The Edge of Sleep

by Wiltse, David

  “There’s no reason to think that ...”

  “I feel it,” she said.

  “Just because the case is on your mind ...”

  “I feel it. So do you, don’t you? Jack wouldn’t wander off, he wouldn’t go into the lake by himself. He’s too good a boy, too well behaved, too concerned about ...” She pulled herself away from Becker and put her hands on his face. Her fingers felt icy cold and her eyes looked to Becker as if they were peering toward him from hell itself.

  “Our people in Pennsylvania are trying to dig up a photograph, or at least a detailed physical description, of this guy Ashford so we’ll know what he looks like. When I find the fucking son of a bitch, Ashford or Lamont or whoever he is, I am going to kill him myself.”

  “No ...” Her fingers pressed into his cheeks, closing off whatever he would have said.

  “Understand me, John. I am not discussing this; I am telling you. When we find him, I will kill him. I want you to just get out of the way and let me do it.”

  “You can’t do that.”

  “You do,” she spat.

  Becker stepped back as if slapped across the face with the words. Karen was paying no attention to him, showed no sign that she had hurt him.

  “Because he’s mine,” she said. “He’s mine.” Becker was not certain if she meant her son or Lamont.

  Freed from Becker’s arms, she began to pace, speaking to herself in a tone too low and garbled for him to understand. Becker let her go, watched her spin around the office, as out of control as a child’s toy top running out of speed and wobbling, careening off of anything in its path. And I was just in her path. Becker thought.

  Suddenly Karen stopped and teetered back and forth, all of the strain breaking through the mask and now revealing itself in her face as well as her eyes. She looked abruptly twenty years older and horribly weary.

  But she had been stopped not by fatigue but by a thought. Her shoulders slumped, her head dropped, and her eyes stared blankly in a kind of silent horror. Becker took a step toward her and she turned to look at him, as if seeing him for the first time. As their eyes met, her face suddenly crumpled.

  “I abused him,” she said, but her voice caught on the word “abused” as if it were a live coal on her tongue, parching her mouth on contact.

  Becker started to protest, but she shook her head and repeated herself.

  “I abused him,” she said, clearly this time. “I hit him. I beat him.”

  “Who?”

  “Jack. My Jack,” and she began to weep, the tears flowing almost immediately as if they had been dammed up so long that finally they had to spill over whatever barrier was holding them back.

  “Right after his father left us, right there in the middle of the mess, at the worst part. He did something, Jackie did something, I don’t know what. It wasn’t bad, he wasn’t that naughty, just something, and I started to spank him and I couldn’t stop, I just couldn’t stop. I kept doing it and doing it. I don’t know what happened to me. I just lost control, it seemed right ... I did it three different times. The last time I hit him so much he was bleeding. I made my Jack bleed. John!”

  This time she sought his arms, pressing against him until the gun in her shoulder holster bit into his ribs.

  She spoke into his shirt, her voice muffled by the cloth, distorted by sobs.

  “Have I done this? Have I made him too passive? Is that why it happened?”

  “No, no ... ”

  “That’s your theory, isn’t it? Lamont snatches the passive ones, the ones who don’t shout or fight or ...”

  “No, it isn’t your ...”

  “Isn’t that what you wanted me to agree to? Didn’t you keep banging at me about how I understood it all but wouldn’t admit it? Didn’t you say I shaped him this way, so he’d follow anybody?”

  “For God’s sake, Karen, you can’t blame yourself for this. In the first place, we don’t even know what’s happened ...”

  She tore away from him again.

  “I know.”

  She sank to the floor, wrapping her arms around herself as if to hold in the anguish, and began a high, wordless keen of grief and pain.

  Becker watched her helplessly for a moment as she rocked back and forth, emitting a sound that sent chills through him. He knelt beside her, his arm around her, and she turned to him abruptly, clutching his shirt and pulling his face toward hers. She pressed her lips against his with such force that she pushed him off balance.

  “God damn it, help me, Becker! I can’t make it till morning, I can’t take it. I’m dying here. I’m dying.”

  She scrabbled at his belt buckle, then stood and turned off the only light in the room. Becker rose to his feet and she was back at him, clawing at his belt. She still wore her blouse and the shoulder holster, but somehow between the light switch and Becker she had managed to remove her skirt and pantyhose.

  “Help me. Christ, John, help me,” she muttered. With his belt and zipper undone she pressed her lips against his again, then, frantically, attacked his mouth with her tongue. It was not a kiss. Becker knew, but another way of crying out in pain.

  He tried to calm her, pulling away from her ravenous mouth and kissing her neck, running his hands down her arms, under the back of her blouse, and pulling her body into his with gradually increasing pressure. She writhed against him, impatient, struggling, and the sour smell of her fear-sweat rose up strongly.

  His hand moved up to cup her breast, teasingly soft and slow, but she mashed into him, rubbing wildly.

  “Don’t be gentle,” she cried. “Not now!”

  Becker tried to lower her to the floor, but she shrugged him off and turned her back to him, pushing her hips back until her half-naked body pressed against his groin.

  He took her from the rear, standing up, his pants at his knees, while she braced her arms against the edge of the desk. She thrust harder than he did, growling low in her throat and grunting with every effort as they hammered at each other. He could not be too hard for her, or fast enough. Becker felt as if she were punishing herself, and using him as the instrument. It was the closest thing to being raped he would ever experience, he thought. When he had shuddered to a climax she simply straightened up and walked away, discarding him as if he were a tool that had served its purpose.

  Half an hour later she took him again and then a third time an hour before sunrise with Becker half asleep and lying on his back. When she had finished her urgent actions and left him supine on the cot, she returned to the window where she had spent most of the night. Becker watched her staring into the night, looking first toward the lake, then at the woods, then back toward the lake, her heart being ripped apart by the two horrifyingly unacceptable possibilities.

  Chapter 21

  EDGAR RAPPAPORT COULD NOT believe his luck. He had taken what looked on the map to be a shortcut between Springfield and Pittsfield and had ended up on a steadily narrowing back road that was threatening to become a cow path. He had been dawdling behind an ultracautious Volvo for the better part of half an hour, aching to pass but being frustrated at every opportunity—and there were few on these hilly, winding roads—by oncoming traffic. There would seem to be no other cars on the road except the Volvo in front of him until they reached a brief section with dotted passing lines and then, out of nowhere, would materialize another car, coming straight at him, pushing him back behind the Volvo. Meanwhile the road seemed to be shrinking in width with each passing mile.

  His luck, however, was good, better than he could have hoped for, because when he was forced to stop at the only stoplight in a village at the base of a mountain, he saw her stopped opposite him, going the other way. It took him a moment to remember her name, but it was her, no question about it. He even remembered the dull green Dodge Charger; he had followed it from the mall to her motel.

  She did not see him, did not even glance in his direction when the light changed and she drove past him, less than twenty feet away. There was no mista
king her. Her face was stamped into Edgar’s memory with all the force of major trauma. He remembered her pulling his clothes off, urging him to fuck her for all he was worth, then demanding more, taunting him, coming at him with a razor.

  Dee, that was her name. Dee the crazy lady. Dee the lunatic. And now, most important. Dee alone. Dee without her monster boyfriend.

  Edgar made a U-turn in the intersection and followed her. He stayed well behind the Charger, trying to think through his options. What he wanted was to have her arrested. No, not just arrested, convicted, sent away and locked up. Let her know what he felt like in the trunk of his car, only for about five or six years. The problem was to arrange that without involving himself in any way that might get back to his wife. Or better yet, fuck her first, then get her arrested. Despite the brutal aftermath, Edgar still remembered the sex with Dee as the wildest, most exciting he had ever had. And she had obviously loved it, too. She couldn’t get enough, in fact, which had been the problem. Edgar thought of ways of getting her alone and disarmed; then he would give her all the sex she could handle—but not when she wanted it, when he decided it was time for more. Chain her to the bedpost, something like that. He laughed at the thought, then realized it wasn’t so outlandish after all. People did do things like that, he read about them. Did it willingly, that was the point. He had no intention of setting himself up for prosecution; he wasn’t going to kidnap her, but she was just the kind of woman who might well be talked into it. She’d like it in the long run, no question. He was scheduled for one night in Pittsfield, but he could stretch it to two.

  Edgar pulled a little closer to the Charger so he could make out her head clearly. She was a good-looking woman. And sexy. Very sexy. Crazy, maybe, but as horny as Edgar himself. And alone now, thank God.

  He wouldn’t have to actually force her, he thought. She’d be willing enough once she understood it was in her own interest. All he had to do was threaten to call the cops on her, swear he would testify against her—how would she know that was a bluff? It wasn’t force, just a little inducement to do what she loved doing anyway. Then get her into a motel without razor blades and the rest would take care of itself. He didn’t really mean to tie her up—although that was an intriguing thought.

  Edgar breathed deeply and tried to dismiss the whole fantasy. He was alone on the road far too much; the solitude was not good for the imagination. He was never as horny at home as he was when he was traveling, he never thought of tying up his wife. Nor, he was sure, did his wife, which was part of the problem. If Mimi showed a little more sense of adventure, hell, if she even seemed to want him, if it wasn’t always Edgar who had to make the overtures, he probably wouldn’t be in this condition in the first place. He remembered Dee on her hands and knees on the carpet, howling like a beast. Christ, there must be a way. Fuck her blind, then get her arrested. Or just fuck her if that was all he could manage. But do it a lot, enough to make up for what she’d done to him. He almost rear-ended the Charger before he realized it had stopped at a railroad crossing. She looked in her rearview mirror; he could see her eyes searching his face. Of course she remembered him, he thought; it was not the kind of night she’d forget. And since she knew he was there, he had to do something or just turn around and drive away. Amid flashing lights and clanging bells, a freight train surged past the crossing. Dee was going nowhere now. She was pinned between the train in front and Edgar’s car behind her. She held his eyes in the mirror now and he saw her lips move. It was either get out of the car now or just look at her in the mirror, then drive away and forget the whole thing.

  Still not certain what he was going to say, Edgar walked to Dee’s car. He leaned down with a big grin.

  “Fancy meeting you here,” he said.

  “Small world,” she said. The train was making so much noise he could barely hear her.

  “Do you remember me?”

  “Sure,” she said with that mocking smile. Edgar remembered that smile. Sexy as hell, as if she were daring him to make the next move. “You’re Lyle.”

  Edgar looked at the train for a moment, willing it to hurry past. Whatever he was going to say, he didn’t want to have to shout it.

  “Do you remember me?” she asked.

  “Vaguely,” said Edgar, trying to muster a copy of her derisive grin. “You’re Dee.”

  “Good boy.”

  “I’ve been thinking about you, actually,” Edgar said.

  “Isn’t that funny? I’ve been thinking about you, too. You want to go first?”

  She looked up at him under lowered lashes. “I always prefer it if the man makes the first move,” she said.

  Edgar said, “That’s not the way I remember it, but I don’t mind. What I was thinking is, should I call the cops and tell them where to find you, or should I take you to the nearest motel and we can work something out together?”

  “Do you have a phone in your car?” she asked.

  “No.”

  “Then you can’t make a phone call to the police from here, anyway, can you? So you might as well go to the nearest motel.”

  “I was hoping you’d say that.”

  “As a matter of fact, Lyle, the closest motel from here is mine.”

  “Oh, no,” said Edgar. “We’re not going to your motel.”

  “Why not? We could start working things out in five minutes.”

  “Because your gorilla boyfriend will be there.”

  “Oh, Ash isn’t at the motel.”

  “He isn’t, huh?” -

  “No.”

  “How do I know that?”

  “I just told you. Don’t you believe me?”

  “Do you think I’m an idiot?”

  “Yes, Lyle, I certainly do.” She smiled so brightly at him that Edgar thought he had misunderstood her because of the noise of the train.

  “I promise you Ash isn’t at the motel,” she said.

  “Why should I believe that?”

  “Because he’s right here,” she said. She took hold of his tie and pulled him toward her. For a second he thought she was going to kiss him, but then he saw the movement in the back of the car. The whole seat seemed to rise up, then an arm flashed out. Edgar jerked away reflexively, but Dee held him within the car by his necktie. He felt the crushing hand on his throat before he saw the face and enormous bulk of Ash emerge from under the blanket.

  Jack heard the voices dimly, all sounds being muffled by the blanket and the body of the man on top of him. The motion of the car had stopped, there was a roar and a clanging which he knew to be a train crossing, then the voices of a man and a woman talking above the clamor of the train. The man’s body was not really on him; he felt no weight from it, just the shape of it, like a huge shell holding him down, or, oddly, protecting him.

  Suddenly the shell was torn away as the body vaulted upwards. Jack saw light and lifted his head, blinking. He saw the man’s arm stretching over the seat back, heard a man gargling dryly as if something was caught in his throat.

  Jack saw the car door, clawed at the handle, then crawled out from under the blanket, out from under the man’s body. The man seemed to have forgotten him. Then Jack was on the road and he began to run without seeing where he was going, just away, as fast as he could, off the road so the man and the nurse couldn’t follow him. For a second he heard the gargling sound grow louder, more desperate, but then Jack had sprinted beyond the sound. He leaped into the shallow dry ditch next to the tracks and ran. The train slammed by him, dangerously close, and Jack recoiled, amazed that he hadn’t noticed it before.

  Almost at once he knew he had made a mistake. The ditch grew deeper, trapping him in its recesses. He had no choice but to continue straight ahead; climbing the bank to flatter ground would take him too long and he knew he had to flee as if hotly pursued even though he had not yet looked back to see if he was being chased. He didn’t dare to look back; he knew that he would be paralyzed by fear if he saw someone coming.

  He could hear nothing; ther
e was nothing to hear over the roar of the train. The wheels clattered against the steel rails and the cars swayed overhead as if they must surely topple into the ditch and crush him.

  The ditch ran parallel to the tracks, around a curve, seeming to sink almost directly under the wheels of the train that never stopped, and then it began to rise again, growing shallower by the step. At the end of it he could see first one, then another house. Within a few steps he could be able to leap out of the ditch, into the adjoining field, then straight to the houses and people and safety.

  He made the leap and felt something catch at his T-shirt. He hung on the lip of the ditch, teetering there, flailing his arms to keep his balance as something tried to pull him back down. He saw a girl in the backyard of a house staring at him from her swing set. She raised a hand tentatively, not certain if he was rotating his arms in a greeting.

  Jack’s weight was thrown to the side and he spun around, still atop the edge of the ditch. He ducked his head and found himself face to face with the nurse who was panting hard, her lips curled into a snarl. Jack pulled backwards and she peeled the T-shirt off his body like she was skinning a rabbit. Suddenly released, he stumbled and sat down abruptly, still looking straight at the nurse in the ditch. Before he could get up, she had him by the ankle. It occurred to him to yell as he was being dragged back into the ditch, but it seemed he needed all his breath to resist the nurse. Jack saw the girl on the swing watch in amazement as he disappeared, inch by inch, into the ditch. He managed to scream very briefly before he sank out of sight entirely and a hand clapped over his mouth.

  The nurse was calling him “precious” and her “darling boy” as she dragged and carried him back to the car, but Jack was too frightened to make any sense of her words. A huge man waited by the car, another man hanging limply from his hand. The big man looked puzzled, still clutching the other by the throat, holding him as if not quite certain what to do with him, like a toy rendered useless now that the game was completed. Jack had seen a cat look like that, baffled and no longer interested, embarrassed to explain how the mouse had gotten in its mouth in the first place.