London Bridges

still remembered the way she used to teach her students on the field trips, so I took over as the guest lecturer.
    “Jannie and Damon, this is the last fleet of working sailing vessels in North America. Can you imagine? These ships have no winches, just manpower and blocks and tackles. The fishermen are called watermen,” I told them, just as Nana had told her classes years before.
    Then off we went on the
Mary Merchant
for a two-and-a-half-hour cruise into the past.
    The captain and his mate showed us how to hoist a sail with a block and tackle, and soon we had caught a breeze with a loud whoosh and the rhythmic smack of waves against the hull. What an afternoon it was. Gazing up at a sixty-foot mast made from a single log shipped all the way from Oregon. The smells of salt air, linseed oil, residual oystershells. The closeness of my two eldest children, the look of trust and love in their eyes. Most of the time, anyway.
    We passed stands of pine woods, open fields where tenant farmers raised corn and soybean, and great white-columned estates that had once been plantations. I almost felt as if I were back in another century and it was a good break, much needed R & R. Only a couple of times did I drift into thoughts of police work, but I quickly pulled myself back.
    I half listened as the captain explained that “only boats under sail” can dredge for oysters—except twice a week, when engine-powered yawls were allowed on the bay. I suspected that it was a clever conservation ploy to make the watermen work hard for their oysters; otherwise, the supply might run out.
    What a fine day—as the boat heeled to starboard, the boom swung out, the mainsail and jib filled the air with a loud smack, and Jannie, Damon, and I squinted into the setting sun. And we understood, for a little while anyway, that this had something to do with the way life was supposed to be lived, and maybe even why such moments needed to be cherished and remembered.
    “Best day of my life,” Jannie told me. “I’m not even exaggerating too much.”
    “Same here,” I said. “And I’m not exaggerating at all.”

Chapter 91
    WHEN WE GOT home early that evening I saw a scuffed-up white van parked in front of the house. I recognized the bright green logo on the door: HOMECARE HEALTH PROJECT. What was this? Why was Dr. Coles there?
    Suddenly I was nervous that something had happened to Nana while I was out with the kids. The fragile state of her health had been on my mind more and more lately; the reality that she was in her mid-eighties now, though she wouldn’t tell exactly how old she was, or rather, she
lied
about it. I hurried out of the car and up the front steps ahead of the kids by a couple of strides.
    “I’m in here with Kayla,” Nana called as I opened the front door and Damon and Jannie slid by me on either side. “We’re just kicking back, Alex. No need for alarm. Take your time.”
    “So who’s alarmed?” I asked as I slowed and walked into the living room, saw the two of them “kicking back” on the sofa.
    “You were, Mr. Worrywart. You saw the Health truck outside, and what did you think?
Sickness,
” said Nana.
    She and Kayla both laughed merrily, and I had to smile, too—at myself. I made a very weak protest. “Never happened.”
    “Then why did you rush up the front steps like your trousers were on fire? Oh, forget it, Alex,” Nana said, and laughed some more.
    Then she waved her hand as if to chase away any unwanted negativity in the room. “Come. Sit down with us for a minute or two. Can you spare it? Tell me everything. How was St. Michaels? Has it changed very much?”
    “Oh, I suspect that St. Michaels is pretty much the same as it was a hundred years ago.”
    “Which is a
good
thing,” Nana said. “Thank God for small favors.”
    I went over and gave Kayla a kiss on the cheek. She had helped Nana when she was sick a while back, and now she stopped in regularly. Actually, I’d known Kayla since we were both growing up in the neighborhood. She was one of us who got out, received an education, and then came back, to give back. The Homecare Health Project brought doctors to the homes of the sick in Southeast. Kayla had started it, and she kept it going with incredibly hard work, including fund-raising, which she mostly did herself.
    “You look good,” I told her. The words just came out.
    “Yes, I lost some weight, Alex,” she said, and cocked an eyebrow at me. “It’s all this running around