against the wall, holding his hand over the entrance wound. “In front of the children?”
And they heard her. A shriek that came out of the darkness ahead of them. Her shriek. She was coming. She was up there somewhere in the dark and she was running toward them full tilt and the little girl said, “Help us.”
“I’m not your daddy. It’s not my place.”
“I’m going to call you Daddy.”
“Fine,” Teddy said with a sigh and took her hand.
They walked the cliffs overlooking the Shutter Island shore and then they wandered into the cemetery and Teddy found a loaf of bread and some peanut butter and jelly and made them sandwiches in the mausoleum and the little girl was so happy, sitting on his lap, eating her sandwich, and Teddy took her out with him into the graveyard and pointed out his father’s headstone and his mother’s headstone and his own:
“Why are you a bad sailor?” the girl asked.
“I don’t like water.”
“I don’t like water, either. That makes us friends.”
“I guess it does.”
“You’re already dead. You got a whatchamacallit.”
“A headstone.”
“Yeah.”
“I guess I am, then. There was no one in my town.”
“I’m dead too.”
“I know. I’m sorry about that.”
“You didn’t stop her.”
“What could I do? By the time I reached her, she’d already, you know…”
“Oh, boy.”
“What?”
“Here she comes again.”
And there was Rachel walking into the graveyard by the headstone Teddy had knocked over in the storm. She took her time. She was so beautiful, her hair wet and dripping from the rain, and she’d traded in the cleaver for an ax with a long handle and she dragged it beside her and said, “Teddy, come on. They’re mine.”
“I know. I can’t give them to you, though.”
“It’ll be different this time.”
“How?”
“I’m okay now. I know my responsibilities. I got my head right.”
Teddy wept. “I love you so much.”
“And I love you, baby. I do.” She came up and kissed him, really kissed him, her hands on his face and her tongue sliding over his and a low moan traveling up her throat and into his mouth as she kissed him harder and harder and he loved her so much.
“Now give me the girl,” she said.
He handed the girl to her and she held the girl in one arm and picked up the ax in the other and said, “I’ll be right back. Okay?”
“Sure,” Teddy said.
He waved to the girl, knowing she didn’t understand. But it was for her own good. He knew that. You had to make tough decisions when you were an adult, decisions children couldn’t possibly understand. But you made them for the children. And Teddy kept waving, even though the girl wouldn’t wave back as her mother carried her toward the mausoleum and the little girl stared at Teddy, her eyes beyond hope for rescue, resigned to this world, this sacrifice, her mouth still smeared with peanut butter and jelly.
“OH, JESUS!” TEDDY sat up. He was crying. He felt he’d wrenched himself awake, tore his brain into consciousness just to get out of that dream. He could feel it back there in his brain, waiting, its doors wide open. All he had to do was close his eyes and tip his head back toward the pillow and he’d topple right back into it.
“How are you, Marshal?”
He blinked several times into the darkness. “Who’s there?”
Cawley turned on a small lamp. It stood beside his chair in the corner of the room. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to startle you.”
Teddy sat up on the bed. “How long have I been here?”
Cawley gave him a smile of apology. “The pills were a little stronger than I thought. You’ve been out for four hours.”
“Shit.” Teddy rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands.
“You were having nightmares, Marshal. Serious nightmares.”
“I’m in a mental institution on an island in a hurricane,” Teddy said.
“Touche,” Cawley said. “I was here a month before I had a decent night’s sleep. Who’s Dolores?”
Teddy said, “What?” and swung his legs off the side of the bed.
“You kept saying her name.”
“My mouth is dry.”
Cawley nodded and turned his body in the chair, lifted a glass of water off the table beside him. He handed it across to Teddy. “A side effect, I’m afraid. Here.”
Teddy took the glass and drained it in a few gulps.
“How’s the head?”
Teddy remembered why he was in this room in the first place and took a few moments to take stock. Vision clear. No more thumbtacks in his head. Stomach a little queasy, but not too bad. A mild ache in the right side of his head, like a three-day-old bruise, really.
“I’m okay,” he said. “Those were some pills.”
“We aim to please. So who’s Dolores?”
“My wife,” Teddy said. “She’s dead. And, yes, Doctor, I’m still coming to terms with it. Is that okay?”
“It’s perfectly fine, Marshal. And I’m sorry for your loss. She died suddenly?”
Teddy looked at him and laughed.
“What?”
“I’m not really in the mood to be psychoanalyzed, Doc.”
Cawley crossed his legs at the ankles and lit a cigarette. “And I’m not trying to fuck with your head, Marshal. Believe it or not. But something happened in that room tonight with Rachel. It wasn’t just her. I’d be negligent in my duties as her therapist if I didn’t wonder what kind of demons you’re carrying around.”
“What happened in that room?” Teddy said. “I was playing the part she wanted me to.”
Cawley chuckled. “Know thyself, Marshal. Please. If we’d left you two alone, you’re telling me we would have come back to find you both fully clothed?”
Teddy said, “I’m an officer of the law, Doctor. Whatever you think you saw in there, you didn’t.”
Cawley held up a hand. “Fine. As you say.”
“As I say,” Teddy said.
He sat back and smoked and considered Teddy and smoked some more and Teddy could hear the storm outside, could feel the press of it against the walls, feel it pushing through gaps under the roof, and Cawley remained silent and watchful, and Teddy finally said:
“She died in a fire. I miss her like you…If I was underwater, I wouldn’t miss oxygen that much.” He raised his eyebrows at Cawley. “Satisfied?”
Cawley leaned forward and handed Teddy a cigarette and lit it for him. “I loved a woman once in France,” he said. “Don’t tell my wife, okay?”
“Sure.”
“I loved this woman the way you love…well, nothing,” he said, a note of surprise in his voice. “You can’t
