"Well, what do you expect?" Ivy asked. "Of course he's read about angels.
He's trying to understand exactly what you are and why you've come back.
And we already knew he was curious enough to look in the envelope that contained the key. I would have done the same thing if I were him," she added defensively.
"There was also a copy of Beth's story," Tristan said. "The one about the woman who committed suicide, the one she recited for your drama club assignment the month before Caroline died. Do you remember it?"
Ivy nodded slowly. "The woman tore up photographs of her lover and his new sweetheart, leaving them like a suicide note when she shot herself."
"Just as Caroline supposedly tore up photos of Andrew and your mother," Tristan said.
Once before Ivy had thought about the similarity between Beth's story and the setup the police had found at Caroline's house. She had assumed it was another example of the uncanny way Beth anticipated events, but now she realized that Gregory could have borrowed the idea from Beth.
"And there's a clipping of the story about the girl in Ridgefield," Tristan went on. "The one who was attacked right after you were, in the exact same way. It worked, didn't it? The style of attack convinced everyone that it was part of a series of crimes by someone who didn't know you."
Ivy dropped her head in her hands, thinking about the girl.
"So what are you saying?" she asked at last. "That Will has figured out a lot more than we thought? I'm glad. I wanted to protect him, but now there's no reason to hold anything back."
"But there is a reason," Tristan replied quickly. "Will has something else. The jacket and cap."
Ivy sat up straight. How had he gotten the clothes? Did he know they were important evidence? Why hadn't he told her?
"Oh, he knows they're important," Tristan answered her thoughts. "They were wrapped carefully in plastic bags and hidden with everything else."
"But I never told him what I saw. I never told him what tempted me to cross the tracks, and that story wasn't released to the papers."
"So either he was in on it-" "No!" said Ivy.
"— or he's somehow figured it out. Maybe Eric told him something. In any case, he knows a lot more than he's telling either of us."
Ivy remembered the day at the station when they had caught Eric searching the drainage ditch by the side of the road. Will must have already found the cap and jacket. He was faking it in front of Eric-and her.
She stood up abruptly, pushing back the piano bench.
"Ivy?"
She mentally pushed Tristan away and walked over to the window. Dropping down on her knees, Ivy rested her arms and chin on the windowsill.
"Ivy, talk to me. Don't push me away."
"He's just trying to help us," Ivy said. "I'm sure it's nothing more than that."
"How can he be helping when he's hiding things from us?"
"Because he thinks that's what's best," she replied, though she knew it didn't make sense. "I know him. I trust him."
"Suzanne trusts Gregory," Tristan pointed out.
"It's not the same!" Ivy cried, thrusting Tristan out of her mind together. "It's not the same!"
She had cried out loud, and for a moment she thought she heard her own voice reverberating in the room. Then she realized the shouting came from below. Suzanne was calling out. Ivy heard Gregory's voice drowning out Suzanne's. She rushed down to her bedroom and raced across the second-floor hall to the back set of steps. Suzanne was hurrying up the narrow stair, her long black hair fanning out behind her, her face pale and glistening with perspiration. She clutched the copper cup in which Ivy had fixed her soda.
Gregory trailed her. "Suzanne," he said, "give Ivy a chance to explain."
Suzanne threw back her head and laughed wildly, so wildly she almost fell backward down the stair. Then she looked at Ivy, and Ivy knew something was terribly wrong.
"I can't wait," Suzanne said. "I can't wait to see how she explains this one."
Suzanne shoved the soda toward Ivy, forcing her to take the cup in her hands. Then she uncurled her left fist. In the damp palm of her friend's hand, Ivy saw a round orange pill. Ivy glanced quickly at Gregory, then back at the tablet.
"What is it?" Suzanne asked. "Tell me, what did I find in my drink?"
"It looks like a vitamin," Ivy said cautiously.
"A vitamin!" Suzanne shrieked with laughter, but Ivy saw the tears in her friend's eyes. "That's good," Suzanne sputtered. "A vitamin. What were you going to do, Ivy? Send me on a nice trip like Eric's? You're crazy.
You're a screwed-up, crazy, jealous witch." She dropped the orange tablet in the soda. "Here, let's put the vitamin back. Now you drink it, drink all of it."
Ivy stared down at the copper-colored cup. She knew that Gregory had set her up, and she figured it was harmless, but she couldn't take the chance.
"Swallow it," Suzanne said, tears running down her face. "Swallow the vitamin."
Ivy put her hand over the top of the cup and shook her head. She saw Suzanne's mouth jerk.
Suzanne turned, ducked under Gregory's arms, and ran down to the first floor. Gregory followed her. Ivy sank down on the steps and dropped her head to her knees. She didn't try to hide the tears, though she knew that Gregory paused to look over his shoulder, enjoying the view.
Tristan thought that warning Ivy about Will would have made him feel good. After all, his suspicions were right. Will was not admitting to them what he knew, and he wasn't telling them how he knew it. Now Ivy could trust only Tristan. He should have felt smart and victorious-at least satisfied. He didn't. No matter how much they needed and loved each other, he and Ivy stood on either side of an un crossable river.
Monday evening the world seemed grayer, chillier to him. He stood outside of Caroline's dark house and felt the autumn coming on like a creature who has no home. When Tristan slipped through the walls, he felt like an intruder, a ghost who haunted, not an angel who helped those he loved. He longed to be with Ivy, but he didn't dare go to her now. He knew the information about Will had hurt and angered her. Now that he had told her, what could Tristan say to make things better?
"Tristan?"
He looked around, surprised.
"Tristan?"
He wanted so much to hear Ivy's voice that he thought he did.
"Are you in there?" she called. "Let me in."
Tristan hurried to the door, focusing quickly in order to materialize his fingers. They kept slipping on the latch as he struggled to undo it. He wondered if it looked strange to Ivy when the door of the darkened house swung slowly in on its hinges.
She stepped inside and stopped just within the moonlit rectangle made by the gaping door. In the silver light her hair shimmered, and her skin looked as pale as an apparition's. For a moment Tristan believed something terrible and wonderful had happened, and she had come to him as a spirit like himself. But then he saw how she turned toward him, her eyes full of love but unfocused, the way eyes see a glow, but not the features of a face.
"I love you." They shared that thought, and he moved easily inside her mind.