Shadowfires

pleasure and fun than any dozen past- or future-oriented citizens.
    “You're the best kind of present-oriented woman,” Benny had once told her over a Chinese dinner at Peking Duck. “You prepare for the future but never at the expense of losing touch with now . And you're
so admirably able to put the past behind you.”
    She had said, “Ah, shut up and eat your moo goo gai pan.”
    Essentially, what Benny said was true. Since leaving Eric, Rachael
had taken five courses in business management at a Pepperdine
extension, for she intended to launch a small business. Perhaps a
clothing store for upscale women. A place that would be dramatic and
fun, the kind of shop that people talked about as not only a source
of well-made clothes but an experience. After all,
she'd attended UCLA, majoring in dramatic arts, and had earned her bachelor's
degree just before meeting Eric at a university function; and though
she had no interest in acting, she had real talent for costume and
set design, which might serve her well in creating an unusual decor
for a clothing store and in acquiring merchandise for sale. However,
she had not yet gone so far as to commit herself to the acquisition
of an M.B.A. degree nor to choosing a particular enterprise. Rooted
in the present, she proceeded to gather knowledge and ideas, waiting
patiently for the moment when her plans would simply… crystallize. As
for the past-well, to dwell on yesterday's pleasures was to risk missing out on pleasures of the moment, and to dwell on past pains and tragedies was a pointless waste of energy and time.
    Now, resting languorously in her steaming bath, Rachael drew a
deep breath of the jasmine-scented air.
    She hummed along softly with Johnny Mathis as he sang “I'll Be Seeing You.”
    She tasted the chocolate again. She sipped the champagne.
    She tried to relax, to drift, to go with the flow and embrace the
mellow mood in the best California tradition.
    For a while she pretended to be completely at ease, and she did
not entirely realize that her detachment was only pretense until the
doorbell rang. The instant the bell sounded above the lulling music,
she sat up in the water, heart hammering, and grabbed for the pistol
with such panic that she knocked over her champagne glass.
    When she had gotten out of the tub and put on her blue robe, she
held the gun at her side, with the muzzle pointed at the floor, and
walked slowly through the shadowy house to the front door. She was
filled with dread at the prospect of answering the bell; at the same
time, she was irresistibly drawn to the door as if in a trance, as if
compelled by the mesmeric voice of a hypnotist.
    She paused at the stereo to switch it off. The ensuing silence had
an ominous quality.
    In the foyer, with her hand upon the knob, she hesitated as the
bell rang again. The front door had no window, no sidelights. She had
been meaning to have a fish-eye security lens installed, through
which she would be able to study the person on the doorstep, and now
she ardently wished that she had not procrastinated. She stared at
the dark oak before her, as if she might miraculously acquire the
power to see through it and clearly identify the caller beyond. She
was trembling.
    She did not know why she faced the prospect of a visitor with such
unmitigated dread.
    Well, perhaps that was not exactly true. Deep down-or even not so
deep-she knew why she was afraid. But she was reluctant to admit the
source of her fear, as if admission would transform a horrible
possibility into a deadly reality.
    The bell rang again.

----
3 JUST
VANISHED
    While listening to news on the radio during
the drive home from his office in Tustin, Ben Shadway heard about Dr.
Eric Leben's sudden death. He wasn't sure how he felt. Shocked, yes.
But he wasn't saddened, even though the world had lost a potentially great man. Leben had been brilliant, indisputably a genius, but he had also been arrogant, self-important, perhaps even dangerous.
    Ben mostly felt relieved. He had been afraid that Eric, finally
aware that he could never regain his wife, would harm her. The man
hated to lose. There was a dark rage in him usually relieved by his
obsessive commitment to his work, but it might have found expression
in violence if he had felt deeply humiliated by Rachael's rejection.
    Ben kept a cellular phone in his car-a meticulously restored 1956
Thunderbird, white with blue interior-and he immediately called