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Jeremy, he was not his real self; he hated his real self as much as he hated nearly ever-yone else on
Distingue. He was only Jeremy now, no one else. When Jeremy mentioned the killer's real name, real
self, he spoke of another individ-ual, someone else altogether. And when the mur-ders were committed,
and when Jeremy faded out, relinquished control of the mind, when the real man and real identity
returned, the real man would never understand that he had killed with his own hands.
Basically, though neither the Jeremy-self or the real self would understand this, he was not an evil
person. He was simply schizophrenic, completely and totally insane.
FOURTEEN
Despite her injuries, and despite the immediate danger which hung over Seawatch like a black cloud,
Sonya managed to fall asleep almost as soon as her head touched the pillow. She slept soundly,
dreamlessly, and she woke shortly before nine o'clock Monday morning, stiff and sore but decidedly
better than she had been when she crawled between the sheets the night before. She had felt as if she
were a hundred years old, then; now, overnight, she had lost seventy-five years, anyway, and was almost
her old self. Her head-ache was gone, and her eyes no longer felt red and grainy. Her throat was less
swollen than it had been, but it was still quite sore, a condition which she knew she would have to endure
for a few days yet.
Her drapes were drawn tightly shut, still, and they prevented all but a few tiny streams of sun-light
from entering the gloomy chamber. She lay there in the shadows, staring at the ceiling, wanting to think
out her situation before she got up to face another day.
The big question in her mind, now, was whether or not she should remain as the Dougherty
govern-ess and tutor . . .
Originally, she had taken the position, because it had seemed like a fun thing, working for a
mil-lionaire, living in a mansion on a private island in the Caribbean . . . She had always gone out of her
way to avoid bad scenes, depression, sadness . . . And she had been sure that here on Dist-ingue, she
would meet only happy people, people who were on top of the world, who knew how best to enjoy
everything life had to offer, who had little or no reason to be gloomy. She had expected much laughter,
many interesting friendships, per-haps a few parties, for diversion, of the sort you read about on the
society pages of all the better, metropolitan newspapers.
Actually, she had expected almost anything but what she had found when she arrived on Dist-ingue.
Of course, once this horrible business about the children was over and done with, perhaps they
would be much happier and more pleasant to know than they now were. Everyone was under
tremendous pressure over this affair, waiting for the worst and praying for the best, passing time like
cattle under the swaying blade of an automatic executioner. When that pressure was re-moved, they
might be
No, she thought, things would not be so much better, even if the present crisis passed. Even if they
caught the would-be killer and packed him off to some remote prison or asylum, there would still be a lot
of negativism on the island: Henry Dalton and his grumpiness; Leroy Mills' strange, quiet, almost secretive
ways that made her think he was always planning to do something of which he was utterly ashamed; the
Blenwells at the far end of the island, hating everyone else, talking about killing the parrots, sitting in their
dark drawing room like creatures who would ash and rot if they came into contact with direct sun-light . .
.
No, already there were too many bad memories associated with this island, memories that would
haunt her if she remained. It was best to go.
They'd be disappointed with her, at first.
But they'd understand.
She would write out her resignation that after-noon and give it to Joe Dougherty when he and Helen
arrived back from California this evening.
Then she'd be free.
After all, they'd realize that no one wanted to live around a place full of bad memories, full of the stink
of death and the threat of death. It was always better to get out, go elsewhere, slough off the bad past.
You couldn't be happy if you didn't slough off the bad things that happened, stick them away in a corner
of your mind, forget them, let dust cover them. Anyone could see that.
Her decision firmly made and justified, at least to herself, she let her mind wander over the people on
Distingue who might fit a murderer's shoes. She found that she suspected almost everyone, from Mills to
Henry Dalton, to Saine and Peterson. They all had the opportunity, she supposed, to commit such a
crime, though she could see no mo-tivation. Even a madman, it seemed to her, would need some
motivation, no matter how inconse-quential it was, some spark to set him off. And that made Kenneth
Blenwell the chief suspect, of course; he wanted Seawatch and all of Distingue. She let her mind wander
through the memory of her first meeting with Kenneth and his grandpar-ents, and she became convinced
she was right. She would have to speak with Rudolph about it, con-vince him to be more serious about
the possibility of Blenwell's guilt.
At last, her mind began to return to the same thoughts, as if in a circle, and she knew it was time to
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