Homing (43 page)

"All right," Alice sighed when she, JoAnna, the emergency room resident, and two orderlies had exhausted every other possibility, "let's start notifying people. Alice, you call the police, and I'll call her doctor." Her eyes shifted to the young resident from the emergency room. "And you can call her parents," she said. Before the resident had time to object, Alice picked up the phone and dialed Ellen Filmore's number in Pleasant Valley. On the fifth ring, an answering machine picked up the call.

"This is Ellen Filmore. I'm not at home right now, but please leave a message. If this is an emergency, please call 555-6472." When the electronic tone beeped, Alice left a brief message, then dialed the number she'd jotted down as Ellen Filmore's voice had spoken it. After four rings, a sleepy male voice came on the line.

"Hello?"

"I'm looking for Ellen Filmore."

instantly, the sleepiness left the voice. "This is Roberto Munoz. I'm her nurse."

Alice Jenkins quickly explained what had happened.

"We're notifying the police, of course, and the girl's parents. If you can tell me where I might find Dr. Filmore, I'd be glad to-"

"It's all right," Roberto interrupted. "If she's not at home, I'm not sure where she might be, but I can find her a lot faster than you can. I'll take care of it."

Hanging up the phone, Roberto dialed the number of the clinic, starting to pull on his clothes even while the phone rang. When the answering machine there finally picked up, and Roberto heard his own voice beginning to deliver a variation of the same message that was on Ellen Filmore's phone, he hung up, thought a moment, then dialed the sheriff's dispatcher. "Carla? It's Roberto Munoz, in Pleasant Valley. Any idea where I might be able to find Dr. Filmore? Has something happened with our missing kids?"

"We've got a couple of deputies out cruising around the area, but if something's happened, I haven't heard," the dispatcher replied. "And I haven't heard from Dr. Filmore in weeks. Is there a problem I can help you with?"

"I don't think so," Roberto sighed. "Another of our kids just turned up missing, this time from a hospital in San Luis Obispo."

"Oh, Lord," the dispatcher replied. "You're sure there's nothing we can do?"

"The cops over there are taking care of it," Roberto told her. "Talk to you later." Hanging up, he finished dressing while he tried to figure out what to do next.

The thing was, his boss never went anywhere without telling him where she could be reached, or leaving a message on her machine. In the three years he'd worked for her, this was the first time Roberto hadn't been able to tell a caller exactly how to get hold of her.

Picking up his wallet and the keys to his car, Roberto Munoz set off in search of Ellen Filmore.

Something was wrong.

Karen Owen's eyes snapped open, and for a moment she wasn't quite certain where she was. Then she recognized the living room of the farmhouse, and as the fogginess of her restless sleep began to lift from her mind, she shifted stiffly on the sofa in an attempt to ease the dull ache that was throbbing in the small of her back.

In the big brown leather chair across from her, Russell was snoring rhythmically, his head lolling on his chest, his mouth partly open. Beside her on the couch, Marge Larkin had lain down, curled her legs up almost to her chest, and slept with her neck bent at an angle so severe it almost made Karen wince. Slowly, her muscles protesting every movement, Karen unfolded herself from the sofa and started toward the kitchen for a cup of the coffee it seemed she'd brewed a few minutes ago. As she passed the clock, it struck a single deep note, and she automatically glanced at it.

Twelve-thirty.

Which meant that she hadn't made the coffee a few minutes ago at all, and by now it would be stone cold.

How could she have slept for two hours?

The strain of keeping her emotions in check, when what she really wanted to do was burst into tears and collapse, had exhausted hen She turned the heat on beneath the coffeepot, then reached for a mug on the counter. And stopped.

She looked around the kitchen, frowning as she tried to focus her mind. Something wasn't quite right. What was it? Was something out of place? Or something not there at all?

The silence of the sleeping household was unnerving her. That's all it is, she told herself. Still, something didn't feel right.

Her heart beating faster as a pang of fear twisted in her belly, Karen started up the stairs.

This is ridiculous, she scolded herself There's nothing wrong. Why was she getting so upset?

But as she started down the hall toward Molly's room, she broke into a run, throwing open Molly's door and snapping on the light.

The room was empty.

"No," she whispered, already starting toward the room next door. "Not Molly, too." It was going to be all right.

She would open the door and find Ben asleep, with Molly and Bailey curled up on the floor next to him, a blanket wrapped around them to keep them warm.

But even as she pushed the door open, she knew that Kevin's room would prove to be just as empty as Molly's had been.

Now a scream burst from her throat-a scream that was meant to be her husband's name, but erupted only as a formless howl of anguish. Frantically, she rushed from one room to another, calling out Molly's name, and by the time Russell arrived at the top of the stairs, followed a second later by Marge Larkin, she had checked them all. A sob of hopelessness racked her body, and she stared first at her husband, then at Marge Larkin. "They're gone," she breathed. "Oh, God, Marge, now our babies are gone, too."

Her frayed emotions finally snapping, she collapsed into Russell's arms. "They took Bailey," she sobbed. "Why would they do that? Oh, God, why would they do that?"

But even as she asked the question, deep in her heart she already knew the answer.

Molly and Ben had gone out into the night to look for their sister and brother.

How long had they been gone?

Breaking away from Russell, Karen rushed down the stairs and out into the night.

"Molly! Ben! Come back! Oh, God, please come back .....

As Russell dashed down the stairs to call Mark Shannon, and Marge Larkin burst out of the house to join Karen in the yard, Karen's screams slowly died away into the silence of the night.

Over the next half hour, as Mark Shannon began spreading the word that Molly and Ben were gone, lights came on in the homes of Pleasant Valley and men began to leave their houses, knowing they wouldn't sleep again until Molly and Ben had been found.

Or until they discovered exactly what was happening to the children of their town.

Roberto Munoz pulled into the parking lot of the clinic, not because he expected to find Ellen Filmore there, but because he had no better ideas of where to look next. He'd already been to her home, checking her garage to make certain her car was gone. Next he'd driven slowly up and down every street in town searching, half expecting to see the doctor's car parked in the driveway of someone she knew.

Her car, though, seemed to have disappeared off the face of the earth.

Was it possible she hadn't come back from San Luis Obispo at all? No, she would have called him. Ellen took her responsibility as the town's sole doctor very seriously; if she were going to be out of town unexpectedly, he was always informed, no matter how late the hour.

Parking near the clinic's door, Roberto let himself inside, going first to Ellen's office, where he rifled through her calendar, searching for any clue as to plans she might have had.

Nothing. He moved through the rest of the clinic, not certain what he was looking for, but knowing that if anything anything at all-was out of place, his practiced eyes would spot it immediately.

The open drawer in one of the examining rooms drew his attention. The moment he looked inside it, he knew what was gone.

The antivenom that Carl Henderson had brought to the clinic the day Julie Spellman had been stung.

But why would the antivenom be gone? Why would anyone want to steal But it hadn't been stolen! He'd seen nothing to indicate that the clinic had been broken into, and no thief would have left a drawer standing open, where either he or Ellen would be sure to notice it first thing in the morning.

It had to have been Ellen who had taken it.

The connection clicked in Roberto Munoz's mind just as it had occurred to Ellen Filmore a few hours earlier. He knew where she must have gone. Leaving the clinic, he drove out to Carl Henderson's house. There, parked in the driveway behind Henderson's gray Jeep, was Ellen Filmore's car.

He was about to get out of his car when he noticed that something was odd about the house.

Two cars in the driveway, but not a single light on in the house.

Roberto started once again to get out of his car, tempted to barge into the house, to break in if necessary, to find Ellen. But then he changed his mind. Henderson was six inches taller than he was, and outweighed him by at least fifty pounds. If Ellen were in danger, he alone could never rescue her. He had to get help-but he couldn't just leave.

Then Roberto remembered one of Ellen Filmore's habits, one that he had warned her, to no avail, that she should break. Leaving the engine of his own car running, he ran over to Ellen's car and opened the driver's door.

Just as he'd hoped, the keys were hanging in the ignition.

Switching on the ignition, he picked up her cellular phone and called Mark Shannon's number. The deputy answered on the first ring, and didn't sound as though he'd been sleeping at all, though only a few minutes ago, when Roberto had passed his house, Shannon's lights had been out, too. "It's Roberto, Mark," he said, keeping his voice down. Quickly, he told the deputy what had happened and what he now suspected.

"Okay," Shannon began, thinking quickly. Only minutes ago, he'd heard from Russell Owen that Molly and Ben had disappeared, and he'd been about to head to the Owen farm when Roberto's call caught him. Reaching a quick decision, the deputy said, "Stay there. I'll be out in a couple of minutes."

Shaking, Roberto put down the phone. And then, as if from a great distance, he heard it Though it was muffled to the point where it was barely audible, Roberto was sure it was the sound of a scream.

Ellen Filmore screamed once more, and scrabbled across the floor of the pitch-black chamber in which she was imprisoned.

She had no idea how long she'd been locked in the room, but as the minutes had turned into hours, and she'd heard Carl Henderson moving around beyond the locked door, she'd grown more and more terrified.

She'd tried to keep calm, refused to give in to the panic that threatened to overwhelm her when she'd first been plunged into the blackness of the chamber.

instead she'd moved around it, carefully exploring, crawling across the floor on her hands and knees at first, then finally standing up to feel the walls, working her way slowly around the perimeter, taking the measure of the room with the span of her arm reach.

It seemed to be empty, save for some heavy spikes she'd discovered on the back wall, driven deep into the upright timbers that seemed to have supported the house before the concrete retaining walls had been added. One of spikes had seemed slightly loose, and she'd spent a time-she didn't know how long-working at it, trying to pull it free, until, sobbing with the exertion and frustration, she gave up.

There was a drain in the floor, too; and in the wall that separated her from the rest of the basement, there were some irregularities she hadn't yet been able to figure out.

Once she'd gone over the room with her hands and been able to discover nothing she might be able to use, she decided the best thing to do was simply to sit and wait.

And stay awake, and listen.

Sooner or later Carl Henderson would leave the basement. And when he did, she would go to work again, gouging at the door, prying at its hinges, until somehow she got it open.

Screaming she knew, would do no good. No one was close enough to the house to hear her, and screams might very well induce Carl Henderson to kill her right now.

So, for what seemed like an endless eternity, she had sat on the floor, her back Against the wall, forcing herself to stay awake and listen.

A few minutes ago Henderson had come close to the door and spoken to her.

"It occurred to me you might be getting lonely," he said.

"So I thought I'd send in some company for you."

There had been a long silence, and Ellen had wondered if perhaps Henderson had gone away.

She was just about to get up and move closer to the door when she suddenly felt it.

Something crawling up her leg.

instinctively she reached down to brush it away, but as her hand touched it, she felt a sharp stinging in her calf.

She uttered a sharp cry of pain and surprise, and then Henderson had betrayed his presence.

He laughed.

Then he spoke.

"Do you like spiders?" he asked. "I hope you do, because there are several hundred of them in there with you now."

Though she could see nothing, she suddenly imagined the darkness to be alive with creatures creeping toward her from every direction.

Ellen shrank back Against the wall.

A moment later she felt the first of the vile creatures crawling up her leg, and instantly a scream erupted from her throat.

Then she felt the spiders everywhere.

Dropping from the ceiling into her hair.

Creeping up both legs.

She could feel them on her hands and arms now, her face, her neck.

Another scream burst from her throat, building quickly into an agonized wail of pure terror.

Sara lay near the entrance to the cave.

She no longer had any sense of time, any memory of where she was or how she had gotten there. All she was now aware of, all she responded to, was a steady throbbing, a pulsating rhythm that came not only from deep within her grossly distended body, but from beyond it, as well.

insects were everywhere now, bees lining the walls of the cave, clinging to the rock so closely together that they formed a solid curtain, their wings humming steadily as they worked in concert to keep the air within the cave fresh, its temperature constant.