Robbie's Wife

by Russell Hill

  Robbie lay motionless on the wet floor, blood oozing from his head, and I dragged him to the puddle of black water next to the stall so that his head was next to the post where I hoped they would think he had struck it and then I picked up the shears. They had gone off automatically when Robbie dropped them. I unplugged them, and tugged at the frayed wires at the base of the shears, worrying them until I had them exposed. I carefully plugged them in again, holding the shears gingerly, and then, making sure that I wasn’t standing in the pool of water, I dropped them. There was a blinding blue-green flash that filled the shed, and it was suddenly black, fuses blown. Jack began to bark frantically and I felt sheep surge past me toward the open door. I went with them, stumbling blindly and now I was running, climbing the low wall to the field, the rain coming down again, slipping, the muddy field grabbing at my shoes. All I could see was Robbie’s startled face and then the green flash and I felt sick, paused to vomit, bent over, hands on knees, and began to run again, struggling up the field.

  Behind me Jack was barking, sheep were bleating, and I struggled, head down, almost on all fours, gasping, up the slippery slope toward the far end of the field. Once over the brow I paused for breath, and I could see Robbie’s startled recognition again and I thought, what if he isn’t dead? What if he’s only unconscious and when he wakes he’ll remember me standing there swinging that piece of timber with both hands and this time Clive Owen will hunt me down, knock on my hotel room door, and I would see him there with a young constable and hear his clipped British accent and I sank to my knees and I hoped that Robbie wasn’t dead, that I had only stunned him and that the electricity hadn’t been enough to harm him and I repeated over and over again, out loud, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” and I began to run again toward the car.

  But when I reached the hedge and worked my way along it until I found the opening, I couldn’t find the car. I thought perhaps in the darkness I had gone too far, so I doubled back, hunched over at a half trot, stumbling over roots and clods along the hedge, but the field began to slope down and there was neither an opening nor a car. I doubled back, stumbling, blindly putting one foot in front of the other in the darkness, slipping on the muddy track, almost falling, wondering at each step if I would step in a hole or a rut and twist my ankle and still I ran. The rain had been light but now it was harder and it stung my face and I knew it was no longer rain but sleet. Another degree and it would turn to snow. I was soaked and suddenly the opening was there, the pavement of the road a lighter black. I got down on hands and knees and felt for the tire tracks and they were there, filled with water, and there was broken glass, crumbs from a broken car window and I realized that the car had been stolen. I remembered Robbie saying I should lock the car even in the farmyard since it might get broken into. The fucking English countryside isn’t safe from the bastards anymore, he said, and now the car was gone, a rental car parked just inside the entrance to a field between high hedgerows along a little-traveled road in the rain and dark and it had been an easy target. I knew I couldn’t stay where I was and I remembered the travelers at the top of the ridge. They were up there in the copse, the ancient buses, parked in a haphazard circle surrounded by makeshift lean-tos and abandoned cars. If I were you I’d steer clear of them, Jack. That’s what Robbie had said. If anybody would take money to hide me I knew they would. It was my only chance now.

  I went through the opening in the hedge and crossed the road, searching for a break on the other side. I finally found a weak spot, worked my way through the hedgerow into the field and began to climb. It was an easy slope, tall grass, and I was worried that I was leaving a track that would easily be followed in the morning, but I continued, now at a half-trot.

  Suddenly the field was no longer tall grass but freshly plowed and I slammed into the wet earth, landing on my shoulder and side, the pain shooting up my arm. I lay there for a moment, listening to my breath come in harsh gasps, moving my fingers on my numb hand, hoping that nothing was dislocated or broken, and then I pushed myself upright, rose unsteadily and started out again. Through the rain I could see the blurry lights of Hazelbury Bryan off to the left and the ground began to rise. Clumps of mud clung to my shoes, making them heavy to lift. I slowed, moving at a fast walk, my breath still coming in gasps, temples pounding, wet to the skin now, the sleet stinging my face, forcing myself to keep moving.

  Another hedge loomed in front of me and I ranged along it to the right. Finally I found an iron gate and when I climbed over it I found to my surprise that I was standing on pavement. It must be the road to Mappowder, I thought, and I tried to remember where I would be. If I cross the next field and go up I will have to bear left if I hope to find the travelers.

  The hedge on the opposite side of the road was impassable, higher than my head, a thick bramble of branches and thorns. More panic. I was out on the road in plain sight of any car that came, but the blackness of the hedgerow lessened and it was another gate and I was over it and into a field of rape, thigh high, and I knew I would leave a trail across it that would be easy to follow. In the daylight the rape was bright yellow, blinding to the eyes under the sun, and my passage would be a steady unbroken line through it and that was no good. I stopped, trying to catch my breath. I could no longer see the lights of Hazelbury Bryan, only the red of the beacon on top of Bulbarrow Hill, and the rain was letting up.

  Then I saw the pulsing blue light of the police car coming down the side of Bulbarrow, disappearing along the hedgerow, reappearing when the road broke open. I watched to see if it was coming in my direction. Like a blue strobe in the blackness the light passed off toward the south, then disappeared, only to reappear closer as the car took another road, this time moving toward me.

  I waited until I was sure it was on my road, stumbled to the edge of the field and lay in the rape just at the hedgerow, waiting while the motor grew louder and then there was the slur of tires on the wet pavement and the lightening as the headlights swept the road and the blue light pulsed and the car was gone. I lay there, gasping for breath, the pounding in my head so loud I wondered that the passing car had not heard the insistent beat like the bass from some idiot East L.A. teenager’s car radio thumping through my body.

  I pushed myself to my feet again and searched until I found the gate. I trotted down the pavement looking for another break, hoping it would be a field where sheep were kept for that would mean grass and it would curve smoothly up the hill to where the copse was and the trees and the travelers.

  They would take my money and hide me. Or they would steal my money and turn me over to the police but that was unlikely since they had nothing but contempt for the police. Perhaps they would steal my money and turn me back into the night. It didn’t matter. They were my only chance now.

  The hedgerow was growing smaller and I could see the yellow of the rape only as a lightness in the rain that had come again in earnest, slanting in, cold and hard, and as I ran I remembered a Herbie Mann record that I gave away in Los Angeles and the insistent beat of ‘Coming Home’ pounding in time to my feet, the jazz flute piercing the night rain and I lurched on, letting the remembered music carry me.

  Another lightness in the hedge beckoned and I went off the road, stumbling up against the muddy bank, coming suddenly to my knees. But it wasn’t a gate or an opening and I went back on the road at a half trot until, fifty yards further, I found a gate and climbed over it and into a field and it was close-cropped grass and I remembered that this was the field on the Mappowder road where Robbie had taken the sheep the day I took the long walk across the fields from the farmhouse.

  There was a fierce pain in my chest and I wondered if my heart would burst and they would find me in the morning when the rain stopped. I slowed, forcing myself to keep moving, stumbling, the pain in my chest rising into my head, and I slowed to a walk, trying not to gasp, remembering somewhere from my teenage years a warning from a high school coach that if I gasped too heavily I would hyperventilate and lose c
onsciousness.

  Now I stumbled blindly in the icy rain, the field rising sharply. Somewhere there would be sheep and above me the blackness of the copse and the travelers and respite from the rain and the pain in my body. My arm and shoulder were numb and I wondered if I had broken something in my fall. I stopped and turned, trying to hold my breath, steady the pounding in my head and I looked out into the space where I knew on a clear day I could see three or four villages but there were no lights as the rain came steadily.

  I climbed at a walk, my shoes heavy with mud, the blackness of the copse near, rounding the shoulder of the hill onto flat ground, the dim outlines of the two buses just in front of me, no lights, no voices, but the smell of smoke told me that there had been fires where the smokestacks were. I stood, breathing heavily, and there, facing me, was the black-bearded man I had seen that day I hiked away from the farm.

  He spoke. I half-expected some sort of Eastern European accent, since Robbie had warned they were gypsies, but this voice had an accent that would have been common in London. “Help you, mate? You lost?” But it wasn’t a voice of comfort, offering help to a lost hiker. It was a hard voice, as if he had caught me trying to steal something.

  “Yes,” I said. My voice was hoarse, gasping. “My car was stolen, I need some help.”

  “It’s the middle of the fucking night, mate. You don’t expect me to drive you someplace at this hour.”

  “No. If you’ve got a dry place where I can stay until daylight, I can sort this out.”

  “You mean go to the coppers and tell them your auto got nicked.”

  “I’m not sure. Maybe I just couldn’t find it in the dark.”

  “Maybe you was hoping to nick one yourself.”

  “No. I can pay for the night.”

  “You think this is some fucking B and B, mate?”

  “Please. Just some place out of the rain and a blanket. I’ll pay you.”

  “There were copper’s lights in the vale tonight and you show up here all muddy in the middle of the black and I’m thinking it’s more than just a blanket that you want. I’m thinking what you want is a place to hide and those places don’t come cheap.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said. “Either my car has been stolen or I couldn’t find it in the dark. All I want is a dry place for a few hours.”

  “I’m thinking maybe you should piss off, mate. And then, again, I’m thinking you sound desperate for a place to be right now. I’m thinking it will cost you fifty quid for a seat on the coach and another fifty quid for a blanket.”

  I was shivering uncontrollably now and a hundred pounds seemed cheap. But I knew that if I agreed, he would know that I was in some sort of trouble, that the last thing I wanted was to see a policeman, and I would be at his mercy. I had no choice.

  “You’re taking advantage of me,” I croaked. “You know I’m too cold and wet to go any farther. If I could make it to the village I could find someone to take me in, but I can’t go any farther.”

  He didn’t reply. He moved away toward the coach and I followed. He pulled open the door and climbed up the short steps toward the driver’s seat. I followed.

  It was dark inside and suddenly a flashlight flared and he set about lighting an oil lantern. The dull glow from the lantern illuminated the interior of the coach and I could see that most of the seats were gone, there was a small pot-bellied stove at one side, and in the back what appeared to be sleeping quarters, bunks along each side. An old couch was along one wall, there was a table and several chairs. Nothing was distinct. A woman’s voice from the darkness at the back of the bus said, “Who’ve you brought in here,” and he said, without emotion, “Shut your mouth.”

  He turned to me and said, “A hundred quid, mate.” He reached out his hand.

  I fumbled in my pocket, pulling out my soggy wallet. I counted out five twenty-pound notes. There were still another five bills in the wallet and I sensed he knew it, too. He was the kind of man who could count money with his nose, that much I knew. The coach smelled of bodies and sour food, strange spices, sweat, smoke and damp. He smoothed the notes, took a small roll of bills from his pocket and added mine to it. “Over there, mate,” he said, motioning to the couch. I sat. He went toward the back of the coach, pulled a blanket off one of the bunks. The voice said, “Give me back that!” but he snatched the blanket away, saying, “Shut the fuck up.” He threw the blanket at me, watched while I pulled it around my shoulders. “That’s your spot,” he said, pointing again to the worn couch. “Don’t move from it.”

  35.

  I was conscious of the smell of oil and rank clothes and something cooking, and I woke groggily, sitting up on the worn couch to see two women wrapped in layers of clothes, one watching me, the other cooking something in a frying pan on the potbellied stove. It was warm and I was inside an old bus, the driver’s seat empty, most of the seats removed, and then I remembered Robbie and the terrible hike up the wet fields and I looked around for the dark traveler. He was nowhere to be seen.

  Neither woman spoke when I sat up. The one looking at me was younger, a tangle of wild hair framing an almost feral face, and she nudged the other woman who turned to look disinterestedly at me. She was older, stout, layered in coats and sweaters with her hair coming out from an old watch cap pulled down around her ears. She grunted and turned back to the skillet.

  “Where’s your man?” I asked.

  There was no response.

  I shucked off the blanket and stood.

  The young woman who had been silent suddenly spoke.

  “You come from Sheepheaven Farm.” Her voice rose accusingly. “You been there, that much I know. I put a curse on that mean bastard and now he reaps the curse. It touched you, too. There’s black smudges on your soul, the devil’s fingerprints, I wager. The devil’s fires will blaze, you mark my words. You best be getting a long way from those fires or they be burning you, too.”

  I had a sudden image of the great pyre in the Strykers’ field, the petrol-fueled carcasses blazing in the half-dark, the smell of burning wool and hides, the stink of charred flesh. And I could see Robbie’s startled look as I swung the club and the bright flash before everything went dark and I felt sick again, and I stumbled out of the coach. The dark traveler stood a few yards off and he spoke.

  “Sleep well, did you mate?”

  I looked past him to where my small white rental car was parked behind the coach.

  “That’s my car,” I said.

  “Is that right? You parked it here last night, did you?”

  “You stole it, you thieving son of a bitch!”

  “Let’s just say somebody retrieved it for you.”

  “It was here all the time!”

  “Are you accusing me of nicking your car, mate?” His tone was threatening. He took out the roll of bills from his pocket and fingered it.

  “I reckon you want to drive off from here and my guess is that you’d like to do it right away and not spend a lot of time discussing the matter. So, another hundred quid would make things right, if you know what I mean.”

  “I don’t have a hundred pounds.”

  “Empty your fucking pockets, mate. You want your car, you can have it. If you don’t want me to tell the coppers you came here in the middle of the night all caked in muck, my guess is you’ll pay me and leave and I won’t even remember you were here.”

  “You don’t want to call the police. I’ll tell them you stole the car and you’ll be in for a shitload of trouble.”

  He smiled. “You could take that to Ladbrokes and they’d give you hundred to one. Be cheaper to drop a hundred quid and be done with it, wouldn’t it mate?”

  “I’m not your fucking mate!”

  “You’re nothing to me, you quivering cunt. You want your car?”

  I had no choice. I took my soggy wallet out of my pocket, counted out the rest of my twenty pound notes and he took them without a word. I crossed to the car and looked in the broken d
river’s window. The ignition had been punched out and a tangle of wires dangled below the steering wheel.

  “How do I start it?” I asked.

  “Touch them two wires together, the red one and the black one. Same as a key.”

  He turned and went toward the coach, obviously finished with me. I got into the car, took the two wires and touched them together and the starter cranked, the engine coming on just as if I had turned an ignition key.

  I went north on the A36 until I met the M3, then turned east toward London. I tried not to think about Robbie. What was done was done. I felt a strange calm, a numbness that stayed with me until the traffic began to stack up as I neared the city. It took all my concentration to drive, and I went straight to the hotel, changed my clothes, and drove out to the car hire agency.

  I explained to the same young man that I had surprised car thieves on a road in Devon, and they had fled, leaving me with the ignition wires hanging.

  “Lucky for you they took off. If it were me, I’d have given them the bloody car,” he said. I had taken insurance on the car and he said I wouldn’t owe anything.

  “You get a police report?” he asked.

  “It was out in the country. I have no idea where the police were,” I explained.

  “That’s all right,” he said. He gave me some forms to fill out, asked me where it had happened, and I pointed to a spot on his map.

  “Country’s not safe anymore,” he said. “They steal them right off the forecourt. Thieves and murderers.”

  I took the underground back into the city and bought a bottle of scotch at a liquor store on Woburn Street. When I was, once again, in my grotty little room on the fourth floor, I filled a glass and downed it, and I drank steadily until I was unconscious.