"Well, I've got this much," he said, holding up some wood he had gathered. "Shall we try it?" He walked toward the rock they had selected as a shelter for the fire, but Melinda did not follow him. Vic looked back when he got to the rock, and saw her staring down at the quarry. He wondered if she was going to propose a walk down the path to the bottom, and he decided that under no circumstances would he go down. Not that the place made him uneasy, he thought, but that there might be bloodstains and she might notice them. They might not look like rust stains. But at this moment she had no plans. He could tell that from her relaxed, purposeless stance at the rim of the quarry. After a moment she came back toward him and proposed having a drink.
They poured two glasses of iced Scotch and water from the thermos and ate a deviled egg as a canapé. The fire was doing nicely after a stubborn start. It was certainly not warm, but Melinda stoically took off her polo coat, spread it to lie on, and stretched out on the rock facing the fire. She was wearing her old buff-colored corduroy slacks and her old brown sweater that had holes at the elbows. They had forgotten to bring the lap rug, Vic realized. Vic sat down, rather uncomfortably, on the rock to one side of Melinda.
"What did Tony really say to you that day he took a ride with you?" Melinda asked suddenly.
"I told you what he said."
"I don't believe it."
"Why not?"
She was still staring into the fire. "Didn't you take him for a little ride and just dump him somewhere—dead?"
"Dead how?"
"Maybe strangled," she said with surprising calm. "Didn't you dump him somewhere in the woods?"
Vic gave a short laugh. "Good lord, Melinda." He was waiting for the quarry, perhaps, to cross her mind. She might have been going over, now, all the places in the woods where he might have dropped a body. Melinda knew these roads so well. Hadn't she thought of the quarry? Or would she think that he couldn't possibly have caught a big fellow like Cameron enough off his guard to have pushed him over? That was Vic's only explanation of her not thinking of the quarry. "Aren't you getting hungry?" Vic asked. "I'm ready for a piece of chicken."
Melinda dragged herself up to help Vic unload the picnic basket. Roger was very interested in the chicken, but he was not allowed to have any. Vic sent him off chasing a stick. Then he and Melinda—just as he had foreseen—huddled near the fire and chewed their chicken, but Vic wondered if even in primitive times a man and woman whose relationship was more or less marital had ever known such mistrust of each other. The conversation of a few minutes before had not dulled Melinda's appetite for lunch. Vic smiled, watching her concentration on a chicken breast. They talked of buying Trixie a bicycle for Christmas. It was Vic's idea.
Then Melinda said, “You know, Vic, I think you killed Charley and Tony, too—so why not admit it to me? I can take it."
Vic smiled a little, his suspicions confirmed. The purpose of her sweetness and light lately had been to make him believe she was on his side. "And then have you go to the police and tell them I've made a confession?"
"A wife can't testify against her husband, I've heard." "I've heard that she doesn't have to. She can."
"But I just meant—as long as I know it—"
"Is this all you and Wilson can dream up between you?" he asked. "It isn't good enough."
"You admit it, then?" She looked at him, her eyes full of triumph.
"No, I do not," he said quietly, though he felt angry. Or perhaps it was only embarrassment that he felt, for her. He remembered her embarrassing pretense of affection for him the night he had sat in her room. His anger drove him up. He wandered to the edge of the quarry again and looked down.
And there now in the twinkling water, he saw it. It was next to the step where he had pushed Cameron off, parallel with the edge of the step, just where one might have expected the corpse to rise, if it rose. It had risen.
"Coffee, Vic?" Melinda's voice called.
He peered harder, not bending his body because he did not want to arouse Melinda's curiosity, but tensing himself to concentrate all the power of his eyes. One end was lower than the other. It looked rather beige, but that could be caused by the damnable twinkling of the water lightening Cameron's brown tweed jacket. The weight at one end might be the rock in his trousers. At any rate, the chain had come off.
"Don't you want your coffee, Vic?"
He took a last staring look, trying to estimate how conspicuous the form would be to an ordinary person standing where he was, an ordinary unsuspecting person. Anyone seeing it would look twice, however, might even go down to investigate, especially if the Cameron story crossed his mind.
Vic turned slowly. "Coming," he said, and began to walk back.
Though Vic might have proposed leaving almost immediately, in order to hear the radio concert he usually listened to on Sun day afternoons, he felt this would have been a small concession to his anxiety, so he waited until Melinda had had her coffee and a cigarette and suggested leaving herself. They packed the basket together.
They were home by three-twenty-five, and Vic at once turned on the radio in the living room. He heard the throbbing,
