by Peter Israel
“Wait for what?”
“A call-back.”
“What do you mean, a call-back?”
“A telephone call.” He gestures at the phone. “We’re not going anywhere till it comes.”
I start to lose it inside. My stomach has just shriveled up, as though a big fist is grabbing at it.
“Oh?” I get out. “And then where are we going?” No answer. “Who are we waiting for? Who’s supposed to call back?”
I’m trying to keep my voice from trembling. He only shrugs and grins at me. Says I led him a merry chase, that I must be some smart cookie. He suggests again that I pour myself a drink.
I don’t think he’s a cop, although he looks like one.
Somebody’s hired hand.
Guess who.
But I can’t let myself think about that.
I glance around the room for possible weapons. The Scotch bottle, the ice bucket, a lamp. Danny’s plastic bo? Our Gap bags, half-filled with stuff?
Or should I fake outrage, start screaming for help?
Or offer him money? How much would it take? I still have over two thousand bucks in cash, my savings left over from working for Georgia, would that do the trick? After all, how much can a guy like him make, overweight and thinning hair, crummy clothes?
But suppose I offered him the money, what would prevent him from simply pocketing it and keeping us there anyway?
And even if he didn’t, how could he let us go? If he’s waiting for a call-back, doesn’t that mean he’s already made a call? To announce that he’s found us? So how could he let us go?
I can’t concentrate on it. Why did we stay? Why didn’t we just leave? If only we’d left at noon! If only I wasn’t saddled with Justin! But if I wasn’t saddled with Justin, I wouldn’t be here myself, would I? And if I hadn’t run away with Robert A. Smith, I wouldn’t be here either, would I? And if I hadn’t done this, hadn’t done that, or gone or been or done or did, if I myself had never … happened!
It’s over, I think. It’s going to go fast now. By tomorrow, when I wake up, they’ll have given me another shot, a big dosage to welcome me back, and I’ll be all groggy, punchy, dry in the mouth, and everything in between will have been like a dream I dreamt to keep myself from going stark, raving mad.
I won’t! I can’t!
I need a drink. I pour myself a Scotch, hold tight to the bottle, sit on the edge of the bed.
The bastards! The goddamn bastards!
The man—Harry—tells me to put the bottle back. Or better yet, give it to him. Carefully, he says.
I do. He tops off his glass.
“Do you have a gun?”
This is Danny, from the floor. For a second, I’d forgotten all about him.
The man laughs.
“Never mind, Danny,” I tell him.
“Is he a oarlock?” Danny asks me back, from the floor.
I shake my head, willing him to shut up.
“A what?” the man interrupts.
“Never mind,” I answer. Then, thinking better of it, “A warlock.”
“What’s a warlock?”
“I think you’d better ask my brother,” I say.
“Your brother?” The man laughs.
“A man ’itch,” Danny answers.
“A what?”
“A male witch,” I explain. “A warlock is a male witch.”
The man—Harry, if that’s his name—thinks that’s funny too. He says he’s been called a lot of things in his time, but never a male witch.
“Harry the witch,” he says. “What is it again? War …?”
“Oarlock,” Danny answers.
“Well, what do you know? How come you know so much about things like that?”
Danny holds forth about ’itches, oarlocks, and how they have all kinds of special powers, you have to be very careful how you act around them.
The man listens.
“The reason he knows so much about it,” I say, willing Danny into silence, “is that I’m something of one myself.”
“Something of what?”
“A witch.”
“Oh?” He seems uncertain as to whether I’m fooling around with him or not.
“That’s right,” I go on. “Actually my mother really is one. You don’t know her, do you?”
“Your mother? How would I know your mother?”
“No reason you should,” I answer carefully. At least he’s answered one of my questions. “She’s devoted a lifetime to it. I mean, most people laugh at it, but witchcraft’s really a very serious field. I’ve only picked up a few of the spells, here and there.”
“I bet you have,” he says, intrigued.
But the phone interrupts us. Goddamn! He lets it ring a second time, and I start forward, but, shaking his head, he waves me off, picks up the receiver.
He listens.
“Yeah, that’s right, the both of them,” he says. “Yeah, no problem, everything’s quiet and peaceful, we’re just having a little conversation. … Yeah, I won’t, no problem.”
I hear him give the motel’s name and address, followed by road instructions.
Then: “Oh?… Yeah, sure, no problem, hold on.” Then, smiling at me: “He wants to talk to you.”
My body goes stiff.
“Who wants to talk to me?”
“It’s Mr. Smith,” he answers with a grin. “Be nice now,” and he pushes his chair back toward the door, making a passage for me and at the same time blocking my escape.
I take the receiver from him. Goddamn, I’ve gone stiff all over, stiff like a board, hard as rock. I toss my hair back with a jerk.
“Hello?” I say.
“You’ve led us some chase, darling.” His familiar voice. “But now it’s over, thank God. I’m so glad. I hope you are too. I’ve missed you terribly.”
“Where are you, Robert?”
“At the airport.”
“The airport? What airport?”
“Columbus, darling. The minute I heard you’d been found, of course I was on the next plane. I’ll be with you shortly.”
“What do you want?”
“I still need the boy, darling.”
“Why? What are you going to do with him?”
“Nothing. No harm will come to him. I need him, that’s all.” He pauses, just long enough for me to know he’s lying. “But I’ve had a long time to think about us too, dear Becca. I’ve missed you terribly, even more than I imagined I would.”
And even now, I think blindly, you can’t resist playing with me.
“In spite of everything,” he says, “I don’t think it’s too late for us. Once this is over, we can pick up where we left off. We might even go away together, let me show you something of the world.”
He made the same promise the first day, I remember. Together, we were going to wipe out my past and see the world.
“Why don’t you let him go then?” I hear myself ask. “You can have me instead.”
“Oh? And how do you propose we go about that? We can’t just leave him here, can we? In the middle of Ohio?”
“Let me take him home first.”
“Home? Oh no, I’m afraid I couldn’t let you do that, darling. But seriously, I’ve a better idea. Why don’t you let Harry take the boy away right now? You wait for me there alone. I won’t be long. There’ll be just time enough for you to get yourself ready. What do you think? Well?”
But I can’t answer. It’s not in me to say anything.
“Of course, if you tried to leave yourself, I’d have to hunt you down again. But you already know that, so why bother?”
He’s playing with me now, the way he always did, and I’m like a fly struggling feebly in his web. My mouth is clotted, my throat, my brain.
“Well, you decide, darling,” he says. “Either you can all wait for me together, or you send them off and wait alone. Either way, I won’t be long. Now why don’t you put Harry on again, let me explain it to him?”
I hand over t
he phone obediently. It’s over, I think. There’s nothing I can say or do or think that will make any difference. Distantly it comes to me: Hasn’t he just offered me a last chance? Freedom for Becca? Couldn’t I just let them go and then walk out the door myself, get in the car, drive off?
Except I can’t. Couldn’t.
He knows that too.
I glance at Justin. He hasn’t moved. His back is to the wall, his dark eyes focused intensely on me. We’re in it together, sweets, I try to tell him. I got you into this, somehow I’ll get you out. There’s no way I’m going to bug out on you.
The man—Harry—hangs up. He squeezes his bulk out of the chair, stands, stretches. Standing, he seems enormous to me, and his overcoat too small.
“I’m supposed to tell you what he said.”
“Yes?”
“Same as he told you. If I take the kid away, though, I better have your car keys. I guess he doesn’t want his little birdie flying the coop.”
“Did he say that?”
“About your car keys? Yep. That’s what the man said.” He grins at me. “Also said if you give me any trouble, I can do whatever I want to with you.”
The goddamn bastard. He couldn’t resist.
I look at Harry, at Justin on the floor, and then, from somewhere deep inside, I feel the anger flowing. I think: No, it’s not over. I’m not going to let it be over. It’s not over!
I study Harry.
“Would you like that?” I ask him, gazing levelly at him.
“Like what?”
“For me to try something? Give you trouble? So that you can do whatever you want to with me?”
He laughs. He even blushes a little. Says nothing.
“Look,” I say, dropping the challenge from my voice, “why don’t you at least let me make us another drink. How much time do we have till he gets here?”
“I don’t know exactly,” he says. “Three-quarters of an hour, maybe an hour. Depends on the traffic.”
“Plenty of time,” I say, smiling at him.
I watch him hesitate, watch him think on the one hand that he has a job to do, but, on the other …?
Light bulbs in his head.
He stays standing. I walk in front of him, inches away, take the bottle, his glass, cross the room, busy myself with the ice bucket.
I know he’s watching me every step. I let him. Not for nothing am I an evil promiscuous bitch. I work him mercilessly. I work him with my eyes, my hands, the swirl of my hair, the twist of my body. My words, my Scotch. He lets on that he’s been tracking us since the beginning, and, sitting on the edge of the bed, smoothing the bedspread with my palm, I tell him he had no idea how lonely it got for me, night after night after night. I tell him it’s pretty hard to get it off on a three-and-a-half-year-old. He laughs at that. I tell him we have just enough time, that no one need know, Mr. Smith least of all, and what kind of trouble does he want me to make for him?
“What about the kid?” he says hoarsely.
“Don’t worry about him,” I answer, my eyes on Harry. “He’s seen a little bit of everything.” Justin is watching me too, and I will him with my mind: Don’t! It’s only a game, but I don’t want you to look.
“Come on,” I say to Harry finally, “a little witchcraft,” and crisscrossing my arms so that when I lift my sweatshirt over my head, my T-shirt with it, my breasts come up before his eyes.
He takes off his overcoat, takes off his jacket. There’s a small holster underneath, with a gun in it, and a sweater. He takes them off too. A little unsteady. I will Justin not to look. I have a last-minute panic—God help me if I fail!—and I want to shout at Justin to run for it, just get out the door and take off. But Harry is already on me, so fast I’m unprepared, arms reaching, grabbing, so close I can smell his boozy breath. At the last second, I duck his grasp, let fly with my knee. All my force. I feel the give, hear the crack, his humongous gasp.
He falls into me, grabs at me, misses, grabs bedspread instead. But he doesn’t go down. He’s reaching, stumbling, bellowing, and I realize Justin has tackled him around the leg and that he’s trying to kick Justin free. He loses his balance, though. Down he goes. I’m free. I grab the Dewar’s bottle, crack him hard in the face. And again, again when he tries to turn away, a fourth time.
My way! my mind is shouting. I’m ending it my way!
Or maybe I’m shouting it out loud. I have this sense of tremendous noise. Justin is screaming too.
I can’t shut him up. He doesn’t understand. He’s Justin again. Danny is dead.
I take the gun from the holster. Then I grab my clothes, my purse, Justin and his snowsuit, and we’re out of there.
This time we won’t stop for anything. We’re both screaming as I drive into the darkness, skidding and swerving on the slick side roads. Blinding headlights coming the other way.
I blew it, that’s all I can think. I should have waited in the motel with Harry’s gun till he walked in the door. I should have shot him in the stomach in cold blood.
I didn’t. I ran like a scared rabbit. That’s my instinct: when in doubt, run, run away, goddamn. With a head start of what? Fifteen, twenty minutes? I picture him finding Harry, reviving him, questioning him.
I see the Jaguar in my mind.
He may even have planned it, figuring I’d find a way to beat Harry, saving the pleasure of hunting us down himself.
It makes no difference which way we go, north, south, west. I failed. If I let him find us once, he’ll find again. In my panic, I think my only hope is east. There’s an outside chance he won’t expect me to quit.
I can hardly see to drive. We’re going much too fast for the roads, the headlights, and cars keep splattering wet stuff onto the windshield that freezes on contact. Justin is screaming his head off in the backseat, and no matter how fast I drive, he’ll be driving faster.
“Shut up!” I roar over my shoulder. “For Christ’s sakes, Justin, take a chill!”
It only makes him scream louder. I can feel him fighting the car seat, struggling to get free.
I turn on the radio—music, volume up to the top. I roll down the window and sing at the frigid night. I careen off the approach road—finally—and onto the interstate, the white arrow crooking “east,” and roar the skidding Tempo into the darkness.
Still I can’t drown Justin out. He’s totally freaked. I worry that somehow he’ll break loose, fly headfirst into the back of the passenger seat. I slow a little, down to seventy, sixty-five, turn off the radio, try to talk to him.
He won’t listen.
For the first time, I resent him totally, violently. I don’t care if he’s only a child, doesn’t he realize we’re in danger? For God’s sake, can’t he understand we have to keep going?
No, he can’t. Won’t.
A few exits down the interstate, I get off. No headlights behind us. We come onto some dark and winding highway where slicks of icy snow stretch across the surface. Few street lights, no traffic. I drive about a mile, then turn off onto another road and stop alongside a snowbank, switch off the headlights.
At least, I think, it’s scared my cramps away. The old shock treatment. All I feel now are intermittent dull echoes. But the blackness, stopping in the middle of nowhere, hasn’t stopped Justin. I click on the interior light, try to talk to him, but he slams back against his car seat, wrenches at the confining harness. I get out of the car, stumble around through the snow, and pull him free.
I envelop him in my parka for warmth. I squeeze him—no love squeeze. I feel like I have to squeeze some sense into him. Finally, fighting to calm my voice, I subdue him. He sobs and sniffles, and at last I feel his fingers reach into my hair, twisting, pulling, and I hear him sniffing my hair.
Was it the bad man at the motel? I ask him.
He nods against my neck.
Did the man hurt him?
Shakes his head.
Did he think I was going to leave him there?
Nods again.
; “But I didn’t, did I? Thanks to you, Justin, we made it. All we’ve got to do now is keep going.”
Apparently, though, there’s something else. What I expect is: Me had enough, me want to go home, but when he manages to get it out, and when I finally understand him, I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.
He’s hungry. In fact he’s “darving.”
And I’d promised him we’d have dinner at the café.
And didn’t I teach him that, once you make promises, it’s for keeps?
I take a deep breath. I have two choices. Either I can stuff him back in his car seat and he can scream his head off while I think through our next move, or I can try to accommodate him.
Another deep breath.
“Yes, sweetie,” I tell him, “promises are for keeps. You’re absolutely right. But sometimes, in very special circumstances, you have to break promises, even though you don’t want to.”
“Why?”
“Because that was a bad man, at the motel. I think he’s probably still there, waiting in case we come back. So we can’t go to the café.”
“Too dangerous?”
“Too dangerous.”
“But you took his gun, didn’t you?”
“Yes, I did.”
“Is he dead?”
“I don’t know. I don’t think so.”
“Was he really a oarlock?”
“No.”
“And the one on the telephone?”
I hesitate. Then, holding him tight, I say, “There are no warlocks, sweetie. Not really. That’s just pretend. All there are is bad people.”
He seems to take it all right, although when I stuff him back into the car seat, he clutches hard at me, and I have to pull myself free. Then we drive off, back onto the interstate, and I promise him we’ll find a great place down the road for dinner, at least as good as the café, while all along, inside, I’m trying to figure out how I’m going to tell him what’s going to happen next when I don’t know myself.
Except I do know, I think. That’s the trouble.
A few exits farther, when I spot the crossed fork and spoon on the sign, I get us off again.
“Here it is!” I call out over my shoulder.