Flight to Darkness

by Gil Brewer

  “You’ve made your bed,” I told her.

  “Darling, it’s not bed. I’m alone in it. Good Lord, Eric. Can’t you see? Can’t a person make a mistake?”

  I thought of her walking out and leaving me in that place in Alabama, behind bars, and said, “Yeah, sure.”

  “You made one toady,” she said. “A bad one. Bantram knows you beat up Frank. You broke his nose, did you know that? It’ll be all over town. Horace Bantram may be a doctor, but he’s an old lady—a gossip. Of course, nobody knows what’s been going on with you, you and your dreams, and all—out there in California.” She waited, breathing hard. “I know what they think of you in Cypress Landing, and they’re going to think worse. Frank’s telling it around already that your coming home killed your mother. I’m sorry, Eric. But being sorry doesn’t help.”

  I didn’t say anything, but I damned Frank under my breath. That was just the kind of move he’d make. Not that it made any difference how people felt. And the dream. She would stick that in.

  Suddenly she said, “I’ve got to get back. He’ll wonder where I am. What with everything the way it is.” She tried to smile. “I’ll be back.”

  “There’s no reason,” I said. “Nothing to say.”

  Her temper changed and abruptly the old energy returned as she lowered her voice. “All right,” she said. “We’ll play it that way, then. You’ll take me back, and I’ll see you later. I’ll see you a lot. I don’t care what people think. I know you want me. And by the way, I notified the sanitarium that you were home, and it’s all right. I signed your brother’s name, because he’d never do it.”

  “All this is no use, Leda.”

  She smiled, watched me slyly. “No?”

  “I won’t see you. We can’t—”

  She interrupted bitingly. “I’ll haunt you, darling. This isn’t a game of new love, remember? I know how you feel about me. Don’t forget that. And I know something about that other one, too. Norma?” She started the car’s engine. “But she’s out of it, and you know it. I’ll be back and I’ll find you. I’m not going to beg, but you’ll see, Eric.”

  The car roared into reverse and as she backed swiftly toward the main road I realized the abrupt change that had come over her. I tried to tell myself she couldn’t come back, she wouldn’t—but I knew she would and I knew what would happen.

  On the main road, she gunned the car viciously and rapped twice on the horn. I stood there and thought I knew what had to happen, and never realized I had no idea at all. . . .

  Chapter 14

  Without returning to the barn, I hiked it back to the main road and caught the beach bus into town. There was still time before the stores closed and I wanted to buy a second-hand car. As I walked down the main street I knew the smartest move would be to leave Cypress Landing. But I knew I wouldn’t leave.

  A gray Stetson swayed up the street with a florid, toothy face beneath it. Clyde Burkette, Sheriff. He was a big man, big and broad, with black-button eyes and overlarge hands and one of the drawlingest backwoods drawls I’d ever heard.

  “Eric, Lord, yes. Eric Garth. Bless my soul.”

  “Hello, Clyde.” We shook hands. Mine was lost in his immense grip and I have a large hand. He never smiled, he grimaced, showing his teeth, which he picked continuously with his right thumbnail. It made a sharp clicking sound and the louder he clicked the madder he was becoming.

  “You’ve lost weight,” Burkette said.

  “Have I?”

  He nodded. “What brings you back here?”

  I shrugged. I got to thinking how bad it would have been with him on my tail if Leda hadn’t notified the sanitarium. He would have enjoyed plucking me up.

  “Yeah, I reckon so. I knew you was in town, all right. Word gets around fast. You know that, too, hey?”

  “Yes.”

  “Sorry about your mother, Eric. A good woman.” His eyes narrowed and he started to say something, but thought better of it. “Word gets around mighty fast.”

  “It’s been good seeing you,” I said.

  “Sure. Your brother’s doing great, isn’t he?”

  “Looks like it.”

  “Sure. He married up with a fine girl, there. She’s sure a looker. I keep telling Frank he should watch his step, though. Playing a mite too close to his vest for real comfort. The Hewitt boys—you remember the Hewitts?”

  I nodded. We were standing in front of the First National Bank. Down the street a block on the other side the large neon sign spelled out the name FRANKLIN GARTH in red letters against a white-and-blue background—literally spelled the name out, then flashed it all once, then spelled it again. The sign seemed to monitor the whole street.

  “Old man Hewitt died a couple months ago. The boys are down on Frank. Airy one of ’em wouldn’t check himself to crack down on Frank with a Winchester.”

  “Oh?”

  Burkette began to pick at a front tooth. “’At’s right. They say Frank sold ’em short. They lost their farm. Your brother owns it now. Legal. Frank sure’s no Garth from the neck up. I mean—” he hastened to add, “so far’s business is concerned. Plumb legal. A smart one. He better stay off the back roads, though.” Burkette grimaced.

  “Probably no real danger,” I said.

  “Probably.” His black-button eyes snapped. “You bust his nose today, Eric?”

  “It’s been good seeing you, Clyde.” I shoved on by. He stood there nodding and picking his teeth.

  Word did get around fast and Burkette didn’t like me. It still made no difference. I went on around the corner and crossed the street to a second-hand car lot.

  The owner was just locking up as I walked in. I didn’t care much what kind of a car it was so long as it ran. My top price was low. But I needed the car.

  I came away twenty minutes later driving a beat-up Ford. When the owner realized who I was he wanted to sell me the whole lot. But that would’ve been trading on Frank’s name. The car’s engine had been souped up so there was plenty of speed, but I figured one more rattle and it’d fall apart in the street.

  So it was all over town that I’d come home and caused my mother to die of a heart attack, then broken my brother’s nose. By now there were doubtless many additions to this tale. Among them Frank’s word that he had managed to deal his rummy brother out of the business he’d built up. I could visualize Frank exclaiming how I’d returned to collect now that he’d put the business on its feet.

  It smelled.

  The barn was dark when I drove the car up behind it. I’d had the feeling Norma might relent and return. She’d gone off in a huff and I didn’t like it. Maybe she wasn’t alone. Maybe today had cracked the case in more ways than one.

  I went into the kitchen, remembered that I’d forgotten to check with the light company about turning on the electricity. I had used to work here all the time, hardly ever going near the house toward the end. I found a candle and lit that, took it with me into the studio. I stood the candle on an empty stand and heard a sound from the old couch.

  “Hello, darling. I told you I’d be back.”

  Leda was lying on the battered couch, her eyes shining in the candlelight and she wore a dress now, bright green with a sheen, and black, high-heeled pumps. Prepared for the execution. She had her legs on the couch with her head propped beneath her arms. She was smiling.

  “Did you see Lenny again?” I said.

  “Lenny? No. I’ve been here about twenty minutes. He wasn’t around here, darling.”

  I didn’t ask about Norma. If Norma had seen Leda come here there was no telling if she’d ever speak to me again. Norma had a dark and specific imagination.

  “Did you drive?” I said.

  “My car’s parked over in the bushes.”

  It was all twisted up inside me. I hadn’t been able to straighten any of my thinking yet. Too many things had happened. Because of my mother’s death I hated to admit it even to myself, but all I could think of was Leda.

  “You ca
n’t hang around here,” I said. It amazed me to be able to say these things, act this way, when I wanted her more than anything in the world. When one look at her set the blood pounding with memory because I was hungry for her; impatient for the fierce unrestrained loving I knew now was mine. “You can’t stay,” I said again.

  “Can’t I?” She lifted her arms, ran her palms down over the thrusting mounds of her breasts, softly down across her hips and thighs. “Afraid of your brother? Afraid to take what’s yours?”

  I couldn’t answer. The dress fitted her like a tight filmy sheath and desire was in her eyes.

  “If you aren’t afraid of your brother, you should be. He’s concocting some fine stories, just fine.” She paused, and I hated Frank just a little more. “Come here, Eric. I’ve waited and waited—” Two women today had waited, but this one was fire. She went on, “I can’t stand it. I won’t stand it any longer, I wasn’t made to.” She sat up, swung her feet to the floor. The tight, thin skirt hissed up over her knees and her smile was warm and sly. She rose slowly and started toward me. As she passed the stand with the candle on it, she blew out the light. For a moment the room seemed dark, then bright stars and moonlight came down through the skylight and she was against me, her body warm, pliant, her breath loud.

  Inadvertently my arms went around her, there was nothing I could do, and her body pushed against me almost angrily. She wore nothing beneath that dress and the expensive weave of the cloth slid softly against her warm curves. Her breasts were full against me, and her mouth sought mine.

  Everything went mad. All of the pent-up longing of both of us was drowned in a fury of caresses.

  Feeling her was like touching a living flame.

  It was wild crazy loving and she said things only I would ever hear and half-recall as we tumbled headlong and viciously up through blackness into the star-studded night.

  “It’s funny, now, isn’t it, Eric?” she said. “All that to-do? I told you I’d be back.”

  We were still lying on the couch, staring up through the skylight at the night and I wouldn’t see anything funny. She was still my brother’s wife, even if she was my woman. And I was helpless with her around; I couldn’t fight, couldn’t do anything save what she wanted.

  And Leda had changed. Here within the past few hours I’d seen a side of her I’d never seen before. She had changed, or she had been holding out on a part of her personality before. This new part was a bit wrong, a little cock-eyed somehow.

  “I love you so much it makes me nuts inside,” she told me. “I haven’t known what to do.”

  “You did well enough.” She had swung everything her way again. She had me hanging there again, like always, and there was nothing I could do about it. Maybe nothing I wanted to do. But I knew I did have to do something because it couldn’t go on this way.

  Up against the wall by the doorway leading into the kitchen was a rack of different sized wooden mallets. I wondered when I’d ever get to use them, then felt a stab of anxiousness because that was the rack where the wooden mallet came from. The one . . .

  Leda saw where I was looking and answered a thought.

  “You can do me in stone,” she said. “In marble. You always said you would.” She was excited. Sitting up, she leaned over me, watching my face. “You will, won’t you? Look,” she said. “It would be a good excuse.”

  “For what?”

  “For my being here, damn it. Can’t you see? Nobody could say anything, then. After all, you are Frank’s brother, and all.”

  “That helps a lot.”

  “Well, so people talk. So what?”

  “So, nothing. I’ll see.”

  “Say you will!” There was something desperate in her voice.

  “Why don’t you get a divorce? Then we could—”

  She interrupted, ignoring what I’d said. “Would you do me in clay first?”

  I watched her, not speaking.

  She grabbed my face with both hands. “Would you? Answer me.”

  “Yes. All right.”

  She sighed. “I knew you would, darling. It’s perfect. You can start right now.”

  “It isn’t that easy. You know that, Leda. There’s a lot of preparatory work.” She had most certainly changed. Too, something of her old self was gone. “Besides,” I said, “The marble would have to wait a long while.”

  “Why, silly? I have money. I’ll get the marble.”

  That shut me up again. She was taking all of this as a joke and I didn’t know how to take anything, any more. I felt ill at ease and sick inside.

  She was a beautiful, demanding woman. Maybe too demanding. She was blind to everything but her own selfish desires, as the old Leda hadn’t always been. Yet I loved her and wanted her for my own. Again I realized what a lousy mixed-up life mine was, how uneasy my mind was, and how peace seemed to be leaving me forever.

  I should have been happy as you are after you’ve been with the woman you really love, and peace should have been there with us, and there should have been no feeling of aloneness. But there was no peace and the antagonism was there because something was missing. But what? I didn’t know.

  I kept remembering, too, the hit-and-run; the accident that had been called off. And there had been none, not with me involved. Yet, my name had been used. A description had been given of my car . . . too many things had happened.

  Then I got to thinking about Leda again. How maybe if I did model her in clay and finally in stone, maybe then I’d find what I was looking for. Maybe it would solve some of the riddle. Peace might be there, waiting, because the work was inside me, too, aching to come out. It hadn’t come out for a long while. Maybe that’s what was the matter.

  “Kiss me,” Leda said.

  I did and it didn’t solve a thing. I had started to dress when the door opened.

  “Eric? You in there?”

  Norma stood in the doorway. I know now that if I’d stayed on the couch she might not have seen us, I might have been able to silence Leda in time. But as it was, Norma looked straight at me and Leda and said, “What is this?”

  Norma stared at Leda in the half darkness. Leda didn’t move her position on the couch. The whole thing was sickeningly obvious. Norma wore a black bathing suit and carried a towel over her shoulder.

  “Get out of here!” Leda said loudly. She sat up on the couch, looked at me. “Eric, get her out of here!”

  “I’m sorry,” Norma said. I couldn’t see her expression very well. Maybe it was a good thing. She left hurriedly, slammed the door.

  Leda was on her feet. “And that’s Norma.”

  “Yes. So what?”

  “My, God, Eric. Do I have to slit her throat?”

  “Don’t speak so loud.”

  “I’ll shout if I like,” she said. “What was she doing here?” She came toward me, her naked body gleaming in the moonlight, her hair in wild disarray. “This is fine,” she went on. “Just fine.”

  I tried to take her in my arms. She twisted free.

  “Stop it,” I told her. “You said you knew about her. Probably just stopped in. Probably.”

  She seemed to calm down, then, and commenced dressing. But she didn’t talk much after that and although she kissed me good-bye with fervor, I thought she acted a bit peculiar.

  Which wasn’t, after all, very odd.

  “Well, it’s really done, now, isn’t it?” Norma was standing in the kitchen as I re-entered the barn. She’d lit two candles and stuck them on a shelf up beside the stove. The cold chops were still in the pan on the stove. Norma was still in the black bathing suit and she was a striking looking woman, but the expression on her face was sad.

  “Nothing’s done,” I said. “What do you mean?”

  “You know what I mean.” She walked over to a chair and sat down, crossing her legs. The night was quite warm and there were sparkles of water in her blonde hair. She’d been swimming.

  “I thought I’d be mad,” she said. “But I’m not, really. Somehow
I’m just sorry for you.”

  “Well, don’t be sorry for me. What reason have you to be sorry for me? And if you mean Leda, never mind getting your back up. She’s—”

  “That’s what I said.” She lifted the towel off the back of the chair and drew it around her shoulders. “I’ll be leaving,” she went on. “Today was a sort of big good-bye, wasn’t it?”

  “Damn it, Norma!” Things were reaching the stage where I wasn’t even sure of a move from one moment to the next.

  “Okay,” she said. “Damn it.” She rose, went into the other room, then came back to the kitchen and walked to the door. She looked at me for a long moment. “You’re a good guy, basically,” she said. “But the breaks are against you.” She opened the door. “I’ll be seeing you,” she said, and the door slammed.

  “Norma,” I called. “For God’s sake!”

  The door opened again. She stood there quietly, with the towel over her shoulders. “It was a long wait. I was a fool to have been sure of some things. Good-bye, Eric,” she said. “Thanks for the ride.”

  Chapter 15

  I saw nothing of Frank until the day of the funeral. Quite a few townspeople were at the cemetery and though they spoke to Frank with the usual undertones and whispers, they did little else than nod to me. I didn’t mind that, either. I was thinking of Mother and how she had come to her grave. I tried not to think Frank’s blundering had caused her death, but I couldn’t keep the thought from my mind. Several people stared at me openly and whispered behind handkerchiefs, or wrists.

  After the service, I started toward the car. Quick footsteps approached behind me. Frank called, “Wait up, Eric.”

  I turned. He wore a dark suit, black tie, black shoes. His eyes were puffy and there was adhesive over his nose. But the contempt was in his eyes.

  “Get in your car,” he said. “I want a word with you.”