Dreadful Sorry (24 page)

So this was how Uncle Wallace thought he would stop her from pursuing an education, was it? By burning her beloved
Atlas of the World—
her only legacy from her father? She stuffed a shred of the leather into her hatbox along with her doll and the locket and ran from the room, rage sending her climbing the stairs to tell her uncle just what she thought of him before she left forever.

She threw the door open, heedless of disturbing the Eternal Invalid, words forming on her lips to berate her uncle for his selfishness and petty vindictiveness. But the words turned to a cry of horror when she saw all the blood.

There was blood, blood everywhere—on the bed sheets, on the floor, on her aunt who lay so still atop the coverlet, and on her uncle, who bent over the bed.

At the sound of her cry, he whirled around. His face was white, teeth bared. "I told you to stay with her!" he spat out. He jumped up and shook her by the shoulders, then grabbed for her hands when she frantically tried to pull away. "I told you to help! But you didn't! You
wouldn't!
And now we've lost them both.
Damn
you!"

The blood from the sheets, from her aunt, seemed to swirl up and fly at her. "No!" she gasped. She ripped her hands out of his, horrified to see that they, too, now had blood on them.

And then she ran. She ran on shaky legs down the stairs, clutching her hatbox. She threw open the front door and nearly collided with the doctor, who had tied his horse to the hitching post.

"
Whoa,
girl!" began Dr. Scopes, reaching out for her. The startled horse whinnied softly.

She darted around them, barely seeing them, and hurtled across the headland. Horrible Uncle Wallace, trying to lay blame! And stupid, ignorant Aunt Ethel, who didn't know when enough children were enough, who didn't have anything else to do with her life but lie in bed and grow thick around the middle. Month after month. She spent her whole life propped on pillows, sipping tisanes, gazing vacantly out the window—never holding a book, never wondering about the world. It was lamentable, but it was nothing to do with Clementine Horn! She would have no part of it, of them—they were nothing to do with her. "I don't care," she whispered.

Blood seemed to swirl all around her as she ran—she saw it running down the road like a river ahead of her.
No!
She felt it dripping down the back of her dress. She smelled it in the night air. It tasted sour in the back of her throat.
It wasn't her fault! It wasn't her fault! It had nothing whatever to do with her!

"I don't care! I don't care!" she screamed and nearly fell along the rutted lane. She leaned against a tree to catch her breath, reaching one hand up to push back her hair. And though the night was dark, in the fragile moonlight she thought she could see the bright smear of blood staining her palm.

"No!" She screamed her denial to the dark night sky and kept running.

If Aunt Ethel had died, how could she still be moaning? Molly lifted her head groggily and listened, peering around her bedroom. The room was in near darkness, illuminated faintly by the moonlight through the open window. The curtains stirred in the night breeze. Her head was throbbing and her legs ached from running—but no, it had been
Clementine
who had been running.
Hadn't it?

There it was again—the moan that had awakened her. Heart hammering, Molly sat up and slid off the high bed. She opened her bedroom door and stepped out into the long hallway. She stood tensely, listening to the silence. The terrible scenes she had witnessed in Clementine's time were still with her. Molly longed to bolt down the stairs and out the door the way Clementine had done. Molly pressed her hands to her temples. If she went to the room at the end of the hall and opened the door, what would she find?

She heard a cough from the bathroom next to her bedroom and the sound of water running into the sink. Then, while she stood in the hall, eyes still wide with alarm, the door opened and Paulette stepped out.

"Thank God it's you," Molly said in relief.

"Oh, Molly!" said Paulette. "You startled me. You must have been sleeping like the dead. We called you earlier for dinner and you didn't answer. We figured you'd come down if you were hungry. Anyway, I'm sorry I woke you." Her face was pale, her orange hair limp.

"What's wrong?"

"I was having a few really bad cramps. But I think they've stopped now."

Molly closed her eyes. The image of Aunt Ethel on the bed flickered behind her lids. "You should call your doctor."

"Billy already called. Diagnosis: pregnancy woes. The prescription: sleep until morning and call again only if the cramps get worse." She shrugged. "The doctor didn't seem worried, so I suppose I shouldn't be."

"I guess not." Molly hugged herself, chilled in the long hallway. She reached up to draw her shawl more tightly around her shoulders, then realized there was no shawl. She was still wearing her rumpled shorts and T-shirt. She felt confused, trapped between two times. It took great effort to make her voice sound normal. "Sleep until morning? Sounds like a good prescription for anybody, really. I ought to follow it myself."

"You do look exhausted," Paulette said. She peered more critically at Molly's face. "Are you all right? Has anything else—you know, happened?"

Molly didn't think she could bear recounting the horror of Aunt Ethel's death just then. She shook her head. "Nothing."

Looking unconvinced but too ill to press for an answer, Paulette said good night and started down the hall.

 

After breakfast Molly went straight to the phone in the pantry and called the Benson operator. "I'm trying to get in touch with Mr. Abner Holloway, who lives in a nursing home in Benson," she said. "Can you help me? Are there a lot of nursing homes?" She'd call them all if she had to.

"Checking," said the operator.

After a moment she gave Molly the name of two places: a nursing home and a convalescent center connected to the hospital. "Thank you," said Molly, then hung up. She decided to call the place connected to the hospital. That made sense, since Paulette and Bill had met Abner in the hospital.

But the receptionist in the Benson Hospital Convalescent Wing and Nursing Home did not have a listing for Mr. Abner Holloway. So Molly dialed the other number. She fingered the end of her long braid as she listened to the ringing.

The receptionist at The Breakers Senior Home put her on hold for a full five minutes. Molly sucked impatiently on the end of her braid, then pulled out a few long blond hairs and nervously twined them around her thumb. Her father shambled into the kitchen in cutoff jeans and a rumpled shirt and dropped a pile of mail onto the table. Then he went to the stove and put the teakettle on to boil.

"How's Paulette?" she asked, covering the receiver.

He gave her two thumbs up. "Looking perky as ever. I'm treating her to breakfast in bed. Looks like the scare last night was"—he reached for the china teapot—"a tempest in a teacup."

Molly watched him slice peaches into a large bowl. The receptionist spoke into her ear. "Sorry to keep you waiting. Now, how may I help you?"

"I'm looking for a patient—a resident?—named Abner Holloway." Molly spoke all in a rush as if afraid the woman would put her back on hold.

"Who may I tell him is calling?"

"Oh, wait, don't tell him anything yet! I mean—well, my name is Molly Teague, but he doesn't know me. I'd like to come see him."

"Shall I connect you to his room?" asked the receptionist patiently.

"No! I mean, not yet." God, she sounded like an idiot. She took a calming breath. "What I'd like is to visit him today. Would that be possible?"

"We have visiting hours between ten and noon and again this afternoon from three till five. Unless you're a family member. Then you can come whenever you like—
if
Mr. Holloway wants to see you. You'll need to ask him."

"Would—would it be possible for you to ask him for me? Just tell him my name is Molly, and I live in his old house in Hibben, and I want to talk to him about ... about Clementine. Clementine Horn. Could you tell him that, please? Tell him I'd like to come this morning. I'll wait."

"This is highly irregular," said the receptionist. She put Molly on hold. Molly watched Bill make a cup of coffee for himself and fill the small pot with herbal tea for Paulette, then set them both on a tray. He came to the pantry, and Molly stepped aside so he could get the milk from the refrigerator.

"Want to join us for breakfast upstairs?" he asked.

"No thanks." She shook her head. "But I'd like to take the van and go to Benson this morning. Would that be all right?"

He nodded. "Sure. We're not going anywhere." He set the tray on the table and sorted through the morning's mail, laid a few pieces on the tray to take up to Paulette, and waved one envelope at Molly. "Hey, this one's for you." He balanced the tray carefully and carried it up the back steps.

After another few minutes the receptionist returned to the phone. "Mr. Holloway says he will look for you at ten o'clock," she said. "But when I gave him your message, he became most agitated. We cannot let our residents be upset by visitors. You must be careful not to agitate him when you come. He is not very strong."

"I'll be careful," promised Molly, and after asking the receptionist for directions to the nursing home and scrawling them onto a piece of scratch paper, she hung up with relief. She checked her watch. Almost nine. Jared would be calling any minute.

She ate a peach while she opened the letter from Kathi:

 

Dear Molly,

I was going to call you at your dad's, but I'm getting a rejection complex, you know? So I thought I'd just write. That way if you tear up the letter unopened or something, I won't have to know about it. I wanted to write to say I miss you, and I'm sorry, REALLY SORRY, that I just stood by while Jared tossed you into the pool at Michael's. I wish I could convince you that I never really thought you'd sink like that. I guess I thought you'd even like it. Anyway—I was wrong. I hope we can still befriends. By now you know that Jared has come up to Maine to look for you. He was so desperate, my parents said he should go. He was tearing his hair out, panicking about stuff. I tried to keep him from going—I knew you'd be really mad, and probably at me, too, for letting him come. I know you hate his guts, but he didn't mean to hurt you. I don't really understand any of what's going on, and I hope someday you'll explain.

Anyway, I hope you'll write. It's Dullsboro Heights around here without you. I went to a movie with Michael last night. He swears you and he really aren't, you know, dating or anything hot and heavy. I hope that's true, because I think he's kinda cute.

Love from your faithful old buddy and pal,

Kathi

 

Molly reread the letter, then folded it neatly and replaced it in the envelope. So much had happened since she arrived in Maine only a few days ago, she hadn't given Kathi a thought. She'd never even thanked her friend for saving her life. Poor Kathi had been beating herself over the head, feeling bad because she couldn't stop Jared from going to Hibben. And yet here Molly was waiting urgently for his call so the two of them could go over to Benson together. She would have to write later in the afternoon and try to tell Kathi what was going on.

If only I
knew
what was going on.

The phone rang at last and she grabbed it. "You have to come with me," she began as a greeting. "It's all set."

"
Whoa!
Let's slow down and start over," Jared teased. "I call and you answer and say hello. I say, 'Hi, this is Jared. Remember I said I'd call at nine? Well, here I am. Shall we get together today?' And you say, 'Yes, Jared, that would be totally fantastic.' Okay? Now let's try it. You start. Say 'Hello, Jared.'"

Molly cut him off in exasperation. "Listen, Jared, you won't want to play games when you hear what's going on. I had another vision last night—well, I'll tell you about that later. But yesterday my dad and Paulette met Abner Holloway in Benson. Can you believe it?"

His response was excited jabbering on the other end of the line. When he had calmed down, she told him the story of how Paulette and Bill met Abner in the hospital elevator, and how Bill had said Abner would be a good one to ask about Clementine, and how she, Molly, had just made arrangements to go visit the old man. "Now, if you'll tell me how to get to your campground," she finished, "I'll pick you up in the van in about fifteen minutes."

"Why don't we just take the ferry? It's a lot faster to Benson across the water than along that coast road."

"Uh—I'd rather not."

"Oh, yeah. I forgot. Too much water out there, is that it? But, hey—what if I promise I'll hold your hand the whole way?"

She winced. "
Right,
Jared." She wanted to trust him now, but the memory of the near-drowning was too vivid.

He was silent a moment. Then he spoke in a soft voice. "Okay, we'll drive. I'll be waiting at my tent. Just take the road toward Benson along the cliff, and turn left on the first dirt road you see. There's a sign that says Blueberry State Park. The tent sites are just past the ranger's office."

 

She dressed carefully in a striped sundress and white sandals. In the upstairs bathroom she re-braided her hair neatly, glancing at her face in the mirror. Maybe a little lipstick? She wanted to look nice for Abner. Or was it for Jared?

As she leaned closer to the glass and smoothed the gloss over her lips, the reflection shimmered and Clementine's face looked back at her. Molly backed away, her heart pounding. But the other girl was smiling. And in an instant the reflection was gone. Why was Clementine smiling? Was it that she approved of the lipstick—or the reason for it? Was Clementine happy that Molly was going to see Abner?

Molly said good-bye to her father and Paulette, then hurried out to the van. She drove carefully down the drive, thinking that when she'd last taken this road, she'd been running in the dark, imagining blood on her hands, blood everywhere. But no—that had been
Clementine
running away from Aunt Ethel. And this was
Molly
going to visit Abner. How had that little boy felt when he lost both his mother and his beloved Clemmy in one night? Had Clementine ever come back to Hibben and seen him after she got her precious education? Molly hoped she would soon know.