Legacy Of Terror

thought that he would be in the city, at work, and that she would be alone.
    “Are you all right, Elaine?”
    She quickly unlatched the door and opened it.
    Gordon stood there, looking a bit haggard himself, as though he had spent a night more tiring than hers. She was pleased to note that, despite this, he was shaved and neatly dressed, as always.
    “I thought you'd be in the city with your father,” he said.
    He said, “I couldn't go today. It's the first day I've missed in some time. But I was up most of the night, listening for the sounds of trouble. I worried about you, and I couldn't sleep. Now and then, when I thought I heard someone moving about, I came out into the corridor to see if anyone was bothering your door, but I never caught anyone.”
    “Oh, Gordon!” she said, leaning against him with a suddenness and a dependency that surprised both of them. She was relieved by his show of concern, as if his interest in her safety insured that safety.
    “Were you bothered during the night?” he asked.
    “Yes.”
    His arm went around her, encircled her shoulders, firm and manly, protective. He gave her a sense of freedom that she had never experienced before. He made her feel that, as long as he were at hand, she no longer had to be so sober and alert and careful of her own interests. He would take care of her. He would be her hands to hold off the world.
    “Tell me about it,” he said.
    And she did-most of it, anyway.
    When she was finished, he said, “I have the feeling that you're holding something back, keeping something from me.”
    She couldn't look directly at Mm, and she couldn't answer him, for he was right.
    “What is it, Elaine?”
    “I don't want to anger you.”
    “You can't. Is it something to do with the family? Do you think you know who it was who threw that rock last night?”
    “Yes.”
    “Well,” he said. He seemed to be trembling just the slightest, but he forced down his fear and faced up to the very thing his father refused to believe. “Which one of the family was it?”
    “Last night, you didn't know whether to believe that it was someone in this house. What changed your mind so suddenly?”
    He said, “I guess I've known all along that there was no hitchhiker involved. Celia might have picked up someone riding to Philadelphia, but he did not try to kill her. I didn't want to face the truth. Just like father, I did not have the courage for it. Now I do. I saw, last night when I couldn't sleep, that I would have no peace of mind until I did accept this burden.”
    She found herself laying her head against his shoulder, listening to the rapid beat of his heart, finding comfort in the crook of his arm.
    “Well?” he asked.
    “Dennis,” she said.
    He was quiet for a long time.
    “Do you believe me?”
    “I think I do. But I want to hear why you suspect my brother. I want to know everything you have seen which points to him.”
    She told him all of it, from the paintings which Dennis worked on, to the way he had held a palette knife and seemed vaguely to threaten her. She mentioned Dennis' concern, at the supper table, when Lee reported that Celia was out of her coma. She reminded him of Dennis' problems, as a boy, when his mother had killed the twins and then herself. And, finally, she told him about last night, about Dennis' catching her on the phone and about the way the man beneath the willow had reacted to Dennis' name.
    “My God!” he said when she was done. He had aged ten years in the time it took her to tell her story.
    “I'm sorry,” she said.
    “You aren't responsible for anything,” he said. “The trouble is not with you, but with our family, with the blood we carry in our veins and with the way we've tried to hide our history. The trouble is with father for letting Denny grow up as he has, without responsibility, frivolous.”
    She nodded, in full agreement with his assessment of Denny's character. “What can we do?”
    He thought a moment, then said, “You'll have to stay here, in your room, Elaine. I'll go up to Denny's studio, by myself. I'll simply confront him with all this.”
    “No!”
    “It's the best way.”
    “Call the police, Gordon!”
    “I couldn't do that,” he said.
    “But-”
    “I feel it's my responsibility,” he said. “He's my brother. Despite what he may have done, if he did do it, I cannot just call Captain Rand. I can't just let Dennis be treated like a common criminal.”
    “But if he is mad-”
    “Then he's still my brother. Nothing can ever change that.”
    “No!”
    She was