Spencerville (42 page)

She nodded, but she knew, and he knew, that time would never come. It occurred to her that he enjoyed the cat-and-mouse game; it gave him some amusement during the days and nights. It was important for him to show her he was smarter than she was, or at least more cunning and better able to survive in this world that he'd created. In one way, he wanted to break her, but in another way, he liked her spunk, liked her to present him with challenges. If she broke too easily, or too fast, he might get bored and depressed, then become more sadistic, until finally he'd just end it all for both of them. On the other hand, if she showed too much resistance, or if he believed that she was clever enough to actually get the drop on him, then he'd kill her out of rage, or out of his instinct for self-preservation. This much she'd figured out in the last three days, but she hadn't fine-tuned the balance between spunk and submission. There were moments when she didn't care, when the humiliations were so grotesque that she just wanted to give up. But each time she felt that way, she rallied herself and promised to go on for another hour, then another, until finally he would handcuff her to the bed and let her sleep.

Baxter said, "Wash the Baxter family jewels, darlin'. Use alcohol. I like that."

She poured alcohol onto a gauze pad and washed his genitals.

"Ahh! That feels good. Put some Vaseline on 'em."

She took a tube of petroleum jelly and squeezed it on his penis and testicles, then rubbed it in, noticing he was getting semi-erect, so she stopped.

He said, "You know, I can fuck three times a day. I'd fuck one or two women in a day, then come home and fuck you. How about that? And you thought you was the only one foolin' around."

She never once thought he was faithful, and she didn't know why he thought this revelation was going to hurt her. But his brain was working hard to find things to do to her and say to her that would hurt, humiliate, and cause her to question her own worth and integrity. He thought if he called her bitch, whore, and slut long enough, she'd start to believe it. If he told her he'd castrated Keith, she might believe it. When he told her he wanted to fuck her sister, it did make her angry and anxious. When he used the belt on her, she felt defeated and powerless, but through the agony, she maintained whatever dignity she could, and the beatings strengthened her resolve to keep her sanity.

She said, "Can I get my blanket now and get something to eat?"

"You was naked when I found you in the motel, and you can stay naked." He got off the sofa and pulled up his shorts and trousers.

"Please, Cliff, I'm cold and hungry. I have to go to the bathroom."

"Yeah? Okay, you can stand."

She stood and, without him giving her permission, she wrapped the blanket around her.

"Let's go," he said.

"Can't I go alone?"

"No way, sweetheart. Go on."

She walked past the kitchen, down a short hallway, and turned into the bathroom.

Baxter sat on the rim of the tub, while she sat on the toilet seat and urinated, avoiding his eyes. She wiped herself with tissue paper, stood, and walked back into the hallway, the chain keeping her from taking the long strides she wanted to take. She turned into the kitchen, but he moved past her and stood in front of the refrigerator. He asked her, "What's a whore eat besides strange cocks?"

She took a deep breath and replied, "I'd like something hot. I can get it."

"You eat what I give you. Sit down, if your butt don't hurt too much, or you can stand, or get on the floor, and I'll get the dog dish like last time."

She went to the small table and lowered herself gently onto the wooden chair, with the blanket draped around her shoulders.

He opened the refrigerator and put two slices of bread on a paper plate, then a few slices of mixed cold cuts, and threw it on the table. "Eat."

She began eating the bread and cold cuts while he watched. She didn't eat fast, but took her time, though she was so hungry, she felt faint.

He took a beer for himself from the refrigerator and put a container of milk in front of her with no glass. He sat across from her and said, "You ain't gettin' no more, so don't ask."

Annie thought it was time to engage him in some normal conversation. He seemed calmed down, self-satisfied, and he might give her some information. She tried to adopt a pleasant tone of voice, as if nothing unusual had happened, as if he hadn't just beaten and raped her. She asked, "How much food do we have, Cliff?"

"Enough for two or three months. Ain't gonna be much fresh stuff left after a week. But I got cans and dried food. Plenty of beer."

"Then what?"

"Then I can go into town and get more. Why? You got someplace you got to be?"

"I just want to know how long it's going to be before we can go home."

"You are home, honey buns."

"I mean to our house in Spencerville."

"Why do you want to go there?"

"I just thought we'd spend some time there."

He smiled. "Yeah? I don't think so. We're retired now, sweetheart. Gonna get that house sold."

"All right. I guess that's a good idea." She didn't want to drink from the container, but she did, then asked casually, "When can I make a few phone calls?"

He looked at her. "When you start feelin' sorry for what you did."

"I am sorry, Cliff. I'm sorry it happened. When will you forgive me?"

"Never. But I might decide someday to go easy on you. But we got a long way to go before that day gets here."

She nodded, knowing that day would never come. It was dangerous, she knew, to remind him that their children couldn't be put off too much longer, that they'd want to come to Grey Lake for Thanksgiving, or Christmas at the latest. Then there was her family, her sister, her parents, and his family. But to remind him that there was an outside world that had to be reckoned with might send him off the deep end. However, she'd already broached that subject by mentioning phone calls, and she could tell he was brooding over this. She said, "If I can call a few people, they wouldn't wonder where we were. I'll say we're back from Florida, and..."

"You let me worry about that. Maybe next week, or the week after. Far as anybody is concerned, we're on a second honeymoon in Florida. I don't have to report to nobody. I'm on extended leave of absence, and it's my fucking business where I am, not nobody else's. The kids ain't kids no more, and they got their own lives and don't give a shit about us. I'll call them now and then."

She nodded. "Okay." She looked at him and said, "Cliff, you really made me pay for what I did, and I got everything I deserved. So why don't we just pretend that nothing happened and go back to Spencerville? You know that you want to go back to the job, to finish out your next few years. I promise you that I've learned how to treat you, and I'm very... sorry for what I've done, and it will never happen again. You're all the man I need." She watched him closely, and she could see that she was actually getting through to him and that he was thinking about it. She continued, "There's no reason to stay here too long. Whatever I learned here, how to satisfy you and make you happy, I can do in Spencerville. If we go back in a few weeks, we don't have to answer a lot of questions. Okay?"

He stayed silent for a full minute, then stood but said nothing. He looked at her, and she stood also, drawing the blanket tightly around her. They faced each other, and she could see he was fighting some inner battle. She didn't know how much of his behavior was a result of rage and how much was psychopathic. But the fact that he hadn't gotten any calmer, and in fact had gotten worse in the last three days, frightened her.

Finally, he smiled and said in a pleasant voice, "Sounds like you want to go back to the way we were, except better."...

"I do."

"That must mean you love me. You wouldn't want to do all those nice things for a man you didn't love."

"No, I wouldn't."

He asked her, "Do you love me?"

She didn't reply.

"Say you love me."

She knew she should say it, just to say it, otherwise he'd know for certain that everything she'd already told him was a lie.

"Tell me you love me."

"I don't."

"I didn't think so. But I love you."

"If you loved me, you wouldn't do this to me."

"I haven't done nothing to you that you didn't have coming. Did I ever treat you like this before you went and spread your legs for somebody else? Did I?"

"You... no, you didn't."

"See? You just don't like payin' the price. You don't like takin' responsibility for your own actions. That's what's wrong with you women. Always lookin' for a free ride, a pass, a way out with no sweat on your part. You pulled that shit in Spencerville. You ain't gettin' off so easy here."

"Neither are you."

"What the fuck do you mean by that?"

She didn't reply.

"You want another strappin'?"

"No."

"I'll bet not. So you don't love me. But you will. And when you finally say it, you're gonna mean it. Really mean it, from deep down inside of you. You're gonna say, 'Cliff, I love you.' And I'll tell you what — if I had my lie detector machine here, it would tell me that you're tellin' the God's honest truth. But I don't need the machine, sweetheart, 'cause when the day comes, I'll know it, and so will you."

"Never."

"Remember you said that. Meantime, be thankful I still love you, 'cause the minute I don't, you're dead. When you say your prayers tonight, pray that I still love you in the mornin'."

"When I say my prayers tonight, I'll pray for your soul, Cliff, and ask God to forgive you. I can't."

He didn't like that and said to her, "Go lock yourself to the floor."

She turned and walked out of the kitchen, into the big living room, and knelt near the rocker by the fire. He came in behind her and watched as she put the shackle of the padlock around the chain and through the eyebolt and snapped the lock shut. She wrapped the blanket around her and under her buttocks and sat.

He poked the fire and added another log, then stood watching the flames awhile. One of the dogs barked again, but he didn't seem to notice. Finally, he turned around and looked at her. He said, "I told you, when I'm through with you, you ain't gonna be you. When that happens, you won't want to go back to Spencerville. Get used to this, sweetheart. This is it, forever." He pointed to the gray timber wolf head, mounted above the mantel. "Just me, you, and these guys for company."

Annie turned away from him and looked into the fire. A tear ran down her cheek.

He turned on the small table lamp beside his chair, then shut off the floor lamp. He sat down and began reading a hunting magazine. After a few minutes, he looked up and spoke in a normal, almost conversational tone of voice. "Tell you what, though. There's a guy out there someplace who fucked you, and if my boys get him and bring him here, or if he somehow comes here and I get him, then after he's dead, I might reconsider things. But meantime, you're stayin' here with me. You can think about that cock all you want, but you're never gonna see it again unless I got it in my hand and I'm feedin' it to the dogs."

Annie wiped the tears from her face with the blanket.

"Don't cry, sweetheart. I know you're worried about me, darlin', but I can take care of myself. You found that out, didn't you?" He laughed and went back to his magazine. "Bitch."

Annie sat in the rocker, feeling cold, hungry, violated, in pain, and exhausted. It had been a bad day, and there would be more of them. She looked at him, then closed her eyes and thought of Keith. She felt his presence inside her and tried to imagine that he was close by. She remembered what he'd said... even if we're separated for a short time, remember that I love you, and know that we'll be together again ... "I promise."

"What?"

"Nothing."

He went back to his magazine. He said, "I bet I know what you're thinkin' about, and it might surprise you that I'm thinkin' the same thing. I hope he comes, too."

Keith found it difficult to sit and wait, but he knew that the later the hour, the more chance of catching Baxter with his guard down. The attacker, he reminded himself, always had the advantage of surprise and mobility, not to mention being psyched up for a fight. The defender had the advantage of having picked the place and prepared it to his liking, and, not inconsequentially, the advantage of creature comforts. But it was this last thing that sometimes lulled the defender into a fatal sense of security.

Billy took a cellophane bag out of his pocket and ripped it open. "You want some peanuts?"

"No."

Billy munched on the peanuts. He said, "Maybe we don't have to kill the dogs. Now that I seen his setup there, I think we can take him from a distance. We just set up firing positions at the edge of the clearing, make a noise, and the dogs bark and he comes out onto that nice high deck and we plug his ass. We got scopes, and we can get off two, three rounds each before he knows what the fuck hit him."

"He's wearing a bulletproof vest."

"Ah, fuck his vest. When those rounds start slapping him around, he's gonna be hurt, even through the vest. And maybe we'll hit an arm or leg. Maybe his fucking head. What do ya think?"

"I like the idea that you're thinking. Okay, he's down. Then what?"

"Okay, after he's down, you move fast — a hundred yards to the house and up to the deck — that's maybe twelve, thirteen seconds, and meantime I'm still layin' down coverin' fire for you, so if he picks his fat ass up from the deck, I nail him again. If there's anything left of him when you get there, you cut his fucking throat. Then I'll come up and gut him. No, shit, Keith, I'm gonna gut him. Hey, if you want, I'll rush him and you lay down the fire. Your call, Lieutenant."

Keith glanced at Billy Marlon. Clearly, the man was enjoying himself, and he had every right to. He said, "Standard fire and maneuver. Not bad. Safe for us."

"Yeah. Whoever's layin' down the covering fire is safe, and the guy who's rushin' the house has to trust the other guy to know how to shoot. You a good shot?"

"Pretty good. You?"

Marlon hesitated, then said, "Used to be the best. Depends now on how steady I can get."

"How steady can you get?"

"For this motherfucker, steady as a rock."

Keith nodded. He thought about Billy's idea. The infantry school would approve. But there were other things going on. A hostage for one, and Keith's image of himself and Baxter face-to-face, for another. They didn't cover any of that in tactics classes, or even in intelligence school. Revenge and payback was something you learned on your own. He said to Billy, "There's a chance that Baxter could take cover before he's badly hurt. He could get around to the blind side of the house, or worse, he could get back into the house."

"Yeah... but..."

"Look, a hundred yards isn't too long a shot, but at night and with the other guy wearing protective armor, it could be a disaster. I don't want him back in the house."

Billy nodded but said, "That's why you or me has to charge across that open space like we got a hundred gooks on our ass. We'll be on top of him before he can get his shit together. Even if he gets in the house, he's gonna be hurt."

"He could kill her."

"Keith, he's gonna be hit, because we both ain't missin' at that distance with scopes, so even if he makes it into the house, he ain't got nothin' on his mind except us and him. He ain't gonna bother her."

"Maybe."

"Hey, you got something else on your mind?"

"Yes, I do. What I don't want to happen is one of us getting him with a lucky head shot." Keith added, "I don't want him to die quickly. That's where I'm coming from. You have to know that."

Billy stayed silent a moment and nodded slowly. "Yeah... I already figured that out. Look, I don't want him to be standin' there one second and the next second he's lights-out with a slug through his brain, no pain, no eye-to-eye. Hell, I want to gut him alive. Alive, Keith, and watch his eyes when I hold his guts up in front of him. But if you're thinkin' we got to low-crawl up to that house and catch him with his thumb up his ass, I ain't buyin' it. I don't have that kind of nerve. Do you?"

"Yes."

"Well, then you go ahead. I'll cover you from the trees. But you got to take those dogs out first."

"Right. That's why I bought the crossbow. Low-tech solution to a low-tech problem."

"I guess so." Billy added, "Hey, what we want to do and what we can do is two different things. I'm givin' you the safe way to take this asshole out, and you're givin' me some commando shit."

"Billy, either way, you do the same thing. Just set up a firing position in the trees."

"Hey, I ain't worried about my useless ass. But I don't want you gettin' wasted out there in the open, or gettin' into that house and findin' out he's waitin' for you. I can't help you there, buddy." He added, "My way, when we get to him, he's either dead or hurt bad. Either way, I gut him."

Keith took a deep breath and informed Billy, "I think I want to take him alive."

"No way."

"Yes, I want to tie him up and throw him in the back of the pickup truck and bring him to the law. I've been thinking about it, and that's the way I want to do it. You think about it."

"I already thought about it, Keith. I know what you mean. He'd rather be dead than face the music for what he done. But I gotta tell you, the fucking law works funny. The law fucks me around, 'cause I'm dog shit, but I never hurt nobody. That motherfucker could walk."

Keith considered that. Aside from all the humiliations that Baxter would face, in a year or two he could be loose on the world again. Cliff Baxter was sick, and the state might agree with Baxter's attorney that he needed therapy and counseling. He'd had a traumatic experience, seeing his wife in bed with another man, a slick seducer from out of town, and he did what any man would do: He beat up the boyfriend, then, instead of kicking his wife out, he took her on a little vacation and tried to work things out. Sure, he overdid it a bit, which is why he needed counseling. Keith thought about that and finally decided that, despite his promise to Annie, Cliff Baxter needed to die. He said, "Okay... we waste him. But I have to do it up close. He's got to know it was me and you."

"Okay... if that's what you need to make it right for you, I'm okay with that. I like it. Hope we can do it."

"We'll do it."

Billy said, "Hey, after we finish this shit, I'm goin' to Columbus to look her up. I couldn't do that while he was alive. You know?"

"I know."

"I couldn't look nobody in the eye, Keith. I hung around that town, and I'd see him on the street, and he'd laugh at me. He'd arrest me sometimes when he saw me drunk and take me in and make me go through a strip search, and the bastard took pictures, and he said he mailed some to Beth with him standin' next to me."

Keith didn't respond.

"And you're probably wonderin' why I hung around. I'll tell you, because I was try in' to get up the nerve to kill him, but I never got the nerve... and I never was going to get it. Until you came along." He added, "Remember, if I don't make it..."

"Okay. Enough." Keith looked at Billy, sitting with his back to the tree, staring off into the dark. Billy Marlon, Keith thought, sober now and with the insight of all lost souls who saw things too clearly, had probably foreseen his own death, and Keith thought he might be right. But Billy had reached one of those rare moments in life, he thought, perhaps the rarest of moments, when it was equally good to live or die.

They waited, listening to the infrequent night sounds of autumn — a chipmunk, a squirrel, a hare, an occasional bird. Keith looked up at the moon, which was nearly overhead now. It would set in perhaps three or four hours. That would be the time to move, except he needed the moonlight if he was going to use the crossbow on the dogs.

Keith didn't want to think about what was going on in the house, but he thought about it. Undoubtedly, Cliff Baxter had snapped, and his possessiveness had turned to something far more ugly. Keith knew that Baxter would beat Annie, degrade her, and punish her for her unfaithfulness. In reality, Baxter was a sexual sadist who had finally found the excuse he was looking for to play out his sick fantasies on the woman he had never completely broken. Keith had every confidence that Baxter hadn't yet broken her, that when he saw her, she would be like he was — beaten and bloody, but unbowed.

He put himself in the right mind-set for what was to come. He had to act rationally, coolly, and with the same cunning that he knew Baxter was capable of. He understood that Baxter could kill her anytime, but he was fairly certain that Baxter hadn't yet finished with her. What was going on between them now was the most exquisite thing that Baxter had ever done in his life, and he wasn't going to end it, except at the very last moment. And it was in that last moment, when they were face-to-face, that everything had to come together: rescue, revenge, and redemption, all long overdue.

Billy said, "I got this feelin' he knows we're here. I mean, he don't know, but he knows."

Keith said, "Doesn't matter. It doesn't change a thing, for him, or for us."

"Right. He's got himself in a corner." He thought a moment and said, "I guess we're in a corner, too. We can leave, but we can't leave. You know?"

"I do."

"Hey, I wish I had a smoke."

"Do you need a drink?"

"Well... you got somethin'?"

"No. I'm asking you if you need a drink."

"I... do. But... it'll wait."

"You know, maybe you can get your life together after this, if you lay off the juice."

"Maybe."

"I'll help you."

"Forget it. We're even." Billy asked, "Did you ever think we got fucked big-time?"

"Yeah. So what? Every veteran since the first war got fucked big-time. Maybe you should stop feeling sorry for yourself. There's no war long enough or bad enough to mess up your head as bad as you messed it up yourself."

Billy thought about that awhile, then replied, "Maybe not your head. You was always together. My head couldn't take too much."

"Sorry."

"Tell you somethin' else, Keith — if you don't think you're a little fucked-up, too, you ain't listenin' to the bells and whistles, in your skull."

Keith didn't reply.

They waited another hour, mostly in silence. Finally, Billy said, "Hey, remember that Findlay game in our senior year?"

"No."

"I was playin' that day, halfback, and we was down seven to twelve, and I take the handoff and shoot off left tackle. They nailed my ass at the scrimmage line, but I didn't go down — I spun off and flipped the ball back to you. You was playin' fullback that day, remember? The Findlay bastards were all over you, but you chuck the long bomb out to some end — what the hell was his name? Davis. Right? And he didn't even know he was in the play, but he turns around, and the ball lands in his hands, and he gets hit and falls in the end zone. Touchdown. You remember that?"

"Yes."

"Hell of a game. Goes to show you. Even when things are goin' wrong, if you hang in there, you can catch a break. I wonder if they still got a film of that?"

"Probably."

"Yeah, I'd like to see that. Hey, do you remember Baxter from high school?"

"No... actually, I do."

"Yeah, he was always a prick. You ever get into it with him?"

"No, but I should have."

"Never too late to settle a score."

"That's just what he's thinking, and that's why we're all here."

"Yeah... but we never done nothing to him in school. I never done nothing to him. He just gets off on fucking with people. I can't understand why somebody didn't take him down long ago."

Keith said, "He picks on weak people."

Billy Marlon didn't respond to that but said, "Hey, he's really pissed at you." He laughed, then added, "You know something, after I saw you in the bar, like the next day when my head was straight, I remembered about you and Annie Prentis. And I got this wild thought in my head that you and her was gonna meet and get it back together. How's that for smart thinkin'?"

Keith didn't reply.

Billy went on, "I guess he figured that out, too. You know, I used to see her sometimes on the street — I mean, I never knew her too good in school, but bein' we was old classmates, she'd always smile at me and say hello. Sometimes, she'd stop and talk a minute, you know, askin' me how I was doin'. I'd stand there, like not knowing what to say, thinkin' to myself, 'Your husband fucked my wife, and I should tell you that,' but of course, I never did. And I didn't want to talk too long, because I was afraid that if he saw me talkin' to his wife, he'd do somethin' nasty to me, or to her."

Keith said, "Maybe I should let you gut him alive."

Billy looked at him and said, "I don't need your permission to do that."

This sort of surprised Keith, but it was a good sign for Billy. Keith said, "We agreed that I give the orders."

Billy didn't reply.

Another hour passed, and it got cold. Keith looked at his watch. It was ten P.M. He was anxious to get moving, but it was too early. Baxter would be awake and alert, and so would the dogs.

Keith saw that the moon was in the southwestern sky now, and he figured he still had about two or three hours of moonlight.

Keith said, "Okay, here's the way we're going to do this. We take out the dogs in the moonlight, we wait until moonset, I charge across that clearing, you cover, I get onto the deck and put my back to the wall near the sliding glass doors. Okay?"

"So far."

"Now you have to draw him out. Can you bark like a dog?"

"Sure can."

"Okay, you bark, he comes out, just like he did last time, only this time I'm behind him with a pistol to his head. Simple and safe. You see any problems with it?"

"It sounds okay... they always sound okay, don't they?"

"Right. Sometimes, they even work."

Billy smiled. "Remember them chalkboard sessions in football? Every play was a touchdown play. Same in the Army. But they never showed what happened when some of your guys got taken out, and nobody ever knew what the other side was plannin' on doin' to fuck you up."