I Know What You Did Last Summer (8 page)

"I don't believe that," said Helen.

"What do you believe, then? Do you have an answer? All I'm
getting at is that you're the one who has the best chance of coming
up with an answer, at least until Barry's able to talk
himself."

"I can't think of anything."

"Okay, okay." He reached out and gave her chin a tap. "Keep it
up. Enjoy your coffee. I'll see you later."

He was off down the hall, and Helen pushed the door shut behind
him. It clicked into place and she turned to walk away from
it-then, slowly, she turned back and slid the bolt.

She went back into the bedroom. The sound of the lawn mower was
dimmer now; the caretaker had moved over to a yard across the way.
The sunlight had shifted slightly, and shafts of gold fell across
the rumpled bed and reached over to touch the alarm clock. On the
dresser Barry's picture reigned supreme, surrounded by a jar
of cold cream, a tube of blusher, a pallet of eye-shadow.

Helen crossed the room and opened the top drawer of the dresser.
For a moment she stood there, as though afraid to reach inside.
Then she did, and with an unsteady hand drew forth the magazine
picture of the little boy on a bicycle.

chapter 9

When school let out that afternoon, Julie found Ray waiting for
her. He was parked in the same spot that he used to park the year
before when he was a student himself, over on the far side of the
lot, away from the building.

She was not surprised to see him. Somehow she had expected to
find him there. When she came through the door, she broke away from
the stream of laughing, shoving students and turned automatically
toward that spot. She crossed to the car and opened the door, just
as she had done so many times in the year that was past, and tossed
her books inside and climbed in beside them.

"It seems funny," she said by way of greeting, "to have you
driving your dad's car."

"He's been pretty great about letting me use it," Ray said. "I
drive him down to the store in the morning, and Mom picks him up
at
night. It's odd, too, because he was plenty burned up
about my taking off like I did last fall. He couldn't understand
why I'd throw over school and go off on my own, and of course, I
couldn't do any decent job of explaining."

"What did you do with your own car?" Julie asked him. "I never
knew."

"Barry and I hammered the dent out and took it over to Hobbs and
sold it to a farmer. I took a loss, but it was worth it to be rid
of it." He started the engine. "Where do you want to go?"

"Anywhere. It doesn't matter."

"Up by the picnic place?"

"No. Not there." She answered so quickly that the three words
came out as one. "How about going to Henry's? We could get a
coke."

"You're hungry?"

"No, but we've got to go someplace. That's as good as anywhere
else."

It wasn't, as they discovered after they got there. Henry's was
having a special on banana splits, two for the price of one, and
the news had traveled quickly. The lot was almost completely
filled. Car horns honked and tooted, and waitresses raced back and
forth in a frenzy with trays in both hands. Some of the junior high
kids were climbing in and out of car windows and sitting on the
hoods and shouting back and forth, while older high school students
in other cars were yelling at them to shape up and be quiet.

"The picnic place?" Ray asked again.

Julie nodded, defeated. "I guess we don't have much choice."

They drove in silence up the curving road, and when they passed
one particular spot, Julie shut her eyes and bit down hard on her
lower lip. They continued to climb until they reached the
sign that said "Cibola National Forest--Silver Springs." Then Ray
turned the car down a narrow dirt road that led off to the left,
away from the cleared area with the tables and benches. Branches
brushed against both sides of the car, and a squirrel ran across
the road in front of them as they came to the stream and pulled to
a stop near the bank.

It was a few moments before either of them spoke.

Finally Ray said, "Well, it's still the same."

Julie nodded. The thin, silver cord of water wound its way down
from the rocks above them and disappeared below in a clump of
evergreens. A scattering of nameless yellow flowers poked their
heads from the fresh, spring earth, and beyond the trees the sky
arched in a high, rich curve of blue.

"There was a sliver of moon caught in the branches of that pine
tree," Ray said. "Remember?"

"I don't want to remember. Not anything about that night."

"Julie, you have to." He reached over to cover her hand with
his. "We've got to remember-to think- to decide together what to
do."

"Why?" Julie asked. "It's been over for almost a year now."

"No, it hasn't. Not really."

"What do you mean?"

"You can't just shove something like this under a rug and
pretend it has never been. Especially now, after what's happened to
Barry."

Julie drew her hand out from under his and folded it with her
other hand in her lap. "What happened to Barry doesn't have
anything to do with-the other. He was shot during a student
demonstration."

"No, he wasn't. There wasn't any shooting during the
demonstration last night."

"Mother thinks-" Julie began.

"Face it, honey, that demonstration was peaceful. A bunch of
kids carrying signs, that's all it was. They sat in the road
awhile, and the people who came to watch the fireworks had a hard
time getting their cars out. There wasn't any violence. Nobody even
fired a popgun."

"Let's drop it, shall we? I really don't feel like hashing
things over."

"Julie, stop it!" Ray said sternly. "We've
got
to
talk!"

"Oh, all right." She turned her face to his, and the pain in her
eyes was so deep that he was momentarily sorry that he had
forced the issue. "All right," she continued, "if you insist on
talking about that night, then, yes, there was a moon in that pine
tree. Yes, it was a beautiful picnic. Yes, we killed a little boy.
Is there anything more?"

"There's Barry."

Julie sat quiet a moment, digesting the statement. Then she said
slowly, "You think Barry was shot- deliberately-by somebody who
knew what happened?"

"By the same person who wrote you that note and sent me the
clipping."

"What clipping?" Julie asked. "I didn't know anything
about a clipping."

"I got it Saturday. It came in the mail, just the way that note
did to you. It was addressed in the same block printing."

Ray reached in his pocket and pulled out his wallet. He opened
it and took out the folded newspaper column and handed it to
Julie.

She took one glance and handed it back to him.

"I don't have to read it, Ray. I remember it-I can quote it word
for word."

"And what about Helen? Has she received anything in the
mail?"

"Not in the mail," Julie said in a small voice. "There was
something though. I talked to her Sunday. She thought Barry
might have done it, that he was playing a trick on her."

"What was it?"

"A magazine picture," Julie said. "It was taped to her door. It
happened on Saturday. According to Helen, she was sitting out by
the pool and this new fellow who has the apartment two doors down
from her came out and pulled up a chair beside her. They sat and
talked for awhile, and then Helen got worried that she might
be getting sunburned and went inside. When she got up to her room
she found that somebody had taped a picture of a boy on a bicycle
to her door. She said she thought maybe Barry had dropped over-he
had said he'd be seeing her during the weekend-and had seen
her there with another guy and thought he'd teach her a
lesson."

"That doesn't sound like Barry," Ray commented. "He plays around
enough himself so he wouldn't have any right to get jealous over
Helen."

"But Helen doesn't know that.
She
doesn't go out with
other people. Besides, not having the right to be jealous doesn't
mean that a person doesn't get that way." Julie paused. "Oh, I'll
admit it does sound pretty unlikely, but that's what Helen thought.
She told me that if Barry didn't call her by noon Monday she was
going to phone him and have it out."

"Do you suppose that was what drew him out onto the athletic
field?" Ray asked thoughtfully. "A phone call from Helen?"

"It could have been. The morning paper said he received a call
from somebody right before he left the fraternity house."

"And then he was shot. . . ."

"You don't think it was
Helen!"
Julie regarded him with
horror. "That's ridiculous! Helen worships the very ground Barry
walks on."

"Of course, I don't think Helen shot
him," Ray said.
"She wouldn't pick up a gun, much less pull a trigger, and she's
nuts about Barry. I'm just thinking out loud, trying to weigh all
sides."

"If it
was
Helen's phone call," Julie said,
"somebody else must have known about it. As you say, Barry
isn't exactly the most faithful boyfriend a girl ever had. Who
knows what might have been going on in other situations? There
could have been girls he was seeing from the University with
jealous boyfriends-we can't know. And then there's the
possibility of its being a totally unconnected accident, just
some freak on a bad trip out walking around with a gun and not even
knowing or caring who was in the sights. You read about things like
that happening."

"It's possible," Ray admitted. "But it would be a darned funny
coincidence after the things the other three of us have had sent to
us. Barry was the one who was driving that night."

"And he's the only one who didn't receive any momento of the
accident. At least, as far as we know, he didn't."

"He received a bullet," Ray said.

The words hung there between them, stark in the soft spring
sunshine.

Julie shuddered.

"All right," she said quietly, "since you insist on taking that
tack, let's suppose for a moment that the person who shot Barry is
the same person who has been sending us the notes and pictures and
clippings. It's the person who knows-or thinks he knows- about the
accident. Then why in the world has he waited so long? And why
should he do something like this when all he has to do, all he ever
had to do right from the beginning, was report us to the
police?"

"The part about waiting I can't answer." Ray shook his head.
"About the other-well, he'd have to hate us. Hate us so much that
he wants to kill us himself rather than let the authorities punish
us in some other way."

"Who could hate like that?" Julie asked shakily.

"Whoever was closest to the kid, I guess."

"His parents?"

"That figures. I know how my folks would feel, or your mom. But
then again we've got the question of the waiting. If the parents
had been able to find out somehow-and I still can't see how they
could have-why would they have waited almost a year to do something
about it?"

"And how would they have known about Helen's phone call? If it
was
Helen's phone call. We don't even know that for
sure."

"That's the one thing we can find out without any trouble," Ray
said. "All we have to do is ask her. And as soon as they start
allowing Barry to have visitors, we can find out a whole lot more.
He might even have seen the person who shot him."

"At night? On a dark field?"

"The person saw
Mm,
didn't he? There must have been
enough light to aim a gun."

"Helen's still at the studio," Julie said, glancing at her
watch. "She usually gets home around five. Let's go over there then
and see what she has to tell us."

"That's fine with me," Ray said. "We can kill half an hour here
until it's time for her to be home. Let's get out and walk along
the bank like we used to. I've thought about this place so often
during the past year. That sounds crazy, I guess-I mean, there I
was with all that California sunshine and salt-water and white
beaches, and I'd keep remembering what it was like here with the
pine smell and the stream and-and-my own girl with me."

He had pushed it too far, and he knew it. He could see Julie
stiffen.

"No," she said. "Look-give me that clipping, will you?"

"The thing about the accident?" He had put it in his wallet. Now
he got it out again, slowly, letting the wallet hang open an extra
minute so that Julie could see her own picture smiling out at them.
It was a year-old picture. She was wearing jeans and a tank shirt.
Her hair hung loose and bouncy, and her eyes were crinkled up with
laughter.

Now, as he handed her the clipping, Ray realized with a start
how much her eyes had changed since the taking of that picture.
There was no hint of laughter in them now. They were eyes that had
not laughed in a long time.

Julie took the article, careful not to brush Ray's hand with
hers, and smoothed it flat.

". . . son of Mr. and Mrs. Michael Gregg," she read aloud, "of
1278 Morningside Road Northeast. That's near here, Ray. It's one of
those little roads just south of the spot where we had the
accident."

"I guess it is if the boy was riding home from a friend's
house."

"Ray-" She drew a long breath. "I want to go there."

"Where?"

"To his house."

"Are you crazy?" Ray asked incredulously. "What would you want
to do a sick thing like that for?"

"It's no sicker than it was to come up here. You're the one who
keeps saying that we've got to face it and relive it and figure out
what it is that's happening. If we're going to do that, I
think we ought to see his house and talk with his parents."

"Talk with his parents!"
Ray was sure he was not
hearing her correctly. "You mean we should just go up and ring the
doorbell and say, 'We're two of the people who were in the car that
ran down your son and we want to interview you and see how you feel
about it?' You're out of your everlovin' mind!"