The Complete Short Fiction of Charles L. Grant Volume 3: Dialing the Wind (Neccon Classic Horror)

by Charles L. Grant

  She’s sick

  He returned to the main room.

  She’s gone.

  The lights were out. All right, he thought.

  From the leaded glass of the front door a faint glow that merely turned everything he saw to shifting shadow.

  “All right,” he said for the sound of his voice. “All right, enough’s enough.”

  He waited for the joker to turn the lights back on, waited for Livy to tap his shoulder, say, “Surprise!”; he waited for the music to begin playing again; he waited for his heart to stop drumming against his chest.

  “All right.”

  He knew then she was next door, in the Lounge. She had guessed his intention (as if it were all that hard), and she’d prepared a little surprise of her own, just for him. Somehow, while he had been playing the perfect idiot to an empty room, she had sneaked out to get things ready.

  That’s all it was.

  She wasn’t sick, and she wasn’t really gone.

  But the least she could have done was turn on the damned lights.

  His hands swept in front of him as he fumbled his way back to the table, found his topcoat and put it on. Then he finger-touched around the table to Livy’s chair, thinking that he’d better bring her things with him or she’d never let him forget it. But her coat was gone, and he closed his eyes tightly, trying to remember if she had taken it with her when she’d left.

  No.

  But her coat was gone.

  A running step brought him up hard against another table, and backing away nearly tripped him over a chair. With a snarl he grabbed it and cast it aside one-handed, grateful for the sound of collision, silverware clattering to the floor, and the chair overturning. Then he made his way to the front, lashing out whenever furniture got in his way, swearing at the top of his voice when his shoulder struck one of the posts that held up the ceiling.

  “This ain’t funny, Livy,” he called when he reached the exit, damning himself for not being able to stop panting.

  No one answered.

  “Livy, damnit, this isn’t funny!”

  No one answered.

  “Damn!” and he shoved his way to the sidewalk, snapped his muffler around his neck, and swung left to the Lounge door, hand out to shove it in, face set to be annoyed.

  It was locked.

  The overhead light was out.

  Okay, he thought, okay. Nothing to it. No party; she didn’t sec me when she came out and she went on to the show.

  He spun around and stomped to the theater several yards to his right. He muttered. He cursed. He tried and failed to find the humor in a gag that took her from him, and he didn’t look up until he reached the ticket booth and realized it was dark.

  And the lobby was dark. And the lobby doors locked.

  He looked back toward the restaurant, and the wind blew in his eyes.

  He looked across the road, up the length of Centre Street to the Pike, and frowned when he saw that all the shop windows were unlit, all the neon signs out, no cars, no late pedestrians, not even a wandering dog.

  Just the street lamps spilling white. Nothing more.

  Nothing more.

  His arms spread helplessly for a moment, and slapped weakly against his thighs; his mouth opened, closed, and his breath hung before him in a pale cloud that swirled and vanished when the wind blew again; his head turned — the theater was still closed —turned again, and he said, “What . . .” before he took a step toward the curb. “What . . .” before he rushed diagonally across the street, not bothering to look for traffic. Just in from the corner he jumped up a short flight of marble steps, and slammed through the police-station doors into the lobby.

  White.

  It was all white.

  And behind the low wood railing at the far end Wes Martin stood with his hands behind his back. He was, oddly, in a patrolman’s uniform, and Nel wondered if he’d lost the Acting Police Chief job.

  “Wes,” he said, unbuttoning his coat as he walked, his voice betraying his confusion, “the damnedest thing just happened.” He pointed over his shoulder. “You’re not going to believe this, but goddamn, I’ve lost Livy.”

  Wes, nearing fifty and showing nothing but a spray of grey at his temples and a hint of jowl, rocked on his heels and puffed his chest.

  “And why’s the Regency closed all of a sudden? We were supposed to go see a movie there tonight.” Nel unwrapped his muffler, let it hang along his chest. “I thought you and Candice were going, too. Jesus, this is weird. Something going on I don’t know about?”

  Wes stared at him silently.

  Suddenly Nel remembered, and thought he knew why the police were acting so strangely. “Hey,” he said, “I’m sorry about the market and all, Wes. I mean, that advice I gave you, it really was legitimate, honest to god, but what the hell can you do, huh? It’s all a crap shoot, y’know. Besides,” he added with a smile, “you didn’t lose all that much, as I remember. A few hundred or so, right? Hell, you can make that up in two weeks of overtime, right? No sweat.”

  He forced a laugh, turned away from it when the policeman’s expression didn’t change at all. Instead he looked back at the doors and said, “Look, Wes, I just got engaged tonight — Livy Parker, you saw us over at the Cove, remember? — and now the funniest damn thing but I can’t find her. I don’t know if you’re supposed to be told these things, but I can’t wait twenty-four hours or whatever the hell it’s supposed to be. Someone might’ve taken her or something, you know what I mean? The whole place is dark out there, a guy could kill himself just walking home. I thought maybe there was a power failure, an outage, but the street —”

  He turned back.

  Wes was gone.

  With one hand against his forehead, Nel pushed through the unlatched gate in the railing.

  “Hey, Wes!”

  He tried all the doors he could find.

  “Jesus, Wes, I said I was sorry, for Christ’s sake.”

  They were locked. All of them. The knobs were cold. The only sound he could hear was the sound of his shoes beginning to run on the bare floor, until he was running, vaulting the railing, racing to the exit and sprinting down the steps and across the street to the Cove, where he slammed shoulder first into the locked door, rebounded, tried again, and stepped away as if it had suddenly turned to flame.

  “This isn’t funny,” he said.

  The wind gusted.

  “This isn’t goddamn funny!” he shouted.

  What it is, he thought, is the dream I was having before I thought I woke up and was late to meet Livy.

  He smiled.

  Dreams, all dreams, and when all was said and done at least his damn feet weren’t bare this time. And there wasn’t any snow. And the wind was worse than when he had left the house but not too bad as long as he kept his head down a little and his collar up and the muffler snug across his throat so he wouldn’t catch pneumonia and die on the best day of his life. Not too bad at all, all things considered. All he had to do was wait until whatever happens next happened, and the next thing after that, and the next, and the next, until he woke up and discovered that he was late for his date with Livy.

  What the hell, no big deal.

  He started walking; his footsteps were too loud. He tried humming; his voice couldn’t find the tune. A decision to count cars was no decision at all because there were none to count — none at the curb, none in the driveways and parking lots, none down the way, passing the village along Mainland Road.

  He looked at his watch; it was after ten.

  He looked up at the sky and saw stars, saw the moon, saw the night drifting across the village like black fog, or black clouds that were almost but not quite transparent, strings and tatters of twisting black that made him dizzy until he looked away, to his feet reaching out, pulling back, reaching out, pulling back, until they made him dizzy and he looked up and saw that he was back on his own street, not conscious of turning corners, barely conscious of moving at all, but that’s the
way it was in dreams, no big deal, no problem.

  He crossed over and stumbled hard up the curb, jamming a toe, making him swear, toppling him against a tree where he leaned and shook his foot.

  Can you feel pain in a dream?

  There was a dampness inside his shoe, chilled and moving, and he thought for a frightful moment he was bleeding. Away from the tree, however, and the dampness spread to his arms, his chest, his back. He couldn’t believe it — he was sweating, and sweating hard, and the coat sleeve was dark when he took it over his face and checked it.

  Can you feel pain?

  Of course you can, he told himself angrily, limping up the walk to the porch; you can feel any damn thing you want in a dream if it’s vivid enough, you jerk. For god’s sake, don’t make it worse than it is.

  He unlocked the front door and hobbled inside, tossed his coat over a wing-back chair in the living room, switched on a table lamp, and dropped onto the couch. He toed his shoe off, pulled off the sock, and winced at the nasty purple red that had spread around his big toe.

  “Christ,” he said. “Jam the damn nail practically up to the knee why not.”

  Can you feel?

  Of course you can.

  After the other shoe was off, kicked halfway across the room, he went upstairs to the bathroom, ran warm water in the tub without turning on the light, and sat on the curved edge, rolling up his trouser leg and soaking his injured foot while he stared out the window. At the dark. At the night. While the water cooled, became cold. While the furnace coughed and died. While the table lamp downstairs brightened and snapped out with a pop that made him jump.

  Until he knew the dream was done, and had been done because he’d already awakened hours ago, and hadn’t awakened to a dream.

  “No,” he said, drying the foot with a rough towel.

  Can you feel, in a dream?

  There was obviously something wrong with the power grids, that’s all. Not the first time. Not the last. Livy was scared, she went home, and all I have to do is call her, no big deal, no problem.

  On the window seat was a telephone, bleached in moonlight. He picked up the receiver and listened before dialing, listened again before he was done — it was dead.

  “Can you —

  “Stop it!”

  In the bedroom he changed his clothes, keeping speculation in its cage by keeping his mind on one simple task at a time, moving about the room as methodically as he could. Heavy shirt, ski sweater, jeans, heavy socks, laced hiking boots; then downstairs — muffler, sheepskin coat, gloves; and in the kitchen — candles, matches, flashlight.

  The matches wouldn’t light.

  The flashlight was empty, the batteries gone.

  “All right,” he said, throwing the candles in the sink. “All right.”

  He was crazy. Going or already there didn’t matter. He was crazy. Not finding work though he knew he was good, watching the bills nibble hungrily at the money he wanted to spend just on Livy, spending more and more time under the covers in bed because his strength was nearly gone.

  He was crazy.

  Hell, who wouldn’t be?

  But he was still going to find Livy and bring her home, to his home, their home, and promise her the moon and the stars and all the roses in the world for the rest of her life, their lives, because he wasn’t going to lose her now that he had gained her.

  I’ll ride this thing, he thought; I’ll ride it, no big deal, no sweat, all the way to the end of the line.

  He stepped outside.

  And the bitter touch of cold didn’t shock him because this time he was ready, and the dark didn’t surprise him because this time he knew, and the sound of old wood grinding along the tarmac didn’t send him into a panic even though he knew it wasn’t a wagon.

  But it was loud, almost echoed, and as he hurried down the steps and along the walk, he jerked his head back and forth, seeking, trying to locate, finally spotting movement up the block, passing in and out of the corner streetlamp’s white cage.

  The grid’s out.

  The streetlamp’s still on.

  He ran, eyes squinting against tears, seeing something dark against the dark slip away behind a hedge.

  “Hey!” he cried.

  He angled across the street.

  “Hey, wait up!”

  Using a telephone pole to keep him from swerving into the street, he turned the corner and ran on, eventually swinging off the pavement to the curb when he couldn’t see anything moving but his shadow.

  But he didn’t slow down; whatever it was he’d find it again, if he wanted.

  He ran on to Quentin Avenue and angled left, not bothering to look for traffic, not checking the houses that he passed. Instead he kept his eye on a small two-story clapboard much like his own, white with tall green shutters, tucked well back from the street behind three broad-bole trees, a magnolia grown wild, and evergreen shrubs that had finally poked up in front of the windows.

  There were two steps to a brick stoop; he jumped them.

  The storm door was unlocked; he yanked it open and punched the doorbell with one gloved hand while he punched the door with the other and shouted, “livy! Livy, it’s me!” until the cold in his throat made his throat feel hot and raw.

  Five minutes later he stopped, arms leaden and aching, hand throbbing, and he backed away to lean heavily against the wrought-iron railing he’d told her twice to replace because the bolts were loosening at the base. Gulping for air. Staring blindly at the street. One leg jumping uncontrollably until he smacked it with a fist. Listening so hard for movement inside that the first needle of a headache began to stab behind his ear.

  He calmed himself breath by breath.

  The headache died, the needle blunted.

  Then, in a single motion, he whirled and vaulted the railing, landing on a runner of packed dead leaves behind the shurbs. He bulled his way to the living-room window, decided he didn’t care about damage and tried to break the pane.

  The glass shuddered, but didn’t shatter.

  He fumbled along the ground and grabbed up a length of branch, stout enough, he judged, to do the job.

  It didn’t.

  Around the side of the house then, the thinning shrubs less protective, where he gave each window he could reach several direct blows before moving on; the back was the same, and the back door wouldn’t open; the far side had one window he couldn’t reach, so he knelt on the ground beside Livy’s brick-rimmed garden and tugged one of the bricks free. He hefted it. He sniffed. He threw it, and it bounced off the glass as if the glass were stone.

  The brick shattered when it hit the ground.

  He walked slowly to the front and backed away from the house, staring at the upper windows, willing a light to snap on, a face to appear, a signal, and when he felt something wet on his cheek he cursed himself for weeping.

  And felt something more.

  And cursed the sky for bringing snow.

  Large flakes, fluffy, seesawing out of the dark to settle on the grass and tum it instantly white, settle on the road to erase the black, settle on his shoulders, in the folds and cracks of his sleeves, while he dug into a breast pocket and pulled out a woolen cap he jammed hard over his hair and felt the snow there melt and run.

  Can you scream in a dream and really hear it?

  He backed farther away, hands fluttering at his sides, his mouth opening and closing as if he’d forgotten a recitation he had to make and make now.

  Can you?

  He did.

  Nelson woke up. It wasn’t a dream.

  He was huddled against Livy’s front door, his leg propping the storm door open to provide a windbreak though the snow found its own way around the edges. He blinked white from his lashes, slapped the white from his gloves and sleeves, and wiped his face. His teeth chattered. He had a headache. His ears had gone from numb to stinging.

  “Oh god,” he said; or maybe he thought it. He couldn’t tell. All he felt were his joints screaming at him
as he pushed against the door and pushed himself to his feet; all he heard was his breathing, trying to steady from a panting as he peered through the snowfall and saw all the lights gone in all the houses he could see.

  His hands were palsied as he pulled back a cuff without removing a glove and held his watch close to his eyes. He needn’t have bothered — the oval crystal had cracked and separated, one of the hands was bent. There was only the hour hand, and it had stopped at 1.

  “All right,” he muttered.

  He staggered away from the house, sliding down the steps, nearly tumbling, windmilling for balance and not stopping until he reached the sidewalk.

  A glance up and down.

  Nothing.

  But falling white.

  The wind had stopped.

  The snow on street and lawn was perfectly smooth, neither track nor ripple, and as he shuffled off the curb he couldn’t help looking behind him, watching his footprints aim at him, point at him, but refusing to lead him.

  The cold.

  He clenched his teeth and jammed his hands under his arms.

  The cold.

  He expected to hear sleigh bells, tire chains, snowball fights, the grind and push of a plow, the bellow of a blower, the scrape of a shovel, a call, a cry, a laugh, a bark.

  The crunch of snow under a wheel, and he spun around so quickly he fell back a step, finally wrapping his arms around a streetlamp to keep him on his feet.

  It came out of the dark at the intersection just behind him, and he swiped the snow away from his eyes so he could stare.

  A wagon, he thought; Jesus Christ, it really is a wagon.