Dolores Claiborne Read online

  She said she set out one day to tell the whole story to Mrs. Sheets, the guidance counsellor. She even made an appointment, but she lost her nerve in the outside office when another girl's appointment ran a little overtime. That had been less than a month before, just after school let back in.

  "I started to think how it would sound," she told me as we sat there on the bench by the aft companionway. We were halfway across the reach by then, and we could see the East Head, all lit up with the afternoon sun. Selena was finally done her cryin. She'd give out a big watery sniffle every now n then, and my hanky was wet clear through, but she mostly had herself under control, and I was damned proud of her. She never let go of my hand, though. She held it in a death-grip all the time we was talkin. I had bruises on it the next day. "I thought about how it'd be to sit down and say, 'Mrs. Sheets, my Dad is trying to do you-know-what to me.' And she's so dense--and so old --she'd probably say, 'No, I don't know-what, Selena. What are you talking about?' Only she'd say TAWkeen about, like she does when she gets up on her high horse. And then I'd have to tell her that my own father was trying to screw me, and she wouldn't believe me, because people don't do things like that where she comes from."

  "I think it happens all over the world," I said. "Sad, but true. And I think a school guidance counsellor would know it, too, unless she's an out-and-out fool. Is Mrs. Sheets an out-and-out fool, Selena?"

  "No," Selena says, "I don't think so, Mommy, but--"

  "Sweetheart, did you think you were the first girl this ever happened to?" I asks, and she said something again I couldn't hear on account of she talked so low. I had to ask her to say it again.

  "I didn't know if I was or not," she says, and hugs me. I hugged her back. "Anyway," she went on at last, "I found out sitting there that I couldn't say it. Maybe if I'd been able to march right in I could have gotten it out, but not once I had time to sit and turn it over in my mind, and to wonder if Daddy was right, and you'd think I was a bad girl--"

  "I'd never think that," I says, and give her another hug.

  She gave me a smile back that warmed my heart. "I know that now," she said, "but then I wasn't so sure. And while I was sitting there, watching through the glass while Mrs. Sheets finished up with the girl that was before me, I thought up a good reason not to go in."

  "Oh?" I asked her. "What was that?"

  "Well," she says, "it wasn't school business."

  That struck me funny and I started to giggle. Pretty soon Selena was gigglin with me, and the giggles kep gettin louder until we was settin there on that bench, holdin hands and laughin like a couple of loons in matin season. We was so loud that the man who sells snacks n cigarettes down below poked his head up for a second or two to make sure we were all right.

  There were two other things she said on the way back--one with her mouth and one with her eyes. The one she said out loud was that she'd been thinkin of packin her things and runnin away; that seemed at least like a way out. But runnin won't solve your problems if you've been hurt bad enough--wherever you run, you take your head n your heart with you, after all--and the thing I saw in her eyes was that the thought of suicide had done more'n just cross her mind.

  I'd think of that--of seein the thought of suicide in my daughter's eyes--and then I'd see Joe's face even clearer with that eye inside me. I'd see how he must've looked, pesterin her and pesterin her, tryin to get a hand up under her skirt until she wore nothin but jeans in self-defense, not gettin what he wanted (or not all of what he wanted) because of simple luck, her good n his bad, and not for any lack of tryin. I thought about what might've happened if Joe Junior hadn't cut his playin with Willy Bramhall short a few times n come home early, or if I hadn't finally opened my eyes enough to get a really good look at her. Most of all I thought about how he'd driven her. He'd done it the way a bad-hearted man with a quirt or a greenwood stick might drive a horse, and never stop once, not for love and not for pity, until that animal lay dead at his feet ... and him prob'ly standin above it with the stick in his hand, wonderin why in hell that happened. This was where wantin to touch his forehead, wantin to see if it felt as smooth as it looked, had gotten me; this was where it all come out. My eyes were all the way open, and I saw I was livin with a loveless, pitiless man who believed anything he could reach with his arm and grasp with his hand was his to take, even his own daughter.

  I'd got just about that far in my thinkin when the thought of killin him crossed my mind for the first time. That wasn't when I made up my mind to do it--gorry, no--but I'd be a liar if I said the thought was only a daydream. It was a lot more than that.

  Selena must've seen some of that in my eyes, because she laid her hand on my arm and says, "Is there going to be trouble, Mommy? Please say there isn't--he'll know I told, and he'll be mad!"

  I wanted to soothe her heart by tellin her what she wanted to hear, but I couldn't. There was going to be trouble--just how much and how bad would probably be up to Joe. He'd backed down the night I hit him with the creamer, but that didn't mean he would again.

  "I don't know what's going to happen," I said, "but I'll tell you two things, Selena: none of this is your fault, and his days of pawin and pesterin you are over. Do you understand?"

  Her eyes filled up with tears again, and one of em spilled over and rolled down her cheek. "I just don't want there to be trouble," she said. She stopped a minute, her mouth workin, and then she busts out: "Oh, I hate this! Why did you ever hit him? Why did he ever have to start up with me? Why couldn't things stay like they were?"

  I took her hand. "Things never do, honey--sometimes they go wrong, and then they have to be fixed. You know that, don't you?"

  She nodded her head. I saw pain in her face, but no doubt. "Yes," she said. "I guess I do."

  We were comin into the dock then, and there was no more time for talk. I was just as glad; I didn't want her lookin at me with those tearful eyes of hers; wantin what I guess every kid wants, for everything to be made right but with no pain and nobody hurt. Wantin me to make promises I couldn't make, because they were promises I didn't know if I could keep. I wasn't sure that inside eye would let me keep em. We got off the ferry without another word passin between us, and that was just as fine as paint with me.

  That evenin, after Joe got home from the Car-stairs place where he was buildin a back porch, I sent all three kids down to the market. I saw Selena castin little glances back at me all the way down the drive, and her face was just as pale as a glass of milk. Every time she turned her head, Andy, I saw that double-damned hatchet in her eyes. But I saw somethin else in them, too, and I believe that other thing was relief. At least things are gonna quit just goin around n around like they have been, she musta been thinkin; scared as she was, I think part of her musta been thinkin that.

  Joe was sittin by the stove readin the American, like he done every night. I stood by the woodbox, lookin at him, and that eye inside seemed to open wider'n ever. Lookit him, I thought, sittin there like the Grand High Poobah of Upper Butt-Crack. Sittin there like he didn't have to put on his pants one leg at a time like the rest of us. Sittin there as if puttin his hands all over his only daughter was the most natural thing in all the world and any man could sleep easy after doin it. I tried to think of how we'd gotten from the Junior-Senior Prom at The Samoset Inn to where we were right now, him sittin by the stove and readin the paper in his old patched bluejeans and dirty thermal undershirt and me standin by the woodbox with murder in my heart, and I couldn't do it. It was like bein in a magic forest where you look back over your shoulder and see the path has disappeared behind you.

  Meantime, that inside eye saw more n more. It saw the crisscross scars on his ear from when I hit him with the creamer; it saw the squiggly little veins in his nose; it saw the way his lower lip pooched out so he almost always looked like he was havin a fit of the sulks; it saw the dandruff in his eyebrows and the way he'd pull at the hairs growin out of his nose or give his pants a good tug at the crotch every now and then.


  All the things that eye saw were bad, and it come to me that marryin him had been a lot more than the biggest mistake of my life; it was the only mistake that really mattered, because it wasn't just me that would end up payin for it. It was Selena he was occupied with then, but there were two boys comin along right behind her, and if he wouldn't stop at tryin to rape their big sister, what might he do to them?

  I turned my head and that eye inside saw the hatchet, layin on the shelf over the woodbox just the same as always. I reached out for it n closed my fingers around the handle, thinkin, I ain't just going to put it in your hand this time, Joe. Then I thought of Selena turnin back to look at me as the three of em walked down the driveway, and I decided that whatever happened, the goddam hatchet wasn't going to be any part of it. I bent down and took a chunk of rock maple out of the woodbox instead.

  Hatchet or stovelength, it almost didn't matter --Joe's life come within a whisker of endin right then and there. The longer I looked at him sittin in his dirty shirt, tuggin at the hairs stickin outta his nose and readin the funnypages, the more I thought of what he'd been up to with Selena; the more I thought about that, the madder I got; the madder I got, the closer I came to just walkin over there and breakin his skull open with that stick of wood. I could even see the place I'd hit the first lick. His hair had started to get real thin, especially in back, and the light from the lamp beside his chair made a kind of gleam there. You could see the freckles on the skin between the few strands of hair that was left. Right there, I thought, that very place. The blood'll jump up n splatter all over the lampshade, but I don't care; it's an ugly old thing, anyway. The more I thought about it, the more I wanted to see the blood flyin up onto the shade like I knew it would. And then I thought about how drops would fly onto the light-bulb, too, and make a little sizzlin sound. I thought about those things, and the more I thought, the more my fingers bore down on that chunk of stovewood, gettin their best grip. It was crazy, oh yes, but I couldn't seem to turn away from him, and I knew that inside eye would go on lookin at him even if I did.

  I told myself to think of how Selena would feel if I did it--all her worst fears come true--but that didn't work, either. As much as I loved her and as much as I wanted her good regard, it didn't. That eye was too strong for love. Not even wonderin what would happen to the three of em if he was dead and I was in South Windham for killin him would make that inside eye close up. It stayed wide open, and it kep seein more and more ugly things in Joe's face. The way he scraped white flakes of skin up from his cheeks when he shaved. A blob of mustard from his dinner dryin on his chin. His big old horsey dentures, which he got from mail-order and didn't fit him right. And every time I saw somethin else with that eye, my grip on that stovelength would tighten down a little more.

  At the last minute I thought of somethin else. If you do this right here and right now, you won't be doin it for Selena, I thought. You wouldn't be doin it for the boys, either. You'd be doin it because all that grabbin was goin on under your very nose for three months or more and you was too dumb to notice. If you're going to kill him and go to prison and only see your kids on Sat'dy afternoons, you better understand why you're doin it: not because he was at Selena, but because he fooled you, and that's one way you're just like Vera--you hate bein fooled worse'n anything.

  That finally put a damper on me. The inside eye didn't close, but it dimmed down and lost a little of its power. I tried to open my hand and let that chunk of rock maple fall, but I'd been squeezin it too tight and couldn't seem to let go. I had to reach over with my other hand and pry the first two fingers off before it dropped back into the woodbox, and the other three fingers stayed curled, like they were still holdin on. I had to flex my hand three or four times before it started to feel normal again.

  After it did, I walked over to Joe and tapped him on the shoulder. "I want to talk to you," I says.

  "So talk," he says from behind the paper. "I ain't stoppin you."

  "I want you lookin at me when I do," I says. "Put that rag down."

  He dropped the paper into his lap and looked at me. "Ain't you got the busiest mouth on you these days," he says.

  "I'll take care of my mouth," I says, "you just want to take care of your hands. If you don't, they're gonna get you in more trouble than you could handle in a year of Sundays."

  His brows went up and he asked me what that was supposed to mean.

  "It means I want you to leave Selena alone," I says.

  He looked like I'd hoicked my knee right up into his family jewels. That was the best of a sorry business, Andy--the look on Joe's face when he found out he was found out. His skin went pale and his mouth dropped open and his whole body kinda jerked in that shitty old rocker of his, the way a person's body will jerk sometimes when they are just fallin off to sleep and have a bad thought on their way down.

  He tried to pass it off by actin like he'd had a muscle-twinge in his back, but he didn't fool either one of us. He actually looked a little ashamed of himself, too, but that didn't win him any favor with me. Even a stupid hound-dog has sense enough to look ashamed if you catch it stealin eggs out of a henhouse.

  "I don't know what you're talkin about," he says.

  "Then how come you look like the devil just reached into your pants and squeezed your balls?" I asked him.

  The thunder started to come onto his brow then. "If that damned Joe Junior's been tellin lies about me--" he begun.

  "Joe Junior ain't been sayin yes, no, aye, nor maybe about you," I says, "and you can just drop the act, Joe. Selena told me. She told me everything--how she tried to be nice to you after the night I hit you with the cream-pitcher, how you repaid her, and what you said would happen if she ever told."

  "She's a little liar!" he says, throwin his paper on the floor like that proved it. "A little liar and a goddam tease! I'm gonna get my belt, and when she shows her face again--if she ever dares to show it around here again--"

  He started to get up. I took one hand and shoved him back down again. It's awful easy, shovin a person who's tryin to get out of a rockin chair; it surprised me a little how easy it was. Accourse, I'd almost bashed his head in with a stovelength not three minutes before, and that mighta had somethin to do with it.

  His eyes went down to narrow little slits and he said I'd better not fool with him. "You've done it before," he says, "but that don't mean you can bell the cat every time you want to."

  I'd been thinkin that very thing myself, and not so long before, but that wasn't hardly the time to tell him so. "You can save your big talk for your friends, " I says instead. "What you want to do right now isn't talk but listen ... and hear what I say, because I mean every word. If you ever fool with Selena again, I'll see you in State Prison for molesting a child or statutory rape, whichever charge will keep you in cold storage the longest."

  That flummoxed him. His mouth fell open again and he just sat there for a minute, starin up at me.

  "You'd never," he begun, and then stopped. Because he seen that I would. So he went into a pet, with his lower lip poochin out farther than ever. "You take her part, don't you?" he says. "You never even ast for my side of it, Dolores."

  "Do you have one?" I asked him back. "When a man just four years shy of forty asks his fourteen-year-old daughter to take off her underpants so he can see how much hair she has growin on her pussy, can you say that man has a side?"

  "She'll be fifteen next month," he says, as if that somehow changed everything. He was a piece of work, all right.

  "Do you hear yourself?" I asked him. "Do you hear what's runnin out of your own mouth?"

  He stared at me a little longer, then bent over and picked his newspaper up off the floor. "Leave me alone, Dolores," he says in his best sulky poor-old-me voice. "I want to finish this article."

  I felt like tearin the damned paper out of his hands and throwin it in his face, but there would have been a blood-flowin tussle for sure if I had, and I didn't want the kids--especially not Selena --comin i
n on somethin like that. So I just reached out and pulled down the top of it, gentle, with my thumb.

  "First you're gonna promise me you'll leave Selena alone," I said, "so we can put this shit-miserable business behind us. You promise me you ain't gonna touch her that way ever again in your life. "

  "Dolores, you ain't--" he starts.

  "Promise, Joe, or I'll make your life hell."

  "You think that scares me?" he shouts. "You've made my life hell for the last fifteen years, you bitch--your ugly face can't hold a candle to your ugly disposition! If you don't like the way I am, blame yourself!"

  "You don't know what hell is," I said, "but if you don't promise to leave her alone, I'll see you find out."

  "All right!" he yells. "All right, I promise! There! Done! Are you satisfied?"

  "Yes," I says, although I wasn't. He wasn't ever gonna be able to satisfy me again. It wouldn't have mattered if he'd worked the miracle of the loaves and fishes. I meant to get the kids out of that house or see him dead before the turn of the year. Which way it went didn't make much difference to me, but I didn't want him to know somethin was comin his way until it was too late for him to do anythin about it.

  "Good," he says. "Then we're all done and buttoned up, ain't we, Dolores?" But he was lookin at me with a funny little gleam in his eyes that I didn't much like. "You think you're pretty smart, don't you?"

  "I dunno," I says. "I used to think I had a fair amount of intelligence, but look who I ended up keepin house with."

  "Oh, come on," he says, still lookin at me in that funny half-wise way. "You think you're such hot shit you prob'ly look over your shoulder to make sure your ass ain't smokin before you wipe yourself. But you don't know everything."

  "What do you mean by that?"

  "You figure it out," he says, and shakes his paper out like some rich guy who wants to make sure the stock market didn't use him too bad that day. "It shouldn't be no trouble for a smartypants like you."

  I didn't like it, but I let it go. Partly it was because I didn't want to spend any more time knockin a stick against a hornet's nest than I had to, but that wasn't all of it. I did think I was smart, smarter'n him, anyway, and that was the rest of it. I figured if he tried to get his own back on me, I'd see what he was up to about five minutes after he got started. It was pride, in other words, pride pure n simple, and the idea that he'd already got started never crossed my mind.