Whirlwind

by Hilary Norman

  ‘Hey,’ Jeremiah said at check-in. ‘Wasn’t this where that nuclear thing happened?’

  ‘That was Three Mile Island.’ Amos grinned. ‘And it was nowhere near here.’

  ‘Pennsylvania.’ The clerk smiled. ‘You’d be surprised how many people remember that when they see our name.’

  ‘Maybe they should change it then,’ Jeremiah said grimly.

  ‘This inn is named after a river near here,’ the young man said. ‘Its original Native American name is—’

  ‘Are we done?’ Jeremiah cut in.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Amos told the clerk. ‘My friend has a headache.’

  They picked up their bags and followed an arrow to their rooms.

  ‘Do me a favor,’ Jeremiah said quietly as they walked. ‘Don’t apologize for me.’

  ‘Don’t be a jerk,’ Amos said, ‘and I won’t have to.’

  Another click on Reaper’s touchpad. Another pushpin in place, south-east of Putnam.

  Amos and Jeremiah

  Only one more to come.

  The one.

  THIRTY

  Michael had decided on a detour, rationalizing that had he gone straight to Woonsocket, his room would not be ready.

  Going instead to a place he’d vowed never to go near again.

  Just looking, he’d told himself.

  Only a section was visible from his vantage point just off Route 6. A small part of the behemoth collection of buildings that made up the Garthville House of Corrections, but enough to bring back the memory of his first glimpse through the window bars of the bus transporting him to the psych wing eleven years ago. The old structures still irredeemably ugly, redbrick long since turned nicotine brown, massive walls and fences topped with coils of vicious barbed wire.

  A jagged fragment of one of Michael’s still-recurring nightmares.

  Worse inside. Bad, bad place.

  Today, he’d sat for a long while in the Toyota, staring back into the pit, wondering why exactly he’d done that to himself, driven there, of all places.

  Not so difficult to answer, he guessed.

  He’d wanted a reminder of what had brought him to Whirlwind.

  His own failings, for sure, but this place was symbolic of his lowest times.

  Fresh, real, sharp fear pierced him suddenly.

  Of returning here, in another prison bus, in shackles.

  ‘Never,’ he said.

  Not that he could be sure of that, since what he was about to embark on might well lead him to exactly such a place. And there was only one way to evade that possibility: turn around now, ditch the car and credit card and driver’s license and flash drive and clothing and MacBook, and get himself the hell as far away from New England as he could.

  Renege on the deal, in other words. Forget about Reaper and the others. Forget about long-overdue justice, because who would that really help now? Not that he knew how to ditch a car that might end up being linked to a major crime: a vehicle that already had his prints all over it, because he’d taken off his gloves earlier, and he’d sneezed twice, so his DNA was spread around liberally too.

  No point kidding himself.

  Too late to cut and run.

  And anyway, he wasn’t entirely certain that he wanted to. Because he was, when all was said and done, a man of his word, and even if all this was sheerest madness, then he was already an integral part of it.

  Had been from the moment he’d said he was ‘in’.

  Hard to believe that was only six days ago, but he was in, and that was that.

  Done deal. No backing out.

  So he’d taken one last look at Garthville, and then he’d closed his mind to it again, turned the car around and gotten back on the road.

  And now, just before two o’clock, he was outside the Red Door Inn in Woonsocket, his mood lifting, because this looked like a seriously nice place.

  An act of generosity by the man leading this operation.

  Reaper, man of mystery.

  Check-in straightforward. No one seeming to hear the pounding of his heart; no one querying his identity as Michael Rees, and now, all alone in his comfortable room, he made up his mind to do something he hadn’t managed since he’d landed the Boston café job.

  He was going to try to enjoy this for as long as it lasted.

  First, though, he had an instruction to follow.

  He pulled his laptop from his bag.

  The last email had arrived.

  Isaiah had checked in.

  A second line tacked onto this message.

  The only one who had not adhered absolutely to directions.

  No harm in it, though. On the contrary.

  THANK YOU

  Reaper leaned back in the armchair in his room at the Shiloh Inn, and closed his eyes.

  ‘I thank you, Michael Rider,’ he said quietly.

  And then, a moment or two later, he opened his eyes, shut down the computer, then rose and moved back to the window, looked out again at the snow falling ever more heavily.

  The plan ultimately strengthened by the weather, though if the new forecasts of a massive snowstorm likely to hit sometime on Christmas Eve were accurate, some vital preliminary changes would need to be made.

  Time in hand to wait and see, forecasts being frequently unreliable.

  He turned, picked up his overcoat from the bed, put it on with a grimace of the pain that seemed to be spreading further through his body, looked over at his pills on the bedside table, thought better of taking one now, picked up his cane and let himself out of the room.

  THIRTY-ONE

  I-95 had been gridlocked for miles. News Radio 920 were reporting a major accident up ahead, and Liza, aware that she’d been expected for lunch and knowing that her grandfather liked meals on time, called the house.

  Ethel Murrow answered tersely. ‘We were wondering where you were. Your grandfather’s getting very hungry.’

  ‘I’m stuck in traffic, Ethel,’ Liza said, though she could see it clearing up ahead. ‘Please don’t wait lunch for me.’

  ‘There’s a good spread waiting for you.’ Ethel was having none of it. ‘I’ll be leaving soon, but I’ll let the doctor know you won’t be long.’

  ‘Maybe we could keep it till dinner?’ Liza suggested.

  ‘I’ve laid the table,’ Ethel Murrow said with finality. ‘I wouldn’t like it to spoil.’

  Guilt-tripping as thick as fudge icing.

  Something she’d probably learned from the guilt-master himself.

  The snow was falling more heavily and the radio was declaring yet another huge snowstorm on its way to the Northeast, which might turn out to be an all-time record breaker, maybe due to arrive over Rhode Island some time tomorrow, though there was a chance that Massachusetts might bear the brunt instead.

  ‘Shit,’ Liza said.

  Screwed either way, the prospect of being snowbound in Shiloh a hellish one.

  She left that station behind and tuned into Magic.

  Sam Smith asking her to ‘Stay With Me’.

  ‘If only,’ she said.

  At two-fifteen, Simon Keenan, having given up on his sermons again, was on his knees on the chancel, praying for inspiration.

  Unaware of being watched.

  By the man who called himself Reaper, seated on a pew halfway back in the nave, sitting very still.

  Keenan rose, crossed himself and bowed, then turned and began to walk up the center aisle, until, noticing the stranger, he paused. ‘Are you all right, sir?’

  ‘Why wouldn’t I be?’ Reaper’s voice was soft. ‘Sitting here in this good place.’

  Keenan smiled. ‘I’ll leave you in peace.’

  Reaper made no reply, and Keenan, inexplicably discomfited, turned back toward the chancel.

  ‘Weren’t you going the other way, Reverend?’ Reaper’s voice echoed slightly in the empty church.

  ‘I forgot something.’ Keenan walked on.

  He climbed the three steps up onto the chancel, tur
ned to the vestry door, then heard small sounds behind him: soft squeaks of rubber on wood.

  He turned again.

  The stranger had gone.

  THIRTY-TWO

  The Plain family house on South Maple Street, right around the corner from St Matthew’s on Main, was a pre-World War Two Colonial with pale blue wood siding and a blue and white porch.

  A handsome, welcoming kind of a house.

  The Honda had no sooner turned left into Maple, then left again halfway up the street onto the old, familiar uphill driveway, than the front door opened and Ethel Murrow appeared, boots already on and pulling on her down coat.

  ‘You’re still here,’ Liza said, getting out of the car. ‘How nice.’

  ‘I didn’t like to leave the doctor. You might have had an accident and then who would have taken care of him?’

  ‘He’s not sick, is he?’

  ‘Not as such.’

  Nothing more forthcoming, and Liza put out her hand, but the other woman made no move to take it. ‘The roads were pretty bad,’ she said lamely. ‘I should have left earlier.’

  ‘You’re here now,’ Ethel said. ‘But I do have to be leaving.’

  ‘I’m so sorry to have held you up.’

  ‘Better late than never, I suppose.’

  Liza popped the hatchback, pulled out her bag and banged it shut. ‘Where is my grandfather?’

  ‘Upstairs. Complaining of hunger.’

  ‘I did say not to wait, Ethel.’

  ‘It’s a special occasion. He didn’t want to start without you.’ She stood back to let Liza through the doorway, then eyed her boots. ‘If you wouldn’t mind. The floors are clean and polished, and I washed you a pair of socks.’ She nodded at a pair of grayish socks on the hall table.

  ‘That’s very kind of you,’ Liza said.

  Ethel Murrow turned toward the staircase.

  ‘Dr Plain,’ she called. ‘Your granddaughter’s here.’

  No response.

  ‘Perhaps he’s sleeping,’ Liza said.

  ‘Perhaps.’ Ethel pulled gloves from her pocket. ‘I’ll be leaving now.’

  ‘Merry Christmas,’ Liza said.

  ‘And to you,’ the other woman said.

  She set off without a backward glance.

  Liza shut the door.

  One down, one to go.

  She took a breath.

  ‘Granddad,’ she called. ‘I’m here.’

  THIRTY-THREE

  At almost three o’clock, the bar of the Shiloh Inn was still hectic when he walked in. Log fire burning, people eating, drinking, talking loudly, laughing.

  Conviviality unconfined. Happy days.

  He made his way slowly to the bar, leaned on his cane, waiting, and when his turn came the woman behind the bar told him she’d bring his Balvenie malt over to the just-vacated table by the window.

  Eleanor Tilden not recognizing him, and no reason why she should.

  Several others he could name, he noted, taking his seat. Gwen Turner and Jill Barrow, her lover, tucking into quiche. William and Freya Osborn, seated at what Reaper supposed was the best table in the house, perhaps the proprietor’s table when he was dining; the boss himself not present, and maybe that was as well. Not that Tilden would be likely to recognize him either, yet still, it might have been one roll of the dice too many.

  It felt strange. Being here, among these people, in this place.

  His drink came, nicely served with a dish of pretzels, water on the side, and Reaper thanked Mrs Tilden, who smiled back down at him.

  ‘Will you be wanting to eat?’ she asked. ‘The kitchen’s about to close but we can still offer sandwiches and chowder.’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ he said. ‘But thank you. I won’t keep the table long. I know it’s a busy time.’

  ‘Don’t you worry about that,’ Eleanor Tilden told him. ‘Take your time.’

  He thanked her again, picked up his drink, took a swallow and found it painful, making it hard, momentarily, to breathe. But he wanted the whisky and managed it, followed it with a little water to douse the discomfort.

  He sat back for a moment, looking around.

  Taking it in.

  And then he put down enough cash to cover the check, and stood again.

  Time to go.

  THIRTY-FOUR

  Still alive.

  Not living, but not quite dead.

  Longing for that now, after what he had come back and done to him.

  Longing for death with every struggling fiber of his being, which was sinful, of course, but he no longer cared, was past that.

  Past everything but suffering, it seemed.

  He still wondered, in moments of cruel semi-clarity, how long it was possible to survive without sustenance.

  In the beginning, there had been the bread and water. Then just water.

  And then his tormentor had come that one last time.

  Had removed his gag – and then done this to him. Had perpetrated perhaps the most blasphemous crime possible. And had not come again.

  He had tried, a few times, to cry out, but such pitifully thin, painful sounds had emerged that he had given it up, yet the loss of the gag was a small blessing, because he could breathe the foul air more easily, could, now and then, catch in his mouth the drips of filthy water that landed on his head from above and rolled downward. And though he yearned for death, he could not reject the water.

  Survival instincts, he supposed.

  Yet still, only one hope remained in him.

  For an ending.

  Not much longer now, surely.

  THIRTY-FIVE

  Ethel had decorated the dining table with winterberries, and a deep red amaryllis stood on the sideboard, probably a gift, but Liza could not recall seeing a Christmas tree in the house since her parents’ death. Not that Stephen Plain had ever spoken to Liza of the grief and pain he must have felt, at least for the loss of his son. Yet it was still here, she felt, in this room, in the unnatural silence forming its usual invisible barrier between old man and granddaughter.

  ‘Mrs Murrow made a great effort.’ His glance at her clothes was an accusation.

  ‘I didn’t want to make you wait any longer while I changed,’ Liza said.

  Not that she’d planned to change at all, and this was even worse than she’d anticipated, and if this single meal felt like an endurance test, how on earth would she survive the next few days?

  ‘I was very pleased when I heard that you were coming, Liza,’ Stephen said. ‘How long has it been?’

  ‘Too long,’ Liza said.

  ‘I don’t suppose you can just drop your noble work at a moment’s notice.’

  ‘Don’t start, Granddad, please,’ she said, and cut them both slices of pork pie. ‘This looks almost as good as Mom’s.’

  ‘I prefer it. Less rich.’

  ‘I thought we’d be eating in the kitchen,’ Liza said.

  ‘Mrs Murrow thought this a special occasion.’

  Liza took some crabmeat salad, and wondered if the housekeeper had made this or ordered it from Glover’s. ‘This is very good. I must remember to leave her a thank-you note.’

  ‘Making leaving plans already, Liza?’ Stephen said dryly.

  ‘Of course not.’ Liza glanced at him, thought she saw some humor in his eyes.

  ‘Then perhaps you could try not to look so thoroughly bored,’ he said. ‘I know that coming home is a painful duty for you, but you needn’t think you have to spend every minute with me. If I were you, I’d get yourself out to the inn this evening. I gather there’s always something going on there.’

  ‘We could both go,’ she said.

  ‘Not me,’ he said. ‘Can’t bear the place.’

  ‘Then I’ll stay here with you.’ Liza drank some of the red wine her grandfather had poured when they’d sat down. ‘So, any village gossip for me, Granddad?’

  ‘For you to pass on to your avid readers?’

  ‘For my ears only,’ Liza
said. ‘Any news of Reverend Pike?’

  ‘The missing vicar stays missing,’ Stephen said.

  ‘What’s the new one like?’ Liza asked.

  ‘Young, golden-haired, popular with the ladies, pleasant wife. Can’t say what his sermons are like because, as you know, I do my best to avoid church.’ He wiped the corner of his mouth with a napkin. ‘I don’t imagine he’ll be much duller than Pike used to be.’

  ‘When did he disappear?’

  ‘Is this why you’ve come? The sniff of a story?’

  ‘I’m here to spend Christmas with you, Granddad.’ She changed the subject to avoid a barefaced lie. ‘You will be coming to the Christmas Eve service, won’t you?’

  ‘I can hardly avoid it since you are here,’ he said.

  Liza smiled. ‘Maybe you’ll come with me to the inn this evening too.’

  ‘Too much of a good thing,’ Stephen said. ‘Never sensible.’

  THIRTY-SIX

  At two minutes before five p.m. Michael sat at the small table in his room at the Red Door Inn, laptop open, flash drive beside it. The lights were out, and though it was already dark outside, the falling snow seemed to draw in its own soft, eerie light.

  Michael glanced at his watch, waited another minute, then inserted the flash drive into the port on the side of the computer, located it, clicked, found the file titled ‘Dec 23, 5 p.m.’, and clicked again.

  An image appeared.

  Shiloh Village in the snow at night. The place looking pretty, lamps casting a glow, St Matthew’s the star of the show.

  The kind of picture taken to attract tourists.

  ‘Welcome,’ Reaper’s voice said. ‘If you’re right on schedule, there should now be less than thirty hours to go before Whirlwind goes into action. Some of us have tasks to complete before that; some, with too much time on their hands, may be tempted to give in to doubts. But we all know it’s too late for doubting now.’