Dolores Claiborne(52)

He give me a hard look then, Andy, his smile dryin up little by little. 'You got that smart look on your face again,' he says, 'the one I don't much care for.'

'Tough titty,' I says.

He looked at me for a long time, tryin to figure out what was goin on inside my head, but I guess it was as much a mystery to him then as ever. He pooched his lip out again n sighed so hard he blew back the lock of hair that'd fallen on his forehead.

'Most women don't understand the first thing about money, Dolores,' he says, 'n you're no exception to the rule. I put it all together in one account, that's all . . . so it'd draw more interest. I didn't tell you because I didn't want to listen to a lot of your ignorant bullshit. Well, I've had to listen to some anyway, like I just about always do, but enough's enough.' Then he raised up the eclipse-viewer again to show me the subject was closed.

'One account in your own name,' I says.

'So what?' he ast. By then it was like we was sittin in a deep twilight, and the trees had begun fadin against the horizon. I could hear a whippoorwill singin from behind the house, and a nightjar from somwhere else. It felt like the temperature had begun to drop, too. It all gave me the strangest feelin like livin in a dream that's somehow turned real. 'Why shouldn't it be in my name? I'm their father, ain't I?'

'Well, your blood is in em. If that makes you a father, I guess you are one.'

I could see him tryin to figure out if that one was worth pickin up and yankin on awhile, and decidin it wa'ant. 'You don't want to talk about this anymore, Dolores,' he says. 'I'm warnin you.'

'Well, maybe just a little more,' I says back, smiling. 'You forgot all about the surprise, you see.'

He looked at me, suspicious again. 'What the f**k're you babblin on about, Dolores?'

'Well, I went to see the man in charge of the savins department at Coastal Northern in Jonesport,' I says. 'A nice man named Mr Pease. I explained what happened, and he was awful upset. Especially when I showed him the original savins books weren't missin, like you told him they were.'

That was when Joe lost what little int'rest in the eclipse he'd had. He just sat there in that shitty old rocker of his, starin at me with his eyes wide open. There was thunder on his brow n his lips were pressed down into a thin white line like a scar. He'd dropped the eclipse-viewer back into his lap and his hands were openin and closin, real slow.

'It turned out you weren't supposed to do that,' I told him. 'Mr Pease checked to see if the money was still in the bank. When he found out it was, we both heaved a big sigh of relief. He ast me if I wanted him to call the cops n tell em what happened. I could see from his face he was hopin like hell I'd say no. I ast if he could issue that money over to me. He looked it up in a book n said he could. So I said, "That's what we'll do, then." And he did it. So that's why I ain't worried about the kids' money anymore, Joe - I've got it now instead of you. Ain't that a corker of a surprise?'

'You lie!' Joe shouted at me, n stood up so fast his rocker almost fell over. The eclipse-viewer fell out of his lap n broke to pieces when it hit the porch floor. I wish I had a pitcher of the way he looked just then; I'd stuck it to him, all right - and it went in all the way to the hilt. The expression on the dirty sonofawhore's face was purt-near worth everythin I'd been through since that day on the ferry with Selena. 'They can't do that!' he yells. 'You can't touch a cent of that dough, can't even look at the f**kin passbook -'

- 'Oh no?' I says. 'Then how come I know you already spent three hundred of it? I'm thankful it wasn't more, but it still makes me mad as hell every time I think of it. You're nothing but a thief, Joe St George - one so low he'd even steal from his own children!'

His face was as white as a corpse's in the gloom. Only his eyes was alive, and they were burnin with hate. His hands was held out in front of him, openin and closin. I glanced down for just a second and saw the sun - less'n half by then, just a fat crescent - reflected over n over in the shattered pieces of smoked glass layin around his feet. Then I looked back at him again. It wouldn't do to take my eyes off him for long, not with the mood he was in.

'What did you spend that three hundred on, Joe? Whores? Poker? Some of both? I know it wa'ant another junker, because there ain't any new ones out back.'

He didn't say nothin, just stood there with his hands openin and closin, and behind him I could see the first lightnin bugs stitchin their lights across the dooryard. The boats out on the reach were just ghosts by then, and I thought of Vera. I figured if she wasn't in seventh heaven already, she was prob'ly in the vestibule. Not that I had any business thinkin about Vera; it was Joe I had to keep my mind on. I wanted to get him movin, and I judged one more good push'd do it.

'I guess I don't care what you spent it on, anyway,' I says. 'I got the rest, and that's good enough for me. You can just go f**k yourself. . . if you can get your old limp noodle to stand up, that is.'

He stumbled across the porch, crunchin the pieces of the eclipse-viewer under his shoes, and grabbed me by the arms. I could have gotten away from him, but I didn't want to. Not just then.

'You want to watch your fresh mouth,' he whispered, blowin Scotch fumes down into my face. 'If you don't, I'm apt to.'