Snowfire

by Phyllis A. Whitney

  I knew how much I needed counseling, and there was only one person to turn to. I stole through the trees until I could reach the drive at a point out of sight of the house. Then I hurried desperately toward the lodge.

  Dinner was already in progress, but Clay had eaten earlier, and he was alone in his office. I flung myself into the chair across from his desk without taking off my things, out of breath and thoroughly distraught. He looked at me for a moment without surprise and then knelt to pull off my boots, and helped me out of my parka. When I started to talk, he listened to me, gave me all his attention while I told him everything that had happened since I’d left the lodge last night.

  Once when I came to a break, he asked if I’d had anything to eat for dinner, and when I said I couldn’t eat, he went to the kitchen and brought me back a bowl of hot oyster stew and crackers. This I could manage, and I ate the stew while I finished my story, including in it the things that had happened most recently—my being locked in the tower, Julian learning who I was, and the strange scene in which Emory had rushed off in his car taking his skis, and Shan had gone up to the attic, and then had sped off in her own car, also carrying skis.

  “Why?” I demanded of Clay. “Why should those two go dashing off with skis at this time of the evening—as though something desperate was happening?”

  He could only shake his head. “It will work out,” he assured me. “When they come home, we’ll know. Julian saw Shan leaving—he’ll ask her.”

  “I feel awfully queer,” I said. “As if something was going to happen. Something terrible.”

  He came around the desk and took my cold hands into his. “I don’t doubt that you’re terrified after all that’s occurred. You don’t need to play hostess tonight. If you like you can have your room upstairs and stay there. Why not go to bed now and relax? I can give you a sleeping pill, if you like. Tomorrow you can begin to work things out. Or perhaps they’ll work themselves out.”

  I studied his bearded face with the wide cheekbones and mouth, the gray eyes that watched me with kindness and sympathy. I had the feeling that Clay was good. He might make his own rules in some ways—he might even be trying to protect someone, and he might have been angry with me at times for this very reason, but he was solid, he was good. He would never hurt me.

  “Sometimes I think you know a lot more than you’re telling,” I said.

  He gave my hands a little squeeze and dropped them, his look grave, perhaps a little remote, and I knew there were matters I could not push with him. He would befriend me, help me, lend a listening ear. But there was a barrier I must not pass. Nevertheless, I had to ask another question.

  “What is Shan up to? I know she feels possessive toward Adria and jealous of me, but I think it’s more than that. I have a feeling that I’m almost onto something.”

  “That may be. Shan has something on her mind. I’d like to know what it is myself.”

  His concern for her was real, but I had no time for it now.

  “Why has she set herself against me? Why should she try to torment me in so many petty ways?”

  “Be glad they’re petty,” he told me. “Be glad she’s not like Margot. When Margot crashed she wanted to take the world with her. Now then—suppose you go up to your room and get some rest.”

  I shook my head. “I’m all right now. I feel better. And there’s nothing to frighten me here. It will be good for me to move around and talk to your guests. But I’ll need to go back to the house afterwards. There’s too much hanging fire there. I’m worried because Julian may decide against Stuart—thanks to me.”

  “Julian’s not like that. He may throw you out”—Clay smiled wryly—“but I don’t think he’ll take his anger with you out on Stuart. He’ll probably guess that your coming here was your doing, not Stuart’s.”

  Through the office door I could hear guests coming in from the dining room, and I stood up. “I’ll go out there now. And thank you, Clay. Thank you for listening—and for everything.”

  “I’m afraid I haven’t done much good.”

  “You’ve done a great deal of good. I don’t feel so frantic now. Clay, I haven’t read your story yet. Too much has been happening. But I will soon.”

  He shrugged. “Take your time. A writer learns not to wait around breathlessly for an opinion. Don’t worry about getting back to the house tonight. If you must go I’ll take you. And, Linda—I’m glad you’ve come here. Perhaps you’re the catalyst we’ve needed. Perhaps you’re dangerous to have about, but I think you’re causing something to happen—to come out in the open. We’ve needed that.”

  I turned away from the warmth in his eyes. He still belonged to Shan, while I—I belonged to a Julian who certainly didn’t want me.

  I went out without answering him, to move among the guests. This, I realized suddenly, was the weekend, Friday night. Events had moved so quickly since I’d come to Juniper Lodge that I’d lost all track of time. There could be days in a life when events were so closely packed that you lived a lifetime in their few hours.

  Surely next week Stuart would be out on bail, and he’d come to Graystones. Then he would be able to help me—if Julian allowed me to stay. All the answers might very well lie with Emory, as Stuart had claimed all along. With Stuart here, perhaps Julian could be drawn into a real search for the truth. Except that I had the strange and growing feeling that no one at Graystones truly wanted to know the truth. Because they were afraid of it? Afraid of what might happen to someone they loved and wanted to protect?

  I was more than a little absent-minded that evening. I found myself catching words and phrases when people talked to me, without really concentrating on their meaning. At least the weekend crowd was large enough so that they mostly amused themselves. The editor from Connecticut had come with his combo and they were keeping everything on the same attractive informal plane—singing their own songs, getting the group to join in.

  I don’t know when it was that I realized Clay was no longer in evidence. I needed to relay a question which had been asked me by a guest, but he was nowhere in the lounge. I tried his empty office, and then went out to the kitchen where the help was finishing up. No one knew where he’d gone, no one had seen him, and he’d left no word.

  I looked in the rear vestibule where outdoor things were hung and saw that his jacket and boots were gone. I flung on my parka and dashed outside along the snow walk that led to where he kept his car. It too was gone. Whether he’d carried his skis with him or not, I didn’t know, but I had the feeling that Clay too had driven off to the slopes to see what was happening with Emory and Shan. In a way, I was glad of that. When he came back he would surely have a few answers.

  The combo was playing, and the guests were doing fine on their own. I went out to the kitchen and made myself a sandwich, suddenly hungry, and while I ate I talked with the boy who was taking dishes out of the big washer and stacking them for tomorrow’s use.

  “Have you ever gone skiing at night over in the area?” I asked.

  He grinned at me, ready any time to talk about skiing. “Sure. Who hasn’t?”

  “I haven’t,” I said. “What’s it like?”

  He shrugged, clattering dishes. “There’re lights on all the trails. And it’s colder—and maybe quieter. You feel—sort of alone when you go down the slopes at night.”

  “Is it more dangerous?”

  “Not if you take care. The light’s not as bright, of course, as by day. But sometimes there’s a moon. Like tonight.”

  I finished the sandwich and went back to my duties. I didn’t know why uneasiness had begun to grow in me, but I felt increasingly jittery, and when the phone rang in Clay’s office, I ran toward it. It rang three times before I got through the lounge and had the door closed behind me. When I picked up the receiver my hand was shaking.

  “Hello, Linda?” That was Clay’s voice, and I felt an immediate and unjustified relief.

  “Yes!” I cried. “Why didn’t you let me know you were g
oing out?”

  “Don’t waste time on questions,” he said curtly. “There’s been an accident on the slopes. A bad one. Emory Ault. He’s been killed in a fall. Ski Patrol is going down for him now. I’ve phoned Julian and he’s coming out right away. But he wants you at the house to stay with Adria. Otherwise Adria will be alone. Shan’s at the base lodge. Will you hurry? I’m sorry I can’t get you back to the house, but you’ll be all right—now. I’ve got to go, Linda. Good-by.”

  He hung up and I stood staring at the phone for a moment before I put the receiver back. Emory—dead? Did that mean the end of all our troubles? Did that mean they’d now let Stuart go—because the prosecution’s main witness could no longer testify? There was no telling. It would depend on the evidence they’d collected. But I knew what Clay had meant—that I’d be all right now—because Emory was gone. It was hard to believe that he could have fallen to his death. Though the fact had just been given me, I found it hard to accept. In his sixties Emory had been more alive than many who were younger.

  I returned to the lounge and spoke to a man who was a long-time guest and knew how things ran better than I did. He agreed to take charge if there was any need—keep the fire going and the guests unalarmed. I had to tell him there’d been an accident and that Clay had to stay away, but he asked no difficult questions, and I hurried into my things and started back to the house.

  This time I took the short cut, in spite of deep snow. I couldn’t endure the delay of the drive. Sometimes I went into snow over my boot tops, but I didn’t care, and I managed to plow through in better time than I could ordinarily have managed. Lights were on in the library and in Adria’s room upstairs. I went in to Julian at once.

  He was waiting for me, ready to leave, and he looked a little gray. His eyes told me that I meant nothing personal to him at all—I was simply someone who worked for him, and he gave me directions curtly. Adria was still awake. He’d told her he must go out and that I would be here to stay with her. He hadn’t told her Emory was dead. Let that wait until morning.

  Then he was gone, and I stood at the window watching his car out of sight down the drive, before running upstairs to Adria.

  She was sitting up in bed, reading a book, and when I came through her open door I saw that she had been crying. She regarded me coolly, distantly. I had lost Adria too, now that she knew who I was. Any earlier sympathy she might have felt for Stuart was gone, and I knew Shan had been getting her insidious work in again.

  “Why did everybody rush off?” Adria asked.

  I sat down in a chair beside her bed, feeling breathless and upset. “I think something’s happened over at the area. I expect we’ll find out tomorrow.”

  “An accident, probably,” she said darkly. “They happen every once in a while. Mostly it’s skiers who get reckless and think they’re better than they are. My father says it’s terribly important to be in control and not take silly chances.”

  I nodded without speaking. Emory! Emory, who was an expert, had fallen to his death. Enough of an expert to have taught Julian McCabe and Stuart Parrish. I felt cold and increasingly frightened.

  Adria seemed to dismiss my presence and returned to the pages of her book. Once I asked her what she was reading, and she mumbled at me, clearly annoyed by the interruption. After a while I got up and looked out the window, but moonlight showed nothing stirring, and from here I could not see the lights that must still burn in Emory’s hut, waiting for someone who would never return.

  I needed something to read myself, and I told Adria I’d be right back.

  “You don’t have to stay with me,” she said, sounding as curt as her father.

  I paid no attention, but went to my room and took the envelope containing Clay’s story out of my dresser drawer. Perhaps his words could distract me in these dreadful moments of marking time. Because no matter what I told myself, I did not think anything had ended. Something terrible had happened out on the slopes tonight. Though I didn’t understand what it was, I had the strong conviction that when I knew what had occurred everything would be worse than ever.

  I settled down in a chair not far from Adria’s bed and opened Clay’s manuscript to the first page. This was a carbon copy, and I couldn’t tell whether it had ever appeared in print or not.

  He wrote well—as I already knew from the article he had done about Graystones—and the mystery story caught my interest at once. Even if I hadn’t known Clay, it would have held me, but now it held me doubly because I felt I knew some of the characters. The victim was a woman skier, based, I could guess, on Margot. The house in which she lived was a disguised Graystones, and she was found dead in the attic of the house. She had gone there with the intent to hide something, and had apparently accomplished her purpose before she was felled with a blow from a mysterious attacker. The murderer was a young man who had been seeking her favors and had been repulsed by her. Based on Stuart?

  Suddenly I could read no more, and I felt an unexpected anger against Clay. He had given me this story deliberately, for a purpose. Yet in the past he had always seemed sympathetic toward Stuart, and he had treated me with kindness and consideration. So why—this? I knew now that it had never been published. He wouldn’t have dared because of Julian’s wrath if he ever saw it in print. The next time I saw Clay I would give back his story and demand to know what he meant.

  “What are you so mad about?” Adria asked, and I saw that she was watching me over the top of her book.

  “I’m just—worried,” I told her.

  “Because your brother killed my mother?”

  “He didn’t do anything of the sort,” I told her sharply.

  “Shan says if he did we shouldn’t blame him too much.”

  I had no answer for that, and my hands were shaking as I folded the manuscript pages and replaced them in the envelope.

  “It’s time for you to go to sleep now. Put your book away and I’ll turn out the light.”

  “Aren’t you going to stay with me while I sleep?”

  “Of course not. You don’t have dreams any more. And I’ll be right down the hall in my room if you want me.”

  With more obedience than I expected, she put her book aside and settled down on her pillow. I pulled the covers over her, but I dared not bend and kiss her cheek as I wanted to do. When she was settled, I turned out the light and went to the hall door.

  “I’ll leave it ajar just a little,” I said. Then I had to soften toward her, no matter how she rejected me. “Sleep well, Adria dear. And don’t worry. Your father will take care of everything.”

  “He couldn’t before.” Her voice was only a whisper across the darkened room. “When my mother died.”

  “Go to sleep, dear,” I said again.

  Her voice grew a little stronger. “Why didn’t you tell me you were Stuart’s sister?”

  I heard the break in my voice when I tried to answer. “Oh, Adria, I couldn’t! I couldn’t tell anyone. I wanted to try to help my brother—because he isn’t the one who pushed that chair.”

  “So you had to sneak around and pretend to be my friend, and—”

  “No!” I cried. “You mustn’t ever believe that. I wanted you for my friend first of all.”

  “I don’t believe you,” she said. “So just go away and leave me alone. I don’t want to talk to you any more.”

  I heard tears in her voice, but there was nothing more I could say or do. I slipped away into the hall and started toward my own room. On my way, I began to wonder where the attic stairs might be, and when I reached my room I paused only to put Clay’s story away, and then wandered down the hall to the very end of the house. There was a bathroom here, and a door I took to be a closet, but when I opened it I saw a narrow flight of stairs running upward into gloom. For an instant I was intensely aware of the great house enclosing me, deserted except for Adria and me. A sense of echoing loneliness pervaded the very halls. But I was not to be stopped.

  A search near the door showed me a swit
ch and when I flicked it a dim light came on high overhead. There was no rail, and I climbed carefully, touching the walls for balance. The top step ushered me into a vast, echoing area where the discarded hoardings of generations had been stored. Two dim bulbs hung from the steeply peaked rafters, one near the stairs, and another toward the far end of the house. It was cold and drafty, and I cast a glance behind me toward the stairs now and then, remembering that I’d been locked into the tower earlier. But no one bothered me here, and no orange cat appeared.

  On every hand were trunks and boxes, pieces of old furniture, discarded pictures, chipped dishes. Had the family never thrown anything away? Cobwebs hung from low portions of the rafters, and there was dust everywhere. Shan must have done no housekeeping up here in her lifetime. But where Shan might have brought that piece of paper from Emory’s hut in order to hide it—if that was what she’d done—I couldn’t tell. There were too many possible biding places, and tracks in the dusty floor led this way and that, as though members of the family must have come up here now and then, leaving footprints behind like marks on bare snow.

  I was shivering with cold and uneasiness, and I stayed no more than five minutes before I gave up and went downstairs to my room. I wondered if there might be some customary hiding place in the attic, where generations of children had hidden their treasures, and which Shan might still use. I would have to ask Adria, coax her to tell me. One thing I knew—the attic would draw me back again to its dusky reaches.

  The thought of Adria depressed me all over again. Shan had used to good effect the weapons I’d placed in her hands. How I was to counteract them, I didn’t know.