Page 63 of The Book of Summer

“You could match me chug for chug back in the day,” he says.

“Ah. Yes. Drinking skills. One of my finer qualities. At least as determined by weaselly local teens.”

“Hey!” Evan yelps. There’s a hint of disappointment in his deep brown eyes. “Iknewyou had a bias against townies. That’s why you won’t drink my beer.”

“No,” Bess says, and picks it back up. “It’s not that.”

She studies the bottle. In holding it, she knows the beer is already warm.

“What is it then?” Evan asks. “You a wine type now? Spend your weekends in Napa?”

“Uh, no. I’ve been to Napa three times. I do like my wine but I like beer just as much. So, no. It’s not that.”

Bess peeks at her watch. It’s five thirty, or two thirty back in the Bay. She wonders if someone is trying to contact her. Right now someone could be calling her name.

“Bess?”

“If you want to know the truth,” she says, “the God’s honest truth is that I’m neither a wine girl nor a beer one, at least not right now. The type of girl I am is pregnant. A pregnant girl who doesn’t know what the hell to do.”

27

The Book of Summer

Nick Cabot

July 29, 1941

Cliff House

Tops told me to write in this book and doggone it, I shall do so.

’Allo folks, the name is Nicholas Cabot. You might know me as just plain Nick, Topper’s Harvard chum. The smarter and more attractive of the duo, to be sure. Alas Harvard boys we are no more. We both dropped out. There are things to do, you see. Battles to be won. People to impress with our dash and valiance.

As for me, I’m registered straight-up class 1-A (no kids or war work to hold me back!) and will soon head out to basic training for the good ol’ army. Meanwhile, Topper’s farting around the island, deciding what to do. I told him don’t wait to be drafted. All sails and no wind, that boy. Looks swell in the harbor but not exactly going anywhere.

I’ve come to Cliff House for our last hoorah. I’m not unaccustomed to Nantucket, been here a time or five. It’s funny how Tops’s island is not the one from my mind though. When I think of the place, my mind conjures the mansions on Main Street. Those grand homes with their heavy knockers and silver nameplates and monstrous screaming eagles above their front doors. But, lo and behold, there’s a charmer of a spot called Sconset, seven miles away but might as well be a thousand. Topper’s family’s spread is about a mile up from its heart.

Cliff House is a stately affair, as are a few others down the lane, though most are modest in size. Little weathered boxes, many drowning in flowers. Why, it almost makes you want to chuck it all and take up a fisherman’s life.

Even in Sconset, there is tennis and sailing and golfing and bowling. There are card games and dances and Friday night parties on the Cliff House lawn. Every person, every last one of us, is tanned and gay. We might be the closest point physically to Europe, three thousand miles dead ahead to Spain, but you’d never know it. Out here, you can almost pretend it doesn’t exist.

Oh yes, I could stay in Sconset the rest of my days and be quite content but that’s not in the cards. On Tuesday I’ll thank Mrs. Young and give Tops one last pat on the back. I’ll leave this place calmer, and more wistful, but with new matchbooks and memories and a clip of honeysuckle to remember it all by.

Always,

Nick C.

28

RUBY

August 1941

Not to sound uncharitable on the matter, but Ruby was damned glad that Nick Cabot character had split.

He was nice enough, if you didn’t listen too closely, and you couldn’t really fault a soldier going off to war. But, goodness, the man sucked up every crumb of Topper’s time. With Nick around, it was as though the rest of them hardly existed, background players all.

On top of that, Nick didn’t seem to like Hattie. Anyone not entirely charmed by the girl had to be several cards short of a full deck. How could he object? Unless he had a beef with beautiful, witty, continental babes who were a gas to boot. If so, then good luck.