It was then that a sheet of white light filled the room, and for a moment nobody reacted because they’d grown so used to the steady, brilliant flashes of lightning. This one held, though, and Arlen turned and looked through the window, and, as a snarling, raging clatter of thunder shook the sky, he saw Thomas Barrett’s delivery van parked at the top of the hill, its headlight beams cutting across the yard. The passenger door swung open, and Paul burst out and ran through the rain. Barrett gave the horn a little double tap and turned the van around and headed back up the road.
When Paul broke through the door and stood before them in a sopping mess, everyone stared at him in silence. He had a paper sack clutched to his chest.
“Some storm,” he said.
“Where in the hell you been?” Arlen said.
“Went up to the store, if it’s any of your business. Which it isn’t.”
“That store’s every bit of five miles away.”
“Felt about like that,” Paul said, flip and indifferent. “Once it commenced to storming, Mr. Barrett said he’d give me a ride back or I’d be waiting till morning. He thinks this one isn’t blowing off quick.”
“Come on over here and get dried off,” Rebecca said, rising and pulling a towel off the bar. “Maybe we should start a fire. It’s warm, but on a night like this it just might be-”
Paul had been crossing to her, and everyone stopped short when Arlen reached out and grabbed the paper sack from his hands.
“Hey!” Paul cried, and reached for it, but Arlen turned his shoulder and blocked the grab long enough to open the sack and see the contents. There were some penny candies and a few packs of cigarettes.
“Give me that,” Paul said, and this time Arlen let him take it. “What’s the matter with you? Got to steal everything from me, is that it?”
“I haven’t stolen a thing from you in the past,” Arlen said. “Never took a damn thing that was yours.”
Paul gave him cold eyes and didn’t answer.
“You don’t smoke cigarettes,” Arlen said.
“What?”
“You got cigarettes in that sack, smart guy. Why?”
“Because I wanted a few, that’s why.”
“I’ll say it again,” Arlen said, “you don’t smoke.”
Paul drew his shoulders back and looked Arlen in the eye. “They’re for Owen. I figured he’d appreciate them. You probably would have, too, but I’m not of a mind to give you anything.”
“Hey, thanks,” Owen said, and Arlen wanted to backhand the fool right through the window.
“So all you got is candy,” Arlen said. “You walked five miles up the road to fetch yourself some candy?”
“That’s right.”
“Arlen, what does it matter?” Rebecca asked softly, passing Paul the towel. He took to drying his face and neck, and Arlen looked at Rebecca in silence. He didn’t have an answer, really. All he knew was that he didn’t like this. It didn’t feel right, Paul taking a walk that long in this kind of heat just to get some damn candy.
“You happen across Solomon Wade in your travels?” he said.
“No. Didn’t happen across a soul but Mr. Barrett and his wife. What it matters to you, I have no idea. It’s none of your concern what I do.”
“How’d you pay for it?”
Paul stopped with the towel over one side of his face. “What?”
“This shit you went hiking for. Cigarettes and candy. How’d you pay for it? I was under the impression you were busted-ass broke.”
Paul switched the towel to the other side of his face and dried it slowly. He seemed to be thinking.
“Mr. Barrett let me have it on credit,” he said.
“Credit,” Arlen echoed. “Son, this is a Depression. That man don’t know you from Adam. Why in the hell’s he giving you anything on credit?”
“I told him I’d be coming into some money shortly,” Paul said. “Owen here set me up with a bit of work.”
“Let me fix us something to eat,” Rebecca said, nervous, bothered by the tension in the air. “We’ll all sit in here where it’s dry and have some food.”
Arlen and Paul held a long stare, and then Paul turned away and tossed the cigarettes to Owen.
“There.”
“Thanks.”
“Sure. We still got our job tomorrow night?”
Owen looked at Arlen, uneasy, but nodded. “Yeah. We got our job.”
“Good,” Paul said. “I could use the money. No offense to you, Owen, but I’ve had my fill of this place.”
Arlen went to the bar and poured a drink but didn’t take a sip of it. He was watching Paul and remembering him the way he’d looked that day when he corrected Arlen’s mistake on the pitch of the roof at Flagg Mountain, the good-natured, deep-rooted interest he took in every joint and every hinge. The way he’d taken that generator apart and scattered its pieces over the porch and set to work putting it back together again without a doubt in his head, sure it could be done. He remembered those times, and the night they’d taken the boat out, and he looked at this thin young man with the permanent scowl who stood before him now and thought, I did this. I was only trying to help, but I did this.
“What are you staring at?” Paul said.
“Nothing,” Arlen said, voice soft. “Nothing at all.”
He took a drink, but he had no taste for it, and then he slid the glass away from him and went through the swinging door into the kitchen.
Rebecca had a slice of ham frying in a skillet on the stove, and she turned to him as if to speak but instead she just stepped forward and wrapped her arms around him and put her face to his neck. He wrapped his own around her, and they held each other in silence for a long time. Her face was warm on his neck, and he could feel her breathing and for some reason he had to close his eyes and hold that moment in darkness.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“Sorry?”
“For it all. This isn’t something you should be a part of. I wish I could-”
“Stop,” he said, voice gentle. “We’re going to handle this. All right? It’s not but a day left, Rebecca. By the time the sun goes down out there on the water tomorrow, you’ll be gone from this place. Going north, to Maine, just the way you hoped. I’ll see that it happens.”
He pushed her back and lifted her chin and kissed her. Soft and slow. When he broke the kiss, he said, “Is there a train that could be taken yet tonight?”
She frowned. “One more before the end of the night, but it’s an hour’s drive. What are you asking for?”
“I’d like to give Paul his share and put him on it.”
She stepped back and looked at him in surprise. “Already?”
He nodded. “I want him clear of this, Rebecca. Make no mistake-I intend to see it through just as we’ve planned, but I want him clear of it. He’s ready to leave this place. We’ve soured him on it, on us, on damn near everything. I can’t change that. But I can put money in his pocket and get him aboard a train and hope for the best for him.”
She put her hands on his shoulders and said, “I love you.”
All he could get out was “Yeah.” They both laughed then, and he took her close and said, “I love you, too. And I don’t give a damn what’s happened since I got here, or what’s left to come-I found my way to you. Any price that must be paid in exchange for that is a small one.”
She kissed him again, and this time he could feel a tear gliding off her skin and onto his own, and then she took the burlap sack with the five thousand dollars down from the shelf and handed it to him. He left her there in the kitchen and went for Paul.
43
PAUL WAS DRINKING WITH OWEN. Trying to engage him in some of the usual tales, asking about Dillinger and Handsome Harry Pierpont, the one they electrocuted up in Ohio, inquiring about them as if he thought Owen had ridden at their sides. Even Owen wasn’t having it tonight, though. He looked worn, and all he said was “Ah, those boys didn’t hardly spend any time in Florida at all. A few months when they was hiding out once, but that was all.”