John Saul - The Right Hand of Evil

"Let me tell you what happened last night," he said so quietly it commanded her full attention.

But she didn't lower her guard an inch. "You mean you remember?"

Ted nodded. "Every bit of it. After you left, I kept drinking, and started wandering around the house. And everywhere I went, all I saw was a mess." A painful smile twisted his lips. "It was like looking at myself," he went on, his gesture sweeping over the kitchen and beyond, to the tangled mess of the grounds surrounding the house. "Everything about it's been let go, just like I've let myself go. Another few years, and it's literally going to fall apart," He turned back to Janet and met her gaze steadily. "Just like me," he went on. "Last night it finally came to me. I'm not just killing our marriage, and my relations with my kids, and my career. If you can call that job at the Majestic a career," he added derisively, but without even a hint of the self-pity Janet had always heard in his previous pleas. "I'm killing myself, too. I decided I didn't want to die."

Janet felt the first tiny crack develop in her defenses, and fought against it. "And," she asked, deliberately edging her voice with sarcasm, "having stumbled drunkenly upon this great truth, what exactly did you decide to do about it?"

Ted flinched, but didn't try to turn away. "I made myself sick," he replied. "I went down in the basement, and I threw up more than I've ever thrown up in my life." For the first time since he'd begun to talk, a genuine smile played around the corners of his mouth, and a sparkle of humor lit his eyes. "And you have to admit, I've thrown up some doozies in my life." When Janet failed to respond to his stab at a joke, his smile fled. "Look at me," he said softly. "Just look at my eyes."

Don't do it, Janet told herself. But she could feel the cracks in her resolve widening, and finally she allowed herself to look into his eyes.

Something had changed.

It wasn't just their clarity, which was surprising enough, given how much he'd been drinking last night. Still, if he'd really thrown up most of it, it might be possible that he'd slept it off.

It was as if he read her mind: "When you drink as much as I've been drinking, it takes a hell of a lot to bring on a hangover."

Janet made no reply, but still she gazed into his eyes. There was something familiar there, something dimly remembered.

And then she knew. It was as if she were looking into Ted's eyes when they'd first met, and she'd felt as if she could sink right into him through his eyes, or float in their blue clarity forever, needing nothing else but him, and his caress, and the look in his eyes when they beheld her.

"Come with me," he said now. Lifting Molly out of her arms and settling her gently back into the playpen, Ted took Janet's hand and led her out of the kitchen, through the entry hall and the living room, to the small room in which she'd found him last night.

The empty bottle still lay on the sofa, and the box of full ones still sat on the hearth, just as it had last night. As Ted lifted a bottle of vodka from the box, broke its seal, and opened it, Janet felt a cold emptiness in her stomach. Was he planning to prove that he'd changed by having a drink? But instead of raising the bottle to his lips, he held it over the sink in the wet bar that had been built next to the fireplace and tipped it up.

Its contents flowed down the drain.

He reached for another bottle, and drained it, too.

And then another, and another, until every bottle in the box was empty. "Have you ever known me to do that before?" he asked.

In her mind, all the assurances and all the promises he'd ever made echoed.

"I don't have to drink - I like to drink."

"Just because it's here doesn't mean I'll drink it."

"I won't touch a drop, but we have to have something to serve company, don't we?"

How many times had she heard it? How many variations had there been? And the couple of times she'd simply poured out his liquor herself, he'd only replaced it, usually within the hour. He'd even had a rationalization for that: "Even if I decide to have a drink - which I won't - wouldn't you rather I had it here?"

No! she had wanted to scream. I don't want you to drink at all!

But no matter what she'd said, it didn't do any good. There had never been a time-unless they ran completely out of money-when there wasn't any liquor in the house. Then she remembered the trailer behind the Toyota.

Again it was as if he'd read her mind. "And I didn't buy any more," he said. There was a flash of lightning, a crash of thunder shook the house, and the first drops of rain began to fall. "Oh, Jesus," Ted cried. "I've got to get all the stuff in the trailer into the carriage house before it gets ruined!" Dropping the last of the bottles into the sink, he raced through the house and out the back door. By the time Janet caught up with him, he was already digging deep into the trailer's depths. "There's some plastic drop cloths-" His hand closed on something and he pulled it out. "Here!" he cried. Ripping a plastic bag open, he pulled one of the polyethylene sheets out and began shaking it open. A minute later he and Janet had it stretched out over the trailer, protecting its contents from the storm. But already the wind was starting to pull at it; in a few minutes it would be gone. "Get in the car," Ted told her as the rain came down harder. "I'll open the carriage house doors, and you can pull it in."

"The garage isn't big enough," Janet protested.

"Back it in," Ted replied. "I'll guide you." The rain was pouring down in sheets now.

"But you'll get soaked-" Janet began, but Ted was already pulling the double doors of the carriage house open. She got into the Toyota, and a moment later Ted was calling out instructions to her.

Janet edged the trailer back, twisting the wheel first one way, then another, trying to maneuver the trailer through the doors into the shelter of the carriage house. Twice she had to pull all the way forward and start over again.

Meanwhile the rain came down harder, until she could hardly see Ted, even with the windshield wipers going full blast.

On the third try, she managed to ease the trailer-and the back half of the Toyota-into the carriage house, and cringed when she felt the right rear fender scrape against the doorframe. Getting out, she dashed into the shelter of the structure, where she found Ted adding another sheet of plastic to the trailer, and tying both sheets down with a length of clothesline. "I wondered why I bought this," he said as he secured the last corner. "Now I know." He looked up through the rafters at the badly leaking roof. "Maybe I ought to get up there and fix that right now."

"Are you crazy?" Janet demanded. "You'd slip off and break your neck!"

"But-"

"No 'buts,' " Janet said. "Let's get in the house before it gets any worse."

Together, they sprinted across the yard to the back door, ducking into the kitchen just as another bolt of lightning ripped at the clouds, followed by a crash of thunder that sent Molly into a fit of terrified screaming. This time it was Ted who plucked her out of the playpen.

"It's okay," he crooned. "Just a little thunder. Can't hurt Daddy's little sweetheart."

As she watched him soothe their youngest child, Janet tried to decide whether this was just another performance designed to keep her here.

But if this were an act, it would take a far better actor than Ted had ever been.

Soaking wet, he was gently soothing Molly's fears away, and when the little girl was finally quiet again, he actually smiled at Janet. "I think it went pretty well out there, all things considered," he said.

Janet looked straight at him. "You do know I hit the doorpost with the right rear fender, don't you?" she asked.