Killer, Come Back To Me

The old man nodded quietly and said, ‘Yes, yes, I remember.’

‘You remember?’ said Alice, staring.

‘A toast!’ said Jonathan Hughes, quickly. ‘To a fine wife, a grand future!’

His wife laughed. She raised her glass.

‘Mr. Weldon,’ she said, after a moment. ‘You’re not drinking? …’

It was strange seeing the old man at the door to the living room.

‘Watch this,’ he said, and closed his eyes. He began to move certainly and surely about the room, eyes shut. ‘Over here is the pipestand, over here the books. On the fourth shelf down a copy of Eiseley’s The Star Thrower. One shelf up H. G. Wells’s Time Machine, most appropriate, and over here the special chair, and me in it.’

He sat. He opened his eyes.

Watching from the door, Jonathan Hughes said, ‘You’re not going to cry again, are you?’

‘No. No more crying.’

There were sounds of washing up from the kitchen. The lovely woman out there hummed under her breath. Both men turned to look out of the room toward that humming.

‘Someday,’ said Jonathan Hughes, ‘I will hate her? Someday, I will kill her?’

‘It doesn’t seem possible, does it? I’ve watched her for an hour and found nothing, no hint, no clue, not the merest period, semicolon or exclamation point of blemish, bump, or hair out of place with her. I’ve watched you, too, to see if you were at fault, we were at fault, in all this.’

‘And?’ The young man poured sherry for both of them, and handed over a glass.

‘You drink too much is about the sum. Watch it.’

Hughes put his drink down without sipping it. ‘What else?’

‘I suppose I should give you a list, make you keep it, look at it every day. Advice from the old crazy to the young fool.’

‘Whatever you say, I’ll remember.’

‘Will you? For how long? A month, a year, then, like everything else, it’ll go. You’ll be busy living. You’ll be slowly turning into … me. She will slowly be turning into someone worth putting out of the world. Tell her you love her.’

‘Every day.’

‘Promise! It’s that important! Maybe that’s where I failed myself, failed us. Every day, without fail!’ The old man leaned forward, his face taking fire with his words. ‘Every day. Every day!’

Alice stood in the doorway, faintly alarmed.

‘Anything wrong?’

‘No, no.’ Jonathan Hughes smiled. ‘We were trying to decide which of us likes you best.’

She laughed, shrugged, and went away.

‘I think,’ said Jonathan Hughes, and stopped and closed his eyes, forcing himself to say it, ‘it’s time for you to go.’

‘Yes, time.’ But the old man did not move. His voice was very tired, exhausted, sad. ‘I’ve been sitting here feeling defeated. I can’t find anything wrong. I can’t find the flaw. I can’t advise you, my God, it’s so stupid, I shouldn’t have come to upset you, worry you, disturb your life, when I have nothing to offer but vague suggestions, inane cryings of doom. I sat here a moment ago and thought: I’ll kill her now, get rid of her now, take the blame now, as an old man, so the young man there, you, can go on into the future and be free of her. Isn’t that silly? I wonder if it would work? It’s that old time-travel paradox, isn’t it? Would I foul up the time flow, the world, the universe, what? Don’t worry, no, no, don’t look that way. No murder now. It’s all been done up ahead, twenty years in your future. The old man having done nothing whatever, having been no help, will now open the door and run away to his madness.’

He arose and shut his eyes again.

‘Let me see if I can find my way out of my own house, in the dark.’

He moved, the young man moved with him to find the closet by the front door and open it and take out the old man’s overcoat and slowly shrug him into it.

‘You have helped,’ said Jonathan Hughes. ‘You have told me to tell her I love her.’

‘Yes, I did do that, didn’t I?’

They turned to the door.

‘Is there hope for us?’ the old man asked, suddenly, fiercely.

‘Yes. I’ll make sure of it,’ said Jonathan Hughes.

‘Good, oh, good. I almost believe!’

The old man put one hand out and blindly opened the front door.

‘I won’t say goodbye to her. I couldn’t stand looking at that lovely face. Tell her the old fool’s gone. Where? Up the road to wait for you. You’ll arrive someday.’

‘To become you? Not a chance,’ said the young man.

‘Keep saying that. And – my God – here –’ The old man fumbled in his pocket and drew forth a small object wrapped in crumpled newspaper. ‘You’d better keep this. I can’t be trusted, even now. I might do something wild. Here. Here.’

He thrust the object into the young man’s hands. ‘Goodbye. Doesn’t that mean: God be with you? Yes. Goodbye.’

The old man hurried down the walk into the night. A wind shook the trees. A long way off, a train moved in darkness, arriving or departing, no one could tell.

Jonathan Hughes stood in the doorway for a long while, trying to see if there really was someone out there vanishing in the dark.

‘Darling,’ his wife called.

He began to unwrap the small object.

She was in the parlour door behind him now, but her voice sounded as remote as the fading footsteps along the dark street.

‘Don’t stand there letting the draft in,’ she said.

He stiffened as he finished unwrapping the object. It lay in his hand, a small revolver.

Far away the train sounded a final cry, which failed in the wind.

‘Shut the door,’ said his wife.

His face was cold. He closed his eyes.

Her voice. Wasn’t there just the tiniest touch of petulance there?

He turned slowly, off balance. His shoulder brushed the door. It drifted. Then:

The wind, all by itself, slammed the door with a bang.

The Screaming Woman

My name is Margaret Leary and I’m ten years old and in the fifth grade at Central School. I haven’t any brothers or sisters, but I’ve got a nice father and mother except they don’t pay much attention to me. And anyway, we never thought we’d have anything to do with a murdered woman. Or almost, anyway.

When you’re just living on a street like we live on, you don’t think awful things are going to happen, like shooting or stabbing or burying people under the ground, practically in your back yard. And when it does happen you don’t believe it. You just go on buttering your toast or baking a cake.

I got to tell you how it happened. It was a noon in the middle of July. It was hot and Mama said to me, ‘Margaret, you go to the store and buy some ice cream. It’s Saturday, Dad’s home for lunch, so we’ll have a treat.’

I ran out across the empty lot behind our house. It was a big lot, where kids had played baseball, and broken glass and stuff. And on my way back from the store with the ice cream I was just walking along, minding my own business, when all of a sudden it happened.

I heard the Screaming Woman.

I stopped and listened.

It was coming up out of the ground.

A woman was buried under the rocks and dirt and glass, and she was screaming, all wild and horrible, for someone to dig her out.

I just stood there, afraid. She kept screaming, muffled.

Then I started to run. I fell down, got up, and ran some more. I got in the screen door of my house and there was Mama, calm as you please, not knowing what I knew, that there was a real live woman buried out in back of our house, just a hundred yards away, screaming bloody murder.

‘Mama,’ I said.

‘Don’t stand there with the ice cream,’ said Mama.

‘But, Mama,’ I said.

‘Put it in the icebox,’ she said.

‘Listen, Mama, there’s a Screaming Woman in the empty lot.’

‘And wash your hands,’ said Mama.

‘She was screaming and screaming …’

‘Let’s see, now, salt and pepper,’ said Mama, far away.

‘Listen to me,’ I said, loud. ‘We got to dig her out. She’s buried under tons and tons of dirt and if we don’t dig her out, she’ll choke up and die.’

‘I’m certain she can wait until after lunch,’ said Mama.

‘Mama, don’t you believe me?’

‘Of course, dear. Now wash your hands and take this plate of meat in to your father.’

‘I don’t even know who she is or how she got there,’ I said. ‘But we got to help her before it’s too late.’

‘Good gosh,’ said Mama. ‘Look at this ice cream. What did you do, just stand in the sun and let it melt?’

‘Well, the empty lot …’

‘Go on, now, scoot.’

I went into the dining room.

‘Hi, Dad, there’s a Screaming Woman in the empty lot.’

‘I never knew a woman who didn’t,’ said Dad.

‘I’m serious,’ I said.

‘You look very grave,’ said Father.

‘We’ve got to get picks and shovels and excavate, like for an Egyptian mummy,’ I said.

‘I don’t feel like an archaeologist, Margaret,’ said Father. ‘Now, some nice cool October day, I’ll take you up on that.’

‘But we can’t wait that long,’ I almost screamed. My heart was bursting in me. I was excited and scared and afraid and here was Dad, putting meat on his plate, cutting and chewing and paying me no attention.

‘Dad?’ I said.

‘Mmmm?’ he said, chewing.

‘Dad, you just gotta come out after lunch and help me,’ I said. ‘Dad, Dad, I’ll give you all the money in my piggy bank!’

‘Well,’ said Dad. ‘So it’s a business proposition, is it? It must be important for you to offer your perfectly good money. How much money will you pay, by the hour?’

‘I got five whole dollars it took me a year to save, and it’s all yours.’

Dad touched my arm. ‘I’m touched. I’m really touched. You want me to play with you and you’re willing to pay for my time. Honest, Margaret, you make your old Dad feel like a piker. I don’t give you enough time. Tell you what, after lunch, I’ll come out and listen to your Screaming Woman, free of charge.’

‘Will you, oh, will you, really?’

‘Yes, ma’am, that’s what I’ll do,’ said Dad. ‘But you must promise me one thing?’

‘What?’

‘If I come out, you must eat all of your lunch first.’

‘I promise,’ I said.

‘Okay.’

Mother came in and sat down and we started to eat.

‘Not so fast,’ said Mama.

I slowed down. Then I started eating fast again.

‘You heard your mother,’ said Dad.

‘The Screaming Woman,’ I said. ‘We got to hurry.’

‘I,’ said Father, ‘intend sitting here quietly and judiciously giving my attention first to my steak, then to my potatoes, and my salad, of course, and then to my ice cream, and after that to a long drink of iced coffee, if you don’t mind. I may be a good hour at it. And another thing, young lady, if you mention her name, this Screaming Whatsis, once more at this table during lunch, I won’t go out with you to hear her recital.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Is that understood?’

‘Yes, sir,’ I said.

Lunch was a million years long. Everybody moved in slow motion, like those films you see at the movies. Mama got up slow and got down slow and forks and knives and spoons moved slow. Even the flies in the room were slow. And Dad’s cheek muscles moved slow. It was so slow. I wanted to scream, ‘Hurry! Oh, please, rush, get up, run around, come on out, run!’

But no, I had to sit, and all the while we sat there slowly, slowly eating our lunch, out there in the empty lot (I could hear her screaming in my mind. Scream!) was the Screaming Woman, all alone, while the world ate its lunch and the sun was hot and the lot was empty as the sky.

‘There we are,’ said Dad, finished at last.

‘Now will you come out to see the Screaming Woman?’ I said.

‘First a little more iced coffee,’ said Dad.

‘Speaking of Screaming Women,’ said Mother, ‘Charlie Nesbitt and his wife Helen had another fight last night.’

‘That’s nothing new,’ said Father. ‘They’re always fighting.’

‘If you ask me, Charlie’s no good,’ said Mother. ‘Or her, either.’

‘Oh, I don’t know,’ said Dad. ‘I think she’s pretty nice.’

‘You’re prejudiced. After all, you almost married her.’

‘You going to bring that up again?’ he said. ‘After all, I was only engaged to her six weeks.’

‘You showed some sense when you broke it off.’

‘Oh, you know Helen. Always stagestruck. Wanted to travel in a trunk. I just couldn’t see it. That broke it up. She was sweet, though. Sweet and kind.’

‘What did it get her? A terrible brute of a husband like Charlie.’

‘Dad,’ I said.

‘I’ll give you that. Charlie has got a terrible temper,’ said Dad. ‘Remember when Helen had the lead in our high school graduation play? Pretty as a picture. She wrote some songs for it herself. That was the summer she wrote that song for me.’

‘Ha,’ said Mother.

‘Don’t laugh. It was a good song.’

‘You never told me about that song.’

‘It was between Helen and me. Let’s see, how did it go?’

‘Dad,’ I said.

‘You’d better take your daughter out in the back lot,’ said Mother, ‘before she collapses. You can sing me that wonderful song later.’

‘Okay, come on, you,’ said Dad, and I ran him out of the house.

The empty lot was still empty and hot and the glass sparkled green and white and brown all around where the bottles lay. ‘Now, where’s this Screaming Woman?’ laughed Dad.

‘We forgot the shovels,’ I cried.

‘We’ll get them later, after we hear the soloist,’ said Dad. I took him over to the spot. ‘Listen,’ I said.

We listened.

‘I don’t hear anything,’ said Dad, at last. ‘Shh,’ I said. ‘Wait.’

We listened some more. ‘Hey, there, Screaming Woman!’ I cried.

We heard the sun in the sky. We heard the wind in the trees, real quiet. We heard a bus, far away, running along. We heard a car pass.

That was all.

‘Margaret,’ said Father. ‘I suggest you go lie down and put a damp cloth on your forehead.’

‘But she was here,’ I shouted. ‘I heard her, screaming and screaming and screaming. See, here’s where the ground’s been dug up.’ I called frantically at the earth. ‘Hey there, you down there!’

‘Margaret,’ said Father. ‘This is the place where Mr. Kelly dug yesterday, a big hole, to bury his trash and garbage in.’

‘But during the night,’ I said, ‘someone else used Mr. Kelly’s burying place to bury a woman. And covered it all over again.’

‘Well, I’m going back in and take a cool shower,’ said Dad.

‘You won’t help me dig?’

‘Better not stay out here too long,’ said Dad. ‘It’s hot.’

Dad walked off. I heard the back door slam.

I stamped on the ground. ‘Darn,’ I said.

The screaming started again.

She screamed and screamed. Maybe she had been tired and was resting and now she began it all over, just for me.

I stood in the empty lot in the hot sun and I felt like crying. I ran back to the house and banged the door.

‘Dad, she’s screaming again!’

‘Sure, sure,’ said Dad. ‘Come on.’ And he led me to my upstairs bedroom. ‘Here,’ he said. He made me lie down and put a cold rag on my head. ‘Just take it easy.’

I began to cry. ‘Oh, Dad, we can’t let her die. She’s all buried, like that person in that story by Edgar Allan Poe, and think how awful it is to be screaming and no one paying any attention.’

‘I forbid you to leave the house,’ said Dad, worried. ‘You just lie there the rest of the afternoon.’ He went out and locked the door. I heard him and Mother talking in the front room. After a while I stopped crying. I got up and tiptoed to the window. My room was upstairs. It seemed high.

I took a sheet off the bed and tied it to the bedpost and let it out the window. Then I climbed out the window and shinnied down until I touched the ground. Then I ran to the garage, quiet, and I got a couple of shovels and I ran to the empty lot. It was hotter than ever. And I started to dig, and all the while I dug, the Screaming Woman screamed …

It was hard work. Shoving in the shovel and lifting the rocks and glass. And I knew I’d be doing it all afternoon and maybe I wouldn’t finish in time. What could I do? Run tell other people? But they’d be like Mom and Dad, pay no attention. I just kept digging, all by myself.

About ten minutes later, Dippy Smith came along the path through the empty lot. He’s my age and goes to my school.

‘Hi, Margaret,’ he said.

‘Hi, Dippy,’ I gasped.

‘What you doing?’ he asked.

‘Digging.’

‘For what?’

‘I got a Screaming Lady in the ground and I’m digging for her,’ I said.

‘I don’t hear no screaming,’ said Dippy.

‘You sit down and wait awhile and you’ll hear her scream yet. Or better still, help me dig.’

‘I don’t dig unless I hear a scream,’ he said.

We waited.

‘Listen!’ I cried. ‘Did you hear it?’

‘Hey,’ said Dippy, with slow appreciation, his eyes gleaming. ‘That’s okay. Do it again.’

‘Do what again?’

‘The scream.’

‘We got to wait,’ I said, puzzled.

‘Do it again,’ he insisted, shaking my arm. ‘Go on.’ He dug in his pocket for a brown aggie. ‘Here.’ He shoved it at me. ‘I’ll give you this marble if you do it again.’

A scream came out of the ground.

‘Hot dog!’ said Dippy. ‘Teach me to do it!’ He danced around as if I was a miracle.

‘I don’t …’ I started to say.

‘Did you get the Throw-Your-Voice book for a dime from that Magic Company in Dallas, Texas?’ cried Dippy. ‘You got one of those tin ventriloquist contraptions in your mouth?’

‘Y-yes,’ I lied, for I wanted him to help. ‘If you’ll help dig, I’ll tell you about it later.’

‘Swell,’ he said. ‘Give me a shovel.’

We both dug together, and from time to time the woman screamed.

‘Boy,’ said Dippy. ‘You’d think she was right under foot. You’re wonderful, Maggie.’ Then he said, ‘What’s her name?’

‘Who?’

‘The Screaming Woman. You must have a name for her.’

‘Oh, sure.’ I thought a moment. ‘Her name’s Wilma Schweiger and she’s a rich old woman, ninety-six years old, and she was buried by a man named Spike, who counterfeited ten-dollar bills.’

‘Yes, sir,’ said Dippy.

‘And there’s hidden treasure buried with her, and I, I’m a grave robber come to dig her out and get it,’ I gasped, digging excitedly.

Dippy made his eyes Oriental and mysterious. ‘Can I be a grave robber, too?’ He had a better idea. ‘Let’s pretend it’s the Princess Ommanatra, an Egyptian queen, covered with diamonds!’

We kept digging and I thought, Oh, we will rescue her, we will. If only we keep on!

‘Hey, I just got an idea,’ said Dippy. And he ran off and got a piece of cardboard. He scribbled on it with crayon.

‘Keep digging!’ I said. ‘We can’t stop!’

‘I’m making a sign. See? SLUMBERLAND CEMETERY! We can bury some birds and beetles here, in matchboxes and stuff. I’ll go find some butterflies.’

‘No, Dippy!’

‘It’s more fun that way. I’ll get me a dead cat, too, maybe …’

‘Dippy, use your shovel! Please!’

‘Aw,’ said Dippy. ‘I’m tired. I think I’ll go home and take a nap.’

‘You can’t do that.’

‘Who says so?’

‘Dippy, there’s something I want to tell you.’

‘What?’

He gave the shovel a kick.

I whispered in his ear. ‘There’s really a woman buried here.’

‘Why sure there is,’ he said. ‘You said it, Maggie.’

‘You don’t believe me, either.’

‘Tell me how you throw your voice and I’ll keep on digging.’

‘But I can’t tell you, because I’m not doing it,’ I said. ‘Look, Dippy. I’ll stand way over here and you listen there.’

The Screaming Woman screamed again.

‘Hey!’ said Dippy. ‘There really is a woman here!’

‘That’s what I tried to say.’

‘Let’s dig!’ said Dippy.

We dug for twenty minutes.

‘I wonder who she is?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘I wonder if it’s Mrs. Nelson or Mrs. Turner or Mrs. Bradley. I wonder if she’s pretty. Wonder what colour her hair is? Wonder if she’s thirty or ninety or sixty?’

‘Dig!’ I said.

The mound grew high.

‘Wonder if she’ll reward us for digging her up.’

‘Sure.’

‘A quarter, do you think?’

‘More than that. I bet it’s a dollar.’

Dippy remembered as he dug, ‘I read a book once of magic. There was a Hindu with no clothes on who crept down in a grave and slept there sixty days, not eating anything, no malts, no chewing gum or candy, no air, for sixty days.’ His face fell. ‘Say, wouldn’t it be awful if it was only a radio buried here and us working so hard?’

‘A radio’s nice, it’d be all ours.’

Just then a shadow fell across us.

‘Hey, you kids, what you think you’re doing?’

We turned. It was Mr. Kelly, the man who owned the empty lot. ‘Oh, hello, Mr. Kelly,’ we said.

‘Tell you what I want you to do,’ said Mr. Kelly. ‘I want you to take those shovels and take that soil and shovel it right back in that hole you been digging. That’s what I want you to do.’

My heart started beating fast again. I wanted to scream myself.

‘But Mr. Kelly, there’s a Screaming Woman and …’

‘I’m not interested. I don’t hear a thing.’

‘Listen!’ I cried.

The scream.

Mr. Kelly listened and shook his head. ‘Don’t hear nothing. Go on now, fill it up and get home with you before I give you my foot!’

We filled the hole all back in again. And all the while we filled it in, Mr. Kelly stood there, arms folded, and the woman screamed, but Mr. Kelly pretended not to hear it.

When we were finished, Mr. Kelly stomped off, saying, ‘Go on home now. And if I catch you here again …’

I turned to Dippy. ‘He’s the one,’ I whispered.

‘Huh?’ said Dippy.

‘He murdered Mrs. Kelly. He buried her here, after he strangled her, in a box, but she came to. Why, he stood right here and she screamed and he wouldn’t pay any attention.’

‘Hey,’ said Dippy. ‘That’s right. He stood right here and lied to us.’

‘There’s only one thing to do,’ I said. ‘Call the police and have them come arrest Mr. Kelly.’

We ran for the corner store telephone.

The police knocked on Mr. Kelly’s door five minutes later. Dippy and I were hiding in the bushes, listening.

‘Mr. Kelly?’ said the police officer.

‘Yes, sir, what can I do for you?’

‘Is Mrs. Kelly at home?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘May we see her, sir?’

‘Of course. Hey, Anna!’

Mrs. Kelly came to the door and looked out. ‘Yes, sir?’

‘I beg your pardon,’ apologized the officer. ‘We had a report that you were buried out in an empty lot, Mrs. Kelly. It sounded like a child made the call, but we had to be certain. Sorry to have troubled you.’

‘It’s those blasted kids,’ cried Mr. Kelly, angrily. ‘If I ever catch them, I’ll rip them limb from limb!’

‘Cheezit!’ said Dippy, and we both ran.

‘What’ll we do now?’ I said.

‘I got to go home,’ said Dippy. ‘Boy, we’re really in trouble. We’ll get a licking for this.’

‘But what about the Screaming Woman?’

‘To heck with her,’ said Dippy. ‘We don’t dare go near that empty lot again. Old man Kelly’ll be waiting around with his razor strap and lambast heck out’n us. And I just happened to remember, Maggie. Ain’t old man Kelly sort of deaf, hard-of-hearing?’

‘Oh, my gosh,’ I said. ‘No wonder he didn’t hear the screams.’

‘So long,’ said Dippy. ‘We sure got in trouble over your darn old ventriloquist voice. I’ll be seeing you.’

I was left all alone in the world, no one to help me, no one to believe me at all. I just wanted to crawl down in that box with the Screaming Woman and die. The police were after me now, for lying to them, only I didn’t know it was a lie, and my father was probably looking for me, too, or would be once he found my bed empty. There was only one last thing to do, and I did it.