Reprisal

by Mitchell Smith

  "I don't know."

  "--Because there is no reason. Have you mentioned any of this to Rebecca?"

  "No, not yet."

  "Well, Joanna, please don't do that."

  "I don't want to, but we're talking about her father. Hers--and now mine."

  "Oh, God. ..."

  "But I'm sorry I troubled you with it." Joanna opened the office door again.

  "--Maybe I am just being stupid. Maybe I've lost too much, too quickly. ..."

  "I'd say that's probably so."

  "Well ... bye-bye."

  "Bye-bye. ..."

  As she left the office, closing the door behind her, Joanna heard Wanda's desk drawer slide open.

  The plump girl looked up from her keyboard and mouthed, spoke softly. "Is she okay ...?"

  "I think so."

  The girl shook her head. "I'm really worried about her," she said, barely above a whisper.

  Chapter Six

  Joanna went out to the island on the late-evening ferry. She sat in the cabin for the trip--not yet ready, she supposed, to see a lot of Atlantic Ocean.

  They were mainly older people in the cabin, going out to the islands. Oteague, first. Then Parkers Island. Then Shell, then Asconsett. Older people, looking tired and staying in the cabin, perhaps also not ready to see more ocean.

  The rhythmic grumbling of the ferry's engine, its vibration through the bench's weather-faded oak, were soothing ... so Joanna sat with her eyes closed and tried to think of nothing, tried to think of no loss at all.--She thought of an empty space where nothing was, nothing had ever been, so nothing and no one could be missing from it. It would be pearl gray, a space with no horizon, a room with no walls, a room of emptiness. ...

  Such a pleasant place to be. Heaven, she supposed, might be a perfect vacancy.-Only its gray was bound to become darker, shade to black as loneliness grew to fill it. Heaven becoming hell, she supposed, and perhaps that simple.

  She sat relaxed, drifting almost to sleep. What vibrations soothed travelers before the internal combustion engine? Steam engines ... trains, of course.

  And before that, the less reliable beat of horses' hooves. Men and women pulled by horses, carried by horses, plowing with horses ... depending on those innocents for all civilization. And betting on their speed.

  Even now, it seemed to her, people had what they had from foundations built by the sweat of horses. Their hoofbeats should echo in human hearts. But what statues had been placed in their honor? What horse-named streets and counties?

  What volumes of poetry ...?

  The ferry came in fourteen minutes late, delayed by crosscurrents. Joanna drove off its ramp, along Bollard to Strand, then up Slope Street to the cottage as a crescent moon rose over ocean.

  ... She carefully thought only of horses, then tomato soup, tea, and toast.

  She did the dishes, then went upstairs, undressed, and took a shower--where other thoughts, memories crept in. She couldn't keep them out. They waited in the bedroom closet among Frank's summer clothes--time and past time to go through them, give them away.

  The memories were there, hanging among seersucker sports jackets and slacks, a summer suit--light blue--and several pairs of jeans. His shoes, old Top-Siders, sneakers, and a pair of soccer shoes--for what, out here on the island? Why had he packed soccer shoes? Why did men do the things they do? ...

  What sweet confusion in their minds obscured practicality? What different determination vaulted instead to inventions, to change, to long-term plans, to organization and the hunt? To possibly useful war?--It was odd that men and women could live together at all, and bear, long-term, such difference. Her father--wanting to be an artillery officer, of all strange things! And Frank

  ... what had Frank wanted that he never had?

  Joanna took off her robe, and looked at herself in the closet door's long mirror. It seemed to her she didn't look quite as she had even a few weeks ago. Her breast didn't appear perfectly the same--it seemed slightly smaller, shrunken, as if it were winter fruit, shriveled in storage ... no longer a perfect match for the prosthesis. And her belly looked softer ... her legs thinner, muscle showing wiry under the skin.

  Death, coming once and then again, had touched her with age, lightly, as it passed by.

  Joanna looked at her face in the mirror, saw concern there, shadowed by the closet's single bulb, and certainly the commencement of an older woman's face, a face from which youth's innocence was gone. A face that once suggested by her mirror, even hinted at, would become inevitable.

  ... Tired, of course. She was still tired from the cave. More tired from losing Frank, and now her father.--And certainly, even now, many men would find her pretty, a few find her beautiful if they liked slender older women with strong bones, black hair, and long-nosed Indian faces. But there was, behind her reflection, now a magisterial judgment only barely seen, but announcing the coming of age ... to be in time more real than any sorrow.

  Joanna peed, turned off the lights, and went to bed. Bed, the vault of memory.

  This summer bed, like all their beds, held history of every warmth, sound, and scent of sleep together, the companionable farts, the kisses, hard words and bitter silences, the effortful sounds, exercise, and oily odors of fucking--once grunting, moaning, then calling out to begin Rebecca.

  In these soft vaults lay recollection. And no escaping it in dreams.

  Joanna woke ... then woke completely to breaking glass. Glass breaking, downstairs.

  She'd heard it, but wasn't sure she'd heard it, and sat up in bed to listen.

  She already knew better than to put her left hand out to wake Frank. She'd learned better than that in only a few days.

  More glass broke below, with a musical small crack and tinkle as pieces hit the floor. Something struck the back door ... kitchen door.

  There were tough boys, tough men, on the island. She'd seen them at Poppy's, downtown, when their boats were in ... or when their boats were sold, and never going out again. Bored men lounging, staring at her and Rebecca once from the long bar, when they'd gone in to order fish and chips to go. Bearded young men, rope-muscled, tattooed, and perfect for piracy, if that were still possible.

  And she was here alone--and of course everyone knew it. She was here alone, with only memories to keep drunken boys from her.

  Something hit the back door again--harder--and Joanna got out of bed. She didn't want to turn on the lights, didn't want to see something bad. She put on her robe, and stood in the bedroom listening, hoping they would go away.

  Frank's shotgun, his revolver, were locked in the storage closet in the house at White River. There was nothing upstairs in the cottage to hurt anyone with, nothing to make them leave her alone.

  It was too frightening to wait. Joanna went barefoot to the head of the stairs, then down several steps and paused, listening. The phone was in the entrance hall. ... Moonlight cast banister shadows down the staircase wall.

  She could hear the sea wind, the ocean's distant conversation, and recalled her dream of Frank swept back to her by the sea.

  A man called out, shouting in the backyard-something she couldn't understand.

  Shouted again, and hit the kitchen door. A stranger's voice, slurred and hissing.

  But not Frank's voice--and Joanna, ashamed to feel relief, was no longer as afraid of the living. She went through the entrance hall and on back to the kitchen. Moonlight glittered on glass along the floor. The door's window had been smashed.

  Careful of the glass near her bare feet, she crossed to the counter drawer, took out a filleting knife, then went to the other window and saw no one standing in moonlight on the back steps. No one in the yard. ... If not for the cool sea breeze drafting through the damaged door, she might have dreamed it all.

  Stepping around bright shards and bits of glass, she turned the kitchen lights on, and saw a minor spatter down the inside of the door, drops of fresh rich red against the white paneling. Whoever it was had cut himself reaching in
for the dead bolt. Broke the door window, tried to get in, cut himself, and was gone.

  Joanna got the broom and dustpan from the narrow mop closet, and carefully swept to pick up all the glass. She paid attention to what she was doing, close attention so as not to have to wonder who had tried to come in ... and shouted, furious, when he was hurt.

  She could have thought about that, but decided not to. It was one thing too many to think about--as if her world might tilt and turn over from the weight of additional trouble.

  --And if she called the police now, other loud men would come. They'd park by the cottage with their lights going, and come into the house and talk and walk around and make her think of everything, try to make sense of it, when she was just too tired. Morning would be time enough. ...

  When she was finished cleaning, had checked the floor carefully for any glass sparkling, Joanna picked up her knife, turned off the kitchen lights, and went up the stairs, exhausted. She was tired as she'd been in the cave's close chimney, that tried so hard to hold her--as if that darkness, silence, and emptiness, weary of millions of years alone, had wanted her to stay.

  She went into the bedroom and closed the door. There was no lock. She brought the ladder-back chair from the corner to tilt and wedge against the knob, then she put her knife on the lamp table and climbed into bed, grateful for a summer night cool enough for covers, a small and softer cave to rest in.

  The phone woke her to a sunny morning.

  Joanna got up, tugged the chair out from under the doorknob, and put on her robe as she went down the stairs.

  "Mom?" A teary voice.

  "Hi, sweetheart. I was going to call you this morning."

  "I called yesterday, but you weren't there."

  "I went up to Chaumette."

  "Mom--what happened? What's happening-these terrible things!"

  "I know. I know. ... They think it was an accident, that Grandpa was careless with the woodstove. They don't think he suffered."

  "Oh, that's just such bullshit! Didn't suffer?"

  "Well, Rebecca, they may be right."

  "--In a fire?"

  "I know. I know ..."

  "And he was just careless with that woodstove?"

  "That's what they think. ... But I have to tell you, sweetheart, I really don't believe it."

  "You don't--"

  "I don't believe it. Louis Bernard was not careless--just the reverse, he was an obsessive pain in the butt."

  "No, he wasn't careless, Mom.--But I don't understand. What was it, if it wasn't an accident? Why would anybody hurt Grandpa?"

  "I don't know, sweetheart.--And I could be wrong, absolutely wrong. Wanda thinks I'm crazy."

  "But it doesn't make any sense. Why would anybody want to do that?"

  "I don't know, Rebecca ... but I think I should tell you, I don't believe what happened to your father was an accident, either."

  "What? Mom, I don't understand. ..."

  "I think neither was an accident." And having said so much, she decided not to mention the broken window, the shouting man.

  "But nobody would hurt Daddy. He had an accident on the boat!"

  "Maybe he did.--And maybe your grandpa had an accident, too, just a couple of weeks later. But I don't believe it."

  "Does anybody say that? Does anybody else say that?"

  "No. They don't."

  "Mom--oh, Mom, please don't be crazy. Please don't do that! We're all that's left. It's just the two of us!" Crying ... crying now.

  "I know, darling. Don't be afraid. ..." Was there ever an end to this caring for a child? This need to guard her? What turned in a woman's brain to leave this black egg of worry in her head for a child old enough now to have children of her own? It was a goddamn bore, and there was no end to it.

  "Mom, I am afraid. Everything terrible is happening. ..."

  "Rebecca, there's something I want you to do. Will you do something for me?"

  "What--what do you mean?" Sniffling. Needed to blow her nose. ...

  "I want you to be careful, Rebecca."

  "Mom--"

  "I want you to be careful! Is that too much to ask?"

  "No. ..." Sullen little-girl's voice.

  "Then do it. Do it for me. Don't go out with some boy you don't know very, very well. Do you understand? Don't ... don't take chances, Rebecca, just in case I'm right, just in case I'm not crazy."

  "Mom, please--"

  "Goddammit, will you just do what I ask? Two members of our family, half our family. ... Your father is dead! My father is dead! Two men who were very careful and knew what they were doing and did it for years are dead, one right after the other! And supposedly ridiculous accidents--and I don't fucking believe it!"

  "Mom--"

  "So, just in case your mother is not going mad, will you please, please do as I ask and be careful!"

  "Okay, I will. I'll be careful, Mom."

  "Sweetheart, I know it sounds weird. And I could absolutely just be ... be shell-shocked. I could be completely mistaken. I try to convince myself I am.

  I tried that--and I just can't believe it."

  "Mom, I said I'll be careful."

  "Thank you. That's all I want. Just ... you know, cautious. Be cautious."

  "Is there going to be a service? Are we going up to Chaumette?"

  "No, I don't think so. Grandpa pretty much--he really was just gone, disappeared in the fire. And except for Wanda, there isn't anybody still up there who was a close friend. His best friends were Elise Brady and Edward and his brother ... and Elise and Edward are gone. So, there's really no reason to go up."

  "All right."

  "Also, Rebecca, I've had all the memorial service I want to attend for a while."

  "I know. I just ... it's so hard to understand."

  "Sweetheart, I know it's hard to understand."

  "Well ... listen, people keep asking me for your number out there, Mom. You know, they call me at the dorm? A lot of people have phoned--Francie, and Brian called, too."

  "Rebecca, I don't want a lot of people calling me out here. I don't want to have to talk to anyone. So don't give them my number."

  "Not even Francie? She called me from New York four times."

  "Nobody. I just ... I just don't want to hear from people about Frank or my father. I don't want to hear any of that yet."

  "Well ... I understand."

  "So--so, what's new at school? Did you have your Spanish exam?"

  "Mom, exams aren't until next month."

  "Right. That's right."

  "I'll do fine. Charis is helping with my Spanish, and I don't have any problems with math at all."

  "All right. I can't tell you how sorry I am, sweetheart. All this ... all this loss. Your daddy loved you very much. Did you know, when you were a little girl--do you know how jealous I was of you sometimes? He loved you so much, I was just part of the furniture."

  "Oh, sure. That'll be the day."

  "No, it's true. And you're young--you're still very young to have lost your father."

  "I think so. I think so ... but we both lost him."

  "Yes. So--you'll be careful?"

  "Yes, I will."

  "No accidents. No more accidents, Rebecca.--And if they were something else

  ... just be cautious. Don't be so trusting. It's okay to say "no" to people, Becky. It's okay to just say, "No, thanks," if it feels wrong to you."

  "Mom, I understand. You know, I'm really not a baby."

  "I know, and I wish you were. If you were small enough, you'd be in a carrier on my back and there damn well wouldn't be any more accidents."

  "Mom, you're too much."

  "Well, it's true."

  "Mom ... you know, it is possible--I mean it's most likely that Daddy and Grandpa had accidents, that that's all those things were."

  "I know. I know that, sweetheart. I know that's possible. ..."

  The constable's outer office was bright with morning light, its white-painted wood looking sea-washed in summ
er air. A deputy, neat in starched khaki behind a gray steel desk, looked like a boy--too young, too slender in his uniform to be a policeman. He observed Joanna with the disinterest of the young in anyone much older--and this despite her careful dressing.

  No dark suit today. Instead, summer casual in a foam-green print dress, showing some leg for that icy old man--still good enough legs. The impression intended to be of a sensible, attractive, and determined widow who had now accepted summer--not of a snotty mainland business-suited pain in the ass.

  And all wasted on this very young policeman--almost young enough to be her son. A good-looking boy, brown eyes and carefully cut thick red-brown hair-run-your-fingers-through-it hair for some pleased girl. J. Spruel was engraved on a small steel nameplate pinned to his right breast pocket.

  "Mrs. Reed, the chief is off-island this morning, and I have no idea when he's going to be in. If you want to leave a message for him, I'll take that."

  "All right, I will leave a message for him."

  The young cop sat politely receptive.

  "Are you going to write this down?"

  "Oh ... yes, ma'am." He took a pencil and yellow legal pad from the desk drawer.

  ""To the chief constable: To remind you, my husband was drowned in a dubious accident over two weeks ago. Now--"' Have you got that?"

  "... Yes, ma'am." A left-handed writer, his hand cramped on the paper.

  ""Now ... night before last, my father was burned alive in his cabin upstate, at Lake Chaumette. A second very dubious accident.""

  The young policeman looked up at the news of Louis's burning, giving Joanna a moment of real attention--also glancing at her breasts. She had become someone.

  "--Do you have that?"

  "... Yes."

  "Okay. Then take this down: "Last night, someone--a man--tried to break into my cottage while I was asleep upstairs. He smashed the kitchen-door window, I suppose to reach the dead bolt--and he cut himself when he did.""

  The young policeman was scribbling away. A crime, at last.

  "--There's a little blood down the inside of my kitchen door. I cleaned up the glass last night, but I left the blood."

  Officer Spruel looked up from his legal pad. "How did you know it was a man did it?"