He nods.

“You can sit right here with me,” she says, scooting over.

Justin sits next to her and Shady stirs, nuzzles his head so that his face rests against Justin’s leg and his belly’s pressed tight to Bell. He grunts in the back of his throat, too lazy and relaxed to bother with opening his mouth.

“Oh yes sir, you’ve got you a friend for life in this’n,” Bell says. Her voice is softer now. Dogs did that to people. Asher reckons that’s what he likes most about them. “He’s like everybody else. Just wants to be loved on.”

Then she’s picking right up where she left off: “I can’t get over some of the messes folks leave.”

Asher swallows hard and smiles around it, trying to get his bearings. He is still swimmy-headed and suddenly cottonmouthed.

“I have a guest cottage and then five guest rooms that I let out. Sometimes people think they have to party big-time because they’re in Key West,” Bell is saying. “But a little guest cottage and rooms like this attract the better quality of traveler, you know. I don’t allow guests to bring kids but I can make an exception for your little boy. All the real terrible ones—the college kids trying to get as drunk as they possibly can and the in-debts trying to impress their girlfriends—they stay at the big chains.”

“Yeah, that’s real good,” Asher says.

“So you’d have to clean the rooms and the cottage, and go to the store for me. Any kind of errand I needed. I like things done when I want them done.”

Asher nodded. “Yes, ma’am,” he says.

“You don’t need to call me ‘ma’am.’ ”

“Alright.”

“Evona takes care of the pool and the grounds. You’ll end up working at least forty hours a week, sometimes more. Would that be alright with you?”

“I’ll do whatever you need me to do,” Asher says. He sounds desperate, even to himself. “I’m not afraid of hard work.”

“Well, sounds like we’re in agreement so far. So it’s yours if you want it.”

“A man at the beach said that sometimes inns offer their workers a place to stay.”

She eyed them all for a moment. Asher, Justin, the dog, then back to Asher. “Well, I do have one side of the worker’s cottage. You’d be sharing the house with Evona. Totally separate, two different entrances. She likes to keep to herself.”

“Me, too,” Asher says.

Apparently Justin has made a little game of watching the two of them talk, Asher notices. The boy’s eyes move back and forth between whoever is speaking.

“Y’all would have to share the porch, that’s all. Evona is honest, I can tell you that.”