She looked over to the bar for a moment. “I don’t know.”

“You want ’em to catch crabs wearing a tuxedo? Think the crabs would be impressed?” He could tell that she was trying not to laugh. “You’ve fished for crabs yourself, you and your brother. And shot coon, too.”

“That was just on weekends in ninth grade.”

He leaned back and looked at her eyes. “You know, babe, until just now, I never thought you might leave town. You hate me and the people around here that much?”

“I don’t hate anybody. Not even you, I don’t think. Except when you come home stinking of diesel oil and leave steel curls in the bathtub.”

He looked down at his beer. “I won’t fight anymore.”

She seemed to consider this. Clarisse sneezed again.

“Damn this pepper.”

He leaned over to her blond frizz and whispered that her nose was running.

“Oh.” She fumbled for her purse with wet fingers and headed toward the bathroom.

Colette looked down at the heap of broken shells between them and shook her head. “If it weren’t for the people here…” She picked up a barnacled crab and hefted it, weighing the problems of the parish. “Everybody aims so low. Most people are so rough.”

He thought he might point out to her that she had tried to break his leg in a truck door in front of half the town. “Baby, this is oil country. Fish country. You don’t wear a suit to those jobs and you don’t listen to Beethoven in your truck.”

She shook the crab in his face. “Damn it, I want to know people who sparkle.”

He made a slight sideways movement with his head. “I’ve got to admit, that’s a tall order for Tiger Island.” He dismantled another crab, working out the sweet flesh with a thumbnail.

She looked at the door that led to the parking lot, and she frowned. “There’s no glitter on these guys, that’s for sure.” As she said this, the Larousse twins, Vincent and Victor, walked through the door, looking around like overgrown schoolyard toughs. They wore shiny floral shirts unbuttoned halfway down their woolly chests, alligator belts with lacquered toothy heads for buckles, and tight dark slacks. Their faces were acne-scarred and their noses had been broken into steps. On their big forearms were identical tattoos, naked girls drawn with green ink, except for the nipples, which were red.

“Oh boy,” Paul said.

Colette’s cheeks flushed. “It’s starting already. Don’t you see—”

He waved a crab claw at her. “Eat. Maybe we can get through the meal.”

“How can we get through life together if we can’t get through a meal here?”

He tilted his head to the side. “I’ll turn over a new leaf.”

From the dance hall came the buzz of an accordion, and Nelson Orville’s band cranked up a chanky-chank waltz. Several old barflies slid off their stools at the counter to claim a dance from any unattached woman.

“I wish I could believe it,” she told him, watching three Partians slide into the restaurant and stand against a plywood wall. The largest one smiled, showing a rotten incisor.