Gathering Lies Read online

  “Well, watch out for Grace,” I muttered. “My bet’s on her as the Big Bad Wolf.”

  Dana laughed softly. “Amelia could be Grandmother, right?”

  I smiled. “Only if I can be Goldilocks. I could use a bowl of nice hot porridge right now.”

  “But that’s a whole other fairy tale,” Dana protested.

  “Hah. You think this is a fairy tale? More like a nightmare. And while we’re at it, where the hell is that bread-crumb trail?”

  Dana giggled. “Are we almost there yet, Mom?” she called ahead to Grace.

  Grace ignored her and continued to follow Luke, the two of them stomping through branches and limbs of trees like angry giants crashing through a forest of Pick Up Sticks.

  We must have walked close to two miles before Luke stopped, sniffing the air. Grace did the same.

  “What is it?” I called out.

  “I smell something,” Luke said, as we all drew up alongside them.

  “I smell it, too,” Grace said. “It’s like…like a fireplace. Wood smoke.”

  “Maybe Jane managed to build a fire?” Dana said hopefully.

  Luke’s gaze swung to the north, to the line of trees ahead of us. The sky was tinged with a rosy glow.

  “What the hell is that?” Grace said.

  “Northern lights?” Kim suggested, following her gaze.

  “I don’t think so,” Timmy answered nervously. “They aren’t usually red. More green, or blue. Besides, it’s…the light is flickering.”

  “Oh, my God,” Luke said softly. “Shit!” He began running.

  I could smell the fire now, and a fine ash had begun to fall on my face and hair.

  “It’s Luke’s house!” Dana cried. “Jane’s in that house!”

  We crashed through the underbrush behind Luke, all of us running as quickly as we could along the tangled path. Vines reached up to grab my ankles, slowing me down and nearly sending me headlong into a tree. My breath became labored, and a pain shot through my chest. At one point I was forced to slow down and take a breath. Timmy stopped beside me, doing the same, but Amelia raced by us.

  Before my arrest, I had run every day, but since then I’d become too sedentary, spending long hours at the computer working on the book. Now my lungs ached so much, I thought they might explode. But as the others pulled ahead, we began to lose their light. I grabbed Timmy’s hand and half dragged her along with me. Shoving my way through snarled weeds, I thrust aside low-lying branches, skirting rocks and potholes, my flashlight showing the way only dimly. Ruts became traps, and trees slapped my face, tearing at my eyes like claws.

  I knew we were almost at the house before I could see it. The flames reached above the tree line now, licking at the night sky with a thunderous roar. I felt the heat, and, looking down, I saw that a gray coating of ash had covered my sleeves.

  Within moments, Timmy and I caught up to the other women, who stood in the trees on the periphery of the Ransford front lawn, staring at the house. It was engulfed in flames, and the women were like ghosts in the dim light, bathed in ash, their eyes blazing reflected red from the fire’s glow.

  The smoke and ash filled our lungs, and we began to cough. “Cover your mouths!” Timmy cried, taking her silk scarf and wrapping it around her mouth, tying it in the back. “Use whatever you can!”

  I had already pulled my jacket collar up around my mouth. Peering above it, I didn’t see Luke anywhere.

  “Where did Luke go?” I yelled, as the roar and pop of the fire nearly drowned out my words.

  Dana and Kim pointed to the house. I took off, covering the last few yards to the front lawn within seconds, praying he had already found Jane safe. The closer I got, however, the more intense the heat became. Huge chunks of cinder flew up into the night sky, then spread out to the surrounding trees.

  The conflagration was total; it was clear we were too late to save Ransford, even if we had the water to do it, which we did not. All three stories were engulfed in flames.

  For one long, desperate moment, I thought that Jane couldn’t possibly have escaped. But then I spotted her, no closer to the house than I was, but off to the right, at the forest’s edge. Jane was watching the fire consume Luke’s house, her face crimson and bathed in sweat.

  I ran to her, reaching out my arms. “Thank God! Oh, thank God, you’re all right.”

  She slowly turned and looked at me. Her eyes were vacant, but a small smile curved her lips. The effect was so eerie, I shivered, despite the fire’s heat. My arms fell to my side.

  “You said they wouldn’t come,” Jane said in a monotone.

  “What?” Confused, I shook my head.

  “You said they wouldn’t know we were here.”

  “I don’t…You mean the rescue teams?”

  “You said they wouldn’t know we were here,” she said in that same flat voice. “Well, now they will.”

  My eyes widened in horror as I realized what she meant. I turned to the other women, who had come up and were standing behind me. There were stunned expressions on their faces, as well.

  “Jane…oh, Jane, you didn’t,” Dana cried softly.

  “You idiot!” Grace yelled, grabbing Jane by the shoulders and shaking her. “What have you done? Do you know what you’ve done?”

  “Stop it!” I yelled, pulling Grace back. “Leave her alone!”

  Grace turned and swung at me, hitting me on the shoulder. “She set the goddamned fire! She’s destroyed the only place on this freaking island with enough shelter to help us survive!”

  “It was the only way,” Jane said in a low, reasonable voice, as if explaining something obvious to a child. “Don’t you see? We didn’t have any flares, or any way to call for help, so I had to make one. A flare, I mean. I had to do something they would see for miles and miles. So I poured out the kerosene from the lamp, and I made a torch, and I set the curtains on fire in the downstairs rooms. When I was sure they had all caught, I ran out.” Again, that eerie smile. “I’ve been waiting for them to come.”

  “Are you insane?” Grace shouted, reaching a hand out as if to strike her, then letting it fall to her side. “This won’t tell them there are people here! They’ll just think the earthquake did something to set it off!”

  “No, you’re wrong,” Jane insisted, though her voice began to show signs of doubt. “They’ll come because this house belongs to somebody important. They always take care of the important people first, don’t they? You said that, Grace, you said the rich run the world.”

  Grace opened her mouth, as if aghast. But for once, she seemed to have no answer. Dana put an arm around Jane and began to whisper soft, soothing words. Timmy and Amelia joined her, and Kim stood a few paces away, hands jammed into her pockets, staring at the fire.

  Grace drew me aside. “You know what this means, don’t you? Somebody’s got to watch her every minute from now on.”

  “I know,” I agreed wearily, rubbing ash from around my eyes. “What she did was crazy. But you know—to play devil’s advocate—Jane may be making some sick kind of sense. Orcas Island is close enough for a fire that size to cast a glow from here, and someone should at least report it. Especially if they know about Thornberry being here. It’s not like this is one of the uninhabited islands.”

  “And what if they do report it? You heard what they said on the radio. Everyone’s busy in the city now. It could be days before rescue helicopters or even boats make it up this far. Shit, for all we know, it could be weeks.”

  “Well, I for one refuse to think that way,” I said irritably. “And I’ve got to believe that among the seven of us—eight, now, with Luke—we’ve got enough smarts and guts to get ourselves through this.”

  Grace gave me a disgusted look. “You don’t get it, do you? We are in serious trouble—”

  She broke off and swiveled around as Kim said, “Where is Luke?”

  No one seemed to know. His house was burning down, and the only clue we had was that Amelia had seen him disapp
ear into the woods on the east side of the house.

  Grace threw up her hands and stalked off. Walking closer to the fire than I would have thought safe, she stood with her hands on her hips, as if defying it to burn her.

  Kim appeared beside me and said, “If you ask me, she’s the one who needs to be watched.”

  “What do you mean?”

  She covered her mouth and coughed to clear her throat of smoke. “I mean, I think she’s more interested in your old boyfriend than she lets on.”

  “Grace? Interested in Luke?” I rubbed my irritated eyes. “It looked to me like they loathe each other. Besides, I think she’s afraid.”

  “Afraid? Are you kidding? That woman doesn’t have a skittish bone in her body.”

  “You wouldn’t think so, would you. But she’s way too edgy, and I have a feeling that’s not her normal self.”

  “And you base this on…what?” Kim said.

  “I don’t know—instinct, maybe. I think that when Grace is her usual self, she can do anything she sets her mind to. In fact, I see her as one of those people who goes on outreach trips, climbs mountains, survives on twigs and skins deer for dinner.”

  “Good God.” Kim shuddered. “If that’s true, then it’s worse than I thought. I have to admit, though, that I sort of agree. No offense, but of all of us, I thought she might be the one to take charge after the earthquake. Instead, it was you. There are times when Grace—”

  “—seems far too concerned about how we’re going to make it until help arrives?” I finished for her.

  “That’s it. Most of the time she acts like she’s just fed up with being around all of us. Then, the next minute, I get the feeling she’s got something else entirely on her mind.”

  “Something we don’t know anything about,” I agreed. “And it’s got her more spooked than even the quake. You know, I hate to think this, but you may be right. Maybe we do have two people to keep an eye on, not just one.”

  Kim said thoughtfully, “You don’t think she’d really hurt one of us, do you?”

  I looked at her, surprised. “Grace? No, actually, I wasn’t thinking that at all. I was thinking more of what Jane did, and whether Grace might let her temper get the better of her and do something equally as damaging. It’s the anger that worries me, the fact that it’s always there.”

  “Shh,” Kim warned.

  “Here she comes.”

  We watched Grace stride down the lawn in our direction. Her hands were deep in the pockets of her anorak, her hiking boots kicking red-hot cinders aside. For the first time, I thought she looked tired and defeated.

  “I’m surprised those trees aren’t on fire by now,” she said heavily.

  Kim agreed. “I’ve seen a few fires in Malibu, and I would have thought the whole island would be in flames by now.”

  “L.A. is a tinderbox compared to Esme,” Timmy said, coming up to us. “It rained buckets here all winter, and the trees are still green. It’s also lucky Luke’s family had the foresight to keep so large a clearing around the house.”

  I began to walk toward Dana and Jane, who stood several yards from us. Amelia was still with them, standing a bit apart.

  As I approached, Dana said worriedly, “You don’t think the fire will spread over the whole island, do you?”

  “I don’t know. We’re about three miles from Thornberry here, which could help if the wind doesn’t come up again. Timmy seems to think we’ll be okay.”

  I looked at Jane, who wouldn’t meet my eyes. “You know what you’ve done, don’t you?” I couldn’t help saying, as if reprimanding a delinquent child.

  Jane turned away, and I didn’t push. Part of me wanted to shake her, the way Grace had, to make her accept responsibility for the situation we were in now. The other part felt compassion and understood the stress she’d been under, worrying about her children.

  Though, as I thought of it, Jane had never really seemed quite stable. Even before the quake, there had been signs that she might break, if only under Grace’s bullying. I wondered what was going on in her life that might have contributed to this—this insanity.

  “I feel so sorry for Luke,” Dana said softly. “Where is he, by the way?”

  “We don’t know. He seems to have disappeared. Again.”

  We stood helplessly and watched, as the home Luke and his parents had lived in every summer of his life burned to the ground.

  When Luke returned shortly after that, he said only that he hadn’t been able to face the loss. He’d gone into the woods to be alone for a while.

  He seemed devastated, and we all told him there was no need to apologize. We could certainly understand how he felt.

  6

  Falling asleep in Thornberry’s kitchen that night proved to be difficult. We had decided to trust the remaining structure to hold against the constant aftershocks, as hard rain had begun again. Even inside, however, we were only partially safe from the elements. Arranging ourselves as far away from the holes in the roof as possible, we wrapped ourselves in the same blankets we’d used the night before. Because of the weather, they hadn’t been able to dry, and were still damp. Timmy, Amelia, Jane, Dana and Kim lay near the old potbellied stove in the kitchen. Luke said he was too warm-blooded; he’d sleep near the back door.

  “One thing—” Dana said, “there’s plenty of wood for the stove now, with all this debris. We’re actually pretty lucky that way.”

  This gave us all a few doleful laughs, which was better than none.

  I sat with my back against the wall a few feet from Luke, uncomfortable with being so close to a stove after the fire at his house. Ridiculous, but there it was. The warmth of the old potbelly brought back terrible pictures of flames licking hungrily at wood, the terrible roar, and finally, the thunderous boom as Ransford collapsed in on itself. Luke’s home—gone so quickly in a huge plume of cinders and flame.

  My home, as I had one day hoped—in my most secret of dreams—it would be. Sitting under that tree in the woods and watching Luke’s family host their parties on the lawn, I’d envisioned one day living at Ransford myself. Not because I envied the house and the parties, but because I wanted to be with Luke.

  One day I’ll marry the boy I love. One of those romantic dreams that most girls have at seventeen. We write his last name down after ours, over and over. We haunt jewelry stores in the mall with our girlfriends, picking out the ring we imagine he’ll give us, and we sort through the bridal magazines for the wedding gown we cannot wait to wear.

  Adolescent dreams—but dreams, nevertheless. They sit in the background of our minds until one day another, better, dream supersedes them.

  At forty, I had to admit that I hadn’t yet found that better dream. Nor did I even have the one about Luke anymore. Somewhere along the way, I must have lost my capacity for dreaming. Still, I had hated to see Ransford destroyed that way.

  Shivering inside my parka, I turned to the present, wondering if we would ever get off this island alive. We were not the most proficient band of campers, nor were we, by nature, hunters and gatherers. Almost anyone could have found more useful items in our cottages or the farmhouse to salvage. We had not done well.

  This I attributed only partly to a lack of skill in that direction, however. Since the quake had occurred, most of us had been walking around in shock—seemingly back up to speed, yet doing and saying things that were at best stupid, at worst damaging, either to ourselves or others. No one seemed precisely themselves, or at least the selves I imagined them to be. I kept seeing things in some of the women’s actions that appeared to be suspicious, though I hadn’t a clue why.

  As for Luke, the fact that he’d appeared on our doorstep seemed a good omen. I guessed that, privately, everyone was relieved to have a man aboard. Even Grace seemed to be warming up to him since his house had burned down.

  Maybe it was something genetic, going back to caveman days. There seems to be something about having a man around, at least a good one, that gives most w
omen a sense of security. We’ve “brought home the bacon, fried it up in a pan.” We’ve proven we can raise children alone, make a decent living, and do without hearts and flowers on Valentine’s Day. Now and then, however, we can still admit that it feels good to let a man drag home the brontosaurus loin.

  We had left Ransford when the rain had begun to pick up. The fire was still smoldering, and though we thought the rain would keep it from flaring up again, we agreed that someone should remain awake at all times throughout the night, keeping watch. If a glow in the sky began to be seen from here, we would get up and start moving our small store of supplies to the shoreline.

  I took the first shift because I felt I’d never sleep. Better that the others get some rest. If help didn’t arrive in the morning, we would have our work cut out for us, making Thornberry more livable.

  The rain turned to a downpour around midnight, bringing more gale-force winds. They howled through the openings in the farmhouse and blew debris around in the living room. I could hear paper skittering about in there…Amelia’s manuscript, no doubt, from the night before, the one she’d been reading when the earthquake hit. She must have forgotten it was even there. The newspapers that came by ferry each week were likely being tossed about, and books, too.

  As the hours wore on, I began to get sleepy—so sleepy, I was afraid I’d nod off during my watch. Several times I got up and walked to the windows, just to stay awake. There was still no glow in the sky, and I assumed that the downpour had done its job and put the fire out.

  It was close to dawn when, despite all efforts to the contrary, I must have fallen asleep. I don’t know how long it was before a sound jerked me awake. Footsteps, I thought groggily. Footsteps outside.

  Motionless, I strained to hear above the howling winds. I was no longer so sure, suddenly, of footsteps. Rather, I thought a shutter somewhere might be flapping back and forth.

  But as the sounds grew louder, and I became more awake, I knew that my first assessment was right—someone was walking across the flagstone terrace outside the back door.