Escape the Night (6 page)

She remembered all at once the angry whispering in the patio of the previous night. Funny she hadn’t asked Jem questions about it—or had she? It must have been Jem. Yet why would he whisper like that? And to whom? Nagging little questions, not very pleasant somehow.

She was glad when, about four, Luisa came out where she sat in the patio and invited her to take a walk. “You need to stretch your legs,” she said abruptly, her pale blue eyes fixed upon Serena. “Get a jacket and come along. Have you tasted the sea air yet? Of course not. You’ve not had time. We’ll walk down that way.”

It was, Serena thought, an excellent idea. She got a crimson sweater and tied a matching ribbon round her hair. When she got down to the patio again Luisa was waiting, with a small blunt-nosed Pekingese who evidenced a reserved and panting pleasure. “I’ll have to carry Pooky home,” said Luisa shortly. “His legs are so short, it takes twice as much effort for him to walk. Ready?”

It was definitely cloudy by that time, the sky gray with a cloud-like mist over the mountains. The sea below was gray also and extremely quiet, and blended with the sky so nearly that Cypress Point and Point Lobos were obscure. They took the road along which the car had come the night before, which descended gradually to the main highway.

Before they reached it, however, Luisa turned along a rocky path. “It’s a cut-off down to the sea,” she said, stumping ahead, a bright green scarf twisted around her neck, her hands thrust into the pockets of her coat. “Then we can cross the road again and go out on a little point of rocks there. It’s rather nice.”

“Isn’t Dave Seabrooke’s house somewhere in this direction?” asked Serena, panting a little from the pace Luisa set. Pooky at her heels was snuffling and trotting happily along but already beginning to gasp.

“Yes,” said Luisa over her shoulder. “If you want to call it a house. It’s more a laboratory than anything else. Jem Daly’s going to have to clean house and fix it up when he takes over. If he does stay on.”

“How long has he been here?” asked Serena.

“A month, this time. Too long, if you ask me. Here’s where we cross the highway.”

Serena drew alongside Luisa as they waited for a car to pass. The Pekingese sat down, exhausted, and Serena picked him up. Across the highway they plunged again into a rocky path, but a narrow one this time, going precipitously out on a point directly above the sea, for suddenly Serena could hear the clamor and clash of waves. Her nerves tightened a little; the wild rocks all around, the twisted, bent black cypress trees, the sound of the waves were poignantly familiar. So far as Serena remembered, she had never been out on that particular point of rocks, but the whole coast-line was like that, wild and rugged; beautiful, dangerous too, for the ledges went out jaggedly into the water which made mad cauldrons of foam and fury around them. It was as much as your life was worth to venture out along some of those irregular points of rocks which rose so spectacularly but treacherously from the sea.

The path was slippery, winding downward, and the little dog in her arms heavy enough so she had to watch her steps. Luisa’s thick gray figure forged ahead doggedly. They were climbing down now, as the path clung to a rocky cliff. They reached another curve and suddenly there was a straight drop, masked only by tough, thickly growing shrubbery, and below a narrow finger of the sea, gray and white around black rocks. The roar and plunge of the sea was close in her ears now. They must, in a moment or two, come out directly above the full curve of the coast-line. She could smell the sea now and almost taste it. Pooky in her arms began to struggle. When Luisa Condit went ahead around another curve and out of sight, Pooky gave a lunge that so nearly carried him out of Serena’s arms and over the edge of the narrow path Serena’s heart gave a sickening lurch. The strongest swimmer couldn’t survive in that maelstrom, let alone a small, elderly dog. He’d be safer on the path. She stopped. “All right,” said Serena, “if you want to walk. But you’ll not like it.”

She stooped to put the little dog carefully down on the path where he would be safer. Getting up again her foot slipped and she caught herself so hard that she skinned her hand. She got upright again and looked at her hand which stung and was bleeding a little. That delayed her another moment while she wrapped a handkerchief around it.

Then she went on around the wall of the cliff.

The sea was there.

The great spread of gray ocean lay infinitely far ahead; nearer there was a melee of black and glistening rocks, of gray, pounding waves, breaking upon them wildly so foam swirled and plunged and seethed.

It was breathtakingly beautiful. It was also mad and frightening.

Then she realized that Luisa’s dumpy gray figure had vanished.

But the path had stopped. It had to stop; there was no farther way for it to go; they had emerged upon a rocky point which was surrounded on three sides by the sea and dropped, sheer, to the churning water below.

They? Where was Luisa?

It was just then that she saw it. Below, in the water about thirty feet away, apparently tied to something that dragged it swirling toward a sharp projection of black rocks there was a flash of green. As she screamed the green object was dragged under and dashed in the direction of the rocks. Then it was gone.

Scream and nothing but the waves can hear you. Nothing but the cruel black rocks. The bent black cypress trees. The gray sky above.

Scream.

Stop screaming because it’s too late. That was Luisa’s scarf. But nobody’s here. Nothing can be done. It’s forever too late.

S
HE HAD SCREAMED, HADN’T
she?

She didn’t know what she’d done. She searched desperately for another flash of bright green and there wasn’t anything but swirling angry waters, dark gray with terrible whirlpools of foam. Nobody could live down there.

She heard herself calling for help. And there was nothing to hear it; only the black rocks behind her, and the crashing sea that drowned the sound of her voice.

Well, get help then, she told herself. But there was nothing to do; no rope; no ladder. The green scarf had disappeared; there were only waves and rocks and whirlpools. She didn’t know that she’d thought of swimming out where the flash of green had been until she started back along the path and discovered she’d slipped out of her moccasin sport shoes without knowing she was doing it. Not even a strong swimmer could live down there in the frantic currents around those horrible, teethlike rocks. She couldn’t have reached Luisa. But she must do something; she must get help. A boat then? Where? The nearest house was Dave Seabrooke’s; she started running along the path. It was dangerous and narrow; the little Pekingese panted at her heels. She didn’t remember just where Dave’s house was, but the highway must lead her there. Besides, along the highway she might encounter a car.

She didn’t stop to think what anyone in a car could do. Or that men in boats, as they valued their lives, avoided such sections of the coast.

She stumbled onto the highway; there was no car in sight. The cottage, as she remembered it, was landward and toward the left. She ran that way, dimly aware of a small wail and whimper behind her. She paused, scooped up Pooky, and ran on. But actually she knew that Luisa was dead. She couldn’t have survived the first plunge. It had been too late from the instant Luisa’s sturdy foot had gone over that grim and hideous ledge. But there might be a chance, she told herself—and knew it to be a vain hope.

Where was Dave’s house? She kept looking ahead, looking for a car along the road and there was none, looking for a lane or a gate leading into a house—any house. Eventually there was a mailbox and a grass-grown, narrow road, leading through a hedge, and to a small stone house.

It was Dave’s. As she flung herself at the door Jem Daly opened it. He caught her as she almost fell into his arms.

“For God’s sake, Sissy! What’s happened?” Pooky gave a lunge out of her arms and down to the floor.

Serena clung to Jem. “Luisa! Sutton’s aunt! She fell over the rocks. She’s in the sea. There against the rocks …”

“Where? When?”

“Just now. I’ll show you. Hurry. The path was so narrow.…”

Jem grasped it all instantly. “You mean down there on the point where the path leads around the rocks and stops above the sea?”

“Yes. I’ll show you.”

“I know the place. She goes there nearly every day! I’ll go. You stay here. Phone for help—the police …”

He was running out the door. She heard him shout, “Dave—Dave …” and the clatter of some other door opening, and Dave’s voice in the distance: “Yeah …”

“Miss Condit. She’s gone over the rocks … Where’s the rope? …”

“Good God! I’ll get it …”

She looked around for a telephone. It was a living room with books and tables and chairs, a man’s room, half-bare, comfortable. The telephone was beside a window near her. As she ran toward it she could hear the men running, the bang of a door thrust open against a wall, then excited voices: “There was a better one around somewhere.” “This will have to do.” “How about a ladder?” “Not long enough.” “How about taking the old bike … ?” “It’s broken. It’d be quicker over the rocks—this way …” A door banged and she could hear them running as she grasped the telephone. “Police—police …”

The operator down in the village was quick and helpful. “That number’s busy,” she said. “Is anything wrong?” And when Serena told her, swiftly, she understood at once. “You’ll want a pulmotor, in case … I’ll get them there right away. The point below Dr. Seabrooke’s house. Right …”

By the time Serena got to the door of the cottage again the men were out of sight. But she’d have to show them exactly the place where she’d seen the scarf. Although that would be small indication of where Luisa’s body might be found, there was no judging or plotting the way of those currents.

Pooky wanted to follow and she shut him in, closing the door behind her. He yelped sadly as she started out again along the highway the way she’d come. She was slower this time; it seemed to her she plodded along the way. Eventually she reached the path going out on the treacherous point of rocks and turned into it. This time she was giddily aware of danger when she came out upon the next to last curve and saw the cove of lashing sea and rocks below.

She went on cautiously and rounded the curve that brought her in full view of the sea, darker gray now with a close-hanging gray sky. Jem and Dave were there. Just standing there, staring out toward the rocks. Jem had a coil of rope in his hand too worn and frayed-looking, really, to have withstood the terrific pull of the current, even if they could have reached Luisa. One end of it was tied around Dave’s waist. Dave had his coat off and his shoes lay on the path.

Both turned to glance at her. But it was no good, any of it, and all of them knew it.

Yet she heard herself telling it again. She pointed, she told of seeing the green scarf. “It’s hopeless to try to find her,” said Jem. “It’d be suicide to try, and useless. We’d never find her or live long enough even to reach those rocks. We know this coast.”

Nobody ever survived a fall like that. They had given up, all three of them, when Dave began slowly to loosen the noose around his waist.

“How’d it happen, Sissy?”

“I don’t know.” She shivered a little. “I don’t know. She was ahead of me, on the path. I’d stopped to put the dog down, and when I came around the curve she wasn’t here. And then I saw it. Her scarf, way out there—dragged under, toward those rocks …”

Jem said brusquely: “We’d better get back. Might as well meet the police. Come on.” He led the way, but at the steep and narrow curve he reached back toward Serena. “Take my hand,” he said. She clutched it until they’d left the sea. “We’d better take the highway,” said Jem. “Easier on Serena.” And then when they reached the highway he glanced at her and put his arm around her. “Hang onto me,” he said.

Dave, looking shocked and white, said: “It’s horrible. One thing, Sissy, she didn’t have a moment of struggle probably. Really. She must have dashed instantly against those rocks directly below and then the current, it’s terribly strong right there, caught her and …”

“Don’t,” said Jem. “Let’s get Sissy back to the cottage.”

Pooky flung himself upon them, squealing indignantly. Jem put Serena on a sofa and Dave lighted the fire; Jem pushed her sofa up near the hearth and brought her brandy while Dave went to the telephone, and presently came back.

“The police are on their way. They’ve notified the Coast Guard too. The fellow at the station says it’s no use. Nobody’s ever been got out alive from a place like that.” He looked at Serena. “Are you all right, Sissy? Oughtn’t you have some spirits of ammonia or something? What’s the matter with your hand?”

She glanced at her hand and the handkerchief that made a white bandage upon it and for an instant couldn’t remember. “Oh, yes,” she said then. “I fell when I put the dog down. Slipped …” Another painful shiver crawled along her body as she thought, that’s what happened to Luisa; she slipped but she didn’t catch hold of anything as I did.

Jem beside her on the sofa felt the shiver. “Drink this,” he said, holding the glass to her lips. Dave went to stand before the fire. “What possessed Luisa to go out on the point like that?”

“She goes there all the time,” said Jem. “I’ve seen her. She goes everywhere. She’s not afraid of anything. Sissy,
stop shivering!”

There was a kind of exasperation of anxiety in his voice. His arm was warm and strong and inexpressibly kind; she shrank against it. Jem went on, in brusque comfort: “There was nothing you could do, Sissy. Thank God, you didn’t go over the edge too. It’s horrible. But it’s over; it was all over before you even knew that she’d fallen. Believe me. That’s true.”

“I suppose we ought to phone Amanda.” Dave went to the telephone again and then looked at Jem. “Jem, you do it. You know Amanda better than I do and you …”

Jem’s arm tightened a little. His face suddenly looked guarded. “Get Sutton, then,” he said shortly. “She was his aunt.”

“Oh, all right,” agreed Dave reluctantly. He got neither, however.