Night Call and Other Stories of Suspense

by Armstrong Charlotte

  Francine was staring at her. Her features were lost in the rounded flesh. It was hard to imagine what kind of nose or chin she had. But her eyes were peering out of their rosy nests, and surely there was fear in them.

  “All I meant,” said Stella, “some people adore cats and can’t stand—” (She hadn’t meant to mention the first Mrs. Sidwell—she must be more careful.)

  “I don’t care for pets, not much,” said Francine and stuffed and totally filled her mouth with whipped cream.

  After a decently brief interval Stella went home, thoughtful and a little dismayed. She told Howard at dinnertime that there was now peace, and for pity’s sake not to break it. Because peace, she went on to confide, was about all there could ever be between Stella Lamboy and the woman next door.

  “It’s not that I don’t like her,” Stella said. “It’s just that I didn’t find one thing—there’s just no—Well, maybe it isn’t fair after only fifteen minutes but there wasn’t one spark! The only thing she seems to care about is food. She didn’t want to know what I care about.”

  “Obviously,” said Howard, “she doesn’t care about being fashionably slim.”

  Stella shuddered and wondered why she did. “She admitted she doesn’t care much for pets,” she said. “But she’s not—well, aggressive about it.”

  “Miggs can coexist,” said Howard loftily, “as long as there is no aggression from out across the border.”

  But he was thinking: Who would spill tomato juice on an antique patchwork quilt? Or was it something else that I saw on it? The color of—blood? He shivered at such nonsense.

  That night Howard got himself trapped in the Late Show. When he took Miggs out on his leash it was after midnight. The street was quiet; the tweedy dark was fresh and cool. As he ambled down the block, with the dog’s eager life tugging, kitelike, on the leash in his hand, Howard fell into what he sometimes called, to himself, his “cosmic” thoughts.

  Suburban, ordinary, these undistinguished rows of boxes, set among the trees, all silent now. What have we here, he mused. Everything commonplace. You betcha! Commonplace stuff—like birth, death, love, hate, fear, hope. In his imagination he could lift the lids from some of these boxes, lift them right off. He knew one box that held patient suffering, another that rang with music all day long. He couldn’t help telling himself that every box on the street was a package of human mystery—which was quite commonplace, he thought complacently.

  When he turned at the end of the block it was his fancy to cross over and come back on the other side of the street. Suddenly, in the upper story of the house next door to his—the Sidwells’—he seemed to see a wash of light. No room lit up. But something paler than the dark had washed along the windows from the inside. Burglars, he thought at once. There it went again. Howard began to walk on his toes, although now the house remained dark, and Miggs hadn’t noticed anything.

  Howard crept on until he was directly across from the Sidwell house and there, again, came that washing light, from inside, but now on the ground floor.

  He hauled on the leash and struck across to his own house, keeping an uneasy eye to his right. Stella was asleep in her bed, trusting and innocent and alone. He must be careful. But his own house seemed to breathe in peace, so he stood quietly on his own porch until Miggs whined a question. Then he unlocked the door and took the dog in.

  Miggs curled around on his own cushion in the kitchen and Howard patted the freshened fur, meanwhile peering out the window. There was a light of some sort in the kitchen over there, across the two driveways. But there was a shade, or drawn curtains. He couldn’t quite see in. And he couldn’t hear anything.

  Nothing was happening. No more mysterious glimmers.

  Finally, Howard locked all his doors and went up to bed. But he kept his ear on the night, until he remembered there was a better ear than his, downstairs.

  The next morning, as Howard went to get out his car, he heard a futile whirring and whining in the Sidwells’ garage. So he leaned over the hedge. “Trouble?”

  It seemed that Ralph was going to work (so much for honeymoons!) but his darned battery—He wasn’t going to drive Francine’s old crate, either. So Howard offered him a lift. They discovered a useful coincidence of routes, Ralph ran into his house to give Francine his Auto Club card, then got in beside Howard, breathless and grateful.

  Ralph worked for the Gas Company. He’d get home all right. A fellow worker lived not too far from here.

  “Say,” said Howard after a while, “anybody prowling around in your house last night?”

  “What?”

  “Well, I just happened to be walking the dog. Wondered if you had a burglar,” Howard went on cheerfully.

  “I wake up once or twice,” said Ralph, bristling. “I’d know if we had a burglar.”

  Howard felt sheepish. “Well, I was really wondering if anybody felt sick. You know, had to get up and take medicine or something?”

  “Not at all,” said Ralph angrily.

  Howard was sorry he had said anything. Whatever intimate ceremonies might take place at night in his neighbor’s house were not his business. He said, “Maybe you ought to keep a dog. I was thinking, last night, he’d hear the softest burglar in the world. Trouble is, you take Miggs, he’s all the time hearing things no man can ever hear. This can be upsetting, too.”

  “I am not,” said Ralph furiously, “superstitious. And I don’t intend to get that way, either.”

  Howard judged it best to change the subject.

  He said to his wife that evening, “They’re bugging me.”

  “Who are?”

  “Next door. I don’t know.”

  “What don’t you know?”

  “I don’t know anything.” Howard stared at her somewhat hostilely, because he was feeling foolish. “I don’t know what he meant by ‘superstitious.’ And there’s something else I can’t get out of my head.”

  “So put it into mine,” she invited.

  “It bugs me that I saw a red stain of some kind on that quilt.”

  “What kind?” she said.

  “Okay,” he confessed. “You know the classics. Ever think of this? How do we know what really happened to Milly Sidwell?”

  When Stella did not laugh it occurred to Howard, with a familiar surprise, that he loved her very much, darned if he didn’t. She said in a minute, “I don’t see how he could have buried Milly in his back yard without Miggs knowing all about it, do you?”

  “That’s right,” said Howard, relaxing.

  “Of course, in the cellar—” She raised an eyebrow at him.

  “They’ve got no cellar,” said Howard at once. All these little houses sat on concrete slabs. There were no cellars. Howard could think of nowhere to hide a body in his house, so he felt cheered.

  “Anyhow, that’s silly,” Stella said indulgently, now that he was cheered. And then she added, “Ralph didn’t care enough about Milly to murder her.” She hoped he wouldn’t want her to explain. She wasn’t sure she could.

  But Howard said, “I’ll tell you what, Stell. Why don’t we ask them over for a barbecue on Sunday? Out in the back yard? Real informal?”

  “Why?” she asked calmly, trusting him to know that she was only wondering, not saying “No.”

  “Because,” he answered, “they bug me.”

  “Me, too,” said Stella in a minute.

  Stella extended the invitation over the phone, coaxed a little, saying that it was right next door, just the four of them, no special trouble would be gone to, everything very informal, just wear any old clothes. Howard was very good with steaks on charcoal. Francine said she would ask Ralph.

  On Wednesday morning, when Howard appeared, Ralph was backing out his revived vehicle. He stopped. “Say, Howard?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Listen, Francine would like to come over on Sunday. The only thing—”

  “Yeah?”

  “I’m wondering, could you lock up your dog?”

&
nbsp; “What do you mean, lock him up?”

  “Well, Francine, she’s nervous about coming over. She’s afraid, I guess, of dogs.”

  “Well,” said Howard, “Miggs isn’t going to think much of the idea, but sure, he can stay in the house. You come along over, both of you.”

  So the invitation was accepted.

  Sure enough, on Sunday, Miggs saw no reason to conceal his anguish at being incarcerated while something interesting was going on behind the house. Howard and Stella did their best, carrying trays of food out to the redwood table, lighting the candles in their glass globes, offering drinks and tidbits, Howard fussing over his coals.

  The guests didn’t help. The meal was uncomfortable, speech stiff, dull, pumped up. No spark, as Stella had said before. Ralph was an unresponsive man, Howard decided. That was a good word for him. He seemed to be locked up inside himself. Lonely, you could say. As for Francine, she ate well.

  When it was time for dessert, Howard went into the kitchen with a trayload of dirty dishes. Under full instructions he was trusted to return with a trayload of sweets, the ice cream and cake, while Stella poured the coffee and kept the lame talk limping along.

  Howard stood over the sink, rinsing off the plates while he was at it, with Miggs coiling and curling around his legs. Begging and apologizing. Whatever I did to offend you, forgive me? Please, I would so like to come to the party?

  Howard felt bad about this. He couldn’t explain, could he? Staring out into the deepening dusk he saw, across the two driveways, that wash of light in the upper story. He stepped nimbly to his own back door and called, “Oh, Ralph, could you come here a minute?”

  When Ralph came in, to be greeted with delight by Miggs (in whose opinion things were looking up), Howard was standing quietly by the sink. “I just saw something funny in your house. Same as I saw before. Come and look.”

  The older man was the shorter. He came up beside Howard. His head, at Howard’s shoulder, was held in tension. Nothing happened for a moment or two.

  “Well, I guess,” said Howard, “it’s like your tooth won’t ache at the dentist’s.”

  Then the light happened again.

  Miggs began to bark suddenly. “Listen, Miggs, shut up, will you?” shouted Howard. Ralph was pushing against the sink. But his mood was not what Howard expected. “You saw something funny?” Ralph said firmly, when the dog was quiet. “You’re not having hallucinations, are you? So whatever it was is real?”

  “Whatever it is,” said Howard cautiously.

  But Ralph went rushing out the back door and Miggs tumbled after. Howard hurried to follow and saw the man jogging on the grass toward the candlelit picnic table with the dog bounding in pursuit.

  Francine screamed in terror.

  Howard swooped to catch the dog, and Stella began to soothe, and Ralph sat down.

  When the noise and confusion had abated, Ralph said to his wife, “He just saw something funny. So now you tell him he’s being haunted.”

  Francine began to cry. The oddest thing was that in the midst of her bawling she took up a piece of roll, buttered it, and stuffed it into her mouth.

  “What’s the matter?” cried Stella. “What did you see?”

  “I don’t know. Some car’s headlight, maybe,” said Ralph contemptuously, “but she says my house is haunted. She thinks we’ve got a ghost in there. Listen, I thought I heard something funny, a couple of times. But she didn’t hear it, so she said that whatever is there must be haunting me. She said it must be Milly—Milly not wanting another woman in her house.”

  “Oh, come on,” said Stella. “Really!” She was shocked, not so much by the idea of the supernatural as by the husband’s ruthless betrayal of his wife.

  “Well, I don’t know,” Francine was sobbing. “I don’t know. I don’t know.”

  Howard said, “Why don’t we take Miggs over there? I told you, dogs can sense things out of our range. If he says it’s okay, you can relax.”

  “No,” yelled Francine. She stood up. Her great bulk, in the growing darkness, was uncanny. “No,” she screamed. “I won’t have a dog in the house. No!”

  Miggs, who knew somehow that he was being insulted, replied in kind. So Howard dragged him back to his kitchen prison. What the hell, he was saying to himself. The worst of it was, he couldn’t help thinking it might be hell.

  The party was now definitely over. Francine kept blubbering and Ralph Sidwell was in a rage. He seemed to be a man who cast out whatever anger he felt, to ripple off on all sides, fall where it may. He seemed to be angry with the Lamboys. So the Sidwells went home.

  Howard, stubborn to be kind whether they liked it or not, walked with them to the front sidewalk. Something made him say to them, “If you need any help, any time, just remember, will you? Here I am, right next door.”

  But they left without answering.

  In the back yard Stella stood among the ruins. Howard went to let the dog out. Miggs raced around joyously for sixty seconds. He had been forgiven? That was fine with him. All was well.

  But it wasn’t.

  The Lamboys ate dessert indoors. They didn’t talk much. Stella could not be rid of the impression that somewhere beneath Francine’s flesh there was a small, frail, and very frightened woman who had not been afraid of the dog. Stella was almost sure now that Francine hadn’t wanted to come at all. But Ralph, unable to read the crooked signal of a false excuse, had fixed it so that she’d had to come. But what was she afraid of?

  Howard kept wondering about that light, and what it had really been, and why Ralph had seemed, at first glad, and then angry, that somebody else had “seen something funny.” What was Ralph afraid of?

  Bedtime came and Howard let Miggs out briefly (no walk tonight), then checked the house and climbed upstairs. He went into their daughter’s room that was always waiting for her, silent, vacant, but in sweet order. It was on the side toward the Sidwells. He looked out. The house over there had a light on somewhere—on the other side, downstairs—but as far as he could tell, all was peaceful.

  Howard gave the whole thing up and dropped into bed.

  At one o’clock in the morning the Lamboys’ front doorbell rang and kept ringing in the manner that says panic. Howard leaped up, put on his robe and slippers, ran his hand over his rumpled hair, and went steadily down the stairs. Miggs, naturally, was curious too, and Howard could not but feel glad that the dog came to press his weight against his master’s leg.

  The porchlight fell on the white face of Ralph Sidwell. He was fully dressed. He said, “I’m afraid.”

  “What seems to be the trouble?” asked Howard quietly.

  “I heard her scream. I think she— I don’t— I’m afraid to go and see.”

  “Where is she?”

  “Upstairs. I— Well, we had a fight. I couldn’t— I didn’t want to go up to bed. Then I heard the scream. I don’t know what to do.”

  “I’ll come with you,” said Howard. “We’ll take the dog. Let me get his leash.”

  Stella was halfway down the stairs and had heard. Howard snapped the leash on Miggs’s collar. He took his flashlight thinking of it vaguely as a weapon. But the weapon he relied on was the dog.

  Ralph Sidwell could hardly stand on his puny legs. “I don’t know if

  I c-can.” His jaw shook.

  Stella said, “We’ll follow, Howard. You go and see.” She bent in womanly compassion to this trouble. Howard walked toward whatever the trouble was, over there.

  Strange night. The street was quiet. The little boxes stood in rows among the softly sighing trees, and how many civilizations—the insects, the little creeping creatures, the birds, the dogs and cats, and what others unknown—were coexisting all around the little boxes?

  Howard went around the walks and up to his neighbor’s box, the door of which stood wide open. He entered cautiously. The dog, keeping close, was silent.

  He called out, “Francine? Francine?”

  There was no answer. The lights w
ere on in the living room to his right. The room was empty. The rest of the downstairs seemed dark and quiet. Howard led the dog toward other doors. He knew the floor plan. But Miggs made no sound.

  So Howard started up the stairs. The dog, seeming nervous now, crowded him toward the railing. The upper-hall light switch was in

  a familiar place. Howard flicked it on and saw a pale blue mound on the floor.

  Francine seemed neither conscious nor unconscious. She moaned but did not speak. She was bleeding from a scalp wound.

  The ladder to the attic, that hinged from the hall ceiling, was down, and the square hole in the attic floor gaped open. Darkness lay beyond it. Howard’s neck hair stirred. He didn’t want to climb that ladder and turn his flashlight into that darkness. Wiser to check elsewhere first?

  Now Miggs began to growl. Howard turned nervously and heard Stella’s voice below. So he called down, “She’s been hurt,” keeping his voice not too loud, because more ears might be listening than he knew. “Not too badly, I think. Don’t come up yet.”

  “Shall I call a doctor?” said his wife’s clear voice.

  “Good idea. Or else—no, wait.”

  Miggs was still growling and doing a kind of dance, advance and retreat, advance and retreat. “In here, eh?” said Howard to the dog. He pushed on the door of the back upstairs room that, in his house, was Stella’s sewing room. It was a bedroom here.

  Howard whipped the beam of his flashlight around the four walls. Nothing. No one. There was no clothes closet, so nobody could be hiding behind another door. Behind the door he’d come through? Howard shoved it flat against the wall. Nothing.

  It was Miggs who saved his reason. (He said so later.)

  Howard walked into the small room that seemed so empty. The dog went with him. But the dog knew. And the dog rushed and skittered, advanced and retreated, and his knowing muzzle, questing, knew where. So that when a hand of thin bone came out from under the bedspread’s fringe and took Howard by his bare ankle, Howard did not fly up to the ceiling or out of his wits.