In the Blink of an Eye Page 2

  “What is it?” Paine strides over to take his daughter into his arms. “Did you have a nightmare?”

  Dulcie’s body is trembling. “Not a nightmare . . .”

  “What happened?”

  “Gram’s here.”

  It takes a moment for Paine to grasp her words. Then, relieved, he laughs. “Dulcie, you were dreaming. Gram isn’t here. She’s back East, and it’s the middle of the night.”

  “No, she’s here.”

  “It was a dream,” Paine repeats, again hearing the steady dripping of the faucet in the bathroom down the hall. He keeps forgetting to call the landlord about that. He’ll do it first thing in the morning.

  “Daddy,” Dulcie says, almost frantically, feeling around in front of her, finding and clutching at Paine’s T-shirt. “I’m not lying, Daddy. I saw her.”

  The last three words are faint.

  A chill slithers over him. “You saw her?”

  Dulcie nods, her sightless eyes focused on a spot over his shoulder. “I don’t know how it happened, Daddy, but I was lying here in bed, and a sound woke me up. I thought it was the wind but then it was more like a whisper. And I saw Gram’s face, standing over me. She was smiling.”

  It was just a dream, Paine tells himself, biting down on his lower lip. Just a dream. It has nothing to do with Kristin . . .

  Or what happened three years ago.

  “Was that all? You saw her smiling?” Paine asks his daughter softly, his tone carefully neutral. He strokes Dulcie’s tousled blond hair, his fingers automatically lacing through the strands, gently untangling them.

  “She talked to me.”

  “What did she say?”

  “She said she loves me. She called me Dulcinea, like she always does. And then she said that she has to go away.”

  Paine’s hand involuntarily jerks toward his mouth, yanking Dulcie’s hair in the process.

  “Owww!”

  “I’m sorry, baby,” he murmurs, his heart pounding. “That’s all she said?”

  “Uh-huh. And then she disappeared. How did she get here, Daddy? Where did she go?”

  “I don’t know,” Paine answers—truthfully to the first question.

  As for the second . . .

  He might know the answer.

  But he hopes to God that he’s wrong.

  THE SUN IS shining on Lily Dale for a change as Julia walks swiftly up Summer Street carrying a bunch of deep purple Dutch irises she just picked from the meager patch beside her back door a few blocks away. After a rainy May and a cooler than usual start to June, she almost gave up hope that seasonal weather will ever arrive, but here it is at last.

  Later she’ll go home and change into shorts, she decides, uncomfortably warm in the jeans and sweatshirt that have pretty much been her uniform for the last nine months. Her short, thick brown hair is damp with sweat around her forehead and at the nape of her neck.

  “Hi, Julia!”

  Startled by the voice, she turns to see Pilar Velazquez hurrying toward her across the small lawn of the pretty blue and white house at Eight Summer Street.

  “Pilar! You must have brought the sun with you from Alabama!” Julia reaches up to return the much taller older woman’s embrace. “How was your winter?”

  “Wonderful. I visited my son Peter in September—did I tell you he’s stationed in Japan?”

  “No—that must have been a fascinating trip.”

  “It was. I even tried sushi—it wasn’t bad!”

  “Well, there are plenty of fish in Cassadaga Lake,” Julia points out with a grin. “Dig in!”

  Pilar makes a face. “Think I’ll pass. Anyway, Julia, when I got down to Mobile in October, Christina and Tom had a surprise for me. They had spent all last summer having an apartment built over their garage for me. Now I don’t have to live in their guest room nine months a year.”

  “That’s great.” Julia knows that Pilar has had a rough transition ever since she lost her husband Raul to cancer a few years ago. She finally sold her house back in her Ohio hometown and now spends winters with her daughter and son-in-law in Alabama.

  “I wasn’t sure I’d be seeing you again this summer,” Julia tells her. “I thought you might decide to stay down South.” That’s what her own mother does now, leaving Julia to live alone year-round in the house where she grew up.

  “Oh, I’ll keep coming back here to work—at least for a few more seasons,” Pilar assures her, adding, as a U-Haul rumbles past, “Guess I’m not the only one.”

  The small village is indeed stirring to life this morning beneath the welcome blue sky. After months of deserted silence, cars roll through the narrow maze of gravelly streets, well shaded by the leafy branches of towering old trees. People call out to each other, delighted to see familiar faces again. Plywood is pried from the windows of turn-of-the-century cottages; dogs bark; children play.

  “Where are you off to?” Pilar asks Julia, eying the purple bouquet in her hand.

  “I’m bringing these flowers to Iris.”

  “She’s back from Florida?”

  Julia nods. “She got in last week. She mentioned the other day that it’s ironic she wouldn’t even recognize the flower she’s named after, and I told her I’d bring her some from my garden now that the blossoms are open, so she’ll know what an iris looks like.”

  “Iris is no gardener,” Pilar says with a laugh, bending to scoop her purring cat into her arms. As she strokes its fur she adds, “I’ll bet Nan Biddle can’t bear to come by her old house and see the way Iris has let all her perennial beds get overrun with weeds. And she never even bothers to put in annuals.”

  Julia’s smile fades. “Actually, Nan hasn’t been out and about much this spring, Pilar.”

  “Oh, no. Don’t tell me she’s getting worse?”

  “That’s what I hear. Myra Nixon told me she hasn’t even made it to the last few healing services.” Though Nan has been battling metastatic breast cancer for several years now, Julia has often seen her around, usually wearing a hat or turban, and, more recently, leaning on her husband’s arm. But she hasn’t glimpsed her at all since before Easter, and the latest news isn’t encouraging.

  Julia’s friend Lorraine Kingsley, who lives a few doors down from the Biddles, said that Rupert has been spending more and more time alone in the yard, sitting in a chair, brooding. Everybody in Lily Dale knows that Rupert and Nan are utterly devoted to each other. It’s heartbreaking to imagine him being left alone.

  “I’ll call Rupert as soon as I settle in,” Pilar says, her dark eyes shadowed. “That poor man. I know what it’s like to be in his shoes. And Nan isn’t much older than Raul was when he died.”

  Julia lays a comforting hand on her arm. “I’m sure Rupert will welcome the support. I actually don’t really know the Biddles very well and I don’t want to intrude, but if there’s anything you think I can do, let me know.”

  “I will. And tell Iris I’ll be dropping by later for coffee. We’ve got a lot of catching up to do.”

  “Good luck unpacking.” Julia leaves Pilar thoughtfully petting her cat and cuts across the small front lawn to the house she’ll probably always consider the Biddle place, even though it’s been three years now since Rupert and Nan sold it to Iris.

  As she walks up the steps she notices that they’re starting to sag badly, and one of the spindles is missing on the porch rail. If Rupert Biddle is inclined to think about anything other than Nan’s declining health, he must be dismayed at the way Iris has neglected not just the garden, but the house itself.

  Maybe if things were different . . .

  But even if Iris hadn’t tragically lost Kristin within days of moving into this place, she isn’t prone to spending much time on appearances. Not her own, and not her house’s. She doesn’t care what people think.

  Funny, because Kristin was always the opposite. She was beautiful, and she knew it. She looks so much like Iris, who shares her bone structure and big blue eyes. But while earthy Iris ne
ver bothered with makeup or even a blow-dryer, Kristin spent a lot of time on her looks. Back in junior high, her goal was to become a model. She had amended that to actress by the time she reached high school, and she was on her way to accomplishing that when she died. She had merely done summer stock theater productions and a handful of television commercials in Los Angeles, but Julia always thought that was only the beginning. So did Iris.

  While Kristin was alive, Julia was never particularly close to her friend’s mother. In fact, both Kristin’s parents tended to keep their distance from her. Julia figured that although they doted on Kristin, they simply weren’t that interested in other kids. Especially Anson Shuttleworth. Whenever Julia was around their house, he pretty much stayed out of the way, mostly in his office doing “paperwork,” according to Kristin.

  Years later, in the days after Kristin disappeared, before her body was found, Julia felt compelled to stay with Iris around the clock. There was no one else. Most of the Shuttleworths’ friends were in Florida. And though Iris had repeatedly tried to reach Edward, Kristin’s stepbrother, who still lived in Jamestown, he didn’t turn up until the funeral.

  So, when Iris’s worst fears were confirmed, Julia was the one who called Kristin’s live-in boyfriend, Paine Landry, in California with the news. She was the one who took charge of the funeral arrangements. And she was the one who comforted Kristin’s three-year-old daughter when both Iris and Paine were overcome by their own grief in the gloomy days after Kristin was buried.

  These past few years, she has become what Iris affectionately refers to as her “summer daughter.” She looks out for Iris during her annual three months at Lily Dale, and they keep in touch by telephone during the winters, when Iris is back in Florida. Julia misses her when she’s gone. More than she misses her own mother, if the truth be told.

  Now, as Julia rings the doorbell, the memory of a chilly Halloween night fifteen years ago flits into her mind.

  Something happened to Kristin in the few moments she was inside this house.

  Kristin’s words echo back to her.

  Do you see her, Julia?

  Who, Kristin? Who did you see? What happened to change you that night?

  Or maybe it wasn’t that night that changed Kristin. Maybe it was the move to Florida, and maybe in Julia’s mind that’s mixed up with what happened here on Halloween. She’s no longer sure.

  But she does believe that Kristin saw something here fifteen years ago.

  And that when she came back to help her mother move in, she might have seen something again.

  That’s the only possible explanation for the strange changes in Kristin’s personality.

  After all, Julia picked her up from the Buffalo airport upon her arrival from L.A., and spent several hours with her before dropping her off at the house on Summer Street.

  In that time, Kristin seemed to be her old carefree self, aside from the sadness that came over her when she discussed Dulcie’s recent illness and the subsequent loss of her vision. Julia suspected that Kristin’s visit back East wasn’t so much to help her mother with the move as it was an effort to get away, even briefly, from the stress of having a newly disabled child.

  But that was normal, being concerned about your child, and needing a reprieve.

  What didn’t seem normal was the haunted expression in Kristin’s eyes when Julia saw her again the day after her arrival. It didn’t show up fleetingly, as did her concern about Dulcie. No, this was an intense apprehension that emanated from Kristin’s core—the same mood Julia had sensed that night in the Biddles’ stair hall.

  A few days after her arrival in Lily Dale—a few days after the aura of dread came to permanently roost in her beautiful blue eyes—Kristin was dead.

  Her death was officially ruled an accidental drowning. And most of the time, Julia believes that.

  Most of the time.

  Where is Iris? she wonders belatedly, trying unsuccessfully to peer through the opaque glass of the oval window. Iris usually answers the door right away.

  Julia checks her watch. It’s only a little past eight—too early for Iris to be out. The official season hasn’t yet started, and Lily Dale’s sparse businesses—a small cafeteria, library, and a few shops—won’t open until later this morning.

  Iris can’t have left the village because the ancient VW Bug she keeps in Lily Dale is parked on the gravel driveway beside the house.

  Worry has begun to filter through Julia’s vague curiosity about her friend’s whereabouts.

  She transfers the bouquet to her left hand and knocks on the door, loudly.

  Maybe she’s gone for a walk, she speculates, but quickly dismisses the idea. Not sedentary, overweight Iris, who often laughingly says that her motto in life is “why stand when you can sit?” She only walks when Pilar drags her along.

  Okay, well, maybe she’s in the tub.

  But that’s her nighttime ritual. Iris is a creature of habit. She once told Julia that a long bath always relaxes her before going to bed. It wouldn’t make sense for her to take one first thing in the morning. And she can’t be taking a shower. There’s no nozzle above the old claw-foot bathtub.

  “Iris?” Julia calls after a few more disconcerting moments of silence, even as she realizes that Iris probably won’t hear her because the windows are closed.

  Wouldn’t Iris have opened them this morning?

  Wouldn’t she have raised the shades?

  “Iris?” Julia’s voice is higher pitched than usual, taking on an edge of panic.

  Still no answer.

  Julia hesitates, her hand pressed against her mouth as she ponders the situation. She glances over at Pilar’s house next door, but the older woman is nowhere to be seen.

  What should I do?

  I can’t just leave. Something is wrong. I can feel it.

  Her trepidation mounting, Julia bends to take a key from beneath the rubber doormat at her feet.

  THE PHONE RINGS just as Paine is stepping out of the shower. Grabbing a towel, he hurriedly rubs it over his body as he strides across the hall into the bedroom to answer it. He glances at the clock on the bedside table as he reaches for the receiver. It’s only seven-thirty. Who would be calling at this hour of the morning?

  “Hello?”

  “Is this Paine Landry?”

  “Yes . . .”

  The caller’s voice is female, and vaguely familiar. It takes only a moment for him to place it. When he does, his breath catches in his throat.

  Until now, he’s forgotten about Dulcie waking him in the wee hours. But the unsettling incident instantly rushes back at him, along with the disturbing memory of another phone call three years ago—a call that began just as this one is beginning.

  “This is Julia Garrity. From Lily Dale—”

  “I know where you’re from,” he says tersely, sitting on the rumpled bed, the towel falling to his feet unheeded.

  I know where you’re from . . . and I know why you’re calling.

  “I—I don’t know how to say this. I’m so sorry to have to be the one to tell you . . .”

  He waits.

  He prepares.

  He knows what she’s going to say; yet still, when he hears the words, utter disbelief swoops in to claim him, momentarily stealing his breath, his voice.

  “Paine, it’s Iris. I found her this morning. She’s dead.”

  FIVE MINUTES LATER, Julia hangs up the telephone. Her legs nearly giving way beneath her, she sinks shakily into the chair beside the desk in Iris’s small second-floor study and buries her tear-swollen face in her hands.

  It’s been more than two hours, but she can’t stop reliving what happened. Describing it in the stilted conversation with Paine Landry didn’t help to calm her frazzled nerves.

  Again, she envisions the gruesome scene she discovered in the bathroom down the hall.

  Iris, facedown in the full bathtub, her naked body dangling over the edge, her legs sprawled across the tile floor behind her.
<
br />   Julia knew instinctively that she was dead even before she touched her hard flesh.

  A freak accident, the paramedics said. She must have slipped on the wet tile as she was getting into her bath. She fell forward, hit her head on the edge of the tub. Unconscious, she toppled face-first into the water and drowned.

  A freak accident.

  Drowned.

  Just like Kristin.

  Julia’s hands flutter to her lap, then back to her face. She’s trembling, her entire body quaking at the unimaginable horror of Iris’s death, and Kristin’s death before hers.

  Her breath is shallow, audible. The only other sound in the room—in the house—is the antique clock ticking loudly in the parlor at the foot of the stairs.

  The old house is empty now, after the flurry of activity that kicked into motion when Julia ran shrieking from the house.

  It was Pilar who dialed 911.

  And it was Pilar who accompanied Iris—Iris’s body, Julia amends—when they took her away. Somebody had to go, and somebody had to stay behind, to call Paine and tell him that his daughter’s grandmother was dead.

  Of course Julia volunteered. Pilar, after all, is a virtual stranger to Paine and Dulcie.

  So is Julia, really. She only met them once, when they came east for Kristin’s memorial service. They were all so caught up in raw grief during the week they were here that she barely remembers speaking to Paine, who spent most of the time silent, remote, lost in anguish.

  But Dulcie . . .

  Julia bonded with Dulcie during those muggy, gray August days.

  Her heart tightens at the memory of Kristin’s beautiful child—a child who was blinded as a toddler after a harrowing bout with meningitis.

  So much tragedy in one family.

  And now this.

  The phone call was as difficult as she had expected. His voice tight with emotion, Paine promised Julia that he and Dulcie would be here as soon as they could. When he asked her about funeral arrangements, Julia pointed out that he would most likely be in charge of that. After all, Dulcie is Iris’s only descendent, aside from her stepson Edward. As far as Julia knows, Iris hasn’t seen him in the three years since he showed up, stone-faced and distant, for Kristin’s memorial service.