About Grace

Winkler wanders the island and finds a public phone sign outside the post office. He sleeps against the gate and is woken by a woman arriving for work the next morning. He asks to use the phone, and she tells him how much it will cost. When he tells her he wants to call collect, she allows him into the building and dials his home phone for him. However, no one answers.

Winkler barters his suit jacket for some food and two jars of rum. He wanders the island and observes the people. At night, he sleeps on the beach. He steals lemons from a tree and eats them like apples. Winkler calls home multiple times, but no one ever answers. He wonders if Grace died and that’s why Sandy isn’t answering. He goes to the bank and the American Express office in an attempt to withdraw money from his accounts but can’t because he has no passport. He pawns his belt and shoelaces for more food. He calls the television station where he works, but the woman who answers is more concerned about him losing his job than telling him anything about Grace and Sandy.

On his sixth day in St. Vincent, Winkler gives his watch to the woman at the post office in exchange for a phone call. The woman is reluctant to take the watch but agrees to a two-minute phone call. Winkler calls Herman Sheeler’s home, and Sandy answers. Winkler asks about Grace, but Sandy is angry that he abandoned her. She tells him to never call again and hangs up. Winkler claims he was cut off, and the woman dials again, but the call isn’t answered. Winkler wanders out into the street, is sick, and feels weak. He passes out on the beach. He feels someone search his pockets twice, stealing what little money he has left.

Winkler wakes and is aware of a man sitting beside him. The man tells him it’s Easter and that his wife says it’s a day of forgiveness. The man gives him a little food, saying that he’s a chef from Chile who once served the visiting Fidel Castro. His name is Felix Antonio Orellana, and his wife is Soma. He urges Winkler to follow him and his young daughter to a canoe. Felix explains that he’s taking Winkler to his home. They travel to another island that is smaller than St. Vincent and surrounded by a coral reef. Winkler is ill, and the young girl teases him.

When they arrive, Felix and his daughter carry purchases in the canoe to a small, blue house. Winkler follows, carrying a box of eggplant. Inside the home are three boys, a few years older than the girl, and the woman from the post office. She introduces herself as Soma. Felix puts Winkler to work chopping onions, while Soma chases the kids outside. Felix makes a meal of small hens, eggplant, and mango chutney. The children return, and Soma says a prayer before they eat. Felix gives the boys models of wooden sloops and gives the girl a black ant in a jar. Felix introduces the girl as Naaliyah, his daughter. Later, Soma and Felix give Winkler the boys’ room, and the children settle in the kitchen to sleep. Soma comes to Winkler and asks him to stay. He goes to sleep, dreaming of memories from his own childhood.

The next morning, Winkler asks Felix where the family is from. Felix says they’re all from Chile and that the boys aren’t their children. Winkler asks how much it would cost to get a plane ticket back to the US, and Felix says it would cost several thousand dollars. Felix tells Winkler he’s welcome to stay. Winkler expresses a desire to repay Felix’s kindness, and Felix tells him about an inn he’s working to build so that he might be the chef when it’s completed. Felix, Winkler, and Naaliyah walk to the clearing where the inn is being built, and Felix introduces Winkler to the owner, Nanton, who offers Winkler a two-week probationary job. He says if Winkler sticks it out that long, he’ll consider keeping him on. Nanton gives Winkler a shovel and has him dig under flags marking sections within the lagoon. Working in the water makes Winkler think of Grace, how he feared for her safety, and how much he misses her.

Winkler works hard and finds it easy when he doesn’t think about Grace. He asks Felix why Nanton wants the holes excavated in the lagoon, but Felix says it’s Nanton’s secret. Over time, Winkler begins to put together Felix and Soma’s story. Both Felix and Soma worked in the Moneda, the president’s palace, and fled when the president was deposed in a coup. Felix and Soma initially went to Patagonia to stay with Felix’s family. There, the boys, who were sons of the commerce minister, joined them and they fled to Caracas, where they met Nanton, who hired Felix and paid for the family to travel to St. Vincent.

After two weeks, Nanton shows Winkler the plans for the inn, explaining that the holes in the lagoon are to support the inn’s foundation, and a glass floor will allow guests to view marine life. Nanton tells Winkler that if he continues to work hard and reliably, he’ll give him a job at the inn. Winkler claims that he won’t be there that long, but he finds comfort in developing a routine and using his body as a tool rather than using his mind. He tries not to think about Grace too often, but he becomes aware of Naaliyah watching him.

With his first paycheck, Winkler buys clothing and airmail envelopes. He writes disjointed letters of apology to Sandy and Grace. He writes one a day, sometimes more than one, using the Kingston post office as his return address, and has Soma mail them. He imagines Herman destroying the letters before Sandy sees them. The work at the inn progresses. Winkler helps the boys with chores at Felix and Soma’s. On Sundays, he goes for walks around the island, and Naaliyah often accompanies him. He teaches her how to read the clouds to understand the weather, while Naaliyah shares her fascination with bugs and insects. Winkler continues to write to Sandy, hoping for a response to his many letters. He learns that all their shared bank accounts have been emptied. He arranges to have a passport issued, and he researches taking another freighter back to the US.

One night, Winkler has a dream that Naaliyah is a grown woman, and she’s on a boat. She throws a cinderblock anchor over the side, and the chain becomes wrapped around her ankle. She’s pulled into the water and drowns. When Winkler wakes, he’s standing over Naaliyah, and the boys are awake in the doorway of their room. Felix takes Naaliyah to Soma before escorting Winkler outside to tell him he must find another place to live. Winkler gathers his things and sleeps on the beach.

Winkler writes to Sandy, telling her how much he misses the rain. He asks for a photograph of Grace. In another letter, he asks if Grace is alive.

Winkler and Felix’s relationship is strained even though they continue to have lunch together each day. Naaliyah no longer comes to the worksite. At night, in the darkness on the beach, he recalls the darkness in Alaska. His father would always shut it out and turn on all the lights, but his mother embraced the darkness, taking Winkler to the roof to look at the constellations and talk about shooting stars. He continues to write to Sandy, telling her how he’s sleepwalking again. He imagines Herman burning his letters. He wonders whether Sandy will welcome him home when he returns, counting the moments until he has the money he needs.

The inn is completed in March 1978, almost a year after Winkler left Ohio. It has 12 guest rooms, will soon have a swimming pool, and has a Plexiglas floor under which fish swim. Guests come from St. Vincent and stay for several days at a time. Nanton hires Winkler to be a maintenance man, giving him a place to stay in a small boat shed. Winkler calculates that he’ll have enough money to go home by June.

One night, Soma arrives at the inn, excited, because a package has arrived for Winkler. He recognizes Sandy’s handwriting and notes that the postmark is from Anchorage, Alaska. Winkler takes the box to his shed and opens it alone. Inside are all the letters he wrote to Sandy. The first letters were opened, but those dated after January are still sealed. A folded piece of paper is among the letters: “Don’t come back. Don’t write. Don’t even think of it. You are dead” (125).

After midnight, Winkler takes one of Nanton’s dinghies and paddles out into the water. His thoughts are full of his life with Sandy and the spring of his mother’s death. He attempts to paddle over the coral reef, but the waves are too strong, and he quickly grows tired. He loses the oars, and the dinghy overturns. He’s pulled under the water and believes he’s about to drown. He has a vision of Sandy with Grace at breakfast. Grace is a toddler with curly hair. He surfaces and catches his breath. Winkler floats on a piece of the dinghy all night and is washed up on shore the next morning. He has lost his glasses and cut his knee on something sharp, but he’s alive.

Winkler is rescued, and his knee is sewn up. Soma and her family care for him. Naaliyah sits vigil with him. Winkler sleeps for several days but wakes late one night convinced that although his body continues to live, he’s dead anyway. He imagines that Grace died and this is why Sandy is so angry with him. He burns the box of letters.