DWE-628. That was the license number. South Carolina license, and the number was DWE-628.
DWE-628. She didn’t have Erskine’s memory for numbers. He seemed to remember them effortlessly — telephone numbers, license plates, the frequencies of radio stations. She was good at math but remembering numbers was something else again.
DWE-628. She repeated it to herself, concentrating firmly on it, and when she got to her house she went directly to her room, not pausing for a word with Roberta, not wanting to chance forgetting the number. DWE-628. She got to her room, opened her diary, uncapped her pen, and wrote it down.
DWE-628.
NINE
Jeff opened his eyes. He was lying on his back on a king-size bed in a Days Inn motel just off I-26. The air was cool on his bare skin. He raised his head from the pillow and watched Roberta, who was sitting a few yards away in a teak-and-vinyl armchair reading a book. Smoke rose from the cigarette she held in her right hand. One leg was bent sharply, its foot propped on the cushion of the chair, and one shoulder was also held at a sharp angle; he was reminded of a couple of pictures from Picasso’s blue period — the guitar player, the woman ironing. Her body displayed that attitude.
He continued to watch her, enjoying the moment, until she evidently felt his eyes on her nude body and turned to meet them. “Look who’s awake,” she said.
“I guess I was sleeping."”
“No kidding.”
“What time is it? Was I sleeping long?”
“It’s past two. I already had my shower.”
“I never even heard the water running.”
“Well, you wouldn’t have heard World War Three,” she said. “You were really out. I’ll never understand why sex wakes women up and puts men to sleep. Whoever worked out the natural order of things seems to have screwed up there, wouldn’t you say?”
“It’s handy for men who work a night shift. They go home, make love, and the little wifey gets up and starts in on the housework.”
“Trust you to see the bright side. The silver lining. Incidentally, who cares if every cloud has a silver lining? You still can’t get a peek at the goddamned sun through it.”
“I keep forgetting what a literal-minded sort you are. What are you reading?”
“The Bible. What else do you do in a motel room? Just commit adultery and read the Bible.”
“Do you think of this as adultery?”
She turned toward him, crossed one leg over the other. “Well, what else would you call it? I don’t think of it as a sin, if that’s what you mean.”
“That’s what I meant.”
“Well, I don’t. This book would tend to disagree with me, however. The Living Bible. That’s what it seems to call itself. Evidently the good old King James version is the Dead Bible.”
“What is it, modern English?”
“Modern and not terribly grammatical.” She closed the book, put it down on the lamp table. “If you’re going to read a Bible it ought to be full of thees and thous and begats. When it starts to sound like the host of a morning television talk show it loses me completely. The mystery is gone, and then what’s left?”
“Like when they took the Latin out of the Mass.”
“That’s right, you’re Catholic. I tend to forget that.”
“Lapsed Catholic. And I can’t blame it on Vatican Two, either. I was gone before they changed the Mass. We’d better get going, don’t you think?”
“I suppose so. You want to take a shower, don’t you? Or do you want to carry my spoor back to Elaine?”
“Your spoor. Like some jungle beast.”
“That’s the idea.”
He showered thoroughly but quickly, toweled dry, and emerged to find her already dressed. “And now the gentleman puts on his clothes,” she intoned, “and the charming couple will be on their way. The gentleman will return to his office — you are going back to your office?”
“Yes.”
“—while the lady goes back to her haunted house. God.”
“It bothers you, doesn’t it?”
“More than ever. I’m living in a hostile environment. Getting away from it just makes me aware of how unpleasant it is. I spend a couple of hours with you in this room or one like it and it’s neutral, it’s uncomplicated and safe. Then I walk through that door and there’s a presence in that house that hits me like a two-by-four between the eyes. Haven’t you felt it yourself?”
He shook his head. “But I don’t have to live with it,” he said. “And I haven’t really been inside your house except for the first time.”
“And you don’t have to live with her.”
“You mean Ariel.”
“Obviously. Who else?”
In the car, heading back into town, he said, “You hardly ever call her by name, have you noticed that? It’s always she or her or the child.” “I’m aware of it.”
“Any particular reason?”
“I don’t know. It just turned out that way.”
“Since Caleb’s death? Or before it as well?”
“Before it. Since his birth. Maybe even before that. There’s been a gradual change in my attitude toward her.”
“Did you love her originally?”
“Yes. Wait, I’m not sure of that. I thought I loved her because we’d adopted her and therefore I was supposed to love her like my own child and therefore I was determined to feel what I was supposed to feel. Once Caleb was born, well, I certainly couldn’t deny that I felt something for him I had never felt for her.”
“What do you feel toward her now?”
“I don’t know. She spooks me.”
“What does that mean? Are you afraid of her?”
“We talked about it. I can’t get rid of the feeling—”
“That she was responsible for Caleb’s death. I know that, and we both know that all it is is a feeling. But let’s deal with present time. Are you afraid of her now?”
“I don’t know.”
“And I don’t know what you mean by that.”
She turned to him, unhooking her seat belt so she could face him, tucking her right foot under her left thigh. “I don’t know means I don’t know,” she said levelly. “You know the cliché about adoption, don’t you? You never know what you’re getting.”
“I’ve heard that.”
“My mother used to say don’t put money in your mouth because you never know where it’s been.”
“Everybody’s mother used to say that.”
“Well, I don’t know where the child’s been. I got her and I don’t know what I’ve got. She’s strange, dammit, and it’s not a familiar strangeness, it’s not my strangeness or David’s strangeness, it’s something uniquely hers and I don’t know what it adds up to. Am I afraid of her? God, I don’t know. I don’t know if I should be or not. Maybe she’ll murder me in my sleep. Maybe she’ll poison my food. Maybe she just gives off an evil presence, the same as that godforsaken house.” She fumbled in her bag, found a cigarette. “And maybe I’m just overreacting to Caleb’s death, and the child’s normal and innocent, and I ought to take David’s advice and lie down on Gintzler’s couch and tell him all my nice Freudian dreams.”
“Is that what you want to do?”
“No.”
“What do you want to do?”
“I want to keep on keeping on, I guess.” She plugged in the dashboard lighter, lit her cigarette when it popped out. “I want to spend as much time as possible with you in nice clean sterile anonymous motel rooms. Incidentally, I want to start paying half.”
“You don’t have to do that.”
”But I want to.” She reached into her purse again, counted out some money. He shook his head impatiently. “Then I pay for the room next time,” she said. “Agreed?”