Red 1-2-3 (9780802192844)

by Katzenbach, John

  She sometimes imagined herself to be willowy, slender, gossamer-dressed, which was the image she suspected an illustrator drawing a writer’s inspiration would create. That she was short and stocky, a little overweight, with mousy brown hair and a smile that seemed lopsided no matter how much pleasure she meant to express, was irrelevant. Inside, she was beautiful. She knew this. Why else would he have fallen in love with and married her?

  And, after so many fallow years, so many literary fits and starts and frustration, to see him once again eager to lock himself away in the spare bedroom that he’d taken over as his writing studio, colored her day and made heading off to work less painful. She envisioned bundles of words, filling pages, relentlessly stacking up by the printer.

  Mrs. Big Bad Wolf often wished she had his imagination.

  It would be nice, she thought, to be able to live in made-up worlds where you control the outcome of all the characters. You can make whomever you want fall in love. You can kill off whomever you want. You deliver success or failure, sadness or happiness. What a wonderful luxury.

  It was not unusual for her to steal a glance at the closed door to the office, wondering what special world was taking form inside. Like Odysseus strapped to the mast of his ship, she longed to hear the siren’s songs.

  She paused, standing at the sink. Water was running over her hands and she knew she should reach for the dishwashing soap and start the machine before leaving for her office, but in that second of envy, she felt a twinge on her left side, just below her breast. The sensation—it wasn’t even significant enough to call a pain—sent a shaft of fright directly through her, and she gripped the counter edges to steady herself as a rapid dizziness swept over her. For an instant she felt hot, as if an oven door within her had been opened, and she caught her breath sharply.

  The only words she could think of were not again.

  She slowed her intake, tried to force her pulse to return to a normal pace. She closed her eyes and cautiously did an inventory of her body. She felt a little like a mechanic working over a car engine with some mysterious failure.

  She reminded herself that she had just the other day been in to see her doctor and received a completely clean bill of health. She’d gone through the routine of poking and prodding and answering questions, opening her mouth wide, feeling the electrocardiograph leads placed on her body and waiting while the machine chewed out an assessment. And when her doctor had smiled, and begun to reassure her, it had been musical, even if she hadn’t quite believed it.

  No signs.

  She almost said this out loud.

  This was the trouble with having a faulty heart. It made her imagine that every twinge and every misplaced beat signaled the end. She thought to herself that she didn’t have an interesting enough life to be this paranoid.

  Mrs. Big Bad Wolf reached over to a countertop drainage rack, where she had placed a few of the bigger pans that wouldn’t fit into the dishwasher. She lifted out a large skillet made of stainless steel and held it up in front of her eyes. She could see her reflection in the clean, polished metal. But unlike with a mirror, the portrait that stared back at her was slightly distorted, as if it was out of focus.

  She told herself: You were beautiful once, even if this wasn’t true.

  Then she searched for pain: None in the eyes. None in the corners of her mouth. None in that extra flesh that sagged around her jaw.

  She pushed further. None in her feet. None in her legs. None in her stomach.

  She held up her left hand and wiggled the fingers.

  Nothing. No sudden shock of hurt plunging through her wrist.

  As if entering a dangerous minefield, she began to mentally examine her chest, an explorer searching some unknown territory. She breathed in and out slowly, all the time watching the face in the steel reflection, as if it were someone else’s and would display some telltale sign that she could spot. There were experts who had studied facial expressions, and detectives who believed that by merely examining a face they could tell when someone was lying or cheating or even covering up some illness. She had seen these people on television.

  But her breathing seemed regular. Her heartbeat seemed solid and steady. She touched her rib cage with her fingers, prodding it. Nothing.

  And her face remained flat, without affect. Like a poker player, she thought. Then she slowly lowered the pan back to the drying rack. No. Okay. It was nothing. A little bit of indigestion. Your heart isn’t going to stop today.

  She reminded herself to go to work—and to hurry, maybe even speed, to make up for the minutes lost to dying fears. “I’m leaving now,” she shouted. There was a small silence, then a muffled reply from inside the locked office.

  “I might be out a bit doing some research, dear. Maybe late for dinner.”

  She smiled. The word research encouraged her. She believed he was really making progress, and she knew enough to make sure that nothing she did would upset that fragile state.

  “Okay, honey. Whatever you say. I’ll leave a plate for you in the microwave if you need to get home late.”

  Mrs. Big Bad Wolf didn’t wait for a response, but she was happy. This sounded like the most mundane conversation any couple could have. It was so ordinary, it reassured her. The writer was working; and like the worker bee she considered herself, she was heading out to her job. Nothing as different as a heart attack could ever enter into a world so determinedly normal.

  She drove through the faculty-and-staff parking lot twice before she found a spot near the back, which added fifty yards of rain and chill to her exposed travel. There was nothing she could do about this, so Mrs. Big Bad Wolf slid her car into the space, gathered her satchel, and maneuvered out of her door, trying to get a small umbrella raised before she got soaked.

  She immediately stepped into a puddle, and cursed. Then she hurried across the lot, head down, making for the school administration building.

  She hung her damp coat on a hook by the door and slid behind her desk, hoping that the dean wouldn’t notice she was a little late.

  He emerged from his office—her desk guarded the entry—and shook his head, but not at her tardiness or at the lousy weather that was turning the school into a dark and dreary place. He had a file in his hand and he seemed dismayed.

  “Can you send a message to Miss Jordan Ellis?” he said. “Have her come in this afternoon to see me during a free period, or maybe after her basketball practice?”

  “Of course,” Mrs. Big Bad Wolf replied. “Is it urgent?”

  “More of the same,” the dean said ruefully. “She’s doing poorly in every subject and now Mr. and Mrs. Ellis want me to referee their custody ­battle, which will only make matters significantly worse.” He managed a wan smile. “Wouldn’t it be wonderful if some of these parents just left their children alone and let us deal with them?”

  This was a familiar complaint and a prayer that never had any realistic chance of being answered.

  “I’ll see that she’s here to see you today,” Mrs. Big Bad Wolf replied.

  “Thank you,” he said, nodding. He glanced down at the sheaf of papers in his hand and shrugged. “Don’t you just hate it when seniors throw their futures away?” he asked. This was a rhetorical question, and one that Mrs. Big Bad Wolf understood didn’t need answering. Of course everyone hated it when seniors did poorly. They struggled in school and then got into lower-tier colleges, and that skewed the school’s Ivy League statistics. She watched as he retreated back into his office, still clutching the file, although eventually it, and all the confidential information it contained, would arrive on her desk for sorting away in a large black steel file cabinet in the corner of the room. It had a combination lock. 8-17-96. Her wedding day.

  9

  Sarah Locksley shifted about uncomfortably in her seat. She was dizzy, twitching, and felt both exh
austed and energized, as if the two opposing sensations could happily coexist within her. Every second that passed was boring and exciting. She felt on the verge of something, whether it was passing out unconscious for twenty-four hours or taking aim and shooting the next person—who would be the first person in weeks—to knock on her door.

  Over-the-counter NoDoz, Stolichnaya vodka and fresh orange juice, a large supply of candy bars, packaged donuts, and sweet rolls, and an occasional peanut-butter-covered banana had fueled her over the past few days. Fattening, calorie-filled, but she felt like she hadn’t gained a pound.

  She wanted to laugh out loud. She imagined a cynical advertising copywriter: The dead woman’s diet. Just have an anonymous someone threaten to kill you and watch the pounds melt away!

  She had placed a stiff chair in a spot where she could cover both the front of the house and much of the kitchen entranceway in the rear, and she had arranged a few pillows and an old sleeping bag nearby, so that when she’d had to sleep, snatching a few hours from night, she’d been able to tumble half-drugged and half-drunk into the makeshift bed. She was avoiding her bedroom. There was something frightening about concealing herself inside the place she’d shared with her husband. The room seemed suddenly prison­like and she was determined that she would not allow herself to be murdered in the place where she had once known so much pleasure.

  She knew this seemed totally crazy, but crazy was a state that she was willing to embrace.

  She had constructed a homemade alarm system by the rear door—hanging a string across the doorway and tying empty cans and pots and pans to it, so anyone bumping into it would rattle and clang with noise. Just beneath the windowsills she had shattered empty liquor bottles into glass shards and spread them around, so a person—no, she thought: a Big Bad Wolf—breaking in that way would likely slice hands or feet clambering into the house. On the stairway leading to the basement she had strung strands of wire an inch or two above each riser to trip the Wolf if he tried to use the steps. She had also spread some ball bearings and old marbles around on the basement floor and unscrewed the light, so that the room was pitched into darkness and likely to cause her stalker to trip.

  She had her dead husband’s gun close by and she periodically checked it to make sure that it was loaded and ready, even though she knew she had already checked it a hundred times. The area around her was a mess of plastic wrappers, empty Styrofoam cups, and discarded bottles. Sarah kicked away some of the trash accumulating next to her bare feet and sighed deeply. Well, this isn’t working, goddammit.

  Her defense systems seemed straight out of the Home Alone movie, better preparation for a slapstick comedy than preventing a killer from sneaking unseen and unheard into her house and slaughtering her in her sleep. She knew she was likely to pass out at any moment and that when she did succumb to inevitable exhaustion, no clattering of pots and pans would wake her. She was all too experienced in the fog that accompanied booze and narcotics.

  And mostly, Sarah doubted that the Big Bad Wolf was anything less than completely skilled at murder and professional at killing. She had no evidence to support this feeling, but she believed it to be the truth. Instinct. Sixth sense. Premonition. She didn’t know what it was, but she knew he would wait until the right moment, which would be the moment he knew she was at her most vulnerable.

  Vulnerable. What a god-awful, pathetic, barely adequate word, she thought. More likely it described her every second of every day and every night, regardless of whether she was asleep or sitting waiting by the front door, gun in hand.

  She looked around. Her back was stiff. Her head ached. Everything she’d done to protect herself seemed precisely what a middle school teacher would do. Scissors, sticky glue, and brightly colored construction paper—it was very much like a class project. All that was lacking were some excited fifth graders and happily raised voices.

  She could see herself, clapping her hands together sharply to get their attention. All right, class! Mrs. Locksley has to protect herself from a psychopathic killer. Everyone bring their favorite materials to the middle, and let’s build a wall so she will be safe!

  Ludicrous. This she knew. But she did not know what else to do.

  She took a long look down at her right hand gripping the pistol. Maybe I should break my promise to my dead husband, she thought, and turn the gun on myself just before the Big Bad Wolf arrives at the door.

  Sarah laughed bitterly. A sudden burst, as if from an unexpected moment of humor. Now, that would be a hilarious sight to see, when the Big Bad Wolf sneaks inside to kill me and discovers that I’ve beaten him to the punch. What the hell could he do? A killer without a target. Joke’s on him.

  Except I couldn’t see it because I would already be dead.

  Words to a song penetrated her memory: “‘No reason to get excited,’ the thief he kindly spoke. ‘There are many here among us who feel that life is but a joke.’”

  She could hear the guitar riff as if it were being played in the distance. She could hear the gravelly voice. It made sense to her. No reason to get excited.

  She sighed deeply, but that release nearly turned to scream when she heard a sudden sound at the front door. She first lurched away, as if she could hide, then she stumbled forward, gun outstretched, ready to shoot. She thought she was shouting aloud incomprehensibly, but then realized that all those noises existed only in her head.

  There is nothing worse, Karen Jayson thought, than the racket caused by silence.

  This held true, she insisted to herself, whether she was on stage, in her office surrounded by work, or alone in her home.

  She was driving home after the day’s work. She had quickly adopted a habit that cost her time: After pulling off the main highway onto the quieter rural roads leading to her isolated house, if she spotted someone behind her in the rearview mirror, she would pull to the side and patiently wait for the car or truck or whatever to sweep past her before resuming her drive. No one was going to tail her. This constant stop, go, find another pullover, stop, wait, then resume made the trip tediously slow, but gave her a sense of satisfaction. She was not in any rush to return home. It no longer seemed safe.

  The trouble was, at the same time that she felt unsettled about returning, she kept insisting to herself that there was no reason to feel that way.

  She approached the turnoff for her gravel driveway. She could just make out the outlines of her house, partially obscured by the foliage even with the leaves all down for winter. Dark pines and deep brown oak trees, lined up like sentinels, were barriers to her sight. She took a quick glance behind her, just to make sure no one was there, and pulled into the driveway. Just as she always did, she stopped at the mailbox.

  But now she hesitated. Crazy thinking, she told herself. Get the mail.

  She did not want to get out of the car. She did not want to open the mail container. It was almost like she expected a bomb to explode if she did.

  There was no reason for her to believe that the Big Bad Wolf would use the mail to contact her a second time. And no reason to believe he wouldn’t.

  She tried to impose rationality on her heart. Medical school discipline, she recalled, summoning up memories of long shifts and soul-deadening exhaustion that she had managed to overcome. Get out. Get the mail. Screw him. You can’t let some anonymous joker disrupt your life.

  Then she wondered whether this made sense. Maybe what made sense was to let him disrupt her life.

  Karen remained frozen behind the wheel. She watched shadows slice through the trees like sword strokes of darkness.

  She felt trapped between the ordinary—the mundane task of getting the daily collection of bills, catalogues, and flyers—and the unreasonable. Maybe a second letter.

  Karen took her car out of gear and waited. She insisted to herself that she was being silly. If someone were to see her hesitate before d
oing something as routine as collecting the mail she would be embarrassed.

  This did not reassure her.

  She very much wanted to talk to someone right at that moment. She suddenly hated being alone, when for so many years that was all she wanted to be.

  With a final glance up and down the road, she got out of her car, mumbling to herself that she was being paranoid and stupid and there was nothing to be afraid of. But still, she cautiously opened the box as if she were afraid there was a poisonous snake coiled inside.

  The first thing she saw was the white envelope resting on top of a bright J.Crew catalogue.

  She pulled her hand back sharply, as if it was indeed a snake. Fangs bared and ready to strike.

  “Jordan, I am so very concerned,” the dean said with appropriate sonorous, serious tones. “Every one of your teachers is surprised by the precipitous drop-off in the quality of your work. We all understand the pressure that your home situation creates. But you need to recognize how important this year is for your future. College awaits, and we fear you will ­cripple your chances at the better universities unless you pull your academic record together rapidly.”

  The dean, Jordan believed, could not possibly sound more pompous. But then, a daily dose of pomposity was the natural state of existence for all deans at all prep schools, so he couldn’t really be criticized for acting like he was supposed to.

  If a mad dog bites you, is that dog being unreasonable? If a squirrel runs away when you come too close, is it being foolish? If a murderer wants to kill you, is that really a surprise?

  Jordan imagined that she was becoming a philosopher. She only half-listened as the dean continued to mix encouragement with criticism, thinking somehow that just the right mix of pep talk and sympathy, colored with dire threats, would combine to make her shape up.