The Dark: A Collection (Point Horror) (13 page)

ISLAND WAITS WITH
BATED BREATH:

BIANCA WINTERS BEGINS
TO

REMEMBER BLOODY
MURDER!

WHO DID IT? ONLY
AMNESIA VICTIM KNOWS FOR SURE!

WHODUNIT ON ST.
SIMONS ISLAND AWAITS CONCLUSION

There were other
articles. Bianca would often glance at those out of the corner of her
eye when Doc was turning the pages. They speculated about Harry, Rick
and Marianna.

Marianna was in a
coma on life support in the same hospital. She'd suffered a massive
concussion, but by some miracle she was still alive.

The evidence against
Mike Fellini for the kidnapping of Little Katie made it an open and
shut case. A warrant had been put out for his arrest. He'd been
apprehended the very next day hiding out in the swamps, where he'd
holed up after fleeing the cemetery. He was back in jail.

The evidence against
Harry and Rick, however, was more "iffy". Rick's lawyer
insisted that there was no evidence against him except hearsay. He
had no criminal record. The court-appointed attorney who was handling
Harry's case pointed out that Bianca had not complained about
Harry's treatment that night in the cemetery. So both boys had been
released while the police collected more evidence against them.

The district attorney
was another person who came in and out of Bianca's hospital room at
regular intervals, hoping that she would remember something about the
killer. Any detail would be appreciated, even the color of his shoes.
The DA wanted to bring charges against Harry and Rick — and
Marianna if she recovered — and couldn't without Bianca's
evidence. Was one of these suspects the killer or not?

When Doc had pointed
the culprits out to the police, he'd been premature out of a desire
to protect her, he said. He'd assumed that Bianca would have
remembered everything by now. He assured her there was no hurry. You
couldn't rush the mysteries of the human mind, he emphasized.

Bianca repeated the
same tale to one policeman after another, the story that she'd told
Harry in the employees' lounge. She related how two years ago she'd
been sitting in the living room with the mists drifting in the
window, how she'd heard footsteps upstairs and gone up to
investigate. She described in detail how she'd heard Mrs. Ingersoll
scream. She'd snatched Katie up and encountered the killer at the
top of the stairs. She tried to remember the details of their battle,
which were fuzzy. She recalled fleeing downstairs, racing out the
door screaming.

They brought in a
police artist to sketch the killer. Bianca couldn't recall the
killer's face. She remembered the eyes staring back at her from the
stairway. She couldn't associate a color with them, let alone a
sex. The killer whispered to her in memory, but she couldn't recall
the tone of voice. Was it the same voice as in the movie theater
bathroom? She could never forget the strong hands, the crushing
force. She'd imagined the killer as Marianna. Now Bianca couldn't
be sure of anything.

"It sounds as if
you remember every detail about that night except for the killer's
appearance and the sound of the killer's voice," the police chief
concluded. "Very odd."

"Usually when
witnesses remember as much as you have, they remember everything,"
the DA agreed. He voiced his suspicions. "It's as if Bianca's
protecting someone, as if she doesn't want to admit his identity,
not even to herself."

"Miss Winters, we
know that you were out with Harry Fellini that night you started to
remember. I saw you with him in the theater lobby," the chief
warned her.

She nodded.

"If he's the one
you're protecting, it won't do you any good to keep on hiding the
truth."

She opened her mouth
to protest.

"I hope you're
not protecting that Roscoe boy either! He claims that you went to the
movie with him to begin with," the chief added.

She shook her head.

"Don't get
discouraged." Doc patted Bianca's cheek. "You're doing much
better now that we've weaned you away from Harry Fellini's bad
influence. You'll remember everything. I know you will."

The police had
released Harry and Rick to the custody of their parents, awaiting
trial. No one would allow either into Bianca's hospital room. She'd
been told by one sympathetic, romantic-minded nurse that Harry had
been in the waiting room two or three times a day. He'd been turned
away. His flowers had been returned.

The treatment that
Harry was receiving broke Bianca's heart. Her parents, the Shipleys
and Doc were adamant. Harry was a terrible influence, if not the
murderer. The nurse was reprimanded for informing Bianca about Harry.

Bianca questioned
Doc. "Can't the doctors give me something to hurry this
remembering process?"

"You could have
gone your whole life and not remembered a thing. Maybe you needed to
hold a particular magazine in your hands that you were holding the
night of the murder. Your chance of holding that old issue would grow
slimmer with each year."

"What made me
remember something that night at the theater?"

Doc shrugged. "Maybe
you've avoided the dark too carefully for the past two years. When
you went to the movie, it reminded you of the last time you were
plunged into darkness and couldn't get away — on the night of the
murder."

"Oh!"

"The unconscious
mind doesn't operate by principles of reason." Doc sat on the
side of her hospital bed. "Of course, you don't want to hear what
I really think."

"I always want to
know what you think, Doc." She leaned closer.

"The reason you
started to remember at the theater was because the killer was there
with you. You saw him and subliminally remembered him. Subliminally
means below the level of consciousness. Since then, that memory's
been working its way back into consciousness."

"Harry is
innocent!"

Doc patted her hand.
"He's good at this game of subterfuge and deceit. Harry and Mike
play it all the time. Mike taught him. Harry's led a life of crime
since he was born."

"You didn't see
how Harry went out of his way to help and protect me. People don't
give him a chance. They're just prejudiced against him — even the
police."

Doc gazed at her
sadly. "You're in denial. Maybe that denial itself is what's
blocking your memory."

He consulted with her
more senior doctors, who praised Doc's insights into her condition.
It was brilliant that he could deduce Bianca's real meaning when
she told him she "really liked" Harry. He could tell by her tone
of voice that she was in a state of false dependence and trust.
Translation — she'd been hoodwinked and seduced.

Doc put his hand on
her forehead. "You do trust me to know what's best for you, don't
you?" He looked directly into her eyes.

She nodded. She
wanted to persuade him to think about Harry the way she did. But when
he looked into her eyes like that, she couldn't hold her own for
long. She supposed that was natural, since she was no match for Doc.

"I think a nice,
long hospital stay and plenty of bed rest ought to calm you down and
make you more rational," Doc explained. "For my part, I promise
to pay more attention to you rather than less. I made a horrible
mistake telling you that you ought to be on your own. We might be
premature by a couple of years, to judge by the state of your
nerves."

She would have been
overjoyed to have more attention from Doc a few days ago, before
she'd met Harry. Now everything had changed. She was confused about
her own feelings. "But—"

He put his finger
under her chin and made her look at him. He was smiling.

"You know, Bianca,
no matter what those other doctors say, you always were my favorite
patient."

He leaned over and
kissed her on the lips.

Her lips melted into
his as they always had. Worries about Harry seemed far away as she
kissed Doc back.

When Doc's kisses
ended with a pinch on the cheek, Bianca did not know what to think.
Kissing him didn't feel the same as kissing Harry. She imagined
Harry's face if he could see her together with Doc.

She smiled at Doc and
waved as he left her room to consult with a team of psychiatric
experts that the Shipleys had hired, though her heart pained her the
whole while.

The Shipleys kept
Bianca sane during her confinement in the hospital. They could afford
to visit her more often than her own parents, who had to work. The
Shipleys lived on their vast global investments. In fact, they were
planning to take a big trip soon to check on them.

Little Katie was
lucky, Bianca decided. She was young enough that she couldn't
remember anything. Even after she grew up, she'd probably never
remember being almost murdered, or kidnapped. The child would play,
sitting in the middle of Katie's lap in the hospital bed. She
toddled around the hospital room as if nothing were going on. She
made Bianca feel better, which of course was why the Shipleys brought
her. She made Bianca feel as if she'd gone through this hell for
some purpose.

That meant much more
to Bianca than the money that the Shipleys kept on giving her. Not
only did Bianca have the original trust fund set up two years ago,
but they had also given her the second million dollars advertised on
the radio as a reward for rescuing Little Katie from Mike Fellini.
The Shipleys had made Bianca Little Katie's godmother, and they
said that they were going to change their will and make Bianca
Katie's official legal guardian as well in case anything happened
to them. The will would take effect as soon as Bianca turned
eighteen, right about the time that she was supposed to graduate from
high school.

"That's such a
big responsibility!" Bianca was awed.

"Nothing you can't
handle," Mr. Shipley assured her. "You've proved yourself time
and time again."

"It might be too
much for Bianca." Doc voiced his concern. "After all, she'll be
only eighteen — not twenty-one."

"We checked with
our lawyer." Mrs. Shipley tried to assuage his doubts. "He said
Bianca could legally become Katie's guardian at eighteen. In fact,
in Georgia there isn't any minimum age. It's up to the judgement
of Katie's parents. If anybody contests the will, it's up to the
judge. But I don't think anybody will."

"I gave them my
honest, personal opinion, though." The lawyer voiced his own doubts
from where he happened to be sitting on the opposite side of the
room. "With all due respect to Miss Winters, for she is a very
courageous young lady, we don't know what really attracts this
killer. It might be Bianca herself. It seems to me that nothing bad
appears to happen to Little Katie unless her babysitter is around. Is
it wise to make Bianca her guardian?"

"And we told you
that was nonsense!" Mrs. Shipley snapped. "Bad things would
happen in any case. Katie's an heiress, after all. Bianca has
risked her own life twice now to save her. That's the kind of
dedication that money can't buy."

Doc wasn't happy
with Little Katie always toddling around Bianca's hospital room. He
insisted that Bianca needed more rest. Once Doc picked the toddler up
off the bed and put her in the living-room area of the suite.

Katie started
bawling.

Mrs. Shipley
exclaimed in mock horror, "You're a good girl. You never cry when
nice people pick you up. Doc is just saying that you should give
Bianca a rest."

Katie, though only
two, was stubborn on this point. Whenever Doc picked her up, she
started bawling.

Katie might give
Bianca hope. But she still wished that this nightmare was long past.

When Bianca went back
to school some days later, it seemed that all of St. Simons Island
had mobilized itself to protect her.

Doc, her parents and
the Shipleys took turns chauffeuring her to the school in the morning
and picking her up in the afternoon. They insisted on marching her up
to the door and meeting her in the afternoon in the front office. In
short, they were trying to make it impossible for the killer to get
to her while Bianca was "remembering".

Police had regularly
stood in front of the school directing traffic. Now they never left.
During classes they patrolled the sidewalks as well as the parking
lot. A policeman guarded each entrance and exit to the building.
There were police stationed in the main office to eyeball everyone
who started down the hallway or tried to leave in a hurry.

The school announced
a new policy over the loudspeaker system the first morning Bianca
returned to classes. Each person who wanted to enter or leave the
building, even parents picking up their children, had to first report
to the office to get an official school pass signed by both the
building secretary and the police officer on duty.

"Do you want a
policeman to escort you to classes?" Mrs. Shipley asked. "We
could arrange for that."

"It won't be
necessary. The school looks like an armed fortress already," Bianca
protested. "I'll be safe."

No one could protect
her from having to see Rick Roscoe, though. She heard kids whispering
about her in corners, speculating what would happen next. They talked
about Marianna's medical progress in hushed tones.

The biggest torture
was to see Harry. Harry and Bianca could look at each other from
across the hallway. But her parents, the Shipleys and Doc had issued
strict orders to the school and to the teachers that the two of them
weren't allowed to "fraternize". The DA didn't have enough
information to prosecute Harry — yet. Many on the island figured
that he would soon. The principal had called Harry into the office
and warned him that if he were seen "pestering" Bianca, he'd be
expelled, less than two weeks before graduation.

Harry went around the
school with a stiff upper lip. He acted as if he didn't care that
his brother, Mike Fellini, was written about every day in the
newspapers and talked about on the radio.