Carolyn G. Hart_Henrie O_02 (37 page)

My right hand still rested atop my purse.

But I couldn’t get the purse open and reach the Mace on my key ring before I would be dead.

Unless I was very careful and quick indeed.

I faced her. I spoke quietly but firmly. “It won’t do you any good to shoot me in front of witnesses—and that’s what you’ll have to do. Because I won’t go with you, Brooke.”

“Yes, you will.” Brooke’s soft, silky, lovely voice contrasted eerily with the hard, intractable words that spewed from her mouth. “Do you see the policewoman coming toward us? I’ll shoot her and then I’ll move so quick and put the gun right up against you and shoot and scream and then I’ll tell everyone
you
had the gun and you shot the policewoman because you thought she was coming for you, that they’d found out that you killed Patty Kay, that you planned it with Craig.”

She said it all so fast, the words blurred in my mind, but I understood.

Brooke was desperate.

She would do whatever she had to do.

I might possibly be able to save my own life.

But the young policewoman would die.

It was a wild and dangerous gamble on Brooke’s part. But it was the only chance she had.

It could work.

“You were listening—when I talked to Brigit and Dan.”

“Yes.” A brittle smile. “I was on the stage behind the curtain. All right, let’s start walking toward the lake. That’s right—stay a little in front of me and to my left.”

She prodded me forward.

“You shouldn’t have talked like that to Dan.” Her voice shook with anger. “It was a prank. That’s all it was. He didn’t realize how serious it was.”

“To write obscene letters? To brutalize a gentle, helpless spirit?” I heard the tremor in my voice. “He didn’t realize?”

The young policewoman came closer, nodded hello, passed us by.

Brooke set a fast pace. We were even with the lovely old mansion. Only a few yards more and we would reach the path by the lake. The path soon plunged into trees.

If I ducked away …

A little boy—a sandy-haired little boy about twelve—ran past us, calling to a friend. I stumbled to a stop.

There was something about the high, happy sound of his voice that brought back a bright, quick, poignant memory:

“Mom, Mom, look at the
key
!” His eyes dancing with delight, Bobby held up the massive iron key that was six inches long at least.

I could smell the dank, dark corridor in the centuries-old monastery that had been converted to a hotel, see the massive oak door, and hear the happiness in Bobby’s voice.

The barrel of the gun gouged my back. “Do as I say. I’ll shoot. And not just you.”

I began to walk. The little boy broke into a run.

“Hurry. Hurry!”

The sandy-haired little boy was well past us now. Safe. And alive.

We turned onto the path. Our shoes scuffed little bursts of dust.

Brooke was watching my every move.

I gripped my purse. How could I open it? When?

“Hurry!” We walked faster and faster.

Soon there was no sound or sight of the school. The chinkapin oaks towered above us. It was cool and shadowy and quiet.

Now I couldn’t be held hostage by the lives of children.

But would I have any chance to open my purse when we reached the place where Brooke intended for me to die?

I had no illusions. My death was to be the finale.

Now there was no subterfuge. The gun was in the open, pointed directly at me.

I know what kind of damage a .38 does at the range of two feet.

If I tried to open my purse, Brooke would shoot.

No. Not yet.

Fronds of willow trees wavered in a soft breeze. Greenish water glistened ahead of us.

We came to a fork in the path. “This way.” Brooke’s once-lovely face was as hard and unfeeling as porcelain.

“Brooke … you can’t do this. You can’t get away with this.”

“Yes. Yes, I will. You see, you’re the last person who knows.”

I almost contradicted her. Chuck Selwyn knew. Surely she realized that. She’d overheard my talk with Dan.

But if Brooke didn’t know, I wasn’t going to tell her.

The path led uphill. A white pavilion crowned the gentle rise. Benches overlooked the shimmering lake water.

We climbed the steps.

Funny to think I could be so aware of the muscles in my legs. The sense of mobility, the awareness of existence.

“It’s your own fault,” she said bitterly. “If you hadn’t come to town, they’d have been sure it was Craig. And my Dan would have been safe.”

We reached the white iron benches.

“You’ve got a notebook in your purse. You carry it around.”

“Yes.”

“All right. Get it out.”

So I had a few minutes left, the time it would take to write the words signing away my life.

But I could open my purse.

We sat down.

I lifted the purse flap, got out the notebook and—behind it, pressed against the back—my keys with the Mace canister. And I flicked on the tape recorder as I set the purse down, still open.

I placed the notebook on my lap and looked at her merciless face. “So Dan would have been safe—at the price of Patty Kay’s life and Amy’s life and Craig’s.”

“I had to. I had to.” It was a deep, tortured cry. “Don’t you understand? Patty Kay was going to ruin Dan’s life.
Ruin
it. All because of a prank. He didn’t mean for Franci to be so stupid. It was just a prank.”

“A prank? Do you know what was in those notes?”

Her mouth quivered. “Boys talk that way. It means nothing. Patty Kay wouldn’t listen to reason. She wanted Dan to resign from all his offices and teams and apologize in an assembly. It would have been so awful. And Stanford —he’s been accepted. They’d want to know why he quit all his activities. He wouldn’t be accepted anywhere.”

“He might have learned something about being human.”

Brooke wasn’t listening. The gun never wavered as her voice rose. “David—I don’t know what David would do. He
would be so angry. It’s terrible when he’s angry. His voice drops and drops and drops. So deep and cold and hateful. He would disown Dan. I know he would. And what could Dan do? Where could he go?”

I understood now what drove her to the horrors she’d committed. David Forrest held high standards. Perhaps impossibly high standards. He expected so much of his wife and his son. It might have been pressure from his father that corroded Dan’s soul. It was certainly that pressure which led Brooke to murder.

“Patty Kay was your friend.”

She drew a ragged breath.

“She wouldn’t
listen
. You don’t know how Patty Kay was. She didn’t care what kind of scandal it caused. She was going to make Dan pay. But it was too late. I tried to make her see. She called me that morning, asked me to come over to her house after lunch. That’s when she told me she’d seen Dan—and found the note. I said I knew it was a mistake, some kind of dreadful mistake. She insisted that it wasn’t. She told me she’d seen Dan go into the building. She looked inside and saw him open a locker and put something in it and that the look on his face was spiteful and mean. She called out and he looked up and saw her and ran away. And she got the note. She showed it to me. I kept telling her that it was a joke. Not a nice one, but sometimes these things happen. They’re kids—they don’t mean it. I tried to make her understand. Why destroy a boy’s life? But she wouldn’t
listen
. Then, the next morning, when we learned about Franci, it was like talking to a stone wall. Dan didn’t mean for Franci to do what she did. And no matter what Patty Kay did to Dan, it would never bring Franci back.”

“When did you decide to kill her?”

“I couldn’t sleep. Not all night. I lay there and listened
to David breathing. I knew he would turn Dan out. Just like that. His only son. You don’t know how harsh he is. I had to stop Patty Kay. She’d promised not to say anything until the trustees met. I was to talk to Dan. I said I’d have him come with me to the meeting Saturday night. I told her he would apologize. She finally agreed that if Dan came before the board and apologized to the Hollises and quit his offices, that would be enough. She said it could all be kept within the board. But I knew better than that. People love to talk. When you’re from a family that matters, they can’t wait to tear you down.

“When I left I’d made up my mind. I drove straight to the bookstore. Craig lets the staff use his car to run errands. I waited until nobody was watching and I got his keys— they hang on a hook in the main office—and I went to his car and got his gun. When I put the keys back in the office, that’s when I took Stevie’s sweater. Everybody at the store knew about Stevie and Craig. I wish now I’d told Patty Kay.” Her voice was sharp, vindictive. “I knew that if the police found out about Stevie and Craig, they’d arrest Craig. So that’s why I got the sweater. I worked it all out, how much time it would take. But up until the last minute on Saturday, I kept thinking it would be all right, that Patty Kay would listen. Things like this don’t happen in Fair Haven. I gave her every chance. Right up to the last minute in the playhouse, I
begged
her.”

“You didn’t give Amy a chance.”

“I couldn’t. She recognized my voice. She called Thursday afternoon. About our schedules. And her tone changed, right in the middle. I knew. So I went to the bookstore.” The mirrored sunglasses hid her eyes. “I didn’t have any choice.”

“She was nineteen years old.”

“I didn’t have any choice.” Now her voice was peevish. I was bothering her.

The lake sparkled in the sunlight.

“All right now. The note.” She’d thought it through, solved her problem. She sounded so confident.

I looked into the dark hole of the gun barrel.

Then my eyes widened. I looked past her, back toward the way we’d come. My mouth opened.

Her head jerked to look back.

I took a deep breath, whipped the Mace canister toward her, and jammed my finger on the button.

Mist spewed over her.

A choking, guttural scream.

A shot.

But I wasn’t there.

As the Mace spewed, I’d bolted to my feet and jumped over the side of the pavilion. I dropped into a crouch and began to run.

Her wavering angry scream rose.

Another shot.

Leaves crunched beneath my thudding feet.

I plunged into the woods.

The gun sounded one more time.

Brooke Forrest’s funeral was two days later. Private services, of course.

There could be no doubt of her guilt, thanks to my tape recorder.

But there was no public revelation.

Charges against Craig were dropped.

The final stories in the media about the shocking series of incidents in Fair Haven were oddly incomplete, simply a statement from the Fair Haven police chief that Brooke Forrest’s suicide closed the investigations into the deaths of Patty Kay Matthews and Amy Foss.

The inference was unmistakable, but no motive was revealed.

I kept in touch with Desmond Marino. Margaret, of course, spoke every so often with Craig.

I’d been wrong about one thing.

Dan Forrest remained as president of the student council at Walden School.

It didn’t especially surprise me. The power of wealth
and privilege may disappoint me, but they never surprise me.

However, I subscribe to the old-fashioned view that people ultimately receive what they deserve.

Of course, when the truth isn’t revealed, imagination takes over. Desmond wrote me about the gossip and innuendos and ugly rumors clouding Patty Kay’s name.

I decided that Patty Kay deserved better. I was not in thrall to David Forrest, the Forrest name, or Walden School. Fair Haven’s precious reputation meant nothing to me.

And I wanted to tell the world about Franci Hollis, who laughed so often and told people nice things and loved to paint. I wanted to give the Hollises a happy portrait to remember, as I remember my sandy-haired Bobby. The sum of their lives is more, much more, than a truck careening out of control or cold, unforgiving water.

I wanted to remind all of us that when we see a child— or adult—withdraw and there are only tears, no more laughter, we can’t simply hope it will go away. We must recognize depression for what it is. We have to know that help must be given.