Midnight Voices

by John Saul

  “It’s a beautiful day,” Caroline said. “I guess most people preferred to be outside.”

  Claire seemed barely to hear her, her expression hardening as she gazed at the meager result of Caroline’s afternoon in the store. “I don’t know,” she said, almost to herself. “I hope I didn’t make a mistake with you.”

  Caroline knew what she would have done six months ago, when Brad was alive. She would have said something like, “You did make a mistake with me: you didn’t bother to thank me for working on my day off,” and quit on the spot. But Brad was no longer alive, and Caroline could not afford to lose this job, no matter how difficult Claire could be. “I’m sorry,” she said, putting as much contrition into her voice as she could muster. “I’ll do better. I promise I will.”

  Claire smiled coolly at her. “Let’s hope so,” she said. “Otherwise, you’ll be looking for another job.”

  Leaving the shop, Caroline pulled her coat close around her, but the thin poplin couldn’t protect her from the coldness of Claire’s last words.

  CHAPTER 5

  “But you promised!” Ryan uttered the familiar phrase with all the outrage a disappointed ten-year-old can muster, and the storm brewing in his eyes looked as if it could build into a tornado at any second.

  “I didn’t promise,” Caroline replied. “I said ‘we’ll see.’ ”

  “You said we could probably go,” Ryan shot back.

  “ ‘Probably’ isn’t a promise,” Laurie put in, and though her daughter was trying to make it sound like she was trying to be helpful, Caroline could also see a glint of amusement in Laurie’s eyes as she watched her brother’s angry disappointment. “ ‘Probably’ only means ‘maybe.’ ”

  Ryan wheeled on his sister. “It does not!” he challenged. “It’s almost like yes!” He turned back to his mother. “If Dad were still alive—”

  “Don’t!” Caroline said, the single word erupting from her with enough force not only to silence her son, but to drain his face of color and fill his eyes with tears. And where she could defend herself from his anger, she was helpless against his pain. “Oh, darling, I’m sorry,” she said, dropping to her knees and gathering him in her arms. “I didn’t mean it the way it sounded. It’s just that—”

  That what? How could she explain to Ryan that she simply couldn’t afford to take them to a movie tonight, not with the threat of losing her job hanging over her like the sword of Damocles? All through Saturday evening Claire’s words had gnawed at her, and though she’d finally gone to bed, she’d tossed and turned sleeplessly, a cold chill of fear threatening to overwhelm her as she thought about what would happen if Claire made good on her threat. And deep in the despair of the small hours of the morning, she’d silently uttered exactly the same words she’d just chastised her son for speaking. Indeed, she’d gone much further than Ryan, silently cursing Brad for leaving her alone, leaving her to cope with the ugly realities that had so quickly replaced the shattered dreams that lay around her. It wasn’t supposed to be this way—she wasn’t supposed to be trying to raise her children as a single mother, trying to figure out how they could survive on the money she was able to make. If only Brad hadn’t—

  She’d cut the words short in her own mind, just as she’d stopped her son from uttering them, but the thought had finished itself, and no amount of wishing would change things.

  Brad was dead, and there was nothing she could do about it.

  Claire might fire her, and there was nothing she could do about it.

  She’d gotten up this morning exhausted, and when Ryan had begged to go to a movie tonight, she’d been too tired to argue with him. What she’d intended as nothing more than a delaying tactic, he’d taken as a promise.

  Now, as she felt the sting her words had caused even more than he did, another thought came to her.

  Brad might be dead, but she was not, and neither were Ryan and Laurie.

  And while she might lose her job, she might also not lose it.

  In fact, if she was going to be completely honest, she had no real idea of what would happen, and what would not. All she had were hopes, and most of those had been dashed with Brad’s death.

  And even though the bank account was almost empty, she had a nice fat commission coming on the Oriental vase she’d sold to Irene Delamond. All right, it wasn’t going to be fat enough to pay the rent next month. But it was certainly fat enough to take them out to a movie.

  She gave Ryan a final squeeze and stood up. “Okay, guys, here’s the deal. I didn’t promise we’d go to a movie tonight, but Ryan’s right—I did say ‘probably,’ which is closer to yes than maybe. And I know I haven’t been a lot of fun to be around today. But I had a good sale yesterday afternoon, so what do you say we go out for Chinese, then go to the movies?”

  Instead of answering, Ryan ran to get his jacket before his mother had a chance to change her mind.

  Three hours later, as they came out of Loew’s theatre on 84th and started down Broadway, Caroline knew she’d made the right decision. Just having a meal in a restaurant for a change, then sitting in the dark theatre and losing herself in the space epic Ryan had chosen for them to see had given her a feeling that maybe life wasn’t hopeless after all. Though nothing had changed (except that she was a few dollars poorer now than she had been a few hours earlier), just the short respite from worrying somehow seemed to have given her hope that they would all survive. And walking home through the spring night, she could almost imagine that Brad was still with them, walking just behind her, watching her. “I like the way your hips move when you walk,” she heard him whisper in her memory, just the way he used to whisper in her ear before dropping back a few paces so he could watch. But he hadn’t whispered in her ear, and he wasn’t with her. It was only in her imagination that she could feel him watching her.

  Yet as they turned on 76th, with only another block to go before they would be back at their building, the feel of Brad’s eyes on her was so strong that Caroline suddenly found herself looking back. For just an instant, she thought she saw a flicker of movement, but the sidewalk was empty, and she decided it must have been a breeze disturbing the leaves on the trees that lined the block. But when they crossed Amsterdam Avenue and started down the last block the feeling of being watched came over her again, and once more she glanced back over her shoulder.

  And once again thought she saw a flicker of movement.

  The leaves again?

  Perhaps a cat or a squirrel?

  Or perhaps someone slipping into the concealing shelter of a doorway.

  She quickened her step, suddenly wanting to get the children inside.

  But surely she was imagining it. Who would be following her?

  Now her mind was racing, and even though she told herself that she was being ridiculous—that the streets of Manhattan were safer than they’d been in years—she found herself having to resist the urge to break into a run.

  Now her heart was racing, too, and the children seemed to be picking up her nervousness.

  “What’s wrong, Mom?” Laurie asked.

  “Nothing,” Caroline said a little too quickly. “I’m just a little chilled that’s all. I’m looking forward to getting home.”

  Then they were there, and as Caroline fumbled in her purse for the keys, she glanced back down the block, searching the darkness for any sign of danger.

  There was nothing.

  She found the key, slipped it into the lock, and a moment later she and the children were safely inside the building. She made sure the outside door was fully latched and the inner door locked, and punched at the elevator. Though she tried to resist the urge, she couldn’t keep herself from glancing at the front door three times before the elevator finally arrived, and only when they were safely in the apartment with the door locked, double bolted, and chained did she finally let herself relax. As the kids got ready for bed she moved through the apartment, not only turning off the lights but checking the windows to make sure they we
re all securely locked. Finally she went to Laurie’s room, said goodnight, then moved on to Ryan’s room to tuck him in. As she bent over to kiss him goodnight, his arms slipped around her neck, and he pulled her close.

  “Mom?” he whispered. “Is something wrong?”

  Caroline froze for a second, but then squeezed him reassuringly. “Of course not,” she assured him. “Everything’s fine. And tomorrow’s a school day and you need to be asleep.” Tucking him in, she turned off his light, but left his door ajar so a little light would leak into the room from the night-light in the hall. Then she checked the door and windows one more time, and at last retreated to her room. Turning off the light, she went to the window and gazed down into the street.

  She saw nothing.

  And there is nothing, she told herself. I’m just imagining things.

  Pulling the curtains, she turned her back on the darkness, but even as she undressed, she knew she was in for another sleepless night.

  Outside, a figure stepped from the doorway across the street from the building in which Caroline Evans and her children lived. The face tipped upward for a moment, scanning the darkened windows one last time.

  A moment later, apparently satisfied, the figure vanished into the night as completely as if it had never been there at all.

  CHAPTER 6

  On Monday morning, Anthony Fleming was feeling almost as dispirited as Caroline Evans had on the day before. He’d spent all day Sunday in his apartment—not a good idea, given the size of the apartment, and its emptiness.

  Children—that’s what it needed. That’s what he needed.

  Anthony liked children—liked their energy, their vitality. That was the one problem with living in The Rockwell these days; there weren’t enough children. In fact, there were practically no children right now. Only Max and Alicia Albion’s foster daughter, Rebecca Mayhew, but even having Rebecca in the building—sweet though she was—wasn’t the same as having half a dozen kids running from one apartment to another, making life miserable for Rodney, but giving the old building a feeling of vitality. That’s how it had been when he still had Lenore and the kids. Not just his own apartment, but the whole building had vibrated with life as the twin boys organized hide-and-seek games that were never confined to a single apartment, but ranged from floor to floor, and sometimes even into the attic.

  Once, a little girl had tried to go down into the basement to hide, but fortunately Rodney had seen her just in time, and kept her away from the maze of steam pipes and old electrical wiring that made going into the building’s substructure an adventure for anyone who had work to do there.

  But as time had inevitably gone by, the handful of children had dwindled away until only Rebecca was left. Anthony remembered well the day Max and Alicia had brought her home. Her brown eyes looked almost as large as those of the child in a terrible painting that hung in Virginia Estherbrook’s apartment. Not over the fireplace, of course; a portrait of Virginia herself occupied that spot, in costume as Cleopatra. The picture of the child hung on one of the walls, where its huge eyes seemed forever fixed on the image of Virginia. Even Virginia admitted that the painting should have been done on black velvet, but she said the child seemed to speak to her. Given its grotesquely large eyes and the single tear that ran down its left cheek, Anthony wondered just what, exactly, the seemingly genderless child might be saying, but he’d certainly never risked Virginia’s wrath by asking. When Max and Alicia had brought Rebecca down to introduce her to him and his family, the first thing that had flashed through his mind was that picture. Rebecca had hung back from Lenore and the twins, clinging to Alicia’s hand as if it were a lifeline. But then Samantha, who looked the same age as Rebecca despite the two years difference in their ages, led the younger girl off to indulge in one of those whispering and giggling sessions that Lenore had always understood perfectly but that he had always found totally mystifying. They’d instantly become best friends, and from that point on Rebecca had spent almost as much time in Anthony’s apartment as in the Albions’, her eyes sparkling with laughter.

  But then, after Samantha and the boys had gone and Lenore had—

  He cut the thought short, pushing it away with an almost physical force, driving it back into that far corner of his mind where so much of his past dwelt, hidden in the darkest reaches of his consciousness.

  Better to think about Rebecca, though every day she seemed more and more like the lonely waif who’d first clung to Alicia’s hand, her eyes constantly growing a little larger, and a little emptier.

  It had been Rebecca whom Anthony had first thought of on Saturday, when he’d met the girl in the park who’d been sitting on the bench with her mother, watching her brother play baseball. A perfect playmate for Rebecca. A year younger, perhaps, but closer in age than Rebecca and Samantha had been.

  And the woman—

  Anthony put the thought out of his mind. It was too early to start thinking about that again. And yet something deep inside him had responded to the woman in the park, even though they’d hardly spoken. He searched his memory, and found the name.

  Evans.

  Caroline Evans.

  Conjuring up an image of her, he suddenly felt better, and even the large rooms of his spacious apartment suddenly didn’t feel quite so empty. Quickly cleaning up the dishes from his breakfast of cold cereal and coffee, he gathered up the clutter of the Sunday Times, straightened it out and folded it neatly for recycling, then left the apartment.

  “Lovely morning, Mr. Fleming,” Rodney observed as he came out of the elevator into the lobby.

  “That it is,” Anthony agreed, pausing just long enough to entrust yesterday’s newspaper to Rodney. “Put this in the recycling bin for me, will you?”

  “Yes, sir,” Rodney replied. “And have a good morning.”

  For the first time in months, Anthony felt a genuine smile come over his face. “Do you know, I think I very well might!”

  From the window of her room on the seventh floor, Rebecca Mayhew watched Anthony Fleming leave the building, and wished she could go with him.

  She couldn’t, of course; she knew that. She still wasn’t feeling very good, and this morning Aunt Alicia had told her to stay in bed. But the sunlight pouring in through her window had been irresistible, and she’d finally crept out of bed to the chair by the window. She was spending more and more of her time in that chair, looking out into the park. During the winter, it had been wonderful—with the trees bare of leaves she’d been able to see everything that was happening. Skaters whizzing around on Rollerblades, weaving in and out of the walkers and the joggers. And down to the south, she could see the baseball diamonds, where there were always half a dozen games going at one time.

  A long time ago, when she’d first come to live with Alicia and Max, she used to go to the park with Samantha and her twin brothers. Then Samantha had started getting sick, and after a while she and Sam stopped going to the park and spent most of their time in Sam’s room. Finally Sam had had to go to the hospital, and Aunt Alicia had been so afraid she’d catch whatever it was that Sam had that she wouldn’t let Rebecca go visit her. “Plenty of time when Samantha comes home,” Alicia had told her. But Sam hadn’t come home.

  Now Rebecca was alone, and even though Dr. Humphries said she was going to be fine, Rebecca wasn’t so sure. Except that this morning, as she gazed out into the spring sunshine and watched the birds building nests in the trees across the street, she’d had a feeling that maybe, finally, she really was going to start feeling better. And as she watched Mr. Fleming leave the building and start down Central Park West, there was something in the way he was walking that made her feel like maybe something was about to happen.

  Something good.

  Suddenly, as if he’d felt her watching him, Mr. Fleming turned around and looked up at her. Seeing her peering down from the window, he waved at her, and even from her room on the seventh floor, Rebecca could see his smile. It was the first time she’d seen him smi
le since the awful thing had happened to his family, and the smile told her she was right.

  Everything was going to get better.

  She could just feel it.

  It was seeing Rebecca Mayhew in the window that finally made up Anthony Fleming’s mind, and when he walked into his office on West 53rd Street, right next door to the Hundred Club, he smiled brightly at Mrs. Haversham, who was his only employee. She looked after the mail, took care of the bills, and did the bookkeeping. The business itself, the management of money, was conducted by Anthony Fleming. It was a business he both enjoyed, and was good at, and over the years he had managed to shape it into his idea of near perfection: he invested only on his own behalf, and on the behalf of a few people he enjoyed as friends as well as clients. He never invested his clients’ money in securities he would not have in his own portfolio, and he believed in putting his money where his faith was. Thus, both his funds and his clients’ were invested as conservatively as the décor of his office, which was done entirely in old mahogany, old leather, and old prints.

  Things that stood the test of time.

  But this morning Anthony Fleming ignored the Wall Street Journal that was placed exactly in the center of his desk, and pushed the half-dozen specialized investment newsletters to one side.

  When he turned his computer on, he barely glanced at the condition of his stock portfolio before bringing up a search engine and typing in two words:

  Caroline Evans.

  He hit the return key, then sat back to see what, if anything, he could find out about the woman he’d met in the park on Saturday.

  This was the worst part of Andrea Costanza’s job—having to check up on the children in foster care. She knew it had to be done, knew there were places where the children simply weren’t safe. The problem was that you never knew what you were looking at. Last year she had taken a child away from a couple up in Harlem, certain that the family was already far overextended. The father had just lost his job, and what with their own two children to take care of, along with two nieces and a nephew, Andrea had judged that the foster child—an eight-year-old girl with a history of abuse and a learning disability—was just too much for them. The woman, in particular, had begged her to leave the child with them, but Andrea had stood firm, having already found a far better home—a couple on the Upper West Side who could not only give the child far more individual attention, but a room of her own as well.