“Did you find out where he lives?”
A flush of anxiety swept through him as he realized for the first time that although he knew where Fugate’s house was visually, he had neglected to find out the name of the road he lived on or the precise address of the cabin.
“I don’t know the name of the road, but I saw where he lived.”
“What do you mean?”
He explained how Mr. Foley had stood him on a chair and pointed out Fugate’s cabin to him.
“You mean his house is visible from here?”
“Yes,” he returned, and on hearing his response the thing started to move through the room. As it did so, it folded its arms behind it, and he noticed that despite its vaporous appearance, its hands still rested on one another as if they were physical. It suddenly swung around and looked at the telescope gleaming in the moonlight.
“But this is some kind of seeing device, isn’t it?”
“It’s a telescope.”
“But isn’t it able to make distant objects look closer?”
“Yes.”
“And if you looked through it wouldn’t it be possible to see Fugate’s house even better?”
The suggestion startled him, for although he had not thought about it before, he realized now that Fugate’s house probably was within the purview of his telescope.
“If Mr. Fugate’s house is visible from the window, yes, the telescope would allow us to see it much better.”
“Then what are you waiting for?”
He looked at it incredulously, unable to believe it would suggest such a blatant act of spying so casually. But after seeing it was serious, the mischievousness of the idea began to appeal to him and he hopped off the bed. When he reached the telescope he opened one of the bay windows and scanned the distant mountain. It was quite some time before he finally found the yellow fleck of light that marked the spot where Fugate’s house was located, and when he did and aimed the telescope at it, it took even longer to find it through the eyepiece.
To his astonishment he was able to see Fugate’s house as clearly as if he were standing only about ten feet away. Leaning against the outside of the cabin and shining dimly in the moonlight he discerned a rake and several shovels, and through a large window in the front of the cabin he could see a shabby sofa, a dingy yellow lamp glowing on a table, and a set of roughly hewn plank shelves leaning against the wall. But what struck him most was how squalid and unkempt the room was. Even at a distance he could see that both the sofa and the lampshade were grimy beyond words, and scattered everywhere was a nearly impenetrable clutter of rags, dirty clothes, bottles, jars, food wrappers, and other assorted debris.
He was just about to give the thing a run-down of what he was seeing when suddenly a figure darted past the window. It moved so quickly it wasn’t until it had gone by a second time and then a third that Garrett realized it was Fugate. Moreover, as Fugate continued his pacing he kept waving his arms as if he were arguing with somebody.
“What is it?” the thing asked, sensing the sudden change in Garrett’s demeanor.
“It’s Mr. Fugate,” he said. “He seems to be upset about something.”
“How can you tell?”
“Because he’s waving his arms and moving his mouth as if he’s yelling at somebody.”
Garrett glanced briefly at the shadowy form towering behind him and noticed from the sudden swirl of darkness coursing up through it that the information seemed of special interest to it.
“Can you see who he’s yelling at?” it asked quickly.
“No.”
“Then keep watching!”
He obeyed the command and continued to stare spellbound at the scene unfolding in the telescope’s eyepiece. But as he watched, suddenly Fugate’s behavior changed. Instead of pacing he stopped and buried his face in his hands as if racked by some torment he could no longer endure. And then just as suddenly he reached out and wildly pulled the person he was arguing with closer to him.
Only it did not seem to be a person. At least, not really. Although its general form was suggestive of something human, it was leaning at such an awkward angle in relation to Fugate that Garrett could not conceive how a human being could hold such a position without falling. Indeed, there was something so indefinably strange, so chillingly enigmatic, about it that Garrett began to wonder if his eyes were playing some sort of trick on him.
But before he could wring any sense out of what he was seeing, Fugate lunged toward the figure, pushing it out of sight, and for several seconds neither was visible. Garrett watched breathlessly, expecting some terrible fight to erupt at any moment, but instead Fugate finally stood and, uttering some final acrimony at his downed opponent, calmly turned out the light.
Garrett looked up frantically. “I can’t see anymore. He’s turned the light off.”
“But did you see who he was arguing with?”
“I don’t know. It was strange. At first I thought it was a person, but then he started to fight with it before I could get a good look at it.”
The patterns moving through the thing grew darker as the news drove it into a near-frenzy of excitement. “You mean he was fighting with something?
“Yes.”
“But you could not see what it was?”
“No.”
“Then I must know what that something is.”
“But how?” Garrett asked.
It turned its dark and fathomless countenance toward him as an even greater storm of darkness lashed up through it. “You are going to have to go to Fugate’s cabin and find out for me.”
“Me?” he asked incredulously.
“Yes, you must!” it snapped as if the answer were obvious.
“But why can’t you go?” he argued, the idea of spying on Fugate at close range still filling him with terror.
“Because you must go!” it thundered, and although the intensity of its outburst caused him to jump he also detected a strange note of annoyance in its voice. At first this mystified him, and he wondered why his asking it why it couldn’t go would strike such a nerve. But then in a flash it dawned on him. It couldn’t go. Something, some unseen force or limitation, was confining it to the house. Indeed, he realized that its inability to travel also explained why it had wandered the hallways of Lake House for so long, even explained why it had not returned to wherever it had come from. It was something caught. Trapped. Perhaps as desirous to return to its own world, its own kind, as he was to return to his home in the city.
Following closely on the heels of this realization came another, even more startling. He did not know what he had seen taking place in Fugate’s house, but he felt it was something eerie and inexplicably powerful. Suddenly it occurred to him that perhaps the reason the thing was so interested in finding out more about what was happening in Fugate’s cabin was that it believed whatever was going on there held some clue or means of assisting it in its own return home. Indeed, as his mind continued to explode with one fantastic speculation after another it occurred to him that perhaps the thing Fugate was fighting with, the thing that was only like something human, was some kind of friend or relation to his own otherworldly companion.
He looked out the window at the mountain across the lake, longing to know what type of being it was and why Fugate was behaving so meanly toward it. He also knew that no matter how daunting an undertaking it seemed, he was going to have to do what it asked, because he did not want to lose the thing’s friendship. And now that he thought he understood why it wanted him to go, he had even more reason to oblige its request. It needed his help, and given the precariousness of his own situation, he felt it possible that at some future time he might even need its help in return.
“But how will I go without my mother finding out?” he asked, and the tone of his voice communicated his acquiescence.
“You will have to wait until tomorrow night and sneak out after she thinks you have gone to bed,” it said.
The idea of making his way
to Fugate’s house after dark frightened him even more, but the importance of his mission steeled him.
“And how will I let you know what I’ve found out?”
“Tomorrow night after you have returned to the house I will come to you again and you will tell me then.”
“Okay.”
It turned and started to leave.
“Wait!” he called after it.
It stopped and slowly pivoted.
“If I’m going to do this for you, will you at least tell me what your name is?”
It turned and once again started for the door, and for several seconds he thought it wasn’t going to answer. But then, just before it vanished into the darkness of the hallway, it murmured its reply.
“I have no name.”
The next morning Lauren was awakened by a sensation of movement, and when she opened her eyes she found Stephen nuzzling up against her and showing every indication of wanting to make love. Her first reaction was surprise at the ease with which he had apparently put their argument behind him. But before she had a chance to think about the matter any further, the memory of her experience from the night before came rushing back to her.
“Stephen, we’ve got to talk some more,” she said, pulling away from him.
“Oh, do we have to?” He pouted boyishly as he reached for her again.
“Yes, we have to,” she said, getting out of bed and putting on her robe.
“Okay.” He sighed. “Now what is it?”
His prefacing of the question with the word “now” annoyed her, but she let it pass. “I saw someone outside the house last night.”
He frowned. “You mean a prowler?”
“Yes, a prowler. Last night while I was sitting in the drawing room I suddenly had the feeling I was being watched, and when I got up and looked out the window I saw a man standing in the fog at the edge of the lake.”
“Oh, honey, it was probably just Mr. Foley.”
“Stephen, I shined a flashlight on the man, and it wasn’t Mr. Foley.”
“But you said it was foggy. How good a look could you get of him at that distance and in the fog?”
“Good enough to know it wasn’t Mr. Foley.”
“But how can you be so sure?”
“Because I—” She stopped in midsentence and looked at him angrily. “Oh, why is it that lately whenever I try to tell you about something I think we should both be concerned about, all you do is pooh-pooh me and treat me like some kind of over-imaginative child?”
“Because lately you seem to think there’s something menacing lurking in just about every shadow you look into,” he shot back.
She became even more upset. “How can you say that? Why is it so difficult for you to believe that when I say something, it’s because I’ve given it some thought and it’s something I really do believe?”
He faltered, anguishing over whatever it was he wanted to say. “Because I think it’s that kid!” he blurted out. “I think he’s got you so spooked with all of his talk about monsters and things waking him up in the middle of the night, and green, splishy blood, you’re ready to believe just about anything. I mean, if you would just stop and think about it for a moment you would realize how ludicrous this prowler business is.”
His using Garrett as a scapegoat maddened her all the more.
“Why is it so ludicrous to believe there might have been a prowler outside the house?” she demanded hotly.
“Think about it, Lauren. We’re in the middle of miles and miles of wilderness out here. It’s obvious you didn’t hear a car, or you would have mentioned it. That means your would-be prowler would have had to have walked here. But why would someone do that? People don’t just stroll for hours down dark country roads just to stand in other people’s yards.”
An almost dazed feeling passed through her. The persuasiveness of his reasoning caused her to waver a little.
“But this man’s eyes glowed when the beam of the flashlight hit them,” she said in one last feeble effort to support the ominousness of her claim.
“So?”
His disinterest in this caused her to become completely engulfed by doubt. She suddenly wondered if she was just being stupid.
Suddenly another voice entered the conversation. “Human eyes don’t glow like that when light hits them.”
They turned with surprise to see Garrett standing in the bedroom doorway.
“What the hell are you doing, coming in here without knocking!” Stephen barked.
“I heard my mom shouting and I wanted to see what was wrong!” Garrett fired back, standing his ground.
“Well, you can just get the hell out before I—”
“Wait!” Lauren cried. She turned back toward her son. “What did you say, Garrett?”
“Oh, come on, Lauren, he—” Stephen started to protest.
“I want to hear what he said,” she said in a voice that made him realize she meant business. She looked once again at Garrett.
“I said human eyes don’t reflect light at night,” he stated again.
“How do you know that?” she asked as Stephen grunted and shifted his weight behind her.
“I learned about it in a nature movie I saw at the Natural History Museum. Only the eyes of things that hunt at night glow like that when a light is shined in them—you know, like predators and stuff. The reason is that animals that have to see at night have a layer of cells behind their retinas that acts like a mirror. It helps them see better in the dark. But human beings don’t have it, only night things.” Lauren gaped at Stephen in triumphant anger, but before she could say anything he exploded. “Oh, Jesus! Great! This is all I need, the two of you wandering around this house thinking there is some guy with glowing eyes traipsing around out there after dark! For chrissakes, Lauren, will you just listen to yourself? You’re beginning to sound like you belong in some kind of loony bin!”
“She does not!” Garrett shouted, stepping forward belligerently in his mother’s defense.
His insolence was more than Stephen could handle. Wrapping the sheet clumsily around his waist, he stormed out of bed and jabbed his finger infuriatedly in Garrett’s direction. “Listen, you little brat!” he roared. “I’ve had just about all I’m going to take out of you!” After he delivered the lines the air was so charged with tension that for several seconds time almost seemed to stand still. But then just as suddenly they all seemed to realize how dangerously out of hand things were becoming.
Stephen allowed his finger to drop as he shook. “Lauren, would you please send Garrett to his room. I’d like to talk to you alone.”
Something in the tone of Stephen’s voice told Lauren it was probably wise of her to comply.
“Garrett, go to your room. It’ll be okay,” she said as she took hold of his shoulders and gently aimed him toward the door. He looked at her entreatingly one last time, but she only shook her head and sent him on his way. She shut the door behind him.
Stephen looked at her calmly. “Lauren, I know you think you saw something out there. And you know I think it’s hogwash. So I think all that’s left for us to do on this one is agree to disagree.”
She was still so tingling with anger that even his vaguely conciliatory suggestion left her unappeased. “Stephen, I think—”
“No, hear me out,” he said, cutting her off, with a quaver of emotion in his voice. “Listen, Lauren, I’m going to tell you something I’ve never really told you before, no bullshit. I’ve had a lot of women. I mean, in my business it’s just one of the occupational hazards. And I’m not going to lie to you, the truth is I’m not proud of the way I’ve treated some of the women that have been in my life. I guess... well... I guess some of them would probably say I was a real prick. But I think the problem has always been that I didn’t love any of them. In fact, I didn’t even think I could fall in love, until I met you.” He stopped and shook his head as if it anguished him to have to admit what he was admitting. “I don’t know. I know I don’t say it th
at often, but I really do love you. We’ve got to stop this arguing.”
He stared at her searchingly, something strangely beseeching mingling with the anger in his eyes.
“Oh. Stephen, I love you too, but I know what I saw, and I’m frightened. And if you won’t take that seriously—”
“Look, honey. You know I’ll protect you from whatever’s out there.”
He took her in his arms, and she started to cry softly. He rocked her and stroked her hair gently.
After their emotions had subsided, Stephen went down to check if the telephone was working. Lauren got dressed and went to prepare breakfast.
When the food was ready, she went to the entrance hall to get Stephen. As she got closer she heard his voice coming from the coachmen’s waiting room. What struck her as odd was how softly he was speaking, almost as if he did not want anyone to overhear him. She crept up very quietly and stood just outside the door.
“Ah, you know how women are, Marty,” he said under his breath.
Her curiosity was aroused, and she leaned even closer.
“Yeah, she finds something to be freaked out about pretty much every day now. This time I had to tell the bitch what a he-man I was before I could get her to calm down.”
At first Lauren thought he was talking about someone else. These contemptuous and unfeeling remarks could not refer to her. But still the searing words continued.
“Yeah, of course it worked. She’s a woman, isn’t she?” He gave a dirty snicker, and the dark, queasy void opening inside her grew a little larger.
“No, getting her to agree to send the kid away to boarding school is going to take a little longer than I thought.... Yeah, she’s dead set against the idea.... Naw, of course I’ll get her to do it eventually. She’s willful, but she’s basically controllable.”
A wave of sickly, almost suffocating horror passed through her as she realized with a jolt that she too had never been anything more to Stephen than just an object, another pawn in the tangle of his schemes and treacheries. She heard him mumble something else, but she no longer cared to listen and stalked into the room.
“Lauren,” he gasped, looking up at her with surprise. “Marty, I’ll call you back.” He rattled the phone back into its receiver and gave her a nervous smile. “I didn’t hear you come in.”
Night Things: A Novel of Supernatural Terror Page 12
