"You friggin' little bi-' Steiner reeled sideways, spluttering and choking, wiping his streaming eyes. He half recovered, got himself upright and swung his hammer into the air above Nadine's head. "I'll bloody kill you for that!"
And then he saw the blazing torch...
Ray was coming at him, waving the firebrand from side to side, the flames making a dull roaring sound. Steiner immediately dropped the hammer and backed away, his eyes wide with horror.
"Jesus!" Gene was the first to grasp what was happening. "They've covered 'em in petrol!" He leaped forward. "Ray! Ray! Don't do it!"
But Ray had the two capos backed into a corner now. They tumbled over one another, crying out with terror as Ray danced in front of them, jabbing the flaming brand perilously close to their writhing bodies.
"Ray! Ray... Ray..." Baz tried to get in between Ray and the capos, moved towards him in a crouch, his arms extended. "Don't! Just... just don't, OK?"
He didn't seem to be getting through. Ray's eyes were wild a fevered a as though he were in some kind of trance. Jabbing, poking, weaving from side to side, he brought the flames time and again to within centimeters of the terrified capos.
"No! No! I haven't said anything! I won't tell! Urrghhh-' Hutchinson's pleas and squeals were cut short as Steiner elbowed him in the face, the two of them each fighting to get behind the other for protection. On bare knees they crawled, scrabbling at the wall behind them, cornered like rats in a barn. Black oily smoke surrounded them, and the air was filled with the smell of raw spirit.
"Burn 'em, Ray! Jus' do it, man!" Jubo pushed himself into the circle, sucking at his injured hand and egging Ray on.
And then others joined in a urgent mutters through gritted teeth. Go on, Ray, torch those toe-rags! Do it!
"For Chrissake, Jubo!" Gene tried to make a grab at the waving brand of fire, but Ray simply switched hands and fended him off.
"Rrrr... rrrssss..." He was growling, hissing, teeth bared a a wild animal taunting his prey. Baz was frightened of getting too close, of physically intervening, knowing that if he tipped the balance the wrong way, the two capos would go straight up in flames. They'd be burned alive.
Someone wriggled past him, forcing him to one side. Steffie...
"Hey a Ray. Ray... come on, babe. It's OK. Come on a give it to me."
Steffie put a hand on Ray's back, moved it up to his shoulder. Ray flinched, but didn't pull away.
"It's only me, Ray. Come on, that's enough. We've done it, yeah? We've done it."
Steffie's arm was around Ray's shoulder now. She pulled him sideways towards her, holding him tight for a few seconds.
And Ray responded. He lowered the torch. There was no resistance as Gene reached towards him and gently took it.
"OK?" Steffie leaned forward and looked into Ray's face. "OK, babe?"
"Yeah." Ray's head hung down. "Yeah."
Steiner and Hutchinson untangled themselves and rolled over onto their knees, but Gene stopped them from going any further.
"Stay there," he said. "We haven't finished with you yet."
"Say right." Jubo was brandishing the claw hammer in his uninjured hand. "Payback time."
"Whoa, hang on, Jubes." Gene held the torch upright and looked around at the circle of boys. The room was heavy with smoke, hanging in a pall below the high ceiling and giving everything a slightly blurred look.
"What are we gonna do with them?" said Gene. "I mean, seriously."
"How about seriously doing what they were gonna do with us?" Amit had retrieved the pickaxe handle, and he jabbed it at Steiner's shoulder. "How about we get a couple of guns and then chuck these two off the jetty? Give 'em the same sporting chance that we were gonna get?"
"No," said Gene. "No guns. I'm not having that."
"Well, they can't stay here. Not alive, anyhow." Amit gave Steiner another prod. "We either kill 'em or we make 'em swim."
"Give 'em the dinghy." Robbie made the first practical suggestion. "Send 'em back to the mainland."
"The dinghy?" Amit wasn't keen on this. "That's our only way out of here. What do we wanna give 'em that for? Make the sods swim, that's what I say."
"No, the dinghy's not a bad idea," said Gene. "We could maybe build a raft or something if we ever wanted to. Got plenty of wood and water butts and stuff. Come on. Let's get rid of them now, while we can. Then it's done. Yeah?"
"We do a vote," said Jubo. "I votin' we shove 'em on the altar and torch 'em. We take 'em to the jetty and talk about it on the way down."
"I'm not setting light to anybody, Jubes. I'll tell you that now." Gene was adamant.
"You won't need to, mate," said Dyson. "There's plenty of others here that'd do it. Me, for a kick-off. And it's not up to you in any case. So let's get 'em to the jetty and take a vote. We do it like we always do it, yeah? Everybody gets a vote."
Gene looked at Dyson, and seemed ready to argue some more. But then he shrugged. "OK, have it your way. We'll take a vote, and whatever it is I'll go along with it. Hold this, Baz." He handed Baz the flaming torch, went over to the workbench and took down a roll of electric cabling that hung on a nail. Then he rummaged around the cluttered bench until he found a pair of pliers.
"This'll do." Gene cut off a length of cabling. "Right," he said to the capos. "I'm gonna tie this round your ankles. You try anything and you're gonna get whacked. Got it?"
Steiner and Hutchinson scowled up at him but said nothing.
Gene crouched down in front of the capos. He tied one end of the cabling to Hutchinson's left ankle and then began to tie the other to Steiner's right, leaving about a half-meter length between the two.
Robbie turned to Steffie and said, "So where were you anyway a the library?"
"Yeah," said Steffie. "But then we went back down to the art room. Tell you about it later."
"OK." Gene got to his feet. "They can walk, but they can't run. Now get up."
It was a strangely silent procession that made its way down to the jetty. Gene was out in front, alone. Then came Steiner and Hutchinson, hobbled together and flanked on either side by Jubo and Dyson. Baz walked immediately behind them, still carrying the torch a although by this time it was merely smoldering, the oil-soaked material having turned to a fragile bundle of layered ashes.
And then came everybody else, a loose and ragged crowd. So much had happened, and there was so much to think about. Perhaps that was why so little was being said.
Baz held an image in his mind of Steffie putting her arm around Ray's shoulders. Calling him *babe'. It hadn't merely been a gesture of persuasion or restraint. It had been one of comfort and affection a more than that even. Familiarity. The hug of a friend... a loving friend...
And Ray had listened to her, responded to Steffie's words. They knew each other, Baz was sure of it. He glanced behind him, and saw that Ray was walking with Nadine and Steffie now, a threesome, slightly apart from the others. It hurt him to see it. Here was he, back from the dead, having gone through an experience that was sure to give him nightmares for months, and Ray had barely spoken to him. Instead he was walking with Nadine. And Steffie...
They came to the beginning of the jetty, and the capos hung back, plainly terrified of going any further. Hutchinson began to bluster and then to blub.
"You can't do this! We... wouldn't really have hurt you. We were just... Gene! Don't let them. Don't let themmmm..."
Gene turned round to look at him. "Too late for all that," he said. "And I can't save you in any case. We have to go with the vote, mate. Majority rules. Sorry." He seemed to have given in a prepared now to burn these two on the altar, if that was what everyone decided.
Steiner's face had gone a weird grey color beneath his mass of freckles. "Listen, Jubo' a he was trying to sound reasonable, but his voice shook as he spoke a *back there... you know... with the vice. I was just worried about the girls, right? I had to find them before the boat came back. Sure, it was a bit rough a but I was running out of time, yeah? I didn't have any choice. Look. We don't need to do this... we can talk..."
Jubo reached in his pocket as Steiner blabbered on.
"And we can all just stay here, can't we? Now that Preacher's gone? We could all-"
Jubo thrust a cigarette lighter into Steiner's face and clicked it. Steiner jumped back from the flame, barging into Hutchinson so that the two of them almost fell.
"Guess which way me gonna vote," said Jubo. "You wan' me give you a clue?" He waved the lighter a couple of times and put it away. "Jus' keep walkin'," he said.
The altar was a horrible sight. The blackened remains of Old Bill still lay there, a charred and rain-sodden mess amongst the bits of unburned wood. Baz looked at it for a moment and turned away. No matter how much he had suffered at the hands of Steiner and Hutchinson, he knew that he could never condemn them to that a nor stand by and watch it happen. He wondered if he was going to be put in the crazy position of having to defend the pair.
"OK," said Gene. "We'll take a vote then." He waved a hand towards the altar. "Either we sling 'em on there and set light to them, or we kick them off the island. Which is it gonna be? Hands up those who want to watch them burn."
Hutchinson collapsed. He fell to his knees, wailing like a child. "No... nooo..."
"Hands up!" cried Gene.
But nobody raised a finger, not even Jubo. The boys shuffled uncomfortably, glancing at one another beneath lowered brows.
He was a clever guy, thought Baz, that Gene. He'd known all along that nobody in their right minds would have voted for such a terrible thing once they were faced with the reality of it.
"OK. So they can have the dinghy and take their chances. Come on." Gene moved away from the altar and walked to the edge of the jetty. "I'll get the engine started." He began to clamber down the stony slope.
Steiner and Hutchinson were being roughly manhandled across the jetty. Maybe there was a general feeling that they'd got off lightly, or maybe some of the boys saw this as their last chance to get a bit of revenge in, but the capos were being helped on their way by numerous sly kicks and punches.
Baz didn't join in. It had already occurred to him that the capos weren't getting off lightly at all...
Then, amidst the hoots and jeers of the boys, came one of those sudden and unaccountable pauses a a chance moment when everybody must have been drawing breath at the same time. An empty space. And into that space, from somewhere behind him, Baz heard a voice, low and urgent.
"Well, we can't go on like this. You're gonna have to tell him sometime-' The speaker stopped, apparently aware of the silence. Baz turned round and saw Steffie's guilty face, a sideways glance towards him, her mouth still close to Ray's ear.
Baz could feel himself beginning to burn inside, a horrible sense that he was being betrayed in some way.
Then Dyson was grabbing his arm, pulling him towards the slope of the jetty. "Come on, mate. You're missing it all."
Baz knew that he was missing something, but he couldn't figure out what.
Drrm-dm-dumdum...
Gene had already got the motor started. He stood up in the stern of the boat and shouted, "OK! Get 'em in here." Steiner and Hutchinson were being hustled down the slope.
Baz looked at the dinghy, the little Seagull motor chugging away, and it was like looking at an old friend. He knew every bit of that thing now, a deep and personal contact. Yet it had only been today that he'd first sat in it. Only today. Already it seemed like a lifetime ago.
"Hey, Gene!" he shouted.
Gene looked up at the sound of his name, brushing his fingers back through his unruly curls. "What?"
"There's a fishing line in there," said Baz. "I wanna keep it. Get it for me, willya?"
Gene looked around the boat and stooped down. "What, this thing?" He held up the fishing spool.
"Yeah."
"OK."
Steiner and Hutchinson were in the boat. They sat side by side in the stern, two wretched figures, and Baz could see Gene leaning forward and giving instructions. Move the tiller this way, move it that way. Throttle open, throttle closed. Reverse gear, forward gear. Baz knew all about it.
Jubo and Amit had moved a little closer to the waterline. Baz saw Jubo stoop to pick up a stone, and then Dyson, off to his right, do the same.
Gene got out of the boat. He was pointing towards the crane and church tower, dark shapes in the mist. He might have been giving directions to a couple of tourists.
The boat began to pull away, bumping awkwardly along the concrete blocks of the jetty. Steiner was at the tiller. He swung it round the wrong way, and the dinghy hit the jetty again. Then he seemed to get the hang of it, and the boat nosed its way into clear water.
"Ow!" Hutchinson grabbed at his elbow a somebody had winged a stone at him. Jubo.
"Ey! That one from me, you rass!"
Another stone. And another. Gene ducked low as a growing hail of stones rained down towards the boat. Everyone had seen their chance, and now they were all at it, scrabbling around on the side of the jetty for likely lumps of stone and concrete.
"Yah! Get out of here, you friggin' weirdos!"
The engine nearly cut out a Steiner presumably having turned the throttle the wrong way a and Hutchinson's voice could be heard, shouting above the catcalls of the boys.
"You call me a weirdo?" He twisted round in his seat, his face snarling with pain and rage. "Yeah, well, I know a few things you don't! Ask that one!"
He raised an arm and pointed to the top of the jetty, where Nadine and Ray and Steffie stood all in a row. "Yeah a that little tart!"
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE.
A couple of the boys turned round to look, just briefly, but most took no notice. They continued to hurl stones after the receding boat.
"Yah! Bloody good riddance!"
Baz stared at Hutchinson. It was the second time that the capo had hinted at some private piece of knowledge, some hidden information. What was it that he was carrying away with him?
Steiner had apparently learned how to work the throttle, and the dinghy was soon out of throwing range. Its outline became less distinct as it approached the fallen crane and tower, heavy mist enveloping it, flattening it to a vague grey shape. The engine note slowed. Baz could just see the dinghy edging its way through the arch of stone and metal, and then it was gone, disappearing into the mist.
They stood there motionless, the X-Isle boys, and listened to the fading sound of the Seagull motor. For a long time it remained audible, a buzzing insect, shrinking as it flew. A bee... a fly... a gnat... a nothing. Gone.
And even when there was nothing left to see or hear, each boy remained where he was, looking out at the blank white fog, a long moment of reflection.
Gene turned round and climbed the stony slope, and then others began to move as well. They became a group again, gathering together at the top of the jetty, drawing Ray and the two girls into their number.
Gene handed Baz the fishing spool. "Reckon they'll make it?"