Precipice

by Tom Savage

  The hand on her shoulder was more of a shock than the knife would have been. She gasped as she was spun around, and the red wig flew off to fall into the void behind her. She stared up at the black mask, her eyes widening as the platinum hair tumbled down around her shoulders.

  This time, however, she was not afraid. Her gaze traveled up his arm to the Kouronos and back down to his startled, pale blue eyes, the mirror of her own. Her surprise was quickly replaced by contempt. When she spoke, her voice was filled with loathing.

  “Hello, Daddy,” she said.

  Then she reached behind her to grasp the rail and leaned back, tilting her head, baring her throat to the knife.

  Albert Petersen staggered backward, lowering the knife, away from her—away from this woman who was not his mother, not Kay Belden. He stared, disbelieving, at the pale hair and eyes so like his own, so like—

  His lips moved, contorted, as he struggled to speak. Finally, the words came out in a strangled gasp.

  “Allie?” he whispered. “Alberta?”

  He looked at her, at her head flung back over the precipice, into her mocking, contemptuous eyes. As he watched, she began to laugh softly, her lovely lips curled upward in a sneer.

  Then, with a cry of animal rage, he was upon her.

  The first cut slashed across her forehead. Instinctively, she let go of the railing and brought her hands up as the blood rained down into her eyes, blinding her. The second stab sank into the base of her neck, just inside the collarbone. She fell to her knees as the pain began to register, overwhelming her, weakening her body and her resolve.

  It seemed to be happening very slowly. Her father was the merest shadow now, a dark mass looming somewhere just above her. Through the darkness and the pain and the blood, she barely saw him raise the knife again, barely heard the shout.

  “Albert!”

  He must not have heard it, either, she thought as she sank lower and he brought the blade once more down into her body.

  They both heard the gunshot.

  The impact sent him crashing forward. He tripped over the girl and fell heavily against the railing. He heard the cracking sound as the wood splintered, felt the sudden numbness in his chest. The Kouronos fell from his hand and clattered down onto the deck.

  At the last possible moment he turned his head and looked behind him. At Potter holding the gun, and at the woman standing next to him. Into her eyes.

  Then the rail gave way, and he was soaring outward into the blinding light, suspended for a moment like the birds outside his bedroom window. He spread his arms and flew, out into the sky and down, down toward the glittering surface of the sunlit sea, where only he . . . was . . . God.

  She felt his leg strike her shoulder, saw him fall against the railing and disappear from her view, but her clouded mind was no longer able to grasp the significance of it. She tried to raise herself up from her kneeling position, but her legs would not support her. She looked up toward the source of the noise she seemed to be hearing from a long way off and saw—or thought she saw—several dark, indistinct figures coming toward her. She swayed, tasting the blood in her mouth, attempting to blink away the curtain of red that now veiled her eyes. In her last conscious moments she reached out to the figures with her hand, moving her lips, oddly aware of the fact that she was making no sound. And yet she had to tell them. She had to communicate it to them. They were her chorus, and it was her final speech.

  But all she knew was that she was falling and the redwood boards were rushing up at her and everything was spinning around her and Mommy was waiting and behold me, she commanded as she toppled forward and the last glimmer of light faded, behold me! I have upheld . . that . . which . . .

  The little group of people in the doorway moved aside to let her pass. Chief Potter lowered the gun to his side and stood looking over at the still, bloody form lying facedown on the sundeck, slowly shaking his head from side to side. Then he turned to the two uniformed officers behind him and pointed back into the interior of the house. They nodded and followed Trish Manning, who was already dashing toward the master bedroom, calling Kay Prescott’s name as she went. A sergeant walked swiftly over to the telephone and dialed. The sounds of running footsteps and doors opening and closing faded as Trish and the policemen moved away through the house, searching frantically for the other woman.

  She was aware of the eyes upon her as she stepped out onto the sundeck, aware of the odd impression of quiet despite the roaring of the waves against the rocks below. Her senses had been dulled by the medication she’d taken in order to make the flight, and the succession of surprises she had confronted in her two hours on the island had further impaired her natural reactions. But now it was all beginning to register, becoming suddenly, sadly clear to her.

  The police chief watched as she went over to the girl and lowered herself down onto the deck beside her. She reached out as gently as possible to turn the girl over and place her head in her lap. The dark blood trickled down, unheeded, onto her white linen suit.

  She pushed the pale gold hair back out of the lovely face and stared down at it, remembering, reliving in mere seconds all the warm, tender moments and words and feelings they had taken a lifetime to create. There were bad things, too: it had not always been easy to love this girl. But only the positive images would come to her, and she wondered at that for a while before she arrived at the explanation. Then, looking down on the sundeck, she knew as much as anyone can ever know about it. Love was never easy. And yet, as difficult as it is, she thought, the very worst of it is easier—oh, so much easier—than living, existing, going on without it.

  Holding the girl as close as possible, leaning over until her tears fell down to wash away the blood, Margaret Barclay began, every so softly, to sing. It was the children’s song that she had always crooned to the child, as she had sung it, years before, to Madeleine.

  Frère Jacques, Frère Jacques,

  Dormez-vous? Dormez-vous. . ..

  AFTER

  KAY STOOD at the gate, staring out over the shimmering runway as she waited for the plane to land. Her friends were just behind her, and she could feel the warmth of Trish’s hand on her shoulder. Jerry was saying something, but she wasn’t listening, couldn’t distinguish the words, so great was her concentration.

  She was feeling better now, better than she had in the last week, ever since that awful moment when she awoke, groggy from the drugs and anxious, disoriented, staring blearily around at the crude walls of the little boathouse on the beach. She had come out of the fog as from a nightmare, waiting as the room spun around her, trying to orient herself. And then she had run wildly, desperately up the path, shouting all the way. Across the lawn and in through the open door and straight into the arms of Trish, who had grabbed her and held her and would not let her go

  It had seemed to take hours for all of it to sink in. Trish was there, holding her, and there were others as well. Chief Potter and several policemen and a tall, regal-looking older woman she’d never seen before. Trish was speaking quietly, in an even tone of voice—something about Adam, and about Diana. Adam, they told her, was dead. He’d fallen from the sundeck after Chief Potter shot him. Why? she’d asked blankly. Why had the chief shot her husband? There must be some mistake: Adam was in Florida. And where was Diana . . ?

  Finally, the facts had begun to register. She had been sitting on a couch by then, drinking something warm and sweet, and the older woman was sitting next to her, grasping her hand. The woman was telling her about Diana—whose name, it seemed, was not Diana—and about her parents. Long Island. Some sort of robbery and murder. And something about Hawaii.

  She’d sat between the two women, Trish and Margaret Barclay, gradually realizing that the killer, the monster they were describing, had been her husband. Adam. Adam Prescott, alias Andrew Phillips, alias Albert Petersen. On Labor Day twenty years ago, on Long Island, Albert Petersen had murdered his wife, Madeleine, and nearly killed his daughter. The crime spree tha
t had preceded the incident had claimed the lives of two neighbors, and his mistress, Karen Lawrence, had later vanished, never to be seen again. Later still—when his wife’s money had run out—he’d turned up in Hawaii as Andrew Phillips, to woo, marry, and eventually murder Darlene Bishop, the hotel heiress. The robbery/murders of four other residents of the island were obviously also his handiwork. Three other people involved in the second case had also disappeared mysteriously: Stephen Ingalls, Kimberly Brown, and her daughter, age four. In both cases, Petersen/Phillips had apparently died, once by accident and once by his own hand. It was now believed that the charred body on the burned yacht in Hawaii was actually that of the mate, Stephen Ingalls. Three years ago, here in St. Thomas, Petersen/Phillips, now calling himself Adam Prescott, had married Kay. His scenario was the same, right down to the date: Labor Day, exactly ten years after the last one. He’d killed Sandra Franklin and Nancy Breen; he’d attacked Trish; and he’d probably killed his original mate, Greg Billings, as well. Next he was going to murder her, Kay.

  His plan had been foiled by the young woman Kay knew as Diana Meissen. Diana, the goddess in three forms: the hunt; the moon; the dark. Protectress of women—appropriate, considering her efforts on behalf of Kay and Lisa. And Meissen, an anagram for another Greek deity: Nemesis, the goddess of righteous anger. The angel of retribution.

  His daughter.

  She had waited a long time for her opportunity: ten years, ever since the day she read about the Hawaiian Labor Day incident—on the tenth anniversary of her own tragedy—and recognized his photograph in the newspaper.

  Diana—Alberta Petersen—had been his final victim. The young woman had carried Kay down to the boathouse to ensure her safety. She had made certain that Lisa would be away from the island. If Adam had found them in the house . . . Kay had shut her eyes, not wanting to think about it.

  Now, as Kay looked out at the tarmac, the sky was filled with the roar of the approaching jetliner.

  The next three days had been a blur. She’d slept through most of that time and spent hours lying, in her darkened bedroom staring at the ceiling. Occasionally she’d ventured out into the living room to sit with Trish and Margaret Barclay, both of whom were staying there with her, seeing to everything that had to be done. The doctor and Chief Potter came and went, and someone came to repair the railing on the sundeck. Trish and Margaret and Nola took turns hanging up the constantly ringing phone and turning away the reporters from all over America who arrived at the front door. She had only the vaguest impressions of most of it. She was aware, as the dullness was slowly replaced by an acute sense of embarrassment, that she was in what was commonly known as a fugue state. The embarrassment soon caused her odd detachment to dissipate.

  She could not believe—still could not believe—that she had been so utterly, so titanically stupid. But that feeling, Trish and the doctor informed her, would eventually pass. She nodded and smiled at them, knowing that it would not. It would never go away. She ultimately confided that secret certainty to Miss Barclay as the two of them sat up together late one night. The older woman had smiled ruefully and nodded her head and reached out, ever so gently, to touch Kay’s cheek with her cool, soft hand.

  The next day they had brought her Adam’s ashes. She placed the terra-cotta urn on the coffee table and sat staring at it for nearly two hours. Then she went over to the telephone. The following afternoon a private jet landed at the airport, and she and Margaret were there to meet it. They collected the sole passenger—a quiet, dignified, elderly widow—and took her to Cliffhanger.

  Shortly after they got back to the house, Kay had walked out onto the sundeck, flanked by Margaret Barclay and their new friend Amanda Bishop, Darlene’s mother, and unceremoniously tossed the urn over the newly repaired railing, into the abyss. The three women watched, expressionless, as the urn soared down—duplicating the path the body had taken—and splashed into the sea. Then they went back into the living room, where Trish was waiting with a magnum of Dom Perignon. It was then, as she drank champagne and spoke quietly with the other women, that Kay knew she would survive this. She would be all right.

  One hour later Mrs. Bishop left the island and returned to her home in Hawaii.

  That evening, the six o’clock news brought further information. Several people in a tiny town in Minnesota, having seen the news coverage of the events in St. Thomas, had that day come forward with another true story. The man in the photographs, Adam Prescott, bore more than a passing resemblance to Arvil Pederssen, Jr., who had been orphaned in a freak robbery/murder in their town thirty years before. His mother had been stabbed to death by a mysterious intruder, and young Arvil had been the only other person in the house. The date: Labor Day.

  Kay had stared at the television screen, feeling nothing. She seemed to be dead inside: nothing was registering anymore.

  The next day she had stood here, at this very gate, with Margaret Barclay, watching the men from the hospital carry Margaret’s niece up the mobile stairway into a New York-bound plane. After a moment the older woman turned to her, kissed her cheek, and followed. As soon as the plane took off, Kay returned home and placed fresh flowers on her first husband’s grave.

  Yesterday morning she had gone to the yacht club, accompanied by Trish and Jerry and her lawyer. The little group had walked through the silent, staring clubhouse and down the beach to the dock where the Kay was tied. The others lagged discreetly behind as she walked out alone to meet the young man who waited for her. The two of them stood there next to the yacht, regarding each other evenly. Whatever she had planned to say went forever unspoken as she looked into his wet, sorrowful eyes. After a while she shook her head and motioned to the others. They joined her, and the lawyer produced the necessary papers. Witnessed by Trish and Jerry, the astonished Kyle became the new owner of the Kay without so much as a penny’s changing hands. There was one stipulation, however, to which he agreed: he must take the boat, leave St. Thomas, and never, ever return. She walked away then, but as she stepped off the dock she turned to look back at the young man who stared after her. She raised her hand and waved to him, thinking that at least she had not been the only fool. She and Kyle had that in common.

  And now, as a final, hopeful flourish in a long week of despair, the plane descended from the sky and glided down the runway. She waited as it taxied toward the gate and stopped, and the stairway moved into place. The door opened and the passengers began to descend.

  Then she saw her.

  With a cry of purest joy, she ran out onto the tarmac, pushing, fighting her way through the crowd. She was so excited, so happy, that she didn’t even mind the presence of the reporters and photographers who had followed her here from the house. Trish cried out in shrill protest behind her as flashbulbs popped, but Kay continued running, paying them not the slightest attention. Yes, she thought as she ran, I can survive this: the whispers and the speculation and the sidelong glances. The newspapers and the magazines and the unauthorized true-crime books and the television miniseries that will surely follow. All of it. We will go back to Cliffhanger, to our lives, with Jumbi and our friends to help us.

  She stopped on the runway and sank to her knees, opening her arms, laughing and weeping simultaneously. The child let go of Frances’s hand and rushed forward. Lisa was grinning as she came toward her mother, and the bright St. Thomas sun danced in her bright red hair, the gift from both her parents.

  Russo helped him into the company car, tossed the crutches into the backseat, and got in behind the wheel. He drove down Broadway, across Fifty-ninth Street, and over the bridge to the Long Island Expressway, remaining tactfully silent. Robin was grateful for that; he needed to think.

  Here I am, he thought, going out there, unannounced and uninvited. There is every possibility that she won’t want to see me. But I know, after all these days of consideration, of weighing it in my mind, that the attempt must be made. I have to try.

  Margaret Barclay had visited his hospital roo
m several times in the few days that she remained on the island. They had not spoken much, but he had welcomed her company just the same. Once he had awakened from a drugged sleep to find her sitting there next to the bed, looking down at him. The day after she left St. Thomas, he had checked himself out of the hospital and returned to New York, to his empty rooms on West Seventieth Street.

  His parents were the first visitors to arrive, followed shortly by Russo and Mr. Yakimadoro. His mother had taken one swift, horrified look at his bare living room and the ratty mattress on his bedroom floor and then swept off to Macy’s. The next morning a truck had pulled up outside his building. He and Russo had watched from the front window as several men unloaded a queen-sized bed, a couch, two armchairs, and a coffee table and carried them around to the service entrance. He had smiled, knowing that drapes and blinds and kitchen utensils would soon follow. They did. The Oriental rug and the potted plants, however, had surprised him.

  His second surprise was the check Yakimadoro handed him from Margaret Barclay. She had paid him the fifty-four hundred she owed him for the five weeks, and she’d added a bonus as well.

  Twenty-five thousand dollars.

  He’d immediately called her at her home in Glen Cove. She’d listened in silence to his protests, and then she had informed him, kindly but firmly, that she insisted that he keep the money. She had thanked him for all his conscientious effort on her behalf, told him she hoped his leg would mend soon, and hung up before he could say anything more.

  That had been three days ago, and in the past three days he’d picked up the phone a hundred times, only to put it back down again. He could not say what had to be said, do what had to be done, on the phone.

  He had to see her.

  If he went out there, he reasoned, Margaret Barclay would not turn him away. He leaned back against the seat, bracing himself as Russo drove the car down the exit ramp. This journey would probably be in vain, but it was necessary. He was a detective, and he could be an actor, and now he had some money. But that was not enough. There was still the one thing, the most important thing.