Jack and Susan in 1933

by Michael McDowell

  As she gradually cleared away the narrow opening, Jack’s head, unsupported by the fall of earth, lolled backward. Finally he was able to see Susan’s face, though it appeared upside down. At the same time, however, breathing became even more difficult for him.

  “I’m going to try to widen this opening a little,” said Susan.

  “Not a good idea,” Jack warned. “These walls aren’t very stable. I might be buried completely. So might you.”

  “I have a rope,” Susan suggested. “I could put it around your neck and pull you out.”

  “Also not a good idea,” said Jack. “This is supposed to be a rescue, not a lynching.”

  “Then I don’t know what else to do,” said Susan. “You’re blocking the opening, and I can’t get past you to dig you out. I can’t widen the hole, and you won’t let me put a rope around your neck. This is still the worst moment of my life, I think.”

  “There is something you can do,” said Jack.

  “What?”

  “Kiss me.”

  “What good will that do?”

  “Well, if I never get out of here, at least I will have died happy.”

  Susan kissed him. They both felt better after that.

  Susan looked around, at the meager lights, at the close, crumbling walls, at the ceiling that bulged down toward her head. “If I were an artist, this is how I’d draw hell. I just don’t understand how I can feel so romantic at a time like this.”

  “We may never have another chance,” Jack pointed out.

  “Maybe we should wait till someone else comes,” Susan suggested.

  Jack sighed as great a sigh as his lungs would allow. “Not a good idea either. The weight on my chest and legs is heavier than before. I can’t take much more of this.”

  “If I can’t put the rope around your neck,” Susan suggested, “maybe I could get it around your chest and under your arms.”

  “A good idea,” said Jack.

  “I even brought a rope,” said Susan cheerfully, “which should make things a great deal easier.”

  Taking an end of the rope in her hand, she dug carefully out beneath Jack’s head, and then clawed her way up under his arm, until she could feel his chest. Then, leaving that arm and hand in position, she began digging around his other side.

  Her hair was pressed against his face, and he breathed deeply through it. On the whole, if he had to suffocate, he’d prefer doing it this way.

  She dug and pushed and pressed until her hands were clasped around his chest, beneath the landslide of earth. She grasped the end of the rope in her left hand, and then carefully pulled herself free, leaving Jack with a rope underneath his arms and around his chest.

  “I’m going to pull now,” said Susan. “This will probably hurt.”

  “Please don’t hold back on my account,” Jack said.

  Susan pulled hard.

  Jack groaned. He twisted, hoping that would help. It didn’t.

  “Pull harder,” he suggested.

  Susan pulled harder. The rope burned in her hands.

  Jack could imagine his head and shoulders being pulled free. He could also imagine his torso, hips, and legs being left behind with the ticking Geiger counter.

  “Harder!”

  She pulled even harder, turning away from Jack, with the rope over her shoulder, like the Volga boatman.

  Jack felt his body shift.

  He also felt a liquid warmth under his arms. His blood probably, where the rope had abraded through his shirt and skin.

  “It’s working!” he called. He twisted more.

  Suddenly his head was free.

  “Keep pulling!”

  He twisted more. Susan jerked on the rope. Jack’s left arm came free. He used it for leverage.

  Susan jerked again.

  At least two more feet of Jack came free: his shoulders, both arms, his lungs.

  He filled his lungs with air.

  “I can breathe,” he shouted.

  Susan dropped the rope and ran over to him. She kissed him again.

  “I have to rest a moment,” she said. “Do you mind?”

  Jack breathed deeply. He waved his arms. He dug his hands into the earth and tried to pull himself out. “No, rest. Kiss me again. It won’t take long to get my legs out. Maybe I can do it myself.”

  He started wriggling.

  “Oh Jack…” Susan complained. She knelt behind him, hooked her arms underneath his, and then pulled.

  Jack kicked and twisted.

  Slowly he was pulled free.

  For several moments he simply lay on the floor, his head in Susan’s lap.

  “I’m very happy,” he said.

  “I am, too,” she said. “But this still feels like hell to me.”

  Jack slowly moved his legs around. “If you help me, I think I’ll be able to stand up.”

  She helped him to his feet.

  “Are you strong enough to walk back?” asked Susan. “Or should we just wait till someone comes?”

  Clop, clop, clop.

  “Here comes someone!” said Jack. “I hope they brought a litter. I never traveled by litter. I’ve always fancied it.”

  Clop, clop, clop.

  “Colleen?” Susan called.

  No reply. Clop, clop, clop.

  “Wesley?” she called, directing the torch down the passage. “Blossom?”

  It was none of them.

  The narrow cone of light shone first on the face of Malcolm MacIsaac. Then Susan played it down the length of the rifle whose muzzle bulged into the dark cylinder of a silencer.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  “CAN YOU FLY a plane?” Susan asked MacIsaac.

  “Yes,” he replied.

  “That solves that question,” Susan sighed.

  “Did you cut the cables on Marcellus Rhinelander’s touring car?” Jack asked.

  “Want to get everything straight before you die?” MacIsaac cackled. “No, I didn’t. I’ve never murdered anybody in my life. Yet.”

  “Then who killed Marcellus?” Susan wondered aloud to Jack.

  “Your husband did,” said MacIsaac. The barrel of the rifle wandered back and forth between then. “Are you two ready to die?”

  “Half an hour ago,” said Jack, “I would have said yes.”

  He stomped on Susan’s electric torch, whose beam was still trained toward the hole where he’d been trapped.

  At the same moment the torch was extinguished, Susan threw herself down on the candle.

  All light was now extinguished.

  Then briefly, the whole passage was lighted again— by the muted explosion of MacIsaac’s rifle.

  Jack felt air against his cheek.

  Then all was darkness again.

  “Scotty?” Jack called. “Zelda?”

  “Attack!” cried Susan.

  In the darkness they heard barks, growls, the scurrying of tiny feet, the ripping of cloth, and then a shriek.

  Another explosion, illuminating the corridor like a bolt of lightning.

  In that brief glow, Jack and Susan saw MacIsaac whirling around and around, the two dogs attached to him by their teeth and flung out horizontally by centrifugal force.

  Then blackness again.

  A crash, a groan.

  Another shot, showing MacIsaac on the ground, but still holding the rifle.

  One more explosion of fire, then blackness again.

  A creaking of wood. A rumble of shifting earth. A hiss of sand.

  “Oh my God,” whispered Susan. “He hit one of the supports.”

  A splintering of wood.

  In the darkness Susan flung out her arm and hit Jack in the chest. Then she grabbed at him till she had his hand. “We have to get out of here,” she whispered. “Right now.”

  A louder splintering of wood.

  A noise of slipping, sliding earth.

  “Scotty! Zelda!” Susan yelled. “Run! Run!”

  Jack and Susan ran also, despite the fact that their way in th
e blackness was barred by MacIsaac and his rifle.

  “No!” the detective screamed. “You won’t—”

  Then there was an even louder noise of shifting earth and the threat was cut off.

  Earth poured over Jack and Susan and knocked them backward onto the floor of the passage.

  The black space was filled with a roar of tumbling earth.

  Jack and Susan, still holding hands, scuttled backward across the floor.

  The noise of falling earth continued.

  They felt it spill over their feet. They went on backing up. The earth still tumbled over their feet.

  In their progress, Susan shoved over the extinguished candle. She instinctively grabbed it out from under her.

  Finally, they were pushed right up against an ungiving wall.

  Jack stood and pulled Susan up beside him.

  “This is the worst way to die that I can possibly imagine,” said Susan.

  “Sorry,” Jack said, as if the whole business were his fault entirely.

  “Oh well,” Susan said, as the earth, having completely buried her feet and ankles, was now intent on burying her calves and knees, “it’s not the worst, I suppose, with you here.”

  He squeezed her hand.

  “Another kiss?” he asked.

  She kissed him.

  “I wish I could see your face,” he sighed.

  “I have a candle, but I lost the matches.”

  “I have some,” he said, reaching into his pocket.

  The earth had now buried them up to the waist. Jack lighted the candle and held it up between himself and Susan.

  She smiled.

  “I love you,” he said.

  “I love you, too,” she said, “but I wish you hadn’t lighted the candle.”

  She looked around. They were trapped in the base of a hill of loose earth. The passage back to the surface was entirely blocked off.

  Earth continued to spill down from the ceiling of the passage, gathering around their waists.

  “Maybe it will stop,” said Susan.

  They waited and listened. The earth continued to spill down.

  “Let me look at you once more, and then I’ll blow out the candle,” said Jack.

  He gazed at her. She smiled.

  Jack sighed, and blew out the candle.

  They were silent for a few moments, listening to the falling earth.

  “I think it’s slowing down,” said Susan. “Or am I just fooling myself?”

  Jack didn’t answer, not wanting to hex it.

  “It is slowing down,” said Susan a few moments later.

  “It’s stopped,” said Jack. The earth was up to Susan’s neck, a little lower on the taller Jack.

  They still held hands, just above the level of the dirt. “Shall we start digging?” Susan asked.

  “I don’t want to take any chances disturbing this hill,” said Jack. “Besides, where would we put the dirt? There’s hardly room for our heads.”

  “Then we just wait for Blossom,” said Susan. “She knows where we are. We should be all right for a while, shouldn’t we?”

  “If the air holds out,” said Jack.

  They were silent a few moments more.

  “I hope the dogs are safe,” said Susan.

  “I don’t think MacIsaac made it, though,” said Jack. “Do you think he was telling the truth when he said he didn’t murder Marcellus—and that Harmon did?”

  “Yes, I do,” said Susan. She was silent a moment, and then asked, “Do you know how much money Harmon had, by any chance?”

  “No, I’ve no idea,” said Jack. “Is there some reason you ask that at this particular time?”

  “Just curious. I have a feeling—”

  “What sort of feeling?”

  “Harmon always spent pretty freely,” said Susan, “before I was married to him, and afterward, too. Maybe he didn’t have as much as he’d like everybody to think he had. He handled Marcellus’s finances, didn’t he?”

  “Nominally,” said Jack. “I can’t imagine he did it all himself. Try to push some of the dirt away from your stomach,” he suggested, “it’ll make breathing easier.”

  “Good idea,’ said Susan, and started to push away as much of the loose earth as she could. ”But perhaps Harmon really was handling Marcellus’s money, and maybe he was stealing some of it, and maybe Marcellus found out, and maybe Harmon murdered him so that he wouldn’t be caught.”

  “But if he were just doing all this for money,” asked Jack, “why was he going after Barbara?”

  “Did you buy all Barbara’s clothes?”

  “On my salary? You must be joking. Marcellus took care of Barbara’s wardrobe.”

  “No he didn’t,” said Susan. “He told me so. It must have been Harmon. Barbara probably didn’t care if he was stealing from Marcellus, so long as she could buy little leopardskin capelets.”

  “Always hated that cape,” said Jack. “Made Barbara look like she had contracted some new strain of chicken pox.”

  I heard that, cried a muffled voice.

  Jack momentarily let go Susan’s hand.

  “Was that Barbara?”

  “Either that,” said Susan, “or else we’ve already died and gone to hell.”

  I’m so angry with you two! came the muffled voice again.

  “You’re angry with us ?”

  The voice was suddenly clearer, and accompanying it was a beam of white light that shone down from somewhere near the ceiling into Jack’s eyes.

  Then it moved over to Susan’s.

  “Barbara? Is that you?” asked Jack.

  “Of course it’s me,” she said. “And you two are holding hands.”

  The light shone on their clasped hands.

  “Barbara,” said Susan, “you’re making the dirt spill faster. You’re going to bury us alive if you’re not careful.”

  “It would serve you two right,” Barbara retorted. “You especially, Susan. Why didn’t you warn me about Harmon?”

  “What about Harmon?”

  “He’s a snake. A reptile. He killed Father. Did you know that? He killed my father. If I had known that, I certainly would never have asked him to seduce me.”

  “You asked him to seduce you?” cried Jack.

  “You had those broken ribs,” Barbara explained dismissively. She directed her light directly into Susan’s face. “The only reason he was going to marry me was he thought Father was rich. And because he found me totally irresistible, of course. Then he found out that Father had spent all his money on smuggling in real liquor from Montreal, so there was no point in marrying me just because he was desperately in love with me. Then he found out that this mine was worth a mint, so he was going to throw me over and keep you. That snake.”

  “Barbara,” said Jack, “let me point out that you weren’t married to Harmon. You were married to me, so you had no right—”

  “Oh, shut up, Jack. This has nothing to do with you. This is between Susan and me.”

  “Barbara, did you see a spade over there? On your side?”

  “I tripped on the damned thing.”

  “You think you might dig us out?” Jack asked.

  “I couldn’t possibly,” said Barbara definitely.

  “Why not?” Susan asked.

  “I’m wearing suede.”

  Eventually, however, Blossom showed up with Wesley and Colleen, and the hill of loose earth that had trapped Jack and Susan was tunneled through.

  “Mr. MacIsaac is under here somewhere,” said Susan. “I don’t think he was as lucky as we were.”

  “We’ll find him,” said Colleen, spade in hand. Digging up a crushed and suffocated corpse in a mine tunnel looked exactly like the sort of work that tested her mettle.

  “Where’s Harmon?” Jack asked.

  “Wesley tied him to some piece of furniture or other,” said Blossom vaguely, “and is now on the way to find somebody who’s capable of making an arrest. You two go on now. We’ll take care of this.�
��

  Jack and Susan walked slowly and wearily toward the entrance of the mine. Barbara sauntered along beside them, holding the flashlight.

  “I heard him,” she explained. “I was in the next room, quite by accident, I assure you, and I heard Harmon talking to that dreadful detective, and he told him to find you and kill you both. There were times, Susan, I admit it, when I wished that you were dead. But believe me, I would never have paid for the pleasure. But Harmon told the detective he’d give him ten thousand dollars if he did it.” Barbara snorted contempt. “I asked Harmon for five thousand— nothing —for my summer wardrobe, and he told me he couldn’t afford it. That snake.”

  “How do you know he killed Marcellus?” Susan asked.

  “Oh, they went on a bit about blackmail and that sort of thing.” Barbara shrugged. “Harmon did it. He was up there that weekend. He knew exactly what was going on. And that will? You know that will? Father didn’t leave you anything, Susan. It was a fake. Harmon forged it to make you look guilty. If you hadn’t torn it up, he would have torn it up himself. He was going to blame the murder on you, and get you convicted to get rid of you—if he didn’t murder you outright. I think he probably would have pushed you out a window. That’s how I’d do it.”

  “I suppose I should thank you for saving my life,” said Susan dryly.

  Barbara was silent a moment, and then she leaned close, and whispered into Susan’s ear, “You wouldn’t give Jack back, would you? In gratitude?”

  “Absolutely not,” said Susan.

  Barbara sighed.

  “But remember,” Susan added in the same confidential whisper, “I’m the one with money now. Jack doesn’t have anything, and once Harmon goes to prison, he won’t even have a job. So you’d be much better off letting Jack go and finding a rich man.”

  Barbara considered this for a moment.

  “What are you two talking about?” asked Jack.

  “Oh, nothing,” said Barbara cheerfully. “Just girl talk. Susan and I are best friends now. There’s nobody else in the world I would allow to marry my only husband.”

  “Barbara’s going to find a new husband who’s very rich and very good-looking and wants to be told what to do every moment of the day,” said Susan.

  “That’s right,” said Barbara. “And when I’ve found him, we’ll all take bridge lessons from the Culbertsons.”

  The light at the entrance of the mine was dazzling.