Ghost House Revenge (18 page)

Alicen’s words came back to him:
I’m glad he died. I hate him!

Derek shook his head roughly.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Derek said. “Dwight Percy was Alicen’s teacher. I understand, though, that
they weren’t too fond of each other. Alicen has a tendency to daydream, and Percy
was a no-nonsense type.”

Liza laughed, a bell-like sound that relaxed Derek at once.

“Oh, I used to daydream all the time,” she said. “I used to pretend I was a prima
ballerina when I was supposed to be doing equations. I think all girls go through
a time like that. How old did you say Alicen was?”

“Thirteen,” Derek said. “And I don’t think this is a passing phase. She’s been having
these dreams for six years.” He lifted his fork and dropped it. “Ever since Elaine
died.”

“Oh . . .”

Looking up at Liza, Derek realized his mistake.

“Oh, hey, I’m sorry,” he said, reaching across the table to take her hand. “I shouldn’t
have said that.”

“You’re just upset because of the accident,” Liza said. “I understand.”

“I don’t want to spoil our lunch,” Derek replied. “Let me think of something better
to talk about. Do you like ghost stories?”

“Sure,” Liza said.

“Then listen to this one,” Derek answered. “You’ll love it.”

He proceeded to relate the story of the VanBuren hauntings. Liza listened intently,
her almond eyes as bright as a child’s. When Derek finished, she stabbed a shrimp
on her plate with a fork and said, “That’s interesting, but a little unbelieveable,
don’t you think? I mean, haunted houses?”

“I don’t believe it,” Derek said, “and yet I don’t disbelieve that something went
on in that house last year. I think the VanBurens made up that story to push the truth
from their minds. But one thing that is true is the fact that three people died at
the house. One of them was a young woman named
Janice. She was Melanie’s best friend, and needless to say, my patient’s wife gets
rather upset at the mention of her name.”

“The poor thing,” Liza said. “It must have been a horrible experience for her.”

“Melanie tends to get emotional about it,” Derek said. “But who can blame her?”

Liza ate a few bites of food, then said, “I’d sure like to see that house. I’ll bet
it’s eerie.”

“You wouldn’t be disappointed,” Derek answered. “But the VanBurens do keep the cobwebs
swept.”

Liza laughed. “Do you suppose I could come there one night?” she asked. “I mean, after
giving Alicen time to adjust after the accident? I think meeting her father’s new
girlfriend would be too much for her right now.”

“You missed your calling,” Derek said. “You should have been a child psychologist.”

“I worked with one for eight years,” Liza said. “That’s how I saved money to come
to New York.”

Derek lifted her hand and kissed it. “You’re a very kind woman,” he said.

“I was just thinking about Alicen.”

“Shh,” Derek said. “Enough about Alicen. You’ll meet her soon, I promise.”

Making his nightly rounds of the bay area, Harold Kent, a security guard for one of
Belle Bay’s prestigious private communities, drove his dune buggy along the water
line. His headlights danced off the little ripples made by the wind, competing with
the golden reflections of the moon. The bay was so peaceful at this hour, just before
dawn. Harold began to whistle.

But something caught his eye, an interruption in the golden ripples of the bay that
made him stop whistling. He stopped his truck and went to investigate.

It was a woman’s body. Harold bent closer to it, waving his flashlight over the wet,
sand-covered flesh. In the moonlight the bloated face seemed to be grinning with evil
pleasure. Blond hair was braided with seaweed. Some of it had wrapped around the woman’s
throat.

Harold rushed back to his truck and drove up to the guard house. There, he phoned
his discovery into the Belle Bay police. Within two hours the body, named Jane Doe
for lack of identification, was taken to the Belle Bay funeral home for
storage. There it would wait until someone came to identify it.

“As soon as you kids are through with your homework,” Gary said at dinner that night,
“come downstairs. I have a chore for you.”

“What is it, dad?” Kyle asked.

“Well, Mayor Kaufman gave me a call today,” Gary explained. “It seems Sarah lost that
big diamond ring of hers, and he wondered if it might be in this house somewhere.
So we’re going to look for it.”

“Gary, I’ve cleaned this house since then,” Melanie said, serving beets to a grimacing
Nancy. “I didn’t see it.”

“Well, it wouldn’t hurt to look,” Gary said.

“Alicen and I will help you,” Derek said.

Alicen, picking listlessly at her food, didn’t hear her father say that. She was thinking
of the old house down the road. Jamie hadn’t mentioned a word of what had happened
in school the next day. And true to her promise, Alicen had kept her own mouth shut.
She wasn’t quite sure what she’d say, anyway. That she had seen a ghost that turned
out to be a curtain? Having had time to decide the whole scene just had to be her
imagination, she felt as silly now as Jamie had. Still, she wished her mother were
there. Her mother would make her feel better about all the crazy things that had been
happening.

Her head felt funny tonight, the way it had just before the bus accident. She stabbed
a beet and saw red juice flow over her plate like blood.

“Nancy!” Gina cried then. “Stop feeding beets to Lad!”

“Yeah, little girl.” Gary said. “You eat those. They’re good.”

“Alicen isn’t eating hers,” Nancy said, pouting.

Melanie looked across the table at her young house guest. She frowned to see Alicen
staring dully at her plate, pushing
her food around. The fork looked ready to drop from her fingers.

“Are you all right, Alicen?”

No answer.

“Alicen!” Derek shouted.

She jumped. “Huh?”

“Mrs. VanBuren asked if you’re all right,” Derek said, studying her face.

“I’m just real tired,” Alicen said. “Can I go to my room?”

“Eat first,” Derek insisted. “It’ll make you feel better.”

“Please?”

“Alicen, just eat dinner,” Derek snapped.

Alicen obeyed him. She ate as quickly as possible without making herself obvious,
wanting only to get upstairs. She had heard a voice in her head, a voice calling her
to her room. When at last her plate was empty, she excused herself and all but ran
from the dining room.

“I’ll never understand that kid,” Derek said, looking over his shoulder.

“You don’t try very hard,” Melanie mumbled.

Derek ignored the remark.

Upstairs, Alicen sat down at her desk and waited. Her head was light as a cloud now,
her ears deaf to the noises around her. Only her mind listened, waiting for the voice
that would mean her mother had come once more to talk with her. The conscious Alicen
was suppressed now, and she waited in a trance.

“Alicen,” she heard.

“I’m here, mommy. Why did you wait so long to talk to me, mommy?”

“Selfish brat!” the apparition hissed. “Do you think I have nothing better to do than
talk with you?”

“Mommy, please don’t be mad,” Alicen begged. She squinted at the cloud of smoke, shaped
like a human body one moment, then unidentifiable the next, and tried to see her mother’s
features.

“Tell me of the man Davis,” she heard.

“He came back to school a couple of times,” Alicen reported. “I told him about the
driver jumping from the bus, like you wanted. But he didn’t believe me ’cause none
of the other kids said they saw it.” Alicen looked down at her hands. “They didn’t
find a body.”

“If they want a body,” the vision said, “I will give them one. Then they’ll be satisfied.
But you must help me. You’ll know what to do.”

There was a deep silence for a few moments. Alicen felt something cold press against
her forehead, but she didn’t move away from its stinging touch. Then the vision spoke
again.

“You will know what to do. Succeed, and I will give you this.”

Alicen saw the diamond ring floating before her. She reached for it, taking it in
her hands. It glowed in an almost unnatural way, as if possessed by the very soul
of the apparition. Alicen gazed into it.

Someone knocked at the door. “Alicen?”

The girl turned around at the sound of her father’s voice, the spell that held her
breaking. She became her own person in a split second, in the same time that the cloud
of smoke disappeared and left her holding the ring. Momentarily confused, Alicen didn’t
think to hide it when her father opened her door.

“Are you okay?” Derek asked. “I want you to come downstairs and help look for the—”

Alicen realized that her father had seen the ring. Not knowing how she’d come to have
it and afraid her father would think she’d stolen it, she dropped the ring in the
pocket of the cardigan that hung over the back of the desk chair. Derek waited for
his daughter to tell him about the ring, but she said nothing.

“I was just putting on a sweater,” she said quietly, standing. “It’s cold in this
house.”

“I was rather warm myself,” Derek said. He debated whether or not to take the ring
forcefully but decided against it. Why create a scene in front of the VanBurens?

“Get busy looking for that ring,” he said. “It’s very important that we find it.”

He left the room and went to the staircase, pretending to look for it. As he poked
around the carpeting, knowing there was nothing to be found, Derek tried to understand
what he had just seen.
Jesus
, he thought,
my daughter’s a klepto! How’d she get the ring? And what the hell am I going to tell
the VanBurens?

“Nothing,” he said out loud. With three kids of their own, they wouldn’t want a little
thief around. They would call her a bad influence and kick her out—and him with her.

He sank down on the step and punched one of the balusters. “Damn you, Alicen,” he
whispered. “I’ve waited too long for a job like this to have you ruin it for me.”

He’d have to get the ring from her and plant it somewhere in the house where Sarah
could have dropped it.

Hearing soft steps on the carpeting behind him, he turned to see Alicen coming down
the stairs. She barely glanced at him when she said, ‘I’m going to look in the dining
room.”

Derek said nothing. He clutched hard at the baluster, resisting an urge to grab and
shake her. When she disappeared into the dining room, he got up and hurried back to
her room.

It looked so innocent, with its yellow curtains and white furniture. Derek went first
to the desk, pulling open all the drawers. He found stationery, pencils, and a roll
of tape, but no ring. Next he went to the bed and pulled back the yellow coverlet.
The ring wasn’t under the pillow, nor was it between the mattress and box spring.
And it wasn’t anywhere else in the room.

“She’s still got it in her pocket,” he guessed. He left the room and walked down the
hall, meeting Melanie.

“Is Alicen still in the dining room?”

“I sent her to help Gina look in the living room,” Melanie replied. “Honestly, I don’t
think any of us will find that ring. One of those hospital people probably took it.”

“It—uh—doesn’t hurt to check,” Derek said, moving down the stairs.

He stood in the doorway of the living room for a few minutes, wondering how he could
get the ring from his daughter. He couldn’t tell her to give it to him—not with Gina
standing right there. He watched Alicen make a big production of the search, masking
her guilt. She poked around the fireplace, looking like such a little girl in front
of the huge structure that Derek momentarily forgot his anger. Could he have made
a mistake? Maybe he hadn’t seen the ring at all but had imagined it. Alicen had never
stolen anything in her life!

Still, he had to be certain. He walked into the room and reached to touch the pocket
of her sweater, in a gesture that would appear to be an embrace. Alicen jumped away
from him.

“Dad!” she cried. “You startled me!”

“Me, too,” Gina said. “I didn’t hear you come into the room.”

“I walk softly,” Derek said.

His smile was a false one—he had felt the ring. Nervously, his daughter had resumed
her search, moving to the window seat. She would not look her father in the eye. Derek
saw
that her hands were trembling. That was good. Let her suffer a little. He’d get the
ring tonight.

By midnight, Derek decided it was safe to enter Alicen’s room. To be certain, he listened
carefully at her door until he heard her even breathing. Then he pushed it open and
groped his way inside. His hands touched the sweater, hanging on the desk chair again,
but found that the pockets were empty. Holding his breath, he carefully searched the
desk. When it came to nothing, he turned and crept to the bed.

Derek stood over his daughter for a long time, wondering why she had done this thing.
She looked so innocent, lying there breathing softly. Her hair was spread out on her
pillow, her lower lip jutted out in a slight pout. She looked more than innocent.
She was like a little child, the way Derek remembered her being before Elaine’s death.
My God, she had been a pretty little girl. What the hell had happened these past six
years? Was Alicen’s crime the result of their struggles to get by on catch-as-catch-can
jobs, living in motels or basement apartments? Or was it the fact that Derek had been
just a little ignorant of a growing girl’s needs?

He had never admitted that possibility to himself. But now, seeing the trouble his
daughter was in, he wondered if he should have been a little more understanding. After
all, she was a child, and—

No
, Derek told himself firmly,
I did the right thing when I tried to make her independent. You have to control your
emotions to get by in this world
.

And right now, I have to get that ring
.