Morning sunlight brightened the colors of the wax flowers under glass
on the high bureau that always seemed to emit the faint odor of old
hair combings. Jack pulled back the diamond-patterned quilt and blinked
the sleep from his eyes. He expected his mind to be busy wondering
about Kesserich and his wife--things said and half said last night--but
found instead that his thoughts swung instantly to Mary Alice Pope, as
if to a farthest island in a world of people.
Downstairs, the house was empty. After a long look at the cabinet--he
felt behind it, but the key was gone--he hurried down to the
waterfront. He stopped only for a bowl of chowder and, as an
afterthought, to buy half a dozen newspapers.
The sea was bright, the brisk wind just right for the _Annie O._ There
was eagerness in the way it smacked the sail and in the creak of the
mast. And when he reached the cove, it was no longer still, but nervous
with faint ripples, as if time had finally begun to stir.
After the same struggle with the underbrush, he came out on the rocky
spine and passed the cove of the sea urchins. The spiny creatures
struck an uncomfortable chord in his memory.
This time he climbed the second island cautiously, scraping the
innocent-seeming ground ahead of him intently with a boathook he'd
brought along for the purpose. He was only a few yards from the fence
when he saw Mary Alice Pope standing behind it.
He hadn't realized that his heart would begin to pound or that, at the
same time, a shiver of almost supernatural dread would go through him.
The girl eyed him with an uneasy hostility and immediately began to
speak in a hushed, hurried voice. "You must go away at once and never
come back. You're a wicked man, but I don't want you to be hurt. I've
been watching for you all morning."
He tossed the newspapers over the fence. "You don't have to read
them now," he told her. "Just look at the datelines and a few of the
headlines."
When she finally lifted her eyes to his again, she was trembling. She
tried unsuccessfully to speak.
"Listen to me," he said. "You've been the victim of a scheme to make
you believe you were born around 1916 instead of 1933, and that it's
1933 now instead of 1951. I'm not sure why it's been done, though I
think I know who you really are."
"But," the girl faltered, "my aunts tell me it's 1933."
"They would."
"And there are the papers ... the magazines ... the radio."
"The papers are old ones. The radio's faked--some sort of recording. I
could show you if I could get at it."
"_These_ papers might be faked," she said, pointing to where she'd let
them drop on the ground.
"They're new," he said. "Only old papers get yellow."
"But why would they do it to me? _Why?_"
"Come with me to the mainland, Mary. That'll set you straight quicker
than anything."
"I couldn't," she said, drawing back. "He's coming tonight."
"He?"
"The man who sends me the boxes ... and my life."
Jack shivered. When he spoke, his voice was rough and quick. "A life
that's completely a lie, that's cut you off from the world. Come with
me, Mary."
* * * * *
She looked up at him wonderingly. For perhaps ten seconds the silence
held and the spell of her eerie sweetness deepened.
"I love you, Mary," Jack said softly.
She took a step back.
"Really, Mary, I do."