Lightfall (26 page)

“
Here?
” asked Iris in some surprise. Didn't they barely speak, these people?

“What?” replied the other woman, with a vague swipe at a curl of hair. She didn't see the distinction. Where she had lived before was the same as here. “Aren't you going to change?”

“No.”

No, she was not. She was wearing the sweater and jeans she'd arrived in. She held to the notion stubbornly: there was nothing she needed to dress for. Maybeth, for her part, had settled on a starched white blouse and ruffled peasant skirt. She looked quite pretty as she drew her calico apron off and hooked the basket under her arm. She went to the foot of the stairs, to call Roy down from his unpacking. Iris would have preferred to let her go on ahead, but she saw they were meant to be tight, like family.

They walked out the front way and onto the lawn. Thus, they avoided the sight of the tattered village strewn all over the hill behind. The noise of the work was in the wind, but only the lighthouse, mute on the point in the hot noon sun, stood in their line of vision. Roy carried sixes of beer in either hand. Iris found herself lagging back, and when the two of them up ahead began to chat about nothing at all, she felt her stomach tighten with annoyance. She was pouting.

Why? The sides were finally drawn, weren't they? At least she'd cast her lot with those who would survive it. What was the problem? She certainly hadn't a thing in common with Michael's broken crew. She chided herself for being perverse, then trotted ahead and slipped between them. She let one hand light on Roy's hard shoulder, while she tucked the other around Maybeth's waist. They were eager to have her—didn't question what had taken her so long. They strode the cliff and laughed with delight when they spotted the others, sitting about in a ring.

Emery clapped his hands to call the stragglers in. There were four more in the group today—all a little shy, it seemed, for having waited till the second round. One was a thin and freckled boy, about twenty, who'd come with Jeff. Building a kite out of twigs and an old newspaper, he stuck very close to his friend. He kept watching over his shoulder, as if he expected Michael or someone to spring from the woods and drag him back. The Griersons, a whey-faced man and his wife, had fought so hard to make the decision to come that they had nothing left to say. They lounged on a threadbare blanket, their backs to each other, lazily picking at clover. Last came Mrs. Jeremy, the tea-party type, with dainty habits and flimsy shoes that wouldn't let her walk a hundred yards.

They had laid on the wild-flowered ground the best of their Belgian tablecloths. The silver and china were fetched that morning out of velvet pouches. When the hampers were unloaded, they had enough food for thirty or forty: covered dishes and bowls of salad, a watermelon in a tub of ice. Polly must have stayed up all night just filling cream puffs. A fire crackled in a sheltered pit beneath the trees, with a dozen ears of corn slowly roasting and a harp of ribs on a spit.

“I want to get a picture,” said Emery, tireless as always. “Everyone stand together.”

He had an old box camera set on a tripod. A cape of black cotton cloth hung down behind. They all groaned and protested good-naturedly, but one by one they came forward. The more agile crouched in the grass, while the others were pushed to form a tight arc behind. Iris knelt at one end beside Jeff. Polly stood directly in back of her, one hand lightly touching the base of her neck.

When Emery was finally satisfied, he trotted around and ducked beneath the cloth. They had to smile for a minute before it clicked, and even then he wanly announced he'd left the film in his pocket. He warned them not to move, as he tinkered about in the innards.

“There's something I have to tell you,” whispered Jeff, not turning.

Why?
she almost said, as if to shrink from confidences. But she lowered her voice and murmured: “What?”

“Simon and I …” he began, then stopped, as if someone had bent to overhear. She couldn't imagine whom he meant, but the moment he spoke again, she remembered the thin shy boy. “We're together,” he said in a halting voice.

“I know,” she answered pleasantly.

It was time for the second shot. They grinned and froze for what seemed forever, till Emery got it right. Then they all laughed and broke to go eat. She rose with an idle look around, thinking to find a spot with Roy. Polly stood waiting to greet her, wearing a bonnet out of her attic. It made her look like a Gold Rush pioneer. Jeff laid a hand on Iris's arm. She turned.

“Listen—you don't understand,” Jeff said. “I love him.”

“Oh,” she replied, vague and slightly tremulous. He kept standing there as if he expected more. How could she tell him she didn't care? “How nice,” she said.

“If you don't want us, we'll leave. Just say.” He spoke with a fierce precision. There wasn't the thread of apology. “There's places we can hide, you know. We don't want any favors.”

“
I
don't care,” said Iris, not really to cut him off. She just didn't want the responsibility. She'd been through too much the night before, wondering who would go home with whom. She didn't want to know.

It flashed in her mind, as she squeezed his arm and turned aside, that Michael allowed no love. She could probably lure some away with the promise of freedom. Some must still be seething with desire. But even as she took her place in the circle next to Roy she rejected the notion out-of-hand, because they seemed content without her. It was the second time today she'd felt it: Michael's people were happy. They'd freely chosen the work at hand. It wasn't her affair.

She did all she could to be with her own kind. She passed the covered dishes and splashed their glasses full of lemonade. She coaxed the Grierson woman to tell the dreary story of her past. In the course of things she must have smiled a hundred times at Jeff and Simon, so they wouldn't think she harbored second thoughts. Besides all that, she ate till she couldn't endure another mouthful. When the homemade ice cream made the rounds she shook her head no with a grin and patted the sweat from her upper lip.

The last dish was hardly passed when they started to wonder aloud what to do next. Emery wanted to go bag mussels along the harbor shore. Jeff suggested a midnight hike through the cliffside woods, as if to defy whatever hid in waiting. Mrs. Jeremy asked them all to dinner. Maybeth proposed a bicycle ride, though there wasn't a bike in the village or even a stretch of road. They decided to vote by secret ballot, and laughingly passed the pen around and tore up a paper napkin. Polly threw her bonnet down so each could place a wish.

In the end they were all too nice to choose. Most every ballot said they didn't care, or so it seemed when Emery read them through, giving out bits and pieces. He came to an inescapable conclusion: If they were really so amenable, why not do it all? There was no point having empty hours. If somebody didn't want to come along on this or that, he should feel free to stay home. It couldn't have sounded fairer—except for one thing: Iris's wish was tossed right out.

Discuss what's going to happen
, she had written, straight up and down like a schoolmarm.
We have to have a plan.

But for all the talk of outings and home-cooked meals, not a word was spoken of Tuesday morning. There was still the rest of today to tame. The gathering of mussels was set for four o'clock. Then dinner at Mrs. Jeremy's: 7:30 for eight, they were told, with the hope of a mussel stew for starters. Comfortable shoes suggested, as the midnight walk would leave directly after sweets.

What they were clearly meant to do in the meantime was go the next step further, two and two. The Griersons were already holding hands, the trauma of getting here forgotten. Maybeth was back on Felix Quinn—offering, now that he was homeless, the one room left at the boardinghouse. The young men flew their kite, dancing across the grass. It wasn't that Iris didn't want Roy or to wish the others well, but she found she couldn't bear the weight of expectation. She wished she knew where it was coming from, so she could fling the smugness back in its face.

Now she was just being hard. They were only doing the best they could, and holding close to give each other strength. She berated herself as a prig—and even then, as the self-abasement rang in her ears, she coldly watched till Roy had turned his back. As he bent to help Maybeth clean up, she edged away between the trees and hurried across the park. She made it all look like a young girl's caper, so no one would think she was trying to get away. When she reached the lighthouse she turned and scanned the group on the lawn. There was nobody watching. She ducked inside.

For a moment she leaned against the studded door with a pounding heart. She gulped for breath as if she'd run ten miles, or as if she had just come through an interrogation. She stared at the trapdoor under the stairs, but she made no move to lift it. It seemed like a lousy hiding place, with the sea always reaching up from below. She climbed the tower stairs, and when she reached the landing she slumped in the keeper's chair and buried her face in her hands. She hadn't a clue what she really felt.

She looked blankly out at the water. Her hands still covered her lower face, as if she were stifling a scream. Because the ocean told her nothing, she drew in her gaze like a telescope and looked at the mess on the table. Papers. Charts. A curious ratcheted instrument that appeared to measure distances. Mice had chewed at the edges of a couple of faded nautical books. Someone had spilled a cup of coffee, so all the butts were soggy in the ashtray.

She drew a sheet of paper toward her, then scrambled around in the toolbox next to the chair till she found a pencil. She started scribbling notes before she thought to wonder what to say.
Twelve
, she wrote, for the number in their group. Then an arrow pointing right. Then:
Emery's house. What's the basement like? Bring water. Matches. Guns (?)

She relaxed a little. She slouched in the chair and teethed on the end of the pencil. She looked around at the cozy space and felt she could almost live here. Rain gear hung from pegs on the wall. A hot plate perched on a shelf. Beside it were all the controls—a row of switches, a rusty crank, levers like a drawbridge—none of it marked as to what was on or off. You simply had to know. There were built-in cupboards, like on a ship. Mostly the place was windows, wrapped in a half-circle around the desk, with even a window behind her head looking in on the works and lenses.

She bent to the paper again and crossed out
Guns.
Then wrote:
Upton
—
can eclipse cause anything else? Say a tidal wave?
It seemed farfetched, the moment she saw it written, but she had to consider everything.
What if we split into two groups?
Under that:
The boardinghouse?
But she'd hardly scrawled the question mark before she wrote the answer:
No
—
too close to the edge.
It was hard to follow the logic here, but then she didn't wish to be followed. In a tiny hand in the corner, almost like an afterthought, she wrote:
Why don't we take the church?

She looked once more to the ocean. Very, very calm. She supposed she hadn't given enough attention to it. In the old days she would stand for hours, not twenty feet from here, just watching the silken shimmer of it. She'd comb the horizon every morning—then, when the others had dropped to sleep, come back and stare at the endless darkness. There wasn't any reason to it. She saw no God out there. She just felt calmer, somehow, witnessing all that nothing.

“I think it's time we talked,” said a voice beside her, cool and slow. As if Death had come in the room.

With a whimper of fear she swiveled her head to the right. It was only Emery, stopping to rest at the top of the stairs, a lopsided grin on his face, a half-eaten apple in one hand. She twisted her mouth into a smile, but the panic wouldn't leave her. Why did they have to be so alone? Even Michael would have been easier.

“I needed some time to myself,” she said.

“I know—I don't blame you. Isn't it wonderful?” He meant the ocean. “I consider it a great stroke of luck,” he declared, “to be given the chance to live here twice.”

“Emery, please,” she said, though she hardly knew what to beg for. He turned the most radiant smile upon her. All he seemed to want was for her to be happy like he was. Her fear went away like a headache. She blurted it out: “We'll be going to
your
house Tuesday—is that right?”

At first, when he shook his head, she thought he meant no. Her mind began to race with other places. Then she saw what it was: he was clucking with fond disapproval. He wagged a finger and spoke in a gelid voice: “One day at a time, my dear.”

She saw it was all deliberate. They didn't want to think about it. What's more, they didn't want
her
to. They weren't going to listen—no one was.

“What's that you're writing?”

She glanced at the scribbled sheet on the desk. Without thinking, she'd covered it up with the palm of her hand. She could feel him leaning slightly up on tiptoe. He couldn't see a thing.

“Oh, just a letter,” she said.

She fought the silence that followed. Emery raised his eyebrows and waited to hear the rest. Who was it to? What was she after? When it didn't come, he stepped forward. He lay a hand on her shoulder and cooed in a pitying way: “Let go, Iris. You're only going to lose this lovely day.”

He gestured with the apple out the window. A sorcerer's gleam was in his eye, as if the sweep of the winter sea had sprung from his imagining. She shook him off by leaning forward for the ashtray. Then she clenched her hand like a spider and crumpled the paper up. “You're right,” she murmured, dropping the ball on the bed of soggy butts. As she picked up matches and struck a flame, she could feel his strange, relentless hunger. The hand he didn't put back on her shoulder flexed at his side. The fire bit into the paper.