Fire Point

by John Smolens

  The road straightened out and Sean was standing in front of Martin’s house. He walked around to the back of the house, shinnied up the drainpipe, and climbed in the window on the second floor. He knew his way around now, and he walked through each room, one hand touching the walls in the dark. The floorboards felt rough beneath his bare feet. There was a familiar smell, something he associated with the laundry room at home. Bleach.

  In one room he found a pile of scrap wood and a newspaper. He had matches in the front pocket of his jeans, and it didn’t take more than a couple of minutes to get the fire going. He watched it until the flames licked the new Sheetrock ceiling. Burning wood popped and crackled. When the heat was too much, he ran down the front stairs, but in the hall he stepped on something sharp—glass, he thought—and fell. He lay on the floor, holding his feet, warm blood covering his hands. The pain was a revelation.

  HANNAH HEARD THE garage door open, squeaks and chains, and metal rollers in greased tracks, an awful sound that always alerted her that her mother was about to pull her car into the driveway. This week she was on day shifts at the hospital; it was better when she was on night shifts and they saw less of each other. It was even better when their dog, Sugar, was still alive because she could detect the sound of the car’s engine well before it turned into the driveway. Often Sugar gave Hannah enough time to pour the rest of the beer down the sink and get in the bathroom to brush her teeth, or to simply flee, run out the back door and disappear until she knew her mother had gone to bed.

  But as the car pulled into the garage, Hannah went into the living room, sat on the couch, and clicked on the television. Her mother banged through the kitchen door, wielding a plastic bag of groceries in one hand, her big leather purse in the other; she spilled these on the kitchen table and came into the living room, yanking off her jacket. “You eat yet?”

  “Hello, yourself.” Hannah looked back at the television. “No, I’m going out in a while.”

  Her mother returned to the kitchen. Hannah listened as she took a glass down from the cabinet, got ice from the freezer, put it in the glass, then poured the Scotch. Knowing that her mother’s back was to the door, Hannah turned and looked past the lamp shade. Her mother was wearing the nurse’s uniform Hannah had given her last Christmas. White pants and green top with sailboats on it. “I was at the fish market,” her mother said as she began to turn and come across the kitchen again.

  Hannah looked quickly back toward the television, which was tuned to CNN. “I’m not hungry, really,” Hannah said.

  Her mother came into the living room and sat in her chair, putting her feet up on the hassock. “I was at the fish market,” she said in her slow, precise voice, then paused to sip her drink. This was one of her signs of anger, repeating something she had just said. It was a strategy intended to force Hannah to sit up and pay attention. It said, Don’t change the subject. She placed her glass of Scotch on the coaster, then said, “And I ran into Margaret Lusic.” She was in her mother’s bridge group. Her daughter had gone to college in upstate New York last fall—one of the good ones, Syracuse or Cornell.

  “And she told you all about how well Jennifer is doing at—”

  “We didn’t talk about Jennifer.”

  Hannah had to look away from the television now. Her mother was staring right at her. There was no getting around those eyes. “Margaret said she was driving down toward Petit Marais last week—Friday, she thought—and saw you coming out of a cabin over there, and she asked if you were working there, baby-sitting or whatever. And then—” She paused and picked up her drink. She liked to put the beginning of something out there and then let it hang until Hannah couldn’t stand it any longer. And finally Hannah would say something like “Then what?” Her mother, more often than not, wouldn’t know what she had intended to say. It was just another strategy. The problem was, understanding these strategies didn’t help. Hannah had often explained to her mother exactly what she was doing, and how aggravating it was, but it didn’t matter. Her mother continued to do it—and it still worked. “And then,” her mother said, “Margaret saw you another time, in a car, with a man. He was bald, she thought, and the car was, I don’t know, foreign?”

  Hannah was tempted to get up off the couch, waving her arms as she stomped out of the room complaining loudly, perhaps even yelling. For several years she did that often, but since the abortion it just didn’t work anymore. Now she also wanted to stay seated and struggle through this with her mother. It wasn’t just mother and daughter living together in this house now, it was two women, and when Hannah understood that, she realized that it gave her something new, like an ally. When she could remain calm and rational, it sometimes pushed her mother back, if only a little. Sometimes her mother would get angry and want to drop the whole thing, but eventually Hannah managed to at least get her point across.

  Hannah turned off the television. “So?”

  “So who is it?” her mother said. “This bald man?”

  “He’s not bald.” Hannah tried to make it light, even funny, but didn’t quite get there.

  “He’s not?”

  “No, he shaves his head. Though I suppose he does that because he’s going bald—which, when you think about it, is a rather remarkable solution. You’re afraid of losing your hair, so you shave it all off!” Hannah now looked at her mother, whose mouth was open slightly. “I guess that means that it’s not being bald that bothers men, it’s the idea of going bald.” She grinned. “It’s the transition between hair and no hair. That’s what embarrasses them.”

  Her mother nodded her head slowly as she reached for her glass. “Well.” Sip. “Does this man with no hair—” Sip. “With some kind of foreign car—” Sip. “Does he have a name?”

  “Martin.” Sometimes being complete worked best. “Martin Reed.”

  Her mother put down her glass. She was nearly done with the first one. “He a classmate?”

  “No.”

  “He’s not in school?”

  “No.”

  Now her mother looked absolutely stupid.

  “Martin’s—well, he’s almost thirty. That’s what you want to know, right? He’s not a classmate. You don’t know his mother. He’s ten years older than me. He’s taught me how to drive a stick shift in that old foreign car, which is a Mercedes-Benz. It’s a really neat car.” Hannah stood up. “Let me make you another one.”

  She crossed the room, picked up the glass from the table, and went into the kitchen. She took her time preparing the drink. This, too, was new. Sometimes she would wait on her mother. When she was little, all those bowls of cereal, pancakes, lunches and dinners; now her mother’s legs were sore and tired, and the least Hannah could do was mix the second drink.

  8

  MARTIN AND PEARLY raked debris into piles, which they loaded into wheelbarrows and dumped into the back of the Datsun. They rarely spoke, and seldom looked toward the road, where cars streamed by—someone else’s misfortune is always interesting. Half the roof was gone, but the front exterior was unharmed except for the charred clapboards above the window.

  Around noon a police cruiser stopped in front of the house. Pearly dropped a piece of wood and its blackness came off on his hands. As he rubbed the gritty stuff between his thumb and forefinger, he watched Buzz Gagnon and Frank Colby climb out of the car.

  Martin stabbed his shovel into the ground and came over and stood next to Pearly. When he reached them, Buzz stopped and put both hands on his hips. Colby remained a few paces behind, his arms folded, on guard.

  Buzz looked at Martin as though he were trying to recall something. “I understand you’re related to Jane Kendall?”

  “That’s right,” Martin said.

  “So,” Gagnon said, looking at Pearly, “that makes you relatives.”

  Pearly nodded.

  “And this is just a nice family enterprise you two have going here,” Buzz said.

  Colby pressed his sunglasses to the bridge of his nose. Like Pearly, he
was primarily a spectator in this, the second. His face had no more expression than the fender on the police car.

  Buzz asked, “Got any ideas why someone would torch the place?” When Martin didn’t answer right away, Buzz said, “Don’t hold back on me, son.”

  “I didn’t start this fire.”

  “That wasn’t my question. You know anyone who would?”

  Martin hesitated, then shook his head.

  “I see.”

  “Could have been some kids just goofing around,” Pearly said.

  “Maybe,” Buzz said. “You can never rule out the random, sheer stupidity of vandalism.” He squinted up at the house. “I don’t believe this was done by just kids, but somebody with a reason. If there was a reason, it invariably means someone’s pissed off. It means they have the inability to articulate their anger any other way.”

  “That’s an interesting way to put it,” Martin said.

  “It’s based on more than a few years of experience.”

  “I’m not doubting you, Captain.”

  “Didn’t think you were. You know anybody like that, Martin?”

  “No.” Then Martin added, “I can tell you who’s pissed off. I am.”

  “I can see that.” Gagnon shrugged. “But no wife? Ex?”

  “No,” Martin said.

  “Somebody you owe money?” Buzz said. “Girlfriend you dumped?”

  “No,” Martin said.

  “I see.” Buzz shifted his weight. “I gotta ask you where you were last night.”

  “After work I went out,” Martin said. “A few beers in the usual places, that’s all.”

  “You didn’t meet anyone?”

  “Just briefly,” Martin said. “Early in the evening . . .”

  Buzz almost smiled and said slowly, “Who was she?”

  Pearly glanced over at Colby. With those reflector sunglasses it was impossible to see his eyes.

  “She got a name?” Gagnon asked. “Care to whisper it in my ear?”

  Martin considered this, but then said, “Hannah LeClaire.”

  Colby’s mouth opened slightly.

  Buzz glanced at him, then back at Martin. “It’s a sour feeling, isn’t it? A fire like this in such an old place.”

  “You might say that,” Martin said.

  “I doubt you’re the sort who’d have your own place torched for the insurance,” Gagnon said. “On the other hand, it can’t be ruled out. But then if that’s the case, you’d better get your money back, because this place is far from burned to the ground. To torch a house this size, you got to know what you’re doing. This fire wasn’t started by any damned professional. And I think you know who did it.” He waited a moment, then said, “All right, that’s the way you want it.” He began to work his way around the debris toward the street, but halfway to the car he stopped. “The county fire inspector said something about blood, fresh blood, on the floor in the front hall. You wouldn’t know anything about that?”

  “No, I wouldn’t,” Martin said.

  Pearly shook his head.

  Buzz continued on toward the cruiser.

  Colby didn’t move, as though he wanted to give the captain a head start. His arms were still folded, but his shoulders seemed less imposing and authoritative. For a moment Pearly was certain Colby was going to say something, but then he walked back to the car.

  SUNDAY AFTERNOON SEAN was sitting on the rock jetty, working on his third quart of beer in a paper bag. Something about the lake put things in perspective. It brought you out of yourself. Sean watched the boats moored in the harbor and tried not to think about his feet, which were killing him.

  Fortunately, when he’d gotten up that morning, his mother was at church and his father was on duty. Sean had managed to avoid seeing either one of them since Friday night. The problem was he could barely walk. The soles of both feet were cut and the gauze pads he’d put on them were stiff with dried blood. Sitting on the edge of the bathtub, he washed his feet, carefully peeling away the old gauze; then after drying them with paper towels, which he flushed down the toilet, he applied new gauze pads. He rinsed out the tub, making sure there was no sign of blood. It took several minutes to pull on his Nikes, and he left the laces untied. When he stood up, it was better—he was able to walk, carefully, out to the driveway and get in his truck.

  Now he was thinking about getting another quart of beer and maybe finding out what Arnie was doing—tonight he could call and tell his parents he was staying at Arnie’s apartment above Superior Gas & Lube. He climbed down off the rocks and began hobbling back to his truck.

  At first he heard the crackle of tires on gravel behind him and he thought nothing of it. But then he looked over his shoulder and saw that it was a patrol car. His father pulled up alongside, about five yards away.

  Sean stopped walking. “What?”

  “What?” his father said evenly. “I’ll tell you what.” Though he was in uniform, he wasn’t wearing his hat because he was sitting in the car. His face was slick with sweat and his sunglasses reflected two tiny suns. “Gagnon is starting to smell that something’s up here.” He raised a bottle of Fanta orange to his mouth and took a long drink.

  Sean kept looking straight at the sunglasses. He knew those glasses were intended to intimidate; to avoid them would give his father the advantage he wanted.

  “But look at your feet,” his father said. “You can hardly walk on them. It was just a question of somebody dumb enough to go in that house at night in bare feet.”

  Sean grinned as he raised the bottle to his mouth. He drank some beer, and then said loudly, “So what’re you going to do?”

  “Do?”

  “Yeah, call the police? You going to take me in?”

  His father nodded his head. Then his head became very still. “I didn’t mention anything to Buzz.”

  “That’s because you’re chicken.” His father’s face settled into something he’d seldom seen. Sean realized that a quart of beer ago he would have handled this differently, but now he couldn’t and it seemed that there was no place to go but straight at it. “You know I’m right,” he said. “Isn’t that what those glasses are really about? You’re chicken.” He laughed and took another swig of beer. “When I was ten, twelve you could slap me around. A year ago you thought you could straighten me out by sending me off to boot camp. Well, I’ll tell you something, mister: You can’t do a thing to me!” Sean began walking again. Slowly.

  He’d only taken a couple of steps when his father said, “Looks like you’ve already done enough.” Sean turned and looked back at his father, who tipped his bottle of Fanta up to his mouth. Then he sort of smiled.

  Sean was standing a few feet in front of the patrol car. He threw the quart bottle wrapped in the paper bag at the front grill. It broke the left headlight.

  His father got out, came up to the front of the car, and looked down at the pavement. His movement, everything about him, was slow, compacted. He leaned over, hands on knees, and stared at the ground. Glass—both brown-bottle glass and the clear, bright kernels of glass from the lamp, which glinted brightly in the sun—littered the gravel.

  “You got to admit it was a pretty good throw,” Sean said. His father turned his head toward him, but he seemed to be looking past him. “I didn’t think you could break a headlight with a beer bottle. Must have hit it just right.”

  “Oh, my word.” A woman’s voice came from behind Sean. Turning, he saw an elderly couple, Mr. and Mrs. Eichhorn. They stood not ten yards away, holding their ancient bicycle built for two, which they rode all around the harbor on summer days.

  “Officer Colby,” Mr. Eichhorn said. “That’s willful destruction of public property.” Though it was a warm day, he wore a blue dress shirt with a red, white, and blue bow tie. Beneath his wide-brimmed straw hat his gaunt face was supported by an ugly series of tendons straining beneath the loose skin on his neck.

  “Oh, Jesus,” Sean said quietly.

  Mrs. Eichhorn was as tall and
scrawny as her husband. Sean recalled that once during a high-school assembly she had spoken to the students about the virtues of good hygiene and a balanced diet. “We’re going to report this,” she said, “if you don’t do anything about it. We see enough of this sort of behavior on the part of tourists.”

  Sean looked at his father, who appeared to be considering his options. Something about the set of his mouth suggested that he was at a loss. Finally he said to Sean, “All right. Get in the car.”

  “What?”

  “You heard me.” His father came over and took a firm hold of his right elbow. “I said get in the car.” He walked Sean around to the passenger side of the cruiser and opened the rear door. As Sean got in, his father placed his hand on the top of his head.

  9

  ALTHEA BRIGGS MADE LAMPS with clear glass bases filled with beach stones, which she sold to tourists. She paid Hannah twenty-five dollars per sack of smooth, colorful stones. Sunday evening Martin went with her down to the beach at Frenchman’s Channel. He carried the sack over his shoulder and followed her barefoot through the shallows. Occasionally she would stop, bend over, and reach down into the water, and she’d hand those stones that passed a brief inspection back to him to deposit in the sack. She was wearing cutoffs that were so short the bottoms of the white front pockets were visible against her thighs.