The Lighthouse: A Novel of Terror (14 page)

“Beating me as usual,” Hod complained. “’Niners are winning, though. How about a beer?”

“No.” Mitch’s hands were steady now; the walk up here had put him back in control again. He said, “Ryerson just showed up down at the
Spindrift.
Says somebody shot up his car with a rifle last night. Did two hundred dollars’ worth of damage.”

Hod said, “The hell!” Adam didn’t say anything; he had his eyes on the cards he was shuffling.

“Accused me of it,” Mitch told them. “Said if it ever happened again he’d call in the sheriff and have me arrested.”

“You do it, Mitch?” Hod asked. “Shoot up his car?”

“Hell no, I didn’t do it.” He said his next words to Hod, too, but he was looking at Adam. “You go out on the cape last night with Adam? After deer?”

“No. Overcast breaking up and all that moonlight . . . just didn’t seem like a good idea.”

“How about you, Adam? You go out?”

Adam popped the cards down on the table, got up in that bouncy way of his. “I went out. No damn deer, though.”

“What’d you take? That thirty-ought-six of yours? The one with the scope sight?”

Adam hopped around a little, let out a breath, and then said, “All right, Mitch, I done it. I put a couple of rounds in Ryerson’s car.”

“Well what the hell
for
?”

“I didn’t plan it. It was just there wasn’t any deer and it got me frustrated. I was out near the lighthouse, nobody around, that big Ford station wagon sitting there in the moonlight . . . hell, I don’t know. I remembered what you said Friday night and it just seemed like the thing to do.”

“What
I
said?”

“About not letting Ryerson get away with murdering Red. About making him pay for it.”

“I didn’t mean by shooting up his goddamn car!”

“What’d you mean, then?”

“I don’t know, not yet. But nothing like that.”

“Hell, Mitch, I’m sorry. I only meant it as a favor to you. I liked Red too, you know that.”

“Yeah.”

“I just never figured he’d come down on you for it.”

“Suppose he changes his mind, decides to sic the sheriff on me? Or tries to sue me for the damages? What then, Adam?”

Adam was silent for a couple of seconds. Then he said, “That ain’t going to happen. None of it.”

“Oh it ain’t?”

“No. Ryerson can’t do nothing to you for what happened to his car, any more’n you can do anything to him for killing Red. Not legally. He’s got no proof who fired those rounds last night. If there was anything he could do, it’d have been the sheriff talking to you this morning, not him.”

“Maybe,” Mitch said, but he wasn’t so sure.

“If he did swear out a complaint against you,” Hod said, “you could do the same thing to him, couldn’t you?” He’d been watching with round eyes and looking nervous. Hod was always nervous when things shifted off an even keel. “On account of Red, I mean?”

“No. I already told you the sheriff said I couldn’t.”

“Well, couldn’t you sue him for false arrest or something? You could get Gus Brooks, up in Bandon. He’s the best lawyer on the coast.”

“Hod, you talk like a man with a paper asshole. I can’t afford to hire Gus Brooks or any other goddamn lawyer. I can’t afford to get arrested or go to court or miss any damn time at all out on the boat. I can’t hardly make ends meet as it is.”

“Ryerson don’t have time for it either,” Adam said. “He’s out there writing some book—got a year to do it and no more. He ain’t going to make trouble no matter what happens. Putting the sheriff or some lawyer on you don’t buy him nothing but headaches he don’t want.”

Mitch didn’t say anything. He was still mad as hell, but now he didn’t know who he was mad at. Yes he did: it wasn’t Adam, it was Ryerson more than ever. Adam was his friend; Ryerson was a damn radical from California who’d murdered Red just because Red nipped him a little. Adam was stupid sometimes and didn’t use good sense; Ryerson was a dog-murdering son of a bitch.

“Whole damn year of him out at the light,” Mitch said finally. “Sitting out there all high and mighty, killing a man’s dog when he feels like it, threatening people. It ain’t right.”

“No,” Hod said, “but what’s there to do about it?”

“Plenty.”

“Like what?”

“Like send him to hell back to California. Pry his ass out of the lighthouse before
this
year’s out.”

“You mean force him to leave?”

“Isn’t that what I just said?”

“How you going to do that without him running to the law?”

“There are ways,” Adam said. He looked relieved that Mitch wasn’t pissed at him anymore. “Ain’t there, Mitch?”

“Yeah,” Mitch said. “There are ways.”

Jan left for Portland at eight o’clock Tuesday morning. Even though there had been no repetition of the shooting incident, no trouble of any kind, he’d seemed reluctant to leave her alone at the lighthouse. It had crossed her mind that in spite of what he claimed, he didn’t really believe it was kids who had been responsible, that he thought it had something to do with the accidental death of Mitch Novotny’s dog and was afraid of further reprisals. But when she voiced the thought to him, he had only repeated what the county sheriff had told him: This was the country; youngsters were made familiar with firearms at an early age, and unfortunately they sometimes misused their weapons by plinking at signs, buildings, even automobiles, in much the same way their urban counterparts spray-painted walls and subway cars. She preferred that explanation herself, rather than believe it was malicious mischief on the part of a grown man or men who ought to know better, and had let the matter drop. She wasn’t afraid to stay alone. And she had enough on her mind as it was—those headaches of Jan’s above all—without cluttering it even more with vague fears that their neighbors were out to get them.

After Jan was gone, she tackled the kitchen again. She’d started painting it on Sunday, and had finished it yesterday with Jan’s help. All that remained to be done was some touching-up work and a general cleanup; then, this afternoon, she could get back to work on her preliminary sketch of the Eddystone Light.

By noon she had managed to scrape off most of the paint that had slopped over onto the window, counters, and floor. There were a few stubborn spots but they would come out with turpentine. She set down the single-edged razor she’d been using and surveyed the room with satisfaction. The white semi-gloss enamel had brightened the space considerably; the kitchen even smelled clean and fresh. Now turpentine—and then she would be done.

She went through the little cloakroom—still gray and dingy, but she didn’t intend to expend any energies on it—and into the pantry, where the painting supplies were. The pantry was good-sized; the staples they had purchased in Hilliard, plus the few supplies they’d brought from home, barely filled its shelves. Obviously, lightkeepers had had to keep much more on hand in the days before the modern automobile made trips into the village both simple and convenient.

She was reaching down for a can of turpentine when she thought she heard a noise. She froze, listening. There was nothing to hear. You’re getting jumpy, Ryerson, she thought. Imagining things. But then she remembered the old well, the one under the trapdoor in the pantry floor. Just thinking of it gave her the creeps. Which was silly, of course; but she couldn’t help disliking that dark, dank cavity filled with God knew what kind of refuse. And—rats, too? Rats would make a rustling sound.

She looked down at the metal ring that served as the handle for the door. She ought to check. If there
were
rats down there she’d have to buy poison, get rid of them. She wasn’t about to live with disease-carrying rodents just a few feet away from their stored food.

Decisively, fighting off a shudder, she bent and grasped the ring and pulled upward. The door yielded, creaking. It was heavy; she drew it up halfway, warily, ready to let it fall again if anything came scurrying out of the darkness. But nothing did. She eased it back as far as it would go on its hinges, left it canted there at an angle to the floor and the well opening it revealed.

The air that rose up from inside the cut-out space was musty, like an old cellar that has gone too long unused. She took their big Eveready flashlight from where it sat on a nearby shelf and shone it down inside the well. Nothing moved in the sweep of light; thank God for that. The cavity was about three feet in diameter, at least a dozen feet deep, with rusted metal rungs mortared into the stone walls. The debris at the bottom was mounded unevenly: unrecognizable metal shapes, some broken china, pieces of dusty glass, a dented tea kettle, even an old (twenties?) automobile hubcap. But no rats. Not even droppings indicating their presence.

Reassured, she shut off the flashlight and lowered the trapdoor. Dusted off her hands, got the turpentine, and started back toward the kitchen with it. But at the entrance to the cloakroom something made her turn and glance back at the trapdoor. It was irrational, but she wished the damned well wasn’t there. Or at least that she didn’t have to be reminded it was every time she entered the pantry.

Then she remembered seeing some carpet remnants out in the garage, leftovers from the carpeting in the living room. One of the bigger pieces ought to cover the trapdoor. And they could use it as a mat to wipe off their shoes when they came in through the pantry in wet weather.

An hour later the trapdoor was not only carpet-covered, but she had tacked the remnant down at its four corners to make sure it stayed in place. She had also finished cleaning up the kitchen, had polished her blue enamel cookware and hung it on the new hooks on the wall, and was feeling rather pleased with herself. Hungry, too. A tuna sandwich, she thought, and maybe a glass of wine.

She was mixing up the tuna at the drainboard when she saw, through the window, that she was about to have company. Mandy Barnett, of all people, had just come through the gate and was walking toward the lighthouse.

Frowning, Alix put the tuna salad into the refrigerator, went into the living room, and opened the door just before Mandy reached it. The girl was dressed in the same Indian-style poncho, jeans, and beaded leather headband; she grinned at Alix and said, “I didn’t see the car and I was afraid you wouldn’t be home.”

“Well, this is a surprise. How did you get all the way out here?”

“A guy I know brought me. He’s waiting down the road.”

“The boy in the green Chevvy?”

“That’s right. Aren’t you going to ask me in?”

Alix hesitated; but she was curious about why the girl was here. “All right, come ahead.”

Inside, Mandy said, “It’s not too bad here.”

“We like it.”

“Nicer than where I live, that’s for sure. You know the trailers up on the north end of town?”

“Yes.”

“My mom, dad, two brothers, and me live in one of them. We don’t even have running water.”

Alix didn’t know what to say, so she kept silent.

“We take turns hauling water from the faucet,” Mandy said. “I sleep on the couch. Last week we had egg sandwiches for supper four days.”

“Mandy, why are you telling me all this?”

“I just want you to know where I’m coming from.” The girl began to pace around the room the way she had at the launderette, examining things and humming a vaguely recognizable rock tune. The lyrics, Alix recalled, had something to do with wanting to “get it on all night.” At Mandy’s age she wouldn’t have even
considered
getting it on all night, much less sung about it. Mandy was obviously much more precocious; she had a tough, put-on assurance that might have been amusing if she hadn’t been so serious.

She said, “Suppose you tell me why you’re here.”

Mandy stopped pacing. “I wanted to talk. You’re from California, right? Someplace near San Francisco?”

“Yes.”

“Nice there.”

“Yes.”

“What do you think of Hilliard?”

Alix debated an answer, but took too long for Mandy’s liking; the girl answered her own question.

“Well, I
hate
it!”

The outburst cracked her tough-girl veneer. Alix took advantage of it and asked her, “Why, Mandy?”

“It’s ugly and cold, and everybody’s poor. There’s nothing to do but go to church or to the fucking Bingo games at the community center. I hate living in that trailer. We used to rent a house, but when my dad lost his boat we couldn’t even afford that. My mother used to have a dream that someday we’d own our own house, somewhere nice like Bandon or Coos Bay, but that’ll never happen. She doesn’t dream about anything anymore.”

“Don’t you have friends in the village? At school?”

“I dropped out this year.”

“Why?”

“Why not? Sitting in school wasn’t getting me anywhere and I had a chance to go to work at a boutique in Bandon. But that fell through. Besides, my dad’s got a high school diploma and look what it’s done for him.”

“What about your friend in the green Chevvy?”