The Bay of Love and Sorrows (28 page)

Everette Hutch was waiting near the Brassaurds’ shed at that moment. He was scared of Madonna for the first time, for she had something that she could refuse him. And that something was
her.

The night before, he had waited for Michael to come downriver and then he had gone to town. All the lights were on at the McNair house, cars were in the yard and parked on either side of the cul-de-sac. He waited near the front of the garage. And he had a piece of luck. Laura ran outside thinking Michael had arrived. She stood very close to him, calling Michael’s name. Then Everette made a lunge. But at the very second he lunged she moved, and he slipped on some ice, and lost hold of her. He snarled when she kicked out at him, and she screamed. Then people came running out of the house to protect her, and he ran.

He had been hiding in thickets all this day, making his way back downriver, through drifts of frozen snow. Everette had done this deed for his friend in jail — the one who had stabbed Tom Donnerel for
him.
But like most events in his life, it was a halfhearted try. She got away. The man in prison was angry. And Daryll Hutch, his cousin, whom he feared, said he wanted the money that he was owed before Christmas Eve. Everette had told Daryll nothing. He had neglected to tell him that Silver had already brought him all of the money early on the morning of September 10.

“And if I can’t get the money?” Everette had asked his cousin yesterday. “What can I do? They screwed both of us, not just you.”

Daryll had looked at him with a sideways glance, and sniffed. “Kill Michael Skid.” He had smiled. “That’d be a good, good thing “

Then Daryll, complaining that the prices of everything were going up year by year, had said Christmas was not the same as it used to be.

When Everette saw Madonna’s upstairs light go on, he crossed the yard and went into the house. He climbed the stairs and opened her door. She had just finished putting on her nightgown and was ready to turn off the light.

She was sitting on the bed with the light-string in her hand when he entered. Two books she had been studying sat open near her pillows.

“So,” she said coolly, “don’t you ever knock?”

“Have you thought over what I asked you?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said. “Every day for a month.”

“And?” He looked at her expectantly, with his eyes half-closed.

She was silent.

“And?” he asked again.

He had asked her to go away with him, to British Columbia. He had not been able to touch her yet, and this was a game she had played for thirteen months. Always using her body, as a chess piece, as a queen that could move in any direction and confound him, to protect her life and the life of others.

“I will go,” she said, “under two conditions.” She smiled almost as if it were a joke. Sadly, it was the only joke she would be able to play.

“What conditions?” he said.

His bald head made him look impressive. The scar on his cheek added to the darkness of his wide eyes. His life had trailed in a vacuum of petty hopes and disillusions. His voice, like the voices of all the powerful, contained nothing special in its vocabulary, but rather rested only on how things were said.

“You must do two things,” she said.

The wind blew.

“What?“

“You must never see Gail or Brian again — you’ve beaten her enough”

“But Gail is my sister — the little boy — I care for him. I can’t — “

She was silent. The room seemed possessed by great weight and determination. In his eyes Madonna saw the slight, unmasked look of confusion. He scratched at his head quickly

“Fine,” he said. “They’re not important, but I have to go back once more. To get something.”

“I said never.” Her voice turned so cold, and yet such fire came from it, that he nodded. Her voice held in its sound the age-old fire of singlemindedness, of suffering and mortification, that the poor and the elderly have.

“But it’s the money we’ll need — I took a chance in hiding it where I did — “

There was a slight start to her eyes.

“I said never go back,” she repeated. “I will find out if you do — and you will never get to touch me!”

“All right, never,” he said. “What else?”

“You must never harm anyone again — in any way — especially Laura McNair — or ever come back here once we leave. You must give Michael Skid that tape, because it will destroy his life — and ruin his chance at getting married — and it is a cowardly thing to do. And if you promise
this,
I will leave with you — you can do me every day But that is my conditions.”

“I don’t harm anybody” And he firmly believed this. All his problems came, in his mind, only because of others.

But she stared at him, in the simplicity of truth and justice and determination, and he felt his hands tremble just slightly when her remarkable eyes were upon him.

“Okay it’s just a joke. I like joking people. I wasn’t going to hurt her.” Then he became relaxed and reflective. “Why did Michael throw all that mescaline away? I owed people too — “

“You’re frightened of Daryll, aren’t you?”

“No, I’m not,” he said.

“What if Daryll found out you had the money you owe him — that you hid it instead of giving it to him?”

He looked at her, trying to understand hen

“You’ll never pay them — you’re a thief, and will steal even from Daryll,” she said, and smiled. “That’s why you want to go to B.C. You are only running away from the evil you have created. But it can’t be run away from.” She made this last phrase in a taunting sing-song voice.

Everette paused and looked at her. He shrugged. Then he moved so quickly she didn’t have time to flinch.

“Look at me,” he said, holding her chin and mouth. “If I went and killed Michael Skid — Daryll would take that as all the payment he’d ever need. Judge Skid’s son. I’d owe him nothing.”

He let go of Madonna’s head as if he had told her something she did not already know. She shrugged.

“No, he would never be satisfied,” she said. “He is like you. Neither of you will be satisfied until you kill one another — that’s the secret”

“I have been keeping the money for us,” he said glumly. “What is so wrong about that?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Madonna said. “No one cares if a person is guilty or not — they care only for the way they can excuse themselves by letting others suffer for them “

She said this not because of him, but because of Tom Donnerel and of the mob reaction against him. She too had initially thought he was guilty. She too had thought what others thought, that the evidence proved Vincent and Tom guilty. And she had been bitter and depressed about it. Now, she wondered if it wasn’t someone else. So she had sent Tom a get-well card, and drew a happy face, which said: “This is the face of Madonna now.”

But Everette was very pleased she had made this statement about
him.
It was what he had believed about himself for years and years. He sniffed happily and then thought of something.

“He’s come back to the farm.”

“Who?”

“Michael if I go there — just to pay him back — not for Daryll, but for you. Look how he treated
you.”

Here she put her hand over his mouth and smiled.

“Don’t be jealous,” she whispered, “It’s over — let him go — he’s not important —"

“After we get married — I’ll give you your tape back too,” he said.

“If you do I’ll just hand it over to the police,” she said.

“You will what?”

“I will hand it over to the police — what does it matter?”

He laughed loudly at this and then, half-genuflecting and half-shaking, he hauled out a diamond and slipped it on her finger, standing quickly as if afraid of being on his knees,

“Here,” he said, proudly “I been waiting a long time to give the right woman this! Hold her up, and look at it under the light.”

She had seen this diamond before. It was the same diamond Tom had tried to give her four months ago, when he was drunk, Same diamond. A woman knows.

“Why are you trembling?” he asked.

“I’m not at all,” she said.

“You have nothing to fear now. I got the money — but your heart is beating like a rabbit in a snare,” he said, holding his hand over her breast.

“It’s just exciting to be with you.” She smiled.

“Well there now — give me — a look,” he said, trying to lift her nightgown.

“Tomorrow,” she said, as a woman can say, without any thought at all, and she looked over his head, as he lay it against her chest. Then for some reason she sang to him, as if she were singing to a child.

Silver came in later. The downstairs was cold, especially the kitchen, so he lit a large fire and sat at the table, smoking. He was very drunk and fell asleep, and the cigarette burned down to his fingers, while the snow on his boots melted, and there was an unpleasant scent of warm wool. He would take a drag, push the cigarette ahead to keep his fingers from burning, look about, and fall asleep again, with his old woollen hat still on.

It was after two in the morning when he was shaken awake.

“I want you to help me,” Everette said. He had always thought of Silver as simpleminded. And he liked the way he had been able to bully him, tease him, and hold him up to ridicule in front of people like his cousin Daryll, whom he truly did fear.

He sat down across from Silver now, and poured a glass of red sherry. He was bare-chested, and Silver could see the man’s half-dozen blue pen tattoos on his white body. He tipped the wine up.

“I’ll tell you where the money is — you go get it — you give Gail two thousand — you bring me a note from Gail that says she has the two thousand — and I will give you a thousand. Fair?”

Silver nodded. But he was too drunk to really understand and had to be told again. Then he stood, washed his face at the kitchen sink, and lit another cigarette.

“Where is it?” Silver asked.

Everette turned and hesitated. He was mulling something over.

“If you do not help me,” Everette said, “things will not be so good for you — everyone will want to know who dealt the bad mescaline — no one will give up looking for who did that.”

At this moment Everette looked like his sister. A part of his family portrait. Yet where the same look in his sister was gentle and good, in Everette it was cold and distant.

“But if you bring me the money — Silver, listen — if you bring me the money, I’ll give you the tape, and have no more evidence on you. Well be all square and count it as a learning experience.” He shrugged to show his affable side. “That’s what I’m willing to do.”

Silver said nothing. But his body felt suddenly as if it had turned to lead.

“What if the money isn’t there — and I’m blamed for stealing it, just like I was blamed for losing the drugs?” For Silver was always thinking of a trick now. He had lived in the world of tricks so long.

“Well then, you come and see me anyway and we’ll figure something else out. I’m not joking,” Everette said. “The world beat and hated me long before I hated it. I kept asking it not to hate me and begged it not to hate me and my sister — but it wouldn’t listen “

“I know exactly how you feel,” Silver said without any emotion at all.

Madonna lay awake, listening to the men talk, smoking and listening to the wind. At 3:30 in the morning, she heard Everette leave. She felt the diamond on her finger grow heavy and could not sleep. But she now understood something very important. It was still up to her to protect Michael Skid and his fiancee. That they had not protected or cared for her or her brother did not matter.

This realization kept her awake, tossing and turning, until dawn. Finally she sat up in bed. The back of her head was pounding. She looked about her room — the busted chair, the small dead flower she had taken from her mother’s casket, still in its plastic, the cardboard box in her closet filled with bits and pieces of clothing. A small painting of Arron Brook bridge she thought looked nice and had bought for thirty dollars three years ago at the church picnic. For a while, every time she looked at it, it had made her feel glad. Now it no longer moved her. She thought of Laura McNair, remembered being interviewed by her, remembered her tweed suit, her small expensive wristwatch, and the sound of her shoes when she walked.

“Well, for her sake, if not mine.” Madonna smiled.

She got up, dressed, put the diamond in her pocket with the intention of throwing it away in Arron Brook, and went downstairs. Silver was lying on the couch, with his shirt and pants undone. His face looked quiet and sad in the early morning. His lighter, with its picture of an alley cat, rested on the small coffee table. Even in that fake glamour and virility there was poverty and useless hope. She looked at him for a long time, and began to cry. Then, she kissed him. He moved slightly, looked at her and smiled.

“Madonna,” he whispered, almost as a plea, and then fell back to sleep.

She threw a coat over him, then a coat around herself, and went outside, crossed the yard to the shed. Above the tool board was the distributor cap she had hidden the night before.

When she switched on the light she saw a rat, with a slick, black face, staring at her. It squeaked, turned, and scurried down the wall and behind the tool board, to the clamour and squeaking of other rats.

Madonna picked up the handle of the rake, began to poke at them. She lifted their nest up, and started to haul it away