Ernie was now in the office, working with a can of wood stain, touching
up a few scratches on the oak counter where guests signed in and checked
out. The counter was not really in bad shape. He was just keeping busy
until customers started pulling in from Interstate 80 in the late
afternoon. If he did not keep his mind occupied, he would start
thinking about how early dusk arrived in November, and he would begin to
worry about nightfall, and then by the time darkness actually came, he
would be as jumpy as a cat with a can tied to its tail.
The motel office was a shrine to light. From the moment he had opened
at six-thirty this morning, every lamp had been burning. A squat
fluorescent lamp with a flexible neck stood on the oak desk in the work
area behind the check-in counter, casting a pale rectangle on the green
felt blotter. A brass floor lamp glowed in the corner by the file
cabinets. On the public side of the counter was a carousel of
postcards, a wall rack holding about forty paperbacks, another rack full
of free travel brochures, a single slot machine by the door, and a beige
sofa flanked by end tables and ginger-jar lamps equipped with three-way
bulbs-75, 100, and 150 watts-which were turned up all the way. There
was a frosted-glass ceiling fixture, too,
with two bulbs, and of course most of the front wall of the office
featured a large window. The motel faced south-southwest, so at this
time of day the declining sun's honey-colored beams angled through the
enormous pane, giving an amber tint to the white wall behind the sofa,
fracturing into hundreds of bright erratic lines in the crackled glaze
of the ginger-jar lamps, and leaving blazing reflections in the brass
medallions that ornamented the tables.
When Faye was here, Ernie left some of the lamps off because she was
sure to remark on the waste of electricity and extinguish a few of them.
Leaving a lamp unlit made him uneasy, but he endured the sight of dead
bulbs in order to keep his secret. As far as he knew, Faye was not
aware of the phobia that had been creeping up on him during the past
four months, and he did not want her to know because he was ashamed of
this sudden strangeness in himself and because he did not want to worry
her. He did not know the cause of his irrational fear, but he knew he
would conquer it, sooner or later, so there was no sense in humiliating
himself and causing Faye unnecessary anxiety over a temporary condition.
He refused to believe that it was serious. He had been ill only rarely
in his fifty-two years. He had only been laid up in the hospital once,
after taking a bullet in the butt and another one in the back during his
second tour of duty in Vietnam. There had never been mental illness in
his family, and Ernest Eugene Block was absolutely
sure-as-hell-andwithout-a-doubt not going to be the first one of his
clan to go crawling and whimpering to a psychiatrist's couch. You could
bet your ass on that and never have to worry what you would sit on. He
would tough this out, weird as it was, unsettling as it was.
It had begun in September, a vague uneasiness that built in him as
nightfall approached and that remained until dawn. At first he was not
troubled every night, but it got steadily worse, and by the middle of
October, dusk always brought with it an inexplicable spiritual distress.
By early November the distress became fear, and during the past two
weeks his anxiety grew until now his days were measured-and almost
totally defined-by this perplexing fear of the darkness to come. For
the past ten days, he'd avoided going out after nightfall, and thus far
Faye had not noticed, though she could not remain oblivious much longer.
Ernie Block was so big that it was ridiculous for him to be afraid of
anything. He was six feet tall and so solidly and squarely built that
his surname was equally suitable as a oneword description of him. His
wiry gray hair was brush-cut, revealing slabs of skullbone, and his
facial features were clean and appealing, though so squared-off that he
looked as if he had been carved out of granite. His thick neck, massive
shoulders, and barrel chest gave him a top-heavy appearance. When he
had been a high-school football star, the other players called him
"Bull," and during his twenty-eight-year career in the Marines, from
which he had been retired for six years, most people called him "sir,"
even some who were of equal rank. They would be astonished to learn
that, lately, Ernie Block's palms got sweaty every day when sunset drew
near.
Now, intent upon keeping his thoughts far from sunset, he dawdled over
the repairs to the counter and finally finished at three-forty-five. The
quality of the daylight had changed. It was no longer honey-colored but
amber-orange, and the sun was drawing down toward the west.
At four o'clock he got his first check-in, a couple his own age, Mr. and
Mrs. Gilney, who were heading home to Salt Lake City after spending a
week in Reno, visiting their son. He chatted with them and was
disappointed when they took their key and left.
The sunlight was completely orange now, burnt orange, no yellow in it at
all. The high, scattered clouds had been transformed from white sailing
ships to gold and scarlet galleons gliding eastward above the Great
Basin in which almost the entire state of Nevada lay.
Ten minutes later a cadaverous man, visiting the area on special
assignment for the Bureau of Land Management, took a room for two days.
Alone again, Ernie tried not to look at his watch.
He tried not to look at the windows, either, for beyond the glass the
day was bleeding away.
I'm not going to panic, he told himself. I've been to war, seen the
worst a man can see, and by God I'm still here, still as big and ugly as
ever, so I won't come unglued just because night is coming.
By four-fifty the sunlight was no longer orange but bloody red.
His heart was speeding up, and he began to feel as if his rib cage had
become a vise that was squeezing his vital organs between its jaws.
He went to the desk, sat down in the chair, closed his eyes, and did
some deep-breathing exercises to calm himself.
He turned on the radio. Sometimes music helped. Kenny Rogers was
singing about loneliness.
The sun touched the horizon and slowly sank out of sight. The crimson
afternoon faded to electric blue, then to a luminous purple that
reminded Ernie of day's end in Singapore, where he had been stationed
for two years as an embassy guard when he had been a young recruit.
It came. The twilight.
Then worse. Night.
The outside lights, including the blue and green neon sign that could be
seen clearly from the freeway, had blinked on automatically as dusk
crept in, but that had not made Ernie feel any better. Dawn was an
eternity away. Night ruled.
With the dying of the light, the outside temperature fell below
freezing. To cut the chill in the office, the oil furnace kicked in
more frequently. In spite of the chill, Ernie Block was sweatin
g.
At six o'clock, Sandy Sarver dashed over from the Tranquility Grille,
which stood west of the motel. It was a small sandwich shop with a
limited menu, serving only lunch and dinner to the guests and to hungry
truckers who swung in from the highway for a bite. (Breakfast for
guests was complimentary sweet rolls and coffee delivered to their
rooms, if they asked for it the night before.) Sandy, thirty-two, and
her husband, Ned, ran the restaurant for Ernie and Faye; Sandy waited
tables, and Ned cooked. They lived in a trailer up near Beowawe and
drove in every day in their battered Ford pickup.
Ernie winced when Sandy entered, for when she opened the door he had the
irrational feeling that the darkness outside would spring, pantherlike,
into the office.
"Brought supper," Sandy said, shivering in the gust of cold air that
entered with her. She set a small, lidless, cardboard box on the
counter. It held a cheeseburger, French fries, a plastic container of
cole slaw, and a can of Coors. "Figured you'd need a Coors to sluice
all this cholesterol out of your system."
"Thanks, Sandy."
Sandy Sarver was not much to look at, plain and washed out, even drab,
though she had more potential than she realized. Her legs were too thin
but not unattractive. She was underweight, but if she put on fifteen or
even twenty pounds, she would have a reasonably good shape. She was
flat-chested, though an appealing suppleness compensated for her lack of
amplitude, and she had a charming feminine delicateness most apparent in
her small bones, slender arms, and swanlike neck. Also, she possessed an
infrequently seen but arresting gracefulness that was usually disguised
by her habit of shuffling when she walked and slumping round-shouldered
when she sat. Her brown hair was lusterless and limp, probably because
she washed it with soap instead of shampoo. She never wore makeup, not
even lipstick. Her nails were bitten and time- glected. However, she
was good-hearted, with a generous spirit, which was why Ernie and Faye
wished she could look better and get more out of life.
Sometimes Ernie worried about her, the same way he used to worry about
Lucy, his own daughter, before Lucy found and married Frank and became
so obviously, perfectly happy. He sensed that something bad had happened
to Sandy Sarver a long time ago, that she had taken a very hard blow
which had not broken her but had taught her to keep a low profile, to
keep her head tucked down, to harbor only meager expectations in order
to protect herself from disappointment, pain, and human cruelty.
Relishing the aroma of the food, popping the tab on the Coors, Ernie
said, "Ned makes the best darned cheeseburgers I've ever eaten."
Sandy smiled shyly. "It's a blessing having a man who cooks."
Her voice was soft, meek. "Especially in my case 'cause I'm no good at
it."
:'Oh, I'll bet you're a fine cook, too," Ernie said.
'No, no, not me, not even a little bit. Never was, never will be."
He looked at her bare, goose-pimpled arms, exposed by her short-sleeved
uniform. "You shouldn't come out on a night like this without a
sweater. You'll catch your death."
"Not me," she said. "I . . . I got used to the cold a long time
ago."
That seemed an odd thing to say, and the tone of voice in which she said
it was even odder. But before Ernie could think of a way to draw her
out and discover her meaning, she headed toward the door.
"See you later, Ernie."
"Uh ... much business?"
"Some. And the truckers'll be pulling in for supper soon."
She paused with the door open. "You sure keep it bright in here."
A bite of cheeseburger stuck in his throat when she opened the door. She
was exposing him to the dangers of the darkness.
Cold air swept in.
"You could get a tan in here," she said.
" I . . . I like it bright. People come into a motel office that's
dimly lit ... well, the impression is it's dirty."
"Oh! I would've never thought of that. Guess that's why you're the
boss. I was in charge, I'd never think of little things like that. I'm
no good at details. Gotta scoot."
He held his breath while the door was open, sighed with relief when she
pulled it shut behind her. He watched her scurry past the windows and
out of sight. He could not remember ever hearing Sandy admit to a
virtue. Likewise, she never hesitated to point out her faults and
shortcomings, both real and imagined. The kid was sweet, but she was
sometimes dreary company. Tonight, of course, even dreary company was
welcome. He was sorry to see her go.
At the counter, eating while standing up, Ernie concentrated intently on
his food, not once lifting his eyes from it until he was done, using it
to take his mind off the irrational fear that made his scalp prickle and
kept the cold sweat trickling down from his armpits.
By six-fifty, eight of the motel's twenty rooms were occupied. Because
it was the second night of a four-day holiday weekend, with more than
the usual number of travelers, he would rent out at least another eight
units if he stayed open until nine o'clock.
He could not do it. He was a Marine-retired, but still a Marine-to whom
the words "duty" and "courage" were sacred, and he had never failed to
do his duty, not even in Vietnam, not even with bullets flying and bombs
bursting and people dying on all sides, but he was incapable of the
simple task of manning the motel desk until nine o'clock. There were no
drapes at the big office windows, no blind over the glass door, no way
to escape the sight of darkness. Each time the door opened, he was sick
with dread because no barrier lay between him and the night.
He looked at hisbig strong hands. They were trembling. His sour stomach
churned. He was so jumpy he could not keep still. He paced the small
work area. He fiddled with this and that.
Finally, at a quarter past seven, surrendering to his irrational
anxiety, he used a switch under the counter to turn on the NO VACANCY
sign outside, and he locked the front door. He clicked off the lamps,
one at a time, edging away from the shadows that rushed in where light
had ruled, and he quickly retreated to the rear of the room. Steps led
up to the owner's apartment on the second floor. He intended to climb
them at an ordinary pace, telling himself that it was silly and stupid
to be afraid, telling himself that nothing was coming after him from the
dark corners of the office behind, nothing- such a ridiculous
thought-nothing, absolutely nothing. But reassurances of that sort did
him no good whatsoever, for it was not something in the dark that scared
him; he was, instead, terrified by the darkness itself, by the mere
absence of light. He started moving faster, grabbing at the handrail.
To his chagrin, he quickly panicked and bounded up the steps two at a
time. At the top, heart pounding, Ernie stumbled into the living room,
fumbled for the wall switch, snapped off the last of the lights below,
slammed the door so hard
that the whole wall seemed to shake, locked it,
and leaned with his broad back against it.
He could not stop gasping. He could not stop shaking, either. He could
smell his own rank sweat.
Several lights had been burning in the apartment during the day, but a
few were unlit. He hurried from room to room, clicking on every lamp
and ceiling fixture. The drapes and shades were all drawn tight from
his previous nocturnal ordeal, so he had not a single glimpse of the
blackness beyond the windows.
When he had regained control of himself, he phoned the Tranquility
Grille and told Sandy that he was not feeling well, that he had shut
down early. He asked them to keep the day's receipts until tomorrow
morning rather than bother him tonight when they closed the restaurant.
Sickened by his pungent perspiration odor-not so much by the smell
itself as by the total loss of control that the smell represented-Ernie
showered. After he had toweled himself dry, he put on fresh underwear,
belted himself into a thick warm robe, and stepped into slippers.
Heretofore, in spite of his bewilderingly unfocused apprehension, he had
been able to sleep in a dark room, though not without anxiety, and not
without the aid of a couple of beers. Then, two nights ago, with Faye
in Wisconsin, when he was alone, he was able to nod off only with the
constant companionship of the nightstand lamp. He knew he would need
that luminous comfort tonight, as well.
And when Faye returned on Tuesday? Would he be able to go back to
sleeping without a light?
What if Faye turned off the lights ... and he started screaming like a
Koontz, Dean R. - Strangers Page 4
