Аврам Дэвидсон - Ellery Queen’s Double Dozen

The woman went back into the house slamming the door behind her. The girl lay quietly, her thin body flat and shapeless on the worn quilt that covered the bed. She became aware of the sounds and the heat of the day. In the mesh-fenced pen a hen sang proudly of a newly laid egg. Across the fields drifted the somnolent purr of a moving machine and the irritating monotonous chir-r-r of cicadas in the dry grass.

Around the corner of the house a small figure appeared picking its way along the overgrown path. Rosellen was a tiny, exquisitely fashioned child with vacant, round blue eyes and curly blonde hair. Louise despised her for many reasons, and her dislike was mixed with a hopeless envy. For her part, Rosellen’s somewhat simple mind couldn’t conceive that in all the world there was a person who did not like and admire her. She lived in a large, beautifully kept house close to the road and her father was the Carters’ landlord. She seldom came to see Louise and when she did, the older girl’s sullen dislike was so apparent that Rosellen went home puzzled and unhappy — which alarmed Louise’s parents so much that they threatened her with dire punishment if she didn’t behave more civilly.

Louise watched her small visitor approach with coldly impassive eyes. Rosellen was wearing a blue-and-white checked pinafore. Her hair was slicked into two braids with blue ribbons and she wore tiny white sandals. She carried a long flat box.

“Hello,” Rosellen said, looking down at Louise with a testy superiority.

“Hello,” said Louise flatly.

The blonde child fidgeted. “Mama said I was to go play and leave her alone. Annie’s gone and Laura’s gone and Sally went to the coast with her mama, so I came over here. Do you want to play paper dolls? I brought mine.”

“They stink, stink, stink!”

The round blue eyes stared. The childish red lips pouted. “They don’t either! If you don’t play nice with me I’ll tell your mama on you.”

Rosellen leaned forward and set the flat box on the bed. She tugged open the lid. As she did so, Louise saw a heavy gold chain around her visitor’s neck and a heavy something that swung below it.

“Whatcha got on the chain?”

The blue eyes widened self-consciously. A small dimpled hand touched the lumped pinafore. “That’s a secret,” said Rosellen mysteriously. “I got it out of Mama’s jewel box.” Defensively she added, “Mama never told me I couldn’t wear it.”

“Lemme see it.”

The blue eyes regarded Louise with a cool importance. “You got to promise you won’t tell anybody.”

“I promise, lemme see it.”

“Mama’d be awful mad if she knew.”

“Thought you said she let you wear it.”

“N-no — she let me look at it though. Daddy doesn’t even know she’s got it. She said he’d be mad and make her send it back.”

“I bet! You’re making up stories, Rosellen. It’s some ole dime store junk somebody gave you.”

“It is not!” The blonde child flushed. “A nice man my mama used to know sent it to her from South America.”

“Quit making up stories. Ole brass chain — turn your ole neck all green!”

Rosellen pulled the heavy chain out from the front of her pinafore. “There, see! It’s not any ole junk! It’s a real ruby! Mama said sol”

The jewel at the end of the chain was the most beautiful thing Louise had ever seen. It was a deep-red stone as large as a sparrow’s egg, surrounded by clear brilliants and smaller red stones, all intricately wrapped in fine gold wire.

“Oh-h-h-!” Louise sat up straight Her eyes glowed. Never in all her life had she seen anything so beautiful or envisioned anything so desirable, even in her most precious dreams. The red gem glowed at her like a beckoning ember.

Rosellen smiled proudly. “It’s terribly valuable,” she said with insufferable self-importance. “It’s a real, real gen-u-wine ruby. I bet you never saw one before, did you?”

“I bet it’s nothing but glass,” Louise said automatically. She put out her hand to touch the wonderful red stone.

Rosellen jerked away from her. “You’ll get it all dirty putting your fingers on it.”

“I just want to see it a minute.”

The blonde little girl dropped the jewel down the front of the dress. “If you aren’t going to play with me, I’m going home.”

Louise caught her arm. “Don’t leave yet,” she said. “Let me just put it on a minute. Then I’ll play anything you like.”

“I’ve got to go home,” said Rosellen uneasily.

“No, you don’t. Just let me wear it a little while. I’ll play dolls with you an’ I’ll be real nice.”

“Give it right back?”

“I promise.”

“Well — all right. You’ve got to take it off when I say so. You promised.”

The chain was unsnapped from the slender white neck and clasped around the bony dark one. The gem seemed to burn Louise’s skin as she slid it down inside the open collar of her old shirt. It settled and seemed to be at home between the swelling bumps of breasts.

She held her hand over it and through the thin fabric of her shirt and the blood-red web of her fingers it seemed to glow with a marvelous and sinister light. Her thoughts folded in on it. It would be her lucky talisman, her protector, her friend. Something really truly would happen to old Miss Miles and old Miss Henderson — something awful, much worse than she could ever imagine. She felt her whole being transformed and made beautiful by the miraculous presence of the jewel against her body.

Rosellen laid her paper dolls out on the bed. She hummed to herself with housewifely zeal. “You can have Maria for your mama,” she said brightly, “and Kathy and Dora for your children. I’ll take Debbie for my mama and Alice and Susan for my little girls.”

She spread the brightly colored dolls and sorted out a pile of elegant paper clothing for each one.

Louise sat silently, her hand clutching the stone beneath her shirt, her thin, ugly face translucent with an inner light.

Rosellen said importantly, “I’m all ready, Louise. You can come visit my house first.” She stared doubtfully at the darkly silent girl. “Louise, come on. You said you’d play. You promised.” She shook Louise’s arm insistently. “If you don’t play I’m going home. Give me my mama’s necklace!”

Louise sat silent and immovable.

Rosellen’s blue eyes filled with angry tears. “I’m going to tell your mama you won’t play with me. You’ll git it! You’ll see!”

She started toward the house.

Louise leaped from the bed and caught her by the shoulder. She dug her wiry fingers into the soft flesh. “You tell my mama anything, I’ll tell your mama you stole her necklace!”

Rosellen began to wail.

“Shut up! Mama’ll hear you!”

The children returned to the bed.

“You said you’d play with me,” Rosellen sobbed. “You promised!”

“I didn’t say where I’d play, did I?” Louise asked. Behind her thick glasses her eyes gleamed redly. “Let’s take the dolls an’ go up to the ditch. I’ve got a nice playhouse up there, all cut out of the weeds. Just like a real house. It’s got rooms an’ a little table an’ chairs.”

“I don’t want to go up there. Mama told me not to get dirty.”

“It’s got real rugs on the floor. You won’t get a bit dirty.” Louise began to press the dolls into the box.

“I don’t want to go. I want my mama’s necklace and my dolls. I’m going home. You’re not nice.”

Louise seemed to swell darkly. “You do like I say or I’ll fix you! I’ll follow you around all day an’ I’ll bite you an’ I’ll hit you an’ I’ll kick you and I’ll tell all the kids nasty stories about you!”