My wife read my own face. She knows I’m inclined to take things hard.
“Why don’t you take a little ride up to Lake Inn and talk to Dr. Rennie?” she asked.
That was what I’d been aching to do. “He’s asleep,” I snapped.
“From what you told me when you got home, I should think he might be awake,” she said, pounding her pillow.
“I’ll wait till morning,” I said. Morning? Then I knew she was right, as usual. If I stayed in the bedroom seeing Johanna Welch’s face I’d go screwier than Gerald O’Moore. I climbed into my pants in a hurry.
It was cloudy gray dawn outside, just the color of the taste in my mouth, but the cooler air felt good.
Before I knew it, the car was taking the hill road to the Welch place. I pulled up there and lit a cigarette. There was a man on the porch, feet on the railing. He got up and came down the walk.
It was Hi Fillmore. He looked all of fifty now. I remembered he’d been in the last war, overseas. Hi’s square-built; not a bad-looking guy, even with those thick glasses on. But all I could see was a suspect. I wondered if he’d been shell-shocked in France.
Hi put a foot on the running board.
“I heard about O’Moore,” he said. “Ed, when I think he thought it was Julie... God, suppose it had been Julie!” His eyes told me he’d been having the same kind of horrors that I had. “I’m going to marry Julie right after the funeral and take her away from here for a long while,” he said suddenly.
He’d got all the blood off his hands and clothes, I noticed.
“Can Julie talk yet?” I asked.
“Good Lord, no!” The mere idea seemed to excite him. “She passed right from that faint into sleep; been asleep ever since. Ma Thoroughgood’s here, you know.” He put a white hand on my shoulder. “Ed, you mustn’t think of worrying Julie. After all, O’Moore’s dead and it’s all over.”
“I’ll be around later, then,” I said, starting the engine. He stepped back, wondering at my tone. I couldn’t tell, myself, why I’d been short with him.
I took the Lake Road, just in case.
My wife had been right. There was a light in Doc Rennie’s room.
The night clerk at the Inn, Timmons, knows me well. He said: “Glad to hear you got that Welch thing settled up, Ed.”
He looked surprised when I snorted at him. I said: “Doc Rennie all right?”
He rallied and grinned. “Busy as a bird dog.”
“Busy?”
“On the phone. Trailing some guy named Tilling — Dr. Tilling — all over everywhere. Ran him down at some vacation place in Vermont about an hour ago. And when he got him, boy did they talk! About thirty-eight dollars’ worth. Wait’ll Doc gets the bill for—”
But I was racing up the stairs. Maybe Doc Rennie had something, although what he could get on a case in Essexville by calling a Dr. Tilling in Vermont I couldn’t see.
Doc Rennie’s door opened as I reached for the knob.
“Thought that might be you, Ed.” From his face, his night had been a thousand times worse than mine. Not just from his ankle, either. He’d been seeing things, too, and from the look behind those blue eyes, he’d seen something worse than I had, something that had nearly taken him to pieces inside.
“Why aren’t you in bed?” was all I could think of to say. He had all his clothes on, even his topcoat. I glanced past him around the room. Every ashtray was full.
He pulled his old felt fishing hat down over his red hair and slipped a black leather case into his topcoat pocket.
“Come on,” he said. “Now’s as good a time as any. We may as well get this thing over with.”
“But what in—” I began.
“Ed,” he said, “you wouldn’t believe me if I told you. I won’t believe it myself until I see it. If I told you what I think you’d swear I was sicker than my sickest patient. Now come on.”
I hardly thought he’d try to mystify me just for effect at a time like this, but I couldn’t help feeling a little sore at being left out in the cold. After all, the case was my job, not his.
“Better get Fillmore and take him over to the Welch place with us,” he said, after he had tucked his bad ankle into the front seat. The morning air had brought a little of the color back to his face, but the hollows were still deep around the eyes and his hands were anything but steady.
“He’s over there already,” I said shortly, and we tooled off. This time I drove slow, on account of his ankle.
He spoke only once on the way over, and that was when we were in sight of the house. “Those two girls — what they’ve been through,” he said, and there was thick pity in his voice. “Ed, if we can save anything at all from this wreck we’ll be putting stars in our crown.”
So tired he’s addled, I thought. But when I stopped the car, and he got out, I could see him getting a grip on himself. His square chin came up and his eyes narrowed as Fillmore hurried down the walk a second time. His voice, as he spoke to Fillmore, was crisp and firm.
Hi Fillmore glanced at the watch on his wrist. The day was orange now, and in another fifteen minutes yellow sunlight would be flooding Maple Road.
“We’re going up to talk to Miss Julie,” said Doc Rennie. “You’d better come along.”
Hi’s jaw dropped. “You can’t possibly do that,” he said. Then, angrily, “Why, the poor kid’s asleep, and after what she went through last night—”
“We’ll be the judges of that.” Doc Rennie’s tone was sharp and irritable. His face gave me the answer. He’d nerved himself to do something he didn’t want to do, and he knew that the longer he put it off the harder it’d be to do. He started up the path, crutches thumping the flagstones, swinging the casted ankle wide. Hi’s mouth was tight with anger.
Ma Thoroughgood had heard us. She was at the top of the second-floor stairs, gray hair straggling, nose quivering, teeth out. She came down when Doc Rennie crooked his forefinger. She was mad at being waked up and started to give us a blast of the temper that’s made Ben Thoroughgood’s life hell, but Doc Rennie shut her up quick.
“Mrs. Thoroughgood.” he said, “the sheriff wants you to go upstairs and awaken Miss Welch at once. Get her into a dressing gown or something. Then come to the top of the stairs and nod.”
“I’ll do no such-a thing,” spluttered Ma Thoroughgood, indignant as all hell, for which I couldn’t blame her. She looked at me.
“Do what he says. Ma,” I told her. She raged off up the stairs. She must’ve had some trouble waking Julie, because it was a good five minutes before she came out and nodded down to us like a thundercloud.
When Doc Rennie started up the stairs, Hi Fillmore tapped my arm.
“You bully Julie,” he said evenly, “and the Daily Farmer’ll run you out of this county, Ed McKay — for good.” Doc Rennie turned and beckoned. He meant both of us. I was so furious at Doc for taking such a high hand — and with no real excuse for it, since eight o’clock or ten o’clock would have done just as well — that I took it out on Hi. The fat was in the fire anyhow. My hand closed around his wrist.
“You’ll come up and do like I say,” I said into his ear, “or you won’t get out any paper tomorrow. You’ll be in jail.”
Doc Rennie faced Ma Thoroughgood’s pouting face. “Which room?” he asked.
It’s a wonder her eyes didn’t sear him. She pointed to a door.
Doc Rennie eased the door open a handsbreadth. Julie Welch, dark hair tumbling down over her shoulders, was sitting on the edge of the bed, hands rubbing her cheeks slowly. We couldn’t see her from that angle — just her reflection in the mirror.