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he said. “Tell her I hope she feels better.”
    Grandpa and I sent our regards, too.
    The afternoon light was slanting low. We all said our goodbyes and hoisted our sails. The southwest wind was even stronger than before, and we skimmed easily across the water.
    I wanted to ask Grandpa why Floyd and William were so sure they'd be surfmen and I wouldn't. But I dared not bring up that particular subject in front of Daddy.
    “That Mr. Griffin robbed us again—fifty cents a pair for those birds!” Daddy scowled, and his bushy eyebrows nearly met in the middle. “He's got some nerve, when I
know
he pays a dollar a pair to any white man who walks into that store.”
    Grandpa shook his head. “And there's not a blessed thing you can do about it, so you better get sixty birds next time instead of thirty and stop your complaining.”
    Daddy shot him an angry glare, and they both fell silent.
    The sun glowed red behind low clouds as it sank toward sunset. We sped along, the wind pushing us with a steady hand. We'd be home before dark.

FOUR
    “It's just always been a family thing,” Grandpa explained. He was picking the berries out of a pile of yaupon leaves, getting ready to make yaupon tea. His gray hair stuck out in thick tufts, and his voice was raspy with early-morning rustiness. “The Bowsers, Tilletts, Midgetts, Berrys, Etheridges—the white families and the black families—they've been in the Life-Saving Service for a while now, and it just stays in the family, I suppose.” A beetle scurried across the table. Grandpa knocked it onto the floor and squashed it with his foot.
    “Couldn't they ever let a new person in?” I asked.
    Grandpa just shrugged. “Go dump these berries outside,” he said, and handed me a pot half full of berries. I scrunched up my nose—the only thing yaupon berries are good for is to make you throw up.
    When I came back in, Grandpa told me to set the pot down and sit myself down. Then he leaned forward. “What's wrong with fishing?” he asked, his face serious.
    “Nothing's
wrong
with it. I guess I just …” I ran my thumbnail down a groove in the table. “I guess I want to hope for something better, that's all.”
    Grandpa patted my hand and nodded. “Then you keep on hoping, boy. Why, it's my hopes of finding your grandma that have kept me going all these years.” He scooped up the pile of yaupon leaves.
    My chest went hollow with dread. I saw myself with white hair and an old, raspy voice saying, “Someday I want to be a surf-man.”
    “No, Grandpa!” I brought my fist down hard. “I don't want to just hope. I want to
do
it!”
    Grandpa stared at me, startled.
    I ran out of the cabin into the gray, windless day. I breathed in the cold air and tried to calm down. What would Mamma say if she were here? “Nathan, you can do anything you set your mind to.” That's what she'd say. I closed my eyes and tried to hear her voice. I could see her in my mind's eye, an apron covering the front of her faded green dress, wagging one flour-dusted finger at me. “Don't expect it to be easy, Nathan, because it
won't
.”
    “Okay, Mamma,” I whispered. “I won't.”The crew of the
Emma C. Cotton
stayed at the station for three days. Then Mr. Etheridge hitched the government team to the driving cart and drove them up to Oregon Inlet so they could take a steamer to Norfolk. The captain, Mr. Ayres, stayed behind, and when the surf finally went calm again, the surfmen helped him gather the topsails, stores, and whatever else they could salvage off the ship.
    On the day of the auction, buyers came from Manteo, Hatteras, Ocracoke, and Nags Head. The day was foggy and rainy, and everyone stood out under umbrellas while the Commissioner of Wrecks, one of the white Mr. Meekinses, called out prices and announced things “sold.” The salvaged timbers, sails, line, and what was left of the stores of coal were auctioned off to the highest bidder. Mr. Ayres said that before the wreck it had all