woods, branches reaching out, scraping her skin, her face,
while she whimpered. That was the only time she let the im-
age of Tommy—gasping, grimly flailing at the water—enter
her consciousness. It was also the only time she admitted,
accepted, the terrible guilt.
If only I had stayed, he’d be alive. 1 could have saved him.
In a fog, she had flagged down a Ford four-by-four and
took a ride with a beer-toting kid who, from his grinning
face, couldn’t believe his luck. But her choking story about
her boyfriend straightened the driver right out. He quickly
dropped her off at the Ellerton police station.
After that she prayed and forced herself to think of
anything else.
Anything. Except the guilt. And the picture of Tommy
under water.
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219
But that morning it was all there for her. Not to be ig-
nored. And somehow it wasn’t all that horrid. There was an
almost poignant sadness in Tommy’s death. It was a
tragedy—the young boy who died with his love un . . .
un . . .
She searched for the word that Mr. Winan had used in
his English class, talking of young Romeo.
Unrequited.
That’s when she knew what she’d do that day. She
wouldn’t tell anyone. Not a soul. That would mar the beauty,
the simplicity of her gesture. She’d bring flowers, not from
the store but gathered from around the town’s parks and gar-
dens. Flowers from his home. She’d bring the flowers to
their spot, right to the secluded place where she’d last seen
Tommy. And she’d throw them in one by one, into the water.
A private memorial.
Just for her, and Tommy.
Slowly Billy Leeper found it easier to look at the lake.
At first it overwhelmed him with a tidal wave of memo-
ries. Biking with Jackie up to the Lakeview Hotel, where
they would fish the small Kenicut Lake until someone from
the hotel would come out and chase them away.
“And don’t come back!” the caretaker would yell.
But they did, nearly every day of the summer, talking
about the universe of things that boys value. What’s a good
knife? How quick would it take the U.S. to lick the Ger-
mans or the Japs? (Never knowing that Uncle Sam would
have to take them on together.) Swapping comic books and
debating whether this new crime fighter, Superman, would
make it big.
Billy smiled a bit, thinking of those talks.
And rainy days, God, the hours they spent at the Glen-
wood, their Keds propped up on the seats in front of
them, wolfing down popcorn and Junior Mints. (With
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more high-level discussions of just how was Buck Rogers
going to get out of his latest impossible jam.)
A childhood gone forever, leaving only fragments, tiny
traces of thought.
But his nostalgia faded—quickly, as if it were a false
reaction—and Billy felt cold.
He rolled down his shirt sleeve over his powerful arms.
The house is down there. Sitting and rotting under the
water. The bloodstained floorboards. The twisting hallway.
The stairs leading to an ever darker basement.
(And what else, Billy? What else?)
He was here now. As much as he hoped and prayed that
he’d never have to do this, he knew it was almost inevitable.
Fated.
Sixty-three years old.
A long enough life, he supposed. But he wasn’t doing
this for Dan or any of them—what do they call them?—
yuppies who lived in Ellerton. That’s not who he came
back to this town to help.
(It’s for you, Jackie, he thought. Unfinished business.
Accounts to be balanced.)
He rubbed the grizzly beard sprouting on his cheek.
He watched Jack Russo crouched in the back of the
small boat.
And if he hadn’t been so lost in his thoughts, he might
have noticed that someone was watching him.
For the first few minutes it was no different than any other
morning dive. Cold water touched the small bits of his ex-
posed skin. That first disconcerting moment when up and
down seemed a tad indefinite. Then the soothing, almost
primeval feeling of kicking, froglike, straight down.
And for a while he didn’t see anything too strange. Af-
ter all, his tungsten lamp only projected a beam fifteen,
maybe twenty feet ahead. For all Dan knew, the story of a
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221
town down here was an enormous hoax, a local fable to
drag suckers to the reservoir to look out at the water and
imagine the buildings (and the stories) beneath such still
waters.
But then the first shapes appeared, a hulking corner of
a building that nearly clipped him on his left shoulder,
and then a flat rooftop pockmarked with holes, and a
yawning valley of what—unbelievably enough—had to
be Main Street.
His equipment was performing fine. (He just wished he
had a radio so he could talk to Russo—some chitchat and
directions would be more than welcome.)
But he was alone.
He concentrated on following the directions to the
church—straight north up Main Street, then right, onto
Lakeview Road, toward the church. How thoughtful of them
to put street signs down here!
And he thought of Tom and Ed. (He didn’t want to find
them. Not at all. Leave that for the guys with the body
bags . . . the people who could fish someone out of the wa-
ter and make jokes—jokes!—about the puffy, “dough-boy”
look caused by all that gas building up in the corpse.)
He barely looked left or right, just enough to notice some
of the signs, all encrusted with algae but still easily readable.
The Gouldens Falls Post Office (no zip code here), F. W.
Woolworth’s, a red sign gone to a sickly greenish-brown,
and the movie theater (he swam especially fast past that).
Until he reached Lakeview Road.
At first all the landmarks seemed to disappear. This
was, according to the map, the end of the town. But even as
he slowed and moved ahead more cautiously, he picked up
some steps, leading to a massive veranda. It was the hotel.
Closed for renovation.
The church had to be close, just past the hotel, and up a
slight hill.
He found himself lower to the ground (lower than he
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wanted to be), and he reached the gentle grade of an in-
cline. He kicked away violently.
I’m swimming uphill, he thought.
Over the murky deposit of years of dead leaves and
trash.
The church appeared out of the water like a gray phantom.
He was glad to see it.
(Somehow it felt better here, even with the small build-
ing all boarded up and its steeple nibbled down to a blunt
stub. The
re was no cross anywhere in sight. Still, it was a
church.)
He circled the building, past the sign listing Reverend
Duncan Passworthy as rector. He looked for some en-
trance. But the doors were crisscrossed with heavy two-by-
fours, and the windows—the stained glass probably long
gone—were covered with sheets of wood. Damn. I could
probably rip the door down, he thought. But how long would it take? Do I have enough air to struggle with the
wooden cross beams and still do what I have to do?
He checked his oxygen gauge. The pressure was down
to nearly a half. Another thirty minutes or so left and he’d
have to be on the surface. He wished Jack had gone closer
to the church (but he had to give him the idea that he was
looking for Tom and Ed, at least somewhere near where
they were lost).
He went to the front door and pulled at one of the two-
by-fours. After fifty years they should be a bit loose.
He tugged, pulling hard while his flippered feet pushed
against the door. The wood struts didn’t move a bit.
Nothing like old-fashioned craftsmanship.
He aimed his lamp upward to look for another possible
way in (or maybe guidance from heaven). He saw the
steeple. It was riddled with small holes. Perhaps he could
widen one of them and work his way through. Or there was
the top itself, open.
If it was big enough. If it was clear down to the church.
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223
He kicked up. ( I’m breathing hard. Too damn hard, us-
ing up my air too quickly. Gotta calm down. Relax, don’t
worry—)
Right. Sure.
No fuckin’ problem.
He glided past the sealed windows, along the steeple,
checking at the holes as he passed (all of them too small).
Catching glimpses of eyes—furtive, dotlike eyes watch-
ing his progress. The fish were about to have their hiding
place disturbed.
He reached the top of the steeple.
It was open. Clear.
(Lucky me.)
He stuck the lamp in and aimed down.
It was unobstructed as far as the light carried.
Unfortunately all it showed was something that looked
like a black hole.
He grabbed some of the wood girding the hole and
snapped it back. A few chunks broke off, then a few more,
until Dan thought it was wide enough.
(Like going into a mouse hole.)
He kicked around and stuck his hands in, the lamp held
out in front, and slowly kicked forward.
Almost immediately his tanks got caught up in the hole.
He twisted left and right. It had looked big enough, dammit.
And he wasn’t wearing fat tanks designed for an all-day ex-
cursion. He reached out to feel for something to pull himself
through. But the walls, sharply arching away, were smooth.
He wriggled around, stuck in that hole, caught. He
breathed even more heavily, his chest rising and falling.
His hands continued to grope until he found a hole.
Great. Now if I can just pull myself through.
With only one hand free, it was difficult. But he strained,
and with a sudden lurch he slid into the steeple.
He saw some fish scurry away. He moved straight down,
trying to remember . . . what the hell is a church like?
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(It had been a while.)
He couldn’t see anything.
Then the faintest outline of—
A floor. Heavy stones. But no pews. (Gone to some
other church, most likely.) No altar. (Ditto.)
No pulpit.
In fact, he thought grimly, there was absolutely nothing
here to suggest that this was a house of God.
Absolutely nothing.
Her mom wasn’t talking.
She was mad at her, mad enough to ignore all of Claire’s
attempts to talk.
The only thing her mom had said when they got in the
car was “I’ll take you with me, Claire, but I’m very angry.
Very. And one way or the other, we’re going to get to the bottom of these fears of yours.”
Her mother was going to go to the office, and then, that
afternoon, she would take Claire to the dam. Claire watched
her abruptly snap the Volkswagen Rabbit into gear and back
out of the driveway.
Her mother was not happy.
But she didn’t care. It was better to have her mom mad
at her, really mad. Much better than having her go to the
dam . . . by herself.
Now, at least, I can warn her.
I can protect her.
But she never once thought that her coming along was
maybe what was supposed to be happening all along.
The young cops were gone, into their car to slug at some
coffee and eat some doughnuts.
Leaving Billy Leeper all alone on the tiny beach.
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225
Jack Russo was out there, on the water, but he was care-
fully watching the blips that indicated where Dan was.
All alone. And Billy didn’t like it.
Remember, he thought, ring-a-levio? Do kids still play
that? He remembered hiding in the woods, waiting to be
found. And sometimes no one came. It was creepy sitting
there, expecting Jackie Weeks to come bounding around a
tree, grabbing at his arm, yelling, “Cor, cor, ring-a-levio!
One, two, three!”
They played down there . . . in the woods, near Old
Man Boozer’s hill, by the graveyard, in all the wide-open
spaces of Gouldens Falls.
Not so wide now. Not so open.
The cops closed the door to their patrol car.
It was chilly that morning. Even getting chillier as it
grew lighter. (No sunrise. Just chunky gray clouds. Dark
He rubbed his hands together.
And saw something.
Off to the right, away from the beach. A bit of move-
ment that just barely registered in his peripheral vision.
He tried to look.
There was nothing there.
Then, again, the movement.
This time he turned quickly. But there was no need.
The person stood there, just a bit inside the overgrown
woods past the beach, looking at Billy.
A guy in a blue suit. Damnedest thing.
Billy stared back at him.
Damnedest thing.
The man smiled. Billy smiled back. Just a detective, or
some official, or—
No.
Billy’s hand came up to the air, and involuntarily he
pointed.
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m a t t h e w j . c o s t e l l o
I know you. I know that face. The hair was different. But no mistake. Different. But the same.
He took a heavy step in the sand, away from the water,
off toward the right, toward the man.
(Who stood there waiting.)
And every step convinced Billy that no, he wasn’t crazy.
It was him.
Thirty feet away. Twenty feet. He left the beach, push-
ing his way through the prickers and stunted maples that
grew in the dappled shade
under the tall, fully grown trees.
Ten feet away. The man grinned. A big, welcoming smile.
“Billy . . .” he said quietly, almost soothingly.
(No fear? Why aren’t I afraid? Why—)
“Billy . . . it’s been a long, long time.”
“Martin Parks,” Billy said (or he thought he said). He
wasn’t sure he made any sound at all. His hands clenched.
They were big, strong hands—he was proud of these hands—
and the fingers pressed into his palms, cutting deep into the
hard, calloused hands.
“You’re back.”
Parks laughed. “Yes. How observant of you. Unfortu-
nately I know what you and your friend down there are try-
ing to do.” Parks put his hands together.
(Like some accountant delivering the bad-news bottom
line.)
“I’m afraid the game is over, Billy.”
He pulled his hands apart.
(Why aren’t I afraid? Billy thought. I ran all the way to Montauk to be away from here. Why . . . aren’t . . . I . . .) Parks pulled his hands apart.
The pain bloomed in Billy’s midsection, bright, flash-
ing, doubling up the old man.
“No,” he said with a moan.
“Yes, your time is up, Billy Boy.”
Parks brought his fingertips together, such graceful fin-
gers. The pain stopped. “All bets are off, Billy.” Parks
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227
pulled his hands apart, and it was as if Billy’s insides were
being ripped apart.
This time he went to his knees.
Billy glanced back at the police car. The doors were
shut.
(Please, he prayed now. Finish your coffee, your dough-
nuts, your bitching and complaining about low salaries and
bills that just keep on coming. Please—)
“I’m sure you’ve got it all figured out, Billy. In fact”—
the hands went together again—
(Oh, no, please.)
The pain stopped.
—“I’m sure you had it figured out fifty years ago when
your friend Jackie Weeks ran into our little Club.” He
laughed, a sick, hollow sound. “After all, how could he
know that they were all supposed to be dead?”
He moved his hands apart.
Now his body opened. A faint tear at first, like squatting
down and—oops—splitting the backside of your pants
apart.
A thin line ran from his midsection, then up, slowly, to
his chest.
Parks laughed louder.
Billy fell backward, his hands going naturally to his
skin, pressing it together, crying now—
A small boy who had hurt himself.