“Oh, be quiet,” Paula said angrily and sat up and wiped off her tears with a handkerchief. “If I’m disturbing you, I’ll go some place else. I’ll go downstairs.”
“You can’t. Mr. Goodwin is sleeping down there.”
Paula rolled off the bed. Like the others, she had not undressed and she looked very funny standing there dressed for skiing, her hair tousled and her eyes red from crying. Mrs. Vista began to laugh, holding her sides and rocking back and forth on the bed. Her laughter was punctuated by the banging of the radiator and the snores of Crawford coming from the next room.
Paula sat down again on the bed and tapped the floor with her foot. Mrs. Vista stopped laughing and said, “What time is it?”
“Midnight,” Paula said shortly.
“What were you making all that fuss about?”
“Nothing. Homesick, I guess.”
“Well, you didn’t come here alone. Your cross young man...”
“He’s not my young man. I’ve just known him since we were children. We’re just friends.”
Her eyes flickered, and even Mrs. Vista, who was no observer of human nature not her own, decided she was lying.
Paula rose and yawned. “I think I’ll have that dash of cold water now. I have to take the lamp with me.”
“Don’t be long,” Mrs. Vista said. “And close the door behind you.”
Paula went out with the lamp. She was too engrossed in her own troubles to be nervous about the dark or to remember the dead cat.
She opened the bathroom door and went in. A trickle of pinkish brown water escaped from the tap. She dashed some on her face and dried it off with her last clean handkerchief.
She had her hand on the knob to go out again when she heard a faint scream. It seemed to come from nowhere. It was just there, like the howling of the wind, and then it was gone again.
Though it lasted only a second and was barely audible above the other noises, the scream was full of terror. It seemed to be torn from a throat that wouldn’t scream again.
Her legs shaking, Paula walked quickly out into the hall. The doors were all shut, the house undisturbed and dark. No one else heard it, Paula thought. Perhaps I imagined it, or it was an animal outside...?
But she knew she had not imagined it when she went back to her room and found Mrs. Vista standing at the window, her face pale with fright.
“Did you hear it?” Mrs. Vista whispered huskily. “Did you hear someone scream?”
Paula nodded wordlessly.
“Someone died,” Mrs. Vista said, putting her hand over her shaking mouth. “I feel it. I feel that someone is dead.”
6
“I feel it,” Mrs. Vista said again, while Crawford’s snoring rose to a crescendo and died into an echo. “We’d better wake him up. Rap on his door.”
“You come with me,” Paula said.
For a full minute neither of them moved. Then Paula took a long breath. “Are you coming? Someone’s life may be in danger.”
She walked out and Mrs. Vista, trembling inside her huge coat, followed her.
Paula rapped on Crawford’s door. Almost instantly the snoring ceased and a sharp alert voice called out, “Who’s there?”
“Open the door,” Paula said.
When Crawford came to the door he was wearing his overcoat and one hand rested in his pocket. His hair was tangled from sleeping but his eyes were wide awake and bright.
“What’s up?” he said.
“We heard a scream,” Paula said. “Someone screamed and we don’t know what to do about it. We thought — we thought perhaps you could...” She stopped because Crawford was looking at her with such a dry, unconvinced smile.
“Yeah?” he said.
“We both heard it separately,” Mrs. Vista said shrilly. “If you don’t intend to do something I’ll wake the others.”
She opened her mouth and began to shriek. “Help! Help! Murder!”
Crawford was too late in putting his hand across her mouth. He cursed at her softly when the doors started to open along the hall.
Mrs. Vista took a deep breath, put her hands on Crawford’s chest, and pushed. Crawford landed ungracefully on one hip. There was a sharp clink of metal as he hit the floor.
He picked himself up, wincing. He said, “You bitch,” so Mrs. Vista began to shriek again and the hall came alive with lamps and people and resounded with the screams of Maudie and Mrs. Vista, and the roar of Miss Rudd pounding on the locked door.
Mr. Goodwin came leaping up the stairs like an overgrown gazelle, for he had recognized Mrs. Vista’s voice, and poet or no poet he knew a good thing when he saw it and fifty thousand dollars a year must not perish. When he saw that Mrs. Vista was not perishing he decided to go back downstairs. But it was too late. Mrs. Vista had spied him and was flinging herself at him. Since Mrs. Vista weighed nearly two hundred pounds, Mr. Goodwin wisely propped himself against the brass banister railing and closed his eyes.
The impact came. Mr. Goodwin fancied he heard the crunch of bone. “There goes a vertebra,” he muttered, and patted Mrs. Vista’s shoulder.
The tumult gradually died down except for Miss Rudd’s pounding, and Paula was able to explain what she had heard.
“But we’re all here,” Isobel said in a puzzled voice. “Nothing happened to any of us. We’re all here.”
“Except,” Mr. Hunter said, “Floraine.”
There was an uncomfortable silence. Then Isobel said, “Nothing could happen to Floraine. I mean, she’s probably in Miss Rudd’s room.”
“That’s easy to find out,” Gracie said. “Just go in and look.”
“She’s locked in.”
“We could smash in the door,” said Herbert, who liked the idea since it was always being done in the stories he read.
“The doors are oak,” Mr. Hunter said.
“Well, pick the lock,” Gracie said with a shrug. “Or yell. Yell Floraine. Like this. Floraine!”
Miss Rudd also began to yell “Floraine!” evidently with a great deal of enjoyment.
After a couple of minutes of this Crawford went to the door and snarled, “Shut up in there!” Then he took out a pocket knife and pried at the lock.
The door swung open and revealed Miss Rudd in her grey flannel nightgown holding a chair over her head.
“Put that down,” Crawford said.
Miss Rudd said nothing, but glared at him balefully.
“Put it down. I won’t hurt you. I want to find Floraine.”
The chair started to descend. Crawford stepped back and the chair crashed at his feet. He thrust the door shut and held his hands against it.
“She’s strong as hell,” he said through clenched teeth. “Somebody help me. Hunter. Put your back against it while I slip the lock back.”
Mr. Hunter did as he was told. Crawford said, “The rest of you, get the hell back to your rooms.”
The hall began to empty. Only Isobel remained, as if her feet were too heavy to move. She heard the lock slip back in place and felt herself trembling with relief.
Crawford turned from the door and saw her. “What are you doing here?”
“Admiring your versatility,” Isobel said evenly. “And waiting to see Floraine.”
Crawford smiled slightly. “I’d like to see her myself. I don’t get along well with Miss Rudd.”
Mr. Hunter said, “It’s very queer she didn’t hear this racket if she’s around. You don’t think she’s had an accident?”
“I intend to find out,” Isobel said.
“Because a couple of women imagined a scream?” Crawford said. “Go ahead and find out then. Search the house.”
“If we’d had any men around with any courage we’d have searched it some time ago,” Isobel said. “And if it’s of any interest to you, Mr. Crawford, I already have done a little searching.”