What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (7 page)

At seven, when Jane brought her dinner tray up to her and left it on the desk without removing its cover, Blanche felt none of the previous day’s apprehension. With only a momentary twinge of
doubt, she moved her chair over to the desk, reached out to the cloth and removed it.

The food looked wonderful. There were two perfectly grilled chops, a small helping of mashed potatoes, carrots and peas, a small green salad and a slice of cherry pie. Eagerly Blanche picked up her fork and took up some of the potatoes.

She had only just put the food into her mouth when with a sharp gasp she started forward. Letting her fork fall, unnoticed, to the floor, she reached quickly for her napkin. And then she stopped, staring down hard at her plate.

She saw now what she had not seen before; the entire meal had been carefully sprinkled over with fine, white sand.

A
t a quarter to nine the house was still silent; Jane had yet to awaken and emerge from her room.

For Blanche the night had passed again in frightened and interminable sleeplessness. Again she had sat the night out in her chair, listening to the endless silence, her heart racing for fear of—she didn’t know what. And again she had watched the dawn come obliquely into the room through the window, creeping in past the grillwork with cold, gray stealth. Now, as the day began to ripen, and a band of golden light appeared on the sill, Blanche waited with increased tenseness, praying fervently that Mrs. Stitt would come before Jane was up.

It was just two minutes to nine when she finally heard a sound from downstairs and rolled her chair quickly over to the door. There was a slight scratching sound which, even from so great a distance, Blanche recognized as Mrs. Stitt’s key being fitted into the lock of the back door. After a moment the door opened then closed again. As Mrs. Stitt’s footsteps echoed through the kitchen, Blanche put her hand out to the doorjamb in an effort to keep from calling out.

Again a door opened, this time the one to the downstairs hallway closet, and Blanche could visualize Mrs. Stitt putting away her hat and coat, taking down her cleaning apron, slipping it on, tying it around her waist. Any moment now the woman would be on
her way upstairs. In anticipation, Blanche wheeled her chair back into the room. The footsteps resumed, approached through the lower hallway, crossed the living room and started up the stairs.

Entering the upper hallway, Mrs. Stitt came briskly forward. At the sight of Blanche sitting there in her chair, she stopped in the doorway in an attitude of surprise.

“Edna!” Blanche said.

“You up already?” Mrs. Stitt asked. “With the house so quiet——”

“Come in here,” Blanche said urgently, keeping her voice low. “Come in and close the door.”

Mrs. Stitt started forward and then, catching sight of the unused bed, hesitated and looked back along the hall toward Jane’s room. “She up, too?”

Blanche shook her head. “Edna, listen…”

Mrs. Stitt, continuing to look down the hall, raised her hand in an abrupt gesture of warning. “Well, good morning,” she said flatly. “I thought I heard you stirring around in there.”

Blanche went slack in her chair, weak with disappointment. Now she would have to wait; she would have to endure more of this dreadful anxiety.

As Mrs. Stitt came into the room, Jane, tying the sash around her soiled wrapper, appeared, swollen-eyed, in the doorway behind her. Her slitted gaze went directly to the desk and the covered dinner tray. Without a word, she shuffled into the room, took up the tray and carried it hastily back in the direction of the door.

Mrs. Stitt glanced around at Blanche. “What was it you wanted, Miss Blanche?” she asked.

“Well,” Blanche fumbled, waiting for Jane to leave. “I——”

In the doorway Jane stopped and turned, her gaze narrowed upon Mrs. Stitt. “You better come down and get breakfast,” she said.

Mrs. Stitt’s face took on a faint flush of anger. “Just a minute,” she said. She turned back to Blanche.

“It’s nothing important,” Blanche said resignedly. “You can take care of it when you bring my breakfast up.”

“Okay,” Mrs. Stitt nodded.

Turning to find Jane still there, she crossed swiftly to the door, moved out into the hallway and past Jane, pointedly refusing to relieve her of the tray or even to give any sign that she thought she ought to. Blanche was unable to hold back a sigh of defeat as Jane, casting a last fleeting glance in her direction, followed on down the hall and out of sight.

Fifteen minutes later Blanche received her breakfast, but it was Jane who carried it up the stairs to her and not Mrs. Stitt. As on the previous morning, Jane put the tray down and removed the cover. It contained only the usual breakfast.

Alone, Blanche forced herself to eat. Mrs. Stitt knew now that she wanted to talk to her; certainly she would return upstairs before she left the house. As the hours of the morning slipped past, however, and Mrs. Stitt still did not come, Blanche’s feeling of desperate uncertainty increased. Mrs. Stitt wouldn’t be back until Friday; if she didn’t get to talk to her this morning it would be nearly four days before the chance came again.

Blanche closed her eyes, pressing back tears of fright and frustration. She had to get word out to Dr. Shelby today. She
had
to. She couldn’t stand any more of this. Whether there was any danger in it or not, she couldn’t bear the prospect of another day in this house alone with Jane. She glanced back at the clock on the stand and saw, with quickened alarm, that it was nearly eleven forty-five. Mrs. Stitt would be leaving in just fifteen minutes!

Moving her chair to the doorway, she paused and listened. For a long moment there was nothing and then, faintly, there came a series of small sounds from the direction of the living room. Quietly, she moved her chair into the hallway and then out onto the
gallery. At the bannister, peering down into the living room, she issued a faint sigh of relief.

“Edna!” she whispered. “Edna!”

Mrs. Stitt, dusting the library table directly below, started slightly and then looked up. Stepping back quickly, she glanced off into the lower hallway. What she saw must have reassured her, for when Blanche motioned to her to come upstairs, she nodded and put down her cloth.

Blanche waited for her to catch up with her at the door of her room. “Thank God!” she breathed. “I was so afraid you weren’t going to come upstairs again.…”

“I’ve been trying every way I knew. She’s been just determined to keep me from it.”

“Where is she now?”

“In the kitchen, I guess—or maybe out on the porch.”

As they entered the room, Blanche nodded back the way they had come. “Close the door,” she said urgently, “close it.…” Mrs. Stitt nodded with a look of sharp concern. Her hand had only just touched the edge of the door when, with startling shrillness, the phone suddenly rang out in the hall. They exchanged quick glances. Mrs. Stitt moved hastily back into the hall.

“No!” Blanche cried. “No, don’t bother with it!”

“But she’ll know I’m up here for sure…” Mrs. Stitt snatched up the receiver before it could ring again. “Hello?” she enquired.

“Edna!” Blanche wailed. “Please! You’ve
got
to listen to me. I’ve got to get word to Dr. Shelby!” She stopped in desperation and then, despite the fact that Mrs. Stitt was speaking—was saying things—into the phone, went on. “Edna, you were right about Jane. These last two days—she has kept me absolutely helpless here in this house. I’ve been a prisoner here in this room, with the…”

“Yes, Mr. Cooper,” Mrs. Stitt was saying rapidly into the phone. “Yes, that’s all right—perfectly all right. Yes, I’m certain. Good-bye—yes—good-bye.” Hanging up, she turned and came back
quickly into the room. “Now, tell me,” she said anxiously, “I couldn’t listen to him and hear you, too.…”

“Mrs. Stitt!”

They turned in quick unison toward the door as Jane’s footsteps clattered with angry rapidity up the stairs and into the hallway. In the next instant she was there in the doorway, panting, her gaze snapping from Blanche to Mrs. Stitt.

“Who were you talking to on the phone?”

Mrs. Stitt folded her hand upon her nonexistent stomach in a stiff gesture of exasperation. “Mr. Cooper from down at the store,” she said shortly. “They’re out of your brand of canned vegetables for tomorrow’s deliveries, and he wanted to know if they could bring another kind. I said it was okay.”

Jane accepted this explanation with a look of narrow suspicion. There was a moment’s silence. “I thought you were going to just do the work downstairs today,” she said finally. Her gaze moved to Blanche, then quickly away again.

“I—I just thought I’d have a look around up here before I leave,” Mrs. Stitt said with muted fury. “That’s all.”

“It’s all right, Jane…” Blanche offered weakly.

Unheeding, Jane looked over at the clock, then back at Mrs. Stitt. “It’s three minutes past your time,” she said flatly. “You’d better go if you’re not going to be late at the next place.”

Mrs. Stitt cast her a deliberately measuring glance and then nodded. “I’m going now,” she said. She looked back at Blanche worriedly, made a slight shrugging motion. “I’ll do your room first thing next time, Miss Blanche.” After another moment of hesitation, she wheeled about and stalked out of the room.

Blanche felt a quick tightening about the heart as, for the first time in days, Jane brought her gaze directly down to hers and held it there. In the depths of Jane’s glittering eyes, more frightening by far than any dead bird on a platter or meal dashed over with sand, was naked, staring hatred. Distantly, like hollow echoes
from another, saner world, Mrs. Stitt’s footsteps sounded in rapid indignation through the lower hallway to the closet and then, after a brief interval, through the kitchen and out the back door.

“Please,” Blanche said, her voice thin with strain, “Jane…” She had to know what was in Jane’s mind, why she was doing these horrible things to her. Now that she had lost her chance with Mrs. Stitt, she couldn’t endure not knowing any longer. “Just tell me——” And then, seeing the blank denial forming in Jane’s eyes, she stopped.

It was always that way with Jane, always had been. Confronted with her own mischief she simply, flatly denied it. She denied it in the face of all logic and proof.
Dead bird?… Sand?… I don’t know what you’re even talking about. You must be crazy.
It was no use, no use at all; Blanche could hear Jane’s answers already.

She shook her head in a gesture of defeat, and Jane, her mouth twisting with an expression of scorn, turned on her heel and left. Blanche sat looking after her, frightenedly aware of the thunderous pounding of her own heart.

One o’clock came, and Jane did not bring Blanche her lunch. Not that it mattered, certainly, not that Blanche was concerned about food in her present mood of sick despondency. Later, when she heard Jane starting up the stairs, she turned away and closed her eyes, pretending to be asleep.

Jane passed the open doorway without hesitation and continued down the hall to her own room. Blanche opened her eyes and sat up. Sounds of activity came from Jane’s room, muted sounds, hurried and purposeful. They continued for some minutes and then the door opened and Jane came out into the hall again.

Jane passed the doorway rapidly without glancing into the room, and Blanche saw, with astonishment, that she had dressed to go out. Over her dress she wore a coat and on her head was her red velvet beret with the preposterous rhinestone clip. Blanche turned, listening carefully, incredulously, to Jane’s progress down the stairs and through the house to the back door.

A moment later there was the distant tap of heels on the concrete walk leading through the back yard and out the gate to the garage. Blanche moved her chair quickly to the window, where the sound carried better from the direction of the garage. After a moment there was the slam of the car door and shortly after that, the roar of the motor.

Blanche couldn’t believe it; there had to be some trick in it. That was it, of course, this was another of Jane’s horrible jokes.… But then there was the sound of the car backing out of the garage, swinging around and heading off down the hill.

The silence, this time, seemed to come into the house as a prolonged sigh of relief. Blanche gripped the arms of her chair with tense alertness. She had to act at once; whatever Jane’s intention, there was an opportunity in this moment that she must seize before it was lost. Boosting herself up in her chair toward the window, she peered hopefully down into the garden below. Mrs. Bates was not there. And probably wouldn’t be for at least another hour or two.

Turning from the window, she wheeled herself rapidly out into the hallway across to the phone. She did not doubt for a moment that Jane had remembered to take it off the hook again downstairs, but she had to be certain.

She put the phone down and turned away, feeling, anew, a sudden rush of panic. No wonder Jane had been willing to go off and leave her alone. She was helpless—completely and utterly helpless—cut off from everything and everyone outside this house. The chill hand of hysteria brushed over her heart making it contract suddenly. She couldn’t stand any more of this; she simply couldn’t! Whatever the risk, she had to get out of here! She had to save herself!

Reaching out tensely, she turned her chair and propelled it, not back toward the bedroom but out into the gallery. The paintings on the walls of the gallery—the trite, undistinguished still lifes, the Spanish dancer in the firelight—gleamed dully, then faded
away behind her as she crossed to the head of the stairs, and braking her chair to a stop, sat looking down.

The stairs seemed to stretch down and down endlessly, and she shook her head, as if in denial of the insane impulse that had brought her here. But she did not let herself move away.

Through the years she had often managed to get down the stairs. Not, of course, without Jane’s help. But that didn’t mean it was impossible for her to do it by herself, if she had to. She had developed amazing strength in her hands and arms from both the constant manipulation of her chair and from using the lifting bar over her bed. She looked around at the newel post at the top of the stairs; if she took a good firm hold with both hands and braced herself with her right leg… Again her head moved in an involuntary gesture of denial. It
was
impossible; she could never do it without falling. Feeling suddenly quite dizzy, she gripped the arms of her chair and closed her eyes.

The ridiculous song, sung in Jane’s piping little girl’s voice, echoed back to her from two mornings before. Behind her closed lids time seemed to spin backward, and there rose a hazy vision of a group of laughing people.

They were gathered around a piano, and at the center was a drunken, cavorting figure, holding her skirts up with delicately arched hands, singing, dancing…