The Walker in Shadows

I

Moved by a single impulse, they fled for the house, snatching up their belongings more or less at random. The gracious blue dusk had become an enemy, inhabited by shadows.

Pat went around the kitchen switching on every light she could find. Mark, who had grabbed the ominous paper, dropped into a chair at the kitchen table and studied the writing, his chin propped on his hands.

"Amazing," he muttered. "I never knew I had the talent."

"I could kill you," said his mother in a choked voice. "How you have the nerve to joke about it…"

"I'm not joking. This is the most fantastic piece of luck! You know what it means."

"What it probably means," Josef said coldly, "is that your uncontrolled subconscious has expressed itself. You've had this idea in mind all along, haven't you?"

Mark looked injured.

"I didn't do it on purpose. That was automatic writ-ing."

"One of the favorite tricks of the fake mediums," Josef said. "They claim the spirits are directing their muscles."

"Honest to God, Mr. Friedrichs-"

"Oh, I'm not accusing you of fraud. In some cases a medium honestly believes he or she has been taken over by some external force. But that force can be the subconscious, just as the spirit guides who speak through the medium can be a secondary personality."

"What are you talking about?" Pat demanded shrilly. Her nerves had been badly shaken, and she was in no mood for generalizations. "What idea?"

"I'll state it," Josef said. "Actually, Mark, I'm doing you a favor; it may sound more sensible coming from me.

"Mark believes that the poltergeist is the conscious intelligence of Peter Turnbull, and that his-er-activities are directed toward and stimulated by the girl who is the spiritual reincarnation of Susan Bates. He thinks Susan and Peter were lovers."

"I don't see that you made it sound any more sensible," Mark grumbled. "They weren't lovers. Not in the physical sense, anyhow. But… yes, I do think they were in love. I mean, a man doesn't come back from the grave to argue about secession."

Mark wasn't the only one who had considered the idea. Pat realized that it had been simmering in her own subconscious for some time.

"But they were first cousins," she said slowly. "Wouldn't that-"

"Prevent them from marrying? No," Mark said flatly. "Not then. And it would have been marriage that was in question, not casual fooling around; in 1860 a guy didn't dally with a young lady of good family-especially when it was his own family. But can you imagine the parents approving of such a match?"

"Star-crossed lovers?" Josef shook his head. "Mark, you stole the plot from Romeo and Juliet. It's highly suspect, and so is this presumed message." He picked up the paper and eyed it critically. " Tell her I've come back.' From the dead, one presumes. It would be difficult, I agree. 'I want her, I want her…' Come, now. It was admittedly a melodramatic era, but that's a bit too much."

"I don't believe it," Kathy said. "I won't believe it. Why would he act so-so violently, if he really loved her?"

Pat started to speak, and then changed her mind. Kathy was visibly distressed; it would be cruel to frighten her further. But if Mark's theory was correct, there was an explanation for the violence of the manifestations.

Peter Turnbull, arrogant, spoiled, unaccustomed to deprivation of any kind, had been deprived of the girl he wanted, first by the intolerance of their parents and then by the final frustration. If one granted that some aspect of personality did survive death-and that was becoming harder and harder to deny-then perhaps the boy was still blindly seeking his lost love. It was not necessary to assume that young Turnbull had been malignant and vicious in life. Didn't some spiritualists claim that ghosts were by definition psychotic spirits, lingering on this plane of existence because the shock of violent, untimely death had made them unable to accept their removal from the body? If the spirit of Peter Turnbull was trapped in some such hellish impasse, their problem was insoluble. In the act of seeking Peter would destroy what he sought, and there was no way of giving him what he wanted, or convincing him that it was unattainable.

Kathy sat hunched over, her arms wrapped around her body as if she were cold, her eyes staring. Pat started up.

"It's getting late," she said, with forced cheerfulness. "I could do with a snack and a cup of hot tea. Kathy, how about giving me a hand?"

"Scotch for me," Josef said.

Mark said nothing. Like Kathy, he stared into empty space, his lips moving as if he were praying.

II

Canned soup and sandwiches were the best Pat could offer, but the food restored their spirits, and, as Josef said, the Scotch didn't hurt. Mark remained abstracted throughout the meal, although he managed to eat twice as much as anyone else.

When they had finished Kathy collected the dishes as if she had done that job all her life. Josef's eyes followed the slim little figure as it moved back and forth between the table and the sink. His expression was unguarded, and the baffled terror in his dark eyes made Pat ache with sympathy.

"I made reservations at the motel," he said abruptly. "For all of us."

Pat half expected that Mark would object. Instead he nodded soberly.

"I guess we'd better. At least you three-"

"You, too," Pat said firmly. "You're not staying here alone with vases and mirrors flying around the room."

"It isn't doing that anymore," Mark said. "The last couple of times there was no poltergeist stuff. Hmmm. That's interesting."

"Why?" Pat asked.

"He's got you well trained as a straight man," Josef remarked disagreeably. "You ought to know how he thinks-if the process can be called that. He interprets everything as a sign of a guiding intelligence-an assumption which, like all his other assumptions, he has yet to prove. The idea is that this nasty apparition was awkward and maladroit at first, unaccustomed to its powers. Gradually it is focusing them, concentrating on its real aim, so that it doesn't have to waste energy in random acts of violence."

Jerry's frown altered his son's face.

"You wouldn't be able to figure that out if you hadn't reached the same conclusions," Mark said. "Why do you keep fighting it? Hell, I don't like it any better than you do! The trouble is, we're caught in a vicious circle. We don't know enough to take the steps that would enable us to learn more. We ought to be testing the thing, experimenting, finding its limitations. But we can't take the risk."

"Mark." Josef rose and began to pace back and forth, his hands in his pockets. "I've gone along with your research because the only thing we stand to lose by it is a few days of time. And because-oh, yes, I admit it- because there is a remote chance that we might be able to learn something that would enable us to deal with this- this thing. Any other method is out. It's too dangerous."

"Why do you say the chance is remote? It seems to me-"

"Because I too, in my long-distant youth, read ghost stories." Josef leaned against the counter; a faint, reminiscent smile curved his lips. "I'd climb into bed at night with a volume of Poe or Lovecraft and read till my hair stood on end and I was afraid to turn out the light. I'm tolerably familiar with the literature, including the so-called 'true' ghost stories. The White Nuns, and the ghostly carriages, the banshees and the headless horsemen… I can't remember a single case in which a ghost was laid by an intrepid investigator who found out what was troubling the troubled spirit. In fiction, yes. Not in fact. Now be honest. You're a screwball, but you have a good mind. Do you know of any such cases?"

The compliment was not exactly wholehearted, but Mark was rather flattered by it, although he tried to appear blase.

"Well," he began.

"I'm not talking about the pop books written by professional ghost hunters," Josef added. "The cases they discuss are so vague, and their evidence is so illogical, that no sane person could take them seriously. I'm talking about ghosts-the kind that walk around old houses politely dematerializing when someone tries to touch them. And that, my boy, is just about all they do. Their activities are singularly aimless. Do you know of any real case like the one you have postulated-a case of a personality returning after death because of some unfinished business or frustrated ambition?"

"Well…"

"I don't either," Josef said.

Mark looked straight at his tormentor.

"Are you going to write this case up, Mr. Friedrichs? Or talk about it at cocktail parties?"

Josef's response was wordless. It might best be described as a growl.

At nine o'clock the others were ready to leave, but Mark had had seconds thoughts.

"You guys could sit in the car with the engine running, ready for a getaway," he proposed. "I'll wait on the stairs, just to see what happens. If it gets sticky I can run out and-"

"And lead the thing to the motel," Josef said.

For once Pat saw her son outmaneuvered. He bit his lip and refrained from further argument.

Perhaps because he had won that round, Josef was actively cooperative with Mark's next proposal-to set up a tape recorder and camera in his room. The tape recorder was simple enough; Mark's elaborate, expensive hi-fi system included recording equipment that would run for almost four hours. The camera was something else. There was no way of triggering it to go off at one a.m., although Mark proposed several unrealistic and impossible suggestions. The final result looked like a mad inventor's contraption; wires and cords ran all over the room, hooked up to the camera.

When the final cord across the doorway had been placed, Josef stood back and contemplated the maze with wry amusement.

"That might work if you were trying to catch a blind burglar," he remarked. "Although I doubt it. Pulling one of those cords will probably just jerk the camera off the tripod."

Pat glanced over her shoulder. Mark was out of earshot; he had gone down to console Jud and shut him in the kitchen.

"You helped him set it up," she said.

"I'll do anything that doesn't involve taking physical risks. Anyway, it kept him busy for an hour; God knows what he would have proposed if I hadn't gone along with this. All right, my dear, let's go."

Instead of heading for the nearest motel, Josef drove on through town and turned north.

"Where are we going?" Mark asked.

" Frederick. I figured we might as well put a little distance between us and our friend."

Having been concerned with far more vital issues, Pat had not considered the social aspects of their situation. But when the desk clerk addressed her as "Mrs. Fried-richs," a belated realization of what she was doing swept over her. As they walked down the corridor toward their rooms, Josef muttered, "You look like the picture of guilt, my dear. If we hadn't had the kids with us, the clerk would have assumed the worst."

"Why did you have to give your own name?" Pat hissed.

"Because I was using a credit card. Relax, will you? I'm already divorced; no one is going to cite you as corespondent." He put his key in the lock and opened the door. "Here we are," he said aloud. "Cozy, isn't it?"

The room looked like all the motel rooms Pat had ever seen: shabby, characterless and bland. The color scheme was green and yellow. The pictures over the bed were prints of chrysanthemums in green vases.

Josef crossed the room to a door in the side wall and unlocked it.

"You and Kathy can share this room," he said to Pat. Then he turned to Mark. "Your room is at the other end of the wing. I couldn't get three rooms adjoining."

For a moment Mark stared blankly at the key Josef had offered him. His eyes narrowed. Then, with a slight shrug, he took the key, and his mother relaxed. After all, it was the most practical way of arranging matters; Mark and Josef had no desire to share a room. And even Mark could hardly expect the older man to take the room at the end of the hall, away from his daughter.

"You don't mind if I stick around until one o'clock, do you?" Mark asked politely.

"Not at all. Make yourself comfortable."

In addition to the double bed, the room contained the usual furniture: a desk, a chest of drawers, and a table and two chairs. Josef pulled out a chair for Pat. She shook her head.

"Thanks, but I'd better hang up my dress. I don't want to go to work all crumpled and messy."

"You aren't going to work tomorrow!" Mark exclaimed.

"Mark, I have to. I can't go on-"

"Just one more day, Mom. I told them you had flu and probably wouldn't be in till the middle of the week. Just tomorrow, and then-"

"And then-what? a miracle?"

"I've got an idea," Mark said. "If it doesn't work… Please, Mom?"

"Well… all right. But what-"

"I think I'll go look for the Coke machine," Mark said, plunging toward the door.

"Get some ice while you're at it," Josef said.

"Sure, right. Kath?"

Kathy followed him.

Pat closed her mouth on the question she had not had time to ask, and turned to see Josef taking a bottle from his overnight bag.

Why she should have chosen that particular moment to speak she did not know. In fact, the words that came out of her mouth were words she would normally not have said.

"Are you going to sit here drinking until one o'clock?"

With one angry twist of the wrist Josef opened the bottle and splashed a generous amount into his glass.

"You sound like my ex-wife," he said. "It doesn't become you, my dear."

"If that's why she left you-"

"That was one of the reasons. If it's any of your business."

Then his face twisted, as anger was replaced by horrified concern.

"My God, Pat, what are we doing? I'm sorry. It is your business, you have every right-"

He came toward her, his arms outstretched. Pat turned away.

"No, don't. Not now, not… I don't know what made me say those things."

She heard his heavy breathing close behind her, but he did not touch her.

"My ex-wife was a religious fanatic," he said. "A middle-aged Jesus freak. When I married her she was devout, a little straitlaced; I found that charming, can you imagine? I thought marriage would… make her see things differently. But she got worse. She despised all the indulgences of the flesh, including… Kathy was an accident, and was resented as such. Until two years ago my daughter never wore makeup, or cut her hair, or owned a pretty dress. Marion sent her to one of those fundamentalist schools, for girls only. I should have interfered long before I did, but I thought raising a girl was a mother's job. I was a damned fool, and believe me, I paid for it. I can't say Marion drove me to drink. It's always a matter of one's own choice, isn't it? I guess I did it to get back at her. I'm still doing it."

"You don't have to tell me this," Pat whispered.

"Yes, I do. It sounds crazy, I know, but I could have admitted that she was promiscuous, or that she had fallen in love with someone else, or even that she found me boring and repulsive. What I couldn't admit was that she was dim-witted enough to leave me for an oily, unctuous evangelist. That's where she is now, in his commune in California, wandering around in a long white robe serving saintly Father Emmanuel…"

"Don't." Impulsively Pat turned, and found herself in his arms. She clung to him, her hands moving over the soft tweed of his jacket, but when he bent his head she turned her face away.

"The kids will be back any second," she murmured.

"I guess Mark isn't ready for this development," Josef agreed. His hands slid slowly down her back, as if reluctant to release her. "Are you ready for it, Pat?"

"No. Not until… We're in an abnormal situation, Josef. I can't trust my feelings."

"I can trust mine. I love you, Pat, I'll even put up with that outrageous son of yours if you'll have me."

"Not now," Pat said. She moved away from him and saw, from his expression, that her withdrawal had wounded him. But it was herself she didn't trust; his physical presence had aroused feelings she had not experienced for over a year, and she knew they were clouding her judgment.

"What would your husband have thought of our ghost?" Josef asked.

"Jerry?" She considered the question. "He'd have been fascinated-but skeptical. He would have been the first to slap Mark down when his theories got too farfetched."

She was interrupted by Mark banging on the door. Josef went to answer it. Something of the tension that had filled the room must have remained; Mark looked suspiciously at his mother.

"What were you talking about?"

"Your name was mentioned," Josef said. "But only in passing. Strange as it may seem to you, there are other topics worthy of discussion. In God's name what have you got there?" Mark had begun unloading various edibles onto the table.

"They are fascinated by machines," Pat explained. "Jerry always said Mark would feed a quarter into a slot if he knew it would only give him a punch in the nose."

She could see that Josef was self-conscious about her references to her husband, and that was something they would have to work out before they could come to any real understanding. Jerry would always be part of her life. She couldn't forget him and she didn't want to. In the last few days she had been able to remember him and talk about him without the gnawing ache of loss, and that was not only a miracle, it was the way things ought to be. Jerry was the last person in the world to expect her to wallow in widowhood. He would rejoice in her new happiness.

Mark arranged a row of cans and a heap of candy bars on the table and sat down with the books he had brought with him.

"I," he announced regally, "have work to do. The rest of you can amuse yourselves as you like, but please keep it down."

"Go get your mother a chair," Josef said, scowling at him.

"Please," Pat said gently.

"Oh." Mark rose and went into the next room. After an apologetic glance at Pat, Josef followed him. They returned, each carrying a chair.

And that was something else that would have to be worked out, Pat thought. Mark was a grown man. He would not lightly submit to the parental authority of a stranger. He didn't need a father, he needed a friend.

Josef was obviously struggling with the same realization, for after they had settled in their chairs he spoke to Mark in kindlier tones than he had used thus far.

"What are you looking for, Mark? Can we help?"

"Well-sure. I guess you could. I'm curious about where and when Peter Turnbull was killed. 'A cavalry skirmish, somewhere in Maryland ' is pretty vague. I thought maybe one of the military-history books would have a record of the engagements White's Rangers fought in."

"If the unit was part of Lee's Army of northern Virginia, we should be able to locate it," Josef said.

"But cavalry troops didn't always stay with the main body of the army. They went off on their own, like that raid on Poolesville in 1862."

"True." Josef picked up one of the books. "We can but try. I don't understand why you think it's important, but-"

"Maybe it isn't," Mark said. "Only I got to wondering… The opposing armies were so close. Right across the Potomac from each other, much of the time. Of course distances were greater then-no, damn it, I mean-"

"I know what you mean," Josef said, smiling. "It took longer in those days to cover the distance. All the same, the armies were close. This area was hit several times by Confederate troops looking for horses and supplies. Perhaps Peter was with one of those units."

"If he was," Mark said, "wouldn't he drop in on his girl friend while he was in the area?"

Josef considered the idea, scratching his chin, but Pat exclaimed impatiently, "Of course he would. Nineteen years old, swaggering in a fancy uniform-"

"They weren't so fancy," Kathy said. "Remember in Gone With the Wind, how they were spinning butternut cloth for uniforms, and dying captured Yankee uniforms because they couldn't get the good gray material?"

"That was after the Union blockade of the South had become effective," Pat argued. "Can you see the Turnbulls, father or son, riding off to war without the whole bit-spurs jingling, blooded horses prancing, gold epaulets and shiny swords?"

Mark snickered. "It's getting to you, isn't it? You talk about them as if you knew them personally-predicting what they would say and do."

"Get lost," Pat said.

"Okay." Mark took a book in one hand and Kathy's wrist in the other. "We're going in the next room to work. Don't worry, we'll leave the door open."

This shaft of irony was directed at Josef, who responded with a raised eyebrow, but made no verbal comment. When the two had disappeared into the adjoining room, he spoke to Pat in a low voice.

"What is he driving at?"

"I'm sure I don't know."

"Maybe I'm unfair," Josef said. "But I swear that kid would make Machiavelli look like an amateur… Well, I'll see if I can find out what he wants to know; maybe then he'll condescend to explain why he wants to know it."

He applied himself to the book he had chosen. Pat tried to read too, but the low voices and occasional bursts of laughter from the next room distracted her. Thank God, she thought, for the resilience of youth. Kathy must be a lot tougher than she looked to have survived the arid childhood Josef had described. If her mother's warped views had scarred the girl, the scars were well hidden; certainly she didn't seem to find the male sex repellent.

As time passed, it became harder for them to concen trate. Josef's eyes began to stray from his book to his wristwatch. Pat had put hers in her purse in order to resist the temptation of watching it. Mark and Kathy appeared to have forgotten the time, but when Josef said suddenly, "It's twelve fifty," Mark emerged from the next room as if he had been propelled by a spring.

"Twelve forty-five," he said. "Your watch is fast."

"Turn on the TV," Pat said.

Josef rose to do so, giving her a sour smile. She shared his feelings; trying to clock a ghost by means of anything as mundane and modern as television…

But the prosaic nature of the apparatus gave her an unreasonable sense of security. Surely no evil spirit would invade a motel room while Perry Mason outfoxed another lawyer.

Abandoning all pretense at indifference, they sat watching Perry mouth dumb protests until Pat said suddenly, "Poor Jud. I feel guilty, leaving him."

"I wanted to bring him," Mark said. "But you-"

"He's too big," Pat said. She didn't want to explain her real objections to bringing the dog. His abject terror had increased her own. "Anyhow, he's shut in the kitchen, away from… I wish we could have located Albert before we left."

"Cats are reputed to be quite comfortable in the presence of evil spirits," Josef remarked.

"That's a vile canard," Pat said. "However, I think cats are more capable of avoiding unpleasant situations. Albert has not been around much the last few days. Maybe he doesn't like what has been going on."

The exchange was their last pretense at conversation. They sat in silence for the succeeding minutes, watching the figures on the TV screen gesticulate. Perry's triumph was followed by six commercials, a late news bulletin, and the "Star-Spangled Banner," as the station signed off. Finally, when the screen had been blank for several long minutes, Josef let out a long sigh and wiped his damp forehead.

"That's that."

"Thank God," Pat said sincerely. "Let's go to bed."

"I don't suppose…" Mark began.

"That we want to go back to the house and see what, if anything, your apparatus has recorded? No," said Josef.

"I had a feeling you were going to say that," Mark muttered. "Good night, all."

By the time Pat had finished her ablutions Kathy was sound asleep. The girl had been stoically silent through the last vigil, but as Pat bent over her, studying her pale face, she wondered how long Kathy could stand it. Even if Josef carried out his threat of selling the house and moving away, the problem would still be unresolved in the area that counted most-in Kathy's mind. She might go on seeing apparitions even after they had ceased to pursue her; and surely her mother's hell-fire religious notions must have left unpleasant seeds of guilt and doubt in her young conscience.

Pat brushed a lock of hair away from Kathy's cheek. The girl's tight lips relaxed into a faint smile, and Pat resolved then and there that if no other solution presented itself, she would suggest to Mark that they manufacture a final, satisfying denouement, something that would settle Kathy's fears. Maybe, she thought grimly, we can burn that damned house down to the ground. Josef wouldn't wittingly cheat an insurance company, but Mark would… And I'm beginning to think it might be the lesser of two evils.

Josef's room was dark and silent. He had left the door a few inches ajar. Pat got into bed, groaning as her taut muscles relaxed. The warm, sweet tide of sleep began to envelop her.

She came bolt upright, all her joints protesting, as someone knocked on the door.

"Mom? Hey, Mom, are you asleep? It's me."

She heard a muffled curse and a creak of springs from the next room. Josef hadn't been asleep either. With a curse of her own she got up and ran to the door.

"Shut up," she said through her teeth. "If you waken Kathy I'll kill you. What do you want?"

Mark, still fully dressed and wide awake, looked hurt.

"I can't find my pen. I must have left it on the table next door."

"You don't need your pen."

"I do, though, Mom. It won't take a minute. Just let me-"

He was past her before she could protest again. Kathy had not stirred. Mark tiptoed to the door between the rooms.

"I'll just slip in," he whispered. "I won't wake him up."

"I'm awake," said a grim voice from the darkness. "If I had been asleep, I'd be awake now."

"Gee, Mr. Friedrichs, I'm sorry. I just-"

"Shut up and get on with it."

"Yes, sir."

Pat heard objects rustle and rattle and jingle as Mark fumbled. There was no further comment from Josef, not even a creak of bedsprings. Mark finally reappeared.

"Thanks," he said "I just wanted-"

"Get out of here," Pat said.

Mark gave her a wide smile full of teeth and ingratia-tion. Before he slipped out the door he glanced at the bed where Kathy was sleeping, and his mother's rude comment died on her lips. He cared so much it hurt her to see him.

IV

She felt less kindly toward Mark when the incident was repeated at what seemed to her an incredibly early hour the following morning.

"Go away," she shouted-and then, remembering

Kathy, she rolled over, clapping her hand to her mouth.

Kathy was sitting up in bed. With her hair tumbling over her bare shoulders and the thin fabric of her batiste nightgown showing all the fresh young curves beneath, she looked good enough to eat. Her eyes were shining as she slid out of bed and headed for the door, where Mark's insistent tapping could still be heard.

Pat fell back against the pillow, wondering whether she was tough enough to become the mother of a nubile young maiden.

"Put a robe on," she croaked.

Kathy came to a stop and turned red from the top of her nightgown to the roots of her hair. Remembering a number of things she ought to have recalled earlier, Pat added quickly, "Mark is always in a weakened state before breakfast; you don't want him to pass out in the hall, do you?"

Kathy's flush subsided. "You're funny," she said, giggling.

"That's me," Pat agreed. "Keep 'em laughing." Mark's attack on the door increased in volume. Pat yelled, "Wait a minute."

"I'll let him in," Josef said. He stood in the doorway between the two rooms, buttoning his shirt; and as Pat rolled a weary, wary eye in his direction he grinned dis-armingly. "Hi," he said.

"Uh," Pat said. Her nightgown was heavy cotton and she knew there were bags under her eyes; there always were when she had not had enough sleep. Josef glanced at his daughter.

"Get your jeans on, honey," he said casually. "The lady is correct, as always; if a passing bellboy gets a look at you, we'll have to beat him off with a club."

Kathy snatched up a handful of garments and vanished into the bathroom. Ignoring the increasing fusillade of knocks, Josef sat down on the bed. Pat was still groggy; his kiss caught her unawares, and for a few moments after that she didn't even hear the knocking.

"You look gorgeous in the morning," he said, his hands on her shoulders.

"You're either blind or a liar or-"

"In love," said Josef against her ear.

"Don't do that. What if one of the kids-"

"They'll have to get used to it eventually," Josef said. His warm breath moved across her cheek and mingled with hers. Pat wondered briefly how he had acquired such skills in a loveless marriage with a frigid wife. She decided she didn't care.

Finally she freed her mouth, fighting her own instincts as well as his, and pushed him away.

"How can you be so frivolous at a time like this?"

"I must have undeveloped talents for frivolity," Josef said, smiling. "I feel drunk. No, I feel better than that. Getting drunk is no fun."

"You'd better let Mark in before he kicks the door down."

"Mark." Josef's smile vanished. "That's right, I have something to say to that young man."

There was a decided swagger in his walk as he crossed the room. Pat pushed a pillow under her back and watched him with lazy amusement. No doubt she ought to inquire why he was annoyed with Mark, but at that moment she was inclined to let them fight it out. Like Josef, she felt slightly drunk. No; it was much better than being drunk…

Josef opened the door. Ruffled and red-faced, Mark stalked in, and Pat's suppressed amusement surfaced in a weird gurgle as her son's suspicious gaze moved from Josef's face to hers.

"What took you so long? What were you doing?"

"I sent Kathy in to dress before I opened the door," Josef said blandly. "Just because we are in an abnormal situation doesn't mean we can lose sight of all the proprieties." Unappeased, Mark continued to glower at him, and Josef went on, "Speaking of proprieties, I'd appreciate it if you would return my car keys. One can hardly speak of theft among friends, but it wasn't kosher, was it, to borrow the car without asking me?"

Pat sat up in bed.

"Mark! Did you really?"

"Mom, you aren't dressed," Mark said.

"Stop trying to change the subject. Did you take-"

"I just wanted to check on poor old Jud," Mark said in injured tones. "I figured you would all get mad if I suggested it, so…"

He handed Josef the keys. The latter inspected them.

"How are the fenders?" he inquired.

"Not a scratch," Mark replied indignantly.

"Hmmm. All right, sport. Let's get some breakfast. The ladies will join us in-"

"Fifteen minutes," Pat said.

She didn't want to lecture Mark in front of Josef. He felt enough hostility already. But she promised herself that she would have a few words to say to him when they were alone.

She knew she was hooked when she found herself hurrying to dress, in order to see Josef a little sooner. Like a high-school girl, she thought, banging her head with her brush in her haste. But it's nice. It feels good. And when she and Kathy entered the dining room, she was surprised to see that the sky outside was dark with rain. She felt like sunshine.

Josef's behavior was sophomorically infatuated. He tried to hold her hand under the table, and the way he looked at her would have been a dead giveaway if anyone had been watching.

But Mark wasn't watching. When he had finished his breakfast he sat staring vacantly at his plate. Pat offered him her toast, and he refused. Then she really got worried.

"What did you say to him?" she hissed at Josef.

He shook his head. "Not much. I'm saving it."

"He's up to something," Pat said aloud. "Mark." She nudged his elbow, which was inelegantly propped on the table. "Mark, wake up."

"Huh?" Mark started. His mother, studying him with undivided attention for the first time that morning, saw the telltale signs. "Did you get any sleep last night?" she demanded. "What were you doing?"

"Working," Mark said. "Thinking."

"That's work," Josef agreed. He exchanged glances with Pat, and some of her suspicions must have slipped into his mind. "What else did you do last night, Mark? Did you really go back to the house?"

"We better leave," Mark said hastily. "Poor old Jud must be about ready to burst. I mean-"

"So you didn't go to the house," Pat exclaimed. "Where-"

But Mark was halfway to the door, and by the time Josef had paid the check, he had vanished into his own room and closed the door.

"We may as well check out," Josef said resignedly. "When we get him home I'll string him up by his thumbs and ask him again. I don't want to make a scene here in public."

True to his promise, he said nothing during the drive. Mark was in a peculiar state, mumbling under his breath, squirming and twitching, and once, to his mother's consternation, bursting into a hoarse, sardonic laugh. Seeing Pat's alarm, Kathy patted her hand.

"It's all right, Mrs. Robbins. He's got an idea, that's all."

"If it affects him that way, he'd better give up intellectual activities," said her father, from the front seat.

"Do you know what the idea is?" Pat asked.

"Well…" Kathy looked as sly as it was possible for her to look. "I promised I wouldn't talk about it till he has it all worked out. If it does-we might have this whole thing settled by tonight. Wouldn't that be great?"

"Uh-huh," Pat said. She wished she shared Kathy's faith in Mark. She did not express her doubts; why should she destroy the girl's optimism prematurely?

Never before, even when it was ramshackle and abandoned, had her house looked anything but innocent to Pat. Now, under an evil, threatening sky, it had a sinister air. The turrets and tower seemed grotesque instead of charming.

Mark led the way. He went straight to the kitchen and Pat heard Jud's yelp of pleasure mixed with reproach as Mark greeted him and let him out. Standing in the hall she sniffed, wrinkling her nose; but there was no trace of that foul aroma. That did not prove that the night had been quiet. The aura was not a physical smell, it probably worked directly on the mind of the person affected.

She lingered by the door, oddly reluctant to go farther. As she stood there, the bushes by the steps rustled. Albert's neatly marked head emerged. He eyed her dubiously for a moment and then meowed.

"I called you last night," Pat said defensively. "It's your own fault if you didn't want to come in."

Mark and Kathy went upstairs. Josef was obviously torn between curiosity and another emotion, but there was no real conflict; he turned to Pat, who was still arguing with the cat.

"Don't come in, then, if you don't want to. But you'll have to make up your mind. I won't leave the door wide open."

The cat took two tentative steps toward her, its tail at half-mast and twitching. Then it spat and bolted into the shrubbery.

"He is acting strangely," Pat said. "I wonder…" Then she heard Mark call from upstairs. "Mom. Mr. Friedrichs. Can you come up here, please?"

The trail of destruction had left debris as far down as the stair landing, where shards of a broken vase glittered. A dent in the plaster showed where it had struck and shattered. The upper hall was strewn with broken glass from pictures. Every one of them had been torn from the wall. Mark's room had taken the brunt of the attack. There was hardly a breakable object left intact, including his camera; but none of the other upstairs rooms had completely escaped. It was as if some large savage animal had been let loose and had ranged up and down, searching and smashing.