The Guardian

“There are plenty of harmless snakes,” Hawkshaw said, looking away. “You just have to learn to tell which is which.”

“Yeah, Mama,” Charlie said enthusiastically. “You just have to learn to tell which is which.”

“I don’t care what it is,” she said, putting her fist on her hip. “If you see one, run.”

Charlie bent down to Hawkshaw’s ear and said in a conspiratorial voice, “Girls are sissies.”

Kate looked both crestfallen and insulted. “Charlie!” she said, “That’s not true.”

“Your mother’s not a sissy,” Hawkshaw said. “But she’s right. Don’t mess with a snake if you don’t know what it is.”

“Can you tell a poison one from a good one?” Charlie asked.

“Yes,” said Hawkshaw.

“Who taught you?” Charlie demanded.

“My—” Hawkshaw hesitated. He’d almost slipped into his old Southern speech habits and said, My daddy. He corrected himself and said, “My father. I grew up here. This was his house.”

“And your mother’s?” Charlie said brightly.

“No. She never lived here.”

“Where is she, then?” Charlie asked with a child’s bluntness. “Did she die?”

“No,” said Hawkshaw. “She lives someplace else, that’s all.”

“Well, where?” Charlie insisted.

“Montreal.” A cold place for a cold woman, his father had always said. Hawkshaw’s father hadn’t been able to hang on to the woman he’d loved, and Hawkshaw had rather despised him for it. Now history had repeated itself, like a bad joke. Like father, like son.

“Montreal,” Charlie mused. “Did your father go there, too?”

“Charlie—” Kate began, her tone warning.

“No. My father’s dead,” Hawkshaw said. He had no taste for sugarcoating the expression nor did the kid seem to want it.

“Did he die of a brain attack?” Charlie asked. “Mine did.”

“Charlie—” Kate warned again.

“No,” Hawkshaw said. “Not that.”

“Then what?” Charlie asked, all amiable curiosity.

“Something else,” Hawkshaw said vaguely. Drinking, he thought. He died from the drinking.

Hawkshaw had never been sure if his mother had left because his father drank, or if his father drank because his mother had left. It was odd. After all these years, he still didn’t know.

“Well, what?” Charlie persisted. “Did a snake bite him? Did a shark eat him?”

“No,” said Hawkshaw. “He just died, that’s all.”

Kate looked humiliated by this exchange. “That’s enough, Charlie.” To Hawkshaw she said, “I’m sorry. He doesn’t mean to pry.”

Hawkshaw changed the subject. He turned so that he and the boy could see where the tidal stream ended and the ocean began. “That’s the Gulf of Mexico,” he said, pointing out toward the open water. “Can you swim, kid?”

“No, he can hardly swim at—” Kate began.

“Some,” Charlie contradicted. “I can swim a little.”

“Well, don’t go near the water without a life jacket until you can swim a lot,” said Hawkshaw.

“Can you swim a lot?” Charlie asked.

“Yeah,” Hawkshaw said. “I can.”

“You could teach me,” Charlie said.

“Charlie,” Kate almost wailed, “stop bothering Mr. Hawkshaw.”

“Somebody needs to teach me,” Charlie told her righteously. “And you can hardly swim at all.”

Hawkshaw studied Kate, raising a critical eyebrow. She’d probably never swum in anything other than a chlorinated pool in her life or seen any water creature more fearsome than a duck in a park pond.

He saw the worry in her eyes, and he saw the questions.

“These are dangerous waters,” he said.

“How dangerous?” Charlie asked, delighted.

Hawkshaw realized his gaze had been locked too long with the woman’s, reading too many things in it. She didn’t want to depend on him, but she had no choice. He hoped she understood that he intended to take care of her and the boy.

But she could probably also read a reluctant hunger in his eyes. He wondered if she knew how primitive and selfish that hunger was. The only reason I would want you is because I can’t have Sandra.

“How dangerous?” Charlie repeated, insistent.

“Very dangerous,” Hawkshaw said, “if you don’t understand them.”

He shifted the boy to a more secure position. “Come on. I’ll show you the boundaries of the land. We’ll worry about the water later.”

CORBETT HAD PROMISED to call at twelve noon, Florida time. The crawling hours seemed like eons to Kate. This morning, she’d been able to make Charlie settle down only long enough to eat a few spoonfuls of cereal and sip distractedly at a glass of orange juice.

The orange juice was fresh, squeezed that morning by Hawkshaw himself on an old machine that looked like a medieval torture device. He said the oranges were picked only yesterday.

Kate found this a small comfort. She felt anchorless, cast adrift. She had left behind everything and everyone except Charlie, and at the moment even Charlie seemed to have deserted her.

The boy was besotted with hero worship; he couldn’t get enough of Hawkshaw. He followed him like a dog and echoed him like a parrot.