Whistling in the Dark

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

It was warm that night. The heat wasn’t giving up like it did sometimes after the streetlights went on. And the air around me smelled like just-cut grass and the macaroni and cheese Mr. Dave had made us for supper with a slice of Ethel’s black-bottomed pie for dessert.

Mary Lane and Troo and me were sitting on top of the monkey bars closest to the shed, watching Bobby play checkers with Mimi Latour over on the benches, and going over Troo’s genius plan one more time.

Everybody knew there was a padlock on the shed door, but it had a chain that was loose and you could pull it apart pretty far. Not real far, a kid couldn’t sneak in between the chain and the door or anything. Not a regular kid. But a kid like Mary Lane, the skinniest kid in the whole world, she was pretty sure she could get in there, and once she did she was gonna get her hands on that Kroger bag and take it to the cops.

“You ready?” Mary Lane asked as she swung down off the monkey bars.

This was one of the reasons Troo and me loved Mary Lane, because she was always ready for anything. Like ringing doorbells and running away, or kicking car tires up at Fillard’s Service Station and then laying down on the ground and moaning like she had got run over. And one time she even said she was a crippled child and went door to door collecting pennies that she used to buy herself licorice. She was a wild little monkey that Mary Lane! Especially when it came to peeping.

“I’m ready,” I said. But I wasn’t. I felt scared the same way I did after I climbed those steps to the high dive over at the swimming pool, walking slowly across that rough board over to the edge. Then I’d just stand there, bouncing in the breeze, waiting for my courage to come push me off. I can’t tell you how many times I backed down those steps, my head hangin’ low and embarrassed.

But I wasn’t gonna back down tonight. I could feel it. I wondered why that was. Maybe it had something to do with Mr. Dave being my father or Mother getting better or both those things getting put into one big bowl and mixed up together to make a batch of a different, braver Sally O’Malley. Was that how growing up worked?

Across the street, the big lights were on at the playground. The ones they put on when there was a softball game being played by the men in the neighborhood. Tonight it was the Feelin’ Good Cookie Factory against the policemen. Mr. Dave was up there. He was playing third base. All the men were yelling baseball words at each other. C’mon, Gil, just a little hit. Pitch, you got about as much control as two rabbits on a first date. Hey, ump, if you’re just gonna watch, buy a ticket. And a lot of hootin’ and hollerin’ from the benches. When the wind changed directions, I was sure that the cookie factory team would win. The smell of those chocolate chip cookies would give those factory men strength.

I jumped down from the bars and looked over at Mr. Dave in his baseball uniform with the red stripes and thought I’d just run over to third base real quick and tell him about Mary Lane seeing that Kroger grocery bag in the shed.

Troo did some of the mental telepathy on me and said snippy-like, “Forget it, I don’t care if he is your daddy, he’s not gonna believe you and he’s gonna get mad that you bothered him while he’s playing ball.”

“Who’s your daddy?” Mary Lane asked.

Troo said matter-of-factly, “Rasmussen is her daddy.” Mary Lane nodded like Ethel did sometimes, all low and wise. “Yeah, I knew that.”

“You did not, Mary Lane. That is your biggest lie ever,” I said.

“Did too know that. For Chrissakes, Sally, who are you? Helen Keller? Look how much you two look alike.”

I looked over at the softball field. Mary Lane was right. Mr. Dave was crouched over at third, smacking his hand into his glove. He’d told me and Troo that we could come over and watch the game but not to leave the playground under any circumstances. Eddie Callahan was playing for the cookie factory because his dad used to work up there before he got all caught up in that cookie press, so Nell was sitting in the bleachers, waving at Eddie every two minutes. I wished Mother could be here to see Mr. Dave. He looked so handsome with his honey-colored skin, his hair almost as white as mine now with just the right amount of muscles, the kind that didn’t look like he wanted to punch you, but that he’d be handy if you needed him to lift furniture. It would make Mother feel a lot healthier just looking at him. I bet they ended up getting married and then they would go on a honeymoon to someplace they both would really like, maybe someplace glamorous like Miami Beach, Florida, and when they came back they-

Mary Lane shoved me and said, “Quit your dreamin’… it’s time to do a peepin’.” She laughed like one of those chimps that lived out on the Monkey Island. “She’s a poet but doesn’t know it but her feet show it. They’re long fellows. He he he.” She didn’t seem scared at all. In fact, I hadn’t seen Mary Lane this happy since she accidentally lit that huge fire up on North Avenue last summer.

“Troo,” I said, “make sure Bobby stays on that bench, and if he doesn’t, yell something like, ‘Oh hi, Bobby, wanna play tetherball’ very loud, okay?”

Troo was staring at Bobby real concentrated with her tongue between her lips. “I got him in my sights.” She had her Davy Crockett coonskin cap on, and her wiggly red hair that had lightened in the summer sun to a not quite ripe strawberry color was halfway down her back. “What about Barb?”

I said, “She’s not workin’ tonight. I asked.”

I turned to Mary Lane to say let’s go but she was already heading toward the shed. I looked over at Mr. Dave one more time and I thought how proud of me he was gonna be if Bobby turned out to be the murderer and molester, and if he wasn’t… no harm, no foul.

Mary Lane disappeared around the corner of the school. I looked back once more at Bobby, who was now leaning over the checkerboard toward Mimi Latour. He had his hands laying on top of hers.

“Sally,” Troo whispered loudly to get my attention.

I looked over at her. She gave me double thumbs-up.

I did the same back to her and then I slipped around the corner. My poor heart. It wasn’t so much beating in my chest as panting like it had Old Yeller rabies. It was pretty dark back there because there weren’t any lights except for a small one over the door of the shed and that one was flickering. While I let my eyes adjust to the dark, I set my face against the brick of the school, hoping it’d be cool. But it wasn’t. It was warm and rough and smelled like sidewalk.

“Mary Lane?” I called out.

She whispered loudly over to my left, from behind a tree, “C’mon, we don’t have a lotta time. It’s the eighth inning.” She ran toward the shed door and waved me over.

There was a light on inside and a streak of it came through the shed and laid there like a piece of broken glass on the grass. Mary Lane pointed at the door. The plan was for me to pull it open as far as I could because I was so strong from all my gardening. I got my hands around the edge and yanked. Mary Lane was standing sideways to the door. She slipped most of her body through, but then stopped and said, “More, you gotta pull it open more, Sally. I can’t get my head in.” I closed my eyes so I could concentrate and tried to pull even harder, with every ounce of strength I had, telling myself if I could do this, I would be named Queen of the Playground. I tugged and grunted and it musta worked, because when I opened my eyes Mary Lane said, “I knew this skinni ness would come in handy one day,” as she disappeared inside the shed.

No other human being on Earth could’ve done it.

And then I listened for Troo, but I didn’t hear anything at all, no warning, no talking. Nothing. I watched Mary Lane through the slit in the shed door as she walked past the big metal container they kept the red balls in and past a bunch of bats and gloves. She hurried over to the long wooden worktable where they probably fixed stuff that broke on the playground and where she said she saw Bobby open up that Kroger bag. She looked in a cupboard and behind these shovels. She pulled the top off a green metal box that had some paint cans in it. Mary Lane turned toward me and hunched her shoulders up to her ears and then let them down. She couldn’t find the bag. Maybe Bobby had figured out she’d peeped on him and had gotten rid of it. Or maybe Mary Lane had been telling one of her big fat whoppers.

I stuck my arm through the slit in the door and pointed over to a corner she hadn’t checked. “Over there.”

Mary Lane walked over and picked something up in her hand. It was just a rusted old swing chain. She turned back again and made a face at me like, now what? I pointed at the red balls container. I just had a feeling. A picture of Bobby always bouncing one of those red balls came into my mind. “Dig into the ball barrel. Way down.”

A cheer went up from the baseball game. Two… four… six… eight… who do we appreciate! The game was over. The playground was closing. Bobby’d be here any minute to switch the big lights off. I called through the door, “Hurry up.” Mary Lane stuck her skinny arms down into the ball barrel as far as she could and was rooting around, and then finally she brought her arm back up. In her hand was a Kroger bag, folded at the top. She grinned and started walking back to me. She was almost home free when I heard the whistling.

I could feel his breath on my neck. How’d he get past Troo?

“Lookin’ for me, Sally?” Bobby asked real friendly. He placed his hands on my shoulders and turned me around to face him. “Cuz I’ve been looking for you.” I looked down and he didn’t have those white tennis shoes on anymore. He had on black shoes, those spongy kind. And pink-and-green argyles. Mary Lane had not been telling one of her fibs.

Bobby Brophy was the murderer and molester.

He had the keys for the shed padlock in his hand. If I didn’t warn her, Mary Lane was gonna get caught by Bobby. So I imagined, just imagined that Bobby was the guy I’d always thought he was. My friend. My chess teacher. “Oh, Bobby,” I said real loud, and laughed. “You scared me. I was just thinking I could get into the shed and get some lanyards for myself. I wanna make one for my mother because she’s coming home from the hospital and I saw you were busy playing checkers with Mimi and… hey, how about a quick game of chess?”

Bobby ignored me and looked all around. “Where’s your pal Mary Lane? I saw the two of you come over here. Where’d she go off to?” He peered into the shed and the light came across his face and lit him up like he was an angel. I held my breath and prayed Dear Mary Mother of God, help your namesake. It seemed like a long time until he pulled his head back away from the crack and asked again, “Where is she, Sally?”

“She’s not here. She had to go home. She…”

Bobby grinned and took another step closer to me. “Gosh, that’s too bad. I had something real special planned for her and now she’s gonna miss out on all the fun.”

“Bobby, I really gotta get going. Troo is waiting for me.” I started to walk off. He grabbed me by my wrist. “Well, actually, Sally, she’s not. Troo seems to have fallen off the monkey bars and is taking a little nap.”

“Troo,” I moaned, and tried to break free. He pulled me closer.

There was a little gap between Bobby’s front teeth that I had never noticed before. He picked up my braid and ran the end of it across his lips. “I just love blondes. And those green eyes of yours. Delicious.” He was making a funny noise in his throat, like the Kenfields’ cat did when I rubbed her tummy. “We are going to have a very special night. I’ve been planning it all summer long. Are you ready?”

I tried to scream then, but all that came out was, “Ahhh.” Just like in my dream when the Creature from the Black Lagoon caught me. Just a gagging sound that nobody could hear but me. And Bobby.

“So that’s a yes?” he purred. He was running his fingers down my blouse toward my shorts. His breathing sounded like it did after we played tetherball. And then he wrapped his arms around me and I recognized the feeling coming off his body from that night in the Fazios’ backyard when he’d come after me with the pillowcase on his face. The feeling that I thought was fear coming off him. It wasn’t fear… I knew that then. Bobby felt excited. The way you do when you wanted something for a very long time and you finally got it.

He pulled me into his chest and held me and his warm breath on my neck smelled milky like a baby’s. If you were in one of the houses across the street and you were watching us, you would think to yourself, what a nice counselor that Bobby Brophy was to care so much about those kids. He put his lips in my ear and his flickering tongue licked the insides and all I could think about was what Mary Lane said about boa constrictors that ate kids whole.

Out of the corner of my eye, I could see her climb out from under the gray shadow of that worktable, and then as quiet as a mouse she pushed open the dirty window that was just above it. Did she have the Kroger bag with her? If she didn’t, and she ran over to find Mr. Dave and tell him that Bobby Brophy was the murderer and molester, he wouldn’t believe lying Mary Lane.

Bobby stepped back and brought one of his hands up to the back of my neck and first tickled it and then squeezed. He stuck his other hand through the crack in the shed door, pulled at something, and the playground went dark. Then he yanked me toward the back of the school, where there was another way out. When I tried to tug back, he said in another kind of growling voice, “If you don’t stop fighting me, I’ll strangle you right here, right now, and then you know what I’ll do?” He pulled me across Fiftieth Street and back behind the Grinders’. He had me up against their garage and was pushing against me with his body and something hard in his pants was pressing against my chest. “I’ll go back for Troo.”

I stopped struggling and fell against him. Then he said in this pretty-sounding voice, “I’m sorry to be in such a hurry tonight, Sally. Usually I like to take my brides out to this spot in the country so we can spend a little more time together, and then I bring ’em back to the lagoon after we’ve gotten to know each other a little better.” He pulled me through another yard with a barking black dog struggling hard against a chain. Bobby kicked at its head. The dog yelped and then went quiet. “You know where we’re going? I’ll give you three guesses.” My legs were shaking so bad that I couldn’t walk, and finally Bobby gave up on dragging me and picked me up in his arms. “We’re going to one of your favorite places.”

I could feel his muscles through his shirt when he half ran past Fitzpatrick’s Drugstore. Through the dim window light I could see Henry at the counter reading. I tried to call, “Henry… help.” Bobby put his hand that smelled like car oil over my mouth and in a raspy voice in between breaths he said, “You like that little Homo Henry, don’t you?” He sounded like I had done something to hurt his feelings. “You don’t like Henry more than you like Bobby, do you?” He was staring through the window at the boy I would never get to marry.

I whispered, “No, Bobby. No. I don’t like Henry more than you. I like you the very best of all.” I didn’t know why I said that because saying it made me cry.

Bobby said kindly, “Oh, now, now, don’t do that. We’re gonna have so much fun and then when we’re done you can be with your daddy. And I’ll bring pink carnations to your funeral just like I did for Junie and Sara.” He stroked my cheek and rubbed his nose against mine the way Daddy used to, humming along with the siren I heard. Was it coming for me?

“I know what you’re thinking, sweetheart, but don’t get your hopes up. Bobby is too smart for those cops. Take my word for it. Nobody knows.” He seemed to get extra strong then, like a second wind. We were almost to the lagoon. “Oh, look, there it is. Our honeymoon spot.” He ran across the street with me flopping in his arms. I could hear the siren getting closer and I prayed please please please let Mary Lane have taken that Kroger bag and found Mr. Dave. If she hadn’t, when he was through with me, Bobby could go back and get the Kroger bag and nobody would be the wiser. And when Mary Lane tried to tell people what happened, they’d just shake their heads and think she was telling another one of her whoppers. And Troo… what had he done to my Troo?

Bobby giggled when he set me down so gently on the grass under the trees right off the zoo entrance. Not far from the red rowboats, but away from the streetlights. I could smell wet dirt and hear the lagoon water lapping up onto the muddy rocks, and not far off, music and a girl laughing. Bobby pulled his shirt off over his head and then began pulling at his leather belt, grunting when it gave him some trouble. When he looked down at the buckle to get it untangled, I heard Daddy’s voice in my head… Now, Sal, now. Fly like the wind. I jumped up fast and scrambled over the fence and ran down the path that led to the zoo before he had time to grab me. Behind me, Bobby’s feet rattled in the chain-link fence and he was singing, “Red light, green light, hope to see the ghost tonight.” His laugh sounded high-pitched, like an air-raid siren.

I couldn’t keep up that running. I was so tired and my chest was fiery hot so I had to slow down, and I knew when I did, Bobby would catch up to me. So I veered off the path toward the animal cages. He didn’t know the zoo like I did because I heard him trip on the old sewer handle that stuck out of the asphalt in front of the bears’ den and he screamed,

“Fuck.” But then right away I could hear his running footsteps and smell his stink when he said from the darkness close, real close, “Stop, or when I catch you, I will make you hurt like you never hurt in your life, you little bitch.” His voice was deep and as harsh as anything I’d ever heard, and I knew in my heart that Bobby was the devil in the details. And that he’d been true to his word. Nobody knew. The siren had stopped.

But I didn’t. I could hear and smell some of the animals stirring around in the dark. I ran past the lion cage and past my and Troo’s favorite tree and jumped over the black iron fence in front of Sampson’s enclosure. I knew they didn’t put the animals away in their houses when it was this hot. He was there in the dark. Waiting for me. I hurried over the grass to the edge of the pit.

I could hear Bobby come up right behind me. When I turned to face him, he said, “Gotcha.” When he leaped for me, the air came off his body like an airplane taking off, his arms the wings. I waited until the timing was right. And then, at the last second, I ducked and he flew over me, his chest shiny and sleek. It happened so slowly, like he was being held up against the sky by an invisible force. He smiled and reached out for me, and when he did, whatever was holding him up let go and he dropped into Sampson’s pit with a beautiful, beautiful thud.

It was quiet for a while after that except for my breathing. Then rustling noises came from below and my King sang out in the voice of an angel… “Don’t Get Around Much Anymore.”