The Dust of 100 Dogs - A. S. King [90]
“You were starting to look pale,” he said. “You need to take care of that foot.”
He finished. Returning with the shovel, he stuck it upright in the sand, peeled off his wet shirt, and leaned down to her. He kissed her, and she grabbed hold of his hair and held him there until he nearly lost his balance.
“I won’t be long,” he whispered, turning toward the sea.
Emer watched him walk into the surf, splashing water on his face and chest to cool off. She imagined him on his dream farm with his dream children and his dream wife. It seemed only fair that God granted her this after so many years of hardship—it seemed only just that she would now have a chance to be truly happy. As Seanie walked back into the firelight, she smiled and tilted her head, feeling deep love twist her innards.
And then, a loud report. Seanie stumbled toward the shovel and fell onto it. He clenched his teeth, clutched his bleeding side, and collapsed.
She leapt to Seanie’s aid, throwing herself down next to him on the cool night sand. He coughed three or four times, gurgling, and then stopped breathing. Emer cradled his head and hugged and kissed him, her face frozen in grief.
She heard someone walking on the beach. Reloading. She scrambled to her feet and hobbled into the trees behind her. Reaching for her flintlock pistol, she loaded it and waited.
The Frenchman approached slowly from the east, his gun scanning the beach for more enemies. He walked toward the two curious boxes and Seanie’s limp body. First, he stopped at the dead body and wiggled it with his foot. Then he took two steps toward the crates, and leaned down to open the lids.
Emer aimed her pistol from the trees and fired.
With one last, almighty roar, the Frenchman fell to his knees and died. When the smoke cleared, Emer kicked him to make sure he was dead. Bent on one knee in the moonlight, holding his head with her left hand, she took a marlinspike and removed his right eyeball with relative ease. She rolled it in the sand next to his head and shoved the spike deep into his empty socket.
Placing her pistol gently into her waistband, she looked toward the sea.
“I curse you!” she screamed at the dark water. “I curse you for all you gave me and for all you pilfered! I curse you for the journeys you begin and the journeys you end! I curse you until I can’t hate you anymore! And I scarcely think I will ever hate you more than on this wretched day!” Her fair hair stuck to her face, wet with sorrow and surf, and her hand-embroidered cotton blouse clung to her, stained with her lover’s blood.
Turning again to the two dead bodies, she retrieved the shovel from underneath Seanie—Seanie, her first and only love. She limped back to the clearing. Looking around to make sure no one was watching, she sat down on the edge of the hole and talked to herself.
“There was only one reason to stop all of this poxy business.” She turned and looked at the distant dead. “What worth is a precious jewel now? Damn it! In all these years, over all this water! And I end up a fool with a lap full of precious nothing.”
She dragged the two crates into the hole and began to cover them quickly, concerned that the Frenchman’s reinforcements would arrive at any minute. She buried the shovel last, on top, and used her hands to fill the remaining depression, covering the sand with sticks and dead leaves.
Returning to the scene of the dead men, she lay down beside Seanie, placed her head on his chest and sobbed.
“It’s like two different lives in the same bloody day.”
Through her sobs, Emer heard footsteps. A voice boomed from the darkness, making her jump. She scrambled to her feet and reloaded her pistol.
“Foul bitch!” he began, in island-accented English. “You have meddled in my life for too many years! I’m sure you didn’t know every whore in these islands heard him scream your name a thousand times! And me, too! Now look at him! Dead!”
Emer saw the man emerging from the tree line, his hands hidden. She had seen him before, on Tortuga and on board the Chester. It was the Frenchman