On the floor beside Michael lay the crucifix, which she had used as a club. It was cracked, straight across the stem.
She went to Michael and bent over him. His eyes were closed. His sleeve, and the arm under it, were shredded. Blood dripped down and formed in a dreadful pool beside his head. But the gesture had saved his life. The dog had gone for his throat.
He opened his eyes when she touched him.
“It’s gone,” she said quickly, feeling him stiffen under her hands as memory returned.
“Gone? How?”
“I don’t know. I hit it-with that.” She touched the crucifix. “But the last lightning flash was so violent that it stunned me for a few seconds. It hit the tree outside the window, and-” She broke off, her eyes widening with a new fear. “Michael, there’s fire out there. I can see the light. The rain is stopping, too.”
The light was only a flickering redness, but as she spoke the curtains at the window caught in a flare of flame.
“That does it,” Michael muttered, struggling to stand. “The outside of the house is soaked, but inside it’s as dry as sawdust. It will go up in a second. We’ve got to get out of here.”
“Get out!” She caught at his injured arm, heard him groan, and transferred her weight to support him as he swayed. “We can’t just walk out and leave the house to burn!”
“How can we stop it? The wood is dry with rot, and there are all these papers and books. Someone will see the flames and call the fire department. We must be away from here before anyone comes.”
“I can’t leave.”
“You aren’t afraid of-what’s out there, are you? It, or its master, will be too canny to stick around. The place will be swarming with people in five minutes. There couldn’t be a safer time for us.”
“It’s not that. I can’t leave…her.”
She was surprised to feel wetness on her face. Michael’s own face, bloodless with pain and shock, softened. They looked at the huddled body, roused to a terrible imitation of movement by the flickering light of the fire, which had seized avidly on the wooden walls.
“She’s dead,” Michael said. “There’s no doubt of that, Linda-I know. What else can you do for her? It’s purifying-fire.” He added, with a glance around the strange little room, “I know, she thought she was doing good. All the same, it seems fitting, somehow, that this should burn… Linda, please.”
His weight was heavy against her; the fact that he made no mention of his own need was the strongest appeal of all. With one last look at the still body, she turned, bracing him; as they passed through the door, the flames leaped from walls to floor. Half the room was ablaze. As they went down the passageway, Linda wondered why Andrea’s body had looked so small. Shrunken, almost, as if part of its substance had been sucked out.
One good look at Michael’s arm made Linda forget her other concerns, but he wouldn’t let her do much, except apply a bandage to stop the bleeding, and arrange a rough sling. A swig of brandy from the bottle on the table brought some of the color back to his face. It also brought him to his feet.
“Take the bottle,” he said, thrusting it at her. “Hurry. God, I can hear the fire now, it’s not raining hard enough to stop it. Let’s go, Linda.”
She lingered, looking affectionately at the old kitchen.
“I hate to see it go without making a fight to save it. The house is two hundred years old.”
“Yes, you’re a fighter, aren’t you. But pick your causes, for God’s sake. Do you want to be found here, with the house ablaze, a dead body, and signs of what the newspapers will be delighted to refer to as unholy practices? The least that can happen is that I’ll go to jail and Gordon will lock you up for the rest of your life. I can just see what his tame psychiatrists could do with this mess.”
It was brutal but effective. She turned, without another word, and started toward the door.
“Wait a minute,” Michael said. “The cats. We can’t leave them inside.”
“They can get out, through the cellar.”
“Just in case…”
Michael drew the bolts on the back door and threw it open. The rain was falling gently now, as if spent by its effort.
“Come on,” he said, and led the way to the front of the house.
II
They made it, but with only seconds to spare. As the car skidded onto the paved road and turned, they heard sirens and saw the flashing red lights of fire engines coming the other way.
Linda was driving. Michael had tried to, but the effort of turning the car in the narrow lane, which was now a bog of mud, was too much for him; he blacked out, over the wheel, with the first movement.
“Stupid,” he said hazily, as she took his place. “Too dangerous, on the highway…I hope you can drive. I forgot to ask.”
“I hope so too. It’s funny, though,” she added, nursing the wheel and the brake as the car curtsied coyly into a rut, “how it comes back to you. I drove one of my boyfriends’ jalopies through an entire Cleveland winter. Ice and snow and mud and…woops.”
He didn’t answer, either to commend her skill or to make suggestions; she knew he was fighting to stay conscious, and she did her best to avoid jolting him. When she swung onto the highway, she was conscious of an absurdly warming glow of pride. It was a long time since she had done anything for herself. Some of the dependence was inevitable when you were married to a man as wealthy as Gordon; you didn’t mend your own socks or scrub scorched pans. Even so-hadn’t Gordon overdone the servant bit? He didn’t do anything himself, except for the exercise necessary to preserve his splendid physical condition. He didn’t even drive a car; he hired the best chauffeurs that were to be had. He didn’t build a fire in the fireplace, or plant a bulb, or groom a horse. The moral value of work was a myth, of course; or was it? Surely there was a healthy feeling of satisfaction in doing some small, needed job and doing it welclass="underline" cleaning a dirty kitchen, mending a piece of broken furniture-getting a car out of a muddy back lane.
She thought Michael had lost consciousness, he was so still; but once they were on the paved road, he spoke.
“You’ve got a good, efficient fire department. There they come now. Maybe they can save the house after all.”
“I hope so. Don’t think I’m sentimental-”
“What’s wrong with being sentimental?”
“Well, this is no time for it,” she admitted. “I don’t know what you want to do now; I didn’t think about anything except getting away from there. But you’ve got to see a doctor, Michael, right away.”
“Sounds good,” Michael said.
“Doctor Gold lives down the next street,” she said, her eyes on the road.
“Isn’t he your little pal? The one I met?”
“Yes.”
“I think we’ll pass him up.”
“But, Michael, he’s the closest.”
“Too close. He’d be on the phone to Gordon before he did anything else.”
“I could stay in the car.”
“Alone? No.”
“I can’t stand knowing how much it hurts you,” she said unsteadily. The car swerved.
“Keep your eyes on the road… Don’t waste your sympathy. I am just about to pass out… Thank God.”
“There must be a doctor in the next town,” Linda said, putting her foot down.
“No, wait…”Michaelroused himself; his voice sounded miles away. “Whatever you do, don’t panic. Keep at the speed limit, we can’t risk…a wreck, or a cop. One thing to do…obvious…”
“Michael…Michael!”
“Don’t wreck the car,” he said; weak as it was, his voice was amused, and Linda was conscious of a strange constriction somewhere in the region of her diaphragm. “Don’t stop…Put a couple of dozen miles between us and the house…”