The words, "Lock the door," had such a chilling effect on Bill. It was her voice, her pitch and tone, yet it wasn't. Those words, "Lock the door," fairly dripped with lewdness, suggesting a lot to him. He kept his smile as he said, "Why?"
Beth slid down on the hospital bed, her breasts launching high and the nipples stabbing through the plain-white cotton. The hospital gown slid up to her hips as she lay down on the bed and Bill saw the delicious curve of one buttock as she looked at him with an intensity that made him uneasy. "I don't want anyone disturbing us."
He didn't really know why he did it, but he went to the door and locked it. Perhaps he did it out of propriety. What if one of the nurses should come in and see her lying like that? Lying there so provocative and tempting? He turned from the door and swallowed hard. Beth was lying spread-eagle on the bed, her shoulders free from the gown and it half covered her breasts. He stood looking at her breasts with the gown barely covering her nipples. The voluptuous swellings of her breasts like two mounds of honey, made him lick his lips.
Her long legs that tapered beautifully and curving all the way down to her toes. More than her thighs were exposed. One whole side; her hip, her waist all the way up to her globular breast was exposed to him with just a corner of the hospital gown flung over her upraised pubic mound. Standing by the door, he could see dark curling little phobic hairs peeking out from under the gown.
And she began to grind and pump her hips in a lewd way, looking at him with a smoldering look. She gyrated and pumped her hips as if she were trying to work that corner of cloth off her crotch without using her hands. "Come here," she whispered.
"Beth," he said, coming toward her, "are you sure you're okay? Do you have a fever?"
"Fever?" she murmured. She looked at him for a minute with her eyes widening before she laughed and said, "Do I have a fever? Oh, if you only knew!"
"Beth, this isn't like you'
"Yes it is!" she said vehemently, stiffening in the bed. "This is what I'm really like. Bill, do you really love me?"
"Well, sure, of course I do. I didn't come out here for the scenery." Something was very wrong. She talked faster than she ever did before, spitting the words out and there was a strange harsh tone to her laugh.
"Then get in bed with me!" she said, whipping the gown away and lying there naked, brazen, her legs spread and her cunt with its ragged vaginal lips spread invitingly. He couldn't help himself, he stepped back. "Beth, what on earth has happened to you?"
She caught his worried tone and a contemptuous look came on her face. "Plenty! How long have I been gone?"
Her tone demanded he answer. "A little over three weeks from the time you left New York City."
"Wrong!" She laughed at him. "I've been gone three years or thirty years." She looked at him with wide eyes. "You don't know what I'm talking about, do you? I've been gone a long, long time. I'm not the same person I was then. Come to bed with me!" she said, holding out her arms.
Bill looked dubious, rubbing his jaw, trying not to look at her writhing naked form on the bed. She was so beautiful and tempting and he thought, for a second, of taking her up and crawling into bed with her.
He walked to the bed, looking down at the floor, not looking at her. Her hands were out, caressing his thighs and a lewd chuckle was heard in her throat. Her hands were stroking his thigh, drawing closer and closer to his groin and he felt his cock growing hard in his pants. He wanted her badly. His hand reached out and picked up the telephone. "Desk? Hello? I want the nurse on duty."
"What are you doing?" Beth asked, her eyes narrowing, sitting up.
Bill put his hand over the phone. "You're ill, Beth, something is wrong."
"Wrong? Wrong?" she asked, her voice rising, "I'll tell you what's wrong! You're wrong! You are so wrong! You are a wrong one! I hate you!"
Bill was stunned by the force and fury of her words and intentions. Never had he dreamed Beth could or would act in such a way as she was now. He had to struggle with her, restraining her from attacking him; only now it wasn't sex, it was hate and she wanted to hurt him. He had a rough time restraining her and getting her under the covers and unlocking the door so that the nurse could help too. A doctor was finally summoned and she was given another injection of a heavy tranquilizer.
Outside her room, in the hall, he was consoled by the doctor who was an older man, near sixty and ready to retire. His tanned and lined face had seen all kinds of heartbreak and disaster and he put his arm around Bill and tried to ease his burden. "Look, she'll sleep the rest of the day and there's no sense in you hanging around and brooding. No sense at all. Get out, eat a good meal and take a drive out in the desert. Do something. That girl of yours had a shock, a big shock, see? And she hasn't come out of it yet, not by a wide margin. Time, gotta give her time."
"But it's just not like Beth."
"I know. I believe you. You believe in time. She'll tell us what's bothering her when she's good and ready. Trust me."
The doctor watched Bill walk dejectedly down the corridor and out of sight. He shook his head. If he had the courage, he'd tell that young man to get in his car and drive as far away from Beth Carruthers as possible and for get about her. He, the doctor, had given Beth a thorough physical examination when she was brought into the hospital. Putting things together, he got a pretty graphic picture of what had caused Beth to crack up. Experience told him to keep his thoughts to himself until Beth herself said something.
She never did, so why should he? How do you tell someone like Bill that the girl he wants to marry has been involved in some kind of no-holds-barred orgy? He grunted and went about his duties. The answer was obvious: you don't. You keep your mouth shut and do your job and wait out the few years left until you could get up in the mountains were things made sense and the air was clean and the fish rising to the bait.
The day passed without incident. Bill was having dinner in a restaurant that night prior to going to the hospital when he got a phone call. It was from the doctor.
Although none of them knew it about the other, Bill, Wilma Gans, Lonny Lamont, and Sheriff Lucas Lamont all got phone calls at the approximate same time. Bill's call was from the doctor. "Is Beth with you?"
"What!" Bill swallowed. "She's at the hospital!"
"No she isn't. The nurse, making her rounds, found her bed empty. I was kind of hoping she might be looking for you."
"Oh, God!"
"Don't panic. Near as we can tell, she couldn't be gone over two hours. Have any idea where she would go?"
"The camper! Is there a black and white Econoline camper parked in the lot?"
"Wait!" The phone was rattled down and Bill could hear footsteps fading from the phone then coming back. "Hello? No, there's no camper there."
"Then she's got it. The keys were under the floor mat. She's got the camper and God where she's going."
There was a pause before the doctor, in a calm voice, said, "Unless you've got a very good idea where she is, I've got to notify the police."
Thus it was that the authorities were notified to be on the lookout for Beth Carruthers and Sheriff Lucas Lamont saw the teletype and grunted. Wilma got a call from Beth and left home, driving Judd's pickup. Judd was again out in the fields for the night. Sheriff Lucas got Beth's call, Lonny himself, not recognizing her voice. He turned the call over to Lonny without a thought and paid little attention to it.
And thus it was that so many people turned their time and attention to the task of getting together with Beth Carruthers. And thus it was that Lonny rode with Beth up to the hippy commune while Wilma traveled in Judd's pickup while Lucas and his deputy patrolled the highway and side roads in search of Beth's camper while Bill drove the highway for fifty miles in one direction before turning around and driving all the way back. Always looking, looking.