John Saul: In the Dark of the Night

“It’s about you renting a house without—” Merrill began, but Dan pressed a gentle forefinger against her lips, silencing her.

“Now, come on,” he went on. “Be fair, honey. We’ve all been wanting to rent a summer place for years, but you’ve been nervous about it. So we’ve stayed home. But this year you need to put your fears aside — by next summer, Eric will be working and getting ready to go to college, and if we’re ever going to do this as a family, it’s now or never.”

He felt her freeze, but then, slowly, her hands reached around his back, and then she was hugging him tightly, pressing herself against him. “You’re right,” she whispered. “I know you’re right. But it’s so hard for me.”

“I know.” His fingers gently stroked the hollow of her back, just where she liked it. “But you want to be a trouper, don’t you?”

She leaned back and looked at him, a twinkle in her eye. “I’m still mad at you,” she said.

“I know you are,” he said, and kissed her.

“You better stop that,” she whispered, wriggling closer to him in a manner that belied her words.

Later, as they lay cuddled in bed, Merrill could tell by Dan’s breathing that he was on the verge of sleep. “Honey?” she said.

He shifted his weight. “Hmmm?”

“Tell me everything’s going to be all right.”

He pulled her closer, brought her head to his shoulder, and stroked her hair. “It’s going to be better than all right,” he whispered. “It’s going to be great.”

And finally, with her husband’s arms wrapped around her, Merrill put her fears aside.

Yet even when the clock downstairs softly struck three, she hadn’t quite drifted into the easy sleep everyone else seemed to find with no trouble at all.

It’s me, she decided. It’s just the way I am, but I have to get over it. I’m not going to let it spoil the summer. Not for me, and not for my children. For once, I’m not going to be afraid of everything I see.

And finally, as the clock struck three-thirty, she slept.

RITA HENDERSON CHECKED the first item off her schedule for the morning as she pulled her two-year-old Mercedes out of the Phantom Lake High School parking lot and headed for Pinecrest, certain that Nathan Humphries would find the right crew for the cleanup job that not only had to be done right, but quickly as well. Rita had been cultivating the high school guidance counselor for five years, and today she’d told Humphries she needed the best three boys he could find. The Brewsters were due to arrive in just over a week, and not only did she need the grounds in perfect condition, but she had to open the house, get seven years of musty air out of it, and take an inventory of everything inside.

Pinecrest was going to look its best for the Brewsters, not only because they were friends of at least two of her best summer clients, but because at summer’s end she wanted Hector Darby’s heirs to give her the listing to sell the house. Given the market, the commission on that sale alone could keep her going through the rest of the year, with plenty left over to add to the retirement fund she swore to start using every year, but never did.

Being the number one Realtor of the entire region gave her far too much pleasure to simply give up working, even at the age of seventy. Besides, it wasn’t really like work anyway, since she loved everything about Phantom Lake. The name, the town, the lake, the people, the seasons — every bit of it. And her job kept her in the middle of all of it.

As she drove over the ancient wooden bridge that crossed Muskrat Creek, she waved to Gerilyn Evans and Carol Stauffer, who were sprawled on a blanket spread out in the park, watching their toddlers trying to catch the squirrels, who in turn were trying to cadge food from Gerilyn and Carol. Farther out in the ornate old pavilion that was built on pilings over the lake itself, the daily chess games had already begun, and Amos Carrier was bent over a board, studying his game with the intensity that Rita reserved only for the analysis of a property she was about to list. And Amos was actually a year younger than she was.

Unconsciously gunning the engine of the Mercedes, Rita left the park behind and sped toward The Pines, not slowing down until she came to the discreet granite block that marked the entrance. The Pines encompassed two hundred acres of lakefront forest that had been subdivided into ten acre parcels half a century ago, none of which could ever be divided any further, and each of which could never hold more than a single house and “appropriate outbuildings,” as the master plan for the development read. Though that plan, of which Rita Henderson heartily disapproved, didn’t specify exactly what “appropriate outbuildings” were, it did specifically say that they could not be for “human habitation” except for a guest house that would sleep no more than four people. For the forty years she’d been involved in Phantom Lake real estate, Rita Henderson had been trying — and failing — to find a way to break the master plan for The Pines, and as she calculated the increasing value of the land every year, she also increased her efforts to find a way to cash in on it.

Making a mental note to remind Tim Graves to have his crew trim the overgrown shrubbery around the granite marker, Rita turned down the road that had once been Pinecrest’s private driveway but now gave access to all twenty of the houses scattered through the acreage. Half a mile farther she turned into the long, circular drive that led to Pinecrest itself, and made another mental note, to talk to Tim about getting the trees trimmed. Just cutting back the limbs of the maples lining the drive would brighten the whole place up a bit.

A moment later she came around the last curve in the drive, and the house itself came into view. Pinecrest had always been her favorite house in the whole area, and this morning it looked almost majestic, with its granite walls supporting the gabled slate roof, all of it looking almost as good as the day it was built. Indeed, not only the house, but the carriage house, the boathouse — even the potting shed — had been built the same way, out of carved granite blocks on foundations sunk to the bedrock below the rich topsoil. None of the roofs sagged, none of the porches were even slightly askew.

Still, seven years of emptiness showed everywhere; the detritus of the surrounding forest had blown into the angles of the vaguely Victorian house, built up on the windowsills and accumulated on the steps and the porch, giving the place an air of abandonment. But once the crew from the high school had swept that away and cleaned out the big stone fountain in front of the house, all that would change.

Rita parked by the front door, scribbled a few notes in the pad she always kept handy for just this sort of occasion, then stepped out of her car. Climbing the six steps that led to the heavy oak front door, she put the key in the lock, turned it, and swung the door open.

Even after the hundred years that the house had stood there, the hinges gave no hint of a squeal, and the door hung true.

Ahead was a marble foyer and vaulted ceilings, beyond which was the living room, its huge picture window perfectly framing a view of the lawn and the lake beyond. As Rita shut the door behind her, the silence of the big house, undisturbed all these years, closed in and she found herself moving noiselessly, as if even a single sound would disturb the tranquility of the place. By the time she got to the living room, though, her notebook was in her hand and she was ready to work.

Pulling all the sheets and dust covers off the furniture, she made a pile of them in the foyer. The furniture seemed to have held up just fine, but of course it had been good furniture to start with: most of the pieces that weren’t original had come from Carol Langstrom’s shop in town, and Carol didn’t deal in any antiques but the finest.