Guilt by Association

by Gilbert, Morris

  “Why, you dumb redneck!” Bix shouted at Lonnie. “Didn’t you ever see a sheepdog work?”

  “No, and you haven’t either, you hippie punk!” Lonnie snapped back. “I been around animals all my life—and you ain’t never been out in the woods once!”

  “Well, maybe not, but I’ve seen movies, and those dogs are smart! And what about how they train all kinds of animals, like at a circus? Why, all those animals, even elephants, keep time to music! That’s not dumb! I’m a musician, and it’s hard enough for humans to keep time, I can tell you! So if animals can do it, they’re not dumb!”

  “You’ve got that wrong, Bix.” Savage spoke so seldom that everyone turned to stare at him. He was sitting at the table with Holtz, Valentine and Canelli, and he was smiling as he said, “I know it looks like that, Bix, but it doesn’t work that way. You’d freak out if you saw how they train those big horses the equestrians ride. They tie a can to the horse’s tail, they fire off guns, rattle a ratchet—anything to make a lot of noise—and the reason for all that is time.”

  “I don’t get that, Ben,” Canelli said.

  “The circus lives on time and by split seconds. Every performer spends years developing that beat, and the people on the horses have to have the same beat as the horse, or they’d break their necks. A good ring horse is the performer’s platform, and he has to keep a steady beat. And that beat never changes.”

  Ben’s face was pensive, and he seemed not to notice that he was talking to an audience. “The tent may fall in, a bomb may go off, a flyer may fall from the top—but if that rosinback is the right kind of ring horse, he’ll keep plugging away until his man says to stop.” Then he halted abruptly, glanced around the room, and seemed embarrassed. “Well, anyway—it’s the band that keeps time to the horses, Bix, and not the other way around. And when you see the elephants do the hootchy-kootchy, why, they’re leading the band. Those animals will do their thing, no matter if the band plays or not.”

  Vince stared at him and voiced what they were all thinking. “You worked in a circus, huh?”

  The answer came slowly, reluctantly. “For a little while.”

  Holtz said sharply, “That’s not on your list of jobs, Ben.”

  Savage shrugged, and a stubborn look came over his face. “I guess I forgot.”

  It sounded weak to all of them. Holtz looked angrily at him and said in a harsh tone, “I don’t see how you can forget a thing like that—”

  At that moment, a cry of pain interrupted him, and Holtz looked around to see Alex, who had staggered into the room. He was holding his stomach, and his mouth hung wide open. “My—stomach!” he cried. “It’s on fire! Help me . . . !” He suddenly fell to the floor, curving in a fetal position, and Karen rushed to his side.

  When she tried to get him to straighten out, Alex’s scream made Dani’s skin crawl. “Get him on the couch!” Karen ordered, and it took four men to do it, for he refused to uncoil, and they could not move him easily.

  As Karen tried to get him to answer her questions, Morrow writhed on the couch in such agony that he would have fallen off if Ben and Vince had not held him. All the time he was screaming in long, womanish cries, taking in breath only to utter another scream.

  “What’s wrong with him?” Holtz demanded.

  Karen gave him an angry look. “How should I know?” she snapped. “He’s got a bad stomach—but I’ve never seen anything like this!” She stayed beside him. Finally when his screams grew fainter, she whispered urgently, “Alex, tell me where it hurts!”

  He gasped and tried to speak, but could only get out, “Stomach!—like a knife—cutting me in two!” He sobbed and doubled up again, with a fearful groan.

  The next hour was a nightmare for all of them. The sick man would cry and beg for help, clutching at Karen. Then he would double up and his cries would fill the space.

  “It could be appendicitis,” Karen said once. “But none of the books describe it like this. Might be a gallstone, but he’s not grabbing the right spot.”

  “He’s got an ulcer, hasn’t he?” Betty asked.

  “Yes, but I’ve never heard of an ulcer—” She broke off to ask, “Rachel, are you all right?”

  Rachel was standing to Dani’s right; turning, Dani saw that Rachel’s face was pale and her lips were blue. A fine perspiration beaded her forehead, and even as they all watched, she suddenly bent over and said, “I—I’m awful sick!”

  “Put her on the other couch!” Karen said. When she was supine, the doctor asked, “Rachel, what is it?”

  Rachel stared at her, pain drawing down the corners of her lips.

  Karen made a quick decision. “It has to be food poisoning. They both ate that omelet and the candy bars.”

  “Can’t be the candy bars,” Karl said. “Not unless I get sick. I had one, too.”

  “We’ll have to give them both an emetic.”

  “Is it in your bag?” Savage asked quickly.

  “No—warm soapy water,” Karen answered. A bitter expression on her lips, she shook her head, saying, “It won’t be pleasant.”

  An hour later, Dani was sitting at one of the tables, her head buried in her arms. Karen’s words had been a masterpiece of understatement! They had forced the emetic down both patients, until they gagged over and over again, yet it had had little apparent effect. Morrow had slipped into a half coma, while Rachel lay on the couch, her face like putty, but not unconscious.

  Dani wanted to run into the other room and bury her face in her pillow, but nobody had left the room. She tried to shut it out of her mind, but could not. Finally she heard Karen say, “Dani . . . ?” and looked up. Karen was standing there, her eyes defeated. “Alex is dying. He’s conscious—and he wants to see you.”

  Dani whispered, “Karen, I can’t!” Her hands were trembling and her throat was so full she could not speak properly.

  Then Rosie came to stand beside her, and putting his hand on her arm, he said gently, “Why, course you can, lady! Come along. You and me, we can pray, can’t we now?”

  Without Rosie, Dani would never have gone to the side of the dying man, but she got up slowly, and with his thin hand guiding her, she made her way to the couch. They both knelt by Alex.

  Morrow looked frightful! His lips were pulled back from his teeth, and his eyes were sunken so that his face resembled a skull. His eyes were shut, but when she whispered his name, the eyelids slowly lifted, and he gazed at her, blindly for a moment. “Dani?” he gasped.

  “Yes—yes, Alex!” she whispered. “I’m here!”

  He tried to lift himself up, but a sudden spasm of pain caught him, and he fell back. He rolled his head, then looked at her. “I’m dying—help me!”

  She shut her eyes, almost ready to faint, but Rosie’s grip on her arm tightened, and she swallowed hard. “Remember the verses we read, Alex?” He nodded faintly, and she began telling him of God’s love. Her speech was broken and faltering. More than once Dani had to choke down the sobs. Alex’s hand grasped hers, and his eyes were locked on her face. Finally she said, “Remember what I said yesterday, Alex? It’s never too late to ask for forgiveness. Would you ask now?”

  “I—don’t know how!”

  “We’ll help you, Rosie and I,” Dani said. “Think of your children, Alex, if they’d hurt you, then came and said, ‘We’re sorry, Daddy, please forgive us!’ you’d forgive them, wouldn’t you?”

  “Yes—yes!”

  “God loves you better than you or I could love anyone. Remember that verse in John, ‘For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.’”

  The breath of the dying man seemed to grow more shallow, and his voice grew even fainter, but he nodded. “I—‘member—help me!”

  Dani’s tears rolled off her cheeks on to the man’s feeble hand, and she said, “Let’s just pray, and we’ll ask him to forgive you and take your pain.” There was a pressure in the fingers, and
she and Rosie began to pray. Soon Dani heard Alex begin to sob, but she also heard him gasp, “O God, O God, forgive me . . . !”

  How long she prayed, Dani never knew. She finally became aware that Rosie was pulling at her, saying, “Come on, Miss Dani. It’s all right. He’s done gone to be with Jesus now!”

  She opened her eyes and saw that Alex’s face was still and the signs of pain had faded. There was the mark of a struggle, to be sure, but the lips were relaxed, and Rosie said, “Gone to be with Jesus—gone to his rest!”

  Dani tried to rise, but her legs would not seem to work. Strong hands lifted her, moving her across to a chair, and she looked up to see that Ben was lowering her. Then she put her head back and closed her eyes, as drained and exhausted as she had ever been in her life.

  Hours later, Karen lifted her head and said with a note of victory, “Rachel’s pretty sick, but she’s going to make it!”

  Dani went to her bunk and fell on it without undressing. Even as she pulled the blankets up and was falling into a heavy slumber, the question came to her, How could food poisoning work so quickly?

  8

  Second Warning

  * * *

  O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law.” Dani’s voice sounded thin and hollow as she read the Scripture—the cold, damp air of the huge drum that towered over the small group muffled her words. She glanced down at the blanket that covered Morrow’s body, in the rough pine box. Shivering slightly, she completed the reading: “But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

  Dani bowed her head, noticing that the others reacted typically. All were there except Rachel, who was too ill to get out of bed. Rosie and Karl bowed their heads at once, as did Karen and Betty—and Lonnie yanked off his green toboggan cap and shut his eyes. Vince and Sid stared straight ahead, stubbornly refusing to do more than stand in front of the body, as Dani had requested. At the very back of the circle, with her face fixed stolidly, Candi had listened to Dani’s brief remarks and the Scriptures. Now, as she met Dani’s gaze, something changed in her eyes, and she bowed her head. Bix tried to look unconcerned, but the strain in his smooth face had not been there before, and after glancing quickly toward Vince, he awkwardly bowed his head slightly and stared at the floor.

  When Dani said, “Amen,” she stepped back and turned to look at the camera. At once the distant whine of the winch came to them, seeming more ghostly than ever in the heavy cold. The line that supported the box slowly tightened, grew tense, and then the box left the floor, swaying from side to side like an enormous pendulum. As it rose to eye level, a thin shaft of light from one of the high vents fell across the body, highlighting the red checks of the wool blanket. All eyes fixed on the swaying burden as it passed out of that light and ascended slowly into the murky air of the cavernous darkness.

  Eerily the body of their companion faded away, lifted into the heights, a chilling counterpoint to the usual practice of placing a casket deep in the earth. Once again a shiver ran through Dani as she stood there with her head tilted back, watching the tiny rectangle of light that marked the opening through which containers were passed. As it went through the opening, the box blocked out the light and the sound of a heavy door clanging shut followed.

  “I guess that’s all,” Dani said quietly, and the group hastily moved away, as if fearful to remain in the area. Like people leaving the cemetery after the ceremony, Dani thought soberly. Except we can’t go home and get the tragedy out of our memories.

  For the next hour she tried to read her Bible, but it seemed incomprehensible. Finally Dani moved toward the door leading to the women’s sleeping quarters, where she found Karen standing beside Rachel, taking her pulse and temperature. She loosed her wrist, took the thermometer out, and read it. “Well, you’re back to normal,” she announced. “Temperature and pulse, anyway.”

  “I feel pretty chewed up,” Rachel responded in a small voice.

  Karen stared at her, considering her words. Karen had, Dani thought, lost much sleep, and it showed in the lines around her eyes. “Try to rest, if you can’t sleep.”

  “I’ll sit beside you for a while,” Dani said, and Karen nodded. She sat there for only a few minutes before Rachel drifted off, saying, “Thanks, Dani!”

  She took the girl’s hands and placed them under the blanket, noting how strong they were, then moved outside to the rec room, where she found Ben and Karl deep in conversation.

  “How’s Rachel?” Ben asked. “I thought she was going to croak, too.”

  “Nicely put, Savage!” Dani snapped. “Nothing like a well-turned phrase!”

  He lifted one eyebrow, saying, “Sorry. I must be losing the keen edge of my highly polished urbane manner.”

  “Oh, shut up!” she commanded crossly. Then she laughed abruptly, adding, “I’m losing mine, too, it seems.”

  He remarked without emphasis, “May have found a way to bust out.” They stared at him, and he continued, “You know that little wedge-shaped space to the left of the refrigerator? All filled up with mops and brooms and stuff?” They both nodded. “There’s a section of the floor in there, right by the wall, that was poured out of a different batch of concrete.”

  Holtz considered that, then asked, “What does that mean, Ben?”

  “Maybe nothing—but that mix wasn’t too good. That section is pretty flaky. Maybe we can get that concrete out and tunnel under the bulkhead.”

  “But we have no chisels,” Holtz protested. He was correct, for there were no tools at all in the silo—a deliberate omission, they all realized.

  “I’ve got this.” Ben held up a section of angle iron about a foot long. “It’s part of my cot. Not very sharp, and won’t hold an edge; but we’ve got twelve bunks, and every one of them’s got four of these braces. I’ll rig up something to use for a hammer, and we can start tunneling through.”

  Dani looked at the piece of steel and shook her head. “It’ll take a long time, Ben, and you don’t know what you’ll hit beneath the concrete. We’re in the mountains; this whole thing might be built over a rock.”

  “It’s the only game in town, boss. If the count of Monte Cristo did it, so can we! We’ll call it the ‘Jericho Project.’ Maybe, like Joshua, we can get these walls to fall down—even if we don’t have any trumpets!”

  Savage wandered away, and Dani spent most of the day with Holtz. He told her about his days as commander of a German submarine, and for the first time she understood how he stood the confines of the silo so much better than the rest of them. The silo was huge compared to the space of a submarine packed with a large crew.

  Finally he grew sleepy, and she walked with him as far as the door. He paused and said, “Thank you for taking care of an old man, Danielle! God will bless you, too, for what you did for our poor friend, Alex.”

  “Oh, Karl, I didn’t do much!”

  “Yes. You helped him from this world to the next, and that is a wonderful thing.” Embarrassed at the emotion he had allowed her to see, he turned away quickly.

  Dani spent the rest of the day ironing clothes, reading a little, and taking a nap before dinner. The group was strained as they sat down, because the memory of Alex’s death was strongly linked to the evening meal. After they finished, Karen came from the serving table saying, “No dessert tonight—just oatmeal cookies.”

  She passed them around. Bix took one, stared at it, then said, “I hope this is all right.”

  “All right?” Rachel asked. “What does that mean?”

  “Well, I guess we’ve all been thinking about Alex,” Bix said defiantly. “It wasn’t no accident, the way he died.”

  Vince stared at him, then nodded. “The kid’s right.” His gaze switched to Karen, and he asked abruptly, “How about it, Doc? It was poison, wasn’t it?”

  Karen returned his look, and there was a stubbornness in the set of her back. “I’m not a coroner, Vince. T
hat’s what it would take to prove that he died of poison.”

  “But you suspect something of that sort, don’t you, Karen?” Dani prompted. “We might as well face up to it.” she added realistically. “We had a warning, and then a man died—and it was nearly two people.”

  Betty nodded emphatically. “Of course it was poison! What else would kill a man that quickly?” She shuddered and added, “And he didn’t even know which one of us it would be!”

  Dani stared at her. “What do you mean by that, Betty?”

  “Why, it’s obvious, isn’t it?” She looked around in surprise, her plain features animated with anger. “Two people ate the omelet, and they were the only ones to be affected. The poison had to be in something that was in that omelet. It could have been the milk or cheese, but I think it was the eggs.”

  “Why the eggs?” Dani asked quickly.

  “Because the rest of the ingredients have been here all the time, but the eggs came in that morning—three dozen.

  “Did anybody get a look at the omelet that was left?” Vince demanded.

  “No, because the dishes were all washed by the time Alex got sick,” Betty said.

  “Rachel and I washed the dishes,” Dani said thoughtfully. “I don’t think there was much of the omelet left, was there, Rachel?”

  “No. Just a few bites that we put with the garbage.”

  Suddenly Sid said loudly, “Well, maybe it wasn’t Stone. Maybe someone in here done it.” A chorus of voices instantly rose to protest, but he insisted, “It could have been one of them women. They were all messing around in the kitchen.”

  Betty immediately began to argue with him, insisting it could have been somebody at the table with Alex.