He glanced down at her pretty face, finding that a strange thing to say. "Just what exactly do the Tropics mean to you?"
She made a face. "Sweat. Bugs. And shame."
"Shame?"
She smiled up at him quickly, then looked away again. "I'll bet you don't know what it's like to be ashamed of your parents, ashamed of yourself for being their child,"
He considered. "I guess you're right there. I wouldn't say I'm proud of my family, exactly. I've never really thought about it that way. But certainly I've never been ashamed."
She'd never told anyone how it was, and she was going to tell him. Curious how light-headed that made her feel. Excited almost.
"It wasn't as though they protected us from the crimes," she said slowly, her voice shaking just a bit. "They used us most of the time. We were part of their schemes."
She cleared her throat, then went on.
"I re member once when I was about ten years old, on a little island near Samoa, they ran a magic show. My father could do some simple magic tricks, enough to enthrall those poor people. They didn't have television yet and weren't very sophisticated. So my father would make things disappear and my mother would dance around in a skimpy dress. They were good, I guess, because they really could mesmerize an audience. Then Mason and Faith and I would move through the crowd…"
Her voice faded and she swallowed hard. Was she really going to tell him about this?
"What we were doing was picking pockets," she said, trembling for a moment. "We did this routine often, going from one island to the next. But one time the locals caught on to what was happening a lit tle too soon, and we all ended up in jail."
Ross felt his chest tighten. Sweet, lovely Charity, her hair spread out around her on the bed-to think of her in jail. It made him want to hit someone. He forced himself to remain quiet and listen.
"They only had one jail cell in this place, so there we were, little woebegone faces peering through bars." Just picturing that, she laughed sadly, and at the same time, tears began to trickle from her eyes.
"My father had a friend, Barney McGraw, who ran a glass-bottom boat out on the reef. He broke us out in the middle of the night."
She shook her head, remembering.
"It was clas sic, just like in an old movie. We actually sawed through the bars and everything. We climbed out the window. Then we took off in his glass-bottom boat and headed for Apia."