'Come to Couth,' Couth said. 'Come on, come on. Want to see some more pictures? Come on, come on ...'
Colm went sprawling over a basket of rolls and Couth swept him up and bore him dizzily off to the darkroom, the girl named Nell following devotedly.
Bobby Pillsbury watched Biggie push her chair back from the table. 'Can I help you with the dishes?' he asked her. I gave Biggie a gleeful pinch under the table; Bobby thought her blush was meant for him. He began to clear the table in clumsy swoops, and I retired to the darkroom to watch Couth dazzle Bobby's girl. As I left her with this bumbling would-be lover, Biggie caught my eye with a comic look of mock lust for Bobby.
But later, in our boathouse racks, as Couth slept with Colm in the master bedroom of the Big House, and Bobby Pillsbury and his young girl Nell were or were not reconciled, Biggie was cross with me.
'He was a perfectly nice boy, Bogus,' she said. 'You shouldn't have left him alone with me.'
'Big, you're not telling me you grabbed a quickie in the kitchen?'
'Oh, shut up.' She shifted in the bottom bunk bed.
'Did he really try, Big?' I asked her.
'Look,' she said coolly, 'you know nothing happened. It's just that you made it awkward for the kid.'
'I'm sorry, Big, really. I was just fooling ...'
'And I'll admit I was flattered,' she said, and then paused a long time. 'I mean, it was sort of nice,' she said. 'A young kid like that really wanting me.'
'You're surprised?'
'Aren't you?' she asked me. 'You don't seem that interested.'
'Oh, Biggie ...'
'Well, you don't,' she said. 'You might pay more attention to who's interested in me, Bogus, and not abuse it.'
'Biggie, it was just a dumb evening. Look at Couth with that girl Nell--'
'That brainless twat ...'
'Biggie! A young girl ...'
'Couth is the only friend you've got that I like.'
'Well, good,' I said. 'I like Couth too.'
'Bogus, I could live like this. Could you?'
'Like Couth?'
'Yes.'
'No, Big.'
'Why?'
I thought about it.
'Because he doesn't own anything?' Biggie asked, but that was stupid; that didn't matter at all to me, either. 'Because he doesn't seem to need any other people around him?' She was edging around it. 'Because he lives on the ocean all year round?' Which has nothing to do with anything we're talking about, I thought. 'Because he can put a lot into his photographs and not need to put much into his life?' She was a prodder, Biggie was. I forgot the question.
'So you could live here with Couth, Big?' I asked her, and she was quiet for a long time.
'I said I could live like this,' she said. 'Not with Couth. With you. But like Couth lives.'
'I'm not handy with anything,' I said. 'I couldn't be a caretaker for anything. I couldn't even replace a fuse in a complicated house like this, probably ...'