The Remigrants
by

Joseph E. Wright
Copyright 2003

All Rights Reserved
Cover created by Joseph E. Wright

Smashwords Edition July 2011
To: Hans,
who never learned how to take,
only to give.

Smashwords Edition, License Notes
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Chapter I

Outside, it was a Christmas card. The snow had been falling since midmorning and it was now a little past eleven in the evening. The streetlight showed a white sheet of fine snow coming down, the kind of snow that was deceptive, the kind that covered relentlessly. As she stood at the window, Alice guessed there was now more than a foot of the stuff out there, judging from the way the wind was causing it to drift up against the house. The tops of the shrubbery were still visible, but it would not be long before they, too, were buried in the whiteness. It had been more than an hour since a car had driven past the house, its slow pace proof enough that the driving was treacherous.
Alice pulled the white lace curtain back and craned to see signs of a car coming from the north. None came. She walked back to the sofa and once again picked up the magazine she had leafed through several times this evening. She wasn’t worried, she told herself. Nicholas was a good driver, was used to the snow, the car was in good condition, and its tires almost new. There was nothing to be concerned about, of that she was certain. She looked at the clock on the mantle over the fireplace, then at her own watch. It was ll:23. Nicholas had promised to be home by eleven. It wasn’t late enough to start pushing the panic button, she mumbled to herself, and tried to smile. She got up again and once more went over to the window. She was standing there, lost in thought, when the telephone rang. She hurried out to the kitchen to answer it.
“Nicholas? Oh, sorry. Yes, this is the Keene residence.”
“There’s been an accident.” The voice on the other end identified itself as belonging to Sergeant Brown of the Ocean City Police Department.
Alice felt her whole body suddenly become stiff, her arm frozen in an awkward position as she pressed the receiver to her ear.
The sergeant verified Nicholas’ license plate number, told Alice where the accident had occurred: at the 34th Street bridge, on the Ocean City side. She managed to say that she would be there as soon as she could. In a daze, she grabbed the first jacket she found in the hall closet, threw it over her shoulders and pulled her old red knitted toque down over her hair. She slammed the front door behind her, then ran through the snow to her car. She backed out of the driveway onto Route 9 and headed north. Underneath, she could feel the tires slipping.
Alice drove half-blindly along the road. The headlights bounced off the falling snow, giving her a visibility of no more than a couple of yards in front of her. The tears in her eyes made it even more difficult for her to see. She drove slowly. Several times the car swerved, and she narrowly escaped driving into one of the snowdrifts along the side of the road. She left Ocean View, went through Seaville, Marmora, then turned right (without actually being conscious of making the turn), onto the causeway which led into Ocean City.
That telephone call should never have come. The stupid policeman--everyone knows how dumb they can be, never getting anything right--must have made a mistake. It was the wrong car, the wrong license plate. Later, when Nicholas got home, Alice decided, they would both have a good, long laugh about the whole thing. Then why was she driving in this terrible storm? She couldn’t answer her own question. The quiet evening, the beautiful snow, should never have been violated by that cruel telephone call.
The windshield wipers were slowing down. The snow, which had become wet and heavy, was piling up on the glass. She was grateful there were no other cars on the road tonight. “I’m the only one,” she said aloud, “crazy enough to be out on a fool’s errand on such a night.”
Her Ford strained to make the steep incline of the bridge. Alice changed to a lower gear, the better to control the car. It swung from side to side as she reached the top of the bridge. There were several sets of amber flashing lights below. She began the descent down the other side, her mind, every nerve, concentrating only on keeping the car under control. As it skidded, she pulled in the opposite direction and came out of the skid. She finally came to a stop behind one of the three police cars.
On the island, the snow was not quite as deep as on the mainland. The salt air, the warmer air currents, caused the precipitation to fall as rain for most of the day. It was not until late afternoon, after sundown, that it turned into snow and began covering the ground. Alice could still see patches of dune grass here and there along the side of the road.
She got out of the car. The wind whipped her face and she pulled the collar of her light jacket up around her ears. A policeman was standing next to one of the cars.
“You Mrs. Keene?” the officer asked. “You know that car down there?” He pointed towards the water with a pencil stub.
Alice followed the direction in which the policeman was pointing. She could make out, at the water’s edge, another police car and several uniformed policemen standing on the strip of beach. They were studying an object protruding from the water. Even from this distance, with very little light shining on it, Alice could make out the silhouette of a large car, a silver Oldsmobile, suspiciously like the one Nicholas owned.
Alice nodded. “He was on his way home. From Atlantic City.”
“Drugs? Alcohol?” the policeman, whose voice was unmistakably that of Sergeant Brown, asked without looking up. He was writing with that same pencil stub in a small black book.
“No!” Alice snapped at him. “He didn’t drink and never touched drugs. Sorry to disappoint you.”
“That’s aright,” the sergeant said, looked out towards the expanse of bay which spread out before them, and shrugged his shoulders. “We’ll probably never find the body, anyway. The undertow along here’s pretty strong.”
“Body? You haven’t found him? Then... then he could be... maybe he isn’t dead. You told me... led me to believe that he was dead, but now you tell me there’s no body. You don’t really know, do you?”
Alice felt sick. The car which was down there, lying on its side in the water, looked exactly like Nicholas’. Now they were telling her, after making her drive here in the blinding snow, that maybe... maybe.... “Maybe he isn’t dead after all,” she thought to herself. “Maybe he climbed out of the car and made it to the shore. He could be here, on the bank, a few feet from where we’re standing, looking for help, looking for me!”
Sgt. Brown busied himself with his walkie-talkie.
“Have you looked everywhere?” Alice asked him. “Here, on the bank? It’s so dark. It’s been snowing. He could be lying here someplace, covered with snow, cold, wet. Have you looked for him?” Her voice was reaching the point of hysteria.
“Your husband’s not anywhere along here,” Sgt. Brown answered. “We looked real careful. We don’t overlook things like that. You say he was in A.C. today? What was he doing there? Meet anybody?”
“I’m not sure. I think so.” Her voice was nearer to normal. She was searching the surrounding area with her eyes, up and down the embankment, hoping for some signs of movement, tracks of any kind. Two sea gulls stirred near a sewer pipe that fed into the bay. “All I know is he had an appointment to meet someone there. In one of the casinos, I think. I don’t know if they met or not.”
“What kinda work did he do?”
“He is a writer.” Alice resented the use of the past tense.
Another policeman came over and spoke to Sgt. Brown. They walked together down to the water’s edge. Alice wanted to follow them, but her feet refused to move. Cold and fear kept her glued to the spot where she was standing. What, she wondered, if Nicholas were still in the car in spite of what the sergeant had said? Alice couldn’t bear the thought of going down there to the water, approaching the car, and seeing Nicholas inside, trapped like a terrified animal, his face pressed against the glass and turned towards her, with panic and pain written across it.
Suddenly, the snow changed direction. It had been swirling around her, but it changed its path, moving out towards the bay, leaving an opening down towards the water. With the police car spotlights fixed on it, the car looked like a large silver whale stuck on a sandbar.
Alice spoke aloud, although in a whisper, as though fearing someone might hear her. “How do those damned fools know it’s Nicholas’ car? The license plate isn’t even visible. They could be wrong.”
Sgt. Brown walked back up the bank to the road. When he was close, Alice spoke to him: “How do you know whose car that is?”
The policeman stared at Alice and seemed not to hear. He walked on. Alice reached out and pulled on the policeman’s sleeve. “I asked you a question,” she said, raising her voice and surprising herself at her own boldness.
The sergeant pulled away and turned to another policeman who had followed him. He mumbled something to his partner and smiled. “Now, what was it that you asked?” Sgt. Brown said to Alice.
She repeated her question.
“Because of the license plate, that’s how.”
“But... but, it’s under water,” she protested.
“It wasn’t an hour ago when the tide wasn’t in so far, and if that damned tow truck don’t get here soon, the whole thing’ll be under water for sure.”
“Look, Sergeant, are you sure? I mean, really sure, that Nicholas isn’t in that car? How can you be so positive?”
“No chance. Nobody’s in that car. We got a flashlight inside it. Clean as a whistle. Ain’t so much as a soda can in that car. Looks like Woodie coming now.” He walked away from Alice and waved down a battered tow truck as it approached.
Alice watched as Woodie’s truck slowly backed down the slippery bank amid much waving of arms and flashlights and shouts of “More t’left” and “Straight back” and “Whoa, damn it, whoa!” She heard the clanging of metal chains as a hitching bar was attached to the side of the car. The tow truck began its grinding uphill climb from an angle so that the car warbled, slid on the wet sand, rocked sideways several times, and finally righted itself. Alice was freezing. She hugged herself tightly. She was still wondering if Nicholas was wandering about someplace nearby, looking for warmth, looking for her. She wished desperately that she had someone here with her now, someone to talk to, someone to lean against, and tell how much she was hurting inside. Once again, there was shouting coming from down below. The car was slowly sliding up the wet grass as Woodie’s tow truck skidded and lost its traction. The climb started over again.
“Tell that drunken sonavabitch to put ‘er in low!” Sgt. Brown yelled. Water was pouring out of the car’s openings, from the doors, the windows, the underbelly. In the zigzagging yellow lights atop the police cars, Alice got a split-second glimpse of the license plate. She turned away and buried her face in her hands.
“You a’right?” It was Corporal Donnatucci who spoke as he approached. Alice looked up at him. It took a second for her to realize that the corporal was speaking to her. She nodded.
“Get you anything?” the young policeman asked.
“Could I make a phone call? I’d like someone to come here.”
“Sure. Where?”
“Ocean City.”
“Give me the number. They’ll call it in from the station.”
Alice gave him the telephone number of Philip Rosen. “Ask him if he can come here. Tell him Alice Keene needs him.”
The corporal hurried over to one of the police cars and slid part way onto the front seat. He spoke into the radio. A couple of minutes later, he returned. “Your friend is on his way. Any chance that’s Doctor Rosen?”
“You know him?” Alice asked, although she knew she did not care if this policeman knew Philip or not.
“Most people in the city go to him. My mom thinks he’s the greatest. I met him last summer in Atlantic City at.... In Atlantic City.”
Alice eyed the young policeman. Barely old enough to be on the police force, she thought to herself, but certainly the type to interest Philip. He was short, much shorter than Philip, muscular, with straight black hair and eyes that were such a dark brown, they almost seemed black.
“They’ll have the car up on the road in a few minutes.” He nodded in the direction of the car which by now was almost level with the road.
Alice did not comment.
“It’s hard,” Corporal Donnatucci went on. “I guess it is. I never lost anyone... I’ve never been that close, I guess, to anyone to....”
Alice appreciated what the corporal was trying to do. Here, in the middle of the night, with the wind blowing and the snow coming down heavily again, with eerie lights flashing against the heavy, pink sky, and sounds of strangers arguing over the right way to extract Nicholas’ car from the bay, it was good, she felt, that another human being was trying so hard, however awkwardly, to reach out and tell her he understood, that he knew what it must be like to lose someone.
“Is there anything else I--we can do?”
“You’ve already helped.” Alice tried pathetically to smile.
They stood there, side by side, for several minutes, like two strangers witnessing a tragedy, having nothing left now to share but the silence and the sound of one another’s breathing.
Sgt. Brown bellowed, “Hey, ‘Tucci, get your ass over here!”
The corporal sprang to attention. Under his breath and without looking at her, he addressed Alice. “You’ll be O.K. Philip will be here in a few minutes. Just hang in there.”
Alice watched the young policeman run over to the spot where Sgt. Brown was standing. She was no longer conscious of the cold, but was mesmerized by the antics of Herman Woods’ Superior Towing Company in the person of its sole proprietor and only employee, the drunken Woodie, maneuvering the silver Oldsmobile onto the road’s surface. Alice could still remember the day she and Nicholas went to pick out that car and how excited Nicholas had been, deciding upon the model, choosing the “extras,” picking out the color. She was still in the past when she heard the sound of breaks screeching.
Philip Rosen’s car came to a halt immediately behind Alice’s. He jumped out and ran over. “What hap..? Oh, my God!” He saw Nicholas’ car. He put his arms around her.
Alice’s tears began to flow, quietly at first, like condensation running down her cheeks, then she could control them no longer. The deluge came.
“Let it all go, Babe,” Philip said as he held her tightly. He leaned down and spoke in her ear, “Let the tears come. The world’s full of bastards. Someone should shed a tear for someone as wonderful as Nicholas.”
“Can you drive me home?” she managed to ask him.
“Of course. That’s why I brought Jerry along, in case we needed him.” He tilted his head in the direction of his own car where his friend, Jerome Cameroon, was sitting. “He’ll take my car. I’ll drive yours. C’mon, get in.” He opened the door and helped Alice inside. “I’ll be with you in a minute.” He shut the car door and walked over to where Sgt. Brown and Corporal Donnattucci were. He was there several minutes, then rejoined Alice. “There’s nothing more we can do here,” he announced as he slid in next to her.
They rode in silence for a while, then Alice spoke. “Something’s wrong.” She uttered the words slowly.
“I know, I know.” Philip reached over and squeezed her hand.
“You don’t understand. It’s not because Nicholas is... is missing. It’s not that. There’s something else, something entirely different, something I can’t put my finger on. I know it hasn’t all sunk in and that things like this take a while before you realize their full import, but that’s not what I’m talking about. I don’t understand, and....”
“Of course you don’t,” Philip assured her. “We never understand, not really. I’ve been through this so many times with families of my patients who didn’t make it. You have to give them time to realize what has taken place and all one can do is wait. Time takes care of everything. Boy, isn’t that a crock!”
Alice looked over and studied this friend. Nicholas and she had known Philip ever since they had moved to South Jersey from Philadelphia. They had grown fond of one another. Over the years--what was it now, ten? eleven years?--they had spent so many hours together, the three of them. They had taken vacations together, like the time they went to New Orleans for Mardi Gras and Philip met Frank Godden, the movie star and spent the night with him, and Nicholas and she got so panicky, they went to the police and reported him missing; or the time they were in New York and Nicholas got sick on something he ate and she had her pocketbook stolen and Philip broke his big toe when he kicked the radiator in the room he and Jerry were sharing because they couldn’t get any heat out of it. Wonderful times, Alice knew. Those are the memories, she was now thinking, that can never be lost, that nothing, no one, can ever destroy. Only their love and fondness for one another made such memories possible. And it now seemed so long ago. At this moment, all Alice cared about was the fact that Philip was with her, sitting next to her, there to understand, Philip the strong one. His patients felt an immediate sense of strength in those hands of his. Like the rest of him, his hands were big. He was only barely six feet tall, but gave the illusion of towering over everyone. His tight curly black hair, the rugged face that blended a firm jaw with a sensuous mouth and gentle, almost femininely large blue eyes, caused many a woman patient to fall in love with him. His gay patients, of whom he had many, even more so. Straight men were equally willing to put themselves into those same competent hands.
Alice was grateful, too, that at this precise moment, Philip was silent. She did not want to hear words. She craved silence.
They turned onto Route 9 and headed south. Alice kept her eyes closed and Philip drove with his attention fixed on the road ahead of them. It was not long before she felt the car slow down, turn right, and come to a stop.
Philip turned off the ignition. He turned and looked at Alice who at this moment looked to him so like a little girl, like his sister Jenifer who had died at the age of twelve, frail and helpless. She opened her gray eyes.
“We’re here,” he said and got out.
The house stood back from the road, one of the few remaining perfect examples of a South Jersey Victorian farmhouse. Tall and narrow, it had a porch along the front and one side, the pillars of which were decorated with elaborate gingerbread. The windows in the living room which looked out onto the porch ran from floor to ceiling. The second floor was topped with a steeply pitched attic whose roof boasted a peacock weathervane. Everywhere: gingerbread decorated gables, eaves, and windows. In the back, midway between the rear of the house and the woods which lined the property, was an abandoned barn. Inside the house, the rooms were originally many and small, to accommodate a large family. With the advent of two world wars and a depression, the house underwent many renovations, most of which did nothing to improve either its beauty or practicality. Alice and Nicholas bought the house after it had sat empty for more than twenty years. They were still in the process of renovating it twelve years later. The outside, which they finished first, they painted in true Victorian colors: pale greens, blushing pinks, sky blues, and plumb purples. So authentic was it, that Victorian scholars came to admire it; decorators to copy it; architects to study it; and all came, cameras loaded, to photograph it, especially in the spring when the garden on the south side was in full bloom. Tonight, with the snow piling up against the house and drifting on the porch, the house resembled more a little girl, bedecked in her finest dress complete with ruffles, lost in a blizzard.
Alice got out of the car and ran with her head bowed against the wind, up onto the porch. She opened the big front door and she and Philip hurried inside. The warmth of the old house felt inviting as they shut out the storm behind them.
Jerry, driving Philip’s car, pulled into the driveway.


Chapter II

“Did the police give you any additional information?” Alice asked as she sat down in one of the wingback chairs in the living room.
Embers of an earlier fire were still glowing in the fireplace. Over its mantle, a massive gilt mirror reached to the ceiling which was fourteen feet high. Elaborate moldings ran the length of the ceiling and culminated in a medallion in the center, from which hung a six-tier crystal chandelier. Walls and ceilings were painted white. A Chinese oriental depicting birds and vines in pinks and greens and ivory lay on the floor between a pair of puce velvet wingbacks and a light green sofa, also in velvet.
“They said very little,” Philip replied. “Only that the accident had been reported a couple of hours earlier, and that they supposed Nicholas’ body had been pulled out to sea.”
“That’s what they told me, too. And that’s what has me so mixed up. I don’t know what to feel. We can’t be one hundred per cent sure he’s dead. He could be roaming about someplace right now, dying from exposure, looking for help. Maybe we should go back out and search for him?”
“He’s dead.” It was Jerry who spoke. He was standing in the archway to the living room. Neither Alice nor Philip had heard him come in.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Philip spun around and faced Jerry. With clenched teeth and glowering eyes, it was obvious Philip was giving Jerry a message.
Jerry missed it. Deliberately. He came into the living room.
“I’ll fix us some drinks,” Philip said and left.
“Why did you say that? About Nicholas being dead?” Alice asked Jerry after the latter sat down on the sofa. “Is there something you know we don’t?”
“I could sense it, the very minute we got there,” he answered. Jerry was younger than Philip, in his early thirties. He had been attending graduate school when they first met, working for his degree in psychology. He was, physically, the opposite of the type Philip usually was attracted to, having a flaming head of hair, about as tall as Philip, and quite thin. “Something is all wrong, though.”
Alice moved to the edge of her chair. “You sensed it, too? I was telling Phil....”
“I can always tell when something is wrong,” Jerry went on. “I could tonight. So very, very wrong.”
Alice stared at Jerry for several seconds, then spoke quietly, weighing each word. “Jerry, tell me the truth. I must know. What is wrong with all this? What is it that doesn’t seem to be... well... to make any sense? Is Nicholas dead? Is it just my feelings getting in the way or is there something going on I don’t know about?”
Jerry did not answer immediately. When he did, he seemed not to be addressing Alice, but rather to be talking to someone unseen in the room. “As I sat there,” he said, and Alice had to strain to hear him, “in Philip’s car, watching what was happening: the police cars, Nicholas’ car being towed up the embankment, the lights flashing, I felt a wave of evil coming over me. I knew death was there tonight. I could see it, feel it touch all of us, almost visible, almost tangible. It was all around us. I could see death had come to take someone away, but even stronger was the presence of evil, evil like I have never known before. Oh, not the evil of death. Death is not evil. No, it was another kind of evil. A kind of... a kind of... sin. Yes, that’s what it was. I couldn’t express it before this very minute, but now I know what it is called. Yes, sin. The whole universe, Alice, even Nature itself, is outraged by what took place out there tonight, something which should never have....”
Philip came into the room carrying drinks. “I hope Jerry hasn’t been running off at the mouth as usual.” He handed Alice her drink. “He does get carried away with all this psycho bull.”
Alice ignored Philip’s remark. “Then, Nicholas is dead?” she asked Jerry.
Jerry stared at her. “Huh? Oh, yes, yes, of course. There is no doubt about it whatever.”
“Oh, for Christ’s sake!” Philip shouted. “Don’t start up with all that shit of yours, Jerry, cause if you do, so help me--”
“Jerry’s right,” Alice said. She was staring down at her drink as she rolled the sides of the glass between her palms. “I got a... a....”
“Vibration?” Jerry offered. “Yes, the vibrations were there tonight. You are tuned in, Alice. I can see that and that means it will come easier for you in time. Those who can not feel, who can not sense death and all that it means, have a much harder time when death comes for someone they love. You will find it much easier, in time, only I do wish--”
“You’ll get your wish in another minute,” Philip snapped at him. “You’ll also get your ass kicked, if you don’t shut up.”
“I should call Lydia,” Alice said after an awkward silence. “She should be told.” She got up and went out to the telephone in the kitchen. “Lydia? Listen, dear, there’s been an accident. Yes. No, I wasn’t with him. He was driving from Atlantic City. And... and....” The words caught in her throat. The tears came. “We think so. No, no, the police don’t really know... not for sure yet.” She told her mother-in-law, in broken phrases between her tears, of the telephone call from the Ocean City police, her driving to the scene of the accident, and what Sgt. Brown had told her. Only the bare facts. She put down the receiver and came back into the living room. Philip had returned with a second round of drinks.
“She’ll be here in a few minutes,” Alice said as she took the drink from Philip.
“How’s she taking it?”
Alice shrugged. “You know Lydia. They don’t make them any tougher than she is.” She was staring at the walls, the ceiling, the fireplace, everywhere her eyes could reach, in a vain attempt to keep the tears contained behind her eyelids. Her voice was still cracking. “She brought Nicholas up against almost impossible odds. It’s going to be hard on her now. He was all she had,” she added as her hand gently pushed back a strand of her soft auburn hair.
“He’s all you have, too,” Philip said.
“‘Oh, Lydia, oh, Lydia, say have you met Lydia?’ Nicholas used to sing that song. When he was quite young, she took him to see Groucho Marx, in A DAY AT THE CIRCUS, where he heard Groucho sing that song he made famous. Nicholas adopted it for himself. ‘Lydia, the tattooed lady.’ He sang it to her, he sang it to anyone who would listen, although she--as far as anyone knew or she would divulge--did not have a single tattoo on her body.”
It was less than fifteen minutes after Alice’s telephone call that Lydia came through the front door and into the living room. Admitting to being fiftyish, she retained every bit of whatever she must have had in her twenties. Her closest friends swore she got younger every year.
She rushed over and threw her arms around Alice and squeezed until Alice feared her life was in danger of being snuffed out. She was almost as tall as Alice and so thin, Alice more than once told her it was possible for her to stab someone if she were to bump into them. Tonight her bleached hair (and Alice realized it was the first time she had ever seen it like this), had its white roots showing and was hastily pulled back and tied with a silk scarf. She (even more remarkable!) was without make-up. Her clothes were pure Lydian: turquoise slacks, bittersweet orange sneakers, and bulky knitted yellow sweater.
“It can’t be true,” Lydia said. “God damn it, it can’t be, not Nicky. Sweets, get me a drink, will you? A stiff one,” she said to Philip who once more headed for the kitchen.
She pulled Alice down onto the sofa, almost crushing Jerry in the process. “You O.K.?” she asked her daughter-in-law.
Alice nodded, but added quickly as she shook her head, “No, not really.”
Lydia took her hand. Alice was grateful she had come. Over the years, Alice had come to think of her as her own mother, not just Nicholas’.
“And what about you?” Alice asked.
“Oh, you know us old tattooed broads, you never have to worry about us.” She took out a cigarette and lit it.
“You’re also full of shit. You’re no tougher than I am. You just keep it in, that’s the only difference.”
Philip brought in the drinks.
Lydia held up her glass in a toast. “My boy would never forgive us if we sat around here with long faces. That dizzy son-of-a-bitch would be the first one here to start telling jokes, if there was any way he could be with us right now. He’d start out by telling his favorite one, the one about the... what is that favorite of his?”
“The one about the frozen popsicle and the fairy,” Alice answered.
“Yeah, that’s the one all right.” She frowned and made her pencil-thin eyebrows look like a pair of tildes. “Let me see, how does it go? Ah, yes, seems there was this fairy--present company not offended, I trust--who went into the ice cream parlor and ordered a frozen popsicle and--”
“Lydia, you’ve got it all wrong, the way you do every time you try to tell that joke,” Philip interrupted. He was laughing quite loudly. “He didn’t try to order a popsicle, he wanted to make his own. There was a sign in the window that said you could come in and make your own sundae, but he wanted to make his own popsicle, so he said to the owner of the ice cream parlor--”
“It’s still all wrong, so completely wrong,” Jerry said. He was slumped in the corner of the sofa, his elbow propped on the armrest, and his face resting on his cupped hand, pushing the side of his face upwards and making his eyeglasses hang crookedly on the end of his nose. “I just wish I knew what was so wrong, so very wrong.”
“What’s his problem?” Lydia asked as she pointed her glass at Jerry. “I may not be the world’s greatest joke teller, but....”
“I’m not so sure he’s talking about Nicholas’ joke,” Alice said.
“He’s not,” Philip spoke up. “Isn’t that right, Jerry, dear? It’s those goddamned psychic powers of his coming to the surface again, like so many infested boils. I won’t warn you again, Jerry, to keep that mouth of yours shut tonight or I’ll shut it for you.”
“Take it easy,” Alice said to Philip, then turned and addressed Jerry. “Jerry, go ahead, tell us what you think is wrong. What’s bothering you?”
Jerry sat silent, staring straight ahead for several seconds, every eye in the room staring at him. The antique oak clock on the mantle seemed deafening. The wind outside had picked up again, causing a howling out there and made the old house creak. Finally, he spoke. “It’s something I feel. I’m sorry I can’t be more explicit and tell all of you exactly what it is. You’d have to feel what I am feeling to understand what I have been through this evening. Nicholas is dead. Of that I am positive. You are deluding yourselves, if you hang on to the hope that he is still alive. Still, there is something not right about his death. It’s eating away at my insides. I’ve never been through anything like this before. Philip, do you mind if I leave? I think it better if I do. Whatever the evil is, it is getting closer. I can almost hear it coming closer to all of us.”
“Go ahead, leave,” Philip said in disgust. “I can take Alice’s car to get home.”
“Alice, could I see you for a moment?” Jerry asked as he stood up and walked through the archway to the hallway.
Alice followed him. “What is it?” she asked as they stood in the vestibule just inside the front door.
“Be careful!” Jerry warned. “Be very, very careful. Someone or something is going to try to harm you. I know it. I feel it. There’s evil all around us tonight. I felt it earlier and I wondered why I felt it. I wondered if it had anything to do with me, but I realized it didn’t. It took me a while to learn that the evil tonight is looking for you. I’ve felt it strongest here in this house. You’ve known about my gift. You know how serious I take it. I have never, never felt anything like this before. I don’t know what to call it, how to categorize it. All I know, all I am completely sure of, is that I am right.”
“I will be careful,” Alice promised. She felt the urge to laugh, a nervous laugh, but repressed it when she realized just how serious Jerry was.
“Maybe you don’t believe me,” Jerry continued, as though he could read the thought passing through her mind. “Still, I know you sense something is not right, just the way I do. I have the feeling someone or something will try to get to you. Promise me you will be alert so that this... this... that’s it, this door!” He had his hand on the door knob and pulled away as though suddenly burned. “It’s this door. Something will come through this door, something that is bent upon causing you harm.” He added, so quietly that Alice wasn’t quite sure she had heard correctly, “No, not something, someone will come through this door and will....”
Alice had been inching Jerry closer to the outside door and out onto the porch. Once more, she promised Jerry she would be careful.
“And don’t trust anyone, not anyone!” were Jerry’s parting words as he stepped off the porch.
Alice closed both doors and returned to the living room.
“What was that all about?” Philip asked her.
“Jerry being his usual self, dramatizing things,” Alice answered. “Always exaggerating. He claims I’m in some kind of danger. I had to promise him I would be careful before I could get him to go home.”
“I’m sorry I brought him along. I thought at the time that it was a good idea, but Jerry has no tact, never stops to think of other people’s feelings when he has something he believes he should say. I’m sorry, Lydia. Alice knows Jerry well enough, but I’m sorry for your sake that Jerry said what he did about your son.”
“He wasn’t my son,” she said softly.
“Lydia, maybe you shouldn’t,” Alice cautioned.
“It’s all right. It doesn’t matter now, not any more. Besides, Philip is almost family. I’ve known him so long, I sometimes think of him as another son.” She looked at Philip. “Don’t be surprised. As a doctor, you must come cross these things often enough, little family secrets. It goes back almost forty years, when I was much younger and, I guess, much sillier than I am now, if such a thing is possible. I was just a kid and had ideas I’d make it big as a singer. I got myself hooked up with a two-bit, flea-ridden, one-night-stand group known as Johnny Tribune, of all names. Anyway, I took to the road with Johnny and we hit every cesspool this side of the Mississippi, up and down the East Coast. There was Ralph, a real dopehead. He played the drums. And Whizzy who played the clarinet, and around. And Liz. Dear, sweet Liz, the most gullible person I’ve ever met in my life. She played--are you ready for this?--the harp and you’ve never known the true meaning of frustration until you’ve shared a cramped dressing room with a young girl who insisted upon bringing that damned ridiculous oversized violin with her every place she went, even though it was rare that Johnny would let her play it. We once shared the same dressing room, Liz, her harp, and a new family of cats. Mother cat had given birth and Liz went into hysterics when I suggested we move them. Liz went under the name of Margo and Her Musical Harp. She had it bad for Johnny, used to follow him around like a lost pup. Of course, so did every other female who saw Johnny. It was easy to see why, especially under those hot lights when he wore tight pants. It drove the women crazy and even disturbed some of the men, too, even the straight ones, who were jealous of what they saw in those pants.
“Well, it was a dirty, stinking hot, run-down fleabag in Alabama one August day when the age-old story unfolded. It’s happened a few million times, I guess, in show business, ever since that first cave man got a better offer to go off and perform in another cave. But, I’m jumping ahead. Liz discovered she was pregnant. She didn’t discover it. I had to tell her. She came to me one day, just about out of her mind. ‘Lyd, something is wrong. I know I’m dying,’ she said to me. ‘You know that time... that time of the month? Well, I ain’t had it, not for the past two months or more and I read once that’s a sure sign a woman’s life is over, that she ain’t no use once that stops happening to her.’ I had to sit her down and explain a few things to her that her dear, sweet mother, if she ever had one, never did explain. I had to tell her about some of the marvelous mysteries Mother Nature reserves for us females and I got it out of her that Johnny had gotten into her. And more than once. Even then, she really didn’t believe that what Johnny was doing to her had any connection with her missing her period or that she could possibly be about to have a baby. I convinced her she wasn’t going to die, that she was going to have a baby, Johnny’s baby. That delighted her. Then it was that that bastard broke the news about accepting a better offer in New York. He did it in a real gentlemanly way: a telegram from the train station, two minutes before his train left for points north. Seems he got an offer to cut a record up in New York with a band that had just lost its lead singer. He was sorry, but there was no place for any of the rest of us in the group. Sorry, too, that he didn’t have any money to give us. So, there we were, out of work, broke, and no money to pay the hotel bill. Ralph was too high to know or care, Whizzy was in the local jail for fooling around with the sheriff’s daughter who just happened to be the local tramp, and a pregnant Liz.
“I was determined to get out of that god-forsaken place, so by hocking everything we had, including Liz’s harp which we convinced the local pawn broker had once belonged to Mrs. Robert E. Lee, and by skipping out in the dead of night, we were able to afford two coach tickets for the West Coast. Liz had some family there. We arrived in L.A. tired and hungry. It took about five minutes for us to find out that Liz’s family wanted no parts of her, especially knocked up the way she was. Liz was as pregnant as we were broke and that’s about as pregnant as you can get. I got a job waiting on tables. Liz tried to work, God bless her, but she bungled every job she got. We were living in one room which cost us three dollars a week. They didn’t charge us extra for the dirt or the stench or the roaches. While some drunk was down on the street yelling obscenities and a crazy woman over us was carrying on an argument with her wallpaper, Liz gave birth and died on us before we could do anything to help her. She didn’t have a doctor, except later to sign the death certificate. There was a very old black woman who lived in the building. She felt sorry for Liz and she came to help when Liz’s time came. I swore then and there that I’d get out of that mess and take the kid with me and make a decent home for the two of us. I kept my job waiting on tables and Sophie, that was the black woman’s name, watched little Nicholas while I was at work. I finally saved enough to make it back East. I intended to look up that son of a bitch, Johnny Tribune, and make him fork over some money for his kid. I found him. He was doing real well, not only with his singing, but scoring with the daughter of a big-time music publisher who wouldn’t take too kindly to the idea of his daughter’s boyfriend having a kid hidden away someplace. Things weren’t so open back in those days, you know. Anyway, I used a bit of legit blackmail and got some money out of him. I had to promise to take the kid and get out of town. We moved to Philadelphia. I rented a small shop on Locust Street and it did so well, I opened another one down here in Cape May County. And, you know the rest, Philip.”
“So Nicholas never knew you weren’t his natural mother?” Philip asked.
“Oh, he knew, all right,” Lydia told him. “I made damned sure he did, although I dreaded something awful having to tell him and I put it off and put it off, year after year. He was in college when I realized I couldn’t put it off any longer. One of these days, I told myself, some skunk would come along and tell him. ‘That’s right, baby, I’m not your real mother,’ I said after I told him pretty much what I just told you. He sat across from me, staring. I tried to laugh. ‘Can you picture me being anyone’s mother?’ I added.”
“Then what? How did he take it?” Philip asked.
“He kept staring at me ‘til I thought I would scream. I felt my whole world falling apart around me. Then, he let out one helluva roar and slapped his thigh. ‘Hell, no, not you,’ he said. He threw his arms around me and hugged me ‘til I couldn’t get my breath, then he pulled away and looked at me and said, ‘Anyone can have a mother. There’s no trick to that. I don’t know any other guy in this world lucky enough to have you. Tattooed ladies are real scarce, you know!’ And he broke out into several verses of that old song.” Lydia took a tissue from her pants pocket and blew her nose.
“I still think Jerry was right,” Alice said, changing the subject after a long silence. “Not about my being in danger. Not that. It’s about something being all wrong with what happened tonight. Why was Nicholas’ body not found? I don’t completely buy that story the police are telling, that he was washed out to sea. The car doors were closed and the windows were up. The police say the car was half out of the water when they got there. That’s how they were able to read the license plate. Then why couldn’t Nicholas have gotten out of the car? If he couldn’t get out because he was injured or sick or already dead when he hit the water, then his body would still have been in the car when the police arrived, but we know the police insist he’s not in the car. On the other hand, if he was strong enough to open a door, the one that was out of the water while the car was lying on its side--and I grant you that door would most likely have closed shut after him--then he would also have been able to make it to shore. The car was no more than fifteen feet from the beach and the water is very shallow right there, even at high tide. He could have walked out of the water and, besides, we all know what an excellent swimmer Nicholas is. He almost made it to the Olympics. No, I just don’t swallow that whole story about Nicholas being sucked out to sea. Or, about his being dead. They haven’t convinced me yet that Nicholas is dead. What I don’t understand is why the police are lying to us.”
“I know a few people I could call, important people,” Lydia said. “I’ll call them right now, even if it does mean waking them up in the middle of the night. They owe me plenty of favors. I, too, want to know what happened to my Nicky!”
After Lydia left the room, Philip leaned over and asked Alice, “Is there anything, anything at all that I...?”
“No, nothing,” she assured him. “You should be getting home. Working tomorrow?”
“No, fortunately. Not until next Tuesday. Long weekend.”
“You should go home and get some sleep. I might need you tomorrow if you don’t mind, need you to drive me someplace or just have someone to talk to. I won’t be in any condition, I’m afraid, to drive and there will most likely be things that... that need to be attended to.”
“I could sleep here,” Philip suggested.
“No, you go home. I’ll be all right, believe me.”
Lydia came back into the room. She sat down next to Alice. She looked straight ahead. “Nicky is dead,” she announced quietly. Her raspy voice was softened. “I spoke to Captain Williams of the Ocean City police and he explained it all.” She took Alice’s hand in her own. “The car went through the guard rail on the bridge at a pretty good speed, according to their examination of the rail, judging from the way the metal was torn apart. The car plunged, front first, down into the water and hit it with a powerful impact. One thing we’ve forgotten--or rather, we didn’t know--was the time of the accident. The police are positive that when the car went into the water, the tide was coming in, probably no more than half way in. It was quite a while, with the storm so bad, before anyone drove by. Finally, a young couple came along, saw what had happened, and called into the police station to report it. The police have gone over the car pretty well and they know a couple of things, things they were able to put together from the evidence. First, the car hit the bottom of the bay with such force that the driver’s door was thrown open. It was most likely then that Nicky was thrown out of the car, probably unconscious, and the undertow dragged him out to sea. As the tide came in and with the movement of the waves, the car eventually fell over, on the driver’s side, just the way you saw it when you got there. Of course, that would account for the driver’s door then being closed.”
“They’re only guessing!” Alice shouted. “Those dumb bastard cops don’t know, so they’re putting things together. They weren’t there when it happened. They didn’t see Nicholas crash through that rail. Maybe he wasn’t even in the car when it went over. Maybe he jumped before it hit the water. Maybe he swam to safety and maybe he’s trying desperately to make it home here right this very minute while we sit around talking about him as though he was already buried. Maybe....” Her voice was rising. She jumped up and ran over to the fireplace and buried her face in the back of her hands which were clutching the edge of the marble mantle.
Lydia shot a quick glance at Philip and nodded. “You want to think he’s still alive. Don’t you think I do, too? There’s not a damned thing in this whole screwed up world I want more tonight than to look over at that hall and see my son come walking through the archway.”
Alice turned away from the fire and looked at her. Her face was wet with her tears. “I know. I’m being selfish. I didn’t think of you. I... I wish he was here, too. There’s so... so much I want to say... to say all the things I should have... to tell him... to tell him that I love him. But now, you tell me it’s too late, that I’ll never have that chance, the chance to tell him the things I never did tell him.”
“It’s always too late. We think too late of all the words we should have spoken, wanted to say but didn’t. It’s always too late, no matter when death comes.”
“I wish I had another chance,” Alice said. “I wish I could tell him about the times I didn’t really mean to be selfish. I wish I could make it all up to him. And I wish I could keep it all inside the way you do, Lydia.” She began weeping again.
“Inside? Yes, I suppose I do keep it inside. I learned a long time ago it didn’t get me anywhere letting others know how I felt. You go ahead, dear, let it all out. It’s good for you. I wish I could. Sometimes. I guess I’ve forgotten how to cry. I thought I could never again lose anything that meant anything to me. I forgot about Nicky. I forgot I could lose him. You go on thinking you can never lose those who mean the most to you. I can still see him, no bigger than a carton of cigarettes and not weighing much more than that. He was so damned small and funny looking when he was born. Who would have thought he could have ended up over six feet tall and such a handsome bastard. He was one helluva kid, always laughing, always smiling, right from the very day he popped out of that dizzy mother of his. He came out with a look on his face that said, “Look, world, here I am and ain’t you lucky to have me.’ It was only lately, these past few months, that I thought I sensed something was bothering him. Alice?”
Alice looked at her.
“Was there? Was something bothering him?”
“I don’t know. Like you, he could keep anything inside he wanted to. Lately, now that you mention it, he did seem a bit more preoccupied than usual, like there was something on his mind. I chalked it up to his latest book he was working on. I think he was at the outline stage or maybe a little beyond it, I’m not sure. He was always in another world when he was working on one of his books, what with the research and all. I learned a long time ago to leave him alone when one of his books was giving him trouble. He’d come around eventually and then he’d be his old self. This time, though, it seemed worse than usual, deeper, sort of. It was taking him longer than usual to pull out of it.”
“What was it, this new book of his?”
“I’m not sure. I think it had something to do with.... You know, come to think of it, I don’t have the slightest idea at all what it’s about. I usually get a hint from questions he might ask or from some of the books he’d bring home from the library or ask me to pick up for him, but since he got a computer, he said he could get whatever information he needed on the Internet.”
“I would like to know. I’d like to know what he was thinking about these past few weeks. If you find out....”
“Of course, I’ll let you know. Want to stay here tonight?”
“No, no, I don’t think so,” Lydia said as she stood up. “I hate to leave you alone, but if you don’t mind, Sweetie, I want to be alone myself tonight. Maybe Philip should stay with you.”
“I don’t need anyone. Like you, I prefer to be alone tonight.” She, too, stood up.
“We have to make... arrangements?” Lydia said, as she fumbled for her car keys, her head almost buried in the large red leather bag she was carrying.
“Yes.”
“You don’t mind if I... that is, I’d like to....”
Alice threw her arms around her mother-in-law. “Of course. You and I. Tomorrow. We’ll take care of whatever has to be done.”
Lydia gave her another hug, one for Philip, then without looking back hurried out of the room and closed the front door after her. Alice and Philip stood in the middle of the living room and heard her car drive away.
“She really is something else, isn’t she?” Philip said.
“Nicholas was very lucky to have her as his mother. They were much more like close friends than mother and son, especially as they got older. Never any of that mother/son relationship, none of the poking around parents often do, none of the butting her nose into his or our business. She respected him and his privacy and our privacy. I’ll always be grateful to her for that. That’s the greatest gift she could ever have given us, Nicholas and me, our lives together. That’s the reason we included her so often in the things we did. We knew she’d never abuse or misunderstand our inviting her along. Never any free advice and that sort of thing. I’m rambling again. You should stop me when I do that. You should also get moving yourself. You’ll be dea... you’ll be tired if you don’t get some sleep.”
“Are you sure?”
“I’m sure.”


Chapter III

Philip left and Alice went out to the kitchen, intending to fix herself a drink and take it upstairs. She changed her mind and turned out the lights on the first floor and started up the staircase. She felt she was in a stupor, not seeing anything around her, not feeling the floor under her. How many times, she asked herself, had she trod these same stairs, going up to join Nicholas or coming down to be with him? But no more. No more Nicholas.
When she reached the second floor, she turned left and went into the library, its walls lined with books, and a pair of leather Morris chairs standing watch on either side of the fireplace. The smell of leather filled the room. She went back out to the hall, up three steps to the next level, turned and opened a door on the left. It was Nicholas’ study. She stepped in and stood next to a large wooden desk on which sat his computer, containing, she was sure, the manuscript of his most recent work. She was too tired, too numb to read it now. Besides, that would be like invading his privacy. She wondered what it was about. Nicholas made is a habit never to discuss his books-in-progress with her. She’d ask him what it was about when he....
The weight of the empty house was beginning to oppress her. The silence of the place was like that of the grave. Only the noise of the old furnace in the basement could be heard as it huffed and puffed to push heat to the upper floors. Alice wanted to cry, but already she was feeling empty as though there were no more tears.
“There will be more tears,” she whispered to herself for fear the old house might hear her and make fun of her. “Days and years of tears ahead, now with Nicholas gone.”
She looked about the room, Nicholas’ Sanctum Sanctorum with its bookshelves and the oak table where he often laid out a current manuscript in sections so that he could sort out, arrange, and rearrange portions of it. On the floor was the wastebasket Nicholas forbade anyone ever to empty. That, of course, was back in the pre-computer age, the cold, neat age where clutter was acceptable for a writer, sort of a message to the world that a genius was busy at work. This room seemed to smell of Nicholas, breathe the way he did, have his personality. She wanted to embrace this room, even though she was jealous of it. So many hours of Nicholas it had had when she, his wife, did not. Now neither she nor this room would ever have Nicholas again. She walked out.
She turned left and stood in the doorway to the bedroom they shared. It was at the front of the house, facing east and looking down on Route 9. It was a large room, once two, but sometime in the past it had been made into one. On the far wall to her left was a massive spool bed they had found in a junk shop. The bed had been little more than a heap of wood, the pieces scattered around the back yard behind the shop when Nicholas discovered it.
“What a great bed!” Nicholas had damned near screamed when he saw it. He was always the one with imagination, Alice readily admitted.
“Bed? That rotting pile of wood?” she asked.
“Help me find all the pieces. We’ve got to have it!” Nicholas insisted.
They gathered all the pieces they could find and brought them into the shop.
“How much?” Nicholas asked the owner of the shop, old Mrs. Prickles. The proprietor of TREASURE CHEST ANTIQUES scratched herself between what was left of her breasts, rendered the same service to the top of her head between the strands of white hair which had not seen water for a long time, mumbled something about it having come from the estate of one of the area’s oldest and richest families, then announced, “Fifty dollars,” in a tone of voice short on conviction.
“I’ll give you ten,” Nicholas said as he pulled out his wallet.
“Fifteen,” she snapped.
He took out a ten and a five and handed them to her.
“Now, what are you going to do with all this shit?” Alice asked as they loaded it into the wagon.
“We are going to make one of the most beautiful pieces of furniture we own,” Nicholas told her.
And so they did. That was four years ago, wasn’t it? Alice asked as she threw herself down on that same bed and stared up at the ceiling. A blue light was coming through the windows, the reflection of the snow outside which was falling as a sheer veil in front of the street light.
As her eyes accustomed themselves to the semi-darkness, she began to see the rest of the room, the carved walnut armoire in the corner which they bought at an antiques show in Atlantic City, the bird’s-eye maple dresser from a yard sale in Mauricetown, the etchings on the wall (one of the composer, Richard Wagner; the other of his wife, Cosima) which they found at a flea market in Rio Grande, and underfoot, carpeting from a Victorian mansion in Cape May.
She wondered if this was what death was, an unending staring into semi-darkness, not seeing, but not totally blind, either. An eternity of black space without definition, was that all that awaits us? She tried to picture Nicholas’ face and could not. The features she knew better than her own would not form themselves in her mind. She could not remember the way Nicholas’ hair, once sandy, now streaked with gray, waved at the back of his head. She could not see again those hazel eyes, soft and lively at the same time, any more than she could again feel the touch of his arms about her. The loss was now total. It was all so damned unfair, this loss. Not only had they taken Nicholas away from her, they had taken, too, her memories of him. She had nothing left now, she told herself. Nothing.
She heard a sound outside. It was the unmistakable crunching of tires on snow. It was followed by another sound, a car door slamming. She propped herself up on her elbow. There was banging on the front door.
“Who the hell can that be?” she asked and pushed herself up from the bed. “Probably Philip come back because....” She left the room and started down the staircase.
More pounding. Louder this time.
“I’m coming, I’m coming,” she called out. As Alice walked the length of the hallway, she could see the front door with its frosted glass decorated with a peacock in the center, surrounded by squares depicting Victorian home life, ladies in bustles, boys in sailor suits, little girls in ruffled panties, and gentlemen in stove-pipe hats. She could make out the outline of someone standing on the porch, a man, judging from the size. She opened the vestibule door and for a split second, she remembered standing on that same spot talking to Jerry and she remembered, too, what Jerry had said about danger coming through that front door. A shiver ran though her and she told herself it was because the downstairs was so cold and, besides, there was always a draft from the outside door. She flicked on the light switch which illuminated the porch and she shot back the brass night bolt on the old oak door. She opened it and stood there, unable to speak. Her right hand instinctively raised itself to her face. The hair on her scalp moved of its own volition. She stumbled back. It was then that she managed to cry out.
“Oh... oh... my God!” she screamed and fell backwards against the tiled wall of the vestibule. She felt her way behind her and inched back into the hall. She began whining. “No... no... it can’t... it just can’t... but I....”
“For a minute I thought you wouldn’t answer the door.”
“I... I... oh, my God.”
“Well, Ali, are you or are you not going to step aside and let me in?”
“You’re alive. Nicholas, you’re alive. Here... here, let me feel you... touch you. I can’t... I was in bed. Not really. Just lying there. I must be dreaming. That’s it, I fell asleep and I’m dreaming all this. You can’t be back. It can’t be true. Are you... are you really alive?”
“Of course I am,” Nicholas Keene answered and walked past her into the living room. “And you are not dreaming.”
“I thought... we thought... the police said--”
“The police? Oh, of course, there would be the police.”
“Yes, they called a little before eleven thirty. Said there had been an accident and that... that... well, they thought... we all thought that you were dead. Let me light the fire. You’re soaked clear through. Get out of those clothes. You’ll have pneumonia. I’ll get you a robe. Don’t move. I’ll be right back.”
Alice started up the staircase, but stopped midway and looked down over the banister at her husband. “I can’t believe it, I still can’t believe it. Don’t you dare move. I’ll be right back down.”
Nicholas followed with his eyes and shook his head.
Alice seemed to reappear immediately. She had two bath towels under one arm, a robe thrown over the other, and a pair of slippers in her hand. “Take those wet clothes off before you’re frozen to death,” she ordered Nicholas as she put down the robe and slippers. “Here, dry yourself.”
“I’m really not that cold,” Nicholas protested as he backed away.
“Let me dry your hair.” She began vigorously rubbing Nicholas’ head with one of the towels.
“Hey, knock it off, will you!” Nicholas pulled away from her and continued removing his clothes. “You can take these smelly clothes and do whatever it is you do with them. Burn them, for all I care. They stink from the bay. Just hand me that robe over there.” Nicholas put on the robe and sat down.
Alice stood looking at him. Could she be dreaming? she asked herself for the tenth time since answering the front door. If so, then this was the cruelest trick of all, to be led to believe Nicholas had come back, only to find out that he really wasn’t there at all.
“What happened? The car. The accident on the bridge? Lydia and I were.... Poor Lydia! I must call her right away. Poor dear has been through so very much this evening. She thinks you’re dead, too.” Alice hurried out to the kitchen. An out-of-breath Lydia answered the telephone. “Yes... yes, he’s here,” Alice told her. “Can you believe it? I can’t either. What? I don’t know yet. Haven’t gotten all the details out of him, but I’ll ask him. It is wonderful, I know. O.K., then come whenever you like.” She hung up.
“Get over here in front of the fire.” Alice saw Nicholas sitting in one of the wingbacks. “You’ve got to be chilled right to the bone. Sit here next to me on the hearth.”
“Stop fussing. I do not need to sit over there near the fire. Honestly, there are times when you’re as bad as Philip when it comes to acting like a mother hen.”
“Philip! I must call him, too.” Alice ran back to the telephone. She had to dial three times before she got the number, her hands were shaking so badly.
“Jerry’s here with me,” Philip said. “Let me tell him what you just told me.”
Alice heard Philip repeat her words to Jerry, then heard Philip shout, “You shithead! I don’t know why I put up with you as much as I do. I don’t know why I even bother to talk to you. All that goddamned mumbo-jumbo.”
“What’s the problem?”
“Nothing,” Philip replied. “Jerry’s being his usual dumbshit self. Always thinks he knows more than anyone else in this world. Hey, that’s the greatest news I’ve ever heard, about Nicholas being alive, I mean. You two deserve this happiness and I bet you two want to be alone right now. What say we come over this evening?”
Alice assured him they would both be welcome and suggested they come early. She returned to the living room and went over and knelt down on the floor next to the chair where Nicholas was seated. “I still can’t believe my eyes,” she said to herself. And, how ironic: Only a few minutes ago, upstairs as she lay across the bed, her mind could not recall Nicholas’ face, and now here she was looking into that same face with its traces of last summer’s tan still visible. She let her eyes feast on that face with its deep laugh lines, those hazel eyes, and the ears--so very large--that would have seemed unseemly on any other face that did not have the large bone structure Nicholas’ had. On him, those ears fit, as Alice so often remarked, as though custom-made for him. She smiled to herself as she looked at Nicholas’ hair, always so very neat, but now disheveled and still damp, looking dark in this light, although Alice knew it was as blonde as ever, even if receding slightly in the front. “Are you really here?” she asked aloud.
“You did not think I would go off and leave you behind, did you? I always said you would never be lucky enough to get rid of me so easily. I said you would be stuck with me for a good long time. Besides, I have too much to do to die so soon. Too many roads I have... we have... to travel yet, too many places to see, too many books to write, before it’s my time.”
Alice reached up and took Nicholas’ hand in hers and immediately dropped it. “And just as pigheaded as ever!” She raised her voice. “Your hand is ice cold, through and through, and you still insist upon sitting here, away from the fire, when you could be toasty warm.”
“I said I am comfortable, so do not bring it up again. If you do, I shall go upstairs.”
“Are you going to keep me guessing or are you going to tell me all about it? I want to hear it all, right from the very beginning.”
“There really is not that much to tell. I was going over the Thirty-fourth Street bridge when I hit a patch of ice under the snow. The car went off the bridge, and next thing I knew, I was in the water. It was not very deep. I got out, made it to the road, and started for here. A car came along and here I am.”
“I heard a car let you out. Who was it?”
“A woman who was headed for Clermont. She said something about no one should be out on a night like this.”
“I hope you got her name and address. You should send her a thank you, maybe some nice flowers. But what took so long? The police said the accident happened earlier in the evening.”
“She did not come along immediately. I walked for quite some time. When she did come along, she was going in the opposite direction. She was on her way to Pleasantville, where she had to pick up her kids. I did not care. The car looked inviting and I was tired from so much walking. The trip to Pleasantville took forever. She got stuck in the snow twice. We finally got to the kids and headed back. That’s when she discovered her battery was dead. We had to wait until a garage truck got to us and gave her battery a charge.”
“It’s very beautiful outside,” Alice said. “The snow has stopped and the moon is up. Everything out there is now a blue-white, dreamlike, right out of a fantasy land. But nothing like it is in here. Nothing will ever be as wonderful as this room at this moment, with you here, back with me again.”
Alice fell asleep propped against the chair in which Nicholas was sitting. She awoke to a splash of blinding yellow which filled the room. Part of that was from the sun which was well up, beaming through the floor-to-ceiling windows which looked out onto the front lawn. She could hear birds outside searching for food and, had she gotten up earlier, would have seen a pair of cardinals on the branches of the holly tree in the middle of their front yard.
The rest of the yellow in the room came from Lydia’s outfit.
Alice sat upright. “God deliver us, it’s the Yellow Snow Maiden come to visit little Hansel and Gretel in the forest,” she said as she rubbed her eyes and saw Lydia standing over her.
Lydia was beaming, quite her usual self and very unlike what Alice had seen a few hours earlier. Yellow pants, yellow ski jacket, yellow scarf tied about her dyed yellow hair, and yellow open sandals. “No one, absolutely no one,” Alice said to herself, “but Lydia would be wearing open sandals on a day like this with so much snow outside.” She turned her head to see what Nicholas thought of this vision in front of him. The chair was empty.
“Where’s that bastard who gave us all such a scare last night?” Lydia bellowed. “When I get my hands on him, I’m--”“
“Dear Lord, Lydia, not so loud,” Alice pleaded. “My ears will never be the same. He’s probably upstairs in his study. Wouldn’t surprise me in the least if he was busy at work on that novel of his.” In a flash, all that had transpired last night came back to her and she felt that delicious pain of loss that is swept away by the relief of return. An old biblical passage came back to her from her childhood: “For he was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.”
“Then, I’m going upstairs,” Lydia announced and headed for the staircase.
Alice went into the kitchen. She fixed coffee. On the table was a bag, obviously left there by Lydia, containing homemade doughnuts from Mr. Frosch at Hohlung’s bakery. The telephone rang, as it was to continue to do throughout most of the morning as their friends heard of Nicholas’ accident. Alice invited several of the callers to join them that evening.
“You’re right.” Lydia came into the kitchen. “He’s up there slaving away on that computer of his, and judging from the way he looks, he’s been at it all night, if you ask me. No one could have had any sleep at all and still look the way he does. Talk about rings under the eyes!”
“Rings or no rings, I’m glad he’s back.” Alice poured coffee for both of them.
“Of course I am, too. I asked him if I could bring him up some breakfast, but he said he wasn’t hungry. He didn’t even want any of Mr. Frosch’s homemade doughnuts. Can’t ever remember him turning down Mr. Frosch’s homemade doughnuts.”
“I’m not surprised. The writing demon has him in his grips again and when that happens, nothing, not even Mr. Frosch’s homemade doughnuts, can tear him away from the creative process. But I do wish he’d come down. I’m selfish enough to want to have him with me for at least a few hours, especially today, and for the next few days. After all this....” Her eyes began to fill.
“Why don’t you two take a few days off and go away? I’ll keep an eye on this place, you know that. It would do you both a great deal of good to get away from everything and be alone.”
“That sounds tempting,” Alice agreed. “Florida. It would be wonderful to go there again. Besides, I’ve had enough of this damned winter.”
“Make the arrangements and don’t tell Hemingway upstairs until you have everything all set for the trip. Surprise him. I’m afraid if you ask him, he’ll use that book of his as an excuse not to go, as though this was the last book he’s ever likely to write. There’ll be plenty of time over the years to write a great many more books.”
“Damn it, you’re right, Lydia, and when you’re right, you’re right.” Alice’s face lit up. Color was just beginning to come back into it. The sallowness of last evening was almost completely gone. “We’re having some friends in this evening. You’ll come?”
“Ever know me to refuse an invitation to a party? Or to a free dinner, especially one of your dinners?” Lydia stood up. “I have a thousand things I want to get done today, so you’ll have to excuse me. I better get started right away, if I’m to be the sensation of the evening.” She stopped at the door which led out to a small porch at the back of the house. She had her hand on the knob. “I’m still a bit worried, Alice,” she said and tilted her head in the direction of the upstairs. “He really doesn’t look good. Not good at all. Get away from all this damned snow and cold.”
“I will. I promise.”
“Isn’t it funny? Life I mean.”
“Why?”
“I was supposed to come here today so you and I could make arrangements for Nicky’s funeral. I dreaded it. You have no idea how I dreaded it. Now, we’re standing here talking about you making arrangements for the two of you to take off for Florida.”
Alice laughed. “Yes. Life is funny. Funny. And so very, very, wonderful.”


Chapter IV

In the living room, everyone was seated around Nicholas, more or less in a semi-circle facing him. Someone was in the process of asking him a question.
“...so it’s a totally new avenue for you?” It was Maudie who was speaking.
Nicholas nodded. “Yes, something quite different, you might say.”
“Then, not another mystery?” Ronald asked.
“That... that would be one way of putting it,” Nicholas said, rather hesitantly.
“Now you’re being mysterious!” Milicent exclaimed.
“No, not really,” Nicholas began to explain. “It is just that when you are writing, it is impossible to discuss it with anyone else. At least it is with me. I can not even discuss my work with Alice.” Nicholas shot a glance at his wife. A look passed between them missed by everyone else in the room. “You do not mean to be mysterious or secretive or unconfiding. It is more that you are not really sure yourself what it is all about. You do not know exactly what is going to happen next with your characters. I know that people who do not write can not comprehend that. They think the whole story comes out in one piece, that it is first in your head, passes through your fingers, and comes out the other end, bound with an intriguing cover in a bookstore. It simply does not work that way. You start with an idea, all right, but what you end up with may not even remotely resemble the original idea. As you progress, you are as much in the dark as any reader will be. You are introduced to your characters and you get to know them, get to understand what they are like, what motivates them, their strengths and their weaknesses, and then they begin to act and talk independently, by themselves. You seem to have so very little control over them or over what happens to them. They lead a life of their own, or at least they make a powerful attempt to do so.”
“I’ll never understand that,” Benji said. “Maudie does a bit of writing and that’s practically word for word what she says, but I’m damned if I can see it.”
“And more than anything else,” Nicholas continued, “once you start, once the book begins to take shape, there is nothing, absolutely nothing, that can keep you from finishing it. You must go on!”
“Whew!” Milicent exclaimed. “That makes me go all oogly-googly. I need another drink.”
“I mean exactly what I said,” Nicholas added. “With this book especially, I could never let anything prevent me from finishing it. I do not suppose anyone else can fully appreciate that.”
“I can.” Every head in the room turned to see who was speaking. Milicent stopped in mid-pour to stare. It was Jerry. These were the first words he had spoken since he arrived. “I think I know, Nicholas,” he added as he stared intently at him. “I think I know how powerful that can be, so strong that no one or nothing can stand in your way, come between you and something you must do, something you must complete.”
Nicholas returned his stare. “Yes, I believe you do understand, Jerry,” he said.
There was a long pause and everyone in the room remained silent as the two men looked at one another.
“Hey, knock it off, you two!” Alice said and got up from the floor where she had been sitting. “Jeff, how about playing the piano for us? Let’s get this party off its lazy ass. It’s time this wake awoke.”
All serious discussion ceased and the music took over. Maudie and Benji danced, and the evening reached its apex when Ronald removed a scarf from the library table, threw it over his shoulders and started his imitation of Judy Holiday.
Shortly before one o’clock, Philip began dropping hints that Nicholas needed some sleep. The party broke up. Alice closed the door behind Philip and Jerry who were the last to leave.
“Let’s go to bed,” she said to Nicholas as she began putting out the lights on the first floor. “I’ll straighten up this mess tomorrow.”
“You go ahead,” Nicholas told her. “I have work to do. I will be there in a little while.”
“You didn’t get any sleep last night. It’s now one-thirty in the morning and you intend to go back to that room of yours? Well, don’t spend too much time there.”
She stomped upstairs to their bedroom. The bed, that same bed she had thrown herself across less than twenty-four hours earlier, crushed by the weight of Nicholas’ death, now looked so inviting. Every inch of her body cried out for rest. Within a few minutes, she was asleep, but it was a fitful sleep. She twisted about, wrapping herself mummy-fashion in the bed clothes. She awoke with a start, thinking someone had called out her name. She sat upright. The place next to her was unoccupied. Across the room, the clock on the dresser showed it was almost four-thirty. She listened for a sound, maybe the sound of computer keys coming from Nicholas’ study. There was no sound. The house had gone to sleep. She got out of bed, put on her robe and slippers, and went down the hall.
The study was empty. A light was burning over the desk and another next to the computer. Half-consciously, she switched them off, turned, and left the room. She went downstairs, expecting to find Nicholas in the living room. That, too, was deserted. She walked into the dining room. A blast of cold air met her. She pulled up the robe collar around her neck. From where she was standing, she could see the kitchen and see, by the light over the sink, that the back door was standing open. Open? Funny, she was positive she had checked that door before she went upstairs to bed. How could it now be open? Had someone broken into the house? Quietly and carefully she inched through the archway leading to the kitchen, looking left and right as she came into the room, making sure no one was there. This room also was empty. She would have to shut that door, she told herself. But what if someone was out there, on the small porch, just on the other side of the open door? To shut the door, she would have to reach out, out into that darkness to pull it inward. She moved towards the door, determined to close it, when she saw something in the middle of the back yard, silhouetted against the snow. A tree? Nonsense. They did not have a tree in the middle of the yard. What, then? As her eyes accepted the darkness, she could see that it was the figure of a man standing there, looking up at the sky.
“Nick... Nicholas, is that you?” Alice managed to cry out.
“Go back to bed,” Nicholas called back to her.
“Are you totally insane?” Courage came with her anger. “It’s bitter cold outside and you’re standing there with nothing warmer on than a thin shirt. Get in here right away.”
Nicholas walked up the back porch. “It is not that cold,” he said as he walked past her into the kitchen.
Alice was now shaking, from the cold, from her fear, and from her anger. “I can’t believe you! What is this, some kind of death wish? You damn near kill yourself driving off that bridge into the ocean Friday night, you don’t sleep, haven’t eaten a decent meal since you came back, and now this... this insanity. It must be ten degrees out there and you practically naked. Something has happened to you, Nicholas, and I’m calling Philip first thing in the morning.”
“There is nothing wrong with me,” Nicholas said as he stopped in the doorway leading to the dining room. He was facing her. “In fact, it is safe to say that I have never felt better in my entire life. You should be as healthy as I am.”
Alice stood in the middle of the kitchen, bewildered, her mouth hanging open, too frustrated to put into words the thoughts that were flying about inside her head. She watched Nicholas leave the room. A few minutes later, she heard sounds upstairs. Alice resigned herself that sleep was now impossible. She fixed a pot of coffee and sat down at the kitchen table while it brewed. She had a problem on her hands, of that she was certain. The problem was Nicholas. Oh, not the Nicholas she knew so well, not the Nicholas she loved so much. It was the Nicholas she no longer knew, who was a stranger to her, the Nicholas who came through the front door the night before last.
The sun came up and everything outside was bathed in blinding light. Towards the back of their property, the snow had blown about during the night and had crested, like layers of white slate. Tracks of small animals punctured it here and there, prints of squirrels mostly and occasional muskrat. Nearer to the house, around the back porch, Alice could see the pattern of birds’ feet. They were expecting the bread she always threw out for them when the ground was covered and they could not get their natural food.
She fixed a large breakfast, hoping the aroma of bacon and the smell of flapjacks and homefries would lure Nicholas downstairs. It didn’t work. She prepared a tray and as she did so, she went over in her mind the things she would say to Nicholas to get him to eat, the arguments, the teasing, the cajoling she’d use. And if Nicholas still wouldn’t eat, she’d.... She’d do what? she asked himself. What, actually could she do, if Nicholas refused to eat?
She knocked on the study door as she balanced the tray with one hand. “Room Service,” she called out as she pushed the door open and walked in with the hot food.
Nicholas turned his head mechanically and looked up at her. He stared as though not seeing or not recognizing. His eyes, so alert at other times they seemed to dance in his head like darkened hazel nuts against his bronzed skin, seemed now in this sun-filled room to be sunken deep into his head. The whites had disappeared. In their place was an almost solid redness. The rims of his eyes were dry, crusted. His face seemed so long, so drawn, so haggard. Lines which Alice had never seen there before were pronounced. She felt a momentary fear come over her, but she quickly succeeded in dispelling it.
“Now, just put everything aside,” she said. “I’ve fixed every last one of your favorite breakfast foods.” She began removing the lids. “Flapjacks. Potholders, as you call them. Fried venetian blinds slats or bacon. Yellow innertube, otherwise known as boursin omelette. Finally, behold, a mug of steaming bilgewater. In other words, a breakfast fit for a king.” She now stood at mock attention, imitating the perfect waitress. “And, if Sir wishes anything else....” She wondered how much longer she could keep up this pathetic pretense at joviality. Nicholas was still staring at her with a puzzled look on his face.
“Now, if you will drag yourself back from that other world--” Alice started to say.
“What made you say that?” Nicholas demanded in a voice that was unnecessarily loud.
“Don’t get upset,” she said. “Just a.... Means nothing, honestly. Just a figure of speech. You looked millions of miles away, that’s all.”
“Sorry,” Nicholas said in a lowered voice.
“Nonetheless, you do look like you’re not entirely with it.” She stepped closer to the desk. “What’re you writing?” she asked as she took a quick glance at the computer screen, then directly into Nicholas’ face. It was all she could do not to turn away in disgust. She had never, not even the time Nicholas was so sick with the flu, seen him look as he did this morning. “Tell me about it,” she added while holding her breath.
“You do not want to know about it, not at this time,” Nicholas said. “It would only spoil it for you later when you read the whole manuscript. I promise to let you read it before I send it off, as I always do. Promise.”
“I’d still like to get some idea what it’s about now,” she insisted. She deliberately injected a bit of determination into her voice.
“Well... basically, it is about second chances,” Nicholas began. He spoke as though it were an effort for him to get the words out of his mouth. “Everyone thinks he or she would like to get a second chance, a chance to redo or undo some of the things they have done in their lives, but I doubt if anyone would really know what to do with a second chance if they got one. And if they did get one, would they do anything differently or if differently, would they necessarily do it better, or would they just make worse mistakes?”
Alice was staring at Nicholas as he spoke. For the first time since the accident, Nicholas actually seemed to be communicating with her, as though he were about to open up. “Second chances? Second chances at what?”
“At life, you might say,” Nicholas answered her. “A second chance to do and to say and to be all that one should be but seldom is.”
“I still don’t understand,” she pressed. She leaned on the edge of his desk. She thought she did understand, but she wanted this conversation to continue. It was a golden moment, not to be lost, the two of them talking the way they used to. “And how does one go about getting one of these second chances? What do you have to do?”
“You do not have to do anything, not on your own that is, not in the usual sense of that word,” he explained. “You just have to want a second chance. I think it just happens to some people. Some people seem to get a lot of second chances, while others never get even one. I guess it is some kind of karma or kismet.”
“So, what I understand you’re saying is that this novel of yours has a plot where someone gets a chance to start all over again, is that right?” Alice got up from the desk and began pacing. “That’s what I like about your novels, dear. They have good, enjoyable plots, plots you can follow, sink your teeth into. So many books today don’t. Oh, they seem to have a plot. Maybe they do, some of them, but... what is it I’m trying to say? They don’t grab you, don’t make you desperately want to interact with the characters, help them, stop them from doing something wrong, something....”
Alice thought she noticed the very slightest hint of a smile around Nicholas’ mouth. Is it possible, she asked himself, that he was actually smiling? If so, it was another first this weekend, for he had not, as far as she could tell, been seen to smile since the accident or at least a couple of weeks just before that.
“It is one of the things I have always loved about you, Ali,” Nicholas said. “You do ramble on and you do get yourself so... so all fired up and emotional and all the time you look like a little girl explaining why she absolutely must have a new dress for the birthday party she will attend next weekend or something like that. You do everything but cross your legs and wet yourself when you go on like this, but I think it is cute, just the same.”
“And you enjoy making fun of me.” She pretended to be offended, all the while flattered by what Nicholas had said and happy that the wall, the new wall erected between them these past couple of days, was beginning to show a few cracks. Maybe before they were finished this morning, it would come tumbling down. “You still didn’t tell me what kind of plot it has,” she added.
“Tomorrow, I will fill you in, I promise.”
“All right, it’s a deal,” Alice agreed and smiled. “I’ll wait until tomorrow if you will stop working this very minute and eat your breakfast. The food is already getting cold. And I won’t take ‘NO’ for an answer, no matter how hard you try to--”
“You are right, completely right,” Nicholas said and turned off his computer.
“No matter what excuse you give for not eat.... You will? Good. Sit over here at the desk.”
“It does look good... oh... oh....” Nicholas clutched his hand to his right side. He let out a muffled scream.
“What is it, Nicky?” Alice cried out. “What’s wrong?”
Nicholas bent over his desk, writhing in agony. “It... it.... There, it is really nothing.” He straightened up.
“Don’t tell me it was nothing,” she said. “And what was that sound I heard? Sounded like something cracking or snapping.”
“I am all right,” Nicholas insisted. He looked at his wife as though he were studying her, his head moving slightly from side to side, as if trying to get her into perspective. “Noise? Oh, that was just this old chair. It squeaks and cracks all the time.”
“I’m calling Philip,” she said and turned to leave the room.
“No! I do not need him.”
“I’m calling him just the same. He should take a look at you. You could have hurt yourself internally the other night during that accident and not have known it and it could be serious later on. It wouldn’t hurt to let him examine you.” She walked into the adjoining room, their bedroom. As she was reaching for the telephone, it rang. She picked it up. It was Philip.
“I was just about to call you,” she told him.
“Alice, are you alone?”
“Of course not. Nicholas is here with me.”
“Next to you? Can he hear you?”
“I suppose so. I’m in our bedroom. He’s in his study. Why? What’s this all about?”
“Listen to me, Alice, and please don’t interrupt. Do you know who Nicholas went to see in Atlantic City last Friday? Did he tell you?”
“No. Why? Something to do with his book, I thought. But I have something to tell you right now.”
Philip cut her short. “Lower your voice. I know who it was he went to see. Alice, you’re in....”
“Goddamn it, Philip, you shut up and listen to me. Nicholas is sick, that’s why I was about to call you. He needs....”
Once more, Philip interrupted. “I know. I know. And that’s the very reason I’m calling you. Alice, can you get away? Alone, without Nicholas knowing where you’re going? I must talk to you. It’s urgent. And there’s someone I want you to meet.”
“Just what the hell are you talking about, Philip? Nicholas is your patient, as well as your friend. He needs you. I think he should be in the hospital. And you want me to come see you without him, so you can introduce me to someone. You’re not making sense at all. You’ve got to see him immediately!”
“I will, I will. He’ll keep, believe me. He’ll be all right for the time being. But first I’ve got to see you alone. Trust me. You know what I’ve always thought of the two of you. You’re the best friends I have. I wouldn’t do anything that wasn’t for Nicholas’ good. Trust me and get over here as soon as you possibly can.”
“Maybe. I’ll think about it. In the meantime--”
“In the meantime, Nicholas will be all right. It’s you I’m worried about right now. Promise me you’ll get here as soon as you can.”
“Maybe, but first I have to ask you about--”
There was a noise from Nicholas’ study. Something had fallen to the floor. Alice abruptly hung up and rushed into the next room. The tray of food was lying on the floor with eggs, bacon, flapjacks, fried potatoes, orange juice, and toast spread across the carpeting, looking as though a diner had exploded.
“Are you all right?” Alice asked as she stopped in her tracks, careful not to step on the food.
“Yes,” Nicholas answered. His voice was hoarse.
“How did it happen? Did you have another pain?”
Nicholas shook his head. “No, no, nothing like that. The tray slipped out of my hand.”
“Well, if you’re all right.” She began picking up the food.
“You spoke to Philip?”
Alice straightened up. She wondered how much she should tell him of what Philip had said to her. Should she betray Philip? Should she keep something from Nicholas? She decided to wait a little while before relating what Philip had said to her.
“What did you two discuss?”
“Nothing much,” she lied.
“He called you. You did not call him. What did he want?”
“Oh, you know Philip. At times, he can be downright silly. Jerry’s been acting up again and you know those two when they’re going at it. Jerry goes off and hides someplace and Philip gets on the telephone calling everyone he knows and cries on their shoulders.” The words kept tumbling out of her mouth and she seemed unable to stop them. Why was she lying to Nicholas?
“I have work to do,” Nicholas said, and resumed his seat.
“I’ll fix you something else to eat,” she said. “What would you like?”
“Nothing,” Nicholas said and began typing.
“Nicholas! Don’t! You’ve got to eat or you’ll be sick, much sicker than you already are. I’ll bring something up.”
Nicholas remained silent.
“Something is terribly, terribly wrong,” she went on. “Tell me about it. Tell me all about it.” She felt she was reaching the end of her patience. “I must know.”
“You must know?”
“Yes. I want you to tell me. You’re cold. Distant. You don’t seem to even want to be with me. It’s like... like you’ve been avoiding me all weekend. You’ve shut yourself up in this study, not eating, not sleeping. I can’t help but wonder if you didn’t spill all this food on purpose so you wouldn’t have to eat it, as though you’re afraid I’m going to poison you.”
Nicholas shot a glance up at her, then quickly went back to his work.
“It’s a whole lot more than not eating and not sleeping,” she continued. “It’s something a great deal deeper than that. Something about you is totally different. I understand that something like you went through Friday evening could shake anyone up. It must have been horrible. Maybe you should talk about it. It might help. And, if you don’t care to talk to me about it, then somebody else. Philip maybe.”
Nicholas shook his head. “No, I do not want to talk about it.”
“Then tell me, is there something wrong with me? Have I done something to upset you?”
“You could never do anything that would upset me.”
For only a moment, Alice thought she felt a hint of love coming through Nicholas’ voice, a warmth that had been missing these past couple of days. “Tell me what happened,” she begged.
“There really is nothing worth telling.” Nicholas waved the matter away with a gesture of his hand. “There was ice on the bridge. You know how that is. They have all those signs as you approach it saying that the bridge freezes over before the main road, but you never think it will apply when you are driving. But there it was, a sheet of ice covering the top of the bridge and I hit it going about fifty miles an hour and I took right off. I hit the side of the bridge, the guard rail, and went right through it as though it were made of paper. Before I could react, I was sailing through the air and then hit the water. It is as simple as that, so you see there really is nothing to tell. The whole event took... what?... five, maybe ten seconds and it was all over.”
“O.k., I’ll buy that. It makes sense. Now, let’s get to what really happened last Friday.”
“I do not know what you are talking about.”
“Tell me about the whole day. Why did you go to Atlantic City? Did you meet someone there? Who? What took place?”


Chapter V

“What is this, some kind of inquisition?”
“I’m just trying to get to the bottom of whatever horrible thing happened that changed you so much.”
“And I do not care for the way you are going about doing it. You make it sound as though I have to account to you for my actions, tell you everything I do. What gives you that right?”
“Our marriage, that’s what gives me the right,” she snapped back. Her voice was again getting louder, shriller. “Our life together and my right to know what it is that has suddenly come between us. It’s tearing us apart and it looks as though it might kill you. You leave me one morning, saying you have business in Atlantic City and that you won’t be late. You’re your usual self. Everything seems fine. But you don’t come home when you say you will. Instead, I get a telephone call from the police saying there’s been an accident, that your body was washed out to sea. Your mother, your friends, all of us sit up most of the night, racked with grief, unable to fully grasp or accept the tragedy that has befallen us. We can’t believe you’re dead. Then you show up at the front door....”
“You make it sound as though you wish I had not come back.”
“...at the front door, and ever since you’ve been here, you’re someone else. You are not Nicholas Keene. You’re not the old Nicky I knew so well. Not once have you put your arms around me, kissed me. You say nothing is wrong, then have the audacity to ask me what right I have to question you. Well, I will continue to question. I will question until I finally get some answers and if not from you, then from someone else, if I have to. But I will get some answers, you can be damned certain of that.”
There was a long silence. Alice never took her eyes off Nicholas. He looked away.
“Are you going to tell me about it?” she pressed.
“I can not,” Nicholas finally replied. “I only wish I could, but I can not. You would not understand, if I tried. No one would. I do not understand myself. I know I do not understand, so how can I expect anyone else to?”
“Try us,” she urged. She felt she had to hit and hit hard. “Just give us a try. We might surprise you. Is it someone else? Have you met someone else? Do you no longer love me?”
“No!” Nicholas shouted. “No, never, never think that. There never could be anyone else but you, you must always believe that.”
“Must I? These past few days, I’m not so sure.”
Nicholas pushed his chair away from the desk. He seemed lost, bewildered as he looked around the room. He sat dejected, his legs spread apart, his hands dangling between them, his eyes fixed on the small area of floor in front of him. “I did... something,” he began, slowly, barely audible. Alice had all she could do to hear him. “Something... different. I am not sure what it was I did. I do not know if I really did it, or just imagined it, or dreamed it. I am so... so mixed up, Ali. Please bear with me. I can not... I do not.... I keep telling myself that I did not do it, that no one could have done it. Such a thing... is so... is so impossible. Yes, that is the word for it: impossible.” He lifted his eyes and looked at her. “Yes, impossible, so I could not have done it, could I?”
“But you won’t tell me what it was. It’s obvious you prefer not to share it with me. Lately, a lot of things are more important to you than I am.”
“Please, please do not talk that way,” he pleaded. His face was distorted as though in the throes of weeping, but no tears appeared in his eyes. They were, instead, dry, lifeless. “You have always come first. You always will. All I am doing is asking for some time. Tomorrow. Is that too much to ask? I am tired. You are right, I have not been sleeping. I am afraid to sleep. I can not sleep. The book, my work, it must be completed. Tomorrow, it will be completed. Then, I shall be able to explain everything to you. Please bear with me. Please help me, Ali. I shall tell you all, if only you will give me a few more hours. That is all I ask.” He turned and looked Alice directly in the eye. “You do know how very much I love you?”
Alice returned the stare that seemed to last an eternity, looking into the face and into the eyes of this man she loved so dearly. She felt her insides were being ripped out of her. “Yes,” she said softly, “I know you love me. I shall wait. You shall have your few hours. But do not become angry with me if I try in my own way to help you, to help us. I can not love you and at the same time stand by idly and watch what is happening to you. I must help.”
She left the room. By the time she reached the first floor, she stopped and listened. She could hear him back at work. “That goddamn book!” she muttered to herself. She went into the kitchen and poured herself a cup of coffee. She wanted a few minutes to think. An idea was taking shape in her head. It did not take long for the idea to mature. She dialed the telephone.
“Philip? I’ve thought over what you said a little while ago. I want to come and see you. Now o.k.? Good. I’ll be there in a few minutes.”
She hung up the telephone. She would not feel guilty, she resolved, for going behind Nicholas’ back to see Philip. She was convinced Philip was the only one who could help them at this time. She was equally certain that both her husband and she needed help.
Besides, she was also more than a little bit curious about the person Philip wanted her to meet.


Chapter VI

“I want you to meet Doctor Sharples,” Philip said as he brought Alice into his living room.
Alice saw a big man with close-cropped white hair get up from one of the overstuffed chairs and come towards her with outstretched hand (or paw, she thought.) She looked up into a ruddy face and was tempted to be charmed by the most beautiful pair of green eyes she had ever seen in another human being.
“Please call me Gus,” he said to her.
“And let’s all sit down,” Philip added.
Alice thought Philip’s voice was a bit shaky, as though somewhat nervous about this meeting he had arranged.
“Can I get you something? Coffee, maybe?” Philip directed his question to Alice.
She shook her head, while still staring at Gus. She guessed this fatherly giant was in his mid fifties, and liked the outdoors judging from the windblown, tanned face with deep lines etched into it by sun and wind.
“Tell me, Philip,” Alice said, never taking her eyes off Gus, “is this the person Nicholas went to see in Atlantic City last Friday?”
“I’m afraid I am,” Gus answered before Philip could.
“And, is this the person you want me to see today?” she continued questioning, her words directed to Philip, her eyes still fixed on Gus.
“Well... er....”
“I’ll answer for Philip,” Gus said. “Yes, he wanted you to come here today to meet me, but I must confess that I was more interested in meeting you. You see, I want to ask you a few questions, if I may. You wouldn’t mind answering a few questions, would you?”
“Before I answer any questions,” she replied, “I want to know a few things myself. First of all, why did Nicholas go to see you? What business did he have with you? Or you with him? And, while we’re at it, what kind of doctor are you? Is Nicholas sick? Is there something wrong with him I should know about? Is there--?”
Gus held up a hand to put a halt to her flood of questions. “Please, Alice. You don’t mind if I call you Alice, do you? Mrs. Keene is so formal and awkward.”
She stared without answering his question.
“Of course, you have every right to ask,” Gus continued. “As for what kind of doctor I am, let me assure you I am not a medical doctor, nor a psychologist. And no, your husband did not make an appointment to consult me concerning his health. I received my PhD from the University of Pennsylvania quite a few years ago. My studies were in anthropology. I have always been fascinated by man--in the generic and genetic senses of that word--man, the animal, the predator, the prey, preying upon all of nature, even upon himself. But I wander. I do that so very often, more so as the years go by. Do you find yourself doing that, Alice? Wandering, I mean. Never mind. There, I just digressed again. I must stick to the point. There is one thing you should know up front, and that is that I did not meet with Nicholas last Friday. We had an appointment to meet at the Claridge Casino. We were to meet around midafternoon. The evening before, Thursday evening, I attended a dinner in Harrisburg in honor of a colleague of mine. We were snowed in, the same storm that hit here on Friday. The airports were closed down. By the time I finally got to Atlantic City, it was late on Friday. In fact, it was past midnight. I inquired about your husband, but as I expected, I found he had left. So you see, we had no opportunity to speak.”
“Why did he want to see you?” she asked.
“Mr. Keene called me a couple of weeks ago and asked if we might meet, that he needed some information for a book he was writing. Well, when I found out he was Nicholas Keene, the writer, I was only too happy to help any way I could. I’ve read all his books and found them most entertaining. Besides, I also confess--although only to a handful of people, and I shall vehemently deny it if you should quote me--that...” (Here, Gus’s frame shook as he silently laughed.) “...I am more than moderately interested in gambling. Nicholas’ call and an invitation to meet one of my favorite authors in a casino was just too much temptation for me to resist.”
“Then all this is even more puzzling,” Alice said. She addressed Gus, but this time her eyes included Philip as well. “If you didn’t see him, and you were anxious to do so, and you’re still in the area, and this is now Sunday, why didn’t you call him at home? Nicholas was home all day yesterday. You could have reached him any time. You could call him right now, if you wish. And, if you do not have the number, you could have gotten it from Philip. Why then are you interested in meeting and talking to me? I’m no author and this certainly is not a casino we’re in right now.”
Gus shot a glance at Philip. Philip answered.
“Alice, you know I’ve always been a good friend to both you and Nicholas, don’t you? You know that if I ever did anything or asked either of you to do something, it would always be because I believed it was for your own good. You do believe that, don’t you?”
Alice nodded in acquiescence.
“Then, I’m asking you to answer Gus’s questions. It’s very important.”
“How do you and Gus know one another?”
“Gus and I have known one another for a good many years,” Philip explained. “We met... what?... ten, maybe twelve years ago. I was taking a course at Fordham one summer. A course Gus was teaching. Over the years, Alice, I’ve come to respect Gus a great deal. We’ve seen practically nothing of one another these past twelve years, but we’ve kept in touch. I said I respect him. There are some, I’m afraid, who don’t share that respect. Some might say they think he’s gone off the deep end, but I know that’s not true. Oh, I grant you I don’t accept everything Gus teaches and believes in. That’s not important right now. What is important, Alice, and I can’t stress this too much, is the fact that Nicholas evidently does. Otherwise, he would never have contacted Gus. Nicholas obviously believes what Gus teaches and writes about. We know that from the conversation Nicholas had with Gus on the telephone a few weeks ago. Once you accept that--that Nicholas does believe--I think you and all of us will be in a better position to help Nicholas.”
Alice turned to Gus. “If there’s anything I want at this moment, it is to help my husband. Obviously, he is going through a very rough time and I want to do anything I can to make it easier for him.”
“Good!” Gus sighed in relief. “First, tell me about Nicholas. Before this weekend, did you notice anything peculiar about him, anything out of the ordinary, different? Any drastic changes in habits, in behavior... in his usual self?”
“No... no, nothing I’d call extraordinary. You understand, I trust, that as a writer he sometimes gets moody. Maybe that’s customary for all writers, I don’t know. I’m accustomed to his spending long periods of time in his study when he’s working on something. But lately? Before this weekend? No, there was nothing out of the ordinary.”
“Last Friday, when he left home that day, to go to Atlantic City to meet me, how would you describe his mood?”
“Normal, I guess. In fact, I remember he was just the slightest bit more cheerful. Teased me a bit about my breakfast cooking, as I remember.”
“And, since then? Since the accident on Friday evening?”
“Since then,” she began thoughtfully, “since then, it’s like living with another person entirely. Totally different.”
“In what ways?” Gus took a pack of cigarettes from his pocket and began tossing it absent-mindedly in his hand.
“In just about every way. He’s cold... distant... unusually so. He isn’t his usual talkative self. It’s difficult to get much in the way of words out of him. He spent all day Saturday in his study.”
“But you said he often does that when he’s working,” Gus pointed out.
“Yes, but not like this. He’ll usually come out every once in a while to stretch and to grab something to eat. Says writing gives him a ravenous appetite. Sometimes, he’ll find me if I’m home and begin rattling on about almost anything, the most trivial things. Says it helps clear his head, so he can go back to his writing. Never talks about what he’s writing at the time, just silly things, you know. But not this time. He won’t talk about much of anything. And he hasn’t eaten a thing that I know of since he came back. And....” Her voice trailed off.
Gus went on staring at her. Finally, he asked, “And?”
“I’m sure it’s absolutely nothing.”
“Please, Alice, we must know everything. Everything!” Philip insisted.
“I said he’s cold,” she started to say, then moved uncomfortably in her seat. “Well... maybe it’s my imagination, and I’m sure it isn’t anything that should concern us. Maybe you, Philip. I’m sure it should be of interest to you. What it is... well, he’s cold. Not just his moods. Cold physically.”
“Not his usual affectionate self, eh?” Gus asked.
“No, I don’t mean it like that.” She made a gesture of helplessness with her hands. “He is cold. To the touch. His hands are like icicles and his face... well, it’s more the temperature of marble than of flesh.”
Gus put away the small pad in which he had been writing. He stared into space and scratched his chin. When he spoke, it was in a totally different way. He was almost stern in his attitude. “Alice, I must tell you about Samuel Adams.”
“You mean the patriot?”
Gus waved a hand in midair to erase her answer. “No, no, someone quite different, I assure you. And, closer to our own time. Well, to my time, anyway. The Samuel Adams I’m referring to lived in the past century. He died... excuse me, lived... in this country and was born in a little town in Iowa in l922. Most of his early life was quite uneventful, coming from a poor farming family. At a very early age, he left home and worked his way across country to New York City. He had little or no formal education. He did learn the basics of reading and writing and precisely because he was such a loner, he began devouring books almost as fast as he could take them home from the New York City Public Library. He educated himself and did a better job of it than all the tutors in the world could have done. Those who tested him later--and that included several professional educators--swore he was a genius and had the equivalent of a PhD in several disciplines.
“The Second World War came along and like all able-bodied young men, Samuel was conscripted into the army. He was sent overseas to the South Pacific. He was among the first contingent of soldiers to recapture the Solomon Islands from the Japanese. Our soldiers were virtually wiped out to a man. Samuel was killed. The medic who found him said his torso was almost torn apart with shrapnel. He was marked for a mass grave, but the medic saw something which took his attention away. A few moments later, he turned and saw the dead Adams no longer in the place where he had been. He was bewildered, to say the least. He looked about, searching to see who might have removed the body, but there was no one. It doesn’t require much of an imagination to picture the state of general confusion under the circumstances, bullets flying overhead, planes dropping bombs, heavy artillery, death and blood and noise all around. The medic couldn’t waste any more time worrying about a corpse that disappeared. Later, when he had time, he spoke to other medics, to anyone who might have been near the spot, might have seen what happened to Samuel Adams, even his superior officers, but no one could help. And, as I said, under such barbaric conditions, the medic was forced to forget about him for the time being and tend to those who needed him. When he told the story, he got as many explanations as there were those who would listen to him: the medic’s eyes were playing tricks on him; he went back to the wrong spot; someone moved the body and didn’t remember doing so. No one believed a dead body got up and walked away. At least no one admitted believing this medic. The day following this incident, at the very height of the war in the Pacific, when every soldier was desperately needed, especially medics, he got transferred to a soft, comfortable desk job state-side. He ended up, with no explanation, filling in forms on a military base in California, a job that was already being done by the women in the army, the WAAC’S, as they came to be known. So why him? Why send him back to the States?” Gus lit a cigarette, took one puff, then put it out.
“I don’t understand,” Alice said. “What does all this have to do with Nicholas? Or with me?”
“The medic was lucky,” Gus continued, not bothering to answer Alice’s question. “His perfect war record was taken into consideration. And, one can only conjecture, he was not considered sufficiently dangerous enough to the army or the country to warrant more severe treatment. Otherwise, he could have received a Section VIII, a discharge for psychiatric reasons. He could have been locked up in a veterans hospital in a loony ward. He was in San Francisco a few days after he got back to the states when he was walking along Market Street. He froze in his tracks. According to him, he saw walking towards him, in uniform, none other than Samuel Adams. Granted, Samuel was in bad shape, but the medic insisted he would never forget that face, that it was burned into his memory. He went to his superior and told him what he believed he saw. You can guess how his story was greeted. He was ordered into a hospital for a check-up. He stuck to his story, insisting that he had seen a soldier who was killed overseas. This time, he wasn’t so lucky. He got his medical discharge. Now, keep in mind this was at a time when the army was inducting anyone who could walk. Casualties were high in the Pacific, and we were running into trouble in Africa and Europe. Medical discharges were a luxury the army could not afford. I’m just surprised he didn’t end up in an alley someplace with a knife in his back. The army has ways of taking care of dangerous people, especially in time of war.”
“So? Maybe he was nuts. He certainly sounds that way,” Alice said. “He was obviously either crazy or was suffering from some kind of stress from the war. Being a medic, he must have seen some horrible sights and it was probably too much for him.”
“You think so, eh?” Gus stroked his chin again and leaned on one elbow on the arm of the chair. “I dare say you don’t know the army very well, Alice. They have ways of silencing those they consider dangerous and the young man was, if nothing else, dangerous. I say dangerous because he was coming too close to something which the army knew all about, had been trying some experiments on, and in fact, so did a few other people outside the army know about it. It was around this same time, during the height of the war, that the United States army smuggled someone out of Nazi Germany, a Doctor Gerhard Ruessling. They offered him a bundle of money, got him a virtual mansion in Virginia a few miles outside Washington, a whole new identity, and even went so far as to provide him with a speech therapist to eradicate his German accent.”
“What was so important about this man to warrant that kind of treatment?” Alice asked. “Just who was this Doctor Russ... Russ...?”
“Ruessling. He was, and as far as I am concerned, will always be the world’s foremost authority on remigrants. His book1 on the subject remains the finest study on the subject ever put on paper. He was kept close to Washington because, as rumor


1. In his seminars, Dr. Gus Sharples gives the title of this book: Abschung des Toten, Ruessling und Müdlen, published 1939 by Mannfried und Weissen, Düsseldorf. He also refers to Karl Gustav Himbeere’s article from the May 1926 issue of Die Welt Übernaturlich. Dr. Leslie Worthering-York of Cambridge University translated this article and incorporated it into his book, Beyond All Understanding in 1934. Unfortunately, there are very few copies of this book extant. Finally, should the reader have access to the Vatican Library, Dr. Sharples suggests the parchment fragment, De Mortuorum Reditione seu Defuncti Qui Terram Ambulant. It is attributed to Terentius Lucanus A.D. 434(?) - A.D. 490(?). For centuries, this document was on the list of the Church’s forbidden books.


had it, President Roosevelt was the one who had arranged getting him into this country, although there are those who insist--not without some credibility, I must say--that J. Edgar Hoover was the one who masterminded the whole plan. Supposedly, President Roosevelt felt the doctor might be of inestimable help not only to this country in winning the war, but to himself, Roosevelt, as well. It seems evident that FDR knew his days were numbered and he wanted, shall we say, to hang on to the bitter end. It is perfectly understandable that he would want to see the outcome of the war he had worked so hard to win.”
“Whoa, whoa,” Alice said. “Let’s back up there a minute, if you don’t mind. Unless I’m completely misunderstanding you, you’re saying that this... this German doctor believed the dead could be brought back and that President Roosevelt believed that, too. Really now!”
Gus nodded. “That’s precisely it.”
Alice laughed. “That’s utterly preposterous!”
“You think so? Don’t be too quick to pin labels on something you don’t understand or haven’t heard before. There’s more to all this, a whole lot more, I assure you and....”
“There may be more,” Alice conceded. “In fact, I’d be surprised if there weren’t. There always is, to these stories. You may go on as long as you like, so long as you don’t expect me to believe any of this... this dribble. And you, Philip, I’m more than a little surprised you’ve wasted your time as well as mine on all this.”
“You should listen, Alice,” Philip said to her. “Let Gus finish what he came here today to tell you.”
“Tell me? Why me?” Alice turned to Gus. “As I said a little while ago, ‘Why me?’ Nicholas was the one who sent for you, not me. He’s the fiction writer, not me. He might be able to use some of this made-up crap. I’m afraid I not only don’t believe a thing you’ve said today, I don’t even have any interest in any of it. As far as I am concerned....”
“But it does concern you, Alice,” Gus said as he leaned forward in his seat.
There was an urgency in Gus’s voice that was not totally wasted on her and she turned and looked at Philip, then back to Gus. “O.K., I’ll listen, but only because Philip thinks it’s important. Keep in mind, though, both of you, I’m not buying any of this. I’m just waiting to see what’s coming next.”
“Thank you.” Gus nodded slightly. “Then, I shall proceed. In the early sixties, I met Dr. Ruessling. He kept to himself in almost complete seclusion. I think that had something to do with the agreement he had with our government. For someone so prominent in his field, it was surprising that he was not teaching, lecturing, or at least writing on the subject he knew better than anyone else. I believed then and I still believe today that our government would not let him. Anyway, someone got me in to see him. You must remember that I was much younger then, just starting on my post-graduate work. I shall never, never forget the evening I spent with that man. The house in which he was living was right out of a Gothic mystery novel. The car which had been sent for me drove up a long, curving driveway and stopped under a canopy. A butler opened the door and I found myself in a three-story entrance hall facing a massive curved staircase. To the right and left were doors, all closed, so I had no idea what was behind them. I was taken in an elevator to the second level and shown into a library that must have been at least forty feet long, completely stacked with books from floor to ceiling.
“Within two minutes, the door opened and Dr. Ruessling came in. He was a tall man, almost a caricature of the classic Prussian, large-boned, short-cropped blonde-hair-turned-white, blue eyes, a jaw that looked indestructible. He held out a massive hand that felt like a steel vice. I am almost six-three, and I suspect he was no taller than I, but I had the feeling I was being overshadowed by him. The only thing missing was the monocle. As he shook my hand, I fully expected him to click his heels together. I was shocked when he spoke. He had a soft, gentle, almost dreamlike quality speech pattern, with no trace whatsoever of a German accent. Like many who have been through speech restructuring, it was impossible to link his voice or his speech to any particular part of this country. One could not say he had been born or gone to school in any one geographic area. He sounded as though he had been born on, educated at, and spent all his adult years with one of the television networks’ evening news, so devoid of anything in his talk that had character to it. He was, I must insist, the perfect host, as he poured drinks for us. (I must admit mine was too strong, although he drank it as though it were water.) He made me feel at home almost from the first minute we met.
“What he told me, Alice, was surprising even for me. And remember, I went there fully prepared--or so I thought--to be surprised, shocked, even have my credulity stretched. I was in no way prepared for what this man was about to tell me.”


Chapter VII

A short while earlier, Philip had gotten up, gone to the kitchen, said something to Mrs. Mahoney who came in three days a week “to do for him,” as she put it. She now came into the living room carrying a tray with coffee and several of her home-made apple muffins.
“Ah, don’t they look magnificent,” Gus said as he reached across the end table next to him and took one of the muffins. “Mrs. Mahoney, you must be in league with the devil himself, to be able to bake like this,” he said to her, to which she let out a scream of false horror and went back to her kitchen shaking with laughter. “You really should try them, Alice,” he said when she refused the tray, settling only for coffee. “I had them earlier, and believe me, they really are the most delicious muffins I have ever tasted anywhere and I do consider myself something of an expert when it comes to breakfast foods. Breakfast is my favorite meal of the day, you know. Philip remembers that, don’t you, Philip? Remember I wrote you once when I was in Argentina and I found this absolutely fabulous little restaurant tucked away up in the hills and I told you about the breakfast they served? They actually had....”
“For Christ’s sake, will you get off food and get on with your story!” Alice shouted. “If I do have to sit and listen to dribble, at least let it be of some slight interest. Breakfast in South America should be left for PBS to cover.”
“You are right, and I beg your pardon.” Gus hastily finished off his second muffin. “What Dr. Ruessling told me, the evidence he had, photographs, documents, depositions, first-hand eyewitness reports, all of it was so overwhelming. And it was not just from remote corners of the earth, as told by peasants. No, not by any means. It was today. Well, at least at the time I met with him. It came from people, many of them still living at the time and a few of them probably still living today, people in this country, Europe, people of standing and credibility. There was the CEO of a multi-national corporation. There was an Italian sculptor who has since become world-famous. A don at Oxford. A housewife in Paris. There was even a Hollywood movie star, one of the very biggest names. The people on whom he had files read like a veritable global Who’s Who. I have memorized just about every name he showed me. Those names are burned into my brain. Since then, my own research over the years has done nothing but confirm the Doctor’s theory to the point where I no longer consider it a theory, but a fact, a fact proven over and over again, with far more proof than would be necessary were it not for the very nature of the subject. People--and I must be honest and say I suspect you are among them--refuse to even consider the possibility that such things might and do happen. To the world, the dead do not come back because the dead can not come back. It is so impossible for them to conceive of it that there is no point in even talking to them about it, much less devote one’s entire life’s work to it. I say people feel this way. I do not include the world’s politicians, the real power people. Our country’s willingness to smuggle Dr. Ruessling into this country at the very height of the war, when there were seemingly far more important things to be done, confirms that. Today, most governments around the world know all about the underground research that is going on. They endorse this research and pour millions of dollars--secretly, of course--into furthering it for their own selfish ends.”
Alice heaved a rather rude sigh of exasperation. “O.K., the world’s paying money to find out how someone who is dead can come back again. It’s getting late, I want to get back to the house because I’m worried about Nicholas. I don’t want to leave him alone for long. Tell me one thing, did Nicholas contact you because he wanted to put some of this into his book, the one he’s working on now? Was that why he wanted to see you?”
“In a way, yes,” Gus answered. His voice was somewhat lower and he deliberately busied himself with the work of lighting another cigarette.
“But there’s more to it than just that? Nicholas wanted more from you, didn’t he? What was it?”
Gus nodded. “Yes, I’m sure he did. I don’t know exactly what, but I was somehow sure he did when he called me. Something in what he said, something in the way he said it, convinced me at the time that your husband was more than just curious, more than just doing a bit of necessary research for a book. I was positive he felt that he could do just that, return from the dead. And from what I’ve learned from Philip, the events of this weekend, I am even more convinced of what I thought I already knew.”
 “Wait a minute!” Alice said as she lifted herself up from the chair in which she had been sitting. “Hold on one goddamn minute. Are you going to sit there and keep staring me in the face and tell me that Nicholas Keene thought he could come back from the dead? If you are saying that, then you are also saying that he tried to kill himself last Friday evening and, if you are, then you probably believe that he succeeded in killing himself and succeeded in returning from the dead. It’s been one helluva long time since I’ve heard such outright bullshit. And as for you, Philip,” she turned and glared at him, “as for you, why are you doing this to me? To Nicholas? You’ve always been our best friend, but now you’ve become as much of a... lunatic... as... as... the one you have here in your house. As for you, Doctor,” she continued with clenched teeth, “as for you, you should try selling this story of yours to one of those supermarket tabloids. I can see the title now: HOW TO COLLECT YOUR LIFE INSURANCE, THEN COME BACK AND ENJOY THE MONEY. You know, it’s really laughable. It would be, if only it weren’t so sad. And so cruel.” She walked towards the living room door.
“Alice?” It was Gus who spoke.
She hesitated for a split second, then reached out and grasped the doorknob. She stared down at it, but did not turn around to face Gus.
Gus spoke again, very softly. “Alice, is there an odor?”
Alice’s body stiffened. “Odor? What kind of odor?” She kept her back to the room.
Gus glanced at Philip and nodded almost imperceptibly, then addressed Alice. “Alice,” he began, as though measuring each syllable carefully. “Alice, there... is... always... an... odor. It’s the odor of... rotting flesh. Do you know what that odor smells like?”
“You are even more insane than I thought.” She spun around. “Both of you. Yes, Doctor, it will no doubt make you very happy to know Nicholas had an odor. He fell into the bay and that place doesn’t smell too great at the best of times. And again last evening, but that was because he had been so busy working all day in that study of his he didn’t take the time to shower. I’ll have to tell him his deodorant failed him. That, as we all know, is an unforgivable sin, isn’t it, Doctors?”
Both Philip and Gus got up and walked towards her.
“It will get worse, much worse, my dear,” Gus said. “Each day--no, each hour--it will become more fetid, to the point that you won’t be able to stand it any longer, I assure you. So unbearable will it become, you may be driven to do something about it. I want to see you spared that.”
“You are both trying to drive me crazy, aren’t you?” she cried as she looked first at Philip, then at Gus, and back again to Philip.
“No, Alice, we’re only trying to help,” Philip said as he reached out and placed his hand on her arm.
“Help? You call this help?” She pushed Philip’s hand away. “I can see that when the time comes when I need help, I will have to look elsewhere.”
“Listen to one last thing, please,” Gus said and stepped closer. “Listen, then if you wish, you may leave. There is one very important thing I must tell you. You must know about it. If you know, and are prepared, I won’t worry about you as much. I feel responsible for much of this. I should never have spoken to Nicholas. I should never have given him even the slightest bit of encouragement by agreeing to meet with him. I feel responsible--”
“Responsible? You, responsible?” she asked and laughed and threw her head back, then forward again so that her hair fell in her face. She brushed it away. “If there is one thing you are not, Doctor, it is responsible, responsible for anything, least of all for yourself and for what you say. And you, Philip, you can now consider our friendship at an end. I never want to see you or speak to you again, do you understand? Nicholas does need help right now and, God knows, so do I. I came here expecting to get help and what do I get? A lot of gibberish about the most insane things imaginable.” She turned and opened the door of the living room, rushed out into the hall and through the front door.
“It’s a shame,” Philip said as he turned and looked at Gus. “I was hoping you’d be able to do something to help her. I don’t know what, but something. What will happen now, I wonder. And what was it you wanted so much to tell her just before she left, the thing you said she had to know?”
Gus walked over to the window and drew the curtain back. He stood there watching Alice get into her car and drive away, then turned to see Philip staring at him.
“Well?” Philip asked. “What was it?”
“Huh? Sorry, I was thinking about something,” Gus answered, then came back and took his seat. “You wanted to know something. Oh, yes, you wanted to know what was so important that Alice should know.” He lit another cigarette and threw the match into the fireplace. “I’m afraid it really doesn’t matter much now,” he mumbled more to himself than to Philip. “Alice Keene is in danger, mortal danger, the more so because she refused the help I could have given her.”
“In danger? From what? Surely not in danger from Nicholas!”
Gus nodded. “Yes, I’m afraid she is. But not from Nicholas in the way you mean it. Nicholas is no more.... He can never hurt anyone ever again.”
“But... I thought you said that....”
“That Nicholas came back? Yes, I did say that, didn’t I? But, you see, Dear Friend, it isn’t Nicholas who came back. The Nicholas you saw, the Nicholas you talked to last evening, the Nicholas to whom Alice will return in the next few minutes, is not the Nicholas you’ve known all these years. No, Alice is not in danger from her husband. She is in danger--very real danger--from that thing which used to be Nicholas Keene and is now in her home and in her bed.”
“You call him a thing?”
“Yes, the Nicholas we are talking about today is nothing more than a shadow of the Nicholas everyone knew before. He’s a... a shell, you might say, without emotion, without... and here’s where the danger comes in... without conscience.”
“Isn’t there anything we can do?”
“Ah, yes, there are a number of things we can do. We can and we will do whatever is in our power to save your friend.”
“But what about Nicholas? We’ve got to help him, too.”
“Nicholas, I am afraid, dear Philip, is now beyond our help. If he can be helped, it will have to come from someone other than you or me and, frankly, I doubt that very much. No, Nicholas Keene can no longer be helped.”


Chapter VIII

Alice was angry. She drove blinded by her anger, mechanically, determinedly, resolved that whatever happened, she would never forgive Philip, Philip, that friend of hers and of Nicholas, who had now betrayed both of them. What made her equally angry was the fact that Maudie was evidently correct in her criticism of Philip last evening. They had been talking, Alice and Maudie, in the kitchen. Maudie claimed Philip had sent a friend of hers to a quack. But, to have done it to her and to Nicholas who had always considered him their closest friend, was truly unforgivable. Return from the dead! It’s Philip who needs help right now, more than anyone else, Alice mumbled to herself.
The car seemed to have a mind of its own, turning onto Route 9 by itself, then blindly following the road and slowing down as it twisted and the curves sharpened. It was not long before she saw their house ahead and her foot applied the brakes. Even from a distance, she could see figures in front of the house, a man and a woman, not unlike two lawn ornaments planted in the snow. She drew nearer and saw one was Nicholas. The other, pink from head to foot, resembling one of those pink flamingos people put on their lawns, could be none other than Lydia. It was. They seemed to be in the middle of a heated conversation. Alice could see their breath in the sunlight.
She slowed down and inched into the driveway, attempting to use the same tire marks already there. She pulled up alongside Lydia’s car. Before opening her own car door, she saw out of the corner of her eye a movement on the lawn. Nicholas had his arm raised. Lydia stepped back, as though cringing. He lowered his arm and stood there as though frozen, staring at Alice. She jumped out and ran towards them. Nicholas, against the snow, looking to Alice like one of the startled deer who occasionally came out of the woods behind their property, bolted and ran into the house.
“You all right, Lydia?” Alice took the older woman’s arm. She thought Lydia seemed a bit shaken.
“Of course, why do you ask?” Lydia tried unsuccessfully to sound indifferent to the question.
“What was he trying to do?”
“Do? Nicky? Oh, that. You know him, always fooling around. He was acting silly, that’s all. We were having a pleasant conversation and he started his usual kidding, nothing more.”
“Oh? And why were the two of you out here on the lawn in the snow in the cold?”
“Well, actually I stopped by to see Nicky, to see how he was doing after all the excitement of last evening’s party. When no one answered the door, I let myself in and went upstairs. He was in his study, sitting, as always, at that computer of his. I tried hard to get him to talk, to loosen up, but you know how he can get at times, especially when he’s working. He just didn’t want to talk to this old broad, and knowing him as I do, I was sure there was really no point in pressing too hard. He’ll talk sooner or later. He always does, but not until he’s ready. He’s always been like that. So, I gave up and told him I was leaving. He surprised me a bit by offering to walk me down to my car, saying he wanted some fresh air. I tried to get him to put a coat on. I did my imitation of a mother hen and fussed a bit, telling him he’d get pneumonia if he didn’t dress properly, but he ignored me and came out wearing only a thin shirt. Know something? He didn’t seem to mind the cold. I was freezing with this heavy coat and the cold rarely bothers me. But that’s neither here nor there. Point is, he got out here in the fresh air, in the sun, and I hoped it would do him some good, get the cobwebs blown out of his head.” Her attempt at laughter was rather pathetic.
“There’s a lot more,” Alice said sternly.
“What do you mean?”
“You know exactly what I mean. There’s more and you think you’re protecting Nicholas by keeping it from me.”
“You’re--”
“No, I’m not. Lydia, there are many things I could say about you. Most of them good. One thing no one can ever say about you is that you make a good liar. You flub your lines everytime. C’mon, spill it!”
Lydia looked down at the ground, then up at her daughter-in-law. “You’re right, you bitch. I didn’t want to tell you, because... well, because it’s so damned stupid and doesn’t mean a thing, really. It’s ridiculous, and isn’t worth wasting our time talking about it.”
“Why not let me be the judge of that? And, if there is anyone in this whole wide world who knows how much I love Nicholas, it’s you. The more reason you should share it with me, even if you do think it’s ridiculous.”
“We had been talking.” Lydia started walking slowly towards her car. “Well, actually I was the one doing most of the talking, as usual. He was just listening. I don’t remember now what I was talking about. Just some of my usual crap, I suppose. Then, suddenly, he began to stare ahead, then all around him, as though he had at that moment been awakened from a deep sleep. He looked towards the back woods and murmured something about the trees being so beautiful, covered as they are with snow and ice. All at once, he began making the most god-awful noises, like whimpering. I had a dog years ago, a real mutt. He used to whimper like that when he was afraid, especially during a thunderstorm. I asked him what was the matter, did he want to go indoors, could I get him something, water maybe. Then, it all stopped, just as suddenly as it had started and he seemed more relaxed somehow, as though something had been lifted off him. I said something else, I think, I’m not sure. Probably another one of my pearls of wisdom. It was then that he looked down at me and said something very cruel.”
They stopped walking. Alice put her hand on Lydia’s arm. “What did he say?”
Lydia shook her head. “That’s what’s so damned asinine about this whole thing.” They had now reached her car. “He must have wanted to hurt me, hurt me very much to have said what he did.” Her eyes were glistening in the blazing white reflecting off the snow. “He said... he said, ‘You know, I am actually dead.’ Alice, that’s what he said to me. ‘I am actually dead.’ And added, ‘I died in the car accident last Friday evening.’ I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I tried to laugh. For a split second I took him seriously, then I realized he must have had too much to drink. It was early in the day, but if he had a few drinks on top of any he might have had last night, well... I couldn’t explain it otherwise. I think I said as much. You know me, always opening my mouth at the wrong time to say the wrong thing. That was about when you arrived. That was when he went all funny and I thought for sure this time he was having some kind of seizure. I don’t exactly know how to describe what happened, but it wasn’t my Nicky who was standing there any more. That was when he raised his arm. For a moment, I thought he was going to strike me, but I know my Nicky. He’d never hurt me. What is it, Alice? What was he really doing? My Nicky would never lift his hand against me.”
“He’d never hurt you,” Alice assured her.
Lydia opened the car door and slid onto the driver’s seat. She shut the door and, as she rolled down the window, Alice leaned in and gave her a kiss. “Everything’s going to be fine, you’ll see. I’ll go upstairs and talk to him.”
Lydia rested her hands on the steering wheel and stared straight ahead. “I hope you’re right.” Then, as she looked up, she added, “Strange things are happening. I’m not exactly sure I understand them all. Maybe. Maybe in time I will.”
“It takes a lot of patience.”
“If Nicky stands a chance at all, it’s because he has you.” Lydia reached out and patted Alice on the hand. “Another thing, try to get him to bathe. He smells like the old outhouse that used to be on the back of this property.”
“Drive carefully, Love, and don’t worry. That sounds stupid, I know, but try not to. He’ll be O.K. I’m going in to talk to him right now. Call me later.” She stepped back and watched as Lydia backed out onto the highway and headed North. Suddenly she realized how cold she was. She ran towards the house and as she ran, wondered what she would say to Nicholas. The anger she had felt earlier had not left her, and now she added Nicholas to the cause of this increased anger, along with what she was feeling towards Philip and that nut, Gus Whatshisname. She was angry, too, with herself. She had always been confident that if anything ever went wrong, she would be the strong one. At this moment, she felt anything but strong.
The house was quiet. She listened for the sound of Nicholas upstairs, the comforting, taken-for-granted sound of his presence. At this moment, there was only silence coming from the second floor. She rested her hand on the newel post of the banister, then slowly began to climb. Only the muffled scuffing noise of her feet on the stair carpeting could be heard. Through the porthole window mid-way up the staircase, she looked out and saw the sky was rapidly becoming overcast, cutting off even more light to the house, leaving an eeriness which these Victorian houses seem to relish. More snow on the way, she told himself as she was approaching the second-floor landing. Where was Nicholas? She reached the second floor and turned on the hall light. She looked into the library on her left. It was empty. She headed for Nicholas’ study. There, too, was no Nicholas. Their bedroom with its unmade bed was also empty. Nicholas, Alice knew, never went in the basement. That left only the third floor. That, too, he rarely ever visited.
“What the hell could he be doing up there?” she asked herself aloud. The sound of her own voice echoing along the hall might, she hoped, help dispel the fear she was beginning to feel. It would take more than just talking aloud to make that fear go away, she realized, as she headed for the top floor.


Chapter IX

The flames were leaping in the fireplace. The aroma of burning oak mingled with the smell of food and tobacco and wines. Over the past hundred years, The Whale Restaurant had served its customers well, oftentimes in the summer crammed to the doors and in the winter, as it was this afternoon, close to being empty. The sun, what little time it still had left today, was diffusing its light through the stained glass windows and playing games, albeit rather weakly, on the carpeted floor. Their waitress approached and placed drinks before them and asked if there would be anything else she could get, which they refused. An elderly couple was seated in one corner, and at the opposite end of the room, a very young couple, so obviously in love they seemed oblivious to their surroundings. Gus lit his cigarette, then picked up his brandy.
“It’s so peaceful here,” he said. His voice was almost hushed, more as though he were seated in a small country church rather than a restaurant.
“I don’t think I could ever go back to living in a big, dirty, crowded city again.” Philip’s voice, too, had taken on the whisperlike quality people assume when they are in public, even though no one is close enough to hear what they are saying.
“I don’t blame you for not accepting everything I say,” Gus began the subject they both knew was uppermost in their minds. “I’m used to people not believing me. It sort of goes with the job, such skepticism. In fact, I’m relieved when all I get is skepticism or strange looks or smirks. So often I get ridicule, outright insults. One guy even went so far once as to threaten to beat me up, he was so upset and felt so strongly on the subject. It’s something no one wants to believe. It goes against everything we are taught when we’re young, taught by our parents, the schools, the church, by everyone and everywhere. The dead just don’t come back and that’s all there is to it! Subject closed. We don’t dare let ourselves believe otherwise or even hope it. It they can come back, then why didn’t my wife or husband or child or parent come back? Why didn’t they come back to me, if they could? There is only one logical answer to that: They didn’t love me, or they would have come back. No one is willing to accept that.”
“You’re convincing, damned convincing, I must say. But it’s hard to swallow, just the same.”
“Are you saying that as a physician?”
“Precisely as a physician. It not only flies in the face of everything I was taught all my life, everything I seem to instinctively believe, it especially goes against everything I know as a physician. How can a body that is completely dead still continue to function? And, if it does function, then it isn’t really dead, is it? You’re sort of going around in a circle when you say that the dead can come back. If they can come back--if, indeed, the dead can do anything--then they’re not really dead. It’s as simple as that. If they come back, then they never were dead in the first place.”
“They’re dead, all right.” Gus shifted positions to make himself more comfortable. “They do not function, not in the usual meaning of that word. Their hearts do not beat, their blood does not flow through the veins in their bodies. If you were to put a stethoscope to Nicholas Keene’s chest at this moment, you would hear nothing. If you tried to find a pulse, you would find nothing. And their lifespan--if you’ll forgive the choice of that particular word--is quite short. Probably no more than a few days. A few weeks at the very most, as far as we know. You see, one of the most frightening things about them is that we know so very little about them. We presume they can only live a few days because their flesh is rotting. Naturally, that time is much shorter in warmer weather or climates. But what if we are wrong? What if they have found, at least some of them have, a way of prolonging their times here after death? How long? What if some of them have found the secret to continuing in their crude, inhuman way? We just don’t know enough about them to be totally definitive in our pronouncements about them.”
“Why, Gus? Why do they come back? Why only certain ones? And, even more important and puzzling, how do they come back?” Philip leaned back in his chair and crossed his legs. The elderly couple was leaving and Philip studied them as the man with snow white hair helped his wife with her coat.
“It’s nice to see a couple like that, obviously devoted to one another,” Gus commented.
“That’s Abner Cummings and his wife, Susie,” Philip told him. “They’re patients of mine, both of them. Abner doesn’t have long to live, I’m afraid.”
“They didn’t say hello to you.”
“Yes, they did. When we first came in. Both nodded ever so slightly. They didn’t want to interrupt our lunch. Imagine how they’d feel if they knew the subject or our conversation.”
“Just as well they don’t.” There was a tinge of sadness in Gus’ voice. “It might only arouse false hopes in them. But, to answer your question, ‘How do some manage to come back?’ I can only say you are right, the how is the most interesting and difficult to answer part of all this. They come back--and remember, we’re talking about a relatively microscopic number among all the multitudes of humans who have died over the course of history--through mere willpower alone. At least that was Ruessling’s theory. He maintained that some inner driving force, something like an overwhelming determination, refuses to let them stay dead. Stop and think for a moment. There are countless instances, fully documented, of people possessing superhuman power and strength when confronted with fear or anger or-- Perfect example: It has happened many, many times. A mother sees her child trapped under something... a car, a fallen tree, anything... and her adrenalin or something starts flowing, pumping through her whole body. All she can see is that her child is in danger. She lifts the car, moves the, does things she couldn’t possibly have done otherwise. Her determination to save her child turns her into a demi-god. Well, it’s something like that. A determination not to die, not to stay dead, gives these remigrants the power to come back. They possess the blind determination to keep on walking, talking, seemingly functioning as live human beings. Ruessling said that in each and every instance of remigrants, where enough facts were known, there was evidence that they had strong reasons for coming back, over and above the usual fear of death. In other words, they refused to stay dead because they had something they wanted to accomplish, something left undone, something they felt they simply had to do or finish. Another interesting fact about virtually all of them is that they come from what you might call the better educated classes. One thing you can’t say is that they had died but were too dumb to stay dead. No, my friend, stupidity is not the earmark of the remigrants. That much evidence we do have.”
“There really is evidence? Oh, I know you said Ruessling supposedly had it, but is there any evidence that anyone else, myself for example, could find? Documentation?”
“Spoken like a true scientist. Evidence? Documentation? Sure there is. Any number of cases, quite well documented.”
“All in Transylvania, I suppose.” Philip put on a mischievous smile.
“As far as I know, there never has been a case reported in Transylvania,” Gus answered with feigned seriousness. “Although that does not prove that there never was at least one remigrant in that particular barren, ill-famed region. It’s just that I know of none. I could be wrong, of course. I’ll look it up, just as soon as I get back home. But would you settle for Pennsylvania? Philadelphia, in fact?”
“You’re serious?”
“Yes, quite serious. But first, let me give you a bit more background on remigrants. The first--the very first record we have discovered up until this time--is from the capital city of Pella in Macedonia, from the fifth century B.C. We have evidence in the form of a cult that believed the dead, at least the more privileged, could walk again after they died. We have physical evidence in the form of a larnaz, or burial chest, with the remains of a young woman, no more than in her late twenties, obviously from a wealthy family. From the inscription on it, we know that she was a student of one Menelaos, who taught that some would not stay dead. The meaning of the inscriptions on the burial chest is not totally clear in all respects, but it is certain that whoever wrote them believed that this young woman had walked again after she had died, and then was buried, put in her final resting place when she could no longer walk this earth.
“There is a third century Roman tidbit that is much clearer,” Gus went on. “There is no doubt about this piece of evidence. We have a papyrus, now in the Vatican Archives, which describes in great detail how the whole process works, and gives first-hand accounts of those who witnessed someone coming back from the dead. The author is one Marcus Antonius Marcellus. We don’t know exactly when he was born, but we definitely know he died in A.D. 3l4. A portion of the papyrus was published in Germany in the seventeenth century, but the remainder has always been on the list of books condemned by the church and no one has been able to obtain a copy so that we could see what was on the rest of the scroll. Typical of these manuscripts, it’s quite possible that the balance of the scroll doesn’t do much more than repeat what we already have.”
“It goes into details? What kind of details?” Philip was becoming engrossed in what Gus was telling him.”
“For one thing, it names names,” Gus said. “Big names, in their day. Names any Roman historian would recognize immediately. Quintilianus, the historian and the greatest philosopher of them all, and Marcus Aurelium, the Elder, who--and you should find this most interesting--was also a great physician. According to dear old Marcus--and frankly, I think Doctor Ruessling got most of his ideas from him--it is the will which controls all movements of the body, even those which today we know are involuntary. Anyway, according to Marcus, the will does it all and if the will is strong enough, nothing, not even death, can counteract its orders. So, if someone refuses to accept death, that person can still go on sort of functioning, moving about, doing things. He is quite interesting, I assure you, and--”
“But what about Philadelphia?”
“Patience, my dear Philip,” Gus said soothingly. “We’ll get to that in just one moment. The next important document we have is from Sagatius, a Pole who lived in the sixteenth century. A quite brilliant scholar, let me tell you. Little is known about him outside his native country of Poland, but in many ways he was the equal to--no, superior to--DaVinci. Way ahead of his century with theories about the heavens, evolution, steam power, electricity, a whole slew of inventions, some of which make DaVinci look like a back-yard tinkerer. He wrote a book2. In it, he goes to great length in describing the history and


2. Dr. Sharples later gave Philip the exact title of this book: Historia Actorum Mirabilium atque Miraculosorum ab Initione Mundi Nostri et ex Arbitris Narrata. It is a compilation of some of Sagatius’ extant works, many of them in fragment form, translated and edited by Dr. Halbesel Übersetzer in 1942 under the title The Complete Works of Sagatius and published in the United States by Gallagher and Sheen. Gus claimed many libraries have copies of this work.


eyewitness accounts of those who came back. His name for them was not remigrants. That name came later, towards the end of the eighteenth century. The name Sagatius used--and I do believe he was the first to use this name--was Miasmata, a very descriptive name, as far as I am concerned. Miasmata are what the ancients called what we today know as swamp gases, often associated with graveyards. These gases or heavy fogs are often seen over cemeteries and legend has it that they could be very harmful. Sort of describes the remigrants, doesn’t it? In his book, he relates incidents of miasmata all over Europe, in England, in North Africa. During the great witch hunts of the sixteenth century all across Germany, when tens of thousands were burned at the stake, the general accusation was that these witches had helped the dead to return and walk the earth. The church squelched the truth and insisted that labels of heresy and devil worship be the going accusation, and never permitted any mention in the official trials of the miasmata or of the dead coming back. Unfortunately for him, Sagatius did not buy into the official version and wrote the truth and as a result, the church excommunicated him and decreed that his memory and his writings be destroyed. From what we know of him, he must have been a genius. Imagine, if we had all his writings! But, you can read all about what he had to say on this subject in his book, if you like. However, I see I bore you. I could rattle on and on, spewing forth all kinds of names. My dear friend,“--here, Gus leaned forward and lowered his voice more, to the point that Philip could hardly hear him--“history is full, chock full, of people who believed they could come back and many of whom did come back.” Gus leaned back in his seat and seemed to be studying the far corner of the room. “I can see you want something closer to home, something closer to this precious little insular world of yours, something nearer, too, in time.”
“You can’t blame me,” Philip objected. “It’s easy to dig up old names, quote vague sources in Latin, but when it’s nearer, at least then you stand a chance of being able to prove or disprove the story. Go ahead, what’s all this about a case in Philadelphia?”
Gus smiled a broad, happy smile. “All right, sir, you asked for one, here goes.” He deliberately took his time lighting a cigarette and exhaled a long puff of smoke. “I don’t know if this will be recent enough for you or not, but let’s give it a try. The City of Brotherly Love, only a few years ago. That will be recent enough to satisfy you, will it not?”
“You proved a long time ago that you’re a sarcastic bastard. You don’t have to prove it again.”
Gus nodded sideways. “And witnesses. Yes, you and your damned witnesses. Will several hundred do? Good. I’m glad to hear that. It happened on Kelly Drive in Fairmount Park, along the banks of the Schuylkill River on a beautiful Sunday afternoon. If you’ve ever been along the drive, when the trees are in bloom, you’ll see scores of cars parked there and people sitting along the river. Most bring a picnic lunch with them and the highlight of the day is usually one of the boat races or at least some of the rowing teams Philadelphia is so famous for practicing on the river. Well, it was just such a Sunday afternoon only two years ago. In the midst of this idyllic setting, the air was filled with the blood-curdling screeching of tires against asphalt, followed by the equally bone-chilling sound of metal striking metal with great impact. In other words, cars plowing into one another. But not just two cars. Oh no, much more than that. Kelly Drive is, as I’m sure you know, not much more than a series of hair-pin turns. It was a pileup of ten, twelve, maybe more, cars. The people sitting under the trees on the banks of the river enjoying the cool breezes were suddenly shaken from their reverie or whatever was possessing their minds, if anything. Every face was now turned towards the road, each and every one frozen where they stood or sat. It was as though nature had wanted to take a photograph and the camera shutter had stuck. Looks of horror, fright, fear, incredulity evidenced on each countenance. Before their eyes, a young man, Billy Wallace, a senior at one of the city’s high schools, an all round athlete, football, basketball, you name it, went flying through the air and his body, like a limp bag of wet laundry, fell directly in the path of an oncoming car. The driver couldn’t stop or even swerve. First one front tire, then a rear tire, rode over Billy’s body. Several witnesses claim they saw his young, muscular body writhe between the tires. All in all, it must have been one hell of a horrible sight, judging from the countless eyewitness accounts we have of it.
“Needless to say, Billy was killed outright. Enough witnesses could tell you that. The two paramedics in the ambulance that transported him to the hospital testified--and their testimony is recorded on tape--that they could hear no heartbeat or get a pulse. No wonder. From their description of the condition of the body, life would have been impossible. Billy was dead, of that there was no doubt in anyone’s mind. With the possible exception, I might interject, of Billy himself.”
“Now you’re going to tell me that Billy got up and jumped out of the ambulance at the first traffic light,” Philip said rather smugly.
“Not quite that.” Gus ignored the insult in Philip’s voice. “Not quite that, but you’re not so terribly far from the truth. He was pronounced dead on arrival at Jefferson Hospital and his body was sent to the morgue, awaiting arrival of his family. By the time the boy’s family got there, coming as they did from the Northeast section of the city, and went to the morgue to identify the body, it was gone. The first explanation was that there had been some kind of mix-up along the line and that the body had not been delivered to the morgue, but the attendant on duty who was responsible for it swore up and down that he had brought the body to the morgue and left it with the attendant there. That attendant checked his register and it proved that Billy’s body had, indeed, been brought there, and no one had checked it out. All hell broke lose in the hospital, the family screaming that they would sue, the orderly and the night nurse--she had just come on duty--yelling at one another, with charges of incompetency flying about and everyone more concerned with his or her own hide than with the whereabouts of Billy’s body. Towards morning, the family left, promising a lawsuit that would close down the hospital. If they thought they had grounds for a suit based upon mental anguish, they sure as hell did when they got home and found, sitting on the sofa in the living room, their son, Billy, waiting for them. They were ready to sue for totally unnecessary pain and suffering because they had been told their son was dead, when, in fact, he was very much alive. Like the personnel in the hospital, they were now more concerned with their own feelings and the promises of quick wealth, than with Billy’s welfare. He, for his part, explained that there had been a mistake, that he had not been the one thrown from the car, that it was another boy from the same school who looked a bit like him and was wearing the same kind of shirt.”
“Sounds plausible to me,” Philip said, a bit tauntingly.
“Very plausible,” Gus agreed. “Perfectly understandable, too. Two young men--and as far as I am concerned, all young men that high school age look the same to me--wearing similar clothes could have been mistaken for one another. Only, there are a couple of hitches to that explanation. First, no other body was ever found, although we know for a fact there was one. A slew of witnesses saw a young man killed. A body had been transported in the ambulance. One was pronounced dead when it was brought into the hospital. An orderly took it to the morgue and the attendant there signed for it. That, of course, would have been a minor puzzle. Hospitals, like all businesses, lose things, and since they deal in bodies, I suspect they’ve lost more than one body over the years. Remember, I said one thing all these people who return from the dead have in common? They all have a strong determination to do something, to finish something, before they lie down and stay still. So did Billy.”
“Ah ha, I see it all now,” Philip said and with elbows resting on the edge of the table, held up his two hands, thumbtips touching, bracketing an imaginary scene. “It’s the night of the big game. The high school is depending on Billy to win the pennant for them and Billy, being the all-American boy that he is, won’t let them down, even if it means pulling himself together and playing with a few broken bones. He comes back from the dead, makes that last winning basket, and gets a kiss from his sweetheart who is also a cheerleader. Unfortunately for Billy, she doesn’t like his kisses now. They’re too cold.”
 “You are more than a little bit of a son-of-a-bitch. But the joke is on you because, for all practical purposes, you’re completely right. There was a game, and yes, they did need Billy to win it for them and yes, he did in fact win it for his school. Afterwards, when the game was over, Billy was found dead in the showers. Listen now, Mr. Smartass, and listen good to what I am about to tell you. The doctor, the school doctor, who examined Billy right there on the spot, before anyone could get to him and get him to change his story, swore that the body had been dead for at least twenty-four hours, if not longer. He later changed that testimony, but not before a number of Billy’s fellow players and some of the press had overheard his comments. He later said that he had been mistaken. Tell me, Philip, as a doctor, could you make that same mistake? Could you confuse the condition of a body of a young man still in his teens who had been dead for five or ten minutes with the condition of that same body that had been dead for ‘at least twenty-four hours?’ Could you be off by twenty-four hours, especially if you had just seen that young man playing basketball a few minutes earlier? Hardly your every-day-of-the-week mistake for a doctor to make, am I right?”
“This is my cue to say something like, ‘Gee whiz, my blood sure is running cold, Mr. Sharples. You certainly do tell the scariest stories.’ This whole story of yours is nothing more than a series of misunderstandings, human errors, and just plain coincidences. Added to which, I suspect one or more of the people involved are not telling the truth.”
“I’m not,” Gus said. “I’ve been lying to you. The boy’s name was not Billy Wallace. I made that part up.”
“Why?”
“Because if I had told you his real name, you wouldn’t have believed me, you wouldn’t have listened to my story. Here--” He took a small notebook from his inside pocket and tore out a sheet. With his hand cupped over the paper, he wrote on it, then spun the paper around and pushed it towards Philip. “That’s the boy’s real name.”
Philip looked down at the paper. The color drained from his face as he read the paper. He looked up at Gus. “You’ve got to be kidding!” he said, disbelief in each word. “Not him! I remember that event only too well. Every newspaper, television station carried the story. Everyone talked about only that for weeks after it happened. A full-scale investigation came from it into the sports programs in the high schools in Philadelphia. They said he died from injuries received playing basketball, but there was no mention of anything... anything like what you’ve been talking about today. It was just about sports, but not.... Probably the investigation wouldn’t have been so thorough if it hadn’t been that the boy in question was the son of such a prominent family. His father ran for mayor of Philadelphia at one time, you know. You mean to tell me you have... you have proof? Testimony, tapes?”
“I gathered a wealth of testimony,” Gus said. “Testimony from eyewitnesses. An audio tape of an interview with the two paramedics. Sworn statements from the hospital orderly and the morgue attendant. Copies of the hospital records, including the death certificate from the doctor who pronounced him dead on arrival. Notes of a conversation with the school doctor who was willing to talk to me, but refused to have anyone present and insisted upon searching me for a hidden tape recorder.”
 “Then, you can prove all this?” Philip asked.
“A few months after all these events, while I was out of town, someone broke into my apartment. They did not steal anything of value, not even a couple hundred bucks in cash I had lying on the dresser in the bedroom. All they took were my files, everything I had written about this boy and those events, all the records, testimonies, tapes, photographs.”
“So, you really have nothing,” Philip said, somewhat disappointed.
“I did not say that. No, I did not say that at all.” The young couple in the far corner finally got up and walked, hand in hand, past Gus and Philip. Gus took the opportunity to light another cigarette. When the couple was well out of earshot, he resumed. “No, my dear friend, I did not say that I have nothing. No one in the whole world but myself knows what I am about to tell you. I am entrusting it to you because I firmly believe I can trust you. I do not think you would ever betray me. They stole all my records, everything I had worked so hard to accumulate. What they did not know, what no one else knows, was that I had had duplicates made of everything--everything, even the audio tapes of the two paramedics--stashed away in a safe deposit vault in New York City. If the family knew that--”
“Then, what are you waiting for? Why don’t you make it all public, then they wouldn’t dare do anything to you.”
“In good time, dear Philip, in good time,” Gus answered. “Shall we? We’ve been here too long. I fear it’s getting late, very late.”


Chapter X

Alice could hear the sound of a radio playing a faint and muffled Mozart Twenty-ninth symphony coming from the top floor. She walked towards the staircase which led to the third floor. Why would Nicholas be up there? she wondered. Slowly, she started up, past the pair of oil paintings of nineteenth-century young ladies which she and Nicholas had purchased at an antiques show in Cape May, to the top of the stairs. She turned to her left and went to the back of the house, to the studio where she spent so many hours painting while Nicholas was busy writing. The room with its low ceiling was enjoying what little late-afternoon sun was still shining, making the room not only ideal for painting, but cozy, inviting, as well.
“We’re a pair,” Nicholas once said, the words suddenly coming back to Alice now, as she looked at the easel in the corner. It was the summer they went to New England, through Vermont and Maine, Nicholas with his portable typewriter and she weighed down with canvas, water colors, easel. They were sitting near the edge of a cliff just outside Ogunquitt in Maine. Below, the foamy surf was beating against the rocks, shooting spray into the air. Alice was sketching the scene before them, the ocean spread out, and off to their left, a lighthouse, a remnant from an earlier century. Nicholas was also sketching, sketching the outline of a new novel which he wanted to set in New England.
“Yes, we’re made for each other,” Nicholas had said that summer afternoon. “The arts farts, you and I. You with your palette, me with my trusty old Olympia typewriter.”
Alice reached down and turned off the radio. If Nicholas was up here, she reasoned, he’d have to be in one of the front rooms, which was unlikely. Nicholas never went up there. Maybe he was outside? That, too, seemed unlikely. She walked towards the front of the house, stopping to look into the smaller bedroom on her left. Dismal, she said to herself. These front rooms were the same as they had found them when they purchased the house. This room still had dark green paint on the walls which were cracked and had chunks of plaster missing. They had never gotten around to finishing these rooms. They kept the heat turned off up here, making the rooms cold and damp, never more so than today. Alice felt the cold going through to her bones. No one was in there. She stepped over to the door which opened onto the large front bedroom, a mate to the one Nicholas and she shared on the floor below. She jumped slightly from shock as she stood in the doorway. Nicholas was there in the room, standing in front of one of the two windows, his back to her.
“So, there you are,” she said and tried very hard to sound casual. “Wondering where you wandered off to.” She walked into the room.
Nicholas turned around. Behind him, the dusk outside came through the window and formed a halo about his head. Alice could not make out his features.
“Are you feeling all right?” She walked towards him. “Surprised to find you up here. You never come here. You claim these rooms are always so depressing. Heard the radio playing, so I presumed you might be here.” She felt a compulsion to talk. As she approached him, she could see his face clearer and it was all she could do to keep her voice from showing the shock, the horror, she was experiencing. Nicholas’ hair had not been brushed, the hair of which he had always been so proud. It was standing away from his head like straw. His face was deeply rutted. This was not the man, Alice thought, who was still in his early forties. No, it was an old, very old, man, feeble, his eyes watery, his head shaking as he stared at her and tried to focus his eyes and his memory, like one trying to place a face which one knows should be remembered.
“Where did you go?” His voice, too, was old, she realized. Staticy, like that beat up old radio in the basement.
“I went to see Philip,” she told him. She walked about the room, telling herself she was not afraid to look at him, although she knew that was a lie.
Nicholas began to search for the words he needed. “I do not... like... to be... alone.” Again, there was an echo in his words.
“That’s nice to know,” she said and immediately wished she could take back those words. They sounded inane. “I mean,” she quickly added, “it really is nice to know I am missed. Nice to know you missed me, even though I was only gone a little while. If it means anything, I missed you, too.”
“Lydia was here.” His voice was shaking more. There was no inflection in the words.
“I know. I was just talking to her. She’s upset. Says you don’t look well. Thinks you’re not eating. I told her I’d get you to eat something and get some rest. She’s right. You must eat something, Nicholas.”
“I can not,” he said and turned and looked out the window again. “I can not eat.”
She refrained from asking the obvious question. Instead, she came closer and stood next to him. She fought off the urge to reach out and take his hand in hers. She was afraid. She was afraid the hand would be cold, like the cold hand of a dead person. After a while, after searching for something to say, she spoke. “It’s cold up here. These rooms have no heat, you know.”
Nicholas stared out the window in silence. When he finally spoke, she had to strain to make out what he was saying. “Ali,” he said, “do you still love me?”
Alice thought her heart would burst. “Of course I still love you.”
“Would you... go someplace... with me?”
“Where?” She turned and looked up into his face, hoping to see a change there.
“Someplace. Just answer me. Would you go away with me?”
For the first time this weekend, Alice felt there was something Nicholas wanted to say to her, that he wanted desperately to open up to her.
“I think that would be great, you and I going away for a while.” She tried to sound enthusiastic, tried too hard.
“Good. You will like it.”
“Of course, I can’t be sure if I’ll like it or not, until you tell me where we’re going. But, you’ve got my curiosity up. Tell me more. Where? When will we leave? Lydia and I talked about us going to Florida. Would you like that? It is delightfully warm there this time of year. Just the two of us. No writing. Just relaxing, together.”
Nicholas moved his arm and rested it against the window frame to steady himself. “No, not Florida. Someplace far lovelier than Florida. And soon. You will see what it is like. We will be there and we will never have any problems again. It is nice there, Ali. You must trust me. Do you trust me?”
“I’ve always trusted you, Nicholas. I would trust you with anything, but tell me all about it, please.”
“Maybe tonight.”
“But I’m not packed. What should we take?”
“Do not worry about that.”
“You’re not going to tell me where this great place is?”
“You said you trust me.”
“Of course I trust you, but you’ve gotten my womanly curiosity up. Besides, I’ve never been one for surprises. You ought to know that. Remember that surprise birthday party you threw for me? I was so upset. I know you planned weeks in advance and went to a great deal of trouble to surprise me, but surprises just don’t sit well with me. I really do need to know where we are going or I might not be able to go.”
Nicholas left the window and started to walk slowly out of the room. “I shall go alone,” he said, each word uttered mechanically. “I shall leave soon.”
“No!” Alice cried and hurried after him. “I’ll go with you, just say the word... when... I’ll be ready.”
Nicholas stopped and stared at her. “Yes, I know you will,” he said, turned around and walked out of the room. He reached the hallway. “I must go to my study now,” he said without turning back to look at her. “Things I must attend to before we can leave.”
Alice watched Nicholas walk down the hall, then descend the staircase to the second floor. There was a knot in the middle of her stomach. She wanted so desperately to cry out, to let the tears run, to scream the primordial scream of pain, of anger, of despair. She felt the pain of seeing her lover in pain, the anger that she could do nothing to ease that pain, and the despair of feeling that it would soon get much worse. There seemed to be nothing, she felt deeply inside herself, that she could do to make things better.
“Oh, Nicholas, Nicholas,” she said aloud and she, too, started down the stairs. “I’ll go with you. Anyplace. If it will help you, I’ll go anyplace with you. Anyplace.”


Chapter XI

Philip called Nicholas’ and Alice’s home several times. There was no answer.
“That’s strange,” he said to Gus. “I mean, both of them out. I can’t imagine where....”
“Why don’t we take a ride over there? Something might be wrong.”
Philip nodded. “I think you could be right. Let’s go.”
A half hour later, Philip pulled into the driveway next to his friends’ Victorian house on Route 9. There were no lights on, either outside or inside the house. “I don’t like the looks of this,” he said to Gus who had come around the side of the car to join him on the path leading up to the front porch.
In the semi-darkness, with only the light from the street lamppost across the highway, they felt their way up the porch steps, holding the wooden pillars, and past the old rocking chair which had been left there since last summer. Philip rang the bell several times.
“They can’t both be out,” he said. “Follow me and be careful. We’ll go around the back. The kitchen door is always unlocked.”
Philip led the way through the snow to the back of the house and walked up the three steps to the small back porch. He opened the outside door and stepped into the kitchen and turned on the wall switch. The room was flooded with light. Nothing seemed out of place. “This way,” he said to Gus who was behind him.
They went through the dining room, then into the living room. Philip turned on the lights in each room and called out Nicholas’ and Alice’s names several times.
“Do you notice anything strange?” Gus asked as they stood in the hallway which ran alongside the dining room and the living room, just at the foot of the staircase.
“That’s the damnedest understatement I’ve heard, I can tell you that. Alice’s car is in the driveway, but she doesn’t answer when I call her name. Is that strange enough for you?”
“Not that. Listen!”
“Listen? That’s all I’ve done since we got here. I don’t hear a thing.”
“That’s precisely it,” Gus said. “The silence. It’s deafening. Not your typical silence. I noticed heat vents in the rooms, but the house is freezing. There’s no sound coming from the basement, so the furnace isn’t running. You can see your breath in front of you. Do they always keep the house this cold?”
“No, never. In fact, Alice’s always complaining about the cold, even when it’s like a hothouse in here.”
Philip called his friends’ names up the staircase. He got no response. He started up and signaled Gus to follow his lead. “I’m worried, damned worried,” he whispered over his shoulder to Gus.
They reached the second floor and Philip headed towards the front of the house. He stopped outside Nicholas’ study door. He pressed his ear to the door.
“Hear anything?” Gus asked him.
“Breathing. No, more like whimpering.” He turned the knob and opened the door. “Nicholas, you in--?” He fell to his knees next to the prone body of Nicholas Keene.
Nicholas looked up at him and tried to mouth some words.
“It’s all right,” Philip said to him as he took Nicholas’ wrist in his hand. “I’ll get you to a hospital.”
“No.” The word came from Nicholas. It was hardly audible, half caught in his throat.
Philip stopped with his hand on the telephone receiver. “What?”
“No. No hos... tal....”
Philip knelt down again and bent over the body of his friend. “I must,” he told Nicholas.
Again, Nicholas managed to utter the monosyllable, “No.”
“Nicholas, what happened? Is there...?”
“Ali. Tell... her....”
“Who did this?” Philip asked. He was looking at a slash in Nicholas’ shirt.
“Ac... dent,” Nicholas answered. The words were coming a bit stronger, albeit not fully clear.
“Where is Alice now?” Philip asked.
Nicholas moved his eyes and stared at Gus. “Who?”
“This is Doctor Sharples,” Philip told him. “Do you remember? You were supposed to meet him last Friday in Atlantic City.” Philip had had his face close to Nicholas’. He could stand the odor no longer. He pulled away.
“It... is... true,” Nicholas said to Gus. He said each word carefully, obviously mustering all his strength for each one. He tried to move to see Gus more clearly, but was unable. “I died that night... when car went into... water. I came back. Do you... unner... stand? I had to.”
“Yes, I understand,” Gus said as he too now knelt down next to Nicholas.
“Don’t talk now,” Philip said to Nicholas as he again looked at him. The sight was worse than Philip remembered from the evening before. Nicholas’ skin was no longer gray. It was turning black. His eyes were so sunken, Philip wondered how he could see out of them. His lips were dry and cracked at the corners. The hand, the one Philip was holding, was now shaking. Fluttering more like it, Philip thought.
“I must,” Nicholas insisted. “You must listen. I had to come back. Had to finish. Could not die like that. I go back now. I know that.” His words had been intended for Gus. He tried to find Philip with his eyes.
“I’m right here,” Philip said to him.
“You know that too, right, Philip?”
Philip nodded and began to cry.
Nicholas moved a finger. “It is bad for those who do not accept death when it comes. They suffer much. They pay for it. They....” His voice trailed off.
Philip placed his hand on Nicholas’ forehead. He knew he had never felt skin as cold as this and hoped he never would again.
Nicholas’ eyes were shut. They flickered. He said, “Good bye, Philip. You have been a good... friend. Take care... care of Ali.” His eyes shut again.
If this was not death, then Philip knew he would never again be sure of it. He stood up. “He’s gone,” he said to Gus.
Gus, too, stood up. “That arm, what about it?”
Philip shook his head. “Beats me. We’ll have to call the police, that’s for damned sure, but first I want to find Alice. You stay here. I’ll look upstairs. She may be on the third floor. I only hope nothing has happened to her.” He hurried out of the room.
Gus looked down at Nicholas. “What a shame we meet so late,” he said to the body lying at his feet. “If only it had been yesterday or even this morning. There are so many things I wanted to ask you. So many questions left unasked and unanswered. So much I so desperately want to know, need to know. Now, you’ll never tell me, my friend.”
Philip appeared in the doorway. “Alice is nowhere upstairs,” he announced. “Let’s get out of here. C’mon downstairs.”
In the kitchen, Philip stood in front of the sink, facing Gus who had joined him. He started to speak, but was interrupted. The back door flew open. Framed in the doorway, the light from the ceiling falling upon her, and the blackness outside as a backdrop, stood Alice. Fortunately, Philip reacted in time, reached out and caught her as she fell inward. He eased her down on the chair next to the table.
“What the hell happened to you?” he asked.
“Is... is...?” she asked, her eyes flashing about madly.
“Yes, I’m afraid so. Here, take this drink.” Philip had grabbed a bottle of brandy and a glass. He pushed the glass towards Alice’s hands, but they were shaking too much to hold it. He wrapped his own hands over hers and guided the glass to her mouth. After she took a sip, he placed the glass on the table, then went over to the sink. He wet a paper towel with warm water and brought it back to the kitchen table. Gently, he wiped her face which was smudged. There was a cut on her left cheek. He sat down at the table across from her.
“Thank God,” Alice said as soon as she caught her breath. “Thank God Nicholas is gone. I hope he finds... he finds peace.”
“Just what happened up there?” Philip asked sternly as he glanced towards the ceiling. “Tell us everything. We will have to call the police, you know, but first I want you to tell me what the hell took place in this house today.”
Alice looked at him, then at Gus, and lowered her eyes. “I guess it all started as soon as I got back here today. Lydia was here. I love her dearly, but this was no time to have her underfoot. I got rid of her. I found Nicholas on the third floor. I tried to cheer him up, get him to talk. All he would say was that he wanted me to go someplace with him, that we’d take a vacation and go someplace where everything would be great. He refused to tell me where that place was. I decided to go along with him on it. I was positive he was in no condition to travel, so I saw no harm in playing his silly little game about going away.
“Well, I went to our room and started going through the motions of packing a couple of bags. He came in and said there was no need to, that we wouldn’t need to pack anything. Only a few minutes earlier, upstairs on the third floor while we were talking, I thought he looked bad, but now, just five... ten... minutes later, I couldn’t believe the change that had come over him. I couldn’t believe what I was looking at. He was standing only a few feet away from me, and, so help me, I couldn’t for the life of me have sworn that it was my husband, Nicholas Keene, I was talking to. He was getting worse by the minute. What you said, Gus, about his being dead, almost began to make some sense to me. But, he didn’t just look bad. He looked... he looked almost... insane. There was both a glazed look and a crazed look in those eyes of his sunken as they were in his head. He didn’t seem to see me, but rather to look past me... no, through me. Do you understand what I’m trying to say?”
 “Go on,” Philip urged.
“Well, I tried again to talk to him, but he wasn’t hearing a thing I was saying. His speech was... how shall I describe it? It was as though he were talking from the bottom of a well, as though the words were coming from somewhere deep down inside him. He kept saying that we would have to leave soon, very soon, that we had to get ready, that he would help me to get ready, would do whatever he had to do to make it possible for me to go with him. I sat down on the edge of the bed and I remember shouting at him. Crazy, isn’t it? Shouting, I mean, at someone under such circumstances. But he wasn’t listening. Whatever I said fell on deaf ears, so I guess I shouted in order to get through to him. I was angry, too.
“Then Nicholas did something horrible. He started to whine, like a wounded animal, saying over and over that he was going to get me ready to go with him. I think I asked him again what he meant. He came over and sat down on the bed next to me, only inches away from me. By this time, the stench was more than I could bear. I thought I would vomit. I could see he had something behind his back. He brought it out slowly, oh, so very slowly and I saw that he had the large knife, the one we keep over there.” She pointed to the knife holder on the kitchen counter with its largest slot now empty.
“I was scared shitless. For the first time in my life, I think I actually could have died from sheer fright. I have never been that frightened before. Then... then something funny happened.” Alice began to laugh and to shake all over.
Philip thought she was on the verge of hysteria. He shook her by the shoulders. “Pull yourself together!” he shouted.
“I’ll be all right.” She gulped another drink. “I still can’t believe what happened next, not because it was so unusual. Oh, no. But because I just wasn’t prepared for it. Guess I was so tense, this was the last thing in the world I expected. For the first time--the very first time since last Friday evening--Nicholas smiled. The change which came over him was unbelievable. He placed the knife down on the bed between us. He smiled. Do you believe it? My Nicholas smiled! He spoke to me and even his speech was now totally different, more like his old self, soft and gentle. ‘Ali,’ he said. ‘I want to tell you something, something you may not believe, but you must. I think you will when I finish. Friday night, when my car went off the bridge, into the water, something happened to me.’
“I then said something real bright, like ‘I know’ or something equally brilliant. I didn’t know what else to say. He went on with what he had to tell me: ‘The car broke through the guard rail on the bridge. I can still hear the sound of metal being ripped. I am not sure if it was the sound of the railing or the metal underneath the car, but it was frightening. There was enough light coming from the headlights for me to see by and I can still see the car, its front wheels going off the side of the bridge. It teetered for a moment, then the weight shifted and the car pointed downward. The beams of light illuminated the water below, just for an instant, then the plunge began. I can remember seeing that vast black sheet of water in front of me, like a black marble floor as the lights hit it and I delved into the darkness, a darkness you can not possibly imagine. All around me was the sound of water rushing as it forced itself into the car through every opening. I tried to get out. I tried to open the door. The car fell over on its side and I panicked. I pounded on windows, on the door, on the windshield, even on the roof. Within seconds, the car filled with water and it surrounded me. It was cold. Oh, Ali, it was so very cold with a coldness that I felt in my very marrow. I could not breathe. Still I fought, trying so very hard to find a way out of that car. I thrashed my arms about and refused to open my mouth until I could hold my breath no longer. Over and over, I kept telling myself that I would refuse to die, that nothing, not this water, nothing was going to steal my life away from me. I had too much I wanted to do, so many things yet to be tasted. The book I was writing, I had to finish that. I swore I would not die, not now. I shouted, ‘Later, later, but I will not die now!’
“Nicholas stopped talking then and I waited until he could continue. I was fascinated, half believing him, half convinced that he had lost all control over his senses and that his mind was wandering in an alien world I could never visit. Finally, he went on. ‘But I did die, Ali. I died and was dead for quite some time. I do not know how long exactly, but I was dead, I assure you. Nothing inside me moved. My limbs could not stir. I sat there in that car, knowing what had happened, knowing I was dead, almost looking at myself, watching my arms and my head sway with the movement of the water. Even then, I kept telling myself that I would not stay dead, that I would somehow or other get back here to be with you. I believe, Ali, that that was the all-compelling reason I would not stay dead, would not accept death. I had to come back to be here with you!’
“I wish you could have seen his face when he said those words.” She was looking at Philip. “In all our years together, I don’t think Nicholas and I were ever as close as we were at that moment, he looking so hideous, looking like a corpse, his voice shaking and I staring at him in complete bewilderment. Yes, we were close just then and you know, whether or not there was anything in what Nicholas said about coming back from the dead, one thing was certain. He loved me so very much and never more than he did at that precious moment.”
“Was that all Nicholas said to you?” Gus interrupted. There was an urgency in his voice.
“Oh, no, there was more, a lot more,” Alice answered him. “He described what took place in that car. ‘It began to grow lighter in the car. I could see my head resting on its side,’--He spoke the words so simply, as though he were talking about taking a ride in the country.--‘my hair floating over my head, moving as the car and the water moved. The darkness began to thin out and the light became stronger, until the car was filled with it, a bright, almost blinding light. I felt a tremendous urge to let go of my life, to give up, and walk away from that body, that cadaver sitting there on the seat of my car. But I could not! I still refused to let go of life. All the while I knew--do not ask me how I knew, I just knew, that’s all--that what I was doing, refusing to let go, was wrong, very, very wrong. Death came for me and I had refused to meet it and go with it. For the very first time, I knew what sin was. I had never believed in such things, you know, but then I knew. I saw sin for what it is, the refusal to do what you know you should do. And, Ali, I saw something else, too. I saw hell.’
“It was then that I came out with my biggest whopper of the day,” Alice told them. “One of those statements for which I have become world famous. I sometimes marvel at my own stupidity. I asked him something to the effect that did he see devils and fire and pitchforks. He just stared at me with the most pitying look I have ever seen anyone give another person. He shook his head. ‘No, Ali, no fire, no brimstone, no devils with tails and pitchforks dancing around the damned.’ His eyes were directed across the room, away from me. ‘I saw what hell really is: Eternal regret. Regret for all the things we do, but especially regret for all the things we do not do, the waste, the time lost, the talents squandered. Eternally regretting all the words we should have said and did not say. Unending regret for all the times we should have held our tongues and did not. I saw hell, Ali, but more important, hell saw me. It stared me in the face. For the first time, too, I knew what regret was and I wanted to scream. I opened my mouth to scream and could not. Nothing came out.’
“The strain of talking was showing on his face. It became even more unlike Nicholas, if that was possible. He visibly pulled himself together and went on. ‘I seemed then to have one more chance to go with death, to leave everything behind, but I refused. The light began to fade and that horrible darkness came back again. I found myself once more inside my own body and control was coming back to me. I could move my arms. I sat upright. The door opened with little effort and I moved out of the car. The water buoyed me upwards to the surface. It seemed so easy, too easy, to swim, and I made it to the beach, then to the road, and I came back here, just as I told you I did.’
“We sat there in silence for a while. I wanted to tell him that he was mistaken, that he probably had one of those experiences people seem to have on operating tables when they are supposedly dead, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t tell him he was wrong. If you could have seen him, the look on his face, the way he spoke, you might have believed him, too.”
“What happened after that?” Gus asked. “Please. It’s so very important to me. I must know.”
“I asked him about the trip he was talking about. ‘I want you to go with me, Ali,’ he said. So, I asked him once more, where it was, what it was like, what the name of the place was, and... and, God help me... he told me.” Alice began to convulse with tears.
Philip put his arm on her shoulder, lifted the glass to her mouth and helped her drink.
“I wish I had never asked him,” Alice went on. “He wanted me to go back there with him. He wanted me to die so that I could be with him, so that the two of us could go there and be together always. I couldn’t believe my ears. I couldn’t believe that he wanted me to die with him, but he did. He picked up the knife and said something like, ‘I shall make it so very easy for you, Ali.’ I jumped up from the bed. He got up, too, and walked towards me, around the side of the bed. I circled around so as to give both him and the knife a wide berth. But, you know, in as bad a condition as he was in, he moved faster than I had seen him move in a long time. He actually lunged at me with the knife. ‘Come with me, Ali,’ he cried out and I mean cried. He was crying. Tears were falling down his cheeks. Doesn’t that strike you as strange, Dr. Sharples?”
“Very strange,” Gus mumbled. “Are you sure?”
“I am sure. I saw those tears, saw them running down his cheeks. Sort of blows a hole through your theory, doesn’t it? If he was dead, really dead as you maintain, and nothing was functioning, then where did those tears come from?”
“I admit, I don’t know,” Gus conceded. “But go on, please.”
“It wasn’t easy, dodging that knife. Finally, he came at me, directly at me, the knife in his right hand, lunging at my side. What happened next, I can’t believe. It must have been my imagination. Please, Philip, tell me I imagined it all. After what you and Gus told me earlier today, my imagination must have been running wild. His arm, Philip, was there? I mean, did you see...? Was there?”
“Yes, Alice, I’m afraid you did not imagine it,” Philip said and tried to soften the blow. “It did happen. Please, try to tell us how.”
“I can’t,” she cried. “I don’t know. I can’t tell you.”
“You must, Alice,” Philip insisted. “Pull yourself together and tell us. Take your time.”
“He... he came towards me. I dodged to one side. To my right. As he lunged past me, I reached out and grabbed his arm. His left arm. I clutched at his shirt. He rushed at me with the knife once more. I felt my hand on the flesh of his arm. I pulled. I don’t know what exactly I was trying to accomplish. Make him lose his balance, I suppose. Trying to protect myself. I yanked on his arm. And... I can’t, Philip, I can’t.”
Philip picked up the glass and held it to her lips. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.
“I pulled on his arm and I heard that sound,” she managed to continue. “I shall hear it every day and every night the rest of my life. I don’t know how to describe it. Something like the sound of a rotten tree branch, wet, fibrous, being pulled apart. There was not much resistance. It tore. I could feel it leave its socket. Then, it sort of swiveled and came lose. I stood there, the arm in my hand. The weight was at the far end. I think I stood there, looking down at the thing in my hand, the thing covered with cloth that had once been... once been an arm that used to hold me... wrap itself around me. My eyes must have bulged out of their sockets, too. He did not cry out. Nicholas did not cry in pain. He, too, just stood there, looking at the thing which had been a part of him, his arm, the thing I had in my hand. I don’t know how long I stayed there, with that thing in my hand, but I do remember dropping it. I think I screamed. I know I screamed, then let go of it and it fell to the floor, this rotting, stinking thing. I ran out of the room.”
“Where did you go after that?” Philip asked.
“Wait, before you answer that,” Gus interjected. “Tell us, did you see Nicholas after you ran out of the room? What I’m getting at is, we found him in his study. I presume he got there under his own power. Did he try to follow you? Did you see him leave the bedroom and go into his study? Did he pick up his arm? Above all, did he say anything else after that?”
“I don’t know,” Alice answered. “I was so panicky, all I wanted was to get out of there. I didn’t see him pick up his arm. He was still standing in the same spot, I think, when I ran out of the bedroom.”
“Where were you when we got here?” Philip asked.
“I ran.” Her voice was quieter now, much of the fear and hysteria gone. “I ran until I was out of breath. I ran into the back woods until I could run no more. I leaned against a tree and started thinking. What if Nicholas came in there after me? I knew I couldn’t stay there all night and it was already getting dark. I’d freeze to death if I stayed there. I headed back towards the boundary line of our property. I figured that if he had wanted to, Nicholas would have found me by that time. Besides, I finally was thinking a little clearer and I remembered my car. I don’t know why I didn’t think of it sooner. My car was in the driveway, and my keys were here, in the kitchen. I thought if I could make it to the house, find the keys, I could get away. Anyway, just as I reached the back of our property, I saw your car parked in the driveway, so I came in here, hoping you’d be able to help me.”
“You know we’ll have to call the police,” Philip told her again.
She nodded. “Will I have to tell them everything?”
Philip looked at Gus who let out a low whistle.
“That’ll take some doing, getting the police to believe what’s been going on in this house this past weekend,” Gus said. “The police, at their best, are skeptics, devoid of any imagination. This will be too much for them to swallow, especially in little old Cape May County. They’ll probably come up with some idea that Nicholas has been dead for several days. The medical examiner will confirm that, of course, so they’ll demand to know why Nicholas’ death wasn’t reported sooner. That’s it! By damn it, that’s it! We’ll buy some time. Just when they’re convinced Nicholas has been dead for several days, we’ll point out that we all saw and spoke to him as recently as today. We’ll say we arrived here this evening, found Alice in such a state of shock she couldn’t bring himself to accept the fact that Nicholas was dead. Naturally, we called the police.”
“The arm. What about that?” Philip asked.
“Ah, yes, the arm.” Gus thought for a moment. “Simple. Alice tried to drag the body from their bedroom where Nicholas died because, in her state of confusion, she thought she should move the body to the study where Nicholas had always spent his happiest hours. As she dragged the body, the arm came off. Think they’ll buy it?”
“Not a word of it,” Philip answered. “But, let’s try it. It could buy us time. Incidentally, why do we need time?”
“Beats me,” Gus replied. “But are you ready to tell the local police that Nicholas came back from the dead? I know I’m not and I’m not a resident of this place. You have to go on living here.”
“You’re right,” Philip agreed. “I’ll call them and we’ll hope for the best.” He went over to the wall telephone and called the County police.
Gus sat down at the kitchen table. Until this moment, he had remained standing. He stared as Alice’s left hand.
“They’ll be right here,” Philip said as he returned from the telephone. “We better keep our stories straight.”
“Alice, why do you keep your hand on your chest like that?” Gus asked her.
“I don’t know,” she answered and took her hand away from her chest. There was a dark brown stain on the shirt.
“Here, let me look at that,” Philip said and began unbuttoning her blouse. “That looks nasty. Thought you said you managed to avoid Nicholas’ knife. This is one helluva knife wound. Gus, do you mind? Second floor bathroom. Bandages in the medicine chest. Bring plenty. I want to get this bandaged before the police get here.”
Gus ran upstairs and returned as Philip was examining the wound by the light of a small lamp on the table. Philip quickly had the wound cleaned and dressed. “Lucky for you you clot so rapidly,” he told her. “We won’t need any stitches. I’ll look at it again later, when we’re through with the police.”
The front doorbell rang.
“I’ll get that. Gus, if you’ll take Alice into the living room. Alice, try to look and sound as though you’re not exactly sure what’s going on or what happened here this weekend. Gus and I will answer most of the questions. Let’s hope the police believe at least a part of our story. We’ll worry about additional lies later.”


Chapter XII

The police were neither understanding nor cooperative. They tried several different approaches to get Alice to come up with a story they could accept. They insisted Nicholas had been dead for several days, judging from the condition of the body and demanded to know why Alice had done nothing about it. Why hadn’t she called the police? Or Nicholas’ doctor? An undertaker? Anyone? Philip answered most of the questions by pointing out that Alice was obviously in no condition to call anyone, that she was so grief-stricken, she had not been able to think rationally.
Police Officialdom was represented by Lt. Clarence Crane who somewhat resembled the bird by that same name. Exceptionally tall (close to six six), with legs notched in the middle at the knees, had he acquired the talent of being able to stand for long periods of time on one leg, he might have enjoyed the title of the world’s first man-bird. Lt. Crane tried sympathy with Alice, telling her he could appreciate how devastating it is to lose someone one loves. When that did not work, he knitted his bushy black eyebrows which went straight across his face above his eyes, and scowled. He went into a somewhat frenzied account of the punishment the state meted out to those who did not report deaths. So dark a picture did he paint, that death itself would have been the preferable alternative for anyone who failed to report another’s death. When Philip laughed aloud, the lieutenant left the room, only to come back almost immediately holding a small notebook out at arm’s length. His scowl had been exchanged for a smirk.
“Well, well, seems we have the truth at last,” he said as he read from the book. “Doctor Joshua Prymm, M.D., County Medical Examiner, tells me that Mr. Nicholas Keene has been dead for at least four days and that his lungs had been filled with water. Death was by drowning. O.K., any of you care to tell me where this drowning took place?” He put the little notebook in his inside coat pocket, clasped his hands in front of him, and proceeded to crack his knuckles. His black eyes went from Alice to Philip to Gus.
Philip managed to outstare him. “First of all, Lieutenant, about Mr. Keene being dead for four days. That’s not only preposterous, it’s impossible. I spoke to him only yesterday. Last evening, Saturday evening, there was a party in this house, at least a dozen people were here. We all saw and spoke to Mr. Keene.”
 “Yeah? It’ll take a helluva lot more than a party to destroy the M.E.‘s report. If he says the body’s been dead for four days, then it’s been dead for four days and not a minute less. And, if he says the deceased died from drowning, you can bet your ass he died from drowning. By the way, weren’t you Mr. Keene’s personal physician?”
Philip nodded. “I was.”
“And aren’t you a personal friend of Mrs. Keene here?” He put exceptional emphasis on the word friend.
“Yes, I have been a friend of the Keenes for many years,” Philip snapped back at him. “And if that’s supposed to mean anything, I can assure you Mr. Keene’s mother spoke to her son as recently as this morning. She was in this house and spoke to both Mr. and Mrs. Keene. Lydia Keene. Perhaps you know her? All of Ocean City does.”
“We’ll check into that,” the Lieutenant said and walked out of the room once more.
“We’ve got them going around in circles,” Philip said. “I don’t like this idea, but it sure as hell’s a lot better than trying to explain to that moron about Nicholas coming back from the dead. I’m going to suggest, Alice, that you get some rest. As soon as the lieutenant gets back here, I’ll tell him you have to have some sleep or else.”
“What the hell you talking about?” Lieutenant Crane’s voice thundered in the hallway. “You trying to tell me... tell me... I’ll get to the bottom of this!” He stormed back into the living room. “O.K., I’ve had it with you three... three.... I want the truth and I want it now, understand? If I don’t get it, so help me, I’ll run all three of you in.” The veins in his neck appeared about to burst. “Sergeant Brown here tells me that according to a police report filled out last Friday night, one Nicholas Keene was supposedly drowned in the bay under the 34th Street bridge in Ocean City. Sergeant Brown was at the scene and remembers Mrs. Keene here as identifying the car that allegedly belonged to her husband. Is that right, Mrs. Keene? Did you or did you not identify the car that went off that bridge as belonging to your husband?”
Alice nodded.
“And wasn’t Mr. Keene supposedly in that car?”
“He wasn’t supposedly in that car,” she answered. “He was in that car.”
“Then how do you explain his being here now, in this house? In the condition he’s in? Next thing, you’ll expect me to believe that he died in that car accident, then got up and walked all the way from Ocean City to Route 9. No, I’m not that stupid, Mrs. Keene. You found the body, brought it here, and in the process, you removed one of the arms, for what reason I hesitate to guess. If I wasn’t a policeman, I wouldn’t even want to know. But, just remember that’s another crime, mutilating a corpse. Necro... necro.... It’s a crime and you could go to jail for it.” Under his breath, he muttered the word: pervert.
“You keep forgetting we all spoke to Mr. Keene right up until this morning,” Philip pointed out.” And that we could produce a dozen witnesses who saw and spoke to him in this very house last evening.
Lieutenant Crane stared at him. “I don’t care if the President of the United States talked to him fifteen minutes ago. Either he was drowned in that car or he wasn’t, but it’s damned strange that the M.E tells me his lungs had evidence of having been filled with water. I’ll be anxious to know if that water was salt water or not.”
“How about letting my patient get some rest?” Philip asked.
“Huh?”
“She’s tired. Hasn’t slept well lately and I really must insist that her health necessitates her getting some sleep. I intend to give her a sedative and get her to bed.”
Once more Lieutenant Crane mumbled under his breath. This time he could be heard to say, “I’ll bet!” He left the room without responding to Philip’s request.
“He’s wearing out the carpet,” Gus said.
In the kitchen, the lieutenant could be heard talking on his telephone. He came back a couple of minutes later. “We have a lot of work to do here,” he announced. “We intend to go over this house, every inch of it, before we’re through.”
“Then, let Mrs. Keene come home with me,” Philip urged. “I’ll be responsible for her. If she doesn’t get some sleep soon, you’ll be responsible for the consequences.”
“O.K., but give your address and telephone number to Corporal Donnattucci at the front door. And don’t get no bright ideas about going anyplace, any of you. We’ll be keeping a close eye on all three of you.”
“C’mon, Alice, let’s get out of here,” Philip said and helped her to her feet. They headed towards the front door.
“Oh, and Doctor Rosen,” Lieutenant Crane called out after him. Philip stopped. “Go easy on that sedative. I’ll want to question Mrs. Keene first thing in the morning.”
Philip continued towards the front door. He took a coat from the hall rack and threw it over Alice’s shoulders. He stopped and gave his address and telephone number to Corporal Donnattucci, then added, “But I thought you had them already” and winked.
The three of them, Philip, Gus, and Alice went out through the front door. Outside, the light over the front porch was casting a conical ray towards the ground and in its beam could be seen the fine, powder-like snow that was beginning to fall.
“They believed us?” Alice asked, as she looked at Philip.
“Not a damned word we said,” Philip answered. “But what else could they do? They had to let us go. The lieutenant doesn’t have a thing to hold us on. There really isn’t any proof Nicholas was in that car when it went off the bridge Friday evening, so they don’t know for sure just how he died. Or when, for that matter. They’re so stumped, they don’t know what to do next. They know something’s not right, but that’s all they know. We bought some time, as Gus said we would. This whole case ought to be a doozy when it breaks.”
“Looks like there’s more to come,” Gus said as he looked upwards at the night sky, heavy and pink with the promise of more snow on the way. He pulled up his coat collar as they trudged through the already deep snow underfoot and headed towards Philip’s car.


Chapter XIII

“Alice did not sleep well last night,” Gus said as he came into the kitchen in Philip’s house. Wearing an old terrycloth robe which belonged to Jerry, he resembled a rather moth-eaten, dingy, white walrus as he sat down in the breakfast nook.
“Oh? I didn’t hear her at all during the night,” Philip said as he poured coffee for both of them. “How do you know she didn’t sleep?”
The sun was pouring in through the side windows and through the French doors which opened onto a deck off the kitchen at the back of the house. There was an unobstructed view of the ocean. More snow had fallen during the night, covering the beach as far as the high tide mark.
“Because I didn’t sleep at all myself, that’s how,” Gus answered him. “I heard her get up five or six times. She would pace the floor for a while, then evidently get back in bed or sit in a chair, then start up her pacing all over again. I was tempted to wake you and see if you could help.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“I’m not sure, really. I just don’t know. Every time I decided I should, I sort of felt myself paralyzed. Probably afraid she’d think I was imposing myself, butting in where I didn’t belong. I told myself that she probably would rather be alone. Eventually, I fell asleep, about an hour or two ago.”
“I was going to call her in a little while, but from what you just said, I think I’ll let her sleep as long as she can. This whole mess was a strain on her. I could see that last evening when we were at her place. She looked tired, although she was trying hard not to show it. I know Alice only too well to know when she’s trying to hide something. And now, with Nicholas’ death.... With him gone, it must be even more difficult for her. It’s bad enough to lose someone one loves, but under these circumstances, it’s a bit too much for the strongest person to handle. Alice is strong. Very strong. I’ve only met a couple of other people in my life who have been as strong as she is. She’s been through a great deal in her life, but she rarely ever speaks about those things. You have to know her for as many years as I have before she’ll open up and talk about herself. She broke down and told me a few things only about a year and a half ago. Her father was an alcoholic and beat her regularly when she was young. From a few other things she’s told me, that was the good part, the pleasanter portion of her childhood. It’s one of the reasons she’s so crazy about Nicholas. Oh, not that Nicholas isn’t... excuse me... wasn’t great himself. He was one of the finest persons you’re ever likely to meet. What I mean is, having been through so much that was ugly, painful, she appreciated Nicholas that much more.”
“You should still keep an eye on her, no matter how strong you think she is,” Gus suggested. “She may appear strong, she may very well be strong, but she could be--in fact, I’m sure she is--under a great deal of stress right now. Much more stress than anyone should be called upon to endure. Remember all that has happened to Alice since last Friday evening and I think you’ll agree that’s more than most people could go through and come out without it affecting them.”
The telephone rang. Philip listened to the caller at the other end, said, “Thank you,” and hung up. He returned to his seat next to Gus. “That was Lieutenant Crane’s office. Alice can go back to her house. They’re through there. Maybe I should waken her and see if she wants to go back.”
Philip finished his coffee, then went upstairs and knocked on Alice’s bedroom door. He heard some shuffling about, then she called out for him to come in. He went in and saw her in bed with only a sheet over her. He relayed the message from Lt. Crane’s office. “They may want to talk to us later, they added.”
“I would like to go home, if you don’t mind.” She tried to smile. “I would feel better there. No offense?”
“Of course not. Whenever you’re ready. Breakfast?”
“You know I never eat breakfast. I’ll be down in a few minutes.”
“It’s cold outside, even with the sun shinning. I’ll wait for you downstairs. And, Alice?”
She looked up at him.
“I’m sorry. Damned sorry. You and Nicholas were my best friends, I don’t have to remind you of that. I’ll miss him, too. And, if there’s ever anything... anything at all....”
“I know.”
Fifteen minutes later, Alice and Gus and Philip got into Philip’s car and headed towards Alice’s house. The distance was not long. As usual, there had been more snow on the mainland than on the island. The snow had drifted into high, razor-sharp peaks along the shoulders of the road, made worse by the snowplows which had gone by a few hours earlier and piled it even higher. The snow on the road was by now packed down into a smooth, white sheet of ice. Several times, Philip’s car swerved and once just missed driving into one of the gullies along the side of the road. Finally, they stopped in front of Alice’s house. The snow was too deep in the driveway for them to pull in.
“Want us to come in?” Philip asked as Alice opened the car door to get out.
“If you don’t mind, I would like to be alone for a while.” She jumped out of the car and hurried through the deep snow to the front porch. Philip and Gus waited and watched until she was inside the house.
“What do you think?” Philip asked.
“I was supposed to leave today, remember?” Gus answered. “Mind if I stay a little longer?”
“Of course not. Besides, the roads are not fit for traveling.”
“I’m not talking about that.” He was staring at the house. He had, in fact, not taken his eyes off it since they arrived. He leaned down so he could get a better look at the upper floors. “It’s not the snow I’m afraid of.”
“Afraid? What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I’m starved. Let’s go someplace and have some breakfast.”
“Not quite the answer I expected, although I should know better by this time,” Philip mumbled as he pulled away from the side of the road. “There’s something on your mind. Unfortunately, I’m beginning to get an inkling of how that brain of yours works and it tells me you have something tucked away inside it and you don’t care to talk about it right now.”
 “There’s hope for you yet,” Gus chuckled. “But I will tell you over hotcakes. There’s more... a lot more... I’m afraid, to this whole... this mess, as you call it, than I’ve told you. Years ago, you and I went to the Hen’s Apron. Does it still serve the best breakfast and home fries on the East Coast?”
“The best.”
“Philip, you really ought to learn to make better coffee,” Gus said as he inhaled the aroma of the freshly brewed coffee the waitress had just put down before him. “This will taste, if my memory serves me right, equally as delicious as it smells.” He held up the cup in a toast fashion, then sipped it, and put it down with a look of satisfaction on his face.
“Sorry my coffee does not measure up,” Philip said with a touch too much sarcasm. “Now, out with it, what’s all this about omens of doom or whatever else it is you were trying to tell me back there at Alice’s place. If it’s more of your... your rather childish tales of--”
Gus held out his hand. “You didn’t believe me before, but you saw, with those two little beady eyes of yours, what happened. You saw Nicholas. You saw him lying there on the floor of his study, his arm next to him. You heard him speak to us and, more important, you heard Alice relate what she had heard from Nicholas. Alice, who only hours before had believed nothing of what I tried to tell her. In fact, she was abusive.”
“I know, I know,” Philip conceded. “But you’re not going to tell me there’s more, that... that.... Oh, hell, I don’t know what to think right now.”
“I am going to tell you there is more, that’s right.” Gus’ voice immediately became serious. “I don’t like the idea of Alice being alone in that house. She could be in very real danger.”
“From what?” Philip interrupted. “Surely, not from....”
“I don’t know about that,” Gus conceded. “None of us knows for sure. It’s quite possible that if someone can come back from the dead once, they can come back again and again, especially if the drive is there, the will is strong enough, if the thing they came back for the first time isn’t realized. We don’t know exactly why Nicholas came back. He said it was because of his work, the book he was working on, and that could very well be true. We do know that that book was important to him, so important in fact, that he contacted me originally to get information about the remigrants. If my suspicions are right, that was no accident last Friday night. I fear Nicholas deliberately drove off that bridge just to see if he could come back from the dead. Once he became interested in the subject of the dead returning, he couldn’t stop thinking about it. Believe me, Philip, this subject, this study of the remigrants, if you let it, can become as addictive as any drug. It’s only because I’m a bit crazy already that it hasn’t put me in a nut house. It’s possible that having become hooked on the subject, he had to find out for himself, find out if he could do it, come back from the dead.”
“All for the sake of a book? Isn’t that pushing research a bit too far?”
“If the book was the cause of all this, then yes. But what if, Philip, what if the book wasn’t the cause of his obsession? What if the book is the fruit of that obsession?”
“Then, he might try to do it again?”
“It is possible. And, take it a step further. Presuming he is obsessed with this subject to the point that he actually took his own life in order to see if he could return, he wants to share that new-found knowledge. Remember, just yesterday he tried to get Alice to go with him, actually tried to take Alice’s life in order that they might be together.”
“That, surely, was the ravings of an insane person,” Philip argued. “His brain was probably already decayed to the point that he was incapable of rationality. He couldn’t be held responsible for what he tried to do.”
“Responsible or not, I don’t think we should take the chance that he might succeed again, having already done it once, and come back to take Alice with him. That’s the reason I say I don’t like any of this, that I don’t like Alice being alone in that house, that I think she could be in mortal danger.”
“Then, we should get back there as soon as possible,” Philip said and made a movement to get up from the table. “Why didn’t you say this earlier? Had I known, I would never have permitted Alice to go back into that house alone. We could have kept her at my place.”
“Sit down, sit down,” Gus said between mouthsful of homefries and sausage. “If Nicholas is coming back, he won’t walk in while you and I are there. What we need to do, you and I, is to be someplace where we can keep an eye on that house and on Alice. Is there someplace where we can watch the house without being seen ourselves?”
“If we go to the small shopping center on Route 9, and park in a certain spot, you can see the house this time of year when there are no leaves on the trees. We found the spot quite by accident one day, Nicholas and I. We were in the shopping center to--”
“And to play safe,” Gus interrupted, “I’m going to pick up that rented car I ordered to drive back home. Alice would be able to recognize your car, so we’ll take the rented one. Ah, here are my flapjacks.”
“Are you going to sit there and calmly gorge yourself while Alice is in serious danger?”
“She’s in no real danger right this moment,” Gus said as he poured maple syrup over his flapjacks and laced his home fries with more salt.
“Before you kill yourself with all that poison,” Philip said and winced as he watched Gus scoop sweet butter onto his flapjacks, “please tell me why you’re so damned sure Alice is not in any danger at this time. Don’t tell me you put garlic in her coat pocket when she wasn’t looking or that your... your remigrants only come out after dark when they climb out of their coffins or only during the full moon.”
“My, my, my, we are testy this morning, aren’t we? Not to mention that we have our folklore monsters all garbled up. Remigrants are neither vampires nor werewolves. Your confusion along with your vile disposition today come from not enjoying the pleasures of this world, pleasures like grease and salt and sugar.” He harpooned several layers of flapjacks and pierced several home fries and managed to get them into his mouth at the same time. “Your friend is not in danger. Not yet. If Nicholas Keene is planning on returning, it won’t be for quite some time. His body was taken away sometime after we left his house, probably nearer to four or five o’clock this morning, if I’m not mistaken. They must have taken it to the county morgue in Cape May Court House where they would perform an autopsy. Lt. Crane’s office called what, about two hours ago? If Nicholas had left before you got that call, I’m sure you would never have gotten it at all. Oh, you might have gotten a call all right, from Lt. Crane, madder than all hell. That means Nicholas was still where he should be.”
“I hope you’re right,” Philip said as he studied his food with the tip of his fork. He hadn’t tasted any of it; rather he was mesmerized by the sight of Gus shovelling large quantities of food into his own mouth.
“Remember, too, that a post mortem will be done on his body. That could take a least a few more hours. It may be nearer to mid-afternoon by the time they’re through with it. We will leave soon, don’t worry,” Gus said. “I only seem to take forever to eat.”
Gus was almost as good as his word. When he had finished his last bit of food, Philip summoned their waitress and they were soon on the road, heading for Ocean City. He dropped Gus off at the car rental office.
“Pick me up at my house. I’ll bring along a pair of binoculars,” Philip told him. Little more than an hour later, they were sitting in Gus’s rented car in the parking lot of the Surfside Shopping Center.
“You can see the house perfectly from here,” Philip said after Gus had parked it in the precise spot Philip indicated. He handed Gus the binoculars.
The minutes turned into an hour. Then two. Three.
“I can’t take any more of this,” Philip eventually said. “We’ve discussed your remigrants, we’ve solved the world’s major problems, we’ve even picked the next two presidents of this country as well as the next prime minister of Great Britain without the citizens of those two countries having any say in the matter. That wouldn’t be so bad, but it looks as though neither Nicholas nor anyone else is going to visit that house. Maybe we should go there, just to check.”
“Better still, why don’t you call Lt. Crane?”
“And say what? Ask him if he’s checked all his dead bodies in the morgue lately?”
“No, dear boy. Just say that you wanted to check in with him, that you’ve been out all day, and you wondered if there were any new developments. If the body’s gone, I’m sure he’ll tell you so or at least you’ll be able to surmise from his tone of voice if anything is wrong.”
Philip took out his mobile phone and dialed. “We can leave here,” he said as he slipped his phone back  into his pocket. “Nicholas Keene isn’t going back to that house or anyplace else, for that matter. Lydia came to the police station today brandishing a court order and demanded the release of her son’s body immediately after the post mortem. It’s been taken to the Dart Funeral Parlor.”
“He could leave from there,” Gus pointed out.
“I doubt it. I spoke to Lt. Crane who’s beside himself and so pissed off at Lydia. She told him she was going to have the body cremated immediately! You’d be surprised how much pull that woman has in this county and the people she knows. It didn’t take her long to find a judge to issue the order to release the body and if Mr. Sam Dart knows what’s good for him, he’ll cremate the body right away, if that’s what she wants. By now, Nicholas could be nothing more than a handful of ashes.”
“Guess I was wrong,” Gus sheepishly admitted. “Remember, though, I never said I was certain he would come back. It was just a fear I had that he might and if he had, Alice could now be in mortal danger.”
“I’d like to stop by, just the same, and check up on her, make sure she’s all right.” They were no more than a few minutes away from Alice’s house. When they got there, Philip rang the front door bell. He heard footsteps. Alice opened the door to them.
“May we come in?” Philip asked.
She stepped aside to let them enter.
“Have you heard from Lydia?”
Alice walked into the living and stood in front of them. “A while ago,” she answered. “She just got back from the city. Had to go up there on business. She and I discussed Nicholas’ cremation. It was something he always wanted. And, since Lydia could pull all the right strings and get things done faster, I let her go ahead with all the arrangements.”
“It’s just as well,” Philip agreed. “And you, how are you doing?”
“You know me. It takes a helluva lot more than this to get me down.”
Philip stared at her, not quite believing what he had just heard. He expected some tears. A few, anyway. But Alice sounded almost indifferent. How could she make light of such a loss? And under such circumstances?
“I keep telling myself,” Alice went on, “it really is better, but still, having had him back for a while, even in that condition, was better than not having him at all. There ought to be a cliché about it, about having a dead person with you is better than having no one at all. All I can come up with is, ‘Half a person is better than none.’”
“Why don’t you come back with us?” Philip urged her. He didn’t like the new Alice. “I don’t think you ought to stay here alone in this house, not tonight, anyway. You could--”
Alice did not let him finish. “No, no, thank you, Philip. I prefer staying here.”
“Very well. But, if you need anything or change your mind or--”
“I’ll call, I promise.” She had been inching towards the front door.
“Did we just get thrown out of this house?” Gus asked as they found themselves standing on the front porch.
“I’m not sure. It happened so fast, I’m not really sure what just took place in there.”
They headed for Philip’s house.
“You’re unusually quiet,” Philip said after they had driven for a while in silence.
“I’ve been thinking.”
“And you can’t talk and think at the same time? Not at all like the old professor I used to know.”
“I’ve been thinking about your two friends, about how crazy this whole thing is.” Gus ignored Philip’s remark.
“Well, it’s about time! You’ve finally realized that that whole story about Nicholas’ returning from the dead was nothing but a crock.”
“It’s not that at all. Today. The things that happened today. They’re too.... Too what? Unreal? No, they’re real, all right. Unlikely? Definitely. Yes, they are unlikely, but that’s not the word I want. They’re too... too pat. Yes, that’s the right word. Pat. Too pat for my liking. No, my dear friend, something’s wrong, something stinks to heaven throughout all this, and I’ll sure as hell say I don’t like it, don’t like it one damned bit. And, I’ll add this: I don’t mind telling you I am more frightened right this moment than I was before. I’m scared shitless. Rather descriptive phrase that, don’t you think?”
“You were never at a loss for the right word.” They were approaching Philip’s house. “What now?”
“Give me a minute, please,” Gus begged. “Maybe I can come up with an answer. I almost had it there for a moment, but it seems to be eluding me. Goddamn it, why didn’t I think of that before? It’s so damned simple, really. And, dear boy, you’re just as stupid as I am for not seeing it, too.”
“Seeing it? Seeing what? I don’t even know what the hell you’re talking about.” The were now in Philip’s driveway. “Stupid? You’re doing an idiotic imitation of Sherlock Holmes and you have the nerve to tell me I’m stupid.”
“Precisely, my dear Doctor Rosen, precisely. You don’t see it, do you? You really don’t know what happened today, here in quiet little Cape May County, in the dead of winter, when even those sea gulls who can afford it go to Florida?”
“No, I don’t see anything,” Philip replied and raised his voice slightly. “And if you don’t tell me damned soon, you’ll wish you were in Florida with those same seagulls at this moment.”
“Think about it. It’s all so very easy, it insults our intelligence. The boldness of it all, and still we did not grasp it right away. It’ll be dark before too long. By that time, I think we will know for sure, you and I. Yes, I’m really looking forward to nightfall. C’mon, let’s go inside. I’m beginning to get cold in this car.”
“You are the most exasperating individual I’ve ever known,” Philip said as they got out of the car.
“If I told you, it would spoil all the fun.”
“Fun? You call this fun?” Philip was standing next to the car door. “I’m sorry, but the loss of one of my dearest friends who died the way Nicholas did, and now with the way Alice is acting, is not my idea of fun.”
“Sorry. That was tactless of me. I meant it only as an outsider might mean it. It has been so very challenging, I can’t help but feel the stimulus, the adrenalin flowing, thinking about what has happened and about what I think might happen this evening. Keep your wits about you, I warn you. Don’t let your guard down, not for a single moment.”
They were now standing in the downstairs hallway of Philip’s house.
“I got very little sleep last night, as I told you earlier.” Gus announced. “I think I’ll go upstairs, if you don’t mind, and take a short nap. Don’t let me sleep past six o’clock, at the latest.”
“How he can sleep at a time like this, I’ll be damned if I know,” Philip mumbled to himself after Gus had gone upstairs. Philip fixed himself a drink and settled down in one of the comfortable overstuffed chairs in the den. The strain of this past weekend, the lack of sleep, the worry over Nicholas, all these combined now and took their toll. Before long, he too was sound asleep. It was a deep, dreamless sleep. He awakened to a sound coming from upstairs. It was Gus who was now descending the staircase.
“It’s after six. We better get a move on,” Gus announced.
Philip sat upright in his chair. “Going? Going where?”
 “You still don’t know, do you?”
“I’m not even awake yet and you expect me to play your cockamamie guessing games.”
“Then, here, take your coat. The cold air outside will awaken you,” Gus said as he helped Philip into the coat. “And, I can’t stress this too much: You better be awake for where we are going.”


Chapter XIV

“You’re so damned cocky about all this, you drive,” Philip said and headed towards Gus’s rented car.
“I intend to. You’re in no condition to drive.” Gus opened the car door.
“Tell me when we get there,” Philip said as he crouched down in the seat next to Gus. Contrary to Gus’ prediction, the cold air did not revive Philip. In fact, he found himself drawing his limbs closer to his body in an effort to keep warm, the effect of which served only to make him sleepier.
“I’m not kidding, Philip,” Gus said sternly. “Wake up! When we get there, you’ll need all your wits about you. Sit up!”
Philip jumped. He hadn’t expected Gus to shout. “You don’t have to yell at me,” he complained.
“Yes, I do. Something has to waken you. You have absolutely no idea of the danger we’re walking into, do you? You don’t yet know what’s been going on.”
“I’m stupid,” Philip mumbled and stared out the car window, studying the heavily laden trees bending downward with their burdens of wet snow and ice.
Gus turned onto Route 9 and drove for about half a mile, then slowed down. “You’ll have to help me now.”
“What’s the matter, lost?”
“This is where it gets deadly serious, Philip. I want you to help me find Lydia’s house. Time for fooling around is over.”
“Lydia? What do you want with her?”
“I want to see if Alice’s car is there, that’s what I want.”
“And if it is? What’s wrong with that? They’re very fond of one another, you know that.”
“Yes, I know that, but if what I think is taking place is actually taking place, then Alice’s car should be at Lydia’s. And if it is, then you and I, dear friend, will pay them a surprise visit. Now, where is that house of hers?”
“Another quarter of a mile ahead.” Philip was leaning forward in his seat to see out the windshield. “There, that white one on the right with the red shutters. And there’s Alice’s car in her driveway.”
Gus stepped on the gas and sped past the house.
“I thought we were going in,” Philip said.
“I also said it would be a surprise visit, remember?” Gus drove along Route 9 until he reached a gas station. He pulled in and out again, making a U-turn and headed south. A couple of hundred feet before the driveway on Lydia’s property, he pulled in as close to the shoulder of the road as the snow would permit. “We should be able to cut through the woods and come out at the back of Lydia’s house,” he explained to Philip. He got out and signaled Philip to move over and get out of the car on the driver’s side. “C’mon,” he ordered.
Philip got out. “But I don’t see why we have to--”
Gus put a finger to his lips. “From now on, it’s silence,” he whispered. “The slightest sound will travel on a night like this.”
There was an element of authority in Gus’s words and voice that finally convinced Philip that Gus was serious, that there was, indeed, danger in the air tonight.
Gus led the way into the woods. There was enough light from the street lamplight behind them and enough moonlight emerging on the horizon to enable them to see where they were going without falling. Underfoot, the crunch of snow and ice and last summer’s dead leaves seemed to Philip to be almost deafening in the stillness found only in a snow-laden forest. Twice they had to step over fallen trees.
“The back door there, that’s the kitchen I presume?” Gus whispered.
Philip nodded.
“Usually locked?”
“I doubt it. No one along here locks their doors.”
“Then we’ll give it a try. Crouch down. Someone could be looking out a window.”
Gus left the woods and stepped out into the clearing. Ahead of them was about a hundred and fifty feet of open space, broken only by a small mimosa tree at the back curve of the driveway which would afford them no hiding place. They ran, bent over and made it to the small back porch. Gus reached up and slowly, quietly tried the knob on the storm door. It turned. He opened it out gradually, then reached in and tried the inside door. It, too, opened. Inward. Once more, Gus signaled him to be silent. He stood up and walked into a room, evidently a laundry room. Philip silently closed the two outside doors behind them.
Gus cupped his hands around his mouth and whispered into Philip’s ear, “You know the layout of the house. You lead the way.”
Philip stepped ahead of Gus. He opened a door on their left. It entered upon the kitchen. A florescent light was burning over the stove, giving them ample light by which to see. The room was cheerful, the walls covered with a bright blue and gray wallpaper. Copper-clad pots hung from a rack over the stove. A small table and two chairs were placed under a window hung with chintz which matched the wallpaper. Everywhere there was evidence of Lydia’s flair for decorating.
Gus pointed towards the dining room, visible through an arched doorway. They moved towards it, still on tiptoe. Philip stopped. Voices were coming from the other end of the house. The two men stood still and listened. Philip shrugged inquiringly. Gus nodded his head. They proceeded, Philip leading the way into the dining room. They walked past a highboy on their right and ahead of them was a large mahogany table with six chairs. As they passed the table, a floorboard under Philip’s foot squeaked. He stopped. So, too, did the voices coming from the next room. An eternity went by before Philip put down his other foot. The voices resumed. Philip took another step, hoping desperately he would find a firmer board as he gingerly put his weight on his foot. No noise. He exhaled, then tilted his head towards the far wall, the wall which separated the dining and living rooms. He and Gus made it to the wall and stopped.
“How long do we have?” a voice asked from the next room. It belonged to Alice.
“It all depends. Maybe not long. Probably not long. I do not know. We shall have to wait and see.”
Philip’s mouth opened as if to scream. His eyes seemed about to pop. He gestured with his thumb in the direction of the living room.
Gus smiled and nodded.
The voice they had just heard was Nicholas’.
“You two should be grateful you have any time at all,” Lydia chimed in. “Whatever it is, it’s a helluva lot more than other people get.”
“Mother, you still get to the core of things, I see,” Nicholas said.
“I thought I heard something, a noise,” Alice announced.
There was silence in the living room, then Lydia spoke. “You’re not hearing ghosts, are you, dear?” Her hearty laugh evolved into a choking spell. “That would be funny, wouldn’t it!”
“Probably snow falling off the roof,” Nicholas suggested.
Gus and Philip heard someone in the next room get up. Footsteps came their way. They quickly backed into the corner of the room where there was less light and as far from the archway as they could. With the light behind her, they could see Alice come to the archway, stand there for a moment, look into the room, then turn to leave. It was then that she saw Philip. She turned on the wall switch.
“So, we do have visitors, after all, a couple of mice hiding in the corner.” She made the announcement loud enough for Nicholas and Lydia to hear. They joined her in the dining room.
“We should have known,” Nicholas said.
“How did you two get in?” Lydia asked.
“Through the kitchen door,” Gus answered her. In a tone of helpfulness he added, “That could be dangerous, leaving your door unlocked, you know. Anyone could walk in on you.”
“I know,” she agreed. “No telling what kind of trouble might come in.”
“Sometimes only dangerous for those who get in,” Gus said, continuing their cat-and-mouse game.
“I wish to hell someone would tell me what’s going on!” Philip almost shouted. He lowered his voice. “I’m more in the dark now than ever.”
“Why don’t you explain it all to him?” Gus asked and looked from Alice to Nicholas.
“It’s because you’re in over your head, that’s why,” Alice said to Philip.
“We should go into the other room,” Nicholas told them and went into the living room. The others followed him.
“Sit down,” Lydia said. “Want something?”
“Just the truth. I’ll settle for that,” Philip told her.


Chapter XV

“Then, Philip, since you have asked for the truth, the truth is what you will get,” Nicholas said. “But do be careful, Ali, when you tell him. He may not be able to handle the truth.”
“He knows most of it,” Alice began. “Philip, everything Gus has told you is true. Nicholas did come back from the dead. He drowned in that car accident, but his will, his determination not to die was so strong, he came back to us. Very few people have ever had that strong a willpower to actually bring themselves back from the other side. But you heard Nicholas tell you all that only yesterday, in his study. Remember?”
Philip did remember the sight of Nicholas lying on the floor of his study. He remembered watching Nicholas die before his eyes. Philip remembered, too, that arm of Nicholas’ next to him, torn out of its socket. He shot a glance at Nicholas who was standing in front of the unlit fireplace. He was wearing a jacket and shirt, but no tie. His right arm was through the jacket sleeve, his elbow resting on the mantle. The left sleeve hung limp and empty at his side.
Philip wanted to speak, but he could not express in words any of the many thoughts that were cycloning around in his head. The words would not come out, the words which would have asked how Nicholas was now with them again, seemingly as good--except for that missing arm--as he ever was. Philip wondered if it was his imagination, but Nicholas seemed to look better than he had Saturday evening at the party. How could that be? There was a new life in his eyes and a vibrance in his voice that had been missing. And, all this talk of Lydia’s about cremation, what was that all about?
“The autopsy. What about the autopsy?” Philip managed to ask. “They must have performed one.”
Alice shrugged. “I’m sure Nicholas’ insides don’t look very nice this evening, I’m afraid. But then, Nicholas never did have a healthy stomach, did you, dear?”
“And Lydia. She helped?” Philip also asked.
“And why not?” Lydia spoke up. “If a mother can’t or won’t help, who will?”
“How did you figure it out?” Alice asked Gus.
“It really was all quite simple. Everything, as I explained to Philip, was too simple, too easy, too pat. I told Philip that remigrants sometimes come back more than once. When I heard about the unbelievably quick cremation, I suspected what was taking place.”
“But how did you know enough to come here?” Lydia asked as she poured herself another brandy. “Why not Nicky’s and Alice’s place?”
“They’d be too smart for that,” Gus explained. “The police, I suspect--and I suspect Nicholas and Alice also suspect--must have someone watching their house. The police still don’t know what’s going on, but they’re not total fools. They know something stinks. They’re just not sure what. Nicholas and Alice couldn’t take the risk of going to one of their friends. How do you explain showing up on someone’s doorstep with a dead person standing next to you. No, Mrs. Keene, this place was the only logical place, the only place they could have used. Nicholas is not able to travel any great distance. I know that, even though he does seem to look somewhat better than last we saw him.”
Lydia held up her glass and saluted Gus. “You’re a very bright man.” She emptied her glass.
“But what about Mr. Dart?” Philip asked. “By this time, he must have reported Nicholas’ disappearance from his funeral parlor.”
“We haven’t heard the radio or television for the latest news, have we?” Gus asked Philip. “We especially haven’t heard the six o’clock news. I’m sure Mr. Dart’s death has been reported by this time and it must be on the local news.”
“You don’t leave anything for anyone else to explain, do you?” Nicholas asked.
“That’s not totally true,” Gus responded. “There are a great many things I’d like explained. For example, I’d like to know how you killed him. The physical strength of remigrants is something that is not fully documented. Was it difficult for you to do it?”
“Not at all,” Nicholas answered and sat down on the sofa next to Alice. “In fact, it would be somewhat dishonest of me to claim to have killed him.”
Gus was busy making mental notes concerning Nicholas, about his speech which this evening was somewhat clearer, did not have that echoey quality, and less slurred, although Gus strongly suspected Nicholas was putting on a front and was having a bit more trouble speaking than he was letting on.
“I did not need any physical strength,” Nicholas was explaining. “I quite simply walked in while mother and he were talking about the disposition of my remains. I am afraid the sight of me was too much for him. The spectacle of a six-foot-three, totally naked man, his coloring not exactly what you would call healthy, with evidence of a recent post mortem, carrying his left arm under his right, is more than even a healthy heart can stand and Sam Dart’s heart, I believe, was not the strongest.”
“I see,” Gus said. He was most careful to register no emotion at Nicholas’ casual account of Mr. Dart’s death. “There is one other thing.” He looked quickly at Lydia, then at Nicholas, and finally directed his eyes at Alice. “I think you should answer my next question, don’t you, Alice? It’s the most important question of the evening.”
“You miss absolutely nothing!” Lydia exclaimed.
“I told you he was intelligent,” Nicholas commented.
“Well? What about it, Alice?” Gus asked.
“Let me see just how I’ll describe it,” Alice began.
“Wait! Wait just one goddamn second,” Philip broke in. “I’m so confused, it isn’t funny any longer, if it ever was. What’s going on?”
“My dear Philip,” Gus said to him, “for such a bright doctor, for all your experience with people, you seem totally unable to grasp the whole picture here. Think, dear boy, think! Why Lydia? Why did she go and get Nicholas’ body? Why not Alice? Or at least, why didn’t Alice go with her? Remember, Alice was home all day. We watched her house for the greater part of the day. Lydia had to go alone! You will recall that when we got to Alice’s place, she told us Lydia had taken care of everything. That bothered me.”
Philip shrugged. “Well, I thought... well, she is his mother and... I thought it was....”
“You did not think,” Gus said to him. “If you had, you would have realized that Lydia was in on the whole thing, she knew what was happening, today at least. I doubt--in fact, I’m sure--she knew anything about any of this before today.”
“Yesterday, actually,” she corrected him.
“That took guts, I must say,” he said to her. “I do admire you for that.”
Again she nodded, this time in acceptance of his compliment.
“Now, to get back to my question,” Gus said as he once more looked at Alice.
“I shall try,” she said. “It is not easy to explain these things to someone who does not understand. Oh, I know you think you understand, but you don’t, not really. I guess I should start off by reminding both of you of the stab wound I got from Nicholas. Remember how I described Nicholas was swinging that kitchen knife? Remember, too, the wound Philip dressed? It was superficial, wasn’t it, Philip? Didn’t need any stitches. What you did not know--I wasn’t even fully aware of it myself--was that it was in the process of healing, healing rapidly because I was willing it to heal. I won’t take full credit for it at that stage. I did not know I was actually willing it to heal. It healed completely after I came back.”
“Are you trying to say that... that you died and that you, too, have come back?” Philip stuttered. “Because, if you are, I... I....”
“Believe it,” Alice said to him. A new sternness was now in her voice. “Remember where that wound was? It was right here, on my left side, and I can assure you, the knife went all the way in. I died, all right. You can not appreciate that, you can have no idea whatsoever how it feels to come back.”
“This is totally unbelievable,” Philip exclaimed. “You’re trying to tell us Nicholas killed you, that you came back from the dead, ran out into the woods, then returned to the house and told us all that Nicholas had done and--”
“No, no, no, you’ve got it all wrong,” Alice protested. “When Nicholas stabbed me with that knife, I ran from the house, just as I told you. I was in the woods, then came back to our house when I saw your car. It was later, much later, at your house, that the true nature of the wound became evident. I began to spit up blood that night, upstairs in your guest bedroom. I wanted to cry out, wanted to let you know I was dying, but I seemed unable to do so. Maybe I could not cry out; maybe I would not cry for help; maybe I didn’t want anyone to help. I don’t know for sure. In a sense, I was welcoming death. I had lost Nicholas. I felt I had nothing left to live for. I wanted, too, to experience death just as Nicholas had, to see if I could do what he had done, if I had the willpower he had. I died, of that you can be certain. And let me tell you, you have experienced nothing until you have known what it is like to overcome death. The euphoria, the incredible sense of floating out of your body, seeing yourself die, then the... the victory, the triumph of winning, the... the conquering of death. Then comes the floating back into your own body, the reentering as though into a completely new, strange body, one you’ve never known before. This is accompanied by the realization that you now are one of a very select few, those who have managed to come back from the other side. You just don’t know what that can be like. It’s all the wonderful feelings you’ve had all your life rolled up into one and then multiplied an infinite number of times over.
“I found out how Nicholas had done it. It’s really very simple and easy, once you understand it. Nothing to it except the determination not to accept the inevitable. If that sounds impossible, then it is, but only to those who accept its impossibility. They’ve been told it’s impossible, they believe it’s impossible, so for them it is impossible. I also learned--don’t ask me how, I don’t know--that it was possible to do this more than once. And, since that was the case, I suspected Nicholas could and would come back again. He had to. I didn’t want to go on without him, all the while knowing I had the strength, the willpower to come back and enjoy life once more. He had to come back to me, that you must understand and accept. I had to have him again. It was a slow process. It took virtually the entire night, at your place, Philip, to come to grips with this and to achieve all this. Then, later, today, when you dropped me off at my place, I immediately called Lydia and told her all that had happened and asked her to see if she could get Nicholas’ body released from the police. I knew if anyone could get a court order in this hick town, it was Lydia. I thought I would have trouble explaining to her why I wanted her to do that, but she surprised me completely. She knew precisely why I wanted it.”
“Now it’s my turn to say how smart you are,” Gus said to Lydia.
“Thank you. I knew what Alice wanted the minute she called. There was something in her voice that gave it away. I knew because Nicholas had told me. He told me yesterday morning when I stopped at their house. At first, it was difficult, if not downright unbelievable to accept. I felt somewhat the way you do now, Philip. But I know my son and I know when he’s serious, deadly serious, if you’ll pardon the pun. He’s never once lied to me. I don’t think he’s ever lied to himself, either. He said, ‘Mother, if anything happens to me in the next few days... weeks... or maybe months... you must help me. Get my body. Give me a chance to come back. Promise.’ He told me all about the accident and how he managed to come back. I did promise and I’ve never broken a promise to Nicky in my life. Alice called only a few minutes after I got back from Philadelphia this morning. She had been trying to get me there, but I wasn’t available. I called Judge Overlock. That old bird owes me a string of favors, and besides, I know enough about him to send him to jail for the rest of his life. It wasn’t hard getting him to issue the order. The police at this stage really have nothing concrete to go on, so they had no choice but to obey the order. From then on it was easy. When Nicky was ready, I drove him back here. Later, Alice joined us.”
“Is it getting any clearer now?” Alice asked Philip.
“Yes... no.... I don’t know. Not really. It’s that... that... well, now that the two of you are here... the two of you... now what? I don’t accept all this nonsense about coming back from the dead. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Both of you experienced something you mistook for death. You may even both have gone through the same ‘clinical death,’ something akin to out-of-body sensations imagined by would-be psychics. And the proof that I’m right is the fact that both of you are sitting there across from me, as alive as I am. I feel just as strongly that both of you should be in a hospital at this very minute. You both need medical attention. That arm of your, Nicholas. I don’t know exactly what happened to it and I was never privileged to examine it, but someone should have a look at it before it gets any worse. And that stab wound of yours, Alice. I cleaned it in a hurry before the police arrived. For all I know, without attention it could be septic by this time. I’d be surprised if it weren’t. Both of you are unwise to be playing these foolish children’s games.”
“As always, you are completely right,” Nicholas spoke up. “I would never argue with you on that point. Don’t you agree, Ali? The good doctor should examine us. Here.” He stood up and began unbuttoning his shirt. “Listen to my heart beat,” he said and walked over and stood directly in front of Philip.
“I don’t have my stethoscope with me and you know it,” Philip snapped at him.
“But you can listen, can’t you? Here, put your ear to my chest.”
Philip stood up, somewhat reluctantly. His face was no more than six inches away from Nicholas’.
“Listen, Philip!” Nicholas shouted.
Philip gingerly bent over and put his ear against Nicholas’ chest, but immediately pulled away. “You’re cold. Ice cold!” He turned his face away.
“But did you hear anything, doctor?” Nicholas asked. “No? Maybe you did not really try. Go ahead, listen again.” He reached out and pulled Philip’s head down to his chest and pressed Philip’s ear against the spot where his heart was.
Philip felt the vise-like strength in Nicholas’ right hand. “That’s hardly scientific,” Philip said as he tried to pull away again. He was unable, until Nicholas released the grip he had on the nape of Philip’s neck.
“And what about this arm? Or should I say, stump?” Nicholas asked as he ripped off the rest of his shirt. There was a taunting lilt in his voice.
“It looks infected,” Philip said as Nicholas turned and pushed his left shoulder almost into Philip’s face. “Nothing’s been done for it and you ask me to examine it? I can actually smell the putrefaction that is there. I don’t have to examine it. There is decay all around the edges. You won’t last long, believe me, with that poison running through your veins.”
“But tell me, Doctor, what if nothing is running through my veins?” Nicholas asked, almost laughing as he spoke. “Shall we see? Shall we see if there is any blood in my veins?” He reached over to the desk and picked up a letter opener. He brandished it so everyone could see. “Shall we?” he asked and brought his own face to the point where his nose and Philip’s were touching.
“Don’t be a fool!” Philip said. “That letter opener isn’t sterile and besides, it’s very dull.”
Nicholas held the opener in his clenched fist, slowly drew it away from his chest, stared at it for a moment, then with one swift and powerful movement brought it to his left side, just below the rib cage. He plunged it in to the hilt. Everyone’s eyes, especially Philip’s, were fixed on him. Nicholas came close to smiling as he pulled the blade out.
Philip was fascinated. He could see that the wound was dry, the skin parted, and slightly pushed inward. No blood came from it. Very slowly, Philip reached out and placed the tips of his fingers on the wound. He pressed gently, but still no blood appeared at the opening of the skin. He bent over until his eyes were no more than four inches from the spot where the letter opener entered Nicholas’ body. He pulled the skin apart, then stood up, quickly glanced at Gus who was still seated, then took his own seat.
Nicholas remained standing over Philip, glaring down at him. “Are you satisfied now? Are you really satisfied that I am dead?”
“It’s some kind of trick knife,” Philip mumbled.
“It’s no trick,” Gus said. “Nicholas has been telling the truth. You have to accept that eventually. That knife, you know, really did enter his body. I saw it. You saw it. I did not accept all this at first, not when I was exposed to it many years ago. I wasn’t always a believer but I came to accept it a long time ago.”
“Good God, I can’t,” Philip cried. He looked as though he might actually break out into tears at any moment.
“I can do the same thing,” Alice said. She had been sitting silent during Nicholas’ demonstration. “I don’t care to become as dramatic as Nicholas, but I can, if you like, Philip.”
Philip shook his head as he stared at the floor in front of him. “No, don’t bother, not on my account,” he answered her.
“As you like,” she said. “You look so shaken, I wouldn’t care to upset you any more than you are already.”
Philip turned his head sideways and stared at Gus. “I need help,” he whispered. “I don’t think I can take any more of this. Just why did we come here tonight in the first place?”
“Well, first of all,” Gus began, “I simply had to see a real--if you’ll pardon the expression--live remigrant. For years, I’ve been studying about them, reading everything I could about them, talking to anyone who had had any kind of experience with them, however remote. There was no possible way I could turn down such an opportunity as this to see, to talk to, not one but two of them. I absolutely had to come and see for myself.”
“You should have come alone,” Philip chided him. “I want to leave right now. This--whatever it is--is too sick for me and it has gone far enough. I want to leave.”
“I would be willing to accommodate you, but I don’t think it will be quite that easy,” Gus said. “Remember, we came here as uninvited guests this evening.” He was not looking at Philip, but rather over Philip’s shoulder. Philip turned and followed Gus’s stare. His eyes rested on Alice who was now seated behind the desk.
“You said there would be danger tonight,” Philip said to Gus without turning back to look at him.
“And so there is,” Gus agreed. “A great deal more, I’m afraid, than even I bargained for. You see, Philip, they can’t let us leave like this.” (His eyes never left Alice.) “They can’t let us leave for fear that we would tell others. That, I’m beginning to discover, is another characteristic of the remigrants. They insist upon anonymity. They want no one to know they have come back and if someone does discover their little secret, they don’t hesitate to make sure that that someone does not repeat it. In a word, they do not stop at murder, if necessary, to keep others from finding out what they have done. Isn’t that right, Alice?”
Alice slowly and silently nodded. Finally, she spoke. “Yes, that’s right,” she agreed in a soft, gentle voice. “You are dangerous to us now, both of you. Surely, you can understand that, can’t you? You could bring the authorities, you could tell others. Not everyone would believe you. That’s not the point. Even if no one believed you, the sensationalism, the notoriety, would be impossible to live with. Imagine the field day the tabloids would have with us. The curiosity seekers, the dying, the bereaved, all clamoring at our doors for us to help them, show them the way back. Hordes would descend. I realize, Philip, that you might very well tell no one. I think you truly do not believe and besides, you would be afraid for your reputation and your precious medical practice. But Gus, now he’s another story all together. He’s written about us and lectured on us for years. I know he can’t wait to get away from here so he can tell the whole world.”
As Alice was speaking, she was also slowly opening the bottom drawer of the desk. She brought something up and placed it on the desk top. Philip was closest and could see it was a gun and a small box.
“Bullets, no doubt,” Philip said to himself. He jumped up and lunged for the desk. Nicholas was faster. He intercepted Philip and threw him to the floor. Philip called to Gus for help. “For God’s sake, do something!” he shouted. Philip was now bent with his legs drawn up to his chest from the blow Nicholas had delivered to him.
Gus reached the desk and quickly grabbed the box of bullets. “A lot of good that will do you now,” he gloated as he put the box in his pocket.
Alice smiled. “Thought you would fall for that. This gun is loaded. You don’t know Lydia very well, do you? Of course not. You don’t know her at all. If you did, you would never imagine for one moment her having an unloaded gun in the house. Loaded or nothing, isn’t that right, Lydia?”
Philip got to his knees, then to his feet. He staggered. “You’ll have a hard time explaining two more corpses, Lydia. They’ll kill us. Take a good look at them. They’re insane. They’re convinced they have nothing to lose. But you, now that’s another story, isn’t it? How will you explain to the police if they find us both shot here in your house?”
Lydia had been looking at Philip as he spoke. She now moved her eyes towards Alice, then to her son, Nicholas. “Maybe there’s another way, Nicky.” she pleaded. “I’ll take you away from here. No one will ever find you.”
“Why, mother dear, you are getting downright soft in your old age,” Nicholas said to her. He was standing behind the desk next to Alice.
“Listen to her, Nicholas,” Philip urged. He was gradually inching his way towards the dining room archway.
“Not likely,” Nicholas answered him. “It is very unlikely that we could ever trust anyone again, once they know. Besides, there is something else which you should know about us, if your friend, Gus, hasn’t already told you. Maybe you do not know about it yourself, Doctor Sharples.” He came around to the front of the desk and sat on its edge, facing Gus. “One of the things which happens to those who come back is the divestiture of so much of life’s excess baggage, baggage like guilt, for example. Along with the absence of vital functions is the absence of concern for what is supposedly right or wrong. Not only are our bodies icy cold, so too are our consciences. The idea of killing the two of you as you sit there in front of us, killing you--as the old expression so aptly goes--in cold blood, would have at one time filled me with horror, repulsion, not to mention fear, fear of punishment, fear of the law. I have no fear now.
“And one other thing, mother dear,” he went on as he looked at Lydia. “You should know this before it goes any further. Along with conscience, along with feelings, disappears anything resembling filial affection. It will avail you nothing to appeal to my finer instincts because I have only one instinct left, the instinct to survive. So, I do not care what the police do to you. We--Ali and I--shall kill Philip and Gus right here in your home, and I am afraid it will be up to you to explain all to the authorities. They will most likely take you away, say you killed these two men. It will do no good to say I did it. I? I am dead, remember, mother? You got the court order for my body. Now that Mr. Dart is dead, they will presume he cremated me. What it all boils down to, you see--” Here he left the desk and walked over and stood directly in front of his mother. “--is that I have nothing to lose. Once you have lost your life, you really have nothing else to lose after that. They can not take that life away from me again. I am a dead man.”
Lydia returned his stare, disbelief across her face as she looked up at him. “I don’t believe it,” she said as she placed her hands on the arms of the chair in which she had been sitting. She lifted herself up until she was standing in front of her son. Without a word, without changing the expression on her face, she brought her right hand upwards with one swift motion, and slapped his face. The sound of her hand hitting his flesh resounded throughout the room. “To think I raised such a son-of-a-bitch,” she said, then turned. “C’mon, Philip, let’s get away from these two dead bastards.” She grabbed Philip’s arm and made a move towards the dining room doorway.
Alice aimed and fired at Philip. The bullet missed his head. Philip pulled Lydia down and threw her bodily into the dining room. Gus made a dive through the doorway and he, too, landed on the dining room floor. He quickly got to his feet. “Out this way!” he shouted to Philip and headed towards the kitchen.
Philip had Lydia’s hand. Another bullet whizzed past him and lodged itself in the dining room wall. By this time, Gus had the back door open and was holding it for them. Philip half led, half dragged Lydia through the rear door.
“The woods,” Gus shouted over his shoulders. “It’s safer there.”
All three headed towards the woods, entering approximately where Gus and Philip had exited a short while earlier.
“We won’t be such easy targets in here,” Gus announced.
It was dark. The moon had set. They made their way through undergrowth with branches snapping at their feet and slapping them across their faces as they ran for the safety of the car. Philip had thrown his coat over Lydia’s shoulder. She was coughing and having difficulty catching her breath.
“Keep low,” Gus called back to them. He was leading the way and was now almost to the road. “The car is straight ahead,” he added encouragingly.
Behind them, Philip heard Alice calling back to Nicholas. Underfoot, there was the sound of snow crunching. Somewhere deeper into the woods, he heard a dog barking.
 “I see the car,” Gus said. “I’ll open the door on this side and get in.” As he finished speaking, he reached the shoulder of the road and got his car keys out. “When I give you the signal, you two slide in on the back floor and keep down.” He crouched as he opened the door and climbed in. Being careful neither Alice nor Nicholas was in sight, he reached over the seat and unlocked the rear door. “O.K., Philip, move it!” he shouted.
Lydia first, followed by Philip, made it to the car and crawled in onto the back floor. Gus had the motor running. “Everyone in?” he shouted. “Then, here we go!” He put the car in gear and pulled away from the side of the road. The car swerved on the smooth packed snow. It skidded towards the other side of the road and he frantically spun the steering wheel in the opposite direction. He managed to get them out of the spin and straightened the wheels.
Philip lifted his head and looked out the back window. “I think I can see Alice on the shoulder back there,” he said. “I don’t see Nicholas.” He looked at Lydia. “You O.K.?”
She nodded. “Sure. Reminds me of the drug raids in the sixties. This isn’t the first time I’ve had to get out of a place in a hurry.”
“Correct me if I’m wrong,” Gus said as he studied Philip in the rearview mirror. “I think we’re going south, right? And if so, then we will drive past Alice’s and Nicholas’ house, right?”
“That’s right,” Philip told him. “So?”
“So, I’d like to stop there.”
“You what? Are you completely out of your mind?”
“No, I’m not out of my mind. I have a good reason to--”
“Just keep driving on and never mind stopping at that house,” Philip insisted. “Get to my place. Besides, Lydia--”
“Don’t worry about me,” she spoke up. “Just why do you want to stop there?” she asked Gus.
Gus studied her in the mirror. “Philip’s right,” he told her. “It was another of my lamebrained ideas, that’s all.”
“I find it difficult to think you ever have any lamebrained ideas. I want to know why you want to stop at my son’s house.”
“Philip and I will drive on to Ocean City and drop you off at his place,” he said. “There’s no need for you to--”
“No!” she snapped at him. “If something is to happen and if it involves my son, I insist upon being a part of it. A few minutes ago, I raised my hand to him. I slapped him across his face. That’s something I’ve never done to him his entire life. Maybe I shouldn’t have done it this time, but that wasn’t Nicky I struck. It was some... some monster who looks and sounds like him, but isn’t my son. If I can help, if there is something I can do to help Nicky, help the real Nicky, and destroy that thing that has taken hold of him, then I want to do it. It’s the least I can do.”
“O.K., so what gives?” Philip asked. “What do you hope to gain by stopping there?”
Gus did not answer immediately, then he spoke slowly, deliberately, obviously weighing every word. “It could be messy,” he finally said. “I mean, it could get very unpleasant. It’s obvious that Nicholas, and now Alice too, have mastered the secret of returning from the dead. If they continue to do so, it is only a matter of time before they harm someone, kill someone, just as they tried to do to us this evening. We were lucky to get away. Their reflexes are somewhat slow, but sooner or later they will succeed in killing someone who isn’t aware of how dangerous they can be. Some innocent person. Maybe a child. There’s no point in going to the authorities. They’d never believe us. They would probably lock us up, if we tried to tell them the truth. No, the only thing we can do is to take matters into our own hands. We must destroy them.”
Lydia sat silent, staring at her hands on her lap. Finally, she lifted her head and sighed. “Then, let’s do it. If that’s what we must do, then we will.” She stared out the car window.


Chapter XVI

Philip could feel for Lydia. He wondered if he could ever be that strong. Could he destroy someone he loved, even if that destruction was for the loved one’s own benefit? He thought for a moment about Jerry, Jerry who annoyed him, Jerry who got on his nerves, Jerry who was now where? They had fought Saturday evening after returning home from the party, and when they fought, Jerry would take off for anywhere from one to three or four days. “To lick his wounds,” Phillip used to tell himself. This evening, Philip suddenly realized how much he loved Jerry. There would be no more fights, no more of Jerry disappearing. He looked up and saw Gus studying him in the mirror.
“Well?” Gus asked.
“Yes, I suppose so.” Philip looked out the window at the darkness.
Within the minute, Gus pulled off the road and onto the driveway adjacent to Nicholas’ and Alice’s house. “Let’s hurry,” he said as he got out of the car and opened the back car door for Lydia and helped her out.
“What makes you think they’re coming here tonight?” Philip asked him.
“I don’t think they’re coming here, I know they’re coming. You weren’t looking out the rear window when Alice pulled out of Lydia’s driveway and started following us. Evidently, she is driving very slowly. I can only conjecture that her reflexes are not very good. Still, they should be here in a very short while. Should we go in the back door?”
“Yes, that will be open,” Lydia said and began leading the way around to the back of the house.
They entered through the kitchen and went directly to the living room.
“Now what?” she asked.
“They’ll be armed,” Philip pointed out.
“I know,” Gus agreed. “But we have a few weapons they do not have. We’re alive, for one thing. We’re still a lot faster than either of them. We can see better than they can. And, above all, we have the element of surprise. When they get here, they’ll see the car in the driveway. They’ll know we’re here, but they won’t know why. They won’t know what room we’re in, so I’m guessing they’ll come in by way of the front door. Whether they come in that door or the back door, we’ll be ready for them.”
“To do what?” Philip asked.
Gus shook his head almost imperceptibly, as though not prepared for Philip’s denseness. “That’s where it can get messy,” Gus answered him. “It won’t be a picnic, Lydia. Would you rather go upstairs and wait up there until later?”
Quietly, deliberately, she said, “No. You do not know me. That is obvious. If you did, you would know that what you’re prepared to do, whatever form it takes, I will be ready for it. We will do, the three of us, whatever it is that we must do. Hurry.”
“And you, Philip, are you ready?” Gus asked him. “We will have to kill them. There is no alternative. If you’d rather.... I know they were your dearest friends, so I’ll understand if--”
“It’s because they are... were... still are... my friends that I must help. I owe it to them.”
“Then, that settles it. Philip, get one of those pokers from the fireplace. Lydia, you will have the most difficult task of all. When we hear them approaching, when we know which door they will be coming through, I want you to stand in front of the fireplace, facing them. I want them to see you--and only you--when they enter the living room. Depending upon the direction from which they come, from the dining room or from the front hallway, Philip and I will be out of sight. We will attack as they come into the room. Can you do that, Lydia? Can you keep your eyes fixed on them without betraying our presence, no matter what? No matter what they look like, no matter what they seem about to do, or what they say to you?”
“I can do anything I set my mind to.”
“Good. I’m glad to hear that, because I just heard something else. Alice’s car drove into the driveway.”
The three of them froze where they were standing. It seemed to Philip as though the house, too, was holding its breath, waiting to see what would happen next. They heard one car door slam. Then the other. Footsteps in the snow, slow, halting steps, and muted voices. The steps came closer. They were on the front porch now.
“Quick, Philip, get next to the archway, just out of sight,” Gus ordered. “You know what you must do. You’ll get only one chance. And, remember, it’s not your friend who is coming in. It’s no longer Alice or Nicholas, but some monstrous thing from....”
The front door opened. Gus now positioned himself on the other side of the archway, opposite Philip. He had his hands clenched in front of him, a cord which he had taken from the drapes wrapped around his clenched fists with little more than a foot of it stretched out between them. The inside door which led to the hallway was no more than six feet away from where Gus was standing. He looked at Philip, hoping the latter would not lose his nerve. It was imperative that Philip take the first to come through the archway with one swift blow of the poker so that he, Gus, could take on the next. The rope he was holding would do the job, Gus hoped, not through strangulation, for he was quite certain that neither could be strangled, that the loss of air would have no effect upon them since the lungs were no longer functioning. The purpose of the rope was to snap the neck and, Gus also hoped, if he was strong enough and if he could use his knee in the right way when applied to the back, it would break the spinal column.
Footsteps shuffled towards them. A figure appeared in the archway. In the darkness of the room, the only light coming through the front windows from the streetlight outside, it was possible to make out an outline of a large figure. It was Nicholas. He stopped when he saw Lydia.
“Mother,” Nicholas said. “How sweet of you to stop by.” His voice was weaker than it had been earlier. The strain of talking was beginning to show. He was stooped over and his only arm was dangling motionless at his side.
Lydia returned his stare. Her face was motionless.
Nicholas took two more steps, short ones, with effort. He was now in the middle of the room. He had seen neither Philip nor Gus who were still in shadows. Gus nodded to Philip. The time was now. Philip had panic spread across his face and Gus could read his mind. He could feel what Philip must now be feeling, the horror of killing someone he had known for so long, loved for so long, done so many things with. Gus knew that if Philip did not move instantly, he, Gus, would have to do it. Once more, he frantically motioned Philip to strike.
Philip moved slightly. Nicholas did not hear him. Again, Gus signaled Philip to raise his poker. Philip did. He lifted the poker high up into the air. He was shaking. He brought the iron instrument of death down upon Nicholas’ head.
The sound which came from Nicholas frightened even Gus who thought himself now prepared for anything, no matter how gruesome.
Nicholas grunted, a raspy, rattling gasp, coming from somewhere in the substernal regions of his body. “Lit-dya, uh Lit-dya, thsat en-thy-kluh-pee-dya, Lit-dya, thuh ta-ta-ta-tooed liddy.” He was swaying from side to side as he forced out the words, trying desperately to sing, desperately to sound as he had always sounded when he sang those words. He held out his one arm in a beckoning gesture to Lydia.
She made a motion to go towards him, then her eyes shifted as she saw Gus wave her back. Nicholas saw her eyes and he, too, slowly, mechanically turned his head and saw Gus standing in the shadows.
“No need, Doctor Sharples,” Nicholas said. “No need. I shall cheat you. I am going.” He turned back to Lydia and again stretched out his arm towards her. He fell to his knees, swayed momentarily in that kneeling position, then fell forward, his body hitting the floor, his face turned sideways. “Mo-thur,” he cried out.
Lydia fell to her knees next to him.
“Mo-thur, I... love...you....” he whispered, looked at her, then closed his eyes.
Both Philip and Gus stepped forward and looked down at the body sprawled out before them.
“Thank God,” Philip said, then looked at Gus. “It is over, isn’t it? Please tell me it is all over now.”
Gus nodded as he still looked down at Nicholas. “Yes, it’s over.”
They now looked at Lydia. She was holding the dead, withered hand of her son in her own. Tears were rolling down her cheeks. She made no sound.
“Where’s Alice?” Philip asked, suddenly aware that she had not come into the house with Nicholas.
Gus looked around, saw nothing, and walked out to the hallway. It was empty. He looked through the frosted glass on the inside door, then opened it and stepped into the vestibule. He opened the outside door and looked out. No one was on the porch or in the front yard. He returned to the living room. “She doesn’t seem to be--” he started to say, then realized what was happening. Alice was in the middle of the room, evidently had come in via the kitchen door, and was standing next to Nicholas’ body. She had Philip in a hammerlock grasp and was holding a gun to his temple.
 “No, I’m not outside, Doctor Sharples. As you can see, I am very much inside. Get over in front of the organ and don’t make any sudden movement, if you care what happens to Philip. Lydia, step back against the fireplace. That’s a good girl. Just stand there and there won’t be any trouble for you.” Alice looked down at Nicholas. “I see you’ve killed him.”
Philip tried to respond, but the grip she had on his throat made speech impossible.
Gus spoke instead. “No one killed him, Alice. You ought to know we couldn’t do that, even if we tried. No, Nicholas died... or should I say ‘gave up’ of his own accord. He spoke to Lydia briefly, then fell to the floor. You might like to know that his parting words to Lydia were to tell her he loved her. So, you see, there’s nothing wrong with showing feelings, nothing wrong with caring about others in your present state.”
“I don’t believe you. You’re lying. You killed Nicholas somehow. I don’t know how you did it, but you did.”
“Believe him!” Lydia snapped at her. “Nicky just gave up. He fell down and his last words were to tell me how much he loved me. Didn’t he tell you that, too, this evening? Maybe on your way here?”
Alice stared down at the body of Nicholas for a long time. Finally, she spoke. “Yes, he told me. In the car, driving from your place to here. But... I thought that was just between us, him and me. I never... never thought he felt that way about another living person, not now, not since he returned. Not even you, Lydia. He always loved you, that I know, but now... now since we... since we came back, he was different. He told me that feelings were impossible for us, that we should not try to feel for anyone else. I... I... thought it was true.”
“Let Philip go,” Lydia said. She walked towards Alice. “And give me my gun. That’s a dear.” She reached out for the weapon.
Alice stared at her as though not fully comprehending her words. Gradually, she released her grip on Philip who pulled away, rubbing his neck, walking towards Gus.
“Now, give me the gun, Alice. That’s a dear.”
Alice shook her head. “I can’t. They... Philip and Gus... will do something horrible to me.”
“No, they won’t,” Lydia assured her. “They will not do anything horrible to you. You have my word on that. I’ll hold the gun and make sure they don’t harm you. Here, give it to me.”
Alice looked at Philip and Gus, then back to Lydia. She held out her hand. Lydia took the gun.
Gus heaved a sigh. Philip sank down on the sofa.
“You must go back, you know that, don’t you, Alice?” Gus asked.
“Go... go back?”
Gus nodded. “That’s right. You know you can’t stay for long like that. You saw what happened to Nicholas. You saw his arm, you smelled the putrid odor. You know that it is only a short while before you will have to give up, to let go of the grasp you have on life.”
“No... no, I won’t go!” she protested.
Lydia reached out and took Alice’s hand. “I was holding Nicky’s hand when you came into the room. That hand, so cold, so like the grave, like your hand right now. Before that, I was prepared to destroy Nicky, or rather the thing that he had become. I thank God I did not have to, that he died of his own accord. Above all, I thank God that he spoke those parting words to me. It will make it all a lot easier for me now. Alice, why don’t you go with him? You should go with him. The two of you should be together now, just as you were in life. It isn’t right for Nicky to go back by himself without the one person he loved more than anyone else on this earth. I know that. I know how much he always loved me, ever since he was a child, and that he never stopped loving me, but I also know how very much more he loved you. You were everything to him. He told me that more than once. I think you know that, too, don’t you, Alice? Go with him. Go back with him. Don’t let him go alone. Don’t be separated from him now, just because of some stubbornness on your part. Give up that willpower to live. You’ve proven your point.”
“I... I don’t know if I know how,” Alice mumbled. She was beginning to shake visibly. Lydia put her hands on Alice’s arm to steady her. “I don’t know if I can go back now, I don’t know the procedure.”
“We will help you,” Lydia said. “We will all help. I think Gus especially will help you.”
“We’ll do whatever we can to help you, Alice,” Gus said and came closer. “Lydia is right. You should go now with Nicholas, with dignity, rather than to just rot away until no one can bear to be near you.”
Philip realized for the first time just how pathetic Alice seemed. All the fierceness, the determination were gone from her face and she began to cry, her face contorted, but no tears came forth. Her body was shaking more than ever now and Philip felt himself being wrenched inside as he watched his dear friend suffer so much. Better death, better the grave, Philip decided, than this. Coming back to life was not worth it, if one were to suffer so much the way he had seen Nicholas suffer and now the way Alice, too, was in pain.
Lydia had her arms around Alice’s waist and Gus was standing directly in front of her.
“What should I do?” Alice pleaded. “I don’t know what....”
“Stop trying so hard, Alice,” Gus said. “Try to let yourself relax. Try to think of sleep. You haven’t slept since Nicholas stabbed you, have you?”
Alice looked down at the floor and shook her head. “Sleep? I forget what that is like.”
“It’s peaceful, Alice, so very peaceful,” Gus began, in a hypnotic voice. “Your whole body relaxes, your eyes are shut, sleep comes over you like a soft blanket being gently placed over your body, a warm, pleasant blanket. Nothing can hurt you with that cover of silence over you. Nothing can make you unhappy ever again. And your body, so tired, so sore, so heavy with the weight of moving, cries out for that rest of sleep, cries out to let it rest. Your mind has been forcing your body to move, to speak, to see. Now, your whole body must stop, it must get the rest it needs and deserves. Give it that rest, Alice.”
Lydia could feel her daughter-in-law’s body relax slightly and the shaking stopped. She nodded to Gus.
“Close your eyes, Alice,” Gus continued. “That’s right, close them. They’re so heavy, so sore, you can no longer keep them open. Think of your home here. Think of springtime which will so soon be here. Think of the flowers you love so much and will soon bloom when the snow is gone. Smell the new grass. Listen to the birds and the crickets. You are going someplace much nicer, sweeter, where everything is beautiful all the time. Above all, Alice, you are going to a place where Nicholas is right this minute waiting for you to join him. You would like that, wouldn’t you, Alice?”
Alice’s eyes were shut. She nodded. The slightest hint of a smile appeared at the corners of her mouth.
Philip had been fascinated at Gus’s method and the way he got Alice to relax so completely in only a few minutes. He wondered if it were his own eyes or his imagination or the poor light in the room, but he thought that Alice’s face was beginning to grow darker with the blackness which sometimes comes over a corpse. Was Alice actually ‘dying’ before their eyes?
“Come, Alice,” Gus said to her and held out his hands. “Come here and lie down on the floor next to Nicholas. Don’t be afraid. Nicholas would want you to be next to him. Here, take my hand.”
Alice took a step towards Gus. Her eyes were still closed. Gus led her to the spot next to Nicholas. “Lie down, Alice. Lie down and go to sleep next to Nicholas.”
Alice let herself be maneuvered to the exact place where she was to kneel down next to Nicholas. Suddenly, Alice’s eyes snapped open. She turned her head ever so slightly to the left, eyeing Gus suspiciously. “No... no,” she shouted and pulled away from Gus’s hands. “No... you’re not going to do it to me. I won’t let you, do you understand?” Before Gus or Philip could react, Alice grabbed the gun from Lydia’s hand. She was too quick for Lydia to stop her. “Don’t Gus! You, too, Philip! Don’t come any closer. I don’t want to hurt any of you now. I didn’t earlier, but you must understand that this time I can not let you make me go back. I can’t die. I won’t die. You don’t realize, any of you, what you’re asking me to do. You can’t for a single second comprehend what it must be like, to have tasted death, to have actually died, then to get the opportunity to come back again, to relish what life is really like. You talk about stench, Gus, about no one wanting to have anything to do with me. Well, let me tell you, I’ll put up with that and so would you, too, when faced with the alternative of death, final, unending death, never again to see, to hear, to talk, to feel your body move. Never again to accomplish anything. Don’t you have any idea what that must be like, Gus? Philip? You must have some inkling.”
“We do, believe us, we do,” Philip assured her. “But you should not be afraid of death.”
“Oh, Philip, Philip,” Alice said. “There is so much, so very much more that I fear. It isn’t just death itself. What if... what if when I came back from the dead last night, instead of coming back in your upstairs bedroom, suppose it was in a coffin, in the ground, deep in the ground, with all that satin around me, all that dirt over me. Suppose I had opened my eyes and instead of seeing the furnishings in your house I smelled the closeness of rotting flowers on my chest, the blackness that no living creature can ever imagine and... and I cried out, shouted as loud as I could, but no one heard me, the sound doing nothing more than hurting my own ears. Think of pounding on the coffin lid, tearing the lining, pushing upwards with all my might, but nothing, nothing moves. Think of that, Philip, and tell me to lie down next to Nicholas. Can’t you understand, any of you? I am afraid, so very afraid, to lie down next to Nicholas, for fear of what might come afterwards, what might happen to me.” She was slowly backing away towards the dining room.
Gus took a step forward.
“Stop!” Alice yelled. “Please stop, Gus. I don’t want to hurt anyone, but I will, if I have to. I won’t go back. Don’t try to make me. Let me leave. Just let me leave.”
“You’ll have to stop eventually,” Gus reasoned and came closer.
“I’ll hurt anyone I have to,” Alice said. “If you’re smart, Doctor Sharples, you won’t come any closer.”
Gus was not smart. He did come closer to Alice. Again, Alice pleaded with him to stay back, but Gus kept coming closer. The sound of the gunshot was deafening in the silent house. Gus spun around, clutched his side, and fell to the floor. Alice stared, then turned and raced towards the back of the house. Philip knelt down next to Gus.
“Is he?” Lydia asked.
“No, I’m not,” Gus answered her. He winced. “I’m sure it’s nothing more than a flesh wound, right, Philip?”
Philip was busy pulling Gus’s clothes away from the place where the bullet had entered his arm. “You’ll live.” He looked towards the kitchen. The back door was standing open. “I guess Alice has gotten away,” he added.
“She headed for the woods,” Lydia told them. “Will she get far, I wonder?”
“Not very,” Gus said and made a feeble attempt to sit upright. He fell back on the floor. “She will go fast, I think, even faster than Nicholas did. She’s alone. Nicholas had Alice and you, Lydia, but Alice is now totally alone, no friends, no one. If she headed for the woods, I doubt if she’ll last the night. Oh, not for the usual reasons, the cold, the exposure. No, unless I miss my guess, it will be the loneliness, the despair, the loss of determination which brought her back in the first place.”
“In the meantime, I’ve got to get you to the hospital,” Philip said and put his hands under Gus’s armpits to help him get up.
“Are you totally out of your mind?” Gus protested. “You know without my telling you that a gunshot wound would have to be reported to the police. Just how the hell will you explain this one to them? That you shot me? That it was an accident? How would that look in the papers? LOCAL DOCTOR SHOOTS HOUSEGUEST. Then, when they add, as they usually do, that ‘Doctor Rosen is known to associate with homosexuals,’ think what that would do for your reputation. And even a rookie could tell that I didn’t shoot myself, that that bullet came from some feet away. Or, would you like to start all over again with Lieutenant Crane? Remember your last encounter with him. He’d throw the book at you this time. Probably at me, too, just for being with you again. Probably Lydia, too. No, Philip, there is no way I can think of at this moment that we can explain any of this to the authorities. This will take some thinking and more than a little bit of conniving, and downright lying, if you ask me.”
Philip began to argue that last point with Gus.
“He’s making sense, Philip,” Lydia spoke up.
Both men stared at her. For a moment, they had forgotten she was in the room with them.
 “I still don’t like it,” Philip said. “I don’t want to leave here until we decide upon a course of action. And I don’t like lying to the police. That could get us all into serious trouble, if the truth ever came out.”
“The truth!” Lydia almost shouted the word at Philip. “The truth? And what makes you think anyone would ever believe the truth, even if we were insane enough to tell anyone? Can you honestly imagine anyone in this place believing us if we told them what happened here this past weekend? We’d all be put away in the state hospital, if we even tried to convince anyone that Nicky and Alice both came back from the dead. No, Philip, Gus is right, we must lie and lie like we’ve never lied before. You have to protect your reputation. Gus will be able to leave here, go back home, and, who knows, maybe someday he will be able to write about what happened here. It doesn’t matter about me. At my age, I won’t be around here much longer. I’ll soon be with my son. You know better than anyone else, Philip, that my health isn’t that great. I never told Nicky what you told me a few months back. Why should I have told him? And now, he’s gone and I’ll soon follow him. It’s really up to you, Philip, to protect yourself and we’ll both back you up. Telling the truth won’t change any of the events of this weekend, but it will make a difference about your future.”
“But we’ll have to say something,” Philip insisted. “We’ll have to explain Nicholas’ body. He was supposed to be at the Dart Funeral Parlor. What’s he doing here?”
“Help me up.” Gus got to his knees. “Let me speak now. Lydia is absolutely right, dear boy. It will be quite simple. First, we shall go back to your place where you can take care of this wound. And we will call the police from there. That will give us ample time to prepare our stories, so we don’t trip one another up. Help me out to the car. You drive. Lydia can close up after us. We will wait in the car for you, Lydia.”
She nodded. “Go ahead, I won’t be more than a couple of minutes.” She held the front door open, first making sure there were no cars going by, as Philip walked Gus to the car in the driveway. She closed the door after them.
Philip helped Gus into the passenger’s seat, then went around and got in the other side. He started up the motor. “I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone who is as tough as Lydia,” he said as he stared at the house.
“I’ve come to realize that, too. Ah, here she is now.”
Lydia hurried over to the car and got into the back seat. “Everything’s o.k.,” she announced.
Gus turned around and looked at her.
Philip pulled out of the driveway and headed towards Ocean City. He was part way there when he pulled over to the side.
“What’s up?” Gus asked.
“The only thing that’s up is my temper. You two are really something else, aren’t you?” He motioned with a jerk of his thumb towards the back seat at Lydia. “I’m slow, but eventually things do sink into my dumb brain. We’re heading back there, that’s what we’re doing.” He made a u-turn.
Gus shrugged. “Whatever you say.”
“I’m just p.o.’d because I sat there in the driveway while Lydia stayed in the house, up to God only knows what. Care to tell me about it, Lydia?”
“I think we’d all be a damned lot smarter if we got our asses out of these parts just as quick as we can,” she answered him.
“Maybe so,” Philip agreed. “But I want to see what kind of handiwork you’ve been up to.”
Within a few minutes, Alice’s and Nicholas’ house came into view. Philip pulled over on the road and came to a stop.
The three of them sat there, in the car, staring at the house with its porch in front and running around the far side, gingerbread everywhere, gabled roof, floor to ceiling windows on the porch, cherry red front door, sky-blue shutters. On the second floor, they could see a light burning in Nicholas’ study, the study where he had worked so long, especially on his last novel, the one that brought about the events they had all been a part of these past few days. Alice’s car was still in the driveway and beyond it, leading to the back woods, a set of footprints.
They were warm in the car. Outside, it was bitter cold. They sat and they watched, spellbound, as the front of the house, then the sides, followed by the upper floors, and finally the attic were enveloped in flames.
“He got his wish about being cremated, didn’t he?” Philip said, to no one in particular.
Lydia was the one who answered him. “Yes, for years he reminded me that if he died before I did, that he wanted to be cremated. No dirt, no deep, dark, damp grave for him, was the way he put it.”
“And he’s finally at rest,” Philip said.
“At rest,” she said softly. “No need for him to ever walk this earth again.”
“At the risk of sounding cowardly,” Gus spoke up after they had sat in silence for several more minutes, “don’t you think we ought to get the hell out of here? Someone’s bound to come along and see this car.”
“And they will call the police,” Philip said. “That’s why you wanted me to leave without calling them, wasn’t it?” Gus and Lydia’s silence he took as an affirmative answer. He pulled the car away from the side of the road, and headed back towards Ocean City.
No one spoke until they reached Philip’s house.
“Please stay here tonight,” Philip said to Lydia.
She silently nodded.
There was an unspoken understanding between them that they did not want to talk or eat or do anything more social than say goodnight and go each to his or her room.
The last light went out in Philip Rosen’s house in Ocean City. No sound or movement came from it until the first rays of a winter sun broke over the ocean and painted the back of his house in yellow. Philip was the first one down. He put on the coffee, then sat down at the kitchen table while it brewed.
Then he turned on the radio.


Chapter XVII

Philip kept the radio volume down so he would not disturb his guests. The news came on and he leaned closer so he would not miss a word of it.

“Police in Cape May County are baffled by a series of events,” the reporter began. “In Ocean View, there was an unexplained fire during the night which destroyed one of the County’s oldest structures, the old Wilbur Strand house on Route 9. Firemen were called to the scene of the fire around ten o’clock last evening after a passing motorist noticed flames shooting from the structure. By the time the Ocean View Fire Company arrived at the scene, the fire was too far spread to be brought under control. Officials are investigating the cause of the fire.

“A local resident said the house was occupied by Nicholas and Alice Keene. This station has since learned from reliable sources that the remains of one person were found in the rubble of the house, presumedly those of Mr.Keene. According to police reports, his wife’s body was found early this morning on Hudson Tavern Road which parallels Route 9, and only a few hundred yards behind the house which burned. Police will only comment that they have the matter under investigation. The strangest part of this is the fact that Mr. Keene was the apparent victim of an automobile accident on the Ocean City bridge last Friday evening. Stranger still, police admit that the remains of Mrs. Keene appear to be a couple days old. This station will keep you informed as additional details are learned.”

The news continued, but Philip remained lost in thought. “They found Alice,” Lydia said as she came into the kitchen.
Philip jumped.
“Will there be many questions?” she asked as she poured coffee.
“I suppose so. Don’t see how we can avoid it. Questions from the police, the papers, everyone we meet, at least for a while. If we stick to our story, that we were here all last evening, I don’t think they’ll be able to break that down. You and I have a few friends in this county and I think our word carries some weight. I haven’t decided yet if Gus, as an outsider, might help or hinder our alibis. Time will tell on that score, I guess.”
“It’s hard to believe they’re both gone,” she said. She was sitting next to Philip. She lit a cigarette. Her face betrayed the fact that she had not slept all night.
“I’ll miss them, too. They were my best friends.”
“Philip?”
He turned and stared at her. In her face, he saw his own loss reflected. “Yes?”
“I don’t know what the hell I want to say. I guess... I guess I want to know... want someone to tell me... no, assure me... that what I think happened this weekend really did happen. Did I imagine it all? Am I going crazy?”
Philip patted her hand. “You’re not going crazy, Lydia. None of us is, although heaven would never blame us if we did, after what we witnessed these past few days. Someday we won’t think of this so constantly. Gradually, the memories will recede. I know, too, that my life and I have both changed. I’m not sure yet whether I’ve changed for the better or worse. To lose someone is hard. To lose them under such circumstances is unbearable.”
“But we saw and heard and know what took place.” The voice was Gus’. He came into the room. “It’s something all three of us will carry with us to our own graves.”
“Would you mind driving me home this morning?” Lydia asked Philip.
Within the hour, Philip was walking Lydia up to the front door of her home. “Promise you’ll keep in touch And promise you’ll call if you need anything.” He kissed her on the cheek.
Back at his own home, as he came through the front door, he saw Gus in the living room, fully dressed, his small overnight bag on the floor. “Leaving?” he asked.
“I must get back. Tons of writing to do. I had plenty when I left home, but now, after all that has happened this weekend, I’ll have no end of work. I must put it all down while it’s still fresh in my mind. O.K. if I call, if I get stuck on some details or if the old brain doesn’t remember exactly what happened?”
“Of course,” Philip assured him. “Any time. But first, let me dress that wound. And call, even if you don’t have a problem. Too many years have gone by without us keeping in touch.”
The house seemed suddenly so empty to Philip with Gus’s departure. Jerry was due back tonight and Philip, for the first time ever in their somewhat rocky relationship, found himself impatient for the sight of him.

*****

Lydia Keene entered her house and went directly to the living room. She took off her coat and threw it across the sofa, then sat down on one of the stuffed chairs and propped her feet up on a hassock. She sat in that position for several hours, as the sun worked its way around the house, then set by late afternoon. As the room filled with darkness, she still sat staring steadily straight across the room, her mind on one thing only: Nicky. During the course of those hours, she relived the life she had known with him, from his infancy to the week before last when she went to dinner at the Whale Restaurant with him and Alice. Finally, towards midnight, her mind now weary and her body aching with the need for sleep, that panacea came over her and she fell into a deep, restful sleep, the first full night’s sleep since the previous Friday when she received news that Nicholas had drowned.
When morning came, Lydia Keene stood up, turned and walked up the stairs to her bathroom. She emerged forty-five minutes later, got dressed, made her customary morning small pot of coffee, smoked as she drank it, put on her coat, and went to her car. Less than an hour later, she was in her shop in Cape May. She notified Cassie, her sales assistant, that there was to be no discussion of Nicky’s death now or in the future, either with herself or with any of the customers.
In the weeks that followed, Lydia found herself more and more occupied with her business and with buying for the forthcoming summer season. She was glad to keep busy and went home each night too tired to think. Sleep and work became drugs which kept her from remembering. She was quieter than before and her friends frequently commented behind her back that something had “snapped inside her” with the death of her son. Secretly, she wondered if it would be much longer before she, like Nicky, would pass through that door to the other side and she began wondering, too, about life after death. She had always been convinced that with death there was nothingness, a cessation of all life, all motion, all thought, all feelings. A door slammed in our faces, after spending so many years getting there, only to be told there was nothing beyond that door.
She began to think she had been wrong. She had seen her own son walk and talk and tell her he loved her after he had died. She began to argue with herself: If he could do that, did it mean that there really was some kind of life after death, that maybe something did happen to us after we stopped breathing and, if so, was her Nicky someplace now, waiting for her? Would she see him again? Oh, how she hoped she would be able to see him once more, touch him once more, look at him, listen to him talk to her. It was that, she began to realize, which gave her the hope and the strength to go on. She never realized that any one human being could possibly miss another human being as much as she missed her Nicky.
A little over three months later, Lydia died quietly in her sleep, alone. Cassie, her sales clerk, called Philip one morning when her employer did not come to the shop and did not answer her home telephone. Philip’s prognosis was proven accurate. It was he who found the body. Lydia was in her bed. A photograph of Nicholas and Alice was on her night table, turned so she could see it as she lay there.


Chapter XVIII

Philip returned home one evening to find a package waiting for him. He tore it open and discovered an inner envelope, quite bulky, to which was attached another, smaller envelope. The handwriting on this inner envelope he immediately recognized as Gus’s. A note fell out at the same time. He picked it up from the floor and read the letterhead. It was from one Quentin Squeech.
Quentin explained that he had loaned the use of his mountain cabin to Gus Sharples back in February. From what Quentin could gather, it was evident that before reaching the cabin, Gus stopped in the nearby town, contacted the elderly gentleman who acted more or less as caretaker of the cabin and instructed him to stop by the cabin within the next several days and pick up Quentin’s car, that it would be waiting there for him. The following week, Quentin was surprised to find his car returned to him in the city without an explanation. He called the caretaker and was told it was returned at Dr. Sharples’ instructions. From what the gentleman found, the cabin was in perfect condition and closed tightly. Quentin presumed Gus’s plans had changed, that he had decided not to use the cabin, and thought nothing more of the whole incident. He did try to contact Gus at his apartment but got no answer. That, too, was not out of the ordinary, for Gus frequently left town for weeks at a time on lecture assignments or to investigate reported happenings germane to his line of research. It was not until the middle of April, Quentin went on to explain, that he himself drove to the cabin to check on it. He found there, on a sideboard, carefully covered with a tablecloth, the enclosed manila envelope and smaller envelope addressed to Philip with instructions that whoever found the package should see to it that it was delivered to Philip Rosen of Ocean City, New Jersey, unopened, which request, Quentin said he was now fulfilling.
Philip tore open the small envelope and began to read.


February l8th l7:30 hours

Dear Philip,

I hope you get to read this letter, for if you do, it also means that you are in possession of the manuscript which I wrote. I have attempted to write down faithfully all that happened in Cape May County the weekend I spent with you. I have used real names. I leave it to you to decide if those names should be changed. You, much better than I, know the individuals involved and their sensibilities. I also impose upon you the responsibility of checking the accuracy of what I have written. Where you find errors, I not only give you permission to correct, I implore you to do so. It is extremely important that every word, every event, everything, be unerringly correct. I also leave to you the responsibility of seeing to it that this manuscript be published. I do not necessarily mean published in the usual sense of that word. I have no illusions that what I have written will ever find itself on a bestseller list. No, but there are those who should and must see it, so that they and later scholars of remigrants shall have the opportunity of knowing exactly what you and I know about Nicholas Keene and his wife, Alice. I have enclosed a list of those people who should see what I have written. Please take care of that, too, dear friend.
Finally, because I trust that when the truth comes out you will be among the few who will fully understand what happened to me, I will tell you now what I am about to do. I would not have you left to wonder what happened to me. When I finish with this letter, I shall put it into a small envelope, seal it and attach it to the manuscript I have already put into a larger envelope. I shall leave instructions that these are to be delivered to you and to no one else. I write this now sitting in the charming little cabin owned by my friend, Quentin Squeech. (I do strongly recommend that you get to know him. He is well worth the knowing. I almost forgot. I am leaving a note for Quentin to pass along to my lawyer. You will hear from him. I want him to hand over to you the contents of my safe deposit box in the city. You already know what is in that box.) I am sitting in front of an open window. I have no clothes on. When I finish typing this letter, I shall put on some clothes, just enough to be seemly, and go out into the woods. It snowed somewhat during the night. I shall walk and walk until my body can move no more. Then, I shall stop. I have no fear of freezing to death. That, as you may now begin to suspect, would be impossible in my present state. On my way back to the City, my arm, the one with the bullet wound, became unbearably painful. I was driving with one hand. There was an auto accident, a fatal one, fatal to me, but I could not let that stop me. I managed to get away and make my way into the city. I knew I had to put down on paper all that transpired in Cape May County this past weekend. NOT EVEN DEATH COULD BE ALLOWED TO STOP ME!
There is only one thing which can bring an end to the condition I presently find myself in: the total and irreparable destruction of my body. And, in these woods, on the mountainside, so far away from what we foolishly refer to as ‘civilization,’ there is one way to accomplish this. I know that before long, as I wander through the woods, my body shall become the food of one or more hungry animals who are just now emerging from their long winter sleeps. They shall do for me what I could never ask any friend, any other human being to do for me. These animals will, in their instinctive and innocent way, bring me peace and final rest.
Dear Philip, never stop thinking that I was fond of you. During the short weekend we were together, I came to respect you and grow to love you. I am truly sorry that we shall never again know the pleasure of spending time together. I cherish the memories of those few precious minutes we spent at the Whale Restaurant and the conversations in front of the fireplace in your warm home. I can only hope for two things: that you find the happiness you so deserve and that some of what I told you and of what you witnessed will stay with you and you will join that small band who know the truth, the truth that some--a small few of us--can and do come back.
Your friend,
Gus Sharples

The End