Promised Land (11 page)

”All right? Okay. We start there. You committed a vicious and mindless goddamned crime and I’m going to try and get you out of the consequences. But let’s not clutter up the surface with a lot of horseshit about who stood by who and how you shouldn’t tell secrets, and oh-of-course-anyone-would-have.“

Susan said, between her teeth, ”Spenser.“

I drank some beer and ate a scallop. ”Now start at the beginning and tell me everything that happened.“

Pam Shepard said, ”You will help me?“

”Yes.“

She dried her eyes with her napkin. Snuffled a little. Susan gave her a Kleenex and she blew her nose. Delicately. My fisherman’s platter had fried haddock in it. I pushed it aside, over behind the French fries, and ate a fried clam.

”Rose and Jane are organizing a women’s movement. They feel we must overcome our own passivity and arouse our sisters to do the same. I think they want to model it on the Black Panthers, and to do that we need guns. Rose says we won’t have to use them. But to have them will make a great psychological difference. It will increase the level of militancy and it will represent power, even, Jane says, a threat to phallic power.“

”Phallic power?“

She nodded.

I said, ”Go ahead.“

”So they talked about it, and some other women came over and we had a meeting, and decided that we either had to steal the guns or the money to buy them. Jane had a gun, but that was all. Rose said it was easier to steal money than guns, and Jane said that it would be easy as pie to steal from a bank because banks always instruct their employees to cooperate with robbers anyway. What do they care, they are insured. And banks are where the money is. So that’s where we should go.“

I didn’t say anything. Susan ate some crab salad. Pam Shepard seemed to have no interest in her lobster stew. Looked good too.

”So Rose and Jane said they would do the actual work,“ she said. ”And I—I don’t know exactly why—I said I’d go with them. And Jane said that was terrific of me and proved that I was really into the women’s movement. And Rose said a bank was the ideal symbol of masculine-capitalist oppression. And one of the other women, I don’t know her name, she was a black woman, Cape Verdean I think, said that capitalism was itself masculine, and racist as well, so that the bank was a really perfect place to strike. And I said I wanted to go.“

”Like an initiation,“ I said.

Susan nodded. Pam Shepard looked puzzled and shrugged. ”Maybe, I don’t know. Anyway we went and Jane and Rose and I all wore sunglasses and big hats. And Jane had the gun.“

”Jane has all the fun,“ I said. Susan glared at me. Pam Shepard didn’t seem to notice.

”Anyway, we went in and Rose and Jane went to the counter and I stayed by the door as a… a lookout… and Rose gave the girl, woman, behind the counter a note and Jane showed her the gun. And the woman did what it said. She took all her money from the cash drawer and put it in a bag that Rose gave her and we started to leave when that foolish old man tried to stop us. Why did he do that? What possessed him to take that chance?“

”Maybe he thought that was his job.“

She shook her head. ”Foolish old man. What is an old man like that working as a bank guard for anyway?“

”Probably a retired cop. Stood at an intersection for forty years and directed traffic and then retired and couldn’t live on the pension. So he’s got a gun and he hires out at the bank.“

”But why try to stop us, an old man like that. I mean he saw Jane had a gun. It wasn’t his money.“

”Maybe he thought he ought to. Maybe he figured that if he were taking the money to guard the bank when the robbers didn’t come, he ought to guard it when they did. Sort of a question of honor, maybe.“

She shook her head. ”Nonsense, that’s the machismo convention. It gets people killed and for what. Life isn’t a John Wayne movie.“

”Yeah, maybe. But machismo didn’t kill that old guy. Jane killed him.“

”But she had to. She’s fighting for a cause. For freedom. Not only for women but for men as well, freedom from all the old imperatives, freedom from the burden of machismo for you as well as for us.“

”Right on,“ I said. ”Off the bank guard.“

Susan said, ”What happened after Jane shot the guard?“

”We ran,“ Pam said. ”Another woman, Grace something, I never knew her last name, was waiting for us in her Volkswagen station wagon, and we got in and drove back to the house.“

”The one on Centre Street?“ I asked.

She nodded. ”And we decided there that we better split up. That we couldn’t stay there because maybe they could identify us from the cameras. There were two in the bank that Rose spotted. I didn’t know where to go so I went to the bus station in New Bedford and took the first bus going out, which was coming to Plymouth. The only time I’d ever been to Plymouth was when we took the kids to Plimoth Plantation when they were smaller. So I got off the bus and walked here. And then I didn’t know what to do, so I sat in the snack bar at the reception center for a while and I counted what money I had, most of the hundred dollars you gave me, and I saw your card in my wallet and called you.“ She paused and stared out the window. ”I almost called my husband. But that would have just been running home with my tail between my legs. And I started to call you and hung up a couple of times. I… Did I have to have a man to get me out of trouble? But then I had nowhere else to go and nothing else to try so I called.“ She kept looking out the window. The butter in her lobster stew was starting to form a skin as the stew cooled. ”And after I called you I walked up and down the main street of the village and in and out of the houses and thought, here I am, forty-three years old and in the worst trouble of my life and I’ve got no one to call but a guy I’ve met once in my life, that I don’t even know, no one else at all.“ She was crying now and her voice shook as she talked. She turned her head away farther toward the window to hide it. The tide had gone out some more since I’d last looked and the dark water rounded rocks beyond the beach and made a kind of cobbled pattern with the sea breaking and foaming over them. It had gotten quite dark now, though it was early afternoon, and spits of rain splattered on the window. ”And you think I’m a goddamned fool,“ she said. She had her hand on her mouth and it muffled her speech. ”And I am.“

Susan put her hand on Pam Shepard’s shoulder. ”I think I know how you feel,“ Susan said. ”But it’s the kind of thing he can do and others can’t. You did what you felt you had to do, and you need help now, and you have the right person to help you. You did the right thing to call him. He can fix this. He doesn’t think you are a fool. He’s grouchy about other things, about me, and about himself, a lot of things and he leaned on you too hard. But he can help you with this. He can fix it.“

”Can he make that old man alive again?“

”We don’t work that way,“ I said. ”We don’t look around and see where we were. And we don’t look down the road and see what’s coming. We don’t have anything to do but deal with what we know. We look at the facts and we don’t speculate. We just keep looking right at this and we don’t say what if, or I wish or if only. We just take it as it comes. First you need someplace to stay besides Plimoth Plantation. I’m not using my apartment because I’m down here working on things. So you can stay there. Come on, we’ll go there now.“ I gestured for the check. ”Suze,“ I said, ”you and Pam go get in my car, I’ll pay up here.“

Pam Shepard said, ”I have money.“

I shook my head as the waitress came. Susan and Pam got up and went out. I paid the check, left a tip neither too big nor too small—I didn’t want her to remember us—and went to the car after them.

It’s forty-five minutes from Plymouth to Boston and the traffic was light in midafternoon. We were on Marlborough Street in front of my apartment at three-fifteen. On the ride up Pam Shepard had given me nothing else I could use. She didn’t know where Rose and Jane were. She didn’t know how to find them. She didn’t know who had the money, she assumed Rose. They had agreed, if they got separated, to put an ad in the New Bedford Standard Times personals column. She didn’t know where Rose and Jane had expected to get the guns. She didn’t know if they had any gun permit or FID card.

”Can’t you just go someplace and buy them?“ she said.

”Not in this state,“ I said.

She didn’t know what kind of guns they had planned to buy. She didn’t really know that guns came in various kinds. She didn’t know anyone’s name in the group except Rose and Jane and Grace and the only last name she knew was Alexander.

”It’s a case I can really sink my teeth into,“ I said. ”Lot of hard facts, lot of data. You’re sure I’ve got your name right?“

She nodded.

”What’s the wording for your ad,“ I said.

”If we get separated? We just say, ‘Sisters, call me at’—then we give a phone number and sign our first name.“

”And you run it in the Standard Times?“

”Yes, in the personal column.“

We got out of the car and Pam said, ”Oh, what a pretty location. There’s the Common right down there.“

”Actually the Public Garden. The Common’s on the other side of Charles Street,“ I said. We went up to my apartment, second floor front. I opened the door.

Pam Shepard said, ”Oh, very nice. Why it’s as neat as a pin. I always pictured bachelor apartments with socks thrown around and whiskey bottles on the floor and waste-baskets spilling onto the floor.“

”I have a cleaning person, comes in once a week.“

”Very nice. Who did the woodcarvings?“

”I have a woodcarver come in once a week.“

Susan said, ”Don’t listen to him. He does them.“

”Isn’t that interesting, and look at all the books. Have you read all these books?“

”Most of them, my lips get awful tired though. The kitchen is in here. There should be a fair supply of food laid in.“

”And booze,“ Susan said.

”That too,“ I said. ”In case the food runs out you can starve to death happy.“

I opened the refrigerator and took out a bottle of Amstel. ”Want a drink?“ Both Susan and Pam said no. I opened the beer and drank some from the bottle.

”There’s some bread and cheese and eggs in the refrigerator. There’s quite a bit of meat in the freezer. It’s labeled. And Syrian bread. There’s coffee in the cupboard here.“ I opened the cupboard door. ”Peanut butter, rice, canned tomatoes, flour, so forth. We can get you some vegetables and stuff later. You can make a list of what else you need.“

I showed her the bathroom and the bedroom. ”The sheets are clean.“ I said. ”The person changes them each week, and she was here yesterday. You will need clothes and things.“ She nodded. ”Why don’t you make a list of food and clothes and toiletries and whatever that you need and Suze and I will go out and get them for you.“ I gave her a pad and pencil. She sat at the kitchen counter to write. While she did I talked at her. ”When we leave,“ I said, ”stay in here, Don’t answer the door. I’ve got a key and Suze has a key and no one else has. So you won’t have to open the door for us and no one else has reason to come here. Don’t go out.“

”What are you going to do?“ she asked.

”I don’t know,“ I said. ”I’ll have to think about it.“

”I think maybe I’ll have that drink you offered,“ she said.

”Okay, what would you like?“

”Scotch and water?“

”Sure.“

I made her the drink, lots of ice, lots of Scotch, a dash of water. She sipped it while she finished her list.

When she gave it to me she also offered me her money.

”No,“ I said. ”You may need it. I’ll keep track of all this and when it’s over I’ll give you a bill.“

She nodded. ”If you want more Scotch,“ I said, ”you know where it is.“

Susan and I went out to shop. At the Prudential Center on Boylston Street we split up. I went into the Star Market for food and she went up to the shopping mall for clothes and toiletries. I was quicker with the food than she was with her part and I had to hang around for a while on the plaza by the funny statue of Atlas or Prometheus or whoever he was supposed to be. Across the way a movie house was running an action-packed double feature: The Devil in Miss Jones and Deep Throat. They don’t make them like they used to. Whatever happened to Ken Maynard and his great horse, Tarzan? I looked some more at the statue. It looked like someone had done a takeoff on Michelangelo, and been taken seriously. Did Ken Maynard really have a great horse named Tarzan? If Ken were still working, his great horse would probably be named Bruce and be a leather freak. A young woman went by wearing a white T-shirt and no bra. On the T-shirt was stenciled TONY’S PX, GREAT FALLS, MONTANA. I was watching her walk away when Susan arrived with several ornate shopping bags.

”That a suspect?“ Susan said.

”Remember I’m a licensed law officer. I was checking whether those cut-off jeans were of legal length.“

”Were they?“

”I don’t think so.“ I picked up groceries and one of Susan’s shopping bags and we headed for the car. When we got home Pam Shepard was sitting by the front window looking out at Marlborough Street. She hadn’t so far as I could see done anything else except perhaps freshen her drink. It was five o’clock and Susan agreed to join Pam for a drink while I made supper. I pounded some lamb steaks I’d bought for lamb cutlets. Dipped them in flour, then egg, then bread crumbs. When they were what Julia Child calls nicely coated I put them aside and peeled four potatoes. I cut them into little egg-shaped oblongs, which took a while, and started them cooking in a little oil, rolling them around to get them brown all over. I also started the cutlets in another pan. When the potatoes were evenly browned I covered them, turned down the heat and left them to cook through. When the cutlets had browned, I poured off the fat, added some Chablis and some fresh mint, covered them and let them cook. Susan came out into the kitchen once to make two new drinks. I made a Greek salad with feta cheese and ripe olives and Susan set the table while I took the lamb cutlets out of the pan and cooked down the wine. I shut off the heat, put in a lump of unsalted butter, swirled it through the wine essence and poured it over the cutlets. With the meal we had warm Syrian bread and most of a half gallon of California Burgundy. Pam Shepard told me it was excellent and what a good cook I was.