Banshee

Chapter Four

One of the members of Michael’s congregation was a woman who worked as a secretary for a deputy sheriff. Esther Garrison knew Annamay and her parents by sight and after the child’s disappearance she’d come to talk to Michael several times to put into words some of the doubts Michael himself was having.

Most of the cases that crossed Miss Garrison’s desk concerned people who were, in some way or another, involved with evil — the victims and the victimizers and all the human links between them, the vicious and greedy, the sick, weak, dim-witted, the alcoholics and drug addicts and their pitiful debris. No evil had ever touched Annamay, and yet here she was in Miss Garrison’s files, and it shook the secretary to the very foundations of her faith.

The immunity she had developed throughout the years deserted her, leaving her as vulnerable as some of the people in her own files.

Esther Garrison was a hardheaded, hardworking woman who commanded respect and wielded considerable power. No one called her by her first name, no one told her jokes or confided secrets, no one even asked her for donations. She wore all her clothes as though they were uniforms. Her sharp little eyes behind the steel-framed spectacles made people uncomfortable. They seemed to be tabulating faults and relaying them by blinking in Morse code to some mysterious consort. On those occasions when she was called to court as a witness she delivered her testimony in such a clear positive voice that no judge or jury member could doubt her.

None of the court people would have recognized the pale disheveled trembling woman who appeared in Michael’s office to ask for guidance.

During the past few weeks Michael had noticed changes in the stone-faced brunette who always sat in the aisle seat of the fourth pew. When the congregation was asked to pray she kept her head erect and her eyes open. During hymns she didn’t pretend to sing or even bother opening the hymn book. It wasn’t until her third visit to his office that Michael learned she worked in the Sheriff’s Department and had access to all the files. In return for his guidance she offered hers.

“Of course I couldn’t ask you to do anything illegal, Miss Garrison.”

“Nor would I comply if you did,” Miss Garrison said. “A little out of line perhaps but certainly within legal limits. You are the spiritual adviser to the child’s family and as such you’re entitled to know what has been done about the case so far. Doesn’t that sound logical?”

“To me, yes. What about your boss?”

“My boss is like most bosses in other businesses. He has to depend on other people to tell him things, mainly me. Now and then there’s something I neglect to tell him.”

“And this is a now?”

“This is a now.”

Miss Garrison provided a rough outline of what the files contained: the first report of the child’s disappearance, lists of areas searched and names of searchers, interviews with the family, the neighbors, domestics, servicemen who regularly visited the neighborhood, gardeners, door-to-door salesmen, transients seen in the creek area, Annamay’s teachers and friends at school, all the phone calls received, the hours spent, the miles covered, culminating in the discovery of the bones by an entomology student from the college on a beetle-collecting assignment, and finally in the pathologist’s report.

It was a long file but as far as results were concerned it could have been condensed into a single sentence: Annamay Rebecca Hyatt had died of unknown causes, possibly asphyxiation, internal bleeding, shock, ruptured spleen, nobody knew.

“A lot of it is unimportant,” Miss Garrison said. “Crank phone calls, letters offering theories and suggestions, searches that led nowhere, interviews with talkative people who had nothing to say, dumb questions and dumb answers. But I suppose you want it all.”

“Every word of it, right from the beginning. Can you manage it?”

“You wouldn’t have asked me if there’d been any doubt in your mind.”

“I’d hate to get you into any trouble.”

“I assure you,” Miss Garrison said, “that I’d hate it even more. When do you want delivery to start?”

“Right away.”

“It will have to be done in batches, of course. I can’t monopolize the copying machine for any length of time. Although my co-workers are not likely to think I’m doing anything wrong, or even interesting, it’s better not to invite questions.”

“How will you get the material to me?”

Miss Garrison took off her steel-rimmed spectacles, as though she could see better without them. “I attend church regularly on Sundays and am treasurer of the ladies’ auxiliary which meets every Wednesday night. I’m in the habit of carrying a large handbag, roomy enough to contain a couple of paperbacks and an extra sweater and rain gear, et cetera. In the past the size of my handbags has been the object of some speculation and humor around the office but now they are, like myself, taken for granted.

“Being taken for granted,” Miss Garrison added, replacing her spectacles, “has certain advantages. I am part of the woodwork. No one expects woodwork to start acting like a tree again.”

Howard’s move into the guest cottage was accomplished quickly and without fuss. The cottage was always kept ready for occupancy, its cupboards and refrigerator well-stocked, even its medicine chest equipped with toothbrushes and paste, aspirin and throwaway razors. The only real change was the telephone which was now a private line with an unlisted number. Besides Michael, only two people were given this number — Kay, and Howard’s confidential secretary.

During the move Howard’s father stood around watching dolefully. He made no attempt to help Howard carry his personal effects over from the main house, and when asked to do so he refused with a sad little shake of his head.

“No, son, I cannot be a party to an act which I consider morally wrong.”

“It surely isn’t morally wrong to move from one section of my house to another.”

“But what is the purpose of such an act?”

“I’ve already explained to you that I’m going to be very busy and I don’t want to disturb Kay… Here, hang this up for me, will you?”

The old man put his hands behind his back to prevent them from honoring the request without his approval. “You’ve always been very busy and Kay has never minded being disturbed. Throughout these many years she’s been quite cheerfully keeping the hours necessary to people in the financial business like us, getting up at four-thirty so you could be at the office by six when the New York Stock Exchange opens.”

“I don’t want to argue with you, Dad, so I’ll simply tell you for the last time that I’m going through with this project.”

“Is this project so secret you can’t even divulge it to me?”

“There’s nothing to divulge yet. Perhaps there never will be. Now why don’t you go work in the garden, Dad? Pick some mandarins. I noticed that one tree is loaded this year, dozens of them have fallen off.”

“I picked ninety-three mandarins yesterday. Chizzy told me she didn’t know what to do with ninety-three mandarins, and I wasn’t to pick any more. You can’t make pie or sauce out of them the way you can with apples, or juice them like oranges.”

“Isn’t it about time to prune the roses?”

“Ah, Howard, you’ve always been a good son to me. Don’t start treating me like a foolish old fellow who must be kept busy. If you wish me not to bother you, you have only to say so in a clear direct manner. Would you prefer that I leave?”

“Yes.”

“Then I will leave immediately. If you need me for anything I’ll be up in the lighthouse logging ships.”

“That’s a good idea.”

“No, it really isn’t a good idea, Howard. You know it serves no purpose whatsoever, my keeping track of ships when no one ever reads my logs. If there’s ever a war, of course, such logs might be of use, so perhaps I had better keep in practice.”

The lighthouse was a thirty-foot tower built on the highest knoll on the property. It had a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree view of the sea, the coastline and the mountains behind the city that separated it from the rest of the world.

The tower contained a powerful telescope mounted on a tripod. Through it Mr. Hyatt could watch the stars by night and the ships by day. During the long dry season he kept the mountains under close observation for the first signs of a forest fire. During the wet season he often watched the freeway, the hundreds and thousands of cars and trucks and vans and campers driving north and south, all of them in a great hurry as if they feared the places they were going to wouldn’t wait for them to get there.

He could also train the telescope on people but he seldom did because he considered spying an ungentlemanly pursuit. Only after Annamay disappeared did he use it for this purpose, scanning every part of the neighborhood that wasn’t obscured by trees and hedges, fences and walls.

He was frequently astonished by what he saw. The maid next door, Ernestina, threw dishes into the garbage cans when she didn’t feel like washing them. Her employers, who were traveling in Europe, were in for a shock when they came home, not merely at the reduction in their stock of dishes and cookware but also at the number of rats who’d developed a taste for Mexican food and lay hidden in the ivy and the crowns of palm trees awaiting their share.

The telescope also offered him a view farther on down the hill of the vine-covered pergola that connected the Cunninghams’ house with the garage. Mrs. Cunningham could frequently be seen using this pergola. Her visits to the garage were quite puzzling since she didn’t drive, and Mr. Hyatt reluctantly conceded that Chizzy had been right all along and Mrs. Cunningham had a great thirst.

Through the feathery leaves of a pepper tree, a section of the Cunninghams’ pool area was also visible. Here Mrs. Cunningham’s son, Peter, gave frequent pool parties which were unusual because the leaves of the pepper tree seemed to be all his guests ever wore. In contrast Mrs. Cunningham moved among the naked young men in her long billowy caftans and huge straw hats.

On a hill across the canyon was the Mediterranean villa of a mad old madam who kept a flock of white-coated attendants fluttering around her like trained doves. She came out on one of the balconies now and then to wave to the world. Mr. Hyatt always waved back though he doubted that he could be seen.

Mr. Hyatt wasn’t aware of her previous occupation until some time after she took over the villa. To him she appeared to be an ordinary elderly woman who dressed in long black robes rather like a nun’s habit and employed a great many servants who didn’t do much of anything except follow her around. In spite of the gardeners who came and went sporadically, the grounds were neglected. Fruit fell off trees and rotted, the oaks were alive with moths, the garden paths overgrown with devil grass. Mr. Hyatt brought the subject up one day when he and Chizzy were having lunch in the kitchen.

“I see we have a new neighbor.”

“You see? How?”

“Through the telescope.”

“That’s all right then. Just so’s you didn’t go charging over to welcome her to the neighborhood. And if she ever approaches you take my advice and shun her like a rattlesnake.”

“Why?”

“She is not,” Chizzy said, “a woman of quality.”

“She must be rich to have so many servants.”

“Keepers, not servants. She came here from up north only one jump ahead of the cops and the butterfly nets.”

“She may only be a trifle eccentric.”

“She’s mad as a hatter.”

Mr. Hyatt swallowed this with a spoonful of soup. “Perhaps you would be interested in the origin of that phrase, mad as a hatter. In nineteenth-century England hatters did in fact go mad because the mercury compound they used to soften pelts affected their brains.”

“Well, this old biddy didn’t get that way by working on any hats, I can tell you.”

“Of course not. The use of mercury was stopped some time ago.”

“She is suffering,” Chizzy said impatiently, “from an occupational disease. Now do you understand?”

“Dear me. Perhaps you should warn Annamay to keep away from there.”

“You warn her. I’ve warned her about so many things it just goes in one ear and out the other.”

Mr. Hyatt found Annamay in the palace bandaging Luella Lu who was somewhat the worse from another round of Shep’s and Newf’s toothy devotion. In the big house on the adjoining hill, Mr. Hyatt explained, lived a wicked witch who could cast evil spells on beautiful princesses, and must be avoided.

“I know,” Annamay said. “Dru told me.”

“Did she tell you the woman was a witch?”

“Sort of-ish.” Dru’s explanation had been rather unsettling since Annamay didn’t understand what bad things people did to get bad diseases. She was grateful for her grandfather’s reasonable alternative. Witches appeared in many of Annamay’s storybooks, and while they were often fearsome they never got away with much in the long run.

The lure of having a spell cast on her proved irresistible. She persuaded Dru to accompany her. Leaving the dogs at home because they might attract attention by barking, the two girls ran through the avocado grove, jumped the creek and crept up the hill to the white stucco wall that surrounded the villa. Standing on Dru’s shoulders Annamay peered into the courtyard. There was no witch in sight, only a young man in a white coat who was sitting reading a book.

He told her to get the hell out and she got the hell out.

“He’s probably into dope,” Dru said on the way back, “and suspects us of being narcs.”

Dru’s explanations had a life cycle of their own. Each one spawned a question which in turn had to hatch another explanation.

“What’s a narc?”

“A narcotics investigator.”

Annamay might have been flattered by this if Dru hadn’t almost immediately added, “He doesn’t know you’re a child. All he saw of you was the top of your head and your eyes. Your eyes look a lot more grown-up and sensible than the rest of your face. It would have been a dead giveaway if he’d seen your teeth. Your teeth are positively childish.”

“I don’t care. I don’t want to be suspected of being a narc anyway.”

“I do.”

“I don’t.”

“You,” Dru said flatly, “are going to remain a child the rest of your life.”

And she did. And the police came and went, and came again and left again throughout the summer, and toward the end of autumn the funeral was held. And Howard moved into the guest cottage, and Miss Esther Garrison made many trips between her files and the copying machine and went to church carrying her handbag. And the Reverend Michael Dunlop transferred its contents to his briefcase.