Peter Straub - If You Could See Me Now

And nearly into the arms of Bertilsson. That hypocritical pink moonface and wet smile were directed, I swear, toward the pocket with Maccabee’s book before Bertilsson decided he wished to favor my face with them. Balder and fatter, he was even more repulsive than I remembered him. His wife, several inches taller than he, stood stock-still beside him, her posture suggesting that I might be expected at any moment to commit an act of disgusting perversity.

As I suppose I had, in her eyes. When Joan and I were married, Bertilsson had taken pains to incorporate into his homiletic address some allusions to my past misdeeds; later, on a drunken night during our honeymoon, I wrote him an abusive letter and posted it on the spot. I think I said that he did not deserve to wear his collar.

Perhaps the recollection of that statement was what put the malicious icy chips in his eyes, far behind the sanctimony, when he greeted me. “Young Miles. What have we here? Young Miles.”

“We heard you were back,” said his wife. . “I’ll expect you at tomorrow’s services.”

“That’s interesting. Well, I must—”

“I was grieved to hear of your divorce. Most of my marriages are of the enduring kind. But then few of the couples it is my privilege to unite are as sophisticated as you and your — Judy, was it? Few of them write notes of thanks as distinctive as yours.”

“Her name was Joan. We never did get divorced in the sense you mean. She was killed.”

His wife swallowed, but Bertilsson, for all his oiliness, was no coward. He continued to look straight at me, the malice behind the sanctimony undimmed. “I am sorry. Truly sorry for you, Miles. Perhaps it’s a blessing that your grandmother did not live to see how you…” He shrugged.

“How I what?”

“Seem to have a tragic propensity for being nearby when young woman are lost to life.”

“I wasn’t even in town when that Olson girl was killed,” I said. “And Joan was anything but nearby when she died.”

I might as well have been speaking to a bronze Buddha. He smiled. “I see I must apologize. I did not intend my remark in that way. No, not in the least. But in fact, since you bring up the matter, Mrs. Bertilsson and I are in Arden on a related mission, a mission of mercy I think I may describe it, of the Lord’s mercy, related to an event of which you seem to be in ignorance.”

He had long ago begun to speak in the cadences of his tedious sermons, but usually it was possible to figure out what he was talking about. “Look. I’m sorry, but I have to get going.”

“We were just with the parents.” He was still smiling, but now the smile expressed great sad meretricious gravity.

My God, how could he think that I had not heard of that?

“Oh, yes.”

“So you do know about it? You have heard?”

“I don’t know what I’ve heard. I’ll be going now.”

For the first time, his wife spoke. “You’d be wise to keep going until you get back where you came from, Miles. We don’t think much of you around here. You left too many bad memories.” Her husband kept that grave, falsely humble smile on his face,

“So write me another blank letter,” I said, and left them. I recrossed the street and stepped over the nodding drunk into Freebo’s Bar. After a few drinks consumed while listening to a half-audible Michael Moose compete with the mumbled conversation of men who conspicuously avoided catching my eye, I had a few more drinks and attracted a little attention by dismembering Maccabee’s book on the bar, at first ripping out one page at a time and then seizing handfuls of paper and tearing them out. When the barman came up to object I told him, “I wrote this book and I just decided it’s terrible.” I shredded the cover so that he could not read Maccabee’s name. “Can’t a man even tear up his own book in this bar?”

“Maybe you’d better go, Mr. Teagarden,” the bartender said. “You can come back tomorrow.” I hadn’t realized that he knew my name.

“Can tear up my own book if I want to, can’t I?”

“Look, Mr. Teagarden,” he said. “Another girl was murdered last night. Her name was Jenny Strand. We all knew that girl. We’re all a little upset around here.”

It happened like this:

A girl of thirteen, Jenny Strand, had been to the Arden cinema with of her friends to see a Woody Allen movie , Love and Death. Her parents had forbidden her to see it: they did not want their daughter to receive her sex education from Hollywood, and the title made them uneasy. She was an only daughter among three boys, and while her father thought the boys could pick things up for themselves, he wanted Jenny to be taught in some way that would preserve her innocence. He thought his wife should be responsible: she was waiting for Pastor Bertilsson to suggest something .

Because of the death of Gwen Olson, they had been unusually protective when Jenny said that she wanted to see a friend. Jo Slavitt, after dinner . — Be back by ten, her father said . — Sure, she agreed. The picture would be over an hour before, that. Their objections were silly, and she had no intention of being restricted by anyone’s silliness .

It did not bother her that she and Gwen Olson had looked enough alike to be taken, in a larger town — one where everyone’s family was not known — for sisters. Jenny had never been able to see the resemblance, though several teachers had mentioned it. She was not flattered. Gwen Olson had been a year younger, a farm girl, in another set. A tramp had killed her — everybody said that. You still saw tramps, bums, gypsies, whatever they were, hanging around town a day or two and then going wherever they went. Gwen Olson had been dumb enough to go wandering alone by the river at night, out of the sight of the town .

She met Jo at her house and they walked five blocks in sunshine to the theater. The other girls were waiting. The five of them sat in the last row, ritually eating candy . — My parents think this is a dirty movie, she whispered to Jo Slavitt. Jo put her hand to her mouth, pretending to be shocked. In fact they all thought the movie was boring .

When it was over, they stood on the sidewalk, empty of comment. As always, there was nowhere to go. They began to drift up Main Street toward the river.

— I get scared just thinking about Gwen, said Marilyn Hicks, a girl with thin fair hair and braces on her teeth .

— So don’t think about her, snapped Jenny. It was a typical Marilyn Hicks comment .

— What do you think happened to her ?

— You know what happened to her, said Jenny, who was less innocent than her parents supposed .

— It could have been anyone, said another girl in a shuddery voice .

— Like Billy Hummel and his friends over there? said Jenny, ridiculing the other girl. She was looking across the street, where some of the older boys from A.H.S., football players, were wasting time hanging around the telephone company building. It was getting darker, and she could see the white flock of the letters on their team jackets reflected in the big phone company window. In ten minutes the boys would be sick of watching themselves in the window and would drift off down the street .

— My dad says the police better watch someone real close .

— I know who he means, said Jo. They all knew whom Marilyn’s father meant .

— I’m hungry again. Let’s go to the drive-in .

They began to trudge up the road. The boys took no notice of them.

— The food at the drive-in is junk, said Jenny. They put garbage in it .