Don't Tell

The door swung inward, swung into darkness. I was sure I had left on the bedside lamp. Bulbs burn out, I told myself, and flicked on the overhead light. My chest tightened.

Everything was in knots — everything that I had untied before seeing Dr. Parker.

I strode across the room and checked the double doors.

They were still locked from the inside. My skin prickled. No one, nothing could have gotten in, except a power that wasn’t stopped by walls. I nervoulsy plucked at my bedsheets. I could untie the knots a second time, but then what? Even locked doors wouldn’t keep me safe. I felt powerless to stop Nora from whatever she wanted to do to me.

I walked across the hall to the room that had been my mother’s, wondering if I’d find knots there. The photos and other things pertaining to my mother had been removed by someone, but nothing else had changed. I saw Holly’s door was open and checked her room from the hallway.

“Looking for something?”

I jumped at Holly’s voice.

“You’re awfully edgy,” she observed. “Are you sure nothing’s wrong?”

“Something is wrong,” I admitted. “Go look in my room.”

She did and I took another quick look at hers. Nothing had been disturbed.

“I don’t believe this!” I heard Holly exclaim. She returned to the hall. “What is going on, Lauren? When did this happen?”

I told her about the knots that I’d found and untied earlier.

“So it’s happened twice tonight?” She rubbed her arms.

“That’s creepy.”

“Do you remember the summer my mother came, how she kept finding her scarves and jewelry knotted?”

Holly nodded. “I don’t like it. I don’t like it at all.”

“That makes two of us,” I replied.

She turned suddenly and pounded on her sister’s door.

“Nora!” she shouted. “Nora! I’m coming in.”

Aunt Jule came hurrying from her room. “What’s going on?”

“Look for yourself, Mom. Look at Lauren’s room. I told you before, but you wouldn’t listen to me. Nora is out of control.”

Aunt Jule entered my room, and Holly opened her sister’s door. Nora stood before us in a frayed nightgown. Her dark eyes darted between Holly’s face and mine.

“I’m losing my patience with you,” Holly said. “You’re way out of bounds, Nora. Get in there and straighten up Lauren’s room. And don’t try something stupid like this again.”

“Just a minute,” Aunt Jule said, coming back into the hall.

“How do you know Nora is responsible? There were lots of kids going in and out of the house tonight.”

“Oh, come on, Mom,” Holly replied, but then she turned to me for backup.

“I found the knots earlier,” I explained, “untied them all, then locked both doors to my room. When I came back, the knots were tied again in the exact same way.”

As I spoke, Nora slipped past us and entered my room. I followed her and watched from the doorway as she touched the knots in the sheets, then the knots in the curtains, fascinated by them, admiring them.

“Did you keep the key with you?” Aunt Jule asked.

I turned back to her. “Yes.”

Her eyes flashed. “So why do you think Nora had a better chance of unlocking the door than anyone else?”

I glanced away. If I talked about poltergeists, I would probably lose Holly’s support.

“It seems to me, Lauren, that if we want to start accusing people, you’re the most likely candidate for this prank,” Aunt Jule went on. “You’re the one who has the key.”

“But that doesn’t make sense!” I protested. “Why would I mess up my own room?”

“For attention. You’re a girl who is used to a lot of attention.”

I saw Holly glance sideways at me; she was considering her mother’s suggestion.

“I didn’t do it!” I insisted.

“Someone else did it,” Nora whispered, emerging from my bedroom. Her face was as white as a wax candle, her pupils dilated.

“Nora, you look ill,” Aunt Jule said.

“She is ill!” I screamed. “And you’re cruel not to get her the psychiatric help she needs!”

Aunt Jule gave me a stony look, then said in a gentle voice, “Nora, love, I want you to sleep in my room tonight.”

Nora slowly followed her down the hall.

I shook my head, amazed at how my godmother could twist things to accommodate whatever she wanted to believe.

Holly sighed. “Come on, Lauren, let’s take a walk. Then I’ll help you undo this mess.”

“Thanks, but you’ve got to be tired. It won’t take long to untie things.”

“Still, let’s walk,” Holly persisted. “You’re not going to fall asleep in the state you’re in now.”

“I’ll be okay. I’ll walk and talk to myself until I bore myself to sleep.”

Holly laughed lightly. “Well, you know where I am if you need me.”

When I reached the hall stairs, Aunt Jule stood at her bedroom door. “It’s late, Lauren. Don’t go far.”

I answered her with a slight nod.

Downstairs, I headed out the river side of the house, then turned toward Frank’s. I walked his land along the river and sat for a while in one of his lawn chairs, thinking things over.

I recalled what Dr. Parker had said at the prom and knew he was right: I could do nothing about Nora’s illness; the one person in my power to heal was myself. I needed to go to the place where my mother had died, this time on my own.

The moon was high, making the unlit dock stand out clearly in the water. I imagined it as my mother would have seen it that night, a vague shape in the river mist The bank wasn’t as eroded then, so she could have climbed up easily. Had she walked the dock the way she used to walk the porch?

Had someone cornered her there?

I climbed up and walked to the end where she had fallen. I forced myself to touch the piling, laying both hands on it, then stared down into the river.

Had my mother known she was going to die that night?

Had she blacked out the moment she hit the piling or did she sink slowly into watery unconsciousness? Did she cry out for me?

“Get over it, Lauren,” I told myself aloud. “You have to let go.”

But I couldn’t, not until I knew what had happened then and what was happening now.

I mulled over the poltergeist theory. Perhaps Nora was so traumatized by finding my mother drowned that she believed and feared she was still in the river. But Nora’s irrational fear would make more sense if she had actually murdered her.

My mother’s presence had brought plenty of anger and dissension to Aunt Jule’s usually quiet house. Perhaps Nora, already unbalanced — more so than any of us had realized — had been pushed over the edge and, in a sense, pushed back.

If Nora were guilty of murder and trying to repress it, my return to Wisteria would be intensely disturbing to her and could evoke a response as extreme as poltergeist activity.

The puzzle pieces fit.

Then Dr. Parker’s words floated back to me: A quick theory is a dangerous way to answer important questions.

But my experiences in the last three days, some of them spookily similar to my mother’s, had convinced me that her death wasn’t an accident And if Nora didn’t murder her, who else could have? Who else had a reason — or the momentary passion and anger — to push my mother against the piling and off the dock? I didn’t want to suspect anyone I knew; the excuse of insanity was the only way I could deal with it being Nora.

I retraced my steps, then climbed the hill and circled the house. It was completely dark now. Passing by the greenhouse, I was surprised to find that a light had been left on. I didn’t remember seeing it when I arrived home and it seemed odd that Holly, given her compulsion to turn off lights, hadn’t extinguished it. I entered the greenhouse, a little timidly after last night’s experience.

The place felt overly warm and stuffy. I wondered if Nora had forgotten to open the vents, allowing the day’s heat to build up. The bare bulb hanging over the center aisle was out; the beacon I’d seen was a large plastic flashlight.

Perhaps Nora had come with it tonight, planning to cool down the place, and been frightened away by party guests.

I knew that when the sun flooded the greenhouse tomorrow the plants would die in the accumulated heat. The wheel that opened the roof vents was at the end of the main aisle, where the small trellises were. As I headed toward it, I played the flashlight’s beam over the plants, listening intently, watching, afraid to blink my eyes. But every leaf was still. At the end of the aisle I shone the light on the pots with the young vines. All of them were limp, hanging from the trellises by their knots.

Above them was the six-inch metal wheel that cranked open the house’s high vents — that is, the axle from it — the wheel was gone. I was sure I had seen the vents open the other day. I reached for the switch that ran the big exhaust fan, flicking it one way, then the other. It wouldn’t turn on.

Stranger yet, despite the breeze that night, the blades were absolutely still. When I shone the flashlight on the fan, I saw that the flap behind it had been closed, which was done only in winter to seal out the cold air. I tried the smaller fans distributed along the plant benches. They didn’t work, nor did the center light.

It must be the power supply, I thought, and searched for a metal cabinet containing a circuit breaker. I found an ancient box with two screw-in fuses. Both had been removed.

Still something was running — I could hear the quiet motors. Space heaters, that’s what was making it hot The heaters burned kerosene and were used in the winter to keep the plants warm. I found four of them in the side aisles of the greenhouse and turned them off, puzzled as to why Nora or anyone else would have them running.

There was little I could do to save the plants except open the door and hope some cool air would waft in. I decided to transport at least one of each kind outside and carried a heavy pot to the entrance.

When I tried to open the door, it wouldn’t budge. I set down the plant and shone the flashlight on the lock. The door had a deadbolt, the kind that required a key and could be locked from inside or out. But I hadn’t locked it and the key kept on the hook next to the door was gone. Someone had taken it and turned the bolt from the outside. I couldn’t believe it — I had walked straight into a trap!

Nora’s trap. She must have been nearby, waiting until I was at the other end of the greenhouse to lock the door. But she was supposed to have been with Aunt Jule. Again I considered the possibility of another person being responsible for my mother’s death and the things that had been happening to me. Nora’s crazy behavior would provide a convenient cover, and it would be easy enough to mimic her. Who knew about the boathouse incident? Nick and Frank, Holly and Aunt Jule — and anyone in the town whom they might have told.

I tried to illuminate the area beyond the door, but the flashlight’s reflection off the glass surface made it impossible to see more than a foot beyond the greenhouse.

I clicked it off and stepped back from the door, retreating farther and farther into the rows of plants, hoping that as I became less visible, I would detect some movement outside.

Something touched my neck. I pulled away from a bench of plants and clumsily banged into the one across from it. It was my own sweat trickling down, nothing else. The heat was oppressive. A dull headache throbbed behind my eyes.

I wanted to sleep.

The obvious way to escape was to break the glass, but I was reluctant to. The large square panes were old and might be irreplacable. I decided to rest there till Holly or Aunt Jule woke up and found me. I sat on the damp brick floor, longing to put my head down, but something kept nagging at me. The missing fuses, the sealed fan. I pulled myself to my feet again and waves of dizziness broke over me. I felt sick, as if I had inhaled fumes, but I could smell nothing but the rich earthiness of the greenhouse.

Lack of ventilation, space heaters, sleepiness, no smellmy muddled mind kept groping for the pattern it sensed but couldn’t identify. Sleepiness, no smell — carbon monoxide!

The gas could be generated by heating units. It was odorless. And it could kill.

I had to break a window. I remembered that there was a hand shovel by the trellises, but I was closer to the front of the greenhouse, and the path to the back seemed long to me now, wavering in front of my eyes like a distant patch of road on a hot day. The flashlight, that would work.

I had left it on the ground when I’d sat down. I leaned over to pick it up and pitched forward. It took all of my strength to straighten up. I discovered I couldn’t look down — just moving my head made me dizzy. Crouching slowly, grasping the end of a plant bench with one hand, I felt with my other for the flashlight.

My fingers curled around its plastic barrel. I pulled myself up and moved uncertainly toward the front of the greenhouse, like an old woman feeling her way along the pews of a church. The open area by the entrance would allow me to take aim at the glass from a safe distance.

I stopped where the benches ended, about six feet from the front wall, and hurled the flashlight toward a pane. But my body had become as sloppy as my mind from the poisonous gas. The flashlight glanced off the metal frame without making a crack in the glass.

Unable to walk without support, I got down on my knees and crawled to the flashlight. I knew I’d get cut, smashing the glass at close range; the best I could do was turn my face away. Kneeling close to the window, holding the flashlight like a hammer, I banged against the glass relentlessly.

Shards fell like a shower of prickly leaves, stinging my arms. I knocked the two-foot square out cleanly, then dropped the flashlight on the grass. Standing up, thrusting my head through the opening, I gulped my first breath of fresh air and felt the cold breeze on my sweaty skin. Then I blacked out.

“Lauren? Lauren?”

I opened my eyes and quickly shut them again, drawing back from the bright light shining in my face. It clicked off.

“Lauren, can you hear me?” Nick asked.

A long dog tongue licked my face. Reaching up, I put my arms around Rocky and sat up slowly. I felt sick and scared.

I wished Nick would hold me and be as gentle as he was with Nora, but I wouldn’t ask for his comfort. I buried my face in the dog’s fur.

“Your arms are cut,” Nick said. “I want to check them.”

Without looking at him, I held out one, then the other, and felt him probing the skin.

“Nothing deep,” he told me, “mostly scratches. Still, you should soak in a tub to make sure all the glass is out,” he added, his voice sounding almost clinical. “What happened? Why did you break the window?”

“Someone was trying to kill me.”

“What?”

I petted Rocky until I felt in control. “I was out walking,” I said, “and saw a light on in the greenhouse, the flashlight you’re holding. I went inside. It was hot and stuffy. I couldn’t ventilate the place. The fuses were pulled, the fan sealed, the vent crank broken. Space heaters had been left on.

When I tried to leave, I found the door locked, locked from the outside.”

I gazed up at Nick’s face, waiting to see the flicker of realization. Behind him, the house lights came on. Nick glanced over his shoulder, then back at me.

“Don’t you understand?” I said, but I could see by his face that he didn’t. He wouldn’t allow himself to believe that someone in Wisteria was a murderer.

“Understand what?”

“Nick, someone tried to kill me — to poison me with carbon monoxide!”

Another light went on downstairs, and three figures came out on the porch.

“What’s going on?” Holly shouted to us. “Is everything all right?”

“Fine,” Nick called back to her.

Fine, I thought wryly. Aloud I asked, “Why are you here, Nick? Did they call you?”

“Someone did,” he said.

“Nick, is Lauren out there?” Holly asked. “She’s not in her room.”

“She’s here, she’s fine,” Nick replied. In a quieter voice he said to me, “After I got home someone telephoned my house three times and hung up. The Caller ID listed Jule’s number. I thought Nora might be upset and trying to reach me.”

“She was upset,” I told him, “and sleeping in Aunt Jule’s room tonight — at least, she was supposed to be.” I saw Holly hurrying toward us, followed by Aunt Jule and Nora.

“So why did you come to the greenhouse?”

He hesitated. “It made sense to check here first. Nora spends a lot of time here.”

I gazed at him doubtfully.

“And I saw the flashlight on,” Nick added.

“When I used it to break the window, it was off.”

“I don’t think so,” he replied.

“I know so.”

Nick glanced away. “You’re too groggy to remember anything clearly.”

Holly stopped a few feet away, noticing the broken pane in the greenhouse wall and the pile of glass shimmering in the grass. Her jaw dropped. Nick stood up quickly and went to her, but I was still too dizzy to move.

Aunt Jule caught up. “Oh, no!” she exclaimed. “Lauren, are you all right?”

“Yes.”

“Nick?” Aunt Jule said, turning to him. “What happened?”

He repeated his story about the phone calls, then recounted what I had told him. Aunt Jule and Holly glanced back at Nora, who was peering at me from behind them.

“Lauren seems to be all right,” Nick concluded. “I saw the glass shattering, then her head come through. I lifted her all the way out. She wasn’t unconscious for long. And the cuts are superficial.”

Aunt Jule leaned down and reached for my hands, stretching out my arms to study them. “I don’t understand.

What was the point of all this?” she asked.

“To kill me,” I answered bluntly. “To poison me with carbon monoxide.”

She let go and took a step back. Holly looked incredulous, but then her face grew thoughtful. If there was anyone I could make understand, it was she.

“I don’t believe it,” Aunt Jule said. “This is the nonsense Frank planted in your head after your accident. Who would want to kill you?”

“I don’t remember,” Nora said softly.

“The same person who killed my mother,” I answered Aunt Jule.

“Don’t tell,” said Nora.

Aunt Jule ignored her. “No one killed Sondra, Lauren. It was an accident.”

“I used to think so.” Holding on to Rocky, I rose to my feet

“So why are you all here? Who got you out of bed?”

Aunt Jule glanced at Holly.

“Nora woke us,” Holly admitted. “She said something was happening outside.”

“How did Nora know that?”

“She always has difficulty sleeping,” Aunt Jule replied defensively.

“Yes, she had difficulty the night my mother died,” I said. “I went to see Dr. Parker tonight.”

Holly looked surprised. “Is that where you went? Oh, Lauren, you should have told me. I didn’t realize you were that upset.”

“We talked about the knots,” I continued.

Holly glanced at Nick, and he put his arm around her.

Aunt Jule and Nora listened, both of their faces pale.

“Dr. Parker said the knot-tying could be poltergeist activity.”

“What?” Holly exclaimed.

“He said that most of the time the phenomenon is caused by an adolescent, someone who is very upset. It’s a way of dealing with intense, suppressed emotions. Often it’s not even conscious. The person doesn’t know he or she is responsible.”

Holly frowned and shook her head slightly.

“My mother’s things were tied in knots just before she died. Tonight, my things were.”

“Lauren,” Holly said, “I think you need to talk to someone else. Coming back to Wisteria has been a lot harder on you than any of us thought it would be. We need to find you another counselor, one who is more—”

“It’s real! It’s happening!” I exploded. “Accept it!”

“It’s real, it’s happening,” Nora echoed.

The others gazed at Nora, then me with the same concerned, tolerant expression. I would have been angered by their patronizing looks, but I didn’t believe they were thinking what their faces showed. I didn’t trust any of them.

Not Nora, not Aunt Jule, not Nick, not Holly. They knew things they weren’t telling me. Maybe they had agreed among themselves not to tell me.

“I promise you,” I said, “I’m going to find out what happened to my mother and what is happening to me.”

“All right,” Holly answered softly, soothingly.

“Nick, I want to keep Rocky tonight.”

“If it makes you feel safer,” he replied with a shrug.

“It does,” I said, starting toward the house. “Rocky doesn’t pretend like the rest of you.”

I finally got some sleep Tuesday night, lying with my back against Rocky’s, listening to his dog snores. Early the next morning I went outside with him. While he swam, I fell asleep again on the grassy bank. Holly awakened me.

“This doesn’t look good,” she said, smiling, “one of my party guests asleep on the lawn the morning after.”

I sat up. “What time is it?”

“About nine-fifteen. How are you feeling?”

“Okay. My headache’s gone and I’m not nauseated anymore.”

She nodded. “I opened the greenhouse door and turned on the fans to air the place out. Did you realize there’s a big exhaust fan at the back of the greenhouse? Of course,” she added quickly, as if afraid she’d hurt my feelings, “it might not have helped last night.”

“The exhaust fan was sealed,” I told her, “as it is in winter.”

“No, it’s automated now. The flaps open when you turn on the fan.”

“So you replaced the fuses?”

“The fuses?” she repeated. “I just hit the switch.”

“Holly, there wasn’t any electric power in the greenhouse last night. I couldn’t turn on the fans or the light.”

She bit her lip, then said quietly, “Sometimes, when people get frightened, they think they’re doing something, but they’re not thinking clearly so they’re not doing it right.”

“I was doing it right.”

She didn’t want to argue with me. “Well, maybe. Let’s get some breakfast.”

“You go ahead. I’m not hungry.”

“Come on, Lauren, you’ll feel better if you eat something.”

I gave in and called Rocky. Nick’s wet and fragrant dog made it as far as the hall entrance to the house. “Please, not on an empty stomach,” Holly pleaded.

I brought Rocky’s breakfast out to the porch, some of last night’s meat and a piece of toast, though the toast was supposed to have been mine. Heading inside to make more, I entered through the dining room door and stopped in my tracks.

Aunt Jule’s work lamp had been knocked over, its white globe broken, the fragments scattered on the table. In the basket next to it a dozen colorful embroidery threads were tied together in fantastic knots. I debated whether to call to the others. No, Aunt Jule might accuse me again of seeking attention. Let her find it and see how it felt when this strange phenomenon was directed at her.

I started toward the kitchen, then backtracked — there was something amiss in what I had just seen. While the lamp’s cord was pulled from the socket, it wasn’t knotted. The cord of my bedroom lamp had been yanked from the wall plate and knotted. The lamp broken the day I arrived had also had a knotted cord. Perhaps it was the process of making the knot, the psychokinetic force used to tie the cords, that caused the lamps to tip over, and similarly, the force exerted to knot the swing’s rope that caused it to snap. But there was no knot in this cord. It was as if someone had added the lamp to the scenario, overlooking that one detail. Maybe someone was mimicking Nora.

But who — who would have a reason to hide behind her behavior and wait for a chance to kill me? The question I had asked myself at the bank two days ago flickered in my mind again, and this time I couldn’t snuff it out. What was the nature of the relationship between my mother and Aunt Jule? Had it gone bad at the end?

My mother had died the summer she’d written the new will, which left everything to me, with that one provision. Aunt Jule had asked me here, knowing I was nine months away from my eighteenth birthday and that she would inherit the money if I died before then. But I couldn’t believe that my own godmother would hurt me.

I wasn’t naive. Life in Washington had taught me how the desire for money destroyed the values of all kinds of people.

But while I could almost imagine that Aunt Jule only pretended affection for me — perhaps it wouldn’t be hard, visiting me twice a year and seeing me now for just a few days — I couldn’t believe that she would allow her own daughter to be blamed.

Still, some curious puzzle pieces fit. Perhaps Aunt Jule had been refusing to get help for Nora because she knew she would need her as a cover. If Nora were accused of murder, she would be helped rather than harmed, getting the psychiatric care she needed and eventually released. In the end Nora would share in the wealth she had “earned.” Aunt Jule had always had a knack for quietly getting what she needed.

Hearing footsteps on the stairs, I continued on to the kitchen. My godmother entered a few moments after me.

“Good morning, girls.”

“ ’Morning,” we both murmured.

“How did you sleep, Lauren?”

“Okay,” I answered.

“And you, Holly?”

She pulled her head out of the newspaper. “Not bad.”

“Well,” Aunt Jule said, “Today’s a new—” A long, plaintive whimper came from the next room. Holly quickly put down the paper.

“I didn’t do it!” Nora cried. “I didn’t!”

“Here we go again,” Holly muttered as the three of us hurried into the dining room.

I watched Aunt Jule’s face, searching for some sign that she already knew what was there. Both she and Holly noticed the lamp first, then the knotted embroidery silk.

Holly suddenly turned to me. “You don’t seem very surprised, Lauren. Did you know this was here?”

“Yes,” I admitted. “I saw it when I came in.”

Holly frowned, silent for a moment. “I want to believe you. I really want to believe you’re not playing pranks, but I just don’t know what to think.”

“I didn’t do it!” I insisted.

“I didn’t do it,” Nora echoed.

“Then who did?” Aunt Jule asked, setting the lamp base upright.

Nora edged toward me. “It’s a secret. Don’t tell.”

“Oh, shut up!” Holly said.

Aunt Jule fingered the knots, her lips pressed together.

“If someone tells, will Sondra wake up?” Nora asked. “I won’t tell.”

Holly whirled around and Nora winced.

“I hate this, Mom!” Holly exclaimed. “Can’t you see that Nora needs help? She’s making life miserable for all of us.”

Aunt Jule stared coolly at Holly.

“Nora, you are so messed up!” Holly said. “You are really sick.”

“Holly!” Aunt Jule chided.

“You’re out of control, Nora,” Holly went on, pacing back and forth, combing her hair with her fingers. “You need to be locked up! You belong in a lunatic—” Suddenly Holly stopped, the color draining from her face.

She yanked on her hair, then she reached back with her other hand. I saw her swallow hard. I thought at first that it was her hands flexing her hair, picking it up off her neck. I watched with disbelief as a long strand of black hair twisted itself into a knot Then another, and another.

Holly clutched at her hair, her eyes widening with fear.

She leaned over and shook her head, pulling on her hair, as if she were being swarmed by bees.

“Make it stop, Nora!” Holly screamed. “Make it stop!”

Aunt Jule stood paralyzed. Nora looked terrified.

I know what this is, I told myself; there is nothing to be afraid of. I reached for the frightened Holly, trying to steady her, then caught her hair in my hands and held it till the bizarre storm of energy had passed.

The hair fell limp, though still in tangles. Nora turned and ran out the porch door. Aunt Jule started after her.

“She’s crazy, Mother,” Holly said, her voice shaking.

“She’s psychotic. Lauren is right — that was no accident last night.”

Aunt Jule looked silently at Holly, then continued after Nora.

Holly was trembling all over — with anger or fear — perhaps both. I felt bad for her but relieved for myself. Finally I wasn’t alone.

“Sit down,” I said gently. “Let’s get you untangled.”

It took a half hour to work the knots out of Holly’s hair; for a few of the tangles I had to use scissors. I knew Holly was upset because she didn’t say a word except yes each time I asked if I should cut out a knot.

Aunt Jule returned without Nora. Holly had regained her composure, but when she spoke she still sounded irritated.

“I know where Nora hides. I’ll find her when I’m ready.”

That wasn’t for another hour and a half. We cleaned up from the party, then Holly left me with the final task and went off in search of her sister.

“Where is she?” Aunt Jule asked, when Holly returned alone to the kitchen.

“I don’t know. I checked all of Nora’s hiding places twice.

And I looked at Frank’s.”

“Did you call her name?”

Holly struggled to keep her temper. “No, Mom, I called out Susie! Let her be for a while, okay? Her behavior is outrageous. It will be good for her to think things over.”

“She thinks too much already,” Aunt Jule said, and retreated to the dining room.

Through the doorway I saw that a lid had been put on the basket of knots and the broken lamp cleared away. With the yard clean and the house quiet, it seemed like just a peaceful day on the Shore. But I knew all of us were waiting; it was only a matter of time before something else happened.

As I headed outside I heard Nick in the garden greeting Rocky. When he saw me, the warmth in his voice quickly disappeared. “How are you?” he asked tensely.

“Okay,” I replied. “But we’ve had another incident.”

“What kind?”

Holly emerged from the house carrying her school backpack.

“You want to explain?” I asked her, not wanting to be the only one relating bizarre events.

“You can,” she said, “but he’ll just defend Nora. He always has.”

When I’d recounted what had happened, Nick put his arm around Holly. “Is Lauren exaggerating?”

I bit my tongue.

“No, it was just so freaky, Nick.”

He touched her hair softly. “Are you okay?”

“Yes. Thanks.”

He turned to me. “Where’s Nora now?”

“We don’t know. Missing, hiding.”

“What happened before the incident?” he asked.

“What do you mean?”

“What did you say to Nora to set her off?”

The heat rose in my cheeks.

“Be fair, Nick,” Holly interjected.

“I didn’t say a word,” I told him.

“You didn’t bring up what happened last night?” he asked.

“You didn’t start talking about your mother again?”

“No!”

“Nick, Nora is crazy, as crazy as they come,” Holly said.

“Maybe,” he replied, “but it sure would help if Lauren forgot the past.”

I looked him in the eye. “You’re asking for the impossible.”

“I’m asking that you think about the effect of dragging Holly, Nora, and Jule through a lot of pointless stuff. You’re making it hard on all of them.”

My eyes stung with tears, and I quickly blinked them away.

“Come on, Holly,” he said.

She looked at me uncertainly. “Lauren?”

“Bye.”

I walked back into the house. I thought I’d be relieved to hear the sound of Nick’s car fade away, but it only made me ache. Why had he turned against me? There had to be more to it than the cartoon. Had someone told him something else that angered him or made him mistrust me?

I paced around the garden room, thinking about Nora. For her safety — and my own — I would feel better knowing where she was.

There was a jingling of tags, then a nose pushed in the soft screen of the porch door.

“Hey, Rocky. Wouldn’t Nick take you to school?” I let him in. When I sat down, the dog rested his chin on my knee, wanting me to pet him. “Maybe you can help, old boy. How are you at retrieving people?”

He wagged his tail.

I wondered if Nora was hiding somewhere off the property. There would be plenty of places in town where she could melt into the surroundings undisturbed by others — the college campus, the docks. I decided to search for her and hurried upstairs to put on my running shoes. The phone rang and I picked it up in the hall.

“Lauren? Frank.”

“Hi, Frank. What’s up?”

“Holly was over here earlier, looking for Nora.”

“Yes,” I said quickly. “Have you seen her?”

“Just now. I was chasing an army of geese off my lawn and saw her enter the boathouse.”

“The boathouse!” I exclaimed. “She’s afraid of going in there.”

“That’s what I thought,” he replied. “What worries me is that she, well — to put it mildly — looked disturbed.”

“We had an incident this morning,” I began.

“Holly told me about it. Is Holly there now?”

“No, she’s gone to school with Nick. I’ll check on Nora.”

“Is Jule at home?” he asked.

“Yes. Do you want to talk to her?”

He was silent for a moment. “No,” he said. “I was going to suggest that she accompany you to the boat-house, but on second thought, Jule doesn’t handle Nora very well. Don’t say anything to her — let’s see what’s going on first. I’ll meet you there myself, in case you need a hand. In about five minutes?”

“Yeah, thanks.”

Frank clicked off. I put the phone down slowly. Holly was sure that Nora didn’t go off the property, and she was wrong.

Maybe I was just as wrong about Nora’s fear of the boathouse. Maybe Nora could pretend like the rest of us.

I went downstairs and called Rocky to take him outside with me.

“Who was that?” Aunt Jule asked as I passed by the dining room.

“Just Frank. I need to take some things back to him that were borrowed for the party.”

She nodded and continued with her needlepoint.

Rocky followed me halfway down to the boathouse, where Frank was waiting for me, then went off for a swim.

“I’m sorry to take up your time,” I told Frank.

“No problem. I thought about going in the boat-house myself,” he said as we walked toward it, “but I didn’t want to scare her and have her bolt again.”

The door was halfway open. “Nora?” I called from the entrance. “Nora?” I thought I heard a whimper and stepped inside. “Nora, it’s me, Lauren. Are you all right?”

My eyes slowly adjusted to the light. I saw a gray shapeNora lying still on the walkway.

“Frank, something’s wrong!”

I rushed to her. As I did, the boathouse door closed swiftly behind me.

I froze. I couldn’t see in the sudden darkness. “Frank?”

“Nothing personal, Lauren,” he called from outside, sounding as easygoing as when he’d said, “No problem.”

I heard him put the padlock on the door.

“Frank? Frank!” I shouted.

There was no reply. My mind raced, trying to comprehend the situation. Why would he do this to me? Why had he put me in here with Nora?

The thin slit between the river doors and the hairline fractures of light between weathered boards allowed me to see no more than her form. I took the last few steps toward her. If I touched Nora and she was cold — I laid my hands on her. She was warm and breathing, but unresponsive to my fingers.

People don’t fall asleep naturally in places they fear, I thought. I debated which to do first, get her conscious or find a way out, then I rose quickly. If Nora awoke and went beserk, I’d be trapped in here with her.

I needed the ax, the one I had left beneath the light chain.

Using my hands more than my eyes, I moved as fast as I dared on the narrow walkway, feeling my way along the wall until I touched the beaded chain. The ax was gone.

Frank knew it was here. He must have removed it — he or Nick. I was bewildered by his actions and sick at the thought that Nick could be involved, but I didn’t have time to figure out the situation.

Maybe the loft would have another tool. I continued working my way to the corner of the building and along the back wall. The ladder should be soon, I thought, it should be now. I should have passed it. I touched the second corner and my heart sank. The ladder, too, had been removed.

I heard a soft moan, then Nora stirring. I held my breath.

“Mom?” she called.

If she suddenly got up and fell over the side, I’d never find her in the dark water. “Stay still, Nora. Stay where you are,” I said, and began to retrace my steps.

“Mom?”

She might not become hostile if she thought I were Aunt Jule. “Yes, love. I’m here. Go back to sleep.”

“Where am I?” she asked. “Is this the place for crazy people? Are you locking me up?”

I winced. “No, Nora, you’re home.”

“You’re not Mom.” Her voice sounded clearer. She would soon realize where she was.

I said nothing more until I was four feet from her. “Nora, it’s Lauren.”

I heard her draw back.

“Everything’s okay. Just stay against the wall. Lean against it.”

There wasn’t a sound from her.

“Are you hurt, Nora?” I asked, moving closer to her.

She didn’t answer.

I took another step and crouched down. “What happened?”

Still, she was silent.

“Do you know what happened to you? Tell me so I can help you.”

“Don’t tell,” she whispered.

“It’s all right, you can tell me.”

“It’s a secret.”

“You can tell me the secret.”

She said nothing.

I waited a few moments, then tried a different tactic.

“What hurts?” I asked. “Does your stomach hurt? Your arm?”

“My head.”

“Why does it hurt?”

“Because I’m crazy,” she said softly.

I blinked away unexpected tears, imagining what it was like for her, trapped inside her own dark world. I felt for her fingers. “Take my hand and show me where it hurts.”

She guided my fingers. When I touched the crown of her head, she cried out.

“Is it sore?” I asked. “Is it bruised?”

She whimpered.

“Did someone hit you?”

“Don’t tell.”

“You can tell me. It’s okay.”

“It’s a secret.”

“When did your head start to hurt?” I asked.

“I don’t remember.”

“Were you in a hiding place?”

She was quiet for a moment. “In Frank’s garage. It hurts, my head hurts!” She whimpered like a small child.

In the distance I heard a boat motor. I hoped it was turning away from us and wouldn’t create a wake. “Did Frank find you in his garage?”

She continued to cry.

I laid my hand cautiously on her back, then rubbed it, trying to soothe her. The boat engine sounded closer. “Is the garage one of your hiding places, Nora?”

“Yes.”

Then either Holly or Frank could have found her there.

After her hair was knotted, Holly was scared and angry. Had she lost her temper? No, it was Frank who had lured me here, and most likely it was he who had struck Nora.

I heard the boat zip past us. So did Nora — I could feel her body get rigid. “Where am I?”

“You’re okay.”

She heard the watery movement and her voice quivered.

“I’m in the boathouse. Sondra is here.”

“It’s not Sondra. It’s just a wake.”

As soon as I said a wake, I realized my mistake. I quickly rephrased it. “It’s the waves from a boat, a passing boat.” I wondered if that was how these imaginings had startedsomeone saying it was “a wake” and Nora, haunted by the death of my mother, twisting the words in her mind.

She was shaking. I reached for her hands and felt the fear in her as she grasped mine with icy fingers. I wrapped my arms around her and held her tightly. The waves slapped against the outside of the building and rocked the water inside. But the motion of the water lessened quickly, the series of waves ending sooner than it had the last time.

And then it started, just as it had before, the slow rocking of the water back and forth, back and forth — sideways, I realized. The direction of the flow was wrong — it couldn’t be a wake.

“She’s here,” Nora said, her voice low and terrified. “She wants you. She wants her little girl.”

The water slapped hard against the walls. Nora’s arms wrapped around me, her fingers grasping my shirt, twisting it so hard I felt her knuckles digging into me. I braced myself, trying to keep myself from being pushed into the water. I felt her shifting her position, but before I could react and throw my weight against the wall, she did. She held me against it, as if protecting me.

At last the water grew quieter and settled into a dark restlessness.

“You’re okay,” Nora said. “She didn’t get you. I didn’t let her have you.”

A lump formed in my throat. She had tried to keep me from being “taken” by my dead mother.

“Nora,” I said. “Do you know how the knots happen?”

“I don’t try to do them.”

“Someone else does?”

“Someone else inside me. I can’t stop her. Only sometimes.”

Her unconscious, I thought. Sometimes she could control the emotions giving rise to the poltergeist, sometimes she couldn’t.

“Listen, I think I know how this water gets stirred up.

There’s a lot of stuff in here, things we threw in the water years ago. There are old ropes and nets, especially around the doors, where we used to fish. I think this person inside of you gets angry or afraid and moves those things, whips them around and ties them in knots. That’s what stirs up the water.”

“No, it’s Sondra,” she insisted.

“Remember how the lamp in the river room broke?” I continued. “When that person inside you got upset, she tied the knot in the cord, which yanked on the lamp and made it tip over. The same thing happened to the lamp in my room.

And the swing — with my weight at one end and the tree anchoring it at the other, it had to snap when it was forced into a knot.”

The heart necklace, too, I thought; it had risen against my neck because it was being tied.

“Nora, we just have to talk to that person inside you, and tell her that everything is all right It’s not Sondra. Sondra isn’t here.”

“But she is,” Nora insisted. “Holly said so.”

I sat back on my heels. Holly, who said she alone knew how to handle Nora — perhaps she alone knew how to torture her. I wanted to blame Frank, Frank entirely. But as I went over the various incidents in my head, I could see how easy it would be for Holly to hide behind Nora’s behavior. I reluctantly took the plunge. “Why did Holly hit you?”

“I didn’t tell, I didn’t!” Nora pleaded, like a child who had been suspected of telling a secret and threatened with punishment.

“Didn’t tell what?”

She wouldn’t answer.

“What did Holly hit you with?”

“I don’t remember.”

She might not, I reasoned, if she were hit on the back of the head. “Do you remember what Holly was carrying when she found you in the garage?”

“The lamp.”

“The lamp that was broken? Your mother’s work lamp?”

Nora nodded yes. “My head hurts,” she whimpered.

“Inside and outside it hurts.”

The mental pain was probably worse than the physical, and I hated to cause more, but if I didn’t know what had occurred and who the enemy was, I couldn’t help either of us.

“How did she hold it?” I asked, wondering if Holly was simply dumping the lamp in Frank’s trash or using it as a weapon.

“With a glove, my garden glove.”

My breath caught in my throat. She’d wear a glove if it were a weapon and she didn’t want her fingerprints on it But why use something as traceable as a brass lamp — why not a block of wood that could float away in the river? Holly was too good at details and planning — something wasn’t right.

I rested my hand on Nora’s. “You and Holly have a secret,” I said. “Holly thinks you told the secret. Now that she thinks you have told, you can.”

I waited for a response, struggling to be patient.

“The secret is about the night my mother died,” I ventured.

Nora didn’t reply, but I took this as a positive sign. She said no quickly when she wanted to deny something.

“You came to my room that night,” I went on, “looking for Bunny, your stuffed animal. You had left him on the dock. I said I would get him for you, but you said you could go as far as the dock. You left the house, and then what?”

She slipped her hand from beneath mine. In the dim light I saw her pull up her knees. She hugged them tightly.

“It’s okay. I just want to know what happened next Were you alone?” I changed the question to a statement “You were alone.”

“No. Holly was there, she was coming in.”

“Coming in as you went out?”

I remembered then, running down from the house to the dock, stepping on something sharp, waving Holly on — she was in her nightgown but wearing shoes.

“Did you say anything to Holly? Did she say anything to you?”

“I don’t remember.”

“I know you do,” I replied gently. “Did you tell her about Bunny?”

“Yes. I started getting scared about going out on the dock. I asked her to get him.”

“And she said?” I laid my hand on Nora’s arm and felt the tension in her muscles.

“She said I couldn’t be afraid of water and I’d have to get him myself.”

“And then?”

“I wanted her to come with me while I got him, but she said no.”

“So you got Bunny yourself? Where was he?”

“On the dock. He was all the way at the end. I had to go all the way to the end.”

I could hear the fear rising in her voice.

“It’s okay. We’re just remembering now. It’s not happening now. Did you pick up Bunny?”

“Yes.”

“Were you alone?”

“No.”

I held my breath.

“Sondra was in the water,” Nora said. “When I picked him up, I saw her floating in the water.”

I sagged back against the wall. My mother had fallen in before Nora arrived.

“I killed her.”

“You killed her!” I exclaimed, then softened my voice.

“Did you push her? I thought she was already in the water.”

“I didn’t get her out. Holly said I should have pulled her out.

Holly said I knew how to swim. I killed Sondra when I didn’t pull her out. But I was too afraid. I knew I should go in, but the water was dark and scary. I thought the river wanted me, too. I rang the bell.”

“Nora, listen to me. You didn’t kill my mother. It wasn’t your fault. You rang the bell. That was a good thing to do.”

Clutching her legs, pressing her forehead against her knees, Nora rocked herself. “Holly said she wouldn’t tell anyone I killed Sondra if I promised I wouldn’t tell anyone I saw her outside. It’s a secret, she said, don’t tell.”

I bit my lip, bit back my anger at Holly. She could be innocent, I argued with myself; she could have been nothing more than scared. She was only eleven at the time. Perhaps she had set up Nora in case she herself were falsely accused, guilty of nothing more than looking out for herself at the expense of someone else. But she had used Nora cruelly, and today she had hit her, left her, and lied to Aunt Jule and me — at least to me.

Nora began to cry. “Holly said you were coming back to Wisteria because you were angry about your mother’s death. She told me not to talk to you and said that you would hurt me if you knew.”

“She was wrong. I’m not going to hurt you, Nora.”

Nora sobbed loudly.

“And you must believe me — you didn’t kill my mother.”

The sobs grew uncontrollable.

“You didn’t. I swear to you!”

Were Frank and Holly working together? What about Nick? I shrank from the thought that he was involved, but he was Frank’s nephew and Holly’s boyfriend, the link between them.

“Nora, why would Frank lock me in here? Do you know?”

Her sobbing grew less as she thought. “To help me?” she guessed.

I doubted it. What puzzled me was the fact that Frank didn’t disguise his effort to trap me. No one would believe what crazy Nora might say, but why wouldn’t Frank worry about an accusation by me?

The answer stopped my breath, shrank my stomach into a cold, hard rock. He wouldn’t worry if I were dead. He planned to kill me.

He — or they — were setting up Nora, beginning to work on her mentally by trapping us together. My death would be hung around her neck. It wouldn’t be hard; she had shown herself confused enough to accept the guilt for my mother’s.

I pulled away slowly from Nora. “I have to get us out of here. I’m going to look for a tool.”

I walked all the way around the boathouse, feeling for something I could use to smash the hinges of the door. The place had been stripped clean.

“Okay, Nora, I’m on the other side now. Don’t get scared.

I’m going to scream for help.”

I shouted till I tasted blood in my throat. It was useless.

Who would come — Aunt Jule? She couldn’t hear from the house. Besides, she could be part of the plan.

She’d have to be if my inheritance were the goal, and that was the only motivation for murder that I could imagine.

Frank, as lawyer and executor of the estate, would be able to process the will as quickly as possible, using his local clout to pull strings if necessary. But Aunt Jule was the designated heir, so there would have to be some agreement between them. As for the tension between my godmother and Frank, partners can quarrel, especially when the stakes are high.

I heard movement outside. I screamed again. Nora started shrieking with me. I hurried around the walkway to her. There was barking.

“Rocky!” I shouted. “Rocky, get help.”

Rocky, get help? What did I think he would do — run off like a dog in a Disney movie and fetch the police? I started laughing and crying at the same time, getting hysterical.

I heard noises at the back wall of the building, Rocky barking, Frank telling him to keep quiet. The noise stopped.

I heard Frank leave, his voice fading as he called the dog.

I removed my shoes. “Nora, there’s only one way out of here, under the doors to the river. I’m going to swim under and go for help.”

I put my feet over the side of the walkway, then rolled on my stomach so I could slide into the black water.

“No,” Nora protested. “No, don’t!”

“I’ll be back.”

“She’s in there. She’ll get you.”

Nora pulled on my arms. I was stronger than she and slipped free of her grasp, then thrust myself back in the water. When I straightened my legs and pointed my toes, they barely brushed the silty bottom. I tread water, trying to keep my mouth above it. Its slimy surface coated my arms and neck. Its earthy, sulfurous odor filled my nose and seemed to seep through the pores of my skin.

I turned my head, sniffing something different from river and rot.

“Nora, do you smell smoke?”

I heard her taking in deep, soblike breaths. “Yes.”

For a moment I was so shocked I couldn’t think what to do. It was too horrible — I could not believe that Frank would set the building on fire with us inside.

“Nora, get in. You have to get in the water.”

I heard her pull back against the wall.

“The boathouse is going to burn down. We have to get out of here now. Now! There’s no time. You must come with me.”

“No!”

“I’ll help you. I’ll hold on to you.”

“No!” she shrieked.

It was useless to try to convince her. She wasn’t thinking fire, she was too afraid of water.

“Okay, never mind,” I said quickly, and grasped the edge of the walkway. “Help me get out.”

As soon as her arms were around me, I pulled her into the water. She screamed.

“I’m here. Float on your back. I’ll help you.”

But she was terrified. I fought to get her into a life-saving carry. She clawed at me and tried to climb up on my shoulders. Desperate to get herself above the water, she pushed me under.

I struggled to the surface. Her fingernails dug into my skin.

She was much stronger than I’d realized and pushed me down again. I dropped way down, pulling Nora with me, hoping she would panic and let go.

It worked. I swam three feet away from her, then came up for air.

The smell of smoke was strong, smoke and lighter fluid.

My eyes stung with it. Nora was treading water but was so frightened she kept gulping it down.

“Get on your back, Nora.”

Her arms flailed wildly toward me, and I propelled myself backward in the water, out of her reach. She went under.

I dived and searched frantically for her, then grabbed her and pulled her to the surface, wrestling her onto her back.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw a bright flame shoot up a corner on the land side of the boathouse. I heard the crackling. Another flame shot up the second corner, as if following a trail of lighter fluid. I thought I heard barking, but it was too late to hope Rocky would draw attention. Doused with an accelerant, the wood in this house could go up in a matter of seconds.

I swam, dragging Nora toward the river doors, then stopped in front of them. She was coughing and I had to make sure she had air.

“Come on, Nora. Deep breath in, deep breath out. Deep breath in, deep breath out. That’s the way. Deep breath in

—” I sucked down my own lungful of air, then pulled her under with me. I swam toward the light, one arm keeping her next to me, kicking hard for both of us. In the murky water I didn’t see the net, didn’t know I had swum into it, until it was around us. I pulled back quickly, trying to find its edge.

I had to let go of Nora for a moment. Using both hands I yanked on the netting in front of me, tearing at it with my fingers and teeth, making a hole just big enough for one of us. I swam through it, then reached back and pulled Nora to me.

Almost there, I thought, my lungs burning for lack of air. I took Nora’s hand and curled her fingers around the waistband of my shorts, wanting her to hold on to me so I could use both arms to swim. Suddenly I felt her let go. She bolted like a frightened animal, driven by her instincts, swimming directly upward. I saw the net, but she didn’t. She was caught in it — a new net — a plastic one, one that wouldn’t tear.

Nora clawed at it, pulling it around her even more, getting hopelessly tangled inside. I tried to pull it off her. She writhed, desperate for air. My own lungs ached, my body began to cramp.

I felt the net twisting, being wrenched away from me, and I lost my grip on her. I spun in the water till I was sick and didn’t know which way was up.

Then suddenly there was clear light around me. The air was cold against my face, and I opened my mouth and drank it down. Strong arms held my head just above the water. I gulped and coughed, bringing up river water and a bitter fluid from my stomach.

“Easy. Easy now.”

It was Nick’s voice. Nick’s arms. He turned me on my back and swam with me, pulling me to the bank. I heard Rocky barking. Sirens wailed, were getting louder, coming closer.

I tried to speak. Nora, I wanted to tell him, get Nora!

I felt other hands take me from Nick. I reached back, but they carried me away from him and the water.

“Two hundred feet!” a woman shouted. “Get her away.

Go!”

I was finally laid down in the grass. I tried to sit up.

Everything slid past me, out of focus, the world running with water, smelling of river and fire. “Nora! Find Nora!”

Someone crouched next to me. An arm wrapped around my back, supporting me. “She’s safe,” Nick said. “She’s just a few feet away.”

I reached out, trying to touch Nora, wanting to make certain she was there.

Nick caught my fingers. “The police are taking care of her,” he assured me. “Paramedics are on the way.”

I leaned back against him and rested my cheek on his shoulder. I could feel the river water dripping off him.

“Thank you,” I whispered. When I looked up, I saw he was crying.

I asked to speak with the sheriff privately. I had left Nora sitting up, fully alert, and very frightened. It had taken the effort of both Nick and me to loosen her grip on my hand and wrap it around his. Aunt Jule was talking to the medics.

The boathouse smoldered — what remained of it — and volunteer firefighters continued to work. McManus, the man who had questioned me about the rock-throwing incident, told another officer to take charge and walked with me toward the house.

“So,” said the sheriff, sitting on the edge of the porch, pulling out a worn notebook, “I asked yesterday if there was anyone you weren’t getting along with these days. Want to try a different answer?”

“It’s a long one,” I warned him, then recounted everything that had happened, including events from seven years ago, ignoring the strange look I got when I told him about the knots. I mentioned the will without telling him why it worried me. If desire for my mother’s money was a reasonable motive, he would see it, I told myself. The truth was, now that I was safe, I didn’t want to believe it. It hurt too much.

“I don’t have any physical evidence against Frank,” I concluded. “It’s what I say against what he says.”

“And Holly?”

I hesitated. “Like I said before, she could have been scared and protecting herself the night my mother died. The spooky stuff that’s happened — I think that was all Nora. I think Holly hit Nora today, but she may have lost her temper without having any idea what it would lead to. I–I just don’t know.”

The light-haired sheriff pushed his hat back and forth, as if he were scratching his head with it. “Frank’s not here. We checked next door — that’s policy with fire. The house is locked up and his car gone. I’ve already talked to Nick and Jule.”

“What did Aunt Jule tell you?”

He ignored my question. “They’re fetching Holly now. And Nick’s parents — I like a kid’s parents to be around for these things. Why don’t we just sit back and see what Holly has to say, without bringing up what you’ve told me?”

“So she doesn’t shape her story around mine?” I replied.

“Is that why you aren’t telling me what Aunt Jule said?”

He smiled. “That wouldn’t be too smart of me, now, would it?”

“What if we pretend Nora died?” I asked. “If we tell Holly that I found Nora unconscious and that Nora died in the fire, she’ll think I know nothing at all about what happened earlier today or the night my mother died. There would be more chances of—” I stopped myself.

“Catching her in a lie?” he prompted.

Was that how little I trusted her now? “Or showing that she is honest,” I replied.

Twenty minutes later we gathered in the garden room.

While I was changing into dry clothes, McManus had told Aunt Jule and Nick about our plan and had instructed them not to contradict him. I felt guilty for setting up Holly and kept telling myself I was giving her the chance to demonstrate her innocence, but when I entered the garden room, I couldn’t meet Nick’s or Aunt Jule’s eyes.

Holly had just come from the boathouse, her face looking pale and damp. “Are you all right, Lauren?” she asked.

“Yes,” I answered, stepping back quickly when she reached for me, not wanting her to touch me.

She turned to Aunt Jule. “Now maybe you’ll believe that Nora is out of control. I blame you for what has happened, Mother, all of it.”

Without saying a word, Aunt Jule retreated to the river room. Both sets of doors were open between that room and the garden room, and I watched her pace.

Holly walked over to Nick and took his hand. Seating herself close to one of the porch doors, she drew Nick into the chair next to hers. Though the doors were open, both sets of drapes that covered them had been closed halfway.

Nora was on the porch outside with a police officer, so she could listen.

I sat opposite Holly and Nick, and the sheriff squatted on the hassock between them and me. He stared at his notebook for several moments, then removed his hat.

“Holly, I have some difficult news to give you. Your sister didn’t make it.”

Holly blinked. “What?”

“Nora died. You know that she and Lauren were trapped in the boathouse.”

“Yes, a firefighter told me, but—”

“Lauren found Nora unconscious. She swam under the doors to get help, but the fire had started, and the place went up like a matchbox.”

“Oh, God,” Holly said. “Oh, God, why?” She turned to me.

“How did this happen?”

I told her about the phone call, finding Nora unconscious, then the door being padlocked by Frank. A warning look from McManus silenced me before I said more.

Holly’s eyes filled with tears. “Where’s Frank now?” she asked.

“We’re looking for him,” McManus replied. “He’s not home. Not at his office. It’s starting to look like he’s nowhere in town.”

Holly frowned. “Why would he do this?”

“That’s what we’re trying to figure out,” the sheriff told her.

“Do you have any theories?”

“No. No, how could I?” Holly said. “It’s horrible! I can’t even imagine it.”

I wanted to end this miserable charade. “Sheriff—” I began.

He cut me off. “I have some theories of my own and would be interested in any ideas or observations you have, Holly.

Sometimes little things you notice can go a long way toward giving the big picture.”

“Things like what?” Holly asked.

“A statement someone made that gave you reason to pause. An argument you overheard. Anything that can help us piece this together.”

Holly stared at the floor, biting her lip, then looked up slowly. “Mother?”

Aunt Jule stopped pacing and came to stand in the doorway.

“Mother, what have you told them?”

“What do you mean?” Aunt Jule asked.

“I want to know what you have said to the police.”

“The little I know,” she replied, stepping into the room. “I was home. I heard Rocky barking, but didn’t pay attention.

Then I heard the sirens.”

There was a long silence.

“Holly, do you believe there is someone else involved other than Frank?” McManus asked. “Have you seen or heard anything to make you think that?”

“No — maybe,” she said indecisively.

“I’d like to hear about that maybe.”

Holly wrung her hands. “This is… really unpleasant.” She looked down at her hands and made them still. “I think that Nora wasn’t the one somebody was after.”

McManus leaned forward.

“I think it was Lauren my mother wanted dead.”

Aunt Jule’s face went white. “What are you talking about?”

she exclaimed.

Holly kept her eyes on McManus. “Before Lauren’s mother drowned, she wrote a will with the help of Frank. She left everything to Lauren, but if Lauren died before she was eighteen, everything would go to my mother.”

“Holly, what are you saying?” Aunt Jule cried She leaned on the wooden back of a chair, her arm rigid, the rest of her body sagging against it “Do you think I would hurt Lauren?

Do you think I would hurt anyone for money?”

Holly straightened her shoulders, steeling herself. “If her name was Sondra or Lauren — yes. I think that you killed Sondra first.”

“I did not!”

“You fought with her constantly that summer,” Holly said, her voice becoming stronger in response to her mother’s denial. “The night she drowned, the arguing was awful.” She turned to me. “Do you remember?”

I saw the curtains move and for a moment was afraid Nora would reply, but she remained quiet.

I looked from Holly to Aunt Jule, not sure whom to believe.

Each seemed shocked by what the other had said. Then suddenly the piece that didn’t fit, one tiny observation, slipped into place. Why would a person who planned as well as Holly use a traceable object to strike Nora? Because the lamp was Aunt Jule’s and would have her fingerprints on it What if it wasn’t Nora who was to be framed for my death, but Aunt Jule, who had the most obvious motivation?

“Yes, there was a lot of fighting,” I admitted, “but I know your mother wouldn’t have hurt my mother or me. And I can’t believe she’d ever hurt Nora. I won’t believe it,” I added, “not without some kind of evidence — stains or fingerprints.”

“Did you look for the weapon?” Holly asked McManus.

“What weapon is that?” he asked.

“I thought that Nora was struck—” Holly stopped midsentence.

She had been too quick to point the investigation in the direction of the lamp, too eager for the sheriff to follow the plan she’d laid out for him.

When she didn’t go on, McManus said, “I told you that Lauren found Nora unconscious. I didn’t say how she got that way. She could have fainted, could have been poisoned.”

I saw the curtain move again, its long cord swinging loose.

“She could have,” Holly agreed. “But I figured it happened the way it does on TV.”

The cord swung as if in a breeze. Nick turned his head slightly. Aunt Jule noticed it. But McManus’s eyes were on Holly, and hers on him.

“I’m not a detective,” Holly went on. “I’m not trained to think of all the possibilities. Like Lauren, I can’t believe my mother would do this. It — it horrifies me. It doesn’t seem real.”

The cord swung like a pendulum, closer and closer to Holly’s right arm.

“And Frank — he’s like an uncle to me. I trusted him! I trusted both of them.”

“Holly,” Aunt Jule cried, “why are you turning on me?”

The tip of the cord curled upward as if invisible fingers had twisted it.

“You’ve got it backward, Mother,” Holly argued. “ You turned on us. My sister is dead. And if I don’t say what I know, Lauren may be next.”

Tears ran down Aunt Jule’s cheeks.

Holly’s face hardened. “Stop faking it, Mother. Who else would want to kill Lauren?”

The moving cord suddenly twisted upward and snaked around Holly’s wrist. It coiled twice and knotted itself, tying Holly’s forearm to the wooden arm of the chair.

McManus rose from his seat, his notebook sliding from his lap. “Good God!”

Holly sat still and appeared perfectly calm, but her arms prickled with goose flesh.

There was a long ripping sound. The curtains on the other door fell and the cord flew across the room. It twined itself around her wrist. Holly’s skin paled, her eyes widened with fear. She struggled to get free of the rope, rocking back and forth in her chair, knocking into the glass door. “Stop it, Nora!” she screamed. “Stop it!”

Two officers stepped into the room.

“Move aside, Nick,” McManus said.

Holly’s eyes darted over the room, as if she expected Nora to come back from the dead.

“Nora, you can come in now,” McManus called.

Holly wrenched around in her chair and stared at Nora as she came through the door, then she turned to me. “Witch,” she said, with unnerving calm.

I didn’t reply. I had no answer for the hate in her eyes.

“You’re such a fool, Lauren,” Holly said. “Did you really think that anything had changed between us during the last seven years?”

“I hoped we had both grown up.”

“You will always be rich and stupid, just like your mother,” Holly said. “You don’t deserve what you have. You don’t deserve your money and you don’t deserve my mother’s sickening admiration. I have always hated you.”

“Enough to attempt murder?” McManus asked.

She ignored him. “I told Frank you were an idiot and would be easy to take in. You trusted him like a puppy dog.”

“I guess I am naive,” I answered. “I never imagined that you could hate me so much you’d make your mother and sister suffer for it.”

“Who doesn’t help me, hurts me,” she replied coolly.

“They stood in the way.”

“Of the inheritance?” McManus asked. “Perhaps, Holly, you figured that if both Lauren and Nora were dead, and your mother charged with double murder, the money would be yours. At least, you’d be given control over it.”

“You’re smarter than the rest of them,” she said.

“Of course,” McManus continued, “it would help to have Frank moving things along legally. What was he supposed to get out of this?”

“My mother’s property for a good price.” She sounded proud — she sounded absurd, as if there were no difference between a murder plan and a yearbook layout.

“The boathouse was Frank’s idea,” Holly went on. “He saw it was in his best interest to help out. I knew Frank was in bad financial shape — he leaves his papers all over his home office, like he thinks a teenager can’t read. He’s got several banks and some real unhappy investors breathing down his neck. He was desperate to have something to offer them.

“I want a deal,” she told the sheriff. “I’ll give you the evidence you need on Frank, but I want a lawyer with brains to represent me and a good deal from you.”

“We’ll talk about it back at the station,” McManus replied.

Holly eyed Nora. “You let me down, Nora,” she said bitterly. “You screwed your own sister.”

Nora stepped behind me, as if needing my protection.

“I am the one who let you down,” Aunt Jule said, “all three of you. It’s way past time that I tell you why I asked Lauren to come back to Wisteria.

“Seventeen years ago, when Sondra came here pregnant and terribly upset, I myself was pregnant for the third time.

Sondra lost her child. Her baby is buried next to her in the churchyard.”

That was the grave I had seen, the one I’d thought was mine.

“Meanwhile, I had a child I couldn’t afford. We agreed that it would be best for all three children if Sondra took Lauren and pretended she was hers. I knew that Lauren would receive all that a child could want and that Sondra would love her dearly. Sondra sent money every month to help support us here. As part of the agreement, my little girl was to visit each summer.

“But as Lauren grew older and Sondra more troubled, Sondra and I began to fight about how Lauren was being raised. When they came that last summer and I saw how painfully confused Lauren was by Sondra’s behavior, I was furious. We fought about Lauren day and night, as you all well know.

“It’s hard not to be overly critical and jealous of the woman raising your child. But I loved Sondra. I did not kill her. Still, I knew Nora had problems and feared that she had. I was afraid that in therapy, that secret would be discovered and they would take Nora away from us. I thought if I could keep her safe here at home, everything would be all right.

“I knew I had to tell Lauren the truth about her birth, but the longer I put it off, the harder it was. When I finally made up my mind to do it, and Lauren came, painful memories were stirred up in Nora. I worried that Nora might hurt Lauren and was afraid to explain the past and make things worse. I didn’t know what to do.”

Aunt Jule gazed at Nora and me, then turned to Holly. “I have not been a good mother. I have made terrible mistakes. But I have always loved you.” Her voice wavered with emotion. “I will never stop loving all three of you.”

I wanted to put my arms around Aunt Jule, to reassure her, but I couldn’t. I struggled to comprehend that she was my birth mother and to reinterpret all the things I had thought I knew about myself. Nick, who was standing a distance behind us, came forward and took Aunt Jule’s hand.

I finally found my voice. “Nora is innocent of my mother’s — Sondra’s — death,” I said. “Holly convinced Nora that she was guilty because she didn’t go into the river to pull her out, but Nora wasn’t responsible.”

Aunt Jule closed her eyes and shook her head.

“Okay,” McManus said, “I think this soap opera’s over, at least for now. I’ll be sending someone back to you folks for some more statements.”

An officer cut the curtain cords around Holly’s wrists.

When Holly stood up, Aunt Jule tried to put her arms around her, but Holly pushed her aside. “I hate you! I hate all of you.”

“I want cuffs on her,” McManus said.

“Traitor,” Holly hissed at Nick, then moved toward me.

Two officers moved with her.

“Excuse me,” she said, “I have something private to tell Lauren.”

They looked at me and I nodded.

She took a step forward and whispered in my ear, “I killed Sondra, but you’ll never be able to prove it.” Then she turned away laughing and was escorted out the door.

As the police exited, Nick’s parents arrived. They said a quick hello to Aunt Jule and rushed over to Nick. I don’t know how the three of them understood each other, for they all talked at the same time. I turned to Aunt Jule — in my mind, that was still her name. I hugged her and Nora, then pulled away, feeling suddenly shy.

My godmother — mother — touched my cheek gently. “It’s okay, love,” she said. “It’s going to take a while to get used to the idea.

“Your dad knows,” she added, “he has since you were three. I didn’t realize Sondra had told him, not until we spoke at her funeral. The loss of Sondra had upset you so badly, we both thought it best not to tell you about your birth until you were older. Whenever I visited you, your dad would call to find out how I thought you were doing. He may not have been an ideal father — he certainly wasn’t a good husband to Sondra — but he does love you.”

I nodded silently. There was so much to absorb.

Aunt Jule hugged Nora and smiled at me, as if to send me the hug vicariously, while giving me the space I needed at the moment.

“Do you want one of your walks alone?” she asked. “See, I’m learning that you’re not a little girl anymore and like to work things through by yourself.”

I smiled back at her. “Yes, but I want to take Rocky with me. Tell Nick I’ve got him, okay?”

The dog trotted next to me down to the boathouse. I kept a tight hold on his collar as we watched the firefighters continue to douse the grass around the burned-out structure.

Fishing line, crab traps, and nets, some of which looked new, had been dragged out of the water. Yellow police tape surrounded the site.

“Come on, Rocky,” I said and headed in the direction of the dock. He raced past me, then plunged into the water. I watched him swim and tried not to think about Nick.

I had discovered that there was something more painful than falling in love with someone who hasn’t fallen for you: hurting that person — hurting him and not being able to do anything about it I wondered if Nick suspected that Holly had killed my mother. I wouldn’t tell him. Holly was just a kid then — maybe a heartless one, but a kid, and legally a minor. If I pursued the matter I’d create more pain, not achieve justice.

I told myself it was Holly and Frank who had betrayed Nick; still, my return to Wisteria had triggered the whole disturbing chain of events. I wondered if Nick and I would ever be friends again. I thought about the way he had cried when he held me on the grass.

Think about something else, I told myself, think about Dad. In nine months I’d inherit my mother’s money and wouldn’t be dependent on him anymore. It would give me a better chance to strengthen our fragile relationship, to let him know I didn’t need, but wanted, his presence in my life.

And the money would enable me to pay for the psychological care of Nora — for the care of my sister, I thought, trying out the new words. I’d stay the summer and, if she needed me, do my senior year in Wisteria.

“It’s going to get better,” I said aloud.

“It will.”

I turned, startled by Nick’s voice. He stood a foot away from me.

“Didn’t mean to scare you,” he said. “Can we talk?”

“Nick, I’m so sorry. I know how much it must—” He reached out and touched my mouth with the tips of his fingers. “What I meant was — can I talk?”

“Okay.”

We walked together, following the riverbank. After a long silence he said, “I’m trying to put it all in order.”

“Don’t try. Just begin anywhere.”

“Do you know what it was like kissing Holly and looking up to see you?”

“What?”

“You said to begin anywhere.”

But I hadn’t expected that as a beginning, middle, or end.

I felt my cheeks getting warm. “I guess it was pretty embarrassing for both of us,” I said, and walked ahead of him so he wouldn’t see my face. “I know, I just kept staring at you.”

“What were you thinking?”

“I don’t remember.”

“Don’t you start using that line,” he chided.

“Then don’t ask me, Nick.” Did he suspect how I felt?

He caught me and turned me around to face him. I focused on his shirt.

“Okay,” he said quietly, “I’ll tell you what I was thinking. I couldn’t believe that I, who was never going to get hooked, had fallen in love with a girl who didn’t want to date, and she was watching me kiss somebody else.”

I glanced up.

“Your turn, brave girl. What were you thinking?”

“That Holly looked beautiful in your arms and that you didn’t pull away from her the way you had pulled away from me when I kissed you.”

He drew me to him. “I’m not pulling away again,” he said, holding me close.

I hesitated, then put my arms around him. “I thought I had done something stupid.”

“No, you just surprised the heck out of me. I knew before then I was getting hooked on you, but I thought I could handle it. I didn’t know a simple kiss could be like that. It was scary, what I felt. My heart was banging against my ribs. I don’t know how you didn’t hear it.”

“I couldn’t hear it over mine.”

He tilted his head back to smile at me. “I love looking in your eyes,” he said. Then the smiled disappeared and his face grew serious. “I found out right after that what really scary was — someone hurting you, someone trying to kill you.”

“You mean today.”

“No. I was suspicious before. I didn’t think that Nora would hurt you, but I had begun to worry that someone was hiding behind her. The night of the prom I realized how jealous Holly was of you. When I returned to the dance — I don’t know, I must have had a dazed look on my face — she knew something had happened between us. She started cutting you down, saying a lot of nasty stuff. No big deal, I told myself, girls and guys get jealous of each other.”

“I was sure jealous of her,” I said.

“Were you?” he asked, his eyes shining. “You don’t mind if I enjoy that, do you?”

“I feel responsible,” I told him, “as if all of Holly’s life I’ve gotten the attention she wanted.”

“Everyone wants attention, Lauren, and everyone gets jealous. But you didn’t try to get rid of her, did you?”

“No.”

He let me go, then put an arm over my shoulder and started to walk with me.

“The day after the prom you told me about the note that had been left in your car. I could explain it as an anonymous prank, but as I did, I remembered that Holly had left school for a few minutes right after you. It would have been easy for her to put the note in your car while you were in the cemetery.

“And the brick that was thrown at your car, I could explain that, too, but again Holly had gone out during the time it happened. She said she had been at Frank’s picking up some party things. Afterward, Frank pressed me for details about how you were getting along with Holly, Jule, and Nora.

He must have realized then that someone wanted to get you.”

“I–I just don’t understand Frank,” I said. “I knew he loved money and thought you should love it, too. I knew he enjoyed using his clout as a lawyer and businessman, but I didn’t think he’d hurt people. I didn’t think he’d hurt me.”

“Me neither. Maybe Aunt Margaret’s family was right about him. It’s scary to think how easy it is to be fooled.”

“I feel so bad for you and your parents, Nick. Frank is family for you; for me, Holly is. And I don’t know how anyone writes off family.”

“Yeah,” he said, “I think Nora will have a lot of company in the next few months. You and I, Jule and my parents, we’ll all be sitting in Dr. Parker’s office, trying to understand what happened.”

I stopped walking and wrapped my arms tightly around him. “You know, I can hear your heart.”

“Could you hear it breaking when I accused you of getting my cartoon pulled?” he asked.

I held my head back so I could look him directly in the eye.

“I didn’t pull it.”

“You couldn’t have,” he replied, “because I did.”

“You?”

“I was worried about your safety,” he explained, “but I thought if I accused Holly, she would deny everything. The only way I knew to protect you was to stick close to Holly and try to anticipate her next move. After the prom, I had to convince her in a dramatic way that I had turned on you. The cartoon was the only excuse I could think of.”

I dropped my head, resting my forehead against his chest.

“I’m sorry, Lauren. When I accused you, I saw how badly I was hurting you. At the party I noticed Holly talking to jason.

Not long after that he and his friends started harassing you. I couldn’t break it up, not without making Holly suspicious, so I sent Rocky into the water. It was the best I could do.”

I smiled up at him. “It worked.”

“I saw Holly enter the greenhouse twice during the party and wondered what she was doing. After I left that night, I parked in Frank’s driveway and waited a while before sneaking back to investigate. I arrived just as you smashed the window.”

“So there were no phone calls to your house?”

“No. You remember my stupid excuse about why I’d come to the greenhouse — the flashlight, which, as you pointed out, wasn’t on.”

“When you lied like that, I was afraid that you were part of it.”

“You looked so betrayed — it was awful,” he said. “When I left the second time that night, I was terrified at what might happen to you and went directly to the police. I talked to McManus’s deputy. He drove by the house, but everything was quiet. He promised that someone would talk to you the next day, but he wasn’t as worried as I. You hadn’t asked for their help, and there had been a big party. Pranks happen.

“Anyway, this morning, when I learned about the knots and the fact that Nora was missing, I knew the situation was critical. I blamed you in front of Holly to make sure I was in solid with her. After we arrived at school, I made up a sudden errand. I called the police, talked to McManus, and rushed back here to talk to you. He, another officer, and I arrived at the same time. Rocky was barking and we smelled smoke. The woman officer and I ran to the boathouse, and McManus called for backup and fire equipment. You know the rest.”

“I thought you had turned against me,” I said, “and all the time you were trying to protect me.”

We had reached the end of Aunt Jule’s property and turned back.

Rocky emerged from the river and came galloping toward us. Stopping in front of us, he shook water all over. I backed into Nick.

“Good dog,” Nick said. “That’s one of the tricks I’ve taught him, shaking water on girls so they back into my arms.”

“Really! How smart of Rocky — and you, of course.”

“That’s another thing I’ve been wanting to tell you,” he said, turning me to face him. “I’m tired of getting jealous of my dog. I mean, he has nice eyes, but so do I.”

I looked from Rocky’s golden eyes to Nick’s laughing green ones.

“I didn’t enjoy the way Rocky got to stick close to you while I played Holly’s boyfriend. He’s going to have some competition from now on.”

“Oh, yeah? Are you good at retrieving sticks?”

“I’m good at stealing kisses,” Nick said, then proved it.