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Calder and the landside around it. Have you ever been anywhere near a seafood plant, a can-nery?
No, Gwyn admitted.
The stench of dead and rotting fish the guts, and other parts they can't use carries for miles. The
sea around the plant is used as a dumping grounds for organic and inorganic wastes, in huge quantities.
You have an open sewer, within six months, and another dead section of the sea in a year.
And the lobster fishermen have been in favor of this cannery? Gwyn asked.
Yes, he said. Not just the lobster men, but all the captains. Because their own traditional grounds
are so close, they'd be able to make a bet-ter profit on their catches. Add, of course, they'd have a
steady market for just about everything they could bring in.
Gwyn nodded. I see.
Don't misunderstand, Elaine said. We're not against progress, and we're certainly not against
capitalism. The seafood company should be al-lowed to build their plant somewhere. One of the offshore
islands, north of here, would do nicely someplace where there aren't people whose lives and property
values would be lessened by such a godawful factory.
I'll admit, her uncle said, that one of my reasons for wanting to keep ISP out of Calder and the
surrounding area is purely monetary. I've spent half a decade acquiring the land necessary to establish a
fine seaside community of upper-class homes. I wouldn't want to see the value on all that land be cut by
half because of the stench of rotting fish. But beyond this consideration, there's the other, of
environmental protection. I don't want to live in a place where a good, deep breath makes me ill or
where the beaches are littered with decay-ing rejects from the cannery.
Neither would I, Gwyn said.
So, Elaine said, if you should see this Mr. Younger again, you'll be able to tell just how much of his
line is pure hogwash.
Actually, Will said, I'd think it better if you don't see him again. If you notice him on the beach,
avoid him. These people have made some threats of violence, I'd feel safer if you avoided them.
She promised that she would keep to herself, though she knew that she would take any op-portunity
to speak, just one more time, with Mr. Jack Younger (the younger). He had departed, this afternoon,
with such a cold, abrupt attitude . . . He had made her feel guilty. Now, she would enjoy let-ting him
know that she had found out exactly who the real villains were in this affair.
On the stairs, when she was on her way to her room, she met Ben Groves coming the opposite
direction.
It looks great, he said.
Confused, she said, What does?
Your tan!
She looked at her bare arms and smiled. I'd al-most forgotten it. Yes, it's rather good, but just a
start. I want to be as dark as everyone else around here, before the summer's over. At least, now, I don't
look like a ghost.
After some additional smalltalk, he said, How about going sailing with me tomorrow?
You've got a boat?
A fourteen-foot beauty, he said, grinning. I keep her moored in Calder. Tomorrow's my day off,
so ...
I'd love to, she said.
Be up and ready to go at nine, he said.
Aye, aye, Skipper.
But leave the corny sea talk behind, he said.
Right, Cap'n, she said, with a mock salute.
Gwyn?
She sat straight up in bed.
Her hands were full of twisted sheets.
She was perspiring.
Tense, leaning forward as if she had just been hit in the stomach, she listened intently.
Gwyn?
She got up, without turning on any light, trying to be as silent as possible, moving like like a ghost.
She stood in the center of the room, weakly illuminated by the remnants of the moon, and she looked
around, trying to catch sight of any stranger, any shadow darker or lighter than the ones the furniture
threw.
She saw nothing.
Gwyn . . .
This was no dream. Someone was most definitely calling out to her in a dry, whispery voice.
She walked cautiously to the door, reached for it, found that it was open.
She stepped into the corridor.
Tonight, as the moon waned, there was insuffi-cient moonlight for her to tell whether or not the
hallway was deserted. She might have been alone or she might have been one of a half a dozen people
standing there in the darkness.
Holding the door frame, one hand to her heart as if to still the rapid beating she listened.
She waited.
Time passed like syrup running sluggishly out of a narrow-mouthed bottle, drip by drip by drip . . .
The voice did not come again.
She willed it to return.
It did not.
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