The Dark: A Collection (Point Horror) (30 page)

The newcomer got up,
fished something out of his pocket, and handed the small package
wrapped in brown paper to Ronnie.

"Thank you, thank
you," Ronnie said effusively with more emotion than was common with
him. "It's about time. Now we can get under way."

He tore open the
package. He popped open the ring box. There were two rings. One was a
plain gold band. The other was a diamond. Ronnie examined the diamond
from every angle.

Bianca had only seen
a diamond as big as this once in her entire life. This ring resembled
the antique diamond ring that Mrs. Shipley had once owned, the one in
her jewelry box that Doc had been trying to steal two years ago when
he had killed Mrs. Ingersoll. It looked like that same ring that Doc
had tried to steal again in May when he had died on the stairs.

Bianca could swear
that it was the same ring! It was every bit as brilliant and as
scintillating. It was cut in the same way as Mrs. Shipley's old
ring. It had to be the one that had made Bianca remember Doc's face
as the murderer's when she'd stepped on it in the hallway two
months ago.

But it couldn't be
the same diamond! Mrs. Shipley had sold it after Doc's death. She
had complained that no jewel was worth people's lives. Where would
Ronnie get hold of such a rare find? Some millionaire had probably
bought Mrs. Shipley's old ring by now! Nor would Ronnie be able to
afford it on a hospital intern's income.

"Job well done."
Ronnie got out a one-hundred-dollar bill and slapped it down into the
palm of the stranger who looked like Harry. "Of course, there will
be a lot more of that where we're headed tomorrow. Then I'll pay
you in full, as we agreed."

The guy flashed a
smile. When he smiled, he showed his teeth. Bianca noticed that his
front incisors were chipped. Harry's front teeth were not. Close-up
observation highlighted several other differences. His skin was a
shade paler. His hair looked almost the same color but not quite. His
facial expressions did not seem the same as Harry's. Again, he
showed no signs of recognizing her.

"Tell the pilot I
want to speak to him," Ronnie barked the order at Marianna. "It's
getting late. It's almost dark."

Marianna knocked on
the cockpit door. Was Bianca to assume that Rick Roscoe was inside as
the pilot or copilot? She didn't see him anywhere else. She'd
clearly seen him board the plane.

"Hello, hello, this
is the pilot." A heavily accented voice came on over the loud
speaker.

"We're ready to
get underway," Ronnie told him.

"Right away, sir,"
the pilot concluded in what sounded like the accent of one of those
Latin American interns that Bianca had met at the Cloister.

The plane started
down the paved runway in the middle of the grass-covered field. It
taxied out to a place where it turned, then stopped. The plane
charged forward with a new earnestness, going faster and faster.
Suddenly the wheels weren't making contact with the pavement. They
were airborne.

They climbed over
water as they turned out to sea. Remembering her dream from last
night, Bianca did not much like the idea that there was only the
Atlantic Ocean beneath them. She turned away from the window toward
Ronnie.

Ronnie put down his
glass of wine, which he had finished. He started to clap. Everyone in
the first-class section began to applaud, including Marianna.
Marianna had buckled herself into the hostess seat in front of first
class during take-off. She unbuckled herself and leaped up cheering.

"This calls for a
celebration! Bring on the champagne." Ronnie's voice sounded more
carefree and party-like than Bianca could ever remember before.

Marianna uncorked
several champagne bottles, which bubbled over. She got out the
chilled champagne glasses. She poured the expensive stuff and started
passing out the filled glasses to all of the passengers in the
first-class section.

Ronnie tapped his
glass against the startled Bianca's glass. "Let's toast to us."

"To — to us?"
Bianca hesitated to raised the glass to her lips. "What do you
mean, to us? Shouldn't we be toasting to Little Katie's welfare?
She's the reason we're taking our trip to London."

The child's rash
looked as if it had subsided more than a little. Little Katie was
scratching herself hardly at all. She was playing with TR Bear and
Lou contentedly in Bianca's lap. Perhaps it was because they were
now away from St. Simons Island. No doubt something there had been
reacting with her skin.

"Yes, I guess you
could say Little Katie's the reason we're taking our trip.
Certainly she's paying for it — or at least her parents are.
They're dishing out top dollar."

Ronnie spoke in a
rather disrespectful tone. He snickered. Up to now he had always
sounded deferential and polite when he had talked about the Shipleys.

Bianca was stunned.
"Of course they're 'dishing out top dollar'. They'd do
anything to help their daughter. They love her more than anything in
the world — just as I do."

"My dear, you'd
better learn to spread your adoration around." Ronnie took hold of
her chin and caressed it. "Little Katie might have golden-blond
hair and curly locks. She might look as pretty as a princess in a
fairy tale. She's certainly as rich. But I'm far more brilliant
and well educated. And after all, I'm to be your new husband."

"My — my husband?
Is this a proposal?"

"You can take it as
a proposal if you like. Reverend!" He turned around and called to
the man with the rounded, white collar. "We're ready for the
ceremony. We have no reason to wait."

Marianna rushed back
into the empty passenger-class section of the airliner. She hurried
up to Ronnie's and Bianca's seats with her arms full of flowers.
Bianca could smell them before she could see them. Their heavy, musky
scent reminded Bianca of magnolias.

Were these the
flowers that Ronnie had been buying from the florist yesterday?
Florists even in Georgia didn't usually sell the big, showy white
blooms that grew in everyone's yards this time of year. But these
were particularly fancy blossoms, much finer than roses, with
perfect, waxy green leaves surrounding them. They looked as if they
might have been cultivated by a florist.

Marianna held the
blossoms out to Ronnie. He studied them and selected the finest one
in the center. "Yes, that one will do nicely."

Marianna took the
other blossoms away. She returned to fasten the blossom that Ronnie
had chosen in Bianca's hair. She attached it with a hair comb.

Magnolia blooms grew
in profusion in Christ's Church Cemetery. Bianca had been gathering
them for the past two months to leave as remembrances on Doc's
grave. Doc had always loved magnolia blossoms. A true Georgian, they
had been his favorite flower. Her hair-piece could not help but
remind her of Doc. Bianca fidgeted in her seat.

She wondered, Why
would Ronnie choose a magnolia bloom over roses or some other flower?
Magnolias don't grow in London!

In a flash the
reverend appeared before them. He read the words of the wedding
ceremony aloud. Bianca listened in total confusion, not able to
understand what was happening. Finally the reverend reached the part
where she had to respond.

"Do you, Bianca
Winters, take this man, Dr.

Byron Kingsley, to
have and to hold, to honor and obey, from this day forth as long as
you both shall live?"

"I ... ah. . ."

"She does,"
Ronnie answered for her. "She's not herself today. Too much
stress, you understand. Now, Bianca, answer the reverend."

"Ah ... I. . ."

"Say you do."

"I do."

"Do you, Dr. Byron
Kingsley, take this woman, Bianca Winters, to have and to hold, to
honor and cherish, from this day forth as long as you both shall
live?"

"I do. Let's get
on with it, Reverend. Don't dawdle."

"It's time to
exchange rings." The reverend hardly needed to remind Ronnie.

Ronnie slipped that
big diamond ring, as well as the matching gold band, on to Bianca's
left ring finger.

"I now pronounce
you man and wife." The minister concluded the ceremony, "You may
kiss the bride."

Ronnie leaned over
and gave Bianca a big smack on the lips.

"Now for the
important part," Ronnie called back to the lawyer. "Bring those
papers up here. I assume you have them ready."

"Ronnie," Bianca
squeezed his hand, "why — why did you want to marry me on an
airplane? Why so fast? Why couldn't we have waited until we got to
London and the Shipleys could be there? Why couldn't we have waited
for my parents to get back from their Alaska cruise? I've been
dull-witted lately, but I don't get it."

"You are a little
bit slow catching on, my dearest darling." He took hold of Bianca's
chin and brought her face up to his. "Or rather I'm devilishly
clever. I planned to marry you from the first moment it was my
privilege to really become acquainted with you. That was a little
over two years ago."

"But — but you
met me only a few weeks ago when summer school started. It was the
beginning of July. You never saw me before that."

"We've known each
other at least a little bit all of our lives. We used to be next-door
neighbors, if I remember correctly."

"We did?"

In her mental
condition, she didn't have much of a mind left. Ronnie liked to
remind her of that all the time. She couldn't imagine forgetting an
important fact like this.

"Granted, this
summer I've had to live in an apartment. Rather cramped and
inconvenient. That's about to change when we arrive in Rio de
Janeiro. You should see the mansion that the Shipleys' money and
that one hundred thousand dollars that you loaned me rented for us.
That is until we can find more permanent quarters — perhaps
something by the beach overlooking the sea."

"The sea?"

"We'll pay for
that with the rest of the money that you had transferred to a bank in
Rio yesterday. Not that I don't have money of my own. I had the
foresight to transfer it into Swiss bank accounts months ago, long
before I took on my new name and identity."

This must be a
nightmare. She must be ready to wake up at any second. No one could
sleep long with their heart pounding as hard as Bianca's.

"What do you mean
by Rio? We're headed to London, aren't we? I don't remember
loaning you one hundred thousand dollars. Not that I'd begrudge it
to you. Did I loan it to you, and I don't remember? Is that it?"
she asked anxiously. "I can't recall a thing about having my
money transferred to a bank in Rio." She grabbed the seat with the
free hand that wasn't convulsively clutching Little Katie around
the waist.

"Look deep into my
eyes. Tell me that you don't know me." He touched his nose to
hers. "I used to live across the street, Bianca dear, when you
lived in your old house near the Shipleys. That was before you came
into that delightful two million dollars that enabled your parents to
move into more opulent quarters."

Bianca knew that she
MUST be dreaming. She wanted to pinch herself. Ronnie had never lived
across the street from her before she and her parents moved into
their new house. Only the Shipleys had — the Shipleys and the
McColloughs, Doc's parents.

A cold fear clutched
at the pit of her stomach. She looked into his eyes as he had
commanded. Her head whirled around. He was drawing her deep down into
a whirlpool. She was holding her breath the whole time. She felt as
if she might drown. Only one other person had that power over her
before . . .

"Some glimmer of
consciousness inside you has recognized me all along." Ronnie still
spoke in his English accent. "It felt the same when you were with
me. In the middle of the night when you woke me and clutched on to me
because you'd had a nightmare, because you were afraid of the dark,
your arms went around me in exactly the same way as mine went around
you. Every time I kissed you, your lips parted in the same way as
before."

She shook her head
and groaned. The moan welled up from deep within her being.

"You can't be
him. He's dead. He died in May when he fell down the stairs at the
Shipleys' house."

"You mean when you
shot me, my dear. We mustn't forget an important detail like that.
You were wearing those turquoise earrings that I gave you for your
seventeenth birthday, as you are now." He reached across the seat
and tugged at one of them.

"Doc!" she
gasped. No one knew about the earrings except Doc himself.

"Yes, I'm Doc
Ernie McCollough all right. That's who I've been all along.
That's the man you married. Look at the name I'm signing on the
marriage certificate." He pointed at the paper that the lawyer had
slipped on to his lap.

Bianca watched in
horror. He signed the name she had been so familiar with in his dark,
bold, cursive hand. It was hard for her to make a sound. He pushed
the pen into her hand and then, when she couldn't hold it, forced
her hand to close around it.

"Sign the marriage
certificate right under mine on the dotted line. Remember that you
are now Mrs. 'Doc' Ernie McCollough."

Her hand spasmed. She
dropped the pen. He forced her hand around it again.

"Sign!" he
commanded her.

She was so spellbound
by shock that she couldn't move an inch to save her own life.

"You're going to
have to get used to taking orders from me. I'm your husband now
—" he dropped the English accent in favor of the old Georgia
accent that she had associated with Doc — "and I'm still your
doctor. You're in no fit mental condition to make your own
decisions."

His southern accent
was the same voice that she had heard when she had been kneeling in
the cemetery in the rain. She had thought that Doc's voice had been
speaking to her from beyond the grave. On the basis of that
impression about her own mental condition — that and Rick showing
up in the window well — Bianca had stopped going to school or just
about anywhere else that Dr. Byron Kingsley couldn't accompany her.
She had ceased to have any free will. Now he was sitting here telling
her that it had been a cruel hoax.