“I’ve lost a little weight, I guess,” Julie said.
“Sit down,” said Helen. “Let me get you a beer or a Coke or something.”
“Thanks, but we didn’t plan to stay very long.” Julie made no move to take a seat. “We just thought we’d stop by to see what you’d heard about Barry. We didn’t know you’d have company.”
“Oh, don’t worry about me,” Elsa said. “I was just getting ready to leave anyway.” She spread her legs apart, shifted her weight forward, and got heavily to her feet. “I came by for the same reason. When I read that article in the morning paper, I couldn’t believe it. I said to Mom, ‘That’s Barry Cox who got shot! That’s Helen’s boyfriend!’ I said, ‘I’d better stop over after work and see how Helen’s taking it.’ I thought she’d be a wreck.”
“I was one last night,” Helen said, “when Collie drove me down to the hospital.”
“Collie?” Elsa’s sharp little eyes brightened with interest. “Who’s that?”
“A nice guy who lives down the hall. He heard the report on TV and knew how I’d take it, so he came down to the studio to get me. The Coxes were there at the hospital, and Barry was in surgery, and they didn’t know if he was going to live or not. It was awful. But today things are better.”
“I called the hospital this morning,” Ray said. “They wouldn’t tell me much, but they did say he was out of recovery.”
“I called too, and then again this afternoon.”
“I’m surprised that you’re not down there with him now,” Elsa commented. “After all, to hear you talk, you’re practically engaged to the guy.”
“Barry needs his rest. I’ll be going down to see him later.” There was a note of strain in Helen’s voice. “Thanks for coming by, Elsa. It was nice of you.”
“Well, of course I came! My sister’s boyfriend, shot in the stomach! It’s like something out of a movie. You think of things like this happening in New York City and Chicago and places like that, not in peaceful towns with normal people.” Reluctantly, Elsa began to move in the direction of the door.
Helen stepped ahead of her to open it.
“Oh, by the way,” Elsa paused again, “Mom says to ask you if you want to come home for a couple of days. You know, move back into the old homestead where she can feed you and give you hot tea and stuff. She’s afraid you won’t eat over here by yourself.”
“No. Tell her thank you, but I’m doing fine.” Helen held the door open wider. “Goodbye. Give my love to the rest of the family, and thanks again for coming over.”
“That’s okay. Like I said, it’s just terrible. Mom will be calling you tonight, I guess, since you don’t want to come home. She’s worried about how you’re taking this. Goodbye, Julie, you take care of yourself. It’s nice to have met you, Ray.”
The words kept coming as Elsa moved through the door and out onto the terraced hallway and only ended when Helen pushed the door closed behind her and leaned against it with an expression of exaggerated exhaustion.
“Thank god!” she said with a sigh of relief. “I was never so glad to see anybody in my life as I was when you two walked in. I was afraid I’d be stuck with her here all night.”
“She sure doesn’t bear much resemblance to you,” Ray commented. “Are you sure you’re really from the same family?”
“Too sure. Why do you think I was in such a hurry to move into my own place? It wasn’t to get away from my parents. I grew up sharing a room with Elsa.” Helen left the door and came back into the living room to collapse onto the sofa that her sister had just vacated. “She was waiting here for me when I came back from the studio, and she’s been here ever since, going over and over every grim detail and asking the most awful questions. I actually think she’s enjoying the situation. She’s never liked Barry anyway, and now she gets to brag toeverybody in the store where she works that her almost-brother-in-law was shot down in cold blood.”
“Are you really going down to the hospital tonight?” Ray asked her. “Are they allowing visitors?”
“Only family, and I don’t qualify. At least, I didn’t when I asked about it this morning.” Helen made a gesture of frustration. “I just told that to Elsa to get her off my back. I ought to be able to see him.”
“You certainly should,” agreed Julie. “Can’t the Coxes take you in with them when they go?”
“Are you kidding?” Helen said ruefully. “That’s the last way I’ll ever get in. You can’t believe the things Mrs. Cox said to me last night while Barry was in surgery. She practically ordered me out of the waiting room. She even accused me of making the phone call that brought him out onto the athletic field.”
“Then you didn’t make it?” Ray asked her. “When the paper said that he got a call from somebody—”
“I know. I read that too. But it wasn’t me.”
“Then I guess you don’t know any more than we do,” Ray said. “We were hoping you could clear up a lot of things for us.”
“I can’t. The only thing—” Her voice fell off.
“What?”
“Well, there’s that magazine picture that was on my door and the note that somebody sent Julie.”
“And the clipping that was sent to me,” said Ray.
“A clipping?” Helen’s eyes widened.
“The newspaper account of the accident. I got it in the mail on Saturday. Somebody went to all the trouble of cutting it out and saving it and sending it to me.”
“And you think there’s a connection between that and what happened to Barry?” Helen asked him. “Oh, there couldn’t be! I don’t want to believe that.”
“Neither does Julie,” said Ray. “She’s doing everything she can to convince herself that there isn’t.”
“No,” Julie said in a low voice. “No, I’m finally convinced, now that we know it wasn’t Helen who made that call. Somebody had to have made it. But I don’t believe it was one of the Greggs.”
“Then who was it?” Ray demanded. “Can you come up with somebody else?”
“Not right off, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t somebody who hated Barry for some other reason entirely.”
“That’s impossible,” Helen said. “Nobody could hate Barry.”
“How do you know?” Julie asked her.
“I know Barry better than anybody. After all, I’ve been going out with him for two full years. He doesn’t have an enemy in the world.”
Julie opened her mouth as though to respond to the statement, thought better of it, and closed it again. She turned to Ray.
“What do you think we ought to do?”
“I vote we go to the police,” Ray said, “and tell them the whole story. It’s what we should have done in the beginning.”
“The police!” Helen exclaimed. “We can’t do that, and you know it. We made a pact.”
“Well, we can dissolve the pact,” Ray said, “if the three of us agree to.”
“I won’t agree,” Helen said. “Not ever. I think it’s a shitty thing for you to suggest. Just because Barry’s flat on his back in the hospital where he can’t stand up for himself, you want to throw him to the wolves.”
“That’s not it at all!” Ray was beginning to get angry. “When we made the pact we never guessed that anything like this was going to happen. If the person who shot Barry did it for revenge, why should he stop with shooting one of the four of us? Next time it will be you or Julie or me.”
“And if Barry wasn’t shot for that reason, if it was just a crazy accident because some college freak was high and walking around waving a pistol, then you’d be reporting him for nothing. Barry would get out of the hospital and find himself facing a prison sentence. Hasn’t he suffered enough without that?”
“Couldn’t we talk to him?” Julie said. “He’s bound to know what happened.”
“How do you propose to get into the hospital to do that?” Helen asked bitterly. “If I can’t see him, how can you?”
“Could we talk to him by pho
ne?” Ray suggested.
“There’s no phone in his room. I already asked.”
“What about his parents?” asked Julie. “They get in to see him. Surely he must have told them who it was who called him right before he went out.”
“They think it was me,” Helen said.
“They may have thought that last night, but at that time they hadn’t had a chance to talk with Barry. By now they may have learned the truth.”
“I’ll call and ask them,” Ray volunteered.
“You?”
“Why not me? Barry and I have been friends for a long time. I tried to call his folks last night when I first heard about what happened, but they weren’t there.”
“Go ahead and try,” Helen said. “There’s nothing to lose. At least you may be able to find out more details about how heis.”
“Fair enough.” Ray got up and went over to the telephone. “Do you know the number?”
“It’s on the front cover of the phone directory, written in red. The other number, the blue one, is the frat house.”
Ray took the receiver off the hook and dialed. The phone was answered immediately by a low, male voice.
“Hello, Mr. Cox?” Ray said. “This is Raymond Bronson.”
“Ray?” The man’s voice sounded older than he remembered it. “Oh, yes, of course, Barry’s friend. I didn’t know you were still in town.”
“I haven’t been,” Ray said. “I just got back from California a few days ago. I hadn’t even had a chance to see Barry to say hi before I heard about the shooting. A bunch of his friends are real shaken up about it. I said I’d be the one to call you and see how things are going.”
“He’s going to pull through,” Mr. Cox said. “There doesn’t seem to be any doubt about that now. His mother and I were at the hospital this afternoon, and he seemed to have a good deal more strength than he had this morning.”
“That’s great,” Ray said sincerely. “Do they think he’ll be playing ball again next fall?”
“Well, that’s something else again,” Mr. Cox said slowly. “There’s some question. You know the bullet lodged in his spine? Well, that’s a tricky area. An injury there can cause paralysis.”
“You mean, Barry might be paralyzed?!” Ray could not keep the horror from his voice.
“Not necessarily. We’ll certainly pray not. At the moment that condition does seem to exist below the waist, but that could be only temporary. Of course, he hasn’t been told anything about it. There’s no sense in worrying him until he gets stronger, and by then there may be no need. He may be fine.”
“I sure hope so,” Ray said.
“We all do. You were kind to call, Ray. I’ll tell Barry you’re wishing him well.”
“Please, do that. And, sir, I was wondering—do you suppose I might be able to see him?” In the light of what he had just been told, Ray asked it hesitantly. “It’s been months since I saw him last, and I’d really like to talk with him.”
“I’m afraid that’s out of the question,” Mr. Cox said firmly. “Barry’s mother and I are the only visitors he’s allowed to have. He’s not up to socializing, as I’m sure you can understand. I’ll pass along your good wishes.”
“Mr. Cox?” Ray brought out the question quickly. “Have you had a chance, from anything he’s said, to find out what actually happened? The phone call that the newspapers made such a big thing of, has he said who made that call to him? Is there any connection between that call and what happened after?”
“It seems very doubtful,” Barry’s father said. “According to Barry, that call was from Helen Rivers.”
CHAPTER 12
“But Helen says it wasn’t, and she should know if anybody does.” Julie leaned her head against the back of the car seat with a sigh of such weariness that Ray turned to glance at her worriedly.
“You holding up okay there?”
“Oh, sure. I’m just fine. Just having a blast.” She was frightened by the note of hysteria in her own voice. “Somebody’s lying—Helen or Barry or Mr. Cox. Who is it, Ray? And why?”
They were driving back slowly through the gathering twilight. The mountains in the east were touched with pink from the last rays of the setting sun.
Somewhere up there, Julie thought, is the Gregg’s house, and Megan’s there now, standing in the yellow kitchen, deciding whether it’s worth it or not to fix a hot dinner for just one person. And a couple of miles north of that, the Silver Springs picnic area is growing cool and shadowy. Maybe later tonight there’ll be a moon caught in that pine tree.
“It’s like a merry-go-round,” she said wearily, “with everything going in circles and no answer to anything. Why would any one of the three of them lie?”
“Maybe they’re all telling the truth.”
“But how can they be, when the stories are different?”
“I don’t mean telling the real truth,” Ray said, “I mean the truth as they see it. Mr. Cox could be repeating exactly what Barry told him. Barry could have believed the person on the phone was Helen, even if it wasn’t.”
“You mean, somebody imitating Helen’s voice?” Julie thought about that for a moment. “I suppose it’s possible, though, he knows her so well….”
“He was expecting her to call him. She’d called earlier that day and left word for him to phone her and he hadn’t. If the person on the phone was a girl or woman, somebody who knew Helen well and was able to copy her voice, and if Barry was expecting it to be Helen, he could have been fooled.”
“But who would do such a thing?” Julie asked, and then suddenly a thought occurred to her. “Elsa!”
“Helen’s sister?”
“Why not? She’s a horrid person and obviously as jealous of Helen as she can possibly be. I remember the first day I met her—”
Her voice trailed off as her mind flew back to that bright spring day just over a year ago, when she had walked home from school with Helen to see her prom dress.
It had seemed strange at the time to be going over to Helen’s. Despite the fact that they dated boys who went around together, the girls themselves had little in common. Helen was not a girl for confidences and easy friendships and she took little interest in school activities. Julie, on the other hand, was almost too involved with clubs and committees and cheerleading practices to have time for a close, consuming relationship with any one particular person.
On this day, however, Helen had stopped her in the hall.
“I’ve got a dress for the prom,” she had said excitedly. “Do you want to come over and see it?”
Her eyes had been shining, and her face had held the delighted look of a child who wants to share a marvelous treasure.
It had been impossible not to smile back at her.
“Sure,” Julie had said, making a quick decision to skip the dance committee meeting, which was scheduled for after school. “I’d love to see it.”
So they had met at the south door and had walked together through the soft, blue afternoon—an afternoon, Julie remembered now with a twinge of pain, so much like this one, except that there had been nothing to mar it. It had been a day filled with sunshine and plans for the coming dance and the wonder of being young and pretty and in love.
Helen’s house had been small and shabby and overrun with children. Two little boys had been fighting in the front yard, and a blaring TV set had dominated the living room where a solemn-faced girl of about twelve and a toddler in a wet diaper had sat mesmerized.
Helen’s mother had been in her bedroom.
“She’s not feeling too good,” Helen had remarked matter-of-factly. “The noise and the yelling and everything gets to her when she’s pregnant. Come on, my room’s at the back of the house.”
That was where she had met Elsa. A heavily built girl, apparently a couple of years older than Helen, she had been sprawled upon one of the twin beds, leafing through a magazine. She had glanced up at them as Julie and Helen had come in, and her eyes had narrowed a little beh
ind her glasses.
“Don’t tell me,” she had said, “the Princess is actually bringing home a girlfriend!”
“This is my sister, Elsa,” Helen had said. “This is Julie James.”
“The cheerleader.” Elsa’s voice had been flat. “We hear about Julie James all the time around here, her and Barry Cox and the other high-class people Helen runs around with.”
“Hello, Elsa,” Julie had said as pleasantly as she could. Her eyes rested on the dress that was spread out across Helen’s neatly made bed. “Oh, isn’t it beautiful!”
It was, too. Simple and white with flowing Grecian lines and a thin gold thread running along the edge. As Helen had lifted the dress and held it up in front of her, Julie had caught her breath at the effect.
“It’s gorgeous!” she had exclaimed. “Just elegant! Where in the world did you find it?”
There was a moment’s silence, and then Elsa said, “Well, speak up, Helen. Aren’t you going to tell her?” She turned to Julie. “She got it at the thrift shop. That’s where she gets all her ‘elegant’ clothes. They’re things other people don’t want. That dress probably belonged to some society lady who got too fat to wear it.”
“You didn’t have to say that, Elsa.” Helen’s face turned bright red and she lowered the dress, holding it defensively in front of her as though to shield herself from the words. “It doesn’t look like it’s from a thrift shop.”
“I think it’s wonderful that you found it,” Julie said quickly. “It doesn’t matter where it came from. I’m sure it looks better on you than it ever could have looked on anybody else. If that’s the sort of thing you can find at the thrift store, I’m going to start shopping there too.”
“I don’t always,” Helen said. “Most of the time I go to regular stores. It’s just that formals are so expensive.”
“And our lovely Helen can’t look like everybody else—she’s got to be a princess.” Elsa sat up on the bed. She spoke quietly, but there was a bitterness in her voice that made Julie wince.
“This is my day off, Monday. A great time for a day off, isn’t it? What can you do on a Monday? The rest of the week I’m standing on my feet all day behind the lingerie counter at Wards. For what? To bring home enough money so that Mom can turn right around and hand Helen enough to buy a prom dress that she’ll wear one time and stick in the back of the closet.”