“O Lord, deliver her from dreadful weeping and wailing, through thine admirable conception!”
A sudden hum of rising voices and a shuffling of footsteps forced Janice to open her eyes. Everybody was standing, watching the screens, pressing forward to get a better view of the picture, which, Janice saw, had lost the images of Ivy and Dr. Lipscomb, though their voices, rising in opposition, were clearly heard.
“Mommydaddy mommydaddy daddydaddy hothothot!”
“One … two … three.…”
Janice took a deep breath, knowing that they must be at the window now, out of camera range.
A wailing shriek coming through the speakers, half of pain, half of horror, started the exodus from the recreation hall as the reporters gave up on the TV and hurried to the stairway.
Janice rose. It was time for her to go, too. She would neither hurry nor linger but descend the three floors at a normal rate of speed. It would take her just under two minutes to get there. She had timed it earlier. By then it would be over.
In the observation booth, all eyes clung to the scene being played just beyond the length of the glass—
—The figure of the child, blurred, ethereal, rushing back and forth across the length of the glass—
—Her hands beckoning toward it, withdrawing, weeping, “hothothothot—”
—The doctor, “… four … five! Awaken, Ivy!” moving toward her, reaching out—
—The child screaming, struggling violently, furiously, eluding him—
—Her face wild, her breathing heavy, her eyes reflecting coruscating glints of panic, her senses sharpened now by the encroaching peril—
—Her fists balled into hard knots, mustering the energy of despair—
“It was just horrible. I could still see the little girl screaming and beating her hands against the window.…”
—Pounding the glass and sobbing, “Hothothothothot!”
“I could see her through the flames as the car was melting all around the window.…”
—A loud, shrill scream bursting suddenly from her throat, causing the line of jurors at the glass to jerk back in their chairs—
—“You will obey me, Ivy!”—
—Hoover shouting shudderingly, “AUDREY ROSE.”
—“One … two.…?—
—“They can’t hear you,” Velie explaining. “Room’s soundproof.”—
—“three … four.…”—
—Langley watching open-mouthed—his mind refusing to comprehend what was happening—
“… five! Awaken, Ivy!”—
—“AUDREY ROSE!”—
—Panting, gasping for breath, helpless prey to a whirl of emotions beyond her control, clawing, beating against the glass, screaming, “Daddydaddydaddyhothothot!”—
—Hoover shouting, “I’m here!” and plunging over chairs and bodies, stumbling down to the window—
—The guard withdrawing his revolver, indecisively—
—Velie shouting, “Put it away, Tim!” decisively—
—“Daddydaddydaddy!”—
—Hoover’s body splayed against the glass, hands outstretched—
—“Hothothothot!”—
“… she screamed and screamed and tried to get out of the car.…”—
—Bill frozen, staring mutely, a crazed and awful guilt in his eyes—
—“… and kept beating her hands against the window.…”—
—“HOTHOTHOT!”—
—Dr. Lipscomb, grim-faced in defeat, speaking up at the mirror. “I’ll have to give her a sedative. Your Honor,” then hurrying in helpless frustration to his medical bag—
—“Hothothot … Daddy … hot … hot.…”—
—Her voice, scarcely sane, growing feeble, the pallor of her face reddening, taking on a ghastly hue—
—“Hot … hot … hot.…”—
—Coughing, choking, the words dying in her throat—
—“… hot.…”—
—Clutching her throat, collapsing to her knees, her eyes disappearing upward into her head—
—Mrs. Carbone shrieking, “Oh, God, she’s dying!” extending her arms to the suffering child struggling to survive on the other side of the glass. “She’s choking to death!” rising, pleading. “Somebody help her! SHE’S DYING!”—
—“DADDY-EEEEE!” the agony in her soul bursting forth in one long and final scream of anguish—
—Mrs. Carbone shouting at Hoover, pummeling his arm, “You’re her father! Help her! HELP HER!”—
—Hoover turning to his assailant, eyes widening, body tensing, his movements measured, deliberate, seizing Mrs. Carbone’s chair and, with a sharp cry, “AUDREY!” swinging it in a powerful arc against the far end of the glass, shattering it into a hailstorm of shimmering splinters—
The corridor outside the observation theater was clogged with reporters. Two tight-lipped Connecticut highway patrolmen stood guard before the closed door, indifferent to the litany of questions battering them from all sides.
“Please let me through,” Janice asked at the outer fringes of the gathering.
Upon seeing who she was, a hush fell in a gradual wave across the assembled group, and a path was cleared for her.
“She’s the child’s mother,” someone informed the patrolmen, who immediately opened the door just wide enough for her slim body to slip through.
The dimly lit room enveloped her in its suffocating closeness, offering her its quiet murmurings and air of deep, unredeemable gloom.
The floor was gritty with powdered glass, causing her footsteps to announce her presence as she slowly approached the men and women gathered in a semicircle, their bodies shielding an object of intense concern from her view. They were faces she had come to know welclass="underline" Scott Velie, Brice Mack, Judge Langley, the court clerk (she never did know his name), Hoover’s guard (Finchley or Findley, she had once read), the twelve jurors, each face reflecting sensations of sadness, awe, and disbelief. Mrs. Carbone weeping into a handkerchief, people from the courtroom, people from the hospital, the three psychiatrists standing shoulder to shoulder, ludicrously, Janice thought, seeing no evil, hearing no evil, speaking no evil. And Bill—finally Bill—alone in the observation booth, sitting with his back pressed against the wall, dramatically framed by jagged splinters of glass, staring sightless into space, shaking his head from side to side as people whose burdens in life are too great often do.
“Mrs. Templeton—” The gentle hand, the kindly voice were Dr. Webster’s. His expression combined disillusion and grief equally. His stethoscope, still in place around his neck, glittered like a jewel. “It … it happened so fast … we tried … I can’t tell you how.…” His voice faltered, the words too painful to express.
Heads turned. A channel parted. Janice pushed through and for a panicked moment felt her breath stop, saw a wavering opaqueness begin to draw across her vision.
Someone’s hand gripped her arm. Steadied her. Forced her back to consciousness. Forced her to look down toward the floor at her child, at her own sweet Ivy, lying now so still and breathless in the arms of Elliot Hoover. Her eyes were open, reflecting a luster that seemed to radiate life; her pale lips were slightly parted, as if about to speak.
But it was Hoover who spoke for her.
“It’s all right,” he said, rocking the body gently back and forth in his arms. “She’s at peace now.” His voice was depleted, yet tranquil, and strangely reassuring. Looking up at Janice, and in the half-light, his face seemed worn, scarred by the marks of a long and grueling battle, yet at peace.
“It’s all right now,” he repeated, offering her the strength and comfort of his belief like a legacy from God to His beleaguered children, lending the words an emphasis and finality of a conviction so powerful as to be indisputable, while clutching the still and lifeless form of—