Part Twenty-Two

Aah, Peggy thought to herself, my kind of day. The sky was blue overhead, and to the east it was a mixture of orange, pink, and hints of green. She walked up the ramp to the ferry at 5:10, noticing how the high tide was touching the low-hanging madrona trees that grew out from the banks.

"Good morning," she said to Raoul, sliding in next to him on the bench seat. "It's scone day."

"Mmm, what a treat," he said. She offered him a homemade currant scone and then poured herself a cup of tea.

"I can't help celebrating Thursdays; end of the week," Peggy said.

Then Peggy heard a loud clacking of high heels and looked up to see Florence enter the booth, accompanied by a well-dressed thirtyish-looking man who, Peggy thought, must be her latest conquest.

"Good morning, Raoul," said Florence. "This is Luke. Luke, this is Raoul." Then, looking at Peggy, she said, "And you are, wait, wait, it's on the tip of my tongue. Peggy. Right?"

"Right." They shook hands with Luke. Peggy had met Florence only once and knew that she was an old friend of Raoul's who, like Peggy, had recently moved to Bainbridge Island from Seattle. She was in her forties, Peggy guessed, and dressed in a short, pin-striped skirt, stylish high heels and a silky blouse. She kept crossing and re-crossing her legs. Peggy could imagine her with a cigarette between her fingers. Luke had a tanned, good-looking face and wore a blue suit.

"I'm sorry I didn't bring an extra scone for you," said Peggy.

"Oh that's okay, it's not good for my girlish figure anyway," she winked at Peggy.

The ferry departed and soon made the turn out of Eagle Harbor. Peggy noticed that Mt. Rainier was bathed in an orange glow, visible all the way to the summit. Seattle itself, though, was shrouded in fog.

"Luke and I met in a foursome at Wing Point," Florence was saying to Raoul. "My God, I don't know how you guys do this five-twenty ferry everyday. Whew. I'm beat and I still have a long day at the office."

"You get used to it. I like that it's not so crowded," said Raoul.

"Where do you work?" asked Peggy.

"At Microsoft. And you?"

"Northwest Environmental Fund."

Luke's face brightened. "We're in the same building. I work at Blue Hill Software."

"I wouldn't have guessed you were the software type," said Peggy.

"Yeah, they don't wear ties. I'm in sales."

"That's why he hangs out at the golf course picking up old ladies," laughed Florence.

"Old? Are you kidding?" Luke looked at her with surprise.

"You are such a dear." Then, to Peggy, she said, "That's why I keep him around. Every girl needs to have a fan club, right?"

Peggy wondered if she had a fan club.

"I believe your organization has been in the papers recently," said Luke to Peggy.

"Yes. We're on the governor's coastal planning task force. Raoul's on it, too."

"They held a gun to my head," said Raoul.

"That's the spirit," said Florence. "I always knew you were a dutiful public servant."

"Ha. That's a good one," said Peggy.

Raoul looked at her. "Look who's talking. I believe you were the one complaining that yesterday's meeting was a waste of time."

"That's because certain members were trying to make new rules that effectively limited debate on certain topics."

"Sounds like the other Washington," said Luke.

"Politics is politics," said Raoul.

"It's all over my head," said Florence, opening an issue of Cosmopolitan.

"Why does everyone just lay down and take it like road kill?" said Peggy. "Go ahead, trample on my rights. I don't care."

"I think it's a generational thing," said Luke. "I was reading an article the other day that talked about how, thirty or forty years ago, it was cool to be broke and homeless. Now it's cool to have money and a nice car and a cell phone. So, people my age are going for the bucks. That means you go along with the status quo, because that's where the money is."

"I definitely see a change in what young people go in for these days," said Peggy.

"Sounds practical to me," said Florence. She got to an advertisement that had a perfume sample and she lifted it to her nose and sniffed. "Ugh, you could wear that to the Pike Place fish market."

"Young people are smarter now than they used to be," said Raoul.

"You were young once," said Peggy.

"And I was as clueless and broke as the rest of them."

"I'll bet you didn't say that at the time," said Luke.

Raoul cleared his throat. "Let's see, how does that line from Bob Dylan go? '…I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now.'" He sang in a pleasant, husky bass voice. Peggy liked that side of him, the thoughtful part of him that could recite a poem or sing a song and play music and grow wonderful flowers. Then there was this darker side, that seemed negative and cold and uncaring. Which was the real him?

Then Peggy learned something new about Raoul. It was Luke who was speaking. "Were you in Vietnam?"

"Two years," said Raoul. Peggy was shocked. Of course, he was the right age. But the thought had not crossed her mind.

"What did you do?"

"Infantry. I walked patrols in the jungle."

"Awesome," said Luke.

"That's exactly what young people say now. But you didn't say it when you were over there getting shot at. There was a draft going on and everybody, well almost everybody, went."

"But young people now are volunteering to go to Iraq," said Luke.

Raoul shrugged. "Those numbers are relatively small, in my opinion. I think there's always been a segment of the population that is willing to go to war. Maybe it's a patriotic thing, maybe they just like shooting stuff. I don't know. But in Vietnam you had those guys plus everybody else, including the guys who didn't want to be there. And they were all mixed in together. When you think about it, today, there's about a hundred-and-fifty thousand in Iraq. In Vietnam we had half a million in 1968."

"Do you think they'll bring back the draft?" asked Luke.

"They will if they have no other choice," said Raoul.

"Don't worry, Luke, you're over the age limit," said Florence, patting his knee like he was her son.

"Of course, they do have other choices," said Peggy. "Like bringing everybody home."

Raoul looked at Peggy; he had a twinkle in his eye. "Are we going to add the war to our list of things to argue about?"

"Sure. Why not." She smiled and realized that she kept liking him even when she didn't want to.