by Jack Martin
Time stood still.
Ellie saw their eyes on her and gave up.
One of the graysuits pointed apologetically to a sign, STRICTLY NO ADMITTANCE. Workmen moved in to lock the steel door.
The graysuits let go.
Eyes watched her, waiting to see what she would do next.
She composed herself and walked back to Challis.
On the platform, Cochran relaxed.
She came up to Challis. One foot placed carefully in front of the other. Her hands were clenched and her nails were digging into her palms, white moons rising on her thumbs.
“I saw it. I know I saw it.” Her eyes were sprung wide again and tears of rage were welling there.
He forced her arm to bend through his. He led her away.
“I’m scared,” she said. He realized what an admission that was for her. “I—I think we should leave.”
He walked her one step at a time. The eyes were at their backs. Another step, another . . .
He smiled for the cameras he knew were on them.
He said, “Then I think it’s time for the Marines.”
The tour went on awhile longer. They stayed with it.
You can’t yell fire, he thought, in a roomful of arsonists.
Shadows were falling over Rafferty’s Deluxe by the time they got out.
In the motel room he told her, “All right. You pack. I’m going to call the police. This place falls under somebody’s jurisdiction. If that doesn’t work, I’ll throw it back to our old friend the sheriff.”
“I know that license number by heart,” she said. “I rode in that car when I was a little girl. I know every scratch, every dent . . .”
“Then you have what we need. Proof.”
“Let’s get out of here, okay?”
“Okay.”
Rafferty was at the gas station, scrubbing down the islands. Challis dodged behind his back and made it to the office.
A television set in the back room was playing a commerical. Challis heard the tune. He covered one ear with the receiver, slugged a coin into the slot and pinched his other ear closed. He dialed zero.
“Operator. May I help you?”
“Operator, this is an emergency. Get me—”
There was a distinct click on the line.
The signal was interrupted.
“I’m sorry, but we cannot complete your call as dialed. Please hang up and dial again. This is a recording.”
Challis banged his hand on the phone box. There under his fist was a card with instructions, IF PHONE IS OUT OF ORDER, read the card, PLEASE DIAL THIS NUMBER . . .
“I’m sorry . . .”
“ONE MORE DAY TO HALLOWEEN,” sang the voices from the TV, “HALLOWEEN, HALLOWEEN/KEEP YOUR EYES ON THE TV SCREEN/SIL-VER SHAM-ROCK!”
“Operator!”
“. . . But we cannot complete your call as dialed . . .”
The tyranny of the machine.
He hung up with savage force.
Time was short. He knew that. His subjective perception of it was racing, gaining momentum and about to spin out of control. Already blue shadows were spreading across the motel lot, about to engulf the cottages under a cape of darkness.
He wanted to run back. But Rafferty was close by. And Rafferty was Cochran’s man.
As was everyone else in this town.
He did a slow march back to the cabin. His heart sounded in his ears like a drum beating underwater, counting off the remaining seconds of his allotted time. The shadows were closing in.
At the end of the lot, a late-model car shifted into gear and drove off.
He ignored it and opened the door to Cabin One.
“Ellie?”
No answer.
Her overnight bag was on the bed.
“Ellie!”
He crossed to the bathroom in three steps.
Empty.
He rushed back to the door, flung it open.
Six gaunt Irishmen in gray suits stood in a line outside.
The car was moving out of the lot behind them. The windows of this one were not tinted.
Inside, two slender hands were splayed against the glass as Ellie, black curls flying, opened her face in a silent scream.
The car picked up speed, destined for the factory.
The tallest Irishman came forward. His face was granite and his eyes were cold steel. He raised his hand like a weapon.
Challis leaped back and kicked the door shut.
He bolted it and retreated to the bathroom.
That door wouldn’t lock. But there was a window over the tub. It was up partway but wouldn’t budge.
He put his forearm under it.
Behind him, the front door ripped off its hinges.
He got his head through the window, his shoulders. He reared with his back and forced it.
As the bathroom door splintered open, he dove through the window and dropped to the ground.
Hands reached for him.
He was gone.
Down the alley. Slippery pools of black water captured the first lights of evening. He splashed through oily rainbows and ran on through mud and ooze, kicking up gravel. He dodged trash and zigzagged to avoid clusters of light.
The street ahead.
The sound of radial tires screeching away from the factory. Coming this way.
Closing in.
At the end of the alley, a car idled in neutral.
It was waiting.
He flattened against the fence.
He heard the car’s doors open and close. The motor purring.
He edged backwards.
He felt the last board in the fence.
There was a break in the alley. Another pathway, a tunnel-like passage. Between the houses, to the main street.
The way was tinged with candlelight from pumpkins set out on back windowsills.
One more day to Halloween, he thought.
Even here.
Especially here.
He plunged down the path.
Something else moving. High above him, on the eaves of a frame house. A cat?
No. It was a camera. As he ran past, its servomotor panned with him, tracking him with the deep cherry glow of infrared.
He did not slow until he came to the pavement. London Bridge is falling down, he sang in his head, falling down, falling down . . .
One more block gone, another. His legs pumped past the dingy stores. All closed. In one doorway, a reddish face watched his passing but made no attempt to interfere. Dead eyes, utterly without compassion. A symbolic sentinel, like a cigar-store Indian. No more than that. Hardly alive.
There. Off the walkway, half-hidden by an awning:
A phone booth.
He couldn’t believe it.
He slowed to a walk and, at the last second, disappeared inside.
He closed himself in, rifled his pockets for change. No traffic outside. He could see the street clearly, razor-sharp through the glass. Absolutely no graffiti.
He plugged the last of his coins into the slot. He dialed zero.
Still clear outside.
A busy signal.
He broke the connection.
Think, think!
The coin came back. He shoved it in again and dialed another number. He knew it by heart.
“Please deposit eighty-five cents for the first three minutes.”
“For God’s sake.”
“Please speak up, sir. I can’t hear you.”
“Operator, this is a matter of life and death!”
“Eighty-five cents for . . .”
He throttled the receiver. “Make it collect,” he rasped.
“The name of the party you’re calling?”
“Anyone. Whoever answers. I don’t have time to—”
“Your name, sir?”
“Daddy.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Dan. Daniel Challis.”
“One moment, sir.”
Ring.
“Hello?”
<
br /> “Willie! This is—”
“I have a collect call for anyone from Daniel. Will you accept the charges?”
“It’s Daddy, son!”
“Daddy!”
“Will you accept the charges?”
“Huh?”
“Will you . . . ?”
“I wanna talk to my Daddy!”
“He accepts the charges, operator.”
“Go ahead, sir.”
“Willie, listen to me. You remember those masks your mother . . . ?”
“Daddy, I didn’t see you! I . . .”
“Honey, is your mother home? Is Mommy there? I need to talk to Mommy.”
“Mom! It’s Daddy! He’s coming over right now! He says . . .”
“Hello, Dan? Where have you been? The children waited all day yesterday. And today . . .”
“Will you shut the hell up? I’m calling—never mind where I’m calling from. There isn’t much time, only one more—”
“You’re drunk again. You were drinking yesterday and you’ve been drinking all day today, and now you . . .”
“Will you shut the fuck up with all that? I’m trying to tell you something! It’s about the masks. Silver Shamrock. You have to burn them—no! Don’t try to burn them. Throw them away. Take them to the sheriff. Yes, and tell him to get the state police up here—Santa Mira—right now! Do anything, but get them out of the house! Do it!”
“Masks? What are you talking about? The ones I bought? Oh sure, I get it. Mommy gives them something, and Daddy tries to take it away. It’s the same old crap. It’s not enough that you walk out on us, that you stand your children up every—”
“YOU FUCKING BITCH! You fool! You—”
“You’re jealous because you know they love me and they don’t need you anymore. Well, you can go to hell!”
She hung up.
The phone became silvery. He jerked around as light strafed the booth.
Headlights.
He left the coiled cord dangling as he ducked out of the booth and cloaked himself in shadows.
The receiver swung in a slow arc, the metallic cord stroking like a pendulum.
Until a man in a gray suit stopped at the booth long enough to hang it up.
More graysuits.
They spread out, combing the street in every direction.
From his hiding place, Challis watched them coming. They came on and on.
THE LAST
HALLOWEEN
C H A P T E R
11
The sun was a red eye on the horizon.
The sky closed over with clouds the color of blood, dark wings massed high over water, preparing for the migration south, tides rose and embraced the dunes, and night came to the cliffs of the California coastline at the end of a long, very long season.
Storefronts were boarded, signs came down, windows were locked and clocks ran faster toward a rapidly approaching winter.
The sun became the eye of a man waiting to die.
Houses flickered with candles as pumpkins carved like skulls were set out as part of an ancient ritual. The sun sank into the sea but was born again as eyes of flame in orange lanterns welcomed in the night.
In Santa Mira, there were other eyes that did not close.
The eyes were black as crows’ but alight from within by the deep ruby of infrared. Polished jewels in automated cameras, they scanned the town from hidden mounts like metal cobra heads, sentries of an unsleeping surveillance. Their lidless irises were opened wide, permitting no movement to go unnoticed. Sensors hummed tirelessly, ready to record any approach or escape.
But, like all eyes, each had its blind spot.
Directly under one now, a man crouched in darkness and counted the seconds of its cycle.
When the mechanical eye had passed over, he raised himself and made his break.
An unmarked car cruised out of the factory. Behind the wheel a gray-suited figure was alert to any sign of a runner.
But it was too late.
The man from the shadows had made it to the wall.
Challis waited as the car scudded past like a shark.
Then he hoisted himself over the chain-link fence and dropped inside the grounds.
I could leave, he thought. I could drive away. They left her purse and keys behind. I could go back to the motel and charge out of this town and not take my foot off the gas till I find the highway patrol. I could do that. Cochran’s men might catch up with me, of course. But it would be worth a try.
Except for one thing.
They’ve got her. And how can you run when you know?
You already have the answer to that one, Danny Boy. You. can’t. Not this time. Whatever way it falls, it’s got to end right here. There’s no time for anything else. Not while they’re holding Ellie.
He sprinted the length of the east wall, staying close to the building.
High windows zipped by over his head. He came to a door but it was padlocked. He ran on.
Then:
There. A crack of yellow light. A window that was warped and had not been locked properly. It was open only an inch or two.
But that was enough.
No system is perfect, thought Challis. Not as long as it’s designed by the human mind. It’s an old story—the oldest. You can chrome-plate everything in sight, but there is always a flaw. Because it was built by flesh and blood.
He pried the window up. It took a minute, but he got it.
He was in.
An empty corridor louvered with shadows. It was lined with hand-rubbed wood and inlaid floors. All too familiar.
An old-fashioned door gave under pressure. He displaced it a fraction of an inch and pressed his eye to the crack.
The maskworks.
Even at this hour, with so little time left, a tall, curly-haired young man in a green smock passed benches with a pushcart, collecting unpainted molds from the tables. No one spoke. It was eerie, to say the least.
He thought, The sun never sets on the sign of the Silver Shamrock. For them it will always be 3:00 A.M. in another endless round of manufactured illusion. At this rate they would soon have the entire world tricked.
He withdrew.
In the middle of the corridor, a stairway.
Without a moment’s consideration he went down.
Another unlocked door, a side entrance to the display room. Cochran’s inner quarters had to be nearby.
He entered, ignoring the glass-encased masks and collection of clockwork constructions. There was just enough illumination to highlight their surreal features as he tiptoed through, but there was no time to indulge his imagination now. In fact the medusa mask on the pedestal did appear to shake its head at his progress, the eyes in the snake-hair jarred by the vibration of his footsteps. But he was not about to turn back now.
He found the door marked PRIVATE.
It was the one Ellie had tried that afternoon, beside the pipe organ.
The one behind which a gray-suited guard had been waiting.
He grasped the knob.
His palm was sweating. Around him spring-driven animations ticktocked maddeningly, synchronizing with the pulse in his ears.
He twisted the knob.
It opened without resistance.
An office. The lamps were off, but light was leaking around a partition, edging every detail in luminous bas-relief.
A pretentious desk with blotter and leatherbound chair, a model train track encircling the setting. Toys lay about in various stages of repair. There were early examples of coin-fed machinery, children’s musical instruments, an automated one-man band from a turn-of-the-century arcade. He might have been in the attic storeroom of a Victorian house. Except that everything here was meticulously dust-free and perfectly preserved. It was a tinkerer’s paradise, an inventor’s personal retreat.
Cochran’s own sanctum sanctorum, no doubt about it.
From the other side of the partition came a gentle, rhythmic sound.
Ch
allis crossed the room.
There, around the divider in the other half of the office, a green-glass table lamp burned with an undersea glow. A muffled clock was ticking faintly.
Someone was seated at the desk, back to Challis.
A crocheted shawl draped over a high collar of ruched lace. Long white hair pinned back in a bun. The easy locomotion of a rocking chair.
An old woman.
Cochran’s mother? Was that possible? She would have to be at least ninety, perhaps older . . .
With a soft snap she flipped over a card from a pasteboard deck.
A game of solitaire.
Her eyes are still good, then, thought Challis.
And her ears?
“Where’s the girl?” he said.
Her rounded shoulders did not flinch. Delicate gloved hands flipped another card.
He approached the table and stood behind her. The ticking grew louder.
“Where is she?” he said.
No response.
Then she can’t hear, he thought. But I’ve got to make her understand. She might have seen something.
He reached out and touched her arm.
Another card. Flip.
“Listen.” He gripped firmly to get her attention. “Where is . . . ?”
The antique lace sleeve ripped apart in his fingers.
Her arm came off.
He held it in his hand, still covered by the rotten threads of her blouse. In the open shoulder-hole a blued steel spring drove an arrangement of cogs and levers and watchwork wheels. Now the ticking was quite loud. The fingers flexed and unflexed, flipping cards that were no longer there.
The body tipped out of the chair. He grabbed for it.
The head drooped at an impossible angle as the body slid to the floor, and then the head detached completely.
Cards scattered at his feet. He leaned down as the mechanism ceased ticking and lay before him in pieces, a broken doll.
The pasteboard playing card against his shoe was worn but readable. It was the ace of spades.
Another sound. In the other part of the office. He tensed.
Two black gloves caught him around the chest and lifted him from the floor. His feet dangled.
He was whirled around.
The granite face and steely eyes of the tall man in the gray suit, the same one from the motel, stared coldly back.
Challis felt fury. He bared his teeth and slammed his fist into the assassin’s midsection.
