Clydine and I went on out and got in the car. I backed on out to the road and drove on down toward Fife.
“She kept saying that all night,” I said. “‘It’s only for a little while.’ What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
“You’re not as smart as I thought you were,” Clydine said to me. “It’s as plain as the nose on your face.”
“What?”
“She’s going to kill herself.”
“Oh, come on,” I said.
“She’ll be dead before Christmas.”
I thought about it. Somehow it fit. “I’d better tell Jack,” I said.
“Mind your own business,” she told me. “It hasn’t got anything to do with him.”
“But —”
“Just stay out of it. You couldn’t stop it anyway. It’s something that happened to her a long time ago. She’s just waiting for the right time. Leave her alone.”
Women!
“Let’s go back to your place,” she said. “I want us both to take a good hot bath, and then I want to sleep with you — just sleep. OK?”
“Why not?” I said.
“Seems to me you said that was the worst reason in the world for doing anything.”
“I’m always saying things like that,” I told her.
11
The following Wednesday, the first of September, we were all going to get together out at Carter’s to make sure we had everything all set for the hunt. We were going to be leaving on the ninth, and so we were kind of moving up on it.
Stan had finally committed himself to going along, which surprised me since I figured that Monica would just flat veto the idea. I guess maybe she figured that that would be too obvious — or maybe she’d tried all the tricks in her bag, first the nagging, then the icicles, then crossing her legs, and none of them had worked. Stan was pretty easygoing most of the time, but he could get his back up if the occasion came along. I’d gotten a vague hint or two about the kind of pressure she was putting on him, but he was hanging in there. Then, quite suddenly, she seemed to give in. She got real nice to everybody, and that really worried me.
The other guys had decided to bring their wives on out to Carter’s to kind of quiet down the rumblings of discontent which were beginning to crop up as a result of our frequent all-male gatherings and planning sessions. I’d asked Clydine, but there was a meeting of some kind she wanted to attend. Besides which, she told me, she’d about had the establishment types and their antics. I’d wanted her to meet Claudia; but, all things considered, it was probably for the best that she didn’t come. Jack and Cal would have been as jumpy as cats with her around after the little orgy on Sunday. I knew she could keep her mouth shut, but they wouldn’t have been so sure.
Anyhow I was over at Mike’s that afternoon finishing up the rifle. Maybe it was just luck, but the thing was coming out beautifully. I hadn’t really taken pride in anything for a long time, and I was really getting a kick out of it. Mike came out when he got home from work and sat on the edge of the workbench with a quart of beer while I put the last coat of stock-finish on the wood. I’d finished bluing the action the day before. All that was left was a last rubdown on the wood, mounting the sling swivels and assembling the gun.
“Man,” he said admiringly, “that’s gonna be one fine-looking weapon. How much you say you’ve got into it?”
“About seventy-five bucks altogether,” I said, “and about thirty-forty hours of work.”
“Beautiful job,” he said, handing me the quart. I took a guzzle and gave it back.
“Now I just hope the son of a bitch shoots straight,” I said. “I never fired it before I started on this.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t worry,” he said. “That old Springfield was always a pretty dependable piece of machinery. As long as you can poke one up the spout, she’ll shoot.”
“I sure hope you’re right,” I said, carefully leaning the stock against the garage wall to dry. I scoured my hands off with turpentine and began working at them with some paste hand-cleaner.
“Betty says you’re staying to dinner.” He finished the quart and pitched it into a box in the corner.
“Yeah,” I said. “I’ll have to start paying board here pretty quick.” I had been eating with them pretty often.
“Glad to have you,” he said, grinning. “It gives me somebody to swap war stories with.” Mike and I got along well.
“Hey,” he said. “I hear that was quite a party Sunday.”
“It was an orgy,” I said. “You ever met Helen — that pig of Sloane’s?”
“Once or twice.”
“Then you’ve probably got a pretty good idea of how things went.”
“Oh, gosh, yes.” He chuckled. “Jack was telling me that little girl you brought has got quite a shape on her.”
“You can tell that she’s a girl.”
“He said he didn’t much care for her though.”
I laughed about that, and then I told Mike about the little confrontation.
“No kidding?” He laughed. “I’d sure love to have been able to see the expression on his face.”
“What face?” I laughed. “It fell right off.”
“Was Sandy What’s-her-name there with Jack?” he asked.
“Yeah. Quiet as ever.”
“She’s a strange one, isn’t she?”
“Clydine — that’s my little girl-chum — says that Sandy’s gonna kill herself pretty quick.” I probably shouldn’t have said anything, but I knew Mike had sense enough to keep his mouth shut.
“What makes her think so?”
“I don’t know for sure — maybe they talked or maybe my little agitator is relying on the well-known, but seldom reliable, intuition women are supposed to have.”
“Maybe so,” Mike said thoughtfully, “but I’ve heard that girl say awfully weird things sometimes. If that’s what she’s got in mind, it would sure explain a helluva lot. You tell Jack?”
I shook my head. “He wouldn’t believe it in the first place, and what could he do about it?”
“That’s true,” Mike admitted. He slid down off the bench and looked ruefully at his belly. “Sure is gonna get tiresome carryin’ this thing up and down mountains. God damn, a man can get out of shape in a hurry.” I think we both wanted to get off the subject of Sandy.
“Beer and home cookin’,” I said. “Do it to you every time.” I washed my hands at the outside faucet, dried them on my pants, and got my clean clothes out of my car. We went inside, and I changed clothes in the bathroom. After we ate, Mike and I had a couple beers and watched TV while Betty cleaned up in the kitchen. She sang while she was working, and her voice was clear and high, and she hit the notes right on. There’s nothing so nice as a woman singing in the kitchen.
Jack and Marg showed up about seven with a case of beer, and we all sat around talking. Marg looked like she’d gotten a head start on the drinking. She was a little glassy-eyed.
“How’d you get tangled up with this Larkin guy, Dan?” Jack asked me. “He seemed a little standoffish when I met him the other day.”
“Oh, Stan’s OK,” I said. “He’s just a little formal till he gets to know you. He’ll loosen up.”
“I sure hope so.”
“We shared an apartment for a while when I was up at the U,” I said. “We got along pretty well.”
“He done much hunting?” Mike asked.
“Birds, mostly,” I said. “I’ve been duck hunting with him a few times. He’s awfully damned good with a shotgun.” I told them about Stan’s triple on ducks.
“That’s pretty good, but I’ll bet I could still teach him a thing or two about shotgun shootin’,” Jack boasted.
“Here we go,” Margaret said disgustedly, “the mighty hunter bit.” Her words were a little slurred.
“I’m good, sweetie,” Jack said. “Why should I lie about it? I am probably one of the world’s finest wing shots. Every time I go out, you can count on pure carnage.”
“You know what’s so damned disgusting about it?” Mike said. “The big-mouth son of a bitch can probably make it stick. I saw him bust four out of five thrown beer bottles one time with a twenty-two rifle.”
“Never could figure out how I missed that last one,” Jack said. “Must have been a defective cartridge.”
“You’re impossible.” Betty laughed. Nothing bothered Betty.
“Just good,” he said, “that’s all. Class will tell.” Jack smirked at us all.
“When you guys get him out in the woods,” Margaret said dryly, “why don’t you do the world a favor and shoot him?”
We drank some more beer and sopped up dip with potato chips. Mike and Betty had a comfortable little house with furniture that was nice but not so new as to make you afraid to relax. It was a pleasant place to talk.