Psychlone (6 page)

“It was my duty as a father. I didn't like doing it."

“You got in trouble for doing it. Every six months you can see them for a while, right?"

“I had to."

“So now,” she pursued, “this is your duty as a friend?"

“As a coward,” he said. “I don't believe Jordan Taggart was nuts. It isn't possible."

“What's the alternative?"

He wasn't willing to face that, either. For a moment he was more willing to accept Taggart's insanity than the alternative. “For crying out loud,” he said. “I don't know. I have to find out."

“Larry, your vacation is up. You can't go back now."

“I can arrange for another week's sick leave. Say it's an emergency.” He suddenly felt queasy. The thought of losing the office and his work was unnerving. His work—and Dorothy—were all he had going for him now. “I can't keep thinking of myself as a coward."

“There was really something up there?” she asked.

“No. I don't think so."

“Then what will you find? The same thing the police could tell you here, on the phone. Call. Don't be silly about this—"

“I'm not being silly,” he said ominously.

“Okay, okay,” Dorothy said. “But you're upsetting me now. I've always thought you were stable, maybe a little too stable, but reliable. Someone who wouldn't do strange things. God knows I've—we've had enough of that sort of person."

“You think I'm acting unstable?"

“I make no accusations,” she said. “Only suggestions."

“I backed down out there. Maybe there was something there. Whatever, I backed away from it."

“We're both immune to spirits and spooks, aren't we?” she said. It was their private joke, in reference to their avowed, deep-seated agnosticism. “Matter is all."

“I have to go back."

“So be it, then. But make sure everything is set here, first."

“I will.” His armpits were damp. She was right.

The thought of going back was terrifying.

Albuquerque

Timothy Townsend turned twelve on December second. He put together a spaceship model kit given to him by the hospital staff, and looked out the window at the hospital parking lot, the church across the street and the airplanes leaving the airport.

There was still blood on his hands, but only he could see it. He had learned that the doctors didn't want him to see it, so he didn't. It was better not to talk about certain things.

He had been allowed to see Cynthia Furness in her room, once. It had been bad. She was still unconscious, and her hand was in bandages, but he could see it glowing through the dressings. He had screamed and they had taken him back to his room. In her sleep, Cynthia had moaned and turned her head a little.

So he didn't tell them about that any more. He didn't like the hospital, but his future was even more bleak. Rick, his brother, was going to pick him up in a few weeks and take him to Salt Lake City to live. Tim didn't like Rick very much. They used to get along fine, but now Rick was different. He had changed since being married. His hair was short, he wore funny clothes, and he talked to Tim in a funny way. But the only choice was to go to Rick's house or stay in the hospital. Neither prospect sounded good.

Tim knew he had problems to solve—personal problems. His nightmares were bad. Sometimes he would dream he was back in the house when everything happened. Other times he would dream his mother and father and somebody else were coming to visit him. They were very unhappy. The third person was a man in a uniform. Tim was pretty good at recognizing uniforms, but this fellow's was a puzzle.

It was better not to think much at all. So he put together the spaceship model, careful that no glue slopped over—only little kids slopped glue, and it was time to grow up—and glad that they had finally let him use enamels and thinner. For a while he had used a plastic paint that a nurse had brought in. She was an artist as well as a nurse and she said that paint was called “acrylic” and wouldn't hurt him, wouldn't catch on fire or anything. But it scraped off with just fingernails. The enamel was better. Permanent.

When he was done with it, the nurse put a tack in the ceiling and hung it from a thread. The doctor who talked to him that afternoon congratulated him. “It's a good job,” he said. His name was Jason, a neat name, and he was black-haired and dark-skinned, a Mex probably, but he was okay. Sometimes Tim's father complained—had complained—about Mexes, but he had once called Juan Oliveros the best mechanic in Lorobu, and Juan was—had been—a Mex.

He hadn't told them that he wanted to see if the enamel thinner took the blood off his hands. He tried and it didn't.

Tim ate dinner, feigning an appetite, and the orderly who picked up his tray said, “You'll be out of here real soon. Cynthia and Beverly are coming along fine, too."

But he was lying. Cynthia was still in a coma. Another doctor had said that in the hall when Tim had gone to the bathroom. Cynthia was sleeping and she didn't even need to. Her hand was doing fine, though. She didn't have any fingers left, he could tell that because of the shape of the bandage, but it wasn't going to kill her.

Tim wondered if Michael Barrett came to visit her, and if the fellow in the funny uniform was with him.

He wrote a name down on the cardboard model box, using the citrus-smelling glue tube. The glue made the name shiny and transparent, just like his night visitors. Dream visitors, he corrected himself. He was asleep—must have been asleep—when he saw them. The name was Corporal S.K. Percher.

The first snow of winter forced Larry Fowler to spend the night in Lone Pine. He bought a local newspaper looking for more details on the killings, but the story had blown over quickly. Father-son murder-suicides were odd, but not odd enough to excite comment.

Most of the news stories concerned Lorobu. There were conjectures about “killer” satellites, hidden caches of nerve gas, germ warfare and even UFO attacks. Several religious groups used the story to further their own ends. One evangelist in North Carolina announced that Lorobu was merely the beginning of God's wrath, brought down on the United States because of loosening laws against homosexuals.

Fowler paid no attention. For the moment he simply wasn't interested. His heart was like a shriveled walnut. He watched the drifting flakes of snow through the Venetian blinds in the motel room. Something occurred to him and he picked up the paper to re-read a notice he had barely glanced at before.

The dam Henry had mentioned would be diverting water soon—December tenth, weather permitting. The forecast was for weather warm enough not to freeze the water in the spillways. The cabin would be surrounded by two streams soon.

He had less than a week. It wasn't much time.

He spent the night polishing and testing the equipment. In the morning, he loaded it back into the Z, bought chains at an exorbitant price from a garage near the motel, and headed north on US 395.

By early afternoon the storm was too thick and he had to stay over in Independence. While there, he made a phone call to Bishop but hung up before it was completed. It would be no good trying to convince the sheriff's department or State Police that his cause was noble. Better to just hope the roads were clear and make it to the cabin before a big snow closed everything.

The next morning was sunny and warm and his fears abated with the melting snow. He drove into Bishop at eleven and filled his car with gas, asking for directions to the local library. Then he stopped for lunch at Jack's Barbecue, keeping his eye on the fluffy clouds whisking over the town.

He spent an hour in the library, reading week-old newspaper accounts and thumbing through the occult shelves briefly. There was nothing there to help him, he was certain; the two experiences he had had at the cabin didn't seem to fit standard categories.

“This is crazy,” he muttered as he climbed back into the Z, clutching three Xeroxes of short news stories. There wasn't much more to learn about the killings, apparently—murder-suicide clear and simple.

The car had been giving him some trouble going up the long grades, overheating twice between Independence and Bishop. In Bishop everything showed normal, and in the service station there was no sign of coolant spillage. The Z was almost new—he had only put five thousand miles on it—he decided there was something wrong with the temperature gauge.

Just to be sure, he double-checked the hoses and radiator in another garage before leaving Bishop and heading into the White Mountains.

The roadsides were dotted with patches of melting snow. He had to watch for game on the highway—deer mostly, but once a lynx.

It was four-thirty when he reached the rest stop above the valley. He pulled out and stood by the guard rails, his hair blowing in the rising cold wind.

Fifteen minutes later he turned onto the drive and heard the unpleasant grind of the gravel beneath his tires. He turned off the ignition and sat in the car, looking at the cabin, suddenly uncertain.

If the cabin was sealed for evidence, he would have to break in. That was illegal. On the other hand, if the case had already been decided and no further evidence was necessary, why would they seal it? The state would probably seal it, he told himself, until the will was put through probate, if there were any heirs. Fowler didn't relish the idea of breaking the law. Still, he had come this far, knowing (at least subconsciously) what he would face when he arrived. The only alternative was to turn around and go home, feeling foolish and carrying a guilty little hairball around for the rest of his life. He tapped the steering wheel, then pounded it and swore.

The equipment was in two aluminum camera cases. He swung them out of the back and put one under each arm, then reached into the car and pulled out his suitcase. Waddling slightly, he approached the front porch. Night was coming fast and the cold bit through his windbreaker.

A latch had been screwed onto the door and frame, and a steel cable with a lock and a tag hung from the latch eye. He put the cases down and read the tag, then tugged on the cable. Sealed by the State of California.

He returned to the car to get a pack of tools and spent the next ten minutes removing the latch. This far out in the country, such a seal was bound to be ineffective. He made sure he didn't damage the fitting, so he could re-seal the cabin after he left.

“Optimistic, aren't you?” he said grimly. The key slid into the lock and he pushed the suitcase and equipment across the threshhold with a foot while reaching for the light switch. “Open for business,” he, said aloud, closing the door behind him, “with advertising.” Anyone who was curious would see the lights in the cabin, just as he had seen them a week and a half ago.

It was a chance he'd have to take.

Next, to get it out of his mind, he searched for the bloodstains. There'd been no description of where the killing had taken place. If it had been in the cabin, he wanted to know about it and, if possible, avoid the area completely. The police usually cleaned up after shooting photographs and collecting evidence—didn't they? He had never read much about such things.

There were no bloodstains in any of the rooms. The killings must have taken place outside.

He pulled the shades on the living-room windows—no sense in being blatant—and took a few sticks of wood from the hopper to stock the fireplace.

There was nothing to do now but wait. He hummed an ominous “do-dooo” as he started the fire, then shook his head. No sense trying to cut the gloom. Be grateful for small favors. The larder was full, the cabin looked like Jordan had just left for a walk, and it hadn't snowed enough to block the roads.

He wondered if he should try to call out. He tested the phone and it hadn't been shut off yet. It was a cinch the phone company didn't expect any outgoing calls from the cabin. He wanted to tell Dorothy he had made it safely.

But that would take courage. Suddenly he wanted to be very cautious about advertising his presence in the cabin—to anyone.

Tim Townsend woke up from a pleasant dream about fishing with his parents at Tahoe—pleasant, but peculiar, because the man in the odd uniform was in the boat with them. He listened for a moment, trying to decide what had awakened him.

He shut his eyes. Then he sat up as someone ran by his door. There were voices outside—nurses and orderlies, whispering anxiously. Something was going on.

He climbed out of bed and bumped his shin on the night table. The room was still unfamiliar. Following the gleam of the door crack, he walked across the cold tile and stood by the door, leaning forward to catch any outside noises.

“She's not in her room,” a man said. “Nancy checked there a half-hour ago and everything was fine."

Tim turned the doorknob slowly and peered through. Two nurses walked past quickly, one with a green sweater thrown over her whites. An intern followed shortly thereafter, then a security guard. Tim opened the door farther and stepped into the corridor.

“Hey kid!"

He spun around and saw another nurse, a man, at the end of the hall. He started to go back into his room.

“Hey! Hold it! Kid, did you see a woman go past here in a nightgown?” The nurse approached Tim with a clipboard in one hand. He looked at the board and frowned. “Say, you're Tim Townsend, aren't you?"

Tim nodded.

“It was Beverly Winegrade, Tim. Remember her?"

“Yes."

“Did you see her?"

“No. What's going on?"

“She's not in her room. She was supposed to be sedated."

“Maybe she's sleepwalking,” Tim suggested. The nurse shrugged and patted his shoulder.

“Back to bed,” he ordered. “We'll find her."

Tim turned to the dark room and wondered how he'd made it across a few moments earlier. Even with the door wide open, there were shadowy areas he didn't like. He thought he'd left the nightlight on, but it was off now. The nurse was at the other end of the hall, and besides, Tim didn't want to look like a sissy. He walked across the floor slowly, his stomach doing funny flipflops. When he was by the edge of the bed, his ankles tingled and he knew something was under it, reaching out to get him. He jumped up and pulled the sheets over his head, wrapping himself until only his nose and mouth were exposed. Then he arranged the blankets so there wouldn't be any “leaks,” places where something could seep in, and felt better.