Kiss and Kill (10 page)

Johnny smiled and raised his brows. “Open me a beer.”

“You've broken the spell, you rat.” She opened the cooler and took a beer out of the ice. For herself she fixed a rum and Coke. She watched him drink, noting with pleasure the matted hair showing through the opening of his shirt. He was barefoot. His muscular arm rested on the tiller; he was studying the shore like a corsair. Looking for a place to enjoy his prey, Claire thought. She felt deliciously anticipatory.

An hour later Johnny grumbled, “The guy I rented the boat from said the river ended at a waterfall. I got the impression it was a lot closer than this. If he's conned me, I'll kill him.”

“How,” Claire asked dreamily, “do you manage to carry on these complicated conversations? You don't speak Spanish.”

“Sign language,” he said, recovering his good humor; and he acted out a waterfall, a river, an alligator, and a boat with such ludicrous fidelity that she laughed until she ached.

Then they rounded a bend; and there was the waterfall, cascading into a crystal lagoon. It looked like a movie location for a jungle romance. The sun splintered through a canopy of leaves. There was a thatched shelter nearby with two absurd tables. An olive-skinned woman stirred a pot over a charcoal fire; a man squatted nearby hacking coconuts with a machete. The air was heady with flower scents.

“We're here, Mrs. Crusoe!” said Johnny.

They munched dried shrimp and peanuts in the primitive
hostería
, then went for a swim. They decided it would be fun not to change clothes but to dry themselves in the sun afterward. Claire went into the air-clear water first; Johnny dived off the board, his long body breaking clean while bubbles streamed after him like little fish. They embraced under water until she ran out of air.

He held her.

Terror struck her from nowhere. She would have screamed had she been able to get a lungful of air. She turned and she twisted and fought while he held her easily down. Panic gave her a bloody feeling in her throat. What was he trying to do?
Let me go, let me go …

He released her. She struggled to the surface and crawled out on the stones gulping and gulping. Her chest was one white-hot ache.

She gasped, “What in God's name do you think you were doing? I nearly drowned.”

“I'd have saved you.”

“Take me back. I don't want to swim any more.”

He flipped over and floated. “No,” he said lazily.

The ridiculous thought struck Claire then that he was a psychotic. He did act strangely. What had she got herself into? She was helpless: the woman was useless, the man hacking coconuts was grinning, enjoying the show. She couldn't even communicate with them. And the boat—she didn't even know how to start the engine.

She got up weak-kneed, shivering in the strong sun. And a curious thing happened to her. Suddenly she did not care. It was absurd, anyway. He was a brute, and he was playing with her, and so be it. She had never felt so reckless. “I'm going for a walk,” she said.

He gave her an amused look. “Go ahead.”

She climbed the rocky slope to the ledge where the waterfall spilled over. Sunlight pierced the trees. She stripped off her wet clothing, hung it on a branch, and was sitting naked in the sun when Johnny appeared with a blanket.

“Nice little nest,” he said. “Shall we go to it, Miss English?”

Hating him, she watched him spread the blanket. She inched up and settled on the blanket and stared into the trees. Then she felt his hands, and she closed her eyes.

“That,” Johnny laughed, “is what I wanted the first day.”

“You picked a funny way to get it,” murmured Claire.

“Seems to me I did everything exactly right. Here we are.”

“Here we are.” She looked up through the leaves: a buzzard wheeled, uttering crowlike cries. A purple-black kite flew against the brilliant sky; it descended in a lazy spiral somewhere above the mountain. Something dead up there, she thought. In the river below, a bird screeched, and there was a loud splash. Something got eaten, she thought. The blanket tickled her perspiring back; she smelled the forest mold and thought of death, of everything blacked out; silence, nothing. She felt a sudden panic for life, to eat and drink and laugh and fill herself with love. She stretched out her hand and touched him.

“No,” said Johnny.

“No?”

“No.”

She rolled over and nuzzled his neck. “No what?”

He laughed again, and she felt the sound inside her body. “No waiting.”

Later she smoked a cigarette and rested her head between his legs.

“I like that about you,” he said. “You get what you want.”

“I suppose I do. Even while I was fighting it. Doesn't everybody?”

“Not everybody. And some know they can never get it.”

“Like for instance?”

“Like me. I could get real hung up with you.”

“Go ahead.”

“Permanently?” She thought he shook his head ever so little.

Claire felt something tighten inside. “I don't know about permanently,” she said lightly. “I don't even know what you do for a living.”

“I live.”

“I couldn't support a gigolo.”

“Sure, it's like having a pet elephant. A lot of fun, but, man, the expense.”

“I just couldn't have a man dependent on me. It would sour both of us.”

“I should have my own money, huh? How much would I need?”

“Millions.”

“No kidding. A hundred thousand?”

“We're getting into fantasy.”

“Okay,” he said. “Just don't keel over when I cover this body of yours with thousand-dollar bills.”

She laughed. “I'll sew them into a bikini and wear it to the beach.”

“With a ten-carat diamond in your navel.”

They got a little squiffy that afternoon. The Mexican woman killed a chicken and fried it, and Claire wished that she could stop time forever; joy existed only here, beside this little lagoon in the jungle. They slept that night on a straw mat in a thatched hut. The bugs would have eaten them alive if they had not rubbed each other repeatedly with insect repellent.

The next morning the group came chugging upriver, some of them worried, the others merely curious. At first there was a tendency to giggle and leer at the fact that Johnny and Claire had obviously spent the night together. But Claire's glow and Johnny's possessive calmness soon killed the awkwardness. The visit turned into a celebration. It was late afternoon when they all returned to the hotel.

That night at dinner the food stuck in Claire's throat. She caught Johnny's eye and walked out to the beach. He came up behind her and kissed her neck.

“I got a room by myself tonight,” he said. “Mosquito netting over the bed. It's like a little bower.”

“What have you done to me, Johnny?”

He grinned. “If you don't know by now, you'd better see your analyst.”

“You know what I mean. You make me feel as if I'm about to explode.”

He fondled her. “We'll trigger it.”

“Damn you! Leave your door unlocked.”

Three nights later in the crummy hotel in Guadalajara, Liz said: “I think I'll get my own room from now on.”

Claire looked at her. “Why?”

“You never sleep in it. You'll catch your death running through the corridors at night in your pajamas. Let him come to you.”

“Liz, I've never done this before—” She felt the pink tide again.

“You don't have to explain to me. You might as well move in together. He's a damned attractive man. Sex personified.” Liz shrugged. “I'm happy for you, only …”

“What?”

“He's so … obscure, so mysterious about what he does for a living. Look, it's none of my business. Why don't I shut up?”

Claire stared at the fly-specked ceiling. It was bothering her, too. Johnny grew vague and flippant when she brought the subject up, and she had stopped doing it. His evasions gave her a funny feeling. And it annoyed her with herself. After all, what difference did it make? When the tour was over, they would part and go their separate ways; they would probably never lay eyes on each other again.

There was another thing: Now and then he would vanish like smoke, and Claire would find herself pacing the lobby, waiting for him to rematerialize. Oaxaca … Taxco … Cuernavaca … Was he tiring of her already? Had he found another girl?

Once Liz said: “Don't fret, Claire. He'll be back. He went scouting for a seafood restaurant.” And Claire felt a jealous anger because he had told Liz and not her.

“You'd have wanted to come along,” explained Johnny when he showed up. “I had to be alone for a while.”

“Why?” murmured Claire, already melting.

“So that I could forget what you looked like. Now I've the fun of discovering you again.”

She could never get serious with him; he immediately dodged into flippancy. When Johnny sat next to Liz at the
corrida
in Mexico City, Claire was furious.

“I came in late,” Johnny pointed out. “You were sitting between Rod Aiken and Mrs. Barton. What should I have done, booted one of them off the seat?”

“Why were you late? I waited outside until the bloody thing started.”

He grinned and shook his handsome head. “You'd be happier, Claire, if you got rid of your hangups.”

“What hangups?”

“Money, pride, possessiveness.”

“What about yours?”

“Name one.”

“Cynical pursuit of kicks. Mixed with a little sadism.”

“I may die tomorrow.”

“Not if you're careful.”

“If I'm careful, I'm dead today.”

That made no sense. Claire stalked off and they didn't speak for the remainder of the day. But that night, when he knocked, she jumped up as though hurled from a catapult; she forced herself to walk slowly to the door. Afterward, she decided: We're fine when we're alone; it must be the others.

“Let's leave the group, Johnny. Go to Acapulco.”

“Can't now, baby.”

She found herself saying: “If it's money …”

“Not that. I've got something to do in Tula. Then we'll see.”

In Tula he disappeared while they were touring the Toltec ruins on the hill behind the city. An hour passed. Suddenly Claire noticed that Liz Tollman was missing, too. When the others gathered at the limousine to return to the hotel, Claire tried to ignore the glances in her direction. At sunset Liz came walking toward the car, alone. Behind her stood the silhouette of a pyramid topped by twelve-foot stone figures, like the Fates. Claire said nothing to Liz; her temper was already in too delicate a balance.

“Where's Johnny?” asked old man Barton.

Liz looked surprised. “I haven't seen him since we left the ball court.”

Johnny approached from the opposite side of the car. He walked with a jaunty stride, as though he had just accomplished something notable. He grinned at Claire, and the grin turned her anxiety to flaming anger.

“You're grinning like a tomcat. Are you enlisting all the females in the group in your personal harem?”

“All except old Sue. She's holding out for top spot.”

“She can have my place,” Claire said through her teeth. “I'm
through
.”

His grin faded. “Hey, you're mad. Why?”

“Liz just got back. You must have come around the long way.”

He went stony. “I don't get this.”

“If you didn't get it, I'm sure you gave it the old Talbot try.”

“Oh, hell. Look. I bought something for you, that's all. A miniature of those Toltec warriors on the pyramid.”

“Give it to Liz,” she said, and jumped into the car.

That night he rapped on her door and softly called her name. She lay there willing herself not to get up and open the door. But after a minute she found herself opening it. Johnny was gone. She walked down the hall and heard his voice in Liz's room. Dazed, Claire returned to her room, swallowed two sleeping pills, and got back into bed. A quarter of an hour later, as her eyelids began to droop, she changed her mind. By God, she'd go to Liz's room and find out just what was going on.

Suddenly it was morning.

Johnny was not in his room. Neither was his suitcase.

When he did not appear for breakfast Claire, jumpy now, began asking questions. The driver, Kiddoo, said Johnny had taken a taxi ahead to San Juan del Rio. He would meet the group at noon there in the marketplace, he had told Kiddoo.

They were drinking
cerveza
in an outdoor café and comparing their purchases of straw goods when Claire spotted Johnny across the highway, towering over the milling Mexicans. He looked flushed, as though he had been running. His eyes searched the crowded market; Claire tried to call, but her throat was suddenly dry. Then old Barton's voice bellowed:

“Hey, Talbot! We're over here!”

Johnny spotted them, waved, and started across the road. There was an unearthly screech and an enormous Bronx cheer of air brakes. But the bus was coming too fast. Its bulldog front bounced Johnny into the air, arms and legs flapping like a rag doll's. He landed on the asphalt ahead of the bus.

To Claire, everything was small, far away.

She saw Johnny start crawling on his elbows. Then the front wheels of the bus ran over his waist.…

The next thing Claire felt was Liz rubbing her wrists and Rodney Aiken bathing her forehead with a beer-soaked handkerchief.

“Johnny,…” she moaned.

“They carried him off in the ambulance,” said Liz. “Easy, Claire.”

“Dead?”

“Almost,” muttered the schoolteacher. “Bleeding internally. We'll take you there.”

She managed to get to her feet. She tried not to look at the blood where Johnny had fallen. But something caught her eye. It was the statuette he had tried to give her the night before. All at once it seemed profoundly significant. She picked it up and put it in her purse.