Chapter 12

"Base to Twenty-one."

"Base, this is Twenty-one," Jack Petty answered. "What's up, Cookie?"

"I took this down on the telephone, Chief." Cookie had a sexy radio voice. "Me: Police Headquarters. Her: I want to report a missing girl. I mean I think she's missing. Me: Your name, please? Her: I think this girl is missing. Her name is Pat Emory and she's about twenty-two years old. She's blonde, short, good figure, pretty. She wears her hair long and hanging over her face. Me: Your name, please?"

Petty waited.

"Over to Twenty-one," Cookie said. "That was all."

"She hung up, Chief."

"Thanks, Cookie. You hear any more you give us a call, hear."

"Wilco."

Petty frowned at the radio. "What do you make of it?" Niles Jergens asked. Petty looked thoughtfully at a thumbnail. Things had been going too damned smoothly so far. With all the potential mischief bottled up in those college kids, and the beach so full of weekenders, he'd been expecting something to happen. "It would help if we knew where she was missing from," he said.

As if in answer the radio crackled into action again.

"Base to Twenty-one."

"Go ahead, Cookie."

"She called back, Chief. I took it down."

"Never mind the verbatim account. What did she say?"

"She said she forgot to tell me that Pat Emory is missing from the group of college kids down at the new motel. She still wouldn't give me her name."

"O.K., Cookie." Petty hung up the mike and sighed. "Guess we'd better drive down and see what's going on."

Niles flipped on the siren and stomped on the gas.

"Oh, for Christ's sake," Petty shouted. "Cut that damned thing off and slow down."

Niles complied with a sheepish grin.

"Whoever made the call probably did it from that telephone booth," Petty said, when the police cruiser eased into the motel parking lot. The phone booth was brightly lit. It sat near the road in front of the motel.

"Wanta see if anyone is in the rooms?" Niles asked.

"What, and start a panic?" Petty asked in return.

"Well, if you don't want to disturb the young lovers," Niles grinned.

"Come on and shut up," Petty said jokingly.

They started up the stairs to the deck in front of the rooms. Petty pounded on the first door on the south end. A glow of light in the window suggested that the room might be occupied. He had to pound three or four times before a young man with tousled, blond hair looked out.

"Jack Petty, Lundy Beach Police."

"Yeah?" Ernie Harper's heart gave a little thump. Had some of the cats gone haywire? He'd warned them about rough stuff and being too intimate in public.

"We had a call saying that a Miss Pat Emory is missing from your group. Do you know anything about it?"

"No sir," Ernie said. "I've been right here in the room."

"Taking a nap?" Niles Jergens asked sarcastically.

"Knock it off," Petty said to Niles. "Do you have any idea who might have made the call?"

"None at all," Ernie said, recovering his composure.

"Any idea where Pat Emory is?"

"I'm afraid not, but she was around earlier. I saw her on the beach."

"Who would know?" Petty asked. "Who's she with?"

"I don't know, right now," Ernie said. "She was Tom Jack Murray's date. He might know where she is." Tom Jack wouldn't know, but it would get the cops off his back before they decided to look in the room and embarrass the little blonde.

"Where's this Tom Jack Murphy?"

"Murray," Ernie said. "Tom Jack Murray. He's on the beach, probably."

Petty started to say something but he didn't have a chance. From across the road and slightly to the north came a series of high-pitched, hysterical screams. Niles was three jumps down the stairs before Petty could move. They pounded through the parking lot as the screaming continued and were halfway across the road when a group of kids came out, helping a struggling screaming girl.

"What's wrong?" Niles asked, puffing, as he jerked to a halt in front of the girl. She was a good looker, brown hair, good body, but she was rolling her head on her shoulders and screaming.

"You'd better help the boys," one of the girls with Jean Loras said, pointing toward the dunes, her eyes wide and frightened.

Again, Niles led the way. A pitched battle was going on out on the dark strand. Three boys were being bounced around by a berserk giant of a man. Two others were holding a tall, gangling boy who made strange sounds in his throat as he tried to break away. Petty flashed his light on the boy, saw a look of near madness. He moved his light to the big man, a bull of a kid, eyes grim. mouth set in a snarl as he batted away at the three fellows who tried to grab him.

"That's enough!" Petty yelled.

The thin fellow was saying, "I'll kill him." He said it over and over. The big man stepped forward and laid out one of his tormentors with a roundhouse right. Niles Jergens moved forward. He wasn't a small man, but he was dwarfed by the big fellow. He circled carefully and laid his billy almost gently across the bulge of skull behind the big man's ear.

Tom Jack went down easily, sliding on his knees before hitting the sand on his face.

Ernie had followed the two policeman, running on the gravel of the parking lot in bare feet, heedless of the damage. He watched the subjection of Tom Jack from the top of the dune. He heard David saying over and over, '"I'll kill him."

"All right," Petty said forcefully, "what's going on here?"

"Tom Jack raped her," one of the boys said.

"This Tom Jack Murphy?" Petty asked, putting his light on Tom Jack's limp form.

"Murray," Ernie said automatically through the dull pain which came over him. "Tom Jack Murray."

"And he raped the girl who was screaming?"

"He must have," one of the boys said. "We heard her screaming and ran up the beach and he was he was-"

"He was what?" Pretty asked.

"Well, he was on her."

"I'll kill him," David Wofford repeated endlessly.

"Calm down, son," Petty said, standing in front of David. "You don't want to kill anyone."

"He rape him, too?" Niles Jergens asked, indicating David's nudeness.

Petty slapped David lightly and David stopped saying it. He took his eyes off Tom Jack for the first time and realized that he didn't have his swim suit on. He covered himself, and Ernie, by the light of the policeman's torch, saw large tears form in his eyes. He fell limply against the two boys holding him.

"I couldn't stop him," David sobbed. "I tried to. God, I tried to."

To Ernie, David's voice was as piercing as a piece of needle-sharp, red-hot steel. "I tried to stop him," David said, and he broke down completely.

Ernie had seen Jean's face. It was a study in torment. When he passed her they were just bringing her out under a street light and he could see the pain in her face. He could hear her screams. Now he saw David disintegrate in front of his eyes and he had to turn away. He was almost shamed by seeing a man collapse completely. They had been so happy, the two of them. When he had stumbled onto them they'd been talking about their wedding plans. He knew that Jean was a little prude, probably a virgin, the kind of girl who wants to save her sex for her husband, and he knew what kind of a guy David was. David wasn't Ernie's type of cat, but he was a steady, serious, nice guy and he looked as if he'd really taken a beating from Tom Jack. His face was bloody and one eye was closed.

He tried to imagine what had happened. Judging from David's state of undress, he and Jean must have been going at it hot and heavy, all happy and in heaven, alone on the beach, maybe whispering nice things to each other as they did a little exploring of each other's bodies. Then there was Tom Jack, mean, angry at the world because Pat Emory had tossed him over.

Jesus, he knew Tom Jack was nuts, but he'd never thought the big idiot would be that crazy. Beating up David and then raping his girl. It wasn't a very pretty picture.

It didn't occur to Ernie, then, to blame himself for what happened. It wasn't until he was walking back across the road that he remembered David's telling him about Tom Jack making passes at Jean, asking him to talk to Tom Jack about it. All he'd done was joke with T.J. a little and suggest that he try Tina. Maybe he could have stopped it.

He stood under the deck of the motel and heard Jean Loras crying in one of the rooms above him. He watched them carry Tom Jack across the road and put him in the rear seat of the police car. Tom Jack had handcuffs on. The older policeman started taking names and addresses and statements from the boys who had been first on the scene. David Wofford stood with his head down, his face bloody and tears still corning from his eyes. Now and then he looked up toward the room where Jean was crying hysterically. David looked like a dead man. Ernie didn't like death and he'd never seen many corpses, but David looked to him like a dead man.

The fuzz finished his questions and started up the stairs toward Jean's room.

"Hey," Ernie said, "can I go up with you?"

"Why should you," Jack Petty asked.

"Good question," Ernie said. He had to answer it for himself, too. "I know the girl," he said.

Petty shrugged. Ernie followed him up the stairs. Petty knocked, and the door was opened by a white-faced girl. Jean was sitting on the edge of the bed, rigid, staring straight ahead. Her crying had stopped while they were climbing the stairs.

Tm Jack Petty, Lundy Beach Police."

"She doesn't seem to hear anything," one of the girls said.

Petty knelt in front of Jean and looked into her eyes. He turned to the girls. "What's her name."

"Jean. Jean Loras."

"Jean," Petty said. "I'm a policeman. You're going to be all right."

She gave no sign of hearing him.

"I know it's rough," Petty said, "but I'd like to know what happened."

"Leave her alone." David burst into the room, putting himself between Jean and Petty.

"Look, son," Petty sighed. "You want to see that fellow punished, don't you?"

"No," David said, thinking of the shame which would come if there were questions, a trial. "Just leave her alone."

"You want, to just forget about it, is that it?"

Ernie saw Jean's hand come up to her face. She rubbed her cheek, like a person coming out of a deep sleep. "No," she said. "No, David."

He turned around and kneeled in front of her and put his hands on hers. She was looking at him with a strangely calm expression.

"He took something that belonged to us," she said. "I want him punished."

It was Ernie who first saw that her calmness was deceptive. He started to step toward her, to do what, he didn't know. She burst into tears.

"I want them to kill him," she screamed. "I hate him, oh, God, I hope they kill him."

David took her into his arms and she subsided as suddenly as she started. "Because, don't you see, David? He took it all. He took all of our love, all of our tenderness, all we had."

"Don't talk now," David said. "Look, it's all right."

"Because he took it all, David. He took your love for me and he destroyed it, and now I have nothing, because how can you ever love me now?" The last word was a wailing, tortured sound which made the onlookers uncomfortable in its intensity.

David held her and whispered soothingly. He turned his head and jerked it toward the door. Ernie looked at the policeman. Petty nodded. They filed out. Ernie looked back and saw David patting Jean's shoulder. He was trying to muffle her sobs with his body.

"Of course I love you," he heard David say. Then the door closed behind him.

"You can't love me," Jean sobbed. "I'm bad."

"You're not bad, darling. It wasn't your fault."

"But you don't understand," she protested. "You just don't understand."

"Yes. Yes, I understand. It's all right. It doesn't change things between us."

She looked at him with wet eyes, wonderingly. "Why didn't you go ahead? Why didn't you go ahead and do it. It would have been all right if it had been you."

"It's all right," he said. "Nothing is changed-between us."

"Isn't it David? Won't you always remember that you couldn't stop him? Won't you always think yourself less a man because you couldn't stop him?"

He couldn't find the words.

"That's part of it," she said. "But you still don't understand all of it. That's part of why you can't really love me any more. Every time you'd look at me you'd be reminded that you weren't man enough to stop him. And every time I would look at you, I would know that you weren't man enough to stop him, but that still isn't all."

"No, no," he said. "Don't worry about it." He held her tightly. "It's over."

"It can never be over," she said, "because I can never forget how I felt."

"It was horrible, I know, but you'll forget."

"How can I, David?" She looked at him steadily. "How can I ever forget that I enjoyed it?"

"Enjoyed it?" he asked incredulously.

"Yes," she said, biting her lips. "I liked it, David. Oh, God, I liked it. That's why you can't love me any more. Because I liked it. I had a climax."

Somewhere inside him a huge stone fell. It tore its way downward through his guts. "You don't know what you're saying."

"I liked it, David. I had this tremendous climax and-"

"Don't talk like that," he said sharply.

"It's true," she said, nodding her head a little hysterically. "I had a very good climax."

He stood, looked down at her as if she were a stranger. She wouldn't look up at him. She stared straight ahead, her eyes even with his belt buckle.

"They called a doctor," he said, "I'll see if he's here."

Ernie was standing outside the door. He felt as useless as a chip in the ocean. When David came out he said, "Hey, David-"

"She liked it," David said unbelievingly. "She said she liked it."

"That's crazy, Dave."

"She said she had a tremendous climax."

"She's still in shock, boy. She doesn't know what she's saying."

David brushed his arm away and walked down the deck. He went into the room on the end. Ernie stood helplessly. He stayed in front of the door, a volunteer guard at the barn already emptied of horses. When the doctor arrived, he left. The group was gathered under the deck and around the police cruiser. Tom Jack was sitting up in the back seat.

"Hey, Em," the big man called plaintively, "What's with these cats. What are they doing to me?"

The poor son-of-a-bitch didn't even know what had happened. Ernie turned away, his head down. Tom Jack would pay for something which, as far as his memory was concerned, hadn't even happened. He'd pay and pay and he wouldn't even have the satisfaction of knowing what little pleasure he'd had.

"Base to Twenty-one." The police radio coming to life stopped Ernie.

"Come in, Cookie," Petty acknowledged.

"Drowner, Chief. Two hundred yards south of the pier. Girl."

"Thanks, Cookie." Petty's voice was tired. After a quiet evening, events were making up for the quietness. "I'll need someone to drive me," Petty said. "I want to send the prisoner back in the police car."

"Over here, Chief," Ernie yelled. Because he suddenly realized that he hadn't seen Tina in the group of people scattered over the parking lot, and thinking of a drowner, a girl, sent chills down his spine. He didn't want it to be Tina. God, he didn't want it to be Tina.

He drove rapidly past the pier and pulled off on a clay shoulder at the Chiefs direction. Three or four people were gathered around a bundle of something near the water. Ernie's feet were unnaturally heavy. He followed the Chief through the loose sand. He was afraid to look at the limp bundle. When he finally did, he saw a face he didn't recognize at first because the long curtains of blonde hair weren't protecting Pat Emory from the world any more. Her hair was wet and stringy and stuck to her head in a sandy mess. But it wasn't Tina.

But it was bad. It was plenty bad enough. That sun-browned body, cold and lifeless. Big, blue eyes open and horrible and glazed and staring. He turned sideways and scuttled away, and was sick on the sand. When he came back they had lifted her and were carrying her over the dunes toward an ambulance which came roaring and screeching down the beach road, turned around, stopped. He saw Pat's face again as they put her into the ambulance. The blanket fell away from her dead face, white eyes staring.

She was, had been, a fine girl. Thing about Pat Emory, she didn't care. Hell, she didn't know nothin'.

He felt guilty. Was that all he could say about Pat? Now that she was dead, was that all he could say about her? High praise, the highest, coming from Ernie Harper who didn't care and who didn't know nothin', and it wasn't enough. It wasn't enough to explain why that fine girl's body was cold, why all that lush girl was nothing.

"I'll ride back in the hearse," Petty told him.

They left him standing beside his car on a dark, asphalt road, and he was a little confused. Things sure had gone to hell. His weekend was shot.

His weekend.

After what had happened to Pat, to Jean and David, and ole stupid Tom Jack, he had the gall to moan about his weekend.

Well, it was his weekend. That girl dead in the hearse, and that girl, shocked and pained back in the motel room, they were a part of the weekend and if it was his weekend then they were his, too. And he didn't want them. Jesus Christ, he didn't want them. They couldn't blame him, could they? He hadn't forced them to come to the beach. He hadn't forced Pat to go into the sea alone, and he hadn't forced Jean and Dave to go off away from the safety of the crowd, and he hadn't held Tom Jack's head and forced all the ignorant oil down him.

But it was his weekend. All of it was his idea.

He'd break things up. Send them all home before something else happened. He drove back to the motel. They were still hanging around, talking quietly. A tall, lithe girl met him.

"It was Pat Emory, wasn't it?" she asked, dreading the answer.

"Yes. How did you know?"

"I just knew," Ellen said. "I was worried about her. I called the police about her."

I wonder why, Ernie thought, as the girl walked away, her shoulders slack. He circulated through the crowd, counting noses. Five people missing. Jean-upstairs. David-upstairs. Tom Jack-in jail. Pat-dead. Tina-missing, just missing. He went up on the deck and looked in all the rooms. David was lying on the bed.

"You all right, Dave?"

"I guess so."

"You feel better?"

"Yeah, I guess so."

"Listen Dave, about what you said when you came out of the room-"

. "Yeah, I know. I was crazy. It's all right, Ernie. I'm fine."

"You know she was in shock."

"Yeah, I guess I was, too."

"About what she said, it's possible that she did, uh, have a climax, but if she did it was just a physical thing."

"Yeah, I know. It's all right, Ernie."

"But what about Jean? How is she going to feel when she finds out you got so shook up?"

David sat up, running his hands through his hair. "Shell never know," he said. "I'm going to marry her just as if nothing happened, just as if she hadn't-"

"Just as if she hadn't been raped against her will," Ernie finished. "Hell, it was the girl who lost it, not you, Dave. Remember that, you damned fool, she was raped! You couldn't stop it, how could she?"

David stood up and looked at him angrily. "Don't preach to me," he said. "If you'd talked to that son-of-a-bitch like I asked you-"

He shuffled his feet, looking over Ernie's head. "Sorry, Ernie. It wasn't your fault, either. I guess I'm just not thinking straight. I guess I keep remembering what she said."

"What she said?"

"She said we'd never be able to forget it, either of us. She said I would never be able to forget that I wasn't man enough to protect my own girl, and she'd never forget that she enjoyed it."

Ernie didn't know what to say. He was afraid David was going to break down again.

"But it's all right," David went on. He managed a weak smile. "It's all right."

Ernie wasn't so sure. He left the room with a new little chunk of sadness in him, cursing under his breath. That was the trouble with the do-gooders and the prudes. They placed too high a value on an intangible thing like virginity and then anything that happened could throw them for a loop. Oh, he figured David could find the strength to go ahead and marry Jean, but the magic would be gone. They'd go through the rest of their lives reliving the night at Lundy Beach, wishing that it hadn't happened, when all they would have to do to make it as if it hadn't happened would be to forget about it.

It didn't make sense.