"That's what it means," said Linh.
The next morning June also tied a second thin line, one that went from a different screw eye on Wendell's pole down to a second hook under the counter at a sharper angle, so the main line could rest against it in a gust like a sailboat leaning on a keel. She drew it all in the black notebook, on a clean page after her grandmother's last entry, in her own handwriting, which looked very small and messy next to Valentin's and Dot's: AUG 22 1985. PENNY IN THE CUP. KEEL LINE. LINH SAYS CENTER OF MASS. — J.H.
Wendell looked at the page a long time. Then he took a pencil from behind his ear and added, underneath, in small careful cursive: She's right. — W.T.
* * *
Shelby Kruse had not come back to the counter since Sunday. But she watched.
June saw her every day, across the concourse, in the serving window of the big white trailer, filling shake-ups and making change. Every twenty minutes, when June put her hand flat on the counter and the crowd went quiet, the window across the way went quiet too. Shelby would stop with a cup in one hand and a lemon in the other and stare, with her eyes narrowed, like someone trying to read small print from far away.
On Thursday evening, a little before eight, the sun went down red behind the Grandstand, low and flat, shooting straight up the concourse, gilding everything, the Sky Glider cables, the cotton candy bags, the sweat on everyone's faces. June floated the cup for a family from Spencer with four little boys. And just as the cup lifted off the counter, she saw Shelby standing at the edge of the crowd, not in the window, out here, off to one side, nearly behind Wendell's booth.
With the sun at her back.
June saw her see it. Saw her eyes go wide and then fix, and follow something in the air from Wendell's pole, along the runway, down to June's hand. Saw her mouth go flat.
June finished the float. She had to. The littlest Spencer boy got the cup and screamed with joy and spilled half of it on his brother. And when June looked up again, Shelby was gone.
Wendell had seen too. "Low sun's the only thing that ever gives it away," he said. "Dot never floated after seven-thirty in August. My fault. I wasn't watching the clock."
"It's not your fault."
"Go on after her," Wendell said. "Your mama and I can mind things for ten minutes. Don't let it sit overnight. Things that sit overnight get worse."