by Ann Self
Jane sat up to look at the rocking chair. Empty. Sam’s desk and chair stood vacant also. The screen-saver was running on the computer, giving the office its only pool of light. Jane squinted at her digital watch: 5:55. It was raw and cold in the office; the baseboard heaters had been off for hours. Jane jumped up, opened the office door and peeked out into the dark cave of a corridor, and realized most of the barn was dark now. But the computer worked, so she knew the building still had electricity.
“Sam? Reggie?” she yelled. A familiar terror stabbed through her body, and her skin began its fear-crawling sensation. “Oh no, where are you guys,” she cried, “where are you?” She backed up, slammed the door and rushed over to jump in Sam’s office chair, feeling better about having her back against the wall; although the snicking and clawing of branches slapping at the windows made her nerves sing. She tried to forget about the nasty black hole in the ceiling. The computer screen illuminated her terrified face. The minute she touched the mouse, America Online sprang into view, and she saw that Sam had mail. The buddy list announced that Brian was online! She strained to control shaking as she manipulated the arrow to click on Brian. Then she selected the IM button. “Come on instant message!” she whispered. A box sprang into view with a space for messages. She typed with uncooperative fingers:
BRIAN PLEASE HELP, I AM TRAPPED ALONE IN THE BARN. EVERYONE HAS DISAPPEARED. PLEASE SEND HELP! CALL DETECTIVE WESTERLUND! JANE
“Okay, here goes...” She pressed SEND and the screen indicated the message was sent, just before a horrendous screeching of wind threatened to rip the wires from the barn. Jane waited and watched the screen. Nothing happened. She began to doubt the speed of the so-called instant message. Her eyes flicked up to the Buddy list. He was still on the net—or so the screen said. Thunder rumbled across the vast acreage surrounding the barn.
“Come on, come on, Brian. Answer, say something!” The screen stared back at her blankly. “So much for modern electronics,” she grumbled. The wind still howled and Jane cringed, waiting for the wires to be finally snatched down and the screen to go dark. She slowly looked up and could barely see the dark dot in the ceiling, staring down like a black eye. She sighed, leaning close to the electric glow as if for comfort. Maybe he’s a real slow typist…
Three feet behind her the monster tree still played with window panes. Water was beginning to breech the sweatshirt and duct tape.
Brian hung up the phone after talking with Madeline and grabbed a heavy-weather jacket. It was just about 6:00—with a little luck he should be able to get to the barn in about an hour, depending on traffic, and just how bad the driving actually was. The computer was on standby and still connected to the internet. Brian stopped as he was going out the door when he heard the computer signal an instant-message. He threw down the jacket and jumped into the chair in front of the monitor to see the message. He was stunned at what he read, and jabbed at the keyboard like a wild man.
Jane was startled by chimes, and right under her nose a message popped up, almost making her jump:
JANE I’M ON MY WAY, AND SO ARE DETECTIVES WESTERLUND AND RUSSELL. HANG IN THERE. STAY SAFE, I’LL WALK IF I HAVE TOO! BRIAN
Jane stared at it over and over. She thought it was an idiotic time to be experiencing the warm flush creeping over her entire body. “Great! I’m about to die, but at least I’m in love.” She decided to retrieve the mail and clicked the appropriate selections, until the list of incoming mail flashed on the screen. She chose the one from Brian. The time read: 5:20 PM. Brian had sent a message to Sam, thirty-five minutes before Jane got on the computer. She read the message:
SAM—JUST RETRIEVED YOUR MAIL. I GOT A MESSAGE FROM YOUR ELECTRONIC ADDRESS AT 3:15 PM SAYING EVERYTHING WAS OKAY AT BARN EXCEPT PHONES WEREN’T WORKING AND A TREE FELL ON THE CARS. SOMEONE IS IN THAT BARN SENDING MESSAGES WITH YOUR SCREEN NAME. PROBABLY FROM A NETWORKED COMPUTER. ADVISE GREAT CAUTION. BRIAN
Jane’s eyes were locked on the screen message as the creeping, skin crawling sensation continued. She jumped up and raced from Sam’s desk to peek into the black menacing corridor again. Her iron circular stairway was barely visible in the darkening gloom across the corridor, and halfway down the west-wing aisle was the small door leading to the outside. She could hear the door clattering on its frame in the rough wind.
Jane decided to run for it and try to make it to the mansion. She now knew for sure she was trapped in the barn with the killer, and Sam and Reggie could already be dead. She dashed from the office, her back tingling in fear because of the dark tunnels of intersecting corridors behind her. She stopped for a second to try a light-switch, but the corridors remained dark. She jiggled Reggie’s newly-replaced door, but it was locked and he did not answer her yell, so she raced to the small side door and slammed against it. Horses in the dark stalls beyond the door began a fearful nickering. Jane fumbled with the doorknob; clutching, grabbing and breaking her nails. The minute the door unlatched, it blew back in her face, glancing off her forehead and slamming back against the inside wall. She cried out and grasped the doorjambs with both hands as the wind and the rain stretched her hair straight back from her head, stinging her face with pine needles and debris. She let go with one hand to shield her face, hearing an ominous groaning and creaking. Jane was afraid to look up at the swaying, bending trees crowding close to every wall of the barn. Her mind flashed back for a second to the bright morning when Reggie was painting this very door—in what was it? A million years ago?
A massive pine tree with a six-foot girth stood near the door, twisting like a hula-dancer as if it was made of rubber. The bark snapped and popped like breaking bones as boughs dripping with needles rotated crazily—a carousel from hell. The roar of the wind blowing through limbs was an angry whine, terrifying Jane. Lightning crackled and lit up the tree and the ground around the fifty-foot pine suddenly undulated as if it were pudding with unearthly monsters swimming under it. She realized the roots were close to being ripped from the earth. Another bolt of lightning smashed to the ground near a paddock, making her scream.
The thought of running underneath the menacing, writhing, trees and dodging falling limbs, or running with a whole sixty-foot tree falling at her back was more than she could risk. Any one of the thirty or so trees around the barn could drop at any moment to join the one laying against the back of Sam’s office. The barn, the pasture and the two mile road to the mansion were completely dotted with behemoth trees. Trees that she used to think pretty were now howling monsters blocking her escape. And the bolts of lightning were terrifying.
“Brian will never get through this,” she gasped. “No one could drive in this kind of weather.” With a sinking heart, she manhandled the door shut and raced back to the office, expecting at any moment to fall into some kind of trap, not noticing that Reggie’s door had opened a crack. She jumped through the office door and slammed it. The room still had an eerie glow from the computer, keeping it from being totally black.
Jane groped for the shelves over the file cabinets and squinted at the junk, slapping her hands over it until she found what she wanted. The large halogen spotlight was still there. She pulled it down and swung around with her back against the files, turning on the lamp and exploding the office with light. Black shadows swirled around the room, but the traveling light revealed no skulking person. She swung the beam into the tiny washroom, blasting it with illumination. She had a moment of fright, but it was just a couple of Sam’s shirts on hangers, hooked over the pegs.
Sam, Sam, Sam where are you..?
Jane advanced to the office door again. The beam reflected harshly off window squares and raced through the broken panes, showing her squares of coal black. She half expected a hand to suddenly reach through and grab her as she turned the door handle. Her hand was left unmolested, however, and she opened the door and jumped into the corridor, brandishing her heavy lamp in two hands, as if it was a police weapon. Reggie’s door eased shut. Jane swung the spotlight in wide arcs, aimin
g it into every corner, and making sure the floor in front of her was intact as she walked. Not that anyone could instantly create a trap door, but it didn’t hurt to be cautious. She carefully made her way to the front north wing, to search for a phone, deliberately ignoring the big fuse box in the east wing. It felt too much like a trap—and traps were this psycho’s forte. She was not going to run to the box and bury her nose in there looking at fuses and circuit breakers while her back was uncovered. And circuit breakers might not be the problem—it could be an axe again. That idea made her shudder. A test of the light switch in the north wing proved futile; the overhead lighting did not respond.
She clutched the curved handle of the spotlight in a death-grip, turning like a ballroom dancer in the wide corridor, swinging the light beam in a protective circle and catching the faces of startled horses, scaring them to the back of their stalls. The wind and the shuddering and creaking drove her crazy, it robbed her of an important sense: hearing. She wouldn’t hear an army marching down the corridor. She thought about screaming again for Reggie and Sam; but that had yet to do her any good, and it might bring something other than help.
Halfway down the north wing the beam of her spotlight found the second base unit for another phone. Her heart lurched hopefully, but then fell to her feet. No phone. Then the beam hit a red metal box.
The fire alarm! It was a manual pull-station connected to a main control panel in Elliot’s office, and Jane knew this alarm would trigger a dial-up service that would then summon the fire department. She pictured a whole group of wonderful strong men in fire engines coming to save her. She grabbed the PUSH/PULL handle and pulled, but nothing happened. No ACTIVATED sign displayed. Jane realized, with cold dread, that the main control panel must have been keyed off—or else there was just no juice to the alarms as well. That meant no burglar alarm, no sprinklers or smoke detectors. If she were in denial before, this act—more than anything else—brought home to her how completely committed someone was to making sure she didn’t live another day. She was not meant to leave the barn, at least not standing up. It was something about the thoroughness, the not giving her even the slightest chance to find help that raised the hair off her scalp.
“Someone has been doing a lot of planning...”
Jane thought it was a stroke of good luck that the murderous nut had someone how missed cutting juice to Sam’s computer. It also made her realize that her enemy was probably leaving on selected areas of electricity, causing him to preserve power to a place he didn’t plan to.
Another blinding flash of lightning hit the barn area. Jane heard a shuddering crash back near the west wing and knew another tree had come down. The roll of thunder that followed sounded like a bomb, scraping her nerves raw and making her jump out of her skin. She rushed to the front office and yelled and banged on the heavy paneled door. It was firmly bolted and didn’t so much as budge. Elliot was terrified of losing his trophies and paintings—if the phones were still working in there she would not be using them. She thought about dashing out to try to break in the office windows; then recalled Elliot’s theft-deterrent bars. So that was out.
With a jolt, Jane suddenly remembered that the computer in Sam’s office was on the same electrical circuit as this front office—and that the front office computer had probably been used to send false messages. Adrenalin seared her veins and she quickly backed away from the heavy door, realizing Elliot’s office could now be command-central for a homicidal maniac. As she raced away from the mahogany door, she listened to the overhead howl of a powerful wind slithering into every crevasse in the roof and attic, mentally shaking herself not to go weak-kneed and give in to panic. She swept the spotlight in wide arcs to check her immediate surroundings as she ran towards the central hall, putting distance between herself and the front office as quickly as possible. The fan of light ran down the north-wing corridor and then dissolved into the darkness at the juncture of the four wings.
Jane decided to scope out the skybox for possible entry—even though Sam had said he couldn’t get in earlier. It might succumb easier than the office to forcible entry. She jogged swiftly down the new east wing, her long legs carrying her like a graceful deer. She swung the heavy light from side to side as she went, passing curious horses and staying carefully in the center of that aisle in case something was hiding in a stall. She ran the whole length of the wing to the indoor arena and stood in the twenty-foot wide doorway, listening to the storm raging on the high roof. She recalled how Elliot had sprung out at her in that exact spot Sunday night, grabbing Charmante after her exhibition ride. Jane trained the spotlight on the switches next to the arena entrance and then tried to snap on the big mercury lights high overhead. They did not respond. No surprise there.
She passed into the dark expanse of arena that was completely empty, making it extraordinarily creepy. She moved slowly into the center of the ring, surrounded by a half-wall and an apron of cement. The cement apron was broken only by the outdoor entrance on the side. Plexiglas panels on the roof, high over the floor of the arena, rattled and shook, and the heavy rain on corrugated steel was deafening. The whistling and moaning kept her nerves in a state of tightness that was nearly unbearable. Jane’s spotlight traveled dozens of yards over the soft dark footing and found the jumble of painted tin that was the neighbor’s horse trailers, parked to one side near the large outdoor exit. She stepped soundlessly on the velvet footing and found the softness agitating. Jane knew the soft ground would also muffle any approaching footfalls. Turning backwards, she held the lamp with two hands and locked elbows, sweeping the light back and forth over the doorway she had just come through. No one there.
As she passed the line of horse trailers, she bent down to look for any sign of legs. The lamp revealed only painted tin, tires and chrome hubcaps that flashed light back into her eyes. She then looked up towards the gallery at the far end, over the judge’s platform, and shot a beam into the darkness up there; making tall nasty shadows out of the plastic seats. As she moved the lamp the shadows ran around like frantic ravens. Her mind jumped back again to the previous evening, when the gallery had been filled with faces. She’d been in about this spot, mounted on Charmante and surrounded by bright lights, noise and activity, and she’d even had her own State Police Detective. Westerlund had been standing in the back corner.
Jane turned and swung the spotlight behind her again; too many minutes had passed without checking her back. But no one was there. And the corner formerly occupied by Westerlund was now emptier than empty. She wondered where Westy was at this moment...where Madeline was. Where anybody was. She pictured Brian racing down the highway towards her. Could he get through? Would the highway be blocked? Was he in a disabled vehicle on the side of the road, many miles away..?
She checked her watch: 6:15.
Detectives Westerlund and Russell sped up the dark Cape highway in a cruiser, the siren screaming and lightbar pulsing colorful beams into the storm. Route 6 was an endless black tunnel of trees and asphalt and they could only see about four painted stripes ahead of them. They sped through Harwich, Yarmouth, Barnstable and Sandwich without seeing much of anything. Westy knew at the speed they were going if they encountered a pile-up they’d likely become part of it; but so far luck was holding and the storm-lashed road was deserted.
“What time is it now?” Westy asked for about the fifth time.
“Six-twenty,” Russell answered, checking his seatbelt. “We must be close to the Cape Cod Canal.”
“About five miles to the SagamoreBridge,” Westy muttered, pressing his foot harder on the gas pedal. He was sick with the knowledge of what might be going on at that barn.
The skybox was suspended high over the ring to her right, as Jane faced backwards; a black-glass eye that began to intrude on her consciousness—staring down at her. A large square pupil. She looked up over her shoulder at it and thought she detected movement in the darkness behind the window-wall. The strange skin-crawling sensation enveloped her a
gain, running down her spine, over her arms and down her legs. She quickly swung her light up to the glass. Most of the beam reflected back at her, because of the slight, downward angle of the glass, and what light did penetrate only illuminated the ceiling of the skybox; again creating monstrous shadows that ran crazily when she moved the spot light.
Jane suddenly felt that whatever horror lay in wait for her in that barn was now in the glass skybox. Watching her in the dark. Waiting for her to come up and search for a phone. Which was exactly what she had planned to do.
Maybe, she guessed, that’s what Sam and Reggie did.
Maybe they’re laying dead up there right now...
Or was her imagination working overtime? The skybox could be completely empty. Jane strained to listen over the rain and wind. She snapped off the spotlight and set it down—the thing was growing heavier by the minute and irritating her shoulder. She stood in the center of the arena, frozen like a hunted rabbit and waited for her eyes to adjust. She began to see the shadowy outlines of the arena, the skybox, the catwalk, the stadium seats and the judge’s platform. She scanned them carefully—forcing her eyes and ears into hyper-acuity.
Rain continued to patter the high metal roof and the wind moaned soughed and whistled, announcing the hurricane’s slow but steady advancement. A rapid flutter of lightning made the building and its contents jump and move like an old kinescope, and then it went dark again. She frowned when she heard a strange static crackle—and suddenly the whole arena burst into “Yellow Bird” in a volume loud enough to deafen, blasting from huge overhead speakers.
The skybox has power! She was right—only selective areas had electricity. Murder lighting. Areas carefully chosen by a killer who was sensitive about being seen; a sly monster that lurked in the shadows to strike and kill. The song that was so pretty the day before now seemed like the refrain of a horror movie. The noise was making her dizzy and disoriented. She blocked her ears to muffle the sound of the chimes, moon harps, guitars and bongos raging through the arena. There was someone in the skybox, or at least there was a minute ago—it was where the music was controlled. The plan was for her to die to the music of her greatest triumph. She had to act or die and join Bill Welsh. And maybe Reggie and Sam. If they were alive, they’d be here helping me.
