Banshee

Chapter Three

On a bluff overlooking the sea, Annamay was buried in the Hyatt family plot. Granite headstones marked the graves of those already there, Howard’s mother, and his older brother and his wife who’d been killed in a plane crash.

“Don’t you worry,” Mr. Hyatt told Kay. “Grandma will take good care of Annamay just the way she did of me. You mustn’t fret that she’ll be neglected.”

Kay pressed his arm. “Thanks, Dad.”

“She never let me miss a meal or go out in the rain without my umbrella… It seems to me it never rains anymore, Kay. Did you notice that?”

“The rains will start soon.”

“Aristophanes had something quite blasphemous to say about rain but I can’t remember what it was. Did Chizzy make the right kind of sandwiches?”

“You’d better ask her.”

He asked her and Chizzy said, well, yes and no. She’d made a few peanut-butter for him and Dru but the rest had to be fancier for Vicki and her husband and Ben and the Reverend Dunlop.

“But Annamay never served anything but peanut-butter.”

“Now you stop fussing here and now. If Mrs. Hyatt were still alive she’d give you one of those sharp looks of hers and you’d shut up like a clam.”

The old man was pleased. “She could stare down the devil himself, couldn’t she? I don’t mind admitting I used to shake in my boots sometimes.”

“You can start shaking again right now because Miss Vicki is giving you the eye. That means she’s fixing to make one of her speeches if you don’t be quiet.”

“God forbid.”

“Him and me too.”

Vicki was not, in fact, paying any attention to the old man. She was watching her daughter, Dru, with critical appraisal. Dru, who’d inherited her father’s mousy brown hair and gray eyes, was not turning out as pretty as she’d hoped. If she was to make a good marriage she would have to be taught some of the charming little graces that came naturally to Annamay. Dru was devastatingly direct. She bossed her boyfriends, beat them at games, and if they still had any doubts about their inferiority she put it to them in blunt language. She treated her stepfather, John Campbell, with equal candor and she didn’t mind in the least when she was treated back the same way.

“I think I see a whale,” Dru told him.

“What kind?”

“Gray.”

“Wrong time of year,” John said. “The herds of gray don’t pass here on their way to Baja until late winter or early spring.”

“Maybe this one is independent and decided to go ahead on his own.”

“Her own.”

“You can’t tell if it’s a female all the way from here.”

“If a whale decides to be independent and louse up the whole routine it’s a her.”

“I guess you’re right,” Dru said fairly. She had few illusions about either sex or any species.

“On the other hand,” said John Campbell who could be as impartial as Dru, “I must point out that females often make excellent leaders. When a flock of pintails or widgeon flies by, it will be a female at the head of it. And among predators like hawks and owls the female is about one-third larger and much fiercer.”

“I’m going to be big like my father, aren’t I?”

“Very likely.”

“Oh well, I don’t care. Maybe I’ll be a professional basketball player, maybe the world’s first girl champion slam dunker.”

“I’ll come and cheer.”

“Why did you marry my mother?”

“I’m not sure.” He looked across the open grave at Vicki who was standing with Kay and Howard waiting for the casket to arrive. “She’s pretty and cute. Also, she asked me.”

“Did she really really truly ask you?”

“Yep.”

“You could have said no.”

“I didn’t want to.”

He had met Vicki through his job at the Museum of Natural History. She was into Conservation at the time and was taking a course in marine biology. She often stayed after class to ask questions and she appeared so interested in the subject that he would take her down to the beach to make on-the-spot studies of tide-pool life. He would remove a starfish clinging to a rock or a sea urchin half buried in the sand, show her how each one functioned, then replace the specimen carefully where it belonged. She listened with wide-eyed fascination. By the time he discovered that the object of her fascination was not inside but outside the tide pools, it was too late. Her previous husbands, daughter, succession of lovers, didn’t matter.

“Do you suppose,” Dru said, “that she also asked the others?”

“I wouldn’t be surprised.”

He seemed amused at the idea and looked across the grave at his wife and met her eyes and smiled. She was indeed pretty and cute even if she hadn’t learned a thing about sea urchins.

The hearse arrived and four of the mortician’s assistants brought out the casket. All through the church service Dru had avoided looking at it. Now she couldn’t help it. There it was, and underneath the camellias and heather and cornflowers was Annamay, her dearest friend and most gullible confidante. Uttering a little cry of protest Dru ran over to her mother and threw her arms around her.

“I don’t want any more Experience. I want to go home.”

“Why, baby,” Vicki said, hugging her daughter. “I had no idea you were going to be upset. I thought it would be an enriching experience.”

“I don’t want to be enriched.”

“All right. You go wait in the car. John, give her the keys, please. You can unlock the car, can’t you, Dru?”

“I can drive the car,” Dru said.

John handed her the keys and whispered in her ear that she wasn’t to drive any farther than L.A. because there was only half a tank of gas. He looked as though he wished he were going with her.

“Lock the doors and windows,” Vicki said. “And if a strange man comes anywhere near, start blowing the horn.”

“Why couldn’t I just drive away?”

“Because you’re only ten years old and… oh, for God’s sake, do as I say without arguing for once.”

“The horn won’t blow unless I turn on the ignition.”

“All right, then start screaming.”

“If the windows and doors are closed nobody will hear me.”

“Then just sit there,” Vicki whispered fiercely. “Stop this nonsense. You’re ruining Annamay’s funeral.”

“She doesn’t care. She’s not here.”

“Split, kiddo,” John said and gave her a friendly whack on the butt.

The casket was lowered into the ground and the Reverend Michael Dunlop threw in the first handful of earth.

“We all must die,” he said. “Of dust we are made and to dust we shall return.”

When it was over, the family and Ben York went to the Hyatts’ house for some of Chizzy’s coffee and sandwiches and cake.

Dru and old Mr. Hyatt carried their plates down to the palace while Vicki took John to the garage to see the new car Howard had bought Kay to cheer her up. The car talked. The doors said, I’m open, the lights, I’m on, the gas tank, I’m getting empty. Even the speedometer issued a stern warning, Slow down.

Kay wasn’t cheered. She turned away from the car as though it were a bribe, and went on driving the old station wagon she’d used to take Annamay and her friends on outings to the beach and zoo, to Disneyland, Sea World and Marineland. People talked at her, told her the new car was marvelous and she ought to be grateful and why didn’t she drive it to Carmel or La Jolla for a weekend. She paid no more attention to them than to the synthesized voices that came from the car.

Vicki thought the voices were really neat though she was quick to point out one disadvantage as she and John sat in the front seat:

“What if we were making love and we heard someone say, that’s illegal? What would you do?”

“I’d finish making love,” John said. “And then I’d hire a lawyer.”

Vicki giggled and kissed him on the side of the neck. “Oh dear, I guess we’d better go back inside.”

“Why?”

“We’re supposed to be offering our condolences, saying all the correct things.”

“I can’t think of anything more to say than I’ve been saying for the past four months.”

“Still, it doesn’t seem right that we’re out here together like this, happy and everything. Does it seem right to you?”

“Nothing’s a hundred percent right in a fifty percent world.”

“You don’t think we should be… well, suffering more?” “It wouldn’t help them any.”

“Oh, John, you’re so sensible.”

“I’m learning from Dru,” John said with some truth.

Dru was feeding chocolate cake to the goldfish in the lily pond behind the palace. The pond was an exact replica of the larger one beside the main house, and the fish in it looked like babies of the huge colorful fish in the other pond, which were called koi.

Annamay had given names to all the smaller fish and firmly believed that each one knew and responded to his or her own name. Dru refused to buy such nonsense. The fish all looked alike, so if you called Lancelot and one of them responded, it wasn’t necessarily Lancelot, as Annamay always thought. It could just as well be Lucretia or Charlemagne or Beauregard. None of them liked chocolate cake very much.

“I venture to suggest,” the old man said, “that they prefer fish food.”

“Annamay and I tasted fish food once. It hasn’t got much flavor.”

“Apparently that doesn’t bother them. It’s reasonable to assume that taste was originally a condition of survival. What tasted good to a creature was good and what was unpalatable was bad. That doesn’t hold true anymore, alas, or we would all be sitting around eating strawberry shortcake and cream puffs.”

“And french fried potatoes and rocky-road ice cream.”

“Not to mention pecan pie.”

“And tacos and pizza and brownies.” She paused, frowning. She frowned with her whole face. Her eyebrows met, her forehead wrinkled, her mouth squeezed into a straight line. “No. No, not brownies.”

“Why not?”

“Because of the poem Chizzy wrote.”

“I find it hard to imagine Chizzy as a poet. And brownies are surely an odd subject for a literary effort.”

“It wasn’t actually about brownies, it was about strangers who offered you rides in their car and money and brownies. Only the brownies might have razor blades in them.”

“People are writing poems about nearly everything nowadays but brownies with razor blades in them is surely stretching it a bit. Do you remember how it goes?”

“Yes, but I’d rather not say it out loud.”

“I’d like to hear it. It might alter my perspective on Chizzy.”

“But it might also make you feel bad, thinking about Annamay and strangers and things.”

“It might, yes. Yes. You’re right, of course.”

He closed his eyes and twin tears rolled down his cheeks like tiny crystal balls, balls too brief and brittle for any fortune-teller to read.

“Don’t cry,” Dru said, and gave him a kindly pat on the head. He had quite a lot of hair that was real, not a wig like Mr. Cunningham’s. She could see his scalp shining through in places, pink and smooth, and she wondered why scalps, which didn’t matter because they were usually covered with hair, never got wrinkles, and faces, which mattered a great deal, did. It was an interesting question but she didn’t intend asking anybody. Vicki’s answer would be immediate and connected in some way with one of Dru’s misdeeds, and John Campbell would use the occasion to deliver a minilecture on birds or snakes or whatever.

“You’re a nice little girl,” Mr. Hyatt wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. “Are you as nice as Annamay?”

“No,” Dru said bluntly. “I was nicer than I am now when I was her age and still innocent. Maybe she would have changed too.”

“Not Annamay, no. Never.”

“Everyone has to grow up.”

She didn’t realize until she heard the words what a terrible mistake she’d made because Annamay would never grow up.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Hyatt. I’m awfully sorry.”

But it was too late. The old man was fleeing, half running, half stumbling, along the flagstone path to the house, his hands pressed against his chest as if to stem the flow of blood.

“Holy hell,” Dru said, and dumped the rest of the chocolate cake into the lily pond.

Only the three of them were left in the sunny birch-paneled family room, Kay and Howard and Ben. Chizzy had gone back upstairs as soon as she’d made the coffee and sliced the cake. She felt an ominous sadness in the air, not just a sadness for the past but for the future, as though an important decision were about to be announced. Nothing had been said to her about such a decision so she was powerless to alter it no matter how deeply it would affect her. Under normal circumstances she would have eavesdropped and, hearing a word here and a word there, put them together into a sentence. But there was no such thing as normal anymore and there never would be again, and she talked brusquely to herself in the bathroom mirror: “Don’t go dreaming. If there’s ever any normal again it will be a new one and you’ll have to get used to it, like it or not.”

Ben shared none of Chizzy’s premonitions. Now that the funeral was over he expected Kay and Howard to grow closer to each other again. Howard would continue to manage the investment firm, Kay would resume her job as a volunteer driver with the Red Cross, and he, Ben, could go back to his own work.

His current project was designing a pavilion for a Hollywood actor who knew exactly what he wanted, a house made entirely of windows and mirrors, no expenses spared and to hell with earthquakes. The actor’s wife wanted a blue tile roof and an indoor-outdoor swimming pool.

Ben hated the assignment. People who claimed to know exactly what they wanted often didn’t like the results and the money-is-no-object crowd had a tendency to ignore their bills, assuming perhaps that money was also no object to the plasterers and cement finishers and plumbers and carpenters.

But his real assignment, first and foremost, was to bring Kay and Howard together.

“I think you two should take a trip in the new car. Drive up the coast route to Big Sur and San Francisco and Point Reyes. Keep on driving. Chizzy will take care of things here and I’ll drop in on Mr. Hyatt every day and take him wherever he wants to go.”

Kay didn’t even look at him. She was watching Howard who was pouring himself some bourbon. “What do you think of that, Howard?”

“Of what?”

“Benjamin has planned a trip for us to Big Sur and other points north. Does that appeal to you?”

“I don’t believe so.”

“You could always talk to the car if you got bored with my company. Or we could take turns talking to the car. Would you like that?”

“No.”

Kay turned to Ben. “You see? Howard and I have become very direct with each other. No unnecessary amenities, just the straight stuff, yes and no.”

“Don’t talk like that,” Ben said. “Stop it right now.”

“I’ll stop talking like that if you’ll stop planning our future for us,” Kay said. “Howard and I have something to tell you and you’re only making it more difficult. I know you’re fond of us, Ben, and you want us to stay together and live happily ever after and all that. But it’s impossible.”

“Only because you’re not trying hard enough.”

“Perhaps we don’t want to try.”

“But you’ve got to. Look at it mathematically. Neither of you alone is half of what you are together. And what’s going to happen to Chizzy and the old man and the dogs and the koi?”

“The koi,” Kay said. “The koi, for God’s sake.”

“And the house? My house? I lived and breathed this house. I love every inch of it.”

“Build one of your own. That new girl who’s living with you, what’s her name?”

“Quinn.”

“Miss or Mrs.?”

“I never asked her.”

“My goodness, we are getting sophisticated, aren’t we?”

“Quinn happens to be my assistant,” Ben said stiffly.

“Really? Well, I’m sure she assists you in one way or another. Anyway, I’ve heard she’s a beauty. Why don’t you marry her, design a house of your own?”

“I don’t want to get married. And I can’t afford to live on a scale like this.”

“It’s a little unfair for you to insist we stay married when you won’t even get married in the first place. Don’t you think so, Ben?”

“Surely there’s no question of a real divorce.”

Howard finished his drink. “There’ll be no drastic change at all for the moment. I’ll move into the guesthouse so my comings and goings and telephone calls won’t interfere with Kay’s life. I expect to be pretty much absorbed in my new job.”

“Your new job? What are you trying to tell me? What about the investment firm?”

“It can get along without me for a while. I have more important things to do… Are you sure you wouldn’t like a drink, Ben?”

“What important things?”

“Michael Dunlop and I are going to work together.”

Ben looked incredulous. “You’re taking up some kind of religious activity?”

“It’s a religion to me by this time though it can’t be called a religious activity.”

“What can it be called then?”

“Michael and I are going to find the person responsible for Annamay’s death.”

Ben went over and opened the door that led into the main patio. He drew in a deep breath of air and held it. He felt almost faint and wished he had some of Mrs. Cunningham’s smelling salts with their scent of lavender and shock of ammonia. He said finally, “So you’re into that again.”

“He was never out,” Kay said. “Never for one single second. People like you and Dad and Vicki have been blaming me for the split in our marriage. I went along with that. It seemed easier to accept the blame than to put it on someone already overloaded with guilt… He never stopped thinking about it, right from that very first night when Annamay failed to come home. Even when we lay beside each other in bed his obsession was like a tangible wall between us. When he asked me for love he meant sex, and I’m not a hooker. Would you agree with that, Howard?”

Her husband gave her a bleak little smile. “Oh yes. It’s pretty obvious you’re not a hooker.”

“So you see, Ben,” Kay went on, “this isn’t a sudden decision. It was made months ago and nothing you can say will change it. Now if you don’t mind I’m going up to my room. I need to be alone for a while.”

The two men watched her leave, interested less in her exit than in avoiding each other’s eyes.

“Okay, I get the picture,” Ben said. “But why Michael Dunlop?”

“Michael and I are old friends.”

“You and I are also old friends. Why didn’t you pick me?”

Howard had been dreading the question and trying to prepare answers to it. But when he spoke them aloud they sounded as if he were reading from a cue card. “Your work won’t go on without you like mine and your hours aren’t flexible like Michael’s. You have to earn a living.”

“That’s not the real reason, is it?”

“Partly.”

“Is it because you think I’m too young, you don’t respect me?”

“You’re an artist, Ben. You’re temperamental and emotional and… well, you’re just not cut out for the kind of job this is going to be. You’re not tough enough.”

“I’m healthy and I stay fit. I play handball. I’m taking karate lessons.”

“That isn’t the kind of tough I mean. Tough is when you’ve seen everything, all the things a minister like Michael is forced to see. Or tough is when your only child has been murdered.”

“I want to be in on the investigation.”

“You will be. We’ll consult you from time to time, ask your advice and so on.”

“Sure,” Ben said. “Sure.”

“Now your feelings are hurt, aren’t they? It’s a good example of what I was talking about. You’re too emotional. You overreact.”

“I can control myself perfectly well.”

“Then start now by facing the fact that Michael and I are going to—”

“Mike should stick to the Lord’s work, dammit.”

“Come on, Ben. There’s a very important role in this for you.”

“What do I get to do — carry a spear? Make coffee?”

“Pay extra attention to Kay. In spite of the way she talks she’s very vulnerable and depressed. She doesn’t have this desire for revenge that keeps me going. She’s not interested in revenge, or in anything else either at the moment, and I can’t help her. That’s where you come in.”

“Oh goody, here’s where I get to make the coffee.”

“Take her out to dinner when you have the chance, maybe even drive down to L.A. for a play or a concert. That is, if your Miss Quinn doesn’t object.”

“Miss Quinn doesn’t belong to me any more than she did to the last twenty guys.”

“Then you’ll go out of your way to be nice to Kay?”

“I’ve always been nice to her. I love her. I love her like a sister.” He paused for a moment. “Or maybe not like a sister. I’m not sure. Maybe I’ll try to move in on you, Howard. How would you like that?”

“There you go, overreacting again. Are you actually trying to make me jealous? Don’t be silly, Ben. I trust you completely.”

“You might be wrong. I consider Kay the most beautiful and desirable woman in town.”

“Well, don’t tell me that, tell her,” Howard said. “She needs it, I don’t.”

“What you need, pal, is a swift kick in the ass. And when I finish my course in karate I might give it to you.”

“I’ll be waiting. Meanwhile, will you take care of Kay? Go places with her, keep her as busy as possible. Don’t let her sit around the house and brood. You could even take her out dancing. I bet you’re a good dancer.”

“Why do you bet that?”

“No particular reason. You seemed like the type who’s a good dancer.”

“There, that’s another sign of the lack of respect you have for me. In that classy world of yours, men who are good dancers are considered suspect. Right?”

“I didn’t—”

“Well, it so happens that I’m a lousy dancer. My feet are too big and I can’t keep time… Now I suppose you think I’m overreacting again, don’t you?”

“It occurred to me,” Howard said dryly.

“You’re wrong. I was simply responding to what I consider an implied insult.”

“No insult was intended. I was merely suggesting, hoping, in fact, that you might be a good dancer because Kay likes to dance and I’m very bad at it.”

“Well dammit, I am a, good dancer. Tell that to your friends at the Forum Club.”

“I doubt they’d be interested. We mainly discuss politics.”

“That would be way over my head, of course.”

“Sit down, Ben.”

“Why?”

“You might think more clearly in that position.”

Ben sat on the edge of the copper-hooded fire pit that dominated one corner of the room. The season for fires hadn’t arrived yet and last winter’s ashes had long since been hauled away. Ben had tried to explain to Chizzy that fire pits were supposed to have ashes in them to look as if they had just been used the previous night. But Chizzy said ashes merely looked sloppy and went right on keeping the fire pit as spotless as one of her own skillets.

“You’re being a problem today,” Howard said. “I was hoping you’d be more of a solution.”

“I will be. I’ll help you and Michael with your investigation.”

“That’s not the kind of help I need.”

“Okay, okay. I’ll take Kay to dinner and out dancing, she’ll fall madly in love with me, ask you for a divorce and marry me. How’s that for a scenario?”

“Full of holes. You’re like a son to Kay and me. Rather a bad boy at times, like right now, but we still love you. Reverting to childish behavior is your way of handling grief, I suppose. Kay’s is to retreat. And mine… well, mine is to get the hell out there and fight.”

Chizzy’s way was to cook.

During the past few weeks she had made stews and casseroles, bread, pies and cakes, a fat turkey and scrawny little game hens. The freezer was filled and still she kept on cooking. In order to cope with the surplus she had to do a great deal of eating. Kay scarcely touched her food and Howard and his father had always been picky eaters.

Ben was of some help. He was usually hungry since none of the women who lived with him from time to time had much interest in cooking. But even he couldn’t keep up with Chizzy’s output.

And so she gained weight and, hating her new image, ate still more to comfort herself, and gained still more. She weighed almost as much as the two Japanese gardeners, Mitsu and Suki, put together. The young man who came to clean the pool and jacuzzi twice a week began calling her Mrs. Five by Five and didn’t stop until she hit him over the head with one of his own skimmers.

Meanwhile the food kept multiplying like some prolific new form of life that couldn’t be controlled. Chizzy was forced to use more drastic methods of disposal. She sent casseroles over to Dru’s house, pies and cakes to Mitsu’s wife and sons and to Suki’s parents. She even personally delivered a meat loaf to Mrs. Cunningham down the road.

Mrs. Cunningham looked quite astonished. “What did you say this was?”

“A meat loaf.”

“You mean, to eat?”

“Yes. To eat.”

“Are you sure you came to the right place?” Mrs. Cunningham raised her voice. “Peter dear, did you order a meat loaf?”

“No one ordered it,” Chizzy explained. “I’m giving it to you.”

“To eat?”

“To eat.”

“How extraordinary. I don’t believe anyone has ever given me a meat loaf. Is there anything wrong with it? It’s rather rude to ask that, I know, but now and then when there’s something a wee bit wrong with something one gives it to someone else hoping they won’t notice.”

“There’s nothing wrong with it,” Chizzy said roughly. “And if you don’t want it I’ll take it back again.”

And she did. She took it home and fed it to Newf and Shep who found nothing wrong with it at all.

It was almost dark when she appeared at the door of the family room to invite Ben to stay for dinner.

“We’re having something you specially like, Irish stew with dumplings.”

“Sounds great,” Ben said. “But somebody is expecting me at home.”

“Some woman, I suppose.”

“Actually she’s my assistant. I’m teaching her to read blueprints.”

Chizzy sniffed and said, “Since when does an architect hire an assistant who can’t already read blueprints? I can’t possibly eat a whole pot of Irish stew all by myself.”

“No, but I’ll give odds that you’ll try.”

“We can build a fire and I’ll leave the ashes right here in the pit, won’t go near them with a ten-foot pole. And for dessert—”

“Some other time, Chizzy,” Ben said and smiled at her, the kind of smile that every woman interpreted in her own way. To Chizzy it meant he would have liked nothing better than to stay and eat Irish stew but duty called and he was forcing himself to go home and face the rigorous demands of his assistant. To Howard he said, “May I have one last word?”

“Go ahead.”

“Do you think the sheriff is going to appreciate a couple of amateurs homing in on his investigation?”

“No.”

“And how far do you suppose you’ll get without his cooperation?”

“Farther than I am now, which is nowhere.”

“I don’t like the sound of this,” Chizzy said. “No sir, I don’t like it one bit. I want to know what’s going on.” She tugged at the sleeve of Ben’s coat like an anxious child. “You mustn’t let Mr. Howard do anything dangerous.”

“I have no control over him,” Ben said. “I’m his little boy… Right, Dad?”

He waited a moment for a reply. When none came he let himself out the back door, slamming it behind him.

Chizzy listened disapprovingly to the sound of his old Porsche roaring down the driveway. “I wish he’d buy a more respectable car. That thing makes enough noise to wake the— Oh dear. Oh dear.” She sagged against the wall as if her bones were dissolving. “I didn’t mean to say— Oh dear, I could bite my tongue out.”

“It’s all right, Chizzy. Forget it.”

“This is a terrible day, the worst day of my life. Worse even than when Chisholm walked out on me for that redhead with the cast in her eye. At least then I had someone to blame. But today, today I don’t even have anyone to blame.”

“I’ll find you someone,” Howard said. “I’ll find you someone to blame.”