Strange Seed (18 page)

She set the suitcase on the floor and replaced it with a brown vinyl two-suited that had the look and smell of newness to it.
 
Paul had bought it especially for their move to the house, she remembered.

*****

The station wagon wasn’t heavily loaded.
 
“If you want,” Paul said, and set a large box filled with dishes, pots, pans and silverware on the tailgate, “we can find room for your desk and chair.”

“No,” Rachel said.
 
“That’s all right.”
 
A pause.
 
“Can we take the rug, though?”

Paul peered into the car and said, “Yes.
 
I think so.
 
I’ll get it in a second.”
 
He pushed the box of dishes forward, straightened.
 
“I’m sorry,” he whispered, his gaze on the house.

“No need, Paul.
 
Let’s not look backward, okay?”

“Yes,” he said tonelessly.
 
He sighed.
 
“I’ll get that run and we’ll get the hell out of here.
 
We’ll have to stop in town to close our bank account, you know, and settle things with Marsh and the glazier.”

“Uh-huh.”
 
A pause.
 
“I’ll wait here while you get the rug, if that’s all right.”

He stood quietly for a few seconds, then moved slowly down the shallow incline of weed-choked lawn to the house.
 
When he’d closed the front door behind him, Rachel turned and critically examined his packing job.
 
It was obvious he’d done it hurriedly—the boxes and suitcases hadn’t been packed into the car so much as thrown in at random, and much of the available space hadn’t been utilized.
 
It didn’t really matter, Rachel decided, but it wouldn’t take long to tighten things up a bit.
 
She set to it.

Several minutes later, she remembered: “Damn!” she whispered.
 
They’d forgotten the cat, Mr. Higgins.
 
Paul had probably purposely forgotten him—he’d never seemed to care much for the animal; he had, more than once, even prepared to kick him when Higgins had gotten in his way and his mood was bad.

On all fours, she backed out of the car’s interior and stepped to the ground.

“Higgins?” she called.
 
“Mr. Higgins!”
 
She listened for his answering meow from the thickets fifty feet south of the house.
 
Nothing.
 
“Higgins, here kitty-kitty.”
 
She waited.
 
Still nothing.

She started down the lawn.
 
Stopped.
 
“Higgins, c’mere Higgins!
 
Do you want to eat?”
 
The cat had learned what the phrase meant and it never failed to bring him running.
 
“Higgins!”
 
She moved further down the lawn, peered hard into the thickets.
 
“
There
you are,” she said, smiling as if the cat had been playing a game with her.
 
He was just inside the shadows of a huge chokecherry bush.

Rachel slapped her thigh.
 
“Well, c’mon,” she coaxed.
 
“Do you want to eat?”
 
The cat turned its head and blinked lazily at her.
 
She sighed and moved quickly across the side lawn and scooped him into her arms.
 
“What’d you do, find a couple mice?”
 
She stroked him; he purred loudly.
 
“We’re taking you to a new home, Higgins.
 
You think you’ll like that?”

She started back across the lawn.
 
Stopped.
 
Turned her head slowly.
 
Out of the corner of her eye she had detected movement near the station wagon.
 
“Paul?” she called, think it was him stowing the rug away.

“Yes?” he answered from within the house.

Rachel snapped her head toward the sound of his voice, then back toward the car.
 
Because of the weeds and the slope of the lawn, she could see only its roof and the upper half of its windows.

A wisp of dust arose from behind the car and was followed almost immediately by a dull thumping sound.
 
Rachel stared, confused.
 
Another wisp of dust, another thump, then she heard various metallic, tinkling sounds.

“Paul!” she screamed, then, cat in her arms, she ran up the lawn.
 
A dozen feet from the car, she halted, gasped, heard Paul, behind her, running across the porch and down the steps, across the lawn.
 
“Rachel!” he called as he ran.
 
“What’s wrong?”

He stopped beside her.
 
“Jesus Christ, Rachel!
 
What in the hell is wrong?”

“I went looking for Mr. Higgins,” she said, “and I thought I saw something…”

Here and there among the scattered boxes and suitcases—one of the boxes had popped open upon hitting the road, spilling its contents; books, clothing, an alarm clock, a toaster—there were footprints lightly traced in the earth to the side and in back of the car, and then to the opposite side of the road.

A child’s footprints.

Paul nodded at four thin, parallel scratched, one seeping blood, on Rachel’s left forearm.
 
“Did you see those?” he asked.

Rachel gave the arm a cursory examination.
 
“They’re not deep,” she told him.

“Well, maybe you should put something on them.”

“No.
 
It’s okay.
 
Let’s go.”

“It might get infected.”

“I said it’s all right, Paul.”
 
Her tone had sharpened.
 
“He’s scratched me before and nothing happened.”

Paul attempted to touch the scratches but Rachel jerked her arm away.

Paul put the car in gear.
 
“We’ll get something in town,” he said, and took his foot off the brake.
 
The car rolled forward slowly;
 
Paul was drawing this out, Rachel knew.
 
He was saying good-bye to the house.
 
It was okay.
 
He was entitled.

“Paul, if you don’t mind!”

He increased speed, though just slightly.

Against her better judgment, Rachel craned her head around and stared blankly at the house.

“I’m sorry,” Paul said.

“We didn’t know,” Rachel said, uncertain of the direction of his apology.

“We couldn’t know, Paul.
 
Not really.”

The thickets that crowded up to the road hid all but the house’s roof, now.
 
Rachel craned her head around further to keep her eyes on it.
 
Mr. Higgins climbed onto the back of the seat, then into her lap.
 
She idly stroked him, her head turning slowly as the car took her further from the house.

“Well, that’s it,” she whispered, and settled back, eyes on the narrow road ahead.

“Yes,” Paul said.
 

“That’s it,” she repeated, at a whisper.

“Yes.”
 
He took his foot off the accelerator to negotiate a long, slow curve.
 
“Yes, that’s certainly it.”

“Maybe it would have worked, Paul.”

“Maybe.”

“And maybe not.”

“That’s true.”

“Well, it doesn’t matter.”
 
God, this was worse than silence.

“No, it doesn’t matter.
 
Not anymore.”
 
He accelerated.
 
The road was straight for another quarter mile.

“Do you think they were trying to keep us there, Paul?
 
Throwing everything out of the car like that.
 
Do you think it was a challenge or something?”
 
That was better—more to the point.

“It’s possible,” he said.
 
It can wait, Rachel.
 
He cranked his window up against the road dust wafting into the car.
 

“Well, it’s hard to say why they did it, isn’t it?
 
I mean…we don’t know anything about them, do we, Paul?”

“No.
 
Nothing.”
 
Drop it, Rachel.
“Why did they do what they did to the house, for instance?

“We have no proof..”

“Who needs proof, for God’s sake?
 
Mr. Marsh didn’t do it, and I’m certain Mr. Lumas didn’t…”

“How can you be so certain of that?” Paul asked.
 
He brought the car nearly to a stop; a severe right-hand turn to the west confronted him.
 
Out of the turn, he remembered, the road narrowed, and it would require all his attention to keep the car from wandering onto the soft shoulder to the left or into the heavily wooded valley to the right.
 
If, improbably, he met another car along that precarious half mile, he thought…

“You don’t really believe Lumas could have vandalized the house, do you, Paul?”

He was through the turn—the half mile was before him.
 
He accelerated to just over twenty-five miles an hour.
 
I really don’t see that it matters a whole hell of a lot, Rachel.
 
What’s done is done.
 
Lumas is dead—“

“Yes.”

“And it’s all behind us.
 
As you said, let’s not look backward.”

“Of course,” Rachel said.
 
“But…well, it’s something that’s going to be on our minds for a long, long time.”

“Which means we don’t have to talk about it now.”

“You want me to shut up?”

“No.
 
It’s this damned road, that’s all.”

“I don’t remember coming this way when we came up, Paul.”

“Well, we did.”
 
He let off on the accelerator; the car’s front right wheel lowered into a deep pothole, which threw Rachel against her door.
 
The cat bounded from her lap and into the back of the car, tail fluffed.

“Jesus!” Paul muttered, and touched the accelerator gently.
 
He felt the back wheels spin for a moment, then catch on the loose, dry gravel, and the car lurched forward.
 
A second later, the right back wheel caught the pothole and threw Rachel toward the back of her door.
 
She reached for her seat belt.
 
“It’s not you,” she explained, and hurriedly fastened the belt.

“It gets worse,” Paul said.

“I’m sure it does.
 
All that rain during the summer.”

“Uh-huh.”

“You know, Paul, now that I think about it, the more convinced I am that it was a challenge.”

He looked confusedly at her.

“Throwing our stuff on the road,” she said.
 
“They were challenging us.”

Another pothole threw Rachel toward Paul, then violently to the right; the side of her head struck the window.

Paul glanced at her.
 
“You all right?”

Rachel rubbed her ear and attempted a smile.
 
“Yes.
 
Is it going to be like this all the way to town, Paul?”

Again, he looked confusedly at her; she’d ridden this road before—surely she remembered.
 
“Just a mile or so, then we’ll hit Route 58.”

“Oh yes.
 
I remember now.”

“And the road widens a couple hundred feet ahead.”

“Uh-huh.”

“We’ll be all right, Rachel.”

“I have no doubt,” she said.
 
“Paul?”
 
A brief pause.
 
“What are we running from?”
 
She glanced at him, saw his grip on the wheel tighten, the suggestion of a grimace appear on his face.
 
He said nothing.

“Paul?”
 
She thought of repeating her question—
What are we running from?—
as if he hadn’t heard her.
 
“Why are we running” she said.
 

“We aren’t,” he said.

“You don’t think so?
 
Then what would you call it?”

He chanced a quick look at her; she saw pleading in his eyes:
Later, Rachel.
 
Later.
 
“I’d call it,” he began, eyes on the road again, “admitting that a situation has gone sour.”

“You were unhappy there—at the house?”

“Wasn’t it obvious, Rachel?”

“That’s not an answer.”

“Yes, then.
 
I was unhappy.”

“No you weren’t, Paul.
 
Not with the house, not with what you were doing, only with the fact that the boy was with us.
 
Even the others didn’t matter that much.”