common cases, and then again it may not. I hope to God you don't go across the creek, or under it. You'd only start
“All right… forget it.” He knew the wisest thing to do would be to turn the subject. “Forget that I ever mentioned it. Let's knock off, they're not biting.”
“Wait a second,” Oliver said, and raised a hand to shade his eyes against the sun.
“What is it?” Gary followed his glance to see.
“Thought it was a sail. Couldn't be sure but for the last couple of hours I thought I could see a sail out there.”
Sally looked at him in surprise. “There is.”
“Where? I wish
“Over there.” She pointed to the southeast. “It was there' — she indicated the west—”and it went all the way across.”
“From New Orleans or Mobile, most likely,” Oliver guessed. “Steering for some point down the peninsula.”
Gary couldn't see it and said nothing, dropping his eyes instead to watch the sea swirling about Sally's legs. The water rushed in with little waves to dash against her skin and form eddies about the parted legs, kicking up foam. He continued to watch with a quiet contemplation, letting the motion of the water and foam stir dream images in his mind.
“Oh, well,” Oliver said after a while, “let's eat.”
Gary glanced up, startled from his reverie, to find Sally watching him with a patient knowledge.
They observed what they believed to be Christmas Day by going swimming in moderately cold water, and then spending the remainder of the afternoon on the warm beach sand. Sally lay between them, entranced as usual by the sound of the sea and the fantasy cloud-castles floating overhead. The routine was nothing out of the ordinary but there was no new thing to do, no new way to celebrate a holiday. Gary gave the girl a wooden link chain he had carved and saved for weeks, saved for the day, while Oliver contented himself by stretching out on the sands and resting his eyes on her body. He suspected Sally was gaining weight.
And at what they believed to be midnight of New Year's Eve, Gary pushed open the cabin door and stepped into the darkness inside, to raise a pointed finger and shout, “Bang!”
“Get the hell out of here!” Oliver cried from the blackness.
Gary laughed at him and backed out.
They made no real effort to tell time, to calculate the passing days or weeks, but waited with unspoken consent for the coming of a warmer season.
It may have been late January, or perhaps early February when the remainder of the provisions stacked in the mail truck were transferred to the cabin. The transfer represented the halfway point in their remaining supplies but the season was far advanced and they had no fear of the storehouse's being exhausted before spring. After the truck was emptied, Oliver tugged at Gary's sleeve and motioned him away from the cabin. They strode down the beach in silence.
“Spill it,” Gary suggested after a time. “You've had something on your mind for days.”
“Bit difficult,” Oliver answered. He walked along with his eyes on the water, kicking up loose sand.
“First time I've ever seen you fumble with words. Come on, spill it. We're fifty-fifty, remember?”
“That's just it,” Oliver hesitated. “About our partnership…”
Gary stopped walking. “You want to break it up?”
“You guessed?”
“I guessed now, by the way you're acting. Why?”
Oliver turned to face him. “Corporal, something's come up. I think it best that we break up.” He frowned and kicked sand again. “Sally thinks so, too.”
“Spill it,” Gary ordered once more.
“Well… one of us is going to be a father.”
Gary held his silence, considering the news. It did not particularly surprise him, although he had not suspected it. He had formed the habit months earlier of taking Sally for granted, accepting her casually as no more than another woman, a convenient cook, a pleasant interlude. Now this new element had been added.
“One of us, huh?” he answered at last. “How do you act when this happens? Are we supposed to congratulate each other, or what?”
“I don't know,” Oliver said desperately. “It never happened to me before! And I don't know which of us is the father — that upsets me. Sally doesn't know, either.”
The beginning of a grin appeared on Gary's lips.
Oliver was quick to stop it. “I refuse to think of it in a humorous vein and I don't want any wisecracks! That's why I want to dissolve our partnership, corporal; right now,
“Oh the hell you do?”
“Corporal…” He hesitated and then plunged forward into the most difficult part of it. “
“You
“Don't play a dumb bastard! I
Gary regarded his partner with a momentary silence. So this was the end of the line. “All right,” he said. “I can take a hint.”
Almost bashfully, Oliver put out his hand. “Thanks, corporal.” He made no attempt to hide his relief or that he was pleased with the outcome. “Damned white of you! Sally and I talked this thing over; we didn't know what to do. The kid scares her a little bit but the thought of you and me fighting scared her more. I'll tell her everything is all fixed up.” He turned and started back toward the cabin, a wide grin pasted foolishly across his face. “And corporal — if you're down this way next winter, drop in and see us, will you? Stop in and see my kid?”
“Now don't rush me,” Gary objected. “I'll be around for a while yet.”
It had been a hollow, thoughtless promise. He left in less than a week, too aware of the sudden tension that sprang up between the girl and himself, and vaguely uncomfortable because of it. Both Sally and Oliver tried to pretend that nothing had changed, nothing was different and the old fifty-fifty partnership remained the bond between the trio. The pretending was false and the tension grew. Gary stayed away from the cabin as much as possible and seldom spoke to the girl.
“We've had some good times,” Oliver said reminiscently.
“Sure as hell have! I like to froze in those damned mountains, talking you into coming south.”
“Pretty good place to hide out.”
Gary loaded his pockets with ammunition and packed food in a shoulder bag, choosing a revolver and a heavy rifle for protection. At the final parting, he shook hands with a grinning Oliver and blew an empty kiss to the girl standing in the cabin door. She half lifted her hand to return it, and then stopped herself.
“Where do you think you'll go?” Oliver asked.
“Dunno. Work my way over to the river,” Gary guessed with an indifferent shrug. “Upstream, maybe.”
“No cable-crawling!”
“No cable-crawling,” Gary returned. “Keep your eyes open.”
“Will do.” He nodded somberly. “You do the same.”
Turning his back on them, Gary left the island and made his way by hand across the partially dismantled causeway. Once past the opening where the timbers had been torn up, he shifted the bag of food to a more comfortable position and strode off toward the distant, empty highway. There entered his mind a brief memory of the girl — a pleasant memory. He didn't look back to fit the memory to the person.
The partnership was dissolved.
