Nevertheless, I was quiet on the stairs, and thankful to find the lower hall empty. No music came from the living room now, though candlelight illumined the doorway, and a flicker of firelight made the shadows move. I turned off my flash and crept softly toward the outside door. The bad moment would come when I opened it and the storm rushed inside. That was when I must move fast, somehow getting down the steep flight of steps in the dark, and escaping to the driveway before anyone could stop me.
I had my hand on the doorknob when a soft radiance fell about me and I turned, startled, to see John standing in the living-room doorway holding up a hurricane lamp in one hand.
“Courtney!” he said in surprise. “You’re not going to attempt the storm again, are you? I can’t let you do that, you know.”
I was caught and a sense of my own helplessness swept through me, weakening even my knees.
“I suppose it is hopeless to go out there,” I said, and turned back to the stairs.
He came to me and took my arm gently. “I need your company tonight, Courtney. Perhaps this will be our last chance to talk. Come and sit with me before the fire.”
In his face I could read the truth as he held the lantern high, and I knew that he knew what I had learned tonight. Hastily I cast a look down the hall toward where the Ashers had been sitting in the kitchen and John shook his head.
“You don’t want them for company tonight, my dear. And they’ll never hear you if you call. No one will hear. Don’t you think you’d better join me now for a little talk?”
My father, I thought. One out of the two from all creation who had given me life, and who might now threaten the life he had given. I had never wanted it to be my father.
His hand on my arm propelled me, and I found myself walking into that beautiful, comfortable room that held no comfort for me now. Long shutters had been closed against the storm, but gusts forced their way in, and not even the fire on the hearth could offer much warmth while that cold fury outdoors crashed on. Tudor lay upon the hearth rug, and when he saw me he stood up with a swift movement that gathered his feet beneath him and raised his great body instantly into a guard position. Involuntarily, I drew back.
John patted my arm. “You needn’t fear Tudor tonight, Courtney. I’m here and he will obey orders.”
He led me into the room and seated me in a chair near the fire, much too close to the dog.
“Sit,” he told Tudor. “Stay,” and the animal relaxed into a sitting posture, though still alert.
I could only stare at him helplessly. It sickened me now to think that I had felt moments of affection and longing toward this man.
He went to pour two glasses of wine and brought me one. “You may need this,” he said.
I took the wine glass and glanced around the room. It seemed to be filled with movement as eddies of wind stirred the tall candles in their holders. The storm lantern added further light, but there were shadowy corners and unfamiliar black patches up the walls. It was a room that should have been quiet, peaceful, but the tumult outdoors offered no peace.
“It’s really too bad that you had to find those pages from Alice’s notebook,” he went on conversationally. “I searched for them in Stacia’s room, but you must already have had them. It is too bad. You and I could have got on very well, eventually. I could already see that you might do more for me in the long run than Stacia ever would. She was terribly greedy, you know—and possessive of what she regarded as hers. Of course I’ve read those pages too now, and I understand what Stacia believed she held over me. It was clever of her to cut out my name, but not quite clever enough.”
Something new had come into his voice—a hinting of anger long suppressed. It frightened me, but I tried to talk to him calmly.
“You’re right,” I said. “She wasn’t clever enough. The pattern of the way Alice wrote names was there. A longer cut could have meant either Judith or Herndon, but the short one could only mean John. Or Nan. For a little while I wondered about that.”
“Nan!” He laughed unpleasantly. “May I ask what it was you had planned to do?”
I couldn’t miss the past tense, or that quiver of rising anger in his voice. “What does it matter? I hadn’t really decided. After all, I would be acting against my own father.”
He smiled at me, falsely gentle. “If only I could have trusted you, Courtney. But I found I couldn’t even trust Stacia. After all I’d done for her all her life . . .” Anger was in the open now—blazing in his eyes as he looked at me.
“I can understand about Alice,” I said. “But not why you had to hurt Stacia. Weren’t you two of a kind and on the same side?”
His smile stiffened, froze on his mouth. “Not exactly. Perhaps we both wanted money, and we’d always had it withheld from us. But Stacia was like her grandfather—my father. She was power-hungry. And after she had read those pages she came to the mistaken conclusion that she had power over all of us. And especially over me. That was where she made her mistake.”
“What do you mean? She loved you, surely?”
“I think not. She could play that game while I was useful to her, but not a moment longer. When I refused to go along with what she wanted—which was to get rid of you—she was against me. Who else would have struck me down that night on the terrace, when she believed I meant her harm? Though I couldn’t admit it to anyone afterwards. I had to deal with her myself. And I did.” For the moment anger had died, and there was only cold, unbelievably treacherous fact in his statement.
I found that I was shivering. “What about Alice?”
He had no reluctance to tell me everything, still deadly cold as he spoke. “Olive Asher saw me with Alice that day on the beach, and she told Judith what she had seen. Judith was still half in love with me then, Alice’s words to the contrary, and even though she’d found it sensible to return to Herndon, she kept what she knew to herself and paid Olive off, sent her away. I was stupid enough to think she might turn to me after Alice’s death, but she didn’t.”
He paused and anger was rising again—stronger now as old rage surfaced, old fury burst through, shattering the guise of sanity.
“Judith will have to pay for what she did,” he went on. “Because I will inherit as the older son. I will have the money and the power, and I can pay them all off—make them grovel.”
What he meant, of course, was that with me gone he would inherit, and my terror grew. I wanted to close my eyes, to shut out the terrible look in his face, somehow shut out the seething hatred in his voice. All these years this had been masked, hidden—while he waited. The new, dreadful voice went on.
“But she didn’t turn to me. A few months after Alice was out of the way, it became apparent that Judith was going to have Herndon’s baby. That was when she told my father the truth about what Olive had seen on the beach, and the shock killed him. She has never tried to tell anyone else, and she’s been a little afraid of me ever since. But I would never hurt Judith—not physically. I’m very fond of her, really. It’s just that she owes me a debt from long ago—and she’ll have to pay it now. In full.”
“She must have told Herndon,” I broke in.
“No, strangely enough. Alice had seen to it that he learned about the affair between Judith and me, but he never let her know that he knew. He forgave her, but he couldn’t be rid of me. My father’s will stipulated that I was to live in this house as long as I wished, until the new heir inherited. But Herndon never knew that it was I down there on the beach that morning. That’s one of the priceless jokes Judith managed to play on herself, without knowing it.”
John laughed softly again, and I shivered at the sound.
“Do you know,” he went on, “what my loyal brother has believed all these years? He believes that Judith was behind Alice’s death because Alice threatened her with exposure of our affair. He has given his life to protecting her. I don’t know but
what he might even have protected me, being a good Rhodes, and my brother.”
“But Stacia loved you. She—” My words came out weakly and I broke off.
“Stacia always loved Stacia. She began to guess that from my viewpoint it might be much better for me if I made peace with you as your father. You would have been more generous toward me, since you’re far more loving than Stacia. You haven’t discovered it for yourself yet, but you are, you know. So we quarreled about a number of things that last day of her life. As I say, she had attacked me, and she threatened me further.”
“I still think she had an affection for you. She was planning to take you away to Europe when she came into her money.”
“But of course she couldn’t do that, could she, once you had inherited?”
His words seemed so calm, so reasonable—and were so utterly twisted by the fury that drove him.
“Stacia was jealous and angry and bitter!” The furious words ran on. “And she became dangerous when she started sending those anonymous letters to stir everyone up again about Alice and Alice’s baby. In the end she actually taunted me with exposure. So what could I do?”
So reasonable a question, rising out of total unreason. I had never known John Rhodes, and I didn’t know him now. I only knew that my flesh crept when I thought of him as my father.
“What did you do?” I asked faintly.
“The same thing I did with Alice. There are pressure points that can make a person quickly unconscious—and I’m strong enough. The water took care of the rest. It was very simple.”
So calm, so clear, so reasonable, except for that cracking of his voice on certain words.
The sickness in me was growing, I didn’t know what he meant to do with me, but I knew it would be terrible. And the most terrible thing of all—the thing that kept beating at me in reminder—was the fact that John Rhodes was my father.
As though he had read my thoughts, he spoke to me with that dreadful, seemingly gentle note in his voice. “I’ve really liked you, Courtney, and I never wanted to hurt you. But if it will comfort you, you might as well know that you are not my daughter.”
For a moment I could only stare at him blankly. “But then—then who—?”
“No! I’m not going into all that. It’s too long a story, and it doesn’t matter any more. There isn’t time. Though I must tell you something else. Do you know what I saw tonight, Courtney? Earlier, when the storm died down at the center, I saw the moon—”
“I saw it too,” I said with a sense of fatalism.
“Then you noted that odd configuration of clouds?”
“Yes—like a unicorn.”
“Of course I don’t believe in any of this, but you know what the legend says, don’t you?”
I answered as though he had hypnotized me. “That when a Rhodes sees that moon it can mean either great good fortune, or utter disaster. But perhaps I’m not a Rhodes?”
His smile gave me no answer. “Tonight I think that moon will carry out both prophecies—one for you, and one for me. Perhaps it won’t be very difficult for you to figure out which will be for which.”
“What will it profit you?” I asked between stiff lips.
“Profit? I’ll have your silence assured, of course. And then there is the inheritance—since I am the elder son the trust will come to me.”
I was very cold, and fear seemed to pulse with every beat of my heart. “John,” I managed, “you can’t get away with another accident. And you can’t do anything to me in this house.”
He regarded me calmly. “I can get away with anything I choose. No one has ever known the man I am. I’ve hidden from all of them—behind the cheerful, unambitious playboy! I’ve taken their beastly treatment—but now it’s my turn. Though you’re right about the house. Let’s go outside.”
Without turning my head, I tried to measure the distance behind me to the door, to a place where I could make the Ashers hear me if I called out to them. It was hopeless to think of reaching Judith and Herndon upstairs.
He must have seen the movement of my eyes. “I’m faster than you are, and in this uproar no one will hear, however loudly you scream. Come outside with me, Courtney. Like Stacia, I’ve always enjoyed a good storm. I like to test myself against the elements.”
I stayed where I was, my hands gripping the arms of my chair.
He picked up an oilcloth slicker from another chair and pulled it on, buttoning it high, and turning up the collar. When he bent to fasten a lower button, I sprang from the chair and hurled myself toward the door, forgetting the dog. But Tudor, though he snarled and showed his teeth, was still obedient to the command to “stay” that had been given him, and it was John who caught me and pulled me back with a jerk that wrenched my still tender arm. I cried out in pain, but he did not let me go. It was all in the open now—the rage gone out of hand.
“Don’t try that again,” he said. “You’ll excite the dog.”
Tudor was on his feet, watching me, alert for the slightest command.
John directed me in a voice turned low and deadly. “We’ll go out through the terrace door. Come, Tudor—guard.”
The dog was beside me at once, huge and menacing. Futilely I felt for the unicorn under the scarf at my throat, touching its golden surface.
John flung open the door to the terrace room, letting in a roar of wind, while the unprotected candle flames around the room dipped, smoking and trembling. John pushed me ahead of him into wild darkness and closed the door after the dog came through.
Earlier, someone had dragged all the terrace furniture in and stacked it in this semishelter, where it blocked our way. The night screamed with sound, and cold rain slashed our faces as John pushed me past tables and lawn chairs, with Tudor close on our heels.
On the terrace, the full buffeting struck us, but John made no surrender to these banshee forces. Perhaps the wind wasn’t quite as strong as it had been, or we would not have been able to move into it as we did. Even then, the terrible thrust of it was greater than anything I had ever felt. My arm ached with pain, and I stumbled and might have fallen if John hadn’t held me firm by the other arm.
Out here the night was pitch black and wet sand stung my face and gritted between my teeth. Wind tore and whipped my hair into a wet tangle. All around us there was a howling, as though demons had risen from the ocean and been let loose on the land.
Again I felt John’s hand pushing me from behind, and I heard the whining of the dog, who liked this night no better than I, but who would do as he was told. I could see nothing now, but John knew his way instinctively, and he was thrusting me out from the terrace to stand on the rim of the high dune. The beach must have vanished as waves boomed across it and broke against the dune, sending spray into the air, eroding the embankment and carrying sand back into the sea. The treacherous undertow would be working tonight. My face felt like ice and my lips were stiff with sand and salt spray.
John’s voice sounded close to my ear, so the wind couldn’t snatch his words away. “We can’t risk the steps in the dark. Dig in your heels as you go down the dune. Slide with the sand.”
I shouted back at him. “No! I won’t go down.”
“Tudor!” John cried, and the dog pressed against me. He was so close that I could hear the growl in his throat and I knew that I might feel his teeth in another moment.
“You have a choice,” John shouted in my ear. “The water or the dog. I don’t mean to lay a hand on you. This time I don’t need to.”
There was a madness in him that I was powerless to oppose. If I went down the dune the waves would snatch me away, drag me out to sea in the undertow, where I would drown, as I was supposed to have drowned twenty-five years ago. And John would concoct some story that would leave him free of guilt. But if I stayed, Tudor would gladly obey any order of John’s. I would be driven into the sea in either case.
As my heels dug into the sand, I felt it slide beneath me, taking me down a few feet. The water was close now, black and unseen, but painfully felt as it hurled itself upward, soaking me in icy wetness beneath my coat. I fell backward from the force of wind and water, sliding farther down the sand, so that water came over my ankles and up my legs. I had already lost my shoes and my feet were numb. My wounded arm had gone numb as well, but I managed to thrust myself to my feet, so that I was standing in the surge of water that rose up the dune. John had slid along beside me. “Go down, Courtney! Go all the way!”
Water would be better than the dog. Perhaps I could fight the water as I couldn’t fight the dog. Perhaps I could struggle out of the sea and make my way up some dune farther along the beach. Darkness was the one thing in my favor. The moment I was away from John’s touch, he couldn’t see me.
I took another step into the sea and was promptly knocked down by a wave, submerged, with water in my mouth and the deadly suction drawing me out. I came up choking, pulled up by John.
“Go out farther,” he shouted. “Let the water take you. It will be easy that way.”
He let my arm go and I flung myself away from him, away from the dog. Another wave battered me down, but I came up choking farther along the beach, and John wasn’t grasping me now. If I could manage the struggle against waves and wind until I came to a place where I could climb up the next dune, out of sight in the darkness, I might escape. I could hear him shouting behind me, coming nearer, and knew that he was in the water too, pursuing me—to make sure of what he wanted to happen.
My hands were stiffening in the bitter cold and my feet and legs were without feeling. I struggled in water up to my knees, trying to stay on feet I couldn’t feel—a struggle that seemed to go on forever. John shouted again, but he must be floundering too. I rose and fell, choking, my lungs burning, my eyes afire, fighting against that fatal suction that tried to pull me out to sea. Only the fact that I was not in deeper water saved me.
The Golden Unicorn Page 32
