The corridor was dimly lit now. Lois had changed the bulb to a lower wattage. She hesitated. Something to the left caught her eye. It was a small field mouse nibbling on a piece of cheese. She couldn’t move because the mouse seemed to grow larger and larger right before her eyes. It took all her control to repress a scream. Finally, an abrupt jerk of her foot away from the door frightened the creature and it scurried over the floor and under the doorway of the unused bedroom.
Once again she started out of her room, and once again she stopped in the doorway. There were all kinds of sounds coming from everywhere in the house. It was a symphony of animal noises: the hissing of snakes, the squealing of mice, the flapping of wings, the gnawing of rats … all of it growing louder and louder until …
Lois stepped out of Greg’s bedroom. She had her back to Dorothy. Her appearance instantly ended the cacophony of the invading creatures. Instinctively, however, Dorothy backed into the bedroom again and closed her door softly. She waited and listened. Lois’s footsteps died away as she descended the stairs. One more time Dorothy opened the door and peered out.
The house was empty and quiet, but the walls dipped in and out like molds of Jell-O. She was afraid to touch them, afraid she might be sucked in somehow and consumed. She would be digested into the walls and become part of this insane house. It was imperative that she not even graze the sides of the corridor as she walked through it and down the steps.
She inched forward, hugging herself, drawing her body together as tightly as she could. She kept an intense concentration on the path before her, afraid that if she looked to the right or to the left, she’d lose her balance and fall against the walls. When she reached Greg’s doorway, she debated whether or not she should look into it and decided quickly that she had better not take the chance. After she came to the top of the stairway, she paused. Would it become the snake she had foreseen? It had to be chanced. She had to get into the fresh air. Everything that was holy told her that had to be done.
She started down, her body shivering so much she thought she might topple forward and roll into a heap at the bottom. If that happened, the animals would be upon her. They would tear at her skin and hair, claw out her eyes, burrow into her stomach. She had to be careful, extra, extra careful. It seemed to take her hours to get to the bottom, but it was worth the effort. When she got there, she paused and listened. She could hear no one and figured Billy and Lois were in their rooms.
It wasn’t necessary to call them; they didn’t have to know she was going out. In fact, it was better that they didn’t. She took her time opening the front door so they wouldn’t hear, but when she went to tug it completely, she was surprised by the chain lock. It made so much noise she was positive they heard. She waited, but they obviously hadn’t. She unchained the door, opened it completely, and moved into the night, closing the door softly behind her.
Professor McShane turned his car lights off just moments before Dorothy Wilson appeared at the front of her house. His thoughts had been frantic as he drove down the driveway. He had come to investigate, but he had no idea how he was going to conduct an investigation. How would he begin? What would he say? What demands could he make? He was afraid Lois Wilson would make a fool of him and he’d come away the cause of more grief for this family, a family that certainly had enough on its own.
But the moment he looked at Dorothy Wilson, he knew he was on the right track. She appeared like a fugitive from a mental asylum: barefoot, her robe buttoned wrong and hanging lopsidedly, her hair puffed and wild, her hands up shoulder height and in front of her. She backed off the porch carefully, slowly, obviously afraid someone would see or hear her leaving. She nearly tripped on the top step and caught herself on the column. Then she turned around and came down the porch steps quickly. He got out of his car.
“Mrs. Wilson?”
She stopped her flight and gaped at him. He knew he should move slowly and speak softly. Even so, she backed up fearfully, her hands clutching her throat. He looked back at the house. The small porch light threw barely enough illumination to outline him against the darkness.
Because he stood about Greg’s height and had come from a car parked in their driveway, Dorothy Wilson’s confused mind revived images of her husband. She tilted her head to the side, trying to focus in on the reality. Was the bad dream over? Had the nightmare ended? Oh, Greg, she thought, Greg, when I tell you what horrible thoughts I’ve had …
“Greg?” she called. McShane stopped his approach. “Oh, Greg, you don’t know how happy I am you’ve come home.”
“I’m afraid you’re making a mistake, Mrs. Wilson. My name’s Kevin McShane. I’m one of Lois’s teachers from the community college.”
“No,” she said, putting her hands together and pushing the air before her.
“I’ve come to help you. I’ve got to know what’s happening in your house, the things Lois is doing.”
“No, no,” she said, backing farther away. “I don’t want to go back in there.”
“You don’t have to go back in there. Just tell me about it.” She continued to retreat from him. “Where are you going, Mrs. Wilson?”
“I don’t want to go back there.”
“OK. Why don’t you go into my car? I’ll drive you to town or anywhere you want. Is there someone you want to go to see?”
She paused to consider his offer. He gestured toward the car. Now that he was farther into the light, she could see he was smiling, and she could certainly see he wasn’t Greg. Greg was upstairs; he was still upstairs.
She looked at the second-story windows, her face becoming sorrowful. The nightmare hadn’t ended. It was still here; she was still in it. The man came closer. He was one of Lois’s friends, one of her teachers. He wanted to bring her back into the house. That’s why he had come; that’s why he was here.
She turned and ran into the darkness. The man shouted after her, but that only made her run faster. She fell once, fortunately falling on a soft part of the lawn. When she looked back, he was still standing in front of the house and looking in her direction. She got up quickly and ran again. She didn’t stop running until she had reached the road. Then she wiped her hands on her robe and looked back. That was when she heard them.
All of the animals were coming out of the house. Lois had sent them after her—rats and mice and snakes. The bats were in the air. She had to get away and find someone to help her. She vaguely recalled the tourist home some distance down the highway. Get to it, the voices told her. Quickly.
In a jog, her robe bouncing against her naked body, her bare feet slapping the pavement, the soles of her feet continually stung by pebbles and debris, her arms swinging widely as she pumped the air around her, she went on. The headlights of an oncoming car caught her coming out of the darkness. With her mouth agape, her eyes wide and maddening, she continued as though she hadn’t even seen the automobile.
The driver put on his brakes and looked into his rear view mirror, but she was already swallowed in the darkness. “What the hell was that?” the man wondered. He shrugged and drove on.
After the car was gone, the only sound was the echo of Dorothy’s feet rising and falling on a sheet of darkness. She was a winged Mercury gone berserk, carrying a message of insanity into the night.
Back at the house, McShane studied the darkness. The woman was gone. He could go back into town for help, or he could go inside to discover what had driven Dorothy Wilson from her own home. After a moment’s hesitation, he walked toward the front porch.
17
McShane opened the door slowly and peered in. There was no one in the hallway and all was quiet. He wondered if Lois knew that her mother had run from the house. Softly closing the door behind him, he moved to the stairway and paused at the bottom. There were still no signs of anyone. Perhaps neither Lois nor her little brother was at home. They would return to discover that Mrs. Wilson was gone. More determined than ever now, McShane started up the steps.
Barely making a soun
d as he ascended, McShane felt his heartbeat quicken. Unconscious of the fact that he was holding his breath, he had to stop to inhale. He heard the sound of footsteps below, but they died out quickly and it was totally silent again. He continued up the stairway, but the moment he saw the chart on the wall, he stopped.
A quick perusal told him what it was. He shuddered to see something else confirming his wildest fears. From what he understood of the chart, Lois’s experiments had been going on most of the summer. He couldn’t tell what had been done specifically, but he knew it had something to do with obedience control. She had apparently developed a satisfactory level. For a moment he thought about the charts he had constructed and demonstrated in class. Even though there was nothing unique about this chart’s style, it was as though he could recognize his own imprint. He moved quickly to the doorway of what he assumed had become Gregory Wilson’s controlled environment.
He was confronted immediately by the bright green walls and ceiling, realizing that they were the same shade as those streaks painted on the hallway walls. Standing in the doorway, he studied everything in the room. Mr. Wilson was supine and unable to see him there.
McShane traced the path of the cable that ran back from the gong to a pulley and down to a small bar dangling a little higher than Gregory Wilson’s left hand. He remembered little Billy’s eagerness to mark down the sound of it. Its purpose was obvious.
As he studied the bed he realized that Gregory Wilson’s right leg wasn’t under the blanket. McShane stepped to the left and saw that the leg had been placed on a stool beside the bed. Mr. Wilson apparently had no control of it. But the thing that stunned Kevin and sent shivers down his spine was the wiring around each of Gregory Wilson’s toes. The wire was connected to a small terminal that was presently unplugged from the wall socket. She could control the intensity of the voltage.
McShane swallowed and took out his handkerchief to wipe the perspiration from his face. He was almost afraid to walk any farther into the room.
Lying there with his head back, his mouth open, Gregory Wilson looked as though he had already passed away. But the short rise and fall of his chest and the wheezing sound coming from his nostrils proved otherwise. McShane moved closer. Mr. Wilson’s eyes were closed, but the eyelids flickered with a nervous twitch every few moments. McShane thought the man had a dreadful pallor and was probably anemic.
He wondered if he should wake the man up. He didn’t want to frighten him, and with his limited means of communication there wasn’t much he could get out of him now anyway. Later, he would have a lot to relate. That was for sure. Also, he didn’t like leaving him with his toes entwined in that wire. Gruesome, gruesome, Kevin thought. All in the name of science. What hath the New World wrought?
He was about to leave him and seek out Lois when he saw Mr. Wilson’s eyelids flutter. In a moment they were open, but Greg blinked rapidly as he focused in on a new face. Kevin could see something of panic in his expression. He realized that for some time now, everything new that was brought into this room brought with it new terror for Gregory Wilson. It was only natural for him to assume that Kevin had something to do with Lois’s work.
“Relax, Mr. Wilson. I’m here to help you.”
Even those words brought no comfort; they were words Lois had used often. Greg began to gag on his guttural sound, a sound that had diminished in intensity since Lois had begun her experiments. Kevin moved closer and put his hand on Mr. Wilson’s shoulder.
“Easy,” he said. “Just listen. I’m one of Lois’s teachers at college.” Greg’s eyes widened even more. He has been driven into a deep paranoia, Kevin thought. “I became suspicious about what she was doing here and I decided to investigate on my own. I just saw your wife running from the house in a panic, and I can see from all this paraphernalia that my suspicions were correct. I’m going to put a stop to it. Please trust me.”
Greg’s eyes softened. He blinked once, then blinked once again.
“That’s your way of communicating?” Greg blinked once. “Yes is once. Good, good.”
Kevin found the bed controls and brought Greg to a sitting position. Then he carefully undid the wire from his toes.
“I have some idea what all this is for, but I have no idea what she was trying to accomplish, Mr. Wilson. We’ll find out about that later. Right now, I’d better call the police so we can find your wife and get you to a hospital.” Greg blinked once. Kevin went to the phone on the night table to the right, but when he lifted the receiver, he didn’t get a dial tone. “This phone’s dead?” He traced the path of the wire under the bed and saw that it had been ripped from the wall. “What was the point of this? You couldn’t use it.” He stood up and brushed off his pants. “Yeah, but your wife could, I suppose. Where’s your other phone, in the living room?” Greg blinked twice. “In the kitchen?” He blinked once. “OK, I’ll be right back up,” Kevin said. He patted Greg on the hand. “This is all going to end. Believe me.”
He started out quickly, his mind made up now. If he confronted Lois, he would call the police first and then talk to her. This man needed immediate attention, and who knew where her mother had gone? As he left the bedroom he looked to his left and then headed for the stairway. There was no chance he could have seen the wire in time. Drawn over the top step, it caught his right foot and sent him headlong. He was barely able to break his fall with his right hand. The edge of a step punched into his left side, knocking the breath out of him as he tumbled over and over until he landed on the bottom, stomach down. He groaned as the various messages of pain were telegraphed from different parts of his body. He felt sure his wrist was broken.
For a moment he could barely move. Then, using his left hand, he pressed himself into a sitting position. The moment he did so, the pillowcase was dropped over his head. The darkness came so suddenly and smoothly that it confused him. He almost believed he had passed out. His reaction was slow, mainly because he had trouble lifting his right arm.
Instantly a cord was tied snugly around his neck, pulling the bottom of the pillowcase against his skin and locking out any seepage of light. He felt the knot being tied, but instead of struggling against it, he started to stand. Blindfolded and in pain, he reached a crouching position. The moment he did so, he received a sharp, hard blow to his groin and crumpled to the floor again. He squeezed his upper body to hold down the aching. Too late he realized that a rope had been dropped over his upper arms. It was wound around him expertly and then tied.
“Open the basement door,” Lois commanded. He felt her grab his ankles and begin to drag him across the carpet. He pulled and struggled to resist, managing occasionally to free himself of her grip. But he was helpless in the darkness, and she simply seized his feet again and again, pulling him farther along the way. His head bounced on the floor. He shouted, but his muffled screams did nothing to stop her.
Finally he felt himself being turned. She lifted his legs. He kicked and pulled, but she had his ankles gripped tightly against her body. She was pushing his legs up higher and higher until he was braced on his shoulders, and then his legs went over his head and she was pressing at his buttocks. In a moment he lost contact with the floor. His legs slapped down on the first rung of the basement steps. When his feet caught on the step, his body rose and she pushed him at the shoulders until he went over backward, smashing against the sides of the stairway and spinning over until he crashed against the basement floor, his body twisted. He unscrewed his torso and lay back, trying to fight off unconsciousness. He heard the basement door slam shut. He didn’t pass out, but all was dark.
“What did I tell you?” Lois said. Billy was in awe. His sister had always appeared powerful to him, but he couldn’t believe the way she had twisted and lifted that man. She had moved with catlike efficiency, blindfolding him with the pillowcase and subduing him with the rope. Not a motion had been wasted. She appeared to know exactly where to put the pressure and how to pivot and lift. Later, she would tell him it was all a matter
of physics.
“He came to steal my research. I knew it; I knew it.”
“How’d he get in?”
Lois looked to the front door.
“Mother let him in.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know. Maybe she did it by accident.”
“Where is she?”
“Somewhere outside, I suppose. We can’t be concerned with her now. We’ve got to go upstairs and see what he might have done to Daddy. Maybe he took my chart. Thank goodness you heard him,” Lois said, patting Billy on the top of his head. “You did a smart thing by coming right to me.”
“I remembered him from before.”
“Good. I’m proud of you,” she said and headed for the stairway upstairs.
Billy hesitated a moment, looked at the closed basement door, and then quickly followed behind.
“I did all I could to keep her on that lounge out there,” Sidney Rosenfield said. Patty looked back at Sam Cohen, who had remained in the patrol car. When the call came, he had been playing gin rummy in Miller’s Bar and Grill. Sam Cohen, the stout sixty-year-old who owned one of Sandburg’s small construction firms, often accompanied Patty when he had an evening call. Local people called him the unofficial chief of police. He had been elected fire department chief twice.
“Turn off the roof light, Sam,” Patty called and made a circle with his hand to illustrate what he meant. Then he turned back to Rosenfield and moved with him in the direction he had indicated.
“My wife’s been with her, trying to calm her down.”
“Yeah, well, she’s had quite a scare, quite a scare. We’ve got to get back to her house right away.”
“Thought it was somethin’. Can’t get much sense out of her, though. She’s too upset. Just babbles.”
“Came upon a burglar,” Patty said.
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