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Show 393 and when he reached the top of the stairs he sat down on the curb in front of the carousel and put his shoes on. The carousel was nearly empty, and riderless painted horses rose and fell as though they were swimming. He stood up and began walking down the pier, rapidly, keeping to the left-hand sidewalk and counting the cars that passed him in both directions, cancelling each other out. The other pedestrians were mostly wearing street clothes, so he didn't feel as conspicuous, though one or two people turned to look at him as he hurried by, so something about him still looked odd. He tried to count the weaving masts of the sailboats moored on both sides of the pier, but he couldn't be sure he hadn't counted some of them twice, so he stopped. He passed the harbor master's office and the bait and tackle shop and the lobster house. A man with a green dragon on his chest sat in the doorway of the tattoo parlor and watched him go by. He passed the restrooms, which occupied a platform that hung out over the water, and noticed the silver backs of swarming trash fish in the water directly below. Something startled the fish and they flitted off for an instant. The water boiled under them and he looked away, and then they were back. The street ended in a turnaround, and he descended a flight of wet iron steps and came out where people stood fishing from the lower platform. Tackle boxes lay open on the deck and pieces of fish seeped blood onto the slippery planking. He stopped, eaten by curiosity, behind three men who were leaning over the rail. "Catching anything?" he asked. He had always wanted to do that. The man on the end turned to look at him and then turned back. His face had been on upside down, so the smile that had split his forehead under his dirty felt hat with the hooks stuck in it was actually a frown, and the white undulating caterpillar of a beard in which two marbles had |