Don

'The Blue Lady!'

'Yes. She wants you to come here, too.'

'She?'

Natalie's eyes flicked to Constance 's. 'Dad, it's Ruth.'

'Ruth?' he said blankly. 'Ruth Meadows?'

'Yes.'

He emitted a little gust of air. 'Natalie, this isn't funny.'

'She isn't really Ruth Meadows, Dad, she's Constance Farley.'

'Constance Farley? Eugene Farley's mother? Someone is pulling a stupid joke on you. I have seen Constance Farley.'

Natalie lowered the phone and looked at the woman holding Paige. 'My father says he's seen Constance Farley.'

'Two years ago. I weighed seventy pounds more. I had long, dark hair pulled into a bun and I wore glasses. And he saw me for exactly three minutes when he came to tell my husband and me how very sorry he was that my son had not survived the surgery.'

Natalie raised the phone again. 'Dad-'

'I heard her,' he said thinly.

'She's standing here in front of me with a gun to Paige Meredith's head. Please get here as soon as possible. I repeat, do not call the police.' She paused. 'And do not bring a gun-'

'A gun! I don't own a gun!'

'I know you don't.' Please pick up the emphasis on you, she implored silently.

'That's enough,' Constance said. 'Hang up.'

'Dad-'

'Hang up!' Constance shouted. Andrew must have heard her. Natalie clicked off the phone. 'Lay it down.' Natalie placed the instrument on the floor. 'Now we wait.'

Natalie looked at Paige's chalky face. 'Please take the gun away from Paige's head.' Natalie made her voice gentle and respectful. 'You're frightening her terribly, and I'm sure she's not going to run away, are you, Paige?'

'I won't move. I swear' Paige said fervently.

Constance hesitated. 'If I take the gun away, I know you won't make a run for it,' she said to Natalie. 'You're far too noble.'

'I'd never make it to the door.'

Constance smiled. 'That, too. I said you were a bright girl.'

The cool drizzle had turned into a lonely rain spattering against the dirty windows of The Blue Lady. Rose- scented smoke drifted out from the candles on the dais. The flames danced and flickered in the musty darkness. 'While we wait for my father to come and watch my execution, why don't you tell me what this is all about?' Natalie said.

'You know that it's all about Eugene.'

'Vaguely. But I didn't even know Eugene. He must have been quite the son to warrant all this wanton slaughter.'

Natalie had meant the statement to be a taunt and it worked. Constance 's eyes narrowed. 'My son was worth everything. And what I've done isn't wanton slaughter. It's justice.'

'Pardon me if I don't understand what in the name of God Tamara and Alison had to do with your son's death.'

'They had nothing to do with it directly. But their parents did.'

'Innocent children paying for the skis of the father and all that nonsense?'

'It isn't nonsense!' Constance flared.

'Then explain. Dad can't get here for at least ten minutes. We have time for you to describe your brilliant plan. How did you pull all this off, Constance?'

'You're trying to stall me. It won't work.'

'Stall you from what? Killing me as soon as my father gets here? I don't think it would work.' She shrugged nonchalantly although everything inside her quivered. 'You can talk or we can stand here staring at each other with me thinking you are an absolute lunatic for trying to avenge your criminal, suicidal son. It's up to you.'

'My son was not responsible for what happened to him,' Constance said with quiet venom. 'His problems started a long time ago. With his father.'

'I thought his problems only started in Port Ariel.'

'They culminated in Port Ariel. They started with Hugh.'

'I thought your husband's name was Walter and he had a government job in Washington.'

'That was all a lie, the fictitious background of Ruth Meadows.'

'Is Ruth Meadows a complete fantasy?'

'Of course not. None of this would have worked if she'd been a complete fantasy.' Constance sighed and looked slightly beyond Natalie, seeing another world. 'My father was a professor of anatomy at Ohio State University,' she said. 'If you're wondering where the skull on your bed came from, it belonged to a skeleton he used in class. I kept it after he died.'

'Only now it's missing a head.'

'No matter.' Slowly Constance lowered the gun from Paige's head. Relief flickered in the child's dark blue eyes, but she didn't move. For an eleven-year-old, Paige was showing remarkable presence of mind.

'So your father was a professor of anatomy,' Natalie prodded.

'Yes. He was a brilliant man, and everyone thought he was kind and quite refined.' She sneered. 'In reality he was brutal. He beat my mother and me. And he made us do horrible things. The worst for me was the pigs.' The pigs? Nat alie wondered, keeping her gaze steady as Constance dredged up memories. 'We had a farm outside of Columbus. My father knew I loved animals, so he made me slaughter pigs. Wrestle them down and slash their throats. Pigs can be quite vicious, you know. It takes great skill and strength to kill one quickly and cleanly, but he made me do it, over and over, until I became a master at it. All that slaughtering later came in quite handy.'

It also traumatized you, Natalie thought in horror. How awful-a young girl who loved animals forced to struggle with pigs emitting high-pitched, terrified squeals as they fought for their lives. Had it been so different for a young Constance than killing humans so many years later?

'I married Hugh when I was twenty,' she went on. 'He was an accountant, ten years older than I, very conservative, especially where money was concerned. Believed in living on a shoestring. We did have a lovely honeymoon, though. We spent it here, at The Blue Lady. It was before the fire. I thought the hotel was fabulous- my father had never taken us anywhere. I didn't see how shabby The Blue Lady had become by the late sixties. I didn't realize Hugh had chosen it because it was cheap.' She glanced around the musty, cavernous room. 'We danced in this pavilion. There was a perfect red rosebud on our table. The mirrored ball sparked so beautifully.'

'You've been coming in here and polishing that ball,' Natalie said.

'Oh, yes. Such hard work. At first I thought it was ruined, but I was determined to restore it as best as I could.'

'Why was it so important?'

Constance looked directly at her and smiled beatifically. 'I told you we danced here. I wore pink silk. Blue lanterns hung around the outside, making the place look like a fairyland. The light from the lanterns and the flames from the candles on the tables reflected over and over in those hundreds of tiny mirrors. It was magical. And after we danced beneath that glittering ball, Hugh and I went back to our room and made love.' She sighed. 'That was the night I conceived Eugene.'

Oh, God, Natalie thought. No wonder The Blue Lady held such significance for Constance. How many nights had she spent in here, polishing that damned ball, recalling, no doubt romanticizing, the night she thought her precious Eugene had been created?

'You did tell me you'd been here before,' Natalie said. 'That part was true.'

'Yes. Unfortunately I told Eugene so much about The Blue Lady and Port Ariel, he decided he might like it here, so he applied to Bishop Corporation. He was hired and he met that bitch.'