A Cry In the Night (39 page)

Jenny turned off the radio. Any minute the phone would start to ring. Within hours reporters would be swarming here. Erich would see them, would perhaps hear the broadcast, would know it was over. And he would take his final revenge on Jenny, if he hadn't already.

Blindly she stumbled out of the kitchen. What could she do? What could she do? Without knowing where she was going, she walked into the parlor. The evening sun was streaming into the room, illuminating Caroline's portrait. A bleak pity for the woman who had known this same bewildering helplessness made her study the painting: Caroline sitting on the porch, that dark green cape wrapped around her, the tiny tendrils of hair brushing her forehead. The sun setting, the small figure of the boy Erich running toward her.

The figure running toward her. . . .

The sun rays were diffused throughout the room. It
would be a brilliant sunset, reds and oranges and purples and charcoal clouds streaked with diamondtinted light.

The figure running toward her. . . .

Erich was out there somewhere in those woods. Jenny was sure of it. And there was only one way to force him to leave them.

The shawl Rooney had made for her. . . . No, it wasn't large enough, but if she wore something with it. . . The army blanket that had been Erich's father's in the cedar chest? That was almost the same color as Caroline's cape.

Racing up the two flights of stairs to the attic, she tore open the cedar chest, reached down into it, pushed aside the old World War Two uniforms. On the bottom was the army blanket, khaki-colored but not unlike the shade of the cape. A scissor? She had scissors in the sewing basket.

The sun was getting lower. In a few minutes it would begin to sink. . . .

Downstairs, with trembling hands she cut a hole in the middle of the blanket, a hole just large enough for her head, and drew it around her. Then she pulled the shawl over her shoulders. The blanket fell around her, draped capelike to the floor.

Her hair. It was longer than Caroline's now, but in the painting Caroline had it loosely drawn up into a Psyche knot. Jenny stood in front of the kitchen mirror, twisting her hair, curling small tendrils over her fingers, fastening it with the large barrette. Caroline inclined her head a little to one side; she held her hands in her lap, the right hand lying over the left. . . .

Jenny stood at the west door of the porch. I
am
Caroline, she thought. I will walk like Caroline, sit like her. I am going to watch the sunset as she always did. I am going to watch my little boy come running toward me.

She opened the door and unhurriedly stepped out into the sharp cold air. Closing the door she walked over to the swing, adjusted it so it directly faced the sunset and sat down.

She remembered to shake the shawl so that it folded over the left arm of the swing, as it had in the painting. She tilted her head so that it was at a slight angle to the right. She folded her hands in her lap until the right hand lay encased in the left palm. Then, slowly, very slowly, she began to rock the swing.

The sun slipped out from behind the last cloud. Now it was a fiery ball, low in the heavens, about to slip over the horizon, now it was going down, down, and the sky was diffused with color.

Jenny continued to rock.

Purples, and pinks and crimsons and oranges, and golds, and the occasional clouds billowing like gossamer, the wind just sharp enough to move the clouds, rustle the pines at the edge of the woods. . . .

Rock, back and forth. Study the sunset. All that matters is the sunset. The little boy will soon run out from the woods to join his mother. . . . Come, little boy. Come, Erich.

She heard a high wail, a wail that grew louder and shriller. “Aai. . . yee . . . devilll. . . devilll from the grave. . . . Go away. . . . Go away. . . .”

A figure was stumbling from the woods. A figure holding a rifle. A figure draped in a dark green cape, with long black hair that the wind blew in matted tangles, a figure with staring eyes and a face caught in a grimace of fear. . . .

Jenny stood up. The figure stopped, lifted the gun and aimed it.

“Erich, don't shoot!” She stumbled to the door, turned the handle. The door was locked. It had snapped locked behind her. Lifting the army blanket, trying not to stumble over its trailing ends, she began
to run, zigzagging down the porch steps, across the field, while she heard the sound of shots following her. A burning sensation bit into her shoulder . . . warmth flooded her arm. She staggered, but there was no place to run.

The strange screaming was behind her. “Devilll, devilll . . .” The dairy barn loomed to the right. Erich had never gone in there, not since Caroline died. Frantically she wrenched the door open, the door that led into the anteroom where the vats of milk were stored.

He was close behind her. She rushed into the inner area, the barn itself. The cows were in from the pastures, had already been milked. They stood in their stalls, watching with mild interest, grazing at the straw in the troughs before them. She could hear footsteps close behind her.

Blindly she ran to the end of the barn, as far as she could go. The stock tank was there, the pen for the new calves. The tank was dry. She turned to face Erich.

He was only ten feet away. He stopped and began to laugh. He lifted the gun to his shoulder and took aim with the same precision he had shown when he shot Joe's puppy. They stared at each other, mirror images with the dark green capes, the long dark hair. His hair too had been clumsily pinned up in a knot; his own blond curls escaping from under the wig gave the impression of tendrils on the forehead.

“Devilll. . . devilll. . . .”

She closed her eyes. “Oh, God. . . .”

She heard the gun going off, then a shriek that gurgled into a moan. But not from her lips. She opened her eyes. It was Erich who was sinking to the ground, Erich who was bleeding from the nose and mouth, Erich whose eyes were glazing, whose wig was matted with blood.

Behind him Rooney lowered a shotgun. “That's for Arden,” she said quietly.

Jenny sank on her knees. “Erich, the girls, are they alive?”

His eyes were dim but he nodded. “Yes. . . .”

“Is someone with them?”

“No. . . . Alone. . . .”

“Erich, where
are
they?”

His lips tried to form words. “They're ...” He reached up for her hand, twisted his fingers around her thumb. . . . “I'm sorry, Mommy. I'm sorry, Mommy . . . I didn't mean . . . to . . . hurt. . . you.”

His eyes closed. His body gave a last violent shudder and Jenny felt the pressure on her hand released.

T
he house was crowded but she saw everyone as vague shadows on a screen. Sheriff Gunderson, the people from the coroner's office who chalked the outline of Erich's body and took it away, the reporters who swarmed in after the news of the art forgery and stayed for the far bigger story. They'd arrived in time to snap pictures of Erich, the cape draped around him, the wig matted with blood, the curiously peaceful face of death.

They'd been allowed to go to the cabin, to photograph and film Caroline's beautiful paintings, Erich's tortured canvases. “The greater the sense of urgency we give to the search, the more people will try to help,” Wendell Gunderson said.

Mark was there. It was he who cut away the blanket and her blouse, bathed the wound, disinfected it, bandaged it. “That will hold it for the present. It's only a flesh wound, thank God.”

She shivered at the touch of those long, gentle
fingers through all the burning pain. If there was help possible it would come through Mark.

They found the car Erich had driven, found it hidden in one of the tractor paths on the farm. He'd rented the car in Duluth, six hours' drive away. He'd left the children at least thirteen hours ago. Left them where?

All through the evening the driveway was filled with cars. Maude and Joe Ekers came. Maude, her strong, capable bulk bending over Jenny. “I'm so sorry.” A few minutes later Jenny heard her at the stove. And then the smell of perking coffee.

Pastor Barstrom came. “John Krueger worried so about Erich. But he never told me why. And then it seemed as though Erich was doing so well.”

The weather report. “A storm is moving into Minnesota and the Dakotas.” A storm. Oh, God, are the girls warm enough?

Clyde came to her. “Jenny, you gotta help me. They're talking about committing Rooney to the hospital again.”

At last she was startled out of her lethargy. “She saved my life. If she hadn't shot Erich, he would have killed me.”

“She told one of them reporters that she did it for Arden,” Clyde said. “Jenny, help me. If they lock her up, Rooney can't take it. She needs me. I need her.”

Jenny got up from the couch, steadied herself against the wall, went looking for the sheriff. He was on the phone. “Get more flyers. Tack them up in every supermarket, every gas station. Go over the border into Canada.”

When he hung up, she said, “Sheriff, why are you trying to put Rooney in the hospital?”

His voice was soothing. “Jenny, try to understand. Rooney intended to kill Erich. She was out there with a gun waiting for him.”

“She was trying to protect me. She knew the danger I was in. She saved my life.”

“All right, Jenny. Let me see what I can do.”

Wordlessly, Jenny put her arms around Rooney. Rooney had loved Erich from the moment he'd been born. No matter what she said, she had not shot him because of Arden. She had shot him to save Jenny's life. I couldn't have killed him in cold blood, she thought. And neither could she.

The night wore on. All the properties were being searched again. Dozens of false reports were coming in. Snow was starting to fall, swift, biting flakes.

Maude made sandwiches. Jenny could not swallow. Finally she sipped consommé. At midnight Clyde took Rooney home. Maude and Joe left. The sheriff said, “I'll be at my desk all night. I'll call you if we hear anything.” Only Mark remained.

“You must be tired. Go on home.”

He didn't answer her. Instead he went and got blankets and pillows. He made her lie down on the couch by the stove; he poked a new log on the fire. He stretched out on the big chair.

In the dim light she stared at the cradle filled with wood, beside the chair. She had refused to pray after the baby died. She didn't realize how bitter she'd been. Now . . . I accept his loss. But please let me have my girls.

Could you strike a bargain with God?

Sometime during the night she began to doze. But the throbbing in her shoulder kept her on the edge of wakefulness. She felt herself stirring restlessly, making soft hurting sounds. And then it eased, the pain and the restless tossing. After a while when she opened her eyes, she found herself leaning against Mark, his arm around her, the quilt tucked over her.

Something was teasing her. Something in her subconscious
that kept trying to surface, something desperately important that was eluding her. It was something to do with that last canvas and Erich watching her, his face peering through the window at her.

At seven o'clock Mark said, “I'll fix some toast and coffee.” Jenny went upstairs and showered, wincing as the stream of water struck the adhesive on her shoulder.

Rooney and Clyde were in the house when she came back down. They sipped coffee together as they watched the national news. The girls' pictures would be shown on the
Today
show and on
Good Morning America.

Rooney had brought the patches. “Do you want to sew, Jenny?”

“No, I can't.”

“It helps me. We're making these for the girls' beds,” she explained to Mark. “The girls are going to be found.”

“Rooney, please!” Clyde tried to quiet her.

“But they are. You see how nice and bright the colors are. No dark stuff in my quilts. Oh, look, here's the story.”

They watched as Jane Pauley began the report: “A forgery that rocked the art world yesterday turned out to be only a very small part of a far more dramatic tale.

“Erich Krueger . . .” They watched as Erich's face came on the screen. The picture was the same as the one on the brochure in the gallery: his bronze-gold, tightly curled hair, his dark blue eyes, the half-smile. They had films of the farm, a shot of the body being carried away.

Now Tina and Beth smiled from the screen. “And this morning those two little girls are still missing,”
Jane Pauley said. “As he died, Erich Krueger told his wife that her children are still alive. But police are not certain he can be believed. The last canvas he painted seems to suggest Tina and Beth are dead.”

The entire screen was filled with that last painting. Jenny looked at the limp puppet figures, her own tortured image staring, Erich looking in the window at them, laughing as he held back the curtain.