Zebra Forest (5 page)

“Open it!” he said. “Now.”

Rew wouldn’t. He tried to pull away, but, watching Andrew Snow’s face, I knew it would be better just to listen. So I did it. I didn’t want him pushing Rew.

We hated going down to the cellar. It smelled of wet, and Rew thought there were rats down there. I was more familiar with it, though, since our washing machine was down there and I used it every week. I’d never seen a rat, but I did hate the bare pipes and the stinky old sofa Gran kept there, plus all the old clothes and other garbage that smelled of mothballs and damp.

Still, I opened the door — and got a faceful of stale air before Andrew Snow hustled us down into the dark. In the cellar, the only light from outside filtered through a rusted old vent in the wall just over the couch.

Andrew Snow saw it and pushed us that way. He looked around the room, and I wondered if he was searching for something to tie us with. But instead he whipped us around and pulled us down onto the smelly cushions with him, clamping a firm hand over both our mouths.

Above us, through the vent, I could hear the police car pull up and the engine cut off. Doors slammed.

“Just keep quiet, and we’ll all be fine,” Andrew Snow whispered. “No one’s going to bother us down here.”

I could feel the stubble of his face against the side of my head. He still smelled of mud and sweat. I tried to pull away, but it was no use. Rew squirmed and tried to twist out of Andrew Snow’s grip, but he had us with those arms of his. I took a try at biting the hand over my mouth, but Andrew Snow didn’t even flinch. So I kicked him, and then Rew did, too.

He grunted, and I felt satisfied for a minute, then scared, thinking he might kick back. Instead, he lifted his legs and wrapped them tight over ours, pressing our feet into the base of the couch. No matter how we wriggled and tried to pull at his arms, he didn’t budge.

Upstairs, the policemen were ringing the doorbell.

Gran won’t answer,
I thought,
and they’ll break down the door.

Break it down!
I thought.

“You think no one’s home?” one of them said. Their voices came through the vent clearly.

“This early?” another voice said. “No, ring it again. And knock.”

The doorbell echoed through the house, followed by a loud banging.

Break it,
I pleaded silently.

“We’d better call it in,” the first one said. “See if we ought to get in here.”

“Try it again,” the other one answered. “It’s early yet.”

Behind me, I could hear Andrew Snow’s harsh breathing.

What would he do when they came for him? Would he try to run? Would they shoot him?

I wanted to turn my head and look at Rew, see if he was thinking the same thing. Did he want them to shoot Andrew Snow? Did I?

But I couldn’t turn my head. Andrew Snow held it too tight. His heart was beating twice as fast as it had the night before. Were they going to break the door down?

Then we heard someone overhead. Gran. I could tell by the shuffling sound of her footsteps that she was wearing her slippers. And then she was at the door.

“Yes?” we heard her say.

The first policeman must have been consulting his notes, because it took a second for him to answer. “Miz Morgan?” he said. “Could you open up? We’d like to talk to you a minute.”

We heard the door open. “Certainly, come on in,” Gran said. I tried to listen for the strain in her voice but realized with a start that she had her liar’s voice on. The same steady voice she used with Adele Parks on the good days.

Tell them,
I pleaded silently.
Tell them to take him and just put him back. No shooting.

But Gran didn’t say that. Instead, she said, “Would either of you like a drink or something?”

“No, ma’am,” the first policeman said, and now that they were inside, I had to strain to hear them. “We’re just checking on all the houses in the area. I don’t know if you heard, but there was a prison break last night over at Enderfield.”

Gran didn’t miss a beat. “Really? No, I don’t get the news much. No TV.”

“Yes, well, we’re checking on all the neighbors, just to be sure they’re all right.”

I heard the creak of the sofa overhead. Someone must have sat down. Maybe Gran.

“Should I be worried?” she asked.

“No, ma’am, we don’t think so.” It was the second policeman who answered. “In most of these cases, the ones who run want to get as far away as quick as they can. Most of them went up toward the bigger cities, and we’ve got a fugitive alert for them up there.”

“Well,” Gran said, “that’s good to hear.”

“Do you mind if we take a look around, ma’am? Just to go over things?”

Gran didn’t answer right away, and I heard the sofa creak again.

If I could have held my breath, I would have, but since Andrew Snow’s sweating hand was already nearly smothering me, I couldn’t afford to. Instead, I closed my eyes, to hear better. I wondered if Gran would give the least hint that they ought to look — that things weren’t okay.

But she answered, “Oh, certainly. Please forgive the mess.”

“Oh, no, Miz Morgan, we only meant outside. We’ll go around back and take a look.”

“Oh, certainly,” she said again. “If you want to go through the house, the kitchen door’s that way.”

They’d pass the cellar door if they went that way. Had Andrew Snow closed it? Rew must have been thinking the same thing, because he started trying to kick again. But the first policeman said, “That’s all right — we’ll go around the house. Thanks for your time, Miz Morgan. And just in case, make sure you keep your doors locked for the next few days. I tell you there’s nothing to worry about, but if you see anything to make you the least bit concerned, you give us a call at this number.”

I thought for a minute how strange it was that the first time anyone ever told us to worry about locking our doors was when Andrew Snow had already gotten in and locked us in with him.

We heard footsteps again overhead, and the front door close. Outside, the policemen’s voices grew clearer, near the vent.

“Well,” the second one said, “three more houses, and then it’s a clean sweep. Every one of them up the highway. What a mess.”

“Be glad you don’t work at the prison,” the other one said as they moved off.

I felt sick. Between the taste of Andrew Snow’s sweaty hand against my mouth, the stink of the old couch, and the mothbally basement, I thought I might retch. But it must have been Andrew Snow’s lucky day, because I didn’t. Instead, I felt myself going greener and greener as the minutes ticked by. Rew kept squirming every once in a while, but I was too nauseous even to try moving. Finally, we heard the policemen again. They’d made their way back to their car. We listened as the doors creaked open and slammed shut, the engine revved to life, and they drove off, down our muddy front lane.

The police car had been out of earshot for five full minutes before Andrew Snow let us go. All that time, sick and smothered by his hand, I kept thinking,
Where is Gran?
But she didn’t come looking. She didn’t even call out to us.

A
ndrew
Snow marched us upstairs and went straight to rebolt the front door. Then he put his chair against it again. Rew and I stood blinking in the light of the kitchen. Neither of us said a word. My head still felt funny, and my stomach worse. I sat down in one of the kitchen chairs and pressed my cold hands against my forehead, trying to right myself.

Rew leaned over me, tugging a little at my arm.

“You okay? Did he choke you too much?”

I tried to shake my head, but it made my stomach lurch. So I said, “No, it’s just the stink of that old basement. I hate that couch.” I looked at him from the corners of my eyes and tried to smile, but I could see his relief quickly turning to fury again. He looked up, past me, into the living room.

“She cares more about him than she does us,” he said.

With an effort, I lifted my head and followed his gaze. Gran was sitting there, still, on the couch. But she hadn’t spoken to Andrew Snow. She looked frozen, staring out the window. As for Andrew Snow, he seemed to find his hands extremely interesting, because he didn’t raise his head once.

My stomach was beginning to settle, and I took a deep breath. “Maybe she was afraid they’d shoot him or something,” I said quietly.

But I could see Rew working himself up. His face had gone blotchy. Ever since he was little, Rew’s face would go red and white and his freckles would stand out when he got mad. He’d been white-faced when we’d come from downstairs. Now the red was coming out.

“She’s worried, Rew,” I told him, getting more worried myself by the minute. “That’s all. That’s why she sent them away. She won’t let him do anything to us.”

But Rew was so mad, tears started in his eyes. And Rew was tough. Once, in third grade, he’d been bullied so badly in school, I found him curled up in the back of the bus, nursing a big scrape he’d gotten down one arm when some bigger kid pushed him off the jungle gym. And he hadn’t even cried then. Now the tears only made him angrier.

“I
hate
her,” he said. He raised his voice a little with every word, and the red from his face crept right down his neck. “I hate both of them. They
both
should go to jail. I wish the both of them were
dead.
”

The first time I’d ever done our shopping, I was nine, Rew’s age. Gran had given me a list and money, and told me it would be okay, she just couldn’t manage to go into town that day. But I was nervous, thinking of the big grocery store I’d been in with her, the one on the end of town, and so I took Rew with me. When we got there, the place was so big and bright, Rew got overexcited. While I read the list, trying to figure out the aisles, Rew followed some woman who had a little dog in her cart, and when I turned around for him, he was gone.

I called him, but he didn’t come. And I got a feeling then, a sudden, terrified feeling, like nothing would ever be okay again. Nothing would ever be good. It settled right inside my throat and squeezed so tight, I could barely speak up enough for the cashier to hear me when I asked for help finding my brother. She paged him over the intercom, and we found him not far away, standing by the fresh-flower display. We got home all right; we even got our groceries. But I never forgot that feeling, so sudden and awful.

That was the feeling that hit me in the kitchen. Because I looked up when Rew said that, about wishing Gran were dead. And I saw Gran. She was turned around on the couch, staring straight at us, her eyes big.

Rew saw her, too, but it didn’t stop him. He walked right into the living room, up to one of the side tables beside the couch, where a stack of her favorite
Life
magazines sat.

“You care about
him
so much,” he said to her, his voice husky. “Why don’t you just
go
with him!”

Andrew Snow lifted his head at that, but he didn’t speak. I’d come up behind Rew and saw now that Gran’s eyes were filling with tears.

“Rew . . .” I started.

He didn’t let me finish. He kicked the side table hard, and the
Life
magazines toppled over. Gran and I both jumped, and Andrew Snow half rose, but Rew didn’t care. He grabbed the magazines and threw them, threw them at Andrew Snow, one after the other. I saw Joe DiMaggio’s face fly by, saw Andrew Snow duck. He walked across the room and grabbed Rew’s wrist, pulling him to his feet before he could scoop up another magazine.

I ran at Andrew Snow then, taking hold of his arm and trying to get him to release Rew. Gran was on her feet.

“Let him go!” I yelled. “You’ll break his arm!”

Andrew Snow abruptly let Rew loose, and Rew staggered backward.

“I wasn’t hurting him,” Andrew Snow said. “I was stopping him.”

I ignored that. “You okay?” I asked Rew.

But he didn’t answer. He just scooped one more magazine off the floor and threw it directly at Andrew Snow’s face before he turned and dashed upstairs. A second later, he slammed his bedroom door so hard, the ceiling shook.

Gran hadn’t moved. She just stood there, looking at the mess.

“I’ll clean it up, Gran,” I whispered to her, not wanting Andrew Snow to hear.

But he wasn’t paying attention anyway. I stole a glance at him out of the corner of my eye, to see if he’d gone back to his chair, but he was looking at Gran, his face unreadable. I looked at Gran, too. Would he do something to her? Was
that
how bad he was? Did he think Gran could have stopped Rew? I wondered how well he really knew her. Or how well she knew him. Because Gran didn’t seem scared when I turned to her. Just sad. Awfully sad.

Then Andrew Snow came up close to her, and he whispered, too, but I could hear him anyway. And what he said surprised me, because it had nothing to do with Rew at all.

“What did you think would happen?” he asked Gran. “When you did this?”

I hadn’t an idea in the world what he meant. But Gran must have, because she looked at him so suddenly, and with such a terrible sadness in her face, that I had to look away. I couldn’t stand it. And then she went upstairs, too, and shut her door, but quietly.