He remembered the night she had first told him about the money and his feelings of utter incredulity and shock and pity.
“You’ve been stealing?”
“Yes.”
“In the name of God, what for?”
“I don’t know. I don’t spend it, not much, anyway. I just—well, I want it. I just want it.”
“Listen to me. You’ve got to put it back, make restitution.”
“I won’t do that.”
“But you’ll go to prison.”
“They haven’t caught me yet.”
“You don’t know what you’re saying.”
“Yes, I do. I stole some money, a lot of money.”
“You must put it back, Alberta. I couldn’t go on living without you.”
“You won’t have to. I’ve got a plan.”
Her plan seemed crazy to him at first, but eventually he came to accept it because he had no better one to offer her; in fact, he had no plan at all, he was not used to doing his own thinking.
He insisted on one promise from her, that after O’Gorman was out of the picture, she would take no more chances at the bank. She would stop falsifying the books and wait for the time when it would be safe for her to leave Chicote without anyone connecting her with O’Gorman’s disappearance. She had broken the promise and made the mistake that sent her to prison. It wasn’t like Alberta to make mistakes. Had she been thinking too much of him and of their future together? Or had she acted out of an unconscious desire to be caught and punished not only for her embezzlements but for her relationship with him? Though she had never voiced her feelings of sexual guilt, he was aware that they were strong in her, and aware, too, that she had known no other man.
His own feelings of guilt were strong, too, but they were assuaged by the hardships and austerity of the life he led. Occasionally, in rare moments of insight, he wondered whether he had chosen such a life in order to make his guilt more bearable. On being awakened each morning by the scurrying rats in the hay or the sharp bite of a flea, the sting of cold or the pangs of hunger, he did not resent any of these things, he used them as excuses to an unseen, unheard accuser: See me, how miserable I am, see the circumstances I live under, the pain, the hunger, the loneliness, the privation. I have nothing, I am nothing. Isn’t this penance enough?
His long wait for the future had become a way of life to such an extent that he was afraid to think beyond it and reluctant to repeat the past. Though desperate for companionship, he didn’t want the members of the colony to come back. The only ones he had really liked would not be coming back anyway: Mother Pureza, whose wild flights of fancy amused him, and Sister Blessing, who had looked after him when he was ill. He did not miss Sister Contrition’s querulous whining, Brother Steady Heart’s boasts of his success with the ladies, Brother Crown’s sour self-righteousness, or the Master’s harangues with the devil.
As time passed, his memory began to fail about certain events. He had only a dim recollection of the colony’s last day at the Tower. His mind had been numbed by the sudden shock of seeing Haywood again and realizing that all the careful planning and the long wait had been for nothing. He had not intended to kill Haywood, only to reason with him.
But Haywood wasn’t reasonable. “I’m going to stay here, I’m going to hound your footsteps every minute of every day until I discover where you’ve hidden the money.”
He was too dazed even to attempt a denial. “How... how did you find me? Alberta told you?”
“I followed Quinn’s car from Chicote. No, Alberta didn’t tell me, lover-boy. I give her credit for one thing, anyway, obstinacy. Once a month for over five years I’ve coaxed and bullied and nagged her to tell me the truth so I could help her. I suspected something right from the first, ever since she told me she’d given some of my clothes to a transient. She gave them to you, didn’t she?”
“Yes.”
“You couldn’t take the chance of buying a new set of clothes that might later be reported as missing from your wardrobe. Oh, you two were very careful, all right. Everything was thought out in advance, everything went into the great scheme except plain ordinary common sense. Her planning must have begun months in advance. She started going out alone every night, to the movies, lectures, concerts, so that when she went out in her car that particular night no one would think anything of it. She started to buy the Racing Form, always from the same newsstand, laying the groundwork for the gambling story in case she was ever caught embezzling and questioned about where the money went. All that planning, and for what? The poor woman sits in a prison cell, still dreaming great dreams. Only they’re not going to come true.”
“Yes they are. I love her, I’ll wait for her forever.”
“You may have to.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means,” Haywood said, “that when her parole hearing comes up in a few weeks, some people aren’t going to believe her story of gambling away the money any more than I believe it. And if they don’t believe it, if they consider her uncooperative, she’ll have to serve her full term. This is where I enter the picture. I want that money. Now.”
“But—”
“All of it. When I have it, Alberta will know the game’s up and she’ll be forced to tell the parole board the truth and make restitution to the bank. Then she’ll be a free woman, free of prison and free of you, too, I hope to God.”
“You don’t understand. Alberta and I—”
“Don’t start prattling about love and romance. Big romance. Big deal. Hell, I don’t even think you’re a man. Maybe that’s the reason behind the whole thing: Alberta isn’t quite a woman and you’re not quite a man, so you decided to play the star-crossed lovers’ game. The game had a big advantage for both of you. It kept you apart for the present while allowing you to believe in a future of togetherness.”
He couldn’t remember pushing Haywood over the railing, but he remembered the sight and sound of him as he fell, a great gray flapping bird uttering its final cry. He didn’t wait to see Haywood land. He hurried back to his room at the third level of the Tower where Brother Steady Heart had sent him to rest after hoeing in the vegetable garden. He waited until Mother Pureza ran out and the Master went after her. Then, walking like a robot that had been given orders, he went directly to the barn to get the rat poison.
He had only one vivid recollection of Sister Blessing’s death, her scream as the first pain struck her. Sometimes a bird made a noise like it and the bearded man would turn numb and fall to the ground, as though he believed Sister Blessing had returned to life as a bird to haunt him. These were the worst times, when he doubted his own sanity and imagined that the creatures of the forest were human beings. The mockingbird, arrogant and loud-mouthed, was Brother Crown. The tiny green-backed finch, clowning among the tall weeds, was Mother Pureza. The crow, strong and hungry, was Brother Light. The band-tailed pigeon, haughty in a treetop, was the Master. The mourning dove, sounding the sorrows of the world, was Sister Contrition, and the scrub jay was Haywood, criticizing him, taunting him.