Reprisal

by Mitchell Smith

  She climbed--hands, knees, and elbows scraped and seeping blood--climbed holding that occasional reflection as her mark ... until she paused to rest, looked up again, and saw the silver was a slice of the setting moon, obscured by shifting clouds.

  Joanna switched off her helmet lamp, then managed slowly up--more frightened now to be so close to freedom, afraid she would panic at last, so cramped, and begin to scream and thrash, a mindless animal. ... She wriggled, wedged her way up a little more, then reached to touch the chimney's capped edge and the open air. She kicked, kicked and climbed, then hooked her hand over and dragged herself up and out, arms. ... helmeted head ... shoulders. Up and out into the sea's night wind, a spatter of salty rain.

  She clambered down from the chimney top to stand trembling on a slant of roof

  ... reached back to drag her small tethered pack up behind her. The wind's fine-blown rain was in her eyes, its salt stung her hands, hurt her where her skin was scraped. Smears of blood, through torn cloth at her elbows and knees, showed black under an obscured moon.

  Joanna stood exhausted, legs shaking, and looked out into the night. ... Far below, on the dock past the foot of the alley, a small group of men were gathered in the bright pool of a fishing boat's lights.

  She watched them for a little while, then took off her helmet and let the sea wind, murmuring over the roof's cracked and ragged shingles, come combing through her hair, lifting it--soot-caked, damp with sweat--separating it with cool fingers for the gusting rain to rinse.

  Joy flowed into her and out of her, as if she breathed it in and out. Pleasure as specific as a trumpet's sound. ... She'd felt nothing like it before--and supposed men knew such sweetness after risking, bleeding, to win a battle.

  Their wars fought for the chance of this reward.

  "We have them," she said, as if Frank were standing with her, angled against the roof's steep fall. "Oh, dear heart, we have them. ..." Joanna stood resting a few moments more, then stepped up to the wet roof's high ridge in clouded moonlight, balanced, and began to dance a slow dance of triumph along it, holding her arms out to the sea wind as if it might lift her as it lifted its gulls, to swoop and slide and rise again.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Sand Hill was hard climbing in the rain. The sand, lying steep, and soaked here and there as the rain came blowing in, sagged away from under Joanna's boots as she labored up the slope. ... The patches of sea grass helped, gave better footing.

  It had been an easy slide down to the warehouse eaves--a more difficult swing in to the roof's downspout and the drainpipe. ... Then a careful descent, her hands, arms, and back muscles aching, to the alley's darkness.

  There'd been men still gathered down at the docks --several of them, in yellow sou'westers, standing in blowing rain under a lamppost too near the parked pickups and her car. So, carrying her helmet and pack, and staying in shadow, Joanna'd limped up the alley. Strand Street had been almost empty. But there'd been three men, fishermen by their boots and coveralls, standing in a storefront beside the police station, the next block down.

  She'd waited until they'd turned away from gusting wind, then had crossed Strand quickly under rain sleeting gold past the streetlamps ... and gone between the hardware and Michael's Antiques to start up Sand Hill, and stay off other streets fishermen might be searching.

  Climbing wet collapsing sand in darkness was hard as climbing a wall. Weary to nausea, Joanna worked up the slope, grunting with effort, tending to the right to reach the cottage. There was no moonlight now, so the rain sheeted down out of darkness, drenched her by surprise, then slackened and blew away.

  The sand made a soft rasping sound, spurned from under her boots, and Joanna chanted to it softly to keep herself from being sick, or lying down to sleep.

  "I am justified. Justified. Justified."

  Then she supposed she was taking too much pleasure in having proved herself right, proving others wrong--as if Frank and her father had died so she might show off, demonstrate her skill and courage. Prove what a personage she was.

  ...

  It was an unpleasant thought, and Joanna considered it as she struggled up yielding steeps ... dropping to climb on all fours for a while, her hands'

  scraped skin burned by the salt and sand. --That burning seemed an answer to her, and she decided to make anonymous phone calls, take the chance they wouldn't be heeded. Call the mainland tonight, the Coast Guard, state police, and federal drug people. Pay-phone calls, information from no one known--so justice would be less infected by herself, and self-satisfaction. ... Then she would have done what needed to be done, and nothing more.

  She was able to stand and climb crouched, then walk upright as the hill's slope rounded to the ridge. The cottage, and Slope Street, were still off to the right. The rain, come with the wind, was easing as the wind eased.

  "Tired," Joanna said aloud, as if to confirm it. "Tired. ..." She stumbled along the sand crest, and had a growing urge, almost compulsion to lie down, since the sand, wet or not, was so soft.

  There was nothing to prevent it. She could lie down and sleep through the rest of the night, then get up with the sun in the morning, sand-caked and stiff

  ... go on to the cottage for a hot shower ... then walk back down to Strand, to the pay phone to make her calls. The captains would not have had time enough to clear all those bales, get them out. There was more than a night of unloading and loading there. ...

  Joanna thought of that--dropping her pack and helmet, lying down in the sand--then decided not. She took a deep breath of wet and salty air, kept walking, hobbling along, and after only a little while saw a streetlamp on Slope. Near enough ... near enough. There was only a last labor through wet sand, wet sea grass--shaking from fatigue, her heart thumping--exhausted, and all glory gone.

  No lights in the cottage. No cars parked there. ... Joanna trudged across the yard to the side door of the garage, took her keys from her pack pocket, and unlocked it. She left the light off, and went in to hang her helmet and pack on wall pegs, unzip her torn coveralls and step staggering out of them.

  Beneath, her jeans and shirt were torn as well, certainly bloodstained at knees and elbows. ... She took her kitchen knife from the coveralls--the blade's point had cut through the bottom of the side pocket--and slid it into her belt.

  She locked the garage, limped to the back steps, and climbed them with deliberate effort ... then opened the kitchen door and stepped into the dark, and the pleasant tobacco-and-work-sweat odor of men.

  --Joanna was startled by her body. It spun around while she was still considering, and leaped with her out the door and down the back steps. Her body ran away with her like a frightened horse, as if it had not been worn and wearied at all, and now was ready to run.

  She stretched across the yard in darkness, into a spatter of rain--thought of the street, then decided the hill instead and ran through sea grape and out onto the sand.

  She reached to her belt as she went, felt the fillet knife's handle--and as if that minor interruption in perfect running had cost her dearly, heard footsteps--bootsteps coming behind her.

  Now her body realized how tired it was after all. Those swift strong steps behind had reminded it. Joanna stumbled, and kept running.

  She ran and pulled the knife free--it was surprising how that slight motion unbalanced her. Heavy steps behind. Heavy and quick ... muscle mass. Too worn for fear, though her body seemed terrified, Joanna drew in a breath deeper than the running breaths, and used that to scream.

  It was a wail ... almost trilling, not the tearing shriek she'd hoped for. The night, the occasional gusts of wind and rain, seemed to swallow her sound ...

  so she screamed again as she tripped, then almost fell down a steep pitch of sand. She went into the sand up to her knees, and whoever it was almost caught her. She heard his breathing, the churning of effort just behind.

  Joanna heaved and kicked out of the sand, leaped down through sea grass, and gripped the knife as firml
y as she could. Running through the grass, sobbing with effort, she felt him close and closer --he was almost running with her.

  She took the last longest strides she could, all in darkness plunging--then turned, turned as she ran, and as he reached to take her, swung the knife up and into the pale indication of his face.

  Almost his face, but something stopped it. His arm, he'd put up his left arm, and the knife stuck in and then slid in farther, a greasy sliding, and he said, "Jesus!"

  For a few seconds, they swayed and staggered together in darkness and slipping sand as if they were drunk and dancing--and Joanna knew she should pull the knife blade out of him and stick it in again and again as hard as she could until, in the dark, it reached where he wasn't guarding and killed him.

  She should, but to do it meant she'd have to tug it free, pull the blade out of his arm, and she didn't want to feel that. She hesitated only that instant, and the man took her wrist and twisted it so the knife was pulled out and gone--and she kicked him, tried to kick up into his groin. He hit her, slapped her ... something, and she fell down, seeing sheets of bright tiny dots parading and marching up and up in her sight.

  Joanna tried to stand, but he came to her in the dark, gripped her and shook her as if she were a child, and she turned her head to where he held her, found his wrist with her mouth, and bit as hard as she could.

  He grunted, yanked his arm away, then came again, grappled with her and suddenly lifted her up into the air, did something, turned her in some way, and she was over his shoulder ... being carried over his shoulder.

  He began walking up the sand slope, holding her over his shoulder like a sack, a duffel bag. He had both her hands gripped in one of his at the small of her back.

  Nothing had made their difference in strength as clear as this walking up Sand Hill with her over his shoulder. It was such ... such a caveman cliche, it would have made her laugh if she hadn't been so frightened.

  And a terrible thing happened--because she was so frightened, so tired. She peed a little ... just a little bit in her jeans. And it was as if this was the worst that could happen, that nothing--even being killed--could be as bad, as humiliating. And another attempt at screaming would only add embarrassment, before she was clouted to silence. A woman reduced to peeing in her pants ...

  to wailing like a frightened baby as she was carried along.

  Better to be silent, until she could bite again.

  He carried her back into her yard, and Joanna writhed to turn on his shoulder, bent her head to catch flesh on his upper arm, and bit deep.

  "For Christ's sake," the man said, a voice she just recognized as he yanked his arm away, so she lost the mouthful of shirt and skin. Joanna wished she had the red pit bull with her --wished she were the red pit bull, could change to a weredog. Then there would be a serious bite. ...

  He went up the back steps as easily as if she weren't on his shoulder--pushed through the kitchen door into bright light, and swung her down, dumped her on the floor so suddenly she almost fell, staggering against the sink counter.

  Captain Lowell, in rain-wet jeans, gray shirt, and black rubber boots, stood staring at her. His sharp fox face was flushed with anger, and blood was running along his forearm, soaking his shirt-sleeve and dripping from his fingers to the floor.

  "What did you do to her?" Mr. Manning-bulky in a khaki windbreaker--stood by the stove, his broad, padded face calm as pond water.

  "Not a goddamn thing, except bring her in."

  "Didn' do enough."--Joanna hadn't seen this man. He was standing behind her at the kitchen door, a younger man, crewcut ... and short, almost squat, his torso slabbed with muscle under a worn blue work shirt. His jaw was too heavy for a small-nosed face. "Didn' do enough to this bitch." The young man had dreaming unfocused brown eyes.

  "She's bleedin'." Manning shifted by the stove.

  "She's bleeding? I'm the one who's fucking bleeding. Took a knife to me. ..."

  Lowell went to the sink, rolled up his sleeve, and exposed a neat, small cut in his forearm. He turned his arm over and an identical cut bled on that side as well. "--Through and through, and hurts like sixty. Thank Christ it didn't get an artery. ..."

  "Need to put a knife to her." The young man behind Joanna.

  "Take it easy, George," Manning said.

  "I just want to know what we're goin' to do. Need to finish up right now."

  Joanna heard snoring from the other room, the dining room. Bobby Moffit was still in there, sleeping.

  Captain Lowell was rinsing the blood off his arm in the sink. "--Shouldn't have parked your car down by the docks," he said to Joanna. "Blue Volvo. We know people's cars, out here."

  "No asking permission to come aboard--to come into my house?" Joanna was pleased at the sound of her voice. It seemed important they not know she was afraid, as if knowing that would make it easier for them to kill her.

  "Apologize for that, for not asking," Lowell said. He stopped rinsing the wound, still held his arm over the sink, and began searching through the counter drawers. "--Sure wish you hadn't done what you did. And you look tired, Mrs. Reed. How'd you get out of that building?"

  "The chimney," Joanna said. "I want you all out of my house."

  "The chimney. ..." Lowell shook his head, examined her. "Will you people look at this? Woman went up a damn three-story chimney from the basement. Chewed herself up doing it, too." He checked through another drawer. "Where the hell are your dish towels?"

  "Top drawer, on the other side." Joanna wished she didn't look so bad, dirty, wet from the rain, and bleeding where her clothes were torn. If she looked nicer ... was prettier, younger, they might not hurt her.

  Lowell took out a dish towel, bound it tightly around his forearm, and using his teeth to hold a cloth end, knotted it. "comThen, I suppose, you climbed off the roof ... but not down that rope of yours." He nodded to the kitchen table, and Joanna saw the length of PMI there, neatly coiled. "--Beautiful line," Lowell said. "Had to go up an extension ladder to get it untied from that vent. Really fine. What is it?"

  "It's ... a kernmantle climbing rope," Joanna said. The kitchen light, dull yellow, seemed to vibrate ... fix her and the three men in their places.

  "Cost an arm and a leg, I'll bet. So you got off that roof what way?"

  "Drainpipe."

  "Drainpipe. ... And climbing is how you learned to do that chimney stuff?"

  "Caves. I'm a caver." An odd last conversation. Joanna supposed most last conversations were odd.

  "Caves." Lowell seemed amused. "I bet you're a pistol down in those caves.

  ..."

  "I want you to get out of my house."

  "You shut your mouth." The young fisherman shifted behind her. Joanna knew, as she'd known when men wanted to touch her, sexually--knew he wanted to put his hands on her, but for a different pleasure. And she felt an odd melting, as if it were her proper role to be taken into these strong men's hands. To be taken and held ... to be done to, whether she liked it or not. She felt she might like it in a way, even to death. It was a dream feeling, frightening, sickening, and sweet.

  "I just talked to the deputy, downtown," Joanna said, and remembered saying the same thing to Bobby Moffit, when he'd come up to fix her window.

  "You dirty liar," the young fisherman said behind her. An enraged boy's insult, and all the more frightening.

  "George. ..." Lowell adjusted his towel bandage. It was spotted with blood.

  "--We know you didn't do any such thing, Mrs. Reed. Had a couple of people over by that station, and one inside, visiting with the duty man, and you didn't call or go in there tonight, and nobody else did either." He pulled out a chair, and sat down at the kitchen table. "So we came up to settle some things before you made any phone calls, talked to anybody."

  "What did you do to my husband?" Joanna looked at Lowell, not at the others.

  ... She'd spoken to him on his boat. And he'd glanced at her breasts, and taken her arm to steady her off the Eleanor II
... walked her past winches and gear, and down the gangplank to the dock.

  Tom Lowell was all she had in the kitchen.

  "You people," he said, and rested his injured arm carefully on the table. "...

  Tourists, summer people, come out here every year. You take pictures of us working, take pictures of the boats and so forth, and you eat a lot of lobster and clams. ... Consider us very quaint out here."

  "Right," the young man said behind Joanna. "Fuckin' quaint."

  "--ationow, we've been fishing off this island almost four hundred years."

  Lowell paused, considering centuries. "... Maybe we got too good at it. Maybe with the Japanese and Russian factory ships, and the Canadians. Maybe we all got too good at it. But whatever, we can't make a living fishing anymore."

  "Shippin', processin' either," Manning said, by the stove.

  "--We had two men kill themselves last couple of years. Boat captains that couldn't pay their crews, feed their families."

  "My husband--"

  "I'll get to your husband, Mrs. Reed. ... Now, we had a choice out here. We could sell our boats for next to no money, and then we could get off the island and take our families into a city--Portland or Providence or Boston, in some neighborhood not too good. And we could take a job in a gas station or doing roofing or cleaning up construction sites, if we could get apprenticed in the union."

  "Welfare," the young man said.

  "--That's right," Lowell said. "We could get on welfare, tide us over a few years in those cities. Real bad for men with families. ..."

  "You murdered my husband and my father," Joanna said, and couldn't imagine why she'd said that, when they might not yet have decided to kill her. She couldn't imagine why in the world she'd said it.

  "Her father?" There was still no emotion visible on Manning's round face. No expression in the striking moss-green eyes. Joanna wondered how his wife knew what he was thinking, whether he was pleased or not.