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the state of the world. I broke him of this by telling him that I was a religious person and didn’t believe in radios or newspapers or getting involved with more than one’s immediate area. Any mania is instantly excused in the name of religion; he now shut off his own radio the moment he saw me coming.
    “Fish line, fish hooks, fish anything?” I shook my head. “Bait? No, you use fish bait, don’t you? Catching much lately?”
    “Some.”
    “Whiskey? A quart of shine, which the Lord loves, it being a natural product?” My religion was a devious one. “Not the best I’ve ever stocked, but better than the last.”
    Two drinks every day before dinner, otherwise none. “My bottle’s running dry,” I said. “Better let me have a pint.”
    “Didn’t bring the bottle, did you? Course not, if it’s not altogether dry. Do you mind taking a quart? Thing is, I’m out of pint bottles, but I could pour out some soda bottles if you want.”
    “A quart’s all right.”
    “And bottled water, of course. Three gallons? Four?”
    “Three.”
    “Tins, now, you’ll help yourself.”
    I went over to the shelves of canned goods and picked out what I wanted, then selected a couple of pork chops and a steak from the meat cooler. Clint went down the rest of his list— String? Twine? Axe handle, whetstone, matches, bandaids, iodine? Coffee? Toothbrush, toothpaste, ’ hesive tape? Batteries, dry cell or wet? And what-all else? Dozen aigs and what-all else and what did I forget?
    “Couple new books on the rack,” he added. “Might have a look while I pack this up.”
    There were no books that interested me. I had given up fiction long ago, and the two nonfiction titles on the rack didn’t appeal. One was philosophy, which I figured was just fiction without a story line, and the other was a basic guide to atomic physics; I read the first few pages and decided it would be too difficult for me. I still had almost half of The Lives of the Great Composers to read, plus a history of Australia and New Zealand.
    “Next time the book delivery comes, ask him if he can come up with a paperback dictionary.”
    “Damn, and he was just here, and you asked me that last week and I forgot. I’ll do that, though. I’ll remember.”
    I wasn’t quite sure why I wanted the dictionary. It was never that difficult to guess the meanings of those words which I didn’t know.
    Clint helped me carry the goods to the boat. I was able to dock just a few dozen yards from his store. We made two trips and filled the little rowboat with cartons. “Just about room in there for you,” he said, “and you can bet she’ll run lower in the water than she did coming over here.” This was another of the things that he always said.
    “Well, ’bye now.”
    “’Bye.”
    “And I’ll remember about that dictionary. Sorry for forgetting, and I’ll make a point to remember.”
    “If you happen to. If not, don’t worry about it.”
    “Man who worries loses his hair.” This was a joke—he was bald as a dozen aigs and what-all else. “Take care, now!”
    The boat rode lower in the water, which was certainly understandable, but not low enough to make any difference. He went back into his house and I rowed the boat steadily and evenly, putting my back into it, enjoying the way my muscles slipped at once into the proper meter. The sun was high in the sky, the sea was blue and still. It was good to be alive. It was really, honestly good to be alive.
    I had reached my little island as the occasional bits of driftwood did, by floating with the tide. Miami was no good at all. People, noise, music, hot outside and frigidly air-conditioned inside. I spent a very bad week there. That week would have been bad anywhere, but Miami made it worse.
    Eventually I got to Key West, and that wasn’t right either, but it was better than Miami. I compared the two and figured out what it was that made Key West better than Miami, and then it became easy to determine just