Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy Read online

  And when that spray fell back in sheets to the following waves, it left Turner still standing on the top of the cliff, knees still flexed, toes still clenched.

  He was breathing about as hard as any human being can breathe.

  Then the laughing hollers began to come up from the rocks below the outcropping. He tried to slow his breathing, to stop the shivering in his legs. He found his clothes, put on his pants, and stretched the suspenders over his shoulders. He didn't wait to put on his shirt but willed himself to climb up the ledges and start for town even though his legs were still shivering.

  Around him soft bright moss curled up the yellow birches, lichens roughened the rocks, and crushed needles let go their piney scent. But Turner hardly noticed. If only he were on Tremont Street, the gold on the State House glowing in the sun, the horsey smell of the carriages and the brogue calls of the cabbies filling the air, the bells of Park Street Church singing the hours, the grass of the Common—oh, the sweet grass of the Common.

  He tried not to cry.

  He came out of the woods and onto Parker Head Road a little below Phippsburg. Ahead of him, the sky pirouetted on First Congregational's sunlit steeple. Beneath it, the bell tower angled down to the clapboard front and granite steps, hewn a hundred years ago by the first congregation. Aside from the granite and the green window shutters, the whole building was shining white with a new coat of paint for the new minister.

  In fact, all the buildings up and down Parker Head Road were white, and though most looked as if they had seen more winter storms than any house should have to, they all stood with corners as straight and trim and proper as if they wore invisible corsets. All of them had green shutters and all of them had green doors—except for one, whose shutters were as yellow as sunlight and whose door was as red as strawberries.

  Turner skipped a rock down Parker Head, trying to keep it between the lines of grass. It threw up yellow dust for three skips and then skidded off. He wondered if Willis could hit a pitch thrown honestly, and tossed another rock, more fiercely, that skipped five times. He wondered if Willis could hit a pitch that had spin and speed, and skipped another stone, which skidded off after the first skip, jumped over the grass, and smacked sharply against the picket fence that bound the narrowest, sharpest, most peaked house on the street. The elm that draped over its roof shadowed its high windows

  It was not the house with the yellow shutters and the red door.

  "Oh no" whispered Turner when he heard the smack.

  "Doggone," he muttered when he saw the green door of the house open.

  "Darn," he said aloud when a woman came out with a hand up to shield her eyes so she might see him all the better. It was a large hand, attached to a large woman. "You the new minister's boy?"

  Turner nodded.

  "A boy that belongs to a minister should know how to answer a lady."

  "Yes, ma'am. Turner Buckminster."

  "Well, Turner Buckminster, what are you doing standing in the middle of the road half naked like that, throwing stones at my house in the middle of the day?"

  Turner wondered wildly if there was a better time to throw stones at her house, but all he said was,"I'm on my way home. From swimming."

  "We don't run around half naked in Phippsburg. Maybe that's the kind of thing they do down to Boston, but not here. Not in a God-fearing town. And especially not the minister's son. Throwing stones at my house—my very house! You're supposed to set some kind of example. Don't you know that?"

  "I'm just on my way home."

  She shook her broom at him. "Then put your shirt on so you don't walk down the main street of Phippsburg like that, in front of God and everyone. And find something to do fitting for a minister's son, instead of being a trial and a tribulation to an old woman. Standing in the middle of the road, throwing stones."

  "Yes, ma'am." Turner wondered if this was a third failure. It seemed almost too much to bear—three in two days.

  "Your father is sure to hear of this. See if he doesn't. You tell him that Mrs. Cobb will be down to call on him."

  Turner thought he might start bawling right there in the middle of the road, in the middle of Phippsburg, in the middle of Maine.

  And then across the road, the strawberry door on the sunlight-shuttered house opened, and a tiny, frail bird of a woman stepped out. Turner figured she had reached her peak of height sometime around the Civil War and from that time on had been folding and shrinking until someday she would probably just disappear. The white of her dress had faded to yellow and matched her skin almost precisely. One hand held a pale blue shawl tight around her chest, and the other held a book, which she used to beckon him.

  Turner glanced back at Mrs. Cobb and her large hand—he could imagine that even a tidal wave wouldn't shiver her—and crossed over to the yellow-shuttered house, buttoning on his shirt and strapping on his suspenders again.

  "Turner Buckminster," she said, her voice the dry rustling of fallen leaves. "Turner Buckminster III. Well, you never mind that Mrs. Cobb." He heard the green door slam across the street, heard the gate of the picket fence open and shut, felt a disapproving presence move behind him like a wave frothing up the street to the parsonage.

  Yes, ma am.

  "She's more thunder than lightning. I'm more ... a cloud. A wispy one. Mrs. Elia Hurd, mother of the present deacon."

  She held her hand out, and Turner went up the steps to take it. It felt as dry as her voice, like one of those pastries with layers that flake off, thin as paper.

  "Turner!"

  His father, coming up Parker Head in the custody of the town dignitaries. Since he was smiling, Turner figured he had—who knows how—missed the thunderous Mrs. Cobb, and that God had given him at least a brief reprieve—which he deserved after the last two days, not to mention the Sears, Roebuck catalogue.

  "Come along with me," Reverend Buckminster called, his arm out and gesturing.

  Mrs. Elia Hurd looked at Turner, her head a little to one side, her old eyes as pale as her shawl. Her lips parted, closed, parted again, and then she said what he had never expected anyone else in the wide world to say: "So, Turner Buckminster III," she asked,"when you look through the number at the end of your name, does it seem like you're looking through prison bars?"

  Turner fell back one step.

  She came closer and laid her hand against his cheek. He did not move. "Sometimes," said Turner softly, "I just want to light out..."

  "Oh yes," said Mrs. Hurd, her hand still on his cheek,"I do, too. Just light out for the Territories." And suddenly, Turner thought he could smell sweet grass.

  "This instant!" called Reverend Buckminster.

  ***

  The sea surge that had drawn up the coastal waters of Maine poured past the cliffs and tore along the ragged coast. It covered the high rocks—dry for more than three months of high tides—all the way from Small Point up past Harpswell. When it had finished its fussing, it seethed back down the New Meadows River, sluicing between the mainland and the islands. It spent its last surge on one rock-shouldered heap just a spit or two off the coast, frothing over the mudflats, setting the clam holes flapping, and carrying a small, startled crab out from its weedy hiding place. It tumbled upside down up the island shore and onto a toe stretched toward the water.

  Lizzie Griffm, who belonged to the toe, grinned at the crab's frantic turnings as it tried to sort out claws and legs. Its shell was so pale that she could see the mess of the inner workings. Another almost-spent wave came up behind and tumbled it off-—claws and legs all to be sorted out again. Lizzie plucked her toe and the rest of her foot out of the covering mud and slowly backed up the shore, letting a wave catch her and cover her ankles, then moving away some until she was on the thin line of gravelly sand that marked the reach of the water.

  She looked out at the thrusting tide, clenched her toes into the loose sand, and smelled the salty, piney air. At thirteen, she was, as her grandfather liked to remind her, one year older than the ce
ntury, and so a good deal wiser. Too wise to stay on Malaga Island, he said, but she planned to stay there forever. Where else, after all, did the tide set a pale crab on your toe?

  She turned and scrambled up the outcroppings, picking up the hatchet that was to have been splitting kindling all this time. But she could hardly help it if there was something so much better to do, like watching the tide come in. She balanced the hatchet on her finger as she walked, carefully keeping herself under it while her feet guided her through the scrub and tripping roots. When she came to the pines that stood as close to the ocean as they could and still reach sweet water, she tipped the hatchet into the air, caught it by the handle, and swung it back over her shoulder. She set her eye on the heart of a youngster pine and flashed the hatchet through the scented air; it tumbled over and over itself in jerks, like a crab caught in a ripple, until it slapped high up into the trunk. Lizzie looked around to see if anyone might be nearby, half wanting to show off, half wanting to be sure that no one had seen Preacher Griffin's granddaughter throwing a hatchet around. No one had, and Lizzie slicked up the tree, her feet finding the branches easily.

  She jerked out the hatchet and let it fall to the soft pine needles beneath her. Then, since she was already partway up, and since the set of the branches made it so easy, and since the pine was young enough that she could get it swaying pretty good if she got close to the top, she kept climbing until she felt the tree moving with her from side to side. She let her weight into it, back and forth, and the whole heap of Malaga Island rushed beneath her—ocean, sand, rock, scrub, mudflat, pale little crab, all rushing back and forth as the soft boughs laid their gentle, dry hands against her laughing face.

  The day might come, she thought, when she would take her grandfather's dory and row to the mouth of the New Meadows. She'd take it out past West Point, past Hermit, past Bald Head, and drift until she was alone with the whales in the open water. Then she'd come back in close and follow the coast, maybe row all the way to Portland, maybe even to Boston.

  And then she'd row home. She would always come back to Malaga Island, just as sure as the tide always came back.

  And that was when Lizzie looked across the water to the mainland and saw the group of men gathered high on the granite ledge above the tide. If Lizzie had been down on the beach, they would have towered above her, but up in the pine, she was just about eye level with them. They wore dark frock coats, top hats they held against the sea breeze, and shiny shoes that probably hadn't walked on honest granite ever before. Standing there, they all looked alike: too much weight in the front—for that matter, too much weight in the behind—and dressed for a deacon's funeral. All except one. A boy wearing a shirt so white it hurt to look at it. Why would a boy wear a shirt so white this side of paradise?

  One of the frock coats pointed, and then another, and Lizzie knew where they were looking. At the turn of the island, where the slack water let the tide in soft and easy, where the clams buried themselves so thick you could gather a meal with just one rake, Lizzie's house watched New Meadows with weathered eyes. Its boards were warped beyond hope, and its roof slumped in the middle like a fallen pudding— and there wasn't a house in Phippsburg where she'd rather live.

  The afternoon bell of First Congregational tolled, and one of the men turned his eyes toward Phippsburg. When he looked back, he saw Lizzie. He said something to the others, who turned with him and stared, some smiling. Then he pulled back the side of his frock coat and laid his hand on the pistol it had hidden.

  The gorged sound of their laughter stained the sea breeze that came in over the tide.

  CHAPTER 2

  "WOULD you look at that monkey go? Look at her go. She climbing down or falling?" Deacon Hurd watched the last leap to the ground. "Sheriff Elwell, I believe she thought you might shoot her."

  "Wouldn't have been any trouble, Mr. Hurd. One less colored in the world."

  Standing beside the frock-coated men, Turner shivered with the sea breeze that had come up to him and circled his feet. The gulls that rode it screeched overhead.

  "More to the point," said the tallest of the group—the one with the most expensive frock coat, the most expensive top hat, and the most expensive shiny shoes—"one less colored on Malaga Island." Laughter from the group, louder than the gulls. "Though the issue is much larger than one colored." His eye searched the pine shadows across the water for the girl, as if he sensed her watching him. His hands moved to the lapels of his coat. "The issue is how to relieve Malaga Island of the girl, her family, her neighbors, what she would call her house, what they would call their town."

  "All it should take is a good sound storm." Sheriff Elwell pointed down to the turn of the island. "Good high tide running up there, lift that shanty right on out to sea, Mr. Stonecrop."

  "God has not seen fit to be so helpful." Mr. Stonecrop stared down across the water. "Reverend Buckminster, behold the cross we bear in Phippsburg: a ragtag collection of hovels and shacks, filled with thieves and lazy sots, eking out a life by eating clams from the ocean mud, heedless of offers of help from either state or church, a blight on the town's aspirations, a hopeless barrier to its future."

  Mr. Stonecrop said this mouthful without taking a breath. It was, Turner thought, quite a trick.

  "If the shanties were gone, think what a resort site this very cliff might be." Mr. Stonecrop spread his arms out wide. "Imagine the white porticoes of the place, the gracious stairway, the glass doors open to bring in the sea breeze, the red carpet of the lobby, the tinkling of the glass chandelier. I tell you, Reverend, a resort here would be the salvation of Phippsburg."

  "Still," said Deacon Hurd, grasping Reverend Buckminster's elbow, "if the governor takes them off the island, he'll add every blessed one onto Phippsburg's pauper rolls. Before we know it, the town will be paying for them to live somewhere else, and paying a proper penny year in, year out. Phippsburg couldn't afford it—and not a single soul will stand for it."

  Mr. Stonecrop began to shine his rings against his lapels. "The days of shipbuilding are coming to an end here, Reverend. Traditions change, and we must change with them. If Phippsburg is to survive long enough for your boy to grow up here, it needs new capital, new investment."

  "Tourists," said Reverend Buckminster.

  "Exactly so. Tourists from Boston, New York, Philadelphia."

  "And tourists will not come if there are shanties by their hotel doors."

  "You see the situation precisely. The question that remains is, How to do it?" Mr. Stonecrop leaned toward Turner. "Perhaps you would enjoy exploring the coastline, young Buckminster. Take a half hour. You may find some tidal pools to wade in."

  "It's high tide," said Turner. "There are no tidal pools at high tide."

  "Another quick study, just like his father," said Mr. Stonecrop. "Deacon, he's figured out the tides already. And you said he wasn't very bright."

  Shame filled Turner, and his heart beat against his chest so loudly that he imagined it could be heard above the waves.

  "Go on along," said Reverend Buckminster, his voice tight. "Things may be different along this coast."

  Things would not be different along this coast, Turner thought. Tidal pools came at low tide in Boston, in Phippsburg, in Timbuktu. It didn't take someone very bright to figure that out.

  He climbed down the ledges, his heart still beating loudly. The afternoon had become as hot as meanness, and since the shirt he was wearing had enough starch in it to mummify two, maybe three, pharaohs, he began to feel he could hardly breathe. The only thing that saved him from absolute suffocation was the sea breeze somersaulting and fooling, first ahead, then behind, running and panting like a dog ready to play. And he followed it, pulling at his collar, trying not to wish what a minister's son should not wish.

  Beneath the granite ledges, Turner found two gnarled pines that begged to be shinnied up, a cave that would just about die to be explored, and mudflats where herons longed to be chased. But he was wearing his white s
hirt. He felt the starch stiffening against his sides, felt his sweat accumulating in places he could not reach.

  So it wasn't exactly fair that when he and his white shirt climbed back up the ledges—after thirty-seven minutes—Mrs. Cobb had appeared among the frock coats. He wasn't surprised that God hadn't given him much of a reprieve. His father's face was red, and Turner knew that supper would be very quiet that night, and that sometime later he would hear about his sins, repent sincerely, and learn what he should do to make amends.

  He groaned, quietly.

  Reverend Buckminster glared once at his son as they followed the frock coats and a satisfied Mrs. Cobb back into town. Turner wondered if he should grab the Sears, Roebuck catalogue and hide in the outhouse when they got back to the parsonage, even though the day's heat might give it a ripeness he wouldn't care for.

  No one spoke to him.

  On Parker Head Road, Mrs. Cobb took her outrage into her house, but Turner looked across the road, and there, sure enough, was Mrs. Elia Hurd, watching by her yellow shutters. He waved, then felt his father's hand on his arm.

  "You don't want to be getting to know her," said Deacon Hurd. "She's daft as a loon. Will say anything to anyone—not that it will make much sense." Turner heard Sheriff Elwell laughing behind him.

  ***

  Turner was right about the ripeness of the outhouse, so he came out for supper, which was as quiet as he had expected. Later on, he heard about his sins, and he repented sincerely, but he thought the amending was harder than it had any right to be.