Gallows Hill Part 2

The statement was offered as a challenge, but Sarah ignored it.

"Morris," she repeated. "Yes, that's what it is-Morris. But there's something wrong with the letters. They keep shifting around. It's like they're not sure they belong there-as if there was a time when your name was something else."

"I don't know what you're talking about," the girl said nervously.

"Maybe I'm wrong. Things aren't always what they seem. If you did have another name, it was at a time when your smile looked different and your hair was darker."

"What do you mean, *darker'?" Cindy demanded in a defensive voice. "I'm a natural blonde."

"Like I said, things aren't always what they seem," Sarah said. Her eyes remained glued to the crystal sphere. "The person I see in the gla.s.s is not the same as the person who is sitting across from me. In the gla.s.s I see past the outer sh.e.l.l into the soul. What I see is an insecure child in need of a friend. No, wait-she has a friend-someone-something ..." She leaned closer to the gla.s.s. "She is hugging someone and gaining comfort, but it's not a flesh-and-blood person. It's too soft and cuddly to be a person. It's a ... doll!"

"So what else is new?" Cindy said. "All girls have dolls when they're little."

"Not like this one," said Sarah. "This doll has a distinct personality. She has an old-fashioned name. Her name ..." She paused for effect and then said softly, "Her name is Dorcas."

There was a long pause.

Then Cindy exclaimed, "How did you know that?"

"I am Madam Zoltanne," Sarah said as if that explained everything. "Now the gla.s.s grows dim and the pictures fade. Peace be with you, and may the stars in the heavens watch over you."

The girl left the tent, and Sarah drew a deep breath. She couldn't believe it had gone so well! For once her mother had been right; all her experience in high-school theater was paying off.

Cindy's place was taken by a little girl in a Minnie Mouse costume.

"That's Amy Albritton." Kyra's voice spoke into Sarah's headphones. "I sometimes baby-sit her. She's in second grade and has an older sister named Jennifer. She's a Sesame Street freak and watches it every afternoon. She's afraid of the dark, so her folks gave her a Big Bird night-light."

Talking to Amy was easy, because the child had been so conditioned by television that nothing struck her as fantastic. Although Sarah mentioned her sister, Jennifer, by name and made a subtle reference to the night-light-"A big yellow bird watches over you every night"-Amy didn't seem too impressed. What she did respond to was Sarah's improvised description of what her life would be like as an adult when she appeared on screens throughout the country as "a glamorous movie star."

Amy went rushing out of the tent, eager to share the news of her thrilling future with her mother. No sooner was she gone than a teenage girl took her place.

"This is cool!" she said. "Cindy's right, you do look like a Gypsy. What can you read about me in that magic ball?"

Even as the girl spoke, Kyra was filling Sarah in on her.

"Leanne Bush is Cindy Morris's best friend. She dates Bucky Greeves, the captain of the football team, but he's got a crush on one of the other cheerleaders."

It wasn't much to go on, but Sarah did her best.

"I see you with a boy-very strong physically-he's looking at you and smiling, and you're smiling back at him. But his eyes are gazing beyond you."

"That's my boyfriend, Bucky," Leanne said. "You say he's looking past me? What's he looking at?"

"I can't quite see," Sarah said. "She's standing in the shadows."

"It's Debbie!" Leanne exclaimed. "I just bet it's Debbie Rice! What does she look like? Does she have thirty-eight-D b.o.o.bs?" She didn't pause long enough to get an answer. "It is Debbie, I know it is. I've suspected it all along, but Bucky keeps saying I'm being ridiculous. That two-timing slime ball! He's no better than any of those other jerks! How long has this been going on?"

"I can't see anything now," Sarah told her, a bit startled by the outburst. "The ball has been emptied of visions. Peace be with you, and may the stars in the heavens watch over you."

Leanne left the tent, visibly shaken, and from then on people arrived in a steady stream. No sooner did one leave the tent than another stepped in, and when the flap was pulled back, Sarah could see that there was a long line of prospective clients waiting their turns.

It was evident that people were busily spreading the word about the amazing Madam Zoltanne, because each client seemed to generate others. Bucky Greeves arrived with a chip on his shoulder, announcing that Leanne had sent him.

"She's p.i.s.sed off at me," he said irritably. "What kind of bull did you feed her?"

"I tell each person what I see in the gla.s.s," Sarah informed him. "Nothing more or less." She realized to her amazement that she was actually enjoying herself. With only a few exceptions when she had to wing it because the costume concealed a wearer's ident.i.ty, she received feed-in from Kyra about everyone who entered the tent. Although she was glad for the information, Sarah couldn't help wondering about someone who knew so much gossip, especially family secrets, such as the fact that Cindy Morris was adopted.

She took Bucky by surprise by revealing her knowledge that when he'd had chicken pox at age five, his mother had sent him to kindergarten anyway and he had infected the whole cla.s.s; that he would have flunked first-year algebra if the coach hadn't pulled some strings to keep him on the football team; and that he was a heavy-duty pot smoker. She also let drop the name Debbie and watched his face turn crimson. He was immediately on his feet and out of the tent.

As Bucky exited, Kyra's voice said, "The one who's coming in now is our paperboy. His name's Charlie Gorman, but behind his back everybody calls him Lard a.s.s. He's sort of like the cla.s.s clown. His mom is a bookkeeper or something, and his dad's a cripple. The guys on the football team found out the combination to his locker and last week they put a dead fish in it."

By this time the boy was in the tent, easing himself into the chair across from Sarah. He was definitely overweight, and his extra chins were nestled one on top of the other like towels in a linen closet. Still, there was something likable about his face, and Sarah immediately decided not to mention the fish.

"I hear you tell great fortunes," the boy said good-naturedly. "So, what do you see for me?"

Sarah lowered her eyes and stared into the ball.

"Your name starts with an O," she began, in repet.i.tion of the beginning of her fortune for Cindy Morris. "No-wait-it's only half an O."

"I'll save you the trouble," the boy said. "The name's Charlie. You may not have noticed, but I'm in your history cla.s.s, two rows over and three seats back. What I'm interested in is what do you see in my future?"

Kyra's voice fed in through the earphones. "Tell him he'll be manager of a fish store."

What a horrid girl, Sarah thought, feeling a surge of sympathy for the boy across from her. This poor guy had enough problems without having people continue to make fun of him after the joke was over.

She decided to give him a good fortune, something pleasant to look forward to, even if they both knew it was only a game.

"I see you on a cruise ship headed for Hawaii," she said. "You're dressed in a tux, and you're with a beautiful woman. It's obvious that you're very rich and successful. The orchestra's playing, and you and this lady are getting up to dance. You're-"

Something was wrong.

The globe on the table was no longer clear, it seemed to be filling with smoke that was twisting and turning within it, creating shadows that were superimposed upon shadows. In the midst of the smoke she saw the stocky figure of Charlie Gorman poised at the top of a flight of steps. A foot came out from behind him and snagged his ankle, and with a shout of surprise he pitched forward.

CHAPTER.

FOUR.

SARAH STARED INTO THE ball in silence, unable to believe what she was seeing. The figure in the gla.s.s waved his arms wildly in a desperate attempt to regain balance, clutching frantically at the air. Then he plunged down the steps with his arms thrust straight out in front of him and disappeared into the thick coils of smoke at the bottom of the globe.

"What is it?" Charlie asked. "Is all that good stuff too exciting for you to handle?"

"It's-it's-" Sarah raised her eyes and focused upon the round, pleasant face across from her. In the dimly lit tent it was hard to see Charlie in detail, but she felt certain that he was the same person as the figure in the smoke.

Or had she seen anything at all? Perhaps her eyes had been playing tricks on her, as they had when she'd seen that flash of yellow in her mother's bedroom mirror. After all, she had been staring into the globe all night, straining to appear as if she were focusing on something.

She glanced back down at the ball. It was as clear as window gla.s.s. No smoke, no visions. Obviously her imagination had been working overtime, but the experience had been scary.

"I'm sorry," she told Charlie shakily. "I don't see anything."

"You mean I don't have a future?"

"Of course you have a future. I just don't see it, that's all. You know it's all just a game, and I'm getting tired. It's been a long evening."

"The carnival folds at eleven," Charlie said sympathetically. "It's almost that now, but you've still got a long line waiting. Do you want me to tell them you're closing up shop?"

"Would you, please?" Sarah said gratefully. "I don't think I can handle any more of this. I'm sorry, and I'll see that you get your money back."

"Don't worry about that. It was worth it to hear about the cruise ship. Maybe next time we do this you can get me onto the dance floor."

The heavyset boy got up from the chair and shoved the tent flap aside, and Sarah leaned back in her chair and let her eyes fall closed. She was exhausted, and she suddenly realized she was getting a headache. She could hear a chorus of voices reacting with disappointment to Charlie's announcement that the booth was shutting down.

"That's not fair!" a girl's voice complained. "I've been waiting in line fifteen minutes! Everybody says that Gypsy girl's amazing!"

"I want her to tell me if Jennifer's going to let me get lucky tonight," a male voice bellowed with a macho laugh, and a girl with no laughter in her voice said, "You are so crude, Danny."

"What's going on?" Kyra's voice came crackling through the earphones. "Why is the crowd breaking up? It isn't time to close down yet."

"Don't you try to tell me what to do," Sarah said out loud, although of course there was no way Kyra could hear her.

She pulled off the earphones so that she would no longer have to be subjected to Kyra's voice, although she had been hearing it for so long now that it still echoed in her head. Then she took off the Gypsy outfit and dumped everything into a tote bag that she had stashed beneath the table. Under the costume she had been wearing jeans and a T-shirt, and when she lifted the back flap of the tent and stepped out into the gym, n.o.body gave her a second glance.

Charlie had been right, the crowds were definitely thinning out. The elementary-school children had pretty much disappeared, but a number of high-school students were still horsing around, shoving each other's heads into the Dunk for Apples tank and tossing battered-looking pumpkins at the dummy on the gallows. She caught a glimpse of her mother and Ted standing by the door with Ted's nine-year-old son, Brian.

Sarah hoped this didn't mean that Ted's kids were coming home with them. The last thing she wanted to do was join the group, but there was no way to avoid it, since they were obviously waiting for her.

Her mother saw her approaching and gave her a big smile.

"From the comments I've heard, the fortune-telling booth was a huge success! I kept hearing people raving about the fabulous Madam Zoltanne!"

"Great job, Gypsy lady!" Eric called to her, striding toward them across the gym, with Kyra, as usual, bobbing along beside him as though attached by an unseen thread.

"Boy, what a night!" he exclaimed enthusiastically as he came up to her. "We haven't had a chance to tally up yet, but from the looks of the cashbox, we're going to have one great prom."

"We had good promotion," Kyra said.

"And some red-hot drawing cards. Like I predicted, your booth was the hit of the evening, Sarah. I wanted to get my own fortune told, but the line was too long. How would you feel about giving me a private reading?"

"You know it was a hoax," Sarah said.

"But a fun sort of hoax. Everybody loved it."

"Can we go to your house and eat brownies?" Brian asked Rosemary, who now directed her smile at him and said, "We certainly can, honey."

"Do you want to come back to Rosemary's?" Ted asked his daughter, wording the question for Eric's sake in such a way as to mask the fact that he was living there as well.

"No, I've got other plans," Kyra said. "A bunch of the kids are going to the Halloween Special midnight movie. Eric will take me home afterward."

She put a slight emphasis on the word home, another subtlety that Sarah caught but was in this case far from opposed to. It was nice to know that Kyra recognized that her "home" was with her mother.

"Want to join us, Sarah?" Eric asked as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

"I don't know ... ," Sarah said, taken by surprise. She had no desire to do anything social with Kyra, but it was Eric, not Kyra, who was inviting her, and this was the first time anyone in Pine Crest had asked her to do anything. She was on the verge of accepting, when she suddenly remembered the sad state of her finances. She had two dollar bills and a small amount of change in her jeans pocket.

"Our treat, for both of you girls," her mother said quickly.

"Right!" Ted agreed, groping in his pocket for his wallet.

"I don't need money," Kyra said. "You gave me my allowance yesterday."

"Sarah ... ?"

"I'm fine too," Sarah said stiffly. "I'm just tired, but thanks anyway, Eric. It was nice of you to ask me."

They left the gym together and split up in the parking lot. Sarah got into the backseat of Ted's Ford with Brian. The boy, who had the same red, curly hair as his father and sister, was a nonstop talker and jabbered all the way home. Unlike Kyra, he seemed to have latched on to Rosemary as a second mother.

At the house Brian headed straight for the kitchen, followed by Rosemary, who set out the brownies and then opened the freezer to get out ice cream.

"Our own Halloween party," she said happily. "What flavor does everybody want, chocolate or strawberry? I should have gotten orange sherbet to go with the decor, but I just didn't think about it."

"Chocolate for me," Ted said. "And Brian will want both. Sarah?"

"Nothing, thanks," Sarah said.

"We've still got the spice cake ... ," Rosemary began.

"I'm not hungry."

Leaving the little family of three at the kitchen table, Sarah went down the hall to her bedroom. She flicked on the overhead light, closed the door, and dumped the tote bag onto the second bed. Then she stuck a CD into the CD player to listen to while she changed into her nightshirt.

New Age instrumentals usually had a soothing effect on her, as if they were resting her soul and giving light to her spirit, but tonight was different-she couldn't concentrate on the music. Her eyes kept being drawn to the tote bag. She finally sat down on the bed, reached into the bag, and took out the crystal ball. The muted light of the tent had lent it a magical quality, but in the bright glare of the overhead fixture it was only a paperweight, round and smooth with the bottom leveled off so that it could stand flat on a desk. She wondered how her mother had produced it so quickly. The moment Sarah had announced her intention to partic.i.p.ate in the carnival, Rosemary had gone straight out to the garage and reappeared with the ball, saying, "Here! Doesn't this make a perfect crystal ball? It almost seems like that's what it was made for."

There was a rap at the bedroom door.

"Sarah?" her mother called softly. "You're not asleep already, are you?"

"No," Sarah said. "Come on in."

Rosemary opened the door and came into the room, with Yowler at her heels. She was carrying a bowl of strawberry ice cream.

"I thought maybe you'd changed your mind about being hungry. I got the strawberry especially for you."