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The Italian wore scarlet. Jacob knew he liked red. He daubed it across canvases far too big for many besides Jacob to appreciate. Squinting at the approaching caravel, he frowned. “Yare, indeed. Yet the world to come will not abide such vessels.” Jacob shrugged. “This does not enforce your attention, as it should. The greatest power can be rendered unto utter desolation. Even here.” “So you say.” “Yon smoky servitor may be exampled. A plenitude of tempered harmony would restrain it.” “No doubt.” “Even you cannot fight the future, Jacob.” Jacob, who had always preferred to conscript it, smiled benignly. *** This time the ship was a galley. Jacob’s guest, who was currently Scottish, watched it from a curious chair: a canvas strip within a wooden frame. He had trapped his arm (once) and his head (twice) putting it together. Jacob’s guest enjoyed clutter, and fixing things. Doctors often do. “What is your friend’s story?” asked Jacob. The guest looked back at the spot of blue in the shadow of the Statue. “She blew something up; started running; never stopped.” Jacob liked this story. The hook of his guest’s umbrella threw a punctuating shadow on the sand. Jacob liked that, too. *** Jacob flipped the cooking fish. “Would you care to join me?” The bald man standing in the surf shook his head. “I only observe.” “You always say that,” Jacob scratched his head, “but is it true? You let yourself be seen, for one thing. At the very least, you are kibitzing.” The bald man was silent. “Not that I play cards myself. More one for board-games.” Jacob removed the fish from the heat. “Not chess, though. I never could understand how the bishops move.” The bald man did not answer. From the sky, the whine of engines was growing louder. FINIS