It was her agent, Jack Dent.
Immediately Karen began making excuses—she had scarcely even thought about her unfinished novel since the surgery, let alone work on it—but Jack cut her off politely.
"That's not why I'm calling," he said, his thick Brooklyn accent making her smile. "I've got some exciting news for you, Karen. I got a call from Viking yesterday, and another from Doubleday this afternoon."
Karen said nothing. She had no idea what he was getting at.
"They want you to do a book. About the operation, your life. . . before and after, that kind of thing. It should be easy enough for you to do. And they mentioned some very large numbers."
"How large?" Karen asked, her imagination already reeling.
"Are you sitting down?"
He told her and she did sit down, hard.
"I think we should run with the Doubleday offer," Jack went on. "It's about the same as Viking's but they hinted at a hardcover market for your fantasy stuff later on. . ."
Jack was still talking, but Karen tuned him out.
Suddenly, she was rich. Very rich. And all she had to do was sit down and do what she did best, what she had always enjoyed doing best. A book like that would be easy, she could dictate most of it. And she would donate a sizable chunk of the advance money to the Transplant Fund. . .
"You still there, Karen?"
"Yeah. . . sorry, Jack, I—"
"I know. Listen, I'll send you the paperwork by registered mail. Sign it and send it back—and good luck!"
"I will, Jack. And thanks."
Karen hung up and went outside. She wandered the yard in a happy daze, feeling like a child in a fairy tale who'd wished on a star and the wish had come true. Suddenly things were really taking off, and it left her breathless. In a matter of weeks she'd been given more than she'd ever dared hope for. . .
And when she tilted her face to the twinkling heavens, she murmured a quiet thanks.
Full dark found her back inside, snoozing fitfully on the living-room couch. She awoke with a start when behind her eyelids something seemed to claw at her face—
Momentarily disoriented, Karen rose and started through the night-drenched house the old way, like a blind person, believing at first that the whole incredible show—the new eyes, Cass's visit, the book deal—had all been a cruel joke of the mind. Then in a wondrous flash she remembered, and went gleefully about flicking on every light she could find.
Afterward, shifting slowly from room to room, she acquainted herself visually with a way of life she hoped never to endure again. Everywhere was the evidence of her blindness, from the unadorned walls to the braille-tagged canned goods, and it saddened her to realize how much of her life had been spent in lightless exile. Standing before the small table in her workroom, looking at the humpbacked brailler she had thumped out her manuscripts on, Karen got a fleeting image of herself seated there cold and alone in the icy depths of a mid-winter squall, hammering away at those four smooth keys, converting the best of her dreams into stiff little dots on paper. And as she watched it the image grew old and infirm, its back bending until it, was humped as the machine it labored over, its soul withering to the barrenness of the snow-clotted fields outside.
In that instant the bug of change stung her hard. Despite her already firm decision to move to the city, hopefully by winter, Karen vowed right then to totally remake the place, erasing even the remotest trace of its previous inhabitant—that sightless, withering ghost in her workroom upstairs.
With that resolve firmly in mind, Karen strode downstairs, grabbed the Eaton's summer catalogue, that had come in the mail and began thumbing it through page by page, marking off the items she wanted with big red check marks. For a long time now she'd been sitting on a sizable cache of royalty money—without even considering the mind-boggling advance Jack had managed from Doubleday—and she meant to burn through it now like a blaze in a bank vault.
By the time Cass got back and heard the news—and the two of them had paged through the catalogue again—Karen's red marker had run out of ink.
"You're wrong, you know."
They sat on pillows on the living-room floor, chatting and drinking, Cass teaching Karen the fine art of Crazy Eights from the opposite side of the coffee table. Behind them on the boom—box the Shangri-Las belted out "Leader of the Pack." The cuckoo had just clucked twelve—"the witching hour," Cass joked—and the second of three wine bottles, tall amidst the clutter of Pepsi cans and crumpled Humpty Dumpty potato chip bags, was down to the dregs. Karen was giddily, falling-down drunk. . . and loving it.
"Whaddaya mean, wrong?" Cass said, blowing out smoke and slapping down an eight, changing the suit to clubs.
Coyly, Karen dropped out a deuce, making Cass pick up two. She was a fast learner. "About me getting laid," she said, and a spasm of hurt shaded her face like a fast-moving bird.
Cass closed her fan of cards and set it down on the floor by her knee. "Tell me."
Karen took another swig of wine. "I met him last June, at the annual CNIB conference in Toronto. A doctor. . . a resident, really, in ophthalmology. She smiled wistfully. "Boy, could he talk. Smooth as silk."
Cass grunted huskily and sneered. She knew the type.
"Said he'd never met anyone so lovely, you know. . . and that the blindness didn't matter. . . and that he looked forward to a small town practice when he was done in the fall." She affected a gruff but sincere man's voice. "By the way, how big is Arnprior?"
"Fucker," Cass put in.
"That too," Karen said, but now her tone was only partly bitter. "Every night for five nights, sometimes two and three times a night." She giggled and sipped at her wine. "I guess I walked like a cowgirl for about a week afterwards. Oh, I went home happy, believe me. Happy and hopeful, with a bagful of promises and an ache deep in here." She pressed two joined fingertips low to her belly, and Cass nodded knowingly.
"And the bastard never called, right?"
Karen shook her head and shrugged nonchalantly—but Cass could see the hurt, imagine its depth.
"Like a fool I waited—"
But that was all she got out before a shriek escaped her, and her outthrust hand sent a wine bottle spinning to the rug.
"Wh-what?" Cass stammered, jerking her head in the direction of Karen's pointing finger.
"At the window," Karen said in a frightened whisper. It had been white and leering, there and then gone. "A face in the window. . ." The way the light had struck it, its staring eye sockets had seemed empty.
Grabbing the poker from in front of the fireplace, Cass dashed to the window and peered outside, brandishing the poker like a broadsword—
But there was nothing beyond the screen but night breeze, sifting somnolently through the honeysuckle.
Cass replaced the poker and sat next to Karen, whose face had turned waxy and pale. "I bet it was that hard-on Danny," she said, not doubting Karen's perceptions for an instant.
"I. . . I don’t think so," Karen said in a voice that shook. "I haven't seen him around for a couple of days. I think I hurt his feelings. . ."
But even as she spoke she recalled the way Danny's gaze had cruised her body that day by the chopping block, the feeling of being pawed by his eyes.
Cass touched Karen's cheek. "Wanna pack it in?" she said. "It's late, and I for one am all talked out." Karen managed a disbelieving half-smile. "We should get some sack time anyway. I want to be wide awake tomorrow, so I can help you spend off some of that loot." She got Karen unsteadily to her feet. "And if you're not too hung over, I'm gonna let you drive the Camaro out to the highway."
"Really?" Karen asked. She had forgotten how to walk.
"No shit at all," Cass assured her. And they negotiated the staircase together.
Chapter 17
May 13
True to her word, Cass let Karen drive to the highway, a distance of about two miles over rutted dirt road. She did well, too, panicking only slightly when a big old barn owl, sailed sleepi
ly past not five feet from the, windshield. She was quiet during the trip down, wonderstruck, Cass suspected, like a visitor from an alien planet, gazing wide-eyed at the sunlit miles of forest and farmland.
But that quietness vanished the minute they hit town.
They raided the Rideau Centre first, the newest and most chock-full shopping concourse in the city. To Cass, it was like taking a millionaire ten-year-old to the World's Fair.
Literally everything caught Karen's eye and dragged her in for a closer. look. To the casual observer, she must have looked like a parolee from, an insane asylum, flitting with honeybee randomness from item to item, exclaiming and gesturing excitedly over even the most mundane of articles.
And it wasn't long before Cass got caught up in the fever, too, seeing things afresh through Karen's eyes, much as a child might see them.
They bought curtains for the bedroom and living-room windows; cheery wallpaper for the kitchen and hallway; three new lamps; a porcelain opera-mask wall hanging; a stained-glass suncatcher in the shape of a macaw; a trunkload of new summer clothes in vivid neons and rich pastels; makeup; a Polaroid Spectra—"Who can wait for 35mm prints?"—with a dozen packets of film; and a twenty-eight-inch color TV.
Karen got her hair styled by an old friend of Cass's who managed a beauty salon on the Sparks Street Mall. Her name was Crystal, and she gave Karen a faintly punky layer cut which Karen adored. They shared a late lunch at the Japanese Village, where a grinning Oriental wearing a chef's hat juggled salt-and-pepper shakers, stir-fried shrimp and vegetables, and made ridiculous Japanese jokes. During the latter part of the afternoon they hit the computer shops. Her biggest treat to herself, Karen decided, was going to be a word processor—just as soon as she learned to read the printed word. After that they started in on the bookstores, where Karen went wild, so wild Cass had to remind her that tomorrow was another day.
There was just enough time before the stores closed to take in an art shop—where Karen picked out four framed prints and one original by a painter named Ely Kish—and raid a travel agency. Anxious to close, the agent gave Karen a box in which to carry out the huge wad of travel brochures she'd collected within minutes of entering the office.
During the drive home, with the overstuffed trunk all but dragging on the blacktop, Karen was manic, her cheeks and eyes shiny with adrenaline. Raves over the day they'd just spent got all jumbled up with plans for the next, all of which blurred into a rapid-fire itinerary for the evening ahead. They were going to walk and wallpaper and teach her to read and watch TV and have another driving lesson and, oh, yes, eat dinner. And hang the drapes and rearrange the furniture and—
Waiting strategically for Karen to breathe, Cass suggested they make hanging the drapes their number-one priority.
"I can just see that sick sonofabitch Dolan squatting in the field outside of your window, diddling himself into a pair of your thrown away panty hose." Cass had always harbored an open dislike for Danny.
A month ago Karen would have guffawed at such an idea about Danny Dolan. But now. . .
So they hung the drapes. And wallpapered more than half of the kitchen. And read the first chapter of de Lint's Moonheart phonetically. And, of course, listened to rock and roll music.
Toward midnight, seized by a sudden, shadowy foreknowledge, Karen went out to-the roadside mailbox to pick up the mail.
The Sudbury newspapers, eight of them, came rolled and packaged in plain brown paper. Walking back to the house, smelling the clean night air and seeing the stars wink playfully overhead, Karen's first impulse was to sling the package into the bush. Cass was right. It was time to go on, forget the donor, be quietly grateful and leave it at that.
But she had to know who he was; it was that simple.
"What've you got there?" Cass said as Karen came into the kitchen. "Dirty books?"
Karen unwrapped the bundle and laid it on the table, where Cass had set out wine for them both. Grabbing the scrapbook, she tossed that onto the table, too.
"I'm. . . going to need your help," she said, the bright, excited flush of earlier that day absent from her cheeks.
Cass turned off the taps and wiped her hands on her jeans.
She'd been rinsing the wallpapering trough.
"What's up?" she asked, a little concerned. She joined Karen at the table and examined the topmost paper. "The Sudbury Star? What're you doing with these?" She glanced at the dates. . . and then she knew.
"I've got to know who he was," Karen said quietly but with inarguable firmness.
Cass sat in the chair across from her and frowned. "What in hell for?"
Karen was thoughtful a moment, realizing that before now she had never tried to articulate this nagging curiosity.
"I don't know," she said finally. "I guess it's sort of like adopting a child. Part of you hopes that the baby comes from good, clean, intelligent parents. I just want to know something—anything—about the donor. I have since the outset." She shrugged, a little embarrassed, Cass thought. "You know, windows of the soul and all that.”
Cass opened her mouth to object. . . then abandoned the notion with a sigh. She'd seen this look on Karen's face before—stony, obdurate—and realized that any protest would be futile. Once the girl's mind was made up, even a petition from the Pope would fail to change it. If Cass didn't. help her, then she'd find someone else.
"All right," Cass conceded. "I think it's nuts, but all right." She took the top paper. "What are we looking for?"
"Obituaries," Karen said, her jaw grimly set. "Let's check the obituaries."
Fifteen minutes and a dozen obits later, they had it.
It was brief and to the point:
"Eden Crowell, 27, beloved son of Mr. and Mrs. Bertrand Crowell of 444 Copper Street in Sudbury, died Monday, April 4 at the University Hospital. Visitors may call at the Gavin-Howe Funeral Home on Paris Street, Wednesday, April 5. Mr. Crowell's organs were generously donated for transplant."
"That's him," Karen said, an alarming mixture of sadness and certainty in her eyes.
"How can you be so sure?" Cass queried. "And why does it matter anyways?"
"It's him," Karen replied, deliberately skirting Cass's second question. She flipped open the scrapbook to the pasted-in article from Life. "Here. . ." Pointing, she quoted from memory. "‘The donor was a twenty-seven-year-old Sudbury man who—'"
"Well, it could've been anyone," Cass cut in, disturbed by all of this. "Sudbury's a big enough place. I bet more than one person died around there that night. It could've been anybody. And not everyone gets an obit, you know—"
"It's him," Karen said flatly. "I can. . ." She finished her wine in one noisy swallow. "I can feel it."
"Cut this out," Cass said. "You're giving me the creeps. It could've been anybody, damn it. " She gathered the newspapers and twisted them into a knot. "Can I toss these out now? Perhaps interest you in getting your butt kicked in a game of Crazy Eights?"
Karen shook her head. "We're not finished yet."
Cass rolled her eyes. "What now?"
"Now we try to find out how he died," Karen said implacably. "The obituary didn't say."
Cass made no move to unroll the newspapers. "Shit, kid. This is where I draw the line. This is morbid, and I don't want any part of it."
"Okay," Karen said. "Hand 'em over. I'll get my father to read through them. Or Ida Teevens—"
"All right," Cass moaned, "all right."
She made a huffy show of going through the papers, snapping the pages, grimacing as if painfully constipated.
"Here's one," she quipped. "Truck driver injured while pulling out to avoid a child. " She stifled a chuckle at Karen's rapt anticipation. "He fell off the couch!" Then she did laugh, uproariously—but only for a few seconds. "Christ, if looks could kill. . .”
"Please, Cass. I can't explain why, but it's important to me. Okay?"
"Okay," Cass said. "Okay."
But she didn't like it. Not one bit.
"Here,
" Cass said. A half hour had gone by. "Here it is: 'Sudbury police are investigating the—'" She slapped down the paper as if swatting a fly.
"Please," Karen said. "Go on." In spite of the bright kitchen light, the edges of her vision had begun to go gray.
Cass regarded her pleadingly. "Why can't you just drop this, Kar—"
"Please."
"Okay!" Cass said, fighting the urge to ball the thing up and rip it to shreds. She read on ". . . investigating the beating murder of a Sudbury man found comatose Friday night in an alleyway in the downtown quarter. Eden Crowell, 27, died early this morning in hospital, following emergency surgery to remove a clot from his brain. So far there are no suspects."
Eyes averted, Karen rose slowly to her feet and crossed the kitchen to the door. Without a word, she went outside and sat on the stoop. Cass thought of going out after her, but decided against it. Instead, she bundled the newspapers together and stuffed them deep into the garbage pail under the sink.
A murdered man's eyes, Karen thought again and again, as unaware of the night around her as she had been when she was blind. I've got a murdered man's eyes in my head.
She sat there a long time before going back inside.
After rescuing the newspapers from the trash bin, she dragged herself upstairs to bed.
And dreamed.
Chapter 18
I hate to admit this," Dr. Forget said, "but I can't explain Shirley's symptoms."
Mary Bleeker let out the breath she'd been holding; it sounded ragged and strained, the way Mary looked. She gazed down at her child, at the sullen hollows of her eyes, and something jagged painfully at her heart.
"But, Doctor," she protested, "just look at her. She feels terrible. It's gotten so bad that she's refusing to go out of the house, never mind school. And I can't say I blame her. Can you imagine the embarrassment? You know how cruel kids can be."
Helpless and perplexed, Dr. Forget could only nod. He'd been involved in renal transplantation since its inception, had even taken part in some of the early research but he had never seen anything like this. According to the child's mother, Shirley had begun urinating uncontrollably about two weeks ago—in her seat in her second-grade classroom, on the bus on the way home at the, dinner table, even in church. No warning. And not just wetting herself, but major floods. The bus driver had told Mary that a few days ago a stream of urine had run the length of the bus while Shirley just stood there, crying her eyes out, the tiny, acid-wash jeans she was so proud of soaked and still leaking, all of the other kids laughing and pointing. Not only that, at night when she tried to sleep, Shirley was seized by sudden, colicky cramps, spasms that were at times so violent, she became utterly inconsolable.
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