Fun With Problems by Robert Stone Page B

"They should stick to balloons or drones," someone else said, and a third person muttered under her breath. But they did not seem to be changing arrangements. The Secretary continued his rotations.

    When it became plain to the small civilian crowd that no one would share the Secretary's boat in any weather, folks began sauntering away. Some strolled toward the pretty town, some to see if they could reclaim Heron's Neck.
    Captain Negus and Taylor Shumway stood on the A deck, one up from the car deck, looking at the scene. Scully, a boozy but efficient deck sailor from away, stood beside Jimmy Slaughter, the dockmaster, who was very short and fat. Jimmy never went to the mainland, and for that reason never bothered about his few yellow teeth, which were mostly lower incisors. His appearance annoyed the senior menials at Heron's Neck, which cheered him somewhat. Jimmy had two assistants, his children. One was Jin, the pretty blonde in the Bosox cap on the dock. The other was Jimmy Slaughter Junior, a youth with his father's shape but with fresher tattoos and the island's first, only, and apparently last Mohawk. Both male Slaughters had been impressed for the trip across.
    "Son of a bitch tells me I ain't allowed onto my own goddamn boat all night," Captain Negus said.
    "Lookit the Secretary or whatever," Scully said. "Fuck-face dimwit. Turkey."
    "Jeez," Jimmy Slaughter said, "gimme a passenger load of drunks anytime over these weasels." He shook his head at them, causing one security agent to frown from the dock.
    "Yah, well," Jimmy's cocky son told his father. "Good money for this, right?"
    "Ya," the captain said, "you get a receipt but ya gotta wait for it. Your fuckin' fuel's twice as much by then. Taxpayers don't get it. Never will. Fuckin' nation of sheep."

    "'He calleth his own sheep by name,'" Taylor said rather bitterly.
    "So? That there's in the Bible or what?" Scully asked. But Taylor was too amazed and upset to answer. He had recognized a man on the dock as his recent guest, Eric. He began to tremble.
    Some of the disappointed passengers and their friends were being accosted by Eric with a notebook. They appeared to appraise him as a nobody at best. Eric also approached some of the politicians, who with their wives graciously eased around him with sour looks. One politician wished him a pleasant morning. Another actually said that it was good to see him again. But it became obvious to the Secretary's detail, if not to the Secretary himself, that Eric's spindle-legged progress was directed toward that official.
    Scully was trying to engage Taylor for reassurance. The kid had his fits, not that he couldn't work right through them. No one could say he wasn't a good worker. Scully was also trying to engage Captain Negus's eye.
    "Know what?" Scully said. "Now they took Johnny Damon down there and made him look like a fuckin' salesman." By "down there" Scully meant New York or Washington or anywhere. Scully called Cape Ann "down there" and the Bay of Fundy "down there."
    "You're right," Taylor said, but he never lost sight of Eric. His thoughts were confused but his anger was not in the least diminished. "I'll be a son of a bitch," he said. No one responded to this.
    Scully went on about Johnny Damon.

    "Fuckin' Steinbrenner," he cawed. "Says he looks good now, he looks like a Yankee." He noticed Taylor's evil eye on the pier. "I kinda liked it when Johnny Damon looked sort of like you, Taylor."
    Below them, the Secretary was screaming at Eric. Eric was trying to smile. But the Secretary simply kept screaming, halting some of the in-crowd—though only for a moment—in their tracks.
    "Look at the little rat," the Secretary screamed. The chief of security put his weight against the Secretary as if assisting him to stand. He might also have seemed to be holding him back. Ignoring the Secretary, two other agents, one male, one female, were taking Eric down.
    "Why are they doing that to him?" Taylor asked.
    "They better