Clarence was nearing one of the bright green plastic buoys that marked his lobster pots. The rights to lobstering in the bay had been in his family since before his grandfather’s day. Now retired, Clarence rowed out to the pots every other day or so, depending on the weather. He had lost his tolerance for icy winds and roiling waves. Today, the waves lapped gently against the boat, almost knocking on the wood as if to say hello. It was so quiet he could hear the oars squeaking in their oarlocks and the plunge and pull of the oars through the water. The sun had just come up and a mist was melting away. Using a short rope he clipped the rowboat to the buoy and started to pull up a pot.
The buoy had two ropes—one attached to a large hook screwed into a giant concrete block marking where his family could fish. The other was attached to a lobster pot. Clarence preferred the old style pot made from slats of hemlock with funnel netting to hold the catch. The newer, metal lobster traps supposedly lasted longer and didn’t require maintenance, but Clarence found the aged wood brought in more lobsters and crabs—maybe because it smelled like the bottom of the sea.
His knobby hands pulled up the dripping rope, but the first pot was empty. He reloaded the bait box with rotted fish guts, careful not to get any of it on his clothes, and pushed it back overboard with a splash, the rope disappearing into the water.
He unscrewed the cap from his thermos which he filled with black coffee. The waves gently rocked the boat and one of the oars bumped against the side, the thump sounded like the washing machine at his old house which reminded Clarence of his wife Mary, now four years dead from cancer. Clarence had been a carpenter—building and repairing boats in dry dock. The paint, tar, and lacquer he used to waterproof the wood often found its way onto his clothes which Mary dutifully worked to remove. He also at times had to rebuild the hold of a ship, embedded with the black slime from decades of fish remains. Mary had almost as many bottles of cleaner as Clarence had paint, and somehow managed to remove every stain. Each morning he found his clothes in a neatly starched and folded stack.
Mary’s cancer moved quickly, turning her into a shadow, cold to the touch despite being piled under a mound of blankets. She had no meat left—just stick limbs, lungs and a head she couldn’t raise. When she was gone, Clarence sold the house and moved in with his daughter. She and her husband had an apartment over the garage with a kitchen, his own bedroom, a fireplace—the whole works. Clarence lived with his dog Taffy who liked to ride along in the boat. The family had Saturday brunch together but otherwise he was mostly on his own.
He pulled up to the second buoy and clipped on his line. The lobster pot felt heavy, which was encouraging. Once out of the water he found it brimming with lobsters and crabs. A couple of them were clinging to the side of the trap, either struck dumb or determined to the point of death to get to the bait. He shook the trap empty and sorted the catch, tossing the little ones back in the water. He was left with four lobsters and six crabs. After he put them into his cooler, he noticed what looked like a couple of chewed up Lit’l Smokies sausages rolling around the bottom of the boat. He picked one up and could see a bone inside. As he reached for the other, it rolled over to reveal a fingernail. He hesitated, but then saw he was alone on the water. Picking up the finger he noticed flakes of purple paint still clinging to the fingernail. He looked at the finger remains as salt water slowly dripped from his hand. He slipped the fingers in his pocket, tossed the lobster trap over and emptied the cooler of shellfish into the ocean.
The next day he returned to the second buoy and again could feel that that the trap was packed tight. Crabs and lobsters again spilled into the bottom of the boat. Clarence checked each one for any morsels they may be holding greedily to their mouth parts before tossing each one back in the ocean. This ritual continued for a few weeks until the pot started to come up nearly empty. In the end Clarence had collected two complete hands including wrist bones, a pinky ring, a toe ring, a Grand Master Shriner ring, parts of a foot, a tailbone and a rib. After each day’s catch, before anyone got home, he would boil the remains on a gas barbecue the family kept out back. He kept the bones and poured the rest down a sewer cleanout.
He and Mary had often spent their evenings quietly working on jigsaw puzzles, so putting the bones together was second nature. Once he had all the hand bones in place, he hot glued them together. The name inscribed on the Shriner ring was Grand Master Darrell Newman. Based on what he knew about the Shriners, Clarence couldn’t square the fingernail polish with the Grand Master. The pinky and toe ring had no names and had started to corrode from the salt water—no doubt cheap plated trinkets.
Clarence did a Google search for Darrell Newman but didn’t find anyone that seemed like the right fit. He considered contacting the Shriners but feared it might lead to questions from the authorities about how he found the ring. He didn’t think they would understand his finger bone puzzles. Plus, the Shriner rings were easy to find in antique stores up and down the coast, so the bones could be from anyone. He decided to try some forensic work on his own and found the internet was rich with information. He looked at the photos of skeletal remains with highlights about bone size, wear, signs of old fractures, demineralization and other indications to help identify a victim. The word victim bothered Clarence. It made him think about the family out there wondering what had happened to this person with a toe, pinky and Shriner ring. He fell asleep in his chair working on his iPad trying to narrow down the age of the bones on his end table.
The next morning he woke with a start, realizing he’d left the bones out all night. He quickly put them back in the shoebox he kept above the refrigerator. He could hear murmuring outside and realized the family was gathering for Saturday brunch. His daughter made the basics—eggs, bacon, toast, some fruit and hash browns. Various other family and some neighbors brought lots of pot-lucky items to add to the choices. As Clarence filled his plate, scanning the many choices before him, he took the lid off a crockpot and found it filled to the brim with Lit’l Smokies swimming in barbecue sauce. He stared at them long enough that someone asked him if he was alright.
“Yes, fine. Senior moment.” He returned the lid and moved on down the line of food. He sat alone, watching as they all chatted benignly with each other. He felt he was watching a movie. They all seemed so trivial with the petty babbling about their little lives. Cars and houses and new salad recipes—complaints about their work and kids and spouses all while he was trying to solve a murder.
His daughter, Ramona, approached him, looking cross. “Dad, you have keep a better eye on Taffy. She’s been digging again,” she held out what looked like a stick.
“Oh, I hadn’t noticed. Sorry. I guess she gets bored sometimes. I’ll start keeping her on her leash when she’s in the yard. Okay?” Clarence smiled his best apology smile.
“Fine. And get rid of this bone. It could splinter and she’d choke.” She handed him what turned out to be the victim’s rib. Taffy had apparently raided the card table last night while Clarence slept. He tucked the rib under his leg, and finished his plate as quickly as he could. He then took Taffy back up to the apartment.
“Is your dad okay? He seemed a little weird today,” Jeff, his daughter’s husband, said.
“I don’t know. He hasn’t brought any lobster or crab back in weeks. I wonder if he’s getting a little senile. He rows out, but comes back empty. The fishing is never that bad.”
“Maybe he just rows out for the exercise, or is tired of cleaning the lobsters.”
“All he has to do is boil them. If he stops using the trap sites we could lose our rights to them. It would be just like him to lose our fishing rights. He’s so selfish. He never lifted a finger to help take care of Mom.”
“Honey, that ship has sailed. He’s old school. Maybe he just couldn’t handle it, seeing her like that. He was used to her taking care of him and probably didn’t know what to do,” Jeff said.
“No. He’s selfish. We only see him on Saturday, and God knows what he’s up to the rest of the time,” Ramona said.
“What do you think he’s doing?”
“I don’t know. He could be into kiddie porn or drugs like that priest in the paper!”
“He’s just retired. He rows his boat into the bay, walks his dog, and keeps to himself. I doubt he’s a serial killer or a child molester—although it’s always the ones you least expect,” Jeff observed.
“That’s not funny,” Ramona said.
“What if I checked out his room when he goes fishing tomorrow? I can sneak up there with the spare key, check out his web browsing, nose around the place and see if there’s anything suspicious,” Jeff said.
“Good idea. We’ll go together,” Ramona said.
“You don’t trust me?” Jeff asked.
“I love you sweetie, but you already think he’s innocent. You might miss something.”
“Are you hearing yourself right now? You’re hoping to discover something sinister in your father’s apartment because he didn’t take care of your mother as she was dying.”
The next day, after her father had taken Taffy out to the docks, Ramona and Jeff crept up the stairs to his apartment and went inside. They were immediately overwhelmed by the stench of rotten fish.
“Oh my God, I’m gonna be sick,” Jeff said.
“How does he stand it? It’s like he’s living inside a dead whale,” Ramona said. They opened the windows and tried to sniff out the source of the smell. Clarence kept the apartment tidy so the overwhelming stench was incongruous to what they were seeing. They checked the kitchen, the garbage, opened all the cupboards, checked the bath and bedroom and finally came across a black plastic bag in the closet. When the opened the doors, the funk made their eyes water and they both gagged.
“What the fuck does he have in that bag?” Ramona asked, as Jeff peered inside.
“Dirty clothes,” Clarence said, now standing in the doorway. Taffy bounced in and made a beeline for the bag. Jeff closed the closet before Taffy made it.
“Dad, what’s going on? What do you have in there?”
“Dirty clothes. They’ve got trap bait on them and I can’t get it out. Only your mother was able to get the smell of bait out of my clothes.”
“Why are you saving them?” Jeff asked.
“There’s nothing wrong with them, other than the smell. I guess I was hoping I’d figure something out.”
“Why didn’t you take them to a laundry?” Ramona asked.
“Or an incinerator,” Jeff added.
“I know it’s silly, but I felt like I was betraying your mom. She was always so proud of being able to fix my clothes.” His daughter started to tear up, realizing that her father really did love her mother.
“Well, we can help you with this. All you had to do was ask,” Ramona said.
“You’re busy with your own family. And I don’t mind, and Taffy definitely doesn’t mind.”
“We’d be happy to help, right Honey?” she nudged Jeff.
“Absolutely. Let me just get some hazmat suits and a neutron bomb and we’ll see what we can do.” He paused for a moment. “Just kidding Clarence. We’d be happy to help.”
“I’d appreciate it, and so would your mom. I don’t think she’d like me living with this smell.” They all stood smiling, taking in the new plan for helping Clarence clean the rotten fish bait from his clothes, happy with the solution and reflecting on what they had just learned about each other.
“Why did you come back?” His daughter asked.
“What’s that Sweetie?” Clarence said, stalling.
“Why did you come back to the apartment just now? Why aren’t you out on the water?”
“Oh. I forgot my sunglasses. And to be honest, I needed to use the restroom, which I still do so if you don’t mind …” Clarence trailed off. His daughter and her husband left the apartment, but stopped on the way out to remind him to bring them the bag of clothes when he got back from lobstering.
“I certainly will.”
“I love you Dad,” Ramona said.
“I love you too honey.”
When Clarence heard footsteps going down the stairs he went into bathroom, stood for what he estimated was a proper amount of time and flushed the toilet. He then washed his hands and headed straight for the box with the reassembled bones. To his relief, it hadn’t been disturbed. He put the bones in a pillow case and weighted it with a fistful of pennies. He returned to his boat with Taffy in tow. He stopped at his buoys just as he would on any normal lobstering day, but slipped the bag over side when he was checking the pot at the second buoy.
“Best if the dead can rest in one piece. But Mary and I had fun trying to put you back together, so thanks for that.”
He rowed on to the other lobster pots and returned with four crabs and three lobsters. Plenty for Sunday dinner.