The Frighteners Read Online Free PDF Page A

night before, and had a slightly vacant gaze in her eyes. Upon hearing her, Old Lady Bartlett leaped to her feet, perhaps astonished at having found her daughter alive at all.
    “Patricia! To your room!”
    Lucy thought she saw a special sadness in the woman’s eyes.
    “You’re hurt, Mother,” Patricia said. “Let the doctor care for you.”
    “Go to your room this instant,” the old lady ordered.
    Patricia hesitated, as if torn between obeying her mother and doing what was best for her. Lucy wondered about their relationship. What is it that makes a seventy-something mom order around her fifty-something daughter as if she were a toddler? Yet the younger woman had care in her voice as well as a certain resignation. Whatever was going on between them had been going on for a long time.
    Lucy got to her feet and went to the younger woman, who shrank away as she approached.
    “I’m not going to hurt you,” Lucy said.
    “Are you really a doctor?” she asked, opening up a little.
    “Yes, at the medical center. I’m filling in for Dr. Kamins today.”
    “Is he sick?”
    “No. He’s attending a funeral.”
    “Oh.”
    Lucy touched Patricia’s neck gently. The woman flinched as the doctor eased her collar down, revealing large purple welts on her neck. Lucy frowned and was unable to suppress a glance at Old Lady Bartlett.
    “Who did this?” Lucy asked her patient softly.
    Patricia averted her eyes.
    “You can tell me.”
    It was then that Old Lady Bartlett said, “I think you better go now. Dr. Lynskey.”
    With surprising strength, the old woman took hold of Lucy’s forearm and steered her toward the front door. In her other hand she held the doctor’s coat and bag, which the old woman thrust at her as the storm door was closing behind them.
    Standing on the rickety front porch and blocking the way back into the house, Old Lady Bartlett said, “You don’t know who my daughter is, do you?”
    Lucy looked at the old woman with an air of defiance. “Yes, I do, Mrs. Bartlett. And she still needs medical treatment. How did she get those marks?”
    “That’s none of your business.”
    “But it is my business, Mrs. Bartlett. It’s exactly my business. If your daughter were a minor, it would be my duty to report those bruises to the police, and in that case the child-welfare authorities might act. But since she’s an adult . . .”
    “You have no idea what you’re dealing with,” the old woman said.
    “I know what my eyes tell me,” Lucy replied.
    “I can’t tell you how she got hurt,” the woman said. “All I can say is it’s not true what they say about her. Patricia has been a model citizen since her release.”
    Lucy nodded in reluctant acceptance of the fact that she was powerless to act in this situation. As a gesture, she said, “It can’t have been easy for you.”
    “Thank you for understanding, Doctor,” Old Lady Bartlett said before disappearing back into the house.
    It was nighttime, and unlike the night before when the storm and the rain roared and hissed all night, right now the only sound in the Lynskey house was Ray’s rowing machine. Wearing only boxer shorts decorated with pictures of bulldogs, Ray Lynskey rowed while a small TV silently showed American Gladiators. Lucy sat in bed, propped up on several fluffy pillows, reading a book entitled Killer Couples; the sensationalist photos on the dust jacket showed the real-life Bonnie and Clyde as well as the fictional protagonists of Natural Born Killers.
    “Didn’t you ever see anyone who was completely helpless?” Lucy asked, looking up from her book.
    “All the time,” Ray said, without breaking his rhythm. “There was this fat guy who got stuck in the leg-press machine this afternoon. It took four men from the fire-department rescue squad to pry him out.”
    “You know I’m talking about the young Bartlett woman,” Lucy said, a hint of irritation in her voice.
    “She’s a murderer,” Ray replied.
    “I feel sorry