Nothing but the Night

by Bill Pronzini

  He walked on past the driveway. Wineman was on the porch now, one arm around the blond’s waist, the other around the kid, three of them turning in to the house. Door shut behind them as Nick reached the second pillar.

  No nameplate on that one, either, but just inside, at the edge of the drive, a mailbox on an iron pole with what looked to be printing on the side of the box. He couldn’t make out the words from the sidewalk.

  Front windows of the house were all curtained or draped, nobody peering out. Street was still empty. He moved in fast, bent to squint at the printing on the box. Came back out and kept walking, uphill a short distance, then back on the other side to the Mazda.

  The Gallaghers.

  Okay. Guy’s name was Gallagher. Wineman must be what he was, what he did for a living. Drove a new silver BMW, lived at 74 Ridgeway Terrace in Los Alegres with a wife and at least one kid, had some sort of big-salary job in the wine business over in Paloma, had a classy brunette girlfriend who drove a white Lexus. Enough for tonight. He’d know more, maybe a lot more, by this time tomorrow.

  10

  The attic. Hiding in the attic.

  Cold, damp, dark. Smells of mold and mildew, rain and dust and mouse turds. Sound of the rain outside, beating on the roof, wind-flung against the dormer windows. He hears it dripping, a leak somewhere inside one of the walls. Drip. Drip. Drip. He doesn’t dare shut his eyes because then it won’t be rain he’ll see and hear dripping, it’ll be something else wet, glistening. Something bright red.

  Blood.

  Downstairs, on the bed. Blood.

  Downstairs, on the bedroom floor. Blood.

  He lies curled on the old bare mattress, his knees drawn tight against his chest, his eyes wide open and full of the dark. Shivers rack his body. He has never been so cold. Or so scared. Or so alone.

  Drip. Drip.

  Dad. Daddy.

  Help me.

  He can’t move. He wants desperately to be somewhere else, somewhere warm and safe and far away from here. But he can’t make himself get up. Afraid, so cold, and all he can do is lie there shaking with his eyes wide open, listening to the rain blood rain drip drip drip inside the wall, on the bed downstairs, on the bedroom floor downstairs.

  The rain slackens and then stops. Not the dripping, just the rain and the boom of the wind. He hears something else outside, another car turning in off the road. Light splashes over the window, making it into a dead, staring eye. He trembles, and a sound comes out like the one his puppy made when it got run over on his fifth birthday and he rushed out and found it all broken and covered with wet, glistening red in the street. “Happy birthday, Cameron, your damn mutt just got squashed out front.” Ma’s voice echoing inside his head.

  Drip.

  Door slamming downstairs.

  Oh God, is it Fatso? Is he back?

  Footsteps.

  A voice, calling something he can’t understand. Fatso’s voice?

  Scared, so scared, and I have to go real bad and I can’t get up, I can’t move. Please God don’t let me wet myself. “Pissed your bed again, you little shit.” Please God don’t let me wet myself!

  The voice yelling again, and this time he hears it clearly.

  “Cameron! Where are you, son?”

  Not Fatso. Stranger’s voice.

  Somebody worse than Fatso?

  More footsteps, somebody else yelling. Another stranger. Two strangers in the house now.

  Go away. No, help me. No, go away.

  Daddy, don’t be dead. Mama—

  Drip.

  Dust and mouse turds and red rain.

  Footsteps louder, closer. On the attic stairs.

  Have to go so bad I can’t hold it much longer.

  Thump. Drip. Thump.

  Creak of the door opening.

  Beam of light stabbing through the dark. Poking at him like a sharp thing.

  “Boy? You in here, Cameron?”

  Warm wet flowing under him. No! But he can’t help it, he couldn’t hold it anymore, it isn’t his fault! All he can do is lie there peeing on himself while the sharp light stabs closer and the red rain drips and the stranger’s voice calls his name. And when the light slices into his eyes his mouth opens and the scream comes out—

  CAM JERKED AWAKE with the scream in his ears, a shrill tremolo that was a hammering pressure against the drums. As always, the first thing he did was to feel the crotch of his pajamas, the sheet under him. Dry. He hadn’t actually lost control of his bladder during one of the nightmares since the first year or so. But the fear was still part of him, mixed together with the other fears of boy and man.

  “Oh, Cam,” Hallie said, “it’s been so long I was beginning to hope—” She broke off as he lay back down, limp against the wadded pillows. Moved closer and slid an arm across his chest, held him until his breathing slowed. Then she asked, “Which one was it?”

  “One in the attic.”

  “It must’ve been … intense.”

  “No worse than any of the others.”

  “You were making noises.”

  He winced. “What kind of noises?”

  “Moans. Hurt sounds.”

  His mouth was hot and dry; he sipped water from the bedside glass. “I’m sorry I woke you.”

  “Honey, I don’t care about that. I care about you.”

  “I’m all right.”

  “Are you? Really?”

  No, he thought. At length he said, “Maybe I ought to start seeing Beloit again.”

  “If you think it’s a good idea.”

  “I don’t know. It might be.”

  “With winter coming. Yes.

  “Winter,” he said.

  “It might be a good idea to talk to Caitlin again, too.”

  “Waste of time. She’s not going to change her mind, you know that as well as I do.”

  “She needs money, doesn’t she?”

  “She always needs money. It hasn’t made any difference in the past.”

  “Well, what about some sort of cash incentive? In addition to her share of the sale, I mean. Payable immediately. We can afford it.”

  “I tried that once, remember?”

  “Years ago. Maybe now that the house is vacant again and there’s no rent money coming in—”

  “She won’t take a dime from me, Hallie. And she won’t agree to sell the damn house, not even if she and Teddy are starving. Besides, even if by some miracle I could talk her into it, I’m not convinced it’d make much difference, any difference, in her life or mine.”

  “But it might. Didn’t Dr. Beloit indicate it might?”

  “He’s not God,” Cam said.

  “I’m not God, either, but I believe it will. Get the river house out of your life, and the nightmares and the rest of it will stop. If you could only make Caitlin understand—”

  “Caitlin doesn’t care about my problems. She has enough of her own, and hers happen to be bound up in not getting rid of the river house.”

  “Cam—”

  He said bitterly, “A couple of head cases, Cat and me. Rose must be laughing up a storm in her little corner of hell.”

  “Your mother didn’t hate you and your sister.”

  “The hell she didn’t.”

  “Aunt Ida—”

  “Aunt Ida doesn’t know everything. Rose resented Cat and me, treated us like dirt when nobody else was around, flaunted her affairs in front of us, and if that’s not hatred it amounts to the same thing.”

  “And you can’t stop hating her in return. Until you do, you won’t have any peace. How many times have we had this discussion? How many times have you had it with Dr. Beloit and the others?”

  “All right,” he said.

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to snap at you—”

  “It’s all right.”

  “Will you please try to talk to Caitlin?”

  “If it’s what you want.”

  “What I want is what’s best for you. I can’t stand the thought of losing you.�
��

  Her words touched him, pushed aside the bitterness. He turned to her, nuzzled the warmth and softness of her breast. “You’re not going to lose me. We’re not going to lose each other.”

  “We could if you can’t find some way to resolve what happened twenty-five years ago. I’ll lose you, because sooner or later you’ll end up losing yourself.”

  She was right—of course she was right. He folded her into his arms, held her tightly. Loving her, hating himself, he said, “I’ll call Beloit’s office first thing in the morning. And talk to Caitlin as soon as she’ll let me.”

  11

  Paloma Wine Systems. That was the place Gallagher worked. Led Nick straight to it from Los Alegres on Friday morning.

  Good-size outfit on Blackwell Road, semirural section on the eastern edge of Paloma. One Quonset-type building, like a small airplane hangar, that looked like it’d been there a long time; one newer L-shaped building made of cinder block, part warehouse and part office wing. Property enclosed by a tall Cyclone fence, night-lights on poles that were more for show than real security. Trucking outfit on one side, some kind of animal shelter on the other. Mixed-bag area, mostly industrial. In all maybe a dozen businesses stretching for about a mile along one side of the road, open farmland on the other.

  So what did Gallagher do there? Honcho of some kind—BMW, fancy home, suit and tie he wore said that. But what kind?

  Nick drove next door to the shelter. Animal Lifeline, seemed to be a sort of halfway house for strays waiting for adoption. Type of place Annalisa’d like. That big old orange tom of her folks’, curled up and died with his head in his food dish—Annalisa’d cried for days over that poor cat. She had a soft heart. He wished he’d let her have a kitten like she’d wanted after they were married. Allergic to cat fur, sneezed his head off when he was around one too long, but still he should’ve let her have a kitten. Sneezing and a snotty nose were a small price to pay to make someone you loved happy. He’d get her a cat when she was well, first thing. Orange tom like the one that’d died… Rufus, that was his name. Hell of a name for a cat, Rufus. But if she wanted to call it Rufus II or Rufus Junior, that was all right with him.

  Animal Lifeline was two buildings, tin-roofed shelter in back and a cottagelike one nearest the road that had a sign on it saying Thrift Shop. Elderly woman was opening up the shop as Nick pulled in and parked. She’d gone inside and was behind the counter when he walked in.

  He smiled at her. “Morning, ma’am. Nice morning, isn’t it.”

  Got him a smile and a “Yes, it is” in return. You could almost always put people on your side, get what you needed out of them, with a polite and sunny approach. He’d learned that long ago, even before he met Annalisa. Not that he had to fake it much. He was naturally friendly, liked most people, enjoyed their company. Or had before Gallagher came along and tore up his life along with Annalisa’s.

  He browsed through the shop for a few minutes—patience was something else he’d learned how to use. Picked out a couple of paperback books, took them to the old woman at the counter, paid her fifty cents. While she was ringing up the sale he said, “That big place next door, Paloma Wine Systems. What kind of business is that?”

  “Oh, PWS represents several wineries in the area. Sales, distribution, compliance services.”

  “What’s that, compliance services?”

  “Oh, you know, business licensing and that sort of thing.”

  “Looks like a pretty successful operation.”

  “Largest in the valley,” she said. “Mr. Gallagher is a good businessman.”

  “He the owner? Mr. Gallagher?”

  “Yes, that’s right.”

  “Been at it a long time?”

  “Seven or eight years.”

  “Lot of people working for him?”

  “More than twenty, yes.”

  “I bet he’s one of those workaholics.”

  “Oh, not so much as you might think.”

  “What’s his first name?”

  “Everyone calls him Cam.”

  “Cam. Short for camera?”

  She laughed. “No, Cameron. You seem very curious about him, I must say.”

  “Well, I thought I’d talk to him about a job. If he’s hiring. You happen to know?”

  “I’m afraid I don’t. You’re looking for work, then?”

  “I sure am. Had some bad luck lately and I … well, I’m trying to get back on my feet.”

  Woman said, “Oh, I’m sorry,” as if she meant it. “What sort of work do you do?”

  “Any kind, long as it’s honest. Wouldn’t happen to need somebody here at the shelter, by any chance?”

  “No. We’re mostly volunteers here.”

  “Know of any place around town that’s hiring? In case Mr. Gallagher isn’t?”

  Sad shake of her head. Nice old lady, somebody’s mother, probably somebody’s grandmother. Reminded him of Mom Foster, except Mom wasn’t this old. Never knew his own mom. Died when he was two. Freak accident, slipped on some grease and hit her head on the kitchen stove, old man came in from plowing and found her dead. Poor Pa. Must’ve felt the same way, finding her like that, that Nick’d felt when they came and told him about Annalisa.

  “Well, I’ll find a job somewhere,” he said. “All you have to do is keep looking and something’ll turn up.”

  Woman said, “That’s the spirit. It’s too bad more folks don’t have your attitude, young man. There’d be far less homelessness and welfare cheating. Far less crime, too.”

  “You’re right about that, ma’am.”

  “Well, good luck and God bless. I’m sure things will work out for you, as you hope they will.”

  “I’m sure of it, too,” Nick said. “Just as sure as I can be.”

  12

  Dr. Beloit couldn’t see him for nearly a week. “If it’s an emergency, Mr. Gallagher,” the receptionist said, “perhaps the doctor could find a few minutes….” No, it wasn’t an emergency. He’d felt like saying, I can keep my pants zipped until Thursday, I’m not that far gone. But of course he didn’t.

  None of this was funny. Not the slightest bit funny.

  He wished he had more faith in Beloit, in the whole psychiatric process. He’d been able to open up to Beloit and the others before him, but only to a point—revealing some of the more painfully intimate details about himself, his childhood, his mother, yet withholding others. The night he’d walked in on Rose and Fatso, both of them naked, her legs wrapped around him and her heels beating on his hairy jiggling ass—and the wet dream he’d had about it later. Some of the things he’d seen and heard on Rose and Paul’s last night on earth. And other, later incidents, such as the time a few years ago when he’d been away on business and suffered a blackout migraine and woke up in his motel room with blood on his shirt and hands. Just a nosebleed, but God, he’d been frightened. Blood always disturbed him; seeing it, even talking about it, made him physically ill. He’d never confided any of these things to anyone, even Hallie, and they wouldn’t dislodge for professional scrutiny no matter how hard he tried.

  Beloit’s manner didn’t particularly inspire confidence, either. He was too smug, too glib. He used words to fill up time the way pharmacists used pills and powders to fill up containers. It wasn’t so much that he liked the sound of his own voice (though he probably did), or even that he considered his comments to be profound. (Though he surely seemed to when he said things like “Nightmares, according to ancient Indian superstition, are the result of the soul leaving the body, visiting the nether regions, and returning with visual imprints of the terrible acts it witnessed there. A modern interpretation of that superstition may be helpful in understanding the insidious nature of your nightmares, Mr. Gallagher.”) It was as if his main concern, aside from dispensing aid and comfort to the troubled, was in making sure each session was crammed to the brim to avoid complaint. He charged $100 an hour, but the sessions were only forty-five minutes long; you paid for the extra fifteen m
inutes as a kind of surcharge, so Beloit could clean his professional palette before the next poor bastard hobbled in, like a gourmet priming his taste buds between courses. He didn’t want you to realize it and feel cheated.

  Could Beloit help him with the Jenna problem? He didn’t need to know what to do about his compulsion; he’d had enough psychoanalysis to figure that out for himself. Negate the power of it by using common sense to maintain self-control. Force his conscious mind to lock into other channels—work, hobbies, domestic activities. Keep reminding himself of how much he loved Hallie and didn’t want to hurt her anymore, how it would be if he lost her and the girls. Things he was already doing. What he needed from Beloit was insight into why he was so strongly tempted. Understand that, and he could make the obsession go away. Or at least he’d have an easier time controlling it. Knowledge was strength. One of Beloit’s dictums. So maybe the good doctor could help. It was worth at least one session to find out.

  Next Thursday. Six days. He’d have to take pains to avoid Jenna until he saw Beloit. Then, when he saw her again and she forced the issue, as he was sure she would, his defenses would be stronger. The way they were now, he was afraid they wouldn’t hold up under a direct assault.

  13

  Finding a job wasn’t much of a problem. Man could always work if he wanted to. Some of the guys he’d run into in the shelters and missions kept pissing and moaning about being out of work. He had no sympathy for anybody like that. Being homeless, sure, that was something else. But you could be homeless and still earn a living, even if it was a lousy living. People he respected were willing to take any job they could get, get along on minimum wage if it was the best they could manage. Bottom line was to work, don’t be choosy.

  Best jobs for him were night driving jobs. Short-haul trucking for gypsy freighters and small supply outfits that didn’t care much about references or union cards—they were the cream. But they didn’t come along very often. Kind he’d held most often was pizza deliveryman. Every town, no matter how small, had a pizzeria, and they were always looking for drivers.