by Joe McKinney
Crook wasn’t laughing anymore, but hewas smiling. It was a bland, polite smile, utterly blank.
He looked like he was waiting for Robert to come to a point.
“This is your house,” Robert said. “I’m sorry. I’m sitting at your desk.”
“Doesn’t look like my office,” Crook said. Robert stood up. He watched Crook cross the room, mesmerized by the bat twirling in his hands. It was so effortless, so practiced. He’d watched so many ball games where players headed up to the plate with the bat moving like that, with such unconscious grace. He felt like a rabbit watching a snake. Then Crook was standing opposite him, across the desk. He extended the bat and swung it slowly, with deliberate care, letting it just touch the tip of Robert’s ear. Crook was smiling the whole time. “That’s the sweet spot right there,” Crook said. “Right on the meat of the bat. That ball is gone.”
Then he pulled the bat back, flipped it around, and held the handle out for Robert to take.
Robert looked at it, his head still swirling.
“Go on, take it,” Crook said. “It belongs to the man of the house.”
“But you...”
“You’re the man of the house, Bob.”
“It’s Robert. I don’t go by – ”
“And I don’t go in for pretentious crap, Bob. Familiarizing a man’s name is a sign of camaraderie. It’s how men behave around other men. My momma named me James Crook, but no friend of mine ever called me anything but Jim.”
Crook forced the bat into his hands.
“But then, that’s kind of the root of the problem, isn’t it, Bob? You got yourself a case of the uppity wife, don’t you? We’re both men here, Bob. You don’t mind me talking straight to you, do you, Bob? What you got on your hands is a wife who’s pretty much ruined your reputation. Am I right? Go on, tell me I’m wrong.”
“No,” he said. “You’re not wrong.” From somewhere down the east wing came the sounds of a woman sobbing.
“This is gut-check time, Bob. What happens next will be the difference between living in shame or dying with honor. What kind of man will you be?”
Robert looked up at the rope, hanging from the rafters. Had he done that? When had he put that there?
“You’re not the first to go through this, Bob. No sir. Not at all. My own wife tried to make a fool of me in front of my friends. In front of the whole community. While I was in prison, do you know what she did? She went and had herself the grand slam of all nervous breakdowns. And even then, I bought her the finest care money could buy. And you know how she repaid me, Bob? She went into my youngest boy’s room, where he and his brother had gone to hide from her, and she strangled them both with her bare hands. Three and five years old, my pride and joy, and she murdered them. She burned down this house, or tried to anyway, to cover it up. Killed herself in the process. Good thing too, because if the fire hadn’t killed her I sure as hell would have. Would have cracked this bat right upside her head.” Ringworm scars were spreading from under his collar, up his neck. “Like mine, your wife has put herself out of your influence. She’s made it impossible for you to do what needs to be done. At least with respect to her. But you have another option. A man always has another option, Bob.”
Robert made a fist around the rope. It was coarse against his skin. “Yes,” he said. “I see that.”
“The world can be a cruel and absurd place, Bob. And fortune’s a bitch. You got your ups and downs and, like any man, you handle them. You’ve done that, haven’t you? You’ve had your ups and downs, and you’ve handled them?”
“Yes,” Robert said.
“But sometimes fortune throws you a curve ball, doesn’t it? One you just can’t hit. It’s a woman, usually. Was for me, and it is for you too. They’re frail creatures, Bob, but let’s tell the truth here. They can be a little dense sometimes, can’t they? They don’t realize how much damage they do. How much heartache they cause. We put everything we have into them, making a home for them, making a family for them, loving them, and then they go and do something without thinking, something that brings it all crashing down around you.”
“That’s right.”
And it was too. Absolutely correct. Every word of it was true. He’d put everything he had into making a home for Sarah and Angela, and his love had taken her from a part-time stripper and single mother to the wife of a professor at one of the finest universities in America. He had given her this house, this enormous house. And in return, she’d hurt him. She had no idea how much she’d hurt him. That, in and of itself, was forgivable. The ignorance was. But the crime itself, the deception, the betrayal, cheating on him –formoney no less! – that was too much. He had never considered suicide before, not even in an academic kind of way. But he had his dignity, his pride, and he would not have his good name dragged through the mud. Wasn’t this rope better than living with all that shame?
“Will you ever be able to look at your wife again without seeing all the ways she’s humiliated you both?” Crook said. He handed Robert the noose. “I think this option will make it clear to everyone the kind of man you are. A man of honor.”
Hey, there goes Dr. Bob Bell. He’s married to that porn star. Maybe, if we scrape up enough money, we can get her to...
Robert’s stomach turned over. “But what...what will they do without...Won’t Angela need somebody to take care of her? How will Sarah take care of...” So many complicated questions, and no answers. He felt like he was going to throw up.
The doorbell rang and Robert flinched.
“What’s that? I mean, who...”
“That’s the man who started all this.”
“Who?” Robert asked.
“Jay Carroll.”
“Carroll,” Robert repeated stupidly.
“A man doesn’t get many opportunities like this, Bob. Go down and give him a piece of your mind.” The bat was on the desk. Crook rested his hand on the fat end and curled his lip in a sort of half smile. “Go on. Show him what kind of man you are. Then come back here and show the rest of the world what kind of manyou are. Take this.”
Robert glanced down at the bat in James Crook’s hand.
“Thanks.”
Crook smiled blandly at him.
Robert took the bat and felt suddenly a little dizzy, like he needed to sit down. The pain in his chest was better now, but the headache was still there. He glanced up the length of the rope, and seeing that, he felt a sort of calm wash over him. For the first time in a long time, he was sure of what needed to be done.
He imagined Jay’s head on the desk before him.
“What did you say, that’s the sweet spot right there. Right on the meat of the bat.”
Nothing.
Robert looked up. The room was empty. He still had the bat in his hand, but James Crook was gone. Only the faint smell of smoke remained behind.
The doorbell rang again. A long blast this time.
“Coming!” Robert yelled. He got a good grip on the bat. “Be right there.”
*
Jay Carroll backed away from the door and scanned the windows. He could see somebody moving around up there. Sarah, he guessed, from the hair.
“Hey, what the hell?” he yelled. “I know you can hear me knocking.”
He went back to the door and beat on it with his fist.
When they still wouldn’t answer he took a step back and ran his hands through his hair as he caught his breath and tried to figure out what to do next.
“Okay,” he said. “Okay, fine.”
Jay went around to the garage side of the house. There was an empty door there leading on to the mud room, and beyond that, a hallway that looked like it led to some bedrooms.
Christ, this place is big.
“Hey,” he yelled into the doorway. “Sarah! Robert!”
He stepped back from the doorway and looked around, to see if anybody could see him. There were trees everywhere. He couldn’t even see the neighboring houses through the screen of oaks.
And it didn’t look like there were any video cameras around here. A house like this, he would have thought there’d be cameras. A security system at least. But apparently not.
He was wearing a loose-fitting Hawaiian shirt and jeans. The pistol was tucked into the waistband of his jeans and he gave it a pat, just to reassure himself that it was still there. He went inside.
“Hey Sarah!”
Nothing. He was about to call again when he heard the sound of somebody walking around upstairs and the faint sounds of laughter.
“Nice. Think it’s a fucking game, huh? Okay. Okay, fine.”
Jay went up the stairs and rounded the corner. The east wing stretched out before him. It was empty. No one walking, no more laughter. Had they heard him coming up? For the first time, he felt uneasy. This was stupid. He needed to get out of here and go back to the front door.
But as he turned around he saw a half open door and little girl clothes on the floor at the foot of the bed.
“Angela?” he said.
He pushed the door open. There was no one inside, but that wasn’t what he noticed first. His eye was drawn to the little video camcorder in the far corner of the room. He’d seen these on set last time he had a call back on a commercial. They were cheap, portable, easy to use, and took good digital images. He went over to it and turned it over. It was plugged into the wall and running, and from where it’d been, it must have been capturing the whole room.
“That perverted son of a bitch,” he said. “Filming a little girl.”
He threw the camcorder down and went out to give Robert Bell a piece of his mind.
*
Robert was coming down the stairs when he heard footsteps on the landing. He turned, and saw Jay coming out of the east wing.
“Jay?” he said. “What are you doing in my house?”
Jay’s eyes went to the bat in Robert’s hand, then a smile spread across his face. “Whatcha got there, Robert?”
“Get out of my house. Get out right now!”
“Or you’ll what.” He pulled his shirt up to show the gun tucked into his waistband. “What are you gonna do with that bat, Doc?”
Robert stopped climbing the stairs. Jay seemed to sense his fear and hesitation and his smile grew wider. He crossed the landing and stood at the top of the stairs, looking down at him. Even from six feet away, Robert got a whiff of the odor of stale beer and cigarette smoke that hung about him. There was a mad look in his eye that called forth an old fear in Robert. The man he faced back in that Florida diner all those years ago, the one who’d been only seconds away from putting a bullet through his eye, had looked at him with those same wild eyes.
“Please, just leave my house.”
“You know, you’re a sick fuck.” He took a few steps forward. Robert swallowed, his heel catching on the back of one of the steps, causing him to teeter, and then stagger down two steps. “What kind of goddamned pervert puts a camcorder in a little girl’s room? You into little girls, Doc? Is that it?”
“What? No, those cameras, they’re...”
“What? What are they for, Doc? Come on, tap dance an answer for me.”
He took two more steps toward Robert.
“No? Nothing?”
Another step.
Robert raised the bat. “Don’t do it. Don’t come any closer. You need to get out of my house right now.”
“How about I take that bat away from you and put the sweet spot right there on your ear. Right there on the meat of the bat.”
The words sent a chill over his skin, and he glanced toward the landing, expecting to see James Crook up there, leaning against the railing in his tuxedo with a hugeI told you so grin on his face. But the landing was empty and dark.
From somewhere off in the east wing, he could hear a woman sobbing.
Jay was on him then.
Robert let out a startled whine of surprise. He’d only looked away for a second, but Jay was ready when he did. He got over him, using his higher position on the stairs for leverage to push Robert off balance. Jay pulled the bat away and Robert clutched at it, but he was already teetering on the edge of the stairs. He shot a hand out toward the wall, but there was nothing for him to grab on to and he went tumbling down toward the entranceway, the bat rolling down after him.
He hit at the bottom and folded with a groan.
When he looked up, Jay was coming down the stairs. “You and that wife of yours, you’re a real pair, aren’t you?”
Robert’s nose was bleeding. He was in a puddle of his blood, and when he tried to stand, he slipped in it and hit the marble. Jay got a little closer. Robert reached for the wainscoting and this time was able to pull himself up to his knees.
“The one I feel sorry for is Angela,” Jay said. “Poor thing, her Momma’s a whore and her Daddy’s a pervert that likes to film her when she gets undressed. How can a child be expected to have any kind of future with folks like that? I look at it as my duty to get her out of this den of iniquity.”
He was close to the bottom of the stairs, the bat at his feet.
Robert gauged the distance, then lunged for the bat. He got his hands around the handle, but he wasn’t fast enough. Jay already had one foot across the middle of the bat.
“You just don’t learn, do you?” said Jay.
“I told you to get out of my house.”
Robert snaked a hand out and grabbed Jay by the ankle. For a moment, Jay was too startled to react, and that gave Robert the time he needed. He pulled as hard as he could, yanking Jay’s feet out from under him. Jay landed on his butt with a grunt of pain. He arched his back and winced like the edge of the stair had caught him on his spine.
Robert came up with the bat. “I told you,” he said, grunting as he swung the bat down on Jay, “to get out ofmy house! This is my house!”
Jay raised one arm in a futile attempt to block the blow. The bat caught him just below the elbow, shattering the bone with a crunch that echoed around the enormous entranceway.
“My house!” Robert screamed at him, and brought the bat down again. “My house!” Another blow. “My house!” And another. “My fucking house!” And another.
Blood spattered against the white walls. Two of Jay’s teeth skittered across the wooden stairs and went tumbling over the side like dice. Robert slapped the bat across his Jay’s stomach and made him vomit. Jay rolled over onto his back then and raised a trembling hand to Robert.
“Stop. Don’t.”
“You don’t tell a man what to do in his own home, friend.” Jay crawled up the stairs and Robert walked after him. “Don’t you know that,friend. A man’s house is his castle. A man has responsibilities to protect his family, and his home. You come into a man’s home with evil in your heart you better expect to get the horns.”
Robert swung again, a glancing blow that bounced off Jay’s shoulder and crashed into the balustrade, sending two of its slats flying into the air above the entranceway.
Jay rallied then and scrambled up a few steps, leaving clumps of deep red arterial blood behind him like bread crumbs marking his progress to the landing. With his right hand, which was caked in blood but unbroken, he reached for the gun in his waistband.
“You did this to my family, you bastard.” Another swing. “We were happy before you came back into out lives.” His face was twisted with rage and self-pity. “But you turned me against my wife.” Another ferocious downward swing that took a big chunk out of the lip of the tread plank between Jay’s knees. “You turned my wife against me. I used to love her, and now I can’t even look at her. But you wouldn’t be satisfied with that, would you?”
Another swing, this one cracking across Jay right knee.
“Would you? Answer me, you son of a bitch! Would you?”
Jay got to the top of the stairs and rose to one knee. He managed to get the pistol out just as Robert reached the landing and lifted it toward his attacker. But Robert was delirious with rage and he charged into the gun, already swinging. He connected
with Jay’s gun hand just above the wrist, shattering Jay’s hand and sending the gun skittering across the floor.
Jay tried to limp away, toward the east wing, but Robert got in front of him.
“Not so fast,” he said. “There’s gonna be a little joy in Muddville tonight. The Mighty Casey isn’t gonna strike out this time.”
From a left-handed stance, Robert swung for the fence, putting the meat of the bat right across Jay’s balls.
“And that one is gone!”
Jay slumped to the floor with a groan and lay there bleeding.
“This is my house, mother fucker.My house!”
*
Jay stirred a few moments later, but by then Robert had already dragged him into his study, slipped the noose over his head, and propped him up on the side of the desk. It wasn’t much as far as a gallows went, but it would do for the likes of Jay Carroll.
Jay looked down and started to panic. His hands weren’t tied but that didn’t matter. They were both so badly cracked up all he could do was paw at the noose. He looked like he could barely breathe already.
Robert came around the corner of the desk so he could look Jay in the eye. “I wouldn’t move around too much if I were you. You slip off the corner of that desk and you’ll swing, but your neck won’t break. I’ve read in books it can take up to twenty minutes for a man to die if his neck doesn’t break. Twenty minutes is a long time to think about your crimes.”
“I – I didn’t do nothing.”
“You didn’t...” Robert couldn’t believe the gall of the man. He almost kicked the desk away right then. Then he tightened his grip on the bat, twisting it and twisting until he could talk again. “But you did, Jay. You made my wife do that horrible movie. You put that filth on film. Do you really believe I’m gonna let you leave this house alive? Do you?”