Mary Clark - A Cry In The Night

“He didn’t want to talk to you. He just wanted to know if the lines were down around here last night. He asked me whether or not you’ve been out. Miz Krueger, Jenny, he’s uncanny. He told me I sounded funny. I said I didn’t know about that; it’s been pretty busy trying to feed all the cattle in this storm. That seemed to satisfy him. Then he said the other day… Remember when he called right after we found Arden?”

“Yes.”

“He said he’d been thinking about it. He said that I should have been in the office at that time, that the call should have been picked up there first. Jenny, it’s like he’s right here watching us. He seems to know every move we make.”

“What did you tell him?”

“I said that I’d gotten Rooney out of the hospital that morning and hadn’t been to the office yet so that it was still on the night setting where it rings in the house. Then he asked me if Mark has been poking around here; that was the way he put it, ‘poking around.’”

“What did you say?”

“I told him Dr. Ivanson had been checking the animals and should I have called Mark instead? He said no.”

“Clyde, did he mention the children?”

“No, ma’am. Just said to tell you he’d be phoning and he wanted you in the house waiting for the call. Jenny, I tried to keep him on so they could maybe trace where he is but he talked so fast and got off so quick.”

Mark phoned every day. “Jenny, I want to see you.”

“Mark, Clyde’s right. He is uncanny. He particularly asked about you. Please, stay away.”

On the afternoon of the twenty-fifth Joe came to the house. “Mrs. Krueger, is Mr. Krueger all right?”

“What do you mean, Joe?”

“He phoned to see how I was feeling. Wanted to know if I’ve been seeing you. I said just the one time I bumped into you. I didn’t say you’d come to our place. You know what I mean. He said he wanted me to come back to work when I’m ready but if I ever came near you or if he ever heard me call you Jenny, he’d shoot me with the same rifle he used to kill my dogs. He said my dogs. That means he did kill the other one too. He sounds crazy. I think it won’t do no good for either you or me if I’m around here. You tell me what to do.”

He sounds crazy. He was openly threatening Joe now. Despair anesthetized Jenny’s terror. “Joe, did you tell anyone about this; did you tell your mother?”

“No, ma’am. I don’t want to get her started.”

“Joe, I beg you, don’t tell anyone about that call. And if Erich phones back, just be very calm and easy with him. Tell him the doctor wants you to wait a few weeks more but don’t tell him you refuse to work. And Joe, for God sake, don’t tell him you’ve seen me again.”

“Jenny, there’s real bad trouble, isn’t there?”

“Yes.” It was useless to deny it.

“Where is he with your girls?”

“I don’t know.”

“I see. Jenny, I swear to God you can trust me.”

“I know I can. And if he phones you again, let me know right away, please.”

“I will.”

“And, Joe… If-I mean he might come back here. If you happen to see him or the car. I need to know at once.”

“You will. Elsa was over at our place for dinner with Uncle Josh. She was talking about you, saying what a lovely person you were.”

“She never acted as though she liked me.”

“She was scared of Mr. Krueger. He told her to know her place, to keep her mouth shut, to make sure nothing was ever out of place or changed in the house.”

“I never could understand why she worked for us, the way Erich treated her.”

“The kind of money he paid. Elsa said that she’d work for the devil for that big a salary.” Joe put his hand on the doorknob. “Sounds like she was working for the devil, don’t it, Jenny?”

February is not the shortest month of the year, Jenny thought. It seemed an eternity. Day after day. Minute after minute. The nighttime madness of lying in bed, watching the outline of the crystal bowl against the darkness. She wore Caroline’s nightgown every night, kept a cake of pine soap under the pillow so the bed always held the faint scent of pine.

If Erich came in some night, quietly, stealthily, if he came into this room, this nightgown, this scent, might lull him into security.

When she did sleep she dreamt incessantly of the children. In sleep they were waiting for her. They would call “Mommy, Mommy,” and tumble into the bed, pressing small, wiggly bodies against her, and then as she tried to put her arms around them she awoke.

She never dreamt of the baby. It was as though the same total involvement she had given to preserving the small flicker of life in that tiny body now belonged to Tina and Beth.

She had the confession memorized; over and over it ran through her head: “I am not responsible…”

During the day she was never far from the phone. To pass the time she spent most mornings cleaning the house. She dusted and waxed and mopped, swept, polished silver. But she would not use the vacuum for fear of missing the first peal of the telephone.

Most afternoons Rooney came over, a quiet, different Rooney for whom the waiting was over. “I was thinking we might start quilts for the girls’ beds,” she suggested. “As long as Erich still thinks he can come here and find you and be a family with you and the girls, he won’t hurt them. But in the meantime you gotta be busy at least with your hands. Otherwise you’ll go crazy. So let’s start quilts.”

Rooney went up to the attic to get the bag with the leftover scraps of material. They began to sew. Jenny thought of the legend of the three sisters who spun, measured and cut the threads of time. But we’re only two of the three, she thought. Erich is the third. It is he who can cut the strand of life.

Rooney sorted the pieces of material into neat piles on the kitchen table. “We’ll want them bright and cheerful,” she said, “so we won’t use dark colors.” She began whisking back into the bag the ones she was rejecting. “This was from a tablecloth old Mrs. Krueger had. That’s John’s mother. Caroline and I used to laugh that anyone would want such a dismal-looking thing. And that sailcloth was from a bolt she bought to make a cover for the picnic table. That was the summer Erich was five. And, oh, I don’t know why I don’t just throw out the rest of this blue stuff. Remember I told you I made curtains for the big back room? When they were up you’d think you were in a cave. The whole room was so dark. Oh, well…” She pushed it into the sack. “You never know when you might want to put your hand on it.”

They began to sew. It seemed to Jenny that the end of hope had robbed Rooney of intensity. Everything she said was expressed in the same middle key. “Once Erich is found we’re going to have a real funeral for Arden. The hardest for me now is to think back and remember how Erich encouraged me to think that Arden was still alive. Clyde said all along that she’d never run away. I shoulda known that. I guess I did know that. But every time I started to say that I guess my Arden is with God, why, then Erich would say, ‘I don’t believe that, Rooney.’ He was so cruel getting up my hopes like that; kind of like never letting the wound heal. I tell you, Jenny, he don’t deserve to live.”

“Rooney, please, don’t talk like that.”

“I’m sorry, Jenny.”

Sheriff Gunderson phoned her every night. “We’ve checked out the real estate. We’ve given pictures to all the police in those areas with the understanding there be no publicity and if they see him or the car they don’t apprehend him. He’s not at any of the places listed in his tax returns.”

He tried to offer cautious comfort. “They say no news is good news, Mrs. Krueger. Right now the kids may be playing on a beach in Florida, getting a nice suntan.”