by John Saul
“What did she say?” Cal asked. For the first time since she had begun her recitation, Constance glanced up from the floor.
“I couldn’t hear. The window was closed, and it’s quite a distance to the cemetery. But they were talking, all right, and Susan must have wanted to show Michelle something, because Michelle started to go into the graveyard. Climbed right over the fence, the weeds almost tripping her—how she did it with that limp of hers is beyond me, but she did. Susan waited for her, at least that’s what it looked like. Except for what happened next. That’s the part I can’t understand at all.”
She paused, shaking her head, as if she were trying to fit the pieces of a puzzle together, and they just wouldn’t go.
“Well, what happened?” Cal urged her.
“It was the darnedest thing,” Constance mused. Then she fixed a cold eye on Cal. “Michelle must have said something to Susan. I couldn’t hear it, of course, but whatever it was, it must have been something pretty awful. Because all of a sudden Susan got a look on her face such as I hope I never see again. Fear, that’s what it was. Plain old outright fear.”
A picture of Susan flashed across Cal’s memory. The look Constance Benson had described tallied exactly with the expression Cal had seen on the dead child’s face.
“And then she took off running,” he heard Mrs. Benson saying. “Just took off, like she was being chased by the devil himself. She ran right over the edge of the bluff.”
The last words were whispered, barely audible, but they hung in the living room, chilling the atmosphere.
“She ran off the edge of the bluff?” Cal repeated dully, as if he couldn’t believe his ears. “Was she watching where she was going? She couldn’t have been.”
“She was. She was looking straight ahead, but she didn’t even pause.”
“My God,” Cal said, his eyes closing in a futile effort to blot out the image he was seeing. Then he remembered that his own daughter had also seen what had happened. He opened his eyes again. Almost apprehensively, he faced Constance Benson.
“And what about Michelle? What did she do?”
Constance Benson’s face hardened, and she glared at him coldly. “Nothing,” she said, spitting the word at him.
“What do you mean, nothing?” Cal asked, ignoring her tone. “She must have done something.”
“She just stood there. She just stood there, like she didn’t even see what happened. And then, when Susan screamed, she waited a minute, then started walking home.”
Cal stood rooted to the floor, unable to move, unable to absorb what the woman was saying. “I don’t believe it,” he said finally.
“You can believe it or not, as you see fit,” Constance Benson said. “But it’s God’s own truth, and that’s that. She acted like nothing had happened at all.”
Cal turned to Josiah Carson, as if to appeal to him, but Josiah was lost in thought As Cal spoke his name, he came back to reality. He reached out and squeezed Cal’s arm, but when he spoke, his voice was strange, as if he was thinking about something else. “Maybe you’d better go on home,” he said. “I can take care of things here. You’d better go see if Michelle is all right. She could be in shock, you know.”
Cal nodded mutely and started out of the room. He paused a moment, turned back as if to say something. At the chilly expression on Constance Benson’s face, he seemed to change his mind. Then he was gone.
Josiah Carson and Constance Benson waited in silence until the ambulance had arrived. Then, as Carson was about to take his leave, Constance suddenly spoke.
“I don’t like that man,” she said.
“Now, Constance, you don’t even know him.”
“And I don’t want to. I think he made a mistake, bringing his family out here.” She fixed Carson with a look that was very nearly belligerent “And I don’t think you did him any favor either, selling him that house. You should have torn that place down years ago.”
Now Carson’s own expression hardened. “You’re being silly, Constance, and you know it. That house didn’t have anything to do with what’s happened out here.”
“Didn’t it?” Constance turned away from Josiah and went to the window, where she stood staring out across the cemetery. In the distance, etched against the sky, were the ornate, Victorian lines of the Pendleton house.
“Don’t see how they can live there,” Constance muttered. “Even you couldn’t live there, after Alan Hanley. It doesn’t make sense. If I were June Pendleton, I’d pack up my clothes, take my baby, and get out while I still could.”
“Well, I’m sorry you feel that way,” Josiah said stiffly. “I happen to think you’re wrong, and I’m glad the Pendletons are here. And I hope they’ll stay, in spite of what’s happened. Now I’d better go see Estelle and Henry Peterson.” As he left her house, without saying good-bye, she was still standing at her window, staring into the distance, keeping her own counsel.
Cal ran up the steps onto the front porch, opened the door, then slammed it behind him.
“Cal? Is that you?” June’s voice from the living room sounded startled, but not as startled as Cal felt when he found her calmly sitting in a chair, working on a piece of needlepoint.
“My God,” he swore. “What are you doing? How can you just sit there? Where’s Michelle?”
June gaped at him, surprised by his strangled tone.
“I’m doing needlework,” she said uncertainly. “And why shouldn’t I be sitting here? Michelle’s upstairs in her room.”
“I don’t believe it,” Cal said.
“What don’t you believe? Cal, what’s going on?”
Cal sank into a chair, trying to put his thoughts in order. Suddenly nothing made any sense.
“When did Michelle come home?” he asked at last. “About forty-five minutes ago, maybe an hour.” June set her needlepoint aside. “Cal, has something happened?”
“I can’t believe it,” Cal muttered. “I just can’t believe it”
“Can’t believe what?” June demanded. “Will you please tell me?”
“Didn’t Michelle tell you what happened today?”
“She didn’t say much of anything,” June replied. “She came in, had a glass of milk, said school went ‘okay’—which I’m not sure I believe—then went upstairs.”
“Jesus!” It was crazy, like a nightmare. “Michelle must have said something. She must have!”
“Cal, if you don’t tell me what’s going on, I’m going to start screaming!”
“Susan Peterson is dead!”
For a moment, June simply stared at him, as if the words had no meaning. When she finally spoke, her voice was a whisper.
“What do you mean?”
“Just what I said. Susan Peterson is dead, and Michelle saw it happen. She really didn’t tell you?” As best he could, Cal recounted exactly what had happened at the Bensons,’ and what Constance Benson had told him.
As June listened, she felt an edge of fear begin to grow in her, sharpening with each word. By the time Cal was finished, it was all June could do to keep from shaking. Susan Peterson couldn’t be dead, and Michelle couldn’t have seen anything. If she had, she would have said something. Of course she would have.
“And Michelle really didn’t say anything when she came home this afternoon?”
“Nothing,” June said. “Not a word. It’s—it’s unbelievable.”
“That’s what I keep telling myself.” Cal got to his feet. “I’d better go up and have a talk with her. She can’t just pretend nothing happened.”
He started out of the room. June rose to follow him.
“I’d better go with you. She must be horribly upset.”
They found Michelle lying on her bed, a book propped on her chest, her doll tucked in the crook of her left arm. As her parents appeared at the door, she looked up at them curiously.
Cal came directly to the point. “Michelle, I think you’d better tell us what happened this afternoon.”
Michell
e frowned slightly, then shrugged. “This afternoon? Nothing happened. I just came home.”
“Didn’t you stop at the graveyard? Didn’t you talk to Susan Peterson?”
“Only for a minute,” Michelle said. Her expression told June that she clearly didn’t think it was worth talking about. When Cal began to demand the details of their conversation, June interrupted him.
“You didn’t tell me you’d seen Susan,” she said carefully, trying not to betray anything. For some reason, it seemed important to hear Michelle’s version of the story from Michelle’s point of view, rather than in response to Cal’s impatient questioning.
“I only saw her for a minute or two,” Michelle said. “She was messing around in the cemetery, and when I asked her what she was doing, she started teasing me. She—she called me a cripple, and said I ‘gimped.’ ”
“And what did you do?” June asked gently. She settled herself on the bed and took Michelle’s hand in her own, squeezing it reassuringly.
“Nothing. I started to go into the graveyard, but then Susan ran away.”
“She ran away? Where to?”
“I don’t know. She just disappeared into the fog.”
June’s eyes flicked to the window. The sun, as it had all day, was glistening on the sea. “Fog? But there hasn’t been any fog today.”
Michelle looked at her mother in puzzlement, then shifted her gaze to her father. He seemed to be angry with her. But what had she done? She couldn’t understand what they wanted of her. She shrugged helplessly. “All I know is that when I was in the cemetery, the fog suddenly came in. It was really thick, and I couldn’t see much of anything. And when Susan ran away, she just disappeared into the fog.”
“Did you hear anything?” June asked.
Michelle thought a moment, then nodded. “There was something—sort of a scream. I guess Susan must have tripped or something.”
My God, June thought. She doesn’t know. She doesn’t even know what happened.
“I see,” she said slowly. “And after you heard Susan scream, what did you do?”
“Do? I—I came home.”
“But, darling,” June said. “If the fog was so thick, how could you find your way home?”
Michelle smiled at her. “It was easy,” she said. “Mandy led me. The fog doesn’t bother Mandy at all.”
It was only by the sheer force of her will that June kept from screaming.
CHAPTER 18
Supper that evening was nearly intolerable for June. Michelle sat placidly, apparently unbothered by what had happened that afternoon. Cal’s silence, a silence that had begun as Michelle told them what had happened that afternoon, hung over the table like a shroud. Throughout the meal, June’s eyes flicked from her husband to her elder daughter, constantly wary, constantly vigilant, on the watch for something—anything—that would lend the atmosphere a hint of normality.
And that, she realized as she cleared the table when the meal was finally over, was the problem—the situation appeared too normal, and it seemed as though she was the only person aware that it was not. As she stacked the dishes in the sink, she found herself beginning to question her own sanity. Twice, she started to leave the kitchen, and stopped herself. Finally, the tension was too much to bear.
“I think we have to talk,” she said to Cal, coming into the living room. Michelle was nowhere to be seen: June assumed she was in her room. Cal was holding Jennifer in his lap, bouncing her gently and talking to her. As June spoke, he looked up from the baby and regarded his wife cautiously.
Talk about what?” Cal stared at her, and June could see a wall go up in front of his eyes, a wall that threatened to shut her out entirely. He frowned slightly, the skin around his eyes crinkling into deep lines. When he spoke, his voice was brittle. “I don’t know that there’s anything to talk about”
June’s mouth worked for a moment, then she found her voice. “Don’t know!” she exclaimed. Then she repeated the phrase, louder. “Don’t know? My God, Cal, we have to get help for her.” What was he doing? Was he shutting everything out? Ignoring everything that was happening? Of course he was. She could see it in his eyes.
“I don’t think anything’s so terribly wrong.”
And there it was. That was why he’d been so silent since Michelle had told them her version of the afternoon—he was simply blocking it all out. But she had to find a way to get through to him. “How can you say that?” she asked, struggling to keep her voice calm and reasonable. “Today Susan Peterson died, and Michelle was there—she saw it, or at least she should have seen it. If she really didn’t, then we’re in more trouble than I even thought. She hasn’t got any friends, except Mandy, who’s a doll, for God’s sake. And now there’s this thing with the fog. Cal, there wasn’t any fog today—I know, I was here all day, and the sun was out. Cal, she must be losing her vision! And you say you don’t think anything’s terribly wrong? Are you blind?” June stopped suddenly, realizing her voice had risen and become shrill. But it didn’t matter. Cal’s eyes were icy now, and she knew what he was going to say before he spoke.
“I won’t hear this, June. You want me to believe I’ve made Michelle crazy. I haven’t. She’s fine. She had a shock this afternoon, and blocked it. That’s a normal reaction. Do you understand? It’s normal!”
Stunned, June sank into a chair, and tried to gather her thoughts into some kind of coherency. Cal was right: there was nothing left to talk about—something had to be done.
“Now listen to me,” she heard Cal saying, his voice calm, his words maniacally reasonable. “You weren’t there this afternoon, and I was. I heard what Constance Benson had to say, and I heard what Michelle had to say, and it doesn’t make much difference whom you believe—Michelle had nothing to do with what happened to Susan. Even Mrs. Benson didn’t say Michelle did anything—all she said was that Michelle didn’t react to what happened. Well, how could she have? She must have been in a state of shock. So how could she react?”
Half of June’s mind was listening to what Cal was saying, but the other half was screaming in protest. He was twisting things, forcing things to sound the way he wanted them to sound.
“But what about the fog?” she asked. “Michelle said there was fog, and there wasn’t! Damn it, there wasn’t.”
“I didn’t say there was,” Cal said patiently. “Maybe Michelle did see what happened to Susan, and her reaction—the reaction Mrs. Benson said wasn’t there—was simply to shut it out of her mind. Her mind could have invented the fog, to screen out what she didn’t want to see.”
“Just like your mind is screening out what you don’t want to see?” June regretted her words as soon as they were out, but there was no way to recover them. They seemed to hit Cal with a physical force: his body shrank into his chair, and he raised Jenny just slightly, as if the baby were a shield.
“I’m sorry,” June apologized. “I shouldn’t have said that.”
“If that’s what you think, why not say it?” Cal countered. “I’m going up to bed. I don’t see much point in going on with this.”
June watched him go, made no move to try to stop him, or to continue the conversation. She felt glued to her chair, unable to summon the strength to get up. She listened as Cal climbed the stairs, then waited until his footsteps had faded away toward their bedroom. Then, when the house was quiet, she tried to think, tried to force herself to concentrate on Michelle, and what was to be done for her. Steeling herself for whatever might be about to happen, June made her decision. She would not be dissuaded.
Time seemed to have stopped for Estelle and Henry Peterson. Now, near midnight, Estelle sat quietly with her hands in her lap, saying nothing. She wore a slightly puzzled expression, as if she were wondering where her daughter was. Henry was pacing the floor, his florid face flushed a deep red, his indignation growing every minute. If Susan was really dead, someone was to blame.
“Tell me again, Constance,” he said. “Tell me once more what happened. I just
can’t believe you haven’t left something out.”
Constance Benson, perched uncomfortably on one of Estelle’s better chairs, shook her head tiredly.
“I’ve told you everything, Henry. There just isn’t anything more to say.”
“My daughter would not have run over the edge of a cliff,” Henry stated, as if by saying it he could make it true. That girl must have pushed her. She must have.”
Constance kept her eyes firmly fixed on her hands as they twisted nervously in her lap, wishing she could tell Henry Peterson what he wanted to hear.
“She didn’t, Henry. I suppose she must have said something, but I couldn’t hear it from my kitchen. And she wasn’t even very close to Susan, It was—well, it was very strange, that’s all.”
Too damn strange, if you ask me,” Henry muttered. He poured himself a shot of whiskey, bolted it down, then clapped his hat on his head. “I’m going to talk to Joe Carson,” he said. “He’s a doctor—he should know what happened.” He stalked from the room. A moment later the front door slammed, and a car engine raced.
“Oh, dear,” Estelle sighed. “I hope he isn’t going to do anything rash. You know how he can be, Susan gets so upset with him sometimes.…” Her voice faded away as she realized Susan would never get upset with her father again. She looked beseechingly at Constance Benson. “Oh, Constance, what are we going to do? I just can’t believe it. I just keep having the feeling that any minute Susan’s going to walk through that door, and it will all turn out to be a dream. A horrible dream.”
Constance moved over to the sofa and drew Estelle close to her. Only now, with Constance’s large and comforting arm around her, did Estelle give in to her tears. Her body trembled, and she dabbed ineffectually at her eyes with a crumpled handkerchief.
“You just let it out,” Constance told her. “You can’t keep it all bottled up, and Susan wouldn’t want you to. And don’t worry about Henry—he’ll calm down. He just has to make a fuss, that’s all.”
