The Houseguest (20 page)

Despite Bobby's bluster, he was not all that keen on drowning Chuck. Most of his enthusiasm for the project had been feigned, for the purpose of gaining his father's approval. So far as he himself was concerned, while he was not quite ready to let bygones be, he had not been convinced that Chuck's offenses called for a capital response. Then what would be left as punishment for those who committed hideous and irreversible crimes involving mutilation and murder? The concept of civilized behavior would seem to include at least a sense of balance, if not justice in the narrowest of legalistic senses. But he was only too aware of how his father would react if he were so foolish as to bring up such matters.

Not to mention that Lydia, who was rapidly perfecting a style in which she was morally one-up on the rest of the human race, might well, despite her sudden defense of Chuck, at the same time have only contempt for a husband who would not avenge her.

It was pretty obvious to him that Lydia's purpose, whether or not she was even conscious of it, was only to take profits and never suffer a loss. That is, it might well be true that though she had not, at least at first, known that the houseguest was her bed partner, she had nevertheless enjoyed the experience and been outraged by it only when it was over, seeing as her next pleasure Chuck's expected punishment.

Bobby therefore was going along with the crowd as he saw it. He was merely a part of a movement, with diminished personal responsibility. None of this would be happening to a Chuck who had not behaved badly: that truth should never be forgotten. In destroying this usurper they were protecting what was theirs. Chuck should have stayed on his own ground, or if he had none, then put all his effort into acquiring one in a straightforward, manly way and not through guile tried to divest others of theirs. The pity was that had he made honest application, he might not have gone away empty-handed … though, in truth, he still might have. They were not an agency for the succoring of the envious. It was practical to recognize Chuck for the vile fellow he was, and be done with it and with him. Certainly they owed him nothing. It must always be remembered that he had come uninvited.

The two of them carried him to poolside, Bobby at the end with the bound ankles and loafer-shod feet. Chuck's shoes appeared only about size 8 at the most, but he was somewhat heavier than he looked, especially at his top half, or else Bobby's father lacked endurance, for twice the latter stopped to rest, yet firmly refused his son's offer to switch ends.

One potential hindrance, however, had vanished. Lydia did not accompany them, and therefore they were spared crocodile tears at what of course she had more than a little hand in bringing about. But Bobby's mother was not merely in attendance: she made herself useful by trotting ahead to find the switch inside the little structure that also contained the filtering and heating apparatus, and thereby to illuminate not only the area surrounding the pool but also the water itself by means of the submerged flood-lamps.

The result, in the otherwise utter black of night, was a startling brightness, so much more flagrant than sunshine but also so starkly cold, and the shadow cast by the complex of two men carrying a third surely had a more gruesome connotation than the same trio in the flesh: in silhouette, Chuck probably looked already dead. Bobby liked this less and less. He wished that either Chuck had never come to the house or that he, himself, and Lydia had stayed away this summer. But the alternative would have been to visit
her
family, at some awful inland lake to which they had been attached since before her father had been successful in business. The worst place to meet new relatives-by-law must surely be at a venue uniquely sentimental to them. Lydia had learned that by now!

Bobby was not a vengeful man. Even at this late date he would have been at least sympathetic to an appeal made by the prisoner, but Chuck continued to show nothing but defiance, either with sardonic comments or an arrogant silence which might be worse, for did it not insultingly imply that this whole business was but a bluff?

His father now slowly lowered the upper half of the houseguest, and Bobby followed suit with the ankles, bringing the heels to rest on the poolside concrete. They were about to drown the man, but characteristically saw to it that he was handled with care until the time came.

“Now, look here, Chuck,” said his father. “We hope you're clear as to what we're doing and why.”

“It's hardly complex,” Chuck said, showing his familiar grin. “You've simply decided not to honor your part of the social contract by which I am your guest. I'm at your mercy: it's your turf, and you outnumber me. If you reject any sense of obligation, it follows that you feel justified in doing anything you want to me, including cold-blooded murder.”

Bobby was irritated by the smugness of this summing-up. “Oh, dammit, Chuck, come off it! Nobody was treated better than you were by us until you went too far.”

Chuck shook his sleek head. His bound hands were clenched in the area of his solar plexus. “That's what
you
say, but then you have a vested interest in that version.”

His father told Bobby, “Don't argue with him. Of course he'll try to play on our sympathy. What else can he do in his situation? Just think of what would happen were you or I in
his
clutches! He's a vicious man, whereas we're decent people who have been pushed too far. Remember that. There
is
a difference.”

Chuck sounded a horselaugh.

Bobby's mother, silent till now, came forward and said, “I do think it's not in the best of taste to make him listen to this gloating when he's going to be put to death anyway. It isn't as if he had a chance.”

Bobby's father glared at her. “Now don't tell me that after all this, you're back again on
his
side?”

She made a chin. “No, but I hate any kind of bullying. Throw him into the pool and be done with it. That would be the humane thing.”

“Thanks, Audrey,” said Chuck. “You make me feel a lot better.”

She scowled at him. “Are you still being sarcastic? You know, I will tell you that you wouldn't have come to this if you had been able to suppress your cynical streak. You have many gifts, Chuck, but apparently you can't rise above certain negative traits. So don't blame this on anybody else. Until you changed, you were the best guest we ever had. I don't know why that couldn't be enough for you. I don't want to rub it in at this point, but it must be clear to you that ruining us, even if you had been successful, could not have done you any good in the long run. It's people like us, who come in from the outside, who keep this island alive. You see how shortsighted you were? I may be going too far, but I just think that at least the more level-headed Finches will understand why we had to do what we did, perhaps even applaud us in the end.”

It occurred to Bobby that his mother had proceeded to do precisely what she had asked his father to refrain from. His father, however, did not make this point aloud. Instead he asked whether Chuck had any last request.

“No,” said the houseguest. “There's never been anything you could supply that I would want.”

His father nodded judiciously. “You've just demonstrated why I have no compunction about what I'm going to do. You just can't compromise, can you? Let me say”—he sneered at his wife—“and this is not
gloating!
Let me say that in your position I would swallow a
little
of my pride and at least debate the issue, if only to save my skin.” Suddenly his face was working with rage. “How
dare
you not give us any argument? Do you think it's somehow morally superior to let us do away with you without making any defense of your position?” He shook his fist at the recumbent prisoner. “Do you think it's easy for us? Do you think we make a habit of killing our guests?”

Chuck's smile broadened. “You mean you
don't?”

Bobby's father turned away in disgust, but his mother answered literally. “We've never done it before, and so far as I'm concerned, I don't want to do it ever again. This is the worst weekend I can ever remember having spent here, and that includes the one of Hurricane Carmella.”

Bobby said, “All right, Chuck, if you insist, I'll come more than halfway. Speaking for myself, anyway, I'd be willing to reevaluate the situation if you apologized.” He avoided looking at his father.

“You're a prize,” Chuck said. “You actually believe that after everything you've done to me,
I'm
at fault.” He looked away, which meant, in the attitude in which he lay, he stared at the black sky above the glare of the flood-lamps. “There's no dealing with you people.”

Bobby brooded for a moment, and then he lifted his head and spoke to his father. “Maybe we should call this thing off.”

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“Well, it seems cruel to kill somebody who doesn't even understand what he's being punished for.”

“Since when do we need the
criminal's
consent? Naturally he's going to pretend that justice was denied him!”

“I just wonder whether Chuck's pretending.”

“Who cares?” His father frowned. “Bobby, you're just eventually going to have to acquire some principles of your own. This is as good an opportunity as any.”

“But your idea of my convictions is that they be identical with your own.”

“Think of this,” said his father. “Are Chuck's preferable? Look who's getting drowned.” He bent to the houseguest. “Take his feet.”

Chuck said, “Don't worry about it, Bobby. You can always maintain it was his idea and not yours. In fact, you even protested against it and were overruled. You're actually a totally innocent bystander.”

“You dirty bastard,” Bobby snarled. “I'll be happy to get rid of you!” This made him feel considerably better. He grasped the prisoner's ankles and lifted.

He and his father began to swing Chuck between them, counting in concert.

“One.”

“Oh, my,” gasped his mother, turning her back on them.

“Two.”
This swing seemed sufficiently violent to have hurled the prisoner halfway across the pool had they let him go, and Bobby could hardly maintain a grasp on the ankles.

On the backswing, the lights went out. Bobby immediately relinquished his grip, and Chuck's legs fell away. But his father obviously had enough momentum established to project the houseguest's body into the water unassisted, for an appropriate splash was heard.

Lydia cried out in the darkness.

Bobby shouted, “Traitor!” For it had been she who turned the lights out: that was clear. The joke was on her, however, for her boyfriend was now in the water, hands and feet tied. … . How ungodly it must be to die like that, restrained from doing anything to save oneself. The fact was that Chuck had done nothing so loathsome as to deserve such a death.

Bobby went to the edge of the pool, kicked off his shoes, and dived in. As luck would have it, he came down directly on top of Chuck and carried him into the depths. When they came up, Chuck was free of his bonds, and he lost no time in fiercely grappling with what he obviously believed not a savior but rather an assassin whose bloodlust could not be sated.

“Goddammit!” Bobby managed at last to cry. “I'm trying to help you! Stop fighting!”

“Bobby?” asked the other. “You fool, I'm your father!”

The floodlights came on then, underwater and on the poolside standards, his mother having reached the switch. His father was coughing, had probably got a lungful of the strongly chlorinated water. His own eyes were burning. He climbed out, then leaned down and gave his father a hand.

“I thought you were Chuck,” he said to his father.

“You
dropped him to the ground,” his father said accusingly. “I fell in. And you tied him so loosely he was able to slip right out of his bonds.”

The lengths of venetian-blind cord lay at Bobby's feet. Neither the houseguest nor his ally Lydia was to be seen.

Lydia, in hiding behind the filter-house, was amazed to peep out and see that Chuck had somehow made a Houdini-like escape. Her intention had been only to frustrate the Graveses' attempt to drown him after what did not even deserve the name of kangaroo court. She had not wanted to release the man altogether. Now he was once again at large, and surely they were all once more in peril. Seeing that justice was served, yet protecting one's own interests against evildoers was even more complex a matter than it had been represented, and for a moment she was resentful towards those who had so inadequately prepared her for the world. But then remembering that when younger she had naturally resisted all attempts to present reality in other than the most simplistic terms, she now instituted an effort to determine what could reasonably be made of the current mess.