Kit's Law (21 page)

Plus now the outporters had something new to worry about: would Shine come looking for the man that led the Mounties to his still? And it didn’t matter there was no such man, that the Mounties just happened upon it. No sir. Not with Shine. What mattered was who was Shine going to look at and
think
led the Mounties to his still? And as Old Joe said, that could hinge on something as far removed from the deed as a scab on a dead dog’s arse. Then Shine administered his own law, and the mauled corpse of Rube Gale was fresh testimony to that. And Rube was his drinking buddy who had probably done nothing more than shake his head when he was supposed to be nodding whilst Shine was talking to him. What would he do to someone he believed was trying to put him in jail for life?

The Mounties had been alerted. They came in pairs and was a comforting sight to the people of Haire’s Hollow, although they made it clear there was nothing they could do about Shine until someone came forward about the murder or Jimmy Randall’s ear. They never come near the gully. Sid kept telling me that was a good thing, because if they were to make a link between Shine and Josie, the reverend would be like a hawk to his prey, using Shine’s presence and my safety as a reason to get me out of the gully, and Josie’s moral decline as a reason to keep me out of there. One small blessing with Shine’s return was that the women, scared of running into Shine, stopped coming to the gully. Aside from Aunt Drucie. And it didn’t take much talking to convince her to take a couple of days.

“Just don’t say anything to anyone,” I cautioned as I walked her home the day Sid built the camp. “And if anyone sees you at home, just tell them you’re sick, and me and Josie was just out to visit with you, and everything’s fine.”

“As long as you’re O.K. with it,” Aunt Drucie said. “I must say, I’m some tired from this heat, can’t keep me eyes open at all. But I’ll be worried about you and Josie, Kit. S’pose Shine comes your way.”

“He got no reason to. And like I told you, me and Josie’s goin’ lookin’ for raspberries and we won’t be home much the next few days, anyway.”

“Along the old sawmill road is a good spot for raspberries. Me and Lizzy use to go there, once.” She stifled a yawn. “Course, we had stronger legs them days. Heh, for sure Lizzy’s were, poor old girl. I misses her, Kit, I misses her a lot.”

“I misses her, too, Aunt Drucie. You have a nice long nap, now. Give me a couple of days, and I’ll be back with a gallon of raspberries. How’s that?”

“Watch out for bears. Your grandfather seen one standin’ alongside the old mill, once. That’s why me and Lizzy never went back.”

“I expect he’s gone by now.”

“Bloody bears. But we got worse than that to worry about with Shine back. Make sure you bars your door in the evenin’.”

“I will. Make sure you bars yours. See you in a few days.” Leaving her at her stoop, I ran back to the gully and Sid.

“Now all we’ve got to do is sit tight and wait for the Mounties to catch Shine, or else run him off again,” Sid said, as we sat down on the grassy spot behind the house.

“I still don’t know about Josie,” I said.

“I think she’s going to be O.K. She don’t like Shine. She thinks it’s him that makes her sick, not the liquor.”

I gave something of a smile, sending a silent thank you Doctor Hodgins’s way.

“But, is she afraid of him?” I asked worriedly. “She might forget about being sick after a spell.”

“I told her I wouldn’t come back if she went off with Shine again.”

I sighed heavily, then spoke in a half-whisper.

“Suppose she do? Suppose she leads him to the camp?”

“She won’t. She wants to please me. Lord, Kit, I know it’s not the best of plans, but short of taking you out of the gully … ”

“Let’s not get onto that.”

“Then we’ll have to trust Josie. Come on, Kit. She understands a whole lot more than you think. And she certainly seems willing to go along with everything I say.”

“We’ll see,” I said, and lay back, my hands tucked beneath my head for a pillow, staring up at the hazy sky. Sid lay back besides me, his elbow warm against mine, and if it weren’t for the threat of Shine, it would’ve felt like the most peaceful place on earth, what with the waves washing upon the shore below us, and the gulls crying out above us, and the slight salty breeze fanning off the sea and rustling the air around us.

It was where I spent most of my time the next few days, looking out over the gully for Shine. Sid came as much as he could and helped me make fast work out of a visit from Doctor Hodgins. And I kept paying visits to Aunt Drucie, convincing her everything was fine and no, we hadn’t found the raspberry patch yet, but me and Josie were going off again the next morning and spending the day looking. And there was always Josie that had to be watched. At night, after jamming the door shut with a woodchip, I went to my room and barred the door with the bed and lay there listening, waiting, the picket with the nails resting by my pillow.

It was four days past his first visit that Shine came back. I was in my room, ready to hop in bed for the night, when I heard the crackie yap. Without a second’s hesitation, I lunged for the windowsill and jumped. The second my arse touched the ground, Josie’s was hitting dirt as well. We stared at each other, then scrambling to our feet, took off for the woods.

It was a night in hell. Swatting flies and ants and whatever other unimaginable creatures that were most likely crawling over us, I curled into a tight ball beneath a blanket and tried to force my way through the night. Aside from a few swats and a square dance of twists and turns, Josie slept like a baby. Once, when the sky was still littered with stars, I bolted upright, terrified to hear a bone-jarring screech coming from the house. It sounded like Pirate. Or was it a screech owl? Then the air was filled with the crackie’s yapping and hoarse roars from Shine. Lying back down, I took deep breaths, shutting out everything I’d heard Nan say about the minds of liquor-poisoned men. No runt of a dog would get close enough to hurt Pirate, I soothed myself. Must’ve been a screech owl. And for sure if it was Pirate, most likely it was the crackie who got the worst of that one.

Morning came early. Climbing the black spruce, I sat on a branch and watched the front door. The last star was still in the sky when Shine finally opened it and lurched out through, the crackie at his heels. I waited till he disappeared down the gully, and then some before shaking Josie. She woke like the baby, eyes and mouth opening at once, and all limbs flailing.

“Careful!” I cautioned as she came grumbling to her feet and leaped off the platform before she had a chance to take in where she was. But she was gone for home, any thoughts of Shine evaporating with the morning dew. Keeping up with her, we both came to the house at the same time, yet despite her rush to get home, her step quietened alongside of mine as we opened the door and peered inside. It was a sight that drew a gut-wrenching shriek out of us both and petrified us in its terrifying cruelty. Pirate was skivvered to the floor with a pig knife, his blood in a thick pool around him and his eyes and mouth shocked open, staring at us—as if he, too, was witnessing the horror of his death alongside of us.

I stumbled backwards and Josie began turning around and around in circles, making little whimpering sounds. I tried to reach out to her, but bent over instead, retching out the cries that were coming from somewhere so deep inside of me that they sounded like someone else’s.

“Get Doctor Hodgins! Get Doctor Hodgins!” Josie cried.

“Wait for Sid!” I managed to get out.

“Doctor Hodgins! Doctor Hodgins!” She made to run up over the bank, but I grabbed hold of her arm and pulled her back.

“No!” I said more strongly. “We wait for Sid.”

Surprisingly, she dropped down onto the stoop and wrapped her hands around her face. I slumped down besides her and waited, one eye on the gully for fear of Shine coming back, and the other on the path leading down from the road, praying it would be Sid that came and not May Eveleigh or Doctor Hodgins or Aunt Drucie …

It was Sid. About an hour later. Seeing him, Josie leaped off the stoop and dashed towards him, shouting and barking. I saw the concern on his face as he put together what she was telling him, and then he was holding out his arms and cradling me.

“We’ve got to get you out of here,” he said, finally. “There’s no telling what he’ll do next.”

“No … ohh, I don’t know. I can’t think, not with … ” I choked off, and Sid tightened his arms around me.

“It’s O.K.,” he soothed. “We’ll talk later. First, I’ll take care of Pirate.”

Not wanting to see, I went down to the gully and splashed some cold water on my face and neck. A few minutes later, Sid was sitting on a rock besides me.

“I’ve put him in a brin bag,” he said. “Josie and I’ll bury him out back.”

I nodded.

“Kit, perhaps you should stay with Drucie until something’s done about Shine.”

“What about Josie? She isn’t safe, either.”

“She’ll come with you.”

“No. She’ll keep comin’ home.”

“We’ll talk with her. She listened before.”

“I don’t know,” I mumbled, rocking back and forth. “I just don’t know any more.”

“Kit.” Sid took me by the arms and made me stop rocking. “I can’t let you stay here.”

“I know,” I said. “I just can’t think right now.”

Fear, shame, it was hard to tell which was causing the trembling in my voice, but Sid saw them both, and his eyes pained at the little comfort he could offer.

“Bury Pirate,” I whispered, rising to my feet. Taking a long shuddering breath, I went back inside the house. Ripping off another scrubbing rag from the tail of Nan’s nightdress, I dropped it into the bucket of water and started cleaning the piss, spit and butts off the floor. Tears welled up in my eyes as I started on Pirate’s blood, but I gritted them back and kept scrubbing. The door nudged open behind me, and thinking it was Sid, I dropped the cloth and wiped at my running nose.

“Oh God,” I cried out in horror as the crackie scampered across the floor and started lapping up Pirate’s blood. The doorway darkened and my limbs became like water as Shine lunged in, his eyes filled with pus, and a white froth crusting the corners of his bearded mouth. He stood there, panting, his body shaking like a distempered dog.

I opened my mouth to scream, but it felt like the air had been sucked from the room and all I was gulping in was the stink off his body and the sharp, bitter fear reeking off my own. I managed a yelp before he was on me, smashing me across the face. I fell back onto the floor, my face numbed by the blow, and watched in shocked horror as he straddled a leg on each side of me and looked down, grinning. I opened my mouth to scream, squirming to get away, but he dropped to his knees, imprisoning me with his thighs, and clamped a dirt-grimed hand across my mouth. Smiling a row of rotted teeth, he reached inside his pants and pulled out his dick, as big and ugly a thing as ever I’d seen, with purple veins snaking around its sides, and the smell of rotting dogberries dripping from its head.

He bobbed it in front of my eyes, and I stopped struggling against the hand that was smothering me, prepared to die rather than have that living thing touch me. And just when the light was fading to black, Sid was leaping onto his back, his hands raking across the sneering, whiskered face.

Shine reached back his hand, and grabbing Sid by the scruff of his neck, hauled him over his shoulder and whammed him hard on the floor. Sid groaned, his breath knocked out of him, then shook his head and struggled to sit up. But Shine had let go of me and was now crawling on top of Sid. Stretching a leg across his chest, he straddled Sid the way he had sat astride me and, squealing like a stuck pig, started batting Sid across the face with his purple, swollen dick. Sid screamed, wrenching his head from side to side as Shine continued to playfully bat him in the face, all the time laughing and grunting, laughing and grunting. I managed to get onto my knees and started crawling towards the stove, thinking of finding something that I could beat against the side of Shine’s head, but he caught me by the ankle and yanked me back besides him.

“Lemme go, lemme go!” I screamed, clawing at the floor to get away. But my nails scraped uselessly across the smooth surface of the canvas. Sid’s cries became muffled, and I knew that Shine had placed his hand over his mouth to silence him—or smother him. “Lemme go!” I screamed, clawing harder at the floor, but his grip was an iron band around my ankle and I collapsed sobbing. Giving one last blood-curdling scream, I swung around to chew at the hand holding me down, and widened my eyes incredulously. Coming through the doorway and swinging the axe up over her shoulder was Josie.

“Oh God!” I cried out as she stomped towards Shine, but my voice, hoarsened by my frantic screams, sounded no more than a piteous moan. I stared hypnotized as the silver arc of the axe, glinting in the morning sun, came full across the back of Shine’s head, then fell sideways. A soft groan gushed from Shine and he toppled forward, his hand falling away from Sid’s mouth and a growing stream of blood spewing down over Sid’s terror-stricken face.

Retching wildly Sid wriggled out from beneath Shine and ran out the door. I lurched to my feet, staggering after him. At the door I stopped and looked back. Josie was still standing there, her body arched forward, her hands held out in front of her as if they still held the axe. Not knowing whom to run to, I sunk down onto the stoop and dropped my head in my hands.

“Kit!”

Sid was standing in front of me, water dripping off him from where he had dunked his head in the gully’s brook. His breathing was coming in quick, heavy spurts, and his face, cleaned of blood, was as white as a sun-bleached sheet. Inside the house, Josie had dropped to the floor and was rocking her body to and fro, to and fro, like she had done on the day of Nan’s passing. Only she wasn’t moaning and crying on this day. She was quiet, as quiet as sin, staring at the blood-soaked face of the man she had just killed.

Then Sid was stepping past me. He grabbed hold of Josie’s hand and, grabbing hold of mine, hauled me up from the stoop and led us both down to the gully. We sat there like statues, excepting for Josie’s rocking, rocking, rocking.