Part 18 (2/2)

He showed up one evening in jeans and a sweats.h.i.+rt, taut and somber, but pleasant just the same.

”Let's sit on the porch and talk,” she invited, after they'd had sandwiches and coffee, and her cousin had excused himself to go to bed.

They sat together in the old swing, listening to the sound of crickets and dogs barking in the distance. It was a cool night, but comfortable, and the stars were out in a glorious display.

”I love spring nights,” she mused. ”It's so peaceful here.”

”I'm sorry you can't enjoy it at home,” he returned.

She glanced at him, feeling his indignation. ”Barbara told you.”

”Yes,” he said. ”I wanted to deck him.”

”I felt the same, but it wouldn't accomplish anything,” she said with resignation. ”He's one of those people who doesn't need anybody. I should have realized it, and not gone gooey over him.”

”Don't beat yourself up,” he said. ”He's not the person I thought he was, either.”

She fingered the cold chain that supported the swing. ”I suppose it did look as if I were following him around. I couldn't make him understand that those were normal activities for me.”

”It's water under the bridge. Why did you want me to come up?” He grinned. ”Have you finally discovered a raging pa.s.sion for me, and you want to give me a diamond ring?”

She gaped at him and then burst out laughing. ”You idiot!”

”It was worth a try. Come on, come on, I've got a drug dealer on a back burner and I need to take him off pretty soon. I can't stay long.”

She smiled, remembering him as a sort of juvenile delinquent who was always in trouble at school. Nothing serious, usually, but he couldn't manage to be placid.

She sobered then. ”It's about the child who was killed.”

He was still. ”Yes?”

”I remembered something,” she said. ”I meant to tell Garon, but he thought I went to his house because he hadn't called me.”

”So I heard.”

She drew in a breath of cool air. ”All the children had long blond hair,” she said.

He frowned. ”Well...yes, they did!”

”And light eyes.”

He nodded.

”And red...ribbons.”

He was suddenly very quiet.

She stared down at her hands in her lap. ”Rick, you were away when it happened,” she said. ”But someone, Barbara maybe, must have told you something about it.”

”Very little,” he replied. ”Except that you were traumatized by a s.e.xual predator.” He hesitated. ”I didn't feel comfortable asking you about it.”

She looked up at him and smiled gently. ”Thanks.”

He shrugged. ”I'm a private person myself. I understand.”

She curled her fingers around the swing chain. ”Only a few people ever knew the truth. There was a cover-up,” she said. ”My grandmother was beside herself. Mama had heard about it from Granny, and that very night, she committed suicide.”

”Your mother?” he exclaimed. ”But why?”

”Who knows? Granny said Mama felt responsible, because she'd thrown me out of her life and left me at the mercy of a bitter old woman who drank alcohol to excess almost every night.”

”I didn't realize that old Mrs. Collier ever had a sip of anything alcoholic,” he admitted, surprised.

”She sobered up when she had to come and see me in the hospital. I was...I was a mess,” she bit off. She s.h.i.+fted in the swing. ”If you saw the body of the latest murdered child, maybe you can imagine what I looked like.”

”Dear G.o.d!” he burst out.

”I was lucky,” she continued. It felt good to talk about it, after so many years of stoic silence. ”He panicked. He couldn't quite figure out how to strangle me to death. He was clumsy with the red ribbon, and then the police sirens started wailing. He stabbed me with just a pocketknife, over and over again. I was in terrible pain, but even at the age of twelve, I knew that if I didn't play dead, I'd be dead. I held my breath and prayed and prayed. And he ran. Someone had tipped off the police when they saw him carrying me across a field in the moonlight. I never knew who, but it saved my life.” She looked at him, aware of his tense, smoldering anger. ”Apparently it isn't that easy to choke someone to death, even a child.”

”No, it isn't,” he confirmed tautly. ”It takes several minutes of concentrated pressure. A noose with a stick twisting it is easier than using your hands, but it still takes more than a minute or two to kill a person.”

”I remember his hands most of all,” she said uncomfortably. ”They were bony and pale, weak-looking. I got a glimpse of them, under my blindfold. I think one had deep cuts on it. They were nothing like my grandpa's, who was a deputy sheriff and worked with horses. He had lean, strong, tanned hands. Good hands.”

”They took you to a doctor,” he prompted, because she'd gone silent.

She drew in a steadying breath. ”Dr. Coltrain had just gotten his license. I was one of his first patients,” she added with a smile. ”I learned some new bad words listening to him when he examined me. He was eloquent.”

”He still is,” Marquez said.

”Anyway, it took some minor surgery and a lot of st.i.tches. I lost an ovary and my spleen and even my appendix,” she added. ”They said it would take a miracle for me to ever have a child. As if I'd want to get married and give a man power over me, after that,” she said sadly, and tried not to remember how comforting Garon's strong arms had been in the darkness. He'd walked away from her so quickly when he knew she couldn't have a child. It was just as well, though, that she was barren, after the way he'd treated her.

”A reporter heard something on his police scanner. Not enough to tell him the truth, but enough to make him curious. He came over here snooping around. My grandmother called Chet Blake. Chet told him I was attacked by a crazed man and that I had amnesia, that I couldn't remember anything about it. That seemed to satisfy the reporter, because he left and n.o.body saw him again. But after he left, Granny was afraid the man who abducted me might come back and finish the job if the true story got out. Even though I was blindfolded the whole time, he might think I could still identify him. So our police chief, Chet Blake, hid the file, and talked to the local media. He said I had been slightly injured by a mental patient, that I had amnesia and couldn't even remember how I got hurt. Everybody around me swore it was the truth. The paper ran a story saying a juvenile had been injured by an escaped mental patient and I couldn't remember anything that happened. The mental patient, they said, was taken back to the inst.i.tution he came from, and I was fine. It was too small a story to make the big city papers, so that was the end of it. If the man was checking about what I told the police, and he read our local paper, he'd have felt safe.” She glanced at him. ”I was so afraid that he'd do it again, to some other little child. And he is, isn't he, Rick? He's still out there, but now he's killing children. I didn't want to be protected at the cost of someone else's life, but n.o.body would listen to me. I was just a kid myself. I've had to live with that ever since.”

”d.a.m.n!”

She sighed heavily. The memories were stifling, frightening. Her hands gripped each other. ”I feel guilty because I didn't come forward and tell the truth.”

”You were a child, Grace. You had no say in what was done.”

”But I'm not a child now,” she said earnestly. ”I couldn't pick him out of a lineup, Rick, but I'd remember his voice. At least you could look at the file and see what evidence they saved. I know they had swabs, and they took my underclothes,” she choked, swallowing hard. She didn't want to remember the rest. ”There might be something else that would help with the investigation.”

”Yes, but, Grace, if Chet hid the file, how will we find it?”

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