Into The Darkness

by Kathy

  The servants had gone straight from the church to the house, missing the services at the cemetery—no small sacrifice on their part, as Gran was quick to acknowledge. Giving both hands to Frances Polanski, the housekeeper, who met them in the hall, she said, "I know I needn't ask if everything is ready for our guests, Frances. Thank you for being so helpful."

  Frances must be well into her sixties; she had been in charge of the house ever since Meg could remember, and she hadn't changed in twenty years. Her hair was the same insistent auburn, her figure as rigidly corseted into slimness, her round face as plump and highly colored. She treated Gran like a beloved but very young child, and she ran the household with consummate efficiency. She would have been the perfect housekeeper had it not been for one failing—a fondness for sentimental old novels that led her to adopt the mannerisms of various fictitious housekeepers. With a sinking feeling Meg realized that since they left the house Frances had switched roles. That morning she had been the devoted family servant, wiping her tears away with the corner of her apron, and calling Meg "dearie." I should have known, Meg thought dismally. On this day of all days, I might have expected Frances would turn into Mrs. Danvers.

  The sinister housekeeper of Rebecca did not acknowledge her mistress's greeting with so much as a murmur. Face cold as a marble mask, she took the cat's leash from Gran and summoned a hovering maid with a brusque snap of her fingers. Armed with a brush, the young woman led Mary away.

  Meg started to follow, knowing she wouldn't get away so easily. Frances barred the way, arms folded, eyes boring into Meg's.

  "So you think you've laid him to rest."

  "Think?" Meg caught herself. A discussion with Mrs. Danvers was depressing at best; in her present mood it would be unendurable. "Excuse me, Frances, I've got to—"

  "Think," Frances intoned. When she was Mrs. Danvers her voice dropped a full octave. "He's not at rest. Nor will he be until the truth is known. I've had no chance to talk to you before—"

  "Well, this certainly is not the time," Meg said desperately. "The guests will be arriving any minute."

  "Let them wait. He waited long enough. But you never came."

  Meg felt the blood drain from her face; Frances always knew how to hit a person where it hurt. "I caught the first plane, Frances; I didn't even pack, just threw things into a suitcase. If I'd known how ill he was . . . No one told me. Why didn't you tell me?"

  Under direct attack Mrs. Danvers retreated, to be replaced, if only briefly, by kindly old Hannah, the loyal servant of the March family. "Honey, I didn't know. Nobody did. It was real sudden. . . ." Her features froze and her voice deepened. "Too sudden. There's a curse on this house, I tell you. He was the first. There's two more to come."

  The wide hallway was filling with people. The maids were taking coats. "Don't talk nonsense, Frances," Meg snapped. "This is no time for your morbid ideas. I have duties and so do you."

  "Your first duty is to the dead. He won't rest, I tell you, not while his murderer walks free."

  Meg was so furious she couldn't speak. This was too much, even from Frances. She gave the housekeeper the look that sent her subordinates at the ad agency running for cover, and Frances shrank back, registering exaggerated horror with every muscle of her face and body. Believing her reproof had produced the desired effect, Meg turned, and found herself face-to-shirtfront with someone who had come up behind her—probably just in time to hear Frances's lunatic accusation. "I'm sorry," she began, looking up.

  It was the man she had seen in church and at the cemetery— the king, the leper. His expression was no more benign than it had been earlier. "Oh, don't apologize until you know who I am. I'm the one she was talking about. Dan's murderer."

  Meg held out her hand. "How do you do."

  His face wasn't designed to display emotion, but her reaction obviously took him aback, and the long pause before he responded gave her time to study him in more detail. He was wearing a dark suit that must be the one he reserved for weddings and funerals; though scarcely worn, it was several years out of date. Nice tie—heavy silk, patterned in shades of blue and turquoise—but too narrow. Also reserved for weddings and funerals? His expression was not; she had a feeling it was his normal look. Grim was an understatement. He could have served as the model for a statue of an Aztec god, one of the ones who accepted the flayed skins of victims as tribute.

  The hand that finally took hers was big and blunt-fingered; the skin of his palm felt as rough as a snake's scales. "You're a cool one," he said.

  "Not cool. Just numb."

  Heavy lids, fringed with bristly dark lashes, veiled his eyes for a moment. It was the only sign of embarrassment or apology he displayed, but his deep voice softened slightly when he responded. "Yeah. He was very proud of you."

  It struck Meg as an odd thing to say. Dan hadn't been proud of her; quite the reverse, he had never forgiven her for refusing to follow the career he had laid out for her. "He loved you," would have been more accurate, and more conventional. Was "love" a word this man couldn't pronounce? Who the devil was he? Yet when she started to ask, her throat was tight with unexpected tears and the words wouldn't come. Proud of her? Dan?

  Before she could gain control of her voice he had dropped her hand and turned away, yielding place to others who were waiting to greet her.

  Some of the faces were familiar, most were not. Meg responded to their murmured condolences with robotlike courtesy. It was with genuine relief and pleasure that she finally found herself facing an old friend. Darren Blake was Dan's personal lawyer, having inherited the job from his father. He was only a few years older than Meg; they had played together as children, and he had always been like a protective older brother, defending her against the rougher boys and Cliffs merciless teasing. Meg was not surprised that he had taken to the law, for even as a child he had preferred argument to fisticuffs. He was extremely shortsighted, and the thick-lensed, horn-rimmed glasses seemed as much a part of his face as his gentle brown eyes.

  The clipped dark mustache he had cultivated since she last saw him gave some distinction to a face that was otherwise unremarkable, pleasant rather than conventionally handsome. The bristly hairs tickled her cheek when he bent to kiss her, . holding her hands in a warm, comforting grasp. His suit was in style and expensively tailored, but it didn't quite conceal a slight tendency toward embonpoint.

  The crowd had thinned, and Meg felt she could relax her guard at last. She let out a long, shaken sigh, and Darren squeezed her hand. "Bad day?"

  The genuineness of his sympathy compensated to some extent for the banality of the question. "Bad three days—week— however long it's been. I've lost track."

  With the air of a man gallantly defying convention, Darren put his arm around her and led her toward a chair, capturing a glass of wine from a passing maid along the way. "Sit down and relax for a minute," he ordered. "You look exhausted."

  "No, I look like hell, and I feel like it, too." Meg took a sip of sherry. "Mmmm. Just what the doctor ordered. Maybe I'll take the decanter up to my room and get sloshed."

  "The worst is over, Meg."

  "I wonder. If Frances goes on being Mrs. Danvers, we're in for a sticky evening." Darren looked puzzled, and she realized he was unaware of that particular family joke. She didn't feel like explaining, but she was still furious at Frances and had to unload on someone. "She's predicting doom and gloom and family curses. I really think she's gone over the edge, she said that it was my duty to bring Dan's murderer to justice! Can you believe it? And the worst of it was, the man she was talking about overheard. She meant him to. He was behind me, so I didn't see him, but she was looking straight at him."

  "I saw you talking to him," Darren said slowly.

  The effect of the wine on her empty stomach and weary body was more potent than she had expected. It took her several seconds to react to his statement. "How did you know whom I meant? You aren't trying to tell me—"

  "No, no, nothing of the sort." Darren
looked shocked. "But it's not the first time I've heard that accusation bandied about. Small towns are given to gossip, and they are suspicious of outsiders."

  "Who is he?"

  "I'm surprised you haven't met him. But come to think of it, he's only been in town for three years. You haven't often graced us with your presence, Meg."

  "I've been busy." She had meant to stop at that; she didn't owe Darren Blake or anyone else an explanation for her absence. The mild, reproachful eyes got to her, though. "I saw Dan often, you know that; he came to New York almost every month. Gran too. Darren, if you don't answer my question I'm going to scream."

  "Oh, sorry." Darren blinked. "I can't understand why Dan didn't tell you about him. His name is A. L. Riley. He took over as manager of the store a couple of years ago."

  "Really?" Meg scanned the room with renewed interest, but the man was nowhere in sight. He must have gone into the dining room, where the conventional funeral baked meats were set out.

  So that was A. L. Riley. Dan had mentioned him, not once but a number of times. He had said very little about the man's origins and background; he always claimed he didn't give a damn where a man came from or what he had done, so long as he could use his hands and his brains, and Riley had demonstrated he could and would use both. He excelled at the same skills upon which Dan had prided himself until arthritis crippled his hands: gem setting and goldsmithing, the basic arts of the jeweler. And he had a talent Dan himself lacked: more than a talent, a genuine genius for design.

  If he had said more than that Meg didn't remember; she had done her best not to listen, not only because Dan tended to repeat himself, often and at considerable length, but because the subject was so uncomfortable. A tactful man wouldn't have talked about it any more than was strictly necessary; a sensitive man would have understood why she had fought his efforts to bring her into the profession that elicited such terrible memories. But then tact had never been one of Dan's attributes, and the business was an obsession with him. All his life he had been searching for an unknown genius—the ultimate designer, who, under his tutelage, might come to rival the great artist-designers of the Renaissance such as Holbein and Cellini. Once before he had found such a man. And that man had betrayed him twice over, not only dying before he could fulfill his promise, but destroying Dan's family in the process.

  That man had been her father.

  "Meg?"

  Darren's concerned voice brought her wrenchingly back to the present. She forced a smile. "I was remembering something . . . something Dan said."

  It was impossible for a man as pink-cheeked and cherubic as Darren to look sly, but he tried. "Something about Riley? Did he ever . . ." He stopped, frowning, as a fresh influx crowded into the house. "We need to talk, Meg, but this isn't the time or the place. Don't forget that we're meeting in the library at five for the reading of the will."

  "Yes, all right," Meg said. Someone was bearing down on her, with the clear intent of expressing commiseration and comfort—a stout elderly woman with a face like that of a Cabbage Patch doll. "Who the hell . . ." Darren murmured, "Mrs. Allan. Head of the library board," and then he moved away. Meg squared her shoulders, pasted a social smile on her face and prepared to do her duty.

  It seemed to go on for hours, but by five o'clock everyone had gone, the last diehard celebrants tactfully swept out by Darren and—not so tactfully—by Frances. Meg had passed beyond exhaustion into a state of relative peace; she was simply too tired to feel anything. Or maybe, she told herself, she was too drunk. How many glasses of sherry had she consumed? People had kept pressing them on her, and after a while she had found it easier to sip than to smile or mouth hypocritical platitudes. Dan had had a good life and a long life, but he hadn't been ready to die and she was not resigned to his loss. "Down into the darkness of the grave, Gently they go, the beautiful, the tender, the kind. ... I know. But I do not approve. And I am not resigned." Dan hadn't been beautiful, or particularly tender, and she was damned sure he hadn't gone gently. But the poet had it right. She did not approve; she was not resigned.

  Consternation replaced the pleasant blur of fatigue brought on by alcohol and poetry when she entered the library. She had been looking forward to the moment when her public duties would end and she would at long last be alone with her family and her childhood friend. Wrong again; the library looked like a theater, there were several dozen chairs arranged in rows before Dan's big mahogany desk. Dan must have set this up too. How many people had he mentioned in that will?

  The servants, of course. They were present, filling the back row—Karen Anderson, the cook; the two maids; old Jeb McComber, the head gardener, who had been with them forever, Frances of course; and several others she didn't recognize. Half the chairs were occupied, and people were still coming in. Barby Bothwell and Mike Potter, Dan's old pals from the Rotary Club, several younger faces that looked familiar, but that she was unable to identify in her present state of bewilderment. And A. L. Riley. He was one of the last to enter, and his expression strongly suggested that he wished he were elsewhere. His scowl changed to an equally unprepossessing smile as he surveyed the rows of chairs and their occupants, passing over Meg with an indifference that made her stiffen with inexplicable anger. Not so inexplicable, perhaps; the arrogance in that leisurely survey was unmistakable, and when he ignored the empty chairs and went to lean against the wall next to the window she was convinced he had deliberately chosen the most conspicuous position possible.

  Darren took a seat behind the desk and opened his briefcase.

  His initial statement—"I must ask you to bear with me; this is not a short or a simple will"—brought an unwilling grin to Meg's face. Dan had discussed his will so often and with such relish that it had ceased to be a symbol of death, and had become a running family joke. He spent hours hunched over his desk revising the long list of bequests and the accompanying comments; when he struck on a particularly felicitous insult or well-turned phrase he repeated it, over and over, to anyone who would listen.

  He'd have been delighted at the success of some of his witticisms. Several times smothered bursts of laughter interrupted Darren's reading. But the insults were reserved for his old pals, and there were more tears than mirth. He had left something to every servant, even those who had been with him a short time; the bequests to cook, gardener and housekeeper were of such generosity that Frances forgot to be Mrs. Danvers, and dissolved into sobs. There was an interminable list of trinkets or mementos to people Meg had never heard of, including a boy named Joey Pentovski, who inherited Dan's ten-speed bike, along with an admonition to let his little brother ride it sometimes.

  The body of the estate went to Mary Mignot, Daniel's beloved wife—but only for her lifetime. After her death it passed to Daniel's sole surviving descendant. . . .

  Meg gasped. Dan had gossiped at great length about minor bequests, but he had never discussed what he meant to do for her. He didn't have to discuss it, she trusted him completely, and he had given her so much already, enough to take care of her in comfort for the rest of her life. If she had thought about the matter, which she preferred not to do, she had known that one day—one far distant day—she would probably be a very wealthy woman. But this—it was arbitrary, unfair, autocratic. It left Gran no discretion about the disposal of the estate, and it made no provision for George, who deserved better of the man he had served so faithfully.

  Gran wasn't surprised, and neither was Henrietta, who reclined regally on Gran's lap. Their faces bore almost identical expressions of smug approval. Meg glanced at her uncle. If the news had shocked or distressed him, he showed no sign of it.

  Darren fixed the crowd with critical eyes and waited until the murmur had subsided before continuing, "... with the sole exception of the establishment known as Daniel Mignot Jewelers, at 13 South Main Street, with all its stock and appurtenances. . . ." Meg bit her lip with mounting impatience as Darren droned on through one qualifying legal phrase after another. So, fine, whoeve
r gets the store gets the plumbing fixtures in the john and the curtains in the show window. . . . What, no mention of the dust under the rug? This was building up to another of Dan's little jokes, she knew it as certainly as if she had seen him chortling over the complex phraseology, the delay. The store was his baby, his darling—his favorite hobby as well as the visible memorial to his skill. Who . . . ?

  Eventually Darren (and Dan) ran out of legalisms. One-half interest in the store to her, Meg. The other half to A. L. Riley.

  The reaction wasn't as mild as a murmur this time; it sounded like a flight of wasps boiling out of a threatened nest. Every head in the room swiveled, as if pulled by a single string— Meg's among them.

  Riley had moved closer to the front of the room. Textured patterns of tree limbs and leaves, stained bright emerald by the dying sun, filled the windows before which he stood. Against the brilliance of gold and green his figure stood out in dark silhouette, lifeless as an inked outline. The contrast between the rich, complex background and the still shape it framed was heraldic, symbolic; trained in art and its metaphors, Meg's imagination found sinister parallels: the Dark Angel in the Garden, Death on a summer afternoon. ...

  For a full minute he held his pose; it might have been astonishment, or defiance, or simple uncertainty that held him motionless. Gradually the voices died into silence, and then A. L. Riley spoke. "That tricky old bastard," he said. Turning, precisely as a guardsman, he walked slowly to the door and went out.

  No one felt like eating the elaborate meal Frances had ordered. "For heaven's sakes, try," Gran said in her sweet, calm voice, as Meg cut her salmon into increasingly tiny pieces and pushed it around her plate. "Cook will be heartbroken if you don't eat; it's her way of expressing her sympathy. And Frances will worry about you."