Lights Out

by Peter Abrahams

  She came nearer. “From anywhere.” She was close enough to touch him. She did, resting her fingertips on the side of his face. Behind her, the sun sank into the sea, filling the room with garish light. There was even a flash of green.

  Eddie thought: What does she want? Jack? The money? Evidence to tie him to Messer, El Rojo?

  Those were important questions, but Karen’s breasts pressed against him, and her tongue was searching out his, and his mind refused to deal with questions, refused to acknowledge them, threatened to forget them entirely. He let the backpack slip off his shoulders. It fell on the floor and he put his arms around her. She moaned.

  Soon they were on the four-poster bed, inside the mosquito-net cocoon. Outside the netting bloomed the last rays of the sun, lighting all the words of love in pulses of wild color. Inside Karen moaned and didn’t stop. Eddie lost himself in her sounds, her rhythms, her smells. Pressure built inside him, built and built, passed the point of explosion, kept building, demanding his all, forcing him to abandon self-consciousness, self-control, self-defense. She called his name. Not Nails, his prison name, his animal name, but Eddie; him. At that moment he would have done anything she wanted, but all she wanted was to call his name.

  Darkness fell.

  Some time later a breeze sprang up, blew through the hippie house, stirred the mosquito net. “Jack’s dead,” Eddie said.

  There was no answer. Karen was asleep. He felt her beside him, still hot, damp with sweat.

  Her body cooled. The sweat dried. Eddie got up, went to the window, saw the lights of the cruiser, yellow and white, glowing in the air, sparkling on the water. Two other lights, much duller, one red, one green, separated themselves from the cruiser, grew bigger and brighter.

  Eddie returned to the bed, lay down. Karen rolled over, her arm falling heavily across his chest. He liked the feel of it. The night made soothing sounds-insect sounds, bird sounds, wave sounds. Soon he was sleeping too.

  Something crashed. Eddie sat up, not sure if he had heard a noise or dreamed it. Karen’s arm slipped off his chest. She made a sighing sound and lay still. Eddie listened, heard nothing. His mind, still half asleep, offered a dreamy explanation from the two known elements, toad and wine bottle. He almost accepted it.

  Eddie drew back the mosquito netting and rose quietly, without disturbing Karen. There was moonlight, enough to differentiate the shadows. Eddie entered the square shadow that marked the top of the stairs, went down. The last footboard creaked beneath him. The moon shone through the window on his face.

  There were more shadows in the living room. One was bigger than the rest. The big shadow moved, eclipsing the moon. A man spoke.

  “Surprise.”

  Jack.

  33

  A surprise? Not really.

  Eddie had buried deep in his subconscious the idea that Jack might have survived, too deep for his thoughts to reach, but not deep enough to keep it from giving off a faint miasma of anxiety, anxiety that had stayed with him all the way to Saint Amour. Now unfettered it ballooned inside him. He had abandoned not a dead body but his brother, bleeding on the chicken-farm road.

  “Say something, bro.”

  A horrible betrayal. But since that night on the chicken-farm road, he had learned what Jack had done to him. That was the first complicating factor. The second was that Jack couldn’t have survived alone, couldn’t have gotten away by himself: who had helped him? The third complicating factor was Karen, sleeping upstairs.

  “Eddie? You awake?”

  “Yeah,” Eddie said in a low voice. “I’m awake.”

  “Got a babe upstairs? The jitney boy said something about that.”

  “She’s gone,” Eddie said, moving toward the screened porch. He saw the overgrown lawn, trees, more shadows. They could have been the normal shadows of night. Out on the water, the lights of the cruiser still shone. El Liberador. His real name is Simon, after the Liberator.

  Eddie went into the kitchen, looked out the door. There was a shadow in the front seat of Karen’s car.

  “Gave me up for dead, didn’t you?” Jack said, following him. “But I’m a tough old nut. They fixed me up real good.”

  “Who is they?”

  A geometry problem, as on the chicken-farm road: Jack down here, Karen upstairs, something else outside. This one he couldn’t solve.

  “The doc, of course,” Jack said.

  “What doc?”

  “It was just superficial. Lots of blood, but once they stopped it I was fine.” Jack’s voice broke, as though he was about to sob.

  Eddie went past him, to the foot of the stairs.

  “Where’re you going?”

  “Getting my stuff,” Eddie said.

  “Why?”

  Without replying, Eddie climbed the stairs, opened the netting, leaned in. His lips touched Karen’s ear. “Karen,” he said, barely mouthing the words: “Don’t speak. Don’t move until you hear noise. Then climb out the window and run.”

  Karen lay still, but he sensed the sudden tension in her body, knew she was awake.

  Eddie picked up the backpack, started down. Jack was waiting at the bottom. He wore something white around his neck.

  “Wouldn’t have a gun in there?” he said. Eddie brushed past him. “You don’t seem happy to see me,” Jack said. “I’m happy you’re alive. But it gives you the chance to do it to me again, doesn’t it, Jack?”

  “Do what?”

  “Your seven-and-a-half-percent trick.” Pause. “You lost me.”

  “You can stop lying to me now,” Eddie said. “I’ve talked to a few people-JFK and the detective, Brice. I know everything. I just don’t know how you could have done it.”

  Eddie stepped onto the screened-in porch. A massive, silver-edged cloud slid over the moon, darkening the night. The wind was rising. He picked up the rusted kettle barbecue. There wasn’t going to be a better moment.

  Jack came closer. “Don’t be like this, bro. I was just a kid. I got scared. I panicked.”

  Panic. That had been Mandy’s excuse. Did panic justify anything that came after? Eddie turned on him. “What about Switzerland?” His voice shook.

  “Switzerland?” But Jack knew what he meant.

  “You weren’t a kid then.”

  Jack was silent. There was just enough light to illuminate his teeth and the bandage around his neck.

  “But that’s history now,” Eddie said. “What’s your reason this time?”

  “This time?”

  Something thumped outside. It could have been another coconut falling; it could have been someone stubbing his toe. Eddie said: “And don’t call me bro.” Then he hurled the barbecue through the screen and dove out after it, the backpack in his hand.

  He hit the ground hard, lost his grip on the backpack, lay there for a moment waiting for the sound of gunfire, running men, clubs swishing through the air at his head. All he heard was his own heart, beating against the earth. He got up, shouldered the pack, and started running.

  Eddie ran away from the house, away from the lane. He came to the edge of the bluff, saw the road, a faint charcoal strip in the blackness below. No lights shone on the water. That didn’t mean El Liberador was gone. Eddie turned and crawled feet first over the edge.

  The bluff was steep but not sheer; Eddie found tree roots and toeholds in its face. He could hear nothing but the wind, blowing harder now, and the falling pebbles he dislodged. No gunfire, no shouting, no running men. Maybe he was wrong, maybe Jack had escaped somehow and come to the island by himself, and El Liberador was just a businessman’s pleasure boat. He was beginning to consider going back when he heard a woman scream, somewhere above.

  Eddie lost his grip on the face of the bluff, fell ten or fifteen feet to the road. He got up, took a first running step in the direction of the lane that led back up to the house. Just one step: then a light glared in his eyes, blinding him, and a heavy collar landed on his shoulders. He ripped off the backpack, swung it toward the light
, hit nothing. The collar tightened around his neck, hard and itchy, tightened and tightened more. He dropped the pack, clawed at the rope cutting off his air. He could do nothing.

  A voice spoke. “Be very careful with this one.” Eddie knew that voice, a cultured voice that reminded him of maple syrup.

  “Believe me, I know,” said another voice. Senor Paz. The rope tightened more around Eddie’s neck.

  The first man laughed. There was nothing cultured about that sound, harsh and crowlike: El Rojo’s laugh. Be seeing you. A joke after all; too late, Eddie got it.

  He lay on his back in wet sand. He could feel it in his hair, feel windblown grains against his face. Jack was crying. “You promised I could go. You gave your word.”

  No one answered him. Eddie couldn’t see. He realized his eyes were closed, and opened them.

  Flashlight beams shone at different angles in the night. Eddie caught glimpses of men standing above him: several big olive-skinned ones he didn’t know; Paz, holding the rope; El Rojo, wearing the backpack; Jack, with tears on his face.

  “Where the hell is Julio?” Paz said to one of the olive-skinned men.

  The man pointed to the bluff.

  Karen was up there somewhere. Eddie started to rise.

  “Jesus,” said Paz, “he’s come to already.” The rope tightened around Eddie’s neck, then jerked him back down, flat on the sand.

  “You don’t have to do that,” Jack said.

  No one answered him. The rope remained tight around Eddie’s neck. Jack moved closer, loomed over him, looked down. A light shone on his face, exposing every line, making him look much older, old enough to be Eddie’s father.

  “Brought them to our little island, Jack?”

  Tears filled Jack’s eyes, overflowed them. “They made me.”

  “You get to keep the money, is that it?”

  “Money? They cut off my balls, Eddie.” His voice broke again; this time he couldn’t hold the sob inside.

  “For Christ’s sake,” Eddie said. “They were just trying to scare you. It’s a computer trick, like at the nightclub.”

  El Rojo stepped onto the beam of light. “Computer trick?” he said. “Show him.”

  Jack pulled down his pants. A bloody bandage covered the flatness where his scrotum had been.

  A killing urge flooded through Eddie, raw and animal. He rose again, grabbing at El Rojo’s legs. Paz yanked him back down. Then El Rojo came forward and placed his foot on Eddie’s face, slowly increasing the amount of weight he made Eddie take.

  “Would a computer trick be adequate punishment for murder and armed robbery?” he said. “You know the way punishment works, Nails. That’s one of the things I liked about you, why I offered my friendship.” He leaned harder on Eddie’s face. “You repaid me by scheming, robbing, killing.”

  “That was bad,” said Paz.

  “But not the worst.”

  “No.”

  “The worst was what you did to my little boy. He has dreams about you, every night. He thinks you’re in the closet and wakes up screaming. How can I forgive that?” He peered down at Eddie. “How?” Eddie didn’t make a sound. El Rojo lifted his foot from Eddie’s face. “Answer.”

  “He belongs in a nightmare,” Eddie said.

  El Rojo’s features-eyes, nostrils, mouth-all seemed to expand at once, replacing his civilized look with something wilder. He stomped back down on Eddie’s face.

  “What are we going to do about poor Gaucho?” he said, grinding his heel as though to put out a stubborn little fire.

  “Devise a program of therapy for him,” Paz said.

  El Rojo smiled, revealing the blank where his canine had been. The wild look faded.

  “We’ll have to take him with us for that,” Paz said.

  “We’ll take both of them,” El Rojo said. He raised his foot from Eddie’s face. Eddie, finding he couldn’t breathe through his nose, opened his mouth. Blood trickled in.

  “You promised I could go free,” Jack said.

  No one answered him.

  “You gave your word.”

  Eddie spat out some blood and said: “Shut up, Jack.”

  El Rojo nodded. “Hombre,” he said to Eddie, “explain to your brother here that it’s simply a matter of protecting my business reputation, like filing a suit.”

  “Tell him yourself,” Eddie said.

  El Rojo laughed his crow laugh. “I feel wonderful.”

  Julio moved into the circle, wearing his Harvard sweat shirt, holding a gun.

  El Rojo frowned. “What kept you?”

  “Sorry, senor,” he said, unable to restrain a smile. “He had a girlfriend up there. I got to know her a little bit.”

  Eddie kicked out at Julio, striking him in the side of the knee. Julio cried out, lost his balance, fell. Eddie rolled on top of him, got a hand on Julio’s ponytail, a thumb in Julio’s eye. Then the rope dug deep into his neck and something hit his head. He got lost in a fog.

  For a while he was aware of nothing but the wind and the sea, both growing louder. Then Julio was screaming, “I can’t see, I can’t see.”

  Paz said: “Quiet. You’re all right.”

  Julio screamed: “I can’t see.”

  El Rojo said: “Control yourself.”

  Julio went silent. Eddie, still in the fog, saw him glaring down, blood seeping from the corners of his eye, saw Julio’s foot draw back, saw the kick coming, waited. It came. The fog went red.

  The sea was angry. It put on a spiky face and tried to toss the speedboat away. Eddie, sprawled over the transom between two outboards, with the rope around his neck and his face almost in the water, felt the power of the sea. The sea was his friend. It slapped his face, stinging and cold but friendly, driving away the red fog.

  In Spanish, someone shouted, “I don’t see it.”

  “They’ve moved farther out,” El Rojo said, “because of the weather.”

  “I don’t like it,” said the first man. “How will I find the cut in this?”

  “Steer,” said El Rojo.

  A wave lifted the boat high, banged it back down. Eddie fell on something hard-edged. The fuel tank. Hoses dug into his chest.

  The next wave was bigger still. It raised the propellers out of the water and almost threw Eddie overboard. Only the rope around his neck kept him in place. In the weightless moment before the stern dropped back down, he glimpsed two plugs in it, one above the deck line, for drainage, and the other about a foot below, indicating a double hull.

  The boat rose again, swung sideways. The engines stuttered, the props came up, whining in the air, someone heavy fell on Eddie’s back. The rope tightened around his neck. Then the boat crashed down in the trough, the heavy weight slid off, the rope slackened.

  “Where the fuck are they?” said the man at the wheel, raising his voice over the storm.

  “Radio them,” El Rojo replied. “Tell them to turn on the lights and move in.”

  “Liberador, Liberador,” called Paz. “Come in, Liberador.”

  Someone moaned, close by. Jack. “It hurts,” he said, but not loudly. “It hurts.”

  Double hull. That meant an airspace, didn’t it? Eddie reached one hand below the waterline, felt for the bottom plug. Why not? The sea was his friend, and the alternative was being part of Gaucho’s therapy.

  He found the plug. It had a metal-ring handle, snapped tight to the hull. He unsnapped it, pulled. Nothing happened. He tried rotating it, first one way, then another. The ring turned, counterclockwise, releasing tension in the rubber plug, shrinking its volume. It popped out. Eddie let it go.

  A wave tossed the boat up again, and he saw the round hole in the stern. Then came the fall into the trough, and the hole sank from view.

  “Lights at two o’clock,” shouted Paz.

  “Those?” said another. “So far?”

  “Steer,” said El Rojo.

  “It hurts,” said Jack, close by.

  Eddie lay slumped over the transom, waiti
ng for the hull space to fill with water, waiting for the boat to turn heavy and sluggish, to go down. But the boat didn’t turn heavy and sluggish; it pounded on, into the waves. Why? Some time passed before Eddie figured it out, time that took them farther out. It was simple: forward motion kept water from entering the hole. Forward motion would have to be stopped.

  Eddie felt for the fuel hose under his chest, ran his hand along it to the coupling with the starboard engine, saw that a second hose connected the starboard engine to the port. The sole feeder of fuel was the hose that ran from the tank, under his chest, to the starboard engine. Eddie reached for the coupling, unsnapped it, and hung the hose over the stern.

  The engines roared on. Maybe he had miscalculated, maybe there were factors he knew nothing about. He pushed himself up on hands and knees, and had his hand on the clamps that fastened the starboard engine to the hull, when both engines coughed and died.

  There was a moment of quiet. Then sound poured in: the sea, the wind, raised voices from the cockpit. Eddie turned, saw a wave looming over the bow, saw El Rojo, Paz, Julio, and the olive-skinned men, all gazing at the engines, saw Jack sitting doubled up, his back to the hull, saw that the other end of the rope around his neck was tied to a cleat.

  The front slope of the wave raised the boat high; the back slope crashed it down. This time cold water swept over the transom, and the stern swung heavily in the wash.

  El Rojo said: “Julio.”

  Julio made his way to the stern.

  “We’re sinking,” cried a man in the cockpit.

  “Silence,” said El Rojo.

  Water ran across the deck. Julio slipped in it as he reached the stern. He rose, kicked Eddie out of the way, examined the engines.

  “The fucking hose,” he said. He looked down at Eddie. The boat rose, fell, crashed, settled lower in the water. “I can’t swim,” Julio yelled to no one in particular. He seized the hose.

  Eddie got to his feet. “Anyone can learn to swim,” he said. He lifted up the fuel tank, raised it high over his head, and heaved it overboard. One corner of it caught Julio on the shoulder. He lost his balance, slipped again on the watery deck, now ankle-deep, and fell backward over the transom, sinking out of sight in the black water.