Praying for Sleep

28

“So how long you known the Atchesons?”

The Jeep driver had a narrow face and gray wattles running down his throat. He downshifted the old vehicle and nursed it up a hill north of downtown Ridgeton, exhaust popping and the gears in agony. The big man next to him was studying the shifting with more interest than the driver thought natural.

“Years and years I’ve known them,” he said. “Many years.”

“I know Owen,” the driver said. “Talked to him a few times. We run into each other at Ace Hardware some. A decent sort. For a lawyer.”

“A hundred years, I’d guess.”

“Pardon me?”

“Lis-bone especially.”

“I didn’t think she pronounced it that way. But you know ’em better’n me, I’d guess.” The Jeep bounded over a rough spot of road. “You’re lucky I come by. Nobody’s out on the streets tonight because of the storm. Those weathermen with their toupees and funny names, they said it’s going to be a pisser of a storm but naw it’s just a little rain is all it is.”

The big man didn’t respond.

The Jeep hissed past the intersection of Cedar Swamp and North Street and for a moment the driver thought that he saw someone turn quickly, startled by their passage, and drop over the side of a small hill near the drainage ditch. Simultaneously the sky filled with a huge sphere of lightning and shadows danced every which way. A branch fell nearby. The driver put the apparition down to a freak arrangement of lights and fog and rain. He sped up and followed the winding, uneven course of Cedar Swamp. “Shameful on the part of the county. When’re they going to get around and do it up right? Put some new asphalt along here? This road’s mostly mud and twigs.”

“Mud and twigs,” the big man fired back. “Mud and twigs.”

I believe I may’ve made a mistake here. “What happened to your car?”

“Mud and twigs maybe, something you seem to know a lot about.”

When his rider added nothing more, the driver said, “Ahn.”

“She slipped out from under me on a slick road. She went and twisted. Rolled over and over.”

“What about the police?”

“They’re busy elsewhere. Two of them. Two young men. I was particularly sorry about them. Poor Gunderson boys. But I had no choice.”

Never again, the driver thought. Never ever again, rain or no rain, cracked wrist bone or no.

The big man stared intently at the trees then with great concentration unlocked and relocked his door seven times. He asked, “You ever been in the army?”

What’s the best answer to give? The driver said, “Did a tour, yessir. Was stationed in-”

“Army intelligence?”

“Nope. I was a GI.”

The big man frowned. “What’s that?”

“Government Issue. A dogface. Combat infantry-man.”

“A GI.”

“Yessir.”

“GI, GI. Gee, I wonder if you know where Abraham Lincoln was shot.”

“Uhm.”

“In the head. Or during a play. They’re both right answers.”

“I knew that, sure.” Oh, brother, what’ve I done to myself here? “Quite a storm after all. I stand corrected. Glad I got four-wheel drive.”

“Four-wheel drive,” the man said. “Yes. What is that exactly? What is four-wheel drive?”

“You don’t know that?” The driver blurted a laugh. “Everybody knows what four-wheel drive is.” The big man turned to him with a malevolent glare and the driver rubbed the back of his hand across a stubbled cheek, adding, “That was most probably a joke.”

“Nice try,” the man snapped, leaning across the gearshift, placing his round face very close to the driver’s. “But if somebody was away in a different country for a long time, isn’t it possible that they might not know what four-wheel drive is?”

“Put that way, it’s more’n possible.”

“What if somebody from 1865, for instance, just showed up now? Are you saying it’s not possible that they might not know what four-wheel drive is?”

“More’n possible,” he repeated miserably. “You know, I’m thinking we should really stop by that hospital. Get your arm looked at.”

The big man wiped his face with his stubby peasant fingers, yellow as his teeth, and then took from his pocket a blue-black pistol. He lifted it to his face and smelled it then licked the barrel.

“Ah,” the driver whispered and began to pray.

“Take me to the Atchesons’ place,” the man bellowed. “Take me there now and use all of those damn four-wheeled drivers of yours!”

Several miles up the road the driver pulled the Jeep to a stop, bladder loose and hands quivering. I’ll never forgive myself for doing this to the Atchesons, he thought, but this’s the way it’s gotta be. “That there’s the driveway.”

“Nice try but I don’t see the sign.”

“There it is. There! Underneath that rose on the mailbox. See the name? Are you going to kill me?”

“You get out of this car and I want to make it so it won’t work anymore.”

“The Jeep?”

“Yes. I want to make it so it won’t work.”

“Okay, I can do that. Let’s both get out. Only I’m asking you not to hurt me.”

“You ever have a mind to go to Washington?”

“D.C. you’re speaking of?”

“Of course D.C.! Who gives a shit about Seattle?”

“No, no! Never have. I swear.”

“Good. Show me how to dismember this truck.”

“You take off the distributor cap and pitch it away. This thing’ll never start.”

“Do that.”

The driver opened the blunt hood of the car and ripped the cap off. It sailed into the woods. He looked completely forlorn. The rain matted his hair and ran into the deep grooves of his face. The big man turned to him. “Now, you think I’m stupid. You’re trying reverse psychology. You say you don’t want to go to Washington hoping I’ll say go there? Is that right?”

The man choked. “That’s about right, sir.”

“Well, I want you to run. You run all the way to Washington, D.C., and tell them that revenge is here.”

“Are you going to shoot me in the back?”

“You tell them that.”

“Are you going to-”

“RUN!”

He ran, never looking back, believing that he’d die before he got ten feet. Then before he got twenty. Then fifty. Running through the streams of rain, waiting for death. He never turned and so he never saw the big man, holding the pistol high in front of him like a nineteenth-century Pinkerton detective, stalk slowly down the driveway of gravel and mud.

Lis stared at the young woman’s face. Even in the dark she could clearly see silver dots of reflection in her eyes. Yet Lis would have turned on all the lights in the kitchen, risked attracting a hundred Michael Hrubeks, to witness her sister’s expression at this moment, to see if her words were lies or the truth.

“Tell me honestly, Portia. Did you know about us, Robert and me? Before you… made love with him.”

Either way I lose, she thought. Either her lover had betrayed her. Or her lover and her sister. Still, she had to know the answer.

“Oh, Lis, of course not. I wouldn’t do that to you. Didn’t you know that?”

“No! How could I know. You’re my sister but… No, I didn’t know.” Lis wiped tears, looking down. “I thought he might have told you, and you, well, you just decided to go ahead anyway.”

“No, of course he didn’t.”

Lis’s heart hadn’t beat this hard since she’d been in the cave at Indian Leap, fleeing from her mad pursuer. “I didn’t know. All these months, I just didn’t know.”

“Believe me, Lis. Think about it. Why would Robert say anything? He wanted to get laid. He wasn’t going to spoil it by confessing that he was my sister’s lover.”

“When I saw the two of you there together…” She closed her eyes and massaged her temple. “And tonight, when you were flirting with Owen…”

“Lis.”

“Weren’t you?”

Portia’s lips pressed together tightly. Finally she said, “I flirt, sure. It doesn’t mean I want somebody. If Robert’d told me about you two, I’d’ve said no. Men look at me. It’s a power I have. Sometimes I think it’s all I have.”

“Oh, Portia. It was Robert of course I was so angry with. Not you. I wanted to hit him. I wanted to kill…” Her voice faded. “I felt so betrayed. Claire died because of him. After she saw you two, she was so upset she ran off and got lost in the cave.”

“Half the guys I go out with are Roberts. You can spot ’em a mile away. Lis, he was all wrong for you.”

“No! It’s not what you think. It wasn’t just a fling. We were equals, Robert and me. Dorothy was dragging him down. They hated each other. They fought all the time. And Owen? He doesn’t love me the same way. Not at all. I could feel it. After being with Robert, all I felt was the absence of Owen’s love. The night before the picnic, that Saturday night… Owen was working late in Hartford. And Robert came over.”

“Lis-”

“Let me finish. Owen called and said he wouldn’t be home before two or three. Robert and I made love in the greenhouse. We were there for hours. He’d pull the petals off flowers and he’d touch me with them-” Lis closed her eyes and lowered her head once more to her knees. “And then he proposed.”

“Proposed?” From Portia’s lips popped her breathy laugh. “He asked you to marry him?”

“He and Dorothy had been unhappy for a long time. She’d been cheating on him for several years. He wanted to marry me.”

“And you said no, right?”

“And,” Lis whispered, “I said no.”

Portia shook her head. “So he was pissed at you. And when I turned my big hazel eyes on him in the truck, he jumped at the bait. Oh, brother, did I put my foot in it, or what?”

“I didn’t want to end it with him. I just couldn’t leave Owen. I wasn’t ready to. He’d given up that woman for me. I thought I should try to make it work.”

“Mistake, Lis. Mis-take. Why didn’t you go for it? My God, it may’ve been your only chance to dump the last of the family.”

Lis shook her head, confused. “You?”

“No, no! Owen. You should’ve done it years ago.”

“What do you mean, last of the family?”

Portia laughed. “Doesn’t Owen remind you just a little of Father?”

“Oh, don’t be crazy. There’s no comparison. Why, look what he’s doing tonight.” She waved at the window. “He’s out there for me.”

“Owen’s a despot, Lis. Just like Father.”

“No! He’s a good man. He’s solid. He does love me. In his way.”

“Well, Father put a roof over our heads. You call that love?” Portia had grown angry. “You call it love when somebody says, ‘You didn’t clean up very well this week’ or ‘How dare you wear that low-cut blouse’? Then lifts up your skirt and leaves those darling little welts on you? The willow tree’s still in the backyard, I see. If I’d moved here, that’s the first thing that would’ve gone. I’d’ve chopped that son of a bitch to the ground in ten seconds flat.

“Tell me, Lis, how did you explain the marks in gym class? You probably changed into your uniform with your back to the locker. I told everybody I had an older lover who tied me up and jerked off while he whipped me. Oh, don’t look so horrified. You talk about love… Love? For Christ’s sake, if we grew up in such normal circumstances, how come you hide away in this Neverland and why’m I the easiest fuck on East Seventy-second Street?”

Lis buried her head in her arms, the tears streamed.

Her sister said, “Lis, I’m sorry.” She laughed. “Look what being back here does. It makes me crazy. I’ve had more of a dose of family than I can deal with. I knew I shouldn’t have come on the picnic. I shouldn’t’ve come tonight.”

Lis touched her sister’s knee, observing that Portia was once more wearing her gaudy silver rings, and the flecked crystal, like a huge grain of salt, again hung from her neck. A moment passed and Portia lowered her hand onto her sister’s toughened, ruddy fingers but offered no pressure and soon withdrew it.

Then Lis too took back her hand and looked out the window, staring at the rain snaking down the glass. Finally she stood up. “There’s something I have to do. I’ll be back in a minute.”

“Do?”

“I’ll be right back.”

“You’re going outside?” Portia sounded frightened, mystified.

“The padlock on the basement door. I have to see about it.”

“No, Lis. Don’t. I’m sure Owen checked it.”

“I don’t think so.”

Portia shook her head and watched Lis take the gun from her pocket and awkwardly pull the slide to put a bullet in the chamber. “Lis…”

“What?”

“Nothing. I… Nothing.”

Carefully pointing the muzzle toward the floor, Lis dons the bomber jacket. She pauses at the back door, looking back. The old house is dark, this house three stories high and filled with flowers and books and the spirits of many dead. She thinks how odd it is that we’re awed by our mortality only during the small moments-when we think of painted fingernails, or a passage of music, or the proximity of sleeping bodies-never at mean, ruthless times like these. She flicks off the safety catch of the gun and feels no fear whatsoever as she steps into the rain-drenched yard.

Owen Atcheson, every inch of his skin wet, in agony, ducked against the muddy embankment of the drainage ditch and cringed like a child as a shaft of lightning engulfed the sky above him. The thunder shook his teeth and sent spasms of pain through his left arm.

After all this, he thought, please don’t let me get electrocuted.

He looked along Cedar Swamp Road, down which the Jeep had vanished five minutes before, sending rooster tails of dirty rain into the air behind it. He’d recognized it as Will McCaffrey’s. He supposed the old coot had worked overtime at the mill and was finally heading home.

Owen sank back into the dirty, foaming water. This unpleasantness didn’t bother him. On hunting trips, he’d endured leeches, mosquitoes and temperatures of 110 degrees and 30 below. Tonight, he carried only his pistol and twenty rounds of ammunition; on other occasions he’d borne not only his weapons but an eighty-pound pack and, more than once, the body of a fallen comrade as well.

These hardships he could cope with. Far more troubling was the question-where the hell was his prey?

Owen surveyed the terrain for the dozenth time. Yes, he supposed, it’d be possible for Hrubek to avoid the road completely and reach the house through the forest. But that would require a compass and hours of time, and would force him to swim the lake or skirt the shore, which was thickly overgrown and virtually impassable. Besides, Hrubek had shown a strong preference for roads-as if his impeded mind believed that people could be connected only via asphalt or concrete.

Roads, Owen reflected. Cars…

The Jeep…

McCaffrey, he recalled, didn’t live north of town. His bungalow was on the west side. He’d have no need or occasion to take Cedar Swamp, certainly not to reach his house. The only reason someone who didn’t live near here would come this way was to take the shortcut to the mall in Chilton. And there sure weren’t any stores open there this time of night.

Owen looked up the dark, rain-swept road for a moment then struggled from the water and began the agonizing run to his wife and his home.