Swimmer Read online

  ‘Jane?’ he said. ‘Jane – I’m trying to find out what happened to you in the pool that day. But you have to help me.’

  Jane said nothing, but didn’t take her glassy, empty eyes off him.

  ‘Jane, listen – I need to know if somebody drowned you deliberately, or if it was an accident. If somebody did drown you, I can put things right. I can make sure that they’re punished. I can settle your spirit and give you peace.’

  A convertible Mustang drew up alongside him, with two young women in it. As they waited for the red traffic signal to change, they gradually became aware that Jim was talking to thin air.

  ‘Jane, I know you’re angry and I know you feel that I let you down. But you can’t go on taking your anger out on other people. Tell me what happened, please.’

  One of the girls in the car called out, ‘Looks like she left you already, buddy, or hadn’t you noticed?’

  Jim looked around. ‘I’m an actor,’ he lied. ‘I’m, you know, rehearsing my lines.’

  But when he turned back, Jane’s spirit had flickered away across Olympic. She walked diagonally across the intersection and passed through a huge red refrigerated truck as if it had no substance at all. Jim called out, ‘Hey!’ and immediately ran after her, dodging his way through the traffic. A taxi driver blew his horn at him and yelled out, ‘You lunatic! You got some kind of a death wish?’

  Jim reached the other side of the avenue, looking desperately left and right to see which way Jane had gone. There seemed to be no sign of her anywhere – and he had to face the possibility that she could have simply walked through a wall and disappeared, like she had in the showers at college. He was just about to turn westward when he saw the hose-water that was running across the sidewalk outside the Mexican restaurant. For a split second, it formed into two bare disembodied feet, one of them with half an ankle. The man who was holding the hose didn’t even notice as the feet splashed across the water and then vanished – although they left six or seven footprints on the hot dry concrete on the other side.

  Jim went running after her. He saw the briefest quiver of light and then she disappeared around the next corner. ‘Jane!’ he shouted. ‘Jane, you have to help me!’ A telephone engineer perched up on a utility pole stared at him, mystified. There was nobody else in the street at all. ‘Jane!’ he called again. But now she was walking very fast, as if she had suddenly made up her mind to do something important. She reached the end of the street and turned right. Jim went jogging after her. He was already out of breath and sweaty, and his polo shirt was clinging to him.

  At the end of the next street there was an Amoco gas station. Jane walked toward it and crossed the forecourt between the pumps. She headed right for the drive-through car-wash, which was already halfway through sudsing a large green Lincoln.

  Oh Christ. Water – gallons of it. And who knew what kind of murderous intent she had on her mind. Jim yelled out, ‘Jane!’ and sprinted across the gas station as fast as he could, trying to catch up with her before she disappeared into the spray.

  She stood for a second beside the car-wash, motionless, almost as if she were waiting for him to catch up with her. The warm breeze blew the water into clouds, and the clouds settled on her, so that Jim could gradually see her physical outline appearing, shimmering with rainbows.

  ‘Jane,’ he said, coming closer. He could feel the water prickling softly against his cheek. ‘I don’t know what you want. I don’t know what you’re trying to do. But this isn’t the way. Drowning other people isn’t going to bring you back. You have to move on. You’ve lived out your life. It’s over, even though it was short. Now you have to dream the dream. That’s your future … someplace out there.’

  The figure stayed still, staring at him. Only a few feet away the car-wash started to shoot out detergent, and flecks of foam blew between them like dirty snow.

  ‘Jane … you were one of my favorite students. I loved you. I love you still. But I’m begging you. Don’t hurt anybody else.’

  Jane moved toward him. Her face was iridescent; her hair shone like diamonds. She reached out with watery hands and took hold of his arms, and he could actually feel her, slippery and cold.

  ‘Jane … make me a promise. Don’t hurt anybody else.’

  She looked up at him with her colorless eyes, and she could have been smiling at him, smiling indulgently.

  ‘Jane … remember what we talked about in Special Class II. We talked about showing our feelings, didn’t we? We talked about explaining ourselves. That’s what the English language is all about, isn’t it? It gives us the power to ask for what we want. You learned all of those lessons, like everybody else. Tell me why you’re drowning people. Tell me why you tried to drown me.’

  Jane lowered her head, and for a moment Jim thought that she was going to answer him. But then, without warning, she gripped both of his wrists and twisted him sideways, so that he lost his balance. The next thing he knew, he was toppling into the car-wash, with soapy water blasting into his face, and nylon brushes whirling toward him. He hit his head against the side of the Lincoln, and dropped to his knees, and then a huge brush assembly knocked him to the ground, stunned.

  He tried to stand up, but he was battered again by the brushes, which whipped his face and his arms, and then he was deluged with stinking, recycled water. Coughing and spluttering, he clung to the side of the car, but then he was battered by another torrent of soapy water and a second row of brushes, which lashed his cheeks and stung his eyes and set his ears on fire.

  He dropped to the ground and managed to roll underneath the car. But as he did so, he felt a hand seizing one of his ankles, and then the other. He turned his head and saw that Jane was down on her knees, trying to drag him out into the open again.

  He kicked at her, but she twisted her watery hand around the cuff of his pants and pulled him even harder. Her strength was unbelievable, but then it wasn’t simply the strength of a twenty-year-old girl – it was the unimaginable strength of a natural element. Jane wasn’t just Jane any more; she was the full malevolent power of polluted water. She was the Swimmer.

  Grunting with effort, Jim tried to get a grip on anything he could. The Lincoln’s exhaust pipe was far too hot, and he scorched his knuckles – but he snatched at the parking-brake cable and held on to that.

  Inch by inch, however, the Swimmer managed to pull him out. The brake cable cut deeply into his fingers and when she gave him a final, violent wrench he tore the skin off the palm of his hand and he had to let go. She climbed on to him and pinned him down against the concrete, staring down into his face with chilling intensity.

  ‘What happened in the pool that day?’ she demanded. Her face kept shifting and changing as the water-spray traveled along the length of the car. ‘Everybody was there … everybody must have seen what happened … but none of you lifted a finger to save me. I was drowning, and all you did was laugh!’

  Jim tried to speak but the car-wash gantry was almost directly above him now, and high-pressure water was cascading into his face. He thrashed his head from side to side, spitting and snorting, but the Swimmer seized his hair with one hand and forced his head back so that the water poured directly into his mouth and up his nose. At the same time, she reached out with her other hand and held on to the gantry to stop it from moving any further along.

  God, thought Jim, I’m drowning. No matter how hard he struggled, the Swimmer had him locked hard against the ground, and the water kept gushing into his face, gallons and gallons of it, stinking and thick with wax. He kept his eyes closed and his mouth tight shut, but he knew that he was going to have to take a breath before long – and all he could breathe was water.

  Suddenly, however, he heard somebody shouting. He half opened one eye and saw two men in red Amoco overalls kneeling down beside the car-wash. ‘Hey, you two! What do you think you’re doing in there? You want to get yourselves killed?’

  Almost at the same time, the car-wash abruptly stopped pumping, and
the water was shut off. He looked up at the Swimmer and for a split second she was shining and perfectly formed, even though she was made out of nothing but filthy water. He thought he saw her smile at him. Not a smile of forgiveness or of understanding, but a smile of mockery. Then with a clatter she collapsed, and vanished.

  Jim saw her spirit rise like nothing more substantial than a sunlit reflection and walk away from the gas station, but of course he was the only one who did. The two Amoco attendants came over and helped him up and then they looked around in bewilderment.

  ‘Hey, man – what happened to the girl?’

  ‘What girl?’ he said. He reached up and tore off a sheet of paper towel so that he could press it over his injured hand. The graze wasn’t serious, but it was bleeding all down his wrist and it stung.

  ‘You was in there with a girl. Where the hell did she go?’

  ‘I tripped, that’s all. Fell into the car-wash. The brushes caught me, almost knocked me out.’

  ‘You was in there with a girl. If you want to know the truth, we thought you was doing it.’

  ‘In a car-wash? What do you think I am, some kind of pervert?’

  The attendant bent down and looked under the car. Then he walked around the car-wash to the other side. ‘I swear to God I saw a girl. I swear it. You saw a girl, didn’t you, Freddie?’

  The other attendant didn’t say anything, but kept on looking around the gas station in stupefaction.

  At that moment, the Lincoln’s door opened and the driver managed to struggle out.

  ‘What’s going on? Do I get my car washed, or what?’

  ‘I totally and utterly saw a girl,’ the attendant persisted. ‘You saw her, Freddie, didn’t you?’

  ‘Girl?’ said the driver. ‘I didn’t see no girl.’

  ‘Don’t worry about it,’ said Jim. ‘Sometimes things aren’t all they appear to be.’

  With that he limped out of the gas station and back toward Olympic. His hand hurt, his knees were bruised and his head was thumping, but he was all the more determined to find out what had happened to Jane Tullett on the day that she drowned.

  He met Mary Weiland on the boardwalk at Venice Beach. She had set up a little folding card table to sell hand-made silver earrings and bracelets. She hadn’t changed as much as Piper, except that she had cut her frizzy hair very short and covered it with a blue silk bandanna. She was a petite girl with a round, doll-like face and big round sunglasses with yellow plastic frames. She wore a pink bikini top, blue Daisy Dukes and high cork-heeled sandals.

  ‘Mary … how are things with you?’

  ‘Hi, Mr Rook. Pretty good.’ She had a high, piping voice that went with her looks. ‘Hey – did you have a fight with somebody?’

  Jim tenderly touched the bruise on his forehead, and winced. ‘I had a disagreement with a car-wash, and lost.’

  ‘A car-wash? You were always a true original, Mr Rook, I’ll give you that.’

  ‘These yours?’ he said, picking up one of her bracelets.

  ‘You like them? I make them myself. They’re not exactly Cartier, but they help to pay the rent.’

  ‘They’re good. They’re dangly. I like dangly.’

  ‘You said you wanted to talk about Jane.’

  ‘That’s right. You and she were very close, weren’t you?’

  ‘Like sisters. I still miss her, even now.’

  ‘Did she ever have a serious argument with anybody at college? Was there anybody at West Grove who really didn’t like her?’

  ‘What’s this about?’

  ‘I need to know what happened the day she drowned. The coroner said it was an accident. It sure looked like an accident. But now I’m beginning to think that maybe it wasn’t.’

  ‘You mean somebody drowned her?’

  ‘I don’t know for sure. Did Jane ever argue with her boyfriend?’

  ‘George? For sure, she was always arguing with George. Well, he was a great-looking guy, wasn’t he? Even I liked him, and I never normally went for jocks. He was always dating other girls and then Jane would find out and she would throw books at him and stuff. But they always got back together. I think they would’ve gotten married, if she hadn’t died.’

  ‘Was she involved with any other boys?’

  ‘Not really. But there was this real creepy dude who used to follow her around all the time and send her notes saying how much he adored her. What was his name? He had so much acne we used to call him the Human Pizza. I know – Chris Bayless. I shudder even now. He was always sniffing and wiping his hands together like they were wet, which they probably were.’

  ‘I remember Chris,’ Jim nodded. ‘Poor guy’s mother contracted MS and his father ran off with another woman. He had to do everything at home – cook, clean, take his mother to the bathroom. Then he had to study too.’

  ‘Now you’ve made me feel so mean.’

  ‘Well, you weren’t to know. But I can see why a guy like Chris was attracted to Jane. She was always so full of life, wasn’t she?’

  ‘There were a couple of girls that Jane didn’t particularly get along with.’

  ‘Oh, yes?’

  ‘Vickie Albertyn was one. They had some argument about a dress that Jane had lent her, and which she never gave back. And, like, Vickie always denied that she still had it. And there was another girl, I never found out who it was, but Jane said that she was always flirting with George. Apparently this girl told George all kinds of lies about Jane –like she was incredibly promiscuous and that she had two abortions before she was sixteen. Real nasty stuff, none of it true.’

  ‘Jane didn’t give you any idea who she was?’

  ‘Unh-hunh. She only told me about it the morning before she died. When I asked her, all she said was something like “Can’t you guess?” and then George came over and whisked her off and she didn’t have the chance to tell me. But she was real mad about it, I can tell you that.’

  ‘Hmm … I wonder who that was.’

  ‘I guess you could ask George. He’d know, wouldn’t he?’

  ‘Good idea. Meanwhile, how about selling me a pair of those dangly earrings? I know somebody who’d really go for those.’

  He chatted to Mary a little longer and then walked back to his car. As he unlocked the door, he paused for a moment to watch two girls who were roller-blading in figures of eight. In between them, he was sure he could see an unnatural shimmer of light – a shimmer that could have been another girl, in another existence.

  He climbed into his car and backed out of his parking-space. After all, he was only a hundred yards from the seashore here, and, if the shimmer of light was Jane Tullett’s spirit, the ocean would give her all the water she needed to drown him and half the people on the boardwalk.

  Thirteen

  Karen was pleased with her silver-and-amethyst earrings, and with the huge bunch of lilies he bought to go with them. ‘You’re not trying to bribe me now, are you?’

  ‘I’m just trying to show you that I’m a reformed character. I’m no longer a slob. My sock drawer is still ship-shape, I’ve hoovered the car, and I haven’t eaten anything directly out of a can since yesterday morning.’

  ‘When do you think you’ll be going to Washington?’ she said. They were sitting at a sidewalk table outside the Hungry Harlequin, drinking coffee and eating cinnamon donuts. Karen was wearing tiny sunglasses with very dark lenses so it was difficult for Jim to read her expression.

  ‘I’m still aiming for Sunday evening … my flight’s booked and everything. But I’m not going to go until I’ve exorcized this water spirit, or whatever I have to do to put her to rest. She might try to drown you.’

  ‘I think I can look after myself.’

  ‘Unh-hunh. Not against this thing you can’t. I only wish I could find a way to give her some peace.’

  ‘She wants justice, doesn’t she?’

  ‘Sure. But there’s justice and justice. Somebody might be a murderer, but you don’t punish him by killing his friends and
relatives, do you?’

  ‘Did you talk to George Opal?’

  Jim shook his head. ‘He’s in Tokyo, at some business conference. I might be able to catch him tonight, when he’s having breakfast.’

  ‘What if Jane’s making a mistake? What if she did drown by accident? How are you going to convince her that it was nobody’s fault but her own?’

  ‘I don’t know. If I can’t persuade her to stop drowning people – you know, voluntarily – I’ll have to find some other way to get rid of her.’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘Search me. But Susan Silverstone’s doing some research into vengeful elemental spirits, and so is Laura.’

  ‘You’ll be careful, won’t you?’

  ‘Sure I’ll be careful. I want to live long enough to twist your arm into coming to Washington with me.’

  Karen smiled, and held his hand. ‘You never give up, do you?’

  He was paying the check when his mobile phone warbled. It was David DuQuesne. ‘Jim – I hope I’m not disturbing you, but after we talked about the Swimmer I started to think that it might be worthwhile doing a little research into it. I’ve come up with something that you’ll be very interested to see.’

  ‘Okay … give me a half-hour, and I’ll be up there.’

  Karen said, ‘Don’t tell me, you have to rush off.’

  ‘I’m sorry – but after I’ve sorted out the Swimmer we can spend a whole day together. Two whole days. A lifetime, if you want.’

  ‘Jim – there’ll always be a Swimmer. Well, maybe not a Swimmer, but some other spirit that you have to deal with.’

  ‘I told you: when I go to Washington I’m going to be through with all that. I don’t care if spirits come knocking on my door all night, I’m not going to answer any more. I can’t accept the responsibility for every supernatural manifestation I see – even if I am the only one who can see it.’