The Man in the Net (22 page)

John started after her. But before he could reach her she had squeezed in a flash out through the aperture. Angel was still dancing.

“Nyah. She’s gone. Old Emily’s gone.”

He dropped down on the floor by the hole. Behind him, Angel’s voice tilted threateningly upward:

“You’re not to go. You mustn’t go to Emily. If you go to Emily, I’ll tell.”

Ignoring her, he started to ease his way out through the hole.

“I’ll tell. I’ll go to them. I’ll say, I know where wicked, bad John Hamilton is. I’ll scream. There’s a trooper at the house. I’ll scream and he’ll hear me. I’ll scream and yell. I’ll …”

Her voice was cut off abruptly as he pulled himself out into the hemlocks. He scrambled to his feet. It was as dark in the dense growth of trees as it had been in the cave before the candle was lit. Throwing his hands out in front of him, he started through the branches. Ahead, he heard a faint clank of metal. Emily’s bicycle?

“Emily!” he whispered. “Emily! Wait.”

He was suddenly free of the hemlocks. The woods stretched ahead of him dappled with patches of silver moonlight. There was a dull metallic glint. The bicycle. He ran forward. He could see Emily quite clearly then, pushing the bicycle through the trees. He caught up with her and put his hand on her arm. She shuddered violently away from him.

“Don’t touch me.”

“Emily. Dear Emily.”

He eased the bicycle gently out of her grasp and, letting it drop down between the trees, put his arms around her small, quivering body.

“Emily, you know you don’t believe any of that. You know I love you. You know I only sent Buck because it worked out easier that way. Why do you pay any attention to her?”

“You hate me.” Emily was sobbing hopelessly. “You said it. You said you hated me. And I’ve been trying to help. I’ve been trying to do things right.”

He held her more closely. “You know why I said it. It was because of Angel. We’ve got to do what she says. Don’t you see? She can give everything away and she knows it.”

“I hate her.” Emily pressed her face against his chest. “I guess I love her. I know I love her, but I hate her too. She’s on and on all the time.
John hates you. John hates you. Stupid, fat, drippy old slave.
All the time she’s on at me. I hate her. I want to kill her.”

“But it won’t be for long. Emily, please, everything depends on you. It’ll only be a little while now. I promise.

Let her do whatever she wants. It’ll all be over tomorrow. Of course she’s a brat, a spoiled, jealous, mean little brat, but . .

He broke off and turned sharply as a twig snapped behind them. Vaguely he made out a small form creeping toward them and, as he sprang away from Emily, there was a loud, piercing scream which echoed wildly through the trees around him.

John felt the sweat of panic breaking out on his forehead. He lunged forward and dropped down on Angel. He could hear the deep intake of her breath. She was going to scream again. Just in time, he threw his hand across her mouth. She started to struggle in his grip. “Quick, Emily,” he said. “Get back to the cave.”

“But the trooper! He’ll have heard.”

“I know. But the cave …”

As he picked up the battling Angel in his arms a new sound came, the long, mournful hoot of an owl. It was so realistic that it was some seconds before he realized that Emily had made it.

“There, John. It’ll be all right. He’ll hear the owl. He’ll think it was a rabbit and an owl. That’s what he’ll think. It’s all right. Follow me—back to the cave.”

Her voice was happy and excited because she’d saved him. Emily was herself again. In his pleasure, even the ferocious kicking Angel in his arms seemed to lose some of her menace. Emily slipped away to the hemlocks. He followed. She disappeared through the hole and then her hand came out to him, illuminated by the faint candlelight behind, and he heard her whisper:

“Push her legs in. Keep your hand over her mouth. I’ll pull. Then when we get her in it’ll be all right.”

They got Angel into the cave. John wriggled in after her. He found Angel beating at Emily with her fists. He pulled her away and she swung around, starting to rain blows on him. Her face was red and distorted with fury.

“I heard”—the fists went on flailing ferociously—“I heard what you said. I’m a brat, you said. A spoiled, jealous, mean brat. That’s what you said. I heard. I heard. Louise heard. Everyone heard.”

Abruptly she spun away, dashed to her bed and dropped down on it, kicking her toes against the ground in a frenzy of rage.

“Tomorrow. I’ll tell tomorrow. You can’t stop me. No one can stop me. I’ve got to go back. If I don’t go back, Mother will know. I’ve got to go back and when I go back I’ll tell. I’ll tell them all. Emily’s hiding John Hamilton. Emily’s hiding John Hamilton in the cave.”

John looked down at her. his heart sinking. She meant it, of course. There was no doubting the bitter implacability of the little girl’s fury. It was more terrifying almost than Linda’s rages. He had antagonized Angel forever. And he couldn’t stop her telling. He knew as well as she did that he and Emily could not keep her here by force. Whatever story Emily might invent, Mrs. Jones wasn’t going to be talked into accepting the disappearance of a seven-year-old daughter. No, the children thing had been hopeless anyway. Tomorrow Angel, the rejected one, would go to the village—and that would be that.

“I’ll tell.” Angel’s screaming voice was still echoing around the cave. “I’ll tell.”

Emily had been standing quietly at his side. Suddenly she flashed him a glance and then, with a new, exaggerated swagger, strolled over to Angel and looked down at her.

“You won’t tell,” she said. “You think you’re smart, but you won’t tell.”

“I will. I will.” Angel turned up a face tear-stained and puffy with loathing. “You’ll go to prison. Both of you. They’ll put you in prison for years and years and years.”

“No, we won’t either. We won’t go to prison.”

Emily laughed and, whirling around, ran to the orange crate.

She swept up Louise and the mouse and the cow and, crossing to John, thrust them into his arms.

“Keep them. Don’t let her get them.”

“Louise!” Angel had sprung to her feet. Emily rushed at her and, grabbing an arm, twisted it behind her back.

“Tomorrow we’ll go home when it’s light, but you won’t tell because John will keep Louise and Mickey and Cow. And if you tell, if you ever breathe a word, he’ll kill them. He’ll tear them up; he’ll pull them apart; he’ll mash them; he’ll gouge out their eyes. He’ll kill them.”

“No!” As she struggled, Angel’s eyes were bulging with horror. “No, no. Give me Louise. Give me Louise.”

“He’ll kill them. That’s what he’ll do. So swear. Do it. Swear on Louise. Cross your heart and hope to die. Say it. Say it.”

Angel’s scream soared to a thin squeak. She gave one last desperate tug to release her arm and then collapsed into whimpering defeat.

“I’ll swear. I’ll swear on Louise.”

“Then swear.”

“Cross my heart and hope to die on Louise, I swear that—that I won’t tell.”

“Won’t ever tell.”

“Won’t ever tell. I swear.”

“And you’ll leave Louise and Cow and Mickey here with John. That way you’ll know. All the time you’ll know that if you break your oath he’ll kill them.”

“I’ll know. I’ll know.”

Angel was sobbing desperately. Emily released her arm.

Instantly the little girl dashed to her bed and flopped down on it.

“There.” Emily turned to John, her face seraphic with the delights of revenge. “That’s fixed her. Now let’s go to bed. You’d better sleep by the hole—right across the hole. That way she can’t get out.”

John’s feeling of relief had been delayed. It was only then, as he looked at Emily, that he felt it flooding through him. She’d done it. Wonderful Emily, she’d done it. There was a respite. The recorder could be fixed and he would think of something. If, perhaps, he could work out a trap …

“Is that all right? To go to sleep now?”

“Sure, Emily.”

“You can have a half of Angel’s bed. We’ll pull out the pine needles.”

“No,” said John. “I’m okay.”

“You can have it.” Emily turned back to Angel and said in the clipped voice of authority, “Take out half your needles; bring them here to make John’s bed.”

Meekly, her nose snuffling, Angel got up and started to pull back her blanket. Let it happen, thought John. Let Emily have her victory; let Angel learn something about defeat.

But Emily had run to Angel. “No, I didn’t mean it. No. Keep your bed. John can have mine and you and I can sleep together.”

“But, Emily …”

Angel looked up at her sister, her eyes swollen with tears; then, suddenly, she threw her arms around her and buried her face against her.

“Emily, Emily, he won’t hurt Louise, will he?”

“Of course he won’t, baby, because you’re not going to tell.”

“No, I won’t tell. I won’t tell. Oh, I hate being bad and wicked. I hate it.”

“It’s okay, Angel. You go lie down. I’ll fix John’s bed and then I’ll come to yours.”

Angel dropped down on her bed. Emily went to the other bed, pulled back the blanket and rearranged the pine needles by the mouth of the cave.

She said to John, “You’d better keep Louise and Mickey and Cow. She’s meaning to be good now, but you can’t ever tell with her.”

She moved away from the finished bed and picked up the candle.

“Okay, John? Shall I blow it out?”

“Okay.”

As darkness descended, John lay down on the pine needles, the dolls tucked between him and the wall. It would be all right. Somehow he could work things out. A trap. That was it. He would think out a trap. He was aware that Emily was still standing by him. He couldn’t see her, but he could feel her presence close to him.

“John.” Her voice came in a whisper.

“Yes, Emily.”

She dropped down by him. He could feel her hand groping out for his.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to act that way—like a kid. But I couldn’t help it. I felt so terrible.”

He squeezed her hand. “You’re my girl.”

“John.”

“Yes, Emily.”

“I love you.”

EMILY’s hand on his shoulder awakened him.

“It’s daylight. Let us out, John, and pick up the dolls. Don’t let her get them. We’ll be back as soon as we can.”

For a long time after the girls had slipped away he lay there with the dolls in his arms, thinking and getting nowhere. Eventually he dropped the dolls and squeezed out of the cave. The light in the woods was still cold and grey but there was a hint of sunlight-to-come and the air was wonderfully invigorating. He pushed through the hemlocks and then, gaining courage, moved on to the creek. He knelt down beside it and scooped water up over his face.

Suddenly it came to him. A trap needed a bait and he had the bait. Gordon Moreland just might have thought he’d destroyed the tape with the others in the living-room, but it was much more likely that he knew it still existed somewhere. If he was given the least hint of its whereabouts he would be desperately eager to get at it. Let him know, then, that the tape existed. Somehow … How?

His reflection glimmered back at him from the sliding water. It looked gaunt and unfamiliar with a day’s growth of beard. He should have had Buck bring his razor from the house.

Buck—the children. Of course. Let Gordon know through the children. Have Timmie babble out some story about the children finding a box with jewels in it and something else like a typewriter ribbon? Timmie? Father and son again. Did that matter? Yes, but. . .

Beyond the creek he saw something white moving through the pine trees. He dropped down on to his face among the ferns. Peering through the fronds, he saw Buck in blue jeans and a T-shirt running to the creek bank, his arms piled with packages. He stood up and called softly: “Buck.”

The boy saw him and came panting up.

“Hi, John. I brought our breakfast.”

“Any news?”

“Boy, is it a nuthouse? Pop, he’s fit to be tied. And Mr. Moreland! He was calling up all last night
. Any news? Why aren’t you getting anywheres?
They’re all of ’em fit to be tied. If they knew! Man, if they knew…!”

John found he was ravenously hungry and grabbed at random from the packages.

Timmie telling his story that the children had found a box? Where? At the Fishers’ house maybe? Somewhere in the garage or under the porch steps? Gordon and Linda had used the Fisher house; Gordon should believe it was consistent with Linda’s character to have kept her cache not at her own house but at the Fishers’… Yes, if Timmie said they’d found the box and realized the jewels were valuable and hadn’t dared to take it, that would send Gordon dashing straight to the Fisher house, and if John was there, not alone, but with a witness, the trap could be set. Vickie could be the witness. Why not? She had avowed herself his champion. He could send one of the kids to her with a message. The box of course would be hidden in a prearranged place as a bait. Not with the tape actually in it, but …

He turned to Buck. “You know that tape in the box— the thing you thought was a typewriter ribbon. I’ve got a lot of junk stacked up against the wall of the studio, broken records, bits of canvases. There are six or seven of those tapes mixed in with the other stuff. Could you run up and get one without being seen?

“Gee! Boy! Now?”

“Yes.”

Grinning, Buck jumped up and leaped away across the stepping-stones toward the pines.

It would all have to be carefully timed. Since he would have to go himself to the Fisher house, wouldn’t it be safer to leave it until nightfall or at least until evening? Yes, the recorder would be fixed by then, too. He could play the tape first with Vickie at the Fishers’, then they would know, and later, when Gordon came for the box it would be doubly damning. He’d have to coach Timmie and sometime that evening, as late as possible, Timmie could tell the story to Gordon. But could Timmie be trusted? He felt a diminution of confidence. Timmie with his nerves! Timmie who had blurted out his “secret” to Angel! Everything would depend upon Timmie and …

He heard the sharp crack of a twig beyond the pines. Buck wouldn’t be back already. He threw himself down again among the ferns and, watching through them, saw Leroy with a package in his hand hurrying toward the creek. He sat up again and Leroy, seeing him, broke into a dazzling smile and came springing over the stepping-stones.