The Lighthouse

“Take your shot, that’s what I say.”

“Hod… ”

“I’m still thinking on it, all right?”

Adam shrugged and hopped around, lining up his next shot. Hod watched him and did think on it, and it still made him nervous. He had nothing against jacklighting deer, not on principle. These were lean times and a man had a right to eat, a right to feed his family the best way he could, and to hell with a lot of stupid-ass laws. He’d bought a side of venison from Adam once, traded him ten pounds of fresh sablefish fillets for some venison steaks another time; he didn’t mind doing business that way. But going out himself, running the risk of getting caught, getting fined… he just didn’t like the idea of it. What would Della and the kids do if he wound up in jail? Go on welfare? He had them to think of, four other mouths to feed beside his own. Four for now, anyway; Mandy probably wouldn’t be around much longer, the way she was carrying on now that she’d quit school. Get herself knocked up by that long-haired jerk from Bandon she kept sneaking off with, that was what would happen to her. What could he do about it? She wouldn’t listen to him or Della, you smacked her one and she just looked at you. He knew that look, he’d seen it often enough before. The old fuck-you look…

“… shot, Hod.”

“What?”

“I said it’s your shot. You dreaming or what?”

“Thinking. I told you I was thinking, didn’t I?”

He lined up on the fourteen ball, an easy cut into the side pocket-and missed it. Shit. How could he miss a shot like that? Nervous, that was how. Adam hippity-hopping around like Bugs Bunny, all this talk about jacklighting deer, it was a wonder he didn’t miss every time.

He had left Adam wide open; he saw that and knew it was over. Adam tapped in the six, tapped in the seven with just enough English to give him position, and then tapped in the eight. “My game,” he said, grinning. “Beer’s on you, too, right?”

“Yeah, right.” They’d had a beer side bet on this one and Adam always seemed to win when they had a side bet. Not that Hod figured he was being hustled; Adam wasn’t that good. Just lucky. That was why he’d been able to go out jacklighting and not get caught. Pure luck. Hod didn’t have that kind of luck; first time he went out, game warden would be hiding in the bushes ten feet away when he fired his first round.

There were two stripes still on the table, his last two balls. He gave Adam twenty cents-five for each of the stripes, ten for the eight ball-and went to the bar and called to Barney Nevers for two more Henry’s. Two stools down from where he stood, Seth Bonner was nursing a highball; old Seth must have come in while they were playing the last game.

“Hey, Seth,” he said, “how’s it going?”

“Hell of a question to ask a man just lost his job.”

“Tough about that,” Hod said sympathetically.

“People from California,” Bonner said. “Goddamn college professor. Mr. Jan Ryerson, he says the first time he come around. What kind of name is that for a man? Jan?”

“Man can’t help the name he’s given.”

“Comes all the way up here, takes my job away from me, and for what? Write some damn book. Bookwriter with a name like that, he’s probly queer.”

“Not with a wife like he’s got. She’s a looker, Seth.”

“Don’t mean nothing,” Bonner said. “Lots of ’em go both ways, down there in California. Besides, he probly married her for her money. Her father’s some big mucky-muck politician. That’s how they got hold of the lighthouse.”

Hod shook his head, paid Barney for the two Henry’s, and carried them back to the pool table. Queer-that was a laugh. What did Bonner know about queers? Or anything else, for that matter? He was half cracked, and living alone out at the lighthouse the past three years had only widened the crack. Maybe it was a good thing those people had come up from California. Now Seth had a decent place to live and his sister Emma to take care of him, whether he liked it or not.

Another thing, too. Hod remembered the way that big blond Ryerson had kicked Red the other day, and how he hadn’t backed down from Mitch afterward. Never mind that he was a college professor; he had guts. Probably tough when push came to shove-that quiet type could fool you. Mitch must have sensed the same thing, because he hadn’t tried to push it with Ryerson, hadn’t said much about the incident afterward. Queer? Not that one. No way.

Adam was still hopping around, right foot, left foot, cradling his cue stick across his body like it was that Springfield 30.06 he kept in his van. “Losers rack,” he said, and Hod said, “Yeah, yeah,” and fished the balls out of the return slot and racked them for Adam’s break.

That was when Mitch came in.

Hod knew right away something was wrong. It was the way Mitch moved, hard and angry, and the way he was banging his fisted hands against his thighs. One long look at his face, when he got close enough, and Hod could tell that whatever it was, it was bad. Real bad.

And it was. “Red’s dead,” Mitch said.

“Dead? Christ, Mitch, what-?”