Blowback(12)

While I was getting ready to do that the buzzing of an outboard became audible on the dry air, coming in from the north side of the lake. I looked over in that direction, and a minute or so later I could see the skiff and the two good-sized guys in it, Knox and Talesco. From the angle at which they were traveling, it looked as though they were headed for the pier. I rolled up my towel, put my shirt on, walked over to the pier, and went out along it to where the other skiffs were tied near the end. Then I plunked myself down in front of the outermost boat and tugged at the painter to bring the stern around and pretended an examination of the Johnson outboard while I watched the two of them approach.

When they got close enough for the guy at the tiller to cut off the engine and let them drift in, I stood up and gave them a friendly wave. The one on the bow seat lifted a hand slightly in what might have been a salute, but the other one didn't make any sort of acknowledgment; neither of them looked particularly cheerful, or particularly curious about who I might be.

“Hey,” I called, “need a hand?”

“No thanks,” the guy on the bow seat said, and stood up on pretty good sea legs as the skiff drifted in. He caught hold of one of the pilings and held them off and steady; then he climbed out onto the pier, tied the painter through an iron side ring while the other guy tilted the outboard up out of the water and gathered up their gear-two complete bass outfits and a waterproof tote bag, the kind you use on fishing trips to ice down beer and keep sandwiches fresh. The one who had been at the tiller handed the gear up. They worked together silently and with a good deal of precision and economy, the way two people will who have known each other for some time.

Both of them were big macho types all right, in their early forties and in fine condition, with flat stomachs and good pectoral development indicative of regular weight-lifting programs. Bow Seat had thick curly black hair and one of those fierce Prussian-general mustaches that was so black it shone with bluish highlights in the sun. Humor lines etched the corners of his mouth like hieroglyphics on a chunk of weathered stone. What I could see of Tiller's hair under his jungle helmet was thin and dark brown, and he had long bushy sideburns; his eyes were green, flecked with bits of yellow, and they were not telling you much about what went on behind them. This one looked as if he had not found anything humorous in a long time.

I said to Bow Seat, “You have much luck?”

“Some,” he answered.

“Any particular spot?”

“Nope. Lake's full of bass.”

“I'm anxious to get a line out myself.”

“You just come in today?”

“Yeah. Couple of hours ago.”

I introduced myself, and Bow Seat said he was Karl Talesco and Tiller was Sam Knox, and I shook hands with him. Knox came up out of the skiff and I gave him my hand too. He looked at it for three seconds, and I thought he was not going to take it; then he did, but for all of a heartbeat before he let loose. The green eyes did not look at me, or at Talesco. He said nothing at all.

I sensed an undercurrent of something between the two of them, and I wondered if it could have anything to do with Angela Jerrold. I said, “You're the only other guests I've met so far. Except for Mrs. Jerrold, that is.” I gave them a cocksman's leer that I hoped did not look as phony as it felt. “She's some piece.”

Nothing changed in Talesco's face; but Knox's eyes turned on me, unblinking, still not telling me anything. I had the same odd feeling you get when you're being stared at by a cat. “She's also married,” he said, and his voice sounded rusty, as if he had not used it much recently.

“Well, I know that-”

“If you got any ideas, you better forget them.”

I put the leer away. “No ideas. Just commenting.”

“Sure,” Talesco said. “Thing is, Mrs. Jerrold's old man is a flake. Jealous, very jealous. Sam was just giving you a little friendly warning-weren't you, Sam?”

Knox stopped looking at me again. “Nobody wants trouble in a nice quiet place like Eden Lake.”

“Hell,” I said, “I came up here to fish. That's all.”

“You'll get plenty of that,” Talesco said. He smiled without much humor. “Play poker, by any chance?”

“As often as I can.”

“Well, maybe we can work up a game one of these nights.”

“Any time. I'm in Cabin Three.”

“Okay,” he said, and he gave me that little half-salute again. Then he and Knox bent and hoisted up their stuff and went away along the pier.

I watched their backs all the way up into the trees and tried to analyze the meeting we had just had. But I could not get a handle on anything they had said, or on how they had acted, or on how they had reacted when I gave them the line about Angela Jerrold. It had been an odd conversation, and yet I was unable to define the oddness. The only thing I seemed to have found out in talking to them was that I cared for the situation even less now that I had met everyone involved.