I threw down my spear and machete.
Wesley tossed the book underhand. It tumbled through the night, blazing. And dropped onto the grass near my feet.
"That was sure a close call," he announced.
"Fucking bastard," I said, stomping out the flames.
"Oooo, such language! You've been listening to Connie. A very bad influence, that girl."
"What do you want?" I asked.
"Let me see. What do I want? I want you to step into your new accommodation, over there." Swinging his torch, he pointed out the empty cage beside Billie's cage. "Step right in and shut the door."
With my first step in that direction, Billie gasped, "No! Rupert, you can't honey. If he locks you up . . ."
"I'm not gonna let him burn you."
"Very wise, little buddy."
"You have to take him down," she said.
"Shut up with that kind of talk, bitch! I'll cook your cunt right now!"
Ignoring him, staring me in the eyes, Billie said, "Kill Wesley. At least maybe you'll be able to save the others. Let him burn me, but kill him."
"You asked for it!" Wesley yelled. He bent down and reached into the cardboard box.
"Wait!" I blurted. "Wait a minute!"
He looked at me.
"If you burn her up, you won't have her to mess with anymore."
He grinned. "Oh, I don't know about that."
"You get turned on by her pain, don't you? If she's dead, she won't even feel what you do to her. She won't flinch or cry out or bleed or anything. It won't matter how hard you whip her, or . . ."
"Who needs her?" Wesley asked. Even as he said it, though, he took his arm out of the box, no book in his hand, and stood up. "I've got all the rest of them. And there'll be plenty more, once they start having babies for me." Grinning, he shook his head. "Good old Thelma, she always wanted babies. God save us all. Can you picture it? What if they came out looking like her? Who'd want 'em? Wouldn't be good for shit, girls ugly as that."
"Billie'll have beautiful babies," I said. "Just look at Connie. That's proof of how her babies will look. And you want to burn her up? Are you nuts?"
"You've got a point there, little buddy. I tell you what, go on and step into that cage, and maybe we can give her a stay of execution."
"Okay."
"Wait," Kimberly said. "What happened to Thelma? Where is she?"
Wesley let out a harsh laugh. "Gosh! I forgot to ask! How's my Thelma? I sure hope you didn't hurt my dear, sweet little wife."
I looked over at Kimberly's cage. She stood at its nearest corner, facing me. "I'm really sorry," I told her. "She was trying to kill me, and I . . . I'm pretty sure she's dead. She went down in the cove."
Kimberly was silent for a moment. Then she murmured, "It's all right. I mean . . ."
"All right?" Wesley blurted. "It's fucking perfect. Thank you very much for ridding me of the ugly cow! She did have her uses, but . . . I do believe that we're all much better off without her. My God, what a pig! Three cheers for Rupert! Hip hip hooray!" On hooray, he thrust his torch high. "Hip hip . . . hooray!" Up went the torch. "Hip hip . . . hooray!" He rammed the torch at the sky.
Then, laughing, he performed a weird little dance on top of Billie's cage: stomping his feet on the bars, waving the torch, twisting and shaking, swinging his hips, thrusting with his pelvis. He probably would've jumped and twirled, but was afraid of stepping between the bars.
I hoped for him to slip and fall. I even thought about snatching up the spear and making a try for him while he danced. But Billie would burn if anything happened to make him drop the torch.
His wild gyrations sent sweat pouring down his body, flying off his hair and skin.
"So long, Thelma!" he yelled. "Nice knowing you! Nice, my ass! Ha hah!"
Billie, looking straight up at him, suddenly blinked and ducked her head and rubbed her face.
Then she began to dance.
In silence, she swayed and turned, swung her shoulders, jumped from one foot to another.
Wesley noticed. He quit dancing himself, and bent over. Huffing for breath, he looked down at Billie through the ban. "What the hell do you think you're doing?"
"Dancing."
"Knock it off."
She didn't stop. Though she remained in the center of her cage as if shackled there by Wesley's threats, she hopped from foot to foot, waved her arms, bowed, twirled, shook and leaped.
"You've got nothing to dance about," Wesley said.
"Do, too," she called out.
"Knock it off."
"It's my rain dance!" she shouted. "I'm calling up a storm!"
And her dance suddenly broke into a savage frenzy. It wasn't like anything I'd ever seen before. The way she leaped and writhed, she must've had manic drumbeats in her head.
Instead of ordering her to halt, Wesley stared down at her, captivated by the view.
I was captivated by the view.
It wasn't something you could look away from. Not if you were a guy.
My God, it was like watching some sort of pagan ritual, the way she cavorted naked in the firelight, bowing and rising, spinning, whimpering and grunting with the effort, her feet splashing in the puddle of gas, her shiny buttocks flexing, her glossy breasts jumping and bouncing and swinging, her face agleam and streaming as if dipped in oil, sweat leaping like melted gold off her hair and nose and chin and nipples and fingertips, sweat spilling down her neck and chest and breasts, down her back and belly, her buttocks, her pubis, her legs, sliding down like golden runoff from a torrent of rain.
A downpour.
A squawl.
It's my rain dance! I'm calling up a storm!
Spoken to Wesley.
Meant for me.
Dropping to a crouch, I grabbed the spear out of the grass. Wesley still stood atop the cage, bent over and watching Billie.
He didn't look at me as I straightened up, raised the spear above my shoulder and hurled it at him.
Wesley's Last Stand
He still had his head down when the spear struck him. It caught him near the top of his left shoulder, punched him there but didn't stick, bounced off the bone and leaped out of the thin covering of flesh, its other end whipping upward as if a pole-vaulter was taking off from his shoulder.
He roared.
The whole spear leaped off into the dark behind him.
He raised his sweat-slick, dripping face. His eyes bulged. He bared his teeth at me.
Straight below him, Billie had stopped dancing. She stood in the puddle of gas in the middle of her cage, her head tipped back. Her body gleamed and dripped as if she had just climbed out of a swimming pool. She whined with her struggle to breathe.
"You dirty little fuck!" Wesley shouted at me.
And jammed the torch down between the bars at his feet and let it go.
"No!" I yelled.
The torch fell.
A moment later, it touched off the gasoline. The gas erupted with a heavy WHOP! like a mainsail snapped by the wind. The sudden brilliance hurt my eyes. As I squinted, a hot wind rolled against my body.
Wesley had been right about needing sunglasses.
The cage looked as if a bonfire had erupted in the middle of its concrete floor.
I saw Billie in there. All firelit and bright and shiny, her back to me.
Running. Leaping onto her upside-down bucket. Using it like a step for leaping again. High up at the far back corner of her cage, she caught hold and latched herself to the bars, curled tight with her knees up.
Depending for her life on the sweat of her mad dance, sweat meant to sluice the gasoline off her skin and bathe her with saving moisture.
I didn't know if it would work.
Afraid to see her burn, I turned my gaze to the top of the cage.
Where flames leaped for Wesley.
They wrapped the cardboard of his "bombardier" box, licked the sides of his gasoline tin.
With a squeal of alarm, he kicked the gas container and knocked it flying. The punt sent it well past the far side of Billie's cage, sprinkling gas from its spout. It clamored against the empty cage that he'd intended as my cell.
I looked back at Wesley to find him prancing across the bars like a ballerina as the flames tried to climb his legs. Just as he got away from them, he lost his footing. He crashed down belly-first on the ladder. It jumped and shuddered under him, raising a terrible racket.