Lori, p.8
Lori, page 8
Once more she confronted the metal box-or was it confronting her?
Lori lifted the lid and took out the yearbook. The pages parted to reveal the face of Priscilla Fairmount.
Who was this girl? Where had she come from-and why?, She'd been buried away for more than twenty years, buried away in a metal box that was like a tiny coffin, and the dead don't rise.
Or was she dead?
Lori frowned as she sipped her coffee. Priscilla Fairmount could still be alive and well today; a woman in her early forties. For that matter she might even be listed in the phone book.
As if on cue, the ringing resumed. Lori pushed her chair back and hurried down the hall. She moved across the living room to the table on which the phone rested but made no attempt to lift the receiver. Instead her hand lowered to the shelf beneath the tabletop, grasping the directory.
Flipping it open to the proper section, she scanned the F listings in merciful silence as the rings finally ceased.
Fairbanks, Fairbrook, Fairman-but no Fairmount.
Lori shelved the phone book with a sigh. It had been foolish of her to expect such an easy solution. Chances were that Priscilla Fairmount had a married name by now, or had moved away. Even if she'd remained single and still lived in the area with a listed number, it might be in another book. Greater Los Angeles offered a half dozen or more directories to choose from, but Lori had only the white and yellow pages for two of them. Tomorrow she'd stop by the local phone company offices and check out the others. Calling the operator for assistance would be a hassle because she couldn't furnish an address, and right now she was just too tired. Tired of looking, tired of thinking, tired of the damned ringing. What she needed was a good night's sleep.
Lori reached out to take the receiver off the hook, then hesitated. If Russ called again and got a busy signal he might decide to drive over. The last thing she wanted was for him to come banging on her door, making a scene.
There was another way to solve the problem. She lifted the phone from the end table and placed it on the sofa under one of the heavy cushions. That would muffle the sound, or at least she hoped so. Let him call all night if he wanted to; she had to get some rest.
Lori went back to the kitchen. The yearbook on the table was still open, but she closed it hastily and put Priscilla Fairmount back in her little metal coffin. Good night and pleasant dreams.
As for herself, the night hadn't been good and the thought of dreams to come wasn't pleasant. Perhaps dreams could be avoided, thanks to Dr. Justin and his pills.
She found them in the bathroom cabinet and took two before undressing; a double dosage again, but this was what she needed now, and it had worked last night.
By the time she removed her makeup and put on her pajamas the pills were doing their job. On the way to the bed Lori stumbled, and as her eyes blinked open she realized she was already half-asleep.
Once the pillow welcomed her in the warm darkness her eyes closed in full surrender. Time to rest, time to stop thinking, time to stop time.
But time wasn't stopping. It kept running on, and that was strange, because time kept running backward.
And she was running too, running down the corridor as the bell rang. Could it be the phone? No, there wasn't any phone here, just the long locker-lined corridor.
She recognized the lockers now; they were the kind used in schools. And the bell was a school bell, signaling that she was late for class.
But what class? The corridor looked oddly familiar, though it was not one she could remember seeing before. That didn't matter, really, for school corridors do look pretty much alike. No need to worry about it, no need to think. The only need was to rest.
Only she couldn't rest because she had to run. It wasn't too late, and she could still get to class if she remembered.
And she did remember now as she saw the door, opened it, walked into the classroom. She was on time, in time. The other students were already there, moving to take seats, and she took hers. First row, second from the left.
It was the instructor who was late; if he delayed arriving for a few more minutes she'd have a chance to talk.
Apparently the stocky broad-shouldered young man with the dark red hair had the same idea, for as she started to turn he moved up beside her, grinning a greeting.
"Hi, Prissy."
She frowned. "How many times have I told you not to call me that-"
"Hundreds." His grin broadened.
Funny, she'd seen that grin hundreds of times too, but she couldn't recall his name. Remember! You've got to remember. Don't tell me you've forgotten last night.
"Last night." She was saying it now. "We have to talk."
"Nothing to talk about. It's all settled." But the grin was fading.
And he was fading too, fading away like the rest of the classroom.
No, don't go! Not until we come to a sensible decision, some kind of a choice between Scylla and Charybdis. Don't leave me dangling here!
Here was the place she feared.
Somewhere far away the church bell tolled as she stood alone in the chapel. Alone, all alone, gazing down into the face of the young man with the dark red hair.
He seemed to be sleeping but she knew better. She was sleeping and he was dead. Dead, just as she'd feared. She knew because she'd seen dead people before, or thought about seeing them.
It didn't matter. He was dead and she was dangling. Dangling over an open casket.
There were flowers, their smell was sickening, sickening unto death. She stooped to push them aside, get rid of the smell before she choked.
And it was then, as she leaned forward, that he opened his eyes.
The lids rolled back and the pupils bulged in a sightless, unblinking stare. No, not sightless; he was aware, he saw her. The sunken cheeks rippled, the purple lips were parting. As his jaws gaped she was fouled by the odor issuing from the open mouth, an odor of decay and corruption. Then came the whispered words.
"Forget it." His voice was a mechanical murmur, flat, dull, dead. "Forget last night. It never happened."
She shook her head. "How can you say that? We've got a problem."
"It's your problem now, Prissy."
"How many times have I told you not to call me Prissy-"
Hadn't she said the same thing to him back in the classroom? Or was she still in the classroom and just repeating herself? He'd grinned at her then and he was grinning now.
But this grin was different. Risus sardonicus, the gape of death. And his grin widened as the stench of death welled forth, mingling with the scent of wilted flowers.
Yes, the flowers had wilted, the leaves were turning brown, their petals curled and dropped away.
And what lay inside the coffin was changing too. The eyes stayed open, the mouth remained fixed in its mirthless grin, but the waxen pallor of the face was mottled, darkening. A network of veins rose to crisscross the sagging cheeks with strands of blue. Then they burst, but no blood flowed; what oozed forth were trickles of yellow slime. Little flecks of flesh broke free, curling and dropping away like the petals of the wilted flowers, revealing the naked bone beneath.
She recoiled, gasping for breath, but the reek was rising. And so was he.
He jerked upright into a sitting position, and the spasm of effort dislodged more flakes of flesh from the contorted face. Clumps of twisted hair loosened to expose the surface of the skull beneath, its greenish mold dotted with tiny white specks that writhed and wiggled.
Then he extended his arms.
She screamed, turning to run toward the chapel door. But the chapel was long and narrow, and the door was far away. Beyond it the church bells chimed again, their tempo mounting to mock her movement. And all about her the stench was rising, filling her throat and lungs until she paused, panting, trying to catch her breath.
As she did so she glanced back, only for an instant, but that was long enough. Long enough to see that the casket was empty.
The casket was empty because its occupant had emerged.
It was bending down now, scooping up a mass of wilted flowers, hands scrabbling to mold them in the shape of a rotting bouquet. Then the thing turned and started toward her, grinning and holding out its love offering. She screamed again, ran again, but the door was still distant and her pursuer was coming closer. It moved slowly, stiffly, spastically; no matter how fast she tried to run there was no way to halt its advance. Instead it was she who halted, gasping as the odor around her overpowered effort. And her feet were entangled.
Dazed, she glanced down amid a swirl of faded flowers. There were heaps of them all around her feet, and more kept falling. She tried to kick them aside, but others fell swiftly, and now she could feel their feathery impact on her back, her thighs, her trembling legs. Turning, she saw their source.
The thing that loomed behind was pelting her with petals. Ripping the decaying blossoms from lifeless stems, it hurled them down to encircle her in an ankle-deep pile that mounted with dizzying speed. She staggered and reeled back. Back, into the waiting arms.
Bony fingers raked her shoulders, then dug deep, twisting her to turn until she faced what was no longer a face.
The hairless, fleshless horror wore a moving mask of minute shapes-shapes that swarmed in empty eye sockets, scurried from the nasal septum, crawled across the lipless line above the jagged teeth.
But skulls can grin, and it was grinning now.
It was grinning and she was choking, strangled by waves of putridity that burned away her breath.
Then it pulled her close, holding her rigidly, relentlessly, locked in tight embrace. She sensed its hunger but she couldn't move, couldn't breathe, and now there was no escape as the death's head bent forward to claim her mouth in a kiss.
ELEVEN
Lori's eyes closed but her hands lifted and clawed, clawed at the bony, fleshless face until it fell away. Only it wasn't bone, it was paper-thin, fastened against her own until she tugged it free.
Had she fainted on the chapel floor? It couldn't be, because the floor was hard and what she rested against was soft and yielding.
She took a deep breath. The pure air told her what opening eyes confirmed: she wasn't in the chapel now.
Chapels don't have pastel blue walls or beds with respirators beside them. She stared at the discarded oxygen mask she'd pulled from her face, then turned toward the door as it opened and the three of them hurried in.
It was the nurse who scolded her for removing the mask and Dr. Justin who examined her and said she'd no longer need it. But it was Russ who took her in his arms and spoke.
Just as she'd thought, he tried to reach her last night after she came home. The unanswered rings puzzled him, and he started worrying. That's when he drove over. After pounding on her door he started to panic.
"I was sound asleep," Lori said. "Sorry."
"You'll be sorrier when you see your front door. I kicked it in."
"Russ-"
"Damned good thing I did too. You almost bought the farm. Your face was blue and I couldn't find a pulse. Thank God the paramedics got there fast."
"But all I had was two pills," Lori murmured. "I never realized they were that strong."
"They aren't," Dr. Justin told her. "Russ says he found a half-empty coffee cup in the kitchen."
"Instant coffee. I made some after I got home."
Justin glanced at Russ. "You were right. That's what asphyxiated her."
Lori frowned. "Asphyxiated?"
Russ nodded. "When I got into the apartment I couldn't breathe until all the windows were opened and the fumes started to clear. You were out like a light, and so was the pilot of your stove. But the gas was on."
Lori's frown deepened. "I thought I turned it off after the kettle boiled." Her voice wavered. "I was so uptight I can't really remember."
"You lucked out," Russ said. "The whole place could have blown if your burner had sparked."
Lori held him close, trying to find the right words, but it was Dr. Justin who spoke first.
"That's enough for now, young lady. You've got to rest."
"I want to go home."
"You will, tomorrow."
"Why not now? I promise you I'll go straight to bed." Lori glanced at Russ. "You'll keep an eye on me, won't you?"
He shook his head. "That's what I wanted to tell you last night. I'm leaving for Mexico on the four o'clock flight."
"Mexico?"
"Acapulco. A report came in while I was at the office yesterday. There's been another big quake down there and
some of those fancy hotels got hit. Nobody knows the death toll but late bulletins say hundreds of tourists were injured or left stranded. I'll cover the story from that angle."
"How long will you be gone?"
"Two days, maybe three. Press deadline is Friday noon." Russ bent forward, his lips brushing her cheek. "You're in good hands. Not to worry."
Lori sat up quickly. "What if there's another earthquake while you're there? Or aftershocks, and all those diseases that spread when-"
Russ halted her with the gentle touch of his fingers against her mouth.
"Easy does it. Let's make a deal. I'll be careful if you'll be careful. Stay here overnight. You'll hear from me as soon as I arrive."
"Promise?"
"Scout's honor." He kissed her cheek again, then moved away. It wasn't until he reached the door that he turned to speak again. "Forgot to tell you. The landlord had your door fixed. And I stole your car keys. Had a friend from the office drive it over here for you. It's in the parking lot."
Then he was gone and she was left with Dr. Justin and the silent nurse. In good hands, Russ had said.
But what were those hands doing? The nurse, holding out a needle. And Justin taking it from her, approaching the bedside-
"Oh please," she said. "I'll sleep. I don't need that, really I don't."
She tried to gesture but Dr. Justin was holding her arm, holding it very tightly. "This is a mild dose, just enough to put you under for a few hours."
"No-"
Her voice trailed off as the hypo plunged. There was no pain, only the fear. Put you under.
That's what he said and that's what she was afraid of, being put under. Under sedation, under the covers, under the ground.
But they wouldn't listen and she couldn't seem to move her lips, couldn't keep her eyes open because the light was too bright, too white.
The light is bright mainly in the night.
Who said that? Nobody, of course; she'd gotten it wrong. There was something else, something about pain in Spain. No, not pain. Rain was the word. But where did the phrase come from?
"There-all finished. You can relax now, fair lady."
My Fair Lady. Of course that was it; the voice had reminded her.
But whose voice? It didn't sound like Dr. Justin.
Her eyes blinked open, then closed again quickly as the bright light lanced between the lids. Everything was white, too white to fight but that's all right.
"You'll be all right."
That voice again; the strange, familiar voice. And whoever it was, it told the truth. She was all right. Right here in her hospital bed. And she felt relaxed, just lying there and sleeping, scarcely conscious of the coils and the tubes.
She didn't know when they'd been attached but she needed them now while she relaxed. That was the important thing to remember. She'd been through so much, but it was over and done with now and she could relax. Let the coils and the tubes do their job; the only thing she had to do was rest. Not to worry, not to think, just rest and relaxation. There was nothing frightening about going under, nothing at all, just as long as she didn't go too far under. Keeping a part of herself aware, that was the secret. Mustn't go too far under, not all the way, stay in control now. From time to time she surfaced from the depths of sleep as voices sounded from far away. After a moment she'd go under again, but at intervals-hours, days, weeks, months later?-the voices returned.
It was almost like listening to one of those old-time radio series; you never saw the actors but after a while you learned to recognize them when they spoke, and felt you knew them.
There was a woman whose name was Clara-probably a nurse-and a man whom she called "Dr. Roy."
This puzzled her at first. Wasn't Dr. Justin in charge? And what about this other man, "Dr. Chase." She seemed to know him from somewhere, but that didn't make sense. Dr. Roy called him "Nigel."
"Nigel" means dark, or black. And "Chase" means hunter.
A dark hunter, a royal personage, and "Clara," meaning clear. Only nothing was clear. The words faded as they do when a radio signal drifts off-channel and she drifted off, only to tune in again-tomorrow, next week, next year?
Too many questions. Or were there?
"No question about it." That's what Dr. Roy said. "We've done everything we could. It's useless to go on."
And the tantalizingly familiar voice of Dr. Chase. "There's still a chance. Don't give up now-I know we can do it."
She remembered the way it was on radio shows when an announcer would break in just at a crucial moment and say, "To be continued." That's when the voices stopped, just as they did now. It seemed to be much later when she heard them again, and this time the two men were quarreling.
"No, absolutely not!" Dr. Roy shouted. "You're out of your mind!"
"No need to get excited. I guarantee you there'll be no unnecessary risk involved if we follow normal procedure."
"I'm not concerned with procedure. It's a matter of ethics. And if that doesn't mean anything to you, then just stop and think about the law. That's where the risk comes in. There's no way we can get away with this, no legal precedent."
"There's always a way." Dr. Chase spoke rapidly. "You know what it means to me. If you'd only listen-"
"I've heard enough to know I want no part of this."
"All right, if that's how you feel. I don't need your help. I can do it on my own."
"I forbid it!" Dr. Roy was shouting again. "If you try disobeying my orders I'll notify the district attorney's office. Is that clear?"
It wasn't clear at all because she was losing the voices again. She was losing the voices and finding rest.
