Hotel Paradise (23 page)

To have Ree-Jane be the one to carry this news was utterly horrible. Anyone,
anyone
, else would have been better, even her mother, even Helene Baum. The only thing that saved me was that Ree-Jane knew nothing about the Girl, and so she couldn’t taunt me about this dead blond woman possibly being somebody important to me. Which she would have done out of jealousy that she didn’t know her, too, but even more out of plain meanness.

I held myself together and pretended I was bored until I could get away from her and out to the porch. There, I went around the corner at the very end, where I couldn’t be seen. I sat down in one of the dark green rocking chairs and cried.

The blue devils, for sure.

Finally, I wiped my eyes and took some action. I would go into town, to the courthouse, and try to get some clue as to the dead woman’s identity. I walked the two miles into La Porte, walked boldly up the courthouse steps, and stopped in the open door of the Sheriff’s office. He saw me and smiled and said hello, and so did I. That’s all I said: “Hello.”

I stood there in the doorway, frozen. I felt ice-locked. I could tell there was a lot going on, for I’d never before seen Donny, the deputy, act so busy. The Sheriff gave me a sort of quizzical look, as it was rare for me ever to show up in his office, and I suppose it was. Now, of course, if the dead person
was
the Girl, I knew that he’d want to know what I knew. But that was of no concern to me at all; I couldn’t care less if I helped out the police—not even the Sheriff, for once. All I wanted was for it
not
to be Her.

Just a couple of questions could put me out of my misery: Exactly what did she look like? What was she wearing? But I couldn’t ask these questions. I mumbled something about checking the meters and turned on my heel and left.

The next day would bring the weekly edition of the
Conservative
and more details. It would draw me like a magnet and make me want to look away, both at the same time. On my walk back to the hotel, I asked myself the important question. This question was, of course, Why did it matter so much that the dead woman might be the Girl? I reminded myself that I had seen her only three times, and each time for just seconds, and that I had never spoken to her. How did I know but that she was just a ghost only I could see? (
Just
a ghost?) I didn’t know anything at all about her. I saw her on a railroad platform in Cold Flat, and I saw her walking along Second Street in La Porte, and I saw her across the lake. The first two times she might have been doing what anyone might. But not the third time, no. For no one ever went to that old unoccupied house across the lake. No, the third time I saw the Girl was something totally different. She was somehow connected to the story of Mary-Evelyn Devereau.

So I had come back from the courthouse and the Sheriff to sit on the porch again, around the corner where no one would be likely to see me. After I wiped my face on my sleeve so I could see straight, everything had that terribly clear, icy-edged look of separateness. Each tree lining the dirt path that stretched down to the highway stood out
in stark relief instead of just blending into two blurred lines as they usually did. Each looked cut away from the background, as if separated from the sky.

Why did the world, I wonder, take on this look of separateness when bad news came my way?

I think there are people who feed on other people’s discomfort and fear, really
feed
on it, like vampires. They get their sharp little teeth into your big juicy fear and enjoy sucking away at it. And they can smell blood, too. They can follow that smell to its source—
oh, it’s you, is it?
—Sniff, sniff. Mmmm. And then
chomp!
Since people like this are completely insensitive, it always amazes me how they can sense somebody else’s trouble. I guess the technical word for this is “sadist.” When it comes to Ree-Jane Davidow, I’d use plain old “mean.”

I could not hide from this special talent of hers; that is, I could not hide my feelings. My feelings seemed to hum along electrical wires, showering visible sparks. I think there was always a slight vibration that made the air crackle when I passed through it. So perhaps I’m giving Ree-Jane too much credit for having some sixth sense when it comes to me. This misery-making talent of Ree-Jane’s was never practiced on Will, I’d noticed. But then a lot of people never did anything to Will. For one thing, he was a boy, the only male in the “family.” For another thing, he was good-looking and he was smart. They say brothers and sisters are always fighting and making life miserable for each other, but not Will and me. He played a lot of tricks on me (since I was really gullible), but we got along practically all of the time. I wondered what we would be like when we were old and gray—if I lived that long, what with Ree-Jane around.

Yet, at the same time I think I’m really good at covering up. This is a complete contradiction, but I still think it’s true. The way I turned into a Popsicle when I went into the courthouse. The Sheriff couldn’t
tell I had the blue devils; nobody could. I was cold and stiff from head to toe. My lips hardly moved. Funnily enough, this made a lot of people think I was unfeeling. So I’m back to Ree-Jane’s peculiar ability to read me, even though I do not think I’m an open book.

And that’s what she was doing the next day when I was sitting, again, on my corner of the porch, knowing that the weekly newspaper was out but too afraid to go in search of it. Well, of course, I didn’t have to, for Ree-Jane strutted out to the porch wearing one of her Heather Gay Struther outfits from the exclusive Europa boutique. My mother said Ree-Jane was spoiled by being so indulged by Lola Davidow. Heather Gay Struther was one of those who gained a lot from Mrs. Davidow’s indulgences. They would not lower themselves to shop anywhere else; they would buy only from “Heather Gay” (a big woman who wore lots of purple eyeshadow and chunks of clattering gold jewelry).

Ree-Jane smoothed out the tiny-pleated skirt of her two-piece blue silk dress. In my T-shirt and faded shorts, I was no fashion match for her. After she made a big display of her expensive dress, she then made a big display of the paper, shaking it out as if it had dustballs all over it, and she pretended then to be really surprised by the account (although it was clear she’d already read it) of the finding of the dead woman.

Before she even opened her mouth, I knew what she was up to. I knew she’d sensed in her vampire-bride way (though it was hard to imagine even a vampire marrying Ree-Jane) that I didn’t want to read it or hear about it. Even though I had not let on yesterday, not even for a second, that I minded. I had gone right away into my Popsicle mode, my face expressionless as ice, my body stiff. But she knew I didn’t want to know. Why couldn’t I run away? Just get up, say “Excuse me,” and take off? Probably for the same reason I was
capable
of becoming a robot and emptying my face of expression. You can’t be able to do that at the same time you’re screaming inside, and also be able to jump up and run away. Don’t ask me why.

So I sat there staring straight ahead at the double line of tall oak trees carved against the sky, as Ree-Jane read the story. Suzy Whitelaw (the paper’s star reporter) had written it. I knew because she’d given it a title: “The Mystery of Mirror Pond.” It made me grunt with disgust. She thought she was a big-time writer; she’d written a mystery that nobody on God’s green earth wanted to publish, although Suzy
kept hinting her “agent” was after a huge “advance.” Ree-Jane and Suzy were always yakking around about their writing, when I knew Ree-Jane had never put pen to paper since her measly little piece for the newspaper. They believed they had something in common, despite the big difference in their ages, Ree-Jane being not quite seventeen and Suzy Whitelaw being thirty or forty. A huge difference like that probably doesn’t matter when two people just want to suck up to each other.

So here I was not only having to listen to the facts, but having them come at me from someone who couldn’t write by way of someone who couldn’t read. If I had heard it from the Sheriff, see, that would have softened whatever blow was coming. At least I’d know that he wasn’t trying to give me pain just by telling me. Or even if the death could have been reported by Mr. Gumbel, in his straightforward style, that would have taken some of the awfulness away from it. But no, I had to get it in the worst possible way. I felt doomed. My whole life was like this.

Ree-Jane cleared her throat and read:

“ ‘The Mystery of Mirror Pond.’ The moonlit tranquillity of the little expanse of water by White’s Bridge known as Mirror Pond was broken on Tuesday night—”

I relaxed enough to gag. One reason was because she was reading in the most singsongy, stagy voice she could manage. Ree-Jane also wanted to be a Broadway actress.

Ree-Jane looked up over the paper, really irritated, and asked sharply, “Well? What’s wrong with that?”

“It’s not tranquil. Mirror Pond’s dirty; it has slime on top. The moon couldn’t shine on that pond, not even with one of those big emergency road flashlights.”

“Oh, for God’s sake! Don’t be so damned
literal
!” Ree-Jane loved to swear at me.

“Suzy Whitelaw’s supposed to be reporting a death. It should be literal.” I rocked; this argument was helping to reduce my fear.

“Well, what do
you
know about reporting or writing?”

“More than Suzy Whitelaw, but that’s not saying much.”

Fuming, Ree-Jane started to slide from the porch railing, saying, “Listen, do you or don’t you want me to—” She stopped.

I rocked, feeling almost happy. She stopped because she didn’t,
now, know what to do. If she marched off in a huff, she’d lost an opportunity to make me miserable. It must have been a real problem for her. Making me miserable won out, and she went on:

“—was broken on Tuesday night by the grisly discovery of the dead body of a woman as yet unidentified. When questioned, it was determined by Sheriff Sam DeGheyn that this woman was not—”

Quickly, I put in, “That’s not even good grammar. It’s a dangling modifier.”

The paper came down again. “
What
is?”

“ ‘When questioned, comma, it was determined.’ ” I wasn’t sure if it was, but Ree-Jane couldn’t contradict me, for English was my best subject; I always got A’s. Nothing was Ree-Jane’s best subject. I’m so much better in school than Ree-Jane, it’s pathetic.

So she was stuck with “Who
cares
?”

“Well, I do. I want my news brought to me by someone who can write good English.”

“You think you’re so smart!”

Smug as I felt, I winced.
“You think you’re so smart”
was something I hadn’t said since second grade. That’s what we all said then when we couldn’t think of anything really clever and cutting. “You think you’re so smart! You think you’re so smart!” I could still see me, hands on hips, leaning into the wind or the swings, yelling at Twinkie Petri, who yelled it right back at me. “Yeah? Well,
you
think you’re so smart!” And here was Ree-Jane, supposed to be going to college next year, just yelling like Twinkie Petri. I felt pretty powerful, because now she was getting mad at me and completely forgetting the newspaper account.

“All I said was, it’s a dangling modifier.” I rocked and scratched my elbows. Then I took a chance and said, “Go on.”

“Why should I? You keep interrupting with your smart-ass comments.” She sounded really shrill and must have known it, for she changed her tone. “Writing is an ART.”

Whenever Ree-Jane talks about it, I always hear the word as if I’m looking at the blinking neon sign on top of the greasy spoon between La Porte and Hebrides. The owner’s name is Arturo, and he’s an Italian, which he thinks makes his eating establishment classy, but it’s only an Italian greasy spoon. The neon sign used to spell his name, but the “URO” must have burned out, so he’s left now with
“ART.” And that flashes off and on again with the other word, “EAT,” so the sign over the cafe goes ART—
blink
—EAT—
blink
—ART—
blink
—EAT.

“You still have to punctuate and spell right,” I said, as I watched the sign blink on, off, on, off in my mind, and felt comforted.

“Oh, don’t be
stupid
! Artists are interested in great issues, like Love and Beauty and Death and . . . so forth. They don’t have to walk a line between
spelling
and
punctuation,”
said Ree-Jane, in her most sneering tone.

“Tell that to a tightrope walker.”

“Don’t be stupid!”

She was exhausting her store of insults. But I had managed to completely get her off the subject of the dead woman at Mirror Pond. I was proud of myself.

“Here’s this Tragic Death, this poor soul—”

Ree-Jane concerned with poor souls? I raised my eyebrows.

“—who might have shot herself—”

Shot herself?
I stopped rocking. If that was so, the person could not be the Girl. She would not kill herself. Why was I so certain of that? Because she was searching for something, and it wasn’t death. Don’t ask me how I knew that. My mind went back to Cold Flat Junction and that railway platform, and her sitting there, and her standing up, searching the distance up the track and down it. Standing there in her pale cotton dress and with her long, light hair, she was so . . . lit up that she seemed like the line of oaks (now beginning to melt back into their background) carved away by light from everything around her. This feeling I get when the blue devils come over me of things separating and pulling away might sound frightening. It isn’t, actually, for what I seem to be looking at then just has very sharp outlines, as if before, in my normal state, I see things a little fuzzed over, kind of all blending into one another. But when the fear comes over me, I see differently; things become separate and more themselves. It isn’t frightening; it’s a sort of comfort. But now the oaks were melting back into the sky, for I knew the danger was over. Now Ree-Jane was too taken up with her ART argument.