Color Him Dead (18 page)

“You’re full of stuff like that,” she said, settling herself on the ground. “Like those clams.”

“My old man thought every boy should be a kind of adolescent Rough Rider. When he’d take me on hunting trips in Canada, fishing trips in Mexico, I had to contribute to the pot—or go hungry.”

“You must have hated him for that.”

“No. But it took me a while to appreciate it.” He sat down facing her. “What did you want to say?”

She ran her tongue over her lower lip. “I … know what you hear in the capital—poor Edith Barrington out here alone, starving for affection. If a man wanted to take the risk, she’d be a pushover—”

He smiled. “I didn’t hear that.”

“No, maybe it’s true. I feel drawn to you. This is not a good thing to say to a man, but I have to accept the way I am. And you too. You’ve got to help me and not … tempt me.”

“I’m not sure how I tempt you, Edith. Tell me.”

“Well, I mean …” She met his eyes, then looked away. “Don’t take advantage of … situations. Not yet. Eventually he’ll drop his guard and we can … let nature take its course. If we can’t do it that way, we just can’t be together. That’s final.”

She was sitting with her legs under her with the skirt drawn over her knees. A green-tinted light came through the arching grass overhead and brought a soft surrealistic glow to her face. She was more desirable now than she had been in the bikini, and Drew felt a swelling pressure in his chest.

“In that case,” he said, “let’s get out of here.”

Silently they climbed up the slope through the old English graveyard. The banyans had dropped their questing roots into the tombs, cracked and split the coffins, and tumbled the occupants down the slope. No bones remained; only a few green-tarnished uniform buttons. Drew paused before a tiny vault set on a solid slab of basalt and read the inscription:

He felt Edith’s warm breath against his neck. “Poor kid. Came all the way from England to die on this little clod.”

Drew couldn’t resist the opening. “Did you find out what happened to yours?”

Her hand went to her stomach. “My … baby?”

“You said you’d had one.”

“Oh … but the doctors only told me. I don’t remember.”

“Nothing?”

“Just a feeling, something heavy inside, my stomach all stretched and shiny. And pain …”

“Seems like Ian would’ve told you.”

“Well yes, it does …” Her face drew into a frown, then abruptly cleared. “It must have been stillborn. In fact I’m sure of it. Come here, I want to show you something.”

She hurried up the slope too fast for him to keep up. He followed slowly, picking his way among the weathered stones, avoiding the sunken vaults whose roofs had collapsed to leave only craters in the earth. Edith had been doing some heavy thinking; she must have decided not to get angry if he dug into her past, only to run.

No point in trying to tell her what had become of her baby. She’d gone to one of those homes for unwed mothers where all adoption arrangements are made before birth. She’d never seen the child, but had asked him four years later to find out what had become of it. He’d gone to the home without much hope of success, and only because the same foster parents had made arrangements for another child was he able to learn that Edith’s daughter had died of pneumonia at the age of three months. She’d cried when he told her. “I feel so
guilty,
Drew. Why couldn’t you have said she was beautiful and happy and loved her foster parents?” “Hell, I thought you wanted to know.” “Not when it’s like that; not when it’s so …
tragic.
”

And that, he thought now, could explain her amnesia. She’d erased all her grief in one jolt….

He found her standing beside an enormous cast-iron kettle as big as a dump truck. From the bottom protruded what might once have been a spigot, but was now only a clot of red rust.

“This is where they used to mix the gruel for the slaves,” she said as he came up. “It ran out into wooden troughs. Ian says the weak ones were pushed away from the trough and died. So the breed was improved.”

Drew smiled at her transparent attempt to keep him off the subject of her past. “Like Ti-cock?”

“Ian says he’s a throwback. That other one is more typical, the one who call himself Chaka.”

“Whom you knew as Albert.”

“I … guess.” She faltered, then went on quickly. “Anyway there used to be two hundred of those monsters on this island alone. The Barringtons bred slaves here until our Civil War, long after it was outlawed in the British colonies. Along about 1870 they got around to sending soldiers over here to close up the breeding colony. They found the food still warm and droppings still fresh in the pens, but no slaves. Ian says they tried to swim away and drowned, but most people think they’re buried here. The island’s honeycombed with tunnels left over from when it was a fort.”

“Yes,” said Drew. There had been a flash of white on the stone watchtower above them. For a second he thought Doxie had returned; then he saw that it was Charles in his white mess jacket. He pointed. “Our keeper is on duty.”

Edith looked up and swore softly. “Come on. Let’s get out from under the eyes.”

He had planned to walk her to the house, but as they made their way across the concrete slope of the water catchment he remembered the blackened ruins in the garden. Unobtrusively, he guided her to the right, past the pigeon cote. It was a natural route to the house, and she suspected nothing, not even when he sat down on the crumbling foundation and stretched his bad leg in front of him.

“Got a twinge,” he said.

She looked around the weed-grown clearing. Her eyes widened. “Let’s go on, Seright.”

“In a minute—”

He seized her hand but she jerked free and whirled away. She took two running steps, then her foot twisted on a stone and she fell face down among the coarse weeds. When he reached her she was crying, not with violent sobs, but with a soft, sustained whimper. He dropped to his knees and lifted her head. She came to him with a boneless acquiescence, and for a moment he sat stroking her hair, feeling the dampness of her tears through his shirt. Then he turned her face up and wiped her cheeks with the tail of his shirt. Her eyes were puffed up like bee-stings, and red blotches marred her complexion. He reflected vaguely that Edith’s was a fragile beauty, the kind which needed a framework of serenity. Tears did nothing for her.

“Tell me what’s wrong,” he said.

“You know … what this place is?”

“Tell me.”

“They died here.”

“Who?”

“Some girls Ian was keeping. There was a fire …”

He felt her trembling in his arms. “You remember the fire?”

“I remember flames … screams. Oh God!” She clapped her hands to her head. “I remember!”

He took her hands and held them. “Go on.”

“They …” Her eyes were wide and unfocused. “They were all around me, doctors and nurses. They were all kind and sweet, but they looked at me like I was an animal who might bite at any minute. I … got a lot of shots. I felt cold all the time, and I couldn’t understand why I was cold. I didn’t know I was in Europe. There was another woman in my room. They told me she’d lost her husband and two sons in the first world war. She wouldn’t accept their deaths. Her world had stopped in 1916. She kept getting letters from them, but they were just blank stationery. She wanted me to read them and I … I had to make up things to say. After a while I thought … Hell, maybe it
is
1916. She was so sure, and I wasn’t sure of anything. Maybe my own life was an illusion. The world wavered in my mind. A chair stopped existing when I looked away. I was sure there was just blank empty space there. I’d turn back quickly and for just a minute it would be blurred. Then it got clear. I got the feeling I created that chair, just like I created everything else. I don’t like to think about it, Seright. Hold me a minute….”

He pulled her close and felt the softness of her breasts against his chest. But he felt no desire; he knew he was only an object for her to cling to, and that anything he did might snap the link with her past. When she pulled away, he lit a cigarette and put it in her mouth. “Is there more?”

“Yes.” She said it flatly; the tears were gone and her emotions seemed under control. “You were right about one thing. There was no romance in my marriage. I can’t remember how I met Ian, but we were married on Tobago, that part of his story is true. I married him for his money; it wasn’t love, not even a hint of it on either side. He married me because he needed an heir. I didn’t want a baby—I’m not sure why unless it was the unpleasant recollection of the other one. I took the usual precautions but he threw away my diaphragm and my pills. He found out what time of the month I could conceive, and that was the only time I ever saw him. I came to dread those times, the way you dread a dental appointment. Not that I didn’t want a man, but Ian was obviously interested in nothing but planting his seed. He had ways of working up his interest that … well, you saw the mirror. I had other men for a while, until Ian scared them away. He wanted to be sure the kid would be his. I can remember standing at the waterfront when a strange ship came in, thinking that newcomers wouldn’t know I was Barrington’s woman. But Doxie was a match for any sailor, and all I did was get the boys beat up. When Ian moved his harem out to the island I warned him I’d had enough. I kept hearing the girls giggle and play their stupid radios full blast … and Ian creeping past my house with his sordid little gifts. I started saving household money for a getaway. One night Ian found it, and I … felt the walls closing in. I went crazy; I told him I was going to burn the harem, smoke out the little bitches. He just laughed. I didn’t know the grass would burn like a torch, but Ian knew it. He didn’t care. No, damn it. He wanted it to happen; he wanted something to hang over my head. Afterward he told me, ‘Give me a child and you’re free to go.’ And that’s the way it stands.”

He felt a vague letdown. “That’s all you remember?”

“Yes. And I don’t exactly
remember
that, in the sense of being able to close my eyes and remember sights, sounds, smells and emotions. It’s all sort of remote, like a story I’d read.”

“There’s nothing from before you married Ian?”

She shook her head. “No….”

“It seems to me he went to a lot of trouble to hook you. Any woman could have his kid.”

“I told him that. He said no, I was his kind of woman. The others were soft and weak, but I had come to him like a tigress with her claws sheathed. I was selfish, grasping and a killer by instinct, and those were the qualities—”

“Were you a killer?”

“What?”

“A killer?”

“Of course not. I don’t even like to see an animal die, like that ‘gouti. It’s just one of his theories.”

Drew felt a warning tingle, but he let it pass. “Why don’t you leave him?”

“He’d find me and put me away again. This time I’d crack up for sure.”

“You cracked up before by staying.”

Her jaw tightened. “I can last as long as he can. I can stay sane by watching each red vein that pops out on his nose, each new wrinkle under his eyes. He can’t live more than ten years. He had hepatitis once and his liver is shot. I know that every time he takes a drink he … dies a little.”

“You’ll be dying right with him.”

She gave a helpless shrug and got to her feet. “Come on. I expect my dinner’s ready.”

He came to his feet and rested his arm on her shoulder while he settled his crutch. Her lips were parted and raised toward him. Without thought, he closed the distance and her mouth opened beneath his. He felt the trembling of her thighs and the gentle, insistent thrust of her pelvis.

A frenzied flapping of pigeon wings shattered the moment. They were standing a yard apart when Charles stepped out of the weeds and looked down at the toes of his tennis shoes. “Lunch is ready,
madame.
”

“I’ll be right in, Charles. You may start serving.”

When he was gone she walked to the edge of the clearing and turned. “You see? It isn’t safe.”

He gave a snort of exasperation. “What am I supposed to do when you get that come-hither look? Backhand you across the mouth?”

“I was depending on you—”

“Edith, come here.”

“But it isn’t safe—”

“Then let’s go where it
is
safe. Come to town with me.”

“Seright, I’m the best-known face on the island. Wherever we went, Ian would know within an hour. I’ve been through that.”

“All right. Whale Rock. I can swim out—”

“Oh, darling, that’s too … cold and businesslike. ‘Hello-baby-here-we-are-on-schedule-bam-bam-goodbye.’ I don’t want that.” She came forward slowly and raised her hands to his shoulders. “I want a little time, a little tenderness….”

“I do too, Edith. But I’ve only got three days.”

She stiffened and drew back. “Three
days?
Why?”

“Because that’s all there is. Don’t ask me why.”

“But …” her lower lip trembled, “I thought you’d be staying. I mean, it’s hardly worthwhile …”

“That’s for you to decide.”

She lowered her eyes. “I guess I’m getting soft. I couldn’t see you go without …” She looked up at him. “Listen, I’ll try to find out about Ian’s plans. He goes to Trinidad or Barbados at least once a week on business. I’ll let you know—”

“You’ll pick the time?”

“Don’t you like that?”

“I’m not a jumping jack.”

“But I’m surrounded by people. I can’t just drop everything—”

“I sit and wait, and every hour I’d lose a little pride. In time you’d whittle me down to nothing.”

“I don’t want you whittled down, Seright.” She closed her eyes a moment, then looked up at him. “All right. You lead, I’ll follow. Just tell me when.”

“I’ll know more when I get back from town.”

She nodded, touched her lips to his for an instant, then she was gone.

Drew started toward the jetty, bemused by her sudden capitulation. Ten years ago she’d have fought to keep the upper hand. Had she changed into a compliant female, or was it a pose because she wanted something from him? A baby, for example….