by April Hill
With a sigh, Emma slipped gratefully into the cool water. “No sharks, no salt, and no sand!” she murmured. What she didn’t describe to him was how wonderful the cool, fresh water felt on her swollen and throbbing behind. She had a feeling he already knew. Andrew McLean had done this before.
“That’s not all,” Andrew said, sitting at the edge of the pool to watch her swim. “Look up there.”
Emma looked in the direction he indicated, and suddenly shivered. Entangled in the gnarled upper branches of a large tree hung the rusted hulk of an airplane—an old one, from the look of it.
“Oh my God!” she cried, clambering out of the pool. “What? How long? Is there…there’s not a body inside, is there. Or a skeleton?”
“No,” McLean said. “Jack and I checked it out when we came up to the cave to rescue the two of you.”
“Does that mean there’s someone else on the island?” she said in a hushed voice. “The pilot, maybe?”
Andrew chuckled. “I shouldn’t think so. It’s a World War II fighter, Japanese. The pilot would have to be at least ninety years old.”
“I know a few people over ninety years old,” Emma observed.
“True, but I believe we would have seen some traces of him, if he’d been here all that time. No, I suspect the pilot bailed out somewhere over the Pacific.”
Without the idea of a dead pilot to worry about, the practical side of Emma emerged. “There’s probably a lot of useful things we could do with this,” she remarked, walking slowly around the base of the tree. “Don’t you think?”
“Yes, I do. There’s lot of useful metal up there. Much of it badly rusted, but we can certainly improvise some tools, maybe a saw. Unfortunately, the tires have rotted, so the tubes are worthless, I’m afraid, but…”
“Tubes?” Emma asked.
“God!” McLean shook his head and sighed. “Are you really that young?”
* * *
Meanwhile, back at the campsite, Robin was sitting in the Swamp Plaza plotting her own vengeance. Meredith was at the top of the list, of course, but Jack was a close second. Just when she thought there was something of a romantic nature developing between them. Jack Garrison, the sonuvabitch, had reverted to being a damned, hulking caveman.
On the way back from Batman’s hideout, Jack had taken her to the fresh water pool and the airplane that the dimwitted Meredith had managed to find when nobody else had. After Robin had scrubbed most of the bat guano off, Jack had waited patiently while she “showered” in the pretty little waterfall and rinsed out her clothes. Not wishing to return to camp in the buff, she had put her clothes back on, sopping wet, but blessedly clean.
“In this heat, everything will be dry by the time we get back to camp,” she had explained. “Now, which way do we go? I want to get back and disembowel Meredith before Emma shows up and beats me to it. I think she’s finally got the picture, Meredith-wise.”
But, of course, Jack had something else in mind. “Not so fast,” he said quietly—and a bit ominously. “Before we go back, you and I have a little something to settle.”
And then, just when she was feeling so nice and clean and happy, Jack had dumped her across a rock, yanked her wet shorts back down, and laid into her bare ass with his damned belt. Somewhere long ago, (on the internet, no doubt) Robin had read that wet leather delivers a far more impressive “message” than when it’s dry, and now, she was prepared to agree absolutely with whatever sadist/masochist had discovered that bit of scientific trivia.
This far from the campsite, she felt free to yell, so she did, hoping that her screams of agony would shorten the walloping, which it didn’t. Jack was definitely in a mood.
“I didn’t exactly do what I did on purpose, you know,” she growled, after he had finished. “I’d like to remind you that I was on a mission of mercy. So, why is it that I get my ass welted, and Meredith and Emma get off scot-free.”
Jack grinned. “Well, don’t tell any that it came from me, but I happen to know that Emma and the ‘Scot’ are having a few words of their own about your little misadventure. Andrew and I are thinking of something special for Meredith, like maybe a duet?”
“Emma?” Robin exclaimed. “Miss Goody Two-Shoes! And McLean? Is this spanking stuff contagious or something? Maybe it’s something in the water. On an island this size, what are the odds of finding two men who get off by walloping women?”
“I do not ‘get off’ by … by doing that!” Jack said irritably. “You’re just a damned slow learner.”
Robin rubbed her backside. “Oh. So, you’re going to stick with that explanation?”
“I am.”
“Yeah? Well, what about McLean?”
Jack grinned. “Well, the way I understand it, he’s more like a professional.”
“And just what in hell is that supposed to mean?”
But Jack wasn’t talking.
* * *
By the time Andrew McLean and Emma got back to the campsite, Jack and Robin were already there, sitting on opposite sides of the clearing. Robin was pointedly ignoring Jack, and busily plotting Meredith’s murder, instead. Meredith was nowhere in sight, apparently having developed some sense, or experiencing a premonition about what was in store for her. She had gone into hiding, somewhere, apparently aware of her perilous situation vis-à-vis the other castaways.
“What country are we in, actually?” Robin asked, of nobody in particular. “Does anybody know? I wonder if they give you the death penalty here for murdering someone.”
“In Meredith’s case, no one would convict you,” Emma said, still very aware of a sharp sting as she sat down.
“Finally!” Robin exclaimed. “The light dawns!”
“Well, even though I may not like her much, right now, I still love her,” Emma said defensively. “We’ve been friends since we graduated from elementary school.”
“Meredith graduated from elementary school?” Jack asked.
* * *
Dinner that evening was an unusually quiet affair, with Emma and Robin still angry about what they regarded as Jack and Andrew’s unjust reactions to a well-intentioned rescue attempt. In reality, both men would have confessed, if asked, to having their own regrets about overreacting, and when the two women went to bed still sullen and annoyed, Jack and McLean sat up late, discussing fish and bats, boats and rats, and even women.
“What this conversation calls for is a bottle of good Scotch,” Jack suggested.
“Single malt whiskey,” McLean insisted.
“Of course. Do you mind if I ask you something kind of personal?”
“Yes,” McLean sighed, ”but you’re going to ask it, anyway, so go ahead.”
“You and Emma?”
“Please don’t spread it around, but I believe that I’m in love with Miss Douglas. And you and the lovely Miss Farrell?”
“Likewise. Even though she called me a caveman today, among other things.”
McLean chuckled. “Well, old man, you could use a haircut, and a shave, as could I.”
Jack nodded, and rubbed one hand over his stubbly chin. “I’ve been using the same Swiss Army Knife blade to shave that I use to cut down brush.”
“Well, that would certainly account for it. That’s the best thing about a beard, in these–” McLean abruptly stopped talking, and cocked his head to listen for something. “Did you hear something, Jack? From the trees? I think our prey is near.”
A minute later, the tranquility of the tropical night was shattered by a series of blood-curdling creams, which brought Emma and Robin tumbling out of the Swamp Plaza to see what had happened.
They stopped in their tracks at the cheerful spectacle of Meredith in the moonlight, sprawled across the end of the crude, driftwood plank dining table with her shorts around her knees and her bared bottom already beet red. While Jack pretended not to watch from the sidelines, Andrew McLean had armed himself with a short length of the dreaded bull whip kelp, and was now applying the sort of slow, thorough
thrashing to Meredith’s shapely buttocks, thighs and calves that she would remember in excruciating detail for many, many years.
“Glad to see you back, Merrie,” Emma said, yawning. “Please don’t stop what you’re doing. Andrew. I’ll see you all in the morning. ‘Night, now.” With that, she went back inside, stuck her fingers in both ears, and went peacefully back to sleep.
Robin, on the other hand, pulled up one of the wobbly bamboo chairs, made herself as comfortable as she could on her own tender and recently walloped rear end, and enjoyed every delicious swat of Meredith’s homecoming.
Chapter Eight
In light of the rather extensive and painful spankings both of them had received only the day before, Emma and Robin were in excellent sprits the following morning as they prepared breakfast. Breakfast was more a state of mind than a reality, since all meals on the island were much the same. The menu at every meal included seaweed, coconuts, some bitter but apparently non-poisonous berries that Emma had discovered in the woods, and whatever small sea life they could scavenge. When they were driven to the brink of desperation, one or the other of them would capture a seagull, but when the hapless bird was cooked, it made a poor meal, and everyone felt guiltier than they did well-fed. The castaways harbored no such tender feelings toward the island’s fat black rats, but the rats, once numerous, had apparently grown wise to their status on the food chain, and had virtually disappeared.
Despite the obvious wealth of fish in the ocean, the fishing near the shoreline was not good. There were small schools of silvery fish in the shallows that frequently supplied dried fish for their table, but, as Meredith pointed out, eating them was a lot like eating your own shoes.
What was needed, it was decided over breakfast, was a boat.
Jack designed boats. Yachts, really, but then, a yacht had a hull, and a hull without a sail was a boat, so there was no specific reason why he couldn’t design—and that the five of them couldn’t build—a passable boat. The argument sounded reasonable, so, that very afternoon, after Jack had completed a rudimentary design, they began prowling the woods for a suitable tree.
The design would be simple, inspired by Jack’s education in marine design, Robin’s having once made (during her year as a Brownie) a miniature Iroquois canoe, and Emma and Andrew’s combined memories of having read Robinson Crusoe from cover to cover, several times. Meredith’s contributions were two-fold. The first had to do with the eventual color scheme, and would depend heavily on the sudden, magical appearance on the island of a Home Depot or a Walmart that had a paint department. Her second contribution, made under a certain level of duress, was her pink cigarette lighter.
Robinson Crusoe had dragged the log for his boat from a great distance, but the castaways were luckier, finding a very large, straight tree of adequate size just thirty or forty feet outside the clearing, in the woods. The tree was already on the ground, and seemed relatively free of termites and boring insects. All that was required was to drag it to the clearing.
“Mud,” Emma said. “I remember that Robinson Crusoe used mud.” So they made mud, and with all five of them pulling the log through that mud with maximum effort, they were able to move the tree perhaps eighteen inches in the proper direction. A quarrel ensued, with Emma and Robin pointing out, with some justice, that Meredith wasn’t actually pulling on the improvised ropes, but merely “faking it.”
“I always fake it,” Meredith replied, giggling at her own double entendre. “Besides, I’ve already broken four nails on this piece of shit! Do what you want! I’m going for a swim.”
She dropped her end of the rope, causing the log to shift sideways, and Emma’s foot to be caught painfully between the ground and the “hull.” Andrew checked Emma’s foot serious injury, swore loudly, and then followed Meredith into the woods.
The group took a short rest break, during which Andrew returned with a quarrelsome Meredith, and took her into the Swamp Plaza for a small discussion about fairness, and sharing, and about the advantages to any society of an equitable balance of labor. When this failed to convince her to return to work, he took the direct managerial approach, and bent her over his knee to apply a brief but painful work incentive to her bare backside with a long, flat piece of driftwood.
Meredith’s screams of agony disturbed no one as they rested and chatted. They were all used to it, by now.
“You know,” Robin observed with a cheerful grin. “For Meredith, this must be like taking an all expense paid vacation to the Disneyworld of Discipline. She’s ridden every ride, at least twice, knows what to expect, yet she just keeps getting on, again and again.”
McLean emerged from the Swamp Plaza with a report. “Well, somewhere around the tenth swat, she did apologize about Emma’s foot. I left the young lady with a very sore bottom, but I’m afraid it didn’t improve her work ethic at all. I actually think we’ll do better without her, so I set her to work preparing lunch.”
“I’ll skip lunch, thanks,” Jack sighed. “I’ve seen Meredith cook. Okay, everybody, pull!”
Two days later, the log was half in and half out of the clearing, but was deemed close enough to the fire to begin work.
The plan was to carve a deep trench down the center of the log, and then set it on fire, “Just like Robinson Crusoe,” explained Andrew. “The Iroquois did it all the time,” Robin added.
Meredith perched on the end of the log, stuck her tongue out, and wondered aloud where they planned to rent an Iroquois.
“This time, she’s mine!” Jack said grimly. But by now, he was too tired and too sweaty to face the arduous task of spanking Meredith as long and vigorously as she deserved, so she got a reprieve.
Cutting the “trench” took the better part of two days, and another half day to stuff the crack with dried moss and brush and set it on fire. After which, the flame sputtered cheerfully, smoked profusely … and died.
“The log is too wet,” Jack concluded.
They hacked out a larger, deeper trench, stuffed even more moss and dried brush inside, and took turns fanning it. It smoldered, and smelled, but it kept burning.
“Let’s see,” Robin calculated “It’s 2014 now, so at this rate, we’ll paddle off this fucking island sometime in the year 2050, which is great, because I’ll more than qualify for Medicare by then.”
“I never said this would be fast,” Jack replied irritably. “Run out and round up a chain saw and a couple of adzes. That should speed it up a lot.”
“What’s an adze?” Meredith asked.
They all replied at once. “Shut up, Meredith!”
They took the afternoon off, taking turns minding the slow charring of the log. When they weren’t on log duty, Emma and Andrew sat on the beach and talked.
“You know,” she said, after a few minutes. ”About all I really know about you is that you’re a teacher.”
“For another year or so,” he said. “After which, I will be a retired teacher, and world traveler.”
“That sounds nice.”
“Perhaps. We’ll see.”
“What wouldn’t be wonderful about seeing all the beautiful places in the world?” she laughed.
“Until seven years ago,” he explained simply, ”I traveled with my wife, and it was wonderful. After she died, I hadn’t the interest any longer. Until last month, of course, when I decided on taking my very first ocean cruise. ‘Peaceful and idyllic’ were the words in the brochure, as I remember it.”
They both laughed.
“I’m sorry about your wife,” Emma murmured.
“So am I,” he said, and changed the subject quickly. “And what do you do, Emma, when you’re not cruising the South Pacific and serving as an unpaid nanny to Miss Von Kessel?”
“I work for Mister Von Kessel, Meredith’s father. I’m a paralegal, on my way to being a lawyer, if the money holds out.”
“So, you’re paid to be a nanny,” he said.
Emma bristled. “That’s not the way it is, at all. Von Kessel a
nd Kendrick is one of the most prestigious law firms in the country, and I work damned hard. With Mr. Von Kessel’s help I can afford to finish school. Without it, I can’t. It’s not his fault Meredith is a pain in the ass. She was raised by her mother. She’s really not as bad as everyone thinks. She’s just a little spoiled.”
“A little,” he chuckled.
“Okay, a lot.”
“If she were a few years younger,” he said, “Meredith would be an ideal candidate for Hargrave Hall.”
“Hargrave Hall?”
“Yes, or ‘Her Grave,’ as the students call it. It’s the school where I began teaching four years ago. Hargrave specializes in the difficult, and the hopelessly spoiled.”
“Like a reform school?” she asked.
“Not quite. Academically, it’s actually quite a good school, and the faculty is excellent, myself included, of course. There are some exceptionally bright young women at Hargrave.”
Emma laughed. “It doesn’t sound like Meredith’s sort of place.”
“Ah, but you see, I have left out an important detail—perhaps the most important detail. Achieving academic excellence, while always encouraged, is not Hargrave’s primary function. The vast majority of Hargrave’s young ladies are there because their parents are wealthy enough or influential enough to keep the little animals out of the penitentiary. Not a few of the exceptionally bright young women I mentioned are probably also borderline psychopaths, which is why most of the faculty are male. Men are more expensive to hire and to keep, but studies have shown that they make superior correctional officers and zookeepers, which is more in line with what is required of a faculty member at Hargrave.”
“My God!”
“It isn’t quite as awful as I am making it sound, of course. And one adjusts quickly, if one wishes to survive. You learn to watch your back as they say, and to keep an eye on your car keys. Hargrave takes what might be called a lenient attitude toward violations of our students’ human and civil rights, with everyone’s tacit consent. Most of the ladies’ adoring parents are simply grateful to have their adorable offspring in school instead of incarcerated. The school is operated with a rather ‘heavy hand,’ and I’ve seen some very raw bottoms in my time there.
