And seen herself.
God, she remembered it so clearly now! She breathed deeply, trying to come to terms with the memory, and placed her palms on the kitchen counter for support.
And then she felt it.
That sudden touch of cold air on the nape of her neck. She recognized the sensation immediately but tried to find an explanation for it. Was it a trick of the mind, touched off by her recollection of what she had seen last night? No, it was real enough. Well, could she have left the front door open on her last trip with the groceries? But she distinctly remembered kicking it shut. Of course the latch might not have engaged, and perhaps the wind—
No.
There was something behind her. Something behind her. Ariel, she thought, and as before she could feel those pale little eyes on her, touching her like cold damp hands.
But that was impossible. The music, the horrible wailing of the flute. It was going on, as loud as ever, so loud her skull was pulsing in time to it.
And now the teakettle whistled.
She made herself stand absolutely motionless. With very economical hand motions she inched upon the drawer in front of her. Her right hand slipped inside once the drawer was a couple of inches open, and she groped around until she managed to find one of the long knives and retrieve it very carefully from the drawer.
The child was upstairs playing her hellish music and someone was standing behind her. Not David. David didn’t sneak up on people.
Someone. Or something.
She tightened her grip on the knife. Please, she thought, let it be an overactive imagination. Let it be the house making me crazy, let it be the shock of Jeff’s death, let it be a reaction to too much Valium, too much excitement, too much stress, too much of everything—
The teakettle went on whistling, contending with the music of the flute. She couldn’t just stand there forever. Sooner or later she had to turn around.
She turned.
And Ariel stood framed in the doorway, her little eyes staring, her mouth open.
Roberta screamed. The teakettle whistled, the taped flute played on, and she screamed and screamed.
Twenty-four
Roberta’s funeral was held Monday afternoon. Erskine was there, of course, accompanied this time by his parents, but he and Ariel didn’t get a chance to talk. Tuesday he came to the house but there were other people around. Ariel didn’t really talk to anyone else either, although she participated in various conversations. She got through them with her mind turned to another channel.
She didn’t even write anything in her diary. The night of the funeral she read through several earlier entries before putting the book away in a drawer.
Then finally Erskine came over Thursday after school. David was home, reading a book and smoking his pipes, and he didn’t object when she asked if she and Erskine could go upstairs.
When they were in her room with the door closed they were nervous with each other at first. Erskine kept walking around, picking things up and putting them down again, and she wished he would just sit down.
“Well,” he said. “How long’ll you be out of school?”
“I’ll be back Monday.”
“So you wind up missing a week, huh? Listen, don’t sweat it. You didn’t miss anything so far.”
“I wasn’t worried.”
“They never teach anything anyway.”
“I know.”
“Tashman’s giving us a test next week. And I can get your homework assignments tomorrow so you can do them over the weekend if you want.”
“Thanks.”
“If you don’t feel like it they won’t hassle you. Veronica was in school today and they told her don’t worry about making up the work she missed.”
“How is she?”
He shrugged. “She looks all right. I don’t know if she’s really sick or not. I wish I knew one way or the other. It’s hard to have sex fantasies about someone when you think they might be dying.”
“That’s really creepy.”
“Well, I feel creepy today,” he said. “I don’t know what’s wrong. Why don’t you play the flute or something?”
“I can’t.”
“How come?”
“Not until Monday. It was the same thing when Caleb died. David says it’s a way of showing respect. I didn’t understand it about Caleb because I used to play for him all the time, but she hated my flute so I guess it makes sense.”
“I guess.”
“Even if it doesn’t, I don’t want to argue with him. We had this long conversation the other night. I think maybe he was drunk. Does your father get drunk?”
“Never.”
“David was talking louder than usual, plus he would be cheerful one minute and sad the next. It was a little weird. He talked about Roberta and he talked about God’s will, and how maybe everything was for the best. And how it’s just the two of us now and we have to take care of each other.”
“Does that mean you get stuck with all the housework?”
“We’re going to get a cleaning woman. Roberta used to have help with the heavy cleaning once a week but we’ll have someone come in every day. At least that’s what he said. I guess she’ll do the cooking, too. We haven’t had to cook anything so far. People brought tons of stuff to the house after the funeral. Plus there’s all the groceries Roberta bought the day she killed herself.”
“Oh.”
“Anyway, I don’t feel like playing music. I haven’t felt like it since she died.”
“What do you feel like doing?”
“I don’t know.”
“Do you figure they really loved each other?”
“David and Roberta? No.” She reconsidered. “He told me they did. He also said she loved me, and I know she didn’t. Or maybe she did some of the time. When she wasn’t crazy.”
“Why did she kill herself?”
“I don’t know. Why did the Funeral Game man kill his family and himself? Why do people do things like that? Because she was crazy, I guess. It was really weird.”
“What happened exactly?”
“I’ll tell you if you give me a chance. I was up in my room and I heard her come in with the groceries. And then the next thing I knew the teakettle was whistling and I came downstairs because it just went on whistling and didn’t stop. I had the tape recorder going and the teakettle wasn’t blending with it too beautifully, and I thought maybe she put the kettle on and went out again and forgot it.”
“So?”
“So I went to the kitchen and there she is standing like a statue with her back to me. And the teakettle’s screaming away like mad and old Roberta’s standing there as if she’s frozen. I didn’t know what to do. It was crazy.”
“And?”
“And just as I was ready to go turn off the kettle myself, she turned around. Except it was more like a lion or a panther springing... I mean, turning around all in one motion. And here comes the worst part. She had a knife in her hand.”
“Come on.”
“I’m not kidding. A carving knife with a blade this long.”
“Sure, and the next thing you knew she cut your head off with it. Come on, Jardell.”
“That’s what I thought she was going to do. I swear I did. That’s how she was holding it. And you never saw anything in your life like the look on her face. She was completely crazed.”
“Honest?”
“No, I’m making the whole thing up. Of course it’s honest.”
“We always talked about crazy Roberta but I never knew she was really that far gone.”
“Nobody knew. I couldn’t believe it when I saw her like that. I thought she was going to kill me.”
“What did she do?”
“She just started screaming. That’s all. Just opened her mouth and screamed her head off.”