Reprisal (40 page)

... And another truth was, a certain fisher with his boat down was damn lucky to have the work.

Lowell let the line run through the block and tackle, and the big steel bucket fell back into the pit with a heavy clank. He went to the ladder and down it

... picked up the shovel, and started digging. Shovel was a leaf-point, supposed to be commercial heavy-duty grade.-And just three nights' work had polished and thinned its steel sharp enough to slice bread with. There was that much sand packed into the dirt, even this far back under the bluff. The miracle was Larry passing his perk test down here. ...

Lowell dug along the pit's back wall, began filling the bucket. ... He was working with his mind on the Eleanor's diesel. The Cummins needed heavy shop work, and what he was doing was fooling with the thing hanging off a double-chain hoist--and getting a lot of advice from every man walked down the dock.

It was costing him days not fishing. Costing him money, just working on that diesel. Pete was off the crew. Jackson still hanging on, but not by much. ...

Lowell dragged the heavy bucket closer to shorten his swing with the shovel.

... Frances used to look up from doing the books, and say, "Tom, it's a slow decline."--A slow decline. A slow decline for both of them, too. And the baby.

Baby boy ... not such a baby anymore.

Lowell began edging with the shovel blade, carving the pit corner clearer. ...

A slow decline, and poor comfort that it was money trouble had seen her say good-bye and take the baby--rather than Monash just being a better man. Poor comfort. Solid middle-class back to working-class in about five years, and Frances not up for that at all. ...

Strange, in all those programs on TV-talk shows and so forth--nobody ever said anything about living money. They talked about millions, sometimes, but never about day-to-day money ... the kind that sent women running to lawyers for a better deal. Taking the kid--you bet--and if they were lucky, getting a lawyer as a better deal.

Frances Boothe Monash, now. And little Charlie a Monash, too.

It's less confusing for him, Tom. He's starting kindergarten next year, and I'm sorry, but it's just better for him to take Bud's last name.--It was a peculiar thing how completely a woman changed once she turned to someone else.

She became a different person--not the one who'd made those sounds when you were in her, not the woman who'd cried while you held her ... not the woman who'd cooked your breakfast, not the woman who'd worried about the Eleanor II out in stormy weather.--That woman was dead as Mrs. Reed's husband, dead as her dad and daughter. ...

Bucket was almost full; maybe eight or nine more loads up, and the pit'd be ready.

... So, two ways of losing people, and hard to say which was worse. Have them die, as Mrs. Reed's people had died--or have them just walk away, like his.

Last time on the mainland--April-Charlie had still known him, still said

"Daddy." Still thought of him that way, and was happy with the Tonka toy. But for how much longer?

Women. ... Mrs. Reed. Joanna Reed. Hard to forget her--looked like a caught witch in the moonlight with that long black hair, and flashing her knife into him. Not easy to forget.

Shoveling dirt out of the pit's corner, Lowell thought he heard an engine start, up on the road. It ran for a minute or two, and stopped. ... Sounded like his truck, but probably not. He'd left the keys in the pickup, but no kid would choose it for joyriding.

He topped the bucket, started to set the shovel aside--and heard a steady crunching noise high above the pit. Dirt and sand sifted down where he'd just shoveled the corner clean.

That sound was coming down ... rolling down the gravel. Something coming down the steep drive with the engine off or in neutral, making more dirt shake loose. Coming way too fast. Maybe his truck, after all. ...

The driveway's dirt and gravel slumped just above with a sudden harsh hissing sound--and as if this excavation were his Eleanor's hold, and trouble come so fast at sea, Lowell dropped the shovel and went for the ladder, to climb up and out.

But there was a draft of air, an instant of silence he'd known at sea, though never on the land, and something--rolling off, fallen off the edge of the drive--hit the retaining wall's timbers a terrible blow. He was almost at the ladder.

Heavy lumber broke, with smashing metal--and the retaining wall caved in above and behind the pit. The earth came down with falling timbers, sheaves of splinters, and the truck's front wheels came down with them.

Lowell, deafened, buried to his chest in fast-flowing sand, was struggling up as if from flooding in a boat's below decks, when a timber or one of the truck's wheels suddenly shifted to drive him down again, and deeper.

Underneath, something caught his left leg. He felt it snag his leg beneath the knee, press it down and break it. There was a twist and splitting as it broke.

Then he was sunk under a dry and heavy ocean, with no air. It was quiet except for settling sounds he felt rather than heard, and his body began a slow ...

slow ... swimming, one-legged, through sandy soil to where it hoped the ladder might be.

His body began trying while he was still catching up, figuring his chances--that he might have a minute and a little more for terrific effort, slow-motion swimming under tons of shifting weight, before he smothered. And only two or three feet to the ladder --if he was still turned toward it.

It was that, or wait for Larry Hooper to stand goggling at him in the morning--once people had dug him out--lying on a blanket with sand in his mouth, sand in his open eyes.

Lowell caught up with his body, and went to work. Hard work ... a sort of very slow and effortful breast stroke. The sand made that barely possible; solid dirt wouldn't be giving way at all. ... Miracle that Hooper passed the perk.

Lowell struggled in the soil, inched and wriggled, slow-hauled handfuls of sand and dirt to him and hoped that meant he moved--and wasn't just twisting and curling in a slow circle with no air to breathe at all. The bad leg felt strange-the bone seemed to poke out, catch in the sand.

The weight above him pressed down so he lost direction, and didn't know where his small pinched strokes and one-legged kicks and pushes might be moving him.

He tried breathing in, only a little, and sand slid down his tongue.

In a fucking sewer pit, Lowell thought-and was so humiliated he wrestled and twisted and reached as if he'd breathed a breath.

He hit something with his finger.

He scrabbled with that finger ... then all the fingers of that hand--right hand. He clawed and tried to kick, beginning to die for lack of air. His heart was missing beats; he could feel the skipping rhythm.

"Keep fucking beating," he said to it in his head.

Everything else was still but that working hand ... and Lowell tapped what he'd touched, and curled his fingers around it. He'd forgotten what the thing was ... but he gripped it and convulsed and twisted, felt things pulled away and torn in the muscles of his back.

He used that grip, used it though he'd gone blind. It was not just being buried, unable to see; it was a deeper darkness.

He used his grip on whatever it was as an anchor to work from ... and levered his left arm and hand slowly up, burrowing up as if he might catch a handful of air and bring it down to him. And the hand bumped something. He felt it ...

could feel it and get a grip on the same kind of round thing his right hand held.

His heart was hesitating ... hesitating. Lowell pulled himself slowly up three rungs of a ladder--which ladder, and where, he'd forgotten.

Then his head came up out of cascading sand, and he spit sand, and took a breath.

Joanna woke from breakfast ... to breakfast. She'd been dreaming of a morning with her father--a different Louis than the one she'd known ... perhaps a young Louis Bernard her mother would have recognized.

He'd been very merry in the quipping French fashion, telling a story she couldn't remember, while buttering his toast. They'd been at breakfast, but she'd eaten nothing, only sat at the table and enjoyed her father's company.

There'd been someone on the porch. As her father'd talked, Joanna could see, through the dining-room curtains, a shadow moving. Hear footsteps. ... She'd watched Louis, listened to him, but was conscious of the person waiting on the porch. Her father had smiled and said something to her ... then said, "Not so?" His dark eyes had shone in morning sunlight reflected from the table's glassware and silver.

Joanna had eaten nothing, only smelled the rich odors of her meal--and woke to those odors, her father's voice sounding softly for a moment more.

She lay in bed, sad before she recalled the reason for it--then remembered it was a morning to begin granting Charis her freedom, with thanks. A morning, a day to at least begin to say good-bye, with gratitude for the girl's kindness.

... Then, odd late-night escapes would no longer be necessary, the girl freed to be with someone she loved.

It was liberty owed her, and the only gift Joanna had to give for such patient tenderness. Still, bittersweet to have had such delightful company, then lose it. It was sad, and frightening, to have to learn to be alone after all. ...

It grew more frightening as Joanna lay there, so she got out of bed to leave a little of the fear behind, and went to the closet to dress in worn gardening pants and shirt. Dressing to say good-bye.

"... Still have perennials to plant!" Charis, in worn jeans and white T-shirt--and fresh as if she'd been in and slept all night--served two over-easy eggs each.

"Then that's it. Done."

"We'll have a garden.--Jam? There's marmalade, and raspberry."

"Raspberry. I'll get it."

"I'll get it--"

"Charis, I'm up. You sit, and start eating. ..."

It was a difficult subject to open--over bacon and eggs, toast, grapefruit juice, and coffee--without embarrassing the girl. ... Charis, you don't have to sneak out in the middle of the night anymore. You know--push the VW down the drive and so forth? Really, you can just take off, be with whoever--and thanks, endless thanks, for your help. Joanna put the raspberry jam on the table, and sat down. ... An unpleasant little speech. But if that wasn't said, what could be?

"We still going, tomorrow?"

"Tomorrow morning." Charis had fried only six slices of Barkley's thick bacon.

Moderation. "--But you know, sweetheart, you don't have to go. I mean it. Why don't you stay out here and enjoy yourself? And I'll be back Sunday night or Monday."

Charis spread raspberry jam on her toast. "You don't want me to come?"

"Yes. I would like you to come with me, but not if you have something else you'd rather do--maybe just stay out here and take it easy."

"I don't have anything else I want to do."

"... You don't. Well, in that case--if you're really sure you want to go--then yes, I'd like to have you come with me."

Charis took a bite of her toast, and seemed content. Apparently had no late-night dates planned for the weekend. "... Bird feeder," she said.

"What?"

"Bird feeder. Joanna, I was thinking it might be nice to have a bird feeder and a birdbath. --I bet birds have a tough time finding fresh water on the island."

"... It's an idea. I don't know about the feeder; it might interfere with their normal eating patterns. We could check with the Audubon people. ... But I like the birdbath."

"The garden should have a birdbath."

"I didn't see any at the hardware store."

"We're going over to the mainland; we could look for one. A small one ... on a pedestal." Charis finished her toast, and returned to bacon and eggs.

"Maybe one of the weathered bronze-looking ones."

"We could set it so we could see it from the kitchen. ..."

"I think it's a good idea. I really don't know where they find fresh water out here, except rain runoff." Joanna got up with their mugs, poured more coffee, and came back to the table. "--I think there's only one real pond on the island, over behind Willis. Weren't for the seasonal rains, I understand the island wouldn't have a water table."

"Are your eggs done too much?"

"No. Perfect.--We'll look for a birdbath. ..." And the subject of freedom, postponed.

The little sea lavender plants released lavender's odor when their leaves were gently pinched. They were the last of the perennials going in.

Kneeling, Joanna dug the row of holes along the back beds, allowed Charis the pleasures of planting, nesting the lavender into pockets of dark potting soil, mixed with manure and the yard's sandy dirt.

They worked together down the row, the late-morning sun leaning on their shoulders, planting their shadows beneath them in the beds. They set the lavender to edge the yard, where the remnants of the old fence were weathering away in the hill's tall grass, the clustered sea grapes.

... They finished the last planting, watered with mixed B-1 starter ... then weeded once more through the yard's grass, side by side.

"Is it done?--Joanna, I think we're done."

Joanna stood, and stretched to ease her back. "We're done."

Together, they surveyed their plot--its grass bordered by dark turned beds along the cottage's back wall and the edges of the yard. The ranks of young plants--dozens of them--resting patterned in their various greens.

"Have to keep it weeded." Charis bent to stroke a pansy as if it were a pet

... chucked it under its small chin.

"Perpetual weeding.--A walk before lunch?"

"Let me pee, and I'm with you." Charis trotted up the kitchen steps.

Joanna looked out over the garden--begun in such a lonely agony of labor, furious and repetitive. This was the yard where, frightened of the house's memories, she had slept out in weather. ... Then Charis had come.

--And would go, once her silent late-night rendezvous were discussed. Then she'd be free to be with whoever it was who'd come out to be with her. ...

Which would leave Joanna Reed with only herself for company. Perhaps good enough company, now. ...