Downhill Chance (4 page)

Gid carried on, a studied look occupying his face as he slipped pieces of hay wire through knots, pulling nooses. Once, he looked up, catching Luke’s scrutiny, and as was whenever anyone peered too keenly, his lids drooped, revealing the barest slivers of brown, causing Luke to question just how much of anything Gid ever really saw.

“Your da oughtna hit you like that,” said Luke, startling Gid with the suddenness of his words. And ignoring the questioning look from Frankie, Luke uncrossed and crossed his legs against the prickling of the boughs beneath him, carrying on with his tailing as the sun began its descent beyond the hills.

That evening, eating supper, Luke looked to his father’s gnarled hands as they wrapped themselves around a mug of hot tea. The worst he’d ever seen them do was rip apart a dead animal for supper, and even that was done in a careful, orderly manner, offering full respect, almost kindness, for the carcass about to be stewed and eaten. And when he saw O’Mara the next day, strolling along the bank, calling out liltingly to a couple of his youngsters, he looked at his small, almost womanish hands, gesturing fluidly as he spoke, and wondered how it was that such grace could bruise his boy’s eye for not listening.

It was the following day—the day before they were to set off for the Basin—that the shine fell from the O’Maras like a cheap lacquer. Joey had taken himself to bed, and Prude was standing in her nightdress, unplaiting her braids before a mirror hung over the washstand, when the knock sounded.

“What’s that—who’s that?” she asked, her hand to her heart in fright. No one knocked on doors.

“Bide there,” said Herb as Luke poked his head out from behind the stove.

“No, Herb, wait—go see through the window, first,” said Prude, but Herb, was already crossing the kitchen, opening the door. Peering outside, he then quickly stepped back, opening it fully. The missus stood there, her dress torn, baring a bruised breast, her eye already swollen shut, a harsh burn marking the side of one cheek, and the blood spurting from her bottom lip, dripping thickly onto the crown of the babe she clutched to her bosom. She stared wildly at Prude, her breathing short and rasping over the night wind. Two others, trembling from the cold and whatever else that had touched them on this night, clung tightly to her dress tail, whimpering piteously in their naked feet and half-clad bodies.

“Glory be,” cried Prude, one hand crossing her heart, the other reaching out to the missus. “What’s happened, what’s after happening, now?”

Joey came out of the room, pulling his suspenders up over his shoulders, his cap rolled down over his ears. “Shut the door, Father,” he ordered as Herb stood out on the stoop, ushering the missus and her young ones inside.

“My oh my, I waited for this night,” cried Prude, helping the missus into a chair. “Joey, get the brandy from the cupboard. Show, here, I gets a clean cloth. Luke, take the youngsters in the room and warm them in bed. Blessed be the Lord, what thing, what thing is this?”

Luke faltered, holding tightly to the warmth of the stove. He felt his mother’s urgency in wanting the young ones warmed, as if comfort might ease the hurt this night had inflicted upon them. Too, it would free the missus to speak more openly without the younger ears listening, for it was already sensed by Herb, as he went back to jabbing at the fire with the poker, and Joey, as he kept his head down while passing the missus her cup of tea, and by Luke himself, as he stared with a sickening fascination at the exposed breast and the torn dress, that there was no wild beast prowling their doorstep on this night, no driven lunatic, no haunt exiled betwixt heaven and hell; but, rather it was a beast of their own nature that had caused the missus’s dress to be torn. And it was this debacle of one turning against one’s own and sending women and babies fleeing from their doorstep that caused Luke to cling further to the warmth of the stove. A chill rolled through his belly as he looked again at the sight of the missus’s torn dress, like the time he had come upon Aunt Char’s cat eating her newborn kitten, and then spewing it back up onto the door place, a bloodied, bone-sharded pulp.

But the stove offered poor shelter this night. The missus had no sooner taken a sip of the tea Joey had passed her, when the door was thrust open, and O’Mara staggered in, his eyes bloodshot with moonshine, and his face contorting furiously in the wildly flickering lamplight.

“Home!” he snarled, tilting drunkenly on his feet and pointing a finger towards the missus and her youngsters. And then, when Herb, still holding the poker, took a step towards him, O’Mara lunged. Both men went down with a crash, Herb on the flat of his back and O’Mara on top, hands clenched around Herb’s throat. Joey, as if stunned by what was taking place before him, moved towards the men, slowly at first, as if through water, then with lightning speed as a cry from Prude cut through his benumbed senses. Grabbing hold of O’Mara’s head from behind, he got him in a stranglehold, but O’Mara’s liquor-skewed demonic strength was too strong for Joey’s shocked, almost gentlemanly, defence, and Herb’s eyes began to bulge, his face purpling from the pressure around his windpipe. Letting go of the stove, Luke stumbled forward, colliding against Prude, and for a second, they both held on to each other, watching in silenced horror this assault upon the one they beheld most dear. Never—not even a dog—had turned a baleful eye upon this gentlest of souls. And now, the sight of him as he flailed weakly at O’Mara, choked, strained whimpers escaping his gaping mouth, forged a sight that would forever brand Luke’s eyes.

A hoarse cry from Prude freed Luke, and throwing himself onto the floor besides where the men sprawled, he grabbed hold of the fingers that were dug into his father’s throat, and not able to budge them, bit into them as would a dog. Joey heaved harder on his stranglehold, cutting off O’Mara’s breathing and forcing him to slacken his fingers from around Herb’s throat. Shoving Luke to one side, O’Mara then grabbed hold of Joey’s arm that was wrapped around his neck, and tried to throw him over. But with a sudden thrust of strength, Joey managed to topple O’Mara sideways off his father, then leaped to his feet, both fists curled. O’Mara staggered to his, and heaving drunkenly from one foot to another, stood wagging a finger at the lot of them.

“No one threatens me with a poker!” he roared. And then, jabbing at his missus and youngsters, “And no one comes betwixt me and mine. Now, get home!” Gathering the baby more tightly to her bosom, the missus rose from her chair and scurried out the door. The youngsters fled after her, and O’Mara, stumbling backwards, grabbing hold of the door jamb to steady himself, threw a murderous look at Joey, then lurched out behind them.

No sooner had the hinge snapped in place than Aunt Char, and others behind her, started running in through the door, having heard the commotion. “He’s a lunatic!” Prude cried out as they all gathered around, helping Herb to a chair, and examining the bruises starting around his neck. “A bloody lunatic. The look on his face—ooh, he wore the devil’s face, he did, bursting in through the door, and her sitting there with the baby in her arms, and the young ones too scared to open their mouths—the devil himself! And he was choking Herb, he was—with him pinned to the floor. The black stranger—I seen it, I did; on the first day they come, I seen it, for what’s a decent soul doing with his family away from his kin, unless he was drove out? And he was drove out of Harbour Deep too, mark my words, and I allows there’s more than one place on this island he lived till he got drove out. My oh my, what are we going to do now, hey—we got the devil living amongst us, and his family needing us to keep ’em going? My oh my, I said it, I did; I said it.”

Early the next morning whilst all tossed fretfully in sleep, Luke rose from behind the stove where he had finished the night and snuck out the door. The sea was without quiet this morn, its glassy stillness giving way to the ragged blue of a choppy winter’s wind, and he was thankful; for there was a mar in the ordinariness of this morning, and he was not wanting to be alone with it. Wandering onto the beach, he kicked at a stranded jellyfish, then stood with the sole of his boot pressed hard against the purplish face.

“Luke!” It was Frankie. Appearing on the bank, he leapt down onto the beach, face scrubbed shiny and hair slicked back as though the sun was already shining and the bell donging for church. “What’d she look like, Luke, when she come to your door?”

“God, my son.”

“She had her dress tore off?”

“Why didn’t you come see for yourself, if you’re that nosy.”

“Mother caught me; geez, deafer than a haddock but she hears everything. Was her mouth bleeding?”

Luke jabbed at the jellyfish with the toe of his boot. “She was bleeding,” he muttered, jabbing harder. The sound of a door slamming shut sounded from the O’Maras’ shack and both boys swivelled their heads towards it. There was no one there. The heel of Luke’s boot punctured the jellyfish and he jumped back, stomping it on the beach rock, freeing it from the dying flesh. “Let’s go now,” he said with a sudden urgency, turning to Frankie. “Up the Basin—let’s go get our snares and leave now.”

“Hope now, my son—we said Saturday.”

“Who cares it’s not Saturday.”

“I already told Mother—”

“Tell Mother something else. I wants to go now— quick—before anybody gets up. Unless you’s scared,” he added as Frankie picked up jabbing at the ruptured fish. “Well—you coming or not?”

“What about Gid?”

Luke shrugged, his eyes fixed onto Frankie’s. “Get some bread for later and we’ll meet up behind the point,” he said, tossing his head towards a curve in the shoreline a scant sixty or seventy feet up the beach. “Come on, my son, make up your mind,” he all but shouted as Frankie stared back at him hesitantly, “because I’m going whether you comes or not— Fraidy Frankie.”

“Right, my son. Better hope Mother’s still in bed then, or she’ll be up bawling out to Prude. Geez, my son,” he yelled as Luke grabbed him by the shirt, his face a scant inch before his.

“You better bloody hope she don’t, then,” uttered Luke, his threat falling to the wayside as Frankie shoved him to one side. And muttering still, yet responding to the unspoken signal born out of familiarity, both boys turned, running towards their separate doorsteps. Letting himself inside, Luke quietly sliced off two pieces of bread, smeared them with molasses and, wrapping them in a piece of brown paper, shoved them into the baggy pockets of his cotton trousers. Scooping up the bundle of rabbit snares, he shoved them into his other pocket. Then he stoked up the fire to take the chill out of the house for when his mother got up, and snuck out the door.

He paused for a second, looking towards Frankie’s house, then raced up the beach. Perhaps Frankie was already there. Rounding the turn, he dropped disappointedly onto his belly, staring back at Frankie’s house, jiggling his foot impatiently. “Come on, Frankie,” he ordered loudly, “come on.” Pressing his chin onto folded arms, he stared unblinking at his cousin’s house, willing him to appear around the corner. Aside from the thin trickle of smoke drifting out of Prude’s chimney and the restless stirring of the wind and sea, the outport was quiet as death. Something moved near the O’Maras’ shack and Luke squinted for a better look. “A rat, most likely,” he muttered, then closed his eyes, allowing for the first time that morning the image of his father’s face, purpling beneath O’Mara’s hands and the half-bared breast of the missus as she sat bleeding and bruised with the baby in her arms and the smaller youngsters clinging to her dress tail.

A squawk went up from Aunt Char’s rooster and Luke’s eyes snapped open as Frankie came sprinting around the corner of his house, and alongside of him Gid, his father’s .22 rifle bouncing awkwardly against his shoulder as he ran.

A flush darkened Luke’s face as jumped to his feet, smashing his fist in his hands. “What the hell are you up to, Frankie?” he yelled savagely as both boys came panting around the turn.

“I found him, Luke, sleeping outside your place. He got his father’s gun.”

“You conner; you just wants to screw up our plan.”

“No I never, my son—ask him—he was sleeping outside your place, by the hillside. He woke up as I was coming out the door. Ask him—go on, ask him.”

“Ask him, go on, ask him,” Luke mocked angrily, and was twisting on his heel, about to march off, when Gid spoke.

“You can carry it, Luke.”

Luke turned then, looking first at the yellow-and-brown hair, more knotted than kinked, and the face, pale, splotchy, like day-old cream. He wanted to run, to shut himself inside his house and crawl up behind the stove and lay his head to its warmth. But his eyes found their way to Gid’s and became rooted within the brown slivers, partially hidden beneath heavily padded lids. He knew now why they were thus, and as he stared, the sickening feeling came back again, the same as what he felt upon seeing the missus’s bared breast and the half-eaten kitten.

“Come on, Luke,” coaxed Frankie. “You can carry it like Gid says. She got a bullet in her—you can shoot it—”

“How come you got your father’s gun?” asked Luke, his eyes still implanted in Gid’s.

“Ma throw’d it out last night.”

“After O’Mara went to sleep, right, Gid?” said Frankie. “And he won’t wake up for hours, O’Mara won’t—even pisses his pants whilst he sleeps. Gid just told me,” added Frankie as Luke turned on him, suspiciously. “By then, we’ll be back.”

“We won’t shoot it till we’re on our way back—how’s that, Fraidy Frankie?” Luke snapped. “And it’s his gun, so he can carry it. Better hurry up, my son,” he then growled at Gid, and falling back a step he beckoned for Frankie to start walking, and then Gid. Glancing back he noted the smoke spiralling darker and thicker from his mother’s chimney. She’s up, he thought, and more fancied than heard her crying out, “No good comes from a night like this, mark my words, mark my words.” He then hurried after Frankie, who was taking the lead, and Gid keeping up from behind, the butt of the gun bumping against his knees, and the barrel glinting fiercely in the first rays of the sun.

BOOK ONE

Clair