The Servants of Twilight Read online

  After a moment, she hurried in his wake, caught up with him, put a hand on his shoulder. “Please.”

  He stopped, turned to her. His face was hard, his eyes cold.

  She said, “I’m sorry. I really am. I’m just distraught. I don’t know what to think. All of a sudden I don’t know where to turn.”

  “I understand,” he said, as he had said a couple of times before, but there was no understanding in his granite face.

  Glancing back to make sure Joey was still in the doorway, still too far away to hear, she said, “I’m sorry I flew off the handle at you. And I guess you’re right about watching my language around Joey. Most of the time I do watch it, believe me, but today I’m not thinking straight. That crazy woman told me that my little boy had to die. That’s what she said. He’s got to die, she said. And now the dog’s dead, poor old fur-face. God, I liked that mutt a lot. He’s dead and gone, and Joey saw a face at the window in the middle of the night, and all of a sudden the world’s turned upside-down, and I’m scared, really scared, because I think somehow that crazy woman followed us, and I think she’s going to do it, or at least try to do it, try to kill my little boy. I don’t know why. There can’t be a reason. Not a reason that makes any sense. But that doesn’t make any difference, does it? Not these days. These days, the newspapers are full of stories about punks and child molesters and lunatics of all kinds who don’t need a reason to do what they do.”

  Wilford said, “Mrs. Scavello, please, you’ve got to keep control of yourself. You’re being melodramatic. I won’t say hysterical, but definitely melodramatic. It’s not as bad as you’re making out. We’ll get to work on this, just like I told you. Meanwhile, you put your trust in God, and you’ll be all right, you and your boy.”

  She couldn’t reach this man. Not ever. Not in a million years. She couldn’t make him feel her terror, couldn’t make him understand what it would mean to her if she lost Joey. It was hopeless, after all.

  She could barely remain on her feet. All the strength went out of her.

  He said, “I sure am glad, though, to hear you say you’ll watch your language around the boy. The last couple generations in this country, we’ve been raising anti-social, know-it-all snots who have no respect for anything. If we’re ever going to have us a good, peaceful, God-loving and God-fearing society, then we got to raise ’em up by the right example.”

  She said nothing. She felt as if she were standing here with someone from another country—maybe even from another planet—who not only didn’t speak her language but who had no capacity to learn. There was no way he could ever grasp her problems, appreciate her concerns. In every way that counted, they were thousands of miles apart, and there was no road between them.

  Wilford’s flinty eyes sparked with the passion of a true believer as he said: “And I also recommend you don’t go around without a bra in front of the boy, the way you are now. A woman built like you, even wearing a loose blouse like that, certain ways you turn or stretch . . . it’s bound to be . . . arousing.”

  She stared at him in disbelief. Several cutting remarks came to mind, any one of which would have stopped him dead, but for some reason she couldn’t seem to summon the words to her lips. Of course, her reticence was in part the result of having had a mother who would have made General George Patton look soft-hearted, a mother who had insisted on good manners and unfailing politeness. There were also the lessons of the Church, deeply ingrained in her, which said you were supposed to turn the other cheek. She told herself she had broken loose from all of that, had left it far behind, but now her inability to put Wilford in his place was indisputable proof that, to her dismay, she was still to some degree a prisoner of her past.

  Wilford went right on babbling, oblivious of her fury. “Maybe the boy doesn’t even notice now, but in a couple of years he’ll notice for sure, and a boy shouldn’t be having those kinds of thoughts about his own mother. You’d be leading him in the way of the devil.”

  If she hadn’t been so weak, if she hadn’t been weighed down by the terrible awareness of her and Joey’s helplessness, Christine would have laughed in his face. But right now there was no laughter in her.

  Wilford said, “Well, okay then. I’ll be talking to you. Trust in God, Mrs. Scavello. Trust in God.”

  She wondered what he’d say if she told him it wasn’t Mrs. Scavello. What would he do if she told him Joey had been born out of wedlock, a bastard child? Would he work on the case a little less eagerly? Would he be at all concerned about preserving the life of an illegitimate little boy?

  God damn all hypocrites.

  She wanted to hit Wilford, kick him and hit him and take out her frustration on him, but she only watched as he got into the patrol car where his partner waited for him. He looked back at her, raised one hand, and gave her a curt little wave through the window.

  She returned to the front door.

  Joey was waiting for her.

  She wanted to say something reassuring to him. He looked as if he needed that. But even if she’d been able to find the words, she wouldn’t have been able to deceive him by speaking them. Right now, until they knew what the hell was happening, it was probably better to be scared. If he was frightened, he would be careful, watchful.

  She felt disaster coming.

  Was she being melodramatic?

  No.

  Joey felt it coming, too. She could see a dreadful anticipation in his eyes.

  6

  She stepped into the house, closed the door, locked it.

  She ruffled Joey’s hair. “You okay, honey?”

  “I’m gonna miss Brandy,” he said in a shaky voice, trying to be a brave little man but not quite succeeding.

  “Me too,” Christine said, remembering how funny Brandy had looked in the role of Chewbacca the Wookie.

  Joey said, “I thought . . .”

  “What?”

  “Maybe it would be a good idea . . .”

  “Yeah?”

  “. . . a good idea to get another dog soon.”

  She hunkered down to his level. “You know, that’s a very mature idea. Very wise, I think.”

  “I don’t mean I want to forget Brandy.”

  “Of course not.”

  “I couldn’t ever forget him.”

  “We’ll always remember Brandy. He’ll always have a special place in our hearts,” she said. “And I’m sure he’d understand about us getting another dog right away. In fact, I’m sure that’s what he’d want us to do.”

  “So I’ll still be protected,” Joey said.

  “That’s right. Brandy would want you to be protected.”

  In the kitchen, the telephone rang.

  “Tell you what,” she said, “I’ll just answer the phone, and then we’ll make arrangements for burying Brandy.”

  The phone rang again.

  “We’ll find a nice pet cemetery or something, and we’ll lay Brandy to rest with all the right honors.”

  “I’d like that,” he said.

  The phone rang a third time.

  Heading toward the kitchen, she said, “Then later we’ll look for a puppy.” She picked up the phone just as it completed a fifth ring. “Hello?”

  A woman said, “Are you part of it?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Are you part of it—or don’t you know what’s happening?” the woman asked.

  Although the voice was vaguely familiar, Christine said, “I think you’ve got the wrong number.”

  “You are Miss Scavello, aren’t you?”

  “Yes. Who’s this?”

  “I’ve got to know if you’re part of it. Are you one of them? Or are you an innocent? I’ve got to know.”

  Suddenly Christine recognized the voice, and a chill crept up her spine.

  The old woman said, “Do you know what your son really is? Do you know the evil in him? Do you know why he’s got to die?”

  Christine slammed the phone down.

  Joey had followed her in
to the kitchen. He was standing just this side of the door to the dining room, chewing on a thumbnail. In his striped shirt and jeans and somewhat tattered sneakers, he looked pathetically small, defenseless.

  The phone began to ring again.

  Ignoring it, Christine said, “Come on, Skipper. Stay with me. Stay close to me.”

  She led him out of the kitchen, through the dining room and living room, upstairs to the master bedroom.

  He didn’t ask what was wrong. From the look on his face, she thought he probably knew.

  The phone kept ringing.

  In the bedroom she pulled the top drawer out of the highboy, rummaged under a stack of folded sweaters, and came up with a wicked-looking pistol, a selective doubleaction Astra Constable .32 automatic with a snub-nosed barrel. She had purchased it years ago, before Joey was born, when she’d begun living alone, and she had learned how to use it. The gun had given her a much-needed sense of security—as it did now, once again.

  The phone rang and rang.

  When Joey had come into her life, especially when he had begun to walk, she’d been afraid that, in his ceaseless curiosity, he would find the weapon and play with it. Protection against burglars had to be weighed against the more likely—and more frightening—possibility that Joey would hurt himself. She had unloaded the gun, had put the empty magazine in a dresser drawer, and had buried the gun itself beneath the sweaters in the highboy, and fortunately had never needed it since then.

  Until now.

  The shrill ringing of the telephone became louder and more irritating by the moment.

  Pistol in hand, Christine went to the dresser and located the empty magazine. She hurried to the closet where she kept a box of ammunition on the top shelf, all the way at the back. With trembling and clumsy fingers, she pushed cartridges into the magazine until it was full, then slapped it into the butt of the pistol hard enough to lock it in place.

  Joey watched in wide-eyed fascination.

  At last the telephone stopped ringing.

  The sudden silence had the force of a blow. It briefly stunned Christine.

  Joey was the first to speak. Still chewing on a thumbnail, he said, “Was it the witch on the phone?”

  There was no point in hiding it from him and no point in telling him the old woman wasn’t really a witch. “Yeah. It was her.”

  “Mommy . . . I’m scared.”

  For the past several months, ever since he had overcome his fear of the imaginary white snake that had disturbed his sleep, he had called her “Mom” instead of “Mommy” because he was trying to be more grown-up. His reversion to “Mommy” was an indication of just how badly frightened he was.

  “It’ll be all right. I’m not going to let anything happen to . . . either of us. If we’re just careful, we’ll be okay.”

  She kept expecting to hear a knock at the door or see a face at the window. Where had the old woman been calling from? How long would it take her to get here now that the cops were gone, now that she had a clear shot at Joey?

  “What’re we gonna do?” he asked.

  She put the loaded gun on top of the six-drawer highboy and dragged two suitcases from the back of the closet. “I’m going to pack a bag for each of us and then we’re getting out of here.”

  “Where’re we going?”

  She threw one of the suitcases onto her bed and opened it. “I don’t know for sure, sweetheart. Anywhere. To a hotel, probably. We’ll go someplace where that crazy old hag won’t be able to find us no matter how hard she looks.”

  “Then what?”

  As she folded clothes into the open suitcase, she said, “Then we’ll find someone who can help us . . . really help us.”

  “Not like the cops?”

  “Not like the cops.”

  “Who?”

  “I’m not sure. Maybe . . . a private detective.”

  “Like Magnum on TV?”

  “Maybe not exactly like Magnum,” Christine said.

  “Like who, then?”

  “We need a big firm that can provide us with bodyguards and everything while they’re tracking down that old woman. A first-rate organization.”

  “Like in them old movies?”

  “What old movies are those?”

  “You know. Where they’re in real bad trouble, and they say, ‘We’ll hire Pinkelton.’”

  “Pinkerton,” she corrected. “Yeah. Something like Pinkerton. I can afford to hire people like that and, by God, I’m going to hire them. We’re not just going to be a couple of sitting ducks the way the cops would have us.”

  “I’d feel a whole bunch safer if we just went and hired Magnum,” Joey said.

  She didn’t have time to explain to a six-year-old that Magnum wasn’t a real private eye. She said, “Well, maybe you’re right. Maybe we will hire Magnum.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah.”

  “He’ll do a good job,” Joey said soberly. “He always does.”

  At her direction, Joey took the empty suitcase and headed toward his room. She followed, carrying the suitcase that she had already packed—and the pistol.

  She decided they wouldn’t go to a hotel first. They’d go straight to a detective agency and not waste any time dealing with this.

  Her mouth was sandpaper-dry. Her heart thudded. She was breathing hard and fast.

  In her mind a terrible vision rose, an image of a bloody and decapitated body sprawled on the back porch. But in the vision, it wasn’t Brandy she saw in gory ruin. It was Joey.

  7

  Charlie Harrison was proud of his accomplishments. He had started with nothing, just a poor kid from the shabby side of Indianapolis. Now, at thirty-six, he was owner of a thriving business—full owner since the retirement of the company’s founder, Harvey Klemet—and was living the good life in southern California. If he wasn’t exactly on top of the world yet, he was at least eighty percent of the way there, and the view from his current elevation was quite satisfying.

  The offices of Klemet-Harrison were not remotely like the seedy quarters of private investigators in novels and films. These rooms, on the fifth floor of a five-story building on a quiet street in Costa Mesa, were comfortably and tastefully decorated.

  The reception lounge made a good first impression on new clients. It was plushly carpeted, and the walls were covered with a subtle grass cloth. The furniture was new—and not from the low end of the manufacturer’s line, either. The walls weren’t adorned only with cheap prints; there were three Eyvind Earle serigraphs worth more than fifteen hundred dollars apiece.

  Charlie’s private office was even somewhat plusher than the reception area, yet it avoided the ponderous and solemn look favored by attorneys and many other professionals. Bleached-wood paneling reached halfway up the walls. There were bleached-wood shutters on the windows, a contemporary desk by Henredon, armchairs covered in an airy green print from Brunschwig & Fils. On the walls were two large, light-filled paintings by Martin Green, undersea scenes of ethereal plant life fluttering gracefully in mysterious currents and tides. A few large plants, mostly ferns and pothos, hung from the ceiling or rested on rosewood stands. The effect was almost subtropical yet cool and rich.

  But when Christine Scavello walked through the door, Charlie suddenly felt that the room was woefully inadequate. Yes, it was light and well-balanced and expensive and truly exquisite; nevertheless, it seemed hopelessly heavy, clunky, and even garish when compared to this striking woman.

  Coming out from behind his desk, he said, “Ms. Scavello, I’m Charlie Harrison. I’m so pleased to meet you.”

  She accepted his hand and said she was pleased to meet him, too.

  Her hair was thick, shiny, dark-dark brown, almost black. He wanted to run his fingers through it. He wanted to put his face in her hair and smell it.

  Unaccustomed to having such a strong and immediate reaction to anyone, Charlie reined himself in. He looked at her more closely, as dispassionately as possible. He told himself that
she wasn’t perfect, certainly not breathtakingly beautiful. Pretty, yes, but not a total knockout. Her brow was somewhat too high, and her cheekbones seemed a little heavy, and her nose was slightly pinched.

  Nevertheless, with a breathless and ingratiating manner that wasn’t like him, he said, “I apologize for the condition of the office,” and was surprised and dismayed to hear himself make such a statement.

  She looked puzzled. “Why should you apologize? It’s lovely.”

  He blinked. “You really think so?”

  “Absolutely. It’s unexpected. Not at all what I thought a private detective’s office would look like. But that just makes it even more interesting, appealing.”

  Her eyes were huge and dark. Clear, direct eyes. Each time he met them, his breath caught for an instant.

  “Did it myself,” he said, deciding the room didn’t look so bad, after all. “Didn’t use an interior decorator.”

  “You’ve got a real flair for it.”

  He showed her to a chair and noticed, as she sat down, that she had lovely legs and perfectly shaped ankles.

  But I’ve seen other legs as lovely, other ankles as well shaped, he thought with some bafflement, and I haven’t ever before been swept away by this adolescent longing, haven’t felt this ridiculously sudden surge in hormone levels.

  Either he was hornier than he thought, or he was reacting to more than her appearance.

  Perhaps her appeal was as much in the way she walked and shook hands and carried herself (with an easy, graceful minimum of movement), and in her voice (soft, earthy, feminine, yet unaffected, with a note of strength), and in the way she met his eyes (forthrightly), as it was in the way she looked. In spite of the circumstances in which he was meeting her, in spite of the fact that she had a serious problem about which she must be worried, she possessed an uncommon inner tranquility that intrigued him.

  That doesn’t quite explain it either, he thought. Since when have I ever wanted to jump into bed with a woman because of her uncommon inner tranquility?

  All right, so he wasn’t going to be able to analyze this feeling, not yet. He would just have to go with it and try to understand it later.