Shadowdown consisted of a chalet-style main lodge and three gingerbread wings built one above the other on the mountainside. They were connected by a funicular elevator and two enclosed stairways.
There was a slope for night skiing, an outdoor skating rink and a bubble-top pool just behind the lodge. Accommodations for three hundred people ranged from deluxe, with private sauna, to dormitory-style living, which was one reason the Gallehers liked Shadowdown. For food, guests had a choice of a smart intimate restaurant, a cafeteria open twenty-four hours and a beer hall that served authentic German specialties.
Peter and Gillian had been booked into the second tier of rooms on the mountain. Their room was overheated. They had twin beds with blue spreads, dark Weldwood paneling, snow scenes on the walls, and sliding glass doors to a balcony that overlooked the bright pool bubble and the immense sloped roof of the chalet below. After a minute on the exposed balcony the flying snow, thick as pablum, drove Peter inside.
He sat down on one bed and consulted his left hand. Three fingers gone now, the palm almost without feeling. But a greater worry was a numbed spot about the size of a half dollar he’d found on his forearm just below the elbow. He went into the bathroom for a plastic glass, stripped off the paper and poured two ounces of gin from a new bottle he’d bought.
In the bedroom Peter unfolded the Geological Survey maps of the region which Gillian had xeroxed for him. He located Shadowdown, then found what he was looking for. The river was called the Breed. It began as a trickle half way up Shadowdown Mountain, broadened in the valley below and eventually wound through the middle of Woodlawn College, where, on the eastern boundary of the campus, it had been dammed for a swimming lake. There was a house or a building, unidentified, beside the lake.
The Breed was less than thirty feet wide in places. Probably five or six feet deep at full flood in the late spring, with deeper coves here and there.
Peter dialed for the recorded weather, courtesy of Shadowdown Lodge. The temperature at 6 P.M. was fourteen degrees and falling. Wind northwest at thirty-one miles an hour. There was a heavy snow warning for the twelve-hour period ending at seven Saturday morning. Eight more inches of snow expected on top of the four feet already on the ground.
Peter sipped his gin and thought about the route he would take to Woodlawn.
Counting all the twists and turns in the river, the distance was more than twenty miles. Visibility at all times would be only a few feet. The wind-chill factor might reach forty below. Those were the least of his problems. He didn’t know the river. Depending on the weight of the machine he chose, he needed at least six inches of ice at all times. But snow acted as an insulator over ice, and kept the ice from building up from below. Even in the middle of winter he might, without warning, hit a stretch where ice was only a brittle shell. Ice-fishing holes were a possible hazard. A small spring in a cove could produce a breach in the ice. If the river had any kind of current, then the ice would be very dangerous in places.
But there was no other way to do it. If he tried going overland in the blizzard he would quickly be lost even with a compass, or else he’d bog down in drifts as high as his head. With luck and care the frozen Breed River would take him where he wanted to go—if his left arm and hand didn’t give out completely. Driving a snowmobile over ice for mile after mile was a chore that required a great deal of strength.
He’d been in the room for fifteen minutes; Gillian hadn’t shown up but he wasn’t worried about her. He put on a feather-light, down-filled parka and amber-tinted glasses and went out again.
Shadowdown was filled to capacity and the storm had pushed everyone indoors. Already there was a lot of partying going on. Shadow-down’s security people were easy to spot. He tried to put MORG out of his mind. Even if they were there, doing their quiet work behind the scenes, checking all registrations, he wouldn’t know until it was too late.
Without going to any real trouble Peter discovered four snowmobiles parked in a basement storage area beneath the kitchen; it was accessible by ramp. There were double doors no one had bothered to lock, but he could have picked the lock with a hangnail. The overhead lights were on. Keys were in the ignitions of the snowmobiles. He looked the machines over carefully and found one with a studded track, ideal for running on ice. The two-place snowmobile had a thirty-five-horsepower rotary engine, which was quieter than the customary two-stroke Japanese engine, new wear rods, drive belt and springs. It was fully fueled.
When he returned to the room the door was standing open. Gillian was having open house: Cary, Francis, and a young couple from Hamilton College who were friends of Cary’s. After introductions Peter leaned against a wall with folded arms and smiled and said nothing. In about five minutes the other kids left, and he closed the door.
“I had a sandwich already with the boys, do you want to get something to eat? Cary’s pre-law at SUNY in New Paltz and Francis is a funny-car freak. Tomorrow they—”
“Gillian, we have work to do.”
The reminder was enough to sober her up, and, cause an attack of despondency.
“I know.”
“I want to leave in an hour,” Peter said.
“I don’t see how you’ll get anywhere. It’s a total white-out.”
“Try to get in touch with Robin now.”
Gillian’s eyes flickered down, and up, and across the room, finally lit into him with a remorseful fury. Peter had no trouble standing his ground. His preternaturally calm eye wore her down.
“I’m not sure if—”
“Now.”
She turned away helplessly and sagged on the edge of a bed.
“All right.”
Peter didn’t move. Gillian said, “I think you should be somewhere else. I’m afraid of what might happen if you’re in the room.”
“Do you go there, or what?”
“No, it isn’t like that, Robin can travel anytime, but I have to be asleep or unconscious to Visit. I just try to reach out and find him. Robin says you make a thought-form, and then you throw it. Our minds come together, they interlock.” She held up her joined clenched hands. “He’s much better at it than I am. But this close to him I think I can do it. If it’s quiet and I can concentrate.” There was boisterous laughter in the hall outside their door, and Gillian smiled tensely.
“I’ll put cotton in my ears,” she said.
“There’s a building or a large house at the edge of an artificial lake on campus. That may be the house you told me about. If Robin’s in the house, I want him to stay there. And I need to know a safe way in.”
“Okay.”
“I’ll have dinner now. I’m not hungry, but I’ll need the fuel later. Forty minutes?”
Gillian shrugged.
“If it’s going to work, it’ll work by then.”
Chapter Nineteen
It seemed to Gwyneth Charles that she had just settled into the steaming bath and briefly closed her eyes. When she opened them again Robin was there. In her bathroom, looking starkly down at her. She trembled involuntarily; his stealth was unsettling. For several moments she thought she might be dreaming him. She really didn’t know if she was awake or asleep.
Just a few minutes alone, she thought. Is that asking too much? “What do you want, Robin?” she said tonelessly.
“I got tired of waiting. What’s taking so long?”
“Robin I need—a good soak, and a little goddamn privacy.” The ice rattled in Gwyn’s glass as she drank, swallowed the fire bolt of whiskey in one lump. She waited nervously for it to do some good. The Wild Turkey bourbon quieted her muscles but not her nerves.
Robin hung on, she wasn’t rid of him. Gwyn handed up the glass. “Make me another while you’re here? The bottle’s on the drink cart. Wild Turkey.”
Robin took the glass from her. He looked at it, then ran his tongue around the inside. He was so handsome tonight, Gwyn thought, in his dark blue suede shirt-jac, gray slacks, Gucci loafers. He licked and licked the glass. Ummmmmm-u
mmmmm. As usual Gwyn couldn’t take her eyes off him even when she most wanted to. The dark look of hazard around his own eyes could hypnotize her.
Robin put a lump of ice in his mouth and knelt beside her. He kissed her, then passed the ice into her mouth.
Gwyn shuddered and drew away and spat out the ice. He sat back on his heels, frowning.
“I thought you liked to do that.”
“I do enjoy it, in bed when we’re f—” She quickly covered her face with wet hands: loathing was there for him to see, and make use of, in his incredibly complex, scheming way.
“Please, Robin,” she said, in a voice that was squeaky tight, “get me a drink?”
The next thing Gwyn knew—it had begun to really frighten her, all the gaps in her attention span—he had the cap off the bottle and was pouring the expensive bourbon into the toilet.
“Robin!” She foundered but didn’t climb out of, the marble tub, which was nearly flush with the floor.
“I don’t like it when you smell like this stuff,” he said, eyes on the flowing amber tail.
“I won’t drink any more tonight! Don’t waste it!”
Robin, turned the bottle right-side up before all the Wild Turkey gurgled away.
“Would you like me to do your back?” he asked pleasantly.
“I merely want—we’ve been together for days and days—you never give me—all right. Yes. Please do my back, lover.”
He brought the bottle with him, placed it on the flat edge of the tub. Gwyneth glanced at the bottle with badly concealed longing. He’d put it well within reach to tempt her. But if she tried to steal a nip Robin would be infuriated, and she just couldn’t stomach another of his man-child rages. So she straightened up and handed him a soapy loofah.
Robin peeled back his sleeves and scrubbed along her spine.
“I enjoy a drink once in a while,” Gwyn explained. “I need it to relax. As you know I’m highly allergic to barbituates, and I, I haven’t been sleeping. Not well at all.”
“You can’t sleep?” he said, as if it was news to him.
“Not when you don’t sleep. And you haven’t closed your eyes for, it’s been almost five days. I don’t know how you can stay on your feet.”
“I feel okay.”
“Oh, Robin! You’re in another world. You’ve pushed yourself almost beyond mortal limits. You don’t seem to be aware that there are limits, but I know what’s happened to you.”
He shook his head, seeming puzzled—or was he taunting her? Gwyn felt too bleary to make a rational judgment.
“Nothing’s happened to me, Gwyn.” He put the loofah down and stood, towered over Gwyn in her sunken tub. Six-two and still growing. Youthful-sulky good looks that fascinated her so. Gwyn’s fuddled desire for him seemed a monstrous thing, but imperishable: it grated inside her like broken bones. She slunk to the chin in her bath, eyes smarting.
Robin picked up the Wild Turkey bottle. He uncapped it again and sipped some bourbon. The taste was mildly disagreeable, but the aftertaste and expanding warmth obviously intrigued him.
“I’ve wondered why you drink this.” He had another deep swallow, and savored it. “Okay, I guess.”
“Robin, easy. That doesn’t mix with your medication.”
He drank again, ignoring her. There’d been a third of a quart left when she persuaded him not to consign it all to the toilet.
“You have been taking your medication?”
“Snowing hard now,” Robin observed through a glass port above the bathtub. “Maybe later we could go out and play. We could have a real snowball fight.”
“Robin, if you won’t follow your schedule of medication, then we can’t—you’re caught up in a very destructive cycle, whether you realize it or not. You burn six thousand calories a day! You’re on the verge of consuming yourself.”
“Are you through with your bath?”
“… Yes. What time is it?”
Robin looked at the solid gold, Rolex Oyster wristwatch she had given him for his fourteenth birthday.
“Ten after seven.”
Gwyn sighed. “I need to dress. We’re having company for dinner.” She attempted a lighter tone. “Now don’t drink any more of that; we don’t want you turning into a teenage alcoholic.”
“Who’s coming?” Robin asked, lowering the bottle after another belt.
“Granny Sig. And—my uncle.”
“I don’t like him.”
“I know,” Gwyn said, stepping out of the tub and draping herself in a towel. “I can’t help it. Anyway he’s company. We never have company.
“Who else?”
“No one else. Robin, will you put that shitting bottle down?”
He wiped his lips on a corner of her towel. “Tongue gets numb,” he said.
Warm and wet as she was from the bath, Gwyn could feel the heat Robin gave off. He was burning like a furnace. He helped her dry her body. A blue-eyed bruise peeked at him from beneath one breast.
“How did you get that?” Robin asked.
“Your fist.”
“Hit you? When did I ever hit you, Gwyn?” His voice, still changing, unexpectedly climbed high. If she hadn’t felt so badly she might have smiled.
“Quite often when we—let’s not discuss it. May I have the towel?”
“Don’t you want me to dry between your legs?”
“No.” She was sure it would lead to sex. Four times today; a week of harrowing circus. The body in which she took so much pride had no resiliency any more. Robin had lost all control. When he thought of sex he had to do it, no matter where he was, or who else might be around. Two nights ago he had raped her in front of Granny Sig. A low point in Gwyn’s life, by far.
Robin stepped back and, despite the disapproving expression on her face, he drained the bottle of bourbon, sucking out the last slow drops.
“It won’t hurt me,” he assured Gwyn. “Nothing hurts me.” He was puffed up with boasting: his eyes, looking at her, were busy and clever. “Nothing hurts me. You could put poison in it, and it wouldn’t hurt me.” But he was sweating now. He nursed the empty bottle, turning the mouth of it around and around between his lips.
“Is that what you’d like to do?”
“What?” Gwyn said, drifting and vacant again. She reached for a dry towel.
“Poison me. Get me out of the way.”
Something flared dangerously in Gwyn’s head.
“For God’s sake, what a miserable, stupid thing to say to me!”
“You wouldn’t do it?”
“No. No!”
“But you lie to me. That’s a kind of poison.”
“I do not lie to you, Robin. And I’m tired of—accusations! Your sick demeaning possessiveness! Your taunts and brutality and—”
He turned smoothly and threw the empty bottle against a marble wall of the bath. Gwyn jumped and got gooseflesh.
“Smash,” Robin said, without emphasis. He turned back to her and clamped a hand under her cunt. It was not a loving gesture. He showed a butcher’s indifference to her crawling flesh. He thrust a fingertip against the nub of her uterus.
“GET YOUR HANDS OFF ME!” she screamed, finally past all endurance; and she spat in his face.
Robin’s reaction was, weirdly, boyish shame. Tears welled up in his eyes. He let go of Gwyneth. His lips quivered.
“Because it isn’t kind. It isn’t loving. It’s humiliating!” Gwyn’s voice became a groan. She was weeping too. She used the towel to wipe away the slash of spit that divided his freckled nose. “Oh, God, Robin. Sweet, sweet Robin, what’s happened? I loved you so. I want my boy back. I want my beautiful, loving boy.” She put her hands on his head, groping blindly. He ducked and ran. He slammed the bathroom door. Gwyn stood there and shook from terror and passion.
When she went to look for him Robin wasn’t in the bedroom of her spacious apartment, which took up nearly all of the third floor in the south wing of the house. The door to the living room stood open an inch. Gwyn heard
soft music and Ken’s murmuring voice. She smelled heavenly hot hors d’ouevres on the serving cart. Ken had come in and fixed a big log fire for her. Gwyneth sat naked and almost close enough to singe her hide, mentally immersing herself in the liquid-looking flames. For a few precious minutes she drew on the fire’s heat for the strength to dress herself.
With her cheeks naturally reddened Gwyn added only a touch of lipstick, then shadowed her eyes in bosky green. She gave her hair a few swirling touches with the brush. She put on an ankle-length white wool skirt, white kid boots, a long-sleeved white blouse with a high, Gibson-girl collar, and a white wool bolero vest. She added no ornamentation, not even finger rings.
Ken knocked at the bedroom door and when she opened it he handed her a drink, Wild Turkey on the rocks. Gwyn gasped with pleasure and drank deep.
“Robin said he broke your bottle.”
“Oh.” Gwyn peered anxiously past Ken’s shoulder but couldn’t find Robin in the forty-foot living room. Ken pointed to a grouping of high-backed leather chairs near undraped windows; the storm outside was whirling against the leaded glass.
“How is he?” Gwyn whispered.
Ken held praying hands at the level of his breastbone. His hands flew apart in a mime which she was too brainless to interpret. Perhaps he meant that Robin’s mood was acceptable; perhaps it was a warning. Do not touch.
“I see.” Gwyn drank more whiskey. “Could you leave us alone for a few minutes? We, we had a little spat.” The muscles on one side of her face jerked, telegraphing a wild laugh which she never uttered.
“Right.”
“Hold—hold the others when they get here. I’ll ring.”
“Sure you’ll be okay?”
“Why shouldn’t I be?”
Ken smiled comfortingly and walked away across the living room, closing the outside door behind him.
“Robin?”
He didn’t answer her. Gwyn couldn’t tell, from where she was standing, which one of the deep chairs he occupied. She walked slowly toward the chairs, swaying slightly from fatigue, from the effects of the whiskey. It would be nice to pass out, she thought, and let somebody else worry about him for awhile. But she was possessed by an unreasonable fear: if she lost touch with Robin, even for an hour, she would never see him again.
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