It was a little after two-thirty when he left the premises, on foot. It was a relief to be out in the open air after the confines of the house; his gloomy spirits rose. He knew where he was heading: he'd spotted a small general store not more than half a mile back along the highway from the turnoff down to the house. Meanwhile, there were incidental pleasures along the way: a radiant smile from a local girl hanging out washing to dry; the scent of some flower in the hedgerow; the drone of a jet overhead, and his looking up, squinting against the brightness of the sky, to see it making a white chalk line on the blue.
It was a good day to be in love, and for some strange reason that's how he felt: like a man in love. Perhaps there was an end to his confusions in sight; perhaps, after all, when the shaking and the tears were over, he could settle down with Rachel and live the kind of lush life he knew he deserved. He wasn't a bad man; he hadn't done any harm to anybody. All that had happened of late-the death of Margie, the business with the journal, the chaos attending Cadmus's demise-none of it had been his responsibility. All he wanted-all he'd ever wanted-was to be seen and accepted as the prince he was. Once he'd achieved that modest aim there'd be a golden time again; he was certain of it. Garrison would finally shrug off his depressions, and put his energies back where they belonged, organizing the family business. Old dreams would be realized and new futures made. The past, and all its grimy secrets, would be footnotes in a book of victories.
All these happy thoughts went through his head as he walked, and by the time he reached the store the profound unease that had visited him in the house had been eclipsed. He went about the store whistling; picked up some soda, some doughnuts and two packs of cigarettes. Then he sat outside on the wall of the red-dirt parking lot and drank and ate and smoked and enjoyed the warmth of the sun. After an idling while it occurred to him that perhaps he should return to the house prepared to defend himself. So he went back into the store, and wandered around until he found a kitchen knife that was pretty much to his purpose. He bought it, and went back out to sit on the wall again and finish his little meal. The doughnuts and soda had given him a pleasant sugar buzz; there was quite a spring in his step when he finally started on back to the house.
Galilee's reserves of strength were all used up by the time Rachel and Niolopua got him to the car. He'd become a dead weight, barely able to lift his head for more than a few moments before it sank down again. On the journey back to Anahola he was dearly fighting hard to stay conscious. His eyes would flicker open for a time and he'd speak, then he'd lapse into long periods when he seemed nearly comatose. Even during the periods of consciousness he was barely lucid. Most of what he said was muttered fragments. Was he reliving the destruction of The Samarkand? It seemed perhaps he was, the way he'd suddenly shout, his face a grimace. At one point he began to make choking sounds, and for several agonizing seconds his body stiffened in Rachel's arms, every muscle hard as stone, as he desperately tried to draw breath. Then, just as suddenly as it had begun, the attack ceased and he relaxed in her embrace, his breathing quite regular.
After that, they got to the house without further incident. It was almost night by the time they arrived, and the house was in darkness. But Galilee seemed to know where they were, despite his delirium, because as they escorted him up the path, his weight borne almost entirely by Niolopua, he raised his head a few inches, and looked at the house from beneath his heavy lids.
"Are… they… there?" he said.
"Who?"
"The women," he replied.
"No, baby," Rachel said. "It's just us."
He made the tiniest of smiles, his eyes still fixed on the murky house. "Let me sleep," he said. "They'll come."
She didn't argue with him. If the thought of the Geary women returning here comforted him, then that was fine and dandy. And the prospect seemed to motivate him for those few yards. He made an agonizing effort to enter the house under his own steam, as though there was some point of honor here: that he, who had raised this house, did not want to be seen returning into it with his strength so reduced he could not step over the threshold without help. Once the attempt at autonomy had been made, however, and he was inside, he had no choice but to relinquish himself to Rachel and Niolopua's support. His head drooped again, his eyes closed.
Niolopua suggested they lay him down on the couch, but Rachel had no doubt where he would recover most quickly: upstairs, in the carved, painted bed. It was hard work getting him up the flight of stairs, but Niolopua put his back to the task, and after five minutes of ungainly struggle they got up to the top. From there it was easy enough: along the landing, through the door, and onto the bed.
Rachel tucked a pillow under, Galilee's head, and pulled the sheets out from under his body to cover him. He was cold again, as he'd been when she'd first found him, but at least he didn't have the same ashen pallor. His lips were dry and cracked, so she fetched some balm, and applied it thickly. Then she tore away the remains of his vest, and examined the contusions on his torso. None of them were bleeding, so she fetched a washcloth and bathed them, one by one, just to be sure there wasn't any dirt in the wounds. Niolopua helped her roll Galilee over so that Rachel could bathe the cuts on his back. Then she unbuckled his belt and together they removed his pants. Now he lay completely naked on the white sheet, his massive languorous form sprawled on the bed as though he'd fallen there, out of heaven.
"Can I go now?" Niolopua said. He was plainly uncomfortable at being in the room with his father while he lay there in this state. "I'll just be downstairs. Call me if you need me," and off he went.
Rachel went back to the bathroom and washed out the cloths she'd used to dean the wounds. When she came back into the room she couldn't help but stop for a moment and drink in the sight before her. Oh, he was beautiful. Even in this profound repose, with the great mass of his muscle diminished by deprivation, there was still power in him. In those immense arms, which had so effortlessly wrapped her up; in the thick trunk of his neck; in that aristocratic head of his, with its high bones; his mouth, shiny with balm, his brow, deeply etched, his dense, black-and-salt beard. And down past the raked muscle of his belly, the other power here, presently dormant. Lying against his groin in its sleeping state, hooded and huge. She would have a child out of him, she thought, looking at him like this; whatever the risks to her own body, she would have something of him inside her, as proof of their union.
She set to washing the wounds on his thighs and shins; tenderly, tenderly. There was something about his utter passivity that was unbearably erotic. She was wet thinking of what it would be like to sit astride him; to run his flesh in the groove of her sex until it hardened, then take him up inside her. She tried to put the thought away, and concentrate on the business of tending to him, but her mind, and her gaze, returned again and again to his groin. Though he showed no sign of stirring from his sleep, she had the uncanny sense that his sex was aware of her. Wishful thinking, of course; and yet the suspicion persisted. Galilee was lost in dreams, but his cock was awake. Though she was working at his feet now, it stirred and thickened. The hood drew back a little as its head swelled with blood.
She put down the washcloth, and reached between her legs. It knew what she was up to. It saw with the glistening slit of its eye; it luxuriated in the heat off her blushing face. She touched herself, running her fingers over her labia then sliding them up into her body. Then she took the wetness and ran it, oh-so-Iightly, up and down the length of his cock. It responded like a stroked animal, rising to press its black spine against her caress, luxuriating in her touch.