He and the girl turned north. For a while they trudged in silence. They made an odd pair, not only because of age. He was big and burly, his blunt visage furrowed beneath thinning reddish hair. Her own hair, uncovered, tossed in elflocks as the single brightness to see. Thus far she still walked slim and light-foot, her condition betrayed by no more than a fullness gathering in the breasts. Whenever she crossed a sprawl of kelp she popped a bladder or two under her heel. When she spied an intact sand dollar, she picked it up with a coo of pleasure. She was, after all, just sixteen.
“Here.” She thrust it into Guthrie’s hand. “For you, Uncans.”
He accepted while asking, “Don’t you want it yourself, a souvenir?”
She flushed. Her glance dropped. He barely heard: “Please. You and … and Auntie—something to ‘member me by.”
“Well, thanks, Diddyboom.” He gave her hand a quick squeeze, let go again, and dropped the disc into a jacket pocket. “Muchas gracias. Not that we’re about to forget you anyhow.”
The pet names blew away on the wind as though the wind were time, names from long ago when she toddled laughing to him and hadn’t quite mastered “Uncle Anson.” They walked for another span, upon the wet strip where the sea had packed and smoothed and darkened the sand. Water hissed from the breakers to lap near their feet.
“Please don’t thank me!” she cried suddenly.
He threw her a pale-blue glance. “Why shouldn’t I?”
Tears glimmered. “You’ve done so much for me, and I, I’ve never done anything for you. Can’t I even give you a shell?”
“Of course you can, honey, and we’ll give it a good home,” he answered. “If you think you owe Juliana and me something, pay the debt forward; give somebody else who needs it a leg up someday.” He paused. “But you don’t owe, not really. We’ve gotten plenty enjoyment out of our honorary status. In fact, to us, for all practical purposes, you’re family.”
“Why?” she half challenged, half appealed. “What reason for it, ever?”
“Well,” he said carefully, “I’m auld acquaintance with your parents, you know. Your mother since she was a sprat, and when your dad-to-be married her, I was delighted at what a catch she’d made. Juliana agreed.” He ventured a grin. “I expected she’d call him a dinkum cobber, till she reminded me Aussies these days don’t talk like that unless they’re conning a tourist.”
“But we, we’re nobody.”
“Nonsense. Your sort doesn’t take handouts, nor need them. If I gave a bit of help, it was a business proposition.”
Already in her life she knew otherwise. Helen Stambaugh’s father had been master of a fishing boat till the fisheries failed. Guthrie put up the capital, as a silent partner, for him to start over with a charter cruiser that went up to the Strait of Juan de Fuca and around among the islands. For a while he prospered modestly. Sigurd Ebbesen, immigrant from Norway, became his mate, then presently his son-in-law, and then, with a further financial boost from Guthrie, a second partner captaining a second boat. But the venture collapsed when the North American economy in general did. The old man was able to take an austere retirement. Sigurd survived only because Guthrie persuaded various of his associates and employees that this was a pleasant way to spend some leisure time. However, Dagny, first child of two, must act as bull cook when school was out. She graduated to deckhand, then mate-cum-engineer, still unpaid, her eyes turned starward each night that was unclouded.
“No,” she protested. “Not business, not really. You, you’re just p-plain good—”
Her stammer ended. She swallowed a ragged breath, knuckled her eyes, and walked faster.
Guthrie matched the pace. He allowed her a hundred meters of quietness, except for the wind and surf and sea-mews, before he laid a hand on her shoulder and said, “Friends are friends. I don’t gauge anybody’s worth by their bank accounts. Been poor too damn often, myself, for that.”
She jarred to a stop. ‘Tm sorry! I didn’t mean—”
“Sure.” A smile creased his face. “I know you that well, at least.” He sighed “Wish it was better. If I could’ve seen you folks more than in far-apart snatches—“ It trailed away.