Jimmie was out the door like a shot.

She told him she had to buy a money order for her grandmother in Northeast Texas, that she had to pick up her mail at the post office, that she had to buy sunburn lotion for her back, that she was tied up all day and evening.

"Tomorrow is Sunday. Everything is closed. What are you doing then?" he said, grinning.

She looked quizzically at nothing, her mouth squeezed into a button. "I reckon I could fix some sandwiches and meet y'all at the amusement pier," she said.

"We'll pick you up," he said.

"No, you won't," she replied.

The next day we discovered a picnic with Ida Durbin meant Vienna sausage sandwiches, sliced carrots, a jar of sun tea, and three Milky Way bars.

"Some folks don't like Viennas," she said, and she pronounced the word "Vy-ennas." "But with lettuce and mayonnaise, I think they're real good."

"Yeah, these are a treat. Aren't they, Dave?" Jimmie said.

"You bet," I said, trying to wash down a piece of simulated sausage that was like a chunk of rubber.

We were on the amusement pier, sitting on a wood bench in the shade of a huge outdoor movie screen. In the background I could hear pinball machines and popping sounds from a shooting gallery. Ida wore a pink skirt and a white blouse with lace on the collar; her arms and the top of her chest were powdered with strawberry freckles.

"Dave and I go back on the quarter boat in the morning," Jimmie said.

She chewed on the end of a carrot stick, her eyes staring blankly at the beach and the surf sliding up on the sand.