Home Before Dark (47 page)

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He found himself back at Skylands, waiting outside the
half-open door to his parents’ bedroom. He could see the
mirror on the vanity, reflecting a detail from the painting
over the bed. He moved and the door swung back to reveal
the wider tableau, life stilled by carnage … his mother’s
upside-down eyes staring at him, bitter-tasting as quinine . .
. the grey pink ooze of his daddy’s brains on the walls, the
ceiling . . . the dry rusde of a million insect wings.
It never changed. He heard the high-pitched whine that
felt like icy fingers closing around his heart. Then the eraser
smell hit him … the blood.
He couldn’t step across the threshold into the bedroom,
couldn’t see who was in there with them. In the medullar
centre of his brain he felt a sudden blaze of heat as if some
synaptic or neural circuit had shorted out. But there was
someone … in the mirror, bloodied, small of stature. The
mirror never lies.
Grace’s voice calling you, 'Ernie, Ernie.’ Like smoke the picture cleared; the bedroom, the dusty
landing, Grace’s sobs echoing through the silent house, all
evaporated; leaving him raw and trembling, glad to be reunited
at last with his family, with himself. Glad to be home.
He could hear Ed blundering through the darkness.
Ward lowered his weapon and looked up at the sky, the
cluster of stars.Their little fat faces, terrifyingly plump, watching
him. All right, all right. He pushed the girl back into the
wheel-well. Then slammed the tail-gate shut. He walked
around to the driver’s door, leaned in to pull the gear shift
into neutral.
'When the water reaches you, don’t struggle,’ he said softly,
coaching her over the back seats. 'Just let yourself be one
with the spirit of the river.’
Then he released the handbrake and closed the door.
The station-wagon rolled down the slope, the heavy vehicle
slowly gathering momentum. Ward could see already that it
wasn’t going to be enough. The surface of the single-width
boat ramp had crumbled in places leaving pitted sections of
concrete and gravel which impeded its progress. The Buick’s
front wheels caught in a rut and the wagon had barely entered
the water before it came to a standstill.
He could hear the splashing getting closer. He looked over
towards the reed-beds, expecting Ed to appear at any moment,
and felt the blood rise to his face.
A furious agitation, almost panic, seized him.
He thought about going under the hood and adjusting the
throttle cable, but there wasn’t time. Ward jumped down off
the launch ramp and searched the beach for a decent-sized
rock. He found one right away close to some old pilings – it
felt heavy enough and was the right shape.
He carried it back to the wagon, climbed into the driver’s
seat and started the engine. The big V-8 turned over but
wouldn’t catch. The whirring getting weaker, the battery dying
on him. Ward cursed and switched off, then twisted the key
in the ignition. Nothing. He repeated the process, trying it
again and again until the engine suddenly gave a cough and
spluttered into life.
He pinned the accelerator pedal to the floor with the rock,
jamming it so it wouldn’t budge, then put the automatic shift
in drive and jumped clear as the old Buick lurched forward.
The wagon planed along like a hovercraft, the water up to
its wood-grained side panels, then swung around with the
current and sank.
Ward stood and watched it go down. He thought he saw the girl’s head framed for a moment in the tail-gate window,
but it was too dark to be sure.

The going was harder and slower than I’d expected. Wading
through the marsh, I could see little beyond the high wall of
rushes immediately ahead. I had to keep stopping to realign
myself by the city-glow of Yonkers on the further shore or
the lights of the George Washington Bridge behind me. I
could hear the river flowing off to my right, but it was easy
to become disoriented.
About halfway across, turning inland to avoid a ring of
deeper water, I heard a car engine come to life, then high
engine revs, followed by a heavy splash. I knew at once what
it meant. I raced on, praying I would get there in time.
Emerging at last from the reed-beds, I ran barefoot – I’d
lost shoes and socks in the marsh – along the pebble beach
towards the slipway. I couldn’t see anyone, but the beam of
my flashlight soon picked up the station-wagon lying ten
maybe twenty yards offshore, half-submerged. There was still
hope.
It had beached itself on a sandbank that at low tide sometimes
gives boats trouble along that stretch of the Hudson.
I knew that the deep-water channel lay just a little further
out and that the current would want to drag the wagon that
way. I took it as given that Jelly was on board. Stripping off
my jacket, I plunged back in the water and started to make
for the Buick, when I heard a voice behind me call my name.
It could only be Ward.
I thought of ignoring him and carrying on, but I realised
I wouldn’t get far. I looked back and saw a figure standing
motionless on the edge of the ramp, the glimmer of a curved
blade swinging rhythmically from his left hand.
I switched off the flashlight as Ward jumped down off the
ramp and came loping towards me, splashing through the shallows.
I could feel the sweat rapidly cooling along the length
of my spine.
He was on me so fast I had no time to think how I was
going to defend myself. Instinctively I ducked and heard the
mezzaluna whistle past my head as Ward’s shoulder rammed
into my chest and knocked me over. I scrambled up at once,
before he got his balance back, and grabbed his arm, the one
holding the blade, from behind. He hit me with the back of
his free hand hard across the mouth, but I clung to his arm
as he swung around. He was in better shape than I was, and
much stronger. It was just luck that I was able to stay close;
I knew if I let go now I wouldn’t get another chance. He hit
me again in the head, this time with his fist, and I went down.
I felt my grip on his knife arm loosen and then I was on
my knees in the water and he was standing over me with the
mezzaluna raised above his head. I struggled to get up. He
kicked me in the ribs and I felt a jagging pain in my side
and collapsed.
I waited for Ward to deliver the coup de grace. But instead
he let the blade fall to his side. I was still holding the flashlight
and I swung the beam up into the eyes of Sophie’s murderer.
If I’d been thinking clearly I’d have realised that he had no

interest in killing me, he just wanted to stop me from reaching
the station-wagon.
'Go ahead, take a good look.’ He was smiling down at me.
'You see a family resemblance? I’ve been told I have a lot of
June in me.’
'I met your mother once, a long time ago,’ I wheezed, as

I got up on all fours. I really don’t remember much about
her.’
'Well, ain’t that a shame. Because you seem to have made
quite an impression on her. I like hearing about my mother,
Ed. By all accounts June – Junebug, my pa used to call her

;- was a charming and intelligent woman.’ : 'I do remember her as being pretty fucking crazy. There’s
a trait you may have inherited.’
Ś,,’: He laughed.'You took advantage of her then.’
“I didn’t kill her.’
He was silent for a moment.
'What would you say, Ed, if I told you I don’t believe you
did … kill her? I got it wrong.’ He lifted his shoulders. 'Hey,
we all make mistakes.’
He wanted me to react, get angry with him. I shone the
light at the Buick lying offshore like a stranded whale. I could
see it moving a little now as the strong current tugged at its
hidden bulk.
'Are you trying to say that Sophie died for no reason, for
nothing?’
'Someone has to pay.’ He smiled, shaking his head. 'If it’s
any comfort, your daughter never knew what was coming. I
followed her into the garden, and you know those sheds where
they keep the lemon trees in winter? I snuck up behind her
. . . she felt no pain. None at all.
I loved her, Ed. She just didn’t feel the same way about

me.’
'You’re the one who’s going to pay,’ I shouted at him.
'You know what Dante has Virgil say in the Purgatorio “Love is the seed in you of every virtue and of all acts deserving
of punishment.’”
'What the hell’s that supposed to mean?’
'You still owe me, buddy.’ Ward shrugged. 'See, it doesn’t
matter whether you came to the house that night or not. June
was planning to forsake her family, dump us . . . for you.
You were the one.’
'You think I knew anything about that?’
'We all do things in our lives, Ed, that have unforeseen
consequences or repercussions we never intended and mostly
never even get to know about. You may not have killed my
ma, but you damn sure caused her death, you were the catalyst – you kindled the fire inside her wayward heart – and that
makes you as guilty as if you’d wielded the knife.’
'But I didn’t wield the knife . . . somebody else did.’
He went right on. 'You probably think I’m being too hard
on you because you were young, strange to the city, out of
your depth? Well, just consider the mayhem that resulted
from your night of passion with June Seaton.’
'Oh, I’ve thought about it.’
'I blame you for the damage you did, Ed, for wrecking
my life, for taking everything that was mine, everything I
loved.’
You need to turn that around,’ I said quietly. 'You’re the
one who wrecked our lives. When you murdered that beautiful
innocent child … it was for nothing. You just couldn’t face
up to what you did . . . you knew damn well, you always
knew, what really happened to your mother and father.’
He gave a short puzzled laugh. 'Help me out, Eddie.’
'You killed them, you sick bastard.’
Ward was silent a moment.
'Let’s try to be rational here. I don’t remember everything
that went down that night, but a nine-year-old kid slaughtering
his parents, the two people he loved most in the world? In cold
blood? Now does that make any kind of sense?’
'I thought your kind never forgot.’
'My “kind”? You learn that from Dish Armour too?’
I could hear the station-wagon bumping and scraping along the bottom. I shouted, 'We need to get the girl out of there.’
'You’re a little late, hotshot. But let me tell you, for the
record, Jelena was one sweet piece of ass . . . man, was she ever up for it.’
He waited a beat. 'Just messin with ya, Mister.’ Without warning he lashed out with his left foot, aiming a kick at my head that missed but caught the flashlight and sent it spinning from my hand. I grabbed his foot and at the Same time stood up fast. Ward toppled back and went down
to the darkness. I sprang on top of him and, forgetting he
still had the knife, hit him as hard as I could, connecting with
what felt like nose and cheekbone.
I got up and tried to wade back out to the wagon.
I’d hit him nowhere near hard enough. Already on his feet
and, out for blood now, he came after me with a low roar. I
could hear him surfing my wake, steadily gaining. Imagining
at any moment the mezzaluna splitting open my back, I
weaved and changed course, then suddenly swung back
towards land. A dark shadow shot past me. I heard a curse
followed by a heavy splash. Then silence.
I didn’t see what happened, but guessed he must have
slipped and smacked his head on a submerged rock. I put
my hand down in the water and felt around in the mud and
shingle and almost at once came on an arm, a shoulder. He
was still semi-conscious and groaning as I pulled him up
onto the beach.
I wrenched the mezzaluna from his grip and, kneeling
over him, brought the razor-sharp blade up under his chin. I
couldn’t see Ward’s face, or know how badly he was hurt, but
it occurred to me that I’d only saved his miserable life in order
to kill him. This was the moment I’d dreamt about, lived for.
Here at last I had my chance to avenge Sophie’s death.
I held him by the throat, enjoying the voluptuous feeling
of my fingers digging into the cold stringy muscles of his
neck. All I had to do now was draw the blade swiftly across
his windpipe. It should have been simple.
But it wasn’t. I needed more than this. I needed to hear
Ward say he was sorry and mean it, I needed him to confess
and then beg my forgiveness for what he did to Sophie. He
started to choke and for a second I eased the pressure. I
don’t know what made me relent, whether it was because his
own crazy sense of grievance had stolen my appetite for
revenge, or because I had come to understand that whatever
he’d done, however horrific his crimes, he was still a human
being. Or maybe I just wasn’t capable of deliberately killing
anyone. In the moment I hesitated a slow grinding sucking
sound from the river brought Jelly’s plight urgently back into

focus.
I looked up and saw the bone-pale outline of the station
wagon stand on its front end and slide beneath the water. I
hurled the knife away and, leaving Ward semi-conscious on
the beach, waded and then swam out to where I thought the
wagon had gone down.

76

In the river, treading water, it was more difficult to judge
distances than from dry land. I quickly scanned the surface
for a vortex or stream of bubbles from the submerged vehicle,
but there was nothing. Then, taking several short breaths,
followed by a deep one, I dived down and kept kicking hard
until I touched bottom. I wasn’t afraid, I’ve had plenty of
scuba experience, and I knew what to do. I set about trying
to locate the station-wagon, staying close to the dive point at
first, then gradually expanding the area of search by swimming
in ever-widening circles. It was so dark it made no difference
whether I kept my eyes open or shut. I had to feel my way
over the shifting riverbed. Very soon I lost my bearings.
After forty seconds or so, unable to find any trace of the
sunken Buick, I came back up for air and, again treading
water, looked about for some kind of turbulence. In every
direction all I could see was the dark gliding mirror of the
Hudson. It added to a growing sense of desperation. I could
feel the strong current bearing me downstream and suddenly
my hopes of finding the wagon and reaching the girl in time
seemed negligible. I knew I had to concentrate on the task,
not the person I was trying to rescue; yet it was only the
thought of Jelly and how terrified she must be right now that
gave me strength.
I’d convinced myself she was still alive down there, still
conscious; but with every passing second I was aware of that
becoming less and less likely. Then, a few feet away from me,
as I turned my head towards the shore, I noticed a telltale
eruption of bubbles troubling an otherwise smooth stretch
of water.
I took another deep breath and plunged again.
One thing I’ve learnt from years of diving is the importance
of staying calm underwater. I knew that from the moment
the Buick went down, unless the windows were open, it would
take at least three minutes – maybe more – to become fully
submerged. It didn’t necessarily mean the person trapped
inside had that long. But panic is the enemy. I estimated Jelly
had been down there just over a minute.
I made two more dives before I found the station-wagon
lying on its side in about fifteen feet of water. Moving quickly
over the top of the front wing and windshield, I pulled myself
along by the roof rack until I reached the rear passenger door.
I got the door open and managed to hold it against the current
long enough to swim inside before gravity and the weight of
the water swung it shut behind me.
The interior was already flooded. One of the windows resting
on the riverbed could have been open or shattered, but
whatever the cause it reduced the odds of Jelly’s having
survived. I felt around the cabin, methodically sweeping the
front and back seats in case she was trapped by a seat-belt.
There was no sign of a body.
By now I’d used up most of my air supply. My lungs felt
ready to implode (Ward’s kick in the ribs hadn’t helped) and
I was resorting to every trick I knew for conserving breath,
releasing little bubble streams of air and working my jaw at
the same time. Soon, I realised, I wasn’t going to have enough
juice left to get out. I scrambled through into the trunk space,
ignoring the small sensible voice that was urging me to leave
now, immediately – while I still could.
Then the wagon made a sudden lurch, slid a few feet and
settled at an angle with the front end lower than the back.
I wasn’t sure how far we’d drifted from the shore, but I
guessed the Buick was lying close to the edge of a deep
channel where the water at high tide runs forty to fifty feet.
If the current took it over the ridge, I knew the chances of
anyone surviving would be minimal. On the plus side, the
tipping of the wagon had given me an idea – it was really
my last hope. I kicked upwards and, in the highest corner
of the cargo bay, found what I was looking for – a small
triangular pocket of trapped air.
I broke the surface, mouth and nose first, and after the
relief of that first violent intake of breath, gulped several lungfuls
of what tasted like pure oxygen. It took a moment before
I realised in the pitch dark that the rapid effortful breathing
I could hear wasn’t my own. I felt something move against
my side underwater and knew I was sharing the trunk space.
I couldn’t tell what state she was in.
All that mattered was that she was alive.
I touched Jelly’s face and discovered her mouth was still
sealed with duct tape. She moaned as I felt around the back
of her head, trying to find some way to loosen the tape. There
wasn’t time. I could feel the water in our temporary air cave rising. A voice inside my skull, frantic sounding, was saying
we had to get out now.
'You’ll be okay,’ I shouted at Jelly, holding her chin up to
keep her nose above the surface. Her arms were tied behind
her back. 'We’re going to stay calm and swim out of here
together . . .’
The water had reached my mouth.
I had planned to go back out the same way I came in, but
realised that maneuvering a disabled person through the gap
between the top of the back seats and roof with zero visibility
would be impossible. I felt for the lever that opened the
Buick’s tail-gate on the inside (remembered from when Sophie
and George were little and liked to ride in the back), found
it and pushed the heavy door down with my feet. The hinges
were on the bottom so it stayed open. I instructed Jelly to
take several short breaths, followed by a deep one, then linking
one of my arms through hers, pulled her back under the
water.
As we swam out through the open door, I kicked down
for both of us and pushed off hard from the tail-gate to get
clear of the wagon. I shot upwards, but Jelly stayed behind.
I swam back and tugged at her arm, tried again to drag her
with me, but she didn’t come. Something was keeping her
there, preventing our escape.
I could only think that her feet had become entangled, or
that Ward had tied them in some way to the frame of the
Buick. I knew I had just seconds to free her. Letting go Jelly’s
arm I dived down and felt around her legs for any obstruction.
Reaching under the floating hem of her jeans, I ran my
hand down her bare calf, finding nothing until I touched a
familiar shape that for a second didn’t register because it had
no business being there. I touched it again, felt the contours
of bony limpet fingers clamped to her flesh and realised that
it was a hand – a hand around her ankle, holding her fast.
The shock went through me and I reared back, hitting my
head on the Buick’s bumper. I opened my eyes into the murk
and for a moment all around me was light, a sparkling
turquoise blaze, as if I was staring at a swimming pool on a
summer’s day. I had no idea where I was, or which way was
up or down; it occurred to me I’d started to swallow water
and was hallucinating. I knew the hand belonged to Ward
and that he must have followed me down here, willing to go
to insane lengths to make sure the girl drowned. I thought
of him then not as human but as some kind of implacable
monster pursuing us into the abyss.
I should have killed him when I had the chance.
In a frenzy of rage and loathing I lashed out with my bare
feet at where I thought Ward’s head would be. I couldn’t see
him at all, not even a darker shadow. I just felt my heel
connect with something that yielded and that could have been
a face and I stomped on it again. I had an arm around Jelly’s
legs, still trying to pull her free, but there was no give. Ward
must have attached himself to the wagon somehow. I imagined
him holding the trailer hitch with one hand, his lower body
wrapped around a back wheel, the way a Moray eel winds
its tail around a projecting rock or part of a wreck to keep
its prey until it drowns.
As I kicked down again and again, desperation set in and
I started to black out. I remember thinking it was all over,
we were both going to die, when I became aware of a change
in the water around us. I could feel the current eddying
strongly on the downstream side of the Buick and then,
suddenly, the wagon started to move.
I don’t know if Ward felt it too, but something made him
let go his grip on Jelly’s ankle. I had just enough strength left
to grab her arm and swim her out of the way as the heavy
car flipped over on its roof and, tyres up, fell off the edge of
the underwater ridge and slithered away towards the bottom
of the deep channel.
We rose to the surface. I don’t remember the relief of
my first swallow of fresh air or rejoicing at seeing the night
sky again or feeling grateful to be alive – only an irrational
primitive fear that Ward could still attack us from beneath
as I turned on my back and struck out for the shore, struggling
to keep Jelly’s head above water.
I knew even before I carried her up onto the beach and
lay her on her side that she’d stopped breathing. I went through
the procedure, placing my cheek close to her face, checking
for airflow; looking for the rise and fall of her diaphragm.
Nothing. I grabbed a wrist to feel her pulse, gave up and
slammed my ear to her chest. There was a faint heartbeat.
She was alive, it seemed, but only just.
There wasn’t time to unwrap her head. I scrabbled at the
duct tape that covered her mouth, got my fingernails under a
seam and tore it away, making a slit of an opening. Then I
tilted her head back and, pinching her nostrils shut, took a
deep breath and blew it slowly and gently into her mouth.
After a couple of seconds I broke away, counting one thousand,
two thousand . . . On five thousand, I bent down again to
repeat the kiss of life, when she made a choking sound, river
water came up, she started coughing and then her eyes opened.
It was a while before she could speak.