A Stir of Echoes

by Richard Matheson

Chapter Eighteen

  WITH A GASP I LEAPED OFF THE PORCH onto the cold, wet grass and raced toward the curb. I was halfway across the street when the second shot exploded in the night. I clamped my teeth together and tried to run faster. I leaped the curb and rushed across their lawn. The light from a single lamp illuminated their living room.

  Alan was wrong. For some reason that was the first thing I thought as I jolted to a halt and stared in through the window.

  Because Frank was lying crumpled on the living room floor- in exactly the position I'd seen him in that day. Everything was the same; the twisted pain on his face, the eyes staring, the blood pulsing across the front of his white shirt.

  There was one difference.

  Elizabeth stood like a statue in the hall doorway, the Luger held in her hand, on her face a wild and stricken look. In the silence I could hear the clicking sound as she pulled the trigger again and again. When I ran in, her head snapped around and she stared at me an instant before pitching forward on the rug without a sound. I heard the Luger thump on the rug.

  After that it was all movement and confusion.

  I ran to Frank and knelt beside him, feeling for a heartbeat. It was there; faintly. Only one of the bullets had struck him, it appeared, but it was a bad chest wound. I pushed up, the blood pulsing at my temples, and stepped quickly over Elizabeth. In the hall closet I found clean sheets and pulled one out. As I stepped across Elizabeth again I flung the sheet open and folded it lengthwise. Then, kneeling by Frank, I wrapped it around him as gently as I could. He groaned softly while I was doing it. He was unconscious now, his eyes closed.

  The next thing I did was run into the hall and phone for an ambulance. That done, I managed to get the dead weight of Elizabeth on the couch. Her face was waxen and cool to the touch. I opened the collar of her pajama top and began chafing her wrists. I was doing this when her eyes flickered open. She stared at me a moment as if she'd never seen me in her life. Then, abruptly, she pushed up.

  "Frank!" she gasped.

  I held her back. "Lie down, Elizabeth, lie down," I told her.

  "No. No. "

  She fought me, her eyes on Frank, her shoulders pressing violently against my hands. She kept saying Frank's name.

  Then, suddenly, the strength seemed to empty from her and she fell back on the couch pillow. Her eyes closed tightly and a long, wavering sigh passed her pale lips. I didn't realize what was happening. I was checking Frank again when I heard footsteps outside. I thought it was Anne but it turned out to be the man who lived in the house on the right.

  "What happ-?" he started to say, then stopped, his mouth open. "Holy Christ," he muttered slowly. He stood there staring at Frank.

  In' a short while Anne did come, wearing her topcoat. Her only reaction was to look blankly at Frank a moment, then at me. Then she sat down beside Elizabeth and took her hand. I heard Elizabeth's dry, breathless sobbing as I tightened the sheet to stop the bleeding.

  The ambulance came five minutes later. The police a few minutes after that. When we got back to the house, I went into the bathroom to wash my hands. I saw the half-filled sink and, gritting my teeth, I turned to go into the kitchen. I tried to hide my blood stained fingers from Anne as I walked past her. She didn't speak.

  I heard the clock strike one as I went in the kitchen. It had been an incredible night. And Alan had said I would probably have nothing to worry about now. There was a grotesque amusement to that. I was drying my hands when I heard a rustling sound and, looking over my shoulder, I saw Anne standing in the kitchen doorway looking at me. I turned back and hung up the towel. I wondered what she was going to say to me now. There was not much left in the way of shocks for her. As I turned from the sink I saw her sit down at the table. I started to walk, then stopped. I leaned back against the sink and we looked at each other.

  Finally she spoke.

  "Will he die?" she asked, quietly.

  It was not what I'd expected to hear. For a moment I could only stare at her.

  "I don't know," I said then.

  I saw her throat move.

  "You know," she said. "You just don't want to tell me. "

  "No," I said, "I don't know. I thought. . . Elizabeth was going to. " She lowered her eyes. I looked at her a few moments. Then I went over and sat down across from her.

  "Look, Anne. I think you know-at least I hope you know how badly all of this makes me feel. I'm not a monster, Anne. I'm still the same man you married; believe me. I hate to frighten you. I hate to have all these things happen at a time like this. But I can't help it. Can't you see this? Do you think I'm doing this deliberately? Do you think I'm trying to hurt you? What's happened to me wasn't my doing. I'm just as victimized by it as you are. I don't know what it means or why it should happen to me. But it is happening, Anne. I've faced that fact. It's established. And it isn't going to stop. I feel certain of that. I can't imagine what could end it now. It's a part of me. What else can I say? If only you'd accept that; not fight it so hard. It isn't frightening if only you accept it. Believe that, Anne. It isn't terrible then. It can only hurt you if you struggle against it, if you believe it's something unnatural and wrong. Can't you see that?" I must have sounded pretty impassioned because she looked at me now with sympathy, almost with understanding.

  Then it faded.

  "What about us?" she asked. "Is it going to be-the same? Can it be the same when you're like this?

  Isn't every day going to be a-a new torture? What if. . . Tom, what if you start seeing things about me, about us? I'd know it, Tom, I would. You couldn't hide it, you couldn't pretend you hadn't seen them. " She shook her head in short, choppy movements. "How could it work? Life would be unbearable. I'd just be-waiting for something terrible to happen. "

  "Honey, what happened would have happened anyway. I didn't cause anything. Is that what you've been thinking? How could you? I was aware that they would happen-but I didn't make them happen. Can't you see that?"

  She clasped her hands together tightly and looked at them. She bit her lower lip.

  "I suppose you're right, but. . . " She looked up at me. "Are you reading my mind now?" she asked.

  "Anne, I-" I felt almost speechless. "What in God's name do you think I am, a wizard? No, of course I'm not reading your mind now. I probably couldn't do it if I tried. I told you it was different now. Before it was beyond volition; I picked up things. Now I'd have to concentrate. I don't know what you think it is I can do. But. . . well, believe me, it's not as fantastic as all that. You aren't. . . naked to my mind. Nothing is. I-I. . . I just don't know what to say, Anne. "

  Breath emptied from her slowly.

  "I don't know," she said. "I. . . just don't know either. I don't know if I'm up to it. To live like this every day. " She shook her head.

  "Honey, it wouldn't be like this every day. Is. . . Elizabeth going to shoot her husband every day? Is your. . . mother. . . ?" I didn't finish.

  "What about the woman?" she asked. "Helen Driscoll, if that's who it is. "

  "That's something that has to be settled," I admitted, "but. . . well, once it is settled. . . "

  "And you think you can settle it?"

  "I'm going to try, Anne. "

  She was silent. I could hear the clock ticking hollowly in the cupboard. I sat there a minute. Then I started to get up.

  "If I do try," she broke in.

  I sat down and looked at her.

  "If I try," she said, "will you. . . tell me everything? Everything,' Tom?"

  "I have told you-"

  "I mean everything," she said. "Even about us. "

  "If you want me to," I said, "of course I will. " I reached across the table and took her hand. "I just want you to be with me," I said. "I just don't want you to run away from it anymore. I need you, Anne. That hasn't changed. "

  She tried to smile.

  "I've written to my aunt," I said. "I should hear from h
er soon. Then we'll know if-there's something more to go on. That will make it easier for you, won't it? If you know that it's something in the family?" She hesitated a moment. Then her hand squeezed mine.

  "I'll try, Tom," she said. "I. . . can't say anything more. I think it will frighten me to death but I'll try. " We sat in silence a moment. Then she asked,

  "Will he die, Tom?"

  "I don't know, Anne," I said. "That's the truth. The sense of death I got had to do with Elizabeth, not Frank. I don't understand that really. But. . . well, it must be him. "

  She looked at me intently. I saw how she bit her lower lip.

  "Tom," she said.

  "What?"

  "Wh. . . what about me?"

  "Honey, I don't know anything about you-or us. "

  Then I remembered. I smiled at her.

  "Unless. . . "

  She looked frightened. "What is it?" she asked.

  "Would it make you feel too badly," I said, "if I told you I think we're going to have a girl?" She looked at me, speechless. Then there was a softening around her eyes, a stirring at the corners of her mouth.

  "Really?" she murmured.

  I held her hands in mine. "I think so," I said. "Does that spoil it? To know, I mean?" I don't think she heard me. She was looking into the future.

  "A girl," she said. "A little baby girl. "

  The next afternoon when I came home from work Elsie was on her lawn, watering the grass. As I pulled into the driveway she came over.

  "Isn't it awful?" she said.

  I must have looked blank a moment.

  "Oh," I said then, "yes. Yes, it is awful. "

  "We're all so shocked," she said. "Such a terrible thing. Oooh" I recognized her shudder. It was the same one she'd affected the night Phil had told her about sticking hatpins into the throats of hypnotized subjects.

  "Why should she do such a thing?" Elsie asked, "I thought they were so happy. " I didn't need telepathy or any kindred perception to sense plain old female curiosity.

  "I really don't know Elsie," I said.

  Elsie clucked. "It's so shocking," she said.

  "Yes. " I turned away.

  "Especially about the baby," she said.

  For a split second I broke stride and almost stopped. The pleasure I'd felt at not being exposed to her mind was washed away in an instant.

  "The-" I started to say, then walked quickly around the corner of the house and went inside.

  Anne was in the kitchen scrubbing potatoes.

  "The baby?" I asked after I'd kissed her.

  She nodded sadly.

  "This morning," she said. "I guess it was the shock. She miscarried. "

  "Oh. . . " I felt sick. The vision had been true after all; the death had concerned Elizabeth. More terribly than even I had imagined.

  "That poor kid," I said.

  "Yes, now she's lost everything. "

  We were silent a moment.

  "Then Frank didn't die," I said.

  Anne shook her head.

  "No, he'll live. " Her lips pressed together bitterly. "He'll live. " We picked up Elizabeth at the hospital two days later. There was no relative to take her home and Frank was still in the hospital. There were no criminal charges against her. Frank had told the police it had been an accident; that they hadn't known the gun was loaded. I guess he felt he had to make amends somewhere-ineffectual as they were.

  She was completely uncommunicative when we got to her ward and when we walked her to the car. Anne and I were on each side of her. She walked in slow, faltering steps; as if, overnight, she had become old and infirm.

  The ride home was mostly silent. Anne's attempted conversation regarding weather and other innocuous subjects was received either in silence or answered in words so soft they couldn't be heard. It was during that drive home that I got some of the most awful mental impressions of the entire affair. The most hideous of moments, I discovered then, could take place in bright sunlight, in the most mundane of locations. Night is not a requirement; nor are thunderstorms, high winds or the rain lashed battlements of mad doctors. There were no monsters here; just three human beings. No strange creatures of darkness. No eerie sound or sight. Yet I will never forget the wrenching sickness it gave me. The feeling came from Elizabeth; of that there was not the least doubt. It began slowly; as a strengthless remorse, a despair, a pitiful longing. It did not remain so very long. Gradually it grew, shooting out tendrils of naked emotion, growing into a horrible weed like mass of cruel hunger. Higher and higher it mounted. I didn't have to concentrate on it. Emotions that strong overpower you. The emotion of clutching demand, of cold, animal desire, frightening in its intensity. When the image burst across my mind, I felt myself twitch on the car seat and my hands clamped on the wheel until the blood was forced from them.

  The vision was of Elizabeth. She was reaching down with talon like, trembling hands. She was clawing at Anne's loins. She was ripping open Anne's flesh and tearing loose the child in bloody shreds. She was screaming and screaming. She was tearing her own stitched flesh open-and placing our child inside her body.

  I was glad when we got home.

  Anne wanted to stay with her but Elizabeth said she'd rather be alone. I felt glad about that. As we walked across the porch we heard her lock the door.

  "Tom, will she-do anything to herself?" Anne asked. There was a childlike trust in her voice now; a trust in my ability as a man who could see everything.

  I started to answer that she might, then stopped. I knew I had no right to say it. I had no idea what Elizabeth might do.

  "I don't know, Anne," I said. "I can't tell. I told you, I'm not a wizard. "

  "I'm sorry. " She took my arm. "I should stay with her, though. "

  "She'll be all right," I said.

  When we got to the house, Anne went next door to Elsie's to see if Richard was still playing all right with Candy. I went up on the porch.

  The letter was in the mailbox.

  I took it into the living room and read it. I think I smiled a little. It was really an anticlimax now. When Anne came back, I handed it to her. I saw her lips part as she read it.

  "Your grandfather," she said quietly.

  "Great-grandfather," I said. "Castor James Wallace of Yorkshire, England. Funny; I'd forgotten all about him. I think my mother told me about him when I was a little boy. "

  "So he was a medium," Anne said.

  "Apparently. "

  After a few moments, Anne folded the letter and put it into her pocket.

  "Well?" I said.

  She blew out a soft breath. "Well," she said, "I guess that's it then. "

  "Do you accept it?" I asked. "Can you live with it now?'

  Anne sighed. She looked helpless.

  "You're my husband, Madame Wallace," she said.

  I hugged her until she groaned. "Easy on Sam," she said. "He doesn't like the pressure. "

  "Sandra," I said.

  I rubbed my cheek against her soft hair. I remembered she'd asked me to tell her everything. Well, I wasn't going to tell her what had been going through Elizabeth's mind. I knew that I might have to temper my promise in the future. There were lies and there were lies.

  "Well," she said, after a few moments, "what now?"

  "One more thing," I said. "It has to be settled. "

  "Helen Driscoll?" she asked.

  I nodded.

  "Helen Driscoll," I said.