A Line in the Sand

by Gerald Seymour

  He had not told her that the option was withdrawn, no longer existed. Perry said it again in her ear as he held her.

  "It cannot happen again."

  "Because if anything else happened..."

  "It won't, it can't."

  "Anything... Gussie was the loudest. Gussie was the one drinking fastest, talking the biggest talk.

  More pints of strong beer were passed across the bar by

  Martindale. Two hours they'd been going, and the talk was in the drink. His wife, the timid Dorothy Martindale, had called him back from the bar, into the doorway. Why did he allow the swearing, cursing, drink-talk? Because without these people they'd be at the wall, tramping to the bankruptcy hearing, that was why. She'd gone back upstairs to the flat over the bar.

  The till rang again. They were the only customers he'd have in that night: everyone else was in the hall.

  Vince said, "What I'm reckoning, if the bastard's still here when summer comes, the season starts, we can kiss goodbye to visitors."

  Gussie capped him.

  "No bloody visitors. No money. Need the visitors."

  Donna said, "Something's got to be done, some bugger's got to have the balls to do something."

  It was all the custom he had, and all he was likely to have if the visitors stayed away because armed police were combing the village. Who'd let kids run round? Who'd sit on the green with a picnic or go walking on the beach? Most important, who'd sit on the bench outside the pub with a warm pint and crisps for the kids? Who'd be there if the village, when the season came, was a gun camp? He'd be finished if there were no visitors, and the others with him.

  Gussie shouted, "They got to know they're not wanted, got to know it straight and they're going to."

  Vince wanted a plate of chips.

  Martindale left the bar and went upstairs to ask his wife to make a plate of chips. He could charge a pound for a plate of chips. He apologized to her, but they needed each pound going into the till. He'd told her, when they'd started in the pub, that it would be a money trail, and now he was grateful for the money earned by a plate of chips. He went back down to the bar and Gussie wasn't there. He thought Gussie had gone to piss, and his glass, half full, was on the bar counter. He seemed not to hear the complaining whine across the bar. The bank's letter was in his mind, and the letter from the brewery that stated he was under-performing.

  Martindale saw Gussie through the front window, crossing the car-park and weaving. He was carrying a light plank, one of those the builders had left when he'd said he couldn't afford for them to complete the work on the outside lavatories. Martindale watched him lurching away into the darkness, beyond the reach of the lights, the plank on his shoulder.

  He held her. Meryl had his promise, and the tension of her muscles ebbed. She lay soft against him. He heard the brief triple ring of the bell, then Blake's voice and Davies's wishing him a good night. Davies said, Frank heard it, that the 'bloody place was quiet as a grave'. He heard Blake settle in the dining room, and check the machine-gun they shared. If he hadn't given his promise, she would have taken down the suitcase from the top of the wardrobe, and left.

  He had been stifled in the house. Ahead of him was a meal alone in a pub, then the suffocation of the room in the bed-and-breakfast.

  Bill Davies walked past his car. He had to think, had to be alone. There was no escape from the need to call home. There were enough of them gossiping in his section for him to know the talk of a marriage going down. Some said that, actually, they felt the better for it when it was over. A few said, in a bar with drink, that when it was over the loneliest time in their lives began. He had to steel himself to talk with Lily in the hope that she would let him chat to Donald and Brian. It would probably be like the last time, silences and refusal, then the challenge as to when he was coming home, to which he had no answer, then the purr of the cut call. He had to think, had to walk, had to know what he would say.

  The rain lashed down.

  The road in front of him, towards the hall's lights and the pub's bright windows, was empty.

  There was a shadow of movement at the side of the road, beyond the throw of the lights from the hail and he thought it would be one of the old idiots who took their dogs out, sunshine or rain, and was sheltering against a tree or a hedge.

  He wrapped his heavy coat closer round him. His shoes and the trousers at his ankles were already soaked.

  He would say, "I love you. I love my boy's, our boys. I want to be with you. I want to share my life with you... I am a policeman, I carry a Glock pistol, I protect people who are under threat... I cannot change. I can't go back to chasing thieves, seeing kids across roads. I have to live with it, you have to live with it. Living with it, Lily, is better for both of us than splitting. Splitting is death. Death for me, death for you, death for Donald and Brian. Anything is better than us meeting on the doorstep on Saturday mornings, if I'm not working, and you looking at me like I'm dirt, and letting the kids out with me for four hours, a football match and a McDonald's. Give it another chance..."

  The words jangled in his mind, and he was so tired. He had been sitting for twelve hours in the dining room of the house with his flask of coffee and his sandwiches, with his Glock and his machine-gun, with his newspaper, and listening to them. He was trying to put Lily forefront in his mind, and his boys and they were second best to Meryl Perry. Lily wouldn't understand about Meryl Perry, wouldn't... The shot blasted out.

  He froze. There was no pain, no numbness and he was standing. The shot had missed.

  He spun but they didn't do pitch-darkness practice at Lippitts Hill. They did daytime firing or were under the arc-lights in the shooting gallery.

  He was reaching under the heavy coat, under his jacket, for the Glock. He had it out of the holster. He was turning, aiming into the blackness in front of him.

  He was screaming for control, for dominance.

  "Armed police! Throw your weapon down! Show yourself!"

  But he was in the light, and the rain was in his eyes, and couldn't see a target. If there had been anything to aim at he would have fired, not shouted. Finger on the trigger guard, like they taught -where was the bastard?

  "Get forward, to me, crawl, or I shoot I fucking shoot. Weapon first, then you! Move."

  Bill Davies had never had his gun out before, never drawn it for real. Now he saw the movement... His finger slipped from the guard to the trigger. Not simunition in Hogan's Alley, not on the range. His finger locked on the trigger, and he began to squeeze. He blinked, tried to focus on the aim into the darkness.

  A plank fell towards him, bounced twice, and came to rest at his feet. There was a whimpering in front of him, and an identifiable movement. He had the aim on it, and his finger was tightening.

  "Come out! Come out or I shoot!" Davies bellowed at the blackness.

  The shadow came, with it a whining cry. The young man crawled on his knees and elbows towards the light.

  Davies knew it was over. He had been so shit scared and it made him angry. He saw the slack mouth of the young man and the terror in his eyes. He had seen him in the pub. They used planks in Ireland kids and women used to stand in darkness, put their weight on a plank end, wait for a patrol to pass then heave up the other end of it to let it smash down on tarmac or paving, its sound the replica of a bullet firing. They did it to wind up the soldiers. It was sport. He had been at the edge of firing... It was unnecessary but he caught the collar of the young man and dragged him across the road, out into the street-light. He threw him flat on his stomach, drove the barrel of the Glock into his neck, put a knee into the small of his back and, one-handed, frisked him. He could smell old beer and new piss. He had been at the edge of killing a drunk who'd played a game. He stood high over him and used his foot to turn him over. He saw the big stain where the young man had wet himself and the scratches on his face from being dragged over the road surface. The man made little noises of terror, and Davies realized he still covered him with the
gun.

  He shouldn't have, but he kicked the young man hard in the wall of the stomach.

  "Go on, get back to your mammy. Tell your mammy why you pissed your trousers. Ever try it again, you're dead."

  The young man scrambled to his knees, then to his feet, then lurched away sobbing. Davies watched him as he ran towards the hall and the pub's lit windows.

  He walked back to his car outside the house and slumped in the seat. He didn't know why he hadn't made the final squeeze on the trigger that would have killed the kid, and his whole body shook. He knew he would make no phone call that night.

  '... wildlife is a jewel we are fortunate to see. The brightest of the jewels, making the incredible journey to a~d from west Africa each year, coming back to us, to our place, each spring, is the marsh harrier. We are a privileged people. Thank you."

  The applause burst around Dr. Julian Marks. The lights came on.

  They had all heard the shouting in the road, had all turned in the half-light under the projector's beam, looked at the door and seen Paul slip busily out. Barry Carstairs, attention elsewhere, led the applause. He was about to offer their thanks to the speaker when the swing doors burst back open.

  The silence fell, Paul shouted, "It's Gussie, the police nearly shot him. It was the detective at the Perrys' he had his gun on him, and then he kicked him to shit. I thought he was going to shoot him. Christ, we all know Gussie, he's hardly Brain of Britain, but he was damn near killed!"

  There was a stampede to the door. The crowd surged past Simon and Luisa Blackmore and out into the night. Many were in time to see Gussie staggering across the brightly lit forecourt of the pub.

  Jerry Wroughton said, the rain running on his face, "This nonsense has gone far enough."

  Forgetting her reservations of the previous morning, Emma Carstairs said, "It's time somebody did something."

  Martindale saw him first and dropped the glass he was drying. Vince turned on his stool.

  Gussie stood in the doorway, gasping for breath. His hair was plastered down on his forehead and his eyes showed stark terror, his face laced with bloody scratches. They could all see the dark patch at the crotch of his jeans, and the rips at the knees. None of them laughed.

  Gussie stammered, "He was going to kill me the man at the Perrys', the cop, he had his gun on me. I was only joking him, but he was going to shoot me. I thought I was dead, and he kicked me. I wasn't doing anything, it was a bloody joke."

  Vince stood his full height. The drink gave him the stature and the courage.

  "Don't know about you lot but I don't think those bastards have got the message. Myself, I'm going to see they get it. It's time the shits were gone..."

  When the first rock hit the window, Meryl woke. Half conscious, she heard the cheer. She groped for Frank in the darkness beside her, but he wasn't there.

  There was another crack of breaking glass and another cheer. She pushed herself off the bed, and heard Frank's voice, frantic, calling for Stephen, and the rush of feet through the kitchen below her, and into the hall. He'd promised her, she'd had Frank's promise.

  She went to the top of the stairs. The bell rang, three bleats. Blake had a vest on, the gun drawn. Paget was in front of him. Paget did the door and Blake covered him. As it was opened, she heard the shouting, the obscenities, heard her name and Frank's, clearly. Davies squeezed through the half-opened door, and Paget slammed it behind him. More rocks, maybe half-bricks, and perhaps an empty metal dustbin, clattered against the door.

  She was at the top of the stairs and they had not seen her.

  Blake yelled, "What the fuck is going on here?"

  Davies was leaning against the hall wall and the water dribbled from his coat on to the paper.

  "It's about a bloody moron."

  "What's half the flicking village got to do with a bloody moron?"

  "I was walking. The bloody moron did me with a plank I thought it was a shot. I bloody near fired. Christ, I had him in my sights. He was just drunk. I roughed him. If it's not happened to you then you wouldn't know what it's like. Bloody hell."

  Bill Davies looked up the stairs and saw her. It was as if the panic cleared off his face, and the tiredness; his expression was a mask. He said calmly, as if she'd heard nothing, "Everything's under control, Mrs. Perry. There's been an incident, but it'll be over in a moment. Please stay upstairs, Mrs. Perry."

  "Where's Stephen?"

  "Stephen's with Juliet Seven sorry, with Mr. Perry. Stephen's fine.. . Please, stay upstairs."

  They didn't want to know about her. As far as they were concerned, she was just a woman. She heard the murmur of the voices of Davies, Blake and Paget, and she caught the name Juliet Seven, and the words 'safe area', and mention of 'sector two' and 'sector four'; her man, her home and her garden. There was a window at the front of the landing at the top of the stairs, beside the airing-cupboard door. She peeped past the curtain. A little tableau was laid out below her. For a moment there was quiet, as if they regrouped, reconsidered, as if the fainter hearts ruled. They were all there. On the green, the village~ ids were at the front and behind them were Vince and Gussie and Paul, and others she recognized who worked on the farms or had no work or took the small fishing-boats with visitors and sea-anglerS. Further back, half hugging the shadows, were Barry and Emma Carstairs, Jerry and Mary Wroughton, and Mrs. Fairbrother. Deeper into the shadows, but she could still see them, were Dominic and his partner, and the vicar. She knew them all.

  Paul came from the blackness, holding out the bottom edge of his coat to make a basket. When he loosed it, stones fell to the road.

  The kids scrambled for the stones, snatched them up and hurled them against the walls of the house, and the windows and the door, and the cars parked at the front.

  She saw hatred.

  She had seen such mobs on television flickering, contorted faces from Africa and Asia, and from the corners of eastern Europe, but theirs was an anonymous madness. These faces she knew, and the faces of those who stood back in the shadows and watched.

  There was a flash of light in the far blackness, then the light lit the torso of a youth. She recognized him. He was from the council houses and helped carry ladders for Vince. He held a milk bottle and the cloth stuffed in the bottle's neck was lit. The crowd roared approval. There must have been fifty of them, maybe more. The youth ran forward, past Mrs. Fairbrother and Mr. Hackett, past Dominic, past Emma and Mary, Barry and Jerry, past Paul and Vince, Gussie and Donna, and his arm arched to throw the bottle.

  She heard the pandemonium in the hall below, then the bolt scraping open and the key turning.

  Through the window, she saw Paget go out, crouch, fumble at his belt, then throw his missile. The youth dropped the bottle and turned. It splintered and the conflagration of fire burst where he had been. The gas canister detonated. The wind took the grey-white cloud past the light of the burning petrol and into the black darkness. She heard the choking, the coughing and the screamed protests.

  They had gone, all of them, to the cover of darkness.

  This was not Ireland, or Nairobi, wasn't Guatemala City this was her home.

  The fire guttered, the gas dispersed, shadowy figures moved in the darkness. The two mobile cars were now drawn up to make a barrier in front of the house.

  The argument raged in the hall below her, Frank and Bill Davies in spitting dispute. She was not supposed to hear. Then... Frank propelled Stephen, across the hall and up the stairs, before shrugging into a vest.

  Davies wrenched open the door. She held Stephen and felt the blast of the cold air. She crouched.

  Frank was outside with Davies and Paget. She could not see them. She was down on the floor and clinging to Stephen, holding his head against her and pressing her palms over his ears. He would be on the step, shielded by the bodies of Davies and Paget, protected by their guns and their gas against his friends, her friends.

  He had to shout. To be heard across their low front fence and the grass, hea
rd into the deep shadow, Frank had to shout.

  "It's all right, you fuckers, you can go home. You can go home and be satisfied that you've won as much as you're going to win. I promised Meryl ... Do you all remember Meryl? You should remember Meryl she did enough for you lot. I promised her that nothing more would happen. I was wrong. I had forgotten you, all of you. I can't see you now, any of you, in the dark, but, please, stay and listen. Don't creep away on your stomachs. Don't pretend it didn't happen. You will remember tonight, what you did, for the rest of your lives. If you're still there, if you're listening, then you should know that you have won a little victory. You have broken my promise to Meryl. She'll be going in the morning, and taking Stephen with her. She'll be trying to find somewhere to stay. She'll have to ring round, people she hardly knows, or check into a hotel she's never been to. Everyone she reckoned was her friend is here, soit won't be easy for her to find somewhere. Not me, though, not me... The tears streamed on her cheeks and fell on the hair of her child's head.

  "You're stuck with me. Before tonight, I might just have gone with her, but not now. Your victory is that you've driven out a wonderful, caring woman, and her child. You don't win with me. I'm a proper bastard, your worst fucking nightmare, an obstinate sod. What I did, why there's the threat, I provided the information that killed a busful of men. I was prepared~ to betray a busful of men so, what happens to you is low down on any relevance scale to me. I don't care what happens to you, and I'm staying. Got that? Can you hear me? When you next go to church, put money in charity boxes, when you next volunteer for good works and good causes, think of what you did tonight to Meryl. But, the cruelty doesn't work with me..."

  She could not hold back the tears.

  "You see, you don't frighten me. I'm not frightened of yobs with stones. Where I was, for what I did, if I'd been caught there, I'd have been hanged until dead. That's not a trap under the gallows, and quick, but a rope from an industrial crane, and it's being hoisted up, and it's kicking and strangling and slow. There's not a few drunks watching, not a few cowards, there's twenty thousand people. You understand? Being hanged from a crane frightens me, not you... She lay on the floor beside the door of the airing-cupboard, clutched her boy and squeezed her hands over his ears.