Page 74 of Martha Calhoun

“Aren’t you coming, Arthur?” said Tammy.

“Take it easy,” he groused. But he just stood there, eyeing the hole.

“We haven’t got all night,” she said. There was something familiar and resentful in the way they addressed each other. I remembered Mary Sue’s story of what had happened in Art’s car.

Art shook his head, but he dropped down and slipped effortlessly through the hole.

Before he was on his feet, Tammy had started into the woods, winding silently among the trees. Banyon’s Woods, also known as Bang ’em Woods, rates with the Ledges as a make-out spot, and Tammy knew her way. Muscle walked in front of me, holding branches back so they wouldn’t snap in my face. Roots twisted across the trail and once I stumbled, falling into Muscle’s back. “Oops, sorry,” I whispered.

Behind us now, the fair gave off a cheerful, jumbled commotion, pierced every now and then by a single, powerful sound—the strongman’s bell, a rooster crowing, a particularly loud, high-pitched scream from someone on a ride.

Art reached out and poked my shoulder. “Don’t pay any attention to this,” he said quietly. “It’s only some fun.”

“What is it?”

“Only some fun.”

Tammy heard us and looked back. “Don’t spoil anything, Arthur,” she said.

Ahead of us, the orange light of a fire flickered through the trees. Our procession moved silently forward, and I could see a bonfire with a group of dark figures huddled around it. Someone was talking in a slow, plodding voice. Tammy put up her hand, and we stopped in the trees, just beyond the circle of light. Art crowded up behind me, pressing against my shoulder.

In the fire’s throbbing glow, a few of the faces were familiar—boys I knew from school. The boy talking was Gunnar Nygaard, and he was telling a joke involving three morons and a monkey. The three of us stood listening. The joke went on for several minutes, punctuated by an occasional hoot or shout or laugh from around the fire. Everyone was drinking beer. Someone threw a bottle into the flames, and an explosion of sparks billowed up and drifted off into the night.

Gunnar took great care with his story. He’s a slope-shouldered, loopy boy, always slow on his feet. When we were young, people used to tease him and call him a moron; now, it seemed, he’d acquired a special attraction for the subject.

Finally, he came to the punchline. A great chorus of laughing and whooping erupted, and Gunnar stood awkwardly and took a bow. The celebration carried on for half a minute or so. Then a boy I didn’t know jumped up, almost stepping into the fire. He pumped his fist into the air again and again. “Circle jerk!” he screamed. “Circle jerk!” The boys around the bonfire hooted and yelled.

At that moment, Tammy marched into the light. Art’s hand tightened around my elbow, and I was guided out of the darkness.

Our entrance startled the group. In the sudden stillness, Tammy pranced up and back like a circus ringmaster. She

swung her arm toward me in an extravagant arc. “Look who’s here, folks!” she bellowed. “Look who I’ve brought! The girl you’ve all been talking about. The one, the only … Martha Calhoun!”

Art pushed me forward. I felt as if I’d stepped out of a doctor’s office into a crowded waiting room: Every face turned to me, every patient was part startled, part pleased, part hoping to see evidence of some hideous disease. Then, quickly, around the fire, the yelling started again, a great thunderclap of noise that didn’t abate. There was no place to go. I stood staring into the flames, letting the hypnotic flickerings close things out as much as possible. Beside me, Tammy was clapping and Muscle was waving his arms. Art had stepped away. The heat of the attention seemed to warm my skin and clothes. I wished it were possible to make myself die.

I don’t know how long I stood there. The noise reached a peak and then screeched steadily, as if it came from a giant machine that would only quiet when it was turned off. People got up and moved around, anonymous dark forms hugging the shadows. From behind me, a hand appeared and perched on my shoulder. Neither friendly nor unfriendly, it sat there for a few seconds without moving, then went away. Close by, in the dark, a dog was barking.

Suddenly, the woods exploded in light. The shouting cut off instantly. Two huge spotlights, the size of full moons, bathed the bonfire in a fierce brightness. A man shouted: “Stay right where you are. This is the police. Don’t move.”

Of course, everyone did. The boys jumped up and scattered, screaming and laughing, dropping bottles of beer and tripping over roots and logs and each other. Three uniformed policemen appeared from the woods and started wading into the confusion, grabbing at arms and shoulders. Art snatched Tammy’s hand, and the two of them tumbled off into the darkness. Muscle disappeared. A cop seized Gunnar by the neck and held him out stiff-armed, the way you’d hold a puppy that had got into mud. Another policeman, a big man, wrapped his arms around the necks of two boys, so they dangled from his chest like two enormous medals. I didn’t move. People darted and dodged around me. Screams and hollers floated up from the woods. Finally, someone grabbed my arm, squeezing it with a grip that cut off circulation. I looked back and into a face I recognized: George, the cop who’d given me the Coke at the stationhouse the week before. He’d grabbed me with his right hand. With his left, he was trying to hold on to a boy who was wriggling like a monkey. George had the boy by the shoulder and, in frustration, he gave him two powerful shakes. The boy went limp and started whimpering. Then George looked at me. “You!” he said. In his surprise, he loosened his grip. The fingers that had been pressing into my arm went slack. His eyes, squinted tight against the spotlights, turned gentle. “You,” he repeated, more softly this time.

I sensed my chance. Yanking my arm free, I jumped away, then turned and ran into the woods, beyond the beams of light.

“Hey!” he yelled.

After staring at the spotlights, I was blind in the woods. I ran as hard as I could for about twenty steps and ran right over a small tree. The thin trunk bent back under my weight, but didn’t break, and I ended up straddling it, one leg on either side. The branches jabbed at me, poking all over and lifting my dress. My face was untouched, but burning scratches ran down my arms and legs. Worse, I wasn’t sure how to get untangled. The tree and I were locked in a kind of clumsy embrace. At any moment, I thought, George’s hand would clamp around my neck. I stood for a few minutes, breathing hard and feeling furious at the tree for being in the way. Finally, I backed up, slowly pulling my dress from the branches. By the time I got out, the thin trunk was bent lifelessly toward the ground.

I tried to pull myself together. My breath came in deep gasps, and my head felt light. I put my hand on my chest, hoping to slow my heart. The beams of the spotlights didn’t reach this far, so I was safely in the dark, but I could see perfectly back to the fire. George hadn’t bothered to chase me. He was still holding the whimpering boy, dragging the boy behind him as he stalked around the clearing. Another policeman had gathered Gunnar and some of the other boys and had made them sit by the fire with their backs against each other. After the chaos of the raid, the scene was strangely quiet. Behind me, the noises of the fair drifted up again.

I must be crazy, I told myself. Insane. I must have temporary insanity. I used to think that Bunny had a streak that made her do dumb things, but coming out to Banyon’s Woods was beyond dumb, way beyond dumb. What’s happened to me? I used to be so careful—I was about the most careful person I knew. And then Butcher and now this. Temporary insanity, that’s got to be the explanation.

It occurred to me that I should go back to the bonfire and give myself up. It seemed so clear now, temporary insanity. I’d explain it all to George.

I took a step forward and tripped over a root, falling into a bush. I caught myself, grabbing a handful of leaves, but branches crackled under my weight.

“Listen!” hissed the other cop. “Someone’s there.” He stared out directly at me.

“Forget it,” said George. “We got enough.”

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