Cry for the Strangers Page 0,8

out here.”

“It doesn’t make any sense,” Brad mused.

“Maybe not,” Palmer agreed. “But we don’t question it. Whatever demons were in him, they’re gone now. Gone forever.”

Brad’s fingers drummed softly on the table top as he turned Glen’s statement over in his mind, trying to figure out what could have cured Robby’s disorder. It had been a problem case too long, and Brad was always skeptical of “miracles.” “I wonder if I could see him?” he asked.

“Why not?” Glen agreed amiably. “He always liked you.”

“Tell that to my receptionist,” Brad chuckled. The receptionist had lived in terror of Robby’s visits to the office, and often made up reasons not to be there when the child arrived.

Glen glanced up at the clock on the wall. “Tell you what,” he said, “why don’t you come out to our place this evening or tomorrow morning? Are you staying in town?”

“I guess we might as well,” Elaine said uncertainly, knowing Brad would want to. “Is there a decent place?”

“The Harbor Inn, down on the waterfront,” Glen said. “It’s the only place.” He stood up. “Look, I’ve got a lot to do this afternoon. See you later, okay?”

“Sure,” Brad said. Before he could say anything else Glen Palmer hurried away from their table and disappeared through the door.

“That was sudden,” Elaine commented.

“It was, wasn’t it?” Brad agreed. Then he noticed that as soon as Palmer left a buzz of conversation had started among the remaining patrons of the café.

“Well,” a woman at the next table said a bit too loudly to her lunch partner. “At least he’s shaved off that awful beard.”

“Not that it matters,” the other woman replied. “He still doesn’t fit in around here.”

“You’d think he’d get the message,” the first woman said. “Everybody else like them has caught on right away and left us in peace.”

“My Joe offered to buy that building of theirs just yesterday,” the second woman said. “And do you know what Glen Palmer told him? He told him it wasn’t for sale. Joe told him he’d better sell while he could, before he ruined it completely, but Palmer told him he wasn’t ruining it—he was remodeling it.”

“Into an art gallery,” the first woman sniffed. “What makes him think he can make a living with an art gallery in Clark’s Harbor? And that wife of his—makes pottery that looks like mud pies and thinks people will actually buy it!”

The conversation continued to buzz around them. From the few words Brad could catch, he knew they were all talking about the same person—Glen Palmer. Everyone, apparently, talked about him. No one had talked to him.

“Maybe I was wrong,” Brad heard Elaine say. She also was listening to the comments from the other tables.

“ ‘New England,’ you said.” Brad gave her a wry smile. “Sounds to me like you were right on target. These people don’t seem to like strangers any more than villagers do anywhere else.”

“It’s kind of scary, isn’t it?” Elaine asked.

Brad shrugged. “I don’t know. I think it’s more or less to be expected. We’ll probably get the same treatment no matter where we go. But it’s just a matter of time. People have to get used to you, particularly in places like this. I’ll bet a lot of people in this town rarely see someone they don’t know. When they do they get suspicious.”

Elaine fell silent and continued eating her lunch. The psychiatrist in Brad was enjoying himself, finding the hostile attitudes of the locals “interesting,” and she wasn’t sure she approved. But, she quickly reminded herself, you knew when you married him that he was a psychiatrist; you have nothing to complain about. She concentrated on looking out the window and did her best to ignore the chatter going on around her.

It wasn’t until they were finishing their coffee that Brad spoke again.

“I think we should look around.”

“I’m not so sure …” Elaine began.

Brad tried to reassure her. “Honey, any small town is going to be the same, and if we’re going to live in a place like this for a year, we’re going to have to tolerate some hostility and suspicion at first. It goes with the territory: if you want to be in a small town, you have to put up with small town attitudes.”

He paid the check and they left the café. Downstairs, in the tavern, Brad saw that the checker game seemed not to have progressed at all. One of the old men stared intently at the board, the other out the window.