Legacy Of Terror

walk and listen to the story of Amelia Matherly's madness. It was not the walk which had exhausted her, but the listening. She wanted only to sleep, sleep until she could wake up and find a world as simple and uncomplicated as she desired.
    She did not dream, so deep was her rest.
    Paul Honneker came to the supper table ten minutes late, while the others were beginning the main course. His hair was tousled, his eyes quite bloodshot. His face had lost nearly all its color, except for a bruised and ugly bluish cast beneath his eyes. He stopped in the dining room archway and stared at each of the diners, one at a time, moving around the table, and he seemed somewhat incredulous to have found them here. He wiped at his face with a large hand and made his way round the table to his chair. He did not sit down, but fell into it, hunching forward over his plate as if he might not be able to retain consciousness.
    Elaine looked down at her plate and tried not to see. But with the absolute silence from the others, she could not help but look again.
    Paul was sitting straight now, though he had made no effort to spoon food onto his plate from the serving dishes. It was almost as if he did not want any supper but could not bring himself to break the ritual by not showing up at all.
    “You've been drinking again,” Lee Matherly said. His face was hard, stern lines tracing across the unhealthy pallor he had had ever since Celia's scream.
    “What if I have?” Paul asked. It was meant to be a belligerent response, but there was no anger in the man, only defeat.
    “You know what it leads to.”
    “I can hold my liquor,” Paul said, suddenly defensive. He did not seem any older than fourteen, his mouth drawn up in a pout, his face sullen and unresponsive.
    “You can't,” Lee said.
    “What makes you think you-”
    Lee said, “Did you break your mirror yet?” When Paul didn't reply, he said, “You can't hold your liquor, Paul. You break mirrors and windows and dishes, anything that might cast a reflection.”
    Paul sulked.
    Lee watched him for a moment, undecided, then allowed his face to soften. “Paul,” he said in an utterly different tone of voice, an almost fatherly voice, “please do me a favor; please do not start drinking heavily now, not now, not at a time like this.”
    Paul looked at his plate, as if something were written in the white china, something important.
    He said, “This is the best time to drink. I can't think of a better time, in fact.”
    “It can't help Celia,” Lee said. “And it certainly doesn't do the rest of us any good, worrying about you.”
    Paul gained fire from some unseen source. He raised his head and stiffened his backbone. His words were still heavy with drink, but they came with more power and assurance now. “Do you know what they're saying in town?”
    “Who cares?” Lee asked.
    “I do.”
    “People will always talk, Paul. We've all grown used to that, we've all learned to cope.”
    “I haven't,” Paul said. “They're connecting Celia's stabbing to-to the other-to Amelia.” His dead sister's name required effort; it lay before him, spoken but leaden and still.
    Lee winced, as if someone had struck him. “We'll be above that sort of silliness and-”
    Paul interrupted and said, “Everyone stares at me. People I thought were friends of mine-they weren't. Lee, they think maybe I stabbed Celia!”
    “Nonsense.”
    “You haven't heard the talk. They're saying the Honneker blood is tainted, that Celia's attacker lives here, in this house.”
    “Ignore them.”
    “I hate suburbs and small towns,” Paul said. “I hate living where everyone knows everybody else's business and the women go around looking for topics of gossip.”
    “Still and all,” Lee said, “drink won't help.”
    “It helps me!”
    Everyone was silent for a long moment. Only the clink of silverware against the plates was audible.
    “Aren't you eating?” Lee asked Paul Honneker.
    “I can't eat.”
    “Paul, the doctor thinks her chances are fifty-fifty. The longer she holds on, the better it looks.”
    Paul said nothing.
    “I talked to Captain Rand just a while ago,” Lee said. He had shoved his own food aside, as if he too had lost what little appetite he had brought with him to the table.
    “Oh?” Paul looked so mournfully hopeful that Elaine had to look away from him. She realized, suddenly, that Paul Honneker half believed the rumors he had heard in town, half wondered if he hadn't been the one to take a knife to Celia. The mad often encompassed periods