“Are you hurt? Are you ill?”
“I don’t know.”
“What do you know?”
“I know I love you as much as ever, but something is wrong with me and I don’t know what.”
His voice was so weighted with sadness, it made her want to cry, but surprisingly she felt relief, a weight fallen away, some heavy load of apprehension dropping to leave a less horrible mystery in its place.
“Oh, shit, Simon, so that’s it. But it’s not just you. You’re not alone! It’s an epidemic!”
He sat up, regarding her beneath glowering brows, slightly angry, this dramatic scene, so well set, so long rehearsed, slipped suddenly into the banal. “What are you talking about?”
“You’re depressed, right? You think you should be full of joie de vivre and the Old Nick, but you’re not. Maybe you’ve even considered suicide. I said it’s going around. Lots of people have it. Men. Women. We had a meeting about it. Oh”—she clapped hand over mouth—“I keep slipping! I’m not supposed to talk about it!”
“A secret epidemic?” His brows went up, a tilted glance under a forelock of curly hair. “Come on, Ophy.…”
“It is! The medical establishment is afraid there’ll be panic. Besides, we don’t know what it is. A bug. A virus. An allergy.” She laughed. “Just this afternoon I slipped and told someone. I told her it was an allergy.”
“What am I allergic to?” he demanded. “Life? Women? Or you in particular?”
She shook her head, moved to hold him, was pushed gently away. “Simon, I love you. Damn, don’t let this—don’t let this get in the way of our loving each other, understanding each other. I just said it was an allergy, making it up; I don’t know what it really is. Nobody does.”
“Who did you meet with?” Now he was the journalist, getting the story.
“You can’t write about this, Simon. You mustn’t.”
“Why not? I’ve been in the dumps for months. Think of all the poor bastards out there who’re going crazy. Isn’t it better if they know?”
“Know what! We don’t know anything, except that it’s happening. The suicide rate’s up. Cult-related deaths are up. Rapes are down, but assaults on women are up, or were a few months ago. Probably still are with these guys marching around.…” She described her encounter on the way home.
“The KKK?” His jaw dropped.
“I said dressed like the KKK. Only in black.”
“Who were these people you met with?” he repeated.
“People from CDC.”
“Is it everybody? Just older people? What?”
“You’re not old! And it’s not any particular age. It’s people. They kill themselves, or try to. More men than women. No certain reason. They just do.”
“A disease? Maybe a sexually transmitted disease?”
“Not according to the CDC people. People like the Amish have it. People who’ve never been sexually exposed.”
“And women. What about women? What about you!”
She recoiled. What about her? She didn’t know. She shook her head helplessly. “I don’t think I’m depressed. Any more than usual, that is. Things can be pretty depressing at Misery.”
“There should be riots!” he said almost angrily.
“Depressed people don’t riot, Simon! It’s too much effort! And it’s been kept quiet, so the people who aren’t affected don’t know about it!”
“There’ve been those old-woman riots.”
“Well, yes, but that’s … philosophical. I was talking to the chief about it the other day. It’s a kind of old-women’s wisdom cult. They’re very matter-of-fact about it.”
“You must know more than you’ve told me!”
“Simon, I honestly don’t!” She rose, began to pace. “It’s a mystery. We don’t know how far-reaching it is, we don’t know what the cause is, we don’t know what the ramifications are, we don’t know.”
“How long has it been going on?”
She frowned, trying to recollect. “About two years. Since ninety-eight. I mean, that’s not certain, but that’s when the first cases came to CDC attention. They could have been … infected long before that, of course. AIDS was already quite widespread by the time people figured out what it was.”
“What do the survivors say?”
“I don’t know. They give reasons. Stress. Fear. Being tired. According to the CDC woman, most of them have no physical problems to speak of. That was true of the case I investigated today.…”
“Tell me.”
“This little guy lost interest in life, in sex, his wife maybe nagged at him, he decided to kill himself, but he botched it.”
“How many is it affecting?”
She cast her mind back to the meeting, the lines on the charts. “We have no way of knowing the total. The suicide rate is up almost a hundred fifty percent in two years.”
He leaned back. She took a deep breath, went to sit beside him, insinuating herself under his arm, hugging him. He felt good to her. He felt lean and tough and totally right. She sighed, leaning her head against his chest. “You feel good.”
His arm tightened about her. “So do you.” His voice was husky. She looked up to see tears gathering below his eyes.
“Simon. Whatever you worry about, don’t worry about that, this, us. Don’t. We’ll start you on Prozac or something. Something’s bound to work. Get you on an even keel, anyhow.” She stopped abruptly, making a mental note. Could this be a withdrawal reaction to some widely used drug? Like an antidepressant? Had Simon used anything?
He didn’t notice the hesitation. “I never really planned on an even keel, Ophy. Even keels are for dolts. I always preferred a blaze of passion. But what do I do now? What’s recommended?”
“We get you to a doctor—not me, don’t worry. Someone better than me. And we hold on to each other.”
“And I’ll write the story,” he muttered, wry-faced. “God, I’ll win the Pulitzer. How the world got so damned depressing, everybody died of it!”
IT WAS LATE MONDAY AFTERNOON when Bettiann received the call about Charley. William wasn’t at his office; Maybelle didn’t know where he was. Both she and Bettiann tried his cellular phone without result. Finally Bettiann left a message with Bemis and another taped to the banister where he couldn’t miss it if he came home: “Your brother Charley at Methodist Hospital, car accident, don’t know how bad. I’ll be there. Betts.”
Three hours later she was still there and still didn’t know how bad. The state trooper who came to sit opposite her didn’t know, either.
“Would you mind a few questions?”
She shook her head.
“You’re his …?”
“His sister-in-law. I couldn’t locate my husband. I left a message for him and came on down. Just to be here, in case …”
“Would you know if your brother-in-law drank very heavily, Mrs. Carpenter?”
“Sometimes.” She shrugged uncomfortably. “I’ve never known him to drink and drive, though. Charley was always good about that. He’d always call a taxi or get someone to drive him if he’d been drinking a lot.”
“Would you know if he’d been depressed lately?”
She gestured, palms up. “He wouldn’t tell me. He might tell Bill. We only saw one another at the club, on social occasions, or at holiday time.…”
Bill chose that moment to arrive, breathless, white in the face, and the trooper switched his attention away from Bettiann.
No, said Bill, Charley wasn’t depressed. No, he didn’t drink and drive, not ordinarily.
When the trooper left them, Bill turned on her, muttering, “Why didn’t you call me!”
“Bill, I did! Your secretary didn’t know where you were. I left a message with her.”
“I had my cellular.”
“She tried your phone, Bill. So did I. You didn’t answer.”
He flushed, started to say something, then stopped. He’d been up to something. He had that certain expression around
his eyes. So he’d been with some woman. Probably. Possibly. The expression was a little strange. More puzzled than guilty. If not a woman, then who?
“Why did he ask those questions?” Bill demanded of the air. “He was hurt in an accident, wasn’t he?”
“He drove into a bridge abutment,” Bettiann told him. “I overheard them talking out at the nurses’ desk. They have a witness who saw him do it.”
“So he lost control of the car.…”
“You’re not listening, Bill. He didn’t lose control of the car. He drove into a bridge abutment.”
“Intentionally?”
“That’s why they’re asking those questions. They think he tried to commit suicide.”
“Charley?” His voice was outraged, but only momentarily. He sat down, burying his face in his hands. “God. Charley.”
She sat beside him, putting her arms around him. There weren’t many times when one could comfort William Carpenter. He was a man who despised gifts; who cared only for what he bought and owned. Sympathy wasn’t something he could buy, so he didn’t often get it, or accept it. As now, shaking her off, wiping his face, sitting up. “What are they doing for him?”
“Trying to stop the internal bleeding. Trying to keep his heart going. There’s a lot of alcohol in his system. He’s got broken bones. Ribs. Arm. Leg. Maybe skull, they’re not sure yet, they can’t x-ray until they can stabilize him.”
“How long have you been here?”
She peered at the jeweled watch on her wrist, blinked and peered again. Her contacts were hurting. She hadn’t brought her glasses. She never wore them except when she was alone. “I got the call around four. I really did try to get you, William.…”
“I was at the doctor’s.”
“What?”
He got that peculiar look again, then said, “Indigestion. Nothing. It’s almost eight. You go on home.”
“I’ll stay with you.”
“You don’t need to. You’re tired. You look tired. Go on home. Get some rest.”
Run on back to the pasture, Bettiann. Master will round you up later, give you some grain, maybe a pat on the head. She blinked back tears and took a deep breath.
“I would like to stay with you, Bill. I’d prefer it.”
“Go home,” he said, not looking at her.
She went. When she got to the car, she blinked out the contacts and flooded her eyes with drops, feeling the scratchiness ease, the drops slide down her cheeks like tears. She had a pair of glasses in the glove compartment for emergencies. If Carolyn were here, she’d ask why Betts was wearing contacts at all. Because Bill preferred it. Why did she sing soprano in the Episcopal choir? Because Bill’s associates went there. Why was she head of the country-club charity committee? Why was she doing and being what she was doing and being? Because this is what Bill had bought and paid for.
Why was she being not herself? Sophy would ask that. Who are you, Bettiann? Lately she’d been obsessed by that question. She even dreamed about it. In the dream she was walking down a long, long hallway, and on either side of her there were mirrors. Every time she passed a mirror, she saw a different person. All of them were female, all of them might be she, though she didn’t recognize herself. Some were pretty and some were plain, and in the dream she kept asking, “Who are you, Bettiann?”
If she still didn’t know who she was, did it make any difference? After all these years, why was she dreaming about it? Why was she asking the question?
Because you’re tired, she told herself. Because you haven’t eaten anything today, and you know better. Because Bill was being funny about this Charley business. As though, maybe, he knew why Charley had done it. As though he knew something he wasn’t telling her. Something she wasn’t important enough to be informed about.
Friday night, not long after falling asleep, Carolyn woke into an utter silence, suddenly alerted by a touch on her shoulder, a delicate tapping, a whisper in her ear. It was only after she’d swung her legs out of bed and sat there for a moment, staring into darkness, that she heard the low rumble from the hall. Hector. His growl muffled but continuous.
Fancy and Fandango were standing, muzzles pointing down the hall toward the kitchen, their teeth showing. If all three dogs were away from the bed, who had wakened her?
Carolyn put the question aside, slipped into her robe, and got the gun Hal had given her, taught her to use, and insisted she keep at hand. She thought briefly of waking him, then decided not. He still wasn’t that steady on his legs. Only when that notion was discarded did she tell the dogs, “Go.”
They went, silently, old Hector moving like a young dog, with no trace of his usual arthritic gait. Marvelous what a little adrenaline could do.
They were poised outside the kitchen door. Carolyn reached across them to press the latch, and three dog bodies thrust it open with a cacophony of barking, growling, snarling. Their quarry was brought to the floor before Carolyn got the lights on, one dog hanging on to each arm and Hector standing over him, neck hair raised, teeth bared, a hideous growl rumbling in his chest.
He was young and spotty and greasy-haired.
“Gettum off me!” he screamed at her. “Gettum off me!”
“Hold still,” she told him. “If you’re still, they won’t bite you. If you yell or try to get up, Hector will take your throat out.”
Hal had insisted that Hector be professionally trained. Neither Fancy nor Fandango had been, but since they seemed to be following Hector’s lead, she left them to it.
Hal was at the door, very pale, leaning on his cane. “What in hell …”
“Prowler,” she said, feeling her muscles twitch, her jaw rigid.
Hal reached for the phone. She sat on the kitchen stool while he called the sheriff, gun at the ready until they arrived, her eyes never leaving the lanky delinquent on the floor as she murmured encouragement to the dogs. What was this creature doing out here in the country? How did he get here?
“On their way,” murmured Hal. “Give me that gun, Carolyn, you’re holding it all wrong.”
“Sorry.” She passed him the weapon and offered him the stool, but he preferred one of the chairs at the table.
“Hector,” said Hal. “Come.”
Reluctantly, Hector came, still muttering in his throat. Fancy and Fandango followed his lead, sitting at Hal’s feet, ears up, noses pointed at their prey.
To Carolyn, the wait seemed endless, though it was actually only about ten minutes. The dogs heard the car before she did. She went to the kitchen door and opened it, giving herself a view of the driveway. When the car drew up in a shower of gravel, she stood where they could see her. She didn’t intend to offer some reason to be shot, either accidentally or accidentally on purpose. Now, why had she thought that? Talk about paranoid!
“In here,” she called, standing out of the way.
The two men eased by her, and she closed the door behind them.
“Fredo,” said Hal, greeting one of the men by name: Fredo Gonzales, a longtime local resident, with family sprinkled over three counties. “Hal Shepherd,” he said, offering his hand to the other man, who took it somewhat reluctantly. “My wife, Carolyn,” said Hal.
The other deputy didn’t look at her. He didn’t look at the prowler, either, though the prowler was looking at him with more than passing interest. Did the two know one another? Carolyn looked pointedly at the deputy’s name tag: Al Whitfield.
“You recognize him?” Fredo asked Hal.
“Never seen him before, to my knowledge,” Hal replied. “Have you, Carolyn?”
She shook her head, cleared her throat. “No, I haven’t.”
Fredo Gonzales went through the boy’s pockets and came up with a wallet and a crumpled bit of paper. “He’s got a map all drawed out.”
Carolyn took it from him, spread it on the table where Hal could see it. It was a map to their place, labeled in handwriting. With a sudden frisson Carolyn recognized the handwriting. She’d seen it before. Those cra
mped little letters. Where?
“Before you take that,” she said, “I’d like to make a copy of it.”
“That’s evidence, ma’am, we can’t—” started Whitfield.
“You got a copier?” Gonzales interjected, ignoring him.
“Just down the hall.”
Leaving Hal to supervise in the kitchen, she led the way to Hal’s study. The room was slightly dusty, and it smelled unused. Since the accident he’d used the desk in the big bedroom. The copier clicked on readily, however, and Carolyn set it for two copies, picking up the first one and presenting it to the deputy.
“Write your name on the copy for me,” she asked him.
“I’m taking the original,” he said, puzzled.
“I know. I just want to identify the copy, in case anybody asks. Write your name and date it for me.”
He gave her a blank stare but did so, after which she returned the original to him, ignoring the additional copy in the bin. With him looking on she put the signed and dated copy into an envelope and stuck it between two books on a shelf. “In case the evidence clerk loses that one,” she said.
This time he understood. He grinned and said, “It’s been knowed to happen. You still a lawyer?”
“Sometimes. Mostly retired.”
“Wish I was! Retired, that is.” He tucked the map into his pocket.
“Was there a car or motorbike or anything out on the road?” Carolyn asked.
“We didn’t see any. One car out in front here.”
“That’s mine. Hal’s is in the garage. How did this kid get out here?”
Fredo shrugged. “Hitchhiking, maybe.” He led the way back to the kitchen.
“This here’s Don Bent,” the other deputy said when they returned to the kitchen. “That’s what his driver’s license says. Been here awhile—it’s a New Mexico license. Lives in Mesilla.” He looked past Carolyn, speaking as though by rote. “You figure he got away with anything?”
“I imagine the dogs caught him before he had a chance,” said Hal.
“I just come lookin’ for work,” said the greasy-haired youth. “That’s all.”
“At eleven o’clock at night? In the dark? And you broke the lock on the door?” Fredo Gonzales was incredulous.