Homecoming: Part Two, Chapters 1–6

Maybeth smiled, a tenuous little smile, and turned back to the window.

All the traffic, all the people, the tall buildings—Dicey felt scared, and exhilarated.

There was so much life, all here in one place, teeming, whirling about her. More than at the crowded summer beaches in Provincetown. It was like a pot of vegetable soup boiling on a stove, everything moving.

When they had all four tickets, Dicey started walking along the concourse.

The circuitous route from Baltimore to Annapolis, where they kept getting on and off the same road to stop at little huts by the road and let off passengers, took another hour and a half.

Across this circle, a quiet finger of water, hemmed in by concrete, marked the corner of a narrow area where people thronged, eating, talking, sitting and watching one another. Dicey moved through the milling crowd and along beside the water.

The air grew darker, gray-violet now. The heat did not abate. Sweat ran down her back.

When they stood before the large house, Dicey noticed oddly shaped piles. Old radiators had been dropped here and pipes and slate shingles from the roof and even a bathroom sink.

Quiet as kittens, the water lapped at the boats and the bulkheads.

Their quarrels cut through the quiet slapping sound ropes and rigging made against masts.

The masts and spars of the boats stood stiff and dark.

The colors of the hulls became clear: whites, reds, yellows, greens and one burnished mahogany.

Most of the boats were moored at docks that stretched out into the water. Many had people sitting on them, eating, reading. Others were empty, their sails furled, their hatch covers locked.

More were at work on their boats, polishing brass, sitting on deck splicing ropes, hosing down the sails.

A table was hinged so it could be pulled up flat against the wall and clamped there. This enabled the berth, which served as a sofa during the day, to pull out into a double bed. There was storage space behind and below the berths.

Sammy had lost interest in the conversation and was lying on his stomach on the deck, trying to dabble his hand in the water.

They wandered around again until evening had settled in, milling with crowds of people who seemed to have nothing else to do but saunter down the streets and look in store windows, or peer at the little houses.

Jerry held his hand out stiffly, slanted one way, then reversed the slant. "That’s what the keel does when we tack and come about,” he said.

The sails fell lifeless and quiet, flapping morosely.

Boat, waves, water and wind: through the wood she felt them working for her. She was not directing, but accompanying them, turning them to her use. She didn’t work against them, but with them; and she made the boat do that too. It wasn’t power she felt, guiding the tiller, but purpose.

He was a bony man, with short grizzled hair and long, nervous fingers.

Dicey pulled the five fish out of the water. With the jackknife, she gutted them and scraped off some of their scales. Then she and James threaded them onto supple branches.

James taught Sammy how to put out a fire properly; how to cover it with dirt and then stamp on it and wait, to be sure no telltale smoke rose from the ashes.

As they neared the town of Easton, they began to pass shopping centers and development houses, little, low one-story ranchers with sprigs of new grass and one or two puny trees.

They wagered an hour’s fishing time. If it took too long to get through Easton, Dicey would have to fish for an hour, while Sammy had free time. If it didn’t, then Sammy would have to fish an extra hour. Sammy liked this. Either way, he won.

It was James who sighted the circus ahead, set up on a fallow field.

They ate the bananas as they approached the circus. They came to it from the rear, from behind a big tent. A short midway with a ferris wheel and carousel and a dozen booths for games and food stands led away from the tent entrance.

Three terriers, like little white mobilized mops, swirled around her feet in eager circles.

Maybeth moved closer to Dicey. James stood where he was, his mouth open. Sammy was poised to run.

The sun was going down, then. It grasped at the land with long yellow fingers and made the mottled trunks of sycamores look like people’s skin.

A large, windowless barn, sided in silvery corrugated metal, made one side of the farmyard.

This dog needed a kennel. It was a large gray-and-brown creature, bigger than a setter, with a huge slavering mouth. Its teeth hung long and sharp. It charged against the fence, setting up a clamor that would rouse anyone in the house, Dicey thought.

The screen door opened and a man holding a napkin in his hand stepped out. As soon as he appeared, the dog stopped barking and crouched, fawning and whimpering.

One would hold back the overgrowth, and the rest would reach in for tomatoes, wresting the fruit from the stems.

James moved doggedly on.

They cut across fields. The ground underfoot was dry and crumbly, and although they tried to hurry, it was difficult because the furrows rose up to trip them.

They yapped and yipped, happily. They ran up to the big dog, holding their tails up like little flags. The big dog snarled, growled and dove into their midst. A cacophony of noise burst out of the mass of tumbling dogs.

When Dicey awoke the next morning, she saw filmy shadows, as if the inside of the trailer was swathed in veils.

When Dicey awoke the next morning, she saw filmy shadows, as if the inside of the trailer was swathed in veils.

Back at the circus, Sammy dashed up to tell Dicey that he was going to be in the show with Claire, helping, as long as they stayed with the circus, that Claire thought he would be funny and he thought so too, that Maybeth and Mattie were making him a costume with spangles on it, like Claire’s.