Part 15 (1/2)

”Why don't you like it, Cal?”

”Because the woman is unreal. An illusion.”

Dora smiled quietly. ”Pascal would understand.”

”Yes, he would.”

She said nothing else, but only stepped away and headed for the door.

”Would you like a drink?” I asked quickly. ”Tea. Coffee.” I lifted my half-empty gla.s.s. ”Something stronger?”

”No. I'd better be getting home.”

”Well, good night, then,” I said when we were on the porch again.

”Good night.”

I stood and watched as she headed back down the walkway to the street. She seemed curiously self-possessed as she moved through the darkness, and I recalled how, only a few short months before, I'd stood outside my brother's house, p.r.o.nounced her far too frail for Maine. Now she seemed carved of native stone. So much so that I could not imagine how my brother might ever penetrate, much less win her.

And yet, even at that moment, he'd already hatched a plan.

I learned about it two weeks later as Henry Mason, Billy's employee at the Sentinel, and I sat in Ollie's Barber Shop. It was late in the afternoon, only an hour before closing, a blue evening shade already falling beyond the twirling barber pole.

”I guess you heard about the new arrangement,” Henry said, his breathing somewhat labored, as it always was, his voice coming through a shaky wheeze.

”What arrangement?”

”At the paper.”

Henry was in his late sixties, a frail, sickly man, surrounded by a consumptive air, so that he seemed forever on the brink of physical collapse. His wife had left him years before, and since then he'd been the sole support and caretaker of a r.e.t.a.r.ded daughter, Lois, who, now in her forties, often wandered from her home, sending Henry in all directions looking for her. ”What will she do when I'm gone?” I'd often heard him ask my brother plaintively. ”Who'll take care of Lois then?”

”The arrangement with Dora March,” Henry said, then coughed into his fist.

”What about her?”

”Well, you know how William is.”

”What do you mean, Henry?”

”The way he's never taken much interest in running the paper.” He cleared his throat, s.h.i.+fting in the chair, his bony fingers gripped to its padded armrest. ”I mean, the day-to-day affairs.”

”What does that have to do with Dora?” I asked just as Lloyd Drummond, Ollie's second-string barber, began applying a thick white lather to my face.

”She can write checks now,” Henry replied. ”Write checks from the company book. William never let anyone do that before.”

Ollie stepped over, snapped a wide white cloth, then draped it over Henry's chest and lap.

”He says he wants to bring her more into the business,” Henry said anxiously. ”I think he wants to show her how much he trusts her.”

”Trusts her,” I repeated, almost to myself.

Lloyd flipped open the straight razor. Its long, flat blade winked in the light.

”She always worked the copy desk before,” Henry added. ”But now--” He stopped suddenly. ”Well, William can do whatever he wants at the paper.”

”Yes, he can.”

Ollie took a pair of clippers and a comb from the shelf below the mirror, eased Henry's head forward, and began to clip at the nape of his neck.

”I mean, if he wants to turn things over to a stranger, then, well...”

”She's not exactly a stranger, Henry.”

”No,” Henry said quietly, averting his eyes somewhat. ”Not exactly.”

”What's bothering you?” I asked. ”About this new arrangement.”

The question released a dam in him. ”I can't help it, Cal. You know how I feel about William. He's like a son to me almost. But he's the type of person that someone has to look out for. You know that.”

He waited for some type of confirmation. When I offered none, he continued. ”Anyway. We all do the best we can. All of us at the paper. We keep an eye on him. For his own good. Then ... all of a sudden ... this woman ...” He heaved a weary sigh. ”But it's none of my business what he does. What he lets Dora do, I mean. But you know the way she is, Cal. It worries me. Him giving her access, you know, to the money.”

”What do you mean, the way she is?”

He turned my question over in his mind. ”The way she reacts to things. It's strange. Unstable.”

”What are you getting at, Henry?” I felt my patience slipping.

Henry glanced about. ”Take the other day. We were cleaning out the back issues. Taking them downstairs.”

Ollie pa.s.sed between us. After he'd stepped away, Henry said, ”So we were talking about some of the old papers. The old stories. Wally and me. What was the biggest story the paper ever covered. That sort of thing. And the Phelps mansion came up.”

”You mean, what happened there.”

”That's right.” Henry nodded, wheezing slightly. ”Twenty years ago. The murders.”

The murders.

I'd heard of them all my life, how Simon Phelps and his wife had been slaughtered, their daughter Abigail taken into the groundskeeper's shed, butchered there, then the great house set afire. I could even recall the name of the man who'd done it. It was a name whispered as a warning to the children of Port Alma for over twenty years, finally turned into a scary little rhyme: Be good or he'll get you.

Cut your throat, do you in.

Then vanish in the shadows Evildoer.