Chapter 7: Chili Night

The Gathering was a week sooner, and Dewey's chili night was on Friday.

I had been on days for four days, and I hated every minute of the sun.

On Friday afternoon Dewey caught me by the time clock with his thermos in his fist.

"Bring your fella tonight," he said.

"What fella?"

"The one you drove to the fish house." He didn't look at me.

"I've got a dozen drivers who've been asking, and my wife's making a hotdish."

"Dewey."

"Six o'clock. Wear something that isn't orange."

At six it was full dark.

The depot garage was lit up, with the trucks backed against the wall and a long folding table down the middle.

Twelve plow drivers sat on upturned buckets in their coveralls, passing crackers.

Dewey's wife had made hotdish in three casserole dishes, and no one had touched any of it.

Emlyn came through the side door with a bakery box in both hands.

He wore a dark jacket and a tie, which he had clearly decided on at noon, and his glasses had steamed from the cold.

The room went quiet.

"Evening," he said. "I'm Emlyn. I brought lemon bars."

Dewey stood up very slowly from his bucket.

He walked across the concrete and looked Emlyn over from his hair to his shoes.

He looks at a truck that way when someone else has been driving it.

"You're the one with the English accent," he said.

"Cornish, I'm afraid."

"Is that different?"

"Quite. We're more cross about it."

Somebody laughed.

Dewey held out his hand and Emlyn shook it, and Dewey kept hold a moment, and I saw his eyebrows go up.

"Cold," he said.

"Ah. Yes. Bad circulation."

"Uh-huh." Dewey let go. "Sit down. You eat chili?"

"Not as such."

"Then you can have a lemon bar," said Dewey, and handed him a bucket.

I sat beside Emlyn with a bowl in my lap and watched twelve men decide whether to be afraid.

It took twenty minutes.

A driver with a big beard asked what he did for a living, and Emlyn said he kept the maritime archive.

"Like old ships?"

"Mostly paperwork. But yes. Ships."

"You know anything about the Mataafa?"

"I was there," Emlyn said.

The whole table stopped chewing.

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