“May I ask you why the hell you are working in a bakery?” my father asked.
It was late May and he, Miranda, and Dolores had just arrived on the island.
Before they came, and after our winter tenants left our Vineyard Haven house, I got it cleaned and moved my things from the gingerbread cottage. Though I would have liked to stay in the cottage, the owners were coming for the summer, so I moved into our family’s two-story Colonial on William Street.
Isabelle helped me find a girl who was home from college to come in daily to cook and clean. I imagined that this girl, Bethany, must have been very much like Isabelle when she first left Bridgewater.
“Do you think that we are poor, Jane?” Teddy asked. “You haven’t asked for any money. Do you need any?”
Though it had taken him months to ask, I was still grateful that he thought of it.
“I don’t need money,” I said.
“Then why?”
“I like it at the bakery.”
“Jane, you just can’t do it,” Miranda said. “Think of how it looks.”
“I don’t think anyone cares how it looks.”
“I care,” she said.
She was tanned and wearing a green Lilly Pulitzer dress. Miranda’s face was lined from excessive sun exposure. She should know better. What were all those expensive beauty products for if not to protect her skin? I was surprised Teddy hadn’t said something to her.
“You look better, Jane,” Teddy said. “What have you done to yourself? You look thinner. Have you lost weight?”
I was wearing formfitting jeans and a T-shirt, not one of my usual tent dresses. I’d given them up. I didn’t miss them much, but occasionally I missed their shapeless comfort.
“I got my hair cut,” I said. I thought this might be enough of an answer to satisfy him and make him change the subject.
“Good for you. You look terrific. And your face. You must be using Crème de la Mer. I’ve always said it’s the best.”
“Soap and water,” I said. This wasn’t entirely true. I had invested in some kind of beauty regimen from the drugstore, but I didn’t have to tell him.
“I’m impressed. Very impressed. I’m so proud of you, Jane. Taking a little initiative with yourself.”
“You do look good,” Miranda said. “Different somehow. Maybe even younger. But you’ll have to give up that job. I can’t imagine it will be much of a sacrifice.” Her nasal voice wandered up and down the scale and finally ended on a C-flat.
“I’m not giving up the job,” I said.
“That’s just patently ridiculous,” Teddy said. “I can’t have a daughter of mine working in a bakery.”
“Why not?”
“People will talk. The Fortunes just don’t do that sort of thing.”
“They do now,” I said.
“Someone will have to get the luggage,” Miranda said.
“Have you sprained something?” I asked. She was holding her Louis Vuitton train case. She wore large sunglasses and she looked chic in a Breakfast at Tiffany’s kind of way.
“No,” Miranda said. “Why would you ask that?”
“There’s no Astrid here, Miranda. I hired someone to come in and clean and cook, but she’s not coming until later. I guess you’ll have to get your own luggage.”
Dolores, from her place at the door, said, “I’ll get it.”
“Jane can help you,” Miranda said. “I’ll make coffee.” I didn’t even think she knew how to make coffee.
“I’ll go,” my father said, putting his hand on Dolores’s arm to hold her back.
“I don’t mind helping, Teddy. You know that.” She smiled up at him in a soft and kittenish way. I looked at Miranda, but she didn’t seem to notice.
Though Miranda had come to the island looking as polished as burnished wood, Dolores was a little the worse for wear. The sun had given her freckles and she had gained weight. Since Dolores wasn’t tall, the weight didn’t sit well on her. Some people gain weight all over, while with others, weight gravitates to one place. For Dolores, it was her thighs, and this year she’d be one of the women who would be using every artifice to cover up the one spot on her body over which she had lost control. Dolores also needed a trip to the hairdresser to take care of the dark roots in an otherwise brassy head of hair.
My father didn’t seem to notice any of these changes in Dolores, which was very unlike him. If anything, he paid more attention to her than before they went away. I supposed it was only natural, since they had been living together for months.
I had planned a lobster dinner to welcome them back, and since we didn’t talk anymore about my work at the bakery, we had a pleasant evening. Bethany came over, and together we boiled the lobsters, melted the butter, set the table, and cleaned up afterward.
After the meal, Teddy pushed himself away from the table.
“Thank you, Jane,” he said. He patted his stomach. “This meal was a very nice gesture, and I, for one, appreciate it.” He stood up and took a cigar from his pocket.
“It was very nice, Jane,” Dolores said.
“I don’t know about shellfish,” Miranda said. “Didn’t I read something recently?”
No one answered her.
“I’m going up to the widow’s walk to smoke. Anyone want to come?” Teddy asked.
“I will, Teddy,” Dolores said. She followed him upstairs. Did Miranda understand that if Dolores exchanged Mudd for Fortune—which would no doubt be a happy exchange in name alone—Miranda would be shifted to the role of stepdaughter to a woman over ten years her junior?
“This island air must be good for you, Jane,” Miranda said. She shifted in her seat and stretched into a yoga pose.
“I’ve always liked it here,” I said.
“You and Mom,” she said. “The two of you. You always liked the same things.”
“We did,” I said, and smiled.
“I miss her sometimes,” Miranda said. She stretched backward.
“Me too,” I said. “How long is Dolores staying? I didn’t even know she was coming.”
“Oh, Dolores will stay as long as she likes. We do everything together. I don’t know how I could have coped without her. Not everyone likes to be alone all the time”—she paused—“but you don’t seem to mind it.”
Bethany brought us coffee.
“I wasn’t alone,” I said.
“Oh yes. You’ve been working at that bakery.” She picked up her coffee and thanked Bethany. “You’ll never guess who we ran into in Boston.” They had stayed over a few nights in a hotel on the waterfront on their way to the Vineyard.
“Who?” I asked.
“Guy Callow. Remember him?”
“Your old boyfriend,” I said. This would have been the time to tell her that I, too, had seen Guy Callow. I don’t know why I didn’t, but I didn’t.
“I guess you could call him that. He looks good. He’s coming down here in a few weeks. Daddy says—Daddy called Guy’s father right after we ran into Guy—that the Dutch girl settled a lot of money on Guy when they split. He never even ended up practicing law.”
“That must make you feel better,” I said. “There must be something wrong with a man who lives off a settlement from his ex-wife.”
“Something wrong? Like what?”
If I was going to say anything about seeing Guy, I should do it now. The longer I waited, the more awkward it would become.
“Anyway, I don’t care at all about Guy Callow. He was a mere mosquito bite to me.” Miranda sighed and looked toward the window. “Daddy and Dolores get on so well, don’t you think?”
“I guess so,” I said.
Miranda turned back toward me. “Guy told us he ran into you in Vermont,” she said.
“That’s right. I almost forgot.”
“How you could forget about running into Guy Callow is really beyond me, Jane. He’s such a beautiful man. Don’t you have any feelings about men at all?”
“Not about Guy Callow,” I said.
“Well, that makes sense, I suppose. He was my boyfriend—and sisters, well, they just don’t do that to each other, do they?” I felt that somewhere in there was not exactly a threat but a warning. “I’m not interested in him anymore, of course. I’m not the type of woman to go mooning around after the same man forever. He made his bed, now he can just lie in it. Still, if he wants to be friends, that’s fine too. Either way, it doesn’t matter to me.”
If Miranda was telling the truth, I was glad, because it hardly seemed like she had made a lasting impression on Guy’s heart. And if she really had such a careless attitude toward love, perhaps she could bottle it and share it with me.
After everyone went to bed, I went out onto the widow’s walk. From there, you could watch the boats bob in the bay.
Guy Callow’s imminent arrival didn’t thrill me. If it hadn’t been for Max, maybe I would have found Guy more appealing, but I’d never know because my feelings for Max, no matter how hopeless, were too deeply anchored. Maybe after he married Lindsay, I’d be free. At the moment, though, when I compared Max with Guy, the former always left me wanting more, while the latter was always too much.
At four-thirty the next morning I crept out of the house. I had farther to go now that I was in Vineyard Haven and I had to drive to work. I rolled the car out of the driveway and started the engine when I got to the street. The noise of the engine was jarring in the still of the morning.
When I arrived at the bakery, Isabelle took me aside.
“Have a muffin,” she said.
“What’s the matter?” I asked.
“Nothing,” she said. She paused, took a bite of blueberry muffin, and chewed. I waited. “I was thinking, though, now that your family is back, you might want to stop working here.”
“Why?” I asked.
“I doubt they’d like it very much. I might not know them, but I know what they’re like.” She took a knife and smoothed a slab of butter onto her muffin, then took another bite.
“I don’t care what they think,” I said.
“You’ve always cared what they thought, even when you thought you didn’t.”
“Well, I don’t anymore.”
I felt that there was something more she wanted to say.
“Soon the kids will be coming back for the summer,” she said.
I nodded. Miranda and Teddy had come to the island early, before the season had officially started. Florida was getting too hot and it only made sense for them to move into the only house they had left. There was also the hint of a scandal involving Miranda and a Kennedy cousin, but I couldn’t even bear to think about that.
“Are you firing me?” I asked.
“Of course I’m not firing you. It’s just that the kids will be expecting the job. In the summer I usually hire a few kids so they’ll make money for college.”
I was embarrassed to think I’d almost taken a job reserved for a college kid who really needed the money.
“Okay, and I could use someone to work on the Euphemia Review.” I tried to redeem myself by making a new job for a needy kid. If Isabelle did it every summer, then so could I.
“Can you pay them?” she asked.
“Of course,” I said. I’d have to talk to the bankers, but I didn’t want her to think that I’d hire someone and not expect to pay them. While I was at it, I’d get a stipend for Tad.
“How about Jimmy?” she asked.
“It won’t be much money,” I said.
“That’s okay. He has odd jobs.” Her mother-mind was ticking away.
“Then Jimmy it is,” I said. I hoped he had some feeling for the written word. “You need me today?”
Isabelle looked at me and I realized that she had never needed me. She had made room for me and I was grateful.
“I’ll be going along, then.” I smiled. I wanted her to know how much I appreciated what she had done, but I didn’t know how to say thank you. “You want to have dinner Friday night?” I asked.
“Love to,” Isabelle said.
She turned and walked back into the kitchen. I bought some hot rolls and muffins, left the warmth of the bakery, and walked out into the chilly morning.
When I got home I set out the bread and muffins and made some coffee. Teddy and Dolores came downstairs together, both dressed in tennis whites.
“Jane, what are you doing here? I thought you had that job,” Teddy said.
“Not anymore.”
“Well, thank God for that. You took my advice. Good girl. Never known you to do it before, but it’s a welcome change.”
I poured the coffee.
“The tennis club probably isn’t open yet,” I said. It was too early in the season.
“We’ll find a public court,” Dolores said.
“Isn’t she resourceful,” Teddy said. It wasn’t a question so much as a compliment, the type he’d been throwing her way since they’d arrived.
“Dolores is very resourceful,” I said. I didn’t mean what Teddy meant by it. I glanced at Dolores, who smiled innocently back at me.
Teddy picked out a banana nut muffin and took a bite.
“These are wonderful,” he said after wiping the crumbs from his mouth with a linen napkin. “Who would ever think that the best muffins anywhere could be found on an island?”
He put the muffin down, half eaten, and went outside, as he did every morning, to pick up the newspaper from the front walk—or the shrubbery, depending on the aim of the paperboy. He came back to the kitchen, took a sip of coffee, and laid the local paper out on the table. He licked his forefinger before turning each page. His squint revealed that he probably needed reading glasses but was too vain to admit it.
“Look here,” he said. “The Buffingtons, Veronica and Glenda, are coming down this summer. It says that Veronica has taken that lone house overlooking Menemsha Pond, up-island.”
The Buffingtons hadn’t been back to the island since Michael Buffington had died.
“I wonder how I can get Veronica to forgive me. They always have the best parties. Since my first note of apology didn’t work, I’ll have to prostrate myself. I know it was very rude not to do anything when Michael died, but is she really going to punish me forever?”
Dolores turned her head with a sharp tweak and looked at Teddy. Who was this Veronica Buffington? Was she a rival?
“I’m going to write her another note,” Teddy said.
“Are you sure you want to do that?” I asked. I had nothing against the Buffingtons. I liked them, but I hated to see Teddy humiliate himself just for an invitation.
“It can’t hurt. When Michael was alive, they had the best parties. All the really interesting people were there. We wouldn’t want to be left out this summer. Jane, you never did know the value of the right friends.”
Dolores looked up again. She might have realized that there was nothing especially “right” about her when it came to the scale on which my father measured friends. She might have managed to turn his head with flattery, but that was nothing compared with a Veronica Buffington.
“Why don’t you just call her?” Dolores asked. I think she thought that by offering a suggestion she could retain some control.
“No. I know what I’ll do. I’ll write her a downright obsequious note,” Teddy said. “Jane, where is that paper?”
We kept a stack of cream cards in a secretary behind the sofa in the living room. I went to get them and brought several back to the kitchen.
While Teddy was writing, Miranda came downstairs, still in her bathrobe.
“What are you doing, Daddy?” she asked.
“I’m writing to Veronica Buffington. She’s coming back to the island.”
“Will she have that insipid Glenda-the-Good-Witch with her?” Miranda asked.
“They’re both coming.”
“You’d think they wouldn’t want to do everything together. Glenda’s at least thirty-five. Why doesn’t she want a life of her own?”
Several weeks later, the four of us, Miranda, Dolores, Teddy, and I, were having lunch at a restaurant that claimed to serve the best fried clams on the island. We were seated at a table with a view of the harbor. It was a warm June day and we had just entered the summer season.
“The Buffingtons’ party is next Friday night and we’re all invited,” Teddy said. He pulled out the invitation with a flourish. Apparently he had just received it that morning.
“I can’t go,” I said.
“Why not?” he asked.
“I’m having dinner with Isabelle,” I said. “We get together every Friday night.” It had become our ritual.
“If you have dinner with her every Friday, then you don’t have to go on this particular Friday. I’m sure she’ll understand,” Teddy said.
“The Buffingtons will have other parties.”
“Jane, I can’t believe you’d give up the first good party of the season for something you do every week. Besides, how could the baker be anywhere near as interesting as the people who will be at the Buffingtons’?”
Dolores looked into her clam chowder. Though she’d managed to amuse Miranda and Teddy for months, she couldn’t claim to be as “interesting” as the kind of people you’d find at the Buffingtons’. Dolores had never painted a picture, played a concerto, or danced with the Boston Ballet. These were the type of luminaries you might find at a Buffington party. I’m sure the only reason they invited us is that we were somewhat related to them.
I picked up a fried clam and popped it into my mouth.
“I’m going to dinner with Isabelle,” I said.
“I never could understand you, Jane,” Teddy said.
“No, you never could.” I smiled and lifted my face toward the ocean breeze.
Teddy had a spot of tartar sauce on his chin and Dolores reached over with her thumb and wiped it off.
“Daddy,” Miranda said, “you’re not usually such a mess.”
Dolores came to his defense. “It was just a small spot of tartar sauce.”
“Yes, but it was on his face, and perhaps he should be the one to wipe it off, don’t you think?”
Dolores reddened, but instead of looking down like she usually did, she looked straight at Miranda with an expression of defiance.
“Girls, girls,” Teddy said. “It was only a spot of tartar sauce. Let’s not blow it all out of proportion.”