Page 24 of The Shell Collector
“Here goes nothin’.” Tug took a hearty forkful and shoved it into his mouth.
Maeve took a bite. “Oh yeah.” She lifted her other hand to her lips. She was raised better than to talk with her mouth full, but this was too good to wait. “So good.”
“Just what I was hoping. Love it.”
“I vote for this to be on the menu.”
“At least a special when the crab is in season.”
“Even better than crab benedict.”
Tug’s bushy brows disappeared under his mop of hair, usually hidden by his ball cap with the diner logo on the front. “That’s a real winner, then.”
“Didn’t I already say that?”
From out in the gazebo, The Wife called out, “Winner, winner, chicken dinner.”
“The Wife seems to agree,” Maeve joked.
“She loves me. What can I say?” He paused between bites. “Hey, I’m going to the town council meeting tomorrow. You’re going, aren’t you?”
“Try to always make it,” she said.
“The hearing should be interesting after them naked campers, the workout guy, and I hear there are a couple other businesses trying to get in before the season is over. Meet you there?”
“Maybe I will.”
“Can’t complain if you don’t say your piece.” He chewed, watching her. “People always listen to you.”
“I’ll think about it.”
“Always thinking,” the bird sang out, followed by a whistle that sounded a little like a fizzling firework.
Maybe it was just as well Methuselah couldn’t talk. That would get on Maeve’s last nerve eventually. Since Jarvis had passed, she’d learned to like her quiet life. Actually, it had taken about ten years to feel that way, but finally it had crept in like a comfort.
Tug walked over and unlocked the front door of the diner. A few regulars spilled inside, taking their usual seats at the counter and in booths. The tourists were easy to recognize, always fumbling around trying to figure things out and asking a bunch of questions.
Maeve sipped her coffee, enjoying the clatter and conversation. It kept that needling feeling of something on her mind at bay, and that was a relief.
“Are those shells from around here?” A woman dressed in a Whelk’s Island T-shirt and white jeans pointed toward the shadow boxes on the wall. “Someone down at the surf shop told me about those shells yesterday. She found one.” The woman clomped across the diner floor in what looked like flip-flops on top of two-and-a-half-inch wooden platforms. Not exactly beachwear.
“Really?” Tug handed her a menu. “Yes, those have all been found around here.”
“How’d you get them?” Her head bobbed with each word, but her short overbleached hair didn’t budge.
Tug moved closer, pointing to the shell and news article framed right next to the woman. “Well, some were in articles in the local paper here. I talked the people who’d found them into selling them to me so I could display them with the newspaper clippings.Beachcombermagazine picked up a story about that one. And when folks heard I was hanging them in the restaurant, well, they just started sending them to me. It’s kind of cool. I mean, something nice like that happening right here in our backyard. People who find them say the shells always have the right message at the right time.”
“How is that?”
He shrugged and wiped down the counter. “Just happens that way. Some things are meant to be. Some think its divine intervention. I don’t know. I like how happy it makes people when they find them. Who cares how?”
Her mouth pulled to one side, almost a smirk.
Maeve noticed the young woman’s bad attitude.
“Are they always found at the same place?” the woman asked.
“Are you a reporter?” Tug slung a towel over his shoulder.
