Crying Child

by Barbara Michaels

  Ran was off without speaking, moving at a speed that was reckless on the narrow way. I pelted after, almost as fast, and it wasn’t long before the inevitable happened—a crash, a curse, and a fall; and I jumped a tangle of leaves and dead branches to find Ran sprawled on the ground, head and shoulders propped at a crazy angle by the trunk of the tree whose low-hanging branch had knocked him flat. He wasn’t unconscious, for as I dropped to my knees beside him, he groaned and sat up. There was a trickle of blood just starting from a cut above his eye.

  “You heard her,” he gasped, and tried to stand. At the movement his eyes fogged and he fell back against the tree.

  “Yes. Wait a minute. You’re stunned.”

  “Can’t wait—she’ll get away—”

  “I’ll go after her, just sit till you get your wits back. I’ll go—”

  His hand caught at my arm as I stood up.

  “Not there, she left the path—that’s why I ran into this damned tree; she’s out there somewhere—”

  Before the silence of the twisted darkness he indicated, we both fell silent. Ran shook his head frantically, as if trying to clear it; a small red drop fell onto the back of my hand and I stared at it as if mesmerized.

  And then, through the silence, came the sound that, once heard, could never be mistaken for any other sound. Soft but oddly distinct, it was a child’s voice—the voice of a small child crying.

  It was pitiful and yet horrible; the most pathetic sound I had ever heard, and the most dreadful. When it died away, in a last tremulous wail of misery, Ran and I were both on our feet. My hands were so numb I couldn’t feel them; and then I realized that we had clasped hands and that his grip on my fingers was hard enough to leave bruises.

  “What in God’s name?” I gasped.

  “Not—God’s,” Ran said oddly; his voice broke in what might have been a hysterical chuckle. “That’s what Mary hears. That’s what she is following.”

  “No wonder,” I said, shaking. “Let go, Ran, you’re hurting me. She can’t be far ahead. We’ve got to find her.”

  I left him standing there, swaying and white-faced, with blood streaking down his cheek and dissolving as the rain mingled with it. The blow on the head had been damaging, but I couldn’t stop to look after him then; Mary’s need was more urgent.

  After a time I heard him stumbling along behind me. When I stopped he bumped into me; I turned on him with a fierce demand for silence. Even his ragged breathing made too much noise. I couldn’t sympathize with him, my thoughts were too concentrated on Mary. To be so close, so close that we had heard her, and to lose her now… Then I saw her, on the very edge of the light— only a flicker of movement, quickly stilled, but I knew.

  “Mary! Please—Mary, don’t run away.”

  Only silence answered, but that was encouraging; I would have heard her if she had moved.

  I called again. I willed Ran to silence. He said nothing. Even his heavy breathing slowed.

  “Mary,” I called. “Please, Mary, come back. I’m wet, and I’m so tired…”

  A flicker, a shadow stirring, furtive as some trapped wild thing… Motionless, barely breathing, I realized that the rain had stopped and that a rising wind was breaking up the heavy clouds. Straight ahead, above the trees, a star flickered and was obscured and shone out again steadily. We must be on the edge of the woods. Straight ahead was Will’s house, and the cliff…

  And the cliff.

  “Mary!”

  Perhaps it was the shrill new note of alarm in my voice that broke the spell I had been weaving—with, I think, some success. Or perhaps it was the ghost of a sobbing cry, mingled with the murmur of the wind. Whatever it was, the shadowy shape at the outer limit of the flashlight beam moved away. After the first second I couldn’t see it any longer, but I heard it, crashing through underbrush with the careless disregard of quarry that sees safety within easy reach.

  I went off down the path as if I had been shot from a gun, and I came crashing out of the woods in time to see —too much. There was light now, it seemed brilliant by comparison to the dark woods, for a half-circle of moon was free of cloud and the coarse grass between the house and the cliff edge lay pallid under its rays.

  I saw Mary right away. She was on the road, almost halfway to the cliff. She wasn’t running, she was walking steadily and quickly toward the edge.

  While I hesitated, remembering stories of potential suicides who had been sent over the edge by a shout, Ran came bursting out of the trees behind me. Simultaneously, another figure appeared on the road to the right, where it dipped around to join the wider road. The figure was Will’s; his height and walk were unmistakable.

  At the sight of Mary he stopped short, held, probably, by the same reasoning that kept me silent. But Ran was beyond coherent thought. He went staggering past me, evading my outflung hand, calling her name.

  Mary stopped. She glanced back over her shoulder, and for a second I thought Ran had been right and I had been wrong. Then, for the last time that night, the crying came again.

  It was softer this time and still unlocalized. It might have been the weeping of the night itself, if the night had had a human voice. It turned me sick with pity and cold with terror; and on Mary it acted like a goad and a spur. She started to run. I took a few frantic, running steps, and then stopped; it was obvious that she would reach the cliff before Ran could stop her, and I was even farther away. Will was no closer.

  Will crouched and straightened up. I saw his arm move. And on the very edge of the cliff Mary staggered and swayed and fell—safely onto the grass, five feet from the edge.

  SIX

  I still say you were taking a terrible chance.“

  “For God’s sake, Jo,” Ran said angrily. “He saved her life.”

  “If that stone had hit her in the head—”

  “But it didn’t,” Will said. “It hit her in the midriff, which is where I meant it to hit her. It didn’t even knock her out. She fainted. If she’d gone over the cliff… Oh, hell, this is beside the point. Why should I defend myself from the hysterics of a female? You’re the one I blame, Ran. Why the hell didn’t you tell me?”

  “I don’t know.” Ran’s hand went to his forehead, and the square of bandage that covered a three-inch gash. He looked terrible. Like the rest of us, he had changed into dry clothes, but he kept shivering. “I couldn’t believe it myself, I guess. Or—maybe I was scared to admit that I did believe it.”

  “You didn’t use to be that stupid,” Will said.

  He crossed to the bar and poured a stiff jolt of brandy into a glass and carried it over to me. I was huddled on the rug by the fire; I felt as if I’d never be warm again. But I didn’t want any brandy. Will ignored my scowl and shake of the head. He forced the glass into my hands.

  “Medicinal purposes,” he said. “God knows you need something to clear your brain. Ran, you’d better stick to coffee. I suspect you may be slightly concussed and even if you aren’t, alcohol doesn’t mix with that sleeping prescription.”

  “I can’t figure out how she got it into me,” Ran said dully.

  “You never even imagined that she would try; why should you have been suspicious?”

  That had been hard for me to face, though I had suspected it when I saw how Ran slept—that Mary had deliberately spiked one of his drinks with several of her sleeping pills. Her flight had not been the result of a sudden uncontrollable urge; she had been planning it all day. Her improved behavior must have been part of the plan, to throw us off guard.

  I began to feel better—physically—as the brandy and the fire warmed me. I was thinking about offering to make some coffee when Jed came in with a tray.

  “Bertha’s upstairs,” he said. “That shot you gave Mary seems to be working, Will, but Bertha thought she’d better stay, just to be on the safe side.”

  “Right,” Will said. “I don’t want her left alone for a minute. Coffee or brandy, Jed?”

  “Coffee keeps me awake this time
of night,” Jed said gravely, and accepted a glass from Will. He took a chair, and Will looked at him suspiciously.

  “Did you and Bertha know about this—this quest of Mary’s?”

  “You mean did we know about the crying?” Jed drank brandy. “Bertha suspected.”

  “Well, of all the dirty tricks—! What was this, a conspiracy of silence?”

  “Mary never said anything definite. And,” Jed pointed out delicately, “it wasn’t our business to tell you, Will. I thought you must know.”

  “He knows now,” I said. “If he’d quit harping on how terrible we all are for not confiding in him, maybe we could proceed to some constructive conversation.”

  “You, too?” Will demanded.

  “Now, now,” Jed said calmly. “Stop fighting. That isn’t going to do a bit of good.”

  He was sitting in one of the brocade armchairs. Against the delicate fabric his shabby overalls and thick boots should have looked out of place, but Jed was at ease wherever he happened to be. He looked as suited to his environment as a squirrel in a tree.

  “Okay,” I said. “I’m sorry, Will. You did save Mary’s life tonight, and it was unforgivable of me to talk the way I did. I’m just not at my best.”

  Will looked sheepish.

  “None of us are. We’ve got a lot to talk about, but maybe this isn’t a good time. Ran ought to be in bed.”

  Chin sunk on his breast, hands dangling, Ran looked as if he could have fallen asleep in his chair. But when he heard his name spoken he looked up, and there was a look in his eyes that made me forget the weary lines in his face.

  “We’ve got to talk now. Have you forgotten who’s coming tomorrow?”

  “Oh, God,” Will muttered.

  “The psychiatrist,” I said. “So? Why the consternation?”

  “Psychiatrist?” said Jed.

  Ran explained. As he spoke, Jed’s face grew longer and longer. He shook his head.

  “I wish you’d told us, Ran. I don’t like to sound as if I’m making excuses for me and Bertha; but if I’d known what you were planning I’d have persuaded Bertha to talk to you.”

  Will was right, we were all sodden with fatigue. It took several seconds for the import of Jed’s comment to sink in. Will was the first to understand.

  “You mean—are you trying to tell me that you and Bertha have heard that sound too?”

  “That’s right.”

  “When?”

  “It’s been—oh, I’d say almost thirty years ago.”

  “Both of you?”

  “I only heard it once,” Jed said. “Bertha heard it several times.”

  “I’m really nattered,” Will said heavily. “You all have such a lot of confidence in me.”

  “Now, Will, be reasonable. The first time it happened you weren’t even born. This time—well, now, what did we actually know? It took Bertha a long time to make the connection between Mary’s trouble and that long-past thing that happened to her; even up to last night she wasn’t really sure. And it isn’t the kind of thing you can speak right out about.”

  “That is true,” Ran said. “Don’t you think I would have told you, Will, if I could have brought myself to do so? I thought I was going crazy. There is such a thing as collective hallucination.”

  “How many times, before tonight, have you heard it?”

  “Once. I guess that was what sent me haring off to Boston. I began to have visions of both of us, Mary and myself, prowling the woods every night like a pair of ghouls.” He shivered. “The thing… pulls at you, Will. I don’t know whether you noticed it tonight. But the… pull is very strong.”

  “You didn’t tell all this to your Dr. Wood, did you?”

  “No. I just couldn’t do it.” Ran looked up. “Will, it wasn’t that I didn’t trust you. But sometimes it’s easier to tell these things to a stranger; you know what I mean? At least I thought it would be. I was wrong. I’ve made a mess of it, Will.”

  “Stow it,” Will said. His voice was brusque, but it seemed to tell Ran something he needed to know. The two of them exchanged a long, unsmiling look, and some of the sick despair left Ran’s face.

  “You ought to be in bed,” Will muttered. He shook his head. “There’s so much I need to know, and so little time. I don’t suppose we can head that damned woman off now?”

  “She’s already on her way. She said she planned to stop over along the way, and get in sometime tomorrow afternoon.”

  “She wouldn’t mention where she planned to stay tonight? No such luck…” Will ran his fingers through his hair. “Why couldn’t she fly, like a normal person?”

  “She’s nervous about flying,” Ran said.

  I laughed. They all looked at me as if I’d cut loose with a string of obscenities, and I said helplessly, “It just struck me as funny, a psychiatrist who’s afraid of flying… All right, I’m sorry. But I don’t understand why you’re all so appalled. What difference is it going to make if she does come?”

  The three men exchanged one of those glances that women find so maddening. Jed, always charitable, took it on himself to explain.

  “You’re worn out, Jo, or you’d be thinking clearer. This lady is a doctor. She’s going to be looking for signs of a nice simple nervous breakdown, or whatever fancy name they call it nowadays. She won’t find any, because that’s not what we’ve got here. Do I have to spell it out? Seems to me we’re all afraid of saying the word.”

  “A ghost,” I said experimentally. The word felt funny in my mouth.

  “Now wait a minute,” Will said. “I’m not saying I don’t believe it. What I am saying is that I’m thoroughly confused, and I’d like a couple of days to reappraise the situation. That’s why I’m not happy about having a stranger come in, someone we’ll have to lie to and deceive. Of course we can’t tell her about the—the crying. She’ll think we’re all crazy.”

  “It’s been thirty years since I heard it,” Jed said. “But nobody who ever once heard it could forget it, or mistake it for any other sound on this earth. And you’re not convinced?”

  “My God,” Will said. “You’re asking me to throw overboard a whole lifetime of rational thinking. I—I just don’t know, Jed. I don’t know what to think.”

  “What else could it be?”

  Will shook his head.

  “Jed, there are a dozen possibilities. Some freak combination of wind through a natural crevice in a tree or cliff… A night bird, an animal…”

  “Wait a minute,” I said. “Will, those cats of yours. You told me that a Siamese in heat sounds like a lost soul. Or a baby crying.”

  Ran sat up straighter, with a half-voiced expletive, and for a moment Will’s face lit up. Then gloom settled on it more heavily than before. When he shook his head I could see how he hated to abandon the idea.

  “You’ve never heard a Siamese in heat. I have. It’s a God-awful sound, but not as bad as what I heard tonight.”

  “Add one teaspoonful of imagination, mix with a generous pinch of sheer funk…”

  “No. Look, Jo, I made damn good and sure that both the Siamese were locked in tonight; I didn’t want extraneous animals crashing around in the underbrush while I was listening for Mary. Not to mention the fact that my female is not in heat.”

  “Go on, Will,” Jed said. “Jo doesn’t know this, and maybe Ran has been away from the island too long. But you and I both know every species of bird or animal or insect that has ever lived in these woods. Neither of us is going to get all worked up about an owl or a possum. There’s only one animal I know of could make a sound like that one. A human animal, a young one. A child.”

  I couldn’t argue with that even if I had wanted to. He knew what he was talking about. I was three quarters convinced; Jed was right, no one who had ever heard that sound could mistake it for any normal noise. The thing that held me back from complete conviction wasn’t logic, it was, as Will had said, the accumulated thought patterns of my whole life. It is very hard to reverse every ration
al conviction you have ever held, overnight.

  It was even harder for Will because he didn’t have my knowledge of Mary to reinforce belief. In a crazy way it was easier for me to believe in a ghost than to believe that Mary had cracked up. But people have the most amazing ability to fight truth, even when it’s staring them in the face, if it disagrees with their cherished preconceptions. Out there in the wind-racked night, I believed. If I hadn’t been so busy running, I’d have been down on my knees. Here, surrounded by the comforts of civilized doubt, skepticism fought back.

  I had plenty of time to meditate on these things; there was a long silence after Jed’s speech. Finally Will said stubbornly, “Jed, I’m not saying yes or no. All I’m saying is that we have to consider all the possibilities, no matter how farfetched.”