Greely's Cove (26 page)

“I know it sounds incredible,” said Stu, “but they both said it was Jeremy, the kid who used to be a retard, or words to that effect. And they described him right down to his sneakers.” Carl was incredulous, and becoming angrier by the second. “Don’t you think it’s possible that they cooked up this tub of shit in advance, just in case they were caught? I mean, who better to blame things on than the weird little boy who everybody knows isn’t all there?”

“Come off it, Carl, they had no reason to finger Jeremy. They were amply aware that they couldn’t make things any better for themselves by blaming someone else, least of all a thirteen-year-old. Besides that, they were scared—”

“As well they should’ve been.”

“Not scared of me, or the cops, or the system, Carl. They were scared of
Jeremy
.”

“Jesus, Stu!”

“I mean it. I videotaped their confessions, and I’ll play the tapes for you when you get here. You can see the fear in their faces, the way they were sweating and shaking. Jeremy did something to scare these two dirtballs to death.”

Carl shook his head and groped for words. How could this be happening, just when he was on the verge of a new life, one full of goodness and decency and quiet fulfillment? What malevolent god had brewed up this heap of excrement to dump on his shoulders?

“What about Nora?” he asked. “Is she okay?”

“That’s the other reason you need to come back, Carl,” said Stu. “Jeremy’s been driving her crazy. He’s been refusing to do anything she says, stays out late at night, talks back. And he’s been picking up stray animals—dogs and cats—and he insists on keeping them in the house. Plus—” Stu broke off, allowing a tense silence to endure.

“Plus what?” demanded Carl.

“She’s scared, Carl. Jeremy’s been saying strange things to her, like—well, I’d prefer that she tell you herself. The woman’s close to a breakdown, and Lindsay’s taking her back to Seattle today.”

“So there’s no one to take care of Jeremy?”

“He can stay here at the station house until you get here. Which I hope is soon.”

Wonderful, thought Carl. My son is in jail at the age of thirteen, under suspicion of criminal mischief. His alleged co-conspirators are scared to death of him, as is his grandmother. And from the sound of Stu’s voice, so is
he.

“Tell me this,” said Carl in a flat tone that hinted of accusation. “You and Renzy agreed to help look after Jeremy while I was gone, right? Did you do it?”

“I’ve been stopping by the house every day, usually around lunchtime. A couple of times we went out to eat, and I even took him for rides in the police car.”

“And how did he seem to you? Any signs of his being involved in a vendetta against Hannie Hazelford?”

“None at all, Carl. He seemed—well, he seemed fine. A little quiet, a little suspicious, maybe, but just fine. I got the definite feeling that he would rather have been with someone else, that’s all.”

“And what about Renzy? Did he notice anything?”

“You’ll have to ask Renzy about that. I hear that he took Jeremy out to his boat several times, taught him how to tie nautical knots and read charts, all that sort of thing. Jeremy seemed to get a kick out of it, from what I gather.”

Renzy Dawkins lived on a magnificent forty-two-foot Hinckley sloop that was permanently docked in Greely’s Cove Marina, the final trapping of his patrician life. He had promised to take both Carl and Jeremy sailing as soon as the weather warmed and cleared, and Jeremy had seemed excited at the idea. Perhaps even as excited as Carl had been.

“Okay,” said Carl with a tired sigh, “I guess you’re right. I’d better get my ass out there. I’ll call the airport and get on the first plane that has an open seat.”

“Good. I’m sure that’s what’s best for Jeremy.” Stu grew quiet again, and something in his silence suggested that Jeremy was not the most major of his troubles. Carl detected it.

“Is there anything else I should know about?”

“Yeah, I guess maybe there is. I don’t know what’s happening to this town, Carl. Everything is getting crazy and distorted.” He coughed into the receiver, causing Carl to wince on the other end. “This thing with Jeremy is only the latest, and I have an ugly feeling in my guts that it won’t be the last.”

“What is it? What else has happened?”

“We’ve had another disappearance—this one ahead of schedule, not even two weeks since Teri Zolten. All the others were a month apart, and I’d let myself think we’d have some breathing room before we needed to start worrying again. That’s funny, isn’t it? A little breathing room until another citizen is wiped off the face of the earth!”

“God, Stu, I’m sorry.”
He’s snapping,
thought Carl. The sense of helplessness, the frustration, the gnawing expectation of another tragedy were getting to him. “Anyone I know?”

“I’m afraid so. Sandy Zolten. Happened Tuesday night, or maybe early Wednesday morning. In some ways it was similar to her daughter’s disappearance. We found something slimy on the walls of a closet at the motel....”

Carl’s mouth went dry, and his bones went cold. He hardly heard the rest of what Stu was telling him, and he had difficulty keeping his grip on the telephone handset.

For Lindsay Moreland, the emergency could not have come at a worse time.

She had been wrapping up an important presentation to the senior partners of the brokerage firm on a new investment plan, one targeted at clients who had $100,000 or more to invest. The plan had generated spirited opposition from several of her colleagues in the firm, especially those who worshiped at the shrine of Paul Volcker, the Republic’s white knight in the crusade against inflation. It assumed that the economy would shortly enter another inflationary period. Hence, it called for eschewing bonds, collectibles, and commodities and, in their place, emphasized resource mutual funds, franchise stocks, and gold. Her boss had called the scheme “contrarian.” But he had allowed her this one chance to sell it to the brass.

“Miss Moreland,” called a secretary from the rear of the walnut-paneled conference room, “please excuse me, but there’s an emergency call for you on line five. The caller says it’s very important.”

After muttering a painful excuse-me to the assembled mandarins of the brokerage, Lindsay retreated from the conference room to her personal office, where she took the call from Police Chief Stu Bromton. Five minutes later she was in her Saab, pulling away from the parking garage of the glass and steel skyscraper near Seattle’s Pioneer Square, heading for the downtown ferry terminal.

Destination: Greely’s Cove.

Jeremy was in jail, of all places, facing charges of conspiracy to commit criminal mischief. Worse, Lindsay’s mother was virtually prostrate with nervous anxiety, in need of immediate care.

Within the next two hours, Lindsay had transported Nora from the little bungalow in Greely’s Cove to the Moreland home in Magnolia, a posh quarter of Seattle where many houses boasted expensive views of the Puget Sound. The family internist had administered a mild sedative, sending Nora safely to slumber land.

Lindsay left the sleeping Nora in the care of a family friend and headed back to Greely’s Cove. Stu Bromton had said something on the telephone about turning Jeremy over to the county juvenile authorities unless Carl could return quickly to take custody of him. This, Lindsay had told herself, could not be allowed to happen. Jeremy’s recent aberrant behavior notwithstanding, he had special needs that she doubted the county could fill. He was obviously still very ill and in need of his family. The thought of locking him up in a county facility, treating him like any other juvenile delinquent—even for a short time—raised her choler. She vowed to prevent it.

Lindsay lost any annoyance over having been disturbed while delivering an important presentation to her bosses: There would be other presentations, other chances to show her mettle. What burdened her now was the collection of anxieties and worries she had acquired within recent weeks, all centering on Greely’s Cove and Jeremy.

Since Carl had left for D.C., Lindsay had twice taken Jeremy to Whiteleather Place for his scheduled sessions with Dr. Craslowe—on Valentine’s Day, which had been a Friday, and on the following Tuesday. In fact, she would have taken him there today, had the emergency not arisen, at one o’clock, same as always. She would have sat for ninety minutes in the funereal elegance of the dusky front parlor, endeavoring to read the latest issue of
Forbes
or
Town and Country
or
Gardening
, wondering just what the hell was going on in Dr. Craslowe’s inner office, whether Jeremy was under hypnosis or merely having a therapeutic talk with his physician. Craslowe’s assistant, Mrs. Pauling, would have glided into the parlor now and again to offer tea or coffee, and Lindsay would have declined without knowing exactly why.

The fact was, the house itself disturbed her. Something about it seemed unwholesome, aside from its neglected exterior and grounds. The very atmosphere seemed thick and oppressive, too quiet and too dark. Mrs. Pauling herself exuded a feeling of heavy despair, and behind her almond eyes was a wall of hopelessness like you would see in the eyes of a slave or an indentured servant, Lindsay imagined.

More disturbing was the recent change in Jeremy. Since Carl had left, the boy had jettisoned his elegant manners and replaced them with a sullen hostility. On the occasions when Lindsay had taken him to Whiteleather Place, he had sat silent in the passenger seat of her Saab, hands pocketed, face averted from her own, apparently contemptuous of her tries at friendly banter. If he communicated at all, it was in monosyllables.

Several times Nora had called on the telephone to allege that something was horribly amiss. Jeremy was blatantly defiant and disobedient. He came and went at all hours of the night and day. He had started a collection of dogs and cats, and he kept them in the house, but he wanted no part of their feeding and upkeep (these he left to Nora). And though he pretended no interest in the animals, much less affection, he had threatened Nora with some unspecified misery if she were to set them free.

That was not all.

Nora was convinced that Jeremy could read her thoughts, that he had the power to move physical objects without touching them. Lindsay had only chuckled. She had unconsciously chosen to believe that her mother was
not
going around the bend, that she was only sick with grief over the lost Lorna, that things would get back to normal with time. Besides, Lindsay had been up to her eyeballs in work on her presentation and had lacked the time and emotional energy to deal with her mother’s wild fears.

Nora had come dangerously close to a breakdown. That morning, when Lindsay had arrived at the bungalow on Second Avenue, Nora had been a quaking, sunken-eyed shell of herself, full of wild stories about Jeremy’s bizarre behavior.

“
He stays in his room for hours at a time, reading those awful books, reciting incantations of some kind
—”

“Mother, really.
Incantations?
Listen, everything’s going to be okay. I’ll take you home.”

“
Sometimes in foreign languages. And his voice changes, Lindsay. I know this sounds like lunacy, but you’ve got to believe me. It’s almost as though there’s someone else inside him!
”

After helping Nora pack her things, Lindsay had gone into Jeremy’s room to inspect his mountainous collection of books and had gotten a start. Strewn across his bed, heaped on shelves and piled in the corners, were old, musty volumes with worn leather covers and crinkly pages.

The Words of Power.

The Magic of the Dark.

The Protocols of the Magus.

Authors with strange names like Bishop Gerbert, Count de Saint Germain, and Albertus Magnus.

Some volumes even appeared to be in Old English, while others were in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew.

Lindsay was unable to believe that Jeremy could actually read the classical languages, but the very presence of the books detonated little sparks of apprehension. Why wasn’t he poring over real kids’ books about adventure on the high seas or exploits in outer space or fun with computers? Had
Craslowe
given him these musty tomes from long-gone centuries? Something about the situation seemed profoundly unwholesome, in the same way that Whiteleather Place seemed unwholesome.

The ferry sidled up to the dock at Kingston, which lay quaint and nautical in its blanket of fog. At its watery edge the marina was a forest of bare masts. Lindsay eased her Saab off the ferry and took the main drag south toward its intersection with Bond Road, past quiet shops and businesses that seemed to be hibernating until spring. Bond Road was slick with rain, narrow and walled with lush woods, a deserted corridor of gentle curves.

Ten minutes later she was on the outskirts of Greely’s Cove, where the streets were dead but for a few slow-moving cars and a smattering of lonely looking pedestrians. Lacing the fog was a nearly palpable funk that seemed somehow corrosive, that negated the light of day. The storefronts looked comatose under a sodden blanket of winter gloom.

There was
darkness
here, Lindsay remarked to herself, and then she scolded herself for entertaining such an outlandish notion. Why should Greely’s Cove be
darker
than any other foggy little town in this latitude?

City Hall loomed on her left, and she swung into its muddy parking lot, which was packed with cars. After finding an open spot between a Washington State Patrol cruiser and a news van from KIRO-TV in Seattle, she stepped out of the car, popped open her clear-plastic umbrella and strode toward the entryway marked “GREELY’S COVE POLICE DEPARTMENT.”

The last people she expected to see tramping up the cement steps from the dungeonesque house were Dr. Hadrian Craslowe and Ianthe Pauling, both bundled in long dark coats. The doctor looked very English in a floppy tweed hat with a wide brim and an umbrella hooked over his arm. His hands were thrust deep into the pockets of his coat. Mrs. Pauling was dark and wispy at his side, silent as a shadow. The pair paused face-to-face with Lindsay at the top of the steps.