Forty-five
When the sheriff's deputies arrived, Trent was not
among them. The ambulance showed up a short time later. The streets of
Jumer filled with multicolored flashing lights, all for nothing. Seated
alone in the kitchen in defense against the crowds that came and went,
Lori heard the doors of the ambulance finally slam shut and the vehicle
drive away. The house itself was empty when Sheriff Danielson made his
appearance.
"Lori? Are you okay?"
Lori had no way to answer the question. "Maggie
called and said she saw a prowler in Trent's house. I came over to keep
her company until someone arrived. I found her lying on the floor."
"I need to know what you may have touched or moved in
the house since your arrival."
Lori thought about it and looked at the man in
surprise. "I touched nothing but the phone. The back door was already
open. The furnace was overheating."
"We took care of that.”
"I touched Maggie's face to see if she was still
alive. I didn't know what to do for her."
"There was nothing you could have done."
Lori wiped away her tears. "I don't understand what
could have happened to her. She said there was a prowler in Trent's
house."
"That may well have been."
She glanced toward the back door. "The door was
open."
"She may have left it open to call us. Lori, Maggie
had a bad heart, if that counts for anything. Until I see an autopsy
report, I'm inclined to believe the excitement may have been too much for
her. There seems to be only the one head wound, and we're certain she
struck the phone stand as she fell."
Lori rose to test her shaky legs. "Can I go home
now?"
"Would you prefer one of my deputies to drive you?"
"No, I need my car. I'll be all right."
"I'll stop by in the morning. I may have a few more
questions for you by then. I'll have business out this way regardless."
"I'll be home."
Lori wept on the short drive home. Maggie had
outlived everyone who had ever cared for her and had died neglected by a
world too busy with its own petty affairs to spend an afternoon listening
to stories of bygone eras and the people who had populated them.
Carol met her at the door. "Wendy and Leslie?" Lori
said anxiously.
"Sleeping. I've heard what happened. Lori, I'm so
sorry. Will you be okay?"
Lori didn't think so. "I'll be fine."
"What happened?"
Lori recounted the night's sequence of events in a
monotone.
"Do you want company tonight?"
Lori decided not. Dawn was no more than an hour
away. "We'll talk later, sometime in the afternoon. I need to take a
nap."
Carol kissed her on the cheek and left quietly. Lori
locked the house after her and turned out the lights. She fetched a
blanket from the master bedroom and curled up on the couch with the
television going, waiting for daylight.
In another time and place entirely, she awakened,
sprawled on her back and paralyzed. Cold white glare blinded her. Only
the glimmer of the glass eye pierced the light, and then the shadow of
someone looming over her. Her dual level of awareness of the dream took
away some of her terror. The part that knew she was dreaming tried to
imagine Trent as the mysterious presence and her nakedness a voluntary
thing, as if she could turn a nightmare into a dream of passion, but the
dream had a life of its own, and there could be nothing tender about the
blade that flashed in the light.
She jerked awake to the pressure of a hand on her
shoulder. Leslie backed away in alarm. "What happened, Mom. I got up to
go to the bathroom and you were gone last night and Carol was here."
Wendy stood alongside her brother, far less anxious
to hear more bad news. Lori ran her fingers through her disheveled hair,
imagining that she looked a mess. "Maggie had an accident," she said.
"They took her to the hospital."
Leslie took the explanation at face value and
requested breakfast. When the two were ready to leave for school, Wendy
hung back at the door, hoping for special treatment, but there was no easy
way to tell a child of death. "Go to school, Princess. Sheriff Danielson
will stop by this morning. I'll know more about what happened by the time
you get home."
"Are you going to be okay?"
"I'm upset is all."
"Is Karen and Ronnie still okay?"
"Last night didn't have anything to do with Karen and
Ronnie. They're safe, but remember not to tell anyone just yet."
"I won't."
Leslie had run off on his own toward the bus stop.
Wendy went in pursuit of the boy. Lori put coffee on and managed a shower
and a change of clothing before the sheriff tapped on the front door.
Lori led him to the kitchen. Sheriff Danielson declined coffee and seated
himself. He sighed and gazed up wearily at her. "It's been a bad night."
Lori stood tense and self-conscious at the sink.
"Did you find out anything?"
The man shook his head in exasperation. "It's too
soon to know anything for sure. I can't even be certain that Trent's
property has been disturbed until he shows up and takes inventory. Looks
like somebody got inside and snooped, though. We got a call about the
alarm going off about the same time as Maggie’s call. "
Lori felt the tears starting again.
"I know. Nothing can bring Maggie back. How well
did you know her?"
"Not well,” she managed through her sobs. “Carol
introduced us."
"I would imagine Maggie had more to say about Trent
than you had expected to hear."
Lori evaded his steady gaze. "He never told me much
about himself."
"You found out about his photography? And his
marriage?"
It surprised her that he knew and took it all so
casually, before she realized he’d have no reason and no way to keep any
of that secret from his boss. "I had no idea," she said.
"It's like he tries to lead two lives," Danielson
confided, his voice a low rumble in the quiet house. "His wife running
off on him was quite a blow. It's like he keeps one foot in the past and
the other halfheartedly in the here and now. I keep telling him to let it
go and focus on his job. Law enforcement has been his career through
thick and thin."
"He's not sure what happened to Laura," Lori said,
hoping to coax more information from the man. How could he not know of
the missing women?
Danielson shrugged his helplessness. "We've never
had a clue to go on. It bothers him."
"You don't think anything bad happened to her?"
"Lori, we can't function on what we think what may
have happened. The only true justice is based on what we know for
certain. Trent's private life is his own business. I cut him a lot of
slack. He's better trained than anyone else I have in the department.
I'd hate to manage without him. In fact, I expect him to take my place
when I’m gone.”
Danielson rose to his feet. "I'd love to sit and
visit. One of these days when I retire I’ll talk and make a pest of
myself. I'll get back to you as soon as I can."
Lori gave the man her best poker face. He glanced
back at the front door. "By the way, there were no bodies in the Bates
house. Karen must have the boy. If you hear from either of them, call me
right away. I've instructed my people to patch you through to me wherever
I'm at, day or night."
"I will," Lori said. Sooner or later she would.
"Same goes with Trent. If he's tried to contact you,
or you have some idea of the nature of his problem, I need to know."
"He hasn't tried to contact me," Lori said. "I have
no idea where he may have gone, or why."
Danielson gave an unhappy sigh, a nod of polite
acknowledgment, and returned to his car. Lori watched until he was gone.
Before she had a chance to close and unlock the door, she saw Carol
trotting down the street. She waited to let the woman in.
Carol closed the door behind her and leaned against
it, breathing hard and looking excited. "Karen called Amy to deliver a
message. She said she tried to call you last night when you were gone. I
think I was on the phone."
The news shocked her. "Karen shouldn't have involved
Amy."
"I know," Carol said, "but it's too late now. Karen
says she knows who did it."
"Who did what?" Lori said stubbornly. The critical
state of affairs required absolute precision. A wrong move now would
undermine their ability to deal with the situation at all.
"Karen said that Trent is in Clayton investigating
some old disappearances on his own. She talked with him, and she figured
out who's responsible for all the murders. She can't prove it, so she
doesn't dare go to Sheriff Danielson until she can, or she'll just scare
him away. She says she'll be back tonight and that we shouldn't do or say
anything until then."
Lori felt numbed and weakened by the accelerating
barrage of events.
"There's more," Carol said. "Carl Adler stopped in
for coffee this morning. He insists he's not responsible for the fire."
"He knows about the room with the steel door," Lori
said from the depths of her fatigue. "He all but said as much, and I saw
it for myself. Ronnie was trying to get back in for more pictures to
prove to Carl Adler that he wasn't lying. And he wasn’t lying. Carl
was. He said he burned all the pictures, but I saw them for myself.”
Carol stared at her. "Karen says she knows for
certain, but she frightens me. Do you trust her?"
Lori didn't know who to trust. She couldn't quite
decide what to do about the rapid pace of developments.
"Lori, I hate to say it."
Lori gave her a tired smile. "There's more?"
"Carl Adler says he hired a contractor to fill in the
basement of the Bates' farmhouse. He says he's liable if kids fall in the
basement and get hurt. Sheriff Danielson told him it was okay."
Lori shook her head vehemently. "Carol, I swear to
you, he's trying to destroy whatever might have survived of that hidden
room. We can't allow that to happen. When is he going to do it?"
"He said he can have it done and over with by
tomorrow afternoon. They're going to plow the slope of the yard into the
foundation and smooth it all over."
Lori stared off into space, lost among a jumble of
thoughts and emotions that refused to come together and make sense. She
needed to sleep a thousand years before she could ever again hope to think
clearly.
"What are we going to do?" Carol coaxed gently.
Lori rose wearily to her feet and went into the
bedroom. Carol's eyes widened with surprise when she returned and handed
her Ronnie's drawings. "I want you to keep these for me. Give them to
Sheriff Danielson if anything bad happens.”
Carol looked at her with her mouth wide open. "But
what are you going to do?"
Surely Carol suspected the answer to her own
question. "He must be watching, whoever he is. He must know by now the
danger he’s in. He can’t have me around
to stop the Bates house from being covered over, and I'm betting he knows
that I know enough to put a stop to it. If he hopes to stop me, he’s got to do it
now. Tonight. Tomorrow's going to be too late.”
Carol stared at her in consternation. "You're
baiting him!” she cried out. “You’re risking your life to try to keep
everything that’s happened a secret just so he can try to make sure it
stays that way!”
“You have no idea of what I’ve done to try to protect
us all,” Lori said softly. “I have to stop him, and I don’t want
you to try to stop me.”
Carol stared off into space, then nodded as if
entranced by the unending implications of what Lori was doing.
"Okay. Let me think about it." She turned
away and left without saying anything more.
Lori couldn't rest during the course of the day.
Wendy and Leslie returned home from school. Improvising with tape and
trash bags, they were ready to rush out the door at dusk, dressed as a
green-faced witch and a bat with black plastic wings.
Lori stopped them at the last moment.
Wendy looked alarmed. "We can go, can't we? Mary's
mom says we'll be back before ten."
"When you get back, spend the night with Carol," Lori
said. "It's important that you remember not to come back here."
Wendy stared at her, sensing danger and precariously
close to tears.
"Carol and I almost have the puzzle put together,"
she said gently.
“Puzzle?”
“All the bad things that have happened.”
"Can you and Carol do it by yourselves?"
"We won't be taken by surprise again. I promise."
Wendy took her brother by the hand and turned away,
given no other choice but to trust the adults in her life to resolve
problems beyond her understanding.
Carol phoned moments after they had left. "I saw
them leave. How long will they be gone?"
"They're due back at ten. Wendy knows to spend the
night with you. Don’t let them out of your sight.”
"Did the sheriff ever give you your rifle back?" she
said, her voice tight with tension.
"I don't think the sheriff trusts me with guns
anymore."
It was an issue she hadn’t thought through as yet,
how she intended to stop a cold-blooded killer come to destroy her. After
her experience with Ralph McBride, she knew she had both the courage and
ability to do so. She had yet to determine the means.
"I got one you can use," Carol said.
Lori was startled. “Really?”
"A little something Ruben left behind."
She clenched her free hand into a fist and squeezed
tears from her eyes. A gun? She didn’t want to shoot anyone ever again.
"Bring it over," she said, she heard herself say in a perfectly calm tone
of voice. "I want to see it."
Carol hung up without a reply. She barged into the
house minutes later. Setting her handbag on an end table, she lifted out
a small, shiny revolver with two fingers, set it down, and stepped back.
"Do you know how to use it? It's loaded."
Lori stared at the shiny chrome weapon. "I'm afraid
to touch it."
"Fine, then you can go trick-or-treating with your
children in Clayton. And don't ever come back."
"Have you heard from Karen yet?"
Lori queried.
"Not a peep."
She reached down and snatched the revolver from the
table surface. Carol leaped back, startled by the move. "Lori, be
careful!"
It was a little revolver, probably a twenty-two
caliber that Dave once said wasn't much better than a pea shooter. Lori
figured out how to open the center part with the bullets. She shook the
bullets out, snapped it closed, and released the safety. She pulled the
trigger several times, watching the hammer come back and snap closed.
Once assured that she could handle the gun without risking her own life,
the she put the bullets back in, reset the safety, and put the revolver on
the table.
"Wow," Carol said, "I wouldn't have the guts."
"I'll wait here at the house until we hear back from
Karen," Lori said. "Or maybe from Trent. If they don’t have anything
useful for us, we go to the sheriff before they bulldoze the house in the
morning. We'll
have taken this thing as far as we can on our own."
Carol stuffed her hands in the pockets of her pink
uniform. "You can't trust anyone. It’s horrible.”
"I think I can trust you, though."
Carol gave her a queasy smile. "It's nice to know we
don't have to be one hundred percent paranoid, but I don't think you
should try to do it alone. You're just a housewife. You don't think like
a murderer. You can't anticipate what he will do. I don't know how you
expect to defend yourself, even with a gun."
“What else can I do? Can Danielson
defend me tonight? Will we be safe when the house is bulldozed over and
all the pictures are ruined? Even if Danielson finds
out who it is, will he be caught right away? Will it end here and now, or
will it go on and on?”
Carol stood trembling in panic, tears streaming down
her face.
“I'm not defending myself, Carol. I’m defending all
of us. It has to be me because I’m the only wild card in the deck. One
way or another, it'll be over by morning."
Carol stared off into space. “You won't get trigger
happy and shoot someone by mistake, will you?"
"I'll try not to."
"You won't shoot yourself, God forbid."
"I'll be especially careful about that."
Carol left the house, taut and distraught. Lori
double-checked the locks on the doors and windows and stretched out on the
couch with the revolver clutched in her fist. Fatigue flowed over her
like a lead blanket. The house was dead silent, but her nerves were on
edge. Even if she drifted asleep, she doubted she'd miss even a single
creak of the old structure swaying in the wind.
She finally hid the revolver beneath a cushion and
closed her eyes. He could come for her now and get it over with. She
lowered her guard to give him that final opportunity.
