But it would be foolish to go in there unarmed. A weapon, she needed a weapon. Peering into the murky corners of the garage, she spotted some cobweb-covered golf clubs and grabbed what felt like the heaviest metal one.
Then she walked to the door and put her ear to it. All quiet. She turned the knob and eased the door open, golf club at the ready. The strong smell of a dirty litter box assaulted her nose. She stepped into a darkened area that she took to be a combination laundry and mud room. Moving through it, she entered the kitchen, a room filled with shadows and an odd, sour smell. Feeble light from an adjoining pantry fell across several squares of yellowed linoleum in one corner. She peered into the pantry, and a gray cat glared up at her from its pillow. It flicked its tail and put its head down and went back to sleep.
Thea moved through the kitchen, all her senses on alert. She spotted a wall phone and picked it up. Hope flamed through her as she pressed the handset to her ear. Could it be this easy? No such luck: the line was dead. She hung it up, pushed through a pair of swinging saloon doors, and found herself in a dining room. In the faint light, she could see a long table covered with old newspapers, magazines, and piles of mail. And dust, so thick that she put her hand over her nose, afraid it might set her to sneezing.
Past the dining room was the center hallway of the house. The layout looked like an old farmhouse. She took a peek through the grimy curtains covering the oval glass of the front door. No streetlights, no nearby houses. So it probably was an old farmhouse. It was good that she hadn’t left the garage to go seek help. There wasn’t any.
A staircase rose up the left side of the hallway and Thea glanced up to the landing. Darkness waited there, fat and menacing.
Dread prickled her spine as she realized she was going to have to go up those stairs. But first, she told herself, she’d finish checking out this floor—even though the pale light from the pantry didn’t reach to this side of the house. Across the hallway was what she guessed was a living room. Very dark. She bumped into the back of a couch, or an easy chair, and when she reached out to steady herself her hand came away smelling of rancid hair oil.
Feeling her way along the wall, she found a room with a dank, musty smell and what must be a toilet, gurgling like a brook. Farther on, she stepped into another room, and stumbled over boxes, shopping bags, and more newspapers.
When she came to the end of the hallway she found a back way into the kitchen and returned to the pantry, looking for a flashlight. The cat opened its eyes, then immediately shut them again. No flashlight, but Thea found the stub of a candle and, hidden behind a bulging bag of old twist ties, a box of kitchen matches. Tucking the golf club under her arm, she lit the candle and stuffed the matches in her coat pocket. Then she went back to the center hallway, candle in one hand and golf club, held like a weapon, in the other.
At the foot of the staircase she took a deep breath and began to climb, hot wax dripping on her fingers. Halfway up, the candle flame guttered and flickered, buffeted by motion and a cold draft coming from the second floor. She was forced to tuck the golf club under her arm again and use her free hand to protect the flame. Testing each step as she went, she managed to avoid any creaky ones. As she neared the top of the stairs, she began to be aware of faint noises above her head and stopped, listening.
She guessed that in an old-fashioned house like this, there was an attic. The sounds had stopped, and she wondered if what she’d heard had been mice, skittering across bare floorboards. She reached the landing and held the candle so that she could see down a short hallway, which had three doors opening off it.
Then she heard the noises again. And this time she was sure it wasn’t mice—not unless they were wearing Doc Martens. The sounds seemed to be shoes, scuffing against the floor.
The attic! They were in the attic. She quietly approached each door, peering in at clutter-filled rooms until she came to the end of the hallway. The door was open a crack, and she listened. What she heard sounded like a child chanting a snatch of unintelligible sing-song words.
It wasn’t her mother’s voice, so it had to be Mattie. As the voice grew louder, Thea blew out the candle, set it down, and reached for the door, easing it wider. The stairs were in darkness, but a weak light seeped through the half-open door at the top.
She began to climb, feeling for each step, her eyes riveted to the space above, where the light and the sing-song voice were coming from. As she neared the top, she made out the words “tea party” and “dollies.” The rest sounded like gibberish. What the hell was Mattie doing?
Thea reached the last step and peeked around the edge of the door. Lit by a single bare bulb, the attic was crammed with furniture, trunks, shelves loaded with toys and old books, bird cages, hat and coat racks. In the center, about twenty feet away, was a small round table, where her mother was sitting with her head bowed, sporting a bright-red pillbox hat and a pink feather boa. Two other seats at the table were occupied by life-size dolls wearing party hats. A child-size tea service was in the center of the table, and at each place setting were tiny teacups.
Mattie was flitting about, a flower-bedecked straw hat on her head, continuing her inane riff about a tea party. The sight was so bizarre, so unnerving, that Thea had to blink several times to make sure that she wasn’t in the middle of a nightmare. But, no, it was real, and Mattie was so much worse than Thea had ever imagined—and right now this freakish Amazon was clearly in the middle of a psychotic episode. She had to get Mother out of here, but how?
The tea table was too far away from her, yet Thea still calculated whether or not she could get to her mother and snatch her away before Mattie could stop her. Not likely. But Mattie’s back was to her at the moment, and she eased herself around the door, golf club held behind her.
Mattie whirled, a cheek-cracking grin on her face. “Hey, Daphne! It’s Brenda Starr! I told you she’d come. Now we can get started.”
Mother lifted up her head and stared at Thea. “S’not Brenda Starr,” she said, her voice querulous and defiant. “It’s my Dottie.”
Thea nodded, so pleased with this greeting that she could have burst into tears. “That’s right, Mother,” she said. “What’s going on here?”
Mattie snorted and stepped closer. “Whazzit look like?” she said. “We’re having a tea party. A real tea party—not like that political thingamabob. You,” she added in a dogmatic voice, pointing to an empty seat, “sit over there.”
“All right,” Thea said, edging farther into the room. “What’s it for? Is this a celebration?”
Mattie stopped, a few feet away from the table. A puzzled look screwed up her face. “Yeah,” she said finally. “Yeah, you could say that.”
“What are you celebrating?” Thea said, moving still closer, turning her body so she could hide the golf club at her side.
Mattie gave her a scathing glance. “Whaddya think? I got rid of them all for you. Now you got nothin’ to worry about.”
Thea felt as if she had been punched in the gut. “You—you what?”
Mattie rolled her eyes. “Jeez, I thought you was smart, Brenda Starr. Do I hafta spell it out for ya?”
Thea recognized an opening, a way for her to buy time to figure out how to get her mother away from Mattie. “Well, I guess I’m not as smart as you give me credit for,” she said. “Why don’t you tell me?”
Mattie let out a world-weary sigh. “Yeah, okay,” she said. She was standing next to a large trunk. Its lid was raised, and she rooted around in its contents for several seconds before she produced another pillbox hat, this one in bright blue, and threw it at Thea. “Put that on and sit down.”
Thea grabbed the hat out of the air with her left hand, and popped it on her head. She had to walk around a rusty plant stand and a pile of broken baskets to get to the table. Mattie’s eyes never left her as she sat where Mattie had ordered her to—between two dolls and directly across from her mother—and she managed to slip the golf club down to the floor next to her chair.<
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She gave Mother a look she hoped was reassuring, and was pleased to see another flash of recognition in her eyes. “Why don’t I pour some tea?” she said, glancing to Mattie for approval.
Mattie shook her head. “No. Mother pours. You oughta know that.”
“Oh, you’re right,” Thea said. “But Mother’s tired. She’s had a long day.” She reached out with a tentative hand for the little plastic teapot.
“Don’t touch that!” Mattie barked.
Thea drew her hand back. “Whatever you say,” she muttered.
“That’s right,” Mattie crowed. “It is whatever I say. Mother belongs to me now!”
Thea’s blood went cold as she flashed on the body in the freezer below. “But you have your own mother,” she protested.
Mattie flinched, almost as if Thea had struck her. “No!” she wailed. “No! She died. She left me! Alone! All alone!”
“What happened?” Thea said, knowing she was risking Mattie’s anger, but needing to know the truth.
Mattie wrinkled up her brow. “We were watching The Wizard of Oz, our favorite movie. She loved Toto, so when the flying monkeys grabbed Dorothy and Toto, I looked over at her. At first I thought she had fallen asleep, but I couldn’t wake her up.” She sighed. “I’ll never be able to watch that movie again.”
Thea felt a ripple of relief run through her. At least Mattie hadn’t killed her own mother.
“But you never told anyone about that,” she said, her tone sympathetic.
“Acourse not,” Mattie practically spat at her. “They woulda kicked me outta the group.”
“Oh,” Thea muttered, surprised that belonging to a group would mean that much to an anti-social personality like Mattie.
“I wouldn’ta been able to see my friend.” Mattie smiled. It was an ugly, snaggle-toothed smirk. “Georgie Porgie.”
“Ah.” Thea nodded. It all came back to George. And Mattie’s fixation on him. Was it his death that had set her off on a murderous rampage?
Mattie began to sway. “Georgie Porgie,” she repeated in that singsong voice. “Pudd’n ‘n pie.” She picked up her skirt and swished it back and forth. “Kissed the girls and made them cry.” She giggled. “But when the boys came out to play, Georgie Porgie ran away.” Her face twisted into an angry frown. “Only Georgie didn’t run away. He was pushed.”
Dramatic pause, then, “I saw it.”
For a moment Thea thought she had misunderstood her. “What?” she blurted out. “How could you...?” She shut her mouth, deciding it was better just to let Mattie blather on.
Mattie smirked again, then reached down and started pulling out the contents of the trunk she was standing over. A hat flew across the room, followed by a shawl, then some gloves, a couple of dresses. All the while she kept glaring at Thea. “I was there. I saw it,” she said, her voice defiant.
Thea shot a glance at her mother, wondering if Mattie’s words were registering with her. Mother’s brow was furrowed, as if she were straining to understand. Her troubled eyes revealed a faint flicker of comprehension. Thea’s heart hurt for her, and she wanted to reach across the table and cover her mother’s ears so she wouldn’t even have the possibility of hearing again the story of her husband’s death. But, instead, she turned her gaze back to Mattie. “Why were you there,” she asked, sensing that the question was expected.
Mattie shrugged and tossed a red sweater over her shoulder. “I watched Georgie. I liked to keep track of him. You know, see what he was doing.”
A pleated skirt went flying over the other shoulder. “I was kinda surprised he took Daphne for a walk that day. It was so windy...and cold, it was real cold.” She reached deeper into the trunk and pulled out a purple cardigan, looked at it for a moment as if it spurred some ancient memories, and then flipped it behind her. “I saw what Fred Collins did,” she said. Her eyes narrowed, coming back to rest on Thea. “I wanted to kill him right there and then. But I was too far away. Him and that idiot son of his—that boy pushed Daphne away when she tried to follow them. They got out of there real fast. But I made sure that Daphne got to Georgie’s car all right and I called the police.”
So Whit had been right about thinking someone else was there. Then Thea realized he had lied about making the 911 call. The bastard!
Mattie was aware that she had lost her audience for a moment. “Hey, wake up, Brenda Starr,” she shouted. “I’m tellin’ you important stuff here!”
Thea nodded as if she were chastened, and put her hands together in her lap, out of Mattie’s sight.
Mattie reached into the trunk and threw out a striped scarf and a pair of green mittens. “I knew I was gonna hafta kill Fred to get back at him for Georgie,” she said, “but after that day they stopped goin’ to the overlook. I hadda wait until today.” She smiled. “But I got ‘im.”
She paused for a few seconds, looking down into the trunk, then pulled out an orange woolen hat and threw it away. “And you know that was me that got rid of that stupid cousin of Georgie’s, dontcha?” Her eyes were glittering with pride.
Thea nodded. “I sensed it was you. I thought you were there that first night when I went outside and Mother had wandered off to the neighbors’ house. I—I heard you.”
Mattie chuckled. It was the same sound that Thea remembered hearing when she was in the backyard, right before Cousin Bud knocked her down. “He shoved me,” Thea said. “Did you see him do that?”
Another chuckle. “Yeah, he was so drunk he could hardly stand. I dunno why he did that to you—you woulda never known he was there if he hadn’ta done that.” She sighed. “But he was startin’ to be a pest, so I got ridda him, too.”
“A pest?” Thea echoed.
Mattie sneered. “He was gettin’ in my way. Every time I went to Georgie’s house he was there, hangin’ around. He bugged me.” She made that strangled chuckling noise again. “So I swatted him—real good, too.”
“Ah,” Thea said, nodding as if she actually approved of Mattie’s actions. “So how often did you go to George’s house?”
Mattie threw another scarf out of the trunk. “Oh, c’mon,” she said, her tone scornful. “Whaddya askin’ me that for? You saw me. I was there almost every night.”
“What about the phone calls? Was that you, too?”
Mattie nodded. “Yeah, but I got bored with that. It was more fun to watch the house. I laughed whenever I saw ya lookin’ out the window.” She chuckled. “I knew I was makin’ you nervous.”
“Well, you did that all right,” Thea said. “Then you tried to run me down with your car.”
“Yeah, well you shouldn’ta tried to spy on me!” Mattie thrust out her chin. “I didn’t like that—so I showed ya!”
Thea realized they were probably coming to the end of this discussion—and she still hadn’t figured out how she was going to rescue her mother. Mattie was too far away for her to reach with the golf club...
“I’m sorry about your sister,” Mattie said, tossing a brown sweater out of the trunk.
“Beryl?” Thea said, and she noticed Mother perking up at the mention of Beryl’s name.
“Yeah, I’m sorry I kilt her, but she got in my way.”
Mother started to mewl, and both Mattie and Thea stared at her. “My baby,” Mother cried, “my baby!”
Mattie’s eyes clouded up with confusion. She seemed genuinely surprised by this emotional response. Obviously, she had expected a different kind of reaction from her hostage.
Thea seized on this moment to strike. In one swift move she reached down for the golf club, grabbed it and jumped up, then darted around the table, holding it out in front of her like a sword. “Stay away from her!” she shouted at Mattie.
It was surprising how quick on her feet the six-foot Mattie was. Before Thea could get around the table, Mattie had grabbed Mother by the arm, jerked her to her feet, and dragged her over to the now-empty trunk.
Thea stood frozen, feeling helpless at the sight of her mother’s terror-fill
ed face.
Then Mattie shoved Mother into the trunk, slammed down the lid, turned the key in the lock and pulled it out. “Mine!” she chortled. “Mine!” Then she stuffed the key down the front of her blouse.
A wave of rage flooded Thea’s body, but she still couldn’t move. Her vision blurred as a red haze passed in front of her eyes. The bitch! Mattie had heard Thea tell the support group the story of Mother being trapped in the trunk in George’s attic, how Mother had become hysterical—Mattie had planned this! To Mattie, Mother wasn’t a real flesh-and-blood person, she was just another trophy—one of her “dollies.” She could easily let Mother die in that trunk.
Thea lurched toward Mattie, brandishing the golf club. She could hear Mother’s muffled cries. “Let her out of there!” she screamed. “She’ll die!”
Mattie stared at the golf club. “Hey, Tiger Woods! Whaddya goin’ to do with that?”
“Give me that key!” Thea yelled, hoping that, like Sam had once told her, the mere threat of violence was sometimes enough to stop most ordinary people. “Give me that key!”
Mother’s cries were turning into hysterics.
Mattie laughed. “Make me!”
Oh, God. She was going to have to get physical. Thea knew she couldn’t let Mattie see how afraid she was, couldn’t let Mattie exploit her bodily superiority. She clenched her teeth and swung the golf club back, but her heavy coat restricted her and there wasn’t enough room to complete the arc—she knocked over a coat rack—and when she brought it around she was only able to strike her target with a glancing blow on the arm.
Yet this seemed to enrage Mattie, and with a frightening ferocity she reached out and jerked the golf club from Thea’s hands. But instead of turning it on Thea, she flung it away in a grandiose gesture—as if she knew that her superior size and weight wouldn’t need the advantage of a weapon.
What Has Mother Done? Page 26