The Quiet Game (26 page)

“A couple of years later, the thing to be was a hippie, and I tried my best. Grew my hair down my back, smoked grass, the whole bit. I heard hippies on TV saying the ‘pigs’ this, the ‘pigs’ that. The cops, you know? So, one day, riding in the car, I said something about the pigs. My father pulled onto the shoulder, turned around, and said, ‘Son, if we had to go three days in this country without police, it wouldn’t be a place you’d want to live. We don’t use that word.’ And I never used it again.”

Caitlin’s eyes shine with fascination. “And the third moment?”

“I was fifteen, and I’d been sleeping with this older girl from the public school who went off to junior college. I stole the family car a couple of times to go see her. In the kitchen one night my mother told me I couldn’t do that anymore. In my hormone-intoxicated state, I said, ‘Mom, why are you being such a bitch about this?’ ”

“Oh, my God.”

“My dad clocked me. This man of reason who had never lifted a finger to me slapped me an open-handed blow that damn near blacked me out. I was spiritually stunned. But it was the right blow at the right moment. The only one I ever needed. It drew the line for me.”

Caitlin nods slowly, a smile on her lips. “Thank you for telling me that. You’re lucky to have a father like that.”

I wonder what she’d say if she knew that an hour ago my wonderful father and I sank a murder weapon in a swamp.

Her barbecued ribs finally arrive, and we run through a half dozen other subjects while she eats. Journalism, my law career, publishing. She grew up with money but worked hard to make her own mark. She did internships with the
New York Times
and the
Washington Post
, traveled extensively overseas, and worked a year for the
Los Angeles Times
. When she asks obliquely about the Hanratty execution, I change the subject.

“Where do you live? I don’t picture you in an apartment.”

She smiles and wipes her mouth with a napkin, knowing I’m evading her question. “I pretty much live at the paper. But I did buy a house on Washington Street.”

“Roughing it, huh?” Washington Street is old Natchez; most of the town houses there sell for over three hundred thousand dollars.

“I need my space,” she says frankly. “You should come see it. It was completely restored just before I bought it.”

A wave of warmth passes over my face. Is she hinting that I should go to her house after dinner? I’ve been out of circulation for years, and she’s only twenty-eight. In the realm of dating, she is the expert, not me.

“Do you need to get home?” she asks. “I’ll bet Annie’s waiting up for you.”

That is what she’s suggesting. I look at my watch to conceal the fact that I’m blushing. “Annie’s falling asleep about now. I’m okay for a bit.”

“Well . . . would you like to see it? We could have some tea and talk. Or we could just take a ride. You could show me the real Natchez.”

In the dark?
But the automatic rejections I’ve practiced since Sarah’s death don’t come to me. “A ride might be fun.”

My answer surprises her. More than that, it makes her happy. With a smile of anticipation she signals Jenny over, asks for two go-cups, and passes her a company credit card. Jenny meets us at the front door with the ticket, and while Caitlin signs it, I say hello to a couple of people at the bar. It’s strange to be back in a place where I know someone every place I go.

Stepping from the air-conditioned restaurant to the street is like putting on a mildewed coat in the jungle. October in Mississippi. In Crested Butte they’re skiing right now.

“We could take my Miata,” Caitlin says, “but I don’t advise it. I thought a convertible would be perfect for the South, but it’s too damn hot down here to use it.”

“My car’s right down there.”

I lead her across the street, then turn right on the sidewalk, heading toward the small parking lot where I left Dad’s BMW. A country dance bar is going
strong on this side, and knots of people line the sidewalk for the length of the block. The club draws mainly from the Louisiana farmland across the river, hard-shell Baptist country that birthed Jimmy Swaggart and Jerry Lee Lewis. Caitlin and I weave carefully through boots and hats and clouds of cigarette smoke.

As we near the parking lot, I see four men who look a little rougher than the rest, passing around a bottle of Jack Daniel’s. They’re wearing oil-stained denim and caps instead of hats. Roughnecks who drove straight from the oil field to the bar, most likely. Lean, hard-muscled, burned brick red by the sun, they wear thin mustaches and suck dips of snuff while they drink. As Caitlin and I approach, one points at me.

“You oughta keep your goddamn mouth shut about the niggers in this town, Cage.”

The use of my name surprises me, but I have no intention of stopping to discuss the issue. Feeling Caitlin slow down, I squeeze her arm and keep walking.

“You’re fucking up the chemical plant deal,” says another.

Now that we’re closer, I recognize the man who spoke first. His name is Spurling. A year older than I, he attended the White Citizens’ Council school on the north side of town. Spurling has the sullen expression of a man for whom life holds few happy surprises. He will fight me on the slightest provocation, and probably on none. These guys have never gotten past the emotional age of fifteen. They brawl over disputed calls at little league games, beat up homosexuals for fun, and shoot each other over marital infidelities.

“Keep walking,”
I whisper to Caitlin, and we pass them with only a brush on the shoulder.

“I’m talking to you, cocksucker,” Spurling calls after me.

“That was the newspaper chick,” says a slurred voice. “That stuck-up Yankee bitch.”

Caitlin stops and turns. “Why don’t you dickless Neanderthals find a gun to play with? Maybe you’ll do the world a favor and shoot each other.”

They hoot and run after us. This is exactly what they wanted. I admire Caitlin’s courage, but she is writing verbal checks that I might have to cash with blood. In seconds the four of them have formed a line between us and the parking lot.

“She’s a bitch,” says the one with the slurry voice. “But she’s a fine bitch.” He jabs a finger toward Caitlin’s crotch. “I’d sure like to get in those pants.”

“I already have one asshole in my pants,” she retorts in a voice like a saber’s edge. “Why would I want another?”

The roughneck blinks, thrown off balance by the ricochet comeback. But
Spurling has his Academy Award–winning line ready. “How about sitting on my face when you say that?”

“If I thought you’d know what to do once I sat down, I might.”

Spurling sticks out his tongue and flicks it up and down like a snake. He’s trying to force me to throw a punch, which I do not especially want to do, considering the odds. Chivalry is a wonderful concept, but just now it doesn’t seem the most prudent of options.

Spurling is still wiggling his tongue when Caitlin pops him across the mouth with a closed fist. He’s more surprised than hurt, but he must have bitten his tongue, because he’s spitting blood on the concrete.

“You thucking cunt!”
he gurgles.

“Let’s all take it easy!” I say, holding up my hands. “We were minding our business, walking along a public street—”

“Nobody wants you on this fucking street!” yells the one with the Jack Daniel’s bottle. “Go back to Beverly Hills or wherever the fuck you live. We gotta make a living here, unlike you.”

A few club patrons have noticed our exchange and are moving toward us, but they don’t look like ready sources of aid. I take Caitlin’s arm, spin her around, and walk her toward the BMW. She hisses something indignant, but I’m not listening to her. I’m listening for the scuff of boots on gravel.

Soon enough, I hear it.

I shove her to my right and dart left, feeling a breeze as the whiskey bottle arcs through the space my head occupied a split second ago and smashes on the gravel of the parking lot. Guessing that someone will follow the bottle forward, I whirl and throw a blind punch.

Luck is always better than skill. I hear bone crack, or maybe nasal cartilage, then a strangled scream of agony as someone hits the gravel. Throwing the car keys at Caitlin, I yell, “The black BMW!” then whirl to face the other three, who jump me simultaneously.

We’re wrestling more than fighting, but once they get me on the ground, they’ll remove my teeth two at a time.

“She bit me!”
someone screams.
“She bit my fucking ear off!”

I would probably laugh had not serious blows begun landing on my skull. My thoughts instantly evaporate into survival instinct as I cover my head and try to keep my feet.

A wallop to my right temple obliterates my sense of balance, and I drop to my knees, glimpsing the silver toe cap of a boot just before it savages my ribs. Another head blow puts me on my back, and the fists come down in a steady hail. I see white flashes of light, and my ears are roaring. You hope you black out at a time like this, but I’m not that lucky. Every fist feels like I walked into a steel pole.

Suddenly a new sound breaks through the fog in my jiggling brain. A brief, percussive
pock
. Again:
pock-pock
. At first I think it’s the sound of something hitting my skull, but no one is hitting me anymore, yet the sound goes on.
Pock! Pock-pock!

Rolling onto my side, I see three men cowering against a brick wall. A large uniformed man stands over them, hammering them mercilessly with a stick.

Deputy Ike Ransom.

Ike the Spike is beating Spurling and his redneck posse like willful dogs, his baton cracking shins, shoulders, elbows, and skulls with surgical precision. The flashing lights I saw must have been the arrival of his squad car.

“Penn? Penn, can you hear me?”

It’s Caitlin. Soft hands try to pull me to my feet, but they haven’t the strength to lift my frame.

“Count to five!” she orders, her voice electrified by fear.

“Is that what they teach you at Radcliffe?” I croak, wobbling to my feet. “I’m surprised you’re not over there screaming about police brutality.”

“Screw them. They need to learn some respect for women.”

Two roughnecks have fallen facedown, but Ike shows no inclination to stop what he’s doing. Spurling makes the mistake of lunging at the deputy and screaming “nigger,” which earns him a sweeping baseball-style lick that lays him out flat on the ground.

“Ike!”
I yell.
“Stop it, man!”

Caitlin and I run toward him, but I’m not about to try to grab his baton. In his present state he might not be able to distinguish between white faces quickly enough to spare me a concussion. Caitlin isn’t so timid. She steps between Ike and his targets and holds up both hands, creating a sight arresting enough to paralyze the deputy. Ike lowers his baton and turns to me, his eyes filled with sweat.

“You’d best get out of here quick. Police won’t be long.”

Now isn’t the time for extended thank-yous. I take Caitlin’s arm and hobble toward the driver’s door of the BMW.

“You’re not driving,” she says. “Give me the keys.”

“I’m fine.”

“You took at least ten blows to the head. Your nose is bleeding. I’m driving you to the hospital.”

“My father can check me out when I get home. Get in the car!”

She scrambles over the driver’s seat to the other side. I crank the car and pull slowly out of the lot. Ike’s cruiser is already gone.

One circuit of the block takes me to Caitlin’s green Miata, and I park in the street beside it. Double-parking is an old Natchez tradition.

“I can’t believe you bit that guy,” I tell her, rubbing the back of my skull. “You fight more like a bar girl from Breaux Bridge than a blueblood from Boston.”

“When in Rome, right?” She slaps her thighs and yells, “
Whoooooo,
what a rush! That’s the most fun I’ve had with my clothes on in a long time.”

“Yeah, loads of fun,” I mutter, but her excitement is contagious. Her face is flushed like a sprinter’s, and her breath comes in short gasps.

“I assume that deputy was a friend of yours?”

“I’d say he’s a friend of ours.” I give her a hard look. “We still have a deal, right? No story about that little altercation in tomorrow’s paper?”

“Absolutely. No story.” She pokes me in the shoulder. “I told you I could hold my own.”

“I’m afraid that was just the first round. It’ll get a lot worse.”

Her smile doesn’t waver. “We can handle it.” She gets out of the car and closes the door, then leans into the open passenger window. “Would you be furious if I asked a personal question?”

“Go ahead.”

“Have you thought much about our kiss since last night?”

I’m glad for the dark. The black veil of her hair gleams in the window, framing her porcelain face, setting off her lips and eyes.

“Please tell me to drop dead if I’m out of line,” she says quickly. “It’s just . . . I’ve been thinking about it. It literally curled my toes. And I wanted you to know that.”

A pulse of pure pleasure spreads outward from my heart. How do I answer?
Yes, I’ve thought about it a hundred times, in a way that’s not even thought but a constant awareness of how your mouth opened to mine, the coolness and knowingness of it—