The Silent Scream (6 page)

Closing the door and latching it, she joined the hungry group analyzing the refrigerator’s contents. Trucker handed her a carton of ice cream. Glancing toward the cellar door, he said, “I keep forgetting to replace that latch. Door swings open all the time.”

“It’s cold down there.” She remembered what she’d meant to ask him. “Could that air be leaking into my room, maybe from the chimney? It’s colder in the room than it is out in the hall.”

“Maybe. I’ll check it out.”

“Thanks, Trucker.”

She wrinkled her nose in distaste. “The air from the cellar smells moldy.” She grinned. “There aren’t any bodies buried down there, are there?” Then, remembering Giselle, she flushed with sudden shame.

Trucker seemed unperturbed. “Not as far as I know. Just in case, you can keep the door up here latched. When I work down there, I’ll use the outside cellar doors.”

She knew the doors he referred to. They were old-fashioned wooden panels slanted into the ground above stone steps leading down into the cellar. Her Wisconsin grandparents had the same arrangement.

But their cellar smelled better.

By the time they’d all eaten and thoroughly dissected their first day at college, fatigue had settled in and they were all ready to call it a day.

Jess hesitated only for a second or two in the doorway to her room. Was she going to need flannel pajamas to sleep?

She was. The room hadn’t warmed up at all.

Get used to it, she told herself. It’s no big deal.

Exhausted, she slept like a long-distance runner after a big race.

The following week passed in a blur of new faces, new classes, new routines. The work, Jess found, was harder than in high school, but a lot more interesting. So many books to read, so many papers to write, all involving hours of research. German assignments to translate, math exercises to labor over. The math, she decided, was designed to weed out the weak from the strong. “If you can actually do this stuff,” she told Ian as they studied in the first-floor library at Nightingale Hall, “they let you stay in school and get a degree, which, if you
can
do this stuff, you probably don’t even
need.
”

Cath nodded. “And if you
can’t
do it,” she grumbled, her head bent over a book, “they send you home, and your parents disown you and kick you out of the house to wander through town the rest of your life carrying all of your belongings in a shopping bag.”

Everyone laughed. But Jess suspected Cath had just told them her worst nightmare.

In spite of the heavy work load, which Cath agonized over, driving them all crazy, and Milo pretty much ignored, they all found time for other things. Jon, whose beloved red car had been delivered, went out almost every night with a different girl, although his eyes said he was still waiting for Cath to acknowledge his existence. Linda was busy with swim practices and meets. Ian spent hours taking photographs for
The Chronicle,
the campus newspaper, and occasionally joined Milo and Trucker at the creek behind the house for some fishing.

The following weekend, there were parties, a concert, a football game. Jess and the others enjoyed themselves, but Cath shut herself in her room, studying. Her face lost what little color it had had and her lips became pinched and tight with stress. Her dark eyes took on the look of a trapped rabbit.

Jess couldn’t think of any way to help.

Every night, after a haphazard meal of soup and sandwiches, or hamburgers and french fries, or spaghetti, and the desserts Madeline Carthew dropped off to assuage her conscience, Cath hurried off to her room, her ballet-slippered feet slap-slapping up the stairs with urgency.

“Doesn’t she ever relax?” Jon muttered, annoyed. “All work and no play makes life pretty grim.”

“And all play and no
work,
” Jess said pointedly, “makes a college dropout.”

Jon grinned. “Yeah, yeah. I’ll get to it. I’m just getting acclimated, that’s all.”

On Sunday evening, Cath gobbled half a bacon, lettuce, and tomato sandwich, dumped her plate in the sink, which was still filled with encrusted cereal bowls from breakfast, and announced that she had a “crucial” lit paper to work on.

“It’s due tomorrow and I’m not done with my bibliography.” She aimed a sharp glance at Milo. “But at least I’ve started. Have you even done your outline yet, Milo?”

“Brilliant minds,” Milo said, tilting his chair back against the kitchen counter, “do not employ methods as pedestrian as outlining.”

Cath hooted in derision.

“And while
you
slave away up in your dark little cave,” Milo added, “I’ll be outside gratefully gulping in some much-needed fresh air.”

“It’s raining, Milo.”

“So? A little rain never killed anyone, and the fishing is great when it’s raining.” Milo freed his fishing pole from its customary position between the stove and refrigerator and left the house.

Disgusted, Cath hurried upstairs to her room.

“She does work too hard,” Jess commented to Ian as they loaded the dishwasher. Linda had gone off to a swim meet, Jon to a party, and Trucker, who had begun eating dinner with them at Jess’s invitation, had gone to join Milo at the creek. “She looks so tired all the time, and she’s wound tighter than a spring.”

Ian agreed. “If she doesn’t learn to let off some of that steam, she’ll explode. College isn’t like high school. Some people can’t handle the difference.”

Several hours later, as Jess was finishing her German translation and thinking that Ian’s eyes were the warmest brown she’d ever seen, his dire prediction rang in her ears. A door slammed open, footsteps ran down the hall and stopped at Jess’s door. Cath’s voice, edged in hysteria, shouted, “Jess! Open the door, open it! Let me in!”

“J
ESSICA, LET ME
IN
!” Panic etched Cath’s words.

Remembering Ian’s prediction about Cath, Jess ran to the door and threw it open.

Cath’s narrow face was ash-gray. Her dark eyes echoed the panic in her voice. “What am I going to
do
?” she cried. “The paper I worked so hard on is
gone
! I was sitting on my bed working on my bibliography, and when I finished it I went to the desk for my paper. That’s where I put it. But it’s not there. It’s gone, Jess!”

Jess went weak with relief. “Oh, Cath, I thought someone was trying to
kill
you! You’re hysterical over a missing
paper
?”

“What’s going on?” Linda called as she hurried to Jess’s room. Her hair was still wet from swimming and she was wrapped in a white terrycloth robe.

Ian followed her, while Milo lingered in his own doorway. Three different kinds of music wafted from the open rooms and mixed together in a discordant blend of rock, classical, and East Indian melodies.

“That missing paper is important,” Cath retorted. “It’s due tomorrow morning. And my average in lit class isn’t that high.”

Meaning, Jess thought, a B + instead of an A.

But Cath’s hands were trembling, her eyes glittering with threatening tears. “If I don’t turn in that paper, I’ll be lucky to pull a C in there! A
C
!”

Jess couldn’t imagine falling apart over a simple C. She’d had her share of them and the earth hadn’t stopped spinning on its axis.

“Maybe you moved your paper,” she told Cath reassuringly. “C’mon, we’ll all help you look for it.”

They looked everywhere: on Cath’s desk, in her dresser drawers, under the bed, in the closet, in the pockets of her jeans and raincoat … but there was no sign of the missing paper.

When they were ready to admit defeat, Jess and Ian sat on Cath’s bed. She stood in the center of the room, wringing her hands. “How can I show up in class tomorrow without that paper?”

“Cath,” Jess said, “can’t you tell your professor the truth? You can’t be the first student to lose a paper, can you? Maybe he’ll give you more time.”

Cath turned on her. “But I don’t
lose
things, Jess! Ever.” After a moment, she added, “Someone
took
my paper.”

There was a shocked silence.

Cath’s face was a narrow mask of white. “And
that
means,” she said, her voice tremulous, “that someone was in my
room.
Someone went through my
things
!”

They could all see that the thought horrified her.

“Took your paper?” Ian said. “You mean, as in
stole
it?”

Cath nodded.

“Honestly, Cath,” Linda said, “why on earth would anyone
steal
your paper?”

Cath, her lips firmly pressed together, looked at Milo. “You have the same paper due tomorrow,” she said, “and you haven’t even done your
outline.
”

All eyes moved to Milo, leaning against Cath’s desk.

His eyes behind the wire-rimmed glasses narrowed. “I’m not hearing an accusation here, am I?”

“My paper was right here on the desk, beside the lamp. And now it isn’t. Did you finish
your
paper?”

Milo stood up very straight. His face flushed with anger. “No, I didn’t. Don’t worry about it.”

“The question is,” Cath said, her head high, her dark eyes very bright, “why aren’t
you
worried about it?” Suddenly, she turned and ran out of the room, heading straight for Milo’s room across the hall.

“Hey!” he cried, running after her, “what do you think you’re doing?”

What she was doing, they all discovered as they followed and gathered in the doorway to Milo’s room, was racing around like a crazy person, tossing papers and clothing and CDs in the air, her dark hair flying about her face, her eyes wild.

“It’s here,” she babbled as she tossed a pile of books on the floor. “I
know
my paper is here. You took it so you wouldn’t have to write a paper of your own.”

Linda gasped. “Milo would never do that,” she cried.

“You’re crazy!” Milo shouted, scooping up the discarded books. “You’ve really lost it, you know? I never touched your stupid paper. I never went near your room.” He lunged at Cath as she dumped a handful of CDs on the hardwood floor. “Cath, cut it
out
!” Bending to pick up the disks, he appealed to the others, still in the doorway, their mouths open. “Stop her, will you? She’s wrecking my room.”

And even though it seemed to Jess that the room had already been a wreck before Cath arrived, she stepped forward to grasp Cath’s wrist, saying softly, “Okay, that’s enough. He says the paper isn’t here.”

“Could have blown out your window,” Ian suggested. “While we were eating. Was your window open?”

Drained, exhausted, Cath sagged against Jess. “I … I don’t know. I don’t remember.”

“Well,” Linda said, moving into the room to stoop and pick up some papers and a maroon jacket Cath had tossed on the floor, “I personally think you’ve got a lot of nerve, Cath. Accusing Milo of
stealing
!” She smiled at Milo and reached out to touch his hand. “We all know he wouldn’t do anything like that.”

Actually, Jess thought, we don’t know any such thing. Everyone
seems
nice enough here at Nightingale Hall, but we don’t
really
know each other. Not yet. Aloud, she said, “C’mon, Cath, let’s go back to your room and figure out what to do.”

“What’s to figure?” Cath said bitterly. “I don’t have any choice. I’ll be up all night rewriting that paper, that’s all. But,” leveling a look of fury at Milo and Linda, who stood beside him, “don’t think I’ll forget about this, because I won’t!” Then, in a low voice directed only at Milo, she added, “Get
this
! You probably thought I wouldn’t have time to redo the paper, but I’ll finish it if it kills me. So forget about turning in the one you stole, unless you want to be kicked out of this school for cheating.”

She ran from the room. The door to her own room slammed so hard the posters on Milo’s walls flapped wildly.

Jess decided it might be a good idea to let Cath work on her anger alone. But as Ian walked her back down the hallway to her own room, she said quietly, “That paper couldn’t have just walked away. And Cath doesn’t seem like the sort of person who misplaces things.”

“That’s for sure.”

“Do
you
think Milo took it?” she asked Ian.

“Why would he? Cath’s right, he can’t turn it in.”

“I know, but he could have underestimated Cath. Thinking that she wouldn’t have time to finish a rewrite.” Jess leaned against the wall outside her room. Sighing, she said, “There’s something about this place. I wish I could figure out what it is. I know it’s getting to Cath. I don’t think it’s just the pressure of classes that’s turning her into a maniac.”

Ian ran a gentle finger along the frown lines in Jess’s forehead, smoothing them out. “What you need,” he said, “is food. Let’s roust everyone out of their rooms and raid the refrigerator.”

“Ian, I’m kind of tired …”

“That means your engine needs fuel. C’mon, I saw microwave popcorn in the kitchen. Lots of it. It’s calling to me.” He tilted his head. “Ian, I-an!” He began running up and down the hallway, pounding on doors, calling, “Popcorn break, everyone! Move those tired old bodies down to the kitchen, pronto!”

Laughing helplessly, Jess said, “You sound like a cheerleader. Or a drill sergeant.” But she felt better already.

Cath’s door didn’t open. Jess hadn’t expected it to.

Everyone else seemed grateful for a study break. They all pounded downstairs to the kitchen. Milo had apparently recovered from Cath’s accusation. Ian made popcorn and Linda filled glasses with soda. They ate and drank and talked about their classes and an upcoming formal, the Fall Ball, which Linda had heard was “a very big deal.” Jon arrived from campus just in time to share the last bag of popcorn.

Feeling relaxed and comfortable in spite of Cath’s absence, Jess smiled at Ian and said, “This was a great idea.”

He looked pleased. “Stick with me, baby,” he said in a mock Humphrey Bogart voice, “and the sky’s the limit. Anything you want, name it.”

“I’d settle for a warmer kitchen,” she said, leaning over to nestle into Ian’s red-sweatered bulk. “Can you manage that for me?”

“Just come in June,” Linda said, licking salt from her fingers. “This place is an oven then.”