The Third Eye (7 page)

Shoving back the protective covering, she lifted the folds of material to her face. With her eyes tightly closed, she tried to visualize Carla in the dress. It was easy to imagine what she must have looked like. With her huge eyes aglow and the soft
mouth smiling, the child must have been as radiant as an angel.

Karen could imagine the picture, but she could not
see
it. The face in her mind was only a reflection of the image in the photograph; there was no reality to it, as there had been with her vision of Bobby.

The starched lace was scratchy against her cheek, and the heavy odor of dry-cleaning chemicals assaulted her sinuses. It was obvious, Karen thought ruefully, that any “vibes” she might get from Carla were not going to be found within the confines of this closet.

Karen replaced the hanger on the bar and carefully adjusted the dress so that it hung without wrinkles. Shoving the closet door closed, she went back over to the bed. She started to sit down, and then, on impulse, took off her shoes and stretched herself full length on top of the spread.

Picking up the toy bear, she hugged it against her chest as Carla must often have done.

Again, she closed her eyes.

She lay there for a long time, waiting. Nothing happened. No sudden detailed vision came springing to greet her. The bed was soft and unevenly lumpy, and the bear smelled of chewing gum. Then, as moments passed, it began to take on another, less pleasant odor, like the faint, rank stench of moldy dampness and rotting leaves.

The room was chilly—strangely so, since the day itself was not. Karen shivered and resisted the urge to slide in beneath
the covers. The thick adobe walls of the Valley houses not only insulated against the cold of winter but they also did an effective job of keeping out the gentle warmth of springtime.

Cuddling the bear closer, she focused her thoughts determinedly on Carla. Somewhere she existed, a fragile, sweet-faced child in the company of the man who was her father.
Where are they now?
Karen asked herself, reaching out with her mind as far as she could, holding it open, waiting for an answer.

Time passed. Still nothing happened.

At last, feeling ridiculous for having allowed herself to be persuaded to attempt this feat, she got up from the bed, smoothed the spread, and set the bear gently back on the pillow.

Then she went out into the living room to break the news to Carla’s mother that the experiment had been a failure.

“I shouldn’t have agreed to go there,” Karen
said. “I’ve never felt so dumb in my entire life.”

They were driving back along the road by the river. It was a replay in reverse of the trip that they had made that morning, except that now the sun was high in the sky and the feeling of hopeful anticipation that had brightened the earlier trip was sadly missing.

“It was worth a try,” Officer Wilson said. “Things aren’t any worse now than they were before.” He paused, and then said, a bit too casually, “About the dog…”

“The dog?” Karen repeated blankly.

“The mutt back there at the Sanchezes’. You must have thought I acted pretty weird.”

“Lots of people don’t like dogs,” said Karen.

“Yeah, but… well, here I am, a cop. I’m supposed to have it all together, right? And then I overreact like that. Well, the thing is—” He drew a deep breath. “I got mauled by a Doberman when I was a kid. We were over visiting some friends of my parents, and my older brother and I were out running around in their backyard. The dog belonged next door. I guess it wasn’t used to noisy kids. It went into some kind of frenzy and jumped the fence and tore right into me. It was a terrifying experience. I’ve never been able to get over it.”

“That’s terrible!” exclaimed Karen. “Were you badly hurt?”

“My left arm was mangled. For a while, they thought they might have to amputate. It took two operations to get things fixed, and I’ve still got plenty of scars. The crazy thing was that Steve was closer to the fence than I was. The dog ran straight past him and threw itself on
me
.”

“Your brother wasn’t bitten?”

“No, and he should have been. He pulled the dog off me and never got so much as a nip. That’s how it’s always been with Steve, though. He’s the family Wonder Boy—everything he touches turns to gold. He’s currently at the top of his class in law school, married to another law student who looks like a movie star. When they graduate, they’re going into practice with my father. They’ve got the perfect kid, too; he could be in baby-food commercials.” He took his left hand off the steering wheel to glance at his watch. “Do you want to stop somewhere and pick up a sandwich? You never had breakfast.”

“I’d like that.” Karen suddenly realized that she was, indeed, very hungry. “Thanks, Officer Wilson.”

“Rob.”

“What?”

“My name’s Rob. I’m off duty right now, so you can just call me Rob, okay? If we take the next exit, we should run smack into a Burger King.” He smiled at her.

“That sounds great,” Karen said. But then… it
didn’t
.

“No, let’s not,” she contradicted herself. “Let’s stay on this road.”

“The restaurants are all closer to town,” Rob said.

“I’m sure I remember passing a McDonald’s on our way out here.”

She heard herself making the statement with bewilderment. It was a blatant lie. There were no fast-food places in this area.

Rob obviously knew this. He glanced at her sharply but did not comment.

The silence between them lengthened uncomfortably until Karen finally broke it.

“I don’t know why I said that.”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“I didn’t want you to turn,” Karen said. “I don’t know why. I felt like I had to give you some sort of reason, so I said that stupid thing about McDonald’s.”

“I’m not going to turn,” Rob said. “I’ll drive you anywhere you want to go.”

“It’s not much farther. A mile or so down this road is all, and then to the right. You’ll be turning onto a dirt road like the one that led to the Sanchez place, but it will be narrower.”

She was issuing directions without even thinking about it. The instructions she was giving made no more sense to her than they must to Rob. Karen knew little or nothing about the geography of the Valley. The few previous times that she had been out there had been back in her childhood when her mother had driven her out in the fall to buy apples and pumpkins. She had no memory of any detours on those occasions. The fruits and vegetables they had come for had been on prominent display on stands along the highway.

There was no explanation, either, for the tension that she was feeling. On one hand, she did want Rob to keep on driving in the direction they were headed and to take the turnoff she had indicated. On the other, she wanted him to take her home. The feeling of apprehension was coming out of nowhere, but it was increasing so rapidly that she was beginning to feel weak and a little nauseated.

Was she feeling a reaction to the pressure she had been under at the Sanchezes’? If so, why hadn’t she experienced it sooner? In Carla’s room, surrounded by the child’s possessions, she had felt nothing.

The white lace dress, which must surely have symbolized an important occasion in the little girl’s life, had stirred no response from her whatsoever. The yellow bear, tattered with loving, had lain in her arms like a rock. If Carla was missing
her bear and reaching out with her mind to recall its comforting softness, Karen had not felt any awareness of such longings. Bobby’s terror she had experienced as though it were her own. Carla’s emotions were not coming through to her at all.

Perhaps she isn’t experiencing negative feelings,
Karen thought suddenly.
Maybe she
prefers
being with her father.
This was a possibility. Mrs. Sanchez might have found her former husband selfish and irresponsible, but that didn’t necessarily mean he would appear that way to an eight-year-old daughter. If she loved him and he was good to her, she might actually be happier in the care of an easygoing drifter than she had been with a strict and demanding mother. More minutes passed.

Then Karen said, “Turn here.”

Rob obeyed immediately, pressing his foot to the brake and giving the steering wheel a quick twist to put the car onto a dirt road that was actually more of a hiking trail.

Immediately, they seemed to have left civilization behind them. Brush rose high on either side, cutting off the view of the highway, and branches reached out to claw at the fenders. Leaves flopped against the windshield, and the wheels spun and slid through mud-filled ruts.

“You’re sure this is the turnoff you were thinking about?” Rob asked doubtfully. “It’s just an access to the river. It’s probably a dead end.”

“That’s where we want to go,” Karen said. “To the water.” She didn’t know it until she said it out loud.

They continued to inch their way along as the trail wound
further into the undergrowth. Eventually, as Rob had predicted, it terminated at the river, breaking through the brush and emerging into a sunlit hollow filled with wildflowers. Daisies bloomed there in abundance, thrusting white-fringed heads triumphantly through matted, winter-browned grasses. Scattered among them, assorted other blossoms darted out in unexpected places. Birds were singing, not chirping and calling, but trilling happily, and the gurgle of the rushing river was as joyous as human laughter.

The place was beautiful. And it was terrible.

Karen did not want to be there.

“You were right,” she said. “It’s just a dead end with nothing here. Let’s go back.”

Rob shook his head. “There must be some reason you wanted to come here.”

“There’s nothing to see.”

“There might be. We’ll never know unless we take a look.”

Without giving her time to respond, he shut off the engine and opened the door on the driver’s side. The chorus of bird voices became louder and the sound of the river more uproarious.

Karen’s head began to throb.

“I don’t feel good,” she whispered. “I want to go home.”

“I know.” Rob’s voice was surprisingly gentle. “The truth is, kid, I don’t feel so hot myself.”

“Please, can we leave?”

“I’m afraid not. Not until we check it out.”

Karen opened the door on her own side and got out slowly. Her legs felt weak, and her stomach was churning.

Was it possible that a short time ago she had actually felt like eating? Now the mere idea of food was revolting to her.

The sun was warm on her arms and the back of her neck, yet she found that she was shivering uncontrollably.

“Where to now?” Rob asked softly.

Karen gestured blindly off to the right toward a path that led along the riverbank. Rob took a step in that direction and then turned back and reached for her hand. Numbly, Karen let him take and hold it. To her surprise, she found that his was trembling.

After another few steps, their eyes were caught by a metallic glitter at the hollow’s edge. It was the chrome handlebars of a child’s bicycle, which had been carefully propped against the trunk of a giant cottonwood.

“Is it hers?” Karen asked.

“I can’t be sure. It’s the right size.”

“It’s new,” Karen said. “You can tell that by looking at it. The paint doesn’t have any scratches.”

“On our way back I’ll stop and check out the serial number.”

He released her hand so that they could walk in single file on the narrowing trail. It twisted away from the river to maneuver around a tree trunk and then dipped abruptly to a pebble-covered beach. Flat rocks, black and gleaming, extended into the river and broke the stream of the current so that it
swirled chaotically around them, tossing froth about like confetti.

On the beach, set well back from the water, lay a pair of small sandals.

“You can go back to the car now, Karen,” Rob said.

She heard him, but there was no way that she could have moved from the spot on which she was planted. Her eyes were riveted on the shoes.

They came from Kmart.
The knowledge was as absolute as though she had been there at the time of their purchase. She knew those shoes. She could feel the metal buckles in her fingers as the child who owned them struggled to get them open. The right one came easily, but the left was harder. She gave it a quick, impatient jerk, and the flimsy, imitation leather strap came loose from the sole.

Dios mio!
Mama would be mad about that! “Shoes do not grow on trees!” she would say, because that was what she always said. “Shoes cost money! If that father of yours would send some support money—” But he bought me a bicycle! “You need a bike like you need a hole in your head. You need school clothes!” School is almost over. I won’t need school clothes in the summer!

Karen closed her eyes in a frantic attempt to shut out the scene, but it would not leave her. If anything, it seemed to intensify. She could feel the jagged pebbles beneath the soles of winter-tender feet. Water splashed, cold, upon her ankles.

How lovely it was now, in springtime! In another six weeks or so the river would grow shallow and tepid, oozing dutifully along its well-worn
route, pausing at extended intervals to languish, heavy and motionless, stultified by the heat of the blazing summer sun. It was no fun then. It was boring. Not like today, when it surged young and wild and filled with spirit.

The mud squished deliciously between her toes. The water was like liquid ice. Her feet were becoming numb, but that was all right; that was part of the adventure. The current was stronger than she had anticipated. Her jeans were getting wet now. She had rolled them up to her knees, but one of the pant legs kept slipping down. If she shoved them both higher, maybe she could make it all the way out to the largest of the rocks without getting sopping wet. In the summer that particular rock stuck up a good ten inches above the water, but today it could barely be seen above the surface.

She wondered if her bike was all right, sitting back there in the clearing all by itself. Perhaps she should go back and check on it. The path was so narrow, she had been afraid to wheel the bike along it for fear the bushes would scratch the paint. But, then, who was there to steal it?