terminal, gathered up all the printouts her morning’s work had produced, and left her office.
All her work, according to the computer, meant nothing. And yet she was sure that the computer was wrong. Then, as she thought about it, she came to the slow realization that the computer had not said the CHILD surveys weren’t random. It had simply refused to take a stand on the question.
That was the problem with computers. They were too objective. Indeed, they were totally objective.
But CHILD, Sally was convinced, was not totally objective. The survey, she was sure, was a cover for something else.
A conspiracy.
But would she be able to prove it?
She didn’t know.
All she knew was that the more she learned, the more frightened she became.
Chapter 16
STEVE MONTGOMERY PAUSED on the front porch of his mother-in-law’s house, wondering if he’d been right in his decision to share his problems with Phyllis Paine. When the idea of talking to her about Sally had first occurred to him, he’d immediately rejected it. But then, this morning, he’d changed his mind. After all, who knew Sally as well as her own mother?
He pressed the button next to the front door and listened to the soft melody of the chimes. When there was no answer, he pressed the bell again. Then, just as he was about to turn away, the door opened, and Phyllis, her eyes rimmed in red, and her face suddenly showing her years, gazed out at him.
“Steve.” Her eyes darted around as she looked for Sally, then her brows furrowed in puzzlement “Isn’t Sally with you?”
“No.” Offering no further explanation, Steve asked if he could come in, and Phyllis suddenly stepped back.
“Of course. I’m sorry, Steve. I—well, I’m afraid I haven’t been having a very good day.”
Steve paused. “Maybe I should come back another time.”
“No, no.” She closed the door, and led Steve into the parlor. “I was just getting rid of some things.” Sighing tiredly, she seated herself on the edge of the sofa. “Some dresses I was making for Julie,” she went on. “They were in the sewing room, all cut, and I’ve been waking up every night, feeling guilty about not having finished them.” Her lips twisted into a desolate smile. “You know me—once I start something, I have to finish it. Anyway, I’ve been waking up in the middle of the night and going to the sewing room to finish the dresses, and it isn’t until I start working on them that I remember … what happened. So just now I threw them away. I took them out to the garbage can and threw them away.”
Her eyes, reflecting an uncertainty that Steve had never seen before, searched his face. “It seemed like a terrible thing to do,” she whispered. “And yet, I couldn’t think of anything else. It was a symbol, I suppose. A way of forcing myself to face up to what’s happened.” Suddenly she straightened up and folded her hands in her lap. “But that’s not why you’re here, is it?” The uncertainty in her eyes disappeared, to be replaced by the penetrating sharpness Steve was used to. “It’s Sally, isn’t it?”
Steve shifted uncomfortably, then nodded his head.
“Things aren’t going well, are they? I mean, even considering the circumstances?”
“No,” Steve said quietly. “And I’m beginning to wonder what to do.”
Phyllis’s brows rose. “About Sally?”
“Dr. Wiseman called me on Friday. He’s worried about her—he seems to think she’s avoiding facing up to the fact that Julie’s death can’t be explained by trying to prove that something else happened. Something more reasonable.”
“I see,” Phyllis said. “And what do you think?”
“I don’t know what to think. I barely saw her over the weekend. When she wasn’t at her office, she was holed up in the den, and she wouldn’t tell me what she was working on. But I’m sure it had something to do with”—he faltered, then plunged on—“with Julie. And she’s been talking to Lucy Corliss.”
“Lucy Corliss? Why does that name—oh! The mother of that little boy who’s missing. What’s his name?”
“Randy. He was a friend of Jason’s. But that’s not what she was talking to Mrs. Corliss about, at least not directly. It seems that Jason and Randy as well as Julie were being studied by some group in Boston.”
Phyllis’s brows arched skeptically. “What’s unusual about that? These days it seems as if someone’s studying all of us all the time.” Then her expression changed. “Oh, God, she hasn’t come up with some sort of conspiracy theory, has she?”
“Well,