“And what about the other part of you?” I asked. “What does it want?”
“It wants to go back to my paintings,” she said. “It wants me in the attic, working like a fiend. I suspect it really doesn’t care what you write and what you don’t write.”
“Well, then, maybe that’s the part you should be listening to,” and I asked her for a cigarette.
“We smoke too much,” Constance said. “Both of us. We’re both gonna die of emphysema or lung cancer or something if we keep it up.”
I laughed, and she told me she was serious, but then she laughed, too.
“Personally, I don’t think I need to write the rest of it down,” I said. “I know that I certainly don’t want to. So, perhaps it’s best if we keep it between us.”
“But we’re not talking about it.”
“We’re talking about it right now, Constance,” and she scowled again. She told me not to be an ass, that I knew damn well what she meant.
“I don’t have answers,” I said. “If that’s what you mean, I don’t have any more answers than you do.” And, frankly, I was thinking that maybe I had quite a few less. There were questions that I wanted to put to Constance, questions about what she’d seen down there, below the floorboards, about the things she’d said to me, and where those oak leaves had come from, for starters. But, the few questions I had dared to ask, she’d been unable, or unwilling, to answer.
“Do you think we should stay?” she asked.
“I can’t afford to leave,” I replied. “I simply don’t have the money. But if you do, I would understand if you found another place, Constance.”
“I wouldn’t leave you here alone,” she said, and I think maybe she said it a little too quickly, too eagerly, as though she’d practiced the line beforehand. I wished that the sun were still up, the room still bathed in that buttery late-July sun that the twilight had stolen. By the lamp beside the bed, Constance’s eyes had taken on their old reddish tint.
As for today, well, it was almost as if the whole thing never occurred. She’s gone back up to her garret, and I’ve hardly seen her since breakfast. I’ve gone back to my reading and the television and this typewriter. Earlier, I sat here and just stared out the kitchen window at the red tree for the better part of an hour. Maybe I’ll try to reach the woman at URI again. Maybe I’ll talk to Blanchard. I dreamed of Amanda last night, and it was not a pleasant dream. She’s something else that Constance wanted to talk about, but I told her I thought we had plenty enough ghosts to deal with, thank you very much.
“Besides,” I added, “Amanda is my own private haunting. She’s nothing I want to share. And she’s nothing you need to hear about.” And Constance nodded, but it was more of a if-you-say-so sort of nod than anything else.
I’m thinking of getting a combination lock for the cellar door, next time I go into town.
CHAPTER EIGHT
I honestly believed I was finished with this journal. Over the past six days, I allowed myself to start believing that. Certainly, I’ve wanted nothing more to do with it, or with Harvey’s manuscript, or that goddamn tree. And those six unrecorded days were remarkable only in their consistent, unwavering sameness. I read, watched television, and took a couple of long drives, one as far as Providence. Constance stayed in the attic, appearing only rarely, once more distant, and taciturn, and stained always with paint. I began to imagine this is how the remainder of the summer would proceed. And possibly the autumn, as well. Just yesterday, I sat here and thought how July seemed like some long, thoroughly ridiculous nightmare, but that now it was finally over. Two days ago, I packed Charles Harvey’s unfinished book back into its cardboard box and put it at the bottom of the hall cupboard, under some spare blankets. I had planned to do the same with his typewriter, but, for whatever reason, had not yet gotten around to it.
And then, late this morning, I opened the back door, the kitchen door (I can’t recall why), and found neon green fishing line tied about the porch railing near the bottom step. It was drawn taut, suspended maybe a foot above the ground, and led away into the briars and goldenrod and poison ivy, north, towards the red tree. I stared at it for a few minutes, I think. It seems now it took me a moment to fully process what the fishing line signified. I was startled that it was so very green, and couldn’t recall ever having seen that sort of fishing line before. And then I was shouting for Constance, and when she didn’t answer, I went back into the house. I went directly to the attic stairs. I knocked and asked her to please open the door. Then I tried the knob and discovered that it was locked. I banged on the door again, hard enough to hurt my knuckles. But no response came from the attic, and the door remained closed.
I very briefly considered breaking it down. I’m pretty sure that I could have, but then I admitted to myself that Constance was not behind the door. That she was not in the attic, or, for that matter, anywhere else in the house. Standing there on the narrow landing at the top of the stairs, in the darkness and the heat, I admitted to myself that the only place I would find her was at the other end of the length of green fishing line tied to the back porch. For a minute or two, I permitted myself the luxury of pretending that there was no way on earth I was going after her. It was only seventy-five yards, after all, from the house to the tree, and she’d taken precautions, done her little Hansel and-Gretel trick with the nylon line. If she’d wanted me along, she would have asked me. Constance Hopkins is a grown woman, and she can damn well look after herself. I thought each of these things, in turn, and then I retraced my steps and stared at the fishing line stretching away into the weeds and underbrush. I called her name a few more times, shouting loudly enough that people probably heard me all the way up in Moosup. And then, suddenly, the whole thing felt absurdly like a replay of the episode in the basement, and I stopped calling for her.
It was cloudy, and we haven’t had much of that this summer. Even so, the air was very still, oppressive, and I could tell the day was only going to get hotter. Even if it rains, I thought, the heat will only get worse.
I hesitated, lingering there on the porch, and then I took what I prefer to think was, realistically, the only course of action left open to me. I could hardly have called Blanchard or the police, could I? Even now, I don’t know what else I could have done, except maybe go inside and wait to see if she eventually found her way home. And I couldn’t do that, even though that’s what I wanted to do. I’ve known Constance less than a month now, but, in that time, we’ve shared a bed, and we’ve shared the experience of living in this house on this godforsaken plot of land. I’d gone into the basement and brought her back. I’d washed the filth from her skin and hair, and she’d played nursemaid after my last fit and read Bradbury to me. More importantly, perhaps, we’d tried together to reach the tree, and together we’d become lost, when getting lost was all but impossible. All this went through my head, I know, in only a matter of seconds, and then I left the porch and followed the trail of fishing line leading away from the house. I didn’t call her name again, and I didn’t look at the tree first. I just went.
I walked fast, and it took me hardly any time at all to reach the deadfall marking the halfway point between the house and the red oak. I discovered that the fishing line had been looped several times around one of the sturdier of the fallen pine branches, one that’s not so rotten. From there, it turned west, towards the fieldstone wall and the creek, just as I’d expected it to do. I stopped only long enough to catch my breath and wipe some of the sweat from my face. There was a tick crawling on my pants leg, and I flicked it away. Somewhere nearby, a catbird mewled and warbled, its voice sounding hoarse and angry. I looked up and spotted it, perched fairly high in the limbs of a small maple, and it occurred to me that from that vantage, the bird would likely be able to see both me and Constance. So, it could be fussing at either one of us, or both.