Margaret Noone left her briefcase in Albany. Step number one.
"Massachusetts Welcomes You" and the blue Berkshires exchanged smiles with her, and driving through the turnpike tollbooth, she exhaled as if relieved of a great weight. Step number two on her carefully planned agenda.
Returning to her car with the sweating takeout soda cup at the pike's Ludlow rest stop, she glanced at her watch for the last time until Monday. Memorial Day weekend traffic in the eastern part of the state might reduce her to foul-mouthed condemnation of all mankind, but the late afternoon ferry to the island would make up for it. It would come out even in the end.
She never flew to the island, wanting time enough to let the passing geography prepare her for a perfect weekend in a perfect place. To assure its being perfect, she needed to take it in careful steps, like an ocean diver who takes precautions on rising to the surface to avoid the bends. Hand over hand, that was her way. Such a formidable person in the office, it would have astounded her subordinates to learn how terrified losing control made her. Their assumptions of her being power hungry were groundless; it was only childish fear that made her so careful and so calculating. Margaret did not take pains to correct them; better no one know.
The shaggy hills of Western Mass. left her rearview mirror for good and there was the sniffing for the salty tang as she passed the scrub pine along the road in Plymouth County. She tugged the seat belt from where it had been chewing her right breast for one hundred miles, and thought again how some stupid man must have invented it.
Finally pulling into the parking lot at Hyannis, feeling for her purse between the two front seats, she touched the head of the girl crouched behind her seat.
Margaret leapt out of the car, trailing her quickly unbuckled seatbelt and a colorful ribbon of profanity. The girl tried to slip past Margaret, whose sudden fright had switched to sudden anger.
"Hey!" Margaret grabbed the girl roughly, then noticed a two-day old greenish black bruise on the girl's cheek below her eye illustrating how ugly the healing process can be.
"Massachusetts Welcomes You" and the blue Berkshires exchanged smiles with her, and driving through the turnpike tollbooth, she exhaled as if relieved of a great weight. Step number two on her carefully planned agenda.
Returning to her car with the sweating takeout soda cup at the pike's Ludlow rest stop, she glanced at her watch for the last time until Monday. Memorial Day weekend traffic in the eastern part of the state might reduce her to foul-mouthed condemnation of all mankind, but the late afternoon ferry to the island would make up for it. It would come out even in the end.
She never flew to the island, wanting time enough to let the passing geography prepare her for a perfect weekend in a perfect place. To assure its being perfect, she needed to take it in careful steps, like an ocean diver who takes precautions on rising to the surface to avoid the bends. Hand over hand, that was her way. Such a formidable person in the office, it would have astounded her subordinates to learn how terrified losing control made her. Their assumptions of her being power hungry were groundless; it was only childish fear that made her so careful and so calculating. Margaret did not take pains to correct them; better no one know.
The shaggy hills of Western Mass. left her rearview mirror for good and there was the sniffing for the salty tang as she passed the scrub pine along the road in Plymouth County. She tugged the seat belt from where it had been chewing her right breast for one hundred miles, and thought again how some stupid man must have invented it.
Finally pulling into the parking lot at Hyannis, feeling for her purse between the two front seats, she touched the head of the girl crouched behind her seat.
Margaret leapt out of the car, trailing her quickly unbuckled seatbelt and a colorful ribbon of profanity. The girl tried to slip past Margaret, whose sudden fright had switched to sudden anger.
"Hey!" Margaret grabbed the girl roughly, then noticed a two-day old greenish black bruise on the girl's cheek below her eye illustrating how ugly the healing process can be.
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