In ten, laughing against the door. In half an hour the waves would be roaring with triumph over the motorblock, into the wiring with the corrosive salt, ripping zebra-skin upholstery, breaking windows, and rolling the fuzzy dice hanging from the rear-view mirror. And in an hour would be rolling the whole car like a bathtub toy. The car's passive acceptance of its fate touches Lee. The stoic wisdom of metal. He wishes he could be as calm (The wind gathered on the dunes. It blew over the tube with an intermittent wailing, a phantom pipe played by the wind and tempoed by the beat of a surf somewhere in another world. The boy stopped crying; he decided this couldn't be one of the devil's stovepipes; it was too cold to be part of Hell)--as calm and as accepting: wheels caught in a waiting grave, and with the moon full to boot. . . . He walks directly to the car . . .
The driver eyed my approach but didn't speak. "Hey, man," I called, "what's the bubble?" Say trouble, Lee implores the boy silently. "What's the clatter?" Please say matter, Lee begs as longingly as the doomed car, please say something friendly.
I stopped walking. His cronies, standing ten yards back up the beach in the midst of a collection of trunk paraphernalia--jack, spare tire, blankets, golf clubs--looked slowly from me to their leader.
"Mr. Stamper," he purred when a little space opened in the ocean's roar. "You arrive just like a hero. All you Stampers are heroes, they say. So, hey, you bring along a shovel? A chain maybe? Maybe you called us a tow truck. You call us a tow truck by any chance, Mr. Stamper? Or you got help on the way?"
"Nope. Just strolling past, enjoying the beach all alone."
Alarmed by his sugar-and-venom tone, I quickly realized that this scene might constitute more of a distraction than I had bargained for. "Well, blue-tail fly," I said cheerily and tried to walk on past. Lee stands, looking beyond the kid's Dayglo shoulder in the direction of the whistle buoy calling plaintively out in the dark water (The little boy could occasionally hear the buoys out in the bay's mouth, and sometimes the sound of Diesels going past on the highway . . . but as time passed he came to devote all his attention to the star-dotted coin of sky above him: it seemed to be growing lighter near one edge . . .) But as I passed him he reached out and laid a freckled hand on my arm to stop me, keeping his face turned slightly away; brilliant stigmata of white-heads decorated his rosy cheek. When he spoke I noticed a decided change in his attitude since our earlier encounter. There had been cruelty, but now something had turned it to hate.
"Gee, Mr. Stamper. Where you going? Didn't we give you a hand in need a while back? Don't you suppose you might help us?"
"Sure"--brightly, cheerfully. "Sure, what can I do? Should I phone for a truck? I'm going toward civilization. . . ." I gestured vaguely toward town. "I'll send someone."
"Oh well I jes' guess not," Dayglo crooned. "We already sent somebody to telephone. Can't you help some other way? You being a Stamper and all?" His fingers tenderly rolled the fabric of my jacket. "Sure," I exclaimed. "Sure, I'll do what I can but--" Too bright now, too cheerful. I laughed nervously, and the fingers tightened on my arm.
"You sure happy about something, Mr. Stamper. What is it you so happy about?"
I shrugged, knowing by this time that any answer I gave would doubtless be the wrong one . . . A cluster of sandbirds flickers past Lee's head like leaves in a whirlwind; he watches them with remote interest as they wheel in a sharp turn and settle all together at the edge of the waves a few yards from the car. They go immediately to work as soon as they all light. (Yes! the boy exclaims. Light! He was positive of it now . . . way up through the tube, right over at that one edge of his little spot of sky: light! a Heavenly light! dimming out his allotment of stars as it moved ever so slowly through the sky. . . . A light was coming and was going to stop directly above his hole, just for him! "Help me, O Heavenly Father, O God. You can do it, I know You can. Help me . . .") So I vowed to keep quiet, but that little nervous giggle escaped from me again.
"Oh boy, Mr. Stamper here is got a good sense humor, seein' our car in this fix!" And I felt the hand grow even tighter on my arm. . . . Almost oblivious now to the hand, Lee watches the little birds work the runneling beach: How their poor bonded lives are written for them . . . everlastingly tuned to the pitiless sea, immutably timed to the measured echo of the waves. "An', y'know, guys, the way I see it, a fellow like Mr. Stamper with such a good sense humor about our fix he should be able to help us outen it, I see it that way."
I didn't see it at all that way, but I didn't voice my dissension. I half turned to gauge the distance to the jetty, but the driver's gum-cracking henchmen read my look and shuffled over to cut off any attempt at a sudden break, and I began to feel properly trapped (At the bottom of the hole the boy's eyes burned from long minutes without blinking. His numbed legs had collapsed unnoticed beneath him and his crumpled skull mask dangled from his neck like an amulet. The aching cold in his fingers was forgotten as he watched the light in the sky overhead move closer to his restricted line of vision. "I'm ready, Father in Heaven. O please. Come take me. I don't want to die in this old hole. I don't want to go home ever again. Just come and take me with you, O God . . .") and also for the first time properly afraid; I'd heard tales of these beach hooligans and their ideas of sport. . . . Lee shakes his arm free of the driver's grip and moves a few steps closer to the sea. He feels tired, almost sleepy. He looks for the daytime moon but the clouds have blown across it. He looks back at the busy detail of birds working the dangerous surf; their hectic pecking and hunting makes him more tired than ever . . . "Gosh, I mean, you're a Stamper, Mr. Stamper; a Stamper oughta be able to help us out." . . . He sees the birds as slaves, slaves to the rocking waves. "I mean, now say, for instance Hank Stamper, I bet he could just put a big strong shoulder agin our car and push it out with one heave." Slaves, birds in bondage to the waves. Run run run down the beach right at the edge of the receding wave peckety peckety peckety after sand fleas turn around run run run back before the next wave rolls salty death over you . . . over and over and over. (The little boy prayed fervently in his constricting dark, as the wind blew a hymn over the top of the hole, and the light came closer, brighter . . .) "An' if Hank could do it I bet you could do it too, hey? So let's see you put a shoulder an' try. Come on, hey?"
I saw there was nothing to do but humor my tormentors and hope that they would grow tired of the game; so I rolled my pants legs another roll and walked around to the seaward side of the car. The water was like cold knives against my ankles. I put my shoulder against the rear fender and made as though I were shoving. . . . Slaves to the waves; pause too long pecking out a morsel from the running sand and WATCH OUT all the others turn run run run back except one careless bird, and when the wave rolls back a gray-speckled dot kicks desperately to free its wing from the sand before the next wave run run run up turn run run run back ("O Father in Heaven I see you comin' I'm waitin' I'm waitin'!") turn run run run . . . "You gonna have to do better than that, Mr. Stamper; Hank Stamper'd be downright ashamed, you goin' at it so puny an' the water getting so high." . . . One of the other birds comes across the drowned wad of feathers and pauses for a fraction of a second before running on in his eternal game with the waves; can't stop! no time to mourn! sand feas or starve! No time, no time! (The light brightened. The boy could see one edge of it, like the tip of a great glowing finger crooking to him from the sky!) "Mr. Stamper, I don' even think you're tryin'. We'll have to help you out." I felt the icy rasp of salt water scrape my throat, and the first choking of panic. "C'mon, you can try!" . . . He feels tiredness creeping up his bones like the cold; he tosses his head and spits a mouthful of water. The birds, why do they do it? He thinks of the Darlingtonia he picked earlier. They aren't like the birds, they can afford the luxury of patience. They can wait. And if one doesn't attract his quota of flies and starves, it is only the dropping of a leaf. The plant still lives, the roots still live. Bur that little bird was just one and when he drowned, that was it, that was all of him, the one little bird. He lost. The
wave wins, the bird loses.
And the waves always eventually win. Unless . . .
"Right down here, Mr. Stamper, your shoulder." My mind became frantic as I felt more hands on me. . . . Unless you play it smart, unless you acknowledge your fate and accept it. Like the car. . . . "Get your shoulder here, Mr. Stamper."
"You better not . . . my brother will . . ."
"Your brother will what, Mr. Stamper? Your brother isn't here. All alone, you said." . . . He doesn't struggle against them; they begin to weary of the sport without a struggle . . . "My goodness, you got wet, Mr. Stamper." . . . And even when they step back he doesn't try to come out of the water that is breaking waist deep . . . "You must really like the water, Mr. Stamper." . . . He turns instead toward the incoming froth of the waves, looking out at the beautiful line of the horizon, then at the frantic efforts of the silly birds. All the poor silly devils need do is run run run and then wait . . . for that cold final crack to stop the whole insufferable hassle. A half-dozen steps and you end this frantic game. You don't win, but you don't lose, either. A stalemate is the best you can hope for, don't you see? The very best . . .
"Look."
"Who's that?"
"Oh Christ-o-Friday. It is him. . . ."
"Split! Everybody split!"
The driver leads and the others follow, sprinting off toward the dunes. Lee doesn't notice them leaving. He is tossed off balance by a wave. He is completely under for a moment, and when his face rolls into the air once more, serene and thoughtful, he sees again that tranquil horizon: You come into this scene begging for quarter. Silly bird. You spend all your time calling King's-X, hoping to halt the game temporarily. You could learn from the fox and his sharpie ways. Screw it. Forget King's-X. Stop the game completely, stop the frantic hassle. Call it a draw while there's still a chance. WATCH OUT. No; concede. WATCH OUT! WATCH OUT! WATCH OUT! YOU CAN'T DO THIS TO ME! Just see if I can't. I concede . . . "Lee!" I call it a draw . . . "Bub!"--and walks toward horizon, into the lifting white embrace of the water . . . "Goddammit anyhow--" . . . into the rolling gray What? "Lee!"
"What? Hank?" I pushed myself up from the sand where the Dayglo Gang had thrown me. "Hank?" And through the lace of foam frozen briefly in the air, I saw him coming over the rocks of the jetty. Not running yet; walking fast but not running. His fists clenched and his arms swinging and his boots spitting sand, but not running. They ran, the Plastic People, all five of them, they ran as if the devil were after them. But Hank just walked. He never for a moment blew his cool. . . . Through distance and his foam-flecked glasses, Lee watches the scene on the beach. He watches the teen-agers flee as Hank closes the distance ("O Heavenly Father, I see your old light coming!") He is still being wallowed about by the waves out past the car as he watches Hank come. He makes no move toward deeper or shallower water--but, wait a minute! what's Brother Hank doing out here in place of his wildwoods wife?--no decision until an overpowering curiosity finally breaks the deadlock and he begins floundering awkwardly through the snowy foam toward the beach where Hank waits with his hands in his pockets. All right, it may be a frantic hassle but you can call it a draw some other day . . . not even to come into the water to my rescue did he blow his cool; but, wait a minute: what's he doing out here instead of . . . he just stood on the bank with his hands in his pockets, watching me fight my way out of the surf. "Damn, Lee," he encouraged me when I got close enough, "if you ain't about the poorest excuse for a swimmer I ever saw, I'll eat my hat."
I couldn't even make a clever reply. I plopped to the sand, gasping and spent and feeling as if I had swallowed my weight in salt water. "You could . . . have . . . at least--"
"I tell you one thing that would help," Hank said, grinning down at me; "you'd do better wearing a bathin' suit 'stead of corduroy pants an' a sports jacket next time you go swimmin' with your friends."
"Friends?" I wheezed. "They were a gang of toughs . . . trying to kill me. You were almost too late . . . they might have . . . drowned me!"
"Next time I come I'll bring a bugle an' blow the cavalry charge. What reason did they give, by the way, for the drownin'?"
"A very good reason . . . as I recall." I was still lying on my side with the waves lapping hungrily at my feet, and I had to think a moment before I could remember what that very good reason was. "Oh yes . . . because I'm a Stamper. That was their reason."
"Reason aplenty, it seems," he said, and finally condescended to lean over and help me to my feet. "Let's get over to Joby's an' get you in some dry clothes. Boy. Look there at you. That's something. How a man can be damn near drowned by a gang of toughs and still never lose his specs. That's truly something."
"Never mind that. What are you doing here? What happened to Viv--the rock oysters?"
"I got the jeep parked just back of the driftwood there. Come on. Look out, grab your shoes! That wave like to got 'em . . ."
By the time Lee has retrieved his shoes Hank has already started back up the beach, in the same hurrying walk: Where did you come from, brother, like a Mephistopheles in logging boots? (Out on the dark dunes more and more of the light showed in the hole; the little boy beat at his cramped thighs with mounting anticipation: "Yes! Yes! Yes God yes!"--more and more, brighter and closer, slowly . . .) Why did you come instead of her? "What are you doing here?" I repeated, jogging to catch up with him.
"Something's come up. Joe Ben tried to find you after church but you'd gone. He gave me a call on the phone. . . ."
"Where's Viv?"
"What? Viv couldn't make it. I asked her to stay and help Andy tally up the booms . . . 'cause the heat is suddenly on. Joe phoned to say there was a meeting of Evenwrite and the boys, and the top union dog of the whole business. He said that they got the whole story about our deal with WP. Everybody knows. An' that the whole town's got their tit in a wringer." . . . You were jealous, Lee decides triumphantly; you had misgivings about letting her come in to me! (Slowly brighter and closer . . .) "So you came?" I asked, feeling my disappointment turn to a covert elation. . . . And your jealousy has given me strength to make the moon wait another month. "In Viv's place?"
"Christ yes I came in her place," he answered, flapping his hands against his pants legs to rid them of the sand that he'd picked up helping me to my feet. "I told you that once. What's the matter'th you? one them punks bust you across the head or something? Come on! Let's get up to that jeep; I want to get into the Snag an' see how the winds are blowin'."
"Sure. Okay, brother." I fell in behind him. "Right with you."
My pot hangover disappeared, and, in spite of the cold, I was blooming with sudden enthusiasm: he had come in her place! He was already sweating the possibility of a scene! My feeble embryo of a plan was proceeding better than I had hoped . . . They move up the beach. Hank in front and Lee grimly shivering behind: We are joined, brother, shackled together for all our lives, just as the birds and the waves are immutably tuned together, in a song of patience and panic. We have been tuned thus for years, me piping and pecking after morsels while you crashed and roared (Closer and brighter, the light almost there now; the little boy held his breath at the approaching glow of salvation . . .) but now, brother, the roles are switching, and you are beginning to plaintively pipe the tune of panic and I am beginning the melancholy long withdrawing roar of patience . . . and I faced the future with a confident smirk.
"Right behind you, brother mine. Lead on. Lead on. . . ."
Lee's steps stretch out to keep up with Hank. Indian Jenny prepares her soul for another attack on her manless world. The old boltcutter empties his last bottle of Thunderbird and decides to start for town before full dark. The clouds swarm up from the sea, black-booted and brave with the coming of night. The wind springs up from the slough bottoms. The dunes darken (the boy watches the light). In the mountains past the town, where the streams grow thirsty for winter, the lightning uncurls and begins to flutter in the fir trees, white-orange and black, for Halloween . . . (Then, finally, after cold minutes
or hours or weeks--he has no idea--the earth above the waiting boy has moved far enough. The light is in full view. And the glow of salvation is nothing but that same moon that led him across the dunes, a thin paring of moon that has gradually centered itself in his meager patch of far-off sky) . . . in that kind of sky . . . ("Leee-land . . .") in that kind of world.
"Leeee-land; oh, Leeee-land . . ." The boy doesn't hear; he stares at the moon, a thread-thin crescent hanging there between the stars like the last of a faded Cheshire cat--everything gone but the black reminder and the jeering grin . . . and this time the boy's weeping is not of the cold or the fright of falling into a dark hole, or of anything else he has ever cried about before . . .
"Leeeeelan' boy, answer me . . . !" The call comes again, nearer, but he doesn't answer. He feels that his voice is trapped like his weeping, beneath a cold lid of wind. Nothing can ever get out.
"Leland? Bub . . . ?"
The hole sinks deeper and deeper into the earth and is just beginning to strangle his consciousness when he feels something hail against the back of his neck. Sand. He raises his eyes up to the hole: The grin is gone! A face is there!
"Is that you, bub? You all right?" And a flashlight! "Gawdamn , bub, you gave me a real run for my money!"
With no tool but his pocket knife it takes Hank most of an hour to cut the limbs from a little scrub pine that he dragged onto the dunes. He works as near to the mouth of the hole as he feels safe, so the boy will be able to hear his labors. As he works he tries to talk constantly, keeping up an unconcerned-sounding flow of jokes and stories and shouted commands to the hound--"Come back here an' forget chasing those rabbits, you ol' potlicker!"--that listens, puzzled, from the spot where Hank tied him before starting. "Dang that ol' gadabout dog." He clucks loudly, then crawls to the hole on his belly again to check on the boy, whispering, "That's the kid. Sit good an' still. Don't fret. But don't rustle around down there any more'n you have to, neither."