Only an eyewitness account of a second SHC death! Go on, man, say it! Tell her about the two fire deaths clearly linked by the same doctor. Boost yourself to the skies in her estimation. Make a name for yourself in journalism…
“Ah…well…it’s a bit difficult for me to…” Jerome was appalled to hear himself begin to stammer. “I’m still organizing my notes for the Starzynski piece.”
“Still! Have you done anything about the new pictures?”
“Not yet. You see…”
“Forget about the pictures,” Anne cut in, her voice cold. “I’ll put Cordwell on to that side of it. You, my friend, have an entire page of this newspaper to fill, and you’ve got two hours in which to do it. I advise you to start writing immediately because I’m going to be watching your copy come in. And if it doesn’t come in, you needn’t come in either. Not ever. Got that?” The telephone clicked and began a complacent purring.
Jerome gave a shaky laugh as he set the phone down. His first reaction was indignation over the way Anne had spoken to him, but a moment’s reflection told him he deserved all he had got, plus a lot more. He had won the position with the Examiner on the strength of having been part-time editor of an engineering society journal, and he liked to think he brought unusual and valuable attributes to the job, but events were proving just how shallow his conceits were. Any sub-literate dolt dragged out of a pool hall would have been more useful to the newspaper than a reporter who did not report.
Why had he not simply opened his mouth and told Anne about Birkett’s death? Furthermore, what was stopping him from phoning her back and belatedly putting things right?
Jerome looked down at the telephone and experienced something close to panic as he realized that, not only was he quite incapable of picking it up, he could not face the prospect of being in range of it for the rest of the day. It was an open gateway through which anybody could invade his home, and what he needed was a period of undisturbed peace in which to pull himself together. A vision of the chalet at Parson’s Lake flickered briefly in his mind. Invitingly.
Suppressing a pang of shame, he allowed himself to consider the idea of simply running away to the country for a few days. It would be an immature and irresponsible action, one which was quite likely to cost him his job, but the lake would guarantee him the tranquillity he so desperately craved. Nobody at the office even knew about the holiday home, so there would be no interruptions, nothing to hinder his attempts to rebuild a rational model of the universe inside his head. Again the image of the low-roofed chalet appeared behind his eyes, so clearly that he could almost smell the pine forest backdrop, and before he could even admit to what was happening he was in the bedroom packing a holdall.
The task occupied little more than five minutes, but he could visualize Anne Kruger already standing by a computer terminal in the Examiner’s office, already growing impatient as she waited for his first paragraphs to appear on the screen. All at once nothing in the whole world mattered more to him than escaping from the house before the telephone rang again. He grabbed the tartan bag, strode to the front door and, pausing only to switch on the burglar alarm, went out into the noon sunshine. The avenue, with its glowing lawns and wine-coloured shingle roofs, was a picture of placid normality—except, Jerome reminded himself, any of its inhabitants might suddenly burst into flame. Anybody who had newly acquired that burden of knowledge was entitled to go into retreat for as long as he wanted. He got into his car, slinging his bag on to the seat beside him, and drove in the direction of the state highway which would take him west.
Fifteen minutes out of Whiteford he noticed that his fuel tank was registering quarter full, the level at which he always filled up again. His sense of urgency had not lessened, but old habits prevailed. He pulled into a self-service station he had used several times in the past and which derived most of its business from local farmers. There was the usual cluster of dust-streaked cars and pick-ups parked outside the adjoining lunch counter, and he could see a mechanic at work beneath a car in the maintenance bay. Nobody here was worried about abruptly torching up, burning outwards from the mouth.
Jerome got out of the car, fed a credit card into a pump and began filling his tank. He had been watching the gaseous shimmering around the nozzle for only a few seconds when he developed the uncomfortable conviction that somebody was staring at him. He turned his head and saw, some ten paces away, a man of about thirty dressed in hunting clothes. The man had a city-dweller’s pallor which contrasted oddly with his sports garb, but something about him proclaimed abundant physical strength. He continued openly staring at Jerome with an expression which suggested mild contempt.
Puzzled and irritated, wondering if he could be straying into a bad day at Black Rock situation, Jerome opened his mouth to ask what the stranger found so interesting in him. Then he thought better of it. He was no fighter, and the other man’s physical presence was strangely daunting. Trying to be casual about it, Jerome averted his gaze, but not before he had seen the man smile a derisive, pike-mouthed smile which showed only his bottom teeth. Jerome kept his eyes on the dancing ruby numerals of the pump’s register and was relieved to hear footsteps moving away in the direction of the service bay. He guessed the man had run into car trouble, was seething over the delay and was taking it out on anybody who went near him.
And if that was a psychological duel, I got whipped, Jerome thought, yearning for the seclusion of Parson’s Lake. It had never been a popular location for holiday homes, thanks to the marshy nature of the shore, and the handful of houses that did exist were likely to be empty in midweek. He had been there only once since Carla had died. On that occasion the chalet had felt unbearably lonely, but now it seemed a haven, free from horrors and petty aggressions, a place where a thinking man could contentedly spend the rest of his days. Anxious to complete the journey, he finished pumping gas, retrieved his card and got into the car. A glance at the maintenance bay showed that the disconcerting stranger was watching the mechanic at work on his car. Jerome accelerated out on to the highway, oppressed by a feeling that he had narrowly avoided serious trouble, and settled down for the rest of the sixty kilometre drive.
He made one more stop to buy groceries and reached the lake by early afternoon. The water was an expanse of pure indigo liberally sewn with sun-diamonds and, as he had hoped, there was a stillness in the air which proclaimed absence of people. He stopped the car in the small clearing beside his own chalet and got out, breathing deeply.
His rowboat was in place under its slick cover at the water’s edge, awaiting a fresh coat of varnish. That was a job he might tackle to keep his hands busy while he was getting his thoughts together. The house itself, partially hidden by feathery clumps of oleander, seemed to bid him a mute welcome and he congratulated himself on having retained it. Their insurance had fallen far short of meeting the costs of Carla’s terminal illness and after her death there had been a big temptation to let the chalet go, but now his decision to keep it was proved good. In fact, if Anne Kruger went as far as firing him and he was forced to cut back, he would incline towards selling the house in Whiteford and retiring to the country.
Already beginning to feel restored and comforted, he took his box of groceries from the trunk of the car and carried them on to the screened verandah. A raised nail made itself felt through the sole of his shoe—another homely chore to be taken care of. He opened the front door with his key, went into the hall and carried the food towards the kitchen at the rear of the house. The living room was on his right. He glanced through its open door as he went by, continued on for two more paces and stopped, frowning, as he identified what was wrong with his eidetic image of the room.