“Whose husband?”
“Flora’s. Damn, you have me blocked. I have everything but twos.” Joe began drawing
from the boneyard. Finally getting a match, he looked up at Nick. “You’re gonna catch flies
with that open mouth,” he said.
“B - but, you’re here. Y - you’re her husband.”
Joe grunted. “You’ve lived on this island for how long?”
“Eight years.”
“And you don’t know?”
“Know what?”
Joe caught Nick’s eyes with a long gaze, then tipped his tiles face -down on the table
and shifted his chair to face the sea. Nick did the same and waited for the story.
“Back long time, right after the T ides was built, this Frenchman came to the island. He
was going to be the dive master. So he lived here while the hotel was getting up and running,
and he met Flora. Really fell for her. Well, you can see why, even today.
“She was young, only seventeen, a nd swept off her feet. He married her before any of
us island boys had a chance. But there it was.
“They weren’t married long before the accident. Jules— that was his name — went out to
the reef for a dive. His boatman was this island kid, green as pawpaw. H e didn’t know about
the wreck out there, thought the dark area was just sea grass. They hit it hard.”
Nick crossed himself. A flicker of Joe’s eye acknowledged the gesture.
“The kid came out all right. But Jules— he was paralyzed. The kid got him to shore, and
they took him to hospital, but that was it for him. The hotel owner called his family in France,
and they insisted on taking him there.
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