Baptism in Blood

by Jane Haddam

  “Maggie?” Josh said.

  “Shh,” Maggie said.

  “I’m about to go home now,” Josh said. “Maybe you ought to get up and go home now, too.”

  Maggie Kelleher took another long sip of her wine, and laughed.

  2

  EVER SINCE ZHONDRA MEYER had been murdered, Rose MacNeill had been afraid—so afraid she found it hard to breathe, so afraid she found it hard to walk, so afraid she thought she was going to die right on Main Street. The fear was complicated by her anger, which was still white-hot and strong, even after she knew that Zhondra would never be able to feel it anymore. Hell was the first thing Rose MacNeill had thought of, when she heard that Zhondra Meyer was dead—Hell the way she had been taught to think of it in her childhood, when hellfire-and-brimstone preachers had been hellfire-and-brimstone preachers in­stead of gung-ho positive-thinking pep club leaders who only wanted to let you know that God’s love was there for you. It wasn’t God’s love Rose wanted, but God’s hate, that white-hot fire of retribution that was supposed to visit all the wicked on the last day and before. Henry Holborn was right, she thought. The camp was like a village of the damned. The women there were a pestilence and an abomi­nation, and they would bring the curse of God down on all their neighbors.

  “I don’t think you understand,” Zhondra had told her, in that clipped New York voice with its faint trace of soci­ety caw. Behind her, the fire had been raging and leaping, a figure of Hell for Rose to contemplate, while the interview went on, much too slowly, turning her out.

  “I don’t take lovers from among the women who stay in this house,” Zhondra had said. “I don’t admit as guests women who want to be my lovers. Especially if I don’t want to be theirs. It’s much too complicated.”

  Complicated, Rose had thought at the time. Compli­cated, complicated, complicated. The fire was leaping and dancing and she was so cold, so cold. She wanted to leap across Zhondra Meyer’s big desk and put her hands around the woman’s throat. It was bad enough to be turned away by a man. It was worse to be turned away by a woman and worse yet, worse yet—what? She had thought she was go­ing to go up the hill to the camp and never come down again. Now she not only had to come down, but to do it slowly, and in humiliation. The pictures on the walls of Zhondra’s study were all portraits, big and brooding. Rose had thought they were all staring at her, getting ready to laugh. She was laughable, really. She was worse than laughable. She was a sagging middle-aged woman with delusions of grandeur. She had honestly thought that just because she was attracted to Zhondra Meyer, Zhondra Meyer would have to be attracted to her. She had honestly thought that just because she was dying of love for Zhondra Meyer—what? Rose had been with enough men in her life to know that this was not the way love worked. Why did she think love with women would be different?

  The next thing she knew, she was stumbling down the hill, her eyes blurred with the start of tears she wouldn’t let come. She had broken the heel on one of her shoes and the toes of both feet had blisters. She was in so much pain when she moved she thought she was going to pass out. She was in so much pain even when she didn’t move. The hill seemed to be endless, and much steeper than she re­membered it. The streets between the hill and the center of town seemed to be more numerous and more full of people. Everyone must have seen her go up to talk to Zhondra Meyer. Everybody must have realized what she was going up to do. Everyone must have seen her come down again, rejected, turned down, shut off. Everyone, everyone, every­one.

  When she got to her big Victorian house, she took the back way in and went up the stairs to the rooms on the second floor where she lived. Kathi was in the store taking care of business. Rose turned on the tap in the bathroom sink full blast on cold. She put her head under the water and let the chill go through her. She wanted to be cold, as cold as she had ever been, as cold as a corpse.

  After she heard that Zhondra was dead, it was differ­ent. Then she had thought it was only a matter of time. Clayton Hall would get to her. The whole town would get to her. Everybody would know everything about her and then—

  She was still in the bathroom upstairs when she heard the news about Stephen Harrow, and after the report was finished she had turned the dials on her little portable radio, searching for some other station that had the news. She had come so close, she thought. She had almost given up everything she had ever known and everything she had ever loved and everything that had ever been any good for her, and for what? For a perversion she had no idea if she would actually like once she tried it? She thought now of Zhondra’s long-fingered white hands, with their blunt-cut nails. She had once lain in bed and imagined those hands trailing along her body, the tips of the fingers brushing against the tips of her nipples, the flats of the palms lying in the hollow curve made by her waist. She had imagined herself drunk on emotion, defenseless and free, able to do nothing else but feel.

  Now she stood up, and brushed the carpet lint off her skirt, and went to the bathroom door. It was late, but Kathi was still here, making pudding in the kitchen to take over to the church in the morning. There was something going on with the Sunday school classes later in the afternoon, and Janet Holborn said they all needed food. Rose didn’t use to go out to Henry Holborn’s church to worship, but now, after all that terrible stuff had happened with Zhondra, she knew she needed to get back to basics, back to the Lord. The Lord was the only person she had ever known who had been able to make her feel safe.

  Rose went down the little hall to her kitchen, and found Kathi filling custard cups with rice pudding. The little television was on, showing a sitcom Rose didn’t rec­ognize, instead of one of the religious stations, which was what she and Kathi usually watched. Kathi saw her glance at the program on the television and changed the channel, blushing.

  “I heard all that stuff about Stephen Harrow coming from your radio,” she said. “I thought one of the local stations would have news.”

  “Did it?”

  “CBS had a bulletin sort of thing,” Kathi said. “It didn’t say much. You know what I think?”

  “What?”

  “You know those sirens we heard about an hour and a half ago? All that fuss in the street? I bet that was this.”

  “Oh,” Rose said. “I bet you’re right.”

  “I told you we should have gone to see what was going on. I know you think it looks trashy, Rose, but some­times you have to sacrifice your dignity for your education. I wonder how many people went to see.”

  “Not as many as you think,” Rose said. “We don’t usually chase ambulances in this town. Just police cars.”

  “I’ll bet those reporters were there,” Kathi said. “Oh, I wish we could have seen. Isn’t it exciting? Now it’s all over with, and we’re going to find out everything on the news shows or people will know it around town. I hate mysteries. I can’t even read the fake kind. I like to know what’s going on.”

  “Yes,” Rose said. “I do, too.”

  “And they’ll have to let Ginny Marsh out of jail now, too. I never did think she’d done any of those awful things they said she’d done, and I don’t think a lot of people in town thought it, either. It’ll be good to see her back in church.”

  “Yes,” Rose said. “Yes, it will.”

  “Is there something wrong with you?” Kathi asked. “I thought you’d be excited. I’m excited. I can’t believe the way all this worked out. That damned Yankee phony with all his fancy books about God, as if nobody could under­stand God if they hadn’t gone to Yale and studied—what­ever.”

  The custard cups were lined up in rows on the kitchen table. Kathi was wearing a big white pin with red letters that said IT’S A CHILD, NOT A CHOICE. Rose sat down in one of the kitchen chairs and put her chin in her hands.

  “I’ve been thinking,” she said.

  “About what?” Kathi asked her.

  “About the camp, really. Now that Zhondra Meyer’s gone, it probably won’t last long.”

  “Now that Zhondra Me
yer’s gone, it won’t last at all,” Kathi said with satisfaction. “What I heard is that that fancy family of hers from up in New York is on their way down here already, or their lawyers are, and that’s going to be the end of the lesbians in Bellerton. I just hope I get a chance to go up there and see it when they throw them out.”

  “The problem,” Rose said, “is that they’ll be back.”

  “But how?” Kathi looked confused. “They wouldn’t have anyplace to go.”

  “I’m not saying that these particular women will be back,” Rose said. “I’m saying that once it starts, it never finishes. You have to be vigilant all the time.”

  “Vigilant how?”

  “Well, I was thinking about forming a group. A churchwomen’s group, with women from all the different Christian churches, you know the ones I mean, not only Henry Holborn’s. We could get together and sort of moni­tor things, keep our eye on what’s going on in town, so that something like this couldn’t get set up within our borders ever again.”

  “But how could we do that? The camp was on private property.”

  “We could picket,” Rose said, beginning to see her way to the end of this. “We could go out there and make noise. They do it all the time, the lesbians and the secular humanists and all the rest of them. Why shouldn’t we?”

  “We do do it, don’t we?” Kathi asked. “With pro-life.”

  “Pro-life is different. Pro-life is a special case. I’m talking about our everyday lives here. I’m talking about the air we breathe and the atmosphere we bring our children up in.”

  “It sounds like a lot of work.”

  “It is a lot of work,” Rose said. “But it’s a good idea, believe me. And if we work hard enough, we’ll never be saddled with another lesbian camp again, or anything like it. We’ll never have to watch the homes we live in be eaten up by the filth that comes spewing out of a place of that kind.”

  Kathi looked worse than confused. “Well,” she said. “Actually, that was one of the few things I liked about them up there. They were so clean all the time.”

  Rose got up out of the chair and went to the stove to make coffee. There was no use talking to Kathi, of course. She didn’t have the brains God gave a flea. But Rose was sure she was right, even without Kathi to confirm it. Rose was sure that this was the best idea she had ever had in her life.

  They would form an army of women, that was what they would do, and once they were armed and ready, no­body would ever dare to go against them.

  3

  AS SOON AS HE’D heard, Bobby Marsh had gone over to the jail to tell Ginny about what had happened with Ste­phen Harrow, and for the first time in weeks he had been feeling almost good. It was late, long past visiting hours, but he knew that Jackson would let him in. Jackson and Clayton were pretty loose about Ginny’s visiting hours any­way. Now, with Stephen Harrow having confessed, they would have to let Ginny out into the world as soon as possi­ble. In the old days, that would have been right away, as soon as Clayton was able to find his key to the cell, but these days Bobby understood that Clayton had to follow procedures. It was the Supreme Court that had done that, and the federal government, which just went to show how the government in Washington was always interfering in people’s lives and making things worse. Bobby wanted to grab Ginny up in a bundle and take her home to her own bed. By all rights, he should be able to. Even without that in the offing, though, Bobby thought Bellerton was really beautiful, one of the finest towns on earth. In the dark like this, with the streetlights on, it seemed to glitter and glow. Bobby took in Rose MacNeill’s big Victorian house, and Charlie Hare’s feed store, and Maggie Kelleher’s book­shop. Town Hall loomed up in front of him like a big brick temple. There were people who wanted to go away to big cities, like Los Angeles and Miami. There were people who wanted to go away to Europe. Bobby wanted to stay right here.

  He went in the police department entrance on Town Hall’s side, and waved to Jackson as he came down the hall. The police department was otherwise empty. They must all be out at the hospital or the morgue or someplace, or maybe State Police headquarters. Bobby didn’t know where they were, and he didn’t care. Stephen Harrow was dead. Stephen Harrow had confessed. The world was all right again. Jackson came out into the hall with a big ring of keys in his hand.

  “I told her you were coming as soon as you called,” Jackson said. “She already knows what’s been going on. She’s been listening to the radio.”

  “Is she happy?”

  “I wouldn’t say she was happy, Bobby. Ginny hasn’t been happy since the baby died.”

  “I know,” Bobby said. “I know.”

  “You can’t expect her to be happy, Bobby. Not with Tiffany dead. It wouldn’t be right for her to be happy.”

  “No,” Bobby said. “Of course it wouldn’t.”

  They were already halfway across to the little double jail cell. It wasn’t much of a jail, at least, this place where Ginny had been. It wasn’t like being on the work farm or in the state penitentiary. Bobby reminded himself that that probably didn’t make much difference to Ginny. He re­minded himself of a lot of other things, too, like Ginny’s favorite color (cornflower blue) and the fact that she loved to have him send her flowers. He would have to do that on the day he brought her home. He would have to have the house full of cornflower blue flowers.

  Ginny was sitting on the chair in her cell with the reading light on, reading her Bible. She looked up at them and put the Bible down on the bed. Bobby expected her to smile at him, but she didn’t. Jackson used the key to open the cell and drew back the barred door.

  “You two could talk in the conference room,” Jack­son said. “You’d have more privacy there.”

  “That’s a good idea,” Bobby told him.

  Jackson turned away and walked back down the hall, pushing open the conference room door as he went. Bobby felt elated. Jackson wouldn’t be behaving like this if there was any chance at all that Ginny wouldn’t be released. He would stick around and make sure she didn’t get away in­stead. Ginny was standing in the middle of the cell with her arms wrapped around her body, not looking at him. Bobby was amazed that her hair looked so good, so shiny and curly and long. It had to have been hell trying to take care of it in a dinky little small-town jail cell.

  “Ginny,” Bobby said.

  “Yes,” Ginny said. “I hear you.”

  “Let’s go down to that conference room Jackson was talking about,” Bobby said. “It’s got to be more cheerful there. Anything’s got to be more cheerful than here.”

  Ginny looked around. “I suppose it does.”

  “Come on, then,” Bobby said.

  Ginny looked around. “I don’t think so,” she told him. “I think I’ll just stay right here.”

  “Jackson told me that you’d been listening to the ra­dio,” Bobby said. “He told me you knew all about it. About Harrow.”

  “Oh, I know about Harrow, Bobby. Stephen Harrow is dead.”

  “Stephen Harrow confessed to the murders,” Bobby said. “Didn’t you know that?”

  “I knew that, Bobby.”

  “But you’re free to go, don’t you see that? I mean, not tonight. They’ve got their paperwork to do and all that crap. But you’re off the hook now. Stephen Harrow con­fessed. Everybody will know you didn’t kill Tiffany.”

  Ginny cocked her head. “Really, Bobby? Will every­body know?”

  “Of course,” Bobby said.

  “Even you?”

  Bobby felt a chill go up his spine, a vise of ice close around his testicles. “I knew you didn’t kill Tiffany. I al­ways knew that.”

  “No,” Ginny told him. “I don’t think you did.”

  “I was just—confused, that’s all,” Bobby said. “I couldn’t get around the things you were saying. The god­dess worship and all that. It didn’t make any sense. But I didn’t think you killed Tiffany.”

  “You thought I killed her just like everybody else thought I killed her,” Gin
ny said. “All those people who were supposed to be my friends, and my family, and my husband.”

  “I am your husband,” Bobby said. “We were married in the sight of the Lord.”

  “I don’t seem to have much time for the Lord these days, Bobby. I’m too busy figuring out what I’m going to do with myself next.”

  “You’re going to come home to me.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “It will get better.” Bobby willed himself not to feel the panic that was rushing up into his head like a geyser of bile. “You’ll see. We’ll feel better after a while, both of us will, and then, I know you hate to hear it now, then we’ll have another child.”

  “I don’t want another child.”

  “You don’t want one now, but you will. You will. Reverend Holborn told me. And once we have another child, the wound will heal, it will heal, it won’t be gone but it won’t hurt so very much and then we can—”

  “I think you’d better get out of here,” Ginny said.

  “Ginny, please, all right? Please don’t do this to me. I’m trying as hard as I can.”

  “You always try as hard as you can,” Ginny said, and suddenly Bobby could see it, deep in her eyes, everything she thought of him, and it was not good. Loser, whiner, weakling, mouse. Loser, loser, loser. Loser most of all. You never got away from the place you started at. You were always the person you were born to be.

  “I think you’d better get out of here,” Ginny said again.

  This time Bobby left, half running, not looking in through the open conference room door. He should have called for Jackson. He should have told someone that he was leaving. But he just ran and ran, ran and ran, until he was out in the air and couldn’t remember how he’d gotten there. There was a cool breeze in the tops of the trees and a chill on the ground. Or maybe it was hot. He couldn’t de­cide. He couldn’t tell. He didn’t know what he was going to do.