Chapter Seven:
I was drawn to second room on the right. Why? I couldn’t put it into words if I had a thousand years to think about it. But something led me there. Whether it was a push or a pull, I don’t know. In the end, it didn’t matter. What mattered is that I was there.
The door was open a crack and I tried without success to take a look inside. So, I knocked lightly on the door and waited impatiently for an answer. There was none. I knocked again and waited. And again there was no answer. Nine times out of ten, I would’ve walked away in such circumstances, but this was the one time in ten I would stay.
I eased the door open little by little until I saw, standing at the opposite end of the room, a young woman. A touch over five foot six, she showed slightly more flesh and had much more hair than Sylvia.. Standing full faced to the window, she was dressed simply in a long sleeved cotton blouse and jeans, both of which were colored off black. This young woman was Adrienne, the other daughter born to William and Donna Winters.
“Excuse me,” I said in a low sympathetic voice.
“What is it?,” she answered without turning to face me.
“Have you seen a woman named Alexandria or your aunt Gina? I’m looking for them.”
Adrienne, I sensed, was different from her sister. I was trying to ease my way into her confidence. I didn’t want to just blurt out the nature of what I wanted to say to her. It was a decidedly different approach than I one I used with Sylvia.
“Gina is down the hall in mother‘s room,” she said. “Alexandria is downstairs in the kitchen. But that isn’t what you really want to ask me, is it?’’
“No, it isn’t.”
“Mr. Caterski, isn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“Are you hungry, Mr. Caterski?”
“No, thanks. My stomach isn’t in a good mood right now.”
“Thirsty, then?”
“Something warm.”
“Tea?”
“Sure.”
“Black?”
“Fine.”
“Any particular kind?”
“Surprise me.”
“Okay.”
“Maybe it will calm down my stomach.”
“Mine, too.”
“I’ll just be a minute.”
“Take your time.”
Adrienne reeled in her gaze and went to a bed side phone sitting a couple of steps away. She was unsteady on her feet and walking even a few feet proved trying. I stepped forward in order to get a decent look at her face. But either by chance, or by design, she turned her profile away from me and toward the wall. Having failed to get a better look at her face, I used the time to make a quick inspection of the room. There wasn’t much to see. There was so little to see, in fact, if there had been any less there would have been nothing in the room at all.
Adrienne’s bedroom, like all other rooms in the house, was large. But unlike all other rooms in the house, it was decorated in a complexly minimalist tone. What was in the room is what needed to be in the room. Nothing more. A bed, a dresser, and a night table. The room color was a quiet pastel. Such a color in a room is supposed to lighten moods and provide some sort of general emotional harmony. I doubt, though, that things had rarely, if ever, been achieved here. When finished with her call for tea, Adrienne returned to her sentinel staring out the bay view window.
“The tea will be brought up in a few minutes,” she said. “Do you want to ask me questions now or wait until the tea gets here.”
“Now if it’s okay with you.”
“It’s okay. Go ahead.”
“Were you in the game room a few minutes ago?”
“With Gina, Alexandria, and my brother and sister?”
“Yeah.”
“Yes, I was there.”
All I could see of her was her long, dark hair. Straight and possessing a high, natural sheen, it rolled well past the collar and didn’t stop until it reached somewhere near the middle of her back. Frustrated by this singular view of her, I continued the interview.
“Did Alex ask you any questions.”
“Alex?”
“Alexandria. I call her Alex.”
“Oh yes, I see. Yes, she asked questions while she played pool.”
“And you answered them?”
“All of us answered them.”
“You, Sylvia, and George.”
Doubling up on interviews with the same person is never a bad idea. Even if both interviewers ask entirely the same set of questions. The person can slip up, make a mistake, and let out a valuable piece of information. Or they can sound suspiciously perfect, repeating word for word what had been said previously, and in exact with others who had been interviewed on the same topics. I was not in the mood for a long, detailed interview with Adrienne. I just was not up to it.. So, I did all that I could to keep things moving forward.
“Mind if I use a tape recorder?”
“If you have to.”
I crept to within a few paces of Adrienne and put the recorder down on the night table. She, in response, stepped a pace or two away to the right. Determined to a full, front view of her face, I sat down on a corner of the bed and waited for to return to the window. I mulled over which questions to ask her. Which ones, I wondered, would elicit
the best responses.
“How many times have you met Gina?” “Not many. No more than four.”
“In your life?”
“Yes.”
“When was the last time?”
“The funeral.”
“Before that.”
“I’m not sure. It’s been a long time.”
“Do you remember the occasion?”
“She has a business. She probably wanted money. “
“Do you have an impression of her?”
“I have no real opinion of her at all. As I said, I’ve only met her a few times in my life. And beside the funeral, I have no real memory of her.”
“What kind of relationship did she have with your mother? Did they communicate a lot? Were they close in any way?”
“It wasn’t easy being close to my mother. But she wasn’t the only one. The entire family had the same problem. That applies to communication too.”
Adrienne spoke with the kind of calm assuredness that can persuade you to just naturally accept what she was telling you was the truth.. But why, I still wondered, did she insist on keeping her back to me in this way? Was it to hide grief? Was it to mask a natural shyness? Was it because she was lying to me and this was the only way to keep from giving herself away?
“Do you believe in ghosts?,” I asked. Where in the seven hells that question came from, I couldn’t tell you.
“Ghosts? What kind of ghosts?”
“The kind that haunt your dreams.”
“Why would you ask me a question like that?’
“I just wanted to know if you’ve dreamt about your mother since---.”
“Aren’t you supposed to be asking me about my mother and father?”
“Hasn’t Alex already done that?”
“Yes, but I thought------.”
“Thought what? She was thorough, wasn’t she?”
“Yes, but I-----.”
“You miss your mother, don’t you Adrienne?”
“Yes.”
“You loved her, didn’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Were you the only one?”
Both of her hands came rushing up to cover a down turned face. She started to shiver a little bit, as if she had suddenly been hit by an unexpectedly bitter wind.
“I’m sorry,” I said, “I shouldn’t have gone there.”
“It’s okay, I just----. I mean sometimes I----.”
“Breakdown and cry?“
“Yes.”
“Is that why you’ve kept your back to me?”
“Partly. Where is the damn tea anyway?”
“I think I should be going. I’ve been here too long already.”
“Do you really have to? You haven’t been here long. There are still a lot of questions you haven’t asked me yet. Where was I when my mother died? Where was my father? My sister? When was the last time I saw my mother?” The plea in her voice was strong, strong enoughto even make a deaf man hear. It had a quality that was all too familiar to me. Clinging, desperate, tormented, just like----, just like a woman I used to know.
I took a few steps toward the door, then stopped. I heard another plea for me to stay. A soft, mournful, “Please”. I took a couple of more steps toward the door, then stopped. Again. This time it wasn’t the words that stopped me from leaving. It was a touch of the hand on my upper right arm. The touch closed my eyes and weakened my knees to the point of near collapse.
I fell into another world then, as my mind drifted back to a familiar place and time. A place and time in the not too distant past. In a clear and precise, frame by frame style, that past came surging up to the moment of the here and now. Then I heard the plea yet again. ”Please stay.“
Who made the plea this time? Was it Adrienne? Or was it-----. Or was it the both of them? I didn’t know. I didn’t know. Reality and dream were bending into each other. The past and present had arced up and joined together in a blind, mad rush. They were all bleeding, twisting, and intertwining into each other. I opened my eyes and turned around. Then Adrienne turned around. The instant I saw her face, I saw someone else’s face too. Someone I used to know, someone I used to-----. She had the same high rounded cheek bones, the same thin, slightly jutting tip of the nose, and the same full. Flawlessly sculpted lips. The similarities were so striking that I couldn’t help----. I just couldn’t help to be drawn to them all over again. She had the same big, wide brown eyes and the same long nailed, long fingered hands.
There were dark similarities too. Her face had suffered a beating, Not the worst of beatings, but none good were they? She had the same bruised left cheek, the same darkened left eye, the same dry bloodied nose. I reached out to her, took her hands in mine, and pulled her toward me. Discretion had slipped quietly out of the room.
I took her cheeks slowly into my hands. She offered no protest, no physical signs of resistance, nothing that said she wasn’t in full agreement with what I was doing. I leaned forward; she leaned with a slight tilt back. Then we kissed. A light, but deeply impassioned kiss. Her lips tasted juicy sweet like a ripe cherry fresh off of the tree. And then----, then-----. A servant came into the room. It wasn’t Winslow. This servant was female. A tall, thin forty something female.
“Here’s the tea you asked for,” she said.
The words were like a hard slap in the face and brought me back to reality with a thud. I opened my eyes and saw Adrienne standing there right in front of me with her mouth still opened from the kiss. I nearly jumped out of my skin at the thought of why the kiss had happened. Adrienne rolled her tongue slowly across her lips as if she was trying to recapture the taste of the kiss. Her large brown eyes fixed on me, staring hard with both desire and incomprehension.
What the hell is wrong with me, I thought, kissing Adrienne because she looked like Donna, her mother. I must be losing my mind. What was left of it to lose. Get a grip will you, I shouted to myself. Okay, you screwed up. But it’s over now Get on with the business at hand. Get on with it, then get the hell out of there. My head was pounding, my stomach spinning, and I desperately needed to go home, and get some sleep.
“I’m leaving,” I said with morose abruptness.
“Do you have to?”
“Yes, it’s definitely time to go.” I’d moved to within a two or three steps of the door when Adrienne stopped me cold with this short, blunt line.
“How much to kill him?”
“What?”
“How much to kill my father.”
“You’re asking the wrong person.”
“Not even for twenty five thousand dollars?”
“No.”
“Why not?”t
“Not because I’m not capable of killing. I am certainly capable. Under the right conditions, who isn’t?’
“Why, then?”
“All sorts of reasons.”
“I can’t believe we’re even having this conversation.”
“In this place anything is possible.“
“Waiter, check please. I’m in a hurry. Goodbye Adrienne, it’s been both interesting and strange.”
I headed for the door without looking back. I heard Adrienne trailing no more than a step behind me.
“Wait,” she said. “Come back. Don’t you want to kiss me again and pretend it’s-------.”
“Gina,“ I called out, “are you up here somewhere. Gina.”
“Wait, Mr. Caterski.. Don’t go, please. We can even fuck if you want to. You can close your eyes and pretend it’s-----.”
“Gina! Gina!”
“It’s nothing to be ashamed of. And I wouldn’t mind.”
Desperately leaving Adrienne behind, I left her room and went looking for Gina. I found her in a room at the farthest end of the hall. It was Donna’s room. Jesus, Buddha, Mohammed, Shiva, and whatever other gods you care to name. I crept into the room as if the floor had been booby trapped with mines. The room had been stripped bare of everything except the paint on the walls. No bed, no dresser, no closet full of clothes, nothing.
This condition had sent Gina into a rage. A rage she had just begun to act out. It was too strong and virulent to restrain. There was a large screwdriver in her right hand and just started using it to attack things. First a window, then a wall. Then a wall and a window. Then two more windows and a wall. I shook my head and cursed my luck. I just couldn’t seem to avoid strange situations. Maybe it was the damn house, I don’t know. But I asked myself, were the strange situations following me or was I following them?
The longer I stayed in this room, the more it got to me. I saw Donna’s face, I heard her voice, I felt her touch. My entire body flushed hot, even the room was filled to its very edges with cold. The muscles in my arms and legs began to tremble low and uncontrollably. I didn’t have a clue what was happening to me. But I knew that this room, in some way or another, was the cause.
I had to get out of there. And by out of there, I meant the room, the house, and that entire area of town. And I wanted to get out of there as soon as possible. Which meant I didn’t want to wait for Gina’s screwdriver assault to burn itself down to its last ember. Who knew how long that would be? So, I walked up behind and put my hands of her. A bad error of judgement on my part.
Gina spun around as if she’d been on a coiled spring pivot and punched me in the face with her left hand. It was a vicious shot, like getting hit flush with Thor’s mighty hammer. The punch knocked me to the floor, though I have no memory of falling down. I as hit, then I was down. It hurt like a motherfucker (Nothing hurts worse than a motherfucker. Nothing).
I screamed and clutched at my nose .My eyes teared up so much I couldn’t see.
And blood. There was plenty of blood. God, how I hate the sight of it. Especially when my own. I sat there on the floor and waited for my eyes to clear, my ears to stop ringing, and my nose to stop bleeding. So much for leaving as quickly as possible. All in all, I was on the floor a damn long time. When my eyes could actually focus enough to see again, I looked up and saw Gina standing over me.
“Goddamn you,” I said, “you did that on purpose.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“The hell you didn’t.”
“No, really. I was lost in a daydream and-----.”
“And punching me in the face brought you out of it.”
“You don’t understand. I was thinking about----.”
“Christ, you’re a pathetic liar. You hit me because you wanted to.”
“And why would I want to?”
Gina bent over her wide bearish body and stuck out her right paw as an offer to help me up. I refused.
“You go down and find Alex,” I said. “I’m going out to the car.”
“Shouldn’t you clean up first? You have blood all over you.”
“Really? Is that what this is? Blood? I ran my tongue slowly around on my lips. “Mmm, my guess would ‘ve been a vintage year Chardonnay. But if you say it’s blood, then it must be blood.”
A fitting piece of sarcasm, I thought. Gina didn’t think so. She understood it easily enough though. It wasn’t complex or sophisticated. Yeah, she understood it all right. But she hated it too. And I was fairly certain, she hated me too. I stood up on my own and, once assured of my balance, I headed for the door.
“I’m giving you five minutes to get Alex,” I said, “ and get both your asses to the car. I’m leaving whether you’re there or not.”
“Are you staying on the case?”
That question took a lot of nerve to ask. I didn’t stop to answer it. This house was a strange place of cursed madness and, if I didn’t get out of there in the next two minutes, I was going to go mad myself. I ran(yes ran) out of the room, down the hall, down the stairs, and out of the house. The first rush of outside air was sweet. Not sweet because it was warm and caressing. No, this air was sweet simply because it was not the Winters home. But before I could go, before I could leave this damnable place, there would have to be one more confrontation with Sonny Winters. It would be brief and, once done, a hard rain would fall again.