The Surrogate, The Sudarium Trilogy - Book one (24 page)

1:43

The house was finally quiet.

Hannah lay down on the double bed, but she was beyond exhaustion and couldn’t sleep. Her mind kept racing to the future. There was so much to be worked out - where she would have the baby, where she would live afterwards, how she would find a good lawyer, because the only way she’d be allowed to keep this child, her child, was to get a lawyer on the case.

Other than Teri and Father Jimmy, there weren’t many people she could count on. Father Jimmy had spirited her out of East Acton in the middle of the night, but he’d had to turn around and go right back for early morning mass. Teri was slinging hash at the diner. As for the others … She could still see Judith Kowalski, sprawled on the snowy walk, and Marshall staring at her in silent horror. There was blood on the snow and, when he reached down to pick her up, the blood got all over his hands, so that it looked as if he was wearing bright red gloves, like the end man in a diabolical minstrel show. He had on a fancy top hat and was strutting in the snow, flashing a lecherous grin and waving his red hands—

The phone rang and Hannah sat up with a start. She had dozed off, after all.

She hesitated before answering, willing herself to wake up. It could be Father Jimmy, calling. She reached for the receiver by the bed.

It was Teri. “You okay, hon? You’ll never guess who’s sitting in the parking lot of the diner at this very moment, trying to figure out where you are.”

“Don’t tell me. Jolene?”

“And some man. Her husband, I presume.”

Hannah’s throat constricted. “That didn’t take long! What should I do?”

“Nothing. Stay put for now. I just wanted to let you know.

“You didn’t tell them I’m at your house?”

“What do you think I am? I pretended I didn’t have any idea where you were. She’s a piece of work, that one. I wouldn’t put it past them to follow me home. Wait, they’re pulling out of the parking lot.”

“What if they’re on their way here now?”

“Just don’t answer the door. Have Nick tell them you’re not there. He’ll put the fear of God in them.”

“Nick’s not here, Teri.”

“Of course! I forgot he was taking the kids to the basketball game today. Good old Nick! Never around when you need him.”

“I can’t stay here by myself.” Teri could sense Hannah’s growing fear. Her voice was steady enough; the giveaway was her breath, which grew progressively shorter, so that every few words Hannah seemed to have to take in air.

“Yes, you can. Just check the doors and make sure they’re locked. Oh, and don’t forget the basement door. The kids were playing in the backyard this morning and could have left it open. If it makes you feel safer, draw the curtains in the living room.”

“They’ll break the door down, Teri. I know they will.”

“I don’t—”

“Teri, there’s a lot I didn’t tell you about what happened last night, about these people and this baby. It’s worse than you think. I need protection.”

“Call the police then.”

“I’d…No, I’d rather not.”

“More mystery, huh? Look, you’re tired and you’re overreacting. Calm down and everything will be all right. The important thing is to stay inside. Have you got that?”

In front of the house, a car door slamming attracted Hannah’s attention. The Whitfields couldn’t have gotten there that fast, she thought, not before she’d had a chance to check the locks.

“Did you hear me, Hannah? … Hannah? … Are you still there?”

” … yes …” She sucked in a mouthful of air.

“I’ll be home as soon as my shift is over.”

Hannah hung up the phone and glanced out the living room window, just as the next-door neighbor disappeared into his house. It had been a false alarm. Still, it was only a matter of time before the Whitfields located her. She jerked the curtains shut. Her body felt so heavy. She’d run so much and slept so little today. She was almost too tired to struggle any more.

No, she had to. For the baby’s sake, she had to go where there were other people. All alone, she was defenseless. There was safety in numbers. Father Jimmy was safety. Why wasn’t he here with her? Impulsively, she picked up the phone again, dialed information and asked for the number of a taxi service.

As the cab drove past the familiar, weather-worn houses, Hannah wondered if she should have called ahead. Communication with Ruth and Herb had been practically non-existent the last few months and it had been only marginally better before that. She’d remembered to send them both a card for their birthdays, and there had been a telephone call or two to let them know that everything was okay. Nothing you could call a chat, though. Just a quick touching of bases to verify that everybody was alive and, if not well, “well as can be expected,” as Herb invariably put it.

If they were hostile, she decided, she would take whatever clothes she’d left behind (and still fit her) and have the cabby drive her to one of the motels off the interstate. Once that decision had been reached, her breathing had gone back to normal. She felt better already.

Herb was in the driveway, scraping ice off the windshield of his car, when the cab pulled over to the curb. He didn’t recognize her at first, but something must have registered on his unconscious, because he stopped scraping and took a second, longer look. Hannah thought she detected a faint smile crease the leathery face.

She handed the driver a $10 bill, and while he made change, scanned the street to see if there was any sign of Jolene or Marshall. It was devoid of activity. One of the curtains in the living room was pulled aside, from which Hannah deduced that Ruth was watching.

Herb didn’t conceal his surprise, as Hannah hoisted herself out of the cab.

“Lordy, will you look at you!” Being pregnant in the flesh and being pregnant over the phone were two different realities in his mind. “Careful, now. The sidewalk is slippery.”

He offered his arm to steady her and guided her up the walk to the front door. She couldn’t remember her uncle ever touching her with such solicitude before.

“Do you think Aunt Ruth will be upset to see me?”

“Water under the bridge. If you want the truth, I think she regretted asking you to leave in the first place, although she would probably never admit it. Whenever you’d call, she’d grill me afterwards about everything you said. I told her to pick up the phone and talk to you herself, if she was so darned curious. But you know Ruth.”

As if on cue, Ruth opened the front door. Hannah’s first impression was how old she looked. The image etched in her memory was that of a harder, sterner woman. Ruth’s features had softened, as if they were slowly melting. The mouth was beginning to pull inward, the jowls drooped a little lower, and the eyes had seemed to have lost their predatory gleam.

“Is that a new coat?” was all she said, as Hannah entered the house.

“This? No, it’s Teri’s. I borrowed it. It doesn’t quite fit, does it?” She giggled nervously and tried to tug it over her belly.

“Didn’t look like your style to me. Too flamboyant. You never dressed that way when you lived here.”

“I guess I didn’t.”

“Too red.” She took the coat and hung it up in the front closet.

“So, how have you been?” Herb said to fill the awkward pause.

Where was she supposed to begin? What could she possibly tell them about her predicament that they would understand? There was certainly no need right now to go into details about Dr. Johanson, Judith Kowlalski / Letitia Greene, DNA, or relics that contained the blood of Christ.

“Physically, I’m fine…big as can be, but I feel good…Otherwise, um, well, it’s not always easy to live with people you don’t know…I figured I needed a little break, that’s all…so when Teri said come visit—”

“Does Teri have some place for you to sleep?” Ruth interrupted.

“The couch.”

“In your condition?” Some of Ruth’s old indignation came back. “That’s ridiculous! Why don’t you sleep in your old room?”

“I didn’t know if that would be all right. Anyway, I’m not staying long.”

“Nonsense. It’s your room. You might as well use it, while you’re here.”

It wasn’t an invitation, exactly, but Hannah figured it was the best Ruth could do. She resolved to behave as if it were just an ordinary Sunday and all the wounding arguments were buried in the past. They were making an effort, both of them, and that effort moved her.

“Can I get you some hot tea? You still drink tea, don’t you?”

“Yes, please.”

“Come on into the kitchen then.”

“Now don’t tell me you’ve forgotten the way to the kitchen, Hannah?” Herb joked.

At the kitchen table, sipping tea from mugs and eating what was left of the morning’s sweet rolls, they caught up. Herb and Ruth listened to her stories about East Acton and Father Jimmy and the church. And Hannah listened to their stories about the new neighbor two doors down, who had painted their house robin’s egg blue -surely she’d noticed it driving up - and how the whole neighborhood was in an uproar.

Ruth confided that her legs had been acting up lately and the doctors couldn’t figure out what it was, and Herb said as long as the doctor didn’t cut them off, she should probably consider herself lucky.

The baby wasn’t talked about. But Hannah didn’t mind. They would come to it eventually. Instead, she savored the odd sense of comfort she had begun to feel. Here at Ruth and Herb’s, of all places! She tried to analyze it. Her childhood hadn’t been a pleasant one and she couldn’t pretend that she had close ties with her aunt and uncle.

But they were her family, for better or worse, and this was her home. There was no changing that. The accumulated memories belonged to no one else, had shaped no one else. You could move beyond your past, perhaps, as she had, but you couldn’t pretend it had never happened. Ruth and Herb were part of her, just as she was part of them. Maybe they realized it, too. Maybe her departure had left a hole in their lives and that’s why this homecoming, if that’s what it was, was not as fraught as she had feared.

“You look peaked, Hannah,” Ruth observed. “Wouldn’t you like to lie down and take a little nap before dinner? I have to say you kinda caught us by surprise, but I’m sure we can rustle up something presentable. Anything you don’t eat? Because of the baby, I mean?”

There! Ruth had even mentioned the baby.

“No, Aunt Ruth,” Hannah replied softly. “Whatever you prepare will be fine.”

Her room was exactly as she had left it. The stuffed penguin hadn’t changed its perch on the window sill and the paperbacks she’d been reading last winter were there by the bedside. The bureau drawers she’d emptied out had stayed empty and not been pressed into use as storage space for Christmas decorations or old copies of the National Geographic.

Had they expected her return all along?

She eased herself onto the bed and sank into its softness, relishing the sensation of being able finally to let go. She realized that her nerve endings were raw from the past 24 hours and her muscles ached. She tried to put aside any thoughts of genetics and crazed plots, and concentrated only on the well-being she felt in this bed in which she had slept for so many years.

The presence of her mother seemed to hover in the room, murmuring in a soft sing-song voice, “good night, sleep tight, don’t let the bed bugs bite, if they do, crack ‘em with your shoe…”

As suddenly as if she’d walked off a cliff, Hannah dropped into the profound blackness of sleep.

Her mother was still there, still chanting, but from farther away now, from another room, from outside the window. “Good night, sleep tight…good night, sleep tight…” Soft as a music box, reassuringly hypnotic.

Then her mother was gone and her place was taken by Jolene and Marshall and Dr. Johanson. They were standing over her bed, looking down at her, smiling. Marshall no longer had the red gloves on his hands. He’d changed them for white gloves. No, they were plastic gloves. And it wasn’t Marshall who was wearing them, it was Dr. Johanson. What was he doing in her dream?

She tried to call for her mother, but no sound came out of her mouth, even though her lips had formed the words carefully. She would have to gesture with her hands and then her mother would come back. But her hands were stuck at her side, too heavy to lift, as if embedded in concrete.

“Good night, sleep tight…don’t let the bed bugs bite…” The refrain was a mere tinkling in the distance. And then it turned into another refrain altogether.

“Good night…hold her tight … don’t let her up … this should put her out …”

Was she in a hospital? She looked beyond the three faces staring down at her in an effort to determine her surroundings and she saw that other people were present, as well. There was Uncle Herb! And Aunt Ruth, too. Aunt Ruth’s face was twisted in anger, the way it always used to be, disapproval radiating from the eyes. That was the old Ruth, not the one who’d welcomed her today. What was going on?

If she could just go to sleep, these people would vanish and leave her in peace. But that didn’t make sense, because she was asleep. Asleep in her old bedroom in Fall River. She recognized the penguin on the window sill.

She felt a sharp prick in her arm, followed by smarting, and realized that she’d been stung by a wasp. She was always getting stung by wasps. They were attracted by the hollyhocks in the garden. Time and again, Aunt Ruth would tell Uncle Herb that he had to burn their nest or they’d never leave. But Uncle Herb never did anything about it.