by Philip Craig
Edgartown is so quaint and lovely, so filled with flowers and greenery, so fairylandish and make-believe, that pedestrians think that cars are just part of the scenery and the middle of the street is as much for them as for automobiles. They are surprised and even resentful when they discover some car attempting to occupy the street they are walking in while ogling the sights, and only reluctantly move to the brick sidewalks as the car inches by. Edgartown summer cops do their best to keep both drivers and pedestrians moving, and actually do a pretty good job of it by late summer. In mid-July, they are still a bit green and have a hard time untangling traffic, and need wise advice from the chief.
I found him, walking down North Water Street, Edgartown’s classiest street as well as the location of its excellent library. This surprise was almost as great as the one I had experienced only moments before when a car parked right in front of the library had pulled out just in time for me to pull in. Shocking.
“You look pale,” said the chief, “and I don’t blame you. An actual parking place.”
“Perhaps you’ll take my arm and lead me to a chair before I faint. What brings you up to this part of town? Don’t tell me that the weed of crime is bearing bitter fruit on North Water Street.”
“The weed of crime in this case was a lady in that big house there who phoned that somebody was trying to break through the back door. It turned out it was her cat that she’d forgotten she’d put out, trying to get back in out of the heat.”
“Your story has done much to make me feel more secure on these mean streets. How’s the summer going?”
He wiped his brow and replaced his hat. “Be glad you’ve turned in your badge. We have more jerks in jail than I can ever remember having before.”
In every community the size of the island’s winter population, there are about twenty people who cause ninety percent of all the problems. They are the vandals, the drunks, the druggies, the car racers, the thieves, the people who rob their parents, who beat up women and children, who trash houses, who hate cops, and who never seem to change.
“If you’ll give me immunity and a whole lot of money, I think I know some guys who will shoot the guys who are giving you most of your trouble,” I said.
“Hell,” said the chief. “If you could just move a couple of families off of the island, I could retire. How’s Zee?”
“Fine, I guess. I haven’t seen her for a while.”
He nodded and his eyes floated down toward the four corners, where Main met Water Street. Many cars were not moving there. A summer cop in traffic trouble. The chief tugged on his hat brim and started on down the walk to do his duty.
“Protect and serve,” I called after him and turned to see Geraldine Miles coming down the walk from the library.
She was wearing a wraparound skirt and short-sleeved shirt, and the bruises were no longer apparent on her arms. She was tanned and looked happy. There was a man with her, a tall, strong-looking guy about her age wearing new summer clothes: Vineyard Red shorts and a white shirt that said “Frankly scallop, I don’t give a clam.” He carried a canvas beach bag. His face and arms were tanned, but his legs were still white.
She looked at me, reached into her memory and came up with my name, and smiled.
“J.W. How are things on the beach?”
“You’re looking well,” I said.
“I am well. I’m very well. I’d like you to meet Lloyd Cramer. Lloyd, this is J.W. . . . I’m sorry, but I don’t think I know your last name . . .”
“Jackson.”
“J.W. is a friend of Uncle Dan.”
Lloyd had a mouthful of good teeth and a strong grip. There was a tattoo of a skull on the arm attached to the hand that took mine. There was a tattoo of a knife with a wavy blade on the other arm.
“Any friend of Dan’s is a friend of mine,” said Lloyd in a hearty, Midwestern voice. “Pleased to meet you, sir.”
Sir. I was only six or seven years older than he was.
“You’re new in town,” I said.
“I wrote to him and he came all the way from Iowa City just to visit me,” said Geraldine in a happy voice. “Isn’t that sweet?”
Lloyd shuffled his feet and put his arm around her shoulders. “After she left home to visit Dan and Jean, I realized how important she really is to me, so I just took some time off and came right here to tell her that. We’ve got a lot of things to talk about and we’re having fun doing it. Isn’t that right, honey?”
“That’s right,” said Geraldine, taking his hand. “We’re getting everything straightened out. Isn’t this weather just wonderful?”
I thought that right now Geraldine would feel that a hurricane or a blizzard was wonderful weather.
“I’ll let you get on with your talking,” I said.
Lloyd put out his big hand again and I took it in my big hand.
“Nice to have met you, J.W.,” he said as he gave me his friendly smile.
“How long are you going to be around?” I asked Geraldine.
She looked up at Lloyd and smiled. “Oh, not too much longer, I imagine. I think maybe I’ll be headed back to Iowa City soon.”
Lloyd beamed down at her. “Great to hear you say that, sugar. Hey, let’s hit the beach. I gotta tan up these legs before I go back home.” He looked at me. “You got a really beautiful island here, J.W.”
He showed me his fine teeth and she waved and they walked up North Water Street, headed, I guessed, for Lighthouse Beach. They looked like a happy pair. I hoped that it would last, but I didn’t share the belief of many women that their men would reform if given one last chance.
I thought, Good luck to you, Geraldine Miles, and went into the library.
Libraries are some of my favorite places. They’re filled with books and information and give you the good feeling that no matter how much you’ve read there’s an endless amount of reading material still ahead of you, so you never have to worry about running out. It’s a nice certainty in an uncertain world. I calculated the time left before the West Tisbury book sale, and got myself three books, including one about the popular inclination of conquering armies to burn books and destroy libraries.
The idea of destroying libraries was one that irked me, and it occurred to me that maybe I took the book because I was already irked that Geraldine Miles had gotten back together with Lloyd and irked even more that I hadn’t gotten myself loose from my resentment that Zee was going off to New Hampshire. Reading of the destruction of the great libraries of Alexandria and Constantinople was only one more irritant in my irritated life. I apparently wanted an excuse to be out of temper. I turned this notion over in my mind and was not pleased with what it told me of myself. I went home and called the hospital and invited Zee to supper. She accepted.
She was still wearing her white uniform when she got out of her little Jeep. She inhaled as she came into the house.
“Ah, another delicious meal from the kitchen of J. W. Jackson.”
“Indeed. But first this.” I gave her a perfect martini and waved her back out the door. We went up onto the balcony and I put a plate of smoked bluefish pâté, Brie, and saltless crackers on the little table between our chairs.
We looked out over the garden and Sengekontacket Pond to the sound where, in the haze of the summer afternoon, sailboats were leaning with the wind as they beat for evening harbors. Along the road between the pond and the sound the cars of the beach people were pulling out and heading home.
“I was beginning to wonder whether I was ever going to get another invitation to come here,” said Zee.
“It’s been a while,” I agreed.
“In fact, we haven’t seen each other very much since May.”
“True. My nose has been out of joint ever since you told me you were going away next month. I’ve been sulking.”
“But you’re over it now?”
“Over enough to want to see you a lot before you go off on your pilgrimage.”
“Good. Me too. You’re rea
lly over it?”
“I don’t like sulkers, especially when one of them is me. I want to make up for the time I’ve lost. I know I’ll miss you, but I’m not mad about it anymore.”
“Good.” She got up and came around and leaned over and kissed me. I kissed her back. She went back to her chair.
We sat and drank and ate and looked across at the boats and cars.
“I doubt if New Hampshire is as nice as this,” said Zee.
“Well, you can always come home early.”
“No, I’m going to do it all.”
“A woman’s got to do what a woman’s got to do. A manly man like me understands that. It’s a kind of code you have to obey.”
“You’re so sensitive I sometimes wonder how you survive. What’s for supper?”
“A simple but elegant Scandinavian baked fish served with little boiled potatoes and fresh beans from my very own garden. Madame will find it quite satisfactory.”
“Tell me more.”
“Normally the chef never reveals his secrets, but I know I can trust you to be discreet. You cook a bunch of sliced onions in a skillet with butter until they’re soft, then put them in a baking dish, put a pound or so of fish on top, add a couple of bouillon cubes and cover the whole thing with a couple of cups of roux. Easy and mega-delish. I like to use fish with white meat best, by the way. Today you’re having cod caught up off Cedar Tree Neck. First, though, another drink.”
I brought more martinis and we worked our way through the hors d’oeuvres. I felt happier than I had in a while. When the time was right, I went down and got supper going. At seven, we ate, washing everything down with a nice Graves I’d been saving. Zee ate everything in front of her, leaned back, and patted her lips.
“Yum. You have not lost the touch, François.”
“Note my modest smile. If you will place yourself on the porch, I will bring the coffee and cognac.”
She did and I did and we watched the night darken around the house. She put her hand in mine.
“I’ve got to go home,” she said.
“Sad words for one who has plied the maiden with his best booze and food.”
“I have to go to work in the morning.”
“You can go from here.”
“I don’t have a clean uniform here, J.W.”
“Wear this one.”
“This one needs to be washed. It has smudges from when I helped today’s first moped accident up onto a table where we could patch him up. No, I’ve got to go.”
“I want to see you a lot before you leave.”
She put her arms around my neck. “Why don’t you come to my place for supper tomorrow?”
“Can I bring a clean uniform with me?”
She laughed. “Yes.”
The next day, early, I was on East Beach looking for bluefish that weren’t there. Coming back to Wasque, I found Iowa with his head under the hood of his pickup. Two small bluefish lay at his feet.
“Glad to see you, J.W. By Gadfrey, will you look at this? Broken radiator hose! What next? First a muffler and now this. I have to get me a new truck. This one’s beginning to fall to pieces. Your truck there is even older than this one. How in blazes do you keep it going?”
“Good Japanese engineering. You should stay away from American machines.”
“By Gadfrey, maybe you’re right.”
“Actually I use the ride-it-a-day, work-on-it-a-day technique. I spend a good deal of time underneath this monster. I’ll give you a ride into town then bring you back out. Toss your fish in my box.”
“Damned glad you came along. Not another soul on the beach. Thought I was going to have to radio for help.”
We drove through the dunes and then along the south side of Katama Pond until we got to the pavement.
Iowa looked at his watch. “Let’s go to my place first, so I can put the fish in my big cooler. Have a cup of coffee. By that time the parts place will be open.”
Iowa lived out near the big airport. In the early morning, there wasn’t much traffic, so we were there in pretty quick time. As we pulled into his driveway, Iowa cursed and said, “What’s that son of a bitch doing here?”
There was a car with Iowa license plates in front of the house. As we stopped behind the car, I could see the front door of the house hanging open. Suddenly Iowa’s wife came running out. Iowa caught her in his arms.
“What’s going on, Jean?”
Her voice was high. “He’s in there, Dan! He broke in the door and came right in! He went into her room! I’ve called the police, but . . . He’s in there with her now. I think he’s going to kill her!”
I didn’t have to be told who “he” was. I turned Jean to me. “Does he have a gun? A knife? Anything like that?”
“What . . . ? No! I don’t know! I didn’t see anything, J.W. . . . I tried to stop him . . .”
Jean was small and in her sixties. Far away, I could hear sirens. I put Jean back into Iowa’s arms.
“Get out to the road and make sure the cops don’t go to the wrong place by mistake. Go on!”
“My shotguns are upstairs in my closet,” said Iowa. “He may have gotten to them . . .”
“No,” said Jean. “He went right into Geraldine’s room!”
“Get to the road,” I said and turned and ran to the house. I slowed at the door, listened, and went in through the splintered frame.
The grunting of a man’s voice and the moans of a woman came from a room down the hall from the living room. I went down the hall and into the room. Furniture was overturned and a throw rug was wadded in a corner. Geraldine Miles lay across the bed while Lloyd Cramer knelt over her, his left hand on her throat, his right rising and falling, striking with sodden thumps against the bloody thing that had been her face. I thought I saw a bit of bone through the blood. With every blow he grunted and between grunts he cursed her with vile and unimaginative names.
He heard me and turned as I came in. His face was glowing with a kind of happiness.
“I got the bitch,” he said.
I took him by a shoulder and his belt and jerked him away from the bed. He hung on to Geraldine’s throat and brought her with him. I let go of his belt and hit him as hard as I could under the ear. He let her go and staggered back against a wall. I went after him and his hands came up. He was possessed by the strength of a sort of madness. He got hold of my throat with his left and hit me with his right hand, a punishing blow which I partially blocked. He was a big man and in good shape, so I jerked away and kicked him in the knee. The sound of the kneecap dislocating mixed with his cry as he felt the pain. As he reached for his knee and started his fall, I grabbed his hair with both hands, jerked his head forward and brought my knee up into his face. His nose disappeared in a spray of blood. I brought my knee up again. Then, hanging on to his hair, I drove his face into the floor. He lay there and didn’t move.
Geraldine Miles lay on the floor. Her face was making little red bubbles. I put a finger on her pulse. It was faint, but still there. I heard the siren die in the yard. I turned and kicked Lloyd Cramer in the head. A moment later, the cops were in the room. There was an older cop and a young summer cop.
“You’ll need a couple of ambulances,” I said, and kicked Lloyd again.
“Hey!” said the summer cop. “Don’t do that.”
“Aw, just one more time,” I said, and kicked Lloyd again. “This is the guy who did that to her,” I said, pointing at Geraldine. “I’ll wait for you outside.”
“That’ll be all right,” said the older cop, looking at the figures on the floor. He looked at the summer cop, who was getting pale around the gills. “Joe, go out and put in a call for two ambulances and another car. Tell ’em it’s a Domestic.”
— 6 —
“They flew them both to Boston by helicopter,” said Zee. “I was on duty when they brought them in. It was pretty bad. Her jaw and cheekbone were broken. She may have a fractured skull. I don’t know whether they can save her eye. She had som
e broken ribs and a broken arm, and she was bleeding internally. He had a broken nose and a dislocated knee and head injuries of some kind. They both had blood coming out of their ears. I never like that.”
We were having a drink at her house that evening. Normally Zee didn’t talk much about her work. Like a lot of doctors and nurses, she had learned to put her work away when she went home. Unless they learn to do that, many people in the medical game would soon become dysfunctional. They are like cops in that respect. Of course, also like cops, some of them can’t put aside the sights they see and the things their work obliges them to do, so you’re never surprised to learn of doctors and nurses on the bottle or taking pills or other drugs. It’s a professional hazard.
I had calmed down a lot since morning and no longer regretted that I’d been wearing only sandals when I’d kicked Lloyd Cramer. I had spent some time reminding myself that I had quit the Boston PD because I’d had enough of trying to save the world. But there was a perversion in me; I still doubted if I’d be sorry if I’d been wearing steel-toed boots.
“Is she going to be all right?” I asked.
“I don’t know. I think he will be. As right as he ever was, anyway. Why do men do that to women?”
I thought it was for the same reason I might have beaten Lloyd Cramer to death if the cops hadn’t walked in. “I think we hate the things we fear,” I said. “I think we’re afraid that those things will win out, that they’ll ruin our worlds.”
“How could she have frightened him? It doesn’t make sense.”
“Somebody said it’s transference. We transfer our fear to someone we can hurt,” I said. “Cramer’s world is a bad one for him, so he beat up Geraldine because he couldn’t beat up his real world, the one that scares him.”
“That doesn’t make any sense.”
“We don’t make sense when we take symbols so seriously that we’ll kill for them. When we kill you because you’re Catholic or because you’re a different color, we’re all crazy. I think we’re the same way when we die for the Cause. The flag, our country, whatever. Fear makes us do it.”
“It sounds to me like you’re saying we’re all like Cramer. I don’t think I am, and I don’t think you are, either.”
