At the cove I started to walk up the trail that led to the house. I knew I could not go to the house. But halfway up the hill, where the trees started, it leveled off and the pitch pines grew closely together. I made my way into the grove, holding my right arm in front of me to keep stray branches from catching me in the face. In between two tall trees I stopped. The rain fell steadily here but it was not as bad as the exposed beach. I put my oilskin bag down. I removed my heavy raincoat. From my bag, I took out the good test fishing line. It took me a while in the new dark but I strung the coat between the trees. Tied it firm with the fishing line. I sat down under it. The rain pinged on top of the heavy rubber. But even though the pine needles below me were wet, the rain no longer fell on me. I stood and laid a towel on the pine needles. Then I took out my bedroll and laid it folded in half on top of the towel. I sat back down. This was much more like it. The rain couldn’t reach me anymore.
I opened one of the bottles of wine. I drank straight from it. I lighted a cigarette. I was halfway up the cliff face. The path was to my left. To my right were more trees and the hilly land that led to the cliff walk. In front of me was the dark ocean obscured by the rain and the fog and the dark. Behind me was the house and inside it were Hannah and her mother.
I wondered what they had eaten for dinner. Surely more than the turkey sandwich from the general store that I had devoured as soon as I bought it. I wondered what Hannah talked about. If she was tempted to tell her mother about me, about how in two weeks we had grown closer than many people do in a lifetime. Mostly, I wondered if she looked to the window. If she looked to the window and the rain and worried about me. Worried about me sitting out here getting wet.
Maybe Hannah would come find me. When her mother fell asleep, I thought. Mothers went to sleep early. She probably couldn’t wait. Of course, she’d look for me on the beach. But that’d be okay. I’d hear her on the path when she went by. No one else would be walking the path to the cove in a downpour. I’d surprise her. And then she’d join me under my tarp and we could share the wine and make love with the rain around us. She’d tell me how hard it was to be at the house knowing the whole time that I was down here.
The night moved on. The rain continued. The dark grew more dense. I had a lot of time to think. I couldn’t see anything except for the flash of my lighter when I lit another cigarette. In the quick light I got a sense of rain and trees and water. Lots of water. Spilling off the raincoat above me to the ground. Then the dark shrunk around me. I thought of Victor and the story I would have to tell him. I thought about his eyes, how big they would get when I told him all that happened. When I told him about having sex on the beach. What it was like to have such a beautiful girl move on top of you. No fucking way, Tony, he’d say. I’d tell him the whole thing. God’s honest truth, Vic.
I’d have to get an apartment. One like Victor had. Then on weekends Hannah could come visit and we’d never leave bed. The only thing that would make us move would be hunger. We’d get up to eat and then return to bed. Or maybe we’d just eat in bed. Or not eat at all. For who needs food when you have a warm bed?
I missed Victor. Everything we did together. Our summer routine, those nights drinking beer on the jetty. Someone to talk to like a brother. Who understood me like a brother.
And I missed Berta. She’d be watching television by herself. And she’d fall asleep in front of it. Without me to wake her she’d come to in the middle of the night and groggily make her way upstairs.
I even missed the Lorrie Anne. It would be nasty out there tonight. Fishing in this kind of rain. The deck slick with it. But I also knew when you had the work you didn’t notice the weather as much. You were too busy. Besides, they were good men. Big Al and Ronny. Carlos. Captain Alavares. Brothers of a different kind.
I stubbed out one cigarette and lighted another. I took a long pull off the bottle of wine. Come find me, Hannah. Come find me and take me away from this rain. Take me away from this silly homesickness. Take me somewhere warm where I can climb inside you.
I had no sense of time. I never wore a watch. It had been hours since the sun went down. Because of all the rain it seemed longer. There had not been much light in the day to begin with. It had to be around ten now. Ten or eleven. And no sign of Hannah. No footfalls on the path to the cove. She had not come to get me.
At one point my legs cramped and I stood out from under my jury-rigged tarp. The rain had slowed a little but still fell steadily. Mist rose up all around me in the dark grove of trees. The rain soaked my hair. Where was she? Hannah had not said anything about coming to me, but I didn’t think she had to. It was implied. I knew her mother was there and could not know about me and I respected that. Well, I understood it anyway. But she couldn’t be with her mother all the time. Don’t mothers go to sleep?
I began to walk. I moved carefully through the pine trees, fending off low-hanging branches as I went. Some were heavy with rainwater and when I pushed on them it spilled off in a rush and fell on me like a shower. I didn’t care anymore. I reached the trail and turned toward the house.
The path was muddy from all the rain. My boots sloshed through it as I climbed. Out from under the tree cover it was a heavy rain and I had to wipe it away where it ran into my eyes. To my right the ocean was hidden by the fog.
The ground leveled below me and I knew I was close. I came through the final stand of trees and in front of me now was the house. It was ablaze with light and through the mist and the fog it glowed orange. It was like I was seeing it through gauze and the effect was almost confusing. She only used the one light at night, the one in her room. I had never seen the house like this before. With the heavy fog and the falling rain and the fuzzy light, it was like walking through a dream.
I moved across the wet grass toward the house. The orange lights seemed to pulse with every step I took. Maybe it was the wine, but if I didn’t know better I might have thought the house itself was alive. It looked like it was breathing in the fog.
When I got about sixty yards from the house, I stopped. Through the rain I could see into the floor-to-ceiling windows of the big ballroom on the first floor. The chandelier was on and the whole room was awash with light but I didn’t see anyone. I moved forward and I was even with the house now, standing on the side of it, and the windows were right in front of me, close enough that I could see the whole room but far enough away that anyone looking out would not be able to see me. And as I watched, a tall, thin woman with long blond hair came into view. She wore a black T-shirt and white pants. This must be her mother, I thought. She was really beautiful. I thought maybe she was talking on the phone because she was pacing back and forth on the parquet floor and she seemed to be speaking, though I didn’t see anyone else. Then I realized she wasn’t on the phone because her arms dropped to her side. Then she raised one up high and brought it back down, as people do when they are making a point. I strained my eyes through the rain and the mist. And then behind her, half-in and half-out of the room, I saw Hannah.
She leaned against one of the large doors and was dressed as I had never seen her before. She had on a long dress, almost to her ankles, and her hair was up. She looked remarkable, to tell you the truth, but I didn’t focus on that because I knew she was upset about something. I was too far away and Hannah was partially in the shadows so I could not tell if she was crying. But from her body language I saw that something was not right. Her arms were crossed over her chest and her head hung to one side and downcast toward the floor. Her mother moved back and forth in front of her. I wished I could hear what she was saying because it looked like she was really giving it to Hannah. I hated to see her upset. She seemed so sad. She wouldn’t look up at her mother. At one point her mother just stopped and glared at her. And I saw Hannah shaking her head over and over and for the first time it occurred to me that somehow they might be talking about me. But how was that possible? She wouldn’t have volunteered anything. She was clear about that. And as I was thinking about th
is, I looked to the other end of the ballroom and I realized that they were not alone.
He was against the far wall, the way he stood a mirror image of Hannah, though he looked more bored than distressed. His arms were crossed in front of his chest. He had on a white long-sleeve shirt and beige khakis and maybe this was why I had not seen him before. He blended in with the colors of the room.
But there was no mistaking that slicked-back hair and the leathery sun-beaten skin. Sheriff Riker.
You might have thought that my concerns right then were about getting caught. That I would have immediately broke into a sprint back to the hillside in the rain to get my things and figure out where to hide. But seeing the sheriff made me realize that the only reason he was there, the only reason for the sadness Hannah wore in the very way she stood, was because of me. And if this were true, it meant that the sheriff knew I was the one on the stairs that night. He had told Hannah that I had killed her father.
I was not worried that this meant I could go to prison. Instead I was worried that all we had built in the time we had been together might fall apart. That Hannah might not want to see me anymore. That she might even hate me. And I could not live with that. I needed to reach her somehow, reach her without getting caught, and explain everything. How it was all a mistake, how important she was to me. I needed to lay it out for Hannah and pray that she understood.
I stood in the soaking rain and stared through the fog and into the tall windows. My eyes moved back and forth from Hannah to her mother to Sheriff Riker. At one point Hannah stepped out of the shadows and I saw how hard she was crying and her mother went to her and tried to hold her but she shrugged her off. Then Hannah extended one arm out and pointed toward the back of the house, toward the cove and the beach. When she did, Sheriff Riker brought his hand to his mouth and in the dark to my right, toward the front of the house, I suddenly heard the crackle of his voice, and, more alarming, a human voice in response, some twenty yards away from where I stood.
I took one step back, my boots sinking into the wet earth. I strained my eyes through the blackness and I heard the voice again and then another one. “This way,” one of them said. I couldn’t see anything at all. The rain fell all around me. I was happy for the dense fog. I glanced back at the window and Hannah’s mother held her now. The sheriff was gone. A beam of light swept across the trees behind me. I saw them. They were in the driveway. Two flashlights and then three. Voices. I turned toward the cove and in the fog I broke into a light jog. I looked over my shoulder at the lights. They were moving this way but not quickly. They did not know yet where I was. I started to run. I ran behind the house and across the wet lawn. I kept close to the tree line and it was so foggy it probably did not matter. I could have run right down the middle of the grass and there was no way they could have seen me. I reached the path and sprinted down it. The path was so muddy my boots made big sloshing prints in the dirt. The earth was so soft from the rain that they were deep impressions. This was a problem. If they shined their lights on the ground, they would know exactly where I went.
I did not have much time. I crashed through the grove of trees to my makeshift camp. I left the raincoat up between the trees but I grabbed the oilskin bag and returned to the path. I climbed back up toward the house, moving as fast as I dared, my eyes peeled ahead for any lights. When I reached the grassy lawn I looked ahead through the fog. The house was still lit like a Christmas tree but I did not see the flashlights or the sheriff’s men. I got on my knees with the oilskin bag in front of me. I moved backward on the path, dragging the bag across my footprints as I went. It wasn’t perfect but it seemed to be working. If they came while I was doing this, I would need to stand and sprint for the beach, hope for the best. But I made decent time. The path would have the wipe marks on it but no one would make those out until the morning, if then. My prints, on the other hand, would have been plain as day. I crawled backward and I slid the bag and I looked ahead and I listened. The bag made a scraping sound as I went. The rain continued to fall. I worked as fast as I could. Any moment I expected to see flashlights moving on the path above me. But I made it to where my makeshift camp was and I lifted the bag and went through the trees. I sat again under my raincoat and I listened.
I wanted a cigarette so badly. Now that I was no longer moving, my heart raged in my chest. There was the rain and the heavy fog and the sound of my breathing. I did not hear anything else. Maybe they weren’t looking for me at all. Maybe they were after something else altogether. I mean, I didn’t know for sure that the sheriff had discovered somehow that I was the one in the house that night. I’ll give it ten more minutes, I thought, then I’ll have a cigarette. That’ll calm me down.
A moment later, I heard them. I sucked in my breath and held it. They were on the path. Two, maybe three, men. Loud voices. I looked to my right through the dark and the rain. I couldn’t see anything. Then I saw the fuzzy yellow glow of a flashlight in the fog. It was gone and then there it was again. There would be no reason for them to come in here, unless they saw my footprints or the drag marks from the bag. I released my breath and held it again. I heard them clearly now. They were even with me on the path. I saw two beams of light. One of them said, “How much farther?”
“It’s got to be right here,” the other said.
Then they were gone. I exhaled. I sat still until my legs began to cramp. I shifted and stretched them out in front of me. I stared into the blackness. I didn’t dare move. I had nowhere to go.
Sometime before dawn the rain stopped. I only noticed it when I realized it had grown quieter. At first I didn’t attribute it to the rain. It had been over an hour since the men took what I think was their third pass on the trail that led to the cove. I had spent my time trying to stay awake. Now and again I caught myself drifting off where I sat under the raincoat. Once when I woke I noticed the silence. The only water falling was the drip from the branches above. I spent my time considering my options. My only goal was to reach Hannah. I knew I could not go to the house. I wished I could get to a phone. I would call Victor and find out what they knew. I thought about trying to steal a skiff from one of the two island harbors. Piloting it back to the mainland. But then it occurred to me that if they were looking for me like this, they already had Victor. And Berta knew they were looking for me. And Captain Alavares too. Returning to the mainland wouldn’t do me a lick of good.
My time was running out here. Soon it would be light and when it was light I would not be able to hide anymore. They would bring more men and maybe even dogs. Regardless, they would find me and when they did the jig would be up.
All I wanted to do was to see Hannah. I thought if I could see Hannah then maybe everything would be okay. If they found me, there was no way they would let me see her. But maybe if I went to them, it would be different. Maybe I could make a deal. I will talk to you, tell you what you want to know. In return, I want to be alone with Hannah. Let me explain all that happened. Let me tell her how much I love her, and how love can trump anything, even this.
I allowed myself the cigarette I had denied myself for the last five or six hours. I took my time and savored it. Through the trees in front of me the night was starting to lift. The fog was still heavy but things were turning from black to gray. I smoked and I took solace in the fact that at least I was going to the one place where Hannah was. I didn’t know what other choice I had.
I discovered something new about fear that morning. As I have said before, I had been afraid many times. Both at sea and on land. But my fear in the past had always been somehow tied to choice. I could choose to jump off the bridge with Victor to the waiting water. I could choose to not show up for the boat and the trip to the Grand Banks. Though, of course, once at sea there was not a lot I could do. The ocean was going to dictate what happened to all of us. But that morning, walking up the trail from the cove to the great house for the last time, I was not afraid. That’s the honest truth. A sense of calm and resignation came over me. A
nd I think that’s because all the choices I had made led to this one place, this one lonely walk across rain-soaked earth.
What transpired next was something straight out of a movie. I emerged out of the heavy fog from the side yard of the great house to find a driveway filled with police cars. Sheriff cars, state police cars, a large white van. Men stood in small groups talking. I saw Sheriff Riker leaning against one car sipping coffee out of a styrofoam cup talking to three state troopers. There were men in suits. No one saw me. I stopped at the edge of the grass. All of them were engrossed in conversation. I took a deep breath, and then I shouted, “I want to see Hannah.”
Everyone stopped talking all at once. All heads turned toward me. Time seemed to grind to a halt for a moment. They all just looked at me. And I must have been a sight, sitting in the rain all night. I thought about shouting my request again, as if they did not hear me the first time. But then Sheriff Riker stepped forward from everyone else and he calmly said my name. “Anthony,” he said. “Let us see your hands, okay, buddy?”
And just like in the movies, I slowly raised my hands over my head. I opened my palms for them all to see. “I want to see Hannah,” I said again.
“One thing at a time,” Sheriff Riker said. “I need you to do me a favor, Anthony, understand?”
I nodded.
“Get down on your knees now, Anthony. Keep your hands above your head, just like that. But get down on your knees.”
I did as he said. I slumped to the ground onto my knees and my oilskin bag slid off my shoulder and I let it fall next to me.
“Okay,” the Sheriff said. “Just stay there, Anthony. Two of the officers are going to come to you now. Nod if you understand.”
It seemed pretty clear that I understood since I went to my knees but I nodded anyway. Two of the state troopers, huge men in gray uniforms with jackboots, came toward me from the driveway. When they reached me they did not say anything. One of them took my hands from above my head and he pulled them down behind my back and I felt the cuffs go on, heard them snap into place. The morning was coming on but not yet here, the fog still heavy and the air the color of pigeons. The ocean was right there but you couldn’t have seen it if you wanted to. I was on my knees, two troopers looming above me. I looked over at the house. Men talked all around me but to me it was all empty chatter. My eyes flitted up the façade to the turret window. No light on inside. No sign of Hannah anywhere. The empty glass in the rising misty morning didn’t reflect a damn thing.
Envious Moon Page 9