A Stranger in My Grave Read online

  She remembered the trip down to Los Angeles, with her mother driving. She’d felt so ecstatic and alive, seeing everything in a fresh new light, watching, noticing things, as if she were preparing herself to point out all the wonders of the world to her child. Later the specialist spoke quite bluntly: “I’m sorry, Mrs. Harker. I detect no signs of pregnancy....”

  This was all Daisy could bear to hear. She’d broken down then, and cried and carried on so much that the doctor made the rest of his report to Mrs. Fielding, and she had told Daisy: there were to be no children ever.

  Mrs. Fielding had talked nearly all the way home while Daisy watched the dreary landscape (where were the green hills?) and the slate-gray sea (had it ever been blue?) and the barren dunes (barren, barren, barren). It wasn’t the end of the world, Mrs. Fielding had said, count blessings, look at silver linings. But Mrs. Fielding herself was so disturbed she couldn’t go on driving. She was forced to stop at a little café by the sea, and the two women had sat for a long time facing each other across a greasy, crumb-covered table. Mrs. Fielding kept right on talking, raising her voice against the crash of waves on pilings and the clatter of dishes from the kitchen.

  Now, five years later, she was still using some of the same words. “Count your blessings, Daisy. You’re secure and comfort­able, you’re in good health, surely you have the world’s nicest husband.”

  “Yes,” Daisy said. “Yes.” She thought of the tombstone in her dream, and the date of her death, December 2, 1955. Four years ago, not five. And the trip to see the specialist must have taken place in the spring, not in December, because the hills had been green. There was no connection between the day of the trip and what Daisy now capitalized in her mind as The Day.

  “Also,” Mrs. Fielding continued, “you should be hearing from one of the adoption agencies any day now—you’ve been on the list for some time. Perhaps you should have applied sooner than last year, but it’s too late to worry about that now. Look on the bright side. One of these days you’ll have a baby, and you’ll love it just as much as you would your own, and so will Jim. You don’t realize sometimes how lucky you are simply to have Jim. When I think of what some women have to put up with in their marriages...”

  Meaning herself, Daisy thought.

  “...you are a lucky, lucky girl, Daisy.”

  “Yes.”

  “I think the main trouble with you is that you haven’t enough to do. You’ve let so many of your activities slide lately. Why did you drop your course in Russian literature?”

  “I couldn’t keep the names straight.”

  “And the mosaic you were making...”

  “I have no talent.”

  As if to demonstrate that there was at least some talent around the house, Stella burst into song while she washed the breakfast dishes.

  Mrs. Fielding went over and closed the kitchen door, not too subtly. “It’s time you started a new activity, one that will absorb you. Why don’t you come with me to the Drama Club luncheon this noon? Someday you might even want to try out for one of our plays.”

  “I doubt that very—”

  “There’s absolutely nothing to acting. You just do what the director tells you. They’re having a very interesting speaker at the luncheon. It would be a lot better for you to go out than to sit here brooding because you dreamed somebody killed you.”

  Daisy leaned forward suddenly in her chair, pushed the dog’s paw off her lap, and got up. “What did you say?”

  “Didn’t you hear me?”

  “Say it again.”

  “I see no reason to…” Mrs. Fielding paused, flushed with annoyance. “Well, all right. Anything to humor you. I simply stated that I thought it would be better for you to come with me to the luncheon than to sit here brooding because you had a bad dream.”

  “I don’t think that’s quite accurate.”

  “It’s as close as I can remember.”

  “You said, ‘because I dreamed somebody killed me.’” There was a brief silence. “Didn’t you?”

  “I may have.” Mrs. Fielding’s annoyance was turning into something deeper. “Why fuss about a little difference in words?”

  Not a little difference, Daisy thought. An enormous one. “I died” had become “someone killed me.”

  She began to pace up and down the room again, followed by the reproachful eyes of the dog and the disapproving eyes of her mother. Twenty-two steps up, twenty-two steps down. After a while the dog started walking with her, heeling, as if they were out for a stroll together.

  We were walking along the beach below the cemetery, Prince and I, and suddenly Prince disappeared up the cliff. I could hear him howling. I whistled for him, but he didn’t come. I went up the path after him. He was sitting beside a tombstone. It had my name on it: Daisy Fielding Harker. Born November 13, 1930. Killed December 2, 1955. . . .

  3

  But I cannot help it. My blood runs in your veins….

  At noon jim called and asked her to meet him downtown for lunch. They ate soup and salad at a café on State Street. The place was crowded and noisy, and Daisy was grateful that Jim had chosen it. There was no need to force conversation. With so many others talking, silence between any two particular people seemed to go unnoticed. Jim even had the illusion that they’d enjoyed a lively lunch, and when they parted in front of the café, he said, “You’re feeling better, aren’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “No more skirmishes with your unconscious?”

  “Oh no.”

  “Good girl.” He pressed her shoulder affectionately. “See you for dinner.”

  She watched him until he turned the corner to the parking lot. Then she began walking slowly down the street in the opposite direction, with no special destination in mind, only a strong desire to stay away from the house as long as she could.

  A rising wind prodded her, and on the tips of the purple moun­tains storm clouds were gathering like great plumes of black smoke. For the first time that day she thought of something unconnected with herself: Rain. It’s going to rain.

  As the wind pushed the storm clouds toward the city, everyone on the street was caught up in the excitement of the coming rain. They walked faster, talked louder. Strangers spoke to strangers: “How about that, look at those clouds....” “We’re going to catch it this time....” “When I hung up the wash this morning, there wasn’t a cloud in sight…” “Just in time for my cinerarias…”

  “Rain,” they said, and lifted their faces to the sky as if they were expecting not just rain but a shower of gold.

  It had been a year without winter. The hot, sunny days, which usually ended in November, had stretched through Christmas and the New Year. It was now February, and the reservoirs were get­ting low, and large sections of the mountains had been closed to picnickers and campers because of the fire hazard. Cloud seeders were standing by, waiting for clouds, like actors ready with their roles waiting for a stage to appear.

  The clouds came, their blacks and grays more beautiful than all the colors of the spectrum, and suddenly the sun vanished and the air turned cold.

  I’ll be caught in the rain, Daisy thought. I should start for home. But her feet kept right on going as if they had a mind of their own and would not be led by a timid girl afraid of getting a little wet.

  Behind her, someone called her name: “Daisy Harker.”

  She stopped and turned, recognizing the voice immediately—Adam Burnett’s. Burnett was a lawyer, an old friend of Jim’s, who shared Jim’s interest in cabinetmaking. Adam came over to the house quite frequently as a refugee from his family of eight, but Daisy didn’t see much of him. The two men usually shut them­selves up in Jim’s hobby shop downstairs.

  All morning Daisy had been thinking off and on of going to talk to Adam, and this sudden meeting confused her, as if she
had conjured up his person out of her thoughts. She didn’t even greet him. She said uncertainly, “How funny, running into you like this.”

  “Not so funny. My office is just two doors down the street, and the place where I eat lunch is directly across the road.” He was a tall, heavily built man in his forties, with a brisk but pleasant professional manner. He noticed Daisy’s confusion immediately but could think of no reason for it. “I’m pretty hard to miss, in this neck of the woods.”

  “I’d—forgotten where your office was.”

  “Oh? For a moment when I first spotted you, I thought you might be on your way to see me.”

  “No. No.” I didn’t, I couldn’t possibly have, come this way deliber­ately. Why, I didn’t even remember his office was near here, or I can’t remember remembering. “I wasn’t on my way to anywhere. I was just walking. It’s such a lovely day.”

  “It’s cold.” He glanced briefly at the sky. “And about to be wet.”

  “I like rain.”

  “At this point, don’t we all.”

  “I meant, I like to walk in the rain.”

  His smile was friendly but a little puzzled. “That’s fine. Go right ahead. The exercise will do you good, and the rain proba­bly won’t hurt you.”

  She didn’t move. “The reason I thought it was funny running into you like this was because—well, I was thinking about you this morning.”

  “Oh?”

  “I was even thinking of—of making an appointment to see you.”

  “Why?”

  “Something has sort of happened.”

  “How can anything sort of happen? It happens or it doesn’t.”

  “I don’t quite know how to explain.” The first drops of rain had begun to fall. She didn’t notice them. “Do you consider me a neurotic woman?”

  “This is hardly the time or place to discuss a subject like that,” he said dryly. “You may like walking in the rain. Some of us don’t.”

  “Adam, listen.”

  “You’d better come up to my office.” He consulted his wrist-watch. “I’ve got twenty-five minutes before I’m due at the courthouse.”

  “I don’t want to.”

  “I think you want to.”

  “No, I feel like such a fool.”

  “So do I, standing around in the pouring rain. Come on, Daisy.”

  They took the elevator up to the third floor. Adam’s reception­ist and his secretary were both still out to lunch, and the suite was quiet and dark. Adam turned on the lamps in the reception room; then he went into his office, hung up his wet tweed jacket to dry on an old-fashioned brass clothes rack.

  “Sit down, Daisy. You’re looking great. How’s Jim?”

  “Fine.”

  “Has he been making any new furniture?”

  “No. He’s refinishing an old bird’s-eye maple desk for the den.”

  “Where did he get hold of it?”

  “The former owners of the house he bought left it behind as trash. I guess they didn’t know what it was—it had so many layers of paint on it. Ten at least, Jim says.”

  She knew this was part of his technique, getting her started talking about safe, impersonal things first, and she half resented the fact that it was working. It was as if he’d applied a few drops of oil to the proper places and suddenly wheels began turning and she told him about the dream. The rain beat in torrents against the windows, but Daisy was walking on a sunny beach with her dog, Prince.

  Adam leaned back in his chair and listened, his only outward reaction an occasional blink. Inwardly, he was surprised, not at the dream itself, but at the way she related it, coldly and without emotion, as if she were describing a simple factual chain of events, not a mere fantasy of her own mind.

  She completed her account by telling him the dates on the tombstone. “November 13, 1930, and December 2, 1955. My birthday,” she said, “and my death day.”

  The strange word annoyed him; he didn’t understand why. “Is there such a word?”

  “Yes.”

  He grunted and leaned forward, the chair squeaking under his weight. “I’m no psychiatrist. I don’t interpret dreams.”

  “I’m not asking you to. No interpretation is necessary. It’s all quite clear. On December 2, 1955, something happened to me that was so terrible it caused my death. I was psychically murdered.”

  Psychic murder, Adam thought. Now I’ve heard everything. These damned silly idle women who sit around dreaming up trouble for themselves and everyone else. . . .

  “Do you really believe that, Daisy?”

  “Yes.”

  “All right. Suppose something catastrophic actually happened on that day. Why is it you don’t remember what it was?”

  “I’m trying to. That’s the real reason I wanted to talk to you. I’ve got to remember. I’ve got to reconstruct the whole day.”

  “Well, I can’t help you. And even if I could, I wouldn’t. I see no point in people deliberately trying to recall an unpleasant occurrence.”

  “Unpleasant occurrence? That’s a pretty mild expression for what happened.”

  “If you don’t recall what happened,” he said with a touch of irony, “how do you know it’s a pretty mild expression?”

  “I know.”

  “You know. Just like that, eh?”

  “Yes.”

  “I wish all knowledge was as easy to come by.”

  Her gaze was cool and steady. “You don’t take me very seri­ously, do you, Adam? That’s too bad, because I’m actually quite a serious person. Jim and my mother treat me like a child, and I frequently respond like one because it’s easier that way—it doesn’t upset their image of me. My self-image is quite different. I con­sider myself fairly bright. I graduated from college when I was twenty-one. . . . Well, we won’t go into that. It’s evident I’m not convincing you of anything.” She rose suddenly and started toward the door. “Thanks for listening, anyway.”

  “What’s your hurry? Wait a minute.”

  “Why?”

  “Nothing’s been settled, for one thing. For another, I’ll admit your, ah, situation intrigues me. This business of reconstructing a whole day four years ago...”

  “Well?”

  “It’s going to be very difficult.”

  “I’m aware of that.”

  “Suppose you’re able to do it, what then, Daisy?”

  “I will at least know what happened.”

  “What use would such knowledge be to you? It certainly won’t make you any happier, will it? Or any wiser?”

  “No.”

  “Why not let it drop, then? Forget the whole business. You have nothing to gain and perhaps a great deal to lose—have you considered that angle of it?”

  “No. Not until now.”

  “Give it some thought, will you?” He got up and opened the door for her. “One more thing, Daisy. The chances are that noth­ing whatever happened to you on that particular day. Dreams are never that logical.” He knew the word never was too strong in this connection, but he used it deliberately. She needed strong words to lean on or to test her own strength against.

  “Well, I must be going,” Daisy said. “I’ve taken up too much of your time. You’ll send a bill, of course?”

  “Of course not.”

  “I’d feel better about it if you did. I mean it.”

  “All right, then, I will.”

  “And thanks a lot for the advice, Adam.”

  “You know, a lot of my clients thank me for my advice and then go right home and do the exact opposite. Is that going to be the case with you, Daisy?”

  “I don’t think so,” she said seriously. “I appreciate your letting me talk to you. I can’t discuss things—problems, I mean—with Jim or Mot
her. They’re too involved with me. They get upset when I step out of my role as the happy innocent.”

  “You should be able to talk freely to Jim. You have a good marriage.”

  “Any good marriage involves a certain amount of playacting.”

  His grunt indicated neither agreement nor disagreement: I’ll have to think about that before I decide. Playacting? Maybe.

  He walked her to the elevator, feeling pleased with himself for handling the situation well and with her for reacting so sensibly. He realized that although he’d known Daisy for a long time, he had never talked seriously to her before; he had been willing to accept her in her role of the happy innocent, the gay little girl, long after he’d discovered that she was not happy or innocent or gay.

  The elevator arrived, and even though someone else was already buzzing for it, Adam held the door back with one hand. He had a sudden, uneasy feeling that he shouldn’t let Daisy go, that nothing had been settled after all and the good solid advice he’d given her had blown away like smoke on a windy day.

  “Daisy...”

  “Someone’s buzzing for the elevator.”

  “I just wanted to say that I wish you’d feel free to call me when­ever you get upset.”

  “I’m not upset anymore.”

  “Sure?”

  “Adam, someone wants the elevator. We can’t just—”

  “I’ll take you down to the ground floor.”

  “That isn’t nec—”

  “I like the ride.”

  He stepped inside, the door closed, and the slow descent began. It wasn’t slow enough, though. By the time Adam thought of any­thing more to say, they had reached the ground floor and Daisy was thanking him again, too politely and formally, as if she were thanking a host for a very dull party.