In Dark Corners (13 page)

Galen rubbed the back of his wrist across his eyes, clearing his vision. He focused again on the driveway. Wrong angle; the drawing was upside-down. He moved around the short, straight chalked markings until they took recognizable shape. It was the stylized figure of a man. The figure was bent over, gazing down at something—even from a side view the man was obviously faceless—not a dot for an eye or a slash for a mouth. Faceless. A strange lack of detail. The whole thing struck him as very primitive, crude, just the type of thing a…a child might do. The chill cut through his raincoat as he thought of his daughter again. He sucked in a deep breath and forced the image from his mind. Then he kneeled and touched the drawing. Chalk, expensive green chalk. He recalled Lynn's nightmares, which had forced them to move.
She's still here, Galen, and she needs something from us
.
The tree is holding her spirit
.

Crazy.

He resisted looking back up into the tree and hurried to the VW. Who had done the drawing, and why? He could think of no answers. At the car he shrugged off the questions and the chill. It was getting dark.

Galen opened the Beetle's door and took the for-sale sign from the back seat. He pounded it into the ground in a soft spot under the live oak. Working under the tree added a creepy feeling, a realization that the tree house and rope ladder hung over his head, like something ominous. Like a guillotine.

He hurried and finished the sign. If we can't sell it in a month or so, he told himself, we'll give it to a realtor. Be best for everyone to be rid of the place. Galen straightened and looked up at the old house. The place had been elegant once, but now it needed a lot of work. The old-fashioned wooden gutters were rotted away, paint peeling everywhere.

When they'd first moved in over two years ago they hadn't had a dime to fix much of anything. He'd just graduated from the University of Minnesota, and after moving to the Valley he'd been busy trying to make a name with pen and inks.

A sudden movement in the second-story window caught his eye. Rennie's room. For a moment Galen thought he saw a round, pale face drawing back into the room's darkness.
She's still here
…But he realized it was only a curtain fluttering in the breeze. He stood still for a moment staring and feeling embarrassed by his silliness. Then it dawned on him that the window was open and it shouldn't have been. Strange. Maybe I should check it, he thought, but he didn't have a flashlight. He'd return tomorrow. Maybe I'll give the sheriff a call too, he thought. There could be squatters or kids partying, tearing up stuff. He climbed back into the VW, deciding to return the next afternoon and go through the house. He backed out of the driveway, over the drawing, and headed for Napa.

***

At the apartment complex in Napa, Galen pulled into his stall, noticing that Lynn's place was empty. Probably over at the church, he guessed. For the last year his wife had spent most of her time at First Gospel attending meetings, working on church projects, distributing literature or praying for Rennie.

Galen pushed open the apartment door and stopped in his tracks.

Lynn was sitting in the dark, her coat buttoned up to her neck, two suitcases at her feet. Her face was pale and drawn, the permanently wounded look glazing her brown eyes.

He whispered, "Lynn? Are you okay Lynn?"

She nodded. With an effort she stood. "Aunt Jane's driving the Volvo. She took some of my things to her place," Lynn explained, her monotone matching her appearance. "She'll be back soon…" Her voice trailed off and she looked down at her suitcases.

"What's going on?" asked Galen.

Lynn looked up but avoided his eyes, looking out the front window of the apartment. "I'm leaving, Galen," she said simply, "going to Mother's in the city."

He waited for her to continue.

After an awkward silence, Lunn whispered, "We don't really share much anymore, Galen. Aunt Jane says—"

Goddammit, Galen swore silently, shutting out his wife's voice. He was sick of hearing what Aunt Jane had to say about everything. The old lady had involved Lynn with the church and encouraged the craziness about Rennie. She'd even convinced Lynn that the little girl's accident related to a series of bizarre deaths at the old Victorian, the earliest recorded in the 1880s when the Jamisons hung a half-breed from the live oak for stock rustling; he'd been innocent. Lynn's nightmares about Rennie included the image of a man's face, horribly bloated and discolored. Anyhow, Aunt Jane said it was the tree. A haunted tree? No, he'd had enough of the old lady's meddling. Lynn was dabbing at her nose with a hankie. "And Andrew will be contacting you in a few days," she murmured, shifting her gaze back to the suitcases, "you know, about legal and financial details."

Andrew, her cousin—Handelman, Brooks, and Brooks of San Francisco. Galen stared at his wife. She had been a beautiful woman, charming and lively, before all this. She blamed herself for Rennie's death because she'd been gone that day on her new job. Galen had never been able to tell her the whole truth. Now it was too late. The words were buried inside him.

Honk, honk.

That's her now, Galen thought, feeling deflated.

"Goodbye, Galen," Lynn said, picking up her suitcases, then slipping quickly past him and out the door.

"Goodbye," he whispered softly, as the door shut.

After a moment, Galen took off the raincoat and hung it on the door of the closet. Then, unloosening his tie, he wandered into the kitchen and made a cup of instant coffee. He added a generous slug of brandy. As an afterthought he rummaged through the back of the junk drawer, finding his good stuff, Humbolt Indica, hidden in a Skoal can. He rolled a joint, lit up, and inhaled deeply, holding the smoke in his lungs until tiny, invisible fingers began massaging away the tightness and fatigue from his body; then he exhaled. With the joint dangling from his mouth and a cup of coffee in hand, Galen moved back to the front room.

He built a roaring fire, sipping the coffee, taking hits on the joint, and waiting for some response to Lynn's departure. A sense of loss or anguish or regret—even self-pity. Nothing. His guilt of the last year had sapped his emotions, his ability to respond strongly to anything. Well, that's not quite true, he told himself, because he did feel something—relief. He was actually glad Lynn was gone. He tossed the butt into the flames. The fire crackled.

Galen slumped down in his recliner, sipping coffee. He flipped on the TV with the remote control, watching a face focus on the screen. He finished the last of the coffee, trying to concentrate on the sportscaster. But he couldn't. Something nagged at him.

Rennie's mural.

***

Galen had finally gotten a break, signed a good contract for six pen and ink drawings of Napa Valley landmarks with a specialty card company in San Francisco that planned to reproduce them on postcards. To celebrate they'd decided to use some of the up-front money to fix up Rennie's room—patch original plaster, replace molding, and put on a fresh coat of paint. They started on Friday night after Lynn got off from her new job at Queen of the Valley Hospital. By Sunday morning they were ready for the first coat of latex. About noon, Galen left the roller in the five gallon paint bucket and went downstairs to devour a tuna sandwich and glass of milk. He was putting the dishes in the sink when he heard Lynn shout: "Oh, no, Rennie!"

Then silence.

Galen dashed back up the staircase and down the hall to his daughter's room, not knowing what to expect. Lynn was sitting in the middle of the floor, tears running down her cheeks. She gestured at Rennie. The little three-year-old girl had a felt marking pen in hand. And the walls—the walls were decorated with a mural of green stick figures. Galen sunk to the floor as if hit over the head. "Good God," he moaned, putting his arm around Lynn.

Rennie smiled proudly at her parents. "Da-dee, Rennie draws too." She pointed to the stick figures with the green marking pen.

Struck dumb, Galen just nodded. Then they began to laugh together. They left the stick-figure mural on the walls.

The following Monday Galen had barely noticed Lynn leaving for work. He'd heard her say, "Keep an eye on Rennie; you know how she gets into stuff." But his attention was on the set of drawings for the card company. After his wife left he ignored the sound of the front door opening and closing. Rennie would be okay outside for a few minutes…Finally he put the finishing touches on the last pen and ink. When he glanced at his watch, Lynn had been gone two hours. And Rennie—she'd been unattended all that time.

Galen rushed out the door, shouting her name.

At the oak he'd stopped suddenly, as if he'd run into an invisible wall. It was unreal. Rennie looked like a rag doll, her head bent at a funny angle, dangling from the rope ladder, twisting in the breeze. Unreal…He'd climbed the rope ladder, cut her down and called the paramedics, but it was too late. A freak accident, they said. Apparently she'd been climbing the ladder when a rung gave way, the loose end becoming tangled around her neck. He'd never told anyone about the two hours—he couldn't. After the funeral Lynn began having the terrible nightmares. He vowed to cut the tree down, but then the arthritis hit.

***

In the kitchen, Galen poured himself another straight shot of brandy. He massaged the aching knuckles of his right hand. After a while he went to bed; but he tossed and turned, his rest disturbed by the image of a rag doll twisting in the breeze.

The next morning Galen walked into the staff lounge of the County Office, saying hello to one of the adaptive P.E. teachers. He poured himself a cup of coffee and sat down to check his schedule for the day, making sure there were no field trips or other changes. None. Morning classes at Wintun, the TMR school in Napa, and the afternoon at Theodore Roosevelt, the PH school in Yountville. He made a mental note to stop by and check out the house on Oakwood on the way home. Damn, he'd forgotten to call the sheriff last night. Probably no need, really.

Galen's thoughts were disturbed by a discussion between a speech therapist and an ESL teacher. A kid with a problem. "…it must be a kind of expressive aphasia," the speech therapist was saying. "All the tests check."

Maria Espinoza, the ESL teacher, nodded, her concern easing. "Dr. Raintree will be at my class at State tonight," she said, enthusiasm edging into her tone. "Maybe he can help design a remedial program for Peter."

The speech therapist smiled and nodded. Galen had heard similar discussions in the lounge or teachers' rooms of various schools in the county. After a kid's problem was labeled there was usually a sense of relief, because it was believed that somewhere, perhaps just down the hall, there was an
expert
who could cure
that
problem. Unfortunately the labels were vague, poorly defined: aphasia, autism, dyslexia, low-achiever, developmentally delayed, educationally handicapped. Galen had learned to ignore most of this, focusing instead on Jaime Morris's practical advice: Forget their disabilities and focus on what they can do. She had dramatically demonstrated the principle by taking Galen to a sheltered workshop for adult TMRs. The shop was run by a retired Navy Chief with no training in educational philosophy or psychology and no interest in labeling. The workshop had a contract assembling first-aid kits for Johnson. The problem was that none of the workers could read or count accurately. The Chief had designed a board with silhouettes of each kit item: five Band-Aids, a large compress, a package of ammonia capsules, a bottle of aspirin, and so on. Each worker covered the silhouettes on his board first, then filled each kit from the covered board. Focus on what they can do.

"Morning, Galen."

He glanced up from his coffee cup into Anne Jurgensens's face. "Hi, Anne." He pointed at an empty seat next to him.

She shook her head, indicating the letter in her hands, frowning. "Did you get yours?"

He shrugged his lack of understanding.

"A March Fifteenth letter?"

"Oh, I didn't check my box." He'd forgotten that many teachers across the State were receiving the demoralizing letters today. In the hall he leaned over and checked his box. He had a letter. He tore it open:

Mr. Galen Hendry

21 Oakwood Lane

Napa, CA 94558

Dear Mr. Hendry,

Pursuant to the California State Education code, you are advised that at this time economic conditions do not warrant renewing your contract for the next school year (July 1980-June 1981). The sole intent of this letter is to provide an opportunity for you to seek a position elsewhere for the next school year.

Regretfully,

John D. Martin, Supt.

Napa County Schools

Attached to the outside of the envelope was a note scrawled in pen:
Galen, see me before classes today. JDM

"Hey, it's just a formality, Galen." Anne had followed him to his box and patted his shoulder. "Half the teachers in the county have received them for the last three years. It's a negotiating ploy before each new contract. And anyhow, all first-year teachers get them."

Actually Galen didn't feel much of anything—except curiosity about the note from Martin. "Everyone get one of these?" He let Anne read the note.

She shook her head, perplexed. "Well, good luck, Galen. Let me know how it comes out."

He nodded, turned, and headed down the hall to the main reception area. Mrs. Wallace the receptionist ushered him right into the superintendent's office.

Martin, behind a big desk, set his pipe down as Galen entered the room. "Have a seat," the superintendent said with a fake smile. Behind him the American and California flags hung limply from modified stanchions.

Galen slumped into the chair in front of the big desk.

"Well," Martin began, digging through a stack of papers on his desk, "there's really no kind way to do this." He cleared his throat, holding up a letter and shaking it, as if it were a naughty puppy. "The endowment which enabled us to hire an art specialist for special education has run out and will not be renewed by the State." He let the unruly letter drop to his desktop. "Your position won't exist next year." He shook his head and added, not unkindly, "Your March Fifteenth letter must be taken seriously."