13 French Street Read Online Free PDF Page B

way and we stood that way staring at each other for a long moment.
    I heard nothing, but I saw the listening in Petra’s eyes. She turned slowly. The old woman’s voice reached me thinly from the hall. “That milk was sour, Petra. I don’t like sour milk.”
    “She spies,” Petra said. “Oh, God, Alex. She’s a witch.”
    As she moved out into the hall, I noticed for the first time that she wore a red wrap-around skirt over her shorts. It swung at the hem, pendulous, as she strode off.
    I went over to the desk and looked at the picture again. I had an overpowering desire to steal it, but I laid it back down on the desk and left the room quickly.
    The hallway was dim. Madge Collins. A nice name. Chicago. Madge had blonde hair, dark blonde hair. Her eyes sometimes were blue, sometimes gray. Slim, she was always neat, crisp, quick-moving. She had thousands of sisters, in all parts of the world. Lined up, they would possibly be hard to tell apart. But she was mine and I wanted her always to be mine. Because I knew the woman beneath the crisp exterior. I remembered the letter I’d written to her, and headed for the stairs.
    Petra. She stood alone. There was nobody like Petra. One image was made, then the gods shattered the cast. Why?
    Halfway up the stairs, I glanced at my watch. Ten-thirty. I wanted a drink. Well, I was on a vacation, so why shouldn’t I have a drink if I wanted one? I’d intended to see about mailing the letter to Madge. It could wait. I went back downstairs into Verne’s study, because I’d remembered seeing a decanter of whisky on a shelf beside one of the bookcases.
    There was no glass. For the first time since I’d left the Army, I drank straight from a bottle. It warmed me and I felt better. Some of the panic that had started growing with morning subsided.
    The picture was not on the desk.
    My hand shook as I replaced the glass stopper in the decanter and returned it to the shelf. Verne’s study was directly beneath my bedroom. Somebody was moving around up there.
    Now that I’d drunk the straight whisky, I wanted some water. There was another door in the study. I went over and opened it, expecting a closet. Beyond was a music room, with a baby grand piano, a large leather couch, a record player, and a case stacked with records. There was one window hung with crisp white curtains. The air was stale. I opened the window and autumn breathed on me. It was like summer, only the smell was autumn and blue skies and beyond the edge of an apple orchard colorfully splotched hills rose to a sharp horizon. There was dust on the window sill.
    Dust powdered against my fingers when I touched the piano keys. The record player had been shut off halfway through a now dusty record, the arm and needle somehow evocative of a contented past abruptly severed. The record was Debussy’s Abrabesque Number 1 in E Major. That was not Verne. It might once have been Petra; it might still be. Yes. It was possible. It was not haphazard selection; not with the library of records in this room.
    I went on through the door leading from the music room. A small alcove with a small couch in it led into the main hallway beneath the stairs. I felt myself wishing my own record collection was one tenth as large as the one in this house. I knew I was trying to force my thoughts into other channels—anything so I would not think of that woman.
    It was all foolishness. Less than a day ago I would have laughed at anyone who had said he felt as I did.
    Once, when I was very young, I had wanted to play the piano; wanted to learn how very much. I saved money and took lessons. But I knew my folks wouldn’t hear of such a thing. As I accomplished each lesson and sought out pianos to play on—because we didn’t have one—I knew eventually I’d be found out. It would end. Something would happen.
    That’s how I felt now, only much worse, much more strongly. It had been the same when I tried to paint. I painted anyway, but my family