“I’ve been trying to decide on a course of action, Mrs. Lowndes. His last few entries have a sense of immediacy. This thing is coming to a head. I suggest that you go along as though nothing had happened. When it comes to a head, I’ll be called.”
There had been something about the calmness of Dr. Wiss that gave her the strength to get through the next two days, even to forget for a few minutes at a time that she walked on the outer edge of her world.
She did the customary errands and her usual work, but she felt as though she were constructed of concealed wires and braces, with only emptiness underneath.
On the third evening, Jamie was silent at dinner. And he made no cocktails. She had meekly suggested a movie but he had not answered.
She cleared the table and he walked into the other room. But there was no rattle of newspaper. She heard his heavy tread and knew that he was pacing back and forth.
All at once the night outside was far too dark and the nearest neighbor was too far down the road. She was shocked to find that fear of Jamie had been growing in her and that now the fear was so strong that his pacing brought back a time when she had clutched Dads’ hand while they watched a tiger at the zoo, one that never stopped walking. But, of course, it was dopey to think of Jamie as a tiger. “Tiger, tiger, burning bright...” Then there was something about the fastness of the night. Or the stillness of the night. Or the silence.
The steps were louder and she knew that he had come out to the kitchen. She squeezed the plate she was drying so tight that it snapped inside the dish towel.
She turned when he yanked open the drawer near the sink.
Jamie’s mouth was always firm, but it had gone slack in a funny way. It looked moisty and was drooping as though the underlip were too heavy. He pulled out the biggest carving knife, the one that had been a wedding-present and had come with a spiked platter on which you impaled the roast.
He looked at it and she could hear the thin whir of the electric clock above the table in the booth, the drip of rain water into the cistern in the cellar, the wind that clicked the autumn branches of the maple.
He turned slowly toward her and the gray eyes were without light. His hand clapped over her wrist before she sensed that he had moved. The plate slipped and shattered into even smaller pieces on the linoleum at her feet. His hand moved down and covered hers, held it so tightly that the fingers were rigid, the nails protruding slightly between his thumb and first finger.
He yanked her hand up to his face and drew the nails down his cheek. She felt the rasp of her nails against his beard, felt the scraped flesh pack under her nails, saw the lines that were white at first turn pink, then dark red as the blood welled through the skin.
“You shouldn’t have done that, Fan,” he whispered.
He let go of her hand and she stumbled back, her hip catching the sharp corner of the cabinet.
He put one hand on the edge of the sink and held the knife against his wrist, the handle facing away from him. He brought down the blade in a gradual curve, slicing the tightly-curled hair, grating across the mesh strap of his watch, curving down across the back of his hand toward the little finger where, with a sudden twist, he sent it deep and the red blood spurted toward the sink.
She clenched her fists tight against the angle of her jaw and screamed again and again.
The blood hit the linoleum in heavy clots, but with no expression he raised his right fist after he had set the knife aside and hit her, his fist covering temple, ear and cheek, exploding the world into spinning fragments.
She knew that the screaming had stopped and she was glad because it had been too shrill. She was thinking that this was how it was to be knocked out and it was different than she had supposed because everything wasn’t black at all. It was just sort of misty and far away. She knew that she was face down, with her cheek against the coolness of linoleum, and across her lips was a strand of her hair which she wanted to blow away but couldn’t. She felt her hand picked up, her fingers were squeezed around a handle — and then the object she had touched was gone.
The coolness of the linoleum was good, and she could feel a little tremor in it which was puzzling at first and then quite clear, because of the faraway sound of footsteps.
The voice was distant also. Distant and yet excited. Hoarse.
She pushed herself up but fell over and said, “Ow!” as she hit her head against the low catch on the cupboard door. But the noise she made was lost in the diminishing growl of a siren, stopping practically right in your lap the way they did it on that mystery program.
With her back pushed up against the cupboard, then, she saw the three of them standing there. Jamie had a white face and he held his left wrist tightly, but the blood still came through his fingers.
He said, “I... I had to hit her. I was afraid she’d come out of it before you got here.”
One of the men in uniform moved toward her so quickly that it frightened her. He stopped and kicked the knife across the kitchen. It had been close to her but she hadn’t seen it.
“Jamie cut himself!” she said loudly, knowing that her voice had a funny singsong quality, like a memorized school recitation.
“Take it easy, lady,” the biggest one said.
The other one took a dish towel from the rack and tied the ends together. He slipped it up over Jamie’s arm and put a table knife through it and sat down holding the knife which was twisted in the towel. Jamie’s head sagged and his shoulders shook and his sobs were hoarse.
The two of them came to her and one of them helped her up. The big one had a funny smile. He said, “Do you think this will fit you? Try it on. I’ll bet it’s too big.”
It was a white jacket sort of thing and it didn’t look entirely clean and she did not want it on. She backed away but they took her and pushed her arms down in the sleeves. The sleeves had no place for the hands to come out but had long cords that dangled. They pulled her arms around so that she was gently hugging herself and they tied the cords at the small of her back.
“Is it necessary, Al?” the smaller one asked.
“You can’t tell about ’em,” Al replied. “Once I see a woman smaller than this one it takes four guys to hold. And the lieutenant says, ‘No chance at all.’ ”
Her head hurt and the look of the blood had made her ill. The kitchen swam slowly around and around and the glare of the lights on the sink hurt her eyes. She knew that her arms were going to go to sleep, and she wondered what you did if you stumbled with one of those things on since there would be no way to get your balance and keep from falling.
Dr. Wiss came in and she tried to say hello to him, but then she remembered that Jamie shouldn’t know that she knew him.
Dr. Wiss came over and put his hands on her shoulders and looked down into her face. There was no reason for crying but she felt the sting at the corners of her eyes.
He gently turned her around and she felt him loosen the cords.
The one called Al said angrily, “What the hell are you doing, Doc? She’s all wrapped and ready to go. You just sign the paper.”
Dr. Wiss threw the jacket at the cop and turned away from Fan. She leaned against the cabinet and rubbed her arms.
Jamie lifted his head as Dr. Wiss came over. Dr. Wiss said, “Hold out your arm.”
Jamie meekly held out his arm. The bleeding had stopped and his hand looked oddly shrunken and white. With his thumbs, Dr. Wiss gently separated the edges of the cut at several places along its length. Jamie didn’t change expression.
Dr. Wiss straightened up. He jerked a thumb at Jamie. “He’s your package, boys. Self-inflicted. The cut is the same depth all the way along. You just don’t find that kind of cut unless it was done carefully.”