Frank De Felitta - For Love of Audrey Rose

In his arms, clutched closely to his chest, in blankets, was Juanita. She must have been tired of crying. She only whimpered. For a hideous second, Janice thought the girl had gone into convulsions, but then she saw that Juanita breathed easily enough. Bill clutched her tighter to his chest and edged away along the guardrails of the roof.

Janice watched him.

“Leave me alone!” he barked.

She stopped. Now he had hidden himself behind the main chimney. Frantically, the searchlights pawed the darkness for him, then settled on the red brick of the chimney.

“Bill. Our child is cold. Bring her inside.”

Bill wrapped Juanita tightly in blankets, even draping his own sweater over her. He was wearing only a sweater. Somehow, he must have lost his coat. He shivered, and his lips looked abnormally dark.

“She’s cold, Bill darling. Let’s go home where it’s warm.”

“Leave me alone!”

“Bill! Look at her! It’s below freezing!”

Bill rocked her gently in his arms, edging ever backward. Suddenly, Janice realized there was no railing behind him. She stopped, petrified.

“Bill, if she gets sick, an untimely death. Remember? Is that what you want?”

“Go away,” he repeated, but weaker.

“When does it all end?” she pleaded. “Can you do to her what Hoover did to Ivy? Let her live, Bill! In peace!”

“She’s mine,” he growled.

“Of course, darling, but—”

“Then go away.”

Frustrated, Janice shivered as the wind picked up again. She heard whispers below, behind her, on the fire escape. She thought she heard Wilkins issuing fresh orders. She stepped forward.

“Bill, there isn’t much time. Bring her inside. I’m begging you.”

Bill retreated, saw the danger at the last moment, slipped, and nearly fell the other way. A bottle soared downward out of sight. Seconds later, they heard it crash. Screams rose from the street crowd.

Bill turned to Janice, a hideous grimace on his face.

“A little more time, just a little more time. That’s what you said. And all the while, you were leading me on. You knew three weeks ago.”

“I did it for you, Bill!”

Bill laughed, tucking the blankets closer around Juanita. He rocked her back and forth, comforting her, while his haggard eyes glared at Janice.

“You’ve done nothing for me!” he snarled. “Not since the day Hoover came into our lives!”

Janice paled. She had never seen him spit such venom at anyone, much less herself. It had all backfired, she knew.

He stood upright, pointed a finger at her, “You knew … and you kept it from me!”

“I had to, Bill, for your sake!”

“ Go away! ”

Janice turned. She heard the patrolman hissing to her. She backed closer to the fire escape platform where Borman and Wilkins sat, revolvers drawn.

“Listen, Mrs. Templeton,” Wilkins whispered, “we’ve located this holy man, but in this weather, it’ll be a while before we can get him here. We can’t get nets around the whole building and we think he’s gonna jump. Now, I want you to get his attention. Get him to lower the child.”

“No,” Janice said. “I won’t— You can’t shoot him.”

“Get in position, Borman.”

“No!”

Janice ran halfway across the roof, then saw Bill back away. The gasps rose, from unseen mouths, below. He glared ominously at her.

“Bill,” she pleaded. “There’s a priest coming. The priest of the Temple. You’ll let him talk to you?”

“I got nothing to say to anybody.”

“But he’s a holy man, Bill. He — he’ll know the signs. The real signs. Bill, you could be wrong!”

Bill stared at her, unable to say anything. He clutched Juanita closer.

“Will you let him come?” Janice asked as gently as she could. “Let him make the determination?”

Bill said nothing, yet seemed to acquiesce. He settled himself miserably in the crook formed by the chimney and two guy wires. He turned his back to her, protecting himself as best he could from the wind.

Janice inched back to the fire escape and knelt down. Cooper’s red face jerked, surprised to see her. Below Cooper was Wilkins.

“He’s agreed to see the priest,” she whispered. “That means he’ll listen to reason.”

Cooper and Wilkins looked at each other. Wilkins shrugged.

“Okay. Let’s wait for His Highness,” Wilkins said. “Mrs. Templeton, you better stay up there. Engage his attention, keep talking, keep him calm.”

Janice went back to the corner of the roof. As she circled the guardrails, Bill’s eyes followed her, but not his body, so that he remained hunched under the guy wires. Juanita seemed to sleep peacefully in his arms.

Janice settled to a spot about ten yards in front of him, at a ventilator shaft. There they stared at each other, as though across a no-man’s-land, Bill’s face changing from grief to hostility to guilt, but never saying a word.

He relaxed enough to lower his head, a sign of exhaustion. Then he jerked awake, scrambled to his knees, and stared feverishly into the darkness. He did not seem to know exactly where he was. Snow fell on his hair, stuck to his eyelids. He kissed Juanita’s cheek gently and brushed the snow from her curly hair.

Down below the fire escape, a fresh commotion broke out as Mrs. Hernandez became hysterical with the waiting and had to be restrained.

Suddenly, jeers rose from the crowd. It was like an echo of jackals, reverberating among the alleys and the bricks. The news teams poked one another and shifted their video lenses. Bill pulled himself to his feet, and looked around as the snow began to fall heavily again, obscuring his vision.

“What?” he called. “Who’s there?”

Up onto the roof, wearing black boots under his orange robe, the Master emerged. The wind whipped his robe around in a violent flutter. He blinked nervously, recognized Janice in the forms of snow and shadow among the debris. Then he followed her gaze to where Bill stood, clutching the infant.

The spotlights suddenly crisscrossed over the Master’s body, like an incandescent lamp. He threw himself forward, arms outstretched, his yellow scarf billowing outward in the freezing wind: “Om ayuse samharakesvare hum phat.”

Bill visibly paled, trembled at the words.

The Master stepped closer, out of the swirling snowstorm, and pointed directly at the girl in Bill’s arms: “Om ayuse samharakesvare hum phat!!”

Bill retreated, until snow slipped off the near edge of the roof. The Master hesitated.

“I am Master Sri Parutha,” he whispered rapidly. “Give me the girl!”

“No,” Bill protested, shaking his head, afraid of the Master. “I won’t! She’s mine!”

“Have you passed the ninth circle of initiation?”

“What?”

“Have you?”

“No, I—”

“Then you are unqualified to judge her! It is for a holy man to say!”

Janice did not know whether the Master was making it up or whether, in fact, he was genuinely quoting doctrine. Bill too seemed puzzled. The Master leaned forward but was afraid to take a step.

Bill’s left foot was already slipping on the ice at the edge of the roof.

“Give her to me!” the Master shouted.

“No. Please, don’t make me—”

“Hand her to me,” the Master said, softer now, almost friendly, “and let me make the determination.”

Reluctantly, Bill, blinking back the tears and the snow from his eyes, took a single step and gently transferred the girl to the Master’s arms. In that instant, a shot rang out, red drops flew upward from Bill’s shirt, and he was flung backward onto the roof.

Janice screamed from where she stood at the ventilator, and Borman climbed over the ledge, revolver drawn. Wilkins rapidly followed; the Master, face white, fell to his knees, though whether to protect Juanita or out of sheer terror even he did not know.