by Matt Cohen
He went through the house to see if anything had been taken, got a beer, sat down in the armchair and closed his eyes.
First picture: Chrissy on top of him, her eyes filled with moons—twigs and grass digging into his back while her face slowly froze into a mask he hardly recognized.
Second picture: Ned Richardson’s eyes filled with something bitter and resentful.
Third picture: Ned Richardson giving him the finger as he roared away in his truck.
Fourth picture: Ned Richardson’s truck passing him as he left Frostie’s, after dropping Chrissy off in the parking lot.
Ned Richardson’s truck was all black, everything dented and rusting except for the right front fender which was a dark red waiting to be painted. Carl lit a cigarette. It was one of those August mornings he’d always liked. A cool hollow sky with just a few clouds strung out and bobbing on the horizon like paper boats on a pond.
The lawn was neatly mowed and a flowerbed had been recently dug around the house. Two bushes, one on each side of the front steps, still wore plastic bracelets on their branches. Carl, standing in front of the screen door, tried to imagine Ellie Dean at the kind of place where they sold bushes with plastic bracelets.
“Long time no see,” Ellie said. She had come around the side of the house and Carl, turning to her, caught the sun in his eyes. “I heard you were back, living at the old Balfer place.”
“You’re looking good,” Carl said. His eyes were still adjusting from the sudden shock of light but Ellie Dean was looking good: slim as ever in ironed shorts that hung above her knees and polished white sandals.
“You want to come in?”
“I was looking for Ned.”
Her face contracted.
“It’s okay,” Carl said. “You still give out cookies with coffee or what?”
“You can have the cookies but I was thinking of getting choosy about the ‘or what.’ ”
The house had started off as an inexpensive cottage built a couple of rows back from the lake. Most of the original cottage was taken up by the kitchen—living room, which stretched right across the front. The rest was a hall leading to an even lower structure that had been tacked on the back, a bathroom and two bedrooms.
“I don’t want him slipping away on me,” Carl said, looking towards the bedrooms.
“No one’s going to run away from you, Carl.”
He was halfway down the hall when a bedroom door opened by itself and Ned Richardson stepped out. When he saw Carl he froze.
“You shouldn’t have done that,” Carl said. Ned’s face jumped as though he had already been hit.
“What are you talking about?”
Carl swung his forearm towards Ned, who backed into the wall. “Come on.” He grabbed Ned around the bicep and marched him out of house and across the yard until they were standing beside his truck.
“What are you going to do?” Ned asked. His voice quavered. “Beat me up in front of Ellie? She’ll call the cops, you know.”
“Maybe I’ll call the cops,” Carl said. “You some kind of idiot or something? You know what you can get for break and enter?”
Ned was looking down at the ground.
“I’ll make you a deal,” Carl said.
“You got nothing on me.”
“You want me to make that phone call now?”
“No.”
“Well?”
“Billy dared me to. He said you were Ellie’s old sweetheart and that I should welcome you back to town.” A breeze had come up and Ned’s T-shirt was flapping against his ribs.
Carl looked at the boy shivering in the morning light. He was winding up, vibrating like crystal waiting to shatter. Strange to think a boy could be that tense, that vulnerable.
“What are you going to do?”
“How about beat the shit out of you?”
“Go ahead. Kill me if you want to. I don’t care.” Ned was trying to look defiant but his lower lip was trembling and his eyes had filled with tears.
“Ned, do you expect me to kill you at eight o’clock in the morning?” He took his arm again, this time gently. “You come in the house with me and have some coffee. Then we’ll go over to my place and see if we can’t even things up.”
“What do you mean?”
Carl turned Ned to face the back of his pick-up. Lying amid the rust and dried leaves was a posthole digger.
“You ever hear the saying ‘Good fences make good neighbours’?”
“I hate those things.”
“What things do you hate, Ned?”
“Those diggers.”
“I’ll get you a pair of gloves so you’ll last longer. Think of yourself as being sentenced to community service. Only the good thing about this sentence is that your father doesn’t know. It just stays between you and me.” They were at the house now, and Carl, his arm around Ned’s shoulders, was ushering him in the front door. “I hired him,” Carl announced. “Slave labour.”
Ellie’s mouth worked uncertainly.
“I guess I’ll even pay you,” Carl said. “After your probation is over.” He smiled at Ned, who was still shaking, then took out a cigarette and tapped it on the table—the way, he suddenly remembered, his father used to signal that one chapter was over and another beginning.
Carl reached for his coffee, pushed a cup towards Ned.
“You better eat something before we go. I’m not much of a cook.”
Ned smiled weakly. Carl felt a wrench in his belly. He was still going to have to explain to Lizzie that the cat was gone. And he was still going to have to decide what he intended to do with the boy who had broken into his house and killed his daughter’s cat.
He left Ned with the posthole digger and a series of marks along the back of the garden where he was to make the holes.
“You be here when I get home this afternoon,” Carl said and Ned, terrified, nodded his head vigorously. “At lunch you can go in and make yourself a sandwich. I’ll leave the door unlocked; it’ll save you going through the window.” Just before leaving, he walked along the line where the fence was to be installed and pointed to one of the places Ned was to make a hole. It was away from the house behind a big beech tree and invisible from the road. “This would be a good spot for the gate,” Carl said. “You better make this hole a double one.”
But when he arrived home from work, Carl saw no sign of Ned Richardson. He inspected the garden. All the holes had been made as planned. The digger was lying beside the double hole at the back. In the morning it had been covered with rust but now the rust was worn away and bits of dirt clung to the handle. Carl lowered the digger to measure the depth of the gate hole, then gave it a few extra twists. The soil was heavy with clay, hard to move. Ned would be nursing a few blisters tonight. When Carl went into the house he found him half-asleep in front of the television set, a few of Lizzie’s comics spread out on the floor.
“Suppertime,” Carl said from the kitchen. He opened himself a beer and started a frying pan heating for steaks. On the shelf beside the stove were two brand new cookbooks he’d bought after Lizzie moved in. If Ned hadn’t killed Lizzie’s cat, Carl thought, this would have been the evening to read through them, marking out recipes he could try.
He put on a pot of water for the frozen vegetables, then set the table. Next he set the steaks in the frying pan. The slabs of meat made a loud sizzle as they hit the cast iron and the kitchen filled with the smell. When Carl turned around Ned was standing in the doorway, watching him.
“I don’t eat bought meat, I should’ve told you.”
“I’ll leave it on extra.”
“My mother says it gives you hormones.”
“You could use some hormones.”
“I hope it doesn’t make me throw up.”
“Did you throw up when you slit that cat’s throat?”
Ned hesitated at the doorway.
“Let me see those blisters.” When Ned stepped forward Carl took his hands as though they were a child�
��s and looked at them closely. His fingers were long and thin, his nails bitten down to scabs. Carl felt a flash of pity for Ned, for the man he might become. He turned the boy’s hands over. Small circles of raw flesh glowed on the insides of his thumbs, along the tops of his palms. “Good thing you’re planning to work with your brains instead of your hands,” Carl said. He took a box of bandages from the cupboard over the stove and handed them to Ned.
By the time they were finished dinner the sun was setting and the sky had begun to turn. Carl stood up from the table and opened another beer. “Guess we’d better step outside and see what you did today.” Carl picked up a spade and poked at the holes like a man kicking the tires of a used car. Beside each hole was the pile of dirt and rocks the digger had brought up. When he came to the last hole, the double one, he lowered the spade inside, knocked it from wall to wall.
“Hard to dig?”
Ned nodded.
“You need a good big hole for a gatepost. I was going to pour in concrete first, to make sure the bottom doesn’t rot. You need extra space for that.” He lowered the digger to the bottom of the hole. Gave it a few twists, dragged it up, emptied it, lowered it again, repeated the sequence. “A person could almost fit into that,” Carl said. “If they were thin enough.” He looked speculatively at Ned. “Could you fit into that?”
It had grown dark enough that a passing car had its headlights on. The beams flashed through the branches of the big beech tree. Ned looked down the hole.
“Go ahead, try it.”
Ned shook his head.
“Come on. I bet you could get in. I’ll give you an extra ten if it’s big enough to get in. That’s what my father always made me do when I was digging holes for gateposts.”
Ned crouched down beside it, stuck in one foot, then sat and put both his feet in. Carl could see Ned’s knees knocking together with fear. He wondered how close Ned was to exploding and if he wanted to push the boy that far. “I guess I can,” Ned said, “if I point my toes.” He put one hand on either side of the hole and lowered himself down. He was standing with his feet at the bottom, his arms awkwardly sticking out.
“You have to be able to put your arms in, too,” Carl said. He watched as Ned raised his arms high, curled his shoulders to make himself thin, then turned and wriggled his arms into place. Now only the tops of his shoulders, his neck, and his head were sticking out.
“That’s great,” Carl said. “Perfect.” He used the spade to pour some dirt behind Ned’s back.
“What are you doing?”
“Just seeing how much room there is,” Carl said. He took another spadeful, emptied it against Ned’s neck.
“Hey.”
“Shut up,” Carl said. “Or I’ll slit your throat the way you did that cat.”
“What are you talking about?”
There was something about the way Ned’s face was screwed up in the half-light that made Carl wish Ned was standing in front of him so he could slap him. He reached into his pocket, took out a long bone-handled knife that he opened in the twilight. He ran his finger along the blade. “Sharp,” Carl said. “Don’t make me use it.” He kept spading the earth until Ned’s shoulders and neck were covered and the dirt came right up underneath his chin. He tamped it gently into place. “Don’t let me hurt you,” Carl said.
“I have to go to the bathroom.”
“Go ahead.”
Carl sat down under the tree, lit a cigarette. Another perfect sunset, another spectacular night sky. Beyond Ned the view was of gently rolling fields going back half a mile to a jagged line of trees.
He took a pull of beer, emptying the bottle. Ned was staring at him, his face twisted and streaked with tears. “Got to get another beer,” Carl said. “Promise not to go away?”
While he was in the house he heard Ned calling out but when he got back the boy had stopped and was only snivelling.
“What’s wrong?”
“I can’t get out.”
“I know,” Carl said. “That’s the idea. You’re lucky the bugs aren’t worse; I’d have to swat your mosquitoes with a shovel.”
“You’re a mean fucker. Everyone always said that.”
“That’s true. But then I stopped fighting. Remember that? A man stops fighting and people try to take advantage of him. You know? People start to think they can get away with things. And how’s a man to defend himself if he can’t fight? Got to get other people to use their hands for him. Like you did this afternoon.”
“My father will kill you for this.”
“Shall I give him a call and tell him what you’ve been doing?”
Ned started to scream. Carl threw a shovelful of dirt at his face and he stopped.
“You know what they do to thieves in the desert? I read a book about it once. They dig them a hole in the desert and leave them there, just like you. No problem the first night. Nice cool breezes, winky twinkle stars. And then the next day they die of thirst. The birds come and eat their eyes. Some special kind of eye-eating bird, I guess. The idea is to die before the birds come, if you know what I mean.”
Ned was crying again. “Quiet,” Carl said. “Try and take this like a man. Just think, Ned, what’s happened up to now is nothing compared to what you’ve got coming. Why don’t you just think about how much fun you’re having now while I decide what to do with you? Think of it this way. You’re a hostage, right? Like I’m holding you because of that dead cat buried at the other end of the garden. For all we know the ghost of that dead cat is watching us, waiting to bring us bad luck. You know it’s always bad luck to kill a cat.”
“I’ll get you another cat,” Ned sobbed.
“I’ll get your father another kid. Although when it comes to assholes like you I don’t know how many there are.”
“I’m thirsty,” Ned said.
“Thinking about it just makes it worse.”
“I’m going to tell the cops.”
“When’s that?”
“You wouldn’t kill me.”
“That’s right. I wouldn’t. But after a few days in the hole—anyway, what would you tell them? That you climbed into your own hole and couldn’t get out? And then there’s that little break and enter you pulled last night.”
A car swept by on the road throwing off a stray bit of light that made Ned’s eyes glow briefly.
“Ned, I don’t want to kill you. I need you to work here with me. You, me and that posthole digger, we could really turn this country into something. The trouble is, if I let you out, I have to answer to myself about that cat. You know what I mean? Stop crying.”
“I pissed myself.”
“Ned, stop thinking about yourself. Don’t you see we have a more important problem? Down there, at the other end of the garden, is a dead cat. That cat belonged to my daughter. It was left with me in trust. She didn’t have to say to me, ‘Daddy, please can my cat be alive in three days?’ because she thought that with me it was safe. She trusted me with her cat. And now her cat is dead. Tomorrow my daughter is going to come home and that cat is going to be lying in the bottom of a hole with its throat slit. Don’t you see what you’ve done to me?” He was on his feet, he was shouting, he was waving the spade. Ned’s crying had grown louder, a non-stop wail that was boring into him. “Stop that noise!”
All the blood had gone into his hands. He remembered that feeling, too, what came next. He threw down the spade, stepped back. Another vehicle was approaching. It stopped in front of his house. A door slammed. Carl heard the crunch of footsteps on the drive, the knock at the door.
“Out here,” Ned shouted. “Now you’ll be sorry.”
“Quiet,” Carl said but it was too late, the footsteps had started towards him.
“Is that you?”
“It’s me,” Carl said.
“Heard you were back,” Ray Johnson said. “Thought I’d come and see you before you got yourself into trouble.”
There was something contented about Ray Johnson that always made Carl gri
n from the moment he heard his voice. Ray was wearing jeans, a T-shirt that stretched over his comfortable belly, a beard that was barely on the respectable side of shaggy. From his right fist a twelve-pack dangled invitingly.
He came right up to Carl, set down the beer, then made as though to embrace him but ended up just clapping his big hands on Carl’s shoulders.
“Son of a bitch,” Ray Johnson said. “Never wrote, never called, just came sliding back like an old lonesome wolf. Well, you picked your time.” He paused. “Do I hear something funny?” He looked down at Ned who had started crying again. “Christ, Ned, is that you down there? I could hardly recognize you in the dark. Why did you have to go and bury yourself?”
“I didn’t—” Ned spluttered. “He’s going to kill me. Please.”
Carl watched Ray get down on his knees beside Ned. There was something about Ray that made people feel safe. At least people who never saw him after midnight. With his beard and his size he shambled around the lumber yard like a perfectly trained gentle giant, talking in a courteous stream of profanities, always shouldering the heavy end of the load. When he started to smoulder he just drank more, as though he had long ago decided that anger was something he should turn against himself instead of the outside world, as though there was no fire he couldn’t put out with a bottle or a case of beer.
“How about I kill you instead?” Ray folded his muscular hands around Ned’s neck. “Don’t you know it’s a serious crime to bury yourself in another man’s garden? Used to be a hanging crime but I left my rope at home. Ned, you little sucker, your Adam’s apple is making my fingers nervous. Could you try to keep from swallowing?”
Ned gulped.
“Okay,” Carl said. “Why don’t you finish him off? Do it so you don’t leave any bruises. I’ll go call his mother and tell her where to find the body.” He started towards the house.
“Noooo!”
Carl turned around. Ray had let go of Ned. He had found the posthole digger and was swinging it around his head, faster and faster, as if gathering the speed it would take to drive it into Ned’s head so hard the boy would be decapitated.
“No fucking bruises this way,” Ray said.