I Know What You Did Last Summer (13 page)

"Then think about the rest of us. Think about Helen."

"You think about Helen if you want to; I'd rather not. And if
you see her you can tell her to stop bothering my folks with phone
messages. Girls like her are a dime a dozen, and I happen to have a
pocket full of dimes."

"Barry, listen-"

"No,
you
listen," Barry said savagely. "Somebody shot
me, yes, but that doesn't mean it had anything to do with that auto
accident That's old stuff. It's over. This was something entirely
different."

"How do you know?" Ray asked. "Did you see who did it?"

"No, but I know why he did it. I had fifty bucks in my wallet
when I left the house that night When they brought me in here, I
didn't have anything but some change."

"You mean it was robbery?" Ray exclaimed doubtfully.

"Sure, it was robbery. What else?"

"But what about the phone call? The papers said you got a call
right before you went out. A couple of the guys heard you talking
to somebody, promising to meet her. Your dad says it was
Helen. Helen says it wasn't."

"It wasn't" Barry said. "I told that to Dad because it was
the easiest thing to say. I didn't want to mess things up any more
than they already were. This girl I was talking to is a real hot
little number. I've been seeing her for a long time now, but I
didn't want to hurt Helen by having her find out about it"

This girl called and wanted you to meet her on the athletic
field? Why?"

"I wasn't meeting her there," Barry told him. "I was just
crossing the field because it was the shortest way to reach the
stadium. I was going to meet her there. We were going to watch the
fireworks and men go back to her place. So-I never got there. Hard
luck for me."

"You swear that?" Ray said. "You swear it was another girl you
were dating, Barry?"

"Sure, I swear it, and you can tell Helen if you want to. Let
her face reality for a change. I've got plenty of girls on the
string. Helen's just one of them."

"Then this had nothing to do with the Gregg kid?"

"That's what I'm telling you. They're two different
things. You turn me in for the Gregg kid, and all you're doing is
kicking me when I'm down. I swear, Ray, if you do that to me I'll
never forgive you. We made a
pact."

"Okay," Ray said softly. "Okay. Simmer down, fella. I didn't
mean to get you so riled up."

"What do you expect, throwing something like that at me?" Barry
was
riled up. His head was throbbing and the whole room
was beginning to move out of focus. "Look, how about getting out of
here? I'm not supposed to see people and I-I don't feel so
great."

"Sure. I'm sorry." Ray touched his shoulder. "I really am sorry.
Get better-huh?"

"Yeah. Sure."

Barry closed his eyes, and the room went swinging around
beyond the darkness of bis eyelids.

Get out of here, he shouted silently. Get out, get out, get out!
Walk out of here on your good legs and go run around the block or
something, you Brutus, you Judas, you faithful, loyal best friend
of mine with your new "balanced" thinking and your "let's dissolve
the pact." Get out and let me alone!

He wished he could be there to see Helen's face when Ray told
her the story about the phone call. "It was a girl," he would say.
"Somebody he's been seeing for quite awhile." That would show her,
all right She might as well know that she hadn't quite made a fool
of him. Maybe she was playing around on the side but so was he, and
a whole lot heavier man she was.

It could have been true. It
could
have been
another girlfriend on the telephone. Pam did sometimes
call him, and so did Debbie and some of the others. It could as
easily have been one of them that night calling to ask him to meet
her at the stadium.

Or it could have been Helen. That was whom he had expected. That
was why the strange voice had disconcerted him so completely.

"Hello. Cox here," he had said, and the voice, low-pitched and
muffled, as though the speaker was talking through a handkerchief,
had said, "Barry?"

"Hello? Who's this?"

"A friend," the voice had said. "A friend who knows about
something and needs to talk to you about it"

"About what?" Barry had known that he was reacting stupidly, but
he could think of nothing else to say. "What are you talking
about?"

"I think you know. Something that happened last summer." There
had been a pause. "What would you say if I told you I had a
picture."

"A picture of what?" Barry had asked, his stomach
knotting.

"An action picture with a car in it. And a bicycle. Just part of
the bicycle. Would you be interested in seeing it?"

"No," Barry had said. "I wouldn't"

"Perhaps there might be other people I could show it to." The
voice had been calm and thoughtful. "Like for instance the
boy's parents. I should think they might be interested."

"You can't take pictures at night." Barry had bitten before he
could stop himself. Immediately, on realizing what he had done, he
had been filled with fury at his own stupidity. "Who the hell are
you, anyway?"

"Somebody who uses special film," the voice had told him. "A
fast film that takes in little light, even less light than you get
from headlights. I'm willing to make a deal with you. I'd like to
sell this picture plus the negative it was made from. I'm not
asking you to buy it sight unseen. I'm calling from a phone booth
here on campus. I can show you the picture."

"I'll just bet you can. There isn't any film like that." He had
not been sure of bis ground. He had never been interested in
photography and knew little about it. "Ill believe it when I see
it."

"Then I'll meet you over at the athletic field in about five
minutes. Under the stands."

"That's fine with me," Barry had said. "You'd better be there."
He had placed the receiver back on the hook and turned to the boys
behind him. "It's all yours."

"Man," one of them had said, "if I talked to my girl like that,
she'd shoot me!"

Funny, Barry thought now, that he should have put it that way,
like a premonition. Keeping his eyes tightly closed, he thought
about the place in the bed where his feet were lying. "They're
there," the doctor had said, and they were, for he had seen the
shape of them under the sheet, sticking up like blocks of wood.

So much for you, Ray Bronson, he felt like shouting.
Crashing in here-trying to pump me-making threats! So you came here
to see how I was, did you? Like fun, you did! You came to get
information to protect your own precious hide. So you got it, but
it wasn't what you expected, was it? Well, suppose you figure
things out for yourself with all that good thinking you taught
yourself to do while you were in California. Don't think I'm going
to help you. I don't owe you anything.

You figure things out for yourselves-you and Julie and Helen.
It'll give you something to keep you busy in the evenings. As for
myself, I've got plenty to do chatting with pretty nurses and being
put on and off bedpans and visiting with my mother. It's enough to
keep me busy the rest of my life!

The words blurred in bis head into one massive shout, and the
hot tears finally came.

chapter 14

Ray drew a long breath of relief as he passed through the
swinging glass doors of the hospital lobby and stepped out into the
warm flood of afternoon sunshine.

Well, that's that, he told himself. Here I had myself
worked up to the cracking point, and there wasn't anything to be
worried about at all. The attack on Barry was robbery-just
robbery. Nothing to do with me-or with Julie-or even with Helen.
Nobody's out to get any of us, at least not physically.

The relief was so great that he felt light-headed with the
intensity of it. As he walked down the sidewalk he had a crazy
desire to turn to everyone he passed and shout out, "Hello, there!
We're okay! Everything's okay!"

Though, of course, it wasn't really. One terror out of the way
did not mean that there were not still things to be concerned
about. A person existed who knew-or thought he knew-about last
summer's accident. Though Barry had now erased for them the
fear that this person was out for physical revenge, there still
must be some plan behind the malicious sending of notes and
clippings. No actual threat had yet been made, but soon there would
have to be something. Perhaps it would be blackmail-"Pay me
so much money, or I'll go to the police with my information."

If that happens, Ray thought, he can just
go
to the
police. That would be great with me. I'm not going to hand over one
penny to get further into this mess than I am right now. If I had
my way, I'd be headed straight for the police myself. If only I
hadn't let myself be talked into that blasted pact- if I'd listened
to Julie that night instead of to Barry-

But what was done was done. That night could not be relived by
any of them. Neither could any of them dictate what was to take
place from now on. Elsa-if, as Julie suspected, it
was
Elsa-would do that. The more he thought about it though, the harder
it was for Ray to imagine Elsa in the role of blackmailer. There
was nothing subtle about Elsa. If she had something to use against
Helen, she would use it with full venom, he was certain, but the
brains and patience necessary for this sort of cat and mouse play
would be surprisingly out of character.

"Ray? Hey, you're Ray Bronson, aren't you?"

Ray was startled from his thoughts by a voice from behind him.
He turned and for a moment stared without recognition at the
dark-haired, squarely built young man who had called out his
name.

Then the realization struck him.

"Oh, hi," he said. "Bud, isn't it?"

"Right. I thought that was you, but I wasn't sure. I saw you
come out of the hospital. You have somebody in there?"

"A friend," Ray said. "Barry Cox. Julie may have mentioned him
to you."

"The guy who was shot over at the college?" The older boy
nodded. "That was tough. How is he doing? Are they allowing him to
have visitors?"

"No," Ray said. "I sort of crashed through the gates. He's doing
okay, I guess-as okay as possible under the circumstances."

He made the statement with effort. The sight of Barry's long,
strong body laid out flat and helpless in the hospital bed had
shaken him deeply. Ray had had little experience with hospitals. He
had never even been inside one except one time to see his mother
when she was hospitalized after an appendectomy. That had
been different. The operation had been successfully completed, his
mother had been smiling, and they had all known that she would be
home within a couple of days, strong and well and ready to throw
herself back into the full joy of living.

With Barry, no such guarantee existed.

"Paralysis," Mr. Cox had said yesterday on the telephone. "At
the moment that condition does seem to exist, but it may only be
temporary. Of course, he hasn't been told anything about it."

But he knows, Ray thought now. Maybe they haven't told him. but
he knows. The knowledge had been there in Barry's eyes, and the
bitterness in his voice had been only a thin mask over the sound of
fear.

As though reading his mind, Bud said, "I hate hospitals." He had
moved up to fall into step beside Ray. "I'm heading down to that
drugstore on the corner to pick up a sandwich. Want to join
me?"

"Well-" Ray hesitated. He had had lunch and was not particularly
hungry. At the same time, he had to admit to himself a painful
curiosity about the guy who appeared to have taken his place in
Julie's life. She had said that she was not in love, but there had
to be something in the relationship for her to continue to see him
so regularly.

"Sure," he said. "I could use a cup of coffee."

When they entered the drugstore, they found the fountain section
almost deserted. They selected a booth, and Ray ordered his coffee
while Bud inspected the menu. As the waitress moved about
bringing water and napkins, Ray devoted himself to studying the
face of the young man across from him. What, he wondered, did Julie
see in it? Was it a face that flashed into her mind as soon as she
awakened in the morning? Did it have a place in her dreams at
night?

Bud was not exactly handsome, but he had an air of quiet
self-confidence that a girl like Julie might find attractive. The
cut of his hair and the fact that his face was closely shaven
accentuated the several years between their ages. He had the strong
jaw and direct, determined gaze of a young man who was used to
setting a course and sticking to it.

If he decided he wanted a girl, Ray thought, he wouldn't call it
quits until he got her.

The observation was more than a little disturbing.

"Ham on rye, please, and a coke." Bud handed the menu back to
the waitress. "Are you sure you don't want something besides
coffee?"

"I'm sure," Ray said. "That hospital visit really got to me.
Barry was my best friend in high school. We're not so close now,
but still-seeing him down flat like that-"

"I can imagine," But said. "Like I told you, I hate hospitals.
Just the smell of one is enough to give me nightmares."

"Have you ever been in one?" Ray asked him.

"Yep. After Nam." Bud didn't elaborate. "Say, what's Julie's
connection with your friend? She told me she sent a plant over to
the hospital. She doesn't date him, does she?"

"Lord, no," Ray told him. "She doesn't even like him very much.
We all used to go around together -Julie and me and Barry and a
girl named Helen Rivers. Then something happened and-well, we don't
anymore."

"Helen Rivers." Bud repeated the name slowly. "That sounds
familiar. Maybe Julie's mentioned her."

"You could have seen her on television. She works for one of the
local stations." Ray decided to ask the question that was uppermost
in his mind. "Are you seeing a lot of Julie?"