Page 74 of The Unknown
The smartest thing would be to run and alert the others. I know that, too. Just like I also know there might not be time for that. I assume Lindy’s searching for the camcorder, which still sits in the parlor of the main house. Something she’ll realize within seconds. If I don’t catch her in the act now, there’s a chance no one will.
Crossing the green, I pass beneath the oak. Susie’s clothes remain in the upper branches, an object lesson about what happens to people who go chasing after dark figures moving through the night.
At least I’m armed.
Sort of.
My weapon of choice is a plunger I found beneath the bathroom sink. The best I could do on such short notice. I wield it like a baseball bat, as if that makes it even slightly effective.
Beyond that, I don’t have a plan. Which should make me turn back,which I absolutely want to do. But it’s too late now. I’m at Susie’s cottage, stepping onto the porch, careful not to make a sound as Lindy continues to move around inside. I hear her fumbling about, along with a noise that’s startlingly similar to the thwump I’ve heard in my own cottage.
When I burst inside, I spot a woman in the gloom, kneeling on the floor, sorting through something. I scream when I see her. She does, too, and I realize who it is.
Not Lindy.
Heather.
Even in the darkness, I can make out her dress. Navy fabric. White polka dots. In her hand is a dark object that explodes into brightness. A flashlight, aimed right at my face, its beam blinding.
“Jesus, Marin,” she says. “You scared the shit out of me. Also, what’s with the plunger?”
“I thought you were Lindy.”
“Same, girl. Same.”
Heather makes no move to lower the flashlight, forcing me to hold the plunger in front of my face to deflect its glow.
“Could you lower that, please?”
“Not until you tell me what you’re doing here.”
Her accusatory tone makes it clear she doesn’t trust me. The feeling, honestly, is mutual.
“I could ask you the same thing,” I say. “Why are you breaking into Susie’s cottage?”
“To get this.” Heather finally lowers the flashlight, its beam now aimed at the floor. The glow from below illuminates her tired eyes and the worried set of her jaw. She looks the same way I feel. So utterly depleted, so very scared. “I thought I could use it to signal for help.”
“Do you know how?”
“I know basic Morse code.” Heather aims the light at the wall. “Do you think this is bright enough to be seen from the mainland?”
“I doubt it,” I say. Two miles is a long way for a meager flashlightrunning on a couple of D batteries. “But maybe it’ll be seen by a passing boat.”
“That’s good enough for me,” Heather says, passing me on her way to the door. “It’s better than sitting around doing nothing until we’re all dead.”
I follow her out of Susie’s cottage and back to my own, where I change out of my nightgown and into shorts, a T-shirt, and sneakers. I don’t care that they’re not era-appropriate. Under these circumstances, my crusty blue dress can go fuck itself.
“Do you really think Susie’s dead?” I ask Heather when I rejoin her outside.
“I’d like to think no, but my gut tells me yes.”
We leave the green and push through the woods behind my cottage, the daisy wheels on the trees there looking like eyes in the flashlight’s glare. Even with the light, the forest is tricky to navigate. The uneven turf coupled with the steady decline of the land itself trips up both of us several times. By the time we reach the lake, Heather and I are clinging to each other for support.
We stand next to a downed tree, its fat trunk stretching from the woods all the way to the lake’s edge. The upper branches skim the water in a tangle of dead leaves. Heather aims the flashlight straight ahead, its beam slicing the thin mist rising off the water’s surface. From this spot on the shore, there’s no indication of the light’s reach. It could be two miles. It could be twenty feet.
“Let’s see if this works,” Heather says as she flicks the light on and off in three short bursts, followed by three longer flashes, then another three short ones.
S-O-S.
