14

If every community must have a Coney Island, then Oak Bluffs was the Coney Island of Martha’s Vineyard.

Zach entered the town at about 11:00 in the morning, passing the boats moored in the water on the left. The first sign that he was entering a carnival town was the multitude of paddle boats on the water. The boats were strictly for the amusement-park trade, and no respectable seaman would have come within ten feet of them.

As he proceeded into the town looking for a parking space, he was amazed by the number of bars on each street. He knew that Oak Bluffs and Edgartown were the only two “wet” communities on the island, but he felt nonetheless that Oak Bluffs was trying a little too desperately to outdo its dry neighbors.

He parked three blocks away from the carrousel and began walking back down the main street. The street was crowded, and he might have missed the boy behind him had he not been wearing a bright orange shirt. But the lurid shirt caught his eye, and as he walked past the hot-dog stands and the ice-cream stands and the cotton-candy stands, he became increasingly certain that the boy in the orange shirt was following him. In spite of what had happened since he’d come to the Vineyard, the idea of being followed in this gingerbread-house town was somehow ludicrous. He walked rapidly past the Indian restaurant on the corner, turned right, and found the bar in which a man named Carpenter had hired Ahab. He hesitated outside for just a moment, and then entered. The boy in the orange shirt came in a moment later.

A fishing net had been draped over the mirror behind the bar. The room was long and narrow. Two men, both wearing fishing boots, were playing shuffleboard. The bar top was chipped and scarred. Judging from the number of initials-in-hearts carved into the wood, Oak Bluffs was a very loving town. Zach pulled up a leatherette stool and sat. The boy in the orange shirt walked to the far end of the bar, sat, and ordered a beer. The bartender drew it, and then walked to Zach.

“Call it,” he said.

“Rye neat,” Zach answered. “And a man named Carpenter.”

“I’ve got the rye,” the bartender said. He hooked a shot glass with his forefinger, took a bottle from the shelf below the net, and poured. “Want a chaser?”

“Water. What about Carpenter?”

“Never heard of him. Are you a cop?”

“Do I look like one?”

“The bulls from Axel Center look like Harvard men.” The bartender shrugged. “A guy comes in asking questions, he’s either a bull or a hood. I don’t cater to neither.”

“I’m neither.”

“Why do you want this Carpenter fellow?”

“I understand he’s going out on a boat tomorrow. I wanted to do some fishing. Thought I’d go along with him.”

“He’s a big fisherman,” the boy in the orange shirt said.

Zach turned to him. “You talking about Carpenter?”

“I don’t know any Carpenter. I’m talking about you.” The boy was smiling. He wore his hair in a high crown, with long black sideburns. His eyes were brown, cruel, with the incongruously long-lashed lids of a girl. His mouth was thin with the faint suggestion of a perpetual sneer hovering about the lips. He seemed no older than seventeen, but he was excellently built, the orange shirt stretched taut over bulging muscles which were undoubtedly the product of weight lifting.

“I’d advise you to mind your own business, sonny,” Zach said.

“I don’t take advice from strangers,” the boy answered.

“Shut up and mind your own business, Roger,” the bartender said.

“Did I pay for this beer?”

“That don’t—”

“Don’t go shoving at me, Bill. I don’t like getting shoved.”

“Big man,” Bill said disgustedly, dismissing the boy. “If you’re interested in hiring a boat, mister, there’s plenty around. Does it have to be this Carpenter’s?”

“No. But I thought you might know him.”

“Strangers shouldn’t go around asking questions,” Roger said from the end of the bar.

“Why don’t you take a walk?” Zach said.

Roger was silent for a moment. Then he nodded and said, “Maybe I will,” and he rose from the stool quickly, paid for the beer, and walked out of the bar.

“He’s trouble,” Bill said. “A bad apple. Got a record.”

“At his age?” Zach asked, surprised.

“He’s nineteen. Don’t get mixed up with him, or you’ll have the cops down on your ears.”

“That’s the last thing I want right now.”

“Then don’t mess with Roger. Take my advice.”

“Thanks, I will. You don’t know Carpenter, huh?”

“Never heard of him, Sorry.”

“That’s all right. What do I owe you?”

He was paying the bartender when Roger came back into the bar. There were two other teenagers with him.

“Get your boat?” he asked Zach.

“No.”

“Get your Carpenter?”

“No.”

“That’s a shame.”

“Yeah.”

Zach picked up his change and walked out of the bar. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw that Roger and his friends were following him. And, abruptly, he realized he was carrying forty-five-thousand dollars in his pocket.

He crossed the street, following the music of the calliope to a high wooden building. He walked into the building. The carrousel occupied half of the wooden structure, whirling monotonously. An extended wooden army reached toward the carrousel, bearing rings one of which was presumably gold. The riders were mostly teenage girls reaching for the gold ring each time they whipped past the extended arm. The girls were adept at the game. Each time a girl’s turn at the arm came up, her hand would move in a rapid succession of winking snaps, yanking half a dozen rings from the mechanism before the carrousel whirled her past the arm. Monotonously, the carrousel rotated. Monotonously, the girls performed their sleight of hand with the rings. The calliope music filled the hollow shell of the building, creating a mock carnival spirit. Zach watched for a while and then walked over to the stands opposite the carrousel.

A man whipped cotton candy from the rapidly revolving metal bowl, spinning the pink fluff onto its white holders.

“I’m trying to locate a man named Carpenter,” Zach said.

The man looked up. “I don’t think I know him.”

“He’s a fisherman,” Roger’s voice said behind Zach. “This man is a fisherman, too. A big fisherman.”

“I still don’t know him,” the cotton-candy man said. He turned his eyes away from Roger, as if recognizing him for what he was and not wanting to have anything to do with him.

“Thanks,” Zach said. He turned. The three boys were blocking his path. “You’re in my way,” he said.

“Are we?” Roger answered.

“Come on,” Zach said patiently.

“Where we going?”

“Get out of my way.”

“Why, you can just walk around us,” Roger said.

Zach felt his fists balling at his sides. He forced himself to relax, and then walked around the boys. Roger snickered behind him. He started for the door and heard the clatter of their boots on the wooden floor behind him.

He walked back toward the car, stopping in each bar he passed and asking for Carpenter. No one seemed to know the man. And each time he came into the street again, Roger and his friends were waiting.

He did not want trouble with teenage punks. It was almost 11:30. In a little more than two hours, he had to board the ferry. A street brawl with young hoodlums was not the thing to encourage—not with Penny waiting in Providence, not with her life depending on whether or not he boarded that ferry. Doggedly, he walked back to the car. He was turning the ignition key when Roger and his friends caught up with him.

Roger climbed onto the hood, straddling it. His two friends sat on the right fender. Zach rolled down his window.

“How about it, fellows?” he said.

“We want a ride,” Roger answered.

“Get off the hood,” Zach said.

“Take us for a ride, fisherman.”

“I can’t see with you on the hood.”

“That’s a real shame,” Roger said.

Zach sighed, opened the door on his side, and started for Roger. He was no sooner out of the car than the boys on the right fender leaped off, opened the door opposite the driver’s seat, and scrambled into the back of the car.

“Hey!” Zach said. “What the hell—?” He went back to the car. Leaning in past the wheel, he said, “Look, I don’t feel like—”

He looked across the front seat. Roger was standing in the opposite doorway. A Smith and Wesson .38 caliber revolver was in his fist.

“Get in, fisherman,” he said.

Zach stared at the gun.

“Get in, I said.”

He got into the car.

“Close the door.”

He closed it.

“Now give me the loot,” Roger said.

“What are you talking about?”

“The forty-five grand.”

“What forty-five grand?”

“You want us to take it from you, fisherman?”

“I haven’t got it, so how can you take it?”

“Start the car,” Roger said. “Drive straight through town, and then make a left. We’ll find a place and then convince you.”

Zach started the Plymouth, and then edged into the stream of traffic. On the sidewalks, the crowds bought souvenirs and hot dogs and cotton candy. Slowly, the car moved down the main street.

“There’s a traffic cop at the intersection,” Roger said. “No funny stuff. I know how to use this gun.”

“Suppose I stop the car and yell?”

“I wouldn’t try it.”

“Why not? What have I got to lose?”

“Your life,” Roger said.

“And yours, too,” Zach said. “I’m gambling you’re not that stupid.”

“What do you—?”

Zach stopped the car and then pulled up the hand brake. The man behind him began tooting his horn almost instantly.

“Get moving!” Roger said. “Goddamnit, I’m warning you! Get this heap moving.”

“Go ahead, shoot me,” Zach said. “That cop’ll be here in two seconds. Go ahead, dope. Shoot.”

Roger hesitated. His face was covered with a fine film of sweat. From the back seat, one of the boys whispered, “Rog! The cop. He’s coming over …”

“Get this car moving, you bastard!” Roger shouted. The hand with the gun was beginning to tremble. The traffic cop was waving his hands as he approached the Plymouth. He was a big, red-faced man, sweat staining the blue shirt he wore. Containing his anger, his face getting redder as he came closer, he strode rapidly toward the car.

“You’d better—” Roger started.

“You’d better hide that gun,” Zach said, and Roger instantly put the .38 in his pocket.

“All right, what the hell is this all about?” the cop said.

“I was just letting these boys out, officer,” Zach answered politely.

“At the busiest corner in town? For God’s sake, what the hell do you think—?”

“They were just getting out, officer,” Zach said. “You’d better hurry, boys. We’re holding up traffic.”

“If you’re getting out, get out!” the cop said. “Come on, hurry it up.”

Roger threw a frustrated menacing look at Zach. Then he opened the door and left the car. The boys in the back seat hurried out after him.

“Okay, mister, move!” the cop said, and Zach put the car in motion instantly.

Over his shoulder, he called, “See you, Rog!” and then he made a left turn and gunned the car toward Edgartown.