Stranglehold (37 page)

"You've made up for it a billion times,
Cyn
—and you know it. Just do me one more favor?"

"What's that?"

"Slow down to about a hundred-eighty, will you?"

"Just for you, doll."

They climbed up into the hills along the narrow winding road. Headlights came toward them around a bend and when the bright lights dimmed and the car pulled past them she saw that it was a police cruiser and thought she might have glimpsed Ralph Duggan behind the wheel. She couldn't be sure.

There was a stop sign about a hundred yards from the
Danse
house. That was where the dirt road began, just past a bridge over a stream rushing along below, flowing into a beaver pond a ways beyond. She told Cindy to pull over and stop there.

"This is where we'll meet," she said.

"I gotta tell you. Now that we got here I'm kind of worried about this."

"I'll be fine," Lydia said.

She didn't feel fine. She felt nervous as a cat lost and alone in the big city streets knowing of nowhere to go where it would ever be safe and warm again. She hoped it didn't low.

"You should have brought something."

"Like what?"

"Like a gun for chrissake!
They've
got guns, right?"

"They've got enough guns to start a war but I don't think me showing up with one is going to help any. I'm supposed to be Miss Emotional Stability, remember? Besides, I'm not going in there. And I don't intend to get seen. I'm looking. They're in the light and I'm in the dark, that's the whole idea."

"Right, yeah."

"Don't worry. What time have you got?"

"8:25"

"I'm five minutes slow. Okay, say ten o'clock, all right?"

"All right."

She opened the door. Cindy put her hand on her arm and stopped her.

"Hey," she said. "Good luck. I hope to hell they just had visitors before. I hope you come up empty."

"Me too. See you in a while."

"Be careful."

The penlight was enough to get her up the hill through the sparse woods headed toward the house. When she reached the field spread out in front of it she turned the light off and proceeded by the dim gray light of the waning moon.

There was still no sign of Arthur's Lincoln. Only Ruth's car and now Harry's pickup parked out front. The bedrooms on the second floor were dark. She could see lights on in the living room and in the hall leading in from the porch. The porch light was off. That was good. It would take a lot of seriously bad luck for them to notice her out here.

She peered through the corner window of the living room. Arthur's portrait, an oil done by a local painter, hung prominently over the fireplace.
Not Harry's portrait. Arthur's
. She'd always thought that pretty odd.

There was no one in the room.

She moved beyond the untrimmed hedges to the side of the house. The dining room was dark but she could see light spilling in under the door leading to the kitchen.

She went around back and moved softly up the three wooden steps and heard them before she saw them, looking in through the screen and the glass panel on the door. Harry, Ruth, and Robert seated at the table.

Arthur pacing.

Back and forth from the sink to the refrigerator
.

He had a day or more growth of beard and his white cotton shirt was stained with something in front and had gone yellow under the armpits. He was waving his arms at them, shouting.

Ruth watched him undisturbed.

Harry looked troubled. Two bottles of beer sat in front of him on the table and there was another one in his hand. Robert looked scared.

Even with his back to her she could tell by the inward hunch of his shoulders and when he turned in profile as his father moved past him she was sure.

"... if the son of a bitch comes back again then I'll just go right on
upstairs
again. We can keep playing that damn game forever. I mean, what are you saying? That you don't want me here? Is that what you're saying? My own
mother and father
for chrissakes?"

Harry said something. She couldn't hear.

"Screw it!" Arthur said. "I'm staying with my son. I have a right to. I have a goddamn
right
to!"

Then she heard Harry say something about a warrant.

"For what? A warrant for what? He can't get a warrant unless he has probable cause, for god's sake. So what have I done? What have I done he can get a warrant for? You tell me. No, dammit, I'll tell
you
. Nothing!"

He walked over and put his hands on each of Robert's shoulders.

She could
feel
him cringe under his father's touch. Arthur murmured something.

"... love my son," he said. "
Love
this fucking kid!" She pulled open the screen and then the door and suddenly she was inside in the overheated room that smelled of his sweat. It wasn't part of the plan god knows but there was no way she could stand and watch and listen to this bastard say what he had said and see him touching Robert and then just go away again.

"You son of a bitch," she said.

He smiled. "Oho!
Now
look who's here!
My ex-cunt!
" He released Robert and took two steps toward her. "It's
Mama
!"

"Come on, Robert," she said. "We're leaving."

She wasn't even aware that Ruth had gotten out of her chair, but then suddenly the woman was standing between them. One hand raised to her son and the other to her.

"We'll work this out between us," she said. "It's a matter between us and our boy. There's no reason for you to be here."

"No reason? Are you aware that your precious son is breaking the law just by being in this house? That you're breaking the law by having him here? Robert is not staying in this house with him. Do you understand? If you think I'm letting him you're crazy. Come on, Robert!"

"
Mom
..."

He seemed rooted in his chair, afraid to move.

"You're trespassing," Ruth said.

She'd had enough of it.

"
Oh, fuck you
, Ruth," she said.

And it was the same as Arthur had done to her so many nights and weeks ago. The fist came out of nowhere. She saw stars and suddenly she was on the floor with her back to the door and Robert was yelling
Mom!
and trying to get away from Arthur, and Ruth was standing right over her.

"Harry, go get the shotgun," she said.

She saw Harry glance at her once on the floor and the glance was empty, empty of all meaning, impossible to read, and then he left the room.

Arthur was laughing. Howling.

"
You better get out of here,
Liddy
!
" he said. "He'll do it! Mama says do it, he'll do it. He'll shoot your fucking guts out!" Robert was squirming in his grasp. "Trespassers get their asses shot,
Liddy
!"

Ruth gazed at her calmly.

"What he's saying? You hear what he's saying? That's right," she said.

"Mom! Please! Run!"

And suddenly she knew she'd damn well better run, that these people had all gone mad, that they'd do it and then say they'd mistaken her for a prowler and they'd get away with it too, she was out here on her own in the middle of the night with no car and no apparent justification for even being there and it could happen, they could get away with it, they could kill her right this minute and be done with her.

She hauled herself up. She looked at Robert.

"I'm coming back ..."

"You better not be coming back, missy," Ruth hissed. She ignored her.

''Robert, I'll ..."

But Robert was staring down the hallway now, panicked at what he was seeing, struggling with Arthur and screaming for her to
run, run
, and she threw open the doors and plunged down the stairs. She heard the door slam shut behind her and then fly open again against the side of the house and knew that he was coming after her, quiet, sad old Harry with the shotgun.

She ran across the field and didn't look back until she reached the woods. He was halfway across the field, following her, the shotgun resting on his shoulder pointed toward the stars. She fumbled for the penlight in her pocket, then realized it would give her position away. Arms out in front of her she pushed her way blindly through the scrub and trees and branches.

She heard the stream down over the hill below and made for that. She could work her way downstream and find some lace to hide from him and wait for Cindy. She felt something wet on the palm of her left hand and saw black blood gleaming in the moonlight. She thought she could hear him behind her and tried to hurry forward but the woods had thickened and she stumbled and fell, heart pounding, breath thick in her throat. She pulled herself up and felt another stab of pain as a broken branch slashed across her wrist.

The water was close now, she could hear it.

And then she could see it just below.

She stumbled sliding down off the bank to the pebble bed of the stream where the water had receded during the cold dry winter—and then stood a moment. Staring at but not able to understand at first what in god's name she was looking at.

A hulk, a shape.

Dark in the middle of the water
.

The stream flowing gleaming all around it.

She saw the high rounded head of the thing and the long sleek body half submerged like a stranded sea monster. She moved closer, understanding finally.

It was Arthur's Lincoln.

He'd driven it here. He'd dumped it in the middle of the stream, his precious Lincoln, the water running fast around it.

Above her on the bank to her right she could see where the brush and saplings had fallen beneath its bulk, crushed as it made its way down to the waterline and into the water. She didn't even wonder why.

She didn't need to.

He was crazy.

She had to get Robert.

She crouched listening a moment but she couldn't hear Harry behind her anymore. Maybe he'd given up. Maybe he really had no taste for this after all.

And maybe not.

Staying close to the dark high bank she made her way through the shadows downstream.

She heard the car on the bridge above her and pulled herself up over the embankment.

"Jesus,
Lyd
! What ...?"

"
Drive!
" she said.

She hadn't heard or seen anything more of him but she wasn't taking chances, and one thing had become thoroughly clear to her in the long slow minutes she'd been hiding beneath the bridge. That time was everything now. Something could be happening to Robert this very minute, something she didn't even want to think of. And what was to stop him from throwing Robert into Ruth's car or Harry's pickup and driving away? It could be days, weeks, before they found him.