Rachel Alexander 04 - Lady Vanishes

moving sand from one container to another, rocking or spinning for hours on end—anything that would replace the sights and sounds that were disturbing with something predictable, benign, and most important, comforting.
    Why was I even trying to figure out what might have motivated Jackson? It could have been the sudden screaming of a car alarm, or the pain and confusion when a lamp was turned on. Perhaps he was in the dark the night he surprised me in the garden not to be unseen but because the lights hurt his eyes. How could I possibly understand what might have made him freak? It could have been anything.
    Jackson’s eyes fluttered and closed. I reached out and shut off the lamp. Sitting there in the dark, thinking about the symmetrical smears of paint on Jackson’s shirt, I began to concoct another way the green paint might have gotten onto that bookend.
    He might have come in and seen it on the floor next to Venus, picked it up, seen the blood, then dropped the bookend and frantically wiped his hands against his shirt.
    That would explain it.
    No—it wouldn’t. Dashiell had tried to alert me to something on the desk. The bloodstain under the blotter.
    Had Jackson picked up the bookend and put it down on the desk while he straightened up the books? That would account for the green paint on the dictionary. And the blood on the desk.
    What next?
    He’d seen the blood on his hands and wiped his hands on his shirt.
    But it didn’t end there. He’d picked up the bookend again and taken it outside, burying it in the garden.
    Why?
    And why had he been out there crying after he’d hidden it?
    How I wished he could just tell me.
    I reached out and touched his arm, watched him sleeping on his back, his mouth slightly open, his breathing audible, but no competition for Dashiell’s.
    Jackson, clobbering Venus? It didn’t make sense.
    Had he come in afterward?
    Or had he been there all along, someone figuring it didn’t make any difference, these three witnesses, considering who they were? All good news, no bad.
    But if it wasn’t Jackson who struck Venus, who was it? Were we back to David? Ever the skeptic, I didn’t believe that one either.
    Dashiell was whimpering, running in his sleep. Or was he dreaming he was digging again, using his paws for shovels? They were brown now instead of white, dirt on his face as well. I’d cleaned off Jackson, but not my dog.
    What had alerted him—the fresh dirt? Or had he smelled the blood, something out of the ordinary, something to pay attention to, something, if you were Dashiell, that would make you alert your master?
    It couldn’t have been planned. You don’t plan to murder someone with a bookend from their desk.
    Or with a bicycle.
    Someone was angry, seething.
    Someone’s rage was spilling.
    Someone was coming apart.
    Why couldn’t I see it, see who it was?
    I decided not to wait for Homer. Getting up, I went to David’s room, one flight up from Jackson’s, knocking softly, then opening the door. The bedside lamp was on, but David seemed to be asleep, lying on his side, his back to the door. I listened to his breathing, slow and even. Only that wasn’t the way David normally breathed. It was the sedative, slowing everything down.
    Did that mean it was safe to stay?
    Carefully, never taking my eyes off David, I walked around the bed and looked at his face, tense even now, despite whatever tranquilizer he’d been given.
    His hands were tense, too, one rigid and clawlike, the other in a fist.
    With something sticking out.
    In the light of the lamp, something sparkled, something metallic, all but a tiny piece of it secreted in David’s hand.
    Could I see what it was, this amulet he held in his sleep?
    Could I do it without waking him?
    Maybe I could.
    I called Dashiell, softly, with a whistle. As he ambled over, shaking his head, his ears clapping hard, I patted the bed. Dashiell jumped on and without further ado served up the specialty of the house. He lay down alongside David, sighing as he did. Then he let go, leaning all his weight and the heat of his body against David’s back.
    I waited.
    David stirred. His head moved, but his eyes remained closed. I listened to the sound of David’s breathing. After a moment, I carefully reached for the treasure in David’s hand, grasping the tiny part that was exposed and sliding it toward me until it was free.
    When I held it up in the light from the lamp, it came alive, the diamonds winking and sparkling,