“She went the same way. Mind you, people die all the time, we just usually know the reason.” He was lost in thought a moment. “Both Annie and Henry were found with peaceful looks on their faces and their mouths open, as if they were just about to greet their Maker. Susie, who didn’t yet speak, looked the same.”
“Is that unusual?”
The doctor shrugged. “No, not really.”
“Something’s bothering you,” said Hudson.
“Talking with my colleagues, there may have been two others.
“Older people?”
“The youngest was sixty-one. Except for Susie. She’s the only child.” He grinned. “Don’t make a big deal about it. This isn’t China or India.”
“Where the people are more disease prone?” asked Cilla, with an edge to her voice.
“More densely populated. We’re breeding too much, Cilla. There are getting to be just too many people on earth. Why should humans be any different than, say, the Gypsy Moth?”
“Who die off after a few years?”
“Each species has it,” said Evans. “A built-in control triggered by overpopulation that thins out the numbers. Sometimes wipes them out completely. When was the last time you saw a raccoon? Yet twenty years ago they were all over the Valley. We’re already seeing a substantial drop in human birth rates. So far we’ve been able to survive diseases. But we’ve only been around a short time and we’ve multiplied so rapidly that unless we peel back voluntarily it will get done for us.”
“Meaning?”
“It’s already been happening. The Black Plague decimated Europe. Influenza wiped out more than twenty million in this country and over there before it ended. And look how nervous scientists got over Swine Flu.” He folded his arms tightly around his chest and leaned on the chair arm. “Smallpox, TB, AIDS. And when we find a cure for one, it mutates and a resistant strain develops. There’s no dearth of people who feel the whole planet is on its way up the chimney. Whether or not they’re right at this time, they will be someday very soon if we keep adding to our numbers the way we have. If not a giant collapse through increases or decreases in global temperature, or destruction of the ozone layer, a bacterial or virus outbreak we can’t control in time. Probably starting with our older people.”
“And Susie.”
The conversation over dinner was muted.
Chapter 10
February 20-26
The New England weather gods were in a good mood. It snowed Tuesday and again Friday, and though the sun wasn’t always as ready to appear, there was little wind, and daytime temperatures nudged into the thirties. February will set records, thought Cilla, though the size of the crowds emphasized Great Haystack’s weaknesses. Food service areas were inadequate as was parking. They’d have to do something about both if they got the new quad.
She was at the mountain each morning at six and didn’t break away until nine at night. Kurt Britton had the mountain crews working straight through with no days off. Those who walked into his office left running; he had that effect on employees. His eyes were always on her, daring her to make a mistake or let down from the furious pace he set.
On Wednesday Bob Gold announced that his new walk-in freezer was finished, and he again had a room for Andre. Cilla tried, not completely successfully, to hide relief at her guest’s departure.
“You’re very private people, aren’t you?” Andre echoed her thoughts.
“Hudson and I didn’t have a formal honeymoon, so I guess we’re still on it,” she said by way of apology.
“I can’t tell you how much I appreciate your taking me in.” He pulled at his chin. “It’s been stressful for me, too, sitting across the breakfast table from what could be the girl who walked out on me.”
“Have you heard anything from her?”
“Nothing. One day she was gone and that’s all. No note, no calls.”
“Andre, are you sure she didn’t have an accident, and that’s why you haven’t heard from her?”
“I checked hospitals after she left. But that was while I was still allowing myself the fiction that her departure might be due to something beyond her control. No, she’d been jumpy for a week or two before she left. I didn’t catch the signs until after she’d gone. Then I realized she’d obviously been in the process of making her decision; I was too wrapped in my work to notice. I’m still old fashioned enough to do most of my research in libraries rather than the Internet. I’m often there long into the evenings.”
After he’d gone, Cilla stood looking out the kitchen window at the mountains but hearing the whispered voice. The library, that’s where she’d heard it. It had come from the stacks next to her, unseen. Someone discussing a book with a friend. When they’d left she’d seen only the backs of their heads. Two men. There was something unusual, though… yes; one was wearing a cowboy hat. Was he the one with the whispering voice? She tried to remember who else was there at that time that might also have seen him. She looked up the library phone number and asked for Florence Stone.
“Miss Stone? This is Cilla Wheaton Rogers. Do you remember me? You taught me English at Kennett High School eleven years ago.”
“Of course, Cilla. I remember you in class. Any day the skiing wasn’t good.”
“I’m surprised you passed me, I cut so often.”
“Oh you were bright enough. Didn’t I see you here at the library before Christmas?”
“Yes, as a matter of fact, that’s what I’m calling about. Could you get away for lunch today?”
“Why, I guess so. Want to catch up on what you missed at Kennett?”
“No, I want to see if your eye is as sharp as it always was.”
Lunch, at Cilla’s suggestion, was at Eastern Slope Inn. With food ordered, Florence sat back and studied Cilla with an appraising eye.
“Your hair’s a little shorter. You used to have it all in a big bun on the top of your head. You look happy. I didn’t see that very often back then.”
“It wasn’t there at all. You remember I was different than the other kids.”
Florence wrinkled her forehead. “Well, whose fault is that? You used to wear those dreadful Indian clothes all the time.”
“My mother was Abenaki.”
“So? That wasn’t a criminal offense even then.”
“You wouldn’t know it from the way people treated us. Growing up, there wasn’t anyone lower than an Indian in Bartlett, New Hampshire.”
“So that’s it.” Florence looked around at the room. “Do you know this is the first time I’ve ever been in this hotel?”
Cilla was puzzled. “So?”
“I’m originally from Newton, Massachusetts. In the late nineteen-forties, my family made a reservation here at this Inn for a summer vacation. I was just a kid. The week before we were scheduled to arrive, we received a letter saying that they were sorry to have to let us know that our reservation had been cancelled. The letter went on to say in rather blunt terms that the hotel policy was not to take Jews, and that they had learned that our family was Jewish.”
“Did hotels really do that?”
“Yes, many did.”
“But Eastern Slope Inn! I’ve always thought of it as…”
“Oh, it all changed here a few years later. A man named Sherrard, who owned the Parker House in Boston, bought it and opened it to everyone. Did you ever read the book no I suppose I should ask, did you ever see the movie - Gentlemen’s Agreement?”
“No to both. Why?”
“It was about a hotel that didn’t allow Jews. Some people back then thought it was written about this place.”
“That’s dreadful! Old bastard WASPS. What did your family do?”