Blood Games

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

A tickle on her shin roused Abilene from sleep. A moment later, she felt the tickle moving. She bolted upright, saw a spider scurrying toward her knee, and whisked it off. Squirmy with goose-flesh, she inspected her legs and arms. Nothing else seemed to be on her. Except for a film of dew, which made her skin feel clammy and had dampened the front of her blouse and skirt.

She stretched and yawned. The morning air was pleasantly warm, not yet hot. Though no sunlight was on her, she saw paths of dusty gold slanting down through the trees.

Probably no later than seven o’clock, she supposed.

She’d slept very well. It looked like a beautiful morning, and she felt wonderful until she remembered the task that awaited her and the others: returning to the pool and searching for the keys.

Won’t be so bad in daylight, she told herself.

Then we’ll be out of here.

If we find them.

Ought to wake up the rest of them and get it over with.

On the sleeping bag next to Abilene, Finley continued to sleep. Helen’s bag was flat against the ground. She’d crawled into it last night, in spite of the heat.

But she wasn’t in there now.

Abilene scanned the clearing. Cora and Vivian continued to sleep. There was no sign of Helen.

With a flutter of worry, Abilene decided that she must’ve gone off. To take a pee, or something.

Her blouse and Bermuda shorts were still spread out on top of her sleeping bag. But her swimsuit was missing. So were her shoes.

She must’ve taken the suit with her, Abilene thought, to put on after she finished.

She’ll be back in a minute.

Abilene waited, sitting motionless, listening. The forest was noisy with birds. There were rustling sounds. Buzzes and hums of insects. But no heavy, crunching sounds. Nothing that might indicate a person moving about.

How far did she go, anyway?

Helen was really too timid to go wandering off alone.

Wasn’t she?

It passed through Abilene’s mind that someone might’ve found the encampment and taken her. But that seemed very unlikely. Why would anyone just grab Helen? And how could that happen without a struggle that would’ve disturbed the rest of them? Besides, nobody abducting her would’ve bothered to take her swimsuit and shoes.

No, she’d gotten up and left of her own free will.

In her swimsuit.

Good God!

No, she wouldn’t. She wouldn’t dare go back to the lodge by herself. To go swimming and look for the keys.

She’d offered to go in and search for them last night. Not alone though.

But what if she woke up just a while ago? Already daylight. Everyone else still sleeping. And she’d decided to go ahead and find the keys and return and surprise everyone.

Any minute, she might come tromping through the woods, all wet and grinning, holding up the key case, saying, ‘Look what I found.’

She might be in the pool right now.

Maybe not alone. Maybe struggling, this very moment, with the guy who’d thrown their things in the water last night.

Sick with worry, Abilene shook Finley awake. As the girl groaned and mumbled, she twisted around and shook Cora. ‘Wake up. Quick. Everyone. Helen’s gone.’

‘Huh?’ Finley murmured. ‘Whuh?’

‘She’s gone! I think she went to find the keys.’

Abilene slipped into her moccasins as the others stirred and sat up.

‘Holy shit,’ Cora said.

‘We’ve gotta go after her. Quick.’

‘Helen’s gone?’ Vivian asked.

‘When did she leave?’ Finley asked.

‘I don’t know! I don’t know! I just woke up. She wasn’t here. She took her swimsuit.’

‘She must’ve gone to the pool,’ Cora said.

On her feet, Abilene turned slowly and scanned the woods. When she turned toward the east, she saw the lodge. It had been out of sight, last night, only because of the darkness. Now, bits of it were visible beyond the trees. It was no more than a hundred yards away.

‘My God,’ Abilene said, ‘it’s right there. She must’ve gotten up and seen how close we were.’

‘I can’t believe she’d go without us,’ Vivian said.

‘She sure went somewhere,’ Finley said.

Cora called, ‘Helen! Helen!’

No answer came.

Abilene rushed into the trees. As she dodged trunks and ducked under low limbs, she heard the others following. Soon, she left the trees behind. She raced through the high grass and weeds of the field. Vision jarring, she scanned the length of the lodge, its windows and porch and doors, the driveway and garage area off to the right. No Helen. No one at all.

Straight ahead, the front of the Wagoneer came into view. She ran toward the car. The springy foliage gave way to concrete that smacked her feet through her moccasins. Abruptly, she slowed, knowing that if she took the slope at full speed, she would probably tumble headlong. With short strides, she hurried down alongside the car.

And stopped behind it. There, resting on the pavement, was a cardboard box. One that they’d left in the car last night. The box contained packages of cookies, potato chips, crackers and cheese puffs.

Cora, halting beside her, looked at the box. ‘This explains plenty.’

Finley, huffing, said, ‘What’d she do? Stop by for a snack?’

‘Looks that way,’ Cora said.

‘Someone else might’ve done it,’ Abilene suggested.

‘Must’ve been Helen,’ Vivian said. ‘God, we should’ve just let her eat what she wanted.’

‘If she came here for food,’ Finley said, ‘where is she now?’

‘I still think she went to find the keys,’ Abilene said. ‘I mean, why the swimming suit?’ Without waiting for a response, she made her way down the steep pavement. At the bottom, she scanned the rear grounds. Seeing no one, she peered around the corner of the lodge.

Near the edge of the outside pool were Helen’s sneakers. Propped up between them was an open plastic bag.

She stepped over the flowing water of the drain channel, then followed it to the small pool.

The bag was a package of taco-flavored tortilla chips. It was half empty.

Squatting, she gazed through the archway. The interior pool was murky with shadowed light. A pale mist hung above the water.

‘Is she in there?’ Vivian asked.

‘I don’t see her.’ And all that Abilene could hear was the soft, hollow sound of lapping ripples. ‘Helen! ’ she yelled. She stood, kicked off her moccasins, then leaped off the edge. The hot water tossed her skirt up, clutched her body, splashed her hair and face. Pushing her skirt down, she trudged toward the opening. Her heart thudded painfully. Her bowels felt cramped.

She didn’t want to go in there.

What if Helen’s dead? Floating face down…?

Behind her, someone plunged into the water. She looked back and saw Cora. Still in her tank top. Hadn’t bothered to undress for this.

Her eyes were wide and scared. Her face was pale.

Let her go first?

No. Helen’s my responsibility. She wasn’t sure why she felt that way but, ever since that first week at Belmore, Abilene had seen herself not only as Helen’s friend but also as her protector.

She took one more step, passing through the archway. Then she stopped.

She swept her eyes over the surface of the pool. And saw only water below the gently swirling veils of mist. No floating body. No dark form suspended beneath the surface. Gazing through the white vapors, she scanned the walkway at the far side of the pool. Then the clear area off to the left. And the stools, and the bar.

‘Nothing,’ she said. Her voice reverberated through the silence.

‘She isn’t here,’ Cora called back. ‘Nobody’s here.’

‘Where is she?’ Abilene whispered, moving away from the entrance.

‘God only knows. She must’ve been here, though. She must’ve come for the keys, just like you figured.’

‘Are you coming back?’ Finley asked. ‘What are you doing?’ Cora turned toward the opening. ‘We’ll scout around for a minute. Are you two staying there?’

‘I guess so. Vivian’s still nervous about getting in the water.’

‘I will if I have to,’ Vivian said in a quiet voice as if speaking only to Finley.

‘That’s all right,’ Cora said. ‘Just stay put.’ To Abilene, she said, ‘We oughta see if the keys are still here. They shouldn’t be too hard to find if they fell out of her pocket.’

‘She might’ve already fished them out.’

‘Yeah, but maybe she didn’t. Who knows? We’re here. We might as well look.’

‘Okay. Over this way.’

Abilene in the lead, they pushed through the water toward the center of the pool.

The mist parted around them like smoke stirred and tattered by the mild breeze of their movements.

Peering down through the water, Abilene soon located the dark, barred mouth of the hot spring. As she stepped closer to it, she felt the hot currents roll against her legs and rub her panties. ‘I picked up the shorts right near here,’ she whispered.

‘Oh, great. What if the keys fell through?’

‘I know. I already thought of that.’ She took a long stride to the other side of the bars. ‘Right here,’ she said. She pressed the front of her skirt against her thighs, bent over, and lowered her face into the water. Her legs looked distorted: strangely white, bent at odd angles, undulating as if their bones had turned to squirmy soft rubber.

She could see the pale floor of the pool just fine.

She couldn’t see a key case. Not between her feet, or for a yard in front of her feet, or off to either side. Coming up for air, she glanced over her left shoulder and found Cora hunched down with her face in the water.

She pivoted to the right, ducked under again, and searched a different section of the bottom.

Still no luck.

For a long time, she and Cora hunted in the area surrounding the spring. They even searched the darkness below the crossed bars, diving down and grabbing hold, peering into the mouth of the pit. If the keys were there, however, they were out of sight and beyond reach.

They fanned out and continued looking. Later, Abilene made her way gradually toward the side of the pool, thinking that the keys might’ve dropped out of the pocket while she was returning with the shorts. She reached the wall without finding them. Standing there, she checked the granite in hopes of spotting wet footprints left by Helen.

The granite was wet all right. Puddled. And there were countless footprints. After a moment of confusion and excitement and fear, she realized that she was looking at the water they’d all left on the pool’s apron last night. It simply hadn’t dried.

Out of breath, Cora asked, ‘Anything?’

‘She might’ve climbed out over here, but I can’t tell for sure. It’s still all wet from us.’

‘But where the hell are the keys? Maybe we oughta get the other two in here for some help.’

‘Why bother? The keys just aren’t here. Either Helen already found them or they went down the hot spring.’

‘We’d better keep looking.’

‘We should be looking for Helen, not the keys. If she hasn’t got them… we can’t leave, anyway, until we find her.’

‘Helen!’ Cora shouted. ‘Helen!’

In the silence that followed the boom of her voice, Finley called from outside, ‘Did you find her?’

‘No, damn it!’

‘Find the keys?’ Finley asked.

‘No!’

‘Why don’t you come on out?’ Vivian called.

‘We’re on our way,’ Abilene answered. To Cora, she said, ‘Hey, for all we know, Helen might be back at the sleeping bags and wondering what happened to us.'

‘Fat chance.’

Abilene didn’t believe it, either.

It was about as likely, she thought, as waking up and discovering that Helen’s disappearance had been nothing but a bad dream.

They made their way slowly back through the pool, studying its bottom. Then they passed under the archway. Abilene felt guilty about quitting the search, but it was good to be in the sunlight again and very good to see Finley and Vivian. She climbed out. The morning air felt cool after the heat of the water.

‘Helen might’ve already found the keys,’ she said.

‘Unless they fell down through the grate,’ Cora added.

‘Maybe the guy took them,’ Finley said.

‘Anything’s possible,’ Abilene said.

‘They might even still be in the pool,’ Cora explained, ‘and we just couldn’t find them. Maybe later we should all go in and do a really thorough search.’

‘The main thing’s finding Helen,’ Vivian said. ‘We can get by without the keys, if we have to. We can walk out. But… God, where is she?’

‘Somebody must’ve grabbed her,’ Finley said.

Though Abilene had already suspected as much, the words struck her like a blow. ‘There’s gotta be some other explanation. ’

‘Like what? She left her shoes here. And the chips. Obviously, she went in the water to look for the keys. But she didn’t come out.’

‘How could she go in there?’ Vivian sounded as if she might start crying. ‘Was she out of her mind?’

‘Took a lot of guts,’ Cora muttered.

‘I’m sure she thought she’d let us down,’ Abilene said. ‘Wanted to make things right.’

‘But God!’

‘The thing is,’ Finley said, ‘her shoes are still here. And the chips. So she didn’t come out this way. Unless she was taken out by someone.’

‘No footprints,’ Abilene said.

‘She could’ve been taken out this way,’ Finley said. ‘The sun’s pretty damn hot. Footprints wouldn’t have lasted all that long.’ Turning around, she gazed across the field. ‘Maybe took her into the woods. If it was that kid we saw yesterday.’

‘I’m not sure he was big enough to handle Helen,’ Cora said. ‘Maybe he wasn’t alone.’

‘Look,’ Vivian said. ‘Suppose she was in the pool and someone came in from here? She might’ve climbed out the other side and run upstairs to get away from him. She could be hiding somewhere in the lodge. Maybe she even heard us calling, but she was afraid to answer.’

‘It was all wet over there,’ Abilene said. ‘It was still wet from last night, but she might’ve gone out that way.’

‘She’s gotta be somewhere,’ Cora said.

‘We’d better search the lodge,’ Abilene said, feeling a renewal of hope. ‘Start there, at least.’

‘Come on.’

With Cora in the lead, they returned to the car. She tugged

open a rear door and Abilene braced it wide while she climbed in, crawled over the seat back and came out with a tire iron in her hand. Abilene let the door drop shut. Cora smacked the rod against her palm. ‘Just in case,’ she muttered.

‘We’d better take flashlights, too,’ Abilene said, ‘I’ll go get ’em.’ Without waiting for a response, she trotted up the remains of the slope. When the pavement leveled out, she broke into a run. Her moccasins pounded the concrete. Then she was in the deep grass and weeds of the front lawn, racing toward the section of the woods where they’d spent the night.

It felt good to be moving fast, making her own breeze, a breeze that cooled her wet skin and clothes, that slipped through her hair and caressed her hot scalp. If only there was nothing else. Just the running, the feel of the air, the sweet mixture of aromas, the strong quickness of her body. Like being a kid on a summer holiday. Savoring all the wonderful sensations, free and excited.

Just that, and no dread.

None of this numbing, gnawing fear that Helen might be gone forever.

She’ll be all right, Abilene told herself. We’ll find her. Or she’ll just show up.

Nearing the edge of the woods, Abilene suddenly knew that Helen was sitting on the porch steps of the lodge. Watching her. Wondering why she was in such a hurry. Any moment, Helen would call out, ‘What’s going on?’ Abilene would turn around, and call, ‘Where the hell have you been?’ and run to her, overwhelmed with relief and joy.

She looked over her shoulder.

The porch steps were gray, sunless, deserted.

Abilene’s throat thickened. Plunging into the forest, she didn’t dare to hope that she would find Helen waiting with the sleeping bags.

How could this have happened?

If only we’d gone back to find the keys last night.

How pould Helen have gone there alone?

It was daylight. Daylight can trick us into thinking we’re safe. The spooks that haunt the night have gone back to their dark lairs. So we think.

And if they haven’t, at least we figure we can see them coming. And get away.

Helen must’ve been possessed by that false confidence that comes with the morning light. Figured she’d do her good deed for the day. Save us the trouble of returning to the pool.

Why’d you have to do it!

Abilene burst into the clearing. She staggered to a halt on top of her own sleeping bag.

No Helen. Of course not.

The sight of the girl’s baggy, plaid Bermudas ripped Abilene’s heart. Tears flooded her eyes. She gasped out painful, breathless sobs. With wet fists, she rubbed her eyes. But new tears came, blurring her vision.

No time for this!

We’ll find you, Helen. We’ll find you. You’ll be all right.

Dropping to her knees, she scurried over the sleeping bags. She grabbed the flashlights, then the water bottle. Her mouth was parched. She wanted to drink, but doubted that she would be able to swallow. Out of breath, panting and sobbing at the same time, she figured she would choke.

Blinking to clear her eyes, she glanced around the encampment wondering if there was anything else she should take.

The lantern?

No. The flashlights would be good enough for now. Besides, she didn’t know how she might manage it along with the big plastic water bottle and the two flashlights.

Finley’s camera? Why bother?

She scurried to her feet and rushed into the trees. As she made her way through the woods, another fantasy forced itself into her mind. She would break out of the trees and see the others waiting in front of the lodge. And Helen would be standing there among them. Fat and homely in her black swimsuit. Smiling and beautiful. Waving. Calling, ‘What took you so long?’

Abilene knew it wouldn’t happen.

But it might.

She trotted out of the trees, the water bottle sloshing at her side, and gasped when she saw her friends standing in front of the lodge just as she’d imagined them. Vivian, all in white as if ready to prance onto a tennis court. Cora, as if dressed for a game of basketball in her tank top and shorts. Finley, looking like a tomboy in her safari suit. Helen, doughy white, bulging out of her black swimsuit — smiling, waving.

Then they were crouching over Abilene.

She was on her back, looking up at them.

At Finley and Vivian and Cora.

Cora, bare to the waist, was patting Abilene’s cheeks and brow with the moist rag of her tank top.

‘Are you okay?’ Finley asked.

‘Where’s Helen?’

‘We’ll find her,’ Cora said.

‘But she was with you.’

‘If only,’ Vivian muttered.

‘I saw her.’

‘You passed out, kiddo,’ Finley said, and gently squeezed her shoulder.

‘I what?’

‘Fainted. What do you think you’re doing on the ground?’

‘You… She wasn’t with you?’

From the looks on their faces, Abilene knew the answer.

‘You’d better drink some water,’ Cora said. ‘You’re probably dehydrated.’

‘You gave us an awful scare,’ Vivian said. ‘How are you feeling?’

‘I… thought she was with you.’