Homing by John Saul Page B

from Julie as Carl Henderson's palm smashed across her cheek, then she cowered back, whimpering in terror. "N-No," she stammered. "I was just looking for Mr. Owen! I wanted to"
    But Carl Henderson heard nothing of her words. His consciousness was filled only with Julie's image and his own rage, which was urging him on, whispering to him, telling him to do to her what she had done to him.
    The darkness, the voices in his head whispered. Put her in the dark with the other one. Do to her what she did to you. Now, Carl. Do it now. No one is here ... no one can see you.... Do it, Carl ... do it...
    His grip on Julie tightening, Carl twisted her around, and she stumbled, falling to the ground.
    She felt him drop down on top of her, and now, as his weight held her immobile, she felt his hands closing on her throat. "No!" she screamed once more. "Noooo!"
    Otto Owen emerged from his house. His anger had finally abated. In fact, if he wanted to be dead honest, he felt kind of stupid.
    When Julie had come knocking at his door a few minutes ago, he'd known why she was there: all she'd wanted to do was apologize.
    But he'd refused to listen-hell, he'd even refused to admit he could hear her, even though he was pretty sure she'd known he was right inside the door.
    And it's not like she was a bad kid-not really. After all, weren't all kids mouthier now than when he'd been her age? But whose fault was that? If he was going to be mad at anyone, he should be mad at Karen, not Julie. It was just the way the girl had been raised, that's all. And if he was going to be completely honest, he didn't really think Karen had been such a bad mother, though he wasn't about to admit that to anyone but himself.
    Besides, even now that he was close to eighty, Otto could remember a few times when he was Julie's age, and had wanted to tell off his own grandfather.
    Still, he wasn't going to pretend he was happy about what was going on at the farm. It just seemed like nothing was the way it used to be-the way it should be.
    All his life the farm had run just the way it was supposed to. He and his father-then he and Russell-had worked the fields and the livestock, and his mother, then his own dear wife, Emily, then Russell's Paula, had taken care of the house.
    After Emily died, Paula had taken care of his house, too. Never complained about it, either.
    She'd seen her duty and she'd done it!
    Of course, after she died, he and Russell and Kevin had to pitch in and do the housework themselves. And it wasn't that he hadn't wanted Russell to get married again-he had! Hell, they had to have someone to take care of them, didn't they?
    He'd waited all week, hoping that sooner or later Karen would come down and offer to clean up the growing mess in his house, but she hadn't showed up at all, so this morning he'd gone up to talk to her about it, and she'd hardly even been civil to him.
    He'd seen the way she looked at him when all he asked for was a simple cup of coffee!
    Of course, he had only been a couple feet from the pot, and Karen had been pretty busy.
    Maybe he could have poured the coffee himself.
    In fact, if he really wanted to be fair, he supposed he should have poured the coffee himself.
    Abruptly, he started chuckling as he remembered the act Julie had put on. And now that he thought about it, hadn't Enid Gilman once told him years ago that Karen was off in L.A. trying to be an actress?
    Well, from what he'd seen that morning, it was Julie who had the talent.
    Otto stood on his back porch, looking around the empty yard. No sign of Julie-but why would there be? He'd been a cantankerous old man, just as rude to her as she'd been to him, but at least she'd had a point to make, and he resolved to find her and let her finish apologizing. It would do her good.
    But where had she gone?
    He glanced up the hill toward his son's house. Would she have gone back up there?
    What if she hadn't known he was in his kitchen, listening to her? She'd still be looking for