Night Terror

by Chandler McGrew

  “Nothing.”

  “Why is that?”

  “I would think you’d understand. Audrey was my patient.”

  Virgil felt stupid, keying the intercom on and off like a radio. “This won’t take too long. I don’t want to know anything that happened when you were treating her, just what her childhood was like.”

  “You want to know more than that.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like whether or not Audrey might be responsible for her own son’s disappearance.”

  Virgil said nothing.

  “She’s not, Sheriff.”

  A pickup drove by and the two teenaged boys gave Virgil the once-over but he ignored them. “How can you be so sure?”

  “Because I’ve known Audrey all her life and I’ve been her doctor. She isn’t violent and she has none of the symptoms or background that would cause her to harm her own child.”

  “Can I just come up, please?”

  The sound of the gate swinging back on its rubber hinges was like a sigh.

  Virgil drove up the winding gravel drive, taking in the thick stands of oak and maple and the underbrush that protected the property like a hedge. The house was modern and well cared for but the grounds had been allowed to go wild, more like a field than a yard. He knocked on the door and Tara opened it wide to allow him to enter the foyer. She was shorter than he remembered, but just as stunning in a tight pair of jeans and western shirt.

  “What can I possibly do to help you, Sheriff?” she asked. It was clear he was not going to be invited any further into the house.

  “Are you aware that Audrey’s being treated by another doctor now and that she’s taking Halcion?”

  Tara’s voice was cold. “Yes. I knew that. I wasn’t aware that you did.”

  “That’s a drug to combat depression, isn’t it?”

  “It is prescribed for that among other things.”

  “Other things that I should know about?”

  “You’re being impertinent, Sheriff. Leave Audrey alone.”

  “I don’t want to hurt Audrey. I’m just doing my job.”

  “And I’m trying to do mine.”

  “You have a fan in California.”

  “Excuse me?”

  Virgil told her about the boy-slash-girl and Tara laughed. “I’m happy to know my book is accomplishing its purpose.”

  “When you treated Audrey, did you hypnotize her?”

  “Again, that’s confidential information.”

  But of course she had. Tara had written books on the subject. “When you hypnotized Audrey, did she ever tell you about another little girl?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Audrey told me she kept seeing another little girl. Her mother—your sister—was holding the girl down in a basement, doing something horrible to her.”

  “Audrey has all kinds of terrible memories, Sheriff. Some are real. Some are figments of her imagination.”

  “And that one?”

  “I’d say that one was a figment.”

  “But your sister did do something awful to Audrey or you wouldn’t have gotten custody.”

  “It was a long time ago and it’s really none of your business.”

  “I’m making it my business.”

  “I’m going to ask you to leave now, Sheriff.”

  “You did hypnotize her, right?”

  “I did a lot of things during our sessions. Audrey’s past was particularly traumatic. It took years to build the walls that protect her now. I beg you not to do anything that might bring them crashing down. Now I am asking you to leave. Will you, or must I call your superior officer?”

  Virgil left. He was no closer to finding the boys’ abductor than he had been before. And Doris was dying. It was like a clock ticking over the investigation.

  None of it made any sense. He didn’t really believe Audrey Bock had anything to do with Zach’s disappearance. Maybe a mother might do something to her kid. But no way Virgil could believe she could act as distraught about it as Audrey did. She was going insane with worry and grief. And besides, if it was Audrey then that blew his one monster theory, because he just couldn’t picture her, small as she was, hurling Timmy’s bike over the high bridge rail and far enough out into the creek to have it wash up where it had. He wasn’t even sure someone Audrey’s size and build had the strength to completely overpower a child the size of Timmy Merrill.

  But someone had killed those two boys and someone was going to pay for it.

  25

  BABS’S LIVING ROOM would have given Martha Stewart nightmares. Bead curtains blocked the opening to what looked like the kitchen. Woven straw mats covered most of the floor, and although the curtains seemed normal enough from outside the house, inside they were laced from floor to ceiling with a wild assortment of feathers, leaves, dried flowers, and what Virgil thought might be hair.

  Most of the room was taken up with a wraparound sectional upholstered in faux leopard, offsetting the bright red Persian rug. Instead of a coffee table, a cut-down antique oak dinner table sat in the middle of the floor, covered entirely in half-melted candles of every size and description, all ablaze. A wagon-wheel chandelier, also filled with lighted candles, hung directly over the table and the walls were draped in a deep green fabric that Virgil thought might be silk. A large bookshelf standing between two windows was filled to bursting with leather-bound volumes bearing strange-sounding names like Necronomicon and The Book of Changes.

  “Won’t you sit down?” Babs waved toward the waiting leopard fur with a hand clad overwhelmingly in fake jewels. He sat uncomfortably on the edge of the giant sofa, leaning on his knees. “Can I get you anything? Tea, perhaps? I have green, and chamomile. You look like you could use some. It won’t take but a minute.”

  “No, that’s all right,” said Virgil. But his outstretched hand was too slow. She had already disappeared through the rattling, multicolored beads in a cloud of musk and jasmine. At least he’d waited until after dinnertime. Hopefully she wouldn’t offer him anything to eat.

  The entire house smelled of something, but the mixture was so overdone that it dulled the senses with its cloying sweetness, then drowned them completely beneath deep floral fumes. Virgil wondered if he’d ever be able to smell again. He fingered the upholstery gingerly, assuring himself that the fur wasn’t real.

  Babs rattled back into the living room with a steaming, man-sized mug in each hand. She handed one to Virgil and he took it politely.

  “No cream or sugar, right?” said Babs.

  Virgil’s eyebrows furrowed. “How did you know that?”

  Babs chuckled. It sounded more like the laughter of a logger than a woman only an inch taller than Virgil. But he discovered that he liked the honest sound of it. “No magic, Virg. I’ve seen you around town often enough to know you take your coffee black. Most people that take coffee straight, take tea the same way. Relax.”

  Virgil smiled self-consciously, sipping the odd brew. It tasted like boiled Band-Aids. But it gave him something to do with his hands, a way to organize his thoughts. He expected Babs to ask him why he’d come, but she seemed perfectly content to sip her tea and smile placidly at him until he got around to opening the conversation.

  “Babs,” he said, resting the cup on his knee. “Tell me what happened at the sitting.”

  Babs’s smile was wide and toothy and her eyes lit up eagerly. “A new believer!”

  Virgil shook his head emphatically. “Nothing of the sort. What I want to know is what really went on.”

  Babs’s smile faltered and her eyes took on a questioning look. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “What I mean is, how did you do that? How did you make those voices? How did you know where Timmy Merrill’s bike was?”

  “It was there! I heard you found it.”

  “Yes, I found it. Now, what I want to know is how you knew it was there.”

  “I didn’t. The spirits did. Of course Timmy would know where his own
bike was.”

  “Come on, that’s ridiculous and you know it.”

  “Know what?”

  “There are no spirits. When you’re dead, you’re dead. You don’t get up, put on sheets, and go around talking to the living. I don’t believe that you really believe that.”

  “Well, you better believe it. Except for the sheets, I mean. I believe every word of it. Do you honestly think that I came over to your house and sat with poor Doris and made all that up?”

  “I don’t know what you did. That’s why I’m here. To find out.”

  “No, you’re not.”

  “What?”

  “You’re not here to find out what happened. You’re here so I can tell you what you want to hear happened.”

  Virgil sighed into his cup and took another long sip of the now tasteless tea.

  “I can talk to spirits, Virg, whether you want to believe it or not. Doesn’t matter. They speak through me and they make contact with our side. It’s a gift I have. Or sometimes it’s a curse. But there’s nothing that I can do about it. You heard what everyone else in that room heard. And everyone else there believed they were hearing the voices of the dead. Except you. And you have more proof than any of them.”

  “You sound like you believe what you’re saying—”

  “Of course I believe it!”

  “But there are other explanations.”

  “Such as?”

  “The one that bothers me is that somewhere, sometime, you heard or saw something that gave you a clue about Timmy Merrill’s disappearance. That information stewed around in your head until it came out at the sitting.”

  “Bull cookies, Virg! What other explanation you got?”

  Virgil frowned. “One of them would be that you knew even more than that.”

  “That I was involved?”

  “I don’t believe that, Babs.”

  “Well, I hope the hell not.”

  “I’m a police officer. I’m trying to solve two cases that are the worst I’ve ever worked on. I’m just looking for a little help. That’s all.”

  Babs’s eyes softened. She ran her fingers through her thick brush of hair. “I know that, Virgil. But you’re locking out a whole world of help by refusing to believe.”

  Virgil turned back to his tea. “A man believes what he believes.” He felt a soft hand on his shoulder but didn’t look up.

  “It’s hard for you,” said Babs. “Doris, I mean.”

  Virgil nodded, his throat tightening.

  “I scared you at the sitting, didn’t I? I didn’t mean to. It was all a mistake, my coming. Doris told me she wanted to contact the other side. I thought she understood that she wanted to try to speak to someone she knew who hadn’t crossed over.”

  “No, you didn’t scare me,” said Virgil, glancing at her, then away again.

  “Yes, I did. It frightened you that Doris might end up there, in that darkness, with those lost souls.”

  “I don’t believe in that malarkey. It angered me that you’d frightened Doris with that foo-fraw.”

  “You do believe, more than you even know. I can see it in your eyes. You believe in it just enough to be afraid of it, but you don’t have to be.”

  “Why not? Why wouldn’t anyone be scared to death after listening to you? Is that what you really think is waiting for us when we die, an eternity of darkness and fear? No thanks.”

  “But that’s not what’s waiting for us, Virg! Didn’t you listen? I can’t speak to heaven! I never said that I could. And I don’t know any authentic medium who would ever make such a claim. I am able to make contact with souls who are still on this plane. Souls who have not yet crossed over. That’s what a real medium does. We try to help those souls progress onward. I said it was a gift and a curse. It’s a gift when I can help someone, alive here, or dead there. It’s a curse when I can’t. I’m just trying to help.”

  Virgil still doubted. But he didn’t question her sincerity any longer. Babs believed every word she said. So where did that leave him?

  “I found the bike, Babs. But it doesn’t help much. All it does is confirm that Timmy likely didn’t get lost in the woods, but we already knew that.”

  “So what do you want from me? You want me to try to recontact him? Some I can, others I can’t. It’s not like picking up the phone. Think of it more like trying to catch the same minnow in a barrel with your bare hands in the dark. It happens. But there’s no way of controlling it. If you want me to try now, though, I’ll be happy to.”

  “No. No, I don’t want you to do that.” The last thing he wanted was to hear those voices coming out of Babs’s mouth again. “I just thought if there was any way you could get me more information it would be helpful. After all, you did help find the bike.”

  “I know. And I’ve been thinking a lot about it since Timmy spoke. I wish he had given us more to go on. But the spirits are quite often circumspect in their speaking. It was surprising how forthright he was, to tell you the truth. But I want to give that boy peace. I want it very badly. Just as you must.”

  “Him and the Bock boy, both.”

  Babs shook her head. “I can’t help you with the other boy yet.”

  “What do you mean yet?”

  She stared at the cards in front of them. “I think his mother is coming to see me. I’ll know more then.”

  Virgil let out a sigh that Babs couldn’t help but hear. “You know Audrey?”

  Babs shook her head. “No.”

  “Then why would Audrey Bock come to see you? You didn’t call her, did you?”

  “Of course not. Do you think I need to solicit customers?”

  “I don’t know that much about your business, to tell the truth.”

  “Well, I don’t.”

  “Then why should Audrey come to see you?”

  “I have no idea. But I was right about Earl and Janie, and I’m right about this. I dreamed that we met, so I know that we will.”

  Virgil shook his head. “Babs, I’ve dreamed about a thirty-pound bass I’ve been looking to catch since I was a kid. That’s what dreams are, just dreams.”

  “To you,” said Babs, snatching the stack of cards from the table. She was frowning now, muttering under her breath.

  “What did you say?” said Virgil.

  Babs shook her head. “Dreams are more than you think. And I’ve been having real nightmares lately. And more than nightmares. I’ve been having visions. That’s never happened to me before.”

  Audrey Bock’s words echoed in Virgil’s head. He felt as though he’d stepped into a dryer and kept spinning around past the window, seeing the same room outside, but catching glimpses from a different angle with each spin. “Nightmares and visions about what?”

  Babs sighed. “Just bad pictures. Horrible images. I keep running and running but I can’t get away.”

  “Away from what?”

  “I don’t know. I never see what it is, but I know if it catches me it’s going to kill me.”

  “Everyone has dreams like that, Babs.”

  “I keep having it over and over. It’s getting so I don’t want to go to sleep, then it happens when I’m awake.”

  “Maybe you should see someone.”

  “No!” she said, her eyes flashing.

  “I didn’t mean anything.”

  “I know you didn’t,” she said. She seemed surprised by her own outburst. “I believe in holistic healing. Not having my mind toyed with by some charlatan. I know what they are.”

  “What are you doing?” said Virgil, watching her shuffle the cards.

  “A reading for you.”

  “I don’t want a reading.”

  “You don’t have to stay.”

  But he couldn’t seem to make himself bow out of the room.

  “Give me a question,” said Babs.

  “About what?”

  She shrugged. “What’s bothering you?”

  What wasn’t bothering him? He knew he wasn’t going to escape gracefull
y, but he really didn’t want to air his laundry for Babs. “My health,” he said at last.

  She stared at him as though wondering if he was joking, then began flipping cards, mumbling to herself. The symbols made no sense to Virgil and he couldn’t read the small print upside down and all, but he could tell from the look in Babs’s eyes that she didn’t like what she saw when she turned the last card. She seemed to take forever, glancing from card to card, her brow furrowed and her tongue slipping in and out nervously between her teeth.

  “Well, give me the reading,” said Virgil, “so I can get back to work. If I’m dying, just tell me.”

  Babs shook her head. “I don’t see you dying,” she said.

  Virgil knew then that Babs and her cards were full of shit. “Well that’s good, then,” he said, rising.

  She lowered him back into his seat with a glance.

  “I said I didn’t see you dying. Virgil, this is a bad reading. Real bad. I see people dying around you.”

  Virgil frowned. “Jesus, Babs, you don’t have to be psychic to know that.”

  “Not Doris,” she said. “Or not just Doris…. It’s more than one person.”

  “There was Janie—”

  “This isn’t what’s happened. It’s what’s gonna happen.”

  “Who is it?”

  “I can’t tell that.”

  “When’s it gonna happen?”

  “I don’t know. Soon.”

  “That really isn’t helpful information, Babs.”

  “I know. I’m sorry. I don’t like giving readings like this, but sometimes I have to.”

  “Well, if that’s the best you can do, that’s the best you can do,” said Virgil, rising at last and starting for the door. “I’m really more interested in anything you can dig up on Timmy Merrill.”

  “I’ll see what I can do, Virg.”

  She followed him out onto the front porch.

  “Quiet night,” said Babs, glancing down the street.

  Virgil followed her eyes. Both ambulances sat unattended in the hospital parking lot and Babs remarked on it.

  “That’s a good thing,” said Virg.

  “Good things have a way of being followed by bad,” said Babs.

  * * *

  Marg was clicking a patient’s chart into the stand behind the counter as the automatic glass doors parted for Virgil. He stood in the cool night, smelling the sudden outrush of medicinal odors that could send an eight-year-old into catatonia, wondering how much more his poor nose could stand.