Synopsis: Things are coming to a boil. Peter and the AP lady have gone to the boat. Peter is surprised to find the boat open, but when he descends into the cabin, he finds Anne impatiently waiting for him with a pistol in her hand.
Chapter Fifteen
Anne looked at Peter as if he were a misbehaving child. "I promised you a surprise if Sam didn't call," she said. "Well, he didn't call, so here I am." Her voice deepened and strengthened. "Your friends, and the rest of America's queers, will have to learn that the Priesthood is not to be fucked with! Who's with you? Marge?"
For the barest instant Peter wondered if he could be dreaming. He was almost as surprised by Anne's choice of coarse language as he was her appearance -- surprised and frozen with fear!
He tried to shout a warning to Mar, but his mouth was suddenly dry and incapable of forming letters. Instead, half expecting to feel the numbing blow of a bullet smashing into his gut, he made a sound midway between a bellow and a sob, unfortunately loud enough to attract her attention.
"What'd you say, Pete?" she asked as she descended into the cabin.
Anne smiled in a peculiarly crooked way. "Who in hell is this?" she asked querulously. "I thought Marge was here! What's your name?" Anne's eyes had a reptilian glitter in the cabin's subdued light.
Mar's eyes had adjusted to the gloom by this time, and she stared, fascinated, at the pistol in Anne's hands. "Who are you?" she asked timidly. "What are you doing here?"
"You just shut up!" Anne snapped. "I'll ask the questions! Once again, what's your name?" Her voice had taken on a cold edge. This was the voice Peter had heard on the phone the evening before. Before Mar could answer, Anne called over her shoulder, "You can come out, now, Gene."
The door to the head swung open and a big man stepped into the salon. Anne made the introductions as if they were sitting on her patio. "Gene, I'd like you to meet Pete Baylis. You've heard a lot about him. Pete, this is Gene. He's an associate of mine." The men warily nodded at each other.
"Gene, why don't you bring the little queer out? He ought to join the party."
Gene brushed past Peter and Mar, ducking under the overhead, on his way into the after cabin.
Peter watched him out of sight, then turned back to Anne. He still didn't trust himself to speak. Clammy sweat coated his palms.
"I still didn't catch your name," Anne said to Mar.
Peter wondered how Mar would handle this.
"My name is Mary Taylor," she said, "and I work for the Associated Press." As frightened as he was, Peter marvelled at her cool demeanor. She could very well have been a seasoned prisoner of war reciting her name, rank, and serial number.
"A goddamn reporter. Isn't that great!" Anne's cold blue eyes turned toward Peter. "Pete, you should have known better than to involve the media in this," she said reproachfully.
Peter was a fish out of water. His bearings were gone. "What . . . how . . .?"
Anne smiled again, a little less menacingly. "It's really very simple," she said patiently, as if she were addressing a child, "between you and the abortionists, your ideas threaten the values I've fought for all my life. . ." She paused as a bleary-eyed Kenny suddenly appeared, shuffling like a sleepwalker across the cabin sole, closely followed by a grimly threatening Gene. His eyes fell on Peter, and he nodded blankly.
In addition to the boy's dazed and disheveled appearance, and the duct tape that covered his mouth, Peter's eyes were drawn to a dirty, blood encrusted bandage on the boy's left hand. He sighed.
Gene gave the boy a final push, and Kenny slumped lifelessly to the settee next to Peter and Mar.
Anne smiled again, a little less menacingly. "You had to be stopped. Can't you see that? Your silly idea was threatening the foundations of our society! I didn't care about Gordon. He's always been weak. But what if my little boys, Billy and Jimmy, encouraged by your law, decided to become queers, or Kathy decided to spend her life with another woman? And not just my children, but suppose young people like Billy and Jimmy and Kathy, all across this great country of ours, decided to hell with family responsibilities; that the cost of raising and educating children was simply too high?
"I'll tell you what would happen!" Anne's voice with rising with her emotions. "The black races and the yellow races and the brown races would take over. They are already outbreeding us to an enormous degree, and soon we'd be working for them!"
As near as Peter could tell in the dim light, Gene was one of `them.' He wondered how this racist babble was going over with Gene.
Her voice lost some of its frantic edge. "That's why we had to stop you, Pete. Nothing personal, you understand. I was really beginning to care for you, but I love my country more, and now I despise you for what you have done to it and to my family!"
Hoping to look like John Wayne, but sounding more like a frightened adolescent, Peter croaked, "Anne, please put that gun down. This is something we can work out. Now that I understand your point of view . . ."
Mar cut in. There was nothing wrong with her voice. "Anne is that your name?" Anne nodded. "Anne," Mar said firmly but unhelpfully, "your major premise is flawed."
Peter frantically shook his head, but Mar ignored him and put both their heads firmly on the chopping block. Inwardly, Peter moaned If you've got a death wish, fine. But please, please, don't take me with you. Dimly, he heard her continue: "Study after study proves conclusively that homosexuality is not a matter of choice . . ."
Peter held his breath, waiting for the explosion. Instead, Anne smiled sadly at Mar, and asked, "Is that what you really believe? Haven't you read the Bible? Of course, it really doesn't matter, now, because I'm afraid you're going to have to come with us."
Peter tried again. "Annie, come on," he coaxed. "Give me your gun. We'll go up to the club and have a drink, and that'll be the end of it. Isn't that right Mar?"
Probably realizing she had been talking when she should have been listening, an obviously chastened Mar nodded. "Of course," she said.
