C. Lawrence: Silent Stalker

“He has no idea. He doesn’t even know how sick I am.”

“I’m sorry to hear you’re not well.”

“I’m dying, Dr. Campbell-I have stage-four lung cancer. And I am very worried what will happen to your father when I am gone. That is why I was hoping you might… take pity on him.”

“Look, Ms. Soigne, I-”

“Call me Chloe, please.”

“I’ve lived this long without my father. I don’t need to forgive him, and I don’t want to see him.”

“I see.” Again she gave a little gasp and a cough, but mastered herself. “Perhaps in time your heart will soften and you will forgive him, or at least be willing to speak with him.”

“What makes you think he wants to talk to me?’

“I know he does. He is a proud man, and a foolish one in many ways, but I know he has thought about you and your sister constantly over the years.”

“Actions speak louder than words, Ms.-Chloe.”

“Will you at least think about it, Dr. Campbell? It’s the wish of a dying woman.”

“All right,” he said, irritated at being manipulated so boldly. He thought he heard someone talking in the background, and she lowered her voice.

“I must go now-may God bless you.”

The line went dead. He stood with the phone in his hand, a link to broken promises and shattered dreams. He stared numbly out the window at the mimosa tree, its branches bare and cold in the bitter February wind.

Sara Wittier pulled back the green brocade curtain covering the front window of her apartment and looked down into the street at the patrol car parked at the corner of Fiftieth Street and Ninth Avenue. They had just changed shifts about half an hour ago. The officer on duty had arrived with enough supplies to last a week: a huge bag from Dunkin’ Donuts, another from McDonald’s, and a large cup of coffee. It was too dark to see what he was doing down there, and she couldn’t help wonder how these cops managed to stave off boredom. Was he allowed to listen to the radio or do crossword puzzles? Probably not-the killer could slip right by him unless he was watching every minute.

She shivered and let the curtain drop. Wrapping her arms around her body, she turned from the window and went into the kitchen. She wasn’t hungry, but she longed for the comfort food could bring. Being an actress, and very young, Sara was given to self-dramatizing. Right now she was feeling sorry for herself. Since she couldn’t have the comfort she craved-to feel safe-a bowl of Haagen Dazs would have to do in the meanwhile. Maybe it was an excuse, but she didn’t care. After all, she was being stalked. She opened the freezer and pawed through her roommate’s cartons of organic vegetables until she found the lone pint of chocolate ice cream in the back.

She pulled the biggest bowl she could find from the cupboard and scooped in generous spoonfuls of ice cream. She took the bowl into the living room and curled up on the couch, covering herself with the afghan her grandmother had knitted her. Pink and green, the school colors of Sweet Briar, her alma mater. She sighed as a single tear slid down her smooth young cheek. Her life of sororities and classes and weekends with the boys at William and Mary seemed light years away.

She ate slowly and rhythmically, spooning small amounts into her mouth with each bite to make it last longer. She knew there was half a day’s worth of calories in this bowl of ice cream, but she didn’t care. She might be dead in a few days, so she might as well enjoy herself.

She heard the sound of the dead bolt in the front door and practically leapt from the couch, the afghan still wrapped around her shoulders, her heart beating hot and fast in her throat. The door opened and her roommate Caroline sauntered in, her yoga mat strapped to her back as usual.

“Hi!” Caroline sang out, closing the door behind her. “What are you eating?”

“Ice cream,” Sara replied, sitting down again as thin, cold relief flooded her veins. She didn’t want her roommate to see how frightened she was.

“That stuff will kill you,” Caroline said, tossing her yoga mat in the hall closet. Caroline was tall and thin and sallow, and full of opinions about everything, especially food and nutrition. The more her advice was unwanted, the more relentlessly she gave it, and it usually involved admonitions to avoid everything Sara enjoyed eating. Caroline seemed to take pride in everything she didn’t eat-the list was endless and always changing. Just last week she had come home proudly declaring she had given up gluten-not because she was allergic to it, but because her friend Alice had stopped eating it. Caroline was obsessed with abstemiousness, as though self-denial was a competitive sport.

Sara leaned back on the couch. “I’m going to die soon anyway.” She noted with satisfaction the alarm on Caroline’s face. She had recently suspected that her roommate was borrowing her clothes without asking, but she couldn’t prove anything.

“Don’t be silly-they’ll catch that guy before he gets to you,” Caroline said, bending to touch her toes, effortlessly putting both palms on the floor.

“Maybe, maybe not,” Sara responded. “In the meantime, I’m going to have some Haagen Dazs.”

Caroline sat down on the carpet and stretched her legs out in a split. Sara knew she had just come from yoga class, so she didn’t see why Caroline needed to stretch, but her roommate was always showing off how limber she was.

“That’s not a real name, you know,” Caroline said, touching her nose to her left knee. “They made it up to sound Scandinavian.”

“Well, it’s real now,” Sara said, “because I’m eating it.” She swallowed a big mouthful just to show she was right, and gave herself an ice cream headache.

Caroline shrugged and touched her nose to the other knee. The bones in the back of her neck stood out, poking through her yellowish skin. Sara thought her roommate would look a lot healthier if she would eat some red meat or cheese once in a while. She had given up meat years ago, and dairy ended up on her hit list after she took a nutrition workshop with Gary Null, the NPR health food guru. Sara called him the health food Nazi, which made Caroline livid.

“So are there any leads?” Caroline asked, twisting herself into some bizarre yoga-inspired pretzel shape.

“Not really,” said Sara. “He’s stalking me now.” She looked at her roommate to see if her words had the intended dramatic effect, but Caroline was concentrating too hard on bending her body in unnatural ways. Sara decided to raise the stakes. “He cornered Mindy in the hallway of her apartment. That’s where he ran the sword through her heart.”

In reality, the sword had pierced Mindy’s stomach, but Sara thought “through her heart” sounded so much more romantic. Through her heart. It was as though she’d been slain by an overly fond lover.

The truth was that Sara Wittier, from Middleburg, Virginia, was too naive and too trusting to believe that life could be untimely ripped from her tender young body. In spite of her initial shock at Mindy’s death, and the threatening note she had received, down deep Sara believed that death came to other people-the old, sick, and unlucky-but not to her. She was none of those things. She was young and healthy, and it never occurred to her that even healthy young girls could one day be very, very unlucky.

The next morning Lee took the subway back up to the theatre to observe rehearsal. The Noble Fools had decided not to cancel the production, and Mindy’s understudy was apparently more than willing to step in. Davillia had dramatically quoted the famous dictum that “the show must go on,” though Lee suspected she was more driven by monetary considerations. The landlord had been paid in advance, and a cancelled production would leave a huge gap in the company’s finances. Lee had agreed to keep an eye on things at the theatre while Butts and Sergeant McKinney interviewed Mindy’s friends and family.