Free Cape Fear by John D. MacDonald Page B

fingers on his wrist with hysterical strength and shut her eyes tightly and said, “It makes me feel ill. Oh, God, Sam! What are we going to do about it? Did you talk to him? Did you find out about Marilyn?”
    “I talked to him. Right at the end I lost my temper. I tried to hit him. I was tremendously effectual. I tried to hit him while he was sitting down. I could have tossed a tennis ball at him. Underhand. His damn forearms are as big as my thighs, and he’s as quick as a weasel.”
    “How about Marilyn?”
    “He denied it. But he denied it in a way that was the same as telling me he did it.”
    “What else did he say? Did he make threats?”
    For a moment Sam was tempted to keep the story of Cady’s wife to himself. But he plodded through it, trying to do an unemotional job of straight reporting, looking down at the green bay water. Carol did not interrupt. When he looked at her it was as though she had suddenly, tragically become an older woman. At thirty-seven he had taken great pride in her agelessness, at the way she could look a consistent thirty and, at special times, a gay and miraculous twenty-five. Now, with shoulders slumped, and face all bones and gauntness, he saw for the first time how she would look when she became very old.
    “It’s hideous!” she said.
    “I know.”
    “That poor woman. And what a slimy way to threaten us. By indirection. Did Nancy find out who he was?”
    “She didn’t notice him until toward the end. When she saw us talking, she guessed. When I threw my ridiculous punch, she knew. After he drove away we talked. She made good sense. I think I’m very proud of her. She willingly broke tonight’s date.”
    “I’m glad. Isn’t Tommy nice?”
    “Quite nice, but don’t start talking as if she’s eighteen. He’s better material than Pike. And she seems to be able to handle him well. I don’t know where she learned.”
    “It isn’t something you learn.”
    “I guess she inherited it from you, honey. There I was, minding my own business, looking around for a place to sit in that cafeteria and …” He was trying to be light, but he knew it was falling flat. Her head was bent and he saw the tears clinging to her black lashes. He put his hand on her arm.
    “It will be all right,” he said. She shook her head violently. “Drink your beer, baby. Look. It’s Saturday. The sun is shining. There’s the whole brood. We’ll make out. They can’t lick the Bowdens.”
    Her voice was muffled. “You go back and help. I’ll stay here a little while.”
    After he picked up his brush he looked back. She looked small out on the dock. Small, humbled and dreadfully afraid.

Five
    HE HAD MET CAROL on a Friday noon in late April of 1942 at the Horn and Hardart Cafeteria near the campus of the University of Pennsylvania. He was in his final year of law school. She was in her senior year in the undergraduate school.
    Seeing no seats on the ground floor, he had carried his tray up the stairs. It was almost as crowded upstairs. He looked across the room and saw an exceptionally pretty girl alone at a wall table for two. She seemed to be reading a textbook. Had it happened a year earlier he would never have gone over and balanced the tray on the corner of the table and said, “Do you mind?” He was not particularly shy, but at the same time he had always been awkward about approaching a girl he did not know. But it was 1942 and there was a new and reckless flavor in the world. Standards were changing quickly. He had been hitting the books hard, andit was April and there was the smell of spring, and this was a very pretty girl indeed.
    “Do you mind?”
    She gave him a quick, cool glance and looked back down at her book. “Go ahead.”
    He unloaded his tray and sat and began to eat. She had finished her lunch and was eating cheesecake, taking very small morsels onto her fork, making it last. As she showed no intention of looking up, he felt perfectly safe in staring at her. She was