Dolores Claiborne Read online

  I grabbed at the bushes n got my hands full of stickers n fresh blood. I kicked at his head with the foot he didn't have ahold of, but it was just a little too low to hit; I parted his hair with the heel of my sneaker a couple of times, but that was just about all.

  "Come on Duh-lorrrr-issss," he said, like he wanted to take me out for an ice cream soda or maybe dancin to the country n western over at Fudgy's.

  My ass fetched up against one of the boards still left on the side of the well, and I knew if I didn't do somethin right away, we was gonna go tumblin down together, and there we'd stay, prob'ly wrapped in each other's arms. And when we was found, there'd be people--ninnies like Yvette Anderson, for the most part--who'd say it just went to show how much we loved each other.

  That did it. I found a little extra strength and give one last tug backwards. He almost held on, but then his hand slipped off. My sneaker musta hit him in the face. He screamed, his hand beat at the end of my foot a couple of times, and then it was gone for good. I waited to hear him go tumblin to the bottom, but he didn't. The son of a bitch never gave up; if he'd lived the same way he died, I don't know that we'd ever've had any problems, him n me.

  I got up on my knees n saw him go swayin backwards over the hole ... but somehow he held on. He looked up at me, shook a bloody clump of hair outta his eyes, and grinned. Then his hand come up outta the well again n grabbed onto the ground.

  "Dul-OOH-russ," he kinda groaned. "Dul-OOOH-RUSS, Dul-OOOH-russ, Dul-OOOOOHHH-russs!" And then he started to climb out.

  "Brain him, you ninny," Vera Donovan said then. Not in my head, like the voice of the little girl I seen earlier. Do you understand what I'm sayin? I heard that voice just like you three are hearin me now, and if Nancy Bannister's tape-recorder had been out there, you could've played that voice back over n over n over again. I know that as well's I know my own name.

  Anyway, I grabbed one of the stones set into the ground at the edge of the well. He kinda clutched at my wrist, but I pulled the stone free before he could set his grip. It was a big stone, all crusted with dry moss. I raised it over my head. He looked up at it. His head was outta the hole by then, and it looked like his eyes was standin out on stalks. I brought the rock down on him with all my strength. I heard that lower plate of his bust. It sounded like when you drop a china plate on a brick hearth. And then he was gone, tumblin back down the well, and the rock went with him.

  I fainted then. I don't remember faintin, just layin back and lookin up at the sky. There was nothin to see because of the clouds, so I closed my eyes ... only when I opened em, the sky was full of stars again. It took me a little while to realize what'd happened, that I'd fainted and the clouds had blown away while I was passed out.

  The flashlight was still layin in the brambles beside the well, and the beam was still nice n bright. I picked it up and shone it down into the well. Joe was layin at the bottom, his head cocked over on one shoulder, his hands in his lap, and his legs splayed out. The rock I'd brained him with was layin between em.

  I held the light on him for five minutes, waitin to see if he'd move, but he never. Then I got up n made my way back to the house. I had to stop twice when the world went foggy on me, but I finally made it. I walked into the bedroom, takin off my clothes as I went n leavin em just wherever they fell. I got into the shower n only stood there under spray as hot as I could take it for the next ten minutes or so, not soapin myself, not warshin my hair, not doin nothin but standin with my face up so the water'd hit all over it. I think I mighta fallen asleep right there in the shower, except the water started to cool off. I warshed my hair quick, before it could go all the way to stone cold, and got out. My arms n legs were all scratched up and my throat still hurt like hell, but I didn't think I was gonna die from none of that. It never occurred to me what somebody might make of all those scratches, not to mention the bruises on my throat, after Joe was found down the well. Not then, at least.

  I pulled my nightgown on n fell on the bed n went fast asleep with the light on. I woke up screamin less'n an hour later with Joe's hand on my ankle. I had a moment of relief when I realized it was only a dream, but then I thought, "What if he's climbin the side of the well again?" I knew he wasn't--I'd finished him for good when I hit him with that rock and he fell down the second time --but part of me was sure he was, and that he'd be out in another minute or so. Once he was, he'd come for me.

  I tried to lie there n wait it out, but I couldn't --that pitcher of him climbin up the side of the well just kept gettin clearer n clearer, and my heart was beatin so hard it felt like it might explode. Finally I put on my sneakers, grabbed the flashlight again, and went runnin out there in my nightgown. I crawled to the edge of the well that time; I couldn't make myself walk, not for nothing. I was too afraid of his white hand snakin up outta the dark n grabbin onto me.

  At last I shone the light down. He was layin there just the same as he had been, with his hands in his lap n his head cocked to one side. The rock was still layin in the same place, between his spread legs. I looked for a long time, and when I went back to the house that time, I'd begun to know he was really dead.

  I crawled into bed, turned off the lamp, and pretty soon I corked off to sleep. The last thing I remember thinkin was "I'll be all right now," but I wasn't. I woke up a couple of hours later, sure I could hear someone in the kitchen. Sure I could hear Joe in the kitchen. I tried to jump outta bed and my feet tangled in the blankets and I fell on the floor. I got up n started feelin around for the switch on the lamp, sure I'd feel his hands slide around my throat before I could find it.

  That didn't happen, accourse. I turned on the light n went through the whole house. It was empty. Then I put on my sneakers n grabbed the flashlight n ran back out to the well.

  Joe was still layin on the bottom with his hands in his lap n his head on his shoulder. I had to look at him a long time, though, before I could convince myself it was layin on the same shoulder. And once I thought I saw his foot move, although that was most likely just a shadow movin. There were lots of those, because the hand holdin the flashlight wasn't none too steady, let me tell you.

  As I crouched there with my hair tied back and prob'ly lookin like the lady on the White Rock labels, the funniest urge come over me--I felt like just lettin myself lean forward on my knees until I tumbled into the well. They'd find me with him--not the ideal way to finish up, s'far's I was concerned--but at least I wouldn't be found with his arms wrapped around me ... n I wouldn't have to keep wakin up with the idear he was in the room with me, or feelin I had to run back out with the light to check n make sure he was still dead.

  Then Vera's voice spoke up again, only this time it was in my head. I know that, just like I know that it spoke right into my ear the first time. "The only place you're going to tumble into is your own bed," that voice told me. "Get some sleep, and when you wake up, the eclipse really will be over. You'll be surprised how much better things will look with the sun out."

  That sounded like good advice, and I set out to follow it. I locked both doors to the outside, though, and before I actually got into bed, I did somethin I ain't never done before or since: propped a chair underneath the doorknob. I'm ashamed to admit that--my cheeks feel all hot, so I guess I'm blushin--but it musta helped, because I was asleep the second my head hit the pillow. When I opened my eyes the next time, full daylight was streamin in through the window. Vera had told me to take the day off--she said Gail Lavesque and a few of the other girls could oversee puttin the house to rights after the big party she'd been plannin for the night of the twentieth--and I was some glad.

  I got up n took another shower n then got dressed. It took me half an hour to do all those things because I was so lamed up. It was my back, mostly; it's been my weak point ever since the night Joe hit me in the kidneys with that stovelength, and I'm pretty sure I strained it again first pullin that rock I clouted him with free of the earth, then h'istin it up over my head the way I did. Whatever it was, I can tell you
it hurt a bitch.

  Once I finally had my clothes on, I sat down at the kitchen table in the bright sunshine and drank a cup of black coffee n thought of the things I ought to do. There wasn't many, even though nothing had gone just the way I'd meant for it to go, but they'd have to be done right; if I forgot somethin or overlooked somethin, I'd go to prison. Joe St. George wa'ant much loved on Little Tall, and there weren't many who'd've blamed me for what I did, but they don't pin a medal on you n give you a parade for killin a man, no matter if he was a worthless piece of shit.

  I poured myself a fresh slug of mud and went out on the back porch to drink it ... and to cast my eye around. Both reflector-boxes and one of the viewers were back in the grocery sack Vera'd given me. The pieces of the other viewer were layin right where they'd been since Joe jumped up sudden and it slid out of his lap n broke on the porch boards. I thought for quite awhile about those pieces of glass. Finally I went inside, got the broom n the dustpan, and swep em up. I decided that, bein the way I am and so many folks on the island knowin the way I am, it'd be more suspicious if I left em layin.

  I'd started off with the idear of sayin I'd never seen Joe at all that afternoon. I thought I'd tell folks he'd been gone when I got home from Vera's, without s'much as a note left behind to say where he'd taken his country butt off to, and that I'd poured that bottle of expensive Scotch whiskey out on the ground because I was mad at him. If they did tests that showed he was drunk when he fell into the well, it wouldn't bother me none; Joe could have gotten booze lots of places, includin under our own kitchen sink.

  One look into the mirror convinced me that wouldn't do--if Joe hadn't been home to put those bruises on my neck, then they'd want to know who had put em there, and what was I gonna say? Santy Claus did it? Luckily, I'd left myself an out--I'd told Vera that if Joe started actin out the Tartar, prob'ly I'd leave him to stew in his own sauce n watch the eclipse from East Head. I hadn't had any plan in mind when I said those words, but I blessed em now.

  East Head itself wouldn't do--there'd been people there, and they'd know I hadn't been with em--but Russian Meadow's on the way to East Head, it's got a good western view, and there hadn't been nobody at all there. I'd seen that for myself from my seat on the porch, and again while I was warshin up our dishes. The only real question--

  What, Frank?

  No, I wa'ant worried a bit about his truck bein at the house. He had a string of three or four DWIs right close together back in '59, you see, and finally lost his driver's license for a month. Edgar Sherrick, who was our constable back then, came around n told him that he could drink until the cows came home, if that was what he wanted, but the next time he got caught drinkin and drivin, Edgar'd hoe him into district court n try to get his driver's license lifted for a year. Edgar n his wife lost a little girl to a drunk driver back in 1948 or '49, and although he was an easygoin man about other things, he was death on drunks behind the wheel. Joe knew it, and he quit drivin if he'd had more'n two drinks right after him n Edgar had their little chat on our porch. No, when I came back from Russian Meadow and found Joe gone, I thought one of his friends must've come by n taken him someplace to celebrate Eclipse Day--that was the story I meant to tell.

  What I started to say was the only real question I had was what to do about the whiskey bottle.

  People knew I'd been buyin him his drink just lately, but that was all right; I knew they thought I'd been doin it so he'd lay off hittin me. But where would that bottle have ended up if the story I was makin up had been a true story? It might not matter, but then again it might. When you've done a murder, you never know what may come back to haunt you later on. It's the best reason I know not to do it. I put myself in Joe's place--it wa'ant as hard to do as you might think--and knew right off that Joe wouldn't have gone nowhere with no one if there'd been so much as a sip of whiskey left in that bottle. It had to go down the well with him, and that's where it did go ... all but the cap, that was. That I dropped into the swill on top of the little pile of broken tinted glass.

  I walked out to the well with the last of the Scotch swishin in the bottle, thinkin, "He put the old booze to him and that was all right, that was no more'n what I expected, but then he kinda mistook my neck for a pump-handle, and that wa'ant all right, so I took my reflector-box and went up to Russian Meadow by m'self, cursin the impulse that made me stop n buy him that bottle of Johnnie Walker in the first place. When I got back, he was gone. I didn't know where or who with, n I didn't care. I just cleared up his mess and hoped he'd be in a better frame of mind when he got back." I thought that sounded meek enough, and that it'd pass muster.

  I guess what I mostly disliked about that goddam bottle was gettin rid of it meant goin back out there and lookin at Joe again. Still, my likes n dislikes didn't make a whole lot of difference by then.

  I was worried about the state the blackberry bushes might be in, but they wasn't trampled down as bad as I'd been afraid they might be, and some were springin back already. I figured they'd look pretty much like always by the time I reported Joe missin.

  I'd hoped the well wouldn't look quite so scary in broad daylight, but it did. The hole in the middle of the cap looked even creepier. It didn't look s'much like an eye with some of the boards pulled back, but not even that helped. Instead of an eye, it looked like an empty socket where somethin had finally rotted so bad it'd fallen completely out. And I could smell that dank, coppery smell. It made me think of the girl I'd glimpsed in my mind, and I wondered how she was doin on the mornin after.

  I wanted to turn around n go back to the house, but I marched right up to the well instead, without so much as a single dragged foot. I wanted to get the next part behind me as soon as I could ... n not look back. What I had to do from then on out, Andy, was to think about my kids and keep faced front no matter what.

  I scooched down n looked in. Joe was still layin there with his hands in his lap and his head cocked over on one shoulder. There was bugs runnin around on his face, and it was seein those that made me know once n for good that he really was dead. I held the bottle out with a hanky wrapped around the neck--it wa'ant a question of fingerprints, I just didn't want to touch it--and dropped it. It landed in the mud beside him but didn't break. The bugs scattered, though; they ran down his neck and into the collar of his shirt. I never forgot that.

  I was gettin up to leave--the sight of those bugs divin for cover had left me feelin pukey again--when my eye fixed on the jumble of boards I'd pulled up so I could get a look at him that first time. It wasn't no good leavin em there; they'd raise all sorts of questions if I did.

  I thought about em for a little while, and then, when I realized the mornin was slippin away on me and somebody might drop by anytime to talk about either the eclipse or Vera's big doins, I said to hell with it n threw em down the well. Then I went back to the house. Worked my way back to the house, I should say, because there were pieces of my dress n slip hangin from a good many thorns, and I picked off as many as I could. Later on that day I went back and picked off the three or four I missed the first time. There were little bits of fluff from Joe's flannel shirt, too, but I left those. "Let Garrett Thibodeau make anything of em he can," I thought. "Let anyone make anything of em they can. It's gonna look like he got drunk n fell down the well no matter what, and with the reputation Joe's got around here, whatever they decide on'll most likely go in my favor."

  Those little pieces of cloth didn't go in the swill with the broken glass and the Johnnie Walker cap, though; those I threw in the ocean later on that day. I was across the dooryard and gettin ready to climb the porch steps when a thought hit me. Joe had grabbed onto the piece of my slip that'd been trailin out behind me--suppose he still had a piece of it? Suppose it was clutched in one of the hands that was layin curled up in his lap at the bottom of the well?

  That stopped me cold ... and cold's just what I mean. I stood there in the dooryard under that hot July sun, my back all prickles and feelin zero at the bone, as some poim
e I read in high school said. Then Vera spoke up inside my mind again. "Since you can't do anything about it, Dolores," she says, "I'd advise you to let it go." It seemed like pretty good advice, so I went on up the steps and back inside.

  I spent most of the mornin walkin around the house n out on the porch, lookin for ... well, I dunno. I dunno what I was lookin for, exactly. Maybe I was expectin that inside eye to happen on somethin else that needed to be done or taken care of, the way it had happened on that little pile of boards. If so, I didn't see anything.

  Around eleven o'clock I took the next step, which was callin Gail Lavesque up at Pinewood. I ast her what she thought of the eclipse n all, then ast how things was goin over at Her Nibs'.

  "Well," she says, "I can't complain since I haven't seen nobody but that older fella with the bald head and the toothbrush mustache--do you know the one I mean?"

  I said I did.

  "He come downstairs about nine-thirty, went out back in the garden, walkin slow and kinda holdin his head, but at least up, which is more than you c'n say for the rest of em. When Karen Jolander asked him if he'd like a glass of fresh-squeezed orange-juice, he ran over to the edge of the porch n puked in the petunias. You shoulda heard him, Dolores--Bleeeeee-ahhh!"

  I laughed until I almost cried, and no laughter ever felt better to me.

  "They must have had quite a party when they got back from the ferry," Gail says. "If I had a nickel for every cigarette butt I've dumped this mornin--just a nickel, mindja--I could buy a brand-new Chevrolet. But I'll have the place spick n spiffy by the time Missus Donovan drags her hangover down the front stairs, you can count on that. "

  "I know you will," I says, "and if you need any help, you know who to call, don't you?"

  Gail give a laugh at that. "Never mind," she says. "You worked your fingers to the bone over the last week--and Missus Donovan knows it as well as I do. She don't want to see you before tomorrow mornin, and neither do I."