The Listener

by Robert McCammon

  “Can you tell me what’s goin’ on here?” Ol’ Crab asked Curtis, as if the other man had simply evaporated.

  “No he can’t,” the man answered firmly.

  It struck Curtis who the man must be. “Are you from the police?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Hey, hey, hey!” Ol’ Crab wore a frown that made every line in his face appear to be a bottomless trench. “What’s this ’bout the police? Curtis, you in some trouble?”

  “No sir, it’s not me, it’s—”

  “It’s official business,” said the man. He pushed the ten dollar bill down into the breast pocket of Ol’ Crab’s jacket. “Take this and fix things. Can you do that?”

  “I…reckon I…Curtis, I’ll stand for you with the bossman, but…the police? Can’t you tell me what’s—”

  “No, he cannot.” The man took hold of Curtis’s left elbow. “Come on, I’ve got a car waiting.”

  Ol’ Crab kept pace with them to the station’s entrance. Beyond the doors the rain was falling steadily, puddling the sidewalk and street. “Curtis!” Ol’ Crab called. “You need me, you need anythin’, you call me. Got change?”

  “I do,” Curtis answered. “Thank you, Mr. Crable.”

  “All right. I’ll be callin’ you later on to check up on you, now! Hear?”

  “I hear,” said Curtis, and then the man in the pressed gray suit and crisp fedora guided him toward the right rear door of a rain-speckled but shining black automobile with white-walled tires and chrome so bright it burned the eyes even on this day of gathered clouds. The door was opened for him, he was just about pushed into the plush tan-colored backseat, and there on the left side of the car sat a lean man in his mid-forties. This new man’s angular face was turned toward Curtis, and Curtis thought that something about his light blue eyes looked both hopeful and terrified. He had reddish-blonde hair that was wildly tousled and needed combing, with hints of gray showing on the sides. He wore a plain white shirt with the sleeves rolled up and dark brown trousers, no hat and no coat.

  “Where to?” the driver asked when he’d gotten behind the wheel, started the engine and turned on the wipers.

  “Just drive, Victor.”

  The fine car pulled smoothly away from Union Station and headed west on South Rampart.

  “My name is Jack Ludenmere,” the man sitting beside Curtis said. “Before you speak one other word, I want you to tell me one thing about my daughter that it would be impossible for you to know without…without talkin’ to her like she claims you do.”

  “Like what, suh?”

  “Like…what does she want to be when she grows up.”

  “I never asked her that before.” Curtis saw the man’s slow blink. Then he said, “I’ll ask her now, but I can’t carry on two conversations at once. That’s how this is.”

  Ludenmere’s only response was an almost imperceptible nod.

  :Nilla,: Curtis called while looking directly at her father. :Nilla, you hear me?:

  A few seconds passed, and then came :I hear you, we’re sitting here waiting I don’t know what for but Little Jack started crying and it was awfulIdidn’tknowwhattodoIjusthadto—:

  :Slow down,: he said. :You’re gettin’ all garbled. Take a few deep breaths, that’ll likely help.:

  “When are you gonna ask her?” Ludenmere spoke up, but Curtis paid him no attention and kept his focus on the girl.

  :I’m better now, I think,: she came back. :That man with the gun—Donnie—he’s scaring me, Curtis. It’s like the woman can hardly hold him back from shooting Mr. Hartley.:

  Curtis sent out, :Nilla, I’m with your daddy right now, and a policeman named Victor. Don’t get all rushed and garbled again, but answer me this question…what do you want to be when you grow up?:

  :What? What’re you asking?:

  :Your daddy’s testin’ me. Would you answer that question, please?:

  :I…said I wanted to be a nurse, but daddy says I’m smart enough to be a doctor.:

  :All right. I’m gonna talk to him now, so I’m…: What did they say on the radio when the programs were over? :I’m signin’ off for just a little while,: he said.

  :Curtis! Curtis! Tell daddy we’re all right! Tell him I love him! Tell him we’re scared but we’re going to get home okay, I know we will!:

  :I’ll tell him,: Curtis said, and then he felt the power between them fade like bright radio tubes diminishing to a soft glow…not completely gone, but resting. He seemed to have a fog over his eyes for a few seconds and he had to wait for it to fade as well. Then he said, “Nilla says to tell you they’re all right, that she loves you, that they’re scared but she knows they’re gonna get home okay. To the question, she says…she wanted to be a nurse, but you say she’s smart enough to be a doctor.” He let that hang, and then he added, “I’d likely agree with you there.”

  Jack Ludenmere didn’t move for what seemed to be a long time but was likely only a half-dozen beats of Curtis’s heart. Ludenmere then took both hands and ran them up the sides of his face and into the distress of his hair; he leaned forward with his face almost to his knees and Curtis thought at first that the man was going to be sick. He stayed like that for several more seconds, and over the noise of the wipers and the purr of the car’s engine Curtis heard him make one awful gasp for breath and then he was silent.

  When Ludenmere sat back again the area beneath his eyes was gray and his face was slack.

  “Tell me,” he said in a feeble voice, “how…you can speak to Nilla that way. Is it…I mean…I know you people dabble in voodoo and such…and I don’t give a damn about that, you do as you please…but is that what this is…a voodoo spell that somebody cast on her?”

  “No, it’s not that. Far from it.”

  “My daughter…my Nilla…she’s not crazy. There’s nothin’ wrong with her mind.”

  “No, there’s not,” Curtis said, sensing that Ludenmere was nearly daring him to speak otherwise. “Nothin’ wrong with my mind, either. My mama thought there was, for the longest time. Made me kinda start thinkin’ it, myself.”

  “You mean this is like…a natural thing? I’ve never heard of anything like this before!”

  “I don’t know how natural it is. Maybe it’s supernatural. But there’s nothin’ wrong with Nilla’s mind, I can tell you that.”

  “So…” Ludenmere struggled to put his thoughts into words. “So you hear her voice in your head? And she hears yours?”

  “No sir,” Curtis replied, dropping the subservient softness because he knew that here it wasn’t necessary. “It’s not exactly like that. I don’t hear the voice, but I hear the words. The same for her with me. She’s told me so.”

  “My God,” Ludenmere breathed. He looked as near to passing out as any man Curtis had ever seen. “I thought…my wife and I thought…she had made you up, just to annoy us. Then when she kept on with it…and told us she was talkin’ to you and you were talkin’ back…we thought…maybe somethin’ was really wrong with her. My God, how can somethin’ like this be?”

  “Jack?” said Victor as he drove. “Can’t help but overhear. Goes with what you’ve told me. I’m a fan of the writer Upton Sinclair. Ever read anything by him?”

  “Huh? What’s he got to do with it?”

  “Four years ago he wrote and self-published a book titled Mental Radio, about his wife’s mental telepathy. The jury’s still out on that one and there are lots of questions, but…it’s in the ether, so to speak.”

  “More than in the ether, whatever that is,” Curtis said. “It’s real.” He realized they seemed to be driving pointlessly around the Union Station area. “Aren’t we goin’ to the police station?”

  “No,” said Ludenmere, “we are not.”

  “Your driver’s a policeman, isn’t he?”

  “No. Never mind who he is. I want to know where my son and daughter are. Has she told you?”

  “Yes sir. In Kenner. They’re stopped somewhere in the woods. She says they’re sitti
n’ in the car waitin’.”

  “Waitin’ on what?”

  “I don’t know, sir. I don’t think she knows, either.” He decided not to say anything about the gun, but he did decide to tell him the names as he understood them. “There’s a man named Donnie and a woman named Vesta. She says Mr. Hartley was there, and Mr. Parr.”

  “He’s a detective from Shreveport. But didn’t she say there’s another man?”

  “Yes sir. I didn’t get his name.”

  “They must be waitin’ for him,” Ludenmere said. “He’s the one who made the phone call. From there I’ll bet they’re gonna take the kids to whatever hideout they’ve dug up.”

  “Can I ask…why we’re not goin’ to the police station?”

  “The phone call, that’s why.” Ludenmere again ran a hand across his face and up into his hair. “The sonsofbitches—the kidnappers—say that if I bring the police into this they’ll kill my children. I believe they will. They want two hundred thousand dollars delivered in a cardboard box to the end of a fishin’ pier at one o’clock on Friday mornin’.”

  “Two hundred and fifteen thousand,” Victor reminded him, and he honked the horn at a slow horse cart that had crossed the lane in front of the car.

  “Yeah. That. Victor’s my company lawyer. He can get the money for me. And you, Curtis…you’re not leavin’ my sight until I get my children back, safe and sound. Mental telepathy, mental radio, whatever the hell it is…you’re my only way of keepin’ contact with Nilla, so you’re stickin’ with me.”

  Curtis nodded; of course it made sense, but he still had to ask, “What about my job? I’m gonna lose it if I don’t—”

  “How much did you make last year?”

  “I did pretty good,” Curtis said. “Made nearly five hundred dollars.”

  “I’ll pay you three times five hundred. When this is over, I’ll go to bat for you with whoever needs to be persuaded. That suit you?”

  “Yes sir. That’s a mighty lot of money. I’d appreciate bein’ able to give most of that to my mama and some to Mr. Crable, the man who’s in charge of the Redcaps.”

  “Do whatever you like with it. I just want to keep in contact with Nilla. Can you speak to her now? Tell her I’m gonna get her and Little Jack out of this and not to worry?”

  “Yes sir, I will.”

  Ludenmere watched Curtis’s face; it didn’t change very much, though the expression in the eyes seemed to go a little distant. Otherwise, in communicating with Nilla he was exactly as before. It was a mystery to Ludenmere and he didn’t have the time or energy to try to figure it out. The most pressing and immediate things on his plate were getting the money and somehow telling Jane what was going on, and not having her crack to pieces. He would have to do that as soon as he brought Curtis through the front door. If she was back from her charity club meeting she would already be wondering why the kids were so late at coming home from school.

  “Want me to keep driving around, Jack?” Victor asked.

  “No,” Ludenmere said with a heavy sigh, “it’s time to head home.”

  Victor turned the car toward the Garden District and drove on through the gray rain.

  Seventeen.

  Ginger was out of the Olds in a flash when Pearly pulled up in the Ford on the muddy forest road. She was just as quickly on him nearly before he could get out of the car.

  “How was it?” she asked.

  “Fine. He bought it all.” Pearly had gotten into a phone booth at the Rexall pharmacy and pressed a handkerchief against the phone’s mouthpiece to muffle his voice, plus had spoken the terms in as raspy a whisper as he could manage. “How’s everythin’ here?”

  She ignored the question because she was ready to roll. “You got the goods?”

  “Got ’em.” He went around and opened the passenger door. On the seat were two paper bags, one from the Rexall holding boxes of cotton wadding and a roll of electrical tape and in the other from a market near the Rexall—

  “What’re all the groceries for?” Her tone had sharpened. She’d looked into the second bag and seen four cans of pork ’n’ beans, three apples, a loaf of bread and some ham spread, two bottles of Coca-Cola, three boxes of Cracker Jack, a roll of toilet paper, a kitchen knife with a serrated edge and a combination bottle and can opener. “You got twice as much stuff as I told you to get.”

  “I decided we might need it.”

  “You decided,” she said. Her mouth went crooked. “You decided.”

  Pearly straightened his shoulders. He was ready to let her have it with both barrels. “There was one hitch.” He saw her face instantly tighten. “Ludenmere can’t bring the money until one o’clock on Friday mornin’. He said he couldn’t get hold of—”

  “Bullshit,” Ginger interrupted, and her eyes were fierce. She leaned in so close their noses nearly touched. “Bull…shit.” Her teeth were clenched. “You’re tellin’ me you let him off the hook for an extra day?”

  “It was all I could do. He—”

  “Oh, fuck that! Are you fuckin’ crazy? You let him off the hook! Goddamn it, I told you…if he poor-mouthed about not bein’ able to get the dough, you strong arm him! Tell him we’re gonna cut the brats’ ears off at five minutes after one if he doesn’t show up with every fuckin’ penny on schedule! Oh, no…oh, no…don’t tell me you’ve fucked this up!” She put her hands on her hips and began to walk in circles from the car through the wet weeds and back again. She kept shaking her head, staring at the ground and saying “No, no…no, no,” as raindrops speckled her hair.

  “Okay, it’s not the end of the world,” Pearly said.

  She ceased her circling and suddenly came at him almost at a run, and with such a rictus of rage on her face that the sharp point of a blade of terror pricked his throat. He balled his fists up, thinking that he might have to actually fight the bitch off.

  She stopped short of attacking him. The champagne-colored eyes were full of fire. “Do you think this is a summer camp?” she asked through her gritted teeth. “Do you think we’re gonna sit around the fire tonight and sing songs? You fucked up, Pearly. I thought you were a professional!”

  “I’ve never kidnapped anybody before,” he said. “Have you?”

  “I know better than to give anybody time to think! Too much time, and he’s gonna be thinkin’ he ought to call the cops in! And now we’ve gotta babysit those two for a whole day and take care of that damned chauffeur!”

  Pearly said, “I sweetened the deal by fifteen thousand bucks. Doesn’t that count for anythin’?”

  “No, it does not.” Ginger looked up at the clouds as if trying to find an answer to her frustrations in the sky. When she returned her attention to Pearly her face was cold and the rain ran down her cheeks. “You just sit in the car. Donnie and I’ll take care of the rest of it. Gimme the gun and the bag. Put the knife in it.” She took the .38 and the Rexall bag when Pearly offered them, and he shrugged his shoulders and got back behind the Ford’s steering wheel to gladly stay out of her way.

  Ginger walked back to the Oldsmobile. She opened the left rear door and aimed the pistol at Hartley. “You. Out. Donnie, come on and help me.”

  “Either of you two move,” Donnie told Nilla and Little Jack, “and you’ll wish you weren’t never born. Understand?”

  “We understand,” Nilla answered. She had just finished hearing from Curtis that her daddy said he was going to get them out of this and not to worry. She was near tears but she was not going to let herself break down, if only to be strong for her brother. She was tired and her head throbbed; she had never talked to Curtis like this for so long and so intensely, and she felt drained.

  It was a blessing to know that Curtis could be reached—and through him her father—but she thought that much depended on her too because the mind-talking could only go so far and she was running out of strength.

  “We’re gonna be all right,” Hartley told the children before he got out of the car. He faced the two guns and the two ki
dnappers, and he lifted his chin in defiance and said, “What now?”

  “Take your shoes off and throw ’em in the woods,” Ginger said. He did. “Open your coat,” she ordered. When he obeyed, she told him to take his belt off and also throw it away. “Wallet,” she said, and he gave that up to Donnie. She took his wristwatch and frisked him but left the small change in his pocket. Then Ginger said behind the unwavering pistol, “Stand real still, Hartley. Donnie, go ahead.”

  Donnie plucked the chauffeur’s cap off, exposing Hartley’s close-cropped gray hair, and put it on his own head at a rakish tilt. He opened one of the boxes of cotton. “Open your mouth,” he demanded, and he forced a handful of cotton in. He cut a length of electrical tape with the knife, pressed it to Hartley’s lips and wound it around the man’s head. Then came wads of cotton pushed into the eyesockets and more tape around the head securing them. “Hands in front of you and clasp ’em,” came the following command. The tape was wrapped tightly and securely around Hartley’s wrists and hands. Though his fingers did have a few inches of freedom, his thumbs were trapped. He was then guided back to the car. Next out was Nilla, who was also made to throw away her shoes, have cotton stuffed into her mouth, pressed into her eyesockets and taped up, and her wrists and hands bound as Hartley’s had been.

  When it came time for Little Jack’s binding, the boy had to be forcefully pulled out of the car by his legs, kicking and screaming. “Take those fuckin’ Buster Browns off,” Donnie said as he held Little Jack by the hair, and even though he had the gun in his hand he got a kick to the left shin that rattled his teeth and drew the water of pain to his eyes. For that transgression, Donnie released Little Jack’s hair quick enough to give the boy a stinging slap to the face and then jammed a fistful of cotton into his mouth to swell Little Jack’s cheeks. The tape went on and then Little Jack got the eye treatment, as rough as Donnie could give it.

  “Easy with him,” Ginger cautioned. “Don’t break the merchandise.”

  “I ought to break his fuckin’ neck. I’m gonna have a knot on my leg for a week.” Donnie grabbed a handful of the boy’s hair again, violently shook Little Jack’s head back and forth and hissed in a taped-up ear, “Oh yes…you and me are gonna have some real fun, kid.” He nearly jerked the boy’s arms out of their sockets, and Ginger held Little Jack still by the shoulders while Donnie taped the hands.