“No secret I disrespect dis gorment,” he said. “Bunch a crooks and fools, including my wife’s family. Especially my wife’s family.” His speech was peppered with a sort of nasal “anh?” but not as if to solicit her agreement or reply.
“I read about a secessionist movement,” she said. Little Nevis trying to separate from the bigger St. Kitts, which dominated the Federation’s decisions and sucked up most of its wealth, made her think of Scotland and England, perhaps equally disaffected and equally bound.
“We gon’ win, too, maybe next time around,” he said.
“What’s your response to people who say this little rock is too small to be a country?”
“Way I see it, we more or less on our own anyway. Sinkits only do what good for Sinkits.”
She raised her glass. “Here’s to independence,” she said, and felt a stab of passion for the Scottish cause that had cost her so dearly. She took a sip and tried to swallow that buzz of excitement along with the Perrier bubbles. “Call me Els,” she said.
“Finney,” her companion said, and sipped with his pinkie raised. He settled into the chaise.
“Did you know Jack Griggs?” she asked.
He watched a pelican glide by, its wing tips nearly grazing the water. “Sea claim the best a’ them,” he said. The pelican rose up, dove, surfaced facing the other way, twitched its tail feathers, and gulped down its catch.
“Indulge me with a little information,” she said.
“Why you interested in ol’ Horseshoe Jack?”
“He’s intriguing,” she said. “His house even more so. I’m a bit obsessed with it.”
Finney looked at the yachts. “He a good friend. American. Here about twenty years. He about fifty when he take his leave.”
“A serious drinker, I hear.”
“When he wasn’t sweetin’ up the ladies?” He smiled at the memory. “He cherish every kind a’ women. Old days, he sometimes keep several goin’ at the same time, and somehow they doan claw each other up.” His smile faded. “Near the end, though, things get messy.”
“Catfights?”
“Last gyull he hook up wid, very young. Treat her bad.”
“Violent?”
Finney looked away. “Gotta bounce,” he said. He put his glass on the table and swung his feet off the chaise. “He was unbeatable at darts. Even blind drunk.” When he stood up, his hand went to his lower back. He bent slowly to lift his bucket.
“Why ‘Horseshoe Jack’?”
“He excel at horseshoes too,” he said. “Enjoy you holiday, Miss Els.” He settled his cap and walked toward the fishing shacks at Jessups. As he passed Tybee, who was lounging against the drinks kiosk, he walked taller and gave him the finger.
After sunset, Els ambled to the Resort’s entrance circle. When Sparrow, who was waiting in the taxi queue, spotted her, he climbed hastily into his van.
She walked over to his window. “I could have your license pulled.”
“I done tell you doan go up dere, interfere wid dat jumbie,” he said, his eyes darting about as if to make sure the jumbie wasn’t hiding behind her. “I gotta get outta dere. Sparrow doan mess wid spirits.”
“Stranding me in a strange place when it was nearly dark?” she said. “I’ll forgive you if you come talk with me for a minute.”
After a few moments’ hesitation, he followed her to a bowered bench and sat as far away as possible.
“I’m not infected,” she said. “No jumbie came anywhere near me last evening.”
He hugged his elbows. He was wearing a yellow bowling shirt with “Samson’s Garage, Brooklyn’s Finest” embroidered above the pocket. “They sneaky,” he said. “You doan know if they right in the room wid you.”
“They can’t be scary if you don’t know they’re there.”
“You not taking this serious.”
“If I saw a ghosty thing, all white and floaty, I’d take it plenty seriously.”
He hunched forward, his hands kneading each other. “Jumbies doan look like Casper,” he said to the ground. “They got eyes like fire, no feet.”
She leaned closer to hear him.
“They mostly go about in the dark, very quiet. They miserable spirits, can’t rest no place, like to interfere wid people.”
“Pranksters?”
“Demons,” he said. “They come into you house, slide into you body, mess up you mind. My auntie husband jumbie take she over, and she went crazy and drink poison, kill sheself.”
“So is her jumbie out there, too, united with her husband’s in jumbie land?”
He looked at her. “Me not makin’ joke.”
“That was a serious question,” she said. “Do jumbies harm people the way zombies do?”
“People say zombie and jumbie is spirit wha’ can’t