Creature Discomforts

liver treats and gobbled up. Alaskan malamutes don’t merely have big brown eyes, but use them. If I’d been in my normal state of consciousness, I’d have explained that malamutes operate on the principle that if it could be dinner, it is dinner. Fish corpses and decomposing crabs deposited by the receding tide: dinner. Your lobster, my lobster, everyone else’s lobster, all the clams, com, and potatoes? The hot stones? The seaweed? Maybe even the coals and embers? Dinner. I’d have given examples of objects devoured in their entirety by Alaskan malamutes: leather jackets, zippers and all, songbirds caught on the wing.
    Malcolm Fairley’s arrival spared me the need to explain. He didn’t deliberately rescue me; he just happened to turn up at the crucial moment. Still, I felt grateful. Even if I hadn’t, I’d have liked him the second I saw him, in part because everything about him, from his Yankee jaw to his plaid flannel shirt to his wholesome, weathered face, looked solid and familiar. Although I did not, of course, remember the man, it was instantly apparent to me that I knew men like him. Trusted them, too. Consequently, I felt doubly grateful to Malcolm Fairley. Without so much as uttering a word, he’d not only saved me from an awkward little situation, but had softened my edgy feeling of groping in an alien world. Although he was late for a celebration in his honor, no one seemed to feel annoyed or slighted. If he’d been three or four hours late, everyone would probably have been delighted that he’d arrived. Perhaps I can best convey Malcolm Fairley’s impact by noting his dramatic effect on the canine guests. As soon as he appeared, Pacer, Demi, and Isaac dashed toward him, tails and bodies wagging in undisguised delight. Even Molly wriggled out of Gabrielle’s arms to join the scramble. Rowdy and Kimi jumped to their feet, pointed their noses toward him, and burst into the characteristic malamute greeting, that prolonged, human-sounding woo-woo-woo. Human inhibitions being what they are, the rest of us didn’t go flying toward Fairley or sing aloud for joy. Those who’d been lounging sat up. Eyes brightened. We radiated a collective, doglike happiness. Malcolm Fairley was one of our own. Now that he’d arrived, our pack was complete. We miss him, Ann had written. I could see why. So far, his headstrong, difficult streak was unapparent.
    Maybe I’ve overstated the subtlety of the human greetings. Gabrielle Beamon didn’t pound across the rocks toward Fairley and certainly didn’t mimic the dogs by hurling herself to the rocks at his feet, and she didn’t carol a chorus of woo-woo-woos. Still, it’s fair to say that as Gabrielle hurried toward him, the ruffles of her shirt caught the salty air like the sails of a boat catching a fresh breeze. When she reached him, he transferred his right hand from Demi’s smooth black head to Gabrielle’s shoulder and kissed her on the cheek. I was startled. Malcolm Fairley had struck me as the kind of male Yankee whose typical object of public affection is a Labrador retriever.
    Gabrielle didn’t seem to share my surprise. After returning his kiss, she stated the obvious: “You’re here!” That extraordinary voice of hers, at once mellow and husky, made the banality sound warm, genuine, and wildly seductive.
    “Anita offers her apologies,” Fairley said, “and Steve’s. They should be here in time for dessert.”
    Nature had designed Gabrielle for talking about romance. “So! We get to meet the boyfriend,” she said with satisfaction. “Serious?”
    Fairley just smiled and nodded. I’d already heard enough, though. His voice had hit my gut like a mallet pounding a gong. Although it was far less distinctive than Gabrielle’s, I’d recognized it instantly. It was the voice I’d heard during those fleeting, dreamlike moments of halfawakening. The man who’d promised anonymity to his quiet companion? The man who’d talked of death? Malcolm Fairley. I’d have known that voice anywhere.
     

Chapter Seven
     
    I’M CURIOUS about the Pine Tree Foundation.” I ripped a leg from my lobster’s body.
    Effie O’Brian’s response was a bit snippy. “I would’ve assumed Norman Axelrod’d talked you to death on the subject.”
    Her husband, Quint, called her on the slip. “Effie, find another expression, if you don’t mind.”
    Quint O’Brian, I’d managed to discover, was Gabrielle Beamon’s nephew. Although he and Effie looked