Death On Demand (1987)
“His finger rested on the black-and-white picture of a scrawny, pigtailed girl standing in front of a palmetto.
“Eleven. That was my first summer on Broward’s Rock. See, here’s Uncle Ambrose.”
Oh, and she remembered that magical summer so well, the way the hot sand felt on her bare feet, how it smelted sitting on the end of a dock with her first pole in her hands, not expecting a thing to happen, the excitement when something yanked on her line, and her delight when Uncle Ambrose helped her haul... out a toadfish.
The photograph of Annie and her toadfish was on the next page. It had curled a little with time, but it clearly showed the slimy brown, large-mouthed fish and Annie, grinning through a filigree of braces.
“Mouthwise, you and that fish were neck and neck.”
But she was looking at the pictures of Uncle Ambrose. His hair was still a chestnut brown then, only lightly touched with white. Uncle Ambrose, who taught her so much more than how to cast a line or dig for clams. Because she never knew her father, she felt shy and uncomfortable around men until this gruff old curmudgeon given to long silences took the time to spend his summer days tramping the beaches with his niece and summer evenings pointing out the constellations that glittered in the southern sky like diamonds against black velvet.MoreLess
“Eleven. That was my first summer on Broward’s Rock. See, here’s Uncle Ambrose.”
Oh, and she remembered that magical summer so well, the way the hot sand felt on her bare feet, how it smelted sitting on the end of a dock with her first pole in her hands, not expecting a thing to happen, the excitement when something yanked on her line, and her delight when Uncle Ambrose helped her haul... out a toadfish.
The photograph of Annie and her toadfish was on the next page. It had curled a little with time, but it clearly showed the slimy brown, large-mouthed fish and Annie, grinning through a filigree of braces.
“Mouthwise, you and that fish were neck and neck.”
But she was looking at the pictures of Uncle Ambrose. His hair was still a chestnut brown then, only lightly touched with white. Uncle Ambrose, who taught her so much more than how to cast a line or dig for clams. Because she never knew her father, she felt shy and uncomfortable around men until this gruff old curmudgeon given to long silences took the time to spend his summer days tramping the beaches with his niece and summer evenings pointing out the constellations that glittered in the southern sky like diamonds against black velvet.MoreLess
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