登陆注册
10483300000003

第3章

The sound of his voice seemed to release her. Gagging, she stumbled toward the sink, almost falling as the weight of the man's head held back the bottom of her robe. She jerked herself free and heard the man's head thump on the door.

She lost her supper then. Chris came over and put his hand against her forehead but she twisted away. He stood beside her helplessly.

When it was over, Helen leaned against the sink panting weakly. Her hand reached automatically for the faucet and the rush of water began to clean the sink.

In the bedroom, Connie was screaming. Chris said, "I'll go to her," and turned away.

"No." Pulling down a dish towel, Helen dried herself, not even looking at him as she started for the door. Her stomach muscles tensed again as she saw the man's blood running across the linoleum. She walked past the body quickly, drying her eyes with the towel. She tried not to think. Her baby was crying, that was all that mattered.

Connie was sitting up in bed.

"What's the matter, darling?" Helen asked, hardly recognizing her voice.

"Mommy!"

As she sank down on the bed, Helen realized how exhausted she felt. She put her arms around Connie and kissed her cheek.

"It's all right, baby" she murmured. She smoothed back the hair from Connie's forehead. "It's all right. Mommy's here."

"Mommy—Mommy…"

"Yes, sweetheart."

She held her child in the darkness and whispered comfort to her even though she knew that she was living in a comfortless world.

When Connie had gone back to sleep, Helen went into the bathroom to wash. The face she saw in the mirror was not a pleasant one.

As she was drying herself, she became conscious of her bare foot and remembered the sliver of glass she'd stepped on. Sitting down on the edge of the bathtub, she looked at the bottom of her foot.

The sliver was a small one. She had to get a pair of tweezers from the medicine cabinet before she could remove it. Pressing out the blood, she cleaned the tiny gash with alcohol. She didn't bother to bandage it.

She sat there with her eyes shut, knowing that she'd have to go back to the kitchen. All she wanted to do was get into bed and stay there. She'd never felt so tired in her life.

She tried to visualize performing as a wife and mother the next day but it was impossible. The continuity of her life seemed to have ceased in that moment when she realized that, for more than seven years, she'd loved only part of a man.

Helen stood and left the bathroom. In the living room, she found her slipper and eased her foot into it. She noticed that the kitchen light was out and wondered if Chris had gone. As she did, he came in by the front door, shut it behind himself and locked it.

"No one seems to have heard anything," he said. "It's lucky Grace and Jack are gone." Grace and Jack were their neighbors on the left.

"Yes," she said. "That's lucky."

"I didn't mean it that way," he said.

Helen let herself down onto the sofa and leaned back heavily. It was so quiet in the house she could hear the humming of the electric clock in the kitchen. Chris stayed by the door, watching her.

"Well…?" she finally asked.

His shoulders slumped. "It's up to you," he said.

"Why me?"

He made no reply.

"No, it isn't up to me," she said. "I don't fit in anywhere."

"Helen, that isn't so!"

"Isn't it?"

"Do you think I enjoyed keeping it from you all these years?"

"I'm sure it doesn't matter."

"But it does!" he cried. "It made me miserable to—!"

"You'll wake up Connie."

Chris stopped.

"If it made you so miserable," she said, "why did you do it"?

He sank down on one of the arm chairs. He put a hand across his eyes. "I was afraid to tell you," he said. "Afraid I might lose you. Afraid I might—"

"—have to go to prison?"

"Thank you," he murmured.

"Well, what do you expect?" Helen turned her head and looked away from him. Suddenly, it occurred to her that she'd never been married. To the world, she was Mrs. Helen Martin; but there was no such person. There was no Christopher Martin and no Connie Martin either. All of them were illusions.

"I thought I'd never have to tell you," Chris said. "I never thought he'd find me. Then that—picture had to be taken. It's fantastic," he went on. "A secret I've kept for almost fifteen years. Ended in a second because some kids won a baseball game!" His laugh was closer to a sob. "It's practically hilarious," he said.

Helen closed her eyes. Now it was as if the other end of the balance—his end—were being weighted. He had risked his life for Connie. He had planned to intercept the man. Wasn't it possible that he'd been less motivated by a desire to hide his secret than by a wish to protect his wife and child? That Chris loved them was beyond denial.

No! Helen sat back stiffly. That he was suffering was his own doing, not hers. He had lied to her. All these years, he had trusted her so little that, rather than speak a simple truth, he had constructed a world of falsehoods around himself. A world which was now at an end.

Chris got up and headed for the hall.

"Where are you going?" she asked, suddenly frightened.

He turned in the hall doorway. "To call the police," he said.

She stared at him.

"And then?" she asked.

"I'll be arrested."

She couldn't stop the cold knotting in her throat and upper chest.

His hands closed slowly into fists.

"I'll go to prison, Helen," he said.

"No, Chris!" She didn't realize how anguished her expression had become.

He stood motionless for a few seconds. Then he walked over to the sofa and sat down beside her. "Do you mean that?" he asked.

"What?"

"That you don't want me to go to prison?"

"I—"

"That you're willing to—to consider doing something else besides call the police?"

Abruptly she was thrust back into nightmare again. Now it was a penny thriller, absurd and ghastly. A murdered man sprawled in the kitchen, her husband sitting beside her, asking her if she was willing to consider— "I don't know," she said, unable to keep her voice from breaking. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Listen to me," he said. "If the body isn't found, there'll be no way for anyone to know what happened."

Helen stared at him blankly. She didn't understand.

Christ looked down at his clenching hands.

"I could take him into the hills," he said in a voice that sounded hideously calm to her. "I could bury him. No one would ever find out."

He looked at her.

"It's either that," he said, "or call the police."

She couldn't answer him.

"Well?"

"Chris, I—"

"Do you want me to go to prison, Helen?" he asked. "I've lived a decent life ever since it happened. You know that. I've done everything I could to atone for my past. Is that all to end because of—him?"

"No." She grasped his hand impulsively.

"Helen." His fingers tightened in hers. "Thank you."

"Don't."

"What?"

"I mean—" She shuddered fitfully. "Oh, God, let's get it over with," she said.

***

The folded newspaper page fell from the man's pocket as Chris was lifting him. Helen picked it up and was about to throw it in the wastebasket when she noticed the story outlined in pencil.

LIFERS ESCAPE PRISON!

LEAVE DEATH TRAIL!

Three convicts sentenced to life

imprisonment for a 1943 murder

escaped last night from—

Helen looked up, shocked. "Murder?"

When Chris saw the expression on her face, he put the body down. Helen handed him the paper and he looked at it.

"Helen, I had nothing to do with it," he said.

She stared at him.

"I had nothing to do with it."

She lowered her gaze from his. "All right, Chris."

"Helen, if you don't believe me—"

"All right, Chris."

He stood quietly for a moment, then put down the paper and went back to the body. Helen heard the man's heels scraping slightly on the linoleum, then the door bumping against him as Chris opened it.

She listened to the sound of the body being dragged down the alley and into the garage through the side door. When the door was closed, she lifted the dishwasher again and reloaded it. Then, turning to the sink, she opened one of the doors beneath it. Taking out the pail, she poured in a mound of soap powder, then ran hot water over it, watching it billow into cloud-like suds.

When Chris came back, she was running the mop back and forth across the puddle of blood on the linoleum, her lips pressed together, her eyes looking straight ahead.

"Here, I'll do it," Chris took the mop from her.

"What about—?"

"What, Helen?"

She cleared her throat. "The—knife," she said.

"I left it in him."

"Oh."

She heard Chris wringing out the mop and found herself imagining how the water in the pail looked. Teeth on edge, she moved past Chris and walked into the living room. She sat until she heard the pail being emptied and rinsed out.

She stood as Chris came in.

"I'll be back as soon as possible," he said.

"I'm going with you," she said.

"What about Connie?"

"We can take her."

"I'd rather you stayed," he said. "It's not going to be pretty."

"What about the other two?" she asked.

"Cliff couldn't have shown them that photograph," he said. "If he had they wouldn't have let him come. They're hunted men. They haven't got the time for vendettas."

She didn't look convinced.

"What if Connie woke up and saw him," he asked.

Helen shuddered. "All right," she said, "but what do I do?"

"Lock up, turn the lights out. I won't be long."

"All right," she said.

She watched him walk across the kitchen and move out onto the back porch. He turned to close the door.

Then, with a lunge, he regained the house and shut the door behind him as quickly as he could without slamming it.

Someone was ringing the front door bell.

同类推荐
  • The Graces
  • The Wheel Spins

    The Wheel Spins

    Best known as the basis for Alfred HItchcock's classic film The Lady Vanishes, Ethel White's book The Wheel Spins is a gripping and accomplished work in its own right. The plot is deceptively simple and the premise is classic: a woman meets a mysterious stranger during a long railway journey. It's easy to see in this novel what Hitchcock found so compelling and so well-suited to his particular brand of filmmaking.
  • Grocery
  • Moonshot!

    Moonshot!

    "The future belongs to those who see the possibilities before they become obvious… This is the most exciting time ever to be part of the business world."Throughout history, there are some events that stand out as so groundbreaking that they completely change life as we know it. The Apollo moon landing of 1961 was one of those events—the invention of the Apple personal computer was another. In this book, John Sculley—former CEO of both Pepsi and Apple—claims we are in an era that is giving birth to numerous groundbreaking events and inventions—moonshots—that will change the way we live and work for generations to come.
  • Misty Gordon and the Mystery of the Ghost Pirates

    Misty Gordon and the Mystery of the Ghost Pirates

    Here is a funny middle-grade mystery from a bright new fiction talent. Things in the New England town of Ashcrumb are getting weird. Or just weirder. Misty Gordon, whose antique-dealing parents drive a van that says "D.E.A.D." on the side (for "Deceased’s Estate and Antique Dealer"), is accustomed to weird. One day, when accompanying her father to the estate of a recently departed clairvoyant, Misty discovers a notebook and a pair of eyeglasses that enable her to see ghosts! And solve mysteries. With the help of her new powers and her best friend, Yoshi, Misty learns that her hometown was settled not by respectable colonists but by pirates! And the ghosts of the pirates are returning to reclaim a dangerous, powerful treasure they lost centuries ago. Who will find it first, Misty or the pirates?
热门推荐
  • 只能剩一个

    只能剩一个

    这是一个平常的日子,天既不晴也不阴,没有风,几朵云懒洋洋地悬浮在浅灰色的天空上。喻瑾懒洋洋坐在办公桌边,托着腮,看窗外的风景发呆,百无聊赖。派出所内很安静,绝大多数同事都出了外勤。为了拉动旅游经济,宣传城市形象,T县正在举办一个风俗文化节,今天是开幕式,有数万群众参加,并包括省里来的大领导。
  • 六十种曲怀香记

    六十种曲怀香记

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • Hermann and Dorothea

    Hermann and Dorothea

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 神级支付宝

    神级支付宝

    天上掉下个手机,还特么是苹果八!当然这些都不是重点,重点的是,里边的支付宝是什么鬼?仙界商铺?地府专柜?打架?没关系,从神魂专区买个李小龙和你好好玩玩。治病?很难?没关系,华佗够不够?不要和我玩,你真的玩不起!
  • 御兽女少主:逆世小王妃

    御兽女少主:逆世小王妃

    一道诡异的旋风,扒开了尘封万年的史卷。当天空再次裂开,救补苍天的已不再是女娲。飞尘堡走出一位俏丽的女少主,有上古神兽护体,斩妖除魔,历经重重险阻。冷酷无情的魔君,唯独对她温柔备至。爱上她自信的笑容。一起走过风风雨雨的不羁俊美男子,可曾是她的良人?“如果有一天,世界毁灭了,你只能做一件事,你会做什么?”“如果真的有这一天,我希望,你还在我记忆里。来世,让我还能找到你。”
  • 龙舟魂

    龙舟魂

    榕树头辟成公园,树根洞雕成树根景观。成群结队的鸟儿从四面八方飞来榕树梢栖枝歇息,形成“百鸟归巢”奇景。河边栏杆有若玉石雕砌,熠熠生辉。临江一座《龙舟魂》塑像,艺术家塑造一位赤膊擂鼓的龙舟手,底座四面龙舟竞渡浮雕场面相呼应,仿佛奏响《赛龙夺锦》乐章。
  • 明盲

    明盲

    别墅花园的葡萄架下,高易睿躺在摇椅上,怡然自得。高易睿的别墅不大,除了一栋三层的欧式洋楼,就是这个不算太大的花园和洋楼前的一块草坪。这栋别墅原来的主人是一个富商,几年前全家移民去了加拿大,就出售套现了。虽然是二手房,卖得便宜,可也花了高易睿整整八百万大洋。这让高易睿肉疼了好一阵子。
  • 皇宋锦绣

    皇宋锦绣

    宋朝在文治上面做到了顶峰,诞生了无数可以铭刻到历史上的人物,大文豪,政治家,圣人,军事家,却被蛮族攻破,历史沉沦。穿越本应该死掉的仁宗二子,改变必死的命运,改变将靖康之耻,系统在手天下我有,看一介皇子如何,祛除弊政,强悍自身,追亡逐北,一统天下。
  • 快穿之她可盐可甜

    快穿之她可盐可甜

    “嘶,别动,我好疼啊!”她泪眼汪汪的看着为自己上药的男人。摔!说好的温柔以待呢?疼死了她了好吗。系统:宿主,Boss大人为你疗伤就知足吧。桃夭夭:不然呢?系统:下个世界被男神关小黑屋哦。“滚,狗系统,你是哪边的!”表示她并不想攻略男神好吧。作为六界祸害的桃花精桃夭夭,在拒绝一大票追求者后,被系统坑去三千小世界为男主,男配们送温暖了。“叮咚!”“干嘛的!”苦情男主。“送老婆!”“开门,开门啦!”“何事?”缺爱男配。“送老婆!”(男主切片,1v1)
  • 新幽默故事

    新幽默故事

    无数事实、经验和理性已经证明:好故事可以影响人的一生。而以我们之见,所谓好故事,在内容上讲述的应是做人与处世的道理,在形式上也应听得进、记得住、讲得出、传得开,而且不会因时代的变迁而失去她的本质特征和艺术光彩。为了让更多的读者走进好故事,阅读好故事,欣赏好故事,珍藏好故事,传播好故事,我们特编选了一套“故事会5元精品系列”以飨之。其选择标准主要有以下三点:一、在《故事会》杂志上发表的作品。二、有过目不忘的艺术感染力。三、有恒久的趣味,对今天的读者仍有启迪作用。愿好故事伴随你的一生!