We Both Go Down Together Page 4

  “But it helps if they’re good looking,” said Chastity, before hiding her giggles behind her hand. Jane and Lynn rolled their eyes. This was apparently a common declaration on the other woman’s part. “Elaine’s daddy brought her with him when he moved to town. She was just a wee thing, and he came from local. So he moved back after his first wife died. He remarried after he got here.”

  “Who to?” asked Jonathan.

  Lynn and Angus exchanged a glance, but it was Lynn who answered him: “Aunt Marie.”

  Jonathan and Fran returned to the Gentling home with Lynn and Angus before begging off to pursue their investigations on their own. It wasn’t easy to convince the Gentlings to stay behind, but Jonathan finally managed to sway them by pointing out that if the babies were being stolen by one of their own, traveling with the mayor and the mayor’s sister wasn’t a good way to make any possible witnesses open up. “We don’t want to seem like we’re laying blame,” he said. “We just want to find out what’s really happening.”

  In the end, the Gentling siblings allowed them to leave. What other option did they have?

  There were few enough cars moving through the streets—and even fewer strangers in town—that every child in town emerged to watch Jonathan and Fran driving past. Fran watched through the windows as the children lined up to watch them sailing past. “They really do look completely human at this age,” she murmured.

  “They do,” Jonathan agreed. “It’s actually unusual for a woman Lynn’s age to be so close to returning. She must have tried to help her mother for quite some time after it became clear that she was changing. That much exposure to the sea speeds up the process.”

  Fran shuddered. “I can’t imagine needing to choose between my family and my sense of self. It’s amazing that they’re so calm and friendly, with everything their bodies make them go through.”

  “It’s just how they’re made,” said Jonathan. “I suppose that sort of transition must seem only natural, when you’re raised expecting it to happen.”

  “I suppose,” said Fran dolefully.

  Jonathan pulled off onto a side street, driving toward the edge of town, where he had been told he would find Nathaniel and Elaine Lindsay. The numbers on the houses counted down, becoming a little shabbier and less well-kept with each step they took toward the sea. That made sense, too. The people who built closer to the water would return to it faster, and would have less time to care about things like the condition of their property.

  At the end of the lane was a house which bucked the trend toward dissolution. Its walls were straight and strong, and it had been painted recently in shades of blue and white, making it look like it had been transplanted from another, more picturesque New England town. A weathervane shaped like a mermaid was mounted on the roof, spinning lazily in the breeze. Fran shielded her eyes with her hand as she got out of the car and squinted up at the fixture.

  “I can’t tell if that’s charming or in extremely poor taste,” she said, finally.

  “A bit of both, I’d wager,” said Jonathan. He walked around the car to offer her his arm. “There’s no rule against depictions of merfolk in Gentling, and I suppose some people would see it as a charming, if misguided, way to remember those that have gone.”

  “Seems more ghoulish than gracious if you ask me.” The pair walked up the path to the porch steps, which were as well-maintained as everything else about the property. It was the sort of house that should have been located at the center of town, well away from the water.

  Jonathan nodded. “I tend to agree. I assume their neighbors would say something if it bothered them.” He rang the doorbell, which made a deep chiming noise somewhere deep inside the house.

  A few minutes inched by before the door was finally cracked open and the narrow, anxious face of a girl appeared, looking suspiciously out at them. “Can I help you?” she asked, her broad, Southern vowels marking her immediately as Elaine Lindsay. Not many outsiders chose to settle in Gentling, for a lot of reasons.

  “Hello, Elaine,” said Jonathan. “My name’s Jonathan Healy, and this is my wife, Frances. We’re here because the mayor asked us to come to town to look into a problem he’s been having, and we wanted to get your perspective on the situation.”

  “You’re here because of the missing babies, aren’t you?” Elaine pulled the door the rest of the way open, although she didn’t emerge from the house or invite them inside. The hallway that was visible behind her was unfurnished. The walls were bare. All the effort in keeping up the house had apparently gone into the exterior. “That’s the only reason I can think of that they’d call outsiders here.”

  “Yes, we are,” said Jonathan, quickly covering his surprise. “You were aware of what’s been going on with the infants?”

  “I work at the hospital,” Elaine replied. There was a note of weary resignation in her voice. “We’ve got a pretty good one, you know. We may be a little middle of nowhere town full of fish people, but that’s just meant we worked harder to have our own medical facilities. I went to nursing school and everything. Bet they didn’t tell you that when they said ‘oh, blame Elaine, she came from outside,’ did they?”

  Jonathan blinked. “No one said any such thing to us. We just wanted to find out whether you might have seen anything.”

  “It’s not that we trust humans more’n we trust the finfolk, because that would be prejudiced and wrong and Johnny’d probably make me sleep on the couch for a week or more, which isn’t good when I’m this pregnant,” said Fran, hitting her accent harder than was strictly honest as she fell back into her long-practiced “sweet little country girl” routine. “We just thought maybe you could get closer to the water than they could, since you’re not worried about goin’ all scaly and weird, and maybe you’d seen something.”

  The suspicion faded from Elaine’s eyes, replaced by frustration. “Not a thing,” she said, shaking her head. “I go down every morning, and I’ve never seen any signs of who’s stealing the babies. It’s not safe! Finfolk children are hardier than human babies, at least at first—they’d have to be to survive being born in the open ocean—but they lose that resiliency very quickly. It’s like nature set them up to make it to shore, and nothing more than that.”

  “Sink or swim,” said Fran, with an understanding nod. “What about your mama? She seen anything?”

  “No.” Elaine shook her head again, harder this time. “Marie was the nicest woman I’d ever met, you know? It didn’t matter to her that I wasn’t born her daughter. She wanted me, and she said that mattered even more, because a mother who gets to choose her children will always know that she chose to love them. She said she’d have her own babies after she’d returned, when she wouldn’t have to worry about sharing me with them.” She reached up and wiped her eye with her knuckles, sniffling. “She loved me. She stayed as long as she could. A lot of people around here go to the sea as soon as it starts calling them. They say it’s easier than staying here and forgetting themselves day by day. But not Marie. She stayed as long as she could, because she loved my father, and she loved me, and she knew we’d never come with her to the water.”

  “I’m sorry for your loss,” said Fran.

  Elaine focused on her for what seemed like the first time. “No one really says that around here,” she said quietly. “For them, going to the water is just what happens when your land-life is finished. You go back where you came from, and that’s it, that’s done, you forget the people you had to leave behind. For me, it was a loss.”

  “It’s hard,” said Fran. “People don’t always know what to say when they feel like you’ve lost something you should have been more careful with. I hate to ask—I know you’ve had a hard time of it—but can we see inside the house? It might be easier if, when other people ask whether we considered the outsider, we can say we genuinely did, and that we found nothing.”

  Elaine hesitated for a moment before she nodded. “All right,” she said, stepping out of the doorway. “Co
me on in.”

  “Thank you,” said Jonathan, and escorted Fran inside.

  The Lindsay house yielded nothing but sparsely furnished rooms and the faint but inescapable smell of dusting polish. The windows were all sealed up tight, like the smell of the sea air had been banned. By the time Jonathan and Fran left to return to their room at the Gentling house, they both felt as if they had been intruding on a private sorrow where they had no place or business.

  The sun was hanging low in the sky when they parked the car by the side of the house. Lynn had set a simple meal of bread rolls and fish stew on the table. Angus joined them, and the small foursome ate without conversation beyond what was absolutely necessary. It seemed like there was nothing to be said.

  Finally, Jonathan stood. “I’ll be getting up before dawn to walk the beach and see if I can find who’s been taking your children,” he said. “I have an alarm, and I’ll do my best not to wake you.”

  “I’ll see you there,” said Lynn.

  “We both will,” said Angus.

  “Goodnight,” said Fran, and rose, following Jonathan back down the hall to their room. She carried a bread roll in either hand, which might have seemed odd had Jonathan not been holding a full bowl of stew.

  The reason for their food-hoarding presented itself as soon as they opened the guest room door. The mice, who had arranged themselves in an elaborate star-shape on the bed, turned and cheered, making more noise than seemed possible for such a small assemblage of rodents. Then again, it was best not to make assumptions where the Aeslin were concerned.

  “Simmer down, you ruffians,” scolded Fran, holding up her rolls. “If you want supper, you need to earn it. What’d y’all learn today?”

  “That this domicile is four stories in height,” squeaked a mouse. “The attic is a land of many things.”

  “Including mousetraps, I’d reckon,” said Fran. Behind her, Jonathan closed the door and looked on with amusement. “Anybody get killed?”

  “No, Priestess,” said the novice responsible for the colony. She puffed out her chest a bit and added, “I kept my charges well clear of the snapping metal bars.”

  “That was right good of you,” said Fran. “How many people live here?”

  “Three,” said a mouse. “The two in the kitchen, and the man in the tub behind the closed door.” The other mice murmured agreement with this statement.

  Fran glanced at Jonathan, raising an eyebrow. “Johnny?”

  “Sometimes someone has entered the early stages of the return, but is not yet ready to go, and is still mentally acute enough to refuse,” he said. “The door down the hall that smells of saltwater leads to a room used for just such individuals. The Gentlings wouldn’t mention their housemate unless it seemed relevant. It’s...shameful, to a degree, to flout someone’s helplessness like that.”

  “Huh,” said Fran. She turned back to the mice. “You see any babies? Fish babies or human babies, it doesn’t much matter. We’re looking for any we can find.”

  “No, Priestess,” said the novice.

  Fran sighed. “Guess that was too much to hope. All y’all, get off the bed. Johnny, if you would do the honors?” She handed the rolls to her husband as the mice scattered, spurred on by the promise of food.

  “Eat in the closet, please,” said Jonathan, bending to set the rolls and bowl of stew on the bedroom floor. “The Priestess and I have things to discuss, and it will be easier if your celebrations are not distracting us.”

  “HAIL!” agreed the mice. The food was promptly hoisted on tiny backs and shoulders, and swept away on a furry tide, vanishing through the half-open closet door.

  Jonathan straightened as he watched them go. When the last of the mice was inside the closet and the sound of celebration had begun in earnest, he walked across the room and nudged the door gently closed. Turning back to Fran he said, “It never ceases to amaze me how good you are with them.”

  “They’re probably my favorite things,” said Fran. Then she winced and pressed a hand to her stomach. “Yes, sweet pea, except for you. You’re definitely my favorite thing.”

  “I’ll count myself lucky to come in third,” said Jonathan. “Do you need help with your shoes? We should get a few hours of sleep—I’m assuming you’ll want to come down to the beach with me. Please feel free to tell me that you’d rather stay in bed, like a normal pregnant woman, and avoid the risk of catching a chill.”

  “Only thing I’ve done normal during this pregnancy is get knocked up,” said Fran. She sat down heavily on the edge of the bed. “If you get my shoes off, I can handle the rest. Lord above, I can’t wait to be formally reintroduced to my own feet.”

  “I’m sure they miss you as much as you miss them,” said Jonathan. He dropped to one knee, beginning to unbutton Fran’s shoes with rapid ease. “What are your impressions of the town?”

  “Peaceful, mostly. I suppose you’d have to be, when you grew up knowing that you didn’t have any place else that you could go. But folks seem happy enough. It’s good that they can stay near their kin.” She waggled her toes as he pulled off the first shoe. “Not sure how long they can go on like this. People are bound to figure out that there’s something strange about this place sooner or later.”

  “Yes,” Jonathan agreed. He removed her second shoe before straightening and beginning to undo his tie. “The trouble is explaining things to those who have returned. They’d keep coming back to this beach even if the Covenant were here and setting things on fire in front of them. They’re not good at remembering when a situation changes. So the people here try to adapt as best they can, and they make strangers feel as unwelcome as possible, to keep them from settling and noticing what’s going on. They’ll get caught eventually, and whatever happens then...well, whatever happens then, we’ll do our best to help them.”

  “Is it possible that one of the returned ladies is trying to keep the babies, and they’re drowning?” Fran began unbuttoning her own blouse, remaining seated as she did. She frowned. “No, that doesn’t work. They’d be findin’ dead babies on the beach, not no babies at all. Forget I asked.”

  “I won’t forget, because it was a good question, but you’re right—we’d be finding some sign if this were just a matter of a mermaid trying to keep what she thinks of as hers.”

  “Could it be Elaine?” Fran bit her lip, looking briefly worried before she pushed on, saying, “She seemed awfully sad. Sad people can do some pretty strange things.”

  “It could be,” Jonathan allowed. “But what would she be doing with them? She doesn’t have a room in her house full of stolen infants. We’d have noticed. And why? What would be her motive for doing such a despicable thing?”

  “I don’t know.” Fran shook her head. “Not much of this seems to want to make sense. I’m flummoxed.”

  “That makes two of us.” Jonathan shrugged his coat off. “Maybe the morning will help us to clear things up. If we can find the baby-snatcher in the act, we’ll be able to stop them, and hopefully force them to take us to where they’re keeping the infants.”

  A shadow flickered across Fran’s eyes, dulling her expression and seeming to age her ten years in under a second. “Do you really think those babies are still alive?” Her hand went to her stomach, cupping it protectively.

  Jonathan didn’t hesitate. He nodded, saying firmly, “They have to be. No one could be that inhumane.”

  “I wish I could believe you.”

  “Try.” He leaned forward and kissed her forehead. “Everything is going to be all right. We’re going to save the day.”

  Fran smiled at him fondly. “We always do,” she said, before grabbing the front of his shirt and pulling him in for a more satisfying kiss. Jonathan went willingly, and before long, they slept, gathering strength for the day ahead of them. It was bound to be a difficult one. How difficult, however, they had no idea.

  Jonathan was dead to the world and dreaming of teaching his son—a little boy with Fran’s golden hair and his serio
us demeanor—how to track jackalope migrations when a hand grasped his shoulder and shook him firmly. He made a small grunting noise. The hand shook him again, even harder this time.

  “Dammit, Johnny, wake up,” hissed Fran. “We’ve got a problem.”

  “What?” Jonathan fumbled on the bedside table for his glasses before opening his eyes and rolling over to face his wife. She was sitting up in the bed, barely illuminated by the moonlight coming in through the window. She was also clutching her stomach, a dismayed expression contorting her features. Jonathan pushed himself onto one elbow, fear lancing through him. “Fran?”

  “I think the baby’s coming, Johnny. We need to get me to a hospital.” Daniel had been delivered at home, with Enid serving as the midwife, but home was a long way away.

  “What? No, that can’t be right. It’s too soon.”

  “Appreciate your adherence to the schedule, city boy, but I’m telling you, this baby is showing up here, right now, tonight. Now if you don’t want your son born in a bed in Fishville, you’ll go get the car!” Fran’s voice hit an unusually high note at the end of her command, illustrating just how much pain she was in.

  Jonathan fell out of the bed in his eagerness to get moving. Grabbing his discarded trousers from the floor, he hopped on first one leg and then the other in order to pull them on. He was still wearing an undershirt, and so didn’t bother with his jacket before running out of the room.

  Fran levered herself out of the bed, looking with dismay at the large wet patch she left behind on the previously immaculate sheets. “Well I never,” she mumbled, and bent as well as she could to retrieve her coat. Nothing else seemed worth dealing with at the moment, and if she couldn’t go out in public in her nightdress when she was in the process of giving birth, when could she? Never, that was when.