How Dark the Night (29 page)

By mid-August the fires beneath the pot had begun to moderate, but the water in the pot continued to simmer. America was teetering on the brink. What threats or dangers might be lurking in the future were of minor concern to James Cutler today. The soft offshore breezes were too caressing, the scenery too enticing, and the possibilities of what lay ahead too exciting. Since their first outing together on Nantasket Beach nearly a year ago, Mindy Conner had continued to elicit perspectives and desires he had never before experienced or even believed existed.

“Take the tiller?” he said to her as they left Bumpkin Island to starboard and Peddock's Island lay ahead a half mile. “I'll get the anchor ready.”

“What am I aiming for?” she said as she scooted aft toward the helm. “East End?”

“Aye. Just west of there is the sandy cove I was telling you about. Got it?”

“Got it, Commodore,” she confirmed, and the little boat sailed on with hardly a flutter in her billowing canvas as they shifted positions and Mindy took command of the vessel by placing two fingers gently atop the tiller. Jamie had explained to her that applying a light touch to the helm would allow her to “feel” the small craft better and respond to its motions more effectively when on a beam or broad reach in fair winds. She had quickly grasped both the knack and the thrill of it.

Jamie checked wind and weather a final time; nothing that he could see or sense suggested a shift in conditions anytime soon. The ebb tide had turned and was on its way in. For the next six hours, both wind and tide would be in their favor. How fitting, he thought to himself, on a perfect day such as this.

When the boat entered the indent of the cove, he stood, grabbed hold of the mast, and studied the rapidly shoaling seabed beneath them. Mindy too was studying it, and when she could make out small kelp-draped rocks on the sandy bottom and a lone crab scurrying sideways, she hauled in the mainsheet, gave a warning cry of “Coming about,”
and pushed over the tiller and swung the boat around until her bow was pointed directly into the wind. The boat immediately came to a standstill, its two sails flapping impotently and the mainsail boom jouncing about. As Mindy secured the boom, Jamie dropped overboard the heavy block of stone that served as an anchor and paid out the anchor line, allowing wind and tide to push the boat stern-first toward shore. When he heard the shallow keel scrape against the seabed, he pulled on the line to take the boat out to slightly deeper water and tied its bitter end to a wooden cleat at the bow.

“How did you learn to handle a boat so well?” he asked as they met amidships to service the sails.

“My beau taught me,” she said as she released the throat and peak halyards and lowered the gaff-rigged mainsail. Together they gathered in the canvas and secured it loosely to the boom with ties.

“Did he indeed? He must be a hell of a man.”

“He'll do in a clutch,” she said with a smile so beguiling that it drew him over to her as irresistibly as a moth to a light. He took her in his arms and she melted into him, her arms coming around his neck, her lips parting to duel her tongue with his. They remained entwined for long minutes until she whispered into his ear.

“Lieutenant?”

“Mmm.”

“I have something very, very important to ask you.”

He pressed her lithe body to his, urging her on. “What is it?” he whispered back.

“How do I get ashore without ruining my dress?”

He released her, staring at her. “Mindy!”

“What?” she asked innocently.

“Is that all you can think about at a time like this? Your dress?”

“It's an important question, Jamie,” she said in tones of mock reproach. “What's a poor girl to do in a situation like this?”

He rubbed his chin as if pondering his reply. “You could remove your dress, wade ashore with me, and then put it back on—or not, if no one's around. I surely wouldn't mind.”

“James Cutler, you
are
a rogue!”

“Or I could carry you ashore.”

“Perhaps that would be better,” she said.

He took off his shoes and lowered himself over the side of the boat, feeling for the sandy bottom as cool seawater sloshed up to his thighs. “Ready about,” he said, turning, and held out his arms. When he had
her safely ashore, he waded back out to the boat to collect his shoes and a small seabag stowed forward in the cuddy. This he carried back to the beach with his shoes tied around his neck. In his left hand he held a second line that he had secured to a stern cleat with a clove hitch. When it came time to leave, he would use this line to haul the boat in toward shore, dragging the smooth slab of anchor along the seabed.

“Where to?” she asked after Jamie had pulled on his shoes and wrapped the end of the second line around the trunk of a tree standing close to the beach. “I'm sorry you got your pants wet,” she added contritely.

“Not to worry. They'll dry quickly in this sun. Besides,” he said, “I had to get my pants wet, didn't I? Otherwise,
you
would have had to carry
me
ashore, and somehow I have a hard time envisioning that.”

“So do I,” she giggled. “That would hardly have been very gallant of you, would it, Commodore?”

“No, it wouldn't. It's probably something one of your former beaux would have demanded, though.” He hoisted the seabag and pointed to the cliff above them. “Up we go, my sweet.”

They followed a rough path winding upward through trees and thickets until they came to a clearing atop the hill that was known as East End, predictably, because it was located at the eastern end of the island. The spot offered commanding vistas of Hingham and the long, crooked Nantasket Peninsula that defined the eastern extremity of Boston Harbor. Sunlight reflected off the glassy waters of Hingham Bay and Hull Bay. Two hundred yards to the east, across the treacherous swirls of Hull Gut, rose the forty-foot-high windmill, its four vanes creaking lazily in the summer breeze. To the north, the vast reaches of the Atlantic Ocean blended with eternity.

“It's beautiful, Jamie,” Mindy breathed as her gaze took in the sweeping panorama. “Do you come here often?”

“Just once before,” he replied, adding pointedly, “three summers ago with Will and Adele. It was just about this same time of year, in fact. I kept worrying that Will was plotting to toss me over the cliff to give him time alone here with his bride.”

“I could hardly have blamed him,” she said, laughing. Then: “How many people do you suppose live on this island?”

“Not many.” He set the seabag on a flat stone that he had selected to serve as a dining table. He opened the canvas bag and removed a picnic that featured, among other delicacies, sandwiches of thinly sliced chicken topped with slices of tomatoes sprinkled with fennel. Edna Stowe had
insisted on taking charge of the entire meal, from gathering the tomatoes in the garden to preparing the sandwiches, and Jamie had not objected. He was glad to see her acting her old feisty self, a clear indication that while old age might be creeping up on her, it had not yet overtaken her. “Most of the land on this island is used for pasture. There are several buildings near the western end. I doubt anyone lives in them permanently.”

“This island must have a romantic history,” she ventured.

“Not really,” he said nervously, then bit his tongue for missing the opening she had offered. “Try one of these?” He handed her a sandwich and they sat down together side by side on the stone. For long moments they sat in quiet contemplation of sun, sea, and scenery, absorbed in their private thoughts. Jamie was not hungry. He toyed with his sandwich, his mind awhirl as he tried to decide what to say next—or rather, when and how to say it. Two years ago, even a year ago, he could not have conceived of broaching this subject, of asking the question he was screwing up his courage to ask. Love, he had believed, was best left for the future, for when his naval career was assured and a wife at home would not distract him from his duty at sea. But circumstances had changed that. On the surface it seemed so natural—and inevitable, according to friends and family, and even to people in Hingham he hardly knew. Why, then, his hesitation? Because, he answered his own question, a life-defining moment was now only minutes away.

Before he could say anything, Mindy said, “I have a confession to make.”

He cocked his head at her in question.

She was staring down at her own uneaten sandwich. She put it aside and then blurted, “I didn't mean what I said on the boat down there. I wasn't thinking about my dress when you kissed me, I can assure you. I couldn't care less what happens to this stupid dress. It's just that—” She hesitated.

“It's just that what, Mindy?”

She hunched her shoulders and sighed softly. “It's just that whenever I'm with you, Jamie, whenever you touch me or put your arms around me or hold my hand or just smile at me across a room, I feel as though I am no longer in control of myself. As though I cannot resist doing something I may later regret. So I resort to humor, as a defense. You do that too sometimes. I guess we all do it sometimes. Anyway, that's what I was doing on the boat. I was hiding—I was hiding from myself.” She continued to stare down at her lap. She clasped her hands together and shook her head as if in denial of something.

“Please don't think me brash, Jamie,” she implored. “Please don't think ill of me for saying these things. I realize it's not proper for a girl to say such things to a boy, but God help me it's the truth. You may be sailing away soon, and I don't know when I will see you again. I don't know
if
I will see you again. So there are things I must say to you. Things I need so very much for you to understand. If I have overstepped my bounds, so be it, I'll accept the consequences. But I will not apologize.” Her lips quivered. She was close to tears.

His right hand went to the side of her face. Gently he coaxed her chin around until their eyes locked. “Go on, Mindy,” he half-whispered to her. “I'm listening. I'm listening very, very carefully.”

Emboldened by his words she said, “You know how deeply I care for you, Jamie. It's no secret. It's there for everyone to see. I can't hide it. I can't be coy. Not about something like that. I have been in love with you since that day you returned for Diana's wedding and I saw you standing next to Will in the church. In truth, I have
always
loved you, even when I was a little girl and Diana invited me over to your house and I would go, praying you would be home and I would see you there.” She looked down again at her lap. “Lord, how silly all this must sound to you. How dreadfully schoolgirlish.” She swiped at a tear.

Emotion clogged his throat and blocked his ability to speak. He had long known Mindy Conner to be a free-thinking and independent young woman who was not afraid to speak her mind. It was one of her most endearing qualities. But what she had just said was so unexpected, and so blatantly honest, that it momentarily caught him off guard. But the sight of her sitting there next to him in such obvious anguish at his lack of response quickly brought him back.

“Look at me, Mindy.” His voice, too, quavered.

She did.

“Answer just one question?”

She nodded, swiping at another tear.

“Will you marry me?”

It was much later, when the sun was well on its downward arc and the neap tide had reached its peak, that Lt. James Cutler, USN, revealed to his fiancée what he had also brought ashore in the seabag: a bottle of the choicest French champagne that money could buy in Boston.

R
ICHARD
C
UTLER
cursed under his breath when he saw the heavyset matron bustling toward him on South Street. Rebecca Leavitt Hanson
was the last person he wanted to see. She was a woman of consequence in Hingham, but she was also one of the town's most notorious gossips, albeit always under the mantle of maintaining decorum within the town's polite society, for whom she considered herself the spokeswoman.

When she stepped in front of him, blocking his route, Richard tipped his tricorne hat to her. “Good day, Mrs. Hanson,” he said with as much respect as he could muster.

“And a good day to you, Captain Cutler,” she said congenially. “And what a delightful day it is. I have always said that September is the best month of the year. As warm as summer during the day, and yet sufficiently cool in the evening for one to enjoy the comfort of a fire in the hearth.”

“Indeed,” Richard agreed, preparing to move on.

“By the bye,” the woman launched in, “I understand that your son James is betrothed to Miss Melinda Conner. May I offer you my congratulations.”

“Thank you,” Richard said.

“But I must say,” the lady continued self-righteously, “that I am perplexed by the brevity of their engagement. They are to be wed next month? In October?”

“Yes,” Richard confirmed.

“Why so soon, Mr. Cutler? We are all so surprised. Is there perhaps an urgent reason for the short engagement?”

When Richard's eyes narrowed and bored directly into hers, she quickly added, “I mean, my goodness, you barely have time to post the banns. And the way the two of them have been gallivanting about on their own all summer, without proper chaperones. Everyone in town is talking about it. We understand that they are in love, Mr. Cutler, and we are all so terribly fond of both James and Melinda. Which is why we are so happy for them and why nothing has been said to this point. At least by me. But people are talking and you
do
understand why such casual behavior and a hasty marriage can raise an eyebrow or two, don't you?”