But what did she really know if she was able to lift her boyfriend’s body from the trunk of her car, carry it over to the rim of a stone well, and push it over the edge? True, she stopped Hannah before they committed the final atrocity. Yet the gesture lacked resolve. She reached down to tear the plastic off the top of his head. It was Hannah’s turn to stop her.
“We can't spill any blood here,” Hannah said.
“You said no one ever came here.”
“It doesn’t matter. We can leave no visible evidence.”
Mary was choking. “But in time—the smell.”
“No. We’re standing above an underwater stream. It is another reason I chose this place. Charlie will be swept away. I promise you that he’ll never be found.”
“That makes me feel so much better.” Mary tried to touch his head through the plastic. “I want to say goodbye to him.”
“Say goodbye then.”
Mary cracked then and had to turn away. “No,” she moaned.
Behind her she heard a shove, a distant splash.
It was as if her heart drowned with that last sound. She felt the cold that engulfed Charlie. She saw the darkness where he drifted. And she felt that she should be floating with him, away to a world where there were no guns and no blood. Where there was only their love, worth more than any college degree, any amount of penance for sins wrongly or accidentally committed. Yet even in her despair she knew she was too weak to tell the truth, or too strong not to lie. Still, it was true, Charlie was dead and she was slowly dying.
She knew she would miss him for a long time.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Other acts and facts remained to be performed and told but they were mere details. They moved Charlie's truck, parking it way out of town behind a bunch of trees, on a dirt road that supposedly the loggers didn't even know existed. They soaked their hands in Lysol, drove around, and argued over their story. Then they ran into Deputy Howard, who broke the terrible news. That was how the girls met Sharp and Riles. And when the cops let them go, they escaped from the clutches of Father Spelling and his lawyer and made their way to Harvey's. There they ordered cups of black coffee and sat in a booth by the window. Ten o’clock and the place was still deserted. Maple woke up slowly Saturday mornings. Plus Harvey's was not exactly a favorite breakfast stop, more a lunch hangout.
They sat lost in their own thoughts.
Hannah smoked and Mary felt horrible.
“Well,” Hannah said finally. “That wasn't so bad.”
Mary snorted softly. “I can't imagine that it could have been worse.”
“Not at all. They have nothing on us.”
“Except they think we killed Dick and Charlie. Except for that small detail, we got off scot free.”
“You’re exaggerating. They were just being stupid cops. They were bluffing.”
Mary counted on her fingers. “They already know Dick was killed on the road to Whistler and not at the Crossroads. That Charlie bled a huge amount in the same spot and that he is probably dead. That Charlie and Dick didn't like each other, and that you didn't like Dick, and that I was mad at both Dick and Charlie. That we were at very incriminating locations with our walking and running shoes on. I mean, in a few hours they learned all that. If they're just stupid cops then I’d hate to see the real thing. What will they know in a week? Where you bought the Lysol?”
Hannah frowned. “I should have got rid of that.”
“Why didn't you?”
Hannah picked up a tiny plastic packet of catsup from a table container. She squeezed it, slowly making it burst in her left hand. The red juice, as it squished onto the Formica tabletop, looked nauseating. Mary wished she'd play with the sugar instead.
“There wasn’t time,” Hannah said. “We ran into Deputy Howard right after drenching our hands, remember?”
“You screwed up.”
“I screwed up? What about you, Miss Guilty Looking? Every time they pressed you to spill your guts, you cringed. I told you just to act cool.”
“How could I act cool? Your brother is dead and my boyfriend is missing. If I'd acted cool I would have come off sounding like you.”
“What is that supposed to mean?” Hannah asked.
“Dick is dead. You should have broken down in front of them and wept.”
“I broke down and wept when they had me alone.”
“Yeah, you shed a few tears and then conveniently put them away. That made you seem even more guilty.”
“I did a hell of a lot better than you. Your answer for everything was, ‘I can't remember, officers.’ Christ, it was as if you were suddenly suffering from amnesia.”
“I didn't want to complicate our lies,” Mary said.
“You just made them sound like lies.”
“They grilled me far more than you. I held up pretty well, I thought. I never deviated from the basic story. Which is another thing that I think was a big mistake. Why did we have to say we saw Charlie at all? A dozen witnesses will confirm that he was never at the Pizza Palace.”
“That's bullshit. The waiters at that joint can't count, never mind remember who they served. We had to establish that we'd seen Charlie, that everything was cool, and that was all you knew.”
Mary lowered her voice. “What if they find his body?”
“Impossible. We’ve been over this. It has washed under the earth.”
Mary grimaced. “I can't believe we dumped him like that.”
Hannah put out her cigarette and wiped the catsup off her hand with a napkin. She reached out and took Mary's hand. “You can grieve, Mary. That's natural. But you must be strong. You can't let yourself suffer pangs of guilt in public. People will read into them. You know we planned none of this, not really. It happened because Dick had to go and get loaded and lose his mind.”
Mary stared at Hannah's hand, how she held her fingers with hers.
With affection. Almost as if they were lovers.
“You said he was fine,” Mary muttered. “When and where did he get the drugs?”
Hannah sighed. “I don't know. One thing for sure, I don’t think he went to the movies after he said goodbye to us at the Pizza Palace.”
“When and where did you see him last?”
Hannah shrugged. “Just off the town square, not long before I saw you again. Why?”
“Because his state of mind changed radically in the time he was out of our sight.”
“You're telling me. But it must be what the cops said. He took some PCP.”
“Dick was never a hard drug user,” Mary said.
Hannah took her hand back and studied her friend. “What are you getting at?”
“That there are some huge unanswered questions here.”
“Yeah. But why are you asking me?”
Mary was annoyed. “My boyfriend died last night, I need to ask you these questions. I deserve answers. Who else am I going to ask?”
“Lower your voice.”
Mary snapped. “No one is listening.”
“You don't know that.” Hannah glanced at the counter, at a pimply kid munching on a jelly doughnut. “For the next few months, the walls have ears.”
Mary spoke quietly. “You're not answering my questions.”
“I told you, I didn't know anything about Dick’s drug habits. There was a lot he kept private.”
“How come you didn't check to make sure he was carrying blanks?”
“That was stupid, I should have. But in a way it doesn't matter. If he intended to kill Charlie, it would have only taken him a moment to switch to live rounds.”
“But why would he want to kill Charlie?” Mary asked.
“Because of you.”
“That's bullshit. Dick wanted to screw me, he didn't want to marry me. He wouldn't have thrown his whole life away over inconsequential Mary Dammon.”
“Dick was stoned last night. He needed no more motivation than that.”
“Where were you before you ran into the clearing
and started shouting at Charlie and me?”
“You know, where you dropped me off.”
“That’s impossible. You knew what Dick was up to, even when his car was still up the road from us. You had to have seen him before he reached the Crossroads to know his state of mind.”
Hannah paused. “I did see him. I saw that he was stoned.”
Mary sat back. “So he stopped before he reached the Crossroads and spoke to you?”
Hannah paused. “Yeah.”
“What did you talk about?”
“Nothing. He was too loaded, too fired up to get Charlie.”
“But he had a car, you didn't. How did you outrun him to the Crossroads?”
“I ran as fast as I could when I saw what he was up to. I even tried to take his gun from him.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. I don't understand you. You were there, you saw what happened. This was all a screw-up. I didn’t have anything to do with who got shot.”
Mary considered. “It was dark when they got shot. Very dark as you’ll recall. I didn't see anything.”
Hannah fished for her pack of cigarettes in her pants. “You sound like you don't believe me.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You implied it, and that's a big mistake with me.”
“Really?” Mary paused, thinking. “How many times did Dick...” She stopped herself, something stopped her. Hannah came alive.
“How many times did Dick what?”
“Nothing.”
“What were you going to ask?” Hannah persisted.
“Nothing. What were you saying?”
“You know. Right now, in the whole world, I am the only real friend you have.”
Mary was miserably amused. “Because we're partners in crime?”
Hannah flicked her lighter. “In a sense. I keep telling you that we have to depend on each other now. If one cracks, we both go down.” Hannah blew smoke and reached for Mary's hand again. She tried to catch Mary's eye. Her nails brushed Mary’s skin as she added, “I need you, Mary. You need me.”
Mary held her eye. “You like that, don't you? This dependency?”
Hannah stiffened. “I have never made a pass at you.”
“I think you're making one now.”
Various emotions played across Hannah’s face. But they were too jumbled to decipher easily. Hannah leaned closer, till her face was only inches away. Smoke swam between them and irritated Mary’s eyes. Hannah's pretty hazel eyes seemed to grow moist as well. Certainly, she spoke in a gentler tone than Mary had ever heard her use before.
“Would that be so bad?” she asked.
Mary was not given a chance to reply.
It was right then that she saw Charlie.
He was staggering down the center of the street, coming from the direction of Whistler. He looked like a shivering drunk who had spent the night in the woods. His clothes were obviously wet, covered with mud instead of blood. He still had on the sweater Mary had made him for Christmas, even though it was now torn in six places. But from the expression on his face, even at a distance of two hundred yards, he looked like he might not recognize Mary. Literally, he was moving like a zombie, somebody freshly returned from the dead. Seeing him Mary didn’t immediately feel the wave of relief she should have. He looked so weird that she thought the horror of the last twelve hours had just taken a supernatural twist. He was so white that she could feel her own blood draining from her face as she stared at him.
Hannah turned to see what Mary was gaping at and almost inhaled her cigarette.
“Oh no,” she moaned.
“It can’t be,” Mary whispered.
“He’s alive,” Hannah gasped.
Mary wept. “Are we sure it's Charlie?”
“Of course it is,” Hannah said.
Mary panted. “But he was dead. You said he was dead.”
“I thought he was dead.” Hannah got up.
“Come on, we'd better get to him before the rest of the town does.”
They hurried out of Harvey's, leaving their coffee half finished. They caught up to him as he staggered into a telephone pole with his face and then plopped down on the sidewalk on his ass. He had been leaning toward the side of the road since they spotted him. His eyes were open but he wasn’t seeing anything. Mary knelt by his side while Hannah remained standing.
“Charlie!” Mary cried. “Are you OK?”
He stared at her strangely. “Mary,” he mumbled.
Then he collapsed unconscious in her arms.
Mary hugged him tightly. She must have been crying, there were slippery wet spots on her face. “Oh, Charlie, what have we done to you?” she whispered as she ran her hand through his hair. He was soaked, and cold as ice. There was some blood on his clothes, but it looked as if the sweater had been put through a washing machine before the blood had a chance to dry. She thought of the underwater stream Hannah had mentioned. Unknown to Hannah, it must have come out somewhere on the surface of the earth. Of course there was the question of the bullet Charlie took. He didn't seem to have any holes in him but she’d need to examine him more closely. Hannah spoke behind her. She didn't sound happy.
Mary’s own happiness was an emotion she had yet to allow. But it was coming, she could feel it coming. A wave of clear joy, strong enough to wash away all the trash that had gone down.
“Give me your keys, I’ll get your car,” Hannah said. “We have to get him out of sight.”
Mary handed over her keys.
She stared at Hannah as her friend went for the car.
Somehow Mary knew what was coming next.
Hannah returned shortly and they loaded Charlie into the backseat. He was snoring loudly and breathing easily, although still shivering. Mary climbed in beside him and felt his chest in the area where he had supposedly bled to death. Up front Hannah steered the car out of town.
“Turn the heat on full blast,” Mary said as she pulled off her jacket. “I think he's suffering from hypothermia.”
“He should be suffering from more than that,” Hannah muttered.
Mary understood. Yet, the more she examined him, the more confused she was. Finally she raised his sweater and shirt, past his nipples. Then she almost burst out laughing.
She hadn’t known Charlie was Catholic.
He had on a Saint Christopher's medal. A badly mangled one.
It looked like it had taken a .38 slug.
The skin had burst beneath the medal. Charlie would need stitches, and he had obviously bled a great deal from the chest wound. Yet the medal had absorbed the brunt of the impact of the bullet and saved his life. Mary did laugh a little as she pulled his shirt back down.
“He's going to be OK,” Mary said. “But we've got to get him to a hospital.”
“We're not going to the hospital,” Hannah said flatly. “Climb over the seat, get up here. We have to talk.”
Mary did as she was told. The heat was flooding the car and she knew it would not be long before Charlie stopped shivering. He might even wake up soon, and start talking. Mary knew Hannah was terrified of what he might say.
“Where are we going?” Mary asked.
“Out of town.”
Mary took a deep breath of the warm air. “I see.”
Hannah whirled. “Do you see, Mary? The whole picture?”
Mary stared straight ahead. “Yes.”
“Do you want to talk about it?”
Mary shrugged. “What's there to talk about?”
“We have no choice.”
“Your favorite line.”
Hannah pounded the steering wheel. “What do you want to do? Go back to the police and tell them everything we said was a lie? We do that and we go to jail for a long time. Because after so many lies, they'll never believe that we didn't purposely kill my brother.”
“I hear you.”
“Then why don't you say something!”
Mary spoke bitterly. “What do you want me to say? That
Charlie has to die? You want the words to come out of my mouth? So that later you can say it was my idea?”
Hannah reached over and touched her shoulder. Her next question caught Mary by surprise. Yet it shouldn’t have—it was the question of the hour really, the one upon which everything that had previously happened turned. It was the seed of the night's insanity, Mary realized, and the fun that was still to come.
“Do you know how I feel about you?” Hannah asked.
Mary sighed. “Yeah, I know.”
Hannah sounded scared, finally. So exposed.
“How do you feel about me?” she asked.
Mary spoke carefully. “You’re my friend.”
“Your good friend?”
“Yeah. My good friend.”
Hannah took that in, it seemed she did.
“I don't want to do this. I really don’t.”
“I know,” Mary said quietly.
Hannah hesitated. “Are you with me?”
Mary thought of first grade. Learning to count.
From day one, she knew how to count all the way to ten.
“Yes,” Mary said.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“It can be like it was. No one saw him.”
“I know,” Mary said.
“It can be painless. He doesn't have to suffer.”
Mary closed her eyes. Behind her Charlie probably dreamed.
“That’s all that matters,” she whispered. Hannah squeezed her shoulder. “You won't regret it.”
They returned to the deserted farm. Mary was surprised, the place hadn't worked the first time around. Hannah explained that they could still use it as a temporary holding place. Sort of like a temporary grave, Mary thought.
Yet before they drove to the farm, they stopped at Charlie’s truck, stashed deep in the woods. Hannah said she wanted to check it out, make sure it hadn’t been found. She explained that they would move it later as well, when things cooled-off. As if the minds of the detectives would change with the weather. While Mary waited in her car with sleeping Charlie, Hannah went inside Charlie’s truck.