Hell to pay, p.16
Hell to Pay, page 16
“Well, I might,” said the woman, winking.
“This is not a conversation I want to overhear,” said Stu. “Take it outside, please.”
Laurel thanked Stu for showing her the gun and left the store at exactly the same time Becky decided to take her afternoon break.
Twenty minutes later Laurel was driving home with a Franchi Affinity Catalyst and a box of complimentary shells in the back seat.
Once she got home she put the shotgun and shells in the front closet, just off the kitchen. It wasn’t a closet Jeremy used much, which would give her some time to bring it up with him. I bought a gun, Sweetie, but it’s made for a lady, no cause for alarm, really.
It was late now. Dusk was coming earlier as autumn crept in. She headed to the back door, opened it and stepped out onto the patio.
Max was gone.
VI.
The Road to Hell
THIRTY-SIX
“MAX! HEY BOY! MAX!”
Laurel walked along the road, calling out Max’s name. She’d already circled the back yard, shouting his name, hoping he would come running to her from the trees. She could not understand how he’d gotten out. There was a small gate in the fence, allowing entrance from the side, but it was closed.
Someone opened the gate, Max came out, they closed the gate again.
The thought that anyone would deliberately let her dog out was too infuriating, and too disturbing, to contemplate. He must have jumped the fence. It wouldn’t be hard for a dog as large and energetic as Max. But why would he do that, and where would he go?
Slowly zigzagging up the road, she stared into the thick brush on each side that led quickly into surrounding trees. At one point, hearing a gunshot from the club, she jumped. She immediately worried that Max could be accidentally shot by a hunter, despite the assurance she’d been given that no one hunted on this land. A dog running through the woods might easily be mistaken for a deer, just an animal bounding into the site of a rifle. And if that was improbable, the thorns and ticks Max could be covered with by now were not. He’d walked this road many times with her, but always leashed, and unfamiliar with the terrain beyond the road’s shoulders.
“Max! Boy!” she shouted.
She came upon one driveway obscuring a house, then another. What if he’d not been set loose, but stolen? Was he in one of those houses? Or had he been coaxed into a car, or a truck, and taken away, never to be seen by her again?
She eventually made her way to the Grangers’ driveway. She stopped, staring up toward the house. What would she find this time—a normal house, with an abnormal couple enjoying the late afternoon in a room with no television? Or a ghost house, back again as mysteriously as it had vanished when Jeremy dragged her down here to show her it was all in her mind?
Walking up the driveway, Laurel quickly saw things were as they had been when they’d brought the bowl. A kitchen light was on, visible in the waning afternoon light. And there was Eileen, standing at the sink. Doing dishes? Waiting for Laurel?
She steeled herself and approached the porch door.
Coming out to meet her, wiping her hands on a dish towel, Eileen said, “Back so soon? We love the bowl, it’s perfect for fruit.”
“My dog’s gone,” Laurel said bluntly.
Eileen was taken aback. It was not the way she’d expected to be greeted.
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
Are you, Eileen? Laurel thought. Are you really?
“He must have jumped the fence,” said Laurel, unconvinced that’s what had happened.
“He can’t be far. Let me search with you. I know these woods, we’ll find him.”
“I don’t need any help,” Laurel said. “But thank you. I just thought ...”
“He might be here? Why would he come here, Dear?”
Because a dog can smell the Devil.
“I’ll just keep looking,” Laurel said.
“Let me help you.”
Laurel wondered why she’d come to the Grangers’ home. What had she expected to find? Max sniffing around an abandoned house? Had she simply wanted someone to share her alarm, to know how worried she was?
“That would be nice,” Laurel said. The sun was going down and she wanted to find Max as soon as possible. Having another person with her might help.
A moment later Eileen closed the door behind her. There was no sign of Pete.
They headed toward Laurel’s house, taking turns calling out: “Max! Hey Max!”
Reaching the Calloways’ house, they went around back and looked at the fence.
“It’s not very high,” Eileen said. “It wouldn’t be hard ...”
“For Max to jump it, I know,” Laurel said. “But he never has before.”
“You haven’t had him very long. What do you really know about this dog?”
This dog is loyal, that’s what I know about him, Laurel thought, already regretting she’d allowed Eileen to come with her. She did not believe Eileen cared whether or not they found Max.
Just open the gate, let him out, close the gate again.
She did not want to believe Eileen, or anyone, would let Max out.
Jeremy’s on his way home from Philadelphia. It couldn’t have been him.
At that moment Laurel felt completely alone, despite Eileen standing four feet from her. She wished she’d stayed in the city, or that she’d taken Max with her.
The sound came then.
Thwack.
Not far off, echoing in the woods.
Eileen turned and stared at the tree line. “He’s coming closer,” she said, an edge to her voice.
Laurel saw a look of dread on Eileen’s face. Not terror, but a sense of resignation.
“Who is coming closer, Eileen?”
Ignoring the question, Eileen asked, “Did you look in the woods?”
Thwack.
“I haven’t had time,” replied Laurel.
“I think we should.”
Not waiting for Laurel’s agreement, Eileen started walking toward the trees. It took Laurel a moment to realize Eileen was going with or without her. She hurried to catch up.
They reached the edge of the lawn.
Thwack.
Eileen stood just feet from the trees.
“What’s wrong?” asked Laurel.
Eileen turned to her. “Nothing.”
I don’t believe you, old woman. Something is very wrong.
“Are you afraid?” Laurel persisted.
Looking more sad than fearful, Eileen replied, “No. Joe is an old friend. Everyone knows him.”
Everyone but me.
“I think I know where your dog is.”
Eileen’s expression had changed again, as if she knew she had revealed too much and tried to hide it with a smile.
“Come.”
Eileen headed into the trees, Laurel tagging close behind.
The sound of an axe splitting wood had stopped.
“Will he wait this time?” asked Laurel. “Joe, I mean.”
“No, Dear. We don’t go to Joe,” Eileen said over her shoulder, marching ahead. “Joe comes to us.”
Laurel decided to drop the subject. She was not concerned with a stranger named Joe who split logs in the forest. She was only concerned with finding Max before darkness prevented any further searching.
It suddenly occurred to her that Eileen knew these woods well. She led them on a barely visible path, one Laurel had not recognized before.
“Where are we going?”
“You’ll see,” said Eileen. “Try saying his name now.”
Laurel was hoarse from calling out, but she did it anyway: “Max! Hey boy! Max!”
And in response she heard a single bark.
They kept walking. Two minutes later, her shoes covered in the debris of the woods, Laurel followed Eileen into a clearing.
There, next to two small grave markers, sat Max.
“This is where they’re buried,” Laurel said.
Eileen did not respond.
Laurel walked to the markers and read the names: John Louis Dempsey, 1933 – 2016, and, next to it, Helen Kathryn Dempsey, 1934 – 2019.
“There aren’t any flowers,” Laurel said. She had not been to a graveyard since her grandmother died ten years ago. She imagined them dotted with vases where loved ones diligently kept fresh or fake flowers, something to give a sense of life and remembrance among the dead.
“It’s the woods,” Eileen replied. “It doesn’t need flowers, although Pete comes by from time to time to keep the clearing up.
Laurel noticed the grass around the small area had been recently clipped. She had forgotten Max for a moment as she stared at the markers, little more than gray bricks.
Like the bricks in the archway downstairs. Keeping things out.
Max had been sitting there, watching over the graves.
“At least I know they’re not buried in the basement,” Laurel said, too flippantly.
“Oh, that’s not them,” Eileen said. “Who knows what it is?”
You do, Eileen, thought Laurel. You and Joe and all the people in this godforsaken town.
“Let’s go home, Max,” Laurel said.
He’d gotten up from his place by the graves and trotted to her side, slowly wagging his tail. He raised his snout, forcing her to reach down and pet him.
Eileen looked at her. “I hope you feel better now.”
About the people buried here? About the wall in my basement? What, Eileen, do you hope I feel better about?
“We found Max,” Laurel said. “I couldn’t be happier.”
Thwack.
The sound came again, somewhere far to her left.
“He chops wood in the dark?” Laurel asked, looking up at the fading light.
“He prefers it.” Eileen replied. She began walking back to the house, noticeably quicker than she’d marched into the woods.
Night was coming. Joe was coming. It was time to leave.
THIRTY-SEVEN
JEREMY WAS FURIOUS.
“You don’t know how to shoot a gun,” he said.
“It’s a shotgun,” Laurel replied. “You put the shells in it, hold it up and shoot.”
“Those things have a recoil, Laurel. You could blow your own foot off. Or put a hole in the ceiling.”
“I wasn’t planning on shooting it in the house.”
It was dark outside. Jeremy had made it home early, lamenting the previous weekend’s closing of the play but looking forward to auditioning for the next one set to open in October. He’d also been excited about his new agent and the commercial he was scheduled to shoot in two weeks. His upbeat mood had made Laurel think it would be a good time to tell him she was now a gunowner as well as a homeowner. She had been wrong.
“Do you want to see it?” Laurel asked. “It’s in the closet, with a box of shells they gave me free!”
“You sound like a little girl who just got a doll for Christmas,” he said. “No, I don’t want to see it. Don’t you need a permit or something for one of those?”
“There are ways,” she replied, leaving it at that. She did not want the gun shop, or the woman who worked there, to get into any kind of trouble. She knew what she’d done was skirting the law, but not illegal.
“More importantly,” Laurel said, “someone let Max out.”
Jeremy had changed out of his work clothes into sweats and one of the T-shirts he wore around the house.
“I don’t understand, ‘someone let Max out.’ What does that mean?”
“They opened the side gate, let him out, and closed it again. Someone was on our property, and you wonder why I want a shotgun?”
He stared at her. “Has it occurred to you that he just jumped the fence?”
Laurel knew that was the most obvious way Max got out, but her instincts, and her suspicions, told her otherwise.
“I’ll admit it’s possible.”
“It’s probable, Laurel. He’s a big dog, it’s a small fence. He’s back now, so what’s the problem?”
“The problem is he went into the woods. Eileen thought that might be where he was. I walked to her house when I was searching for him. She came back with me and we went into the forest.”
“It’s not a forest.”
“What’s the difference?” Laurel snapped. “Trees. Lots of trees, whatever name you give it. That man was there somewhere, Joe the woodsman, that’s what she called him. We could hear him chopping wood. And then we found Max, sitting by the graves.”
That got his attention. Laurel had told him about the Dempseys being buried on the property. The alarm he’d shown had been for her sanity, not for the truth of the claim. Now there was proof. Now she’d seen the grave markers.
“So they’re buried here. Who cares, Laurel? A few years from now it’ll be overgrown. Everyone who knew them will be gone—haven’t you noticed we’re about forty years younger than most people here? Just let it go. If it creeps you out, don’t spend time in the woods.”
“We live in the woods, Jeremy. Our house is on a small spot of it that’s been mowed. ‘The woods’ own us, not the other way around.”
“So you want to move back to New York, is that it?”
Yes! Yes, I want to move back to the city. I want coffee shops every two blocks. I want people to do our laundry. I want the subway and the theater and that godawful stench settling over everything in the summer.
“We might be able to soon,” she said carefully, hoping a measured response was the best. “People are interested in the rights to my book. Movies rights, maybe a series.”
“Really? Dotty told you that?”
“She did. And Stan wants a bidding war. We could be looking at three hundred thousand dollars or more.”
The news stunned Jeremy. He sat down in one of the kitchen chairs, letting it sink in. After a moment, he looked up and smiled.
“It’s happening,” he said.
Laurel eased into the chair across from him.
“What’s happening?” she asked, puzzled.
“Everything we wanted,” he replied. “I’ve got an agent, the best at the agency, by the way. I’ve got work as an actor. Eleanor’s convinced I’ll have a career, and a very successful one. Your book is a hit, and now this? Movie rights?”
“You said it as if you knew it was coming.”
He reached across the table and gently took her hand in his.
“I’d hoped, Sweetie, that’s all. We’ve wanted this to happen, and it’s happening. This is our lucky house. If we hadn’t moved here ...”
I wouldn’t own a shotgun. We wouldn’t have a dog. Our neighbors wouldn’t frighten me.
“And soon we can think of moving,” she said. “If we want to.”
He smiled at her: whatever you say, Sweetheart. She knew the smile well. It was the expression he offered to placate her, to let her think her suggestions were treated seriously when he had no intention of taking them.
“Where’s the paperwork?” Laurel asked.
She could tell he was still thinking about the money, his career, their very good fortune.
“What paperwork?”
“For the house. I looked through the boxes. There’s nothing there.”
“Why would you do that?” he said sharply.
“Because I want to see it!”
Realizing she’d almost shouted, she composed herself.
“It’s my house, too. I want to read what we signed to buy this place, that’s all.”
Jeremy got up from the table.
“Stop being so obsessed. It’s somewhere, Laurel. I’ll find it.”
“Please do that,” she said, watching him walk toward the bedroom.
Jeremy stopped in the doorway. Turning around, he said quietly, “I looked up some therapists in Philadelphia who specialize in ... you know ...”
She stared at him, disbelieving and angry.
“No, Jeremy, I don’t know. Why would you look up therapists?”
“I think the strain is taking a toll on you.”
“What strain? I sit at my computer for two hours a day. I get coffee at the farmers market. I take Max for walks. What strain are you talking about?”
Struggling for words, Jeremy finally said, “Success, Laurel. Money. Opportunity. Maybe it’s too much for you.”
“Maybe it is,” she said, refusing to say more. Something told her to tread carefully. “Maybe you’re right, maybe I need to talk to someone. Just, you know, to figure things out.”
“As long as it’s not us you’re figuring out,” he said.
It sounded like a threat to Laurel. What if the marriage was what she needed to think through? What if moving had exposed the fault lines between them?
“I’ll do some research myself,” Laurel said, “for a therapist. It could help, and it couldn’t hurt. I can afford one now.”
Not “we” can afford one. “I” can afford one. I, singular. I, the one who made the money ... enough money to leave this place, with or without you.
She could see the nuance was not lost on Jeremy. His eyes narrowed as he stood there, looking at her.
“Yes,” he said. “You can.”
He turned and walked into the bedroom.
Laurel began planning her escape.
THIRTY-EIGHT
THE SOUND WAS LOUDER THIS time, so loud she heard it through the heating vent in the wall across from their bed. The vent was by the floor. She’d never heard anything through it before. They wouldn’t need to turn the furnace on for another month or more, and she had no idea if it made any noise when heat was pumped up through it. But now, 2:00 a.m. by the digital clock, she heard it clearly: the scratching sound. Slow and steady, not frantic. Chipping away, almost as if it did not want her to hear it, as if this time it was not seeking her attention.
Laurel gently rolled over to look at Jeremy. He slept with his back to her. Most nights he snored, sometimes quietly, sometimes loudly. Tonight there was nothing.
Is he awake? she wondered. Does he hear it, too? Had he heard it before and just acted as if he had not, pretending to be asleep and unaware of the sound from their basement?
She thought about saying his name. She considered shaking him. But then what? Would the sound stop, playing tricks on her? She imagined so. She imagined Jeremy sitting up and listening ... to nothing. “There’s no sound, Laurel. It’s all in your troubled mind.”
