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eaceful cove:
the ketch, [no doubt the same one kept in perfect shape
by BNs] the dockhouse, the pier, the water, the shadows
of the other shore, and the blue heron gliding across the
cove a few feet off the water.
Miss Kate was coming down the lawn carrying
a silver tray. I coughed Teddy out of his near-reverie and
noticed that Miss Kate wasn't the ample-of-body-and-
submissive-good-natured black woman I had expected.
Rather I was confronted with a stiff yet well-mannered
white woman. Erica Unknown was wearing a maid costume [if Teddy
weren't racist he was certainly classist or sexist or
both] that bordered on revealing. I couldn't understand
why Erica Unknown acted so stiffly wearing that outfit.
"Thank you Miss Kate," he said as he took the
martinis and handed one to me.
"Thank you," I repeated. Miss Kate gave me a
quite sly glance as Erica Unknown folded the tray up to Erica's chest
and spun on Erica's heels to return to the house. Perhaps _I_
was the one who was being prejudiced. Erica Unknown wasn't the
kindly old black woman I had expected. Was there a
reason for this. Did the senator do the maid? God, that's
the _oldest_ story.
"Well that was about all we did that time," he
continued when Miss Kate was out of earshot, "W
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