Frank De Felitta - Audrey Rose

There was a short space of silence.

“You feel all right about leaving her there?”

“Yes, I do,” Janice said firmly.

His voice was downcast. “All right. Get down as soon as you can. I’ll wait dinner for you.”

“Fine.”

Janice hung up the phone and turned to Ivy.

“We must pack quickly if we’re going to get you back to school in time for dinner.”

“I’m packed already,” Ivy said a bit nervously. “Remember?”

Yes, Janice remembered. It was for an instant an effort to remember, principally because with memory returned the sickness in her heart, the feeling of dread that had relentlessly pursued her ever since Bill had left the night before. The things that had happened in—what?—less than twenty-four hours, things that Bill would surely have considered trifling and innocuous, were things which, step by step, had plunged her into a renewed state of panic and despair.

It began Sunday night, several hours after she and Ivy had gone to bed—Janice in the bedroom, Ivy next door in the sitting room. Janice had considered sharing the big bed with Ivy and would have if Ivy had wanted to, but since she didn’t mention it, Janice didn’t encourage it.

After calling out their last good-nights to each other in the darkness, Ivy had asked, “Mom, what’s her name?”

The question troubled Janice, for she knew full well to whom Ivy was referring. Still, she had needlessly asked, “Who?”

“Mr. Hoover’s little girl.”

“Audrey Rose.”

Janice could sense Ivy considering it.

“That’s pretty.”

After another moment of silence, Ivy moved a thought closer.

“Do you think she looked like me?”

“No,” Janice answered abruptly.

“How do you know?”

“He showed us a picture of her. She had black hair and dark eyes, and her face didn’t look anything like yours.” Then, putting a cap on the conversation: “Shall we get some sleep now, darling?”

“Okay. Good night.”

“Good night.”

Later Janice was awakened by a slight disturbance. It was the soft creaking of the connecting door and the dying edge of a shaft of light as it closed.

Alerted by the possibility of illness, Janice quickly rose from the bed without turning on the lamp and quietly went to the door. She opened it a crack and saw that the light emerged from the bathroom at the far end of the sitting room. Ordinarily, she would have simply called out to Ivy and asked if anything was wrong, but some inner sense, vague and unspecific, stopped her from doing so. Instead, she silently padded across the ill-lit room to a point still some distance from the bathroom, but that afforded a clear view through the half-open door, whereupon she came to an abrupt stop.

Standing naked before the wall mirror, gazing transfixed at her own dimly reflected image, was Ivy. Her budding breasts pressed close to the glass, there was a strange, mad light in her eyes as they plumbed the eyes in the mirror, seeming to seek a route through the pale and glistening orbs and beyond, into the deep, impenetrable darkness that lay on the other side. For a moment, Janice thought it was the prelude to a nightmare—her proximity to the glass, the dazed, empty expression, her trancelike immobility all seemed to point in that direction—and she was about to enter when, all of a sudden, Ivy began to giggle: tinkling, high-pitched, girlish giggles directed at the image of herself in the mirror, at the eyes that returned the opaque, vacant gaze. Janice felt her knees trembling. The sight of her daughter’s nakedness, the bizarre laughter that seemed both childishly innocent and hideously sinister were totally mesmerizing. Then the laughter stopped as abruptly as it had started, and in a soft, taunting voice, Ivy began to croon the name

“Audrey Rose? Audrey Rose?”

Janice put a hand on the dresser to steady herself, then silently wheeled around and picked her way back to her own room, softly shutting the door behind her. Turning on the bed lamp, she consulted her watch. Twelve fifteen. The light from the lamp and the noises she purposely made alerted Ivy, and soon Janice heard the toilet flushing and her footsteps pattering across the floor back to bed. Janice waited a minute before opening the door and looking in on her. She lay on her side with her face to the wall and the blanket pulled tightly around her neck. Her pajamas were on the floor next to the bed.

“Are you all right?” Janice asked.

Ivy turned to her mother with a sleepy face of candid innocence and sweetness of youth.

“Umm.” She smiled. “Had to go to the bathroom.”

Sleep eluded Janice for what seemed hours. The fears, the terrors, the complexities, the tangles, the unhappy moments, the fevered pace of the past months pursued her toward dawn with a harpy’s persistence.

She was awakened by a shaft of sunlight, hot and bright, digging into her eyes. For a split second she didn’t know where she was, only that a light was burning her eyes and that a voice was shouting, “Mom! Mom!” She sat up.

“Yes—what is it?”

Struggling out of bed, she ran to the door and flung it open. And saw Ivy, standing in her pajamas in the center of the sitting room, shock and anguish splitting her face, her blond hair tousled.

“Mom, my things are gone. All my clothes—dresses, jeans, everything!”

“Gone? What do you mean, ‘gone’?”

Janice automatically moved toward the closet.

“They’ve been stolen!” Ivy persisted. “Somebody must’ve stolen them! Hairbrush, toothpaste, shampoo, everything! Even my medicine!” At which point she coughed reflexively.

“That’s impossible—”

“Well, look for yourself,” Ivy chided and, pointing to a chair overflowing with clothing, added, “The only things they didn’t take are what I wore yesterday. And my hat and coat.”

Janice opened the closet door and saw the row of divested wire hangers. Her eyes drifted down to the floor, which was barren of shoes and boots. She felt a clammy perspiration on her forehead and strove to contain her anxiety so as not to upset Ivy further. Turning to the dresser, she casually opened each drawer to assure herself they were empty.

Ivy’s lips drew into a grim line.

“Robbers must’ve come while we slept, Mom.”

Janice forced herself to smile.

“What would robbers want with your clothes?”

Even before she finished the sentence, she noticed the suitcase peeking out from under the rollaway.

“They didn’t seem to want your suitcase,” Janice idly commented, dragging it out onto the floor and finding it heavy. Releasing the clasps, the lid practically exploded under the pressure of clothes, bottles, brushes, boots, shoes, all beautifully and expertly packed.

Turning to Ivy to question her about it, Janice was stopped by the look of stunned amazement on her daughter’s face, a look that was completely genuine and spontaneous, a look no actor could have simulated.

“Who did that?” Ivy said in a tiny, stricken voice.

“One of us must have,” Janice said lightly.

“I didn’t!” Ivy exclaimed, putting all the force she could manage into the denial.

There was no doubt in Janice’s mind that Ivy had some time during the night packed the suitcase, just as certainly as there was no doubt that she had no idea she had done so.

Later, at breakfast, Ivy suggested that Bill might have packed the bag before leaving for the city.

“You know how much he wants me back home. He really doesn’t like my being up here. Maybe it was his way of saying so.”

“You mean, like a hint?”

“It’s possible, isn’t it?”

“It’s possible,” Janice managed, putting down her coffee cup which was slopping over the sides from the trembling of her hand.