Children of the Storm (18 page)

    “There are two main possibilities,” Peterson said.

    “What possibilities?”

    “Saine may be ignoring Blenwell simply because he likes him as a friend and doesn't want to have to suspect a friend. That's unlikely. I think Saine would actively consider his own mother if the case called for it.”

    “And the other?”

    He looked at her, as if he wondered if he could trust her with his second supposition, then sighed and said, “Saine and Blenwell are involved in some mutual-well, enterprise, here on
Distingue.”

    For a moment, she did not see what he was driving at, and when she did understand, she rebelled at the possibility. “You can't think that Saine and Blenwell are working together-against the children?”

    “I don't
want
to think it,” Bill said. “God knows, it's the most horrifying notion I've ever had.”

    “Rudolph is so concerned for Alex and Tina,” Sonya argued. “He's genuinely concerned, worried about their welfare.” She remembered how Saine, in one of those rare moments when he had let his guard down, compared Alex to his own son, now dead. Could such a man, possessed of such deep sorrow and containing it so well, actually perform the hideously sadistic acts that the madman had threatened, or even sanction them by a friend or associate?

    “As I said,” Bill repeated, “I don't want to believe it, not for a moment. But it's a possibility that shouldn't be overlooked. Kenneth Blenwell could have been the voice on the telephone. If he'd disguised his voice even slightly, no one in the family would have recognized him.”

    “But how could he be sure that Saine would be hired as bodyguard?” she asked.

    “Maybe he wasn't certain. Maybe they didn't know each other before Saine came to
Distingue.
But maybe Blenwell made Saine such a good offer that he couldn't turn it down.”

    Shocked, Sonya said, “Then you think that, maybe, Blenwell offered Rudolph a sum of money in return for a chance at the children-and that Rudolph, knowing what this madman had threatened to do, accepted the money and said okay?”

    “I suspect something of that nature might have happened,” Bill said, “but with a couple of important differences. Blenwell is the obvious main suspect. When he first came to
Distingue,
Saine probably saw that as clearly as we do now. Perhaps he exerted himself toward proving or disproving Blenwell's guilt-and proved it. Perhaps he went with it, first, to Blenwell, with the intention of clinching his suspicions. Perhaps Blenwell explained that he did not intend to kill the kids, that those threats had only been so much stage dressing to terrify the Doughertys. Perhaps he convinced Saine that all he wanted was to eventually scare Dougherty into selling the island. Then, perhaps, he offered Saine a sum of money to remain quiet about things. Saine, realizing the children never would be hurt, and being human enough to be swayed by cold cash, took the money and walked away.”

    She thought about it a while. “That's a possibility,” she agreed. “I can't ever see Rudolph letting anyone harm the kids. But I can see him making a deal if the kids will not be hurt-just barely see it. But at least its a little acceptable.”

    “Remember, we're still theorizing,” Bill said.

    “Well, let's hope we're right,” Sonya said. “If this is what has happened, then the kids are perfectly safe.”

    “Are they?”

    He stopped pacing, looking at her, his eyes full of fear.

    “Well, if this theory of yours is correct-and, Bill, it's the most logical, maybe the only logical thing I've heard yet-then no one really wants to hurt Alex or Tina. All that Blenwell wants to do is scare everyone, a goal that he achieved remarkably well.”

    Peterson was silent for a time, standing before a wall of books, letting his eyes run over the colorful bindings. At last, he said, “Suppose that Blenwell convinced Rudolph that he didn't want to hurt anyone, least of all two defenseless children, that all he wanted was the island. But also suppose that, in reality, he was lying to Rudolph. Suppose, no matter what he convinced Rudolph of, he really does want to take a knife to the kids, really does want to kill them.”

    Her legs shook harder.

    She said, wanting to believe that it was true, “Rudolph wouldn't have been fooled easily. He's a very good man at his job. Sometimes, I feel he can see right through me, right into the center of my mind and know what I'm thinking.”

    “Me too,” Bill said. He stopped examining the books. “He's made me feel like a butterfly pinned on a collecting tray. But remember, Sonya, that a madman-let's say, in this case, Blenwell-can be terribly clever, cunning and quite convincing.”

    “Bill, I don't know what to think anymore!”

    She was trembling visibly now.

    He went to her and encircled her in both his arms, holding her to him like a father with child.

    Fat tears hung in the corners of her eyes.

    “Now, now,” he said.

    She wiped the corners of her eyes.

    He said, “I didn't mean to frighten you, Sonya. I just wanted to let you know what I suspect, ask you for your help. You're the only person I felt I could talk to.”

    “My help?” she asked.

    He let go of her with one arm and offered her his clean handkerchief, which she took and used.

    “Thank you,” she said. “But how can I help? What can I do?”

    “Saine seems to like you better than anyone in Seawatch,” he said, brushing a strand of her yellow hair away from her cheek.

    “Since I was almost strangled,” she said, “he no longer considers me a major suspect.”

    “Well,” Bill said, “perhaps you can get to him where I've failed, open his eyes.”

    “About Ken Blenwell?”

    “Yes.”

    “I've tried before.”

    “Try again, and again,” he said. “We haven't anything to lose.”

    “I guess not.”

    “And I'm convinced,” Bill said, “that sometime during the storm, Blenwell's going to make his move.”

    “I'll talk to Rudolph,” she said.

    “Good.” He kissed her, lightly on the lips, then more firmly, taking her breath away.

    “I'm okay now,” she said.

    “Sure?”

    “Very.”

    He looked at her critically, holding her face in one hand, like an artist holding his creation up to good light, and he said, “I can't even tell that you've been crying.”

    “I wasn't, really,” she said. “Just a tear or two, which can't be counted.” She smiled at him.

    He made a funny, mock expression of bedazzle-ment, holding a hand over his eyes to shield his vision. He said, “God, what a smile that is! It's like the light of the tropic sun!”

    “Or a hundred stars,” she said sarcastically.

    “That too.”

    She laughed, pushed him back playfully and handed over his dampened handkerchief.

    “I will frame it,” he told her.

    “No, you'll launder it.”

    He grew serious again. “Now, you're sure you're feeling all right, good enough to facing everyone in the kitchen?”

    “Yes,” she said. “I've felt better but I've also felt worse. Now, should we get back out there before Bess takes it in her head to come looking for us?”

    He grimaced. “I love that old woman, but-”

    “She tells bad jokes.”

    He laughed. “That too, now that you mention it.”

    She started for the door.

    “Wait!” he called. When she turned around, he pointed at the stacks of books and said, “We'd better not go back empty-handed, or we'll really be adding fuel to the fire of rumors.”

    

    During their simple supper and twice during the card games that followed it, as the staff kept each other company, listened to the weather reports and waited to see how bad the winds and the rain would get, Sonya brought up the subject of Kenneth Blenwell in conversation with Rudolph Saine. All three times, his reaction to her suggestions was as it had always been before, and she got absolutely nowhere with him, as if she were trying to roll a boulder uphill.

    Once or twice, when her failure to convince Saine was terribly evident, she saw Bill Peterson throw her an agonized look, and she knew exactly how he felt. Each time, she shrugged her shoulders as if to say, “What can I do more than I have already done? Isn't this a hopeless game I'm playing?”

    By nine o'clock, the weather report said that Hurricane Greta had slowed its advance on the Guadeloupe area and was nearly stationary now, whirling around and around on itself, kicking up tremendous waves and forming an outward moving whirlpool of winds that were more terrible than anything that had been recorded since 1945. These winds and waves were being felt throughout the Caribbean, especially in the Guadeloupe area, but at least Greta had stalled for the time being.

    “Maybe there'll be no need for the storm cellar after all,” Bess said, relieved.

    “Awww,” Alex said.

    “No pouting,” Bess warned.

    The boy said, “But that's not fair! We're hardly ever here during the worst of the hurricane season, and we hardly ever get to see a really good one. We been in the storm cellar only two times before -and one time, we was only there for an hour or two. What kind of danger is an hour or two? That's no fun.”

    “Can't we go in the cellar anyway?” Tina asked.

    “Where the two of you are going to go,” Bess said, “is straightaway to bed, under warm covers.”

    “Good idea,” Saine said.

    “What if the storm gets really bad tonight, with really monstro waves?” Alex asked.

    “Then,” Bess said, “we'll take you out of bed and cart you down here to the storm cellar.”

    “Promise?” Alex asked.

    “Promise.”

    “Will you wake us?”

    “We'll wake you,” Bess said. “Cause if we didn't, we'd never hear the end of it.”

    Rudolph scooped up the two children, one in each thick arm, and he held them at chest height, as if they weighed less than nothing. They giggled and pretended to struggle against him. He took it in good humor and escorted them upstairs to their room.

    Sonya went across the room and sat next to Peterson where he was peeling an apple. She said, “I didn't have any luck with him.”

    “I saw.”

    “Now what?”

    “Now,” he said, carving away the last of the peel and putting down the knife, his hands moving expertly, as if he'd spent a life peeling apples, “we pray a lot, and we keep our eyes and ears open for the least indication of something unusual.”

    “You think tonight's the night?”

    He took a bite of the apple, chewed it carefully and said, “Not unless the storm arrives tonight. Whenever Greta hits us, full force, that's when he'll strike.”

    “How do you know?”

    “He's a madman,” Bill said. “And lunatics are affected by great displays of nature. Their frenzy is magnified.”

    “Sounds like you've been reading some psychology textbooks.”

    “Browsing,” he admitted. “I wanted to know just what we might be up against.”

    The next weather report said that Greta was moving again, on her original course, though her rate of advance had slowed. Her internal winds, however, had risen. Weather Bureau planes were finding it almost impossible to do any further detailed surveillance.

    With that bad news like a lead weight on her mind, Sonya went to bed shortly past nine-thirty.

    

    Rudolph Saine answered the door of the children's room, his revolver in his hand and his body slightly tensed for quick movement. When he saw who was there, he holstered the gun and said, “Can I help you, Sonya?”

    “I don't know,” she said. She looked past him and saw the kids were at least in bed, if not asleep. “All evening, I've been hinting to you about something, and you've been studiously ignoring my hints. Now, I've decided to use the blunt approach.”

    “About Ken Blenwell,” he said.

    “Yes.”

    “You want to know why I refuse to consider him a suspect?” He was watching her closely, as he had watched her, once, when he had considered her a potential suspect.

    “I would like to know, yes,” she said, a bit surprised that he knew before she asked, had phrased it exactly as she had intended to, in a manner that seemed to make Saine himself slightly suspect.

    “He's helped with my investigation,” Saine explained.

    “How?” She remembered Bill's theory of a payoff.

    “He's done some footwork for me that I couldn't go to Guadeloupe to do myself,” Saine said.

    She had not expected this. “Footwork?”

    “When I first came to
Distingue,
when I first talked with Ken, he gave me what has amounted to my only promising lead in all this time. And since I couldn't go racing to Guadeloupe to follow up on it, he checked it out at my direction.”

    “What did he find?” Sonya asked.

    “Something interesting, but not incriminating. He gave me my one principle suspect, but I've had to wait for the man to make a wrong move before I can do anything.” He sighed. “Thus far, every move he's made has been cautious and disturbingly right.”

    “And who did Kenneth Blenwell point you toward?” she asked.

    “I'd rather not say just now.”

    “I think I have a right, as the governess and-”

    “I'd rather not say just now,” he repeated.

    There had followed an awkward silence, mutual goodnights, and Sonya had gone to bed, wondering if Saine was lying to her, or whether he was telling the truth. She had also to wonder if Blenwell had purposefully misled Saine, just as she and Bill had earlier discussed…