Borderlines (4 page)

“Would you like to see the basement?” Fox asked politely. I could hear a slight inflection of victory in his tone. Rennie patted his arm as we filed by, pretty amused by the entire proceeding by now. “I think we’re outta here.” The Wingates were standing outside with Greta.

“Better luck next time, Bud,” Rennie called over to Wingate. “My name’s not Bud.” The sheer hostility in his voice caught us all off guard. For some reason, it made me think of when the light gets strangely yellow, just before a big storm hits from out of nowhere.

Rennie heard the menace in Wingate’s voice clearly. “Hey, look, “I’m not your problem. If you can’t keep your shit together, don’t lay it on me.” Greta looked from one to the other. “Never mind, Rennie.”

But Bruce Wingate seemed to have found an outlet for his anger and frustration. He was like a stove glowing cherry red. Rennie stared at him for a moment, typically unwilling to walk away and let the situation cool. “What the hell’s the matter with you?” “You people make me sick.”

The words slipped out between unmoving lips.

Greta tugged at Rennie’s sleeve. “Drop it, Rennie, the man’s upset.” “I can see that. What I don’t see is why he’s pissed at us.

Seems to me we put up with enough bullshit from these assholes-them and their fucked-up daughter.” Wingate hit him with his fist hard across the face, making him stagger back. Rennie’s mouth was open, his expression stunned. Buster and I instinctively caught him by his arms and held him. But he didn’t attempt to react. He just watched as Wingate stalked off, stiff-legged, with his wife in tow. Buster patted Rennie lightly on the back. “You okay?” Rennie straightened and shook us off.

“Yeah. Fucking dink.” He walked away in the other direction, rubbing the side of his face.

The three of us, Greta, Buster, and I, were left standing in the dark street. “Christ almighty,” I muttered. “What’s been going’ on around here?” Greta looked at me for a moment, and then left us without saying a word.

As I stood there in the evening chill, I knew one thing: The violence and frustration buried deep inside all of us was working its way to the surface in Gannet, building up slowly, like the sweat of exertion n a hot summer day.

Buster and I stood quietly for a while, watching Greta’s stumpy figure receding up Atlantic toward the Inn.

He sighed gently, the vapor from his nostrils caught in the light from the moon and the blanket of brilliant icy stars overhead. I sensed n him a resignation of sorts, not just about tonight’s behavior, but about the causes behind it. He was one of life’s observers, and the social integration I sensed in this town must have been a focus of his tension for years. I felt the sadness emanating from him like the heat from dying embers.

Buster shoved his hands deeper into his pockets. “You going home?”

I hesitated. “I don’t think so, not yet. I thought I might go back to the Inn. I would like to talk to you about all this, though.” He nodded. “I’ll walk with you. I’m stiffening up.” I let him hit his stride in silence for a couple of minutes, knowing he hadn’t forgotten my request. He wanted to give it some thought.

“You know anything about this group here?” He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “Rennie told me they’re headed by a guy who calls himself The Elephant. They’ve spent a lot of money making friends.” “Right.

Edward Sarris. Well, Greta and I are still Selectmen, along with Renie Cutts. About five years ago, this guy Sarris comes to one of our monthly meetings and introduces himself. He says he’s moving up here with some friends and that they’ll be buying up a bunch of property. He knows people are going to talk ‘cause his bunch is a little unusual, but that we’re all going’ to be real good neighbors.

He’s not asking us for anything, you know-it’s more like an announcement, just so we don’t think he’s sneaking around trying to pull a fast one. “Well, sneaking was hardly a problem. They came in here gangbusters, paying top dollar for about a dozen houses, buying the old Morse farm north of town, building something like a church up in the woods beyond Atlantic, opening that restaurant, spreading money around like snow in January. People were so busy stuffing their pockets, they didn’t see half the town had switched hands.” “How many members are in the Order?” “Oh, I don’t know-seventy-five to a hundred. Anyway, problem was, once they were in, the town was split in two; they didn’t mix with us and we weren’t invited to mix with them. It’s against their religion, or whatever they call it. You saw it in that house: They’re real structured and keep to themselves. They say they’re anti-materialists and that everybody who ain’t like them are the bad guys. It’s like any other bunch of oddballs, I suppose-you got to hate something or someone to make yourself feel better. Maybe that’s what Greta’s doing.” I had seen Greta’s hatred, and Wingate’s, but Fox had seemed downright gracious in the face of our invasion. “Who do they hate?” “The ‘material world,’ as they call it: the pollution, the moneygrubbing, the commercialism, electricity and plumbing and cars-us, in other words.” “Does that animosity ever come out? Have they ever threatened anyone?” He gave a surprised look. “Oh, no, they wouldn’t touch us with songs. Except for Sarris he’s their ambassador in dealing with the outside world.” I shook my head. “So it’s a time bomb?” He chuckled, which came as a relief. “We could be close-minded y now. I don’t know. There’s more, though, a feel to it that unsettles people.

I’m not real bent out of shape myself, mind you. I don’t like hat we lost half the town, but that was our fault. Other people, though, see ‘em as a threat. They dress funny, look weird, keep to themselves.

Hell, when you get down to it, I think it’s just the hippy thing all over again. They’re nature freaks they fertilize their gardens with their own shit; they don’t believe in zippers or in getting married; they call each other by funny names. And then there’s the sex.

Rumor has it everybody does it with everybody else and Sarris gets the pick of the litter. Doesn’t sound too bad to me, but people like Greta ain’t too fond of it. She always was a little strait-laced, I thought.”

“You told me once the restaurant was the only genuine business the town has.” He sighed. “Oh, it is-it’s real successful. It has a mailorder part to it, too, that sells ‘natural food,’ whatever the hell that is.

But with the town half-sold on, and the restaurant pulling whatever traffic comes y, Greta’s found herself pretty pinched. The whole town has, for that matter.” He shook his head and smiled sadly.

“Looks like maybe we sold our soul for a few quick bucks.” “How badly off is she?” “Greta? Who knows? She’s gotten pretty wild about them.

You want to get your ears burned, just mention the Order. This Wingate couple blowing into town has been like a fuse. She’s latched onto them like a mother hen, determined to help them find their daughter. I don’t know, though. They seem pretty weird to me, too.” Despite Buster’s amiable tone, the picture he was drawing was rim, of desperate people in a face-on, the backs of their heels on the edge of a chasm. “Has Wingate blown up before?” Buster frowned. “That was a first; course, he’s only been here a couple of days. It wouldn’t have happened if that damned fool Rennie hadn’t pushed.” I didn’t say anything. I wasn’t going to fault Rennie. It had seemed to me his irritation at Wingate’s tone had been justified, even if he had been a little lacking in sensitivity. Still, that was the Rennie of old ever afraid of being popped if he felt he was right. I’d always loved running in his wake as a kid, glorifying in his bravado.

It was the exact way Buster so disliked in him.

Buster resumed. “Except for tonight, old Bruce strikes me as a pretty tight drum, as buttoned down as his collars. I never seen him so much as smile, I don’t think.” He shook his head. ‘I’m not sure I’d be real keen to go home with folks like that.” We had reached the front steps of the Inn. “You coming inside?” I asked him.

“Nah, I think I’ll go home. Laura usually puts something in a Crockpot for dinner. I’ll leave it on for you, if you like.” “Hmm, I met her when I came in. Sounds like you’re getting decadent in your old age, hiring a housekeeper.

He smiled. “Nice kid. No… I helped her out a few years back-alcoholic family, lousy friends. She straightened herself out and thought I had a lot to do with it; said she wanted to return the favor somehow. I got tired of arguing, so she fixes me the odd meal now and then and cleans the house… well, catch you later.” I climbed the steps and looked back at him, heading toward the corner of North and 114. In the dark, barely visible from the Inn’s anemic lighting, he looked like some bear heading back to his cave.

I stepped inside the door and hung up my coat. Greta was coming out the cafe/’s double doors. “I thought you went home.” “I wanted to ask you something.” She looked at me warily. “What about?” “The Wingates.” She placed her hands on her hips, not the most subservient of gestures. “Is it true you’re working for the State’s Attorney now?” I hesitated, suddenly conscious of how I might be perceived here.

“I’m on temporary assignment for a specific case. It has nothing to do with Gannet, though.” “Are you going to help the Wingates?” “I don’t know if there’s anything legally I can do.” She let out a short bark of a laugh. “Those Order people kidnapped the Wingates’ daughter.

That’s against the law, isn’t it?” “If they kidnapped her. Sounds more like she ran away. There was a burst of laughter from the other room, followed by loud voices competing for attention. Greta scowled. “She’s like a zombie-she doesn’t know what the hell she’s doing. They’ve got her drugged or something.” She bent forward and thrust her face up at me. “Jesus, Joe, stop tiptoeing around. What do you think this Order is anyway-a summer camp?

It’s a cult, just like that Jonestown bunch. They’re sick. Did you see what happened when I asked the woman about Julie? She looked Tarzan for permission. These people can’t even think for themselves. they’re sick and I think they’re dangerous.” I opened my mouth but she wasn’t finished. “Did you see those kids tonight? They can’t read or write, they all act like robots.” She held up one hand like a traffic cop. “I know that Fox guy I’ve seen him round. He’s one of the big shots, one of Sarris’s flunkies. If we went back to that house a week from now, I guarantee you’d find him with different bunch of kids and a different woman. These people move round like rabbits.” I thought about pursuing it, but then I changed my mind, giving to one of those sudden emotional cave-ins that occur when you’re already close to throwing in the towel.

It had been a cop’s impulse to question Greta instead of going back home with Buster. But Greta was right. I should probably just get out of the way. I should go after my ticky-fingered town clerk for the State’s Attorney, avoid further complications in my life, and get the hell back to Brattleboro.

I realized I’d come up to Gannet with false expectations; I’d wanted to find the town unchanged, my friends waiting to greet me.

gannet was a kind of tonic I’d hoped would make me feel better. It had been a silly, self-serving notion. I turned back to the row of pegs on the wall and retrieved my coat. I don’t know, Greta. Seems to me everyone here’s a little too steamed up. If you like, I’ll tell the SA to keep an eye on this bunch.” She stepped forward and stopped me from putting on my coat. My ague, evasive tone had made her quite angry by now. “Don’t you pat me on the head, Joe Gunther. I don’t need you looking down on me.

I watched her eyes, narrow with fury, remembering a similar look n Wingate’s face, and Rennie’s as he had walked away after being punched.

Compared with theirs, Fox’s had been cool and superior, displaying an icier, perhaps more threatening anger.

I removed Greta’s hand from my coat and put it on, bidding her goodnight, suddenly eager to escape back into the cold. Outside, I shook my head. Anger is no byproduct of self-contentment. I couldn’t hake the ominous feeling that Wingate and his wife, Greta and Rennie, and God knew how many other people in this town were all in the process of slipping their mental anchor lines, yielding to the different frustrations that had consumed them over time. I wondered in how many of them this rage might be controllable, and in which ones it indicated a ship drifting toward the rocks.

A searing pain in my shoulder blew me awake. “Ow. Damn.” “Wake up-fast.” Buster punched me again, hard. “Cut it out, goddamn it.”

“Siren’s blowing-we got a fire.” He was already out the door and heading for the stairs.

As I stumbled out of bed, groping for my clothes, I could hear the eerie funereal wail of the firehouse siren, rising and falling, a persistent, nagging, penetrating noise that made my hair stand up on end.

Slipping my shoes on unlaced, holding my coat under one arm, I stumbled downstairs to the front door. As I kicked it open, Gannet’s siren enveloped me, making the air vibrate. Buster’s pickup was already rolling down the driveway, the passenger door open. Come on. Move it.”

I half-ran, half-jumped onto the seat next to him. The sudden acceleration slammed the door for me and threw me back against the seat as we squealed down the street. “There,” he shouted, pointing down South Street as we drew abreast. “Looks like that house we were in earlier.” We came to a skidding stop next to the firehouse just as the siren blew its last mournful note. The firehouse doors were already open and I could hear the roaring of both truck engines being fired up.

Pickup trucks and cars appeared out of nowhere, parking helter-skelter up and down the road, as half-dressed men ran toward the fire trucks, even as they eased out of their tight berths. Buster and I clambered aboard the 55, next to a young man wearing glasses and a mustache. “Hi, Chief.” “Hey, Paul. Hand me that helmet.” Paul cracked my knee with the stick shift as we pulled into the road. It was a two-man cab, and I was the third man in the middle.