How had she thought she could spend another night in this place? The answer was of course that she hadn’t thought about it at all; she had been caught up by the significance of Louise’s glasses, and it had been full daylight, with Torrant there. She hadn’t thought ahead to the graying afternoon or the sounds the wind could make, swallowing other, closer sounds, or the hours of darkness on the heels of the wind. And the nap hadn’t helped. She wasn’t a good daytime sleeper, she woke at odds with herself and the world, and the solidest objects looked subtly mischievous.
Well, pack. And face the fact that she was running again, because she had stumbled into something she couldn’t handle and should have known better than to think she could handle in the first place. It wouldn’t help Louise if—Slippers, Maria said rapidly to herself, and the robe on the back of the bathroom door. Annabelle is busy with something or other, Annabelle can’t possibly know you’re packing. And even if she did know, it’s what she wants, isn’t it?
The telephone on the black-painted bookcase rang like a sharp answer. Maria looked at it and went on capping a bottle of cologne. At the fourth ring, it occurred to her that Torrant might be calling back.
“Miss Rowan?” Annabelle Blair’s voice, cool and authoritative, feeling no need to identify itself. Wanting to know whether Maria had decided to accept her bribe and go harmlessly away? “I wonder if I might see you for a few minutes.”
“I’m—in the middle of a bath right now.”
“Later, then?”
“I’m sorry,” Maria said, stiffened by Annabelle’s faint irony, “but I’m going out. Wouldn’t tomorrow do?”
“No,” said Annabelle, and then her voice changed subtly. “I’m leaving Chauncy, Maria. I thought you’d be interested in exactly what happened before your cousin died.”
“You went into that pretty thoroughly last night.”
“But—not quite.”
And here it was, the dangling and almost irresistible bait that Torrant had warned her about. His voice came back now, grim under the lightness: Don’t go to tea again with Annabelle Blair. But surely the road would be safe enough, even though the daylight was beginning to ebb; Vanguard Street might not be heavily travelled but there would be an occasional car going by . . . Maria made herself look at it as Torrant looked at it, and hardened. “I’m sorry,” she said again, and put the receiver down.
She was a bad packer at best, starting out meticulously, ending in a random tucking-in here and there. Now there seemed to be a layer of blankness between her brain and her hands, so that she stood staring distractedly at a single pump and her hairbrush, paired neatly in the bottom of her suitcase.
This wouldn’t do; for one thing, she had to leave the kitchenette the way she had found it. Maria finished packing and went into the windowed alcove, forcing her whole attention on the neat groups of knives and forks and spoons, the two cups dangling from their hooks, the two saucers under them. She cleaned out the picnic icebox and put the hot plate away, washed the ashtrays and polished the sink. At twenty minutes of five, except for the suitcase at the door with her coat and bag and gloves across it, the apartment looked ready for another stranger.
In the bathroom, she put on fresh powder and lipstick and discovered her toothbrush in the process. The wind murmured around the garage walls; something, rain or sleet, began to tick at the windows. Maria opened her suitcase, poked the toothbrush in and took out the soft navy hat, an abbreviated sou’wester in wool jersey, that stayed on in any land of wind or weather. Her travelling clock was packed, firmly entrenched among slips and nightgowns, but by the time she had smoked a final cigarette and put on her coat, she thought it was almost five o’clock.
She switched off the lamps, and the long brilliant room, already strange, sank down into a blur of deep gray. It seemed briefly incredible, as she stood on the threshold, that she had slept here, sat reading in that dark shape of armchair, heated soup and scrambled eggs at those blank and dimly shining counters. She turned on the garage light, closed the door on a tiny frightening slice of her life and went down the stairs to watch for Torrant’s funny little car.
It must have been minutes, although it seemed no time at all, before she found herself gazing directly into the face at the misted pane in the garage door.
Maria caught her breath, and it was louder in her own ears than the wind and the peppery tinkle of sleet. When Annabelle Blair said, dim but imperative, “Miss Rowan? This will only take a minute,” there was somehow nothing to do but, in slow motion, release the lock, push the door open, step out into the dying afternoon. She didn’t close the door behind her, and the latch felt solid and safe under her gloved fingers.
It was a deceptive time of day, looking nearly dark from a lighted interior, dully luminous under the open sky. The sleet was a faint cold sting in Maria’s face and a crystal dampness in Annabelle Blair’s dark hair; with the dry shelter of the garage only a step behind Maria, neither of them moved. Annabelle’s smile was faintly visible in the thick wet light. “Don’t be afraid, Miss Rowan. I won’t keep you.”
“I’m not afraid,” Maria said steadily.
A sudden small rush of wind sent her dipping hat-brim back, and she put up an automatic hand. Annabelle
