Serpent's Tooth. Michael R. Collings

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СКАЧАТЬ Rick’s...with Rick.”

      Victoria squeezed Carver’s shoulder lightly and went on into the house. I heard her call out “Janet? Greta?” and then the door banged shut.

      “I didn’t know what else to do,” Carver said, as if he had to explain himself to me. “It just seemed automatic to call Miz Sears. I figured she would know....”

      “I’m sure that was exactly the right thing to do,” I said. My heart went out to him. “Was...uh, Rick, was it?”

      Carver nodded again.

      “Was Rick a close friend? Somebody you knew from school?”

      He shook his head this time.

      “I didn’t really know him that well. He’s only lived with Miz Johan...with his grandma for about a year. He was pretty much a loner. But sometimes we worked together on jobs.

      “We were helping Mr. Nielson—Tom Nielson, that is—put up his grain yesterday. And he called me last night from Land’s End to come pick him up. Said he didn’t feel well.”

      Carver seemed to shudder.

      “Let’s go on in, shall we?”

      He looked up and blinked, as if seeing me for the first time.

      “Right. I should be in there to help Mom. And Miz Johansson .”

      He led the way to through the door, which opened onto the kitchen. In the next room—probably the living room—I could hear the low murmur of women’s voices, the kind of sounds that warn of illness or death or other tragedy.

      By the time we entered, Victoria had clearly taken charge. She was standing near a low sofa on which two women were sitting. One held a fragile tea cup that occasionally clinked against the saucer in her other hand. She looked to be about fifty. From the blond hair, blue eyes, and strong features, I could tell that this must be Janet Ellis, Carver’s mother.

      The other woman was much older. She looked even older than Victoria, but that impression might have been wrong since, where Victoria even in her seventies was a fountain of energy and activity, this woman—Mrs. Johansson—looked washed out, drained, as fragile as the china tea cup and saucer sitting untouched on the low table in front of her. In fact, I think the tea cup would have survived a sharp blow more easily that this woman would have.

      Her hair was wispy, almost like a halo-effect, and that odd yellow-white that sometimes happens with old people and that makes them look faded and ill even if they are in the best of health. Her eyes were red-rimmed and watery, and her lips, pursed and tight, nonetheless quivered with each thin breath she drew.

      She was wearing a worn chenille robe that had to have been as old as I was. I wouldn’t even have begun to guess what color it might have started out life as, or if it had ever been printed with a bright, cheerful pattern. Her feet were thrust into shapeless scuffs that had likewise long since lost any hint of color.

      Victoria had knelt beside her and laid her hand on the other woman’s knee.

      “Can you talk now, Greta? Can you tell us anything?”

      Greta Johansson put a lace-edged handkerchief to her eyes and dabbed before nodding.

      “Victoria? Is that you?” The voice quavered and the hand that she laid over Victoria’s shook violently.

      “Yes, dear, it’s me. Janet called me.”

      “Janet?”

      “I’m right here, too, Miz Johansson. We are going to take care of everything. Don’t you worry.” Janet Ellis leaned across and patted the old hand that lay atop Victoria’s. For an awful moment, I was reminded of Shawn and the rest of his little friends grasping the handle of a baseball bat to determine first ups, and found that I had to blink back a few tears of my own.

      Shawn was my baby and he was dead. Almost two years dead. As was Terry. I could feel for this woman—a woman I had never seen before—in her grief and confusion and loss.

      “Janet? Did Rick let you in? I didn’t hear you knock? Why didn’t I hear you knock?”

      “No, Miz Johansson, Rick is....”

      Victoria shook her head.

      “Greta, dear,” she said, drawing the old woman’s attention to her and fixing Greta’s eyes with her own. “We are in Janet’s home. Carver brought you over here this morning. And Janet fixed you this nice cup of tea. Do you remember that?”

      “Tea?” She reached irresolutely toward the cup, then drew back her hand. “Yes. That’s right. Janet made me tea. And Carver woke me up and told me that I was to come with him. He came into my bedroom and woke me up. He helped me put my robe on over my night dress.”

      Now her hand rose to her throat and clutched at the robe’s lapels, pinning them closed.

      “He shouldn’t have done that, you know. Come into a lady’s bedroom like that. If Eric knew what....”

      For a moment there had been a flash of something like life in her eyes, but at the mention of her grandson’s name, the flash expired. She slumped.

      “Is Eric dead? Victoria, is it true? Is my little Eric really dead?”

      Victoria glanced at Carver, who nodded once then dropped his eyes to the floor.

      “Yes, dear, I’m afraid he is.”

      “What happened? Do you know what happened? He was fine yesterday at lunch. I didn’t see him afterward because he had to get to work but he was fine he ate a whole sandwich that wasn’t like him at all he’s usually such a finicky eater and I was so proud....”

      She hid her head in her hands.

      Victoria patted her shoulder in the time-honored “There, there” movement that only certain grandmothers and certain women who should have been grandmothers but never were can quite carry off.

      Victoria could.

      I could see the older woman’s shoulders relaxing under Victoria’s touch.

      “No, dear. I don’t know anything yet. But I will find out. I promise you. We’ll see that everything is taken care of.”

      “Victoria, is that you?” The querulous note was back. “Where am I?”

      Victoria nodded to Janet Ellis, who slid across the sofa and put her arm around the older woman, drawing her in closer as if she were a small child that needed desperately to be consoled.

      I could hear her whispering to Greta, not words really, but sounds of comfort that were apparently enough for the older woman.

      Victoria turned to face Carver and me.

      “Carver, what can you tell us?”

      “Not much. I was supposed to get him up. We were scheduled to go by Mr. Nielson’s place this morning, to talk to him about Rick’s getting his job back because the accident really wasn’t his fault”—I wanted СКАЧАТЬ