Phantom Island

Chapter 5
 
The Dinner Bell Rings

     “Am I correct in taking it as your considered opinion that the person who thinks he can predict the vicissitudes of public capriciousness is a fool?” Dad asked, spluttering over person, predict, and public. He seemed both discomfitted and nonplussed.
     “Yes, you are,” I said, as gently as I could.
     “But—but—that’s just what I’ve been attempting to do throughout my entire business career,” he objected, “and I think you’re going to have to admit that until the last couple of years I have experienced a degree of success that has enabled you and your sister and your mother and—your—um—well—has enabled the—ah—family to live in comfort and—”
     “It was luck,” I asserted. “Your ideas just happened to coincide with the mercurial passions of the public. Call it chance if you don’t like to call it luck, but our success has been the equivalent of a long run at roulette.”
     “Say, there, Larry,” said Rocky, “I think you’re being rather hard on your dad, don’t you?”
     “No,” I said. “I’m being rather hard on your dad.”
     Rocky gave me a fraternal sock on the shoulder and said, “What do you say we set the animosity aside and unite against a common enemy?”
     “Enemy?” asked Lucy.
     “Definitely,” said Rocky. “That’s why I’m here.”
     “In the past last few weeks,” said my father, apparently glad to turn to this subject, “we have suffered a number of accidents, too many to attribute to chance, even if we were to draw the parallel to a losing streak at roulette.”
     “The evidence points to something much more dangerous than bad luck,” said Rocky. “Based on what I know of the world and the evil within it, the vicious things that people will do to get their way, I’d say it’s” —he paused for effect— “sabotage.”
     The dinner bell rang.
     Its ringing was more than an announcement that dinner was ready: it was my mother’s summons. It meant that all of her people were to come to her, to gather around her, and that when they gathered around her they were not to have clinging to them any of the cares of the day that they might have suffered while they were away from her. As she put it herself one time, we were supposed to “feel the cares of the day falling away, drifting away on the breeze,” as we made our way to the big house, into the dining room, and took our places at the table.
     Does the trick work as she wishes? Sometimes. My experience has been that it works best when I’m hungry. Then, the nearer I get to the house and the dining room the more the aromas of dinner work their magic, and if my troubles don’t entirely vanish, they are often overwhelmed by the promise of something good to eat.
     When the trick doesn’t work, and sometimes it doesn’t work at all, we generally try to fake it, to pretend that the magic has had its effect. We are not always successful.
     “Well!” said my father, brightening, even beaming. “That’s the dinner bell!” He rubbed his hands together with pleasure. “Away we go, now, and away all care.”
     We started for the door, but Rocky hung back.
     “I guess I’ll—”
     “What?” said Lucy.
     “I’ll—”
     “You can’t go back to the boat,” she said. “It’s a goner.”
     “I’ll catch the staff boat to the mainland.”
     “Rocky,” said my father, “I’m sure I speak for all of us when I say that—”
     “I’d like to reserve the option of speaking for myself,” said Lucy.
     “Very well, Lucy,” said Dad. “If you don’t like what I say you may speak for yourself. Rocky, we would like you to—ah—think of yourself as a member of the family.”
     “Unless I have seriously misunderstood something,” said Lucy, “he is a member of the family.”
     “Well, yes,” said Dad, “technically speaking—”
     “Technically speaking, I’m a member of the family,” she said. “So is Larry. So is Mom. ‘Technically speaking’ is the same as ‘accurately speaking,’ I think.”
     “Speaking of your mother,” said Dad, “I think it might be best not to divulge Rocky’s full identity to her.”
     “You want him to pretend to be someone else?” I asked.
     “I can do that,” said Rocky. “I’m often required to assume another identity when I’m working undercover.”
     “Working undercover?” said Lucy thoughtfully. “Hmm. Isn’t that what Dad has admitted doing?”
     “There’s that gift for wisecracks again,” said Rocky.
     Dad cleared his throat and said, “Are we agreed then that we will welcome Rocky as warmly as if he were a member of the family but we will not divulge that he—ah—actually—that is—”
     “This should be fun,” said Lucy.
     “Come on, Gorgeous,” said Rocky, “go along with the gag, okay?”
     “Did you say ‘Gorgeous’?” asked Lucy.
     “Sure did,” said Rocky.
     “I hate that word,” she said. “It’s what old women say when they’re admiring cheap lamps.”
     Dad paused at the door to the dining room. “Here we are,” he said. “You know how much your mother wants the dinner hour to be an island of tranquillity in a busy and difficult world.” He was about to open the door, but before doing so he asked, “Can I count on you, Lucy?”
     “I don’t know,” she said, “but we’ll soon find out.”