The path was like a creek of black water, and I silently trod along it and beneath the oaks and the huge pines that swayed overhead. A wind came up. There was a whirl and gush of leaves as the forest undulated erotically. I paused again, thought I heard Carol Marie's voice but couldn't be sure.
I heard the dry crinkling of leaves. An animal? No. There it was. Someone whispering. Oh, Jesus. I froze. It was coming from over there, I realized, just up a ways. I thought of announcing myself, but I hadn't learned anything from any of them by being direct and honest. So I pressed on, hoping to catch a snippet of conversation, a piece to the puzzle of this whole thing. An indication that would tell me what was really going on here. There was a small open area. I could see that. The trees gave way. The night pushed back. But through the dim light and the tangle of branches and leaves I couldn't see anyone standing there. I moved still closer. I heard whispering, hushed conversation. Whoever it was, I realized, was sitting down, perhaps perched on some logs or even the forest floor.
Then I saw Loretta's dress, the big baggy one.
It was flat on the ground, lying there empty, lifeless, formless. She'd stripped it off and thrown it aside among the leaves and dirt. My eyes darted from the abandoned clothing. I moved around a tree trunk, and some twenty feet away, Loretta's naked white body glowed like a fleshy moon. She was leaning forward, straddling another body. I nearly shouted out. That wasn't a dead body beneath her and this wasn't some kind of bizarre murder ritual, was it? No. I saw the person beneath her move. And I saw Loretta lift herself up slightly, then lower herself back down. And next I heard a moan. My stomach turned a second time. Oh, my God. Was it the two sisters, were they having sex, was that it, was that why Helen and Carol Marie hated each other?
No. I shifted around a tree just as another deep satisfied moan rose into the night. It was the groan of a man, and beneath Loretta I saw a pair of pants splayed open and pulled halfway down. I caught my breath. Loretta was totally naked, pinning someone beneath her and humping up and down. And now they were both doing it, thrusting and moaning as they fucked. I stepped around, and beneath Loretta I spied the familiar brown hair, the pressed shirt, the thick, smooth arms. I saw a corner of his face, now recognized the voice of Ray Preston.
“Oh, God.”
Chapter 24
“Oh, God!” repeated Maddy, jerking me out of trance. “How could I have missed that?”
I'd been brought back much too quickly. Maddy hadn't even eased me out of it. No number routine. No reeling me back with coy words and gentle coaching. None of that stuff. Just pop. End of film, end of dream sequence. She'd heaved me out of that world and dumped me back into this one with one crude tug. I rubbed my eyes, stared upward from the recliner. Wooden ceiling. Boards. That was right. There were no pines and oaks swirling overhead like palm trees. No, this was a fixed wooden ceiling. Trance room. Maddy's house. Island. Forget then and there, Loretta and Chicago.
“How could I have been so goddamned stupid?” cursed Maddy. “I can't believe it!”
I could barely move, barely keep my eyes open. Maddy, meanwhile, was sitting up and dragging herself into her wheelchair. It seemed to take her no effort. With her thin, muscular arms, she was holding on to the arms of the chair, lifting her body from the black leather recliner. I watched her like a movie. The two of us here in the same room. But the two of us separate, not connected, not of the same dimension.
In an instant she was in her wheelchair, now positioning her lifeless legs, pinning them down, strapping them into place with Velcro ties. Then she was pulling out that wand, the fishing-rod gizmo she had rigged up to act as a cane. With a heave, she was off, rolling across the huge room, our trance room, that was meant to be a ballroom. A ceiling that soared some thirty feet. A room that was at least that wide, at least twice that long, where orchestras hauled by steamer from Chicago were supposed to play for the chewing-gum magnates and the department-store kings.
Lying on my side, I saw that Maddy was barreling over the planks, headed straight for the three huge leaded-glass windows at the far end. I was sure she would crash into one. But somehow she knew. Maybe via the wand/cane thing she could feel it, sense it. Or maybe my brilliant sister just knew how far she could go; maybe she'd developed batlike radar. Just at the last moment, just when I was set to force a shout, she clenched one wheel of the chair and went spinning around. With another heave, she was off, now zooming toward the Tiffany dome.
“Why didn't I get it?” said Maddy, continuing to berate herself. “I should have put it together. Ray and Loretta. I didn't even suspect that they might have been lovers.”
I lay there like an invalid, and spoke with a faint voice. “They might not have been.”
“What?”
“Just because they were having sex doesn't mean they were lovers.” I added a brilliant and wise observation, saying, “Sex and love aren't the same, you know.”
This was Maddy's form of pacing, this zooming back and forth. And it drove me crazy the way she ricocheted about like a pinball. She was now roaring toward the structure that held the stained-glass dome over the open stairwell. Did she sense it? Did she know how close she was? Oh, Maddy. I wanted to call out, but she hated that. Hated when I was, as she put it, overprotective. Still, she was about to crash, that much was clear. I couldn't just lie there.
I propped myself up, called out, “Maddy—”
“What?”
Proving me unnecessary, she braked, slowed herself, and coasted up to the wall, tagged it with her hand as if it were first base. Then she turned, and with another push sent herself wheeling into the middle of the room. My dear sister was stuck on high.
“I don't know,” I mumbled, retreating and settling back into the recliner.
“No, maybe you're right. Maybe you've got something there. They might not have been lovers. But at the same time, it probably wasn't rape, either.”
“She was on top. And if anything, she was holding him down.”
Maddy braked to a complete stop, turned the chair toward me. “What do you mean, Alex? Bring back that scene. Slip into a light trance and let yourself see it again.”
“Maddy, please,” I chided, “I'm not a VCR.”
“Of course you are.” And as if by remote, she called, “Close your eyes, Breathe in. Out. Listen to me count: One. And two. And three.”
I was that easy, that suggestible. That subservient. My eyes closed and I popped back to then and there, flipping realities as easily as flipping the channel. The woods. Okay. Just peer through the dark. Look past the bushes and trees. I saw what I needed, then opened my eyes and found myself back on the recliner in that room.
‘‘Loretta wasn't just straddling him,” I reported. “She was leaning forward. You know, reaching out, holding his arms to the ground.”
“She had him pinned?”
“Exactly. He didn't really look like he wanted to go anywhere. I mean, he was obviously really into it, so to speak. But it was also obvious Loretta wasn't going to let him go anywhere, either.”
“Do you have a problem with that, with aggressive women?”
“Oh, Christ, Maddy. Of course not. That's not the point.”
“What is?” asked my shrinky sister. “I just want to make sure you don't have a bias in reporting what you saw.”
“I don't. And now that I think about it, now that I look at it again, Loretta looked like she had a purpose.”
“Go on.”
“Oh, I don't know.”
“Yes, you do.”
“Well, she was staring down at him, for Christ's sake. You know, studying him, looking to make sure he was lost in it.”
“What, the sex?”
“Yeah,” I replied, “Like she wanted to make sure she had him completely.”
Maddy muttered, “Control.”
Somewhere behind me, I heard her, my sister, now rolling slowly across the room. Nothing quick. Not now. Maddy's anxious energy was zapped, overwhelmed by a wave of though
t, deep and provocative. I could tell by the slow, unsteady pace of her chair.
“God, I wish I'd just had a couple more sessions with Loretta,” said Maddy. “There was something more she wanted to tell me. And I'm sure this was part of it. I was just about to crack her wide open. It would have all come out.”
“You're talking about her like she was a real nut.” I laughed, couldn't help it. “Which I suppose she was.”
Maddy ignored me, which made me feel like the stupid little brother. So naive. My sister just pushed on, approaching the French doors that opened onto the balcony and all of Lake Michigan.
My eyes settled shut. I was exhausted, couldn't move. I'd been used and abused, my memory taken and plundered. A part of me felt raped, actually. Like I'd been coerced against my will, been forced to hand over more than I wanted, gone farther than I could possibly go. I'd gone into my memory bank and not simply ransacked it, but wiped it clean. Well, maybe not clean. There was more there. More to tell. The rest of the story to finish. The remainder of that night. Oh, God, so much blood. It had been everywhere.
“Helen was probably killed about an hour after that,” I said. “At least, I don't think she was dead then, you know, when I sneaked out into the woods.”
“No, I don't think so, either.”
I opened my eyes. Maddy had pulled up next to the screen door. Rather than going out, however, she was running her left hand up the screen. Did she know something I didn't? Had she possibly picked up on something that I'd said?
“Why do you say that?” I demanded.
“Nothing. Just a hunch.”
“Yeah, right. Since when do you—”
“Control. I think that's what this is all about,” said Maddy, not paying me the slightest bit of attention. “Loretta feared the world because she couldn't control it. That's why she wouldn't go any farther than the library. That's why she wouldn't go out into society. She didn't trust it, didn't feel protected.”
Maddy was playing both hands over the screen now, slowly moving them up and down, palms against the mesh. As if she were gently massaging a lover. Rubbing. Caressing. And she talked on. Not to me. Perhaps to someone else. Some fantasy. But not me. I was gone. Not of importance right then.
“Something traumatic happened to Loretta,” continued Maddy, sounding her thoughts and theories. “Not when she was a kid, but older. A teenager maybe. I don't think it was just the death of her mother. It was something harsher. And from then on, everything was changed. She never said so specifically, but I drew a chart of it all. Her life. When she stopped going out. And it wasn't long after her father married Helen and it wasn't long after they moved into that house. That's when it started. Or rather that's when it ended, her life, her dreams.”
“So she came to you to tell you something about her family—what Billy had done, the car accident, I mean, and the little girl. Maybe even where Billy was. But all this other stuff came out?”
“Yes. It was all a matter of trust. Gaining her trust, earning it. And Loretta wasn't all that sure she wanted to betray her family. So she told me a lot about herself. I guess you could say, in our seven or eight sessions, Loretta and I were just getting to know one another.” Her head turned toward the door and the lake; it almost appeared that she could see the water, its blue-ness, the tips of the whitecaps, and she added, “Loretta was just so bound up in shame and guilt.”
An earlier thought returned. “You know, I wondered before if Loretta might have been raped. I mean, when she was young. What do you think?”
Maddy turned to me. Stared at me with her blind eyes. With those big sunglasses.
“It didn't occur to me back then when she was in therapy. But, yes, she very well could have been.”
“And the poem.”
“ ‘The Rape of Lucrece.’ Of course. That would explain her fascination with it.”
I closed my eyes. Let me hear her voice. Let her chant those lines again.
And mimicking Loretta, my voice taking on her sweet, deep tones, I recited:
“Poor hand, why quiver'st thou in this decree?
Honour thyself to rid me of this shame;
For if I die, my honour lives in thee,
But if I live, thou liv'st in my defame.”
Neither Maddy nor I said anything for a long time. We let the weight of Shakespeare meld with the possible, probable, tragedy of Loretta. We let all of it pin us down with horrible thoughts and endless speculation. Dear Lord, what, if anything, had happened to that poor woman in her youth and how was it twisted, even kneaded, into the present?
“It's no wonder Loretta wanted to kill herself said Maddy.
“What do you mean?”
“Suicide is the ultimate and ultimately final act of control.”
“But you yourself said you don't think she killed Helen.”
“Yes, but by claiming to have done it, she's seizing control of the entire situation.”
I closed my eyes. Rubbed my temples. I couldn't get up. That would mean moving into the present. Dumping the past. And part of me was still back there.
“Maddy, I feel all strung out. The physical part of me might be here, but I think my aura's still back there. You know, in those woods. In that night. In that time.”
“Would you like to go back?”
“I have to.”
“Why?”
“Helen's about to be killed.”
“But you can't change that. What happened has happened. Helen is dead.”
“Of course.” Then why did I want to return to those few hours when I was so brutally attacked and Helen so hideously butchered? “But I have to tell you about it. I have to let go of it. Get it out of me. There's something there.”
“Very good.”
I closed my eyes, and the next thing I knew I saw leaves and tree trunks and a naked, pasty-white body bucking and riding into delight.
Chapter 25
It wasn't a pretty sight, either, and I wasn't much of a voyeur. I'd seen enough to make my mind recoil, and so I kept my presence hidden, turned and more quietly than ever began to make my way through the bushes and trees, down the path, back to the road, out of there, away from them. Oh, shit. Loretta and Ray. How long had this been going on and how serious were they, this agoraphobic woman and this mournful, rageful dry cleaner? I heard them somewhere behind me. A groan of desire and lust and pleasure clawing into the heavens. Just wait, I thought, my feet quickly padding along, carrying me away. Just wait until Maddy hears about this.
“No shit, Sherlock.”
The two of them, Loretta and Ray, had breached the hostile boundaries between their two families. Was it love that compelled them so? A sense of duty? Oh, God. This was just like a Shakespeare drama. No, a tragedy, because I sensed this was all about to come to a head. That nothing but pain and death would explode, soon splatter all of this with a shroud of blood.
Not far from me I heard something crack, perhaps the proverbial twig snapping beneath a foot. Another soul was out here, and I stopped, stood completely frozen except for my heart that thumped and swelled. Helen had been here before, knife in hand. Now I understood why. Helen hadn't come slashing out of the darkness because Loretta was being attacked. There had been no attack. Helen had come racing out of the dark, knife in hand, because she knew about Loretta and Ray. Hated it, the very thought of them together, having sex. Was revolted. And Helen had come chasing through the woods, ready to cut the whole thing to pieces. The Ray-Loretta thing.
So was that Helen now out here, lurking in the woods? A cool finger of fear zipped up my spine, tickled the back of my neck. I pressed myself up against a tree, hugged the coarse bark. Was she out there, that bitch of a stepmother? Loretta had saved me before, stopped Helen just before she attacked, but now I was on my own and defenseless. No weapon. No Loretta.
Or perhaps I was wrong. Perhaps there was no Helen out here. Maybe instead it was them, the odd lovers. I looked behind me, back where I'd seen Loretta and Ray going at it, doing
it. Had they perhaps heard me? Had I disturbed, perhaps ended their feast of the body? Shit. If so, they could be coming after me. Or it very well might be just him. Ray. Which would be a hell of a lot worse than Helen.
There it was again. An abrupt noise. Something breaking, disturbing the soft silence of this forest of darkness. I spun to my right. I saw it. That figure, the shape that so closely resembled the one I'd seen over and over in my fearful dreams. A cloudlike form of someone whooshing through the woods. Oh, God. I saw it for just a moment. An indistinguishable form of flowing clothing. Tannish. Brownish. I couldn't really tell. But it was all too familiar, this unseen shape. Billy? Yes, perhaps.
Fearing for my life, I hunkered down, tore for the street where all of us and all of it would at least be out in the open. I came to a fork in the path, went to the left. Seconds later I burst into an opening where a picnic table sat next to a stone barbecue. That hadn't been here before. I spun, doubled back. The street. Where? Which way? A big round gush of wind billowed over the woods, swishing the leaves. I heard branches creaking, moaning as they tipped from side to side, and thought I heard a woman's deep, satisfied laugh.
Abruptly, I felt fingers and an arm dropping over my head from behind. Wrapping around me. I shouted out, spun and twisted, battled away whoever it was. But there was no one there. Only a branch with little twiggy appendages and leaves. That was all it was. A ghostly branch that had dropped out of the sky and momentarily clung to me.
I started running. Had to get out of there. I came to the fork, turned the other way, the right way, and darted on. Yes, this was good. I could see things. Familiar shapes. The right blend of trees. Then an end. A gray opening. A hole in the woods. I was almost there.
I heard something pounding. Other steps. Somewhere behind me. As I ran, I glanced over my shoulder. An image appeared. That figure. Whether it was a man or a woman, I couldn't tell. But I could see it, that shape racing after me. I didn't waste a moment. Pressed on. And in seconds I'd reached the little hole. I burst through. Came speeding out of the woods, went bounding over the ditch, landed on the pavement. I took a few more steps, slowed. Stopped. I was breathing hard and heavy, and I tensed, expected to see that other person come zooming out after me. I waited, readied myself for the attack.
Blood Trance Page 17
