After the Fire Read Online Free

never complained frankly of the cost of traveling back and forth a couple of times a week to see a husband who no longer recognized her. She always looked cheerful, partly because she always wore a series of brightly colored scarves which lit her face and set off her handsome head of white hair. Karen wished she could make some acknowledging comment, like sending her regards to Mr. Hawkins, but he had been taken off the island a couple of years before she had arrived.
    “Karen,” Henrietta said, as she accepted her ticket, “the funeral for Dickie is going to be at my house tomorrow. Red will be there getting it ready today, and Milly’s organizing, the food. I was wondering if you could speak to a few of the young men and find out if one of them wants to give a eulogy, or maybe several of them would just like to say a few words. There isn’t to be a service, prayers or anything of that sort. Sadie said Dickie, hated that sort of thing.”
    “I’ll ask them,” Karen said. “I’m working at the pub tonight. Riley’s on this sailing.”
    “Good. I’ll speak to him myself. It’s going to be at noon; so the men can come on their lunch break.”
    “Oh,” Karen said as Henrietta’s car started forward, “Miss James is going in this morning.”
    “Fine. I’ll take her. She’s probably going to her dentist. It’s on my way.”
    The bus service into Vancouver, once adequate, was now intolerable. It had taken Karen some months to learn which drivers of cars going onto the ferry were comfortably willing to accommodate foot passengers. There were some drivers—Dickie had been among them—who made a point of driving so recklessly that they wouldn’t ever be inconvenienced. But young men like Rat and Adam were surprisingly amiable about it, even if they were taken out of their way. Riley was reliably unreliable. This morning nobody would be safe with him.
    Karen couldn’t have believed in summer when she had first been hired that she’d ever like this job, the huge lines of tourist traffic, people too late to pick up their car reservations, whole families of tired kids and frustrated parents left behind with nobody but Karen to blame and nowhere to spend the night. She hadn’t known the islanders from the tourists, which ferocious dogs in the backs of pickup trucks were just bluffing, which might lunge for a patch of uniform and flesh. The troubles of winter—getting up in the dark, the wind blowing, ferries often delayed by rough seas, sometimes even cancelled—were experiences she shared with people she now knew.
    After selling the final several tickets, Karen took her keys to unlock the ramp controls and walked down the short line of cars, smiling. She signaled Riley, first in line, onto the dock and then followed him. The wind was fresh and the heavy sky was now washed with modest pinks.
    In the pass the ferry sounded, and the sea gulls parading on the dock railings rose up in noisy anticipation, for some of them would also choose to ride the ferry across the strait. The pigeons paced and racketed about the ramp, full of fretful cooing. Out on the lightening water rode several varieties of ducks.
    Lights were now on in most of the houses around the bay, and smoke from their chimneys made a layer of grey underneath the layer of cloud. Karen wondered when she had learned to distinguish between island mists and smoke.
    The ferry, brightly lighted, came round the point promptly at eight o’clock. Karen knew that everyone waiting to go aboard would take its being on time as a good omen for their day. She herself felt competent lowering the large ramp onto the ferry deck, raising the barrier, and greeting the ferry hand who came to collect her data. There were no foot passengers coming off and from the adjacent island only a couple of work trucks which would be lined up tonight to go home. Once they disembarked, Karen waved the several departing foot passengers aboard, among them the ancient Miss James who was