Cry in the Night (5 page)

All right, all right, Sheila Ramsay to the rescue and to hell with looking like a fool. I turned away from the window, hurried to the lamp, and switched it on.

The light was a sharp reminder, if I needed one, that I was out of my element. Instead of my small but cheerful bedroom with its single bed topped with a down comfort, there was the rich glow of a fruitwood bed and matching ornate dresser. The tile, so cold underfoot, was of bright and charming blue and gold patterns. I knew instinctively that it wasn’t just any old tile. I hesitated, then slipped on my dressing gown. I was determined now. I would not be put off by grandeur. I fumbled in my hurry to tie the sash, driven by an urgency that puzzled then frightened me. It took only a second more to find and step into my slippers.

The doorknob was a long iron handle, cold to touch, heavy to pull. The door swung smoothly in and I stood in the threshold, daunted by the dark and silence of the hall.

Did I dare to move blindly down that hall, perhaps to stumble into some irreplaceable heirloom vase?

Someone had cried out. It had already been a long time since that cry. Too long.

I stepped out into the hall and shut the door behind me. The darkness was an assault on my eyes and on my nerves. I hesitated. I could ring the bell the girl had shown me. But that would waken her and perhaps there was no need. I had no idea of the time but it felt late, that middle watch of the night when dreams terrify and all manner of evil seems possible.

No, I would carefully find my way out to the garden and take a quick look in the pale moonlight, lay my worry to rest, and slip quietly back to my room without bothering anyone. Gradually I could see well enough to move cautiously down the middle of the hall.

I reached the balcony without difficulty and was able to differentiate shapes in the living room. I stopped at the head of the stone stairs. For some reason it was darker below and I looked down into a pool of black. I glanced back at the living room and realized it was lighter there because a faint sheen of moonlight seeped through the glass wall that overlooked the patio. Which meant that once I made it downstairs and to the pool room, I should be able to see quite well because there were glass windows there, too.

This gave me courage to start down the stone steps, to move into that cold darkness, my hand sliding along the rough stuccoed wall to my right.

I heard the scuff of my slippers on the stone steps, the soft splash of water in the fountain below, and, shockingly, the click of a closing door.

I stopped still, my breath held tight in my chest, and listened.

I remembered that moment with absolute clarity, the tiny click of that closing door and how surreptitious it sounded, the faint eddy of cold air, the ache in my chest.

Someone moved quietly in the deep pit of blackness at the base of the stairs.

That did it.

I remembered only one other time in my life when I was scared absolutely frantic. I was new to New York and my date—equally green at subways—had mistaken the station, and late one hot summer night we had walked up subway steps to a street of darkened tenements. I could sense danger as instinctively as a gazelle when a tiger nears. Our footsteps echoed loudly. A man stumbled out of the shadows of an alley. We passed him. A heartbeat later, he turned and followed us, his footsteps loud. We ran and reached a lighted street and, thankfully, a bus lumbered up and we climbed aboard.

I stood on that dark stairway and felt again the same mixture of panic and incredulous dismay and sheer hopelessness.

Whirling around, I tried to run back up the stairs, but my slipper caught I the long folds of my dressing gown and I stumbled and fell and cried out as my knee cracked painfully against a stone step.

I don’t know what I expected, but my first feeling as I crouched on the hard steps was one of surprise that no one raced up the steps after me. Someone stood beneath me in that well of darkness and looked up. I felt sure of that. Then, so quickly that my initial impression was overlaid and distorted, there was, oddly, a splashing sound, a quizzical call, and one by one lights rippled on beneath me. I was half turned now, staring down the hall. Light spilled out from the poolroom. The crystal chandeliers in the entryway sparkled to life.

No one stood in the hall below me. No one.

A man came through the doorway from the poolroom, moving easily, unhurriedly. Most men would be diminished if they stood at the base of stairs, looking up, clad in a soft blue terrycloth robe, barefooted, hair plastered wetly down.

He was not diminished.

He looked up at me and slowly a smile spread on his face.

“What a nice surprise.”

He was coming up the stairs now and reaching out to pull me up, and I liked the firm grip of his hand and the good-humored smile on his face and the definite interest in his eyes.

“Hello. I’m Tony Ortega. I don’t know when I’ve had the pleasure of meeting a beautiful blonde on the family steps in the middle of the night. In fact, I’d go so far as to say it was a first.”

“You’ve been swimming,” I managed. “I’m sorry I disturbed you.

“You haven’t disturbed me at all.”

I freed my hand and moved back a pace from him, but he was still close enough to touch and I was very aware of him. I realized as I looked at him that Dr. Freidheim had told me nothing about the Ortega family. I hadn’t known there was anyone other than Señor and Señora Ortega.

“I’m Sheila Ramsay. I arrived this evening. From New York.”

“New York,” he repeated. “Are you the museum lady?”

I smiled at that. “Yes,” I said agreeably, “I am the museum lady.”

“No one told me the museum lady would be beautiful.”

I didn’t know what to say to this so I didn’t say anything. I’m afraid I’ve never sparkled at this kind of repartee. Yet, even though it wasn’t my kind of conversation, I didn’t feel awkward or embarrassed. He had charm enough, kindliness enough, that I felt devilishly attractive, infinitely desirable. But I didn’t lose my perspective enough to be swept off my feet. I had sense enough to realize that to be so effective he must have had lots of practice.

“Will you join me in a swim?” He smiled. “The water is heated.”

“I’d like that sometime.” I hesitated, then asked, “Have you been swimming long?”

It would have been understandable if he had been a little surprised at my questions, even a little irritated. After all, what business was it of mine? But his manners were impeccable. Not a trace of curiosity did he show.

“A quarter of an hour, perhaps. I’d just come home and decided I would swim before bed.”

“You must think me terribly rude. But, you see, I was awakened by a cry and I wondered if anyone else heard it.”

“A cry?” he repeated. For the first time, there was a reserve in his manner. His face changed, became smooth and unreadable.

“It woke me.” I shivered. “I couldn’t imagine what it was. I got up and listened, but it didn’t come again. I tried to sleep but I couldn’t. I was afraid that perhaps someone had fallen in the garden and might be lying there now. I was coming down to check.”

He frowned. “But you must have been going up the stairs to have fallen as you did.”

I nodded, feeling foolish, but I said steadily, “When I was coming down, I heard someone moving in the hall below, and it was so dark and the sound was so stealthy and I’m afraid I’m not very brave. It frightened me.”

“I’m sorry you were frightened. There is nothing to fear in the Casa Ortega. I think you must have dreamed badly.” He looked down the stairs into the empty hall. “As you see, there in no one here but us. I was alone in the pool.”

I looked down the stairs toward the dark opening into the dining room. He followed my glance and gave an almost imperceptible shrug, as if to say, certainly, someone could have gone in there, but why?

I had my own thoughts, too. I could have been wrong that someone stood below me. Looking up. But I heard the click of a closing door and, before that, a cry in the night.

I said so. Nicely, but determinedly.

“There are always noises at night,” he rejoined. “In all houses. As for a scream or a cry, about that I can set your mind at rest.”

His tone was relaxed, untroubled. And unconvincing.

“Yes,” he continued, “you must have heard one of the peacocks. Come, I’ll show you.”

I followed, of course. He might have been going to show me peacocks, but I was going to look at the patio.

I did wonder if we would rouse the entire household when he opened a door in the glass wall beyond the pool and touched a switch.

The lights that clicked on weren’t harsh; they were gentle, floating wisps of light in delicate filigree iron lampposts. Each light was a different color, rose and aqua, lemon and orange. The effect was enchanting.

Even in the brief moment that I surveyed the patio, I knew it was a work of art, as imposing in its way as the house. Here the lava was tamed. The cost must have been enormous, much like quarrying rock. A gently sloping lawn with graveled paths spread down to the rugged cliff of lava. The lights, the occasional wrought-iron benches, the paths and fountains, all were in perfect harmony. Vines flowed over trellises and clung to the lava cliff. Flowers spread apparently without plan but on second glance were artfully sown. All the paths led to a central tiled fountain where water fell in a graceful circle from what I later realized was a miniaturized version of Tlaloc, the great water god. Dominating the whole was the cliff of lava. The cliff emphasized the delicacy and perfection of the garden and, at the same time, reminded how insubstantial is man’s handiwork. The garden was both beautiful and disturbing. I wondered it that had been its creator’s intent.

All of the garden, neat and perfect, could be seen from where we stood. Whatever the cause of that cry in the night, it had left no trace here. The benches sat empty. The paths lay smooth and unmarred. The central fountain splashed softly in its tiled circle.

“Look there,” he urged, pointing toward a bush behind the nearest bench. He bent down and scooped up a smooth stone and flung it.

The bush quivered and broke apart. In its shadow were sleeping peacocks. They stirred and ran. Two of them spread their magnificent tails. Feathers with huge eyes shone like ripples of quicksilver in the soft lamplight. Two outraged cries sounded, high and shrill and near enough to a scream to satisfy anyone.

Tony Ortega watched them scurry away.

“You see?”

I nodded. The peacocks cried, yes, but that was not the cry I heard. I nodded without answering. We turned and moved back into the house. He touched the switch and the lovely lights behind us faded and dimmed.

I thanked him and again turned down an offer to swim and once more apologize for disturbing him, but I was quickly reassured. It was all very pleasant and civilized. I felt let down because I liked him very much and felt very strongly, deep in my bones, that he was hiding something in this elegant house, hiding something both sad and frightening.

My vague feeling of disappointment crystallized abruptly when we reached the stairs and I looked up. I felt, confusedly, that his exclamation when we met must have been patently phony for there, standing at the top of the stone steps, was a truly beautiful blonde. I felt not only disappointed but like a fool. I am a garden-variety honey blonde with regular-enough features and a sprinkle of freckles. I have always been a little proud of my green eyes because they are nicely shaped and a bright, clear sea green, but I know they aren’t anything spectacular.

The blonde standing at the head of the stairs was spectacular in any language, English, Spanish, what have you. Most men probably wouldn’t care whether she spoke anything at all.

Tony Ortega stopped at the foot of the stairs. The hand politely guiding my arm gripped it harshly for one fleeting moment, then dropped away.

She was one of those women who can make every other woman in a room feel like a drudge. She stood gracefully, one hand clasping the folds of her ice blue dressing gown, and her soft golden hair swirled to her shoulders, shining like moonlight.

She spoke Spanish and her voice was low and husky and sounded like the smoke that wreathes gently upward in a cocktail bar.

Tony replied in English, “Miss Ramsay, our guest from New York, was wakened by one of the peacocks. She mistook the cry for a person and hurried to see if anyone was hurt.”

He turned to me. “Miss Ramsay, I don’t believe you have met Señora Ortega.” He paused, then added expressionlessly, “My father’s wife.”

I said hello as gracefully as I could.

She stood motionless for a long moment, then her cool, husky voice floated down. She spoke English with a German accent.

“How courageous of you, Miss Ramsay, to brave the dark. I hope Tony has managed to set your mind at rest.”

It wasn’t what she said that rankled; it was the way she said it. It did have the effect of bringing Tony Ortega quickly to my defense, but I still felt an inch and a half tall and wished I were anywhere else in the world at that moment. Even the warmth of his hand once again on my arm didn’t help.

I was in the midst of yet another apology when she yawned, delicately, like a cat. “It’s quite all right, Miss Ramsay. As Tony so eloquently says, you surely meant well. But it is late, isn’t it? I’m sure we’ll have a good laugh about it at breakfast. Good night, you two.”