Time Out of Mind (70 page)
Authors: John R. Maxim
Tags: #Horror, #General, #Psychological, #Suspense, #Memory, #Thrillers, #Fiction, #Time Travel
“
Nothing” she answered, wide-eyed.
“
If you're toying with Jonathan ...”
“
I'm hardly
toying,
Uncle Harry. I'm trying to help
him.”
“
You helped him yesterday,” he reminded her, “by giv
ing him a drug whose effect you could not possibly pre
dict.”
Gwen swallowed but did not otherwise react.
“
And today, here you are in what was apparently Laura
Hemmings's house and you are dressed, I presume, to re
semble Laura Hemmings, a woman who seems to have an
tagonized Jonathan in some way.”
”
I
did
help him,” she said stubbornly. “He knows those t
hings he saw were real now. He knows he's not crazy. And he's not afraid of the snow anymore.”
Sturdevant waved that off. “You are playing a very reck
less game with a man who, whether you choose to face it or not, may still be dangerously deluded.”
“
He is not deluded,” she said sharply.
“
Did you see his face just before you left the library?” he asked. ”I won't pretend I know why, but he looked for
all the world like a man who had a few scores to settle.”
“
How would
you
feel, for Pete's sake? In less than
twenty-four hours he found out that Tilden Beckwith was practically his father and that the woman who was practically his mother was badgered out of New York and eventually even out of Greenwich by people who simply would
not allow them to be happy.”
“
Happiness!” Sturdevant snorted. ”I have a feeling
there's far more at stake than that. This is not an episode of ‘As the World Turns.’”
His niece's eyes went flat. “That was patronizing, Uncle
Harry.”
Harry Sturdevant turned toward the window, staring out
at nothing in particular. A plow rattled by, its blade still
up. But no sign of the car Cora described or of his friend
from the library.
”
I think I'd better clear the driveway entrance before it
gets much worse or freezes.” He picked up his coat.
“
You shouldn't be shoveling snow.”
“
At my age, you mean?”
“
Gotcha.” She punched him.
surrender as he
crossed to the door. He stopped there and
turned.
“
These old scores I mentioned,” he said gently, “If I'm
right about them, and Jonathan intends to settle up with the
Beckwiths, he is going to find himself in serious trouble.” He waited for a long moment before finishing his thought.
“But if, God forbid, he intends to settle with people who
are no longer living, I assume it's clear to you that Jonathan
is in deeper trouble than either of us imagined.”
bank Avenue. Corbin chose that route down a long,curving
hill toward the railroad station. It was the way Tilden would have gone. Milbank Avenue was a good carriage road then,
kept well combed and swept because several merchants
who had built new houses along it were also members of
the Greenwich town council.
Corbin was pleased with himself. It was snowing hard
and he was walking in it. The houses, although the newer
ones seemed dimmer than the older buildings, remained
solid. Cars remained cars; they did not fade into sleighs and
wagons. If he looked along the street in a certain way he
could still see it as it probably once was, but he felt content that these were Tilden's memories and not his own. At one
point, a few blocks down, he answered a friendly wave
from a man who was no longer there by the time Corbin
raised his arm. He felt none of the old terror. Corbin fully
understood now that the things he saw were real, or had
been once to Tilden. They could not hurt him. They could
not entrap him in another time. It was not altogether unlike going back to the places of his own boyhood and seeing in his mind, but almost with his eye, the events that happened
then. There I am hitting a three-run homer in my first Little
League game. There I am walking that high tree limb on a
dare. There I am in my fistfight with Mike McConnell and him being the first to quit but both of us getting suspended for it. See? he thought. Anyone can see the past. It seemed almost natural. Even if Corbin had known about the tran
quilizing drug Gwen had twice slipped into his drinks, he
would not have given the drug full credit. He was in Green
wich, and he was walking in the snow without fear. Why
shouldn't he feel good?
deed thoughts of scores that should have been settled. But
again, these were Tilden's thoughts. And they were old
scores. Too old to matter now. Corbin pushed them far back
in his mind. Some were already more distant than others.
The hated Ansel Carling was barely a shadow, far away.
Except that the effect of Carling's seedy little seduction
seemed to go on no end, the man himself no longer mattered.
Anyway, Corbin had an idea that he'd come to some
terrible end down in Texas. He wasn't sure what. Tilden probably knew, but Corbin was not inclined to start any
thing by asking. Carling was done with and that was
enough. So was Colonel Mann, at least in terms of any
future mischief he might have done. Thanks to Billy
O'Gorman. And to Tilden's friends.
found himself thinking how lucky Tilden was to have such
friends. Corbin really didn't have any, at least at the mo
ment. There was Gwen, of course. But that was different.
Gwen was as good a friend as anyone could have, and very
much more, but that wasn't the same as having buddies
like John Flood and Nat Goodwin, and especially Teddy
Roosevelt, and even Georgiana Hastíngs, who would stand
up with you no matter how the breaks were going. Yeah.
But wait a minute. The fact is you have just as many
friends. Good ones. Come to think of it, several are athletes
like Flood, one is an actor, and another one ran for Con
gress last year. Offhand, there isn't anyone who runs a
brothel, but three out of four isn't bad. The real difference between you and Tilden is that Tilden wouldn't have gone
the past five or six months as you have, not returning calls, not even Christmas cards, and burying yourself in your of
fice all week and out here every weekend. And being so
sullen and distant all the time. You're getting like Gould.
Anger.
Corbin felt the surge.
Tilden's anger.
He tried to push it away.
back tears, and he saw little Laura Hemmings reaching up
to dab them with a handkerchief and telling her to smile and not let Tilden see her this way.
Corbin stopped. He bent to pick up a handful of snow
and rubbed it across his face. “What good is this?” he
asked aloud.
Now Laura Hemmings was gone and there was Margaret,
holding a little boy's hand, an embroidered carpetbag at her feet, and they both looked so terribly sad, and as the picture was receding, Margaret was mouthing the words /
love you.
I'm sorry, Tilden,” Corbin said softly. ”I care about
you both and I feel almost as bad about that as you do. I
don't know what you think I can do about it.”
toward the other side of the street.
Corbin watched her, first embarrassed and then alarmed
because she was not watching where she was going and
was about to collide with a large, whiskered man who was coming in the other direction. The man was not watching,
either. He was busily winding what looked like a small box
camera and Corbin noticed that he was not wearing winter
clothing.
The two passed through each other.
Corbin felt another surge of anger, but this time he raised
a patient hand as if to stop it. “That's Comstock, right?”
He nodded with resignation. “Is that Anthony Comstock?”
No answer came. Corbin didn't need one. He knew.
Look,” he dropped his voice, ”I don't even understand
this part.” He watched as the fat man passed him and continued down Railroad Avenue toward the depot area. There
he saw a wagon piled high with vegetables. And another
whose sign said Walker & Sons Fresh Fish and it had a
striped awning that shaded several wooden tubs of mussels
and lobsters. Corbin suddenly realized that the snow was
gone. The trees were the dark green of late summer. He
saw two women coming his way. Both wore dresses that
swept the ground and carried fishnet shopping bags. One held a black parasol against the sun. The fat man spotted them and scurried to intercept them on the wooden side
walk. The older of the two women spoke sharply to him,
but he ignored her. He was looking down, searching for
her in the view-finder of his camera. The woman took one
step and swung her parasol at his head. He ducked, then
tipped his hat, then took another blow across his arms. He
circled round them, having spied still another woman farther down.
“
Comstock is the vice crusader, right?”
Right. Corbin knew that as well.
“
Gwen and I talked about this,” Corbin said. “We don't
know why Margaret should have been worried.”
He listened for his own feelings. He would have been
furious if he had lived here then. Just on general principles.
Here's a man taking pictures of every halfway-decent-
looking female he meets and you know he's going to show them around someplace to try to nail any who might once
have been prostitutes. Corbin would have walked down and
kicked his fat ass. Tilden would have, too. Unless Tilden
was afraid to call attention to himself and therefore to Mar
garet.
“
Then why didn't you just get her out of town? A va
cation. Sail up to Newport or go back down to the Clare
mont Inn for a week or so. See a couple of ball games.”
“
You cannot.” Laura Hemmings took Margaret's hands in
hers. “You will stay here, you will smile sweetly, and you
will go about your blameless life as if that idiot does not
even exist.”
“
Oh, Annie.”
“
My name is Laura. And your name is Charlotte. Even
when we're by ourselves, Comstock or no.”
“
He arrested Carrie Todd this morning,” Margaret said
miserably, “and he claims to have his eye on three others.”
“
You are not one of them, dear. I promise you that.”
And it's not just Anthony Comstock.” Margaret
twisted a lace napkin in her fingers. “Inspector Williams
bought a house in Cos Cob. Everyone's talking about the
grand new dock he's adding to it and all the fine English
furniture he's bringing in. It appears that he's planning to live here, Laura.”
Clubber Williams must spend his graft someplace,”
Laura Hemmings said, shrugging. “In any case, what is that to you? He's never seen you, has he?”