to play the rundown jukebox during the day, when the single island generator didn't have much of a load.
On the second day of the rain, the lights were too dim for reading. Also gnats and other bugs came to life in the muggy weather and made us miserable. We ate up most of the canned goods—all the fancy stuff making us slightly sick—so we got a little drunk and went back to the damp bed. It was raining just as hard when we awoke early in the morning, and I could see Rose was getting the blues. She never can get accustomed to being cooped up. Twice a day we ran to the water to check on the boat, take a bath, and get some fresh vegetables and fish at Ansel's house. Then we'd return home, our feet covered with mud. There wasn't enough juice to read by or even play the radio. I wanted to go out to the boat, run the motors and get some music, but Rose said the bay looked too dreary. Instead we went up to Ansel's and by candlelight played whist. Mrs. Ansel acted like she had a fortune going on every card, which made a dull game even duller.
On the way home Rose slipped in the mud and cursed when I laughed. We took a swim and she was still in a bad mood, snapping at me. Sleeping was a Turkish bath and when I suggested I go out to the boat to sleep, she said she didn't want to be alone. I told her on the next trip I'd see if I could pick up a generator for our own use, but Rose wasn't listening. In the middle of the night I heard her get up and kill a bottle, then reread the papers by the fight of a single candle.
Most times I could bring her out of these moods but now I didn't try. I had a plan going for me and the rain was my sidekick. I wished it would rain for a month, as it did in the rainy season.
Instead of keeping out of her way, I yelled back at her, acted like a real pain. I was waiting for her hysterical tears, a sign she was truly down in the dumps. It made me feel like a heel, but I had to do it—or so I sold myself. The next morning she got into a huff and we didn't talk all day. I thought that would do it but Rose didn't seem to mind. The thing that broke her up was this: Mrs. Ansel came to the hut and Rose whispered to me she wasn't going to play another boring game of whist or checkers. But Mrs. Ansel only asked if we had some cotton to spare. The baby had the measles. Rose said we must immediately sail the kid to a doctor in Georgetown: but Mrs. Ansel said nonsense, she wanted the cotton to rub the boy down with bay rum and keep the fever from rising. She was quite calm, said to let nature take its course and the sooner the kid had the measles and got over them, the happier he would be.
We went up to the house and Rose helped her sponge the kid, who was running 102 and looked sick. I smoked a cigar with Ansel and said maybe I should get a doctor. He said it was nothing, the spots and sores were coming and in a week it would be all over. In the kid's room I could hear Rose arguing with Mrs. Ansel, their voices growing louder. Ansel winked at me as Rose screamed—Mrs. Ansel didn't know or care what she was doing—and ran out of the bungalow. I left a few minutes later. I found Rose sitting on the steps of the hut, wet and muddy... and crying loudly. I took her inside and undressed her, toweled her down, and turned on the gas boiler for a hot bath. She took a big shot of whiskey and in the faint light from the gas range I started reading the night club ads from one of the old New York papers, innocently asking if she'd ever been in this and that club, what did it look like, how was the food and music, and all the rest of the jive. I read most of the ads and nothing happened. Then all of a sudden she became hysterical and savagely tore the paper to bits.
This was the right time to pull the string. I told her to relax and she told me where to go. I asked, “Honey, how about getting away from here? For a few weeks? Be a change.”
Running a hand over her wet face Rose mumbled, “What's the diff? Raining all over these goddam islands.”
“I don't mean island-jumping. I mean a
