Beloved (48 page)

"
That was your mother with you, right? A striking woman; I
'
d recognize her again.
"

"
I bet she
'
d be able to pick
you
out of a li
—
a crowd
— too.
"

She went back to the subject of the funeral.
"
You tossed a tiny red rose in Aunt Sylvia
'
s grave.
"

"
Yeah. Before she moved into the home off-island, she gave me Wicky to take care of, and also a miniature rose she
'
d bought for herself years earlier. I asked her why she wasn
'
t taking the rose to the nursing home. She told me it
'
d be pointless. I
'
ve wondered what she meant by that; everyo
ne else there had a plant in her
room.
"

"
You were there?
"

"
Of course,
"
he said, surprised that she would ask.
"
I
'
d go whenever I got off the island
—
which as you know isn
'
t very often.
"

Jane
did
know. Lately she
'
d been locked onto the comings and goings of his truck like a radar scope; but of course she couldn
'
t tell him that.

"
She never told me about you.
"

"
She never told me about
you.
"

"
She was good at keeping secrets,
"
Jane said, thinking of the sketch on the wall.
"
Sh
e never said a word about Phil
lip either, even though Phillip told me they were great friends.
"

"
Phillip lied.
"

Mac said it with such finality; for a moment Jane almost believed him, even though it made no sense.

"
Why would Phillip lie about his friendship with my aunt?
"

"
He wants to buy your place.
"

"
Mac! I
'
ve already
told
you
—
"

"
Let me rephrase that. He wants to buy
my
place. But first he has to get his hands on your place. That
'
ll tighten the noose around my neck nicely.
"

His mood was turning black, as it always did when the subject of Phillip Harrow came up. Mac
'
s grudge ran deep, and Jane couldn
'
t blame him; there was bad blood between the two men. But it would be so much better if Mac could put it behind him instead of letting it affect his judgment this way.

She tried to draw him away from his anger.
"
If Phillip really wanted your property, surely he
'
d go after Bing
'
s place first. But we know from Cissy
—
"

"
Damn Cissy!
"
Mac said angrily, jumping up from the sofa.
"
What does a little peanut like Cissy know about anything?
Look
,
Phillip got Bing to grant him first refusal on his property, all right?
"
he said bitterly.
"
Now you know.
"

He balled his right hand into a fist and punched it into his left palm.
"
And I have to live with that knowledge every goddamned day of my life.
"

Slowly it began to dawn on her.
"
So if Bing decides to sell his property, he has to offer it first to Phillip. And if Phillip buys the place—
"

"
I
'
m at his mercy,
"
Mac said in a grim voice.
"
I may have to get in and out by helicopter.
"

The image was all too plausibly clear. If Mac was right, he was in a horrible position. His beloved homestead and two hundred years of family history would be completely in the control of his worst enemy.

If
Phillip was as hostile as Mac said he was. And
if
Phil
lip really did have first refusal.
"
Are you absolutely sure Bing and Phillip have an arrangement?
"
she asked.

Mac was staring out the window at the storm, which seemed at last to be abating.
"
I can
'
t swear to it, no. Once I forced myself to ask Bing outright about it. His answer?
'
I
'
d rather not say, but you have nothing to worry about, old boy.
'"

She saw that it must have cost him dearly to ask Bing. As for Bing
'
s refusing to charge him for the right to traipse back and forth across his land
—
she knew already that Mac
considered it an act of charity and resented it as such. And yet, what were his options? He couldn
'
t afford to buy Bing out, and even if he could, he
'
d have to get in line behind Phillip.

She threw off her blanket and went over to him. She wanted to comfort him. She wanted to put her arms around him as he had around her, and say,
"
The hell with
'
em. You
'
ll work it out.
"
But there was something about the set of his back that made her murmur lamely,
"
Still and all, you aren
'
t
positive
that Bing granted Phillip first refusal.
"

Mac stiffened, if possible, still further.
"
Ah, yes
—
the communication thing,
"
he said caustically.
"
I forgot I don
'
t speak or understand English.
"

"
Dammit, you
know
that
'
s not what I mean,
"
she said, dismayed that they were sliding down that slippery slope again.

He spun around angrily.
"
Maybe. But I know goddamned well what Phillip Harrow means,
"
he growled.
"The son of a bitch means to have my land."

He
'
s paranoid,
Jane decided.
In his own way he
'
s more deluded than
I
am. He has no hard facts, nothing, only a gut hatred for Phillip Harrow.

"
Hey, hey, Mr. McKenzie,
"
she said, trying to mimic his earlier tone.
"
That
'
s no way for a gentleman to talk.
"

He grabbed her by her
shoulders
.
"
But isn
'
t it what you expect from me? Good vulgar, savage behavior?
"
He yanked her toward his chest; his breath fell hot on her cheek. She hadn
'
t seen it coming, was overwhelmed by the raw, sexual power in him, left breathless by the force with which he held her against his broad, hard body.

She didn
'
t know what to say. She should be angry
—
she
was
angry
—
but somehow it wasn
'
t working out that way. Somehow her lips were parting, her eyelids lowering, in anticipation of his kiss. Somehow her breath was on hold and all her nerve endings on tiptoe, waiting.

He held her pinned to him as they stood in the dark, their lips half a breath away from one another.

"
God.
"

The single syllable was wrenched from him with obvious pain; she knew he would not yield another.

He released her, then turned on his heel and walked out, leaving her to wonder which of them was more tormented in his own particular hell.

****

If it weren
'
t for the strange, swishing sound, Jane might have slept around the clock. But the noise was subtle and different, more distracting than a jackhammer. It wasn
'
t Billy; he had a small job to do for his mother this morning. It wasn
'
t squirrels in the attic; by now Jane knew exactly what squirrels in attics sounded like. She thought it might be bats
—
she
'
d had two or three of those up there, too
— but no, it wasn
'
t bats.

She got out of bed, the bed she
'
d crawled into just after dawn, and began tracing the sound: it seemed to come from between the walls. Sleepy but curious, she put on jeans and a heavy sweater and raked the tangles from her hair with her fingers, then made her way down the stairs. She caught a glimpse of herself in the hall mirror:
oh well
.

She forced herself to go into the fireplace room, where the mess on the rug came as a brutal reminder of the night before. The smell of burnt wool was unmistakable. She threw open the windows to air the place out. The sound was definitely louder in that room; it was coming from inside the chimney. Puzzled, Jane went outside. Perched on top of her roof like a large crow was a man dressed all in black and wearing a soft peaked hat—obviously a chimney sweep. He had his broom and he had his vacuum, and apparently he had his orders.

"
Hey, you up there!
"
she called, cupping her hands around her mouth.
"
What
'
re you doing in my chimney?
"

"
Heard you had some problems, and lady, I can see why,
"
the fellow yelled down.
"
You have enough birds
'
nests in here to start your own aviary.
"

"
Who
—
?
"
But it was obvious who. For an aloof neighbor who hated anyone butting into his own business, Mac McKenzie seemed to have very few compunctions about butting into hers.

"
Could the nests have caused a bad backdraft?
"

"
Sure could,
"
he yelled down.

Ha,
she thought. What did
he
know?

"
How much is this going to cost me?
"
she yelled, on her guard.

"
Don
'
t worry about it; Mac and I worked something out.
"

Worked something out.
She shook her head and began walking back to the house. Didn
'
t anyone use American currency on this island? And what the hell was Mac up to, anyway? She was getting deeper and deeper in his debt. The only bill she
'
d ever got from him was for moving the holly up and down, and she
'
d had to beg for that. And he hadn
'
t cashed her check anyway. Since then he
'
d mowed and cleared her grass when she was in town; thrown her trash in the back of his pickup for carting off to the dump; and hauled away a massive limb that had been lying behind the house probably for years.

And every time, he had an excuse for refusing payment. Either he happened to have the riding mower out anyway, or he was headed for the dump anyway, or he could really use the firewood anyway
—
he was an expert at maintaining the upper hand over her. It had to stop. She would
'
ve loved to have been on equal terms with him, to give and to take as friends and neighbors do. But this g
ive, give, give on his part ..
. it was a form of rebuffing her, of keeping her at arm
'
s length.

Of course, there are some who
'
d say I was being a little weird about this,
she decided with a rueful smile. And anyway, was he really trying to keep her at arm
's length? Last night —