Nightmare Child (9 page)

With that, he turned, picked up a lone leather suitcase, and started down the stairs to the shoveled drive, where the BMW was parked.

He turned around once again and addressed the house. Because there was no sign of Mindy at any of the windows, his shouts seemed theatrical, even a bit mad.

"Don't you understand, Mindy? Don't you understand by now? We've got to get out—and get out now! Mindy, please! Believe me!"

Maybe his tormented style would have seemed less crazy if it had not been a sunny winter morning and if "The Young and the Restless" hadn't been playing in the background.

Under the circumstances, however, he struck Diane as being insane, pathetically so.

Apparently waiting for a response, Jeff stood in the driveway rubbing his head with a black-gloved hand, staring up at a second-story window.

Three minutes went by, during which time Diane heard two complete plot turns take place on "The Young and the Restless."

"Mindy! I'm going to get in the car now! I mean it!"

With that, Jeff picked up the massive brown leather bag and walked down the driveway to where the red BMW had been parked overnight in front of the three-car garage.

Opening the trunk, Jeff set his suitcase inside, then walked around to the front of the car, opened the door, and leaned on the horn.

The noise was loud and irritating on the quiet, lovely winter morning. He kept it up, his dark gaze mad for sure now.

"Mindy!" he shouted over the sound of the horn. "Mindy, please come with me!"

Three or four minutes rolled by. Mindy, wherever she was inside, chose not to respond.

Finally, shoulders slumping, a tearful expression tightening his face, Jeff slid inside the BMW and started the engine. From the exhaust pipe a putt-putt of cold-morning exhaust could be seen and, anticipating the work of the defroster, Jeff wiped away steam from the inside windshield.

He had not given up entirely. The engine running smoothly now, he sat in the driveway and gave the horn one last try, a mournful, foghorn bass that seemed to rattle the windows of Diane's house. There was a pleading tone to the horn now, a futile summoning that Mindy, for whatever reason, was obviously not going to answer.

Slumping toward the steering wheel, Jeff started pounding the dashboard with his fists, a five-year-old throwing a tantrum.

Then, abruptly, he quit his pounding, sat back, put the car into gear, and started backing out of the driveway.

He had gone perhaps ten yards when smoke started pouring in thick gray clouds from the trunk.

Slamming on the brakes, jumping from the car, Jeff ran to the rear of the car, jammed in the key, and threw back the lid.

The smoke became massive now, and for a moment Jeff was lost to Diane—all but his trousers from the knees down—inside the smudgy gray-black smoke.

She heard him curse once and then she saw him emerging from the smoke. He carried the suitcase. It was on fire and was the source of all the smoke.

He hurled it into a
snowbank
and began scooping up soft white snow to put out the fire. It did not take long. Jeff worked with a certain manic compulsion, as if he needed something physical to do at this moment to keep from going clinically insane.

The fire out, Jeff closed the lid, stood looking up at the house a long moment, then went around and got back behind the wheel again.

He started the engine, put the car in reverse, and started out of the driveway again.

This time he reached the edge of the street before the engine caught on fire.

They were almost pretty, the red and yellow flames against the pure white snow, the pure blue sky.

His life was in no way endangered—he got out of the car in plenty of time—but the engine was most likely ruined, fire and smoke pouring up from under the hood.

He raised his eyes to his house. In the doorway now stood Mindy, dressed in a pale blue robe, gaunt from her loss of weight. She beckoned to him to return and so he did, leaving the car in the driveway to burn out.

He went inside his house and closed the door.

It had been a very short trip.

Dinner that Saturday night was braised beef tips, a salad, and whole-wheat bread that Diane had made from scratch.

She had not used the dining room since well before her husband's death. Now, the candlelight made the room luxurious with the gleam of light on mahogany, of rich warm shadows.

During the meal, Diane told Robert what had happened that day to Jeff
McCay's
trip.

"He just disappeared into the house," she explained. "Then around four this afternoon, he went out and pushed the car up the driveway, away from the road."

"Sounds pretty strange."

"That's what I hoped you'd say."

He glanced up from his salad. "Why?"

"Because then you can go over there and find out what's going on."

He shrugged. Tonight he wore a white shirt, gray cardigan sweater, and chinos. She felt far more comfortable with him than she wanted to admit to herself.

"Mindy would come to the door and that would be that."

"Meaning what?"

"Meaning that she'd say, yes, their car did catch on fire and that, yes, everything is all right now."

"In other words, she wouldn't let you inside?"

"Right."

"On TV, detectives are always getting search warrants."

He laughed. "Maybe on TV, Diane. In real life, judges don't hand those out without a good reason."

"But something's going on over there."

"But what's going on exactly?"

"You said yourself it was 'pretty strange.'"

"Yes, I did. But that doesn't mean I can show cause."

"But—"

He put his fork down and reached across the table, his hand brushing hers there in the romantic shadows. "A little girl lives in the house. She's sick. Two adults live with her. They're kind of funny sometimes, kind of odd. Today their car caught on fire. Nobody was injured, and later in the day Jeff pushed the car back up the drive. Now, does that sound like it's worth giving me a search warrant over?"

"You forgot about him running out into the night stark naked."

"A good point, but what does it prove? That he walks in his sleep? Obviously, he wasn't injured, and apparently nobody else was. You yourself saw Mindy in the doorway."

"She looked gaunt."

"Gaunt, but not in any trouble?"

"Well…"

"Or looking as if she needed help?"

"Well…"

"Or in any way asking you for help?"

"No, but—"

"I think you see what I'm talking about, Diane."

"But we know that something's going on over there."

"No, I'm afraid we don't know anything. What you're really saying is that we suspect, and as yet we don't have any hard evidence for even intelligent speculation. Just fears."

The timer went off, announcing that the chocolate cake she'd baked was ready for frosting.

Once they got off the subject of the
McCays
, they had a fine time.

Two hours later, snug in Robert's arms on the couch, White Christmas with Bing Crosby and Grace Kelly on television, she said, "Do you really think everything's all right over there?"

He smiled. "No, I don't. But right now there's nothing I can do about it except wait until you call me and tell me they're gone. Then we'll pay their house a quick, unofficial visit and make sure Jenny's all right."

"Jenny." Diane sighed. "It'd really be nice to see her again."

Twenty minutes later, Robert raised her face to his and kissed her tenderly on the lips.

"Is that going too fast?" he asked.

"No, that's just going the legal speed limit." She smiled.

He kissed her again.

Terry, the one they'd gotten to replace
Ringo
, the dog they'd said had run away.

At first, the sounds startled her, loud and sharp as gunshots on the silence. But then the sounds only reminded her of how much she disliked the little dog. Not his fault that he was so aggravating—always drooling all over your hand if you tried to pet him, always tearing your nylons, jumping at you in the street —but she would never feel any affection for him no matter what.

Not quite knowing why, she first rang the bell. She supposed it was her good middle-class training. Even when you're breaking into a place, always be polite.

It was one of those afternoons when she really enjoyed domestic work. In the morning she dusted and straightened up the living room and in the afternoon she worked in the warm, sunny kitchen rearranging shelves. Occasionally, memories of last Saturday night came to mind. Hard to believe four days had passed already. Certain things Robert had said and done remained so vivid.

Working on the shelf with all the spices, she sneezed when she held up the paprika, and climbed down from the stool to get some Kleenex from the counter.

Blowing her nose, she looked out over the startling brilliance of white snow. The sun wasn't hot enough to melt it; it just gave it an almost blinding surface.

Watching the way the wind whipped the snowflakes around in a dazzling, diamond-like display, she saw on the edge of her vision something that seemed wrong.

Leaving from the front door of their home, bundled up so heavily that Diane could not see their faces, were Mindy and Jeff
McCay
.

Expecting them to walk around to the side to get their second car, a blue Volvo station wagon, she was surprised when they kept going down the walk and then into the street and then straight across the snowy field Jeff had crossed the other night to reach the brook.

Where could they be going? And both of them at the same time? And why didn't they take the car?

Only then did Diane realize the opportunity she had. Robert had asked her to tell him if Mindy and Jeff ever left the house together, leaving Jenny alone.

Dashing to the yellow wall phone, Diane dialed the number of the police department, a number she knew by heart already.

"May I speak with the Chief, please?"

"One moment."

As she waited, she felt like a child, so excited she could scarcely stop herself from jumping up and down. She stood on the lowest rung of the stool to see if she could catch sight of Mindy and Jeff. Just now, their heads were disappearing on the other side of the hill, dark shapes against the brilliant white day.

"Hello," a male voice said.

"Hello?"

"You're holding for the Chief?"

"Yes."

"Afraid he's tied up right now. There was a fire on the edge of the business district. Pretty bad one. Damage is probably going to run at least half a million."

"But isn't the fire department—"

He'd anticipated her objection. "Right now, the fire department needs all the official help it can get, including the Chief. Sorry. Is there something I can help you with?"

Diane thought about it but decided no. It probably wouldn't be a good idea to let one of Robert's co-workers know that he was at least contemplating "visiting" a place without a search warrant.

"No, thanks. I appreciate your time, though."

After hanging up and stepping down to the floor, Diane leaned against the counter for long moments in the sunshine. Her heart still pounding at the prospect of possibly seeing Jenny, she knew she would have to make a decision quickly.

What if they came back while she was in there? What if she found that Jenny had been abused in some horrible way that Diane could never forget?

Shaking her head at herself, knowing that she owed her young friend all the help she could give, Diane ran to the hall closet, took down her coat, tugged on her snow boots, and went out the back door.

Outside, the sun was even more blinding. It was one of those freezing days when you could scarcely breathe.

She paused a moment as she struggled through the knee-deep snow. She looked up at the
McCay
house. While it was one of the more expensive homes in Stone-ridge, there was still something sinister about it. She'd never been able to figure out what. In the dazzling sun-light and beautiful snow, it should have looked like an ordinary, friendly house. But there was a shut-away aspect to it, the windows too dark with drawn curtains, as if it were a place in which sick people were kept.

Shuddering, knowing she was being silly, Diane went the rest of the way to the
McCays
' front door, determined to go in there, find out Jenny's condition, and take whatever action was appropriate.

Reaching the front steps, she heard the yipping of the tiny golden toy poodle, try the bell first. Terry went crazy, even managing to sound fierce despite his diminutive size.

She rang the bell one more time. Its chimes sounded too full, almost corny on the clear afternoon.

Anxious again, her chest feeling tight, she put her right hand down to the knob and twisted gently. The door was open. She pushed it inward a bit farther. Terry flew at her like a heat-seeking missile.